BBC America’s “Copper” - in search of New York’s Five Points

A still from BBC America's 'Copper'

Irish Americans shouldn’t need Hollywood or the BBC to tell them where one of the most famous Irish neighborhoods in New York used to be.

I was thinking about this last month, when I paid a visit to the great Old Town bar on East 18th Street, owned for the longest time by the Meagher family.  It is a stalwart bar in an ever-changing city, and one of the few places you can still find an Al Smith campaign poster.

I was joined by writer and historian Kevin Baker, author of several excellent novels, including Paradise Alley, set among Irish immigrants in the old Five Points section of downtown Manhattan. Inevitably we began talking about the new BBC America series Copper, about an Irish immigrant cop, set in the Five Points.

There was also an angry, hand-written sign in the window of the Old Town that made this topic impossible to ignore.

“The Brits are at it again,” the sign read.  “BBC has produced a series on New York during the Civil War when half the metropolis was peopled by Irish driven from their homes by Victoria, a dowager so homely they could only marry her off to a first cousin, Albert, a German midget who couldn’t speak English.  It is indeed ironic that the Irish starved as Victoria, a fat slob, stuffed her mouth with groceries.”

The sign continued, “As usual, BBC depicts the New York Irish as a collection of tramps, idlers and thieves.  They even have the main character, an Irish copper, portrayed by a Welshman.  (Irish actors need not apply.)  As part of a New York Irish family since the 1820s that established successful businesses before the Civil War, we reject the Brits’ cartoon. 

“Ya gotta give it to the Brits.  They are consistent.”

I will respectfully disagree with the Old Town’s house TV critic, at least about the quality of the show Copper, if not necessarily about the rotundity of Queen Victoria. 

However, the airing of Copper does represent an important opportunity to address another matter of interest to Irish New Yorkers.

Just where were the Five Points located?

The Five Points have got to be the hottest piece of real estate no one can find on a map.  They are a notorious slice of hell that have been the subject of fascination going all the way back to 1842 when none other than Charles Dickens toured the area and declared, “Debauchery has made the very houses prematurely old. See how the rotten beams are tumbling down, and how the patched and broken windows seem to scowl dimly, like eyes that have been hurt in drunken frays.”

History books will tell you that the Five Points name derives from the intersection of today’s Baxter and Worth Streets.  But that’s not what the streets were named in the 1860s. 

The real problem is that if you stand today at the intersection of Baxter and Worth Streets, northeast of City Hall, there is nothing to tell you that this, in fact, is where the notorious Five Points once stood.

Perhaps there is no point in erecting something like a memorial to the Five Points.  Life there was harsh, and it’s probably best for all involved that the slum is so more. 

Nevertheless, there is much to be learned from the Five Points about the Irish, immigration, poverty and perseverance.  So there should be something to let tourists as well as native New Yorkers know where the Points once stood.

I recommend the Collect Pond Park, a block north and west from the original Five Points, on Leonard Street, between Centre and Lafayette.  Collect Pond was a body of water actually used for drinking until the early 1800s, when the area was solidly middle class. 

Bungled municipal efforts to fill the pond created a festering swamp which bred disease - hence, middle class New Yorkers fled, leaving the Five Points to become an impoverished immigrant enclave.

The New York City Parks Department, which is currently renovating Collect Pond Park, should include efforts to explain what and where the Five Points were before the park reopens this fall. 

I think even the Old Town bar TV critic would agree that New Yorkers should know at least as much about the Five Points as Hollywood and the BBC.

(Contact “Sidewalks” at tdeignan.blogspot.com or tomdeignan@earthlink.net)

Mitt Romney’s secret Irish Catholic Weapon - Senior Adviser Peter Flaherty

Peter Flaherty

Mitt Romney has a secret, Irish Catholic weapon in Tampa this week, one that  experts say is key to him stealing away the Catholic vote from Barack Obama.  

Timothy Cardinal Dolan?  Nope.  Paul Ryan?  Nope.

His name is Peter Flaherty and he is a senior adviser to Romney, and prefers to  keep himself out of the spotlight. Which is a little odd given that Flaherty has worked in both national politics  as well as Hollywood. 

Nevertheless, Flaherty is described as one of Romney’s closest aides.  His main job?  Persuading Irish Americans and other Roman Catholics that Romney is the man they should vote for.

Much attention was paid when it was announced that Dolan would say the closing prayer at this week’s Republican Convention. “The move is perhaps the clearest sign of a more aggressive push by Republicans to win over Roman Catholic voters this election cycle,” according to The New  York Times.

But Romney’s close relationship to Flaherty is arguably more important. 

When Romney served as Massachusetts governor Flaherty was his liaison to Catholics, including Boston’s Sean Cardinal O’Malley.

While much has been made about Romney’s “invitation” (as the Times put it) to  Dolan, the New York Catholic leader also made it clear he would do the same  thing for the Democrats. Rather stupidly, the Democrats have apparently declined Dolan’s offer. 

Yes, there are major differences between the church and the Democratic Party - on gays and abortion among other things.

However, it would seem that President Obama would want to stress common ground, especially when every Catholic vote counts in battleground states like Pennsylvania, Ohio and Wisconsin.

Meanwhile, Romney’s Catholic running mate Ryan has been lauded for his  budget-cutting proposals, but guess what organization slammed Ryan for slashing social services and even misunderstanding the Catholic doctrine of “subsidiarity”? 

None other than the U.S. Conference of Catholic bishops.  And who leads that organization?  You guessed it, Timothy Cardinal Dolan.

No, if you really want to get a sense of how the Republicans are going to try  and sway Catholics away from Obama you’ve got to listen to Flaherty, who told the Times, “We’re going to have outreach to Catholics in a coordinated, organized effort — state by state, diocese by diocese, parish by parish and pew by pew.”

Flaherty grew up in Arlington, Massachusetts and graduated from the College of the Holy Cross, majoring in economics.  An Irish American aunt named Eileen Gill was murdered in Boston when Flaherty was young, and he has long said that terrible crime spurred him to fight the bad guys.

Flaherty became an assistant district attorney in Suffolk County before going to work for his brother, Michael, who runs Walden Media in Hollywood.

Flaherty returned east and began volunteering for Romney, and has been with the GOP candidate ever since. 

Inevitably, the question arises of whether or not there really is a “Catholic vote” in America. 

Obviously, the days of Roman Catholics voting largely for the party of JFK are over.  Irish and other white ethnic Catholics are much more willing to vote Republican these days, while Hispanic Catholics are generally Democratic. 

Nevertheless, it would be silly for either Romney or Obama to dismiss 25 percent of the voting population who - for all of their differences - share important key factors.

First and foremost, they are clustered in key battleground states.  Also, while polls show that a majority of American Catholics are generally not opposed to birth control and abortion, they are also reverent and respectful towards religion in a way that Republicans can take advantage of.  That’s why it seems such a blunder for the Democrats to not accept Cardinal Dolan’s offer to pray at their convention.  It is the type of small thing someone like Peter Flaherty could make a big deal out of. 

(Contact “Sidewalks” at tomdeignan@earthlink.net or tdeignan.blogspot.com)

Are the Irish liberal or conservative? GOP’s Paul Ryan meet Sister Megan Gillespie Rice

Sister Megan Gillespie Rice

Vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan, meet fellow Irish American Megan Gillespie Rice.

As the political world debated Romney’s pick – which means that for the first time, two Irish Catholics will be vying for the vice presidency –Gillespie Rice was doing some political work of her own.
Sister Megan, as she is known, is a Manhattan native and activist nun who has been arrested over 40 times throughout her busy career. 

Now 82, her most recent action landed her on the front page of The New York Times this past Saturday. 

Earlier this summer, Sister Megan and two accomplices carried out what the Times called “the biggest security breach in the history of (America’s) atomic complex,” breaking into the Oak Ridge nuclear reservation in Tennessee.

Sister Megan, in short, is a left-wing Irish Catholic activist, a label she would surely wear proudly, just as the anti-war Berrigan brothers did in the 1960s, as many members of the Catholic Worker movement did, and as activist groups such as the Catholic Radial Alliance did back in the 1930s (which was founded, incidentally, by one priest named O’Toole and another named – you guessed it – Rice).

Anyway, the next day, another Irish Catholic was in the news, this one named Paul Ryan, a darling of the American conservative movement.

Which begs the question -- who represents Irish American politics better, Ryan or Sister Megan?

A few weeks back I wrote a column about Irish America’s tense relationships with African Americans and racism.  Over 100 folks commented on the story on irishcenteral.com and I received loads of e-mails, some thoughtful, others not so much.

And by the way, the debate rages on.  In this Sunday’s New York Times Book Review, an article about race riots in Chicago specifically referred to problems caused by the “mostly Irish police force.”

But at the heart of the question of Irish Americans and race is the bigger question of Irish American liberalism and conservativism. Who is the face of Irish American politics -- Kennedy or Reagan? 

More and more, as people like Ryan rise to prominence, it seems to be Reagan.  Conservative Republican Irish Americans are very easy to spot these days.  Look at the podium during the GOP convention later this month when the keynote speech is given and you will see Ryan’s fellow Irish American, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie.

Quite a few people have traced how the Irish evolved from loyal Democrats until the 1950s and 1960s, when they started trickling, then flooding, to the Republican or independent lines. 
What people have talked about less is whether or not Irish Catholics (voters as well as politicians) have specific responsibilities based on their backgrounds. 

After all, people love flaunting their Irish Catholic roots. On St. Patrick’s Day, Republicans and Democrats love talking about where their grandparents came from in Ireland. 

But doesn’t that also mean you should have sympathy for 21st century immigrants?  

Kissing babies after Mass makes a great photo-op.  But does that also mean you should obey the church’s teaching on gays, poverty, abortion and the death penalty?  Or confront the church over these contentious issues?

Ryan himself waded into this by claiming that his ultra-conservative budget plan was actually in line with Catholic social teaching.

This prompted criticism from, among others, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops because, as Gerald Beyer recently noted in America magazine, “Official Catholic social teaching has long accorded a positive role for the government in protecting the economic rights and well-being of people.”

The sad truth is that most Irish Americans are not true to their Irish or Catholic roots. 
Republicans too often bash immigrants and the poor.  Democrats too often are condescending towards religion. 

So, who is the true face of Irish American politics?

Right now?  Nobody.

(Contact “Sidewalks” at tomdeignan@earthlink.net or tdeignan.blogspot.com)

The problem with Irish American racism

A sixties portrait of William Melvin Kelley

His name was Kelley and he was from the Bronx.  But the Irish kids still did not like him.

The current issue of Harper’s magazine features a memoir written by novelist William Melvin Kelley.
Kelley explores the complex ways skin color, language and bigotry have influenced his own life, as well as recent American history.

“I grew up in the Northeast Bronx with the children of Italian immigrants who mostly embraced me,” Kelley writes at one point. 

Later, he adds, “My Italo friends much preferred me to most Irish kids.”

Then, Kelley recounts a particularly ugly incident.

“One day one of a group of Irish kids passing through our block called me a n****r.  My Creole mother had armed me against this, without going into it very deeply -- anybody who called me a n****r had simultaneously demonstrated his ignorance and his inferiority. 

“I should dismiss the comment as I would dismiss the utterance of a parrot.  So, when the Irish kid called me n****r, I assumed an attitude of superiority and condescension.”

Kelley’s friends were not so kind.  They doled out a beating to “the Irish kid, whom they’d caught while his companions ran away.”

Even when Kelley’s education took him to elite schools and prestigious museums, it seems there was always an Irish American around to remind him of the persistence of racism.

“In 1944 I started attending Fieldston, a Euro and predominately Jewish progressive private school,” Kelley writes.  “Over the next 12 years I went wherever my class went, to the Met and MoMA, to Carnegie Hall, to see Scribner make pulp paper for special editions.

“I went through the front entrance when I went to visit my friends on Fifth or Park Avenues.  Their parents had warned the Irish doormen not to turn me away.”

There is no reason to doubt Kelley’s recollections because, sadly, they are utterly plausible.

His memoir does, however, force us to confront a nasty little question -- have Irish Americans really been disproportionately racist?

Kelley’s own memoir alone proves nothing.  It is the massive accumulation of memoirs, books, novels, movies and TV shows with narrow-minded Irish American characters that is more alarming. 

As with redneck whites (usually Scots-Irish, incidentally), Irish Catholic Americans are often the immoral center of a given story, a stubborn obstacle to be overcome whether we are talking about real life or fiction. 

From the New York City Draft Riots to the Boston bussing mess of the 1970s, some Irish Americans acted deplorably during tense racial times.

As for fiction, there’s Studs Lonigan and his band of brutes from the 1930s novels by (Irish Catholic) James T. Farrell. There’s the psychotic thug Artie West from the classic film Blackboard Jungle, who is finally conquered by his heroic teacher, who had earlier pointed out that West is “Irish American.”

There’s the “ferocious Irishmen” who assault Saul Bellow’s hero in the classic novel The Adventures of Augie March. There is the oppressive Dunn family from the book (and film) Looking for Mr. Goodbar. 

And there is Amy Waldman’s recent novel The Submission, about a Muslim-American architect who is selected to design a memorial at ground zero.  This is opposed by Sean Gallagher, whose brother, Patrick, was a firefighter killed that awful day. We see a not-so-subtle Islamophobia in Sean’s Irish American family.

Again, are Irish Americans truly worse in this area than other ethnic groups?  Or are they simply convenient mouthpieces for ugly thoughts?

The most honest effort to answer this question was a book released last March entitled The Irish Way: Becoming American in the Multi-Ethnic City.

Author James R. Barret argues that “nativist hostility toward the Irish created a defensiveness in their relations” with other groups.

Barrett makes a compelling case but it is far from definitive or satisfying. 

And so, we rightly feel for the victims of bigotry, such as William Melvin Kelley.

And we are left to wonder if Irish Americans need to more forcefully confront a dark chapter of their past? 

Or, instead, if writers and movie makers need to get a little more creative when it comes to creating their villains?

(Contact “Sidewalks” at tomdeignan@earthlink.net or visit tdeignan.blogspot.com)

When the Irish fought the Irish in the Mexican American war -VIDEO

A scene from BBC America's 'Copper'

Next month, the new TV show Copper will premiere on BBC America.  The show will explore the lives of cops and criminals in Manhattan during the time of the U.S. Civil War, so you know there will be plenty of Irish saints and sinners written into the show.

Irish actor Kevin Ryan is among the stars of Copper, while the producers include Tom Fontana, whose groundbreaking prison show Oz included the memorable character Ryan O’Reilly.

The fact that the British are producing a show about Irish American life is, at the very least, ironic.  But that’s a topic for another day.

Copper is set during a time of war and poverty, of tensions over immigration and patriotism.  That sounds familiar, right?

This very much should remind us of our own day.  Last week, in Brooklyn, however, there was another reminder of a similarly tense time that is not so well-remembered.

The setting was Green-Wood cemetery, an oasis of 19th century life (and death) in Brooklyn.

It was here that cemetery workers were joined by a military color guard for a ceremony honoring war veterans, among them numerous Irish Americans.

Men like James McCabe, Lieutenant Francis Boyle and Lieutenant Charles Gallagher had previously been interred under a marker simply stating “Mexico.”  According to The New York Times, these veterans had been lavishly honored at the time of their burial.  There were plans to erect an elaborate memorial to honor the veterans’ sacrifices.

“Sometime later, however, one of the people they city had charged with building an obelisk over the graves made off with the money for the monument,” the Times noted.

For years, little was known about Boyle, McCabe and Gallagher.  Here’s one thing we do know. These Irish American veterans may very well have been fighting against Irish immigrant soldiers.

The Mexican American war broke out in 1846, 15 years before America would be plunged into civil war.  At the time, America was a young nation anxious to expand. 

Mexico was struggling to maintain the vast lands previously controlled by the Spanish. Tensions between the two nations grew into all out war.

When all was said and done, America had acquired vast new tracts of previously Mexican land, a fact that riles many people to this day.

There is another thing the Mexican American war is famous for, and that is the St. Patricio Brigade. 
The Chieftains recently made an album bearing that name, while Black ’47 and others have sung songs in their honor. 

These were disenchanted, mostly Irish souls who sympathized with the fellow Catholic country of Mexico, and took up arms against the heavily Protestant, expansionist-minded United States.  They were led by Galway native Jon Riley and to this day are honored in Mexico.

It didn’t hurt that the Mexican army often offered higher pay and land grants to soldiers.

In their day, you can imagine how most Americans (even Irish immigrants to America) felt about the St. Patricios.  They were ungrateful traitors in the eyes of many and were treated as such when many of them were executed after the war.

Were the mythical St. Patricios honorably men of principle who understandably had no allegiance to an anti-Catholic nation which despised them? 

Or were they mercenaries bent on killing the many Irish Americans – including lieutenants Boyle and Gallagher – who stuck with America and went on to make it a great nation?

That’s probably too big a question to answer right now.  What is important for us to remember is that (to quote Billy Joel) the good old days weren’t always so good.

In particular, those Irish American super-patriots who run around today questioning peoples’ loyalty ought to ask themselves if they have set the bar for treason a bit too high. 

After all, imagine the scuttlebutt on Fox News if a band of immigrants got together to fight for Al Qaeda in Iraq or the Taliban in Afghanistan.

Imagine if there names were Kelly or Ryan or O’Neill or Riley.

Of course, we should remember Jon Riley, love him or hate him.  But Green-Wood Cemetery did the right thing last week so that we also remember the sacrifices of men like Francis Boyle and Charles Gallagher and James McCabe.

(Contact “Sidewalks” at tomdeignan@earthlink.net or facebook.com/tomdeignan)

Watch the promo video for 'Copper' here:

Will the real GOP stand up? Republican’s stance on immigration is vexing

Republican Peggy Noonan

A few weeks back, when an Irish-born journalist (and we use that term loosely) named Neil Munro heckled President Obama’s immigration policy during a press conference, many people pointed out the obvious irony. Here was an immigrant suggesting that the president get tough with immigrants.

To most people, this made Munro a hypocrite. But at least it was clear where he stood.

And now that President Obama has offered a path to citizenship for certain children of illegal immigrants, his position is fairly clear also.

As for the other side, that’s a lot more complicated.

Some Republicans grasp that immigration is a boon to at least some state economies. Some sentimentalize immigrants, while others (I’m thinking Mitt Romney here) are flummoxed to the point of silence.

Which is at least better than echoing the hard-right, anti-immigrant Republican line which was present at the party’s founding.

After all, the party of Lincoln was also the party of anti-Catholic, anti-Irish sentiment in the mid-19th Century.

I’m not demonizing conservatives here. Former Reagan White House operative and Wall Street Journal columnist Peggy Noonan – whose name is as Hibernian as it gets - penned a fine column celebrating the immigrant spirit to mark Independence Day last week.

“The old hatreds,” Noonan wrote. “They dissipate here. In Ireland, Catholics and Protestants could be at each other’s throats for centuries, but the minute they moved here they were in the Kiwanis Club together.”

Again, kudos to Noonan for celebrating America’s immigrant heritage, and perhaps upsetting some fellow conservatives. But really?

“The minute” Irish Catholics and Protestants came to America things were just awesome and cool? I’m not Peggy Noonan for a scholarly dissertation on, say, the hanging of Irish Catholics such as Goody Glover in the 17th century colonies, or the 1870s riots that lefts dozens of Catholics and Protestants dead on the streets of New York.

But a little realism never hurt anybody, even on the Fourth of July.

Noonan’s sentimental approach to immigration is something to which Irish Americans are particularly prone. There is so much emphasis put on the contribution of the well-behaved immigrants of the past, there is an implication that today’s immigrants are, well, different.

Prior to 9/11, it was believed by some that today’s immigrants were simply not as hard-working, or as patriotic, or were gang members, or came here for the welfare benefits. And even if they were hard-working, that was a problem because they were taking jobs, or were simply illegal, which is a fairly unambiguous term.

All the more so in a post-9/11 world where illegal immigrants can be out to kill us all. Nevertheless, there remains a deep, scary and downright un-American strain of nativism out there in America.

And being sentimental or selective about immigration is not much better than being outright hostile to it. Back in 2006, none other than Noonan wrote this, “There are a variety of things driving American anxiety about illegal immigration and we all know them -- economic arguments, the danger of porous borders in the age of terrorism, with anyone able to come in. But there's another thing.

“(We) are not assimilating our immigrants patriotically. And if you don't do that, you'll lose it all. We used to do it. We loved our country with full-throated love, we had no ambivalence.”

Does it really need to be pointed out that, back in the good old days, there was massive ambivalence on the sides of both native-born Americans and immigrants?

We fought not one but two wars against a nation which gave us millions of immigrants (Germany) and we held members of two large immigrant groups (Japanese and Italians) in detention camps during World War II. Meanwhile, how do you think a lot of Americans felt about Ireland being diplomatically neutral during World War II?

All of this is simply meant to point out that immigration has always been vexing.

For now, we know where Obama and the Democrats stand. And even if they’re just after votes, isn’t that partly what our system is all about?

Currently, the Republican Party is made up of historical revisionist sentimentalists like Noonan, neo-nativists like Munro, and confused bumblers like Romney.

By November, will the real GOP stand up?

(Contact “Sidewalks” at tomdeignan@earthlink.net or facebook.com/tomdeignan)

The real miracle of Bishop Fulton Sheen on his road to Sainthood -- Overcoming New York’s Cardinal Spellman was a true miracle

 Bishop Fulton Sheen

Two years ago, an Illinois woman named Bonnie Engstrom gave birth to a stillborn baby. Throughout the pregnancy, Engstrom had prayed for a healthy child.

Specifically, she invoked the name of the popular 1950s television priest, Fulton Sheen.  In a development that surely would have made the media-savvy Sheen proud, Engstrom even watched videos of the former Irish American bishop on YouTube.

Nevertheless, tragedy for Engstrom’s newborn seemed imminent. That is, until the baby’s heart finally did start beating. The two year-old child is now happy and healthy.

Was this a miracle?  Did Sheen, in death, intercede on behalf of this mother to save the child’s life?
If the Vatican believes so, Bishop Fulton J. Sheen may very well become the first male American-born saint.

Last week, the Vatican officially recognized Archbishop Sheen’s “heroic virtues” and gave him the title “venerable.”  The next step towards sainthood is to establish whether or not Sheen is indeed responsible for miracles on earth.

There are fewer and fewer people around these days who remember Sheen, even if millions watched his TV show in the 1950s.  (Sheen even won and Emmy.) 

Those who do remember him recall a firm yet comforting figure, and one who represented arguably the high point of American Catholic power.

However, it’s important to remember that while Sheen may have seemed a stabilizing presence, he rose to prominence at a time of great tension, just two years after a controversial anti-Catholic book became a best seller.

Meanwhile, once Sheen became a household name, he privately battled an even more powerful Irish American force in the church who was known as the “American Pope.”

In other words, you might say Sheen already pulled off a miracle or two, in doing battle with the likes of author Paul Blanshard and Francis Cardinal Spellman.

Sheen’s television show Life Is Worth Living hit the airwaves in 1951.  Just two years earlier, American Freedom and Catholic Power was riding high on the bestseller lists.

Written by Nation magazine editor Paul Blanshard, the book argued – as anti-Catholics had for over a century in American – that Catholics simply could not be Democracy-loving Americans because of their allegiance to Rome.

The book clearly struck a chord with many readers, given its popularity.  In 1954, Blanshard published another book, this time bashing the Irish.  The book was simply called The Irish and Catholic Power.

Given this lingering suspicion of Catholic power, one would think Sheen would tone down his act on TV.  But Sheen always wore his full clerical garb.

At the same time, he reminded viewers that Catholics were deeply committed to fighting Communism, which seemed to go a long way towards establishing their ability to be full-blooded Americans.

One viewer who embraced Sheen is currently leading the New York church -- Timothy Cardinal Dolan.

“(Fulton Sheen) showed the broad American public that the truths of our faith were consonant with the highest values of the society -- patriotism, God, family and the struggle against Communism,” Dolan said back in 2009.

Perhaps an even more formidable foe than anti-Catholicism was Dolan’s predecessor and America’s most powerful Catholic in the 1950s, New York Archbishop Francis Cardinal Spellman.

Tension between these two Irish American powerhouses rose in the 1950s.  In his role as leader of the Society for the Propagation of the Faith, Sheen butted heads with Spellman over money and programs designed to feed the world’s poor.

It has been said that even Pope Pius XII and President Eisenhower were forced to intercede in the war of words between Sheen and Spellman.  In the end, Spellman had the final word: he reassigned Sheen, forcing him to leave New York to head up the much smaller Diocese of Rochester.

Despite all this, Sheen persisted and remained a cultural force until his death in 1979.

Surviving the anti-Catholic rants of Paul Blanshard and the massive ego of Cardinal Spellman?  Seems to me the saintly Sheen has already accomplished several miracles.

(Contact “Sidewalks” at tomdeignan@earthlink.net or facebook.com/tomdeignan)