b'scared. We started with the Harlem River. We called each bridgeand spoke to the guys. Some guys said, Okay, fine. If they didnt,then we tried to get a replacement to cover that spot. We had onebridge in the Bronx where the guy wouldnt do it at all; we didnteven waste time with him. You cant force a guy. On the HarlemRiver, we got every bridge but the last one, the Broadway Bridge.The Broadway Bridge would have been significant because thetrains run over the top. Had that bridge gone up, they would haveshut down the Broadway subway line. But what happened, theLeft: top, pin made from a photograph of one of theoperator says, Ill let you know. I said, let me know now. He said bridges left in an open position during the 1971 bridgestrike; bottom, Daily News article on the strike and hished do it. But when the time came, he wouldnt. indictment and the indictment of Danny Gibson andIn the Bronx, we had to get Unionport; that was the key bridge. Victor Echavarry for their role in bridge strike, fromDanny Sicilianos scrapbook.I was part of the Unionport crew. We had three night crews I was Right: Daniel Scilianos ID cardscheduled to be off. I had already spoken to the other night men,and to the day men, because I didnt know what time the strike was going to come about. We made it mutual; I work for them, and theyll work for me another time. So, I had alerted them allin case I had to come in.That night, after the meeting, I called up this guy Ronnie Goss [who was scheduled to be on duty]. I says, Ronnie, I gotta take over the bridge tonight. I said, Ill do your midnight and at a later date youll do my midnight.Thats how we did it.When I got to the bridge at 11 oclock the shift used to run from 11 to 7the assistant bridge operator that wasthere working with Ronnie already knew what was going to happen, and he said, I gotta go home, Im a sick man. I said,Okay, you can go home, take it easy. So, I got on the phone with my brother Mattie and I told him, Mattie, you gottacome in, we may have to open the bridges. I still didnt have any definite word. When I first got to the bridge, it could stillhave been settled. At 6:00, Lenny might have called and said its off. All that night I was saying to myself, My god, itsgoing to be murder around here. I knew how that traffic builds up. That Unionport Bridge was a disaster. . . .Then at 6 oclock in the morning, Lenny called. He said, Danny, were gonna have it, its on. He says, You go firstbecause youre the recording secretary; Barry wants you to lead.I said, Okay, what time do you want me to go? 6:20.I had 20 minutes to get the leafs up, get all the stuff out, and get off the bridge before people realized what was happening. They would have killed me. You know what Im saying?On the bascule bridges you got the regular set of leafs that go up and you got an emergency set So, me and mybrother removed the handles and the fuses from the emergency set. Once we got the other leafs up, we locked them intoplace. We removed the handles and fuses so it was impossible to get them down, put them in a bag, went downstairs,locked the door. The people who were caught up in the traffic thought we were just changing shifts.When we left, I gave the parts to Mattie to take home, for safekeeping, and I went to the train because I had to go to14th Street, to the union headquarters.114 '