When Bill Greene of Jerome Ave. became a partner in Tsontos Furs it made us think of Mike Tsontos, a close friend of ours, who lived on Bruce Terrace, Mineola. Mike was wounded in the North African campaign in WWII and taken prisoner by the Germans. As Mike lay waiting to have his wounds treated he was near the head of the line. A number of German wounded arrived after him and Mike figured he would be put behind them. But instead they treated the men as they lay, German, American, British and Italian. Mike spent three years in a prison camp and although he was not physically abused he was almost starved to death. The prisoners, toward the end of the war, were given just a single potato a day. The camp was divided with the American and British on one side and the Russian prisoners on the other. Every GI made sure that each man had his potato, while on the Russian side where there were daily battles over who stole whose potato. When bombers came overhead the American and British got all their stretcher cases pulled to safety while the Soviets would run, every man for himself, leaving their non-ambulatory mates just laying there. Mike, who was a big brute of a man, weighed just 100 lbs. when he was liberated. His experience caused him to become a compulsive eater whose weight reached 500 lbs. Mike eventually became a rich man and left Mineola buying a big house in North Hills with a lot of ground and a swimming pool. He used to open the pool and grounds to underprivileged children from Harlem a couple of weeks each summer. Even his death was colorful. He was attending a bull fight in Mexico City where steps to the arena seats were very steep, he lost his footing and plunged down the steps dying instantly of a heart attack.

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Our friend Walter Weismantel of Florida, formerly of Mineola, recently met Robert "Ruby" Dubowsky who was a Mineola High graduate. In WWII he flew B-24 bombers. His plane was hit over Dresden on its 33rd mission. They limped back toward England but it was hit again over France. They all jumped and luckily landed 15 miles behind our lines. He finally got back to the UK but had to fly two more missions to complete his tour. He stayed in the service for 20 more years and came out a Lt. Colonel.

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George and Helen McGahan of Roselle St. recently took a trip through the Panama Canal.

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Joan O'Brien, Ursula Bordonaro and Jean Reidlinger enjoyed lunch at Churrasqueira.

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Marian Dean always has great looking hair thanks to Tres Belle Hair Salon. She and her husband live on Jerome Ave.

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Marilyn Donnellan of White Rd. enjoyed lunch at the Jericho Diner. Others we met during the week at the diner were Irene Murchison (Ellsworth Ave.), Vera Barrick (Coolidge Ave.), Terry Gale (Penn Ave.), Margaret Fleming (Woodnut Pl.) and Charlie and Margaret Cavalconte (Marcellus Rd.).

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Frances Nemecek of Garfield Ave. has a new beagle named Pepper. Her old beagle Pebbles died at age 14.

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Got held up on Dartmouth Ave., WP while momma goose, poppa goose and five goslings leisurely strolled across in front of my car.

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A vicious anti-Catholic publication has been left at our house and I presume at other homes too in the neighborhood for the past several weeks. We thought these things were part of an infamous past like in the 1930s when the night riders of the KKK terrorized the countryside around Mineola and the Willistons.

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Want to experience an interesting Sunday morning? Attend Mass at Our Lady of Kazan Russian Orthodox Church in Glen Head. There are no seats and the Mass lasts three hours. There is a garden in the back where people often go out for a few minutes' break. The singing, the vestments of the priests and the icons make for a fascinating morning even though everything is in Russian and I, at least, understood very little.