Yasmin Tirado-Chiodini Quotes

“As the children left, Antonio shifted his gaze towards his father and gently waved at his family, while they returned the gesture.With half a smile and a tight lip, Antonio’s green eyes spoke, “Adiós” (“Good-bye”).Then, he turned and walked towards the green metal door of the steam cargo vessel that swallowed him away.”

“Antonio looked down, silent, as Shillitoni kept talking. There he was, among cold-blooded killers, talking to a gangster. A much different picture than a year prior.“Can’t trust priests, can’t trust cops either. Can’t trust nobody! Whaddaya say?”“I am not like you,” Antonio said. “I’m not like them, either. That’s what I say. I am not a cold-blooded killer!”“Ya killed, you a killa! There’s not’ng more to it!” Shillitoni said.”

“All Americans were immigrants at one point or another,” he explained in his letters to his parents. Even his father Manuel migrated to Puerto Rico. Manuel was deemed a Peninsular, an immigrant from Spain, and sometimes even the Puerto Rican-born, the criollos, resented the Spanish-born newcomers. Manuel was familiar with being singled out, although not quite as much as Antonio felt while in New York. “It is amazing how people tend to forget their past,” Antonio wrote to his parents, surprised. “I recall what you told me about Maestro Rafael, Papá, when he said to you ‘never forget your history.”

“Do you know who Samuel Langhorne Clemens is, Antonio?” Bessie asked.“No, chood I?” he said. “He is best known as Mark Twain, the author of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer,” she said.“I have herd of the story, but I hav not red the booc,” he said.“Well, you should read it,” she said. “It is excellent reading. An American classic. Mark Twain worked in Schoharie for a while,” she said.“Is that so?” he said.“Yes, he worked as a brakeman on the Schoharie railroad station on Depot Street the winter of 1879, three years after he wrote his famous book,” Bessie said.“Why would he do that, a famos author?” Antonio asked.“A self-published author, I should add.”

“The strength of a woman far exceeds the brawn of a man. ~Lisa Antonio”

“Antonio’s will was cursed. Not once, but twice.”

“On Thanksgiving Day, during our family gathering, we pray you to have mercy on Antonio Pontón …”

“What you are about to witness is a blot upon the civilization of the twentieth century."- Sing Sing Deputy Warden Spencer Miller, Addressing Antonio Pontón’s execution witnesses on January 7, 1916”

“ANTONIO PONTÓN’S TRIAL made front page headlines across major newspapers. On April 17, 1915, the Schenectady Gazette headline read, “Trial of Ponton on the Charge of Committing one of Most Startling Murders in History of County.”

“Antonio could not stop thinking about Dean Fiero’s words during his welcoming speech, “Look to your left; now to your right. One of you will not be here in 1915!” These words were used to intimidate freshman law students to draw their attention to the importance of being diligent in their forthcoming studies. They still are.”