His Way_ The Unauthorized Biography of Frank Sinatra - Kitty Kelley [13]
That meant one more vote that Dolly could deliver for the Democratic machine of New Jersey’s Hudson County, a corrupt political organization run by Mayor Frank “I am the boss” Hague of Jersey City. Dolly’s political activities put such great demands on her time that she turned her baby over to her mother’s care while she attended to her duties. Her main function was to open the way for the poor people in her neighborhood to get help from City Hall. In return, they were expected to vote the way she told them to on Election Day.
Dolly knew that if she delivered enough votes, she would eventually get patronage that she could use to provide employment for her family and friends. But as considerable as her influence was becoming, it was not yet enough to shield her family from punishment for their crimes.
“The whole family had run-ins with the police at some time or other, but Babe was the real bad boy of the family,” said Rose Bucino Carrier, a Hoboken neighbor who baby-sat for young Frank when she was twelve years old. “Babe was the youngest of all the Garavantes and the only one born in this country, but he was the one who got in the most trouble.”
In 1921, Babe was arrested on a charge of murder in connection with the killing of a driver of a Railway Express Company truck. While he was not charged with the shooting, Babe was identified by a witness as the driver of the getaway car carrying the five men who had attempted the robbery. He was arrested a few hours later and held in the county jail without bail because he was thought to know the identity and whereabouts of his five friends, who were eventually captured.
Even before the news of the murder charge was published in The Jersey Observer, people were whispering that Dolly’s brother was going to be locked up forever or sent to the gallows. Dolly left Frankie with her mother and went to court every day of the trial. Pretending to be Babe’s wife, she walked into the courtroom holding a baby she had borrowed just for the occasion. Babe was not married at the time, nor did he have any children, but Dolly wanted to do all she could to engender sympathy for her brother. She wept loudly and cried out that the baby needed his father to take care of him.
The judge was unimpressed by Dolly’s tears. He sentenced Babe to ten to fifteen years at hard labor, fined him one thousand dollars, and ordered him to share the costs of the trial with the other defendants.
Outside the courtroom, Dolly called the judge a “son of a bitch bastard” and shed real tears when she saw the bailiffs hauling Babe off in handcuffs. She called to him, promising to visit every week, and she kept the promise over the more than ten years her brother was in prison.
The costs of Babe’s defense almost bankrupted the Garavante family. None of them was making much money, but everyone contributed something to pay the lawyer. Dolly’s share came mostly from her earnings as a midwife.
Until the turn of the century, most babies in the United States were delivered by midwives. They were not qualified as physicians but were trained to assist women in childbirth.
Dolly began her work as a midwife shortly after Frank was born by accompanying several doctors on home-birth calls. Soon she learned enough from watching them to do it herself.
Dolly’s black bag became a familiar sight in Hoboken even when she was not helping with a birth.
“I remember when Dolly took up midwifery,” said Rose Carrier. “She used it as an excuse to get out of the house at night when there was a party she