As the newspaper obituaries will show, Jacquelyn Littlefield challenged to big boys on a diamond that stretched from Beverly Hills through New York City and back west again to San Diego / La Jolla. 

I met Jacquie in 1979, on my return to San Diego, after a second extended stay in Puerto Rico. It was a whirlwind, professional relationship, centered in the master suite of the now-historic Spreckels Building and Theater in downtown San Diego.

The last time I saw Jacquelyn Littlefield was when the Spreckels Building and Theater celebrated their 100th birthday, in 2012. 

Rather than attempt to repeat my telling of the Jacquelyn Littlefield story as it appears in my memoir, “Manzanero – Mexico – My Dear Old San Juan – Moi,” I thought if more practicable to reprint that portion here below:

Jacquelyn Littlefield was the owner of the Spreckels Building and Theater, a perennial landmark at Broadway and First Avenue. After a short stint as Mrs. Littlefield's secretary and office manager, and after the unceremonious departure of her building manager, I was suddenly installed as temporary manager of the building and the theater (there were pending performances of "Chicago" and "Jesus Christ Superstar," for which I was now responsible in all respects). The Spreckels Building, which at that time housed the downtown redevelopment commission, was itself listed as an historic building, with all the protections prescribed therein. The only part of the redevelopment that would affect the Spreckels concerned a vacant area directly adjacent to the rear of the building which, if not incorporated within a plan for the Spreckels that would be acceptable to the commission, would be designated for other use. That area behind the building was the key to José Rosa's vision of dramatically raising its profile.

The old theater building was quite prominent among other structures that were subject to similar height restrictions in the formerly sleepy Navy town. Jose's concept was–without affecting the original building–to construct a skyscraper directly over it. The new structure would be designed to blend in with the old Spreckels appearance, thereby giving the illusion of a single building. José shared his idea to Fred Meyer, the architect with whom he was working, and they came up with a striking artist's conception of how the completed project might appear. It was a very impressive undertaking.

Now, this is where I come in. Cognizant of my position, José felt that if he were able to hold Mrs. Littlefield down long enough for her to absorb the drawing and his spiel–in other words, get her in his corner–the battle would be half won. The problem was that Mrs. Littlefield was not that available–at least in the flesh. Her visits to the office were rare, and only upon specific occasions. Usually, she could be found in La Jolla or Beverly Hills–and, upon lesser occasion, New York City would complete her triangle of residence. The custom was that I would receive a telephone call, on a daily basis, from some point along the triangle. But, this was not always the case, and a particularly drawn-out departure from this routine caused me considerable angst and required that I draw upon all of the impromptu reflexes I had managed to internalize over many years of uncertainties and unrequited expectations.

Suite Number 666 of the Spreckels Building was a spacious enclave inhabited only by Mrs. Littlefield, the building manager, a female bookkeeper and me. It can already be seen that Jacquie Littlefield is not the ordinary, run-of-the-mill businesswoman. I have not mentioned the diversity of her personality. The variety of her reactions during interpersonal encounters ranges from being completely solicitous up to the highest point of the mercury thermometer. I mentioned the sudden departure of the building manager; he left with the high point of the thermometer protruding prominently from his derrière. Upon that occasion, and completely without any fanfare, I was advised that I would have to take over the building until arrangements could be made to interview building manager candidates. I assumed that this would involve merely a perfunctory holding-down of the fort, where all but routine matters would be suspended. That could not have been further from the truth. I had not a single communication with Mrs. Littlefield for a whole week thereafter!

Fortunately, the building maintenance crew had a foreman through whom I was able to coordinate its activities. Then, I began receiving telephone calls from new office lessees, wanting to know when they could come in to sign their contracts. I discovered that they were ready to move in and that the leases had not been written. I knew from experience that contracts in like situations tend to be basically the same, so I perused the files and was able to adapt the new information appropriately. It turned out that other lessees were not that advanced, and I was required to negotiate even the type and color of carpet to be installed. I had known about the musicals that were scheduled to start the next week, but had no idea I would wind up having to coordinate all of the intricate components, including the box office personnel; ordering the popcorn, candy and soft drinks, as well as hiring the counter crew; arranging for the backstage deliver of scenery; and accommodating the producers and cast. Mrs. Littlefield did not call until two days before the first production was to start. She was in New York! She wondered why I was all excited, saying she would be there by opening night. She arrived the day of the performance, and graciously received the theater people in her office as though nothing out of the ordinary had occurred.

So, here was José with his beautiful drawing, asking me simply to arrange a sit-down with La Folle de San Diego. However, before managing to set up anything, I was off to the Computer Science Corporation at El Segundo (near Los Angeles) to participate in what was the first computer-assisted translation unit formed in the United States, with half of the crew assigned to Mexico City (I had already been there–done that).

Subsequently, I asked José to refresh my memory as to whether he and Fred Meyer actually got to see Mrs. Littlefield. Here is his reply.

No. She had us meet with her "board". They were very conservative and backwards, as is proven out by the fact that rather than use our proposal or at least something else, they lost 25% of her property to the city. I remember being in the meeting and telling them that because of fuel prices and other economic factors the U.S. would "tilt over" and the population come tumbling down into the Southwest. They laughed in a very condescending way, like they were listening to a "kid" who was blowing smoke. Sometimes, it's a curse to be able to see the future.

Today, we Americans are faced with a frightful vision: The “Better Angels of Our Nature,” with clipped wings, tentatively clinging to a wobbly, “Arc of the Moral Universe,” whilst weakly accompanied by the discordant strains of the, “Mystic Chords of Memory.” 

The idea of, “Race,” in one form or another, underlies the full course of this society’s development. Race was not always a separator based on color. And, too, the idea of supremacy or superiority based on race – with no skin color involved – did not begin upon the shores of the newly discovered continent.

As the immensely talented and successful sire of the Kennedy Clan, Joseph Kennedy, with all of his accomplishments – crowned by having been the Ambassador to the Court of St. James – never was able psychologically to overcome the real social and other disadvantages against which he had to struggle throughout his life, because of what he called his, “Raced.”  That sounds strange in these times, but, “Irish Need Not Apply” was a real sign. That may explain Old Joe’s naive attraction to the demonstrative, “Kampf” (struggle) of the nascent German leader of his times. After that faux pas, Joe Kennedy put aside his personal ambitions and pushed them upon his war-doomed namesake, and ultimately found dramatic success with Jack

Distinct from its feudal system of, “Class,” the British invented, “Race” to distinguish themselves from the captured Irish, Scots-Irish and others they considered sub-human.

 As Britain struggled to establish itself upon the northern shores of the new continent, sub-class Brits were recruited as bonded servants at Jamestown. When the first enslaved Africans were brought to Jamestown in 1619, they were immersed in that miserable, manual toil alongside the bonded slaves. When that mixture exploded in revolution against the ruling class, the Brits went themselves one step further and invented race by color. With progressive legislation intended to widen the color gulf, Jamestown thus established the pattern of color distinction that bugs us even to this day!

With his bottomless, filthy American lucre, Joe Kennedy, through the JFK miracle, was able not only to retrieve the Irish Soul from the Americans, but also broke a big Catholic Church bugaboo in American politics. In the meantime, the Ulster Irish were still decades away from retrieving their own souls from the British, through the dint of armed struggle. Lower class Brits, including now many of color, are in a constant fight to overcome class barriers.

JFK discovered there was one American problem that could not be relegated to his, “Ask not…” admonition. Although his pop was able to retrieve the Irish soul and respectability for the Catholic Church, there was yet an unanswered soul out there in the wilderness, and it would not be stilled. Thus, JFK and Bobby were drawn into the struggle with Martin L. King for the progressive retrieval of that last soul in the wilderness, which would last long after each member of this martyred trio had been assassinated.

There are voices today attempting to devalue that progress and drag us all back into some presumed greatness of the past. This brief resume of how we got this way should serve also as a cautionary dissuasion against reversal to the discredited phases of our past experiences.

*****     *****     *****

Hail, America of my soul!

Thee and thy great might makes me whole.

Discarding, “Without”,

“Within” makes me doubt.

Could we be tunneled by a mole?

Mommy, Laurie and me

When I was in the first grade, my mother became very ill with Rheumatic fever. This caused my sister and me to be sent to stay with our grandparents. Laurie went to live with Mama (Valentina Lugo, my mother’s mother) and me with Laura Rosa, Abuelita. The illness effects lasted almost a year and caused me to be ‘left back’ because of missing so much school. This period marked my sister and I in the same way, as each of us stayed closer to the side of the family we lived with ever after. Although each of us went to visit the aunts, uncles and cousins from both sides, the natural affinity imprinted by having lived with each side, became lifelong.

Most of my memories of this time consist of worrying about my mother and the stories of food spoken of earlier. But the subconscious ones are like a metal stamp. It was this period that always made me think of myself as being from South Brooklyn, having a close association with the Italians who still comprised most of the residents and the sights, sounds and smells of the neighborhood, especially Columbia Street which was the main strip. There was a more commercial thoroughfare, Smith Street, but most of the people from this area, just a few blocks over, rarely went there. The irony is that Mama’s (my mother’s mother) apartment where Laurie was staying, was actually on Smith and so, her experience was reversed.

In those days every Italian neighborhood had a street festival that was celebrated on the day dedicated to whoever the local patron saint ‘back home’ was. Henry Street had its local variation and it was the highlight of the year. For those who have been to The Feast of Saint Genaro in Little Italy, picture it before all the modern commercial ventures took over. In fact one of these feasts has a version beautifully documented in Godfather 2, which although it is timed in the early nineteen hundreds, is about what the celebration I remember was like. There were many Italian social clubs but as far as I know only one is still left and each sponsored the festival. The best part of it was that it was literally on the cross street from Abuelita’s house and that year I was allowed to go stroll it, each day, by myself or in company with the Italian boys of the block. All the local stores had booths and for whatever reason that sausage sandwich tasted a lot better when you bought it yourself...

This neighborhood was a throwback even back then. I have many memories of it that a New Yorker my age shouldn’t have, as this was one of the last enclaves to ‘modernize’. The fact that is was in an out of the way area, much of it had been cut off by The Brooklyn Queens Expressway, with no subway stops close by probably helped preserve it, at least in my time. There is a bit of irony as that Same BQE, also earlier had ripped the heart out of the neighborhood. The area along the waterfront was something most would not recognize or even remember, after most of it was torn down years later to build the huge container port. Many of the stores along Columbia Street catered to the Merchant Mariners and Longshoremen and that was especially true of the bars. Because of who my father was and the lax attitude of the times I could easily go in and out of them at will. In fact I had a great aunt who owned one, on one of those no longer existent streets, that was in a building she had bought years earlier. She lived upstairs and had a huge beautiful parrot that could curse it 20 languages. The men who frequented her joint with rough and tumble, from many countries and had either just gotten back from a cruise or were about to go on one.

The housing stock were of basically two types, apartment / tenements and single family homes, many of which were brownstones and a few carriage houses. These were mostly mixed through although most of the tenement were below the BQE and. There are ‘carriage houses’ that are now worth millions, where old men once kept carts that would go up and down the streets to collect rags, sharpen knives and sell fruit. Most of these types of vendors had disappeared in the early 1950’s but here I was in the middle 60’s taking them for granted.

Candelario Lugo (Papa)

Because of the circumstances that separated Laurie and I, my familial connection was most cemented with my father’s side, but that didn’t mean that I didn’t know and love my maternal side. Mama (Valentina Lugo) lived above Smith Street and her children were the younger siblings on my mother. The fact is that the families were intermingled by more than just my parents’ marriage as her two older brother were ‘associates’ of my fathers for many years. Tony Lugo was always opening a restaurant, bar or after hours. As these were local hangouts, my father would often stop while on his rounds. I also went to some, at least the restaurants, with my mother.

Eddie was a bit different. As an uncle he was a great guy, fun, beautiful smile and a ladies man. But years later there were rumors of a much darker side, one that included words like ‘hit man’ and ‘enforcer’. He was rarely with my father when we made the rounds or shopping trips, but was often at the clubs and bars we wound up in.

My mother’s sisters were also ‘in the life’ at least for a while. There were rumors that they had been ‘working girls’, but by the time I got to know them, they had been married and had a set of girls each. So between four female cousins Nancy’s Lizzy & Ruby, Carmen’s Rita and Valley and my little sister, I spent a lot of time with girls in mama’s house. In fact the only male was a second cousin, Raymond.

Valentina Lugp (Mama)

Mama herself was very different from Abuelita. Where Abuelita was a white Jibaro from the mountains of Puerto Rico, Mama was a ‘negrita’ from the coast, a mixture of African and Taino roots. Papa, her husband had died while I was very young, so my memories of him consist of a tall man, who barely spoke English who worked at a commercial laundry. Mama on the other hand learned English quickly, albeit not very well and took to modern fashion and hairstyle. I assume my mother may have had a lot to do with that once she graduated high school (first in family)

With my mother finally on the mend, both Laurie and I would go home and join her to re-start a ‘normal’ life. But the patterns for both of us were set and we would each remain oriented to the side of the family we had stayed with during this period.

Previous Chapter

William Lloyd Garrison headed the Abolitionist Movement. Both he and Frederick Douglass used flaming oratory alone in furtherance of their cause. These impassioned men could only sit and pat their feet as the religious zealot John Brown set about attempting singlehandedly to abolish slavery.

New Englander John Brown got caught up in the raging forces propelled by the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854, which subsequently brought on the terrible violence known as, “Bleeding Kansas.”

After John Brown and his sons had added profusely to Kansas’ hemorrhaging appellation, he upped his game by attempting to take over the United States Arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia (now West Virginia). His rash strategy was to arm other abolitionists and enslaved men, thus putting an end to the offending practice. Apart from his flawed tactics, it is ironic that it was the still-U.S.-loyal Robert E. Lee who put a crimp in his plans.

After a well reported trial, which many felt materially added to the agitation for war between the states John Brown was executed on December 2, 1859. The night before he was hanged, he wrote this final note, which he handed to a jailor on his way to the gallows.:

I, John Brown, am now quite certain that the crimes of this guilty land will never be purged away but with blood...

Here is another irony: John Wilkes Booth was present at John Brown’s execution. Although Booth was pro-slavery, Lincoln’s subsequent assassin expressed sympathy for John Brown’s plight; the fact that he must have felt dejected and abandoned when no one came to his rescue. Of course, this was six years before the ultimate humiliation of the South and the abrupt cessation of its inhumane, “Peculiar Institution.”

ABRAHAM, MARTYRS AND JOHN

Don’t you worry ‘bout old John Brown;
He’s got the plushest grave in town –
Here, before the Blue and the Gray,
And finally, Old Abe Lincoln lay.

I’m the one whose body
Lies molderini’ in the grave.
For reasons not shoddy,
Some may say I was brave.

“Rash”, would better tell it;
I could not bear the lie.
They could never sell it
To me – I’d rather die.

There, in bloody Kansas,
With my sons by my side,
Just as Right commands us,
We traded blood for pride.

Later, Harper’s Ferry
Would cause it all to end,
And for them to bury
This soul, which would not bend.

(Repeat beginning bridge)

Not too long thereafter,
Hundreds of thousands more
Joined my joyous laughter
Here, down under the floor.

Yes, John Brown’s body lies
A- A-molderin In the grave.
B- It takes a lot of tries
C- To make bad men behave.
The hundred thousand more
Who for so long were mum,
Jumped right in to assure
A better “Kingdom Come.”

The Union, thus, was saved,
And bondage dealt a blow.
Although the road was paved,
It’s progress, though, is slow.

History will remember

The passion of John Brown.
He died a full member
Of Life, without a frown.

(Repeat beginning and middle bridge.)