Victor

Victor Salarino is and is not from Confluence.

Yes, it is indeed true that he was born in this town, but before he was even a year old, his mother and father, both Italian immigrants, and his three brothers fled their one room apartment below what is now Porter Park, and moved to New York City. There they reunited with Vic's mother's family. Mrs. Salarino, as Vic himself told me, was a strong woman. Mr. Salarino worked at a factory near the water, where he drove a lift truck for a dry goods company.

The family was poor, but they managed to survive. Vic's three older brothers helped around the house. Their mother often wished out loud that it was a shame her eldest wasn't a girl, because she could use the help.

Just before Vic started grade school, the family had saved enough money to try to strike out on their own again, so they moved back to Confluence. Our sleepy little town was in a bit of a boom at the time; lots of people were moving into the valley because there was plenty of work. Mr. Salarino went into business with another Italian who lived here (whose name I've never been able to discover), and together they imported grapes and made communion wine, which was one of the few kinds of alcohol still legal under prohibition.

Mrs. Salarino raised the boys, and when time allowed, she worked as a seamstress for the men's store downtown. The boys were always well dressed for mass.

In the summer of 1929, as Vic was finishing the first grade, Mr. Salarino announced he was taking a trip to Italy to visit family. He could not take the entire family, but he would take one son, the eldest, Michael.

The entire family went down to the train station to see them off. Vic told me he still remembers the steamer trunk his father took with him. More than anything, though, he remembers the jealousy of not being the one chosen to go with his father. "It's just two months," his mother told him. "He'll be back before you know it."

That October, the market crashed and the Depression began. A postcard came that fall from Italy, saying that they were waiting for things to get better before traveling overseas. Another card came at Christmas. Vic's father and brother were not coming back. With three boys and a disappeared market for tailoring, Mrs. Salarino packed up once more and went back to New York.

Life there wasn't much better. One of Vic's brothers was able to get a WPA job, which helped. They lived in a cramped apartment, which they shared with an aunt and uncle and their two children. Everyone contributed in one way or another, and when Vic turned twelve, his mother told him he needed to find a job and do his part.

Vic hadn't a clue what he ought to do as a school boy looking for work. Plenty of grown men, skilled workers, couldn't find a job. It was a terrible time.

His first job was delivering groceries from the store his uncle ran. It was the job that gave him the keys to explore one of the world's most incredible cities. Vic loved the trains, he loved exploring, and suddenly he had the license to indulge all of his curiosities.

One afternoon, he delivered groceries to the house of a well-to-do businessman who happened to be rushing out of the door just as Vic was knocking on it. "Where are you off to, sir?" he asked.

"Ebbets Field! I'm already late for the first pitch," the man said.

"What's Ebbets Field?"

Vic said the man looked at him incredulously. "Why, son, it's where the Dodgers play."

"Who are the Dodgers?"

The man grabbed his hand. "Come on. I'll show you."

Now, the humor in this story is that Vic knew the entire time who the Dodgers were and that they played at Ebbets Field. Still, the Salarino family didn't have the money to waste on baseball games, and although Vic had once seen the arched facade of the stadium from the street, he had never been inside to hear its roar.

The game was against Philadelphia, and the Dodgers won. It was like being in a gleaming palace, a place where regular life evaporated and all that was left was the beauty of baseball. The men wore ties; the cheers were guttural, the passion, real.

Vic noticed there were boys hustling peanuts and other concessions up and down the aisles. Suddenly it hit him: the boys' job was to go to the baseball park every day and sell peanuts--and, at the same time, they were able to see the greatest game played in the most amazing place. He snagged one of the boys walking up the aisle, and soon he was sitting in the office of Mr. Martin Jacobs, one of the Jacobs brothers who ran all of the food operations at the park. Vic negotiated his first job, which paid him ten cents for every game he worked.

He kept his job delivering groceries and arranged his schedule around baseball games. Still, he hid his new job from his mother, telling her that he was going off to play with some of the other boys in the neighborhood. He'd run down the street, three or four blocks down, and cut the corner to the train station, which he rode to the stadium.

Vic was great at selling peanuts. He still had a child's voice, but he had a knack for working his section hard and remembering customers. He'd learn their names and what they liked, and if they brought their sons to the game, he'd sometimes give them free cotton candy. Soon Mr. Jacobs put him in charge of the other boys. He was thirteen years old and already a manager.

The attack on Pearl Harbor sent a shock wave across the country. Both of Vic's brothers enlisted immediately. Vic was too young to be drafted, but he was determined to join up and fight in Europe.

His mother was beside herself with grief. She suspected her husband and son had joined the Italian army, and the idea of brothers fighting brothers tore her apart. Vic and his mother shared the apartment for an entire year. Mrs. Salarino spent mornings at the breakfast table in tears. Vic counted down the days until his birthday. Then, about two months before he would be able to join the army, Vic came down with polio.

It turns out it saved his life.