Shot by Guard — Albany Stickup Suspect Killed, 1980

by G. Jack Urso

 

Albany Times Union, Dec. 31, 1980.

Sometime just before 6:00 AM, Tuesday, Dec. 30, 1980, 12-year-old- William Koren left his home at 505 Yates Street, Albany, NY, to deliver the Times Union newspaper. The temperature hovered around 32 deg. F and there was about 3-inches of snow on the ground. Fog blanketed the city that morning and the sun wouldn’t rise until 7:45 AM (data from Weatherspark.com). About a block away from his home, heading East, Koren picked up a trail of blood. It led to where a thief spent his last moments on Earth, choking on his own blood due to a .357 cal. bullet that struck his neck.

In my research for the article, The Rise and Fall of Big Dom’s Subs, one of the unsolved mysteries regarded a robbery of the Ontario Street store that led to the death of the perpetrator after being shot by Big Dom’s security officer Leonard (Lenny) Basile, brother of the owners Dominic and Joe. Over four decades later, no one could remember what exactly happened. Rumors suggested the robber met his end after robbing the store three times in a row. While I recalled the incident from my youth, having worked for Big Dom’s, without knowing the exact month and year, I spent several fruitless hours at the library going through the Times Union’s early 1980s archives on microfilm trying to find more information about it before giving up.

The Ontario Street store, still a sub shop five decades later
(author's collection, 2021).

Just recently, however, some five years after I published that article, William Koren came across it while doing his own research on the incident. Koren was a witness to the aftermath that morning and with his assistance I was able to find more information about what happened, during the course of which I discovered several period news reports that filled in many of the blanks, though not quite all.

In my initial article, based upon my own recollection, with some help of a few others who also shared a hazy recollection of the incident, it was thought that Lenny Basile shot the robber who fled before collapsing around the corner and behind a church on Yates Street, just next to the Vincentian Institute Catholic school, later dying as a result. Koren, in an exclusive interview with Aeolus 13 Umbra, remembers picking up the trail of blood.

“I recall seeing it at first on Yates — heading east on Yates. It ended in the back of that church on the other side of a fence, apparently making it over, and looked like he came to rest as he just got over as there was a large pool of blood. I do remember doubling back and saw it started somewhere on Ontario,” Koren reported.

According to Dec. 31, 1980, Times Union account, the robbery occurred about 2 AM the morning of Tuesday, Dec. 30. The robber had previously hit the same store Friday night and early Sunday morning, stealing “less than $120” in total, according to the Times Union. A Dec. 31, 1980, Buffalo News article reports a slightly different amount of $121 with $71 taken on Friday and $50 on Sunday (see article below). In the previous robberies, store employees reported the robber displayed a gun, so Lenny came prepared with his licensed .357 magnum revolver.

Staking out the store from his van, Basile saw the robber enter. Approaching the store as the robber was leaving. Basile saw the gun and told the robber to “freeze,” who instead took off down the street. Basile fired, hitting the thief in the neck. It must have been just a nick, however, because a solid hit would have dropped him right then and there, but it was enough.

According to the Times Union report, the robber was taken to Albany Medical Center where he died later that morning at 8:30 AM.

According to my co-workers at this store when I started working there the next year, the robber left through the open side door in this picture where Lenny Basile approached him (author's collection, 2026)

I knew Lenny at the time because I helped my mother clean the sandwich chain’s main offices on the weekends and I would see Lenny there with his chrome-plated .357 in his shoulder holster. Presumably, it was the same one used in the shooting.

Unless you have actually shot a .357 Magnum it is impossible to appreciate its power. One time, my former brother-in-law allowed me to get off a couple shots with his .357. The first shot blew my arms straight up in the air and over my head. You have to be strong and have a tight grip to control a .357, and Lenny managed to hit his target while the thief was running away — and at night.

Standing at the churchyard where the body was found, looking towards the corner a short block down from Big Dom's. It was a long way for the thief to run with a bullet wound in his neck (author's collection, 2026).

Police found a blood-covered toy gun at the scene, also described as an “imitation” gun in another news report. Toy guns up through the 1970s were frighteningly realistic. Among my childhood toys was an M-1 Garand my father said was a near-replica of his Marine-issued weapon from the Korean War. I also had a German Lugar pistol which, although a toy, was made of cast metal with an authentic looking grip. It looked realistic enough that when I used it as part of my costume one Halloween the police stopped me.

Who the robber was is unknown. Described as 5 ft 6 in with blond hair, he was carrying no ID. A few NYC subway tokens found in his pocket led to police speculation it was a SUNY-Albany student from the NYC-area; however, it was Christmas break. While not unreasonable a NYC-area student might remain in Albany over the holidays, something just doesn’t quite add up. I looked through a couple more issues of the Times Union to see if the robber was ever identified, but that will take a deeper dive.

The temperature fell to -10 deg. F on Dec. 31. It would not rise above 32 deg. until Jan. 18, leaving the trail of blood to remain frozen on the ground until then or the next snowfall covered it up.

The church lot with the approximate location in red where the body was found. According to William Koren, “It [the side yard] went back about 30 feet to a fence. There were trees there and this was more of a yard” (author's collection, 2026).

I began working as a sandwich maker for Big Dom’s a year after the shooting at the Ontario Street store, and often into the early morning hours, so I can easily put myself in the employees' shoes. In reflecting on the incident, one can’t help but note all the tragedy involved. A thief’s life coming to an end in a churchyard recalls the thief crucified next to Christ who was promised paradise. All I can hope for is that while the thief lay choking on his own blood in the churchyard, perhaps pleading to God in his last moments, the same forgiveness Christ extended two thousand years ago to another thief was also extended to that young man.

The original Albany Times Union article is provided below with a transcription.

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Albany Times Union, Dec. 31, 1980, part 1.

Albany Times Union, Dec. 31, 1980, part 2.

Shot by Guard — Albany Stickup Suspect Killed

By Cliff Lee, Staff Writer, Albany [N.Y.] Times Union, Dec. 31, 1980

An unidentified man was fatally shot by a private security guard early Tuesday morning after apparently using a toy gun to rob an Albany sandwich shop of $36.

Late Tuesday Albany police were still trying to identify the man killed outside Big Dom’s Submarine Sandwich Shop at 846 Madison Ave.

Leonard Basile, a security guard for Big Dom’s and brother of the nine-shop chain’s vice president, shot the man in the neck as he left the shop with $36 he’d taken from the cash register after forcing three employees into a meat cooler at gunpoint.

Police reported Tuesday afternoon that a toy gun covered with blood had been found along the route taken by the robber, after he had been shot by Basile.

Det. Lt. William Murray said the man killed is believed to be the same man who robbed the same shop at gunpoint Friday night and early Monday morning.

In the two previous hold-ups, the robber displayed a weapon and forced the employees into the shop’s meat cooler before rifling the cash register and making off with less than $120 from both robberies.

Syracuse Herald Journal, Dec. 31, 1980. The same article also appeared in the Binghampton Press and Sun Bulletin and the Elmira Star-Gazette.

Albany County District Attorney Sol Greenberg said Tuesday the circumstances surrounding the shooting may be presented to a grand jury as early as Friday and the grand jury will make a determination of whether Basile was justified in the shooting of the robber or if charges should be brought against the 38-year-old East Greenbush resident.

Basile, who has worked as security guard for the sandwich chain for the last two years, said he had been patrolling around the Albany shops in the wake of the two previous robberies and had parked in front of the Madison Avenue shop shortly before 2 am to wait for it to close.

Basile said he saw a man walk back and forth in front of the shop, and then enter the shop.

He said the bandit forced the employees into the back of the shop and then went to the cash register and begin taking money out of it.

Daniel Whittan of Loudonville, an employee, told police the man walked up to the service counter, displayed what appeared to be a small handgun and, while holding his coat collar over his face, said, “All three of you, go in the cooler.”

Basile said that he drove his van to the front of the shop and waited for the robber to emerge.

When he came out of the shop, Basile said. “I told him to freeze and he started backing away from me I told him again to freeze and he reached into his pocket and took out the gun. That’s when I fired.”

The single shot from Basile’s 357 magnum revolver struck the man in the neck.

At first I didn’t think I’d hit him. Basile said, “because he threw his hands up in face and I thought maybe he’d been hit with concrete chips from the shop wall where the bullet might have hit and then he began to run.”

Police said the man ran south on Ontario Street, then east on Yates Street and then ran north through some backyards.

He collapsed in front of 800 Madison Ave, police said.

Basile said he climbed into his van and followed the man for a short distance and then lost him.

Police said the man climbed over an eight-foot fence during his flight and Basile said he later saw him running through some backyards and onto Madison Avenue.

“I saw him fall and that’s the first time I realized I’d hit him,” Basile said, “but I didn’t go up to him after he fell because I thought he was still armed 1 called police.”

The man was taken by ambulance to Albany Medical Center Hospital, where he died at about 8:30 am.

Police said Basile’s weapon was registered and Basile is licensed as a private detective.

Joseph Basile, vice president of Big Dom’s, said his brother had served as a captain in the Army Military Police in Vietnam and had worked as a private detective before taking charge of security for the firm.

Buffalo News, 12/31/80

Although Basile was not wearing a uniform at the time of the shooting, he was driving a van with bright gold and black lettering all over it saying. “Big Dom’s Security,” Joseph Basile said.

Basile said his job at the time of the shooting was mainly to serve as a deterrent for anyone thinking about robbing the shop and to let the employees know we were taking an interest in their welfare by being as visible as possible.” Basile said he feels the robber “must have been on some kind of drug, because anybody that was thinking straight would have known it was time to give up when I first confronted him.”

The dead man was described as about 5 feet 6 inches tall, with light brown hair and wearing a two-tone jacket.

Police said no identification was found on the man, although some New York City subway tokens were found in one of his pockets.

Police said they were investigating the possibility the man may have been a student at Albany State University.

Greenberg said no charges have been lodged against Basile in connection with the shooting and cited a section of the State Penal Law which states a private citizen may use “deadly physical force to arrest a person believed to have been involved in a murder or a robbery and is fleeing the scene of the crime.”

Greenberg said the circumstances surrounding the shooting Tuesday morning “appear to meet this category for use of deadly physical force.”

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Krista

by G. Jack Urso 

I just got back from buying groceries. Mostly cat food and litter as usual for my little tribe of rescues. In the parking lot, a young woman, mid-20s, thin as a bone, bad skin, crying, approaches me. Her face screwed up in suffering — not a physical pain, but a deep emotional pain.

I taught in prisons and in an Alcohol and Drug rehab, so I can spot an addict pretty easily. For such a skinny girl, she had very swollen knees, which could be the sign of a site of repeated injections, and her eyes looked red from more than crying, so it seemed she was at some point during a trip. However, that doesn’t mean they still won't try to con you out of some bucks. They're addicts. No one is hiring addicts and whether it is digital, coin, or paper, this world still runs on cash.

There were others in the lot, but I get picked. She runs her story by me, but I can hardly understand a word she is blubbering so much. A crying con job would still be legible enough to hear the hook.

I asked her, “Haven't you got any friends, or family, a church?” I name a well-known one nearby with an active street outreach.

“No . . . no . . .”

“What's your name?”

She mumbles something.

“I'm sorry. I didn't hear you.”

“Crist . . .” she begins, but I can't hear through all her blubbering.

“Chrystal?” I ask, seeking clarification.

“Krista,” she finally stammers out.

I almost never carry any cash, but I had a couple bucks and slipped them to her.

“Well, Krista, my name is Jack. I'll pray for you.”

She silently takes my money and slinks away, still crying.

I'm not a religious or spiritual person, and rejected church a long time ago, but it costs me nothing if she thinks someone in the world is hoping for the best for her.

You have to be hard up to be hustling for a couple bucks in a parking lot. Maybe she'll stop crying as soon as she is out of earshot. Maybe she'll use it for drink and drugs, hopefully food, but that is not my concern.

The question is not what kind of person she is for running a con — if that's what she was doing — but rather what kind of person I would be for turning her away if she was suffering.

“Krista,” by the way, is the feminine Greek word for “Follower of Christ.” 

Matt. 25:40 — And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.

And that, my friends, is the sermon of the day.

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I Am the One He Calls Jones

by Guest Contributor E. Jones

 

Blue Ponderer by Jilly Sutton.

Editor’s Note: Mr. E. Jones, a longtime friend, fellow writer, and occasional comrade-in-arts, commissioned my poem I See . . . Dinosaurs for a musical project he was working on in the 1990s (part of which can be heard in the introduction to the spoken word version available at the previous link). While revisiting that work, my somewhat eccentric, odd, and occasionally sarcastic personality inspired a few verses of his own. — G. Jack Urso

__________________________________________________________

From: E. Jones

Sent: Wednesday, October 29, 2014 6:58 PM

To: Gurso1

Subject: Re: I see dinosaurs

__________________________________________________________

I am the one he calls Jones

A Blue ponder or an Angry Mist

He

Seems to vilify vigilance

Indiscreet.

Mockingbird turnstyle

Sodapie He.

 

Note: According to Interreceipes.com, a soda pie “is an intriguing and playful dessert.” 

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The Spoken Word Project: Old Country Prison Work Death Song (The Existential Hoedown)

by G. Jack Urso

From the Aeolus 13 Umbra YouTube channel. Use full-screen mode to better view the lyric captions or click here for the transcription.

“Old Country Prison Work Death Song (The Existential Hoedown),” is a tribute of sorts to Depression-era songs about the impact of a collapsed economy on the most vulnerable among us. The start of the Depression was a time with few government social services, no welfare, no food stamps, and no health insurance for the unemployed (and barely any for the employed), so the broken often only had themselves and other broken people to rely on for help. This resulted in poverty, misery, and disease for millions, but provided those who survived with a keen understanding of the human condition — we are only as human as the humanity we extend to others.

This project attempts to create a “found artifact” of the past — as if someone discovered an old radio and instead of picking up one of today’s channels it reaches into the past and tunes into a low-power AM broadcast not of Nashville’s finest, but rather a couple old guys scrounging up a few bucks for performing on the local radio station. The sound is raw, and the vocals a bit off-key and not always in synch with the clanging washboard, yet the lyrics reflect a sentiment expressed in many songs from the era, such as “Brother, Have You Got a Dime?” and “Paper Moon.”

The recording was completed with a Shure SM58 microphone connected to a TASCAM digital audio recorder. Audacity was used to edit the recording and add some reverb. A low-volume amplifier sound was added in the background to emulate the hum often accompanying these old radios and gives the audio some texture. The final version was assembled on Filmora.

Special thanks to Monty Von along with Poorer Richard on the washboard for their patient participation in the performance.

A full transcription of the lyrics is available at Aeolus 13 Umbra: Old Country Prison Work Death Song (aka The Existential Hoedown).

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Forgiveness and Redemption

by G. Jack Urso

A homeless woman's abandoned belongings, Albany, NY, Mar. 5, 2026. 

(photo by G. J. Urso).

It looks like a pile of garbage waiting to be tossed out, but it’s not. This is someone’s life — the entirety of all their belongings in this world.

At the beginning of the school year, I was transferred down to the inner-city, same block as “the projects.” I teach adult education and my students range from 18 on up. There was a woman who was a daily fixture. We knew she was homeless, about 40. We offered to hook her up with various services through our program, including free meals, but she already had her high school diploma. Not that it ever did her much good, but she didn’t like fronting for something she didn't think would be of use to her just to eat. Besides, that program was located in the next city over, which she didn’t know. This patch of asphalt she knew. She probably lived in the projects before she ended up on the streets.

She wrapped all her belongings up carefully in garbage bags, hauling them around in carts, finding a place to stash it. Ours was a safe place.

She passed the time away in the reception area and largely kept to herself but shared a friendly word and a smile if approached. She would get in as early as possible and use the bathroom to take a sponge bath. No one was bothered. There were other bathrooms and she always left it as clean as she found it. She had a tablet she would use to surf, looking at ads for apartments she could never afford. Looking at help wanted ads, but she could never get hired because if you don’t have an address, you’re not allowed a future.

Before you think “Well, if she can afford a tablet . . . ” — stop right there. Without computer access in this day and age, she may as well be blind, deaf, and mute. It was an old tablet, doubtful it would fetch much, certainly not enough to rent an apartment, but good enough to look at ads for apartments she could never afford and for jobs no one would hire her for.

Then, in November she disappeared. I came back from Thanksgiving Break and her belongings were neatly packed and arranged behind the bike rack no one ever uses, where she usually left them.

December, January, February came and went, but she never returned. Maintenance had every right to dump them into the garbage and take it out with the trash; however, no one did. Even after four months this woman’s belongings are still there. No one has the heart to remove them. She’ll be back, my students said, but the older among them know. They’ve seen it before. She’s not coming back.

I didn’t get to know her. Exchanged a few words, held open the door a few times, but I was busy with my students. I never even asked her name.

I hope she’s alive. I hope someone saved her and she just left her life in the streets with all her belongings behind. “I hope” — the emptiest phrase in the English language. 

We all have debts and bills and struggles with loneliness and anxiety or whatever, and the future looks bleak, but there’s a roof over my head and I knew one person who would have traded all her miseries for ours if it came with a roof and a home she could call her own.

Maybe she found the helping hand she needed. Maybe the odds caught up to her. Maybe there was nothing no one could do. Maybe there was one person who could have made a difference. Maybe that was me, probably not, but I was busy and we'll never know.

We continue to watch over her things. I still look for her as I drive through the city, but maybe I’m really looking for forgiveness and redemption. 

I hope someday to find both.

 

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RetroFan #43, “Hot Hero Sandwich — We Deliver!”

 by G. Jack Urso 

RetroFan magazine #43 cover.

After a 46-year absence from print entertainment media, Hot Hero Sandwich returns to the popular press in the Jan.-Mar. 2026 issue of RetroFan magazine, #43 with the article “Hot Hero Sandwich — We Deliver!” I wrote as an overview of the series and the Hot Hero Sandwich Project. A featured cover story, the article comprises nearly 4,000 words on eight pages with lots of exclusive pictures. 

Begun as a one-off article here on Aeolus 13 Umbra, Hot Hero Sandwich: The Late 70s TV Teen Scene, the Hot Hero Sandwich Project really took off in late December, 2022, when Emmy Award-winning writer and Kate and Allie creator Sherry Coben saw my article and reached out to me, offering both herself and her husband, noted film editor Patrick McMahon, whom she met working on Hot Hero Sandwich to answer some questions. From that, humble start, with help from Coben, and on my own, and with former crew and staff reaching out, the project grew to a total of 26 interviews and to date nearly 120 articles, including rare production documents, a website, and a YouTube channel, with cuts from every scene in the entire series — most of which, since it had been unreleased on VHS or DVD, had not been seen since broadcast. 

Print journalism still lends creditability to projects, such as this one, that few digital media outlets can provide, and hopefully may lead to more people discovering the series, and more former cast and crew from the show to interview!

For a two-page preview, or perhaps to order your own copy, please visit TwoMorrows Publishing. 

A special thanks goes out to everyone who was interviewed, responded to questions, tolerated my enthusiasm, and who otherwise helped me with the Project.

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NASA Space Shuttle Earth Views: Six-Hour VHS Footage

by G. Jack Urso

From the Aeolus 13 Umbra YouTube channel. 

In the 1990s, NASA had a cable television channel, NASA TV (NTV), which, in addition to its regular programming of educational and news reports, would sometimes just run up to eight hours of Earth views taken by space shuttle missions of the 1990s. No audio. No commentary. No commercials. No station breaks. No channel ID announcements. No on-screen watermarks — just hours and hours of the Earth spinning quite all alone in space. One day in the late 1990s, I taped a long marathon session of Earth views (see the video above from the Aeolus 13 Umbra YouTube channel).

The six hour-plus video compiles footage from three shuttle missions and none of the missions are repeated. Title cards appear periodically to indicate which mission or which part of the Earth the viewer is looking at.

Screen shots from the video.

Shuttle missions used for this broadcast include (in order of appearance):

• STS-75, February — March 6, 1996, the 19th mission of the Space Shuttle Columbia.

• STS-78, June 20 — July 7, 1996, the 20th mission of the Space Shuttle Columbia.

• STS-66, November 3 — November 14, 1994, the 13th mission of the Space Shuttle Atlantis.

It is sobering to see the footage taken from the Space Shuttle Columbia which would later be destroyed on February 1, 2003, while returning from its 28th mission (STS-107), killing all seven astronauts.

Moving from the light side to the dark side. Screen shots from the video.

While writing or working on projects I would throw the Earth views tape on and put on some Miles Davis or Charles Mingus, the Missa Luba, or film soundtracks like those from Planet of the Apes (1968) and Logan’s Run (1976) (see links for articles and music on Aeolus 13 Umbra).

Although I first got my RCA DVD Recorder + VCR about 2010, I hadn’t got around to moving the full six hour-plus VHS recording to digital until this year — a testament to the endurance of an approximate 27-year-old VHS tape as well as for my long-neglected RCA DVD/VCR recorder. I last used it for in 2015 with the same tape, but transferred only 70 minutes of it, which I split up into two 35-minute segments and set to music:

Views of the Planet Earth Captured by the Crew of STS-75

Background music is the album Japan: Shakuhach — The Japanese Flute, featuring Kōhachiro Miyata.

Views of the Planet Earth Captured by the Crew of STS-78

Background music includes tracks from the album 2001: A Space Odyssey, and the ambient band TUU’s album Migration.

Screen shot from the video.

[Note: The camera apertures used to photograph the Earth from orbit are set too fast to catch starlight, which is why no stars can be seen in the background.]

I also used that RCA DVD Recorder + VCR to copy another NASA-related 6-hour broadcast from VHS, the 25th anniversary Apollo Moon Landing ABC News compilation, Apollo 11: As It Happened which I recorded off my local PBS station in 1994. An extremely rare program one would be hard pressed to find recordings of elsewhere, reinforcing the value of saving old VHS tapes and converting them to digital.

Screen shot from the video.

After a while, watching the footage becomes a meditative experience. The busy thoughts of the day running through my mind suspend themselves as I get lost in the deep and silent blues of the oceans and the browns and greens of the land contrasting starkly with the inky blackness of space.

I can’t say whether there is intelligent life elsewhere in the universe, but from this perspective in Earth orbit it really looks like we are all alone and on our own, which makes the chaos in the world today all that much more tragic. This wonderful blue and green miracle we treat so carelessly.

Screen shot from the video.

The video is a bit grainy in places, but, overall, the quality and the tracking are pretty good for an approximate 27-year-old VHS tape. There is something about VHS recordings I find “warmer,” to adopt a phrase often used for vinyl recordings. I don’t need to see every detail in 4K or 5K high-definition resolution. I’m not watching it for the video quality. It’s an artifact of the past — my past, tech past, and America’s past.

It’s a reminder of the fragility of our existence and what an amazing gift we have been given, and one which we continue to ignore. 

Sunrise — Screen shot from the video.

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Albany Student Press, 1970: Submarine Magnate Speaks

by G. Jack Urso

 

I stumbled across this usual article from the State University of New York at Albany’s newspaper, Albany Student Press, from December 8, 1970. At the time, Walt’s Subs, the parent company of what would later evolve into Big Dom’s Subs, which I cover in my article The Rise and Fall of Big Dom’s Subs, had a delivery service, something they would later abandon when they became Big Dom’s. 

As someone who also wrote for my college newspaper, the end of the semester, as it is here, usually leaves staff short-handed as student reporters abandon their beats to prepare for finals. I recall the challenge to find last-minute fillers and that was when we could slip something impromptu and off-the-wall into the newspaper. Here, John O'Grady, features editor, interviews Louis G. Scorca, the “Submarine Magnate” in question who delivers for Walt’s. It is unclear whether Scorca is a fellow student, but Walt's/Big Dom's was a steady employer of SUNY students.

At times, the piece does seem like it was written with the help of a six-pack and a few joints. The humor has an Animal House sensibility and reflects the era with tongue secured squarely in cheek. A full transcription of the article is provided below.

­­­­­­­­­­_________________________________________­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­_________________

Submarine Magnate Speaks

by John O'Grady, Features Editor

Scan of the original article.

[Ed. Note: Original capitalization, spelling, and punctuation retained.]

Louis G. Scorca, currently occupying the position of Executive Deliveryboy for one of the nation's largest submarine concerns (Walt’s, Inc., of Albany), has for many years been an outspoken influence on intestinal and world affairs; his union, the General Association of Submarine Sandwich Executive Deliveryboys (GASSED), represents two-thirds of this country's submarine firm, including Walt’s, Mike's, Milton’s, University Sub, Stalengrisi’s of Flushing, and Polaris. Here with a selection of his more important comments:

Q: Sexual traditions in the United States have undergone radical changes in the last decade; would you speculate on some of the reasons for these changes?

A: Hot Pepperoni has probably influenced sexual freedom in the United States more than any other single factor, owing to its composite qualities of heat, spice, and smoothness. Some have speculated that the introduction of the Meat Ball Sub back in 1957 was an initial cause, but I personally fail to see any suggestion of promiscuity in a greasy meat patty just because it’s longer than it is wide.

Q: The Nation's economy is another field now receiving wide spread popular attention. How can we combat inflation?

A: I have no idea how anyone else does it, but at Walt’s we have eliminated the sales tax on deliveries and substituted a 30 cent delivery charge; the money therefore goes toward paying for our car windows instead of Governor Rockefeller's limousines.

Also, vast improvements in our submarines have contributed both to the economy and to the environment: In 1961 we increased by 6.2% the density of our Russian Dressing, ensuring that single Roast Beef Sub would cause complete gastric satisfaction and that money would not be thrown around on more of these popular tasty treats. In 1964, we decreased the price of our lettuce, tomatoes, salt, and salad oil necessitating a small but non-inflationary increase in the price of our bologna, ham, turkey, roast beef, salami, etc.). And, finally, as early as 1966, Walt’s decided to put all of this food on a roll; not a thick, doughy, chewable roll, mind you, but a thin, flaky, quickly oxygenating roll which disintegrates within 18 minutes after it’s thrown away. We feel we have effected a near ecological revolution by this improvement in our packaging.

Louis G. Scorca, almost, from a photograph accompanying the article (see above).

Q: Would you care to comment on causes of student unrest?

A: Student unrest could probably be eliminated completely if those persons with weak stomachs told us emphatically to go easy on the salad oil.

Q: Getting more personal, if I may, what is your reaction to the recent robberies perpetrated against you and your firm?

A: My union, GASSED, has taken it completely upon itself to bring the perpetrators up on charges under the Taft Hartley Law, which specifically forbids coercion or obstruction of business. The security police on your com pus have unfortunately not been very cooperative in our efforts, being abnormally concerned with the fact that the robbers were armed with pistols and knives, detail not under the jurisdiction of the Taft Hartley Law and therefore irrelevant to the case. I feel compelled here to add that we are now carefully scrutinizing the possibility of bringing charges against the president of your university under this same law, if he doesn’t get rid of those damn barricades around the dormitory areas. Furthermore, students travelling at less than 40 miles per hour on the gravel in front of each quadrangle are a similar obstruction to the free flow of business and may consider themselves criminal mischiefs in danger of prosecution.

Q: May I ask you to state your background prior to becoming a famous submarine magnate.

A Yes, I used to sweep the floor of a delicatessen in Sicily. My background really lends nothing to a better understanding of my opinions of my greatness.

Q: Can you give us some perspective on the future? What lies ahead for the Submarine industry?

A: Well, I’ve already mentioned our interest in ecology we've a plan underway now to clean up all the fats in Patrone Creek and dump them war hot sauce with anchors. That would provide a basis for an experimental, “anti-pollution” sub, which we have tentatively titled “Walt’s Hot Rats Special.”

Organizationally, however, the Submarine Industry may be in trouble. You must remember that I am only one man and that ng union, GASSED, powerful as it is, represents Submarine Executive Deliveryboys only. In the future there has got to be more acted such items as my recent proposal for a Consolidated [unintelligible] Encystation of Every Submarine Employee (CHEESE), organization crucial to future coherent planning and politicking. Right now, I feel an urgent need for a Presidential Institute in Submarine Sandwiches to relate some of the industry's less complex problems.

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