The winter of '88, sorne of you remember, a bLizzard of biblical proportions
The family was snowbound, freezing without food or heat, the father vanished, laid to waste by alcohol. So it was left to this boy, this little man of nine tender years, to fend for himself and his family. Off in the cold he went, worn shoes wrapped in rags, newspaper lining his thin wool coat as he trudged chest‑deep in snow to the railyard, foraging on hands and bloody knees for scraps of coal. He filled his pockets with what little he could find, then set out for the docks, hoping for some potatoes spilled from a ruptured sack. Finding none, he took a broom handle and in desperation killed his family’s dinner — three wharf rats hiding in the hold of a ship. Terrible, yes, but the family survived. And the little boy? Well, the little boy speaks to you tonight from this very podium.