First Paragraph

 The last Gallo living at 51 President Street is the grandmother, Mrs. Big Mama Nunziata, who is 77 and never scared easily before and sees no reason why she should start backing off now. She lives alone in a bare, four-room apartment on the second floor of the empty three-story building which once housed the Gallos, and their armed gang. The door to Mama Nunziata's apartment has a peephole cut into it so you can see if anybody is coming up the stairs to kill you, but she regards this as nonsense. Leave the door open, she tells you when you leave. Mrs. Big Mama Nunziata would spit at a forest fire.

- From "The Last Gallo Living at 51 President Street" by Jimmy Breslin