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This is Bayard Winthrop, founder of American Giant. We make all our clothing right here in the US with American cotton and American workers get 20% off your first order when you use code GIANT20@american-giant.com. 21st. Bracing. Patrolman Jacoby. No, sir. The captain's not in. Yes, sir. He's working today. He's on his way to court with a prisoner uptown arrest. Well, I don't think he's had time to get there yet. Patrol wagon just left you about 10 minutes. You are by transcription in the muster room at the 21st Precinct, the nerve center. A call is coming through. You will follow the action taken pursuant to that call from this minute until the final report is written in the 124 room at the 21st Precinct. All right, inspector. I'll tell him. I'll leave a message on his desk to call as soon as he gets back in the house. 21st Precinct. It's just lines on a map of the city of New York. Most of the 173,000 people wedged into the 9/10 of a square mile between Fifth Avenue and the east river wouldn't know, if you asked them that they lived or worked in the 21st. Whether they know it or not, the security of their homes, their persons and their property is the job of the men of the 21st Precinct. The 21st. 160 patrolmen, 11 sergeants and four lieutenants, of whom I'm the boss. My name is Cronin, Vincent P. Cronin. I am captain in command of the 21st Precinct. I was doing day duty 8am to 6pm it was a little before 7:30 when I entered the station house and walked behind the desk to sign the blotter. I conferred with the desk officer for the 12 to wake tour, Lieutenant Smith Snyder who gave me a quick summary of occurrences in the precinct since I was last on duty. He also informed me that he had been notified by the communications bureau that Sergeant Waters, scheduled for desk duty on the 8th of 4, had gone sick at his home. I looked over the roll call for that tour with Lieutenant Garman, the desk officer and instructed him to have Patrolman Jacoby fill in on telephone switchboard duty. Later, on patrol of the precinct, I instructed my operator, Patrolman Farrell, to drop me on 86th Street, a neighborhood business area. There I walked along both sides of the street observing the crowds of Christmas shoppers and finally headed toward a small jewelry store near third Avenue. Yes, sir. Can I help you? Mr. Benfeld? Yes. I'm Captain Cronin. The commanding officer of the 21st briefing. Oh, yeah, yeah, sure. How are you, Captain? I'm glad to know you. I'm fine. Fine, thanks. Captain Canelli used to come in here once in a while. I got to know him pretty good. I heard he got promoted. I didn't hear the. What? Deputy Inspector. Oh, that's good. He deserved it, all right. Where is he? Borough Headquarters, Manhattan West. Oh, yeah? No kidding. What's that? Well, he works under the assistant chief inspector who commands all the precincts on the west side. Oh, that must be a pretty good job. Yes, it is. It is. Yeah. So how do you like it here? It's a nice neighborhood. We've got everything. You got the richest in the world on Park Avenue and Fifth Avenue. You got the poorest in the tenements. It's some variety, all right. Yeah. Listen, Mr. Banfield, I saw the boys watch and, well, the girls watch you donated for the kids Christmas party at the station house tomorrow. I want to thank you. That's nothing. Don't worry about it. They're very nice gifts. They're going to make a couple of kids pretty happy. But they look too expensive. Look, I get them wholesale, so it ain't so bad. And I've been doing it for, let's see, three years now, so it's getting to be a tradition with me. You know how it's static? No, No, I don't. Well, it was right before Christmas on a Saturday night, late. Everything was closed up. Well, a truck came right racing by here and skidded on some Iceland street and whammy, plowed right through the front of the store. Well, I mean, this isn't Tiffany's, you know, but there's a lot of inventory, even in a small store like this. Sure. I was out someplace to a party in New Jersey. I didn't get home till like 4 in the morning, and it was 5 before I got here. In the meantime, they had a policeman standing right here guarding everything. Yeah. So I was so pleased, I said to Captain Kennelly, I said, captain, what can I do for you? What can I do to show my appreciation? Well, he said he put the man here because it was the job. But if I wanted to do something, there was this Christmas party for the kids coming up at the station house. Each kid that comes with a present, you see, and that if I had something for a present for a kid, that'd be fine. So I gave him two watches, one for a boy and one for a girl. Kind of expensive gifts, all for kids. Weren't they? Yes. Yeah, that's what he said, Captain Kennelly. But then he thought of the idea they could go to the boy and to the girl that was best in the precinct teams during the year. Not the best athletes particularly, but the ones that attended practice the most and, you know, showed the best general all around. Cooperation and interest in the teens. They'd get the prizes for the year, the watches. Well, it worked out fine. I did it every year. I certainly appreciate it, Mr. Bentham. Listen, it's the least I can say, Captain. Yeah? Look. Look out there on the sidewalk. What's that lady arguing with the Santa Claus about? Yeah. You seen him around here before? Oh, yeah. I've seen him walking on this week with his darling and an iron pot. Man, she's giving Santa Claus what for. I should say I better go see what's going on. Oh, and thanks again, Mr. Mental. Don't mention it. Don't mention it. And a Merry Christmas to you and yours. Same to you. Go away, lady. You bother me.
