Ezra's Essays

Category: Favorite

  • OUR PAL – SHANNON P. CATT

    Writing essays is often hard work mentally for me. But all things taken together, it is pleasant work, particularly when the essays are completed. In recent months, I have been writing essays about politicians. That is sordid business. So now I am going to give myself a treat by writing about people I like, including…

  • GET IT IN WRITING

    You may find it hard to believe, but late in 1977, a bill was being prepared to be offered to the Assembly of the New Jersey Legislature, that would require men dating women to declare their intentions, in writing, early on in the romantic process. So if a young man saw a nice looking young…

  • YASSER’S LOVE LIFE

    Preamble I offer you this three part preamble to set the record straight and to prepare you for my thoughts on Yasser Arafat’s love life. Writing about this subject comes naturally. My first name is Ezra who is generally described as the scribe of Jerusalem in what the Christians call the Old Testament. (See the…

  • NEW YORK, NEW YORK Part 12 – The Yanks, The Giants and The Brooklyn Dodgers

    When it was determined that essays would become a permanent fixture in my life, it was apparent that my long term love affair with baseball would result in a piece about what used to be called, “America’s Pastime.” And so this is a baseball story. No politicians, no preachers, no cats or pets, just baseball.…

  • NEW YORK, NEW YORK PART 11 – MOSCOW, MANHATTAN AND THE FBI

    Readers of these essays may recall a story I wrote about Howard Pappert, Dave Dietz and myself setting out to visit some countries behind what Winston Churchill called “The Iron Curtain.” Visiting communist countries in the 1970’s and 1980’s was not a pleasant task for those of us at AT&T who had the responsibility for…

  • NEW YORK, NEW YORK PART 10 – SHOW BIZNESS

    When I started out to write about life in New York, it seemed to me that four or five essays would do the trick. Admittedly, I never won a Rhodes Scholarship for my excellence in mathematics. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that Part 10 of the New York series is now being prepared…

  • NEW YORK, NEW YORK PART 6 – L’AIGLON AND VOGA E VA | TWO GREAT ITALIAN ARTISTS

    In the Book of Psalms in the Old Testament, there are two biblical injunctions or commands to “make a joyful noise.” If you are skilled at reading Roman numerals, you can look them up yourself to make sure that I know what I am talking about. One comes from Psalms, Chapter LXVI, verse one and…

  • NEW YORK, NEW YORK PART 5 – “SORER THAN A BOILED OWL”

    In Part 4 of this New York series, I dealt with a Personnel Vice President of AT&T who earned my complete disrespect and anger over a period of five years. Now that we are free of Jack Marsh, we can return to some men who had my respect and admiration. In this section of the…

  • NEW YORK, NEW YORK PART 2 – THE MAN WITH A COMB

    In Part I of this series of stories about people I knew after coming to New York City, I told you about my friend Bob Creasey who never saw a steak that he could resist. You may recall that lots of those nearly raw pieces of steer meat were consumed at the old time saloon…

  • FAREWELL TO ARMS

    On January first when we celebrated the arrival of the 21st century, there were some commentators who said that few, if any, veterans of World War II would survive the first decade of the new century. That view is entirely reasonable. The last shots were fired in that war in August, 1945. That was 57…