Handshakes

In 2003 I shook the hand of a man named Jack Wally, Jr.

Nearly seventy years earlier, Jack shook the hand of a man named Adam Richetti. A few years before that Jack shook the hand of a man named Tom Pendergast, who ran Kansas City from a small brick office at 1908 Main St. for more than a decade, but… that’s a story for a different time.

Not long after Jack shook Richetti’s hand, Adam had the honor of breaking in Missouri’s brand-spanking-new gas chamber. He was put there for the murder of a Kansas City Police detective named Frank Hermanson. Did Richetti actually shoot Hermanson? Was he even there that day in 1933, on a clear June morning in front of Kansas City’s Union Station? I wrote a graphic novel (Union Station) about those events, and I still don’t know for sure.

Did Richetti get a fair trial? Not even close. He was put to death because it was politically convenient for J. Edgar Hoover to put blame for the massacre at the feet of the most famous at-large criminal at the time, Pretty Boy Floyd. As Floyd’s known associate, Richetti had to go, as well. Thus, at just twenty-nine years of age… into the gas chamber he went.

Jack Wally, Jr. was a photojournalist in the ‘30s. He worked in KC for a while before moving to Los Angeles to cover movie stars as they deboarded trains and planes, always looking causally fabulous. Jack met Adam Richetti because he was sent to cover a somber event: a prison warden informing Richetti that his final appeal had been denied. As I write this, a photo that Jack took that day hangs on the wall of my office, a few feet away. It is a stunning, haunting portrait.

Jack was 90 when I met him, and more chipper than I am today at some thirty years younger. We got to know each other over the several years after that first handshake. I asked him about Boss Tom and “the old days”. We lunched at the legendary Savoy Grill. He taught me to drink Perfect Manhattans. At the age of 93 a cancer Jack had beaten once returned to finish the job, and that was that. But, the impact he had on me was immense and permanent, and that’s the point of this missive.

I love old stuff. Pens, radios, books, records, hats, of course. I love the aesthetic of previous eras: Arts Nouveau and Deco, Noir and so on. I am prone to getting lost in research while working on period crime stories… a process I greatly enjoy. I used to hold these old things, and the people who lived amongst them, at a distance. Jack changed that. When I shook his hand I was a couple of handshakes away from Pretty Boy Floyd. Just one handshake away from Boss Tom.

The more I spoke to Jack about his life and times, the more the mystery – and the distance – fell away. I’m still passionate about those people and things from “before”, but I understand now that those people were not some “other” people. Those who made history might have been gifted. They might have been desperate. In the end, though, they were just trying to get through this shit the best they could. They were trying to keep the lights on and take care of those around them and possibly eat or drink something nice from time to time and maybe, just maybe… be remembered for something once their time was done.

Which brings me to the point. I love walking the streets of my beloved Kansas City, seeing and touching the same pavement and structures that so many memorable people saw and touched before me. They all had amazing stories to tell, but I’m a crime writer, so I’m here to focus on the darker side of life. The desperate side. If you’ll indulge me, I’ll try to share that passion for humanizing those folks… making them real and relevant.

I’m currently writing a new, period crime comics series for Ignition Press. We have a superstar artist and I’m about halfway through the script. It’s too early to say more about that project. One another front, though, the time is now! April brings not just a reprint of the graphic novel I wrote which launched the Extraction universe, but also a brand new Extraction series! Both are from Ignition Press. Please ask your local retailer about ordering them for you!

Thanks for reading. I plan to share a new post each week, with more KC history, cocktails, hats, happy hours and news about new work. Please stay tuned, and love, as always, from Kansas!

-Ande