Today I celebrate the life of someone who had great influence on my own - Nicky Fasano, who passed away a few days ago. He would have been 93 tomorrow. Nicky was a WWII vet, seeing action as a teenager. He was career US Army, retiring as a Master Sergeant stationed at Fort Hamilton in Bay Ridge, a short drive to our beloved Bay 37th Street. He was as passionate about football as could be. When deemed to small to play in high school, he excelled at soccer instead. His brother Bobby was one of the greatest halfbacks in the history of Lafayette High School. For years and years Nicky proudly wore the jacket that celebrated the undefeated 1951 season. His sons, John, a defensive tackle, and Richie, a halfback, played with distinction during the darkest period of Lafayette's football history. One day Nicky dragged me out to a JV practice. I'm so glad he did. I would have missed so much without him. I was privileged to be part of the return of the program's winning tradition under coach Murray "Ace" Adler. He is a significant part of my second novel, Adjustments. I used his real name in tribute. He would invite us to his house the night before a game and play college fight songs on his Victrola. He would drive us to games and get so intense discussing football he would blow through red lights without realizing it. His brother, nicknamed Blackie because of his dark complexion, became a state trooper in, of all places, Mississippi, where he continues to live, a stone's throw from the great river. Blackie's son, John Dan, an Iraq veteran, has completely changed his life, moving to Fasano, Sicily, which is near Palermo, where he operates an olive vineyard, just as his great-great grandfather had. As we say in Brooklyn: "What goes around comes around." I remember Nick's father, whom we called Mr. Fasano, as a kind old soul. "Jimmy Hoffa wasa de besta," he would tell us in accented English. For years we would laugh about that. Whenever I entered the Williamsburg Bank, now HSBC, I'd look up to the second floor and see Nick's wife, Eileen, through a glass partition at the switchboard, headset in place. Wow, that was a long time ago. Our Bay 37th Street old timers have been leaving us steadily. Some have left too soon. My condolences to Eileen, John, Richie, Bobby and Irma, Nicky's sister, and all the grand kids. He was a prince.
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