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Cherry's Galveston Memories |
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Normally
Slick the shoeshine man carried 78 RPM records of black artists, the
ones that Mrs. Evelyn Stein at the Melody Record Shop around the corner
didn't.
But for some reason it was Christmas, and he was pushing a new song
written and sung by a white cowboy film star, Gene Autry. It was "Rudolph
the Red-Nose Reindeer." And it was the Christmas season of 1949, and
that song was on its way to becoming the first tune to ever reach
the platinum benchmark in sales, even bigger than Bing Crosby's "White
Christmas."
The tiny shoeshine parlor was just behind Galveston's
Interurban Queen Newsstand at the corner of 21st and Market Street,
and it had been in business since the war years. I have no idea how
many black men owned it over time, but they were always known as Slick.
The 1949 version of Slick the Shoeshine Man had two gold capped teeth
in the front, one with a perfect five-point star carved in it, and
he had a great head of black hair that was pressed back and held in
place with Peach Dressing pomade. He wore brown and white spectator
shoes year around, and a pocket watch on a long, gold chain that rode
along on the side of his right leg. He all but danced when he walked.
He was an impressive sight. We later became friends.
Slick had a vintage RCA radio-phonograph combination in the back of
his shine parlor. He had taken the big speaker out, put it in a wooden
box with loads of holes drilled in it with a nail he had hammered
in, and had wired it with red and white doorbell wire so that it could
sit in the transom above the parlor's door. He'd turn up the volume
so everyone on the sidewalk could hear.
On both sides of 21st and Market there were end-of-the-line bus stops,
where every bus route on the island began and terminated. Men waiting
for the bus could step into Slick's to get a shine, but mainly to
get away from the foul smell that rose from the gutter and sidewalk.
A spit shine—Slick's specialty—was 15 cents plus a dime
tip.
It
was Christmas Eve, a Saturday, and the stores downtown were finally
closing. The sales ladies from the dime stores had balanced their
cash registers, and the men who sold shoes and haberdashery were on
their way to the Corner Bar for a Christmas toddy before they caught
the bus home.
Slick was still there, catching the stragglers who were planning to
eat supper at the Peacock Cafe's counter, even though they knew they
would be eating the leftovers from the lunch, play the slots at the
Interurban Queen, pull a few tips, and nurse a few highballs before
going to St. Mary's Cathedral for midnight Mass. No sense in going
home only to turn around and come back, they reasoned. Their families
would just meet them there.
Father Dan was a kind soul. He always made certain that he had a doctor
and a nurse on duty to rescue those who would pass out and fall off
the kneeling benches. After all, when you mixed a day on your feet
selling shoes with a few toddies at the Corner Bar, and combined that
with a stuffy, incensed filled cathedral, your chance of making it
without a whiff or two of smelling salts was just this side of zero.
This Christmas Eve night was cold, damp and foggy. Slick had eaten
a take-out plate of turkey with a cloverleaf roll and banana pudding
from the Peacock, and then closed his shine parlor down as the last
bus left for the barn at 10:15.
He and his third wife had five children living at home. They lived
in a two-bedroom apartment above a beauty shop on the northwest side
of 25th and Market Street.
Slick's wife was a housekeeper for an elderly couple who lived in
Cedar Lawn. Slick and his wife's apartment was so small that three
of their children slept on pallets on the living room floor.
As Slick was crossing the alley just south of his shine parlor that
Christmas Eve, he realized that he had forgotten to turn off old Gene
Autry. That cowboy was still warbling about Rudolph even though there
was no one on the sidewalk to hear him.
Slick went back, opened his door, and turned off the RCA radio-phonograph
combination. Just as he stepped back out of the door and turned to
put the padlock through the hasp, his head was struck hard with a
gun wrapped in a handkerchief. Slick went to the ground. The guy grabbed
Slick's paper bag that had all of his shine and record sales money
for the day, and ran to the alleyway, turned east and disappeared
among the shadows.
Slick and his wife were planning to take their children for Christmas
Day dinner at their church, and then to a movie. A movie was all that
the children ever got for Christmas.
And without the paper bag of money, that year there'd be no movie.
Before he began the walk home, for some reason Slick walked up 21st
Street to St. Mary's where he heard the bells sounding to let everyone
know that Mass was beginning. When he got to the church, he sat on
the steps by the north door. What was he going to do? he wondered.
The midnight Christmas Eve service at the cathedral never began until
Evelyn Malloy and Sam and Sedgie Maceo and the kids got there, and
they were always at least fifteen minutes late. They were big supporters
of the cathedral. |
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Sam
Maceo
Photo courtesy Bill Cherry |
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The
front pew on the left side were always reserved for the Maceos.
I don't think I ever heard where Mrs. Malloy sat.
This night Mrs. Malloy was already there. Everyone was waiting for
the Maceos.
About then, Mr. Sam, Miss Sedgie and the kids drove up, got out
of the car, and started toward the cathedral. Mr. Sam spotted Slick
sitting on the steps with his head in his hand.
He walked over to him. Miss Sedgie and the children followed a few
steps behind.
"Slick, is that you?" Mr. Sam asked, bending down.
"Yes sir, Mr. Sam."
"I was hoping I'd find you tonight. I have something for you," Mr.
Sam told him.
And with that, he gave him the paper sack with all of the money
from the shoe shines and records Slick had sold that day. The bag
that had been stolen from Slick by the bandit with the handkerchief
covered pistol.
"And here're two ten-spots for your trouble. Merry Christmas, Slick.
You're a treasured friend. You and the wife stop by and see Mr.
Books at my office after Christmas. He'll have good jobs for both
of you."
As he started to walk into the church with Miss Sergie and the boys,
as an afterthought, Mr. Sam said to Slick, "Ducky Wucky wants you
to know he's sorry he got stupid tonight from those hand-rolled
cigarettes he bought from Pee-Wee the newsboy."
"Merry Christmas, Mr. Sam, and may God always be with you," said
Slick with a big smile.
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Bill
Cherry's Galveston Memories
December
21, 2007 column
© William S. Cherry
All rights reserved
Bill Cherry, a Dallas Realtor and free lance writer was a longtime
columnist for "The Galveston County Daily News." His book, Bill
Cherry's Galveston Memories, has sold thousands, and is still
available at Barnes and Noble and Amazon.com and other bookstores.
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