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Justice Is Served... 'Extra Crispy'

'Evening, folks. We have a very dark chapter of New York City's WWII-era History to share with you tonight.

80 Years Ago Today - (Saturday) March 4th, 1944:

(From left to right, going clock wise) Seen here, in Photo 1, in their mug shots, are Mafia members Louis Capone, Emanuel "Mendy" Weiss (top right), and Louis "Lepke" Buchalter (bottom right) But, these aren’t just ANY mobsters. These creeps are members of "Murder, Inc," the contract killers who worked for the Italian and Jewish mobs, primarily in New York. Buchalter, in fact, was its first President. All three of them are nothing but cold-blooded killers.

Buchalter, in fact, had a hand in The Hit on Dutch Schultz in Jersey City, NJ in October, 1935.

Each man has a bone-chilling record that is too numerous to list here. After years of crime and a body count to match, all three were ultimately caught, convicted, and given the death sentence in New York City on December 2nd 1941 - five days before Pearl Harbor. Capone and Weiss were sent 'Up The River' to Sing Sing Correctional Facility on the Hudson River while Buchalter ended up back at Leavenworth Federal Penitentiary in Kansas on a previous racketeering charge. The State of New York wanted him back - BAD. Following the loss of a long string of appeals, he was extradited to New York on January 21st, 1944.

All three got a seat in "Old Sparky," the Electric Chair at Sing Sing on Saturday, March 4th, 1944 around 11:00 pm, EST - hence while we waited until now to do our post.

Capone, who had been sentenced last among the three, was slated to go first. Ironically, he had a heart condition, and the State was worried he would have a heart attack and "cheat the hangman." Weiss went second, and Buchalter, sentenced first, and being known as a "tough guy," was intentionally made to go last - forced to watch his two henchmen go before him.

Regular... Or Extra Crispy?

Macabre as this you might think this to be, they earned it, and they got what was coming to them. This story plays a unique part of the WWII timeline within America's 1940s Home Front culture as the Mobs were being consistently hunted down and dismantled by the FBI. The glory days of the Depression and the "Public Enemies" in the 1930s were long over, and the Federal Government had little patience or mercy for thugs like these as it had to execute and fight a War that was raging around the planet.

But... quite paradoxically, in the "Fog Of War," American Organized Crime wove itself in and out of America's War Effort - both here, and overseas - with the blessings and absolution of that very same US Government. But that's an incredible story for another day. 😉

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“Tragedy At Sea - The Loss Of Texas Tower 4”

Good evening, everyone. Today is a terrible anniversary, both in the history of our military, and the Jersey Shore.

63 Years Ago, Today - (Sunday) January 15th, 1961, 76.8 miles east of Barnegat Light, NJ:

In the 1950’s, with the Cold War well underway, the military wanted to extend our visibility deep into the Atlantic ocean. To accomplish this, large radar platforms would be built far offshore. With an additional 300 mile increase in range, the towers’ would give the United States additional response time in the event of a nuclear attack by Russian aircraft.

Five towers were planned, from New England to New Jersey. Towers 1 and 5 were never built; Tower 2 was placed on George’s Shoal northeast of Cape Cod, Tower 3 was built on Nantucket Shoal east of Montauk Point, LI, and Tower 4 was built on an unnamed shoal 76.8 miles nearly due east of the Barnegat Lighthouse, in New Jersey. The large platforms earned the nickname “Texas Towers,” due to their similarity with oil drilling rigs in the Gulf of Mexico.

Texas Tower 4 was assigned to the Highlands Air Force Station, here in Monmouth County (present day Hartshorne Woods County Park), with the call signs “Jitney” and “Dora,” as part of the 646th Radar Squadron.

Regrettably, it had a terrible reputation from the start, beginning in 1957. Built on land, it was transported to its shoal via barge. Enroute, two of the three legs were damaged, and the decision was made to repair them at sea - this was never properly done.

The whirring of the massive radar dishes, and their diesel generators, caused extreme reverberation through the entire platform. Due to the depth - 185 feet of water - the Tower’s hollow legs reverberated with the flow of the sea. Not only did the Tower shudder with the waves, it rocked violently, earning it the unenviable nickname of “Old Shaky.”

Repeated pleas for substantial repairs were deferred, and only small piece-meal work was done over time. Requests to abandon the Tower were declined, because of Russian patrol vessels who were ready to swoop in and strip the Tower of its secret materials.

The Tower endured one massive storm after another. It took Hurricane Daisy in August, 1958, and then was battered by Hurricane Donna in September, 1960..

Refusing to the abandon the Tower, the Air Force removed non-essential troops and left a skeleton crew of 14 Air Force personnel and 14 civilian contractors aboard. With the powers-that-be finally acknowledging that the Tower was in danger of collapse, their flash of brilliance to temporarily stabilize it was to mix concrete and dump it straight down the hollow shafts of each legs. As winter of 1960-61 approached, the helipad on the tower filled up with pallets of cement bags. As late as January 7th, Navy Divers, assessing the legs, found the supporting structures were damaged and letting go

As these stories always do, tragedy awaited. A storm arrived in full force - the forecast on January 14th called for winds as high as 60 mph. On the morning of the 15th, the Tower groaned and twisted in ways no one had seen before - another support brace had gone. All day the men on Texas Tower 4 called in damage reports and pleas for rescue.

The Air Force finally relented - but it was too late. At 4 pm, at the height of the storm, they authorized an evacuation, but the weather was too rough for helicopters. All US Coast Guard and Navy ships in the area - including an aircraft carrier, the USS Wasp (CV-18) - made for the Tower at full speed.

At 6:45 pm came the bone-chilling radio message “WE ARE BREAKING UP.”

Texas Tower 4 presented a massive blip on surface radars. Around 7:30 pm, with some ships just miles away - it vanished.

One of the damaged legs finally buckled, and the entire structure crashed into the sea. Texas Tower 4 was gone. And with it, all 28 men. Only two bodies were recovered; the rest were claimed by the sea.

We pause to honor and remember the lives that were lost 63 years ago today off the Jersey Shore. It must be remembered that our Cold War veterans served - and sacrificed - without a shot ever being fired in anger.

28 US Air Force Personnel and Civilian Contractors Lost their lives that day. Of note, many of the civilian contractors were veterans themselves, of several branches. Out of respect so as to prevent confusion, they are listed here without rank, simply by name and age.

They Are:

Abbott, David - 48

Bakke, Roald - 35

Brown, Vincent - 43

Bucherri, Samuel - 45

Cudnick, Chester - 47

Evans, Thomas - 54

Foster, Bishop - 35

Giurastante, Domenic - 19

Green, Kenneth - 27

Haroutunian, Aram - 45

Ide, William - 38

Jones, Leland - 22

Kovarick, Wilbur - 36

Kruse, William - 27

Laino, Louis - 21

Leo, Milton - 50

Martel, Raymond - 34

Opalka, Anthony - 46

Parker, David - 22

Phelan, Gordon - 33

Robertson, Edward - 39

Schutz, Henry - 57

Shaffer, Harry - 37

Smythe, William - 61

Waitt, Donald - 39

Williams, Troy - 39

Wolford, Larry - 24

Yavorosky, Vincent - 44

You Are Not Forgotten

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Good evening, everyone. We have a very tragic WWII Anniversary to discuss tonight.

Eighty Years Ago, Today - (Tue) December 28th, 1943, near Douglas, Arizona:

As WWII rages, the ranks of the US Military swell by tens of thousands. Time is short, and the training is hard, fast and tough across the nation.As Allied victories begin to mount up, the time tables accelerate, and more and more troops are needed on the front as soon as possible.

At an unspecified (at this time) Army Air Field (AAF), either Douglas AAF or Hereford, AAF, a routine training flight is about to take off. 2nd Lieutenant Douglas McDow, US Army Air Forces, a 30-year old native of California, is about to take up 26-year old Flight Cadet Clarence A. Thompson, also of California.

Their mount is a UC-78 “Bobcat,” a military incarnation of the successful, twin-engine Cessna “T-50,” which first flew in 1939. The plane, a five seater covered in fabric, is quite suited to the task as a preliminary military trainer.

The two men climb aboard, and after a successful pre-check, the little plane leaves the runway, climbs into the sky… and vanishes without a trace. Searches prove futile, and the two aviators become another tragic ghost story of WWII.

We’ll never know what happened for sure, but what we do know is that hikers in the Pinelao Mountains come across the shattered wreckage of an aircraft… in April, 1974 - 31 years later. Recovery crews are able to ascertain it is the missing Bobcat, found some 90 miles north of where she took off on that fateful training mission.

Recovery personnel also find the remains of the two US Army Flyers. After being missing for three decades, the men are recovered, and are laid to rest, sharing a grave in San Francisco National Cemetery, overlooking San Francisco Bay from Fort Winfield Scott, the Presidio of California.

Today, we pause to remember 2nd Lt. Douglas McDow and Flight Cadet Clarence Thompson.

Your legacy and memory are safe here, and in the hearts of a grateful nation.

Be Thou At Peace.

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https://www.facebook.com/share/p/YJ7tnSmxM4qvHWsq/?mibextid=gik2fB

111 Years Ago, Today – (Sat) December 20th, 1912, New York Harbor:

The era of wood and sail, thousands of years old, has all but given way to the era of iron and steam. And yet, there are plenty of veteran sailing ships still plying their trades across the seas. One of them is the German “Columbus,” a wooden-hulled, three-masted cargo schooner. Although owned, and flagged, out of Germany, she’s American made. She was built at the Atkinson-Filmore shipyard in Newburyport, MA, north of Boston, and launched in 1876.

Even at 36 years old, she’s still a viable shipping platform. She’s 210 feet long, 40 feet on the beam, and she draws nearly 24 feet of water. She tips the scales at 1,470 tons. Today, she’s loaded with 9,000 barrels of fuel oil, and she casts off lines, bound for Bristol, England. She moves down harbor, and enters the Ambrose Channel. She passes a stone’s throw from the stricken schooner “L. Herbert Taft,” stuck fast on the Romer Shoals, where it wrecked yesterday. (Please see yesterday’s post).

As massive as she is, her large canvas sails would have been plainly visible around the Harbor and from Sandy Hook. She passes “The Hook” under the watchful eye of the Sandy Hook Lighthouse. Clearing the Ambrose Channel, she swings her rudder to port - before her is 2,900 miles of open sea. Those in the Highlands would have seen her slowly crest the horizon; the crew of the Columbus, in turn would have watched the Highlands, and the beams from Twin Lights, slowly vanish as well.

Columbus was never seen again. She vanished without a trace somewhere in the North Atlantic, taking All Hands – 20 Men – with her. We’ll never know for sure what happened.

It is worth noting that this ship was lost eight months AFTER the RMS Titanic disaster that previous April 15th. Even with greater diligence, ice patrols, and increased monitoring, disaster could still – and did – strike.

For perspective, of how savage and violent the sea can be, in 1912 alone, 720 merchant ships were lost in some manner or another. That is nearly two ships a day for an entire year.

Of that number, 72 - TEN PERCENT of the total shipping losses - went missing without a trace, the Columbus among them.

These are staggering figures when laid next to the facts that we are but two years away from World War One.

Today, we humbly remember the Columbus and her lost crewmen as we pause to remember that no matter the time, past, present or future... the Sea will ALWAYS be in charge.

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🇺🇲🇺🇲 ** Please Like & Follow "Sandy Hook History" on Facebook & Instagram for more amazing maritime and military histories of the Garden State and New York Harbor as well as a review of the 80th Anniversary of the Battle Of The Atlantic and World War 2** 🇺🇲🇺🇲