The Key West citizen. [volume] (Key West, Fla.) 1879-current, 1953-03-10
HAL
BOYLE
SAYS

NEW YORK I'll have no more
chamber of commerce spirit than
the next man, but hate to see the
place l dwell in get black eye.
And that is what has happened
to New York, which is getting
quite a reputation for itself as ''the
city of the big fix" The idea is
spreading that you can get any
thing fixed here from a upper to
a boxing match.
Every time somebody turns over
a flat rock anywhere in the munich
pal limits lately he seems to I'M
cover a new mess. A paving scan
dial. waterfront payoH. book
lie bought-and-sold cops. =. bribed
basketball players. !. 500 q night
call girls. police brutality.
commies in the school system.
civic budget that is a beckoning
finger to bankruptcy.
Just name any brand of rascality,
and up we come with it. Each new
case plumb Startles and amazes
our city fathers, but the plain
workaday Joes who lives here are
getting tired Of ii all. The pastors
have leagued together and are de-
manding more action and less sur
prise from city hall. They want
crime bopped-and bopped now.
The ordinary citizen here talks
tough and cynical about his elected
officials, and is inclined to believe
that few ever have to make sad
journey from city hall to the poor
house. He always suspects corrup-
ton is there, but when they do
turn over that flat rock and expose
it-well, he wants something done
about it.
And he'll urn out at the polls by
the millions to see that something
is done about it.
Many an outlander has a jaun-
diced view of the average New
Yorker. He pictures him as q
high-living no-good in a derby hat
who talks out Of the side of his
mouth, says desc" and "dose.
spends his days trying to wear out
a hangover and his nights swilling
booze and ogling lace.pantied cuties
in q night club chorus line. He is
so sinful that If he lived in Sodom
or Gomorrah they'd tar and feath-
er him and ride him out Of town
on q rail.
Anyone who comes here much
knows how false a portrait this is.
There are no slant eyed 0rientals
Jogging opium dens with the blue
smoke of dreams or slashing each
other to hamburger in secret pas
sage.ways in Chinatown. There are
more stenographers living in
Greenwich village than Bohemian
artists.
The plush drink paIlors and gid
ed high-prieed mid-Manhattan res.
taurants would fold in a month if
they depended on local customers.
II is the free-wheeling out-of-town-
err. his pockets full Of chicken mon
ey. who cuts the hi-junks here.
The aborigines don't have that kind
Of sucker money, by and large.
Scratch the native New Yorker,
and you find a small towner. The
only difference between him and
the guy in Corncob, Neb., Is that
he rides to and from work on q
subway, and his feet hurt him
more from walking on all that
concrete.
The only sin be knows Is what
he reads about ia the paper. He
couldn't give you the address Of a
brothel if you paid him 1900.
He loves this tremendous city
with the same quite pride any man
has ia his home town. He thinks It
is In many ways the most moral
and clean-iiving Of the worlds
great metropoliSes. And 10 e.0oo,-
900 people II is. In some respects
It ID downright puritanieal.
Most visitors would have to
agree. Usually they are rather dis
appointed that Manhattan isn't the
bad, mad, vice-fiauntsng civic bell
they had hoped for.
This Is q tame town" they com.
plain. II came here 10 haul off and
have a good time. Why. New York
isn't half as wide open as Chicago
or San Francisco. What do you do
here for fun"
And the answer Is: most people
just 80 90 living - piaeidiy Is
they do In any other small town 10
America. except they bump elbows
more often.