Nov 18, 2013

LBJ Killed JFK: The Roger Stone Interview on Coast to Coast



Everyone should hear the really good interview on Coast to Coast AM Radio from Saturday Night:  John B. Wells interviewing Roger Stone talking about his new book The Man Who Killed Kennedy.......

Roger was a long time staffer and also had a personal relationship with Richard Nixon.

The show is very interesting and informative, if you agree or not, it is good listening conversation and the time races by in seconds.

Here is a link to the show website and the page about the show:

http://www.coasttocoastam.com/show/2013/11/16


here is Jeferson Morley interviewing Roger Stone:

this is copied from the website JFKfacts.......one of the best JFK websites out there:



Why Roger Stone’s JFK book has to be taken seriously




Let’s talk about power: Richard Nixon and Roger Stone.
Roger Stone is the first JFK assassination author to have worked in the White House and among the few who have personal acquaintances with JFK’s sucessors.
As a former aide to President Reagan and confidante of RIchard Nixon, Stone brings unique practical experience and personal contacts at the highest levels of American politics to a subject that has often been written about by people with neither.
Stone’s background doesn’t mean that his interpretation of November 22, 1963, is necessarily correct, but he cannot be dismissed as “conspiracy theorist” who is deluded about the realities of American politics and power.
To the contrary, he has far more first-hand experience with those Washington realities than an academic like John McAdams or a prosecutor like VIncent Bugliosi. I think Stone’s indictment of Lyndon Johnson deserves to be taken more seriously than anyone else’s precisely because of his White House experience.
In an email interview with JFK Facts, Stone opened up about his sources, why he wrote the book, and what he really thinks of Chris Matthews.
Q. To some liberal pundits, anyone who shows an abiding interest in the JFK assassination is seriously lacking in understanding of the realities of American politics, if not clinically mentally ill. I’m thinking of Cass Sunstein, Vince Bugiiosi, and Chris Matthews, for example. What’s your reaction to such pronouncements?
RS: I have been in the mainstream of American politics and have been a senior campaign staffer to three Presidents, having worked on eight national Republican Presidential campaigns. Long before I began my book, the House Select Committee on Assassinations essentially debunked the Warren Commission Report. The Assassination Records Review Board declassified enough documents to bolster the conclusions of the House Committee; there was a conspiracy to kill JFK. Oswald did not act alone — in fact I don’t think he acted at all.
My book is not disparate from many other groundbreaking works like James Douglass’, The Unspeakable; Phillip Nelson’s LBJ: the Mastermind of the JFK Assassination; Barr McClellan’s Blood Money & Power; Craig Zirbel’s Texas Connection; and Glen Sample and Mark Collom’s The Men on the Sixth Floor. I seek to build on these seminal works.
Yes, I believe that LBJ spearheaded a conspiracy funded by Texas Oil and assisted by elements of the CIA and the Mob. Yes, I think LBJ’s unique relationships with J. Edgar Hoover and the FBI, defense contractors, Texas Oil, and organized crime allowed him to spearhead a conspiracy. All had a stake in Kennedy’s death.
Candidly, I have know Chris Matthews for 30 years and have been on his TV show, Hardball. He is an egomaniac and pompous asshole who isn’t nearly as smart as he thinks he is. Liberals like Daniel Patrick Moynihan have done a disservice to the public by pigeonholing anyone who questions the Warren Commission conclusion as a “nut.” If this is true two-thirds of the people in America are “nuts.”

Stone’s book will be published in November 2013
Q. Where were you on the day it happened? Some people on the political right were known to have cheered the news? Did you hear any of that?
RS: I was 11 years old. I was in the Lewisboro (NY) Elementary School. Lots of my young classmates were crying. When the teacher asked why I wasn’t crying I said, “I’m a Republican.” Yet when I saw the photo in the New York Daily News of young John-John Kennedy saluting his father’s casket a few days later, I too wept.
Q. Your book reports on your conversations about JFK with Richard Nixon and John Mitchell about the assassination. How did you get these men to open up about such a sensitive topic?
I worked as a political advisor to President Nixon in his post-presidential years and spent many hours with him talking politics. Nixon liked a dry martini and he liked to talk politics. He was circumspect and never overtly said “LBJ did it” but he did say a number of things that more than indicate he believed this. My book details this. Nixon recognized Jack Ruby and knew him since 1947 as a “Johnson Man.” Upon seeing Ruby kill Oswald on national TV Nixon recognized him — and understood what had really happened in Dallas.
I first met John Mitchell at the Republican National Convention in 1968 when I was  a volunteer assigned to the messenger pool. He wrote me a letter of recommendation to Mort Allyn to secure me a post in the Nixon White House Press operation. I had little contact with him during Nixon’s re-election because I was the youngest staff member at CREEP (Committee to Re-Elect the President) and my boss, Herbert L. “Bart” Porter, and his boss Jeb Magruder, both warned me that “direct contact with Mr. Mitchell was out of the chain of command.”
By 1976, Mitchell was out of prison and quietly helping me line up Republicans for Ronald Reagan, convincing former Kentucky Governor Louie Nunn, to serve on the “Citizens For Reagan” being chaired by Senator Paul Laxalt. Mitchell had a small office in Georgetown. We used to drink at a bar in Georgetown called the Guards. Mitchell confirmed that many of the same things Nixon said to me he had also said to Mitchell. Mitchell shared his own conversations with Nixon.
Also beneficial were my interviews of Ambassador John Davis Lodge who confirmed that his brother Henry Cabot Lodge, JFK’s Ambassador to Vietnam, had knowledge of the involvement of the CIA and Lyndon Johnson in JFK’s murder.  I also interviewed long time Nixon aide Nick Ruwe who probably spent more waking hours with “RN” than any other individual, as well as John P. Sears, whose insights into Nixon and his thinking were invaluable.
I also had the opportunity to talk to Governor Jesse Ventura who’s research confirmed the link between the Bay of Pigs, JFK’s assassination and the downfall of Nixon in Watergate.
Q: In his memoir Bob Haldeman speculated that when Nixon spoke of “the whole Bay of Pigs thing” he was actually referring to JFK’s assassination. Did Nixon ever use that phrase in your conversations?
RS: Nixon ran a covert CIA operation to assassinate Fidel Castro when he was Vice President. Some of the CIA operatives and assassins involved in these plans, altered but not canceled after JFK’s surprise election, ended up working for the CIA in the Bay of Pigs fiasco. These same men, E. Howard Hunt and Frank Sturgis were involved in the JFK assassination. They would surface again in Watergate.
It is important to recognize that in 1963 Nixon was completely out of power and considered politically washed up. Like LBJ, Nixon still burned to be President but he was considered finished. Nixon understood the connection between the Bay of Pigs and the Kennedy assassination and came to understand Johnson’s role in Kennedy’s murder. After his comeback election in 1968, Nixon demanded all CIA records on the JFK assassination seeking them for leverage and insurance.
In my book I make the case that Watergate, like the JFK assassination, was a coup d’etat a in which the CIA participated. Once CIA veteran James McCord was brought in on the Watergate burglary plan, the CIA knew what Nixon’s minions were up to. The Bay of Pigs, the JFK assassination and Watergate are thus inextriplicably linked.
Nixon’s effort to get the CIA to instruct the FBI to back off the Watergate investigation was a threat to expose the CIA involvement in the murder of JFK, which he knew grew out of the Bay of Pigs Invasion failure.
Q. When did you decide to write this book? And why?
RS: I have worked on this book for at least 10 years and have worked on it intensely for the last two years. I am greatly indebted to my researcher and co-writer, Mike Colapietro. Some will say that I have some partisan angle as my motive for writing this book. In fact, Republicans Gerald Ford, George H.W. Bush, Earl Warren, Arlen Specter and John McCloy don’t come off well in the book. All play some role in the events of November 22, 1963.
Many people have asked me why I waited until now to write my book. When I told Mitchell I would write a book about the JFK assassination “someday,” he said, “on the 50th anniversary” and I agreed. I have honored that commitment.
Q. For some conservative commentators (I’m thinking Thom Mallon, James Swanson, and Gerald Ford), JFK conspiracy theories are a hobbyhorse that deluded leftists use to denigrate America and American power? Does your book denigrate America? 
The evidence of a conspiracy is so overwhelming now that the vast majority of Americans believe they have not been told the truth by the government about the JFK assassination. It is important to note that John F. Kennedy was murdered not just because of his plans to wind down the Vietnam War, his entreaties for better relations with the Soviets and his efforts to repeal the oil depletion allowance but also because of his double cross of the mob after their support in the 1960 election and concern by many at the Pentagon about JFK’s drug use. Kennedy was in fact hopped up on intravenously injected meth during the 1960 debates as well as the Cuban Missile Crisis. JFK was no saint.
Q. I have always been personally skeptical about the “LBJ did it” theory because I don’t see much evidence that Johnson or his cronies knew about the existence of Lee Oswald, much less had contact with him or the ability to manipulate him. If LBJ organized the death of JFK what is your theory/evidence about who organized the patsy role for Oswald?
While Johnson was the primary mover of the assassination there is no doubt that the conspirators including the Dallas Police Department, the Dallas County Sheriff’s Office, both perhaps unwittingly as well as  the Secret Service and the FBI, as well as rogue elements of the CIA. The agency set Oswald up as a patsy when fingerprint evidence demonstrates conclusively that the shooter from the sixth story window of the Texas Schoolbook Depository building was in fact Malcolm “Mac” Wallace, a longtime LBJ henchman whose ties to Johnson are thoroughly established and documented in my book.
Interestingly, LBJ acknowledged to both his mistress, Madeline Brown and his Chief of Staff, Marvin Watson, that the CIA was involved in Kennedy’s murder — not exactly his Warren Commission’s conclusion. LBJ was facing political ruin and prosecution and jail for corruption when he insisted on JFK’s visiting Texas and when Gov. John Connally insisted on visiting the Trade Mart and on the motorcade through Dealy Plaza.
I also delve in the LBJ the man. He was a monster. Power hungry, crude, vulgar, abusive, sadistic,vicious and often drunk, this is a man who reveled in his aides’ discomfort by conducting meetings while sitting on the toilet defecating. He had at least three illegitimate dhildren, two of whom are still living. I tie LBJ to at least eight political murders in his ascent to political power and his quest for money. Johnson’s capacity for lying, cheating and crime knew no bounds, which is why Jacqueline Kennedy said, “I never liked Lyndon Johnson and I never trusted him” and why Robert Kennedy described him as “an animal.” LBJ was a murderer, and perhaps even a functional lunatic.
“The difference between me and LBJ  was, we both wanted to be President but I wouldn’t kill for it” Nixon told me in 1989.
Q. Correct me if I am wrong but I think you are the only White House employee since JFK’s death who has ever written a book about JFK’s death. Why do you think that is?
RS: I have been a participant in mainstream American politics for 40 years. I had unique access to a number of individuals who played pivotal roles in the entire drama. While I understand that many JFK assassination researchers believe the President was killed by “the establishment” or the “military – industrial complex,” which would include munitions manufacturers, defense contractors, Texas oil, the CIA, the FBI and numerous ambitious politicians. What these researchers don’t understand is that “the establishment” is not monolithic. Members of the establishment don’t necessarily move in concert. The establishment is racked with its own intramural contests, rivalries and struggles for political power. While it may be true that many establishment figures either knew about Kennedy’s murder in advance or at least acquiesced in it, they were not conspirators themselves. Because I have seen these struggles firsthand I believe I am uniquely qualified to write this book.
Q. When will your book reach stores and Amazon? 
My book will be in stores November 6, 2013. Amazon will ship pre-orders at that time. I will do a book signing at the Barnes and Noble in Dallas on November 22, 2013, as well as book signings in DC, Santa Monica and Ridgewood, New Jersey outside of New York City.

here is a link to the website page:

there are also some very interesting comments on this page....cl

McStay Family News from The Mail Online......

McStay family mystery continues.....

from the Mail online.....this is talking about their ongoing financial problems......a little different from our local papers.........



http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2508766/Mystery-McStay-money-Family-dead-barely-afford-rent-despite-100k-bank.html?ITO=1490&ns_mchannel=rss&ns_campaign=1490

Nov 16, 2013

Sherry P. Fiester--a breath of fresh air and truth in the continuing JFK Assassination Saga.....



Sherry P. Fiester--a breath of fresh air and truth in the continuing JFK Assassination Saga.......

Firing bullets through gel and wood does not a head shot make........

Its not even remotely the same--the frustration with PBS and Nova is just a horrible example of the Kennedy shows this year and their frustrating insistence on the lone gunman/nut philosophy.

The 50th---one would have thought this would be a great breakthrough....they are so many great researchers with brilliant work--not to be ignored--why would it be ignored but instead the media chooses to focus on the easy way out--it that it?

Grace and truth--that would be an adequate description of Sherry P. Fiester and her book Enemy of the Truth.

She says by her career in criminal investigations and criminal science it can be seen that a head shot was from the front and not from the grassy knoll.

Everyone can listen to her talk on the JFK-Lancer website--she is soooo interesting.

here is a link to the page recommended by Larry Hancock who is also an esteemed JFK researcher.

Both of these very important individuals will be speaking at the JFK-Lancer conference this year:  November in Dallas.

I have been planning this trip for this year of the 50th anniversary forever but I now I just can't make it.  Wishing everyone can attend and talk and write about this wonderful event.

Good Job Sherry and thank you for all of your very hard work--I, for one, really appreciate it because I have been very disappointed with the shows and docs this year--it is an opportunity lost and for that I am sad.


chloe louise--the ronie republic.

here is a link to the JFK-Lancer page to listen to Sherry.......scroll down on the page to see Sherry

http://www.jfklancer.com/audioconversations.html

Nov 15, 2013

The Slot Drain In Dealey Plaza.......Jesse Ventura on Coast to Coast

Just wondering if any other JFKers  out there heard John B. Wells on Coast to Coast talking about the slot drain in Dealey Plaza.

Apparently this was a drain that had been used to fire a shot at President Kennedy during the assassination.

He felt he had this on good authority…..the drain was then covered up--cemented in--on authority of the head of the Bonanno crime family.

This story was related by John B. Well on Coast to Coast, the nighttime radio show, during an interview with Jesse Ventura.  It was an interesting show due to the nature of Jesse Ventura and John B. Wells and their ability to tell a story.  Not talking about agreeing or disagreeing but listening to the show was fun and interesting…..especially in light of all of the recent Kennedy shows taking the notion that LHO was a lone gunman/nut.

The question…..this is very interesting information but is it true…..

Can it  be verified in any way shape or form…..

What should the average Joe interested in the Kennedy Assassination and following it for years take away from these thoughts……

In short…...what the heck does all of this mean…..what should we think now….is this true and is there any way of proving it……

All of these tidbits of information seem so grand and exciting at first but what do they really mean……

Your thoughts…..

here is a link to the show….oh, wait…….I think you have to have a subscription to hear it.

some people listen to it on you-tube...does anyone have any tips if one does not want to pay the price of 6.95 per month?

Perhaps one can go to the website and read about it but you cannot actually listen to it.

Regardless, just saying….what does all of this mean?


here is a link to Coast to Coast with a page about that show:


here is a link to the Jesse Ventura page on you-tube if anyone wants to listen to the show:


There may not be any new information but on the issue of the slot drain and a possible connection to the assassination---wouldn't the authorities be interested enough to follow this idea and make a statement about the drain?

The  whole thing becomes very frustrating after a while because obviously the government could shed light on the subject if they wanted to....why is so much info still secret...what is the point....it's almost ridiculous after a while.

Probably rogue elements of the CIA were involved, there never will be any definitive proof--and the government can't just go around and say to Caroline Kennedy that we messed up and killed your dad and or a very beloved president and public figure.


Really, what is the government suppose to do--we are having a hard enough time with health care and public anger.  Can you imagine if the state was a participant in a presidential assassination--the outrage may never end.  People say we can handle the truth but would that actually be the case?

Thanks for reading....what do you think....... 



Nov 14, 2013

I've taken out all of my anger towards mother on Bill O'Reilly

I've taken out all of my anger towards mother on Bill O'Reilly.

It's just that they share the same insane arrogance.

Mother's 97.

She wants me to buy her a sports bra for her birthday--like the kind they wear on the weight loss show.

I invited mother over for dinner because she always complains about the food at the manor.

She can't come over because she is not into people that much right now.

I believe that Rafael (Chi Chi) Quintero was one of the gunman who killed John F. Kennedy: from Spartacus

I believe that Rafael (Chi Chi) Quintero was one of the gunman who killed John F. Kennedy.

this is copied from the twitter account.......

Nov 13, 2013

Larry Hancock, top-notch JFK Assassination Researcher on the Jeff Bushman Radio Show Tonight

New post on Larry Hancock

Patsy 102

by Larry Hancock
Before I continue further down this train of thought, I need to mention that if anyone would think it entertaining to hear me discourse in person, there are a couple of new opportunities.  This coming Wednesday evening I will be on Jeff Bushman's internet radio show for about an hour.  We will be covering a broad variety of topics and Jeff's a great host so it should be a good session.  In addition, a recent lengthy interview by Alan Dale is now up on the Lancer web site and archived for access.  The links are below:


I've been following a number of the current media interviews on the anniversary of the assassination as well as a couple of the television specials - not all of them, after close to 20 years on this subject I do hit overflow now and then - and it appears that there is a new trend.  Many quotable personalities are acknowledging that the Warren Commission inquiry was lacking in a great many ways, even "dysfunctional", and that it was not provided with a considerable amount of information as well as with questionable evidence.  Now that's a good thing, its only taken four decades or so to have that point acknowledged.  Beyond that however, the new operative responses seem to be  for the speakers to fall back on a position of stating that its important to keep an open mind or simply to pontificate that we will simply never know what really happened.  Both of which are pretty safe positions to take, although I've note noticed any of the "open minded" folks on my voice mail, clamoring to be informed of what they might have missed in the past 50 years.  Perhaps we will see all of them joining our ranks in Dallas?
Perhaps the most striking recent comment came from John Kerry, who seems to have taken the position that conspiracy of some sort may well have been in play - with his first thought being that perhaps another look should be taken at Oswald's Cuban and Russian associations. Which of course, in my view, is exactly what the plotters in the Dallas attack wanted to happen - Kerry is simply behind their playbook about 50 years, for those of them still living, it must be pretty frustrating.  In that regard, lets take a step further in thinking about the "patsy" concept I introduced in my last post.
How many of you mystery fans, print or television, have seen the show which begins with the police arresting the supposed murderer - who generally has at least some level of motive but who has been stupid enough to take the murder weapon, with their prints all over it, and hide it in their dresser drawer, in the trashcan out back or maybe the utility shed.  The police and DA are happy, and justice is about to prevail...until Jessica Fletcher, Matlock or Perry Mason steps in to reveal that many murderers are just a little brighter than that.  In other words, the obvious suspect is not necessarily the guilty party, no matter how the evidence originally stacks up.  And the bad guys have usually taken some pains to stack the deck, not only with the evidence but in creating a series of associations and a motive that falls apart with a bit of work -  within half an hour or so of air time.
Now this concept of setting up patsies is not really all that complex, William Harvey's notes address the fact that any ZRRIFLE operative will have to have a fake document trail and evidence pointing them out as a Soviet or perhaps Eastern bloc asset in case they are caught.  And in SWHT I describe Veciana's remarks about how similar one Castro assassination attempt they set up in Latin America was to Dallas, even going so far setting up the patsy with photographs implicating him as a Communist and other evidence showing he was acting for Communist handlers.  So, if Mr. Kerry is open to a conspiracy I would encourage him to consider the fact that the now obvious sponsors might be just a bit too obvious. I would also suggest he consider that both the Soviets and Russians had an excellent reputation for intelligence work and would be unlikely to leave such an obvious trail positioning Lee Oswald as being associated with them if they were indeed the true instigators of a conspiracy.  In other words, lets give the real bad guys just a trace of credit here.
In this series of posts I've brought forth a number of specific incidents and sources that associated Lee Oswald with unknown individuals who were positioning themselves as Castro agents. As we get closer to the attack in Dallas those associations and suspicions continued to grow.  In Dallas Sylvia Odio was introduced to an individual identical to Lee Oswald and told later, out of his presence, that he was a hired gun who could equally kill either Castro or Kennedy.  In SWHT I review Odio (and her fathers) suspicions that those individuals were not the peo0ple they claimed to be but were playing some sort of deeper game in those remarks.  Currently Bill Simpich is in the process further detailing the same type of false associations being planted in Mexico City and later in Dallas, according to FBI Agent Hosty, Oswald would still be in contact with "subversives".   I would submit that it was not Russian or Cuban agents handling Oswald in such a matter so as to implicate themselves in such a transparent fashion, surely insuring American retaliation following an attack on the U.S. President.
I will also submit that Lee Oswald was not stupid enough to shoot the president with his rifle and then think about hiding it at the same location, with fingerprints likely on it and then adamantly deny any such act immediately upon being taken into custody.  If I hear that "he did it to become famous" motive on one more TV show...well enough for now.
Larry Hancock | November 11, 2013 at 1:03 am | Categories: Everything else | URL:http://wp.me/p1DeOb-5Q

copied from Larry Hancock...........

Nov 12, 2013

Geraldo Radio WABC New York: Both Sides of the News Without Yelling

Seriously, Geraldo Rivera is one of the few people in radio who can give the listener both sides of the news without yelling.

Always listening to the radio, always trying to understand both sides of the issues--its hard with Rush and Bill O'Reilly yelling.

Very few radio hosts can interview a guest with whom they completely disagree and inspire them to tell their information....and opinion, why they think that idea.....

Talking about Israel, Iran, Netanyahu and the United States......today we got to hear a representative of Netanyahu explaining his disagreement and fear about Iran....I thought he did a good job of explaining his side of the issue.

This was in the first half hour of the show if someone would like to find it on the podcast.

He has all the big people on his show on a regular basis and we don't have to worry that Mr. Rivera will go O'Reilly and try to insult them.


He doesn't really talk in news speak so we can understand what the heck he 's trying to say.

A lot of regular people call in as if they know him.....to yell at him and to say a complement.

He lets the caller know right away.....right, I'm listening, "I've got ya,"
then they say their point......how does he let them talk in such a short time without being rude and cutting them off--but he does.

Good job Geraldo and good info on the US, Israel and Iran today.

file under:  I should be doing the dishes but I'm drinking coffee, listening to the raio and playing solitaire........



this is bammy bampsters.....he was listening to the radio too, but he decided to jump out of the window to see his friend who is hiding in tree limbs at the edge of the roof.



The Balboa Park Trails.......

Nov 11, 2013

Merry Christmas from the ronnie republic.....

Christmas Angels.......



Victorian Angels: Christmas......

Marcella Cooks: Remembering Marcella Hazan by Mark Bittman.......

copied from the New YOrk Times Magazine............
EAT

Remembering Marcella

Melissa Lyttle for The New York Times
Marcella Cooks: Mark Bittman cooking with Marcella and Victor Hazan at their home in Florida.
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Marcella Hazan, who died Sept. 29 at the age of 89, never intended to bring real Italian cooking to America. But no matter how accidental her impact, it can hardly be overstated. What Alice Waters did for restaurants, Hazan did for home cooks, demonstrating that the simple treatment of decent ingredients leads to wonderful dishes.
Fred R. Conrad/The New York Times
Hazan shopping for herbs in the Bronx in 1988.

Readers’ Comments

Readers shared their thoughts on this article.

In a way, Hazan was the anti-Julia Child, and Child had a sense of that. In a conversation shortly before her own death, Child said to me: “I don’t get the whole thing with Italian cooking. They put some herbs on things, they put them in the oven and they take them out again.” Exactly.
Born in Cesenatico, Italy, in 1924, Hazan did not have it easy early in her life. A childhood accident left her with a permanently damaged right arm, which restricted its use, and as recounted in her biography, “Amarcord: Marcella Remembers,” she spent the war years in trying circumstances. After marrying Victor Hazan in 1955, she moved to New York so that he could work in his family’s fur business. At the time, she spoke no English. In Italy she earned her doctorate in biology, but by the late ’60s she decided to pursue cooking instead.
When I visited and cooked with her and Victor just over two weeks before she died, Hazan told me that she learned almost nothing about cooking when she was young. The first class she took, in 1968, was devoted to Chinese cuisine, but when the course ended her classmates asked her to teach them Italian cooking. Her aptitude immediately became evident.
Encouraged by Victor, she began teaching classes from her home. (Victor, who has written extensively about wine, was Marcella’s usually unacknowledged translator and co-writer, not to mention her muse.) She had a talent for uncovering the soul of Italian cooking, and for making its essences readily understandable to the growing number of American home cooks who were flocking to Italy and its cuisine in the ’70s and ’80s. Soon there was a lunch with The Times’s Craig Claiborne and a visit from the Harper & Row editor Peter Mollman, who on the spot signed her up to write a cookbook.
“The Classic Italian Cookbook” was published in 1973; it was said to be the first to focus on “northern” Italian cuisine, but it was really much more than that. It was the first popular Italian cookbook to go beyond red sauce. In fact it wasn’t strictly northern (as if there even were a northern Italian cuisine), but more pan-Italian, a door into the wonders of Italian regional cooking, which Marcella and Victor were discovering even while they were writing about it.
By the time I was developing a career in food writing — say, 1983 — “Marcella” was as meaningful as “Julia” was a decade earlier. To me, Hazan was the more important author; it was cooking from her book that taught me to interpret Child’s work in a way that felt contemporary.
In 1997, I contacted her and Victor, asking if I could cook with her in Venice, where they were then living, for an article in The Times. We arranged to meet at the Rialto market, where she came flying along in sneakers, full of energy at a wrinkled (she was a lifelong smoker) but buoyant 73. I had never been to the Rialto with such a knowledgeable guide — few have — and she showed me the men who could dismember an artichoke in 10 seconds, the vendors whose porcini could be trusted to come from Italy, the radicchio of Treviso, the seafood of the lagoon.
We cooked pasta with clams, using the thumbnail-size telline she knew made the dish perfect. There were other creations, but most memorable was the market visit and the simple pasta that I was preparing with the woman who had taught it to me, even though I was a complete stranger. I left with the feeling of a successful family visit.
I stayed in touch with them over the years; once, Victor wrote to take me to task for a risotto shortcut I took on a video. This past summer, when I spent some time with old cookbooks, I came across Hazan’s. It was a joy revisiting recipes that had in part made me the cook I became. (Like Hazan, I learned little about cooking as a child.) On a whim, I emailed Victor and asked if I might travel to Florida, where they’d retired, and cook with them once again. We made arrangements almost right away.
On a warm, beautiful day, in their apartment overlooking the Gulf of Mexico, a much-diminished Marcella grew more talkative and energetic as we cooked. She worked on aroasted endive dish that, despite its ridiculous simplicity, is astonishing in its flavor and tenderness. (Do not skimp on oil, time, salt or pepper.) She helped make her famous tomato sauce, a slow-cooked affair of canned tomatoes, a lot of butter (again, don’t withhold) and half an onion. It’s perhaps the best tomato sauce you can make without doing much of anything, and we ate it on store-bought pasta, Hazan apologizing that she lacked the energy to make gnocchi. She showed me how to pound lamb chops for her splendid dish, and teased me for not doing it thoroughly enough. We planned to make anorange cake, but in the end, didn’t; dessert was ice cream topped with coffee grounds and whiskey.
Long before I cooked with her, I felt I knew Hazan through her cookbooks. By the end of this meal I felt again as if I had been reunited with family, and we discussed another visit when winter came. If Victor will have me, I’ll be there, and we can drink to the woman who was largely responsible — however unintentionally — for bringing real Italian food to the United States.

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:
Correction: November 6, 2013
An earlier version of a description of a video with this article misstated the given name of Marcella Hazan’s husband. As the article correctly notes, he is Victor, not Vincent.

Google Doodle--Red White and Blue Honoring Our Veterans

Veterans Day 2013


Google Doodle--Red White and Blue Honoring Our Veterans