The Merchants of Memory, Part One
"I am the greatest, the greatest that ever was." ~ Vito Giambruno
The Merchants of Memory, Part One
“I am the greatest, the greatest that ever was.”
Vito Giambuno, Levittown, N.Y. 1973
Sal’s Shoe Repair used to sit on Gardiners Avenue in Levittown between Torino’s Deli and the Laundromat. It was as much a fixture on that stretch of road as The Gardiner’s Rest, Sammy’s Inferno and The Flame Lounge. It was an austere place with big glass windows, tin ceilings and a warped and dusty wooden floor. A simple counter cut the room in half about two thirds of the way in, behind which stood rows and rows of shelves, all of them loaded with two types of shoes—those that needed to be repaired and those ready to be picked up. This was the late 60s to early 80s, when people actually would have their shoes repaired. Shoes, purses, jackets, wallets, etc. And Sal was a busy guy.
The whole place reeked of leather and glue, and having no air conditioning Sal would leave the front and back doors open and the breeze would carry the aroma of his craft all the way out to the back parking lot to the Sears loading dock. That’s a place I knew well, having spent many a Sunday digging through the discarded boxes behind Sears for buried treasure. Old bicycle parts. Door knob display cases. Sometimes toilet seats and fan belts. Like I said…treasure when you are 12.
But Saturdays were even more fun because that is when I would spend half my day behind Sal’s Shoe Repair. This is because at the very back of his shop, Sal rented out a 12’ x 12’ room to Vic Chivola, the Levittown Distributor of The Daily News. Saturday was collection day, where all the paperboys would pay for their weekly supply of papers with bags and bags of coinage. But it was so much more than that.
We were a true Band of Brothers, us paperboys. We arose in the dark before the town woke up and diligently made sure all the men and women who cared to be informed had that paper on their front step before they even made the coffee. This was 365 days a year. We were more reliable than the U.S. Mail. We were a rag tag fraternity of go-getters, ranging in age from 11 or 12 to 16, representing almost every section and school in Levittown. And we shared the same triumphs and failures.
It was a triumph when you could “secure” a shopping cart from Food Fair or the A&P to deliver your 200 pounds of the Sunday Edition. It was triumph when you finally collected from those same few but diligent customers who hid when you came knocking on the door, sometimes for weeks. Failures included getting caught out in the rain and dropping off 37 water soaked papers inside screen doors that wouldn’t close and beneath soggy welcome mats. But most of all, it was just fun. Because Vic Chivola made it that way.
Vic Chivola (Mr. C.) was a rotund, unkempt man from “Out East” with thick wavy black hair, a five o’clock shadow at nine A.M. and an always mis-buttoned white shirt, who would drop all the thousands of papers in front of his carriers houses by 4:00 A.M. every day. He would usually have one of us ride in the back of his open panel truck, choking on exhaust, tossing out the bundles on the run. He then spent the rest of his work day installing gutters and siding all about The Island. It was work, work, work and run and gun for all of us. You had to hustle to make a buck doing this. And Vic Chivola knew it was hard. And he made Saturday special.
On Saturdays, after our morning deliveries, we would crowd through the back door of Sal’s Shoe Repair, spilling out into the parking lot, to settle up and recount the week’s events: exaggerating your speed and agility when breaking your own record for time spent on your route, and greatly exaggerating your ongoing battle with that ugly bastard mutt of a dog on Cord Lane who lie in wait for you like a gnarling, drooling clockwork demon from hell, the one who would go for your throat and who you’d have to beat back with a rolled up Daily News. That Sunday Edition would knock that dog sideways. But it never relented. Like you, it had a job to do, dammit.
Vic Chivola would take your sack full of coins and run it through one of those spinning coin-counting machines, and as he was rolling them up in the paper sleeves for pennies, nickels, dimes and quarters he would listen intently to your bragging and laments. He had an infectious smile and was always quick with a very bad joke…
“What’s the tallest building in Transylvania?”
“The Vampire State Building.”
And he always made sure we had donuts from Dunkin’ Donuts, bagels from Bagel Town, or (and this was the best) fried egg sandwiches from Torino’s. The back door to Torino’s kitchen, where Bobby sweated over a huge black behemoth of a gas stove, was just a few feet from The Daily News back door and Bobby would make those sandwiches to order, and nothing ever tasted better on a Saturday morning than a Long Island Deli Egg Sandwich.
But Vic was more than just a great motivator. Once he had us all show up early and he took a dozen of us to the Amusement Park in Rye, N.Y. Occasionally he sent out for pizzas from Domenico’s and we sat around that little room all day. Because when he sent out for pizza we knew that something extra special was on its way. The pizza was his way of saying “Stick around boys—you don’t want to miss this.” And we sure as hell didn’t. Because we knew…we KNEW that what Vic Chivola loved to do more than anything was bust Sal’s chops in an incredibly imaginable and phenomenally satisfying way.
Mr. C. was, above all, a prankster. But a prankster of such guile and innovation we couldn’t wait to see what he would come up with next. And Sal… dear, trusting, innocent Sal the Cobbler, never once suspected he was being punked until the Big Reveal at the end. And it was even better, like a great con job, like in The Sting, when the sucker never ever finds out he was indeed taken. And since Vic was usually at the office by 5:00 A.M. and Sal didn’t show up until 8:00, he had the run of the place, and there was plenty of time to mess with the man’s livelihood.
Vic’s pranks ran from the simple things, juvenile for sure, yet elegant in their own way…
…Replacing a pot of amber-colored leather glue with orange marmalade. After a few days of schlopping this stuff on the soles of boots and loafers Sal said, “This fucking glue ain’t worth a fucking shit, but it fucking smells fucking great.”
…Calling his work phone every time Sal went in to use the bathroom, then hanging up the moment Sal, buckling his pants, raced to pick up the call.
“Itsa’ like these fucking people KNOW when I gotta fucking used the fucking toilet!" Sal would say. Every time.
Before I go any further (and boy, will I) I need to tell you a little bit about Sal. First of all, his name was not Sal. It was Vito Giambruno. He had bought the business from Sal and was either too cheap or too lazy to hang a new sign. He was, in the parlance of the time, right off the boat from somewhere in Italy and though his English was broken it was discernable, yet a language wherein “fucking” was his go-to adjective for just about everything. He was mid-40s, spritely, bald but for the sides and back of his head from where his black hair fritzed out like Bozo the clown.
And he was a bundle of nervous energy. He never stopped moving or talking. He was like a Sicilian pin-ball bouncing around his shop from shoe to shoe and boot to boot and purse to purse. He espoused a running commentary on everything he did, popping in and out of the doorless entry to the Daily News office with updates on his day. After all, Sal was indeed a true craftsman and proud of his work, parading his repaired leather pieces (belts, shoes, purses, jackets, etc.) before us like works of finished art. These presentations always, ALWAYS punctuated with the following words:
“I am the fucking greatest…the fucking greatest that ever fucking was!”
By far, Vic Chivola’s greatest gas-lighting of Vito Giambruno came about unexpectedly and organically. And though meant to be a simple prank, it turned into an event that went on for weeks. Getting crazier by the week and funnier by the week. It became a pants-pissing marathon of mirth.
And when it was finally over, the glorious irony of it all was that Vito “Sal” Giambruno truly lived up to his oath that he was indeed “the fucking greatest that fucking ever fucking was.”
And the best part of that legendary stunt was that I was in on it from the start. And I’ll tell you all about it next week. How’s that for a hook?
I think I know where this is going and I can’t wait!
Doug..you’re the best storyteller. I really enjoyed reading this since we lived right there & always had our shoes repaired by Sal. Your story brought back great memories.