[00:16] Meg: Welcome to Desperately Seeking the ‘80s. I am Meg.

[00:20] Jessica: I am Jessica. And yet again, here we are in fair New York City on a sweltering summer day, sitting in my office, podcasting.

[00:31] Meg: About New York City in the 80s.

[00:33] Jessica: Which was also sweltering! And Meg and I have been friends forever. We've been friends forever!

[00:43] Meg: And we still are.

[00:44] Jessica: I know, that's why we're here, doing something together. In my house.

[00:46] Meg: My favorite part of the week.

[00:48] Jessica: Me too. You know what I hated?

[00:51] Meg: What?

[00:52] Jessica: I hated the hiatus.

[00:53] Meg: That long, long week.

[00:55] Jessica: That week was dreadful! J’accuse! J’accuse.

[01:01] Meg: In any case, I focus on Ripped from the Headlines.

[01:06] Jessica: And I do Pop Culture.

[01:09] Meg: Let's get started.

[01:12] Jessica: All right, Meg. What do you got today? How many murders, rapes and pillagings do we have today?

[01:17] Meg: No spoilers.

[01:18] Jessica: I'm so sorry. All three!

[01:20] Meg: I have an engagement question for you.

[01:23] Jessica: I was counting on it.

[01:25] Meg: I was wondering if you had any fond memories of, like, the first day of school.

[01:30] Jessica: No. It usually involves my crying and possibly throwing up on the school bus.

[01:34] Meg: Oh, really? I loved getting school supplies, getting my binders, and my pens together. School shopping.

[01:42] Jessica: I was not a very organized child. And my current OCD is not a reflection of my childhood. My childhood anxiety was played out in different ways.

[01:55] Meg: Interesting.

[01:58] Jessica: Now, the first day, it was fine. It was fine.

[01:59] Meg: You didn't get that, butterflies like, ooh! I’m going to see people after the summer.

[02:01] Jessica: No, I got that I'm going to throw up on the school bus feeling. Or cry. In fact, I cried so frequently on the school bus that my dear friend Nina, who I know is listening, told me on several occasions to, what was it? Stop the waterworks.

[02:18] Meg: Tough love, Nina.

[02:20] Jessica: And she was like eight, by the way. That was a ‘turn awf the water works.’ I was like, who are you? Like, the Bowery Boys? By yourself? Yeah. I didn't like the first day of school. Did you love it?

[02:35] Meg: Yeah, I kind of got excited about the first day of school. Fresh start, all that kind of stuff.

[02:40] Jessica: I liked the pencil case.

[02:42] Meg: Yes. School supplies. I love school supplies shopping to this day.

[02:47] Jessica: Yes. You have a Trapper Keeper or the adult version of that.

[02:51] Meg: I do! With all of our podcasting materials.

[02:54] Jessica: If only you had, like, a Potsie and Ralph Malph sticker on it, that would be so good.

[03:01] Meg: Well, our story today – my story today – is about a young man's first day at school.

[03:11] Jessica: This doesn't sound like it's going to be a happy story.

[03:13] Meg: No, sadly it is not. My sources are a series of New York Times articles that were written between 1988 and 2007. The New York Times definitely covered this story. I'll be interested to know if you have heard of it. American Justice and good old Wikipedia.

[03:34] Jessica: All right.

[03:34] Meg: And also Murderpedia, because that exists.

[03:37] Jessica: Spoiler! Guess who didn't make it to school.

[03:43] Meg: Guess who didn't make it to school.

[03:47] Jessica: Jesus Christ. All right, let's go.

[03:51] Meg: At 6:15 in the morning on September 7, 1988, in Belle Terre, Long Island, 17 year old Marty Tankleff called 911 and cried out to the operator that it was an emergency, he needed an ambulance. His father was, quote, gushing blood from the back of his neck. The operator told him to wrap his father's wounds and elevate his legs, which Marty did. Then he left his father on the floor in his home office and went searching for his mother. He found 53 year old Arlene Tankleff, practically decapitated in her bedroom. Way beyond hope. Paramedics arrived and rushed Seymour Tankleff, a 62 year old retired insurance broker, to the hospital with multiple knife wounds to his chest and neck. There, Seymour slips into a coma. In the meantime, police escorted Marty out of the house and onto the front lawn. Now Marty was the only son of Seymour and Arlene, a wealthy couple who had adopted Marty when he was just three days old. Today was supposed to be Marty's first day of his senior year of high school.

[05:03] Jessica: Oof.

[05:04] Meg: Where he was eager to rejoin his similarly affluent North Shore friends. He had gotten a late summer nose job for the occasion.

[05:10] Jessica: Stop it right now.

[05:15] Meg: He was still a little bruised.

[05:20] Jessica: That's the detail I needed to really pull me in. Okay.

[05:20] Meg: But here he was, barefoot on his front lawn, telling police he believed Jerry Steuerman, his dad's friend and business partner, was behind the attack on his parents. Jerry owed Seymour half a million dollars. Seymour had loaned Jerry the money for his bagel store. Jerry–

[05:41] Jessica: Wait, hold on. This just couldn't get more Long Island right now.

[05:44] Meg: It’s very Long Island.

[05:45] Jessica: All right.

[05:47] Meg: Jerry had a violent temper, and he was the last guest to leave the Tankleff house the night before where Seymour had hosted a poker game. Officer McCready showed up at the crime scene within an hour. He was not assigned to the case, but someone in the department paged him, and he rushed right over. McCready's first impression of Marty was that he was way too calm for someone whose parents had been violently attacked.

[06:12] Jessica: Can I ask a question?

[06:13] Meg: Sure.

[06:13] Jessica: So McCready has not been assigned to the case.

[06:20] Meg: No.

[06:22] Jessica: But did he know them? Like, was there some reason that someone would give him a heads up to go running over?

[06:23] Meg: I don't know.

[06:25] Jessica: That's a weird thing.

[06:27] Meg: Someone paged him to go over. Also, there was no blood on the light switch in the garage, even though Marty said he checked for his mom's car when he was looking for her. So McCready thought that was suspicious.

[06:44] Jessica: Because he had had blood on his hands from helping his dad.

[06:46] Meg: Exactly. Okay. McCready took Marty to the police station to question him more thoroughly. He did not read him his Miranda Rights because he wasn't officially in custody. For 5 hours McCready and other Suffolk County detectives interrogated Marty during the interrogation. They tell Marty they know he's guilty.

[07:07] Jessica: Without giving him his Miranda rRghts and without an attorney present.

[07:10] Meg: Yes.

[07:11] Jessica: Nice. Good job, guys.

[07:12] Meg: Or a parent, because he's a minor.

[07:15] Jessica: He's 17.

[07:16] Meg: Yes, he is a minor, and there was no parent available.

[07:19] Jessica: Or guardian.

[07:20] Meg: Or guardian. Marty continues to insist he is innocent. But then McCready takes a call and tells Marty that his father has come out of his coma and told the police that, indeed, Marty was the person who attacked him.

[07:34] Jessica: Oh, that sounds like a lie.

[07:36] Meg: This changes everything. McCready suggests to Marty that he must have blacked out. Marty concedes that's possible. McCready then reads Marty his Miranda Rights and writes down what he says Marty told him about the attack.

[07:51] Jessica: This McCready character seems very fishy.

[07:54] Meg: Quote, I decided to kill my mother first. I ran across the bed. I got to her quick. She fought me. According to the written statement, Marty used a barbell and a kitchen knife as weapons. Now, by this time, Marty's godfather and family lawyer, same guy, has found out where he is and puts an end to the interrogation.

[08:18] Jessica: Well done, sir.

[08:19] Meg: The confession is never signed by Marty. He's promptly arrested. His motive? Authorities claim he was a spoiled only child, annoyed that his father chastised him for not setting up the poker table properly, and that he didn't like the Lincoln Town Car his father made him drive. And he wanted to inherit his parents' estate sooner rather than later. Marty claims all this is completely untrue and that he would never hurt his parents, despite what he said to the detectives. So what are your thoughts so far, Jessica?

[08:49] Jessica: Well, I've already been exclaiming that McCready sounds fishy. Everything he's done is not correct. The circumstantial evidence that he has claimed, I don't have any other details to say whether or not that sounds reasonable. So I don't know. And Marty? We don't know anything about Marty yet, so I can't comment on whether or not he Menendez-ed his parents.

[09:15] Meg: Right. What if I told you Detective McCready did lie?

[09:18] Jessica: I would not be surprised.

[09:20] Meg: Yeah, he faked that phone call from the hospital.

[09:23] Jessica: Did I not say that?

[09:24] Meg: You sure did. Seymour never came out of his coma.

[09:27] Jessica: I don't like McCready.

[09:29] Meg: And sadly, Seymour died on October 6 without identifying his attacker.

[09:34] Jessica: Seymour succumbed.

[09:35] Meg: No blood was found on the barbell or any of the knives in the house. In fact, the police said Marty killed his parents when he was naked.

[09:48] Jessica: This is like a Forden scenario.

[09:50] Meg: And then he took a shower. And this would explain why no blood was found on any of Marty's clothes.

[09:58] Jessica: I'm sure that they were able to test for blood at that time, like in the drain.

[10:07] Meg: Yeah, no blood in the drain. They said that he was really good at cleaning everything up

[10:10] Jessica: Well, he had to be like, a lab technician. Okay, I don't like McCready.

[10:17] Meg: A week after Marty's arrest, while Seymour was still in a coma. Jerry Steuerman – remember? withdrew $15,000 from a joint bank account he shared with Seymour, named his girlfriend the beneficiary of his life insurance policy, and faked his own death.

[10:39] Jessica: Faked his death?

[10:40] Meg: Pretty much.

[10:41] Jessica: No way.

[10:41] Meg: He shaved his beard, changed his hair weave.

[10:46] Jessica: No, no, please.

[10:47] Meg: Assumed an alias, and fled to California where he stayed at the Big Sur Resort.

[10:52] Jessica: Okay. The fact that he changed his toupé and the nose job.

[10:57] Meg: I cannot wait for you to see a picture of Jerry Stueuerman.

[11:00] Jessica: I am absolutely entranced. Go ahead.

[11:03] Meg: He was soon discovered. He's not a mastermind. In fact, Detective McCready went to California to retrieve him.

[11:13] Jessica: I feel like Detective McCready, he's a wild card, that guy.

[11:18] Meg: Jerry claimed the stress of being possibly implicated in the murders had gotten to him, and he'd panicked.

[11:26] Jessica: I'm so stressed out, I had to change my hair weave. That's an undertaking, Jerry.

[11:33] Meg: And actually, he was never named as a suspect.

[11:37] Jessica: Oh, that's just ridiculous. Even though McCready hopped on the next flight to Anaheim.

[11:44] Meg: Why did you run down to Big Sur, McCready?

[11:46] Jessica: Oh, Big Sur, Anaheim, other coast. Go ahead.

[11:50] Meg: Marty, in the meantime, was put on trial, and the judge allowed that confession into evidence. When Marty took the stand, he said the detectives convinced him he was guilty. He said that his father never lied to him. So when he heard that his father said that he did it, and he couldn't imagine the police lying to him. Inconceivable to this kid, so he thought maybe he was possessed.

[12:17] Jessica: Nose job, hair weave, possession. I'm loving it. Keep going.

[12:23] Meg: But the jury found him oddly unemotional, and Marty was convicted of the murder of his parents and sentenced to 50 years. His entire family supported him throughout his trial and incarceration, testifying to his close and loving relationship to his parents. All except his half sister from Seymour's first marriage.

[12:48] Jessica: This is like an Agatha Christie where the murderer isn't revealed as a character even at all until halfway through.

[12:55] Meg: Okay, so, yeah, his half sister from Seymour's first marriage was and is convinced of his guilt.

[13:02] Jessica: Okay.

[13:03] Meg: She also ended up inheriting the Tankleff estate.

[13:06] Jessica: What's her name?

[13:07] Meg: You know, I didn't write it down.

[13:09] Jessica: We're going to call her Jody.

[13:10] Meg: Sure. I mean, I'll put it on the Instagram.

[13:13] Jessica: I know, but for now, we need to have a name for her.

[13:17] Meg: Okay, for now.

[13:18] Meg: Also, I think you just implied she's a murder. So we can't get in trouble if we gave her, like, a fake name for a second.

[13:25] Jessica: Yes, Jody is listening, I’m sure.

[13:30] Meg: You never know! Over the next 15 years, Marty’s appeals were denied.

[13:34] Jessica: Oh, Marty.

[13:35] Meg: Even though, and this is when my finger of outrage is raised–

[13:42] Jessica: The finger is up!

[13:46] Meg: Even though Suffolk County had a 94% confession rate in homicide prosecutions.

[14:00] Jessica: That's weird!

[14:01] Meg” You think? Far exceeding the 54% to 73% rate in neighboring counties.

[14:04] Jessica: Mr. McCready! That rat.

[14:05] Meg: Mm hmm! And even though it was revealed that Detective McCready was friends with Jerry Stueuerman.

[14:13] Jessica: No!

[14:14] Meg: and that the D.A.–

[14:16] Jessica: Oh, that's why he got the call!

[14:18] Meg: –Thomas Spota, so, the guy who prosecuted the case had represented Jerry Steuerman’s son for selling cocaine out of Jerry's bagel store.

[14:28] Jessica: All right, so first off, the Steuermans are bad eggs.

[14:32] Meg: Oh, completely.

[14:33] Jessica: And secondly, what is up with all the authorities in Suffolk County needing to protect the Steuermans so badly?

[14:41] Meg: One wonders, right? Quite a conflict of interest, wouldn't you say?

[14:49] Jessica: Mm hmm!

[14:51] Meg: It wasn't until 2007 when Glenn Harris came forward saying he was the getaway driver for two hired hitmen who were taken to the Tankleff home on Jerry's orders. Harris claimed the hitmen were named Joe Creedon and Peter Kent. Marty was left alive in order to take the blame.

[15:08] Jessica: Stop it. Remember how I was whining about my terrible day earlier? Oh, girl. Marty.

[15:16] Meg: Marty.

[15:16] Jessica: From now on, if I'm ever whining like that, just say, you're not Marty Tankell.

[15:21] Meg: Harris claimed they were paid $25,000 for the job.

[15:27] Meg: Total?

[15:28] Meg: Total. Cheap date.

[15:27] Jessica: Seems meager. All right.

[15:29] Meg: Due to this and a reexamination of the complete lack of evidence against him, Mart’s conviction was overturned on December 27, 2017. And after 17 years in prison–

[15:45] Jessica: Oh, he went in in in 2007?

[15:47] Meg: No, honey, he went in 1989. And after 17 years in prison, he was set free. He sued the state of New York and Suffolk County for wrongful imprisonment and was awarded $3.4 million from the state and $10 million from the county.

[16:05] Jessica: Did his sour half-sister have to relinquish what was left of the estate?

[16:09] Meg: Nope. He married, had a daughter, and became a criminal defense attorney.

[16:16] Jessica: Really?

[16:17] Meg: Yes. Detective McCready died in 2015.

[16:26] Jessica: McCready!

[16:27] Meg: D.A. Tom Spota, who I haven't spoken about that much, but is a bad guy, was disbarred in 2020 and sentenced to five years in federal prison for obstruction of justice in an unrelated case.

[16:37] Jessica: Nice.

[16:38] Meg: And Jerry Steuerman, who is 82, walks among us. Still walks amongst us.

[16:44] Jessica: Oh, my God. That is horrifying.

[16:46] Meg: Right? No one besides Marty has ever been arrested for the murders.

[16:52] Jessica: Chilling. I know this sounds terrible, but I was just thinking, like, well, he was only 34 when he got out. He still has a life he could lead.

[17:02] Meg: Well, fortunately, yes. He had enough years and enough money to go to law school and have a daughter and watch her grow up and all those lovely things.

[17:12] Jessica: So he got his nose job for his first day in jail. No.

[17:16] Meg: But apparently, Marty, he was just a guy. A sweet dumb kid who, like, squabbled with his dad about his house chores. He did not decapitate his mother. I mean, it's a leap.

[17:31] Jessica: Take out the garbage, what are you, insane? Chop. I like the fact that they used the Lizzie Borden scenario that–

[17:45] Meg: That he was naked?

[17:46] Jessica: Yes!

[17:49] Meg: I mean, is that a thing? I've heard that before, too, with, like, crazy– Why there’s no physical evidence, oh, because they did it naked. Do people do that?

[18:02] Jessica: No!

[18:03] Meg: I don’t think they do!

[18:04] Jessica: No! You watched the thing about Pam.

[18:06] Meg: Yes!

[18:07] Jessica: They're all Pams! They're all like, random blabbing penknife-using dumdums.

[18:14] Meg: But that was the same thing where he was, the D.A. was like, oh–

[18:16] Jessica: I shouldn’t say dumdum. That's completely not fair to the criminal mastermind.

[18:23] Meg: Pam did get away with a lot.

[18:26] Jessica: It's because Pam was so smart. Everyone else was absolutely subpar. What do you mean?

[18:31] Meg: Well, it certainly helped that that D.A. also was compromised.

[18:42] Jessica: Shifty.

[18:43] Meg: Yeah.

[18:45] Jessica: There’s your connection point.

[18:51] Meg: Shifty D.A.s?

[18:52] Jessica: Shifty D.A.s who are redirecting the story and colluding with the McCready's of the world.

[18:58] Meg: Right. Small town.

[18:58] Jessica: I knew McCready was no good from the beginning. I could sense it. There was no reason for him to be there. He was there because–

[19:00] Meg: Why was he there? Somebody, one of his pals–

[19:09] Jessica: I know why! Someone on Jerry’s–

[19:12] Meg: Team Jerry.

[19:13] Jessica: –payroll or Team Jerry, tipped him off!

[19:15] Meg: Or one of his fellow officers is like, you'd be interested in this one.

[19:18] Jessica: No. It's all about Jerry. Jerry said, I'm going to be in trouble. I need you here as fast as you can possibly get here to take control of the situation. I feel it.

[19:31] Meg: Also, you want to hear something really crazy that I left out of the story because it was so nuts? But you do like the details. Remember the sister? The half sister?

[19:40] Jessica: Yes.

[19:41] Meg: Her husband opened a bar with McCready. They were co-owners of a bar. And her excuse for that is like, well, he's my ex-husband now, so it's nothing to do with me. And then she was questioned about, like, is the money that you inherited from the Tankell estate, the money that went into that bar? And she's like, maybe, whatever. Super defensive, this woman. Super defensive.

[20:06] Jessica: As well she should be. Framer.

[20:08] Meg: It's not a good look, Jody, or whatever your name is.

[20:13] Jessica: Yeah, Jody McCready! Bastards. That's a really good story. So let's just have another quick rundown of the details that I so enjoyed.

[20:26] Meg: Nose job.

[20:27] Jessica: Not quite decapitated. It has sort of a very visual effect, there, like sort of like flapping, like a Pez dispenser.

[20:40] Meg: Oh, my God.

[20:41] Jessica: You've got that. You've got the nose job, you've got the weave, the hair weave and the flight to Big Sur, which in my brain is forever going to be Anaheim just because I like it better.

[20:48] Meg: Have you mentioned the bagel store?

[20:50] Jessica: Oh, the bagel store, yeah. The lying, lying sister – half sister. And the bar. It's got everything. It has, absolutely everything. And that Marty emerged from this still a spotless human being wanting to help others who suffered the way that he did. Marty Tankleff. Yes!

[21:16] Meg: I don't want to spoil that.

[21:18] Jessica: Oh, no. God, did he do something horrible?

[21:20] Meg: No, but he is defending one of the people who stormed the Capitpl. But everyone needs a defense attorney. That's not so bad, right? I mean, I don't know. Storming the Capitol, horrible, but everyone needs a defense attorney.

[21:33] Jessica: Well, that's the burden of being a defense attorney. But, you know, what would be really awesome is if he's defending the crazy buffalo guy, the one with the horns. But then his mother was like, he's vegan, so you can't be in jail. I'm on a raw food diet. Yeah. This gruel isn't working for me. Sorry.

[21:59] Meg: I will look up the specific stormer of the Capitol, who he is helping defend.

[22:05] Jessica: I'm sure it's not Buffalo Man or whatever.

[22:08] Meg: That would be too good.

[22:09] Jessica: Yeah, because that's just, I mean, if ever there was going to be a face of something as stupid and horrific as storming the Capitol, they couldn't have found a better character. It was almost too on the nose.

[22:25] Meg: Also, what about the false confession stuff? So awful, right?

[22:29] Jessica: 94%.

[22:31] Meg: 94%. But also, this is a kid who is barefoot, who discovered bloody parents in the morning, and you're going to sit him in a chair and yell at him for 5 hours and think you're gonna get anything other than–

[22:44] Jessica: Well, he didn’t want to slip down to 93. He was making sure he kept his numbers way up.

[22:52] Meg: But can you believe that that's even, like in any way okay?

[22:56] Jessica: Of course it's not okay. And of course, the minute the godfather showed up or whatever.

[23:01] Meg: Yeah, it was his godfather.

[23:03] Jessica: He was like, what are you smoking, McCready?

[23:05] Meg: Guess why the family was so busy? Because they were at the hospital with the dad!

[23:12] Jessica: Someone should have still been with a kid, I have to say.

[23:18] Meg: Of course! They didn't know where he was. They actually didn't know where he was. The godfather was calling all over the place. Where is he? They couldn't figure it out. The police didn't say we have him.

[23:26] Jessica: Okay, well, my takeaway is never live in Suffolk County, even though all those people are out of there now. It leaves a stain. So for anyone who's in Suffolk County, I'm sorry.

[23:37] Meg: Hopefully it's better now.

[23:38] Jessica: Write in, tell us.

[23:44] Meg: Yeah, tell us how is Suffolk County these days?

[23:45] Jessica: What's the incarceration rate?

[24:00] Jessica: Meg, that was a cornucopia of madness. And I have to thank you from the bottom of my heart that you showed me photos of Jerry Steuerman during our little break.

[24:03] Meg: Can you even describe what– it’s such a visage.

[24:07] Jessica: First off, it's a black and white photo and I can tell that he has a spray on tan. That's number one. Number two, that's a rug. It's a pile of pubes on his head. I know that a perm was a thing in the ‘80s, but as curly haired people–

[24:21] Meg: Oh, God. This was a weave!

[24:34] Jessica: No, I'm saying the lure of curly hair was a thing. But I mean, Jerry Steuerman go for a silky mane.

[24:42] Meg: You're right. He could have had any hair he wanted and he chose that.

[24:47] Jessica: He chose– I don't even know who on earth has hair that we could

[25:00] Meg: It's a little Richard Simmons, maybe?

[25:01] Jessica: But it looks oilier and danker.

[24:59] Meg: Yeah, no, Richard pulls his off.

[25:01] Jessica: Richard’s like a halo. A halo of curls. This is just a mat of horror.

[25:09] Meg: And it's a picture from when he's on the stand at Marty's trial. So he looks like he is screaming.

[25:14] Jessica: He looks like he has plucked eyebrows, and maybe he had a very rich inner life and a club life that we don't ever know about. Also, thank you for letting me know that Jody's real name is Sherry.

[25:31] Meg: Oh, my God! You are outing Sherry.

[25:36] Jessica: What. Sherry knows. Sherry knows what she did.

[25:40] Meg: It's true. I saw a TV interview with her where she was incredibly defensive about the whole bar situation.

[25:46] Jessica: Well, she's a super rat. Total rat.

[25:48] Meg: Yeah. We are not Team Sherry. We are Team Marty

[25:50] Jessica: All the way. I'm going to give you an engagement question.

[25:55] Meg: Yeah, I'm ready.

[25:56] Jessica: What do we both have today that we don't normally have in the room?

[26:01] Meg: Wine?

[26:01] Jessica: Yes, I know it's a wine kind of day.

[26:05] Meg: Well, we're recording a little bit later than we usually do. Also, you know what? It's gross outside.

[26:11] Jessica: Today was a bad day.

[26:14] Meg: And I picked up some rosé on the way.

[26:16] Jessica: You know why? Because you're a true friend. Because you're a good person with good instinct. As I guzzle my rosé, here's today's topic. Here's your real engagement question.

[26:30] Meg: Okay.

[26:31] Jessica: We've had many discussions about underage drinking here in the city, and we focused on a couple of establishments, and we talked about Second Avenue.

[26:40] Meg: My mother is not a fan of those episodes.

[26:43] Jessica: Do you recall– I don't know if you were part of this scenario, if this is your thing, but do you recall that if you couldn't get into a bar and we really wanted to drink, there was a weird alternative that would always work.

[27:02] Meg: I'm thinking, like, fake IDs or going to people's houses.

[27:07] Jessica: Think of the engagement question.

[27:09] Meg: Wine. Oh, just like buying alcohol.

[27:13] Jessica: No, Chinese restaurant.

[27:17] Meg: Oh, yeah. No, that's true.

[27:18] Jessica: Yeah.

[27:19] Meg: I think Cathy used to go to China King.

[27:23] Jessica: Yes!

[27:27] Meg: That's what you're going to talk about?

[27:28] Jessica” Yes, we're going to talk about the advent in ‘80s of free wine with dinner.

[27:32] Meg: That is so funny.

[27:34] Jessica: Free wine with dinner.

[27:35] Meg: I don't think I've thought about... And it was China King, right? Am I making that up?

[27:40] Jessica: I think that there were multiple places that did it.

[27:43] Meg: Okay, she will tell us.

[27:44] Jessica: But I do know where it began, and I do know the first copier of it, which was down the block. And that first imitator is the one that I knew from being with Cathy. And that same restaurant opened a couple of other places around the city, and one of them was really close to my parents’ apartment.

[28:06] Meg: Okay.

[28:06] Jessica: Anyway, so I want to talk about free wine with dinner because it was… did it embody the New York ‘80s teenage drinking experience? You know what it was? It was, where there's a will, there's a way.

[28:21] Meg: Seriously, it's creativity. It’s like, getting the job done.

[28:23] Jessica: How many egg rolls… Like, can I order one dumpling? Do you remember Chris Rock did a whole thing about, I think it was from I'm Going to Get You Sucka, but I can't remember. But he played a character in McDonald's, and he only had, like, five cents. And so he's asking for a Coke, and they say, how much it is? And he's like, Well, I only have this much. How much is the cup? And the guy estimates like, fuck the cup, put it in my hand. I feel like we were like, Fuck the lo mein. But we would order the smallest, like a spring roll. Each one of us would have some…

[29:11] Meg: And you could get a spring roll for one dollar.

[29:14] Jessica: Yeah, absolutely. So it was a table always of our classmates, each one of us with one sad spring roll, a pile of duck sauce. And they didn't give it to you in the glass. I don't know if you remember this, but it was a carafe back then. So we would get sauced and fast. The headache should have told us something, because the headaches, I mean, we were children. We should not have been having hangovers. But the hangover began before we left the table. I think also that free wine with dinner is one of the best sales techniques on the planet. These people were pioneers. So today is a tip of the hat to the pioneers of getting teenagers in New York drunk no matter what, for the price of a spring roll. I have sources today, too. I know you're not going to believe this. I may not reference all of them, but my research consisted of the following websites: Wine Spectator, if you can believe it. Thrillist.com, MissChinesefood.com, SeriousEats.com, SilkyKitchen.com, ILoveTheUpper WestSide.com, and NewYorkEater.com. Indeed. You know, I can't resist a good history lesson. So we're going to begin our journey in the heart of darkness by talking about Chinese immigration to New York City.

[30:50] Meg: Oh, my.

[30:51] Jessica: Yup. Didn't see that coming now.

[30:53] Meg: No, I did not.

[30:54] Jessica: No, you did not. Serious Eats has this article about Ed Schoenfeld, who was one of the restauranteurs in New York who got very serious about high-end Chinese food. And what was really fascinating to me is that the waves of immigration that took place from the 19th century through the ‘70s affected the kind of Chinese food that was coming into the city. In the 1860s, Chinese immigrants who were coming to the United States looking for work, as all immigrants did, started in New York City. And then a large number, as many people know, moved out west, went to California, worked on the railroads, where there was a whole other ball of wax for them. But in New York City, the food that came in was Cantonese. And what everyone associated with, when you say Chinese food, was Cantonese.

[31:57] Meg: Chinese food in America or in New York?

[31:59] Jessica: In America, everywhere. Because New York was the entry point. And the people who were coming to cook were not chefs. These were not high-end folks. These were people who cooked at home, and they brought their cooking equipment, and what they were serving was home cooking. And a lot of it also got changed to accommodate Western taste. And then in the 1880s in New York, it got really popular and it got a little more high-end. And one of these websites that I found, told me exactly what the name of this place was. And there's a great photo of it. I'll put it on the Instagram.

[32:40] Meg: Excellent.

[32:40] Jessica: That was the 19th century. And then here's what I learned. There were different waves of immigration, and it was in the ’30s then it was in ‘60s and then in the ‘70s, and with each one came I think it was loosely referred to as Mandarin, then Sichuan, which we all know now is like the most popular one in New York. Oh, and the other thing that was interesting is that the people who came to the United States prior to the ‘70s were really wealthy Chinese people who came with their chefs. So they were bringing really high-end food in in the 20th century. And that's when, like, the fancier Chinese food came in.

[33:26] Meg: So we start with home cooking, and then we've got wealthy people who come with their chefs.

[33:31] Jessica: Exactly. And in the ‘70s, that was the opening up of China. I don't know if you recall, there's, like, a famous photo of Nixon eating Chinese food. So the floodgates opened, and more and more people– It went from being about high end cooking in mid century. In the 70s, it was just the floodgates were open and people were entrepreneurial rather than obsessed with the food. So it went back to a lot of home cooking.

[34:01] Meg: Okay, interesting

[34:01] Jessica: And so, again, that's what we have become accustomed to. Chinese food. Love it. Yum. In fact, I'm starving right now, and there's that place across the street from me, and all I can think I know you want to have tamales, but all I can think about is lo mein now that I've said it.

[34:18] Meg: But we'll flip a coin.

[34:20] Jessica: Okay. So what I remember is that before there was the whole free wine with dinner situation, I remember being at a Chinese restaurant in Chinatown with my parents when I was a kid in the ‘70s and what came to the table for all of us, even the children, was Robitussin in a little stemmed glass. It tasted just like Robitussin. And little did I know that was Chinese plum wine. Retched, but it is a big favorite for many people. But plum wine was where it all began. So by the time we were teenagers, it didn't shock me entirely that they were offering something in these Chinese restaurants around town. And by that point in the ‘80s, that was when there was a Chinese restaurant on every corner. You could not get down a block without having something. Do you remember, right around the corner from us at school. What was the name of the little take out place?

[35:21] Meg: I don't remember.

[35:22] Jessica: Jolly Chan.

[25:25] Meg: Wow.

[35:26] Jessica: I know. And we would get for $3 on Fridays. For $3, we would get some fried rice.

[35:34] Meg: I'm having a flashback.

[35:37] Jessica: Before Glee Club.

[35:38 Meg: Yeah. Also, I didn't take school lunch senior year. My mom just gave me money, and so I was having to budget myself. And so, yes, indeed, I got the dollar spring roll just to save some bucks.

[35:51] Jessica: Indeed, yes. But let's just be honest. Jolly Chan's fried rice is outstanding.

[35:58] Meg: Absolutely. Extra duck sauce please.

[36:03] Jessica: Extra duck sauce. So there we were, not getting into Dorian’s for whatever reason. There we were, not getting into Nell’s. Who knew why, right? It was a total crap shoot. So off we would go. The Upper East Side, kids to the Upper West Side. Ack! Alarming. It was like going to another planet, I tell you.

[36:28] Meg: A whole dollar 50 cab ride away.

[36:31] Jessica: Exactly. There is a place on Amsterdam called Silk Road, and Silk Road was where this began. I'm choked up now. I need to have some more wine.

[36:45] Meg: And Silk Road, that's like in 78th. Am I making that up? Oh, my God, Jessica. You say these things and my brain starts opening up. It's crazy. Why do I know that?

[36:58] Jessica: Because you were there. Welcome to your life. So, Silk Road. And I found out from these articles that they were serving Franzia. Boxed wine, which is not really that surprising. I doubt they were, like, uncorking, anything really impressive. But they would fill up these carafes, and then next door, a block over, I think a block up, was The Cottage, and The Cottage really ran with it because they had multiple locations. So they picked up on the marketing concept from Silk Road and they went nuts. And that was when they regretted their move, I'm quite sure, because every kid in Manhattan would– And I remember going to either one of these two restaurants, and you could see every kid from Spence, Nightingale, Brearley, Chapin, McBurney, Collegiate, Calhoun–

[38:00] Meg: I was gonna say, that was a strip. It wasn't just the Chinese restaurants. I mean, we would just go from place to place.

[38:05] Jessica: There are all the Irish bars that don't exist anymore either. The other thing that really warmed my heart was that we've lost so many restaurants due to Covid. And even prior to Covid, some of the really great old shitholes went by the wayside.

[38:29] Meg: You remember them so fondly.

[28:31] Jessica: Yes. You're like tummy poisoning or two dollar food. I'll risk it. I'm young. Nothing's going to touch me. But there are a lot of places like that on the Upper West Side, and one of them, do you remember Lakaridad?

[38:42] Meg: No.

[38:43] Jessica: It was right near Collegiate, where both of our brothers went to school. For those who are listening and following you'll recall this. And it was a Chinese-Latin something.

[39:00] Meg: Fusion?

[39:01] Jessica: No, not intentionally. Yes, fusion, because it was a natural cultural blending. It wasn't like the brainchild of some chef. This was, for whatever reason that I've never… yeah, Chino-Cubano. That's what it was. But I don't know why it had this crossover. And I'm sure that someone is going to let us know what it is in short order. But the plates of food were so enormous with so much shoved on them, that they always had to have a plate underneath because the beans were always dripping over. Always. And the plates were scalding hot. It was like a test of your will to finally eat there. But it was delicious. Except for the food poisoning, which I did get once.

[39:51] Meg: Oh, no.

[39:52] Jessica: But other than that, it was fantastic. So that place closed. But guess what? A restaurant applied for its liquor license about six months ago, and guess what has moved into that space?

[40:07] Meg: What?

[40:08] Jessica: The Cottage.

[40:09] Meg: No way.

[40:10] Jessica: Revival.

[40:11] Meg: Oh, my God.

[40:12] Jessica: And one can only hope that they're bringing back the Franzia. I mean, why mess with tradition?

[40:18] Meg: I know I say this every week, but we have to go check that out.

[40:21] Jessica: Do we have a list or do we have to listen to all of our own podcasts to figure out what we said we have to go to?

[40:27] Meg: I actually love listening to our podcasts over and over. I’m so weird! I'm a little embarrassed about it.

[40:33] Jessica: No. No! Being proud of your work is fantastic. I'm proud of it.

[40:40] Meg: I've got a mental list. We'll write it down when we go to our tamale or lo mein.

[40:50] Jessica: Yeah. And that really shaped the way that so much of what we did as kids, because everything is a workaround when you're a kid. There's no straight shot to whatever your goal is. There's lying to your parents, lying to your friends. I'm quite sure that half of what people said they did, they did not do.

[41:11] Meg: Fair.

[41:12] Jessica: Except for certain people in our class who will remain nameless, but they definitely did exactly what they said they were going to.

[41:18] Meg: They sure did!

[41: 19] Jessica: You know who you are. But it really shaped the way that we moved around the city and the way that we saw spaces to congregate. You and I have talked about this in the past, that malls were just not part of our world. So as teenagers, we were constantly seeking out places that could be ours.

[41:40] Meg: Right. And we had to be pretty creative about it.

[41:41] Jessica: Exactly. And our parents were not going to be hanging out at The Cottage or Silk Road. And we were quite rowdy. I'm not going to lie. We were very poorly behaved. And there were many occasions when we were kicked out because we got so drunk so fast on cheap wine. Franzia! The silent killer.

[42:06] Meg: Well, thank you, Jessica. That was wonderful. And yeah. Over whether we have a tamale or lo mein right now. Let's make a list of all the places that we want to go in the city. I wanna start promoting them, I want people to go. Not just us. Others.

[42:27] Jessica: I agree, and there’s one other thing about Chinese food that I didn't talk about, and it's not really on point, but I have to bring it up because it's one of my favorite things about Chinatown, or it was. Do you remember The Dancing Chicken?

[42:36] Meg: No.

[42:37] Jessica: Okay, so I forgot which restaurant it was across from. It had been there since time began, and it was down a few steps, and it was really good, but the waiters would yell at you and throw food on you. And it wasn't like a gimmick, like later on, like Johnny Rockets. No, this was really crabby old men who were like, fuck you, eat, get out. Across the street from this restaurant, there was, like, a gaming parlor and, like, video games, and it was clearly filled with gang members and folks you do not want to hang out with. But in the window was a chicken. A live chicken. And this live chicken would just cluck cluck, hang out in this weird window display, and it had what looked like a turntable.

[43:37] Meg: They put the chicken on a turntable?

[43:42] Jessica: No, it's worse than that. So it looks like a turntable, and the chicken would just, like, walk around on it. And then if you put in a quarter, ragtime music would play, and the chicken would dance to the ragtime music. And as a child, I thought this was delightful until I realized they were electrocuting the chicken.

[43:59] Meg: Oh, my God, Jessica, I can't believe you just told that story.

[44:02] Jessica: You talk about child murder. This is just a chicken.

[44:06] Meg: Just a chicken?

[44:08] Jessica: Okay. All the PETA people are now pissed at me. I'm sorry.

[44:12] Meg: No, it’s disturbing.

[44:13] Jessica: It is disturbing. But they electrocuted it in time to the music. It was really well thought out.

[44:23] Meg: I am not laughing at this.

[44:24] Jessica: You are! I was obsessed with The Dancing Chicken. And ask our friends. Ask around, see if they remember. I know that our friend Nick, friend of the podcast, absolutely–

[44:36] Meg: And what street are we thinking?

[44:37] Jessica: Like Mott street.

[44:38] Meg: I was going to say Mott.

[44:39] Jessica: It was downtown. But yeah, I loved The Dancing Chicken until I realized the sordid reality.

[44:48] Meg: He was being tortured.

[44:49] Jessica: And what was amazing to me also as a child is that that dancing chicken stayed alive for as long as it did and it didn't occur to me–

[44:57] Meg: You think it was the same chicken?

[44:58] Jessica: Well, it took me a while to catch up, okay? I was a child.

[45:05] Meg: Oh, God. This whole podcast is about how our youth was destroyed by information that we just wish we hadn't had.

[45:13] Jessica: But isn't that growing up? Isn't that the whole growing up experience? Isn't this whole podcast a metaphor for having the scales drop from your eye? The wool is pulled off of your eyes. You are instantly educated as all revealed the stark horror.

[45:28] Meg: I found out the chicken was being electrocuted.

[45:30] Jessica: In time to the music. I mean, think about this. How long has it been since they had changed the record? By the way, just for accuracy’s sake, while I did first learn of it in the ‘70s, The Dancing Chicken lived on in one of its many forms into the ‘80s. Look it up.

[45:55] Meg: Will do.

[46:00] Jessica: Are you still scarred from the chicken?

[46:01] Meg: I'm sad for the chicken.

[46:02] Jessica: The multitude of chickens, all those chickens.

[46:04] Meg: Years and years of chickens.

[46:07] Jessica: Well, I think we can distract ourselves from the chicken misery by figuring out what is the tie together? What is the link?

[46:14] Meg: Between Marty and Chinese food?

[46:18] Jessica: The sad tale of Marty and drinking Franzia.

[46:23] Meg: Marty had a happy ending.