Tag Archives: New Jersey

Jimmy Hoffa and Giant’s Stadium

Nationality: Caucasian American
Age: 50
Occupation: Professor of Creative Writing
Residence: Monterey, CA
Performance Date: 4/7/12
Primary Language: English

Informant Bio

My informant grew up in Hudson County, New Jersey in the 1960s and 1970s, spending most of his childhood in Secaucus. He remembers having friends whose family members had ties to the Italian mob, and in fact his own father worked as a Teamster (a cement mixer driver, specifically) for the Teamsters local 560. This was the chapter of the Teamsters union run by notorious Italian mob boss Tony Provenzano. My informant does not recall that living in such a mob run area ever caused him or his family any anxiety, it was simply a fact of life in Hudson County.

My informant now lives in Monterey, California, and will occasionally tell stories about New Jersey when his family is around, or when he is feeling nostalgic. I was able to take notes on this story while some of my informant’s family was visiting from the East Coast.

Jimmy Hoffa and Giant’s Stadium

My informant told me that because gangster and Detroit Teamster Jimmy Hoffa mysteriously disappeared during the construction of Giant’s Stadium (now officially named the Meadowlands Sports Complex) in East Rutherford, New Jersey, a popular theory was circulated that Hoffa was killed by the mob and dropped into the newly poured concrete in the stadium’s end zone.

“People liked that theory (where I lived). Most people thought it was possible. They knew how mobbed up the companies building the stadium were.”

However, my informant doesn’t quite believe this theory about Hoffa’s final resting place, because my informant’s father was one of the men pouring the cement at Giant’s Stadium. My informant’s father pointed out at the time that planting a body in the cement at the stadium would require a large number of people knowing about the hit (on Hoffa). It simply takes too many men with cement trucks to plausibly plant that body – and even if they did it at night after the construction day had ended, it would require hands to dig up the cement that had been laid during the day and Teamsters to pour new cement in order to prevent the construction crew from knowing that the cement had been tampered with.

“They’re (the mob) not bright bears as a rule, but they’re not that dumb,” my informant said. So though my informant has a personal connection to the story, he believes that it would have been easier for the mob to carve up Hoffa’s body into pieces and dump him in the Meadowlands, “or Snake Hill landfill, which is home to, a lotta guys apparently.” No reason to give Hoffa any special treatment.

The various theories about Hoffa’s disappearance that have come out of Hudson County, New Jersey seem to be an exhibition of the denizens of their knowledge of the way the mob works. Living with the acceptance of mob activity makes their actions something that can be enjoyable to speculate about, especially when people feel they have some understanding of their dealings. It’s a source of, in a way, town pride and personal connection between those people who lived in the mob’s shadow, but were not directly connected to them.

Certo’s Tailor Shop

Nationality: Caucasian American
Age: 50
Occupation: Professor of Creative Writing
Residence: Monterey, CA
Performance Date: 4/8/12
Primary Language: English

Informant Bio

My informant grew up in New Jersey in the 1960s and 1970s, a classic period of Italian mafia activity in the United States. As a child he lived in Secaucus, New Jersey with his parents and three siblings. His father worked driving a cement truck for the Teamsters Local 560, the union local that was run by the mob boss Tony Provenzano.

My informant now lives in Monterey, California, and will occasionally tell stories about New Jersey when his family from Jersey comes to visit. I was able to take notes on this story during one such family gathering.

Certo’s

According to my informant, Certo’s Tailor Shop was a store in his hometown of Secaucus, New Jersey that was perhaps not-so-secretly run by or, at least used by, the mob. My informant does not know if it was ever proven, but as he put it: “It was reputed that interesting people gathered there, and that interesting things would sometimes be kept there overnight until they could be… uh, well, buried.”

My informant’s belief that Certo’s could have been used to store bodies for the mob temporarily is absolutely plausible to him. Hudson County, New Jersey, where Secaucus is located was the home of notorious Italian mob boss Tony Provenzano, and so stores that were “fronts” for mob activity were simply a fact of life. My informant explained that this was accepted and never something that caused him or his family any anxiety as a child. “This was the lore of the area,” he told me. “And it wasn’t untrue.”