The Deck, the Dinner, and the Tigers’ Den
Outside, the Syracuse winter winds howled off the lake, but the back room of the Solvay Tigers' hall was a furnace of life.
Steam from the kitchen, manned by Louie Letizia and Peter Pecora, carried the scent of simmering meatballs, red sauce, and cavatelli into every corner of the room. That aroma was the Tigers' hall. It meant the cards were about to be dealt.
This was the Pitch tournament, and in Solvay, Pitch was never just a card game. It was the pulse of the village.
Millwrights and welders from Allied Chemical sat shoulder-to-shoulder with businessmen and local leaders.
Beyond those walls, paychecks and titles dictated who you were.
But deal a hand of Pitch, set a plate of Louie's cooking in front of a man, and suddenly everybody was just one of the guys.
Look at who was at that table. Rocco "Rocky" Pirro had played in the NFL for the Steelers and the Bills, served on the Town Board, sat in the New York State Assembly.
For more than two decades he'd coached the offensive line under Ben Schwartzwalder, part of the staff that built Syracuse's undefeated 1959 National Championship team. When the cards were dealt, none of that was in the room.
He was just another neighbor, a gentle giant laughing at the table like everyone else.
Across from him sat the men who kept the plant running: Joe Guarino the welder, Louie Bellotti and Louie Montreal the millwrights, Dan Simiele and my Uncle Amos "Amy" Speziali the repairmen, Angel "Chic" Perez the businessman.
Society drew hard lines between a factory floor and a government office. But a welder's High-Low-Jack carried the same weight as an Assemblyman's.
You could see it in Chic, winding up and slamming a winning card down with that signature declaration, "Take that!" like he was settling something that had needed settling all week.
Winning the tournament twice with Uncle Amy wasn't luck. It took an instinct for knowing exactly when your partner held the Jack or was counting game to hit the eleven-point mark.
More than strategy, Pitch demanded the table sense to handle a bad draw with your composure intact.
I remember one night when our luck ran completely dry. Uncle Amy looked at a miserable hand, stuck with the bid and forced to lead. He didn't fold, didn't complain.
He just shot me a heavy look across the table and grumbled, "Come on, John, I'm gonna need your help to pull this off."
That shared weight, two men at a card table in a back room in Solvay, New York, figuring out together how to play a bad hand, that was the whole thing. That was what the room was actually for.
The factory whistles have gone silent. Many of these men are gone. But I can still close my eyes and find that back room without any effort at all.
Louie's kitchen steam. The sound of Chic's card hitting the felt. Rocky laughing. And Uncle Amy's look across the table that said: we're in this together, so let's figure it out.
The rules of High-Low-Jack never change. As long as I remember the game, those men are never far.