History Lesson
From Here to Eternity
Celebrating Frank Sinatra’s Hoboken heritage on his 100th birthday
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FALL 2015 (201) GOLD COAST
GOOD AS GOLD
Frank Sinatra
shown playing
the piano on
Sept. 30, 1954.
The Best is Yet to Come
Long before the world knew him as “Ol’
Blue Eyes” and “Chairman of the Board,”
friends in Hoboken nicknamed Frank Sinatra
“Slacksy O’Brien” because of his numerous
pairs of dressy pants – a luxury rare among
residents of the cold-water flats on
415 Monroe St. where he grew up.
The Sinatra family, however, was no ordinary Hoboken family. Sinatra’s mother,
Dolly, a third ward leader with political
connections in town, and his father, Marty,
a boxer, firefighter and tavern owner, were
able to cross the dividing lines between the
Italian and Irish neighborhoods – sometimes
by calling themselves the “O’Briens” – as
they struggled to climb the economic ladder.
What Marty and Dolly’s only child saw
while growing up in Hoboken was a city
“bursting with younger singers, who
AP PHOTO
T
he best was yet to
come for Frank
Sinatra when he said
goodbye to his native
Hoboken at age 21,
but the record shows
he wouldn’t have been king of the
hill or top of the heap without contributions from his hometown and a
few nearby Gold Coast communities.
It was in the Loew’s Jersey
Theatre in Jersey City in 1934, after
all, where a 19-year-old Sinatra
witnessed a Bing Crosby concert so
inspiring that he turned to his future
wife, Nancy, and said, “I’m going
to be him.” Years later, it was at
another Gold Coast landmark – Bill
Miller’s Riviera in Fort Lee – where
Sinatra breathed new life into a faltering musical career with a twoweek run of sold-out shows.
“This small part of New Jersey is
connected with Sinatra’s entire
career,” says Tom Meyers, executive
director of the Fort Lee Film
Commission, of the singer’s legacy.
No New Jersey town, of course,
has a better claim to Sinatra than
his hometown, where residents
cruise down the waterfront corridor
known as Frank Sinatra Drive, enjoy
views of Manhattan while relaxing
at Frank Sinatra Park and drop off
parcels of mail at the Frank Sinatra
Post Office Building on River Street.
To mark the 100th anniversary of
Sinatra’s birth – Dec. 12 of this year
– the town is again raising a glass to
its most famous resident, led by the
Hoboken Historical Museum, which
recently unveiled a new exhibit,
titled, “Frank Sinatra: The Man, the
Voice & the Fans,” that sheds light
on the impact early 20th-century
Hoboken had on the singer’s career.
WRITTEN BY JOSEPH RITACCO