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Rizzo’s estate reduced to slim pickings | Stu Bykofsky

But I bought the Riz’s police whistle as a memento

The .38-caliber, five-shot Smith & Wesson pistol once owned by Frank Rizzo, along with the carry permit, was auctioned off Tuesday night at Uniques and Antiques in Delaware County.
The .38-caliber, five-shot Smith & Wesson pistol once owned by Frank Rizzo, along with the carry permit, was auctioned off Tuesday night at Uniques and Antiques in Delaware County.Read moreStu Bykofsky/Staff

I now own Frank Rizzo’s police whistle.

Why?

First, let me tell you how.

In a melancholy ceremony, the Rizzo family liquidated its patriarch’s personal belongings at an auction Tuesday evening.

This was a postscript to a huge estate sale in November.

After that sale, more personal effects were found and were shipped off to be sold by Uniques & Antiques out of its low-rent warehouse on a rainy night in Aston, Delaware County.

Most of the Rizzo fever was cooled by the first sale, attended by thousands. Tuesday’s affair drew fewer than a dozen bidders, some who seemed to have a plan. Others were browsers like me.

Kevin Tobin of Bryn Mawr showed up out of curiosity. He had volunteered during Rizzo’s 1972 and 1976 mayoral campaigns and thought he might pick up a keepsake.

I covered Rizzo off and on over the years. I knew Franny Rizzo better than his father and was surprised to see some of Junior’s memorabilia up for auction too. Who would be interested in buying an award to Franny from Peco, where he worked before he was elected to City Council? Or his passport?

“I didn’t give it to them,” Franny told me from Naples, Fla., where he spends the winter. “They came through the house and scooped everything up.”

Doesn’t watching his family’s history pass into other hands make him sad, I asked.

“No, it made me happy,” he said. At the first sale, “people walking out of the door with a $4 item thanked me for letting them have something they will cherish.”

One item for sale Tuesday was Frank Rizzo’s Smith & Wesson .38-caliber pistol that came with his carry permit. He got the permit in 1986 after two terms as mayor. Under the reason required for applying for the permit, he wrote: “Retired Police Commissioner.”

Not “former mayor.” At heart, Rizzo remained a cop.

“He always said anybody can be mayor, but not anybody can be police commissioner,” Franny told me.

The gun went for $1,560. A Center City man who declined to give me his name (few buyers wanted to be named) bought a leather-covered blackjack for $180 and an oak nightstick — which drew counteroffers — for $390. The book of signatures of people attending Rizzo’s funeral at SS. Peter and Paul Cathedral Basilica was sold for $468, and a Wedgwood Philadelphia Bowl was bought for $390. (Such bowls used to be handed out to dignitaries. On one occasion, while presenting a bowl, Rizzo said it “holds two pounds of rigatoni.” After that, insiders called them Rigatoni Bowls.)

The kid from Rosewood Street in South Philly ended up living in Chestnut Hill, but he retained — for better or worse — a rowhouse mentality, and he loved his city. Like Ed Rendell, he was gregarious and approachable. Rizzo didn’t duck reporters; he was forever quotable, and colorful as a box of Crayolas.

I was in his debt for one thing: In 1991, he was running for mayor for a third time, this time as a Republican against Democrat Rendell. Someone suggested I stage a comedy contest between the candidates in what was going to be a hard-fought battle.

I approached Rendell about a comedy joke-off against the Riz. Rendell was getting ready to stiff-arm me when I told him Rizzo had agreed.

“I’ll do it,” said Rendell.

I went to Rizzo first because I knew he would say yes, and that would pressure Rendell to agree.

That contest — Rizzo’s last public appearance before he died on July 16, 1991 — evolved into the annual Candidates Comedy Night that ran for 25 years and raised $500,000 for Variety, the Children’s Charity.

It would not have happened without Rizzo.

So that’s part of why I wanted a memento.

Whether you like Rizzo or not, the whistle represents a part of Philadelphia history, like the matchbook-size piece of the Independence Hall floorboard I bought after it was put on sale after the building was renovated.

Rizzo’s police whistle isn’t that grandiose, but it is functional and it cost just $30. The fact that my owning it will drive some people crazy — you know who you are — just adds to my personal enjoyment.