June 2, 2025 • 60 mins
Tiny, the former Supreme Spokesman of the Black Spades and founder of TBS New Direction, takes us on a profound journey through the streets of 1970s Bronx in this eye-opening conversation about one of New York's most misunderstood organizations.Born in Harlem Hospital and raised in the Bronx during the height of urban neglect and racial tension, Tiny reveals how the Black Spades emerged not as the gang portrayed in media, but as a community protection force. "These brothers came together to make a difference," he explains, detailing how the organization's founders had roots in the Nation of Islam and Black Panthers. With over 100,000 members in the Bronx alone, the Spades became a powerful response to both the heroin epidemic ravaging neighborhoods and the violent resistance to school integration.Perhaps most surprising is Tiny's account of the organization's diversity – with 40-50% Latino membership and even white and Chinese members from the projects. "We weren't discriminating if you came from our neighborhood," he shares, challenging simplistic narratives about street organizations. His personal journey from being "drafted" into the Spades to becoming Supreme Spokesman offers rare insight into the internal workings and evolution of the group.The conversation takes a fascinating turn as Tiny connects the dots between the Black Spades and the birth of hip-hop culture. His firsthand account of protecting Grandmaster Flash in the 1970s and witnessing the emergence of the Zulu Nation reveals how deeply intertwined these street organizations were with cultural movements that would change the world.Today, Tiny channels that same organizational energy into community service through TBS New Direction, working across cultural and religious lines to create opportunities for youth and returning citizens. "Words are more powerful than guns," he reflec
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
what's going on, everybody?
It's ron brown lmt, thepeople's fitness professional,
alongside my co-host mikey feverand this is a new yorker's
perspective mikey fever's in thebuilding.
Good to see you, brother mikeyfever.
Yes, he was out, man, he out.
Good to see you.
We got the brother Tiny in thebuilding.
Founder of TBS New Direction.
(00:30):
Tiny, I set you up this evening, man.
This is only part one.
This is only part one.
This is only part one.
We need a part two and we needa part three.
We need a part two and we needa part three.
So I want to start off, brotherTiny, I just want to let people
(00:50):
know how we met.
We met through the Brother Musa, sheikh Musa Dramik.
From what is it?
From Parkchester, right, yeah,from Parkchester, parkchester.
And you know it was all aboutsurrounding, like community work
and things like that.
And then, uh, I went to tiny's,um, uh, what was it?
(01:13):
Um, public safety dinner, right.
And then, oh, you remember that, damn, yeah yeah, you came.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
You came to the public safety dinner and you
also came to one of our um, Ithink it was one of our one of
our events Bookbag, or Christmasone of them.
Or New Year's, one of theevents we did.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
Yeah, it was a food give out, okay, yeah.
Speaker 3 (01:31):
Over there on Reverend Polite Boulevard.
Speaker 1 (01:36):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, Okay, yeah.
So I want people to know whoyou are, your history and things
like that.
So you, so you can run awaywith it.
Where were you born and raised?
Speaker 3 (01:51):
Well, first of all let me thank you, brothers, for
having me.
I was born in Harlem, in HarlemHospital.
I was born in Harlem Hospital,but I was raised up on 142nd
Street in Lenox Avenue before Imoved to the Bronx in the 50s,
early 60s.
(02:12):
Really, that's where I was born, the old Harlem Hospital, you
understand, on 135th Street, theold Harlem Hospital, yeah, yeah
.
Speaker 2 (02:24):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
And now so you move from 142nd Street, which is for
my hip hop fans.
That's Big L's block, that'sconsidered the danger zone.
Cam Ron is from over there andall that, max B.
Speaker 3 (02:40):
Well, you had a lot of good brothers that come from
over there.
You understand the Sickles, youunderstand the 143rd Street
crew.
I was young, you know, when Imoved out of there I went to
public school.
But a lot of these brothersfrom there that you have Lurch
and Bobby and all these otherdifferent brothers you
understand that grew up overtime.
You understand they got namesfor themselves one way or
(03:02):
another.
But Manhattan, money-makingManhattan, there's always
money-making Manhattan.
A lot of our good brothers comefrom that neighborhood.
But I had a young sister shepassed away now.
Her name was Patty.
She was born with musculardystrophy and in 115, where we
(03:24):
lived at in Harlem, right thereon the corner 115.
And we lived up on the topfloor and she couldn't walk so
we had to carry her up and downthe stairs.
So one year she got an inviteto the Jerry Lewis Telephone and
if I'm not mistaken which Idon't think I am Jerry Lewis
(03:45):
Telephone and if I'm notmistaken which I don't think I
am she was the very first blackfemale to be on the Jerry Lewis
Telephone with musculardystrophy and after hearing the
story of how she had multipleoperations and we had to carry
her back and forth up and downthe stairs.
It was the Jerry LewisTelephone people, whoever they
got in touch with they got intouch with.
(04:06):
They got us moved to the Bronxinto the projects on the first
floor.
This is when we came up toMonhaven Project and it's down
on 143rd Street, 143rd andAlexander Avenue, right across
the street from Patterson Houses, you understand, with tiny
yachts and all of that.
You know the brothers grew upthere.
You know I ran broccoli but wemoved there and that's where my
(04:31):
journey began.
You know I went to publicschool 49.
From there I went to ClarkJunior High School, where that's
where, you know, I understand,my journey at Clark Junior High
School really began as a member.
You know, my journey in ClarkJunior High School really began
as a member of the Black Spades.
You understand, like ourorganization is TBS that stands
for the Black Spades.
(04:52):
So my journey, my history, allstarted, you understand, from
junior high school, clark JuniorHigh School in the Bronx.
You know, and I was in thatschool.
You know, and I was in thatschool.
I got shot on Easter Sunday,okay real quick.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
You just said I just got shot.
Speaker 2 (05:14):
You just slipped that right through, like yeah, I
just got shot.
Speaker 3 (05:19):
Well, let me tell you something.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
What 16?
Speaker 3 (05:22):
I got shot in 1973 Easter Sunday.
I was selling papers out.
My grandmother lived, we livedon 142nd Street, my grandmother
lived on 145th Street and I hadfamily down there and that's
what kept me coming back andforth to Manhattan, even while I
was still in the Bronx.
And one Easter Sunday, 1973, meand my sisters and my cousins,
(05:47):
we were selling papers and I hadmy spade jacket on and one of
the brothers from the and Ithought I knew everybody down
there.
But you never know who youdon't know.
Found out later these peopleknew me, but we're not going to
go into that.
But anyway, he wanted to takemy jacket and I refused to give
(06:07):
up my jacket.
So I got and that's like 40, 50years ago damn.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
I have a question, though, right, how old were you?
Speaker 3 (06:13):
then I was um.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
I think I was about 16, 16, 16 years old yeah, I
have a question before, beforeyou got shot, before you wore
the jacket, what was the climatelike in the 70s?
We see it on television NewYork was run down.
Were you introduced to any?
Because on this podcast we wasasked were you introduced to any
(06:35):
school of thoughts like Nationof?
Speaker 3 (06:35):
Islam.
Well, when I was growing up,growing back to Harlem when I
was growing up, that's whenMartin Luther King was killed.
You understand, you know, a lotof our black leaders were
killed.
You know, and I wasn'tintroduced, my family didn't
have any history or any type ofrelationship to the Nation of
(06:59):
Islam and the Black Panthers.
It wasn't until I joined thespace that I was introduced to
the Nation of Islam and theBlack Panthers.
It wasn't until I joined thespace that I was introduced to
the Nation of Islam and theBlack Panthers.
The founders I'm not a founder.
I am one of the originalmembers from the 70s, but I'm
not a founder because thefounders came in the late 60s.
The founders of the BlackPanthers I mean founders of the
(07:21):
Black Space.
Their parents' roots come fromthe Nation of Islam and the
Black Panthers.
I mean founders of the Blackspace.
Their parents' roots come fromthe Nation of Islam and the
Black Panthers and that's howthe space was put together.
It was never, ever, ever, and Irepeat, ever, ever to be a gang
.
These brothers came, david, youunderstand David, you
understand Khalid.
(07:41):
You understand Bam Bam.
These brothers came together tomake a difference in the
community.
Oh, you understand Khalid, youunderstand Bam Bam.
These brothers came together tomake a difference in the
community Because, as you know,back in the 70s and coming into
the 80s, it was the dopeepidemic.
There wasn't no cracking andthat stuff.
This was all the dope, youunderstand, and you had your
little minor robberies, but notonly that.
A lot of people fail to hear,fail to realize.
(08:04):
In the 70s and 80s it was areal race war.
Now I'm going to call it a warbecause all the schools that's
up in the North Bronx, lehman,orlando, a lot of schools, high
(08:24):
schools that I'm speaking intoday, talking about Truman,
truman, and I'm living in theTruman area there ain't more
black people up here.
So we had a race war going onfor the schools.
It wasn't on the, you know, itonly spilled out on the street
if you came to the neighborhood.
There was a time we could notwalk on Fortin Road.
(08:48):
There was a time I live up inthe Co-op City area of the block
we couldn't walk up here.
And there's places up here nowthat still don't want you to
walk up here because of thecolor of your skin.
And these schools Roosevelt,you understand Roosevelt, the
bad, the Truman Kennedy allthese schools were white and
(09:11):
they did not want us.
And that's how black spacereally got a lot of their
reputation, because a lot of ourmembers and a lot of people
that we love sisters andbrothers and friends was going
to these schools and they wasgetting beat up and we used to
go to these schools and we usedto fight.
I mean, we used to fight.
Now, today people call itintegration.
We don't know who started it,we don't know.
(09:33):
We came in more and more andmore.
I'm not going to say that theSpades integrated anything, but
we came up there and put on ahell of a fight to let people
know who we were and that wewasn't going to stand tolerating
that nonsense.
So you know, that's how I wasintroduced to the Nation of
Islam and the Black Panthers,not to be a member, but the
(09:56):
familiarity of who they werebecause of the founders of the
space.
They never wanted us to be agang, they just wanted to stop
the robbery, stop the drugs intheir community up in the
Soundview section of the Bronx.
They had brothers that camefrom different parts of the
Bronx how they hang out beingblack Brothers just joined.
(10:17):
The next thing you know.
The next thing.
You know the numbers wasastronomical, you understand.
There was over 100,000 spadesin the Bronx alone 100,000
spades in the Bronx alone,100,000 spades.
That's wild Over 100,000 spadesin the Bronx alone.
You understand, we dominatedall five boroughs, but the Bronx
(10:39):
is the home Now.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
Wait before you go.
When the spades were aroundother, what other gangs were
around at that time?
Okay, you had.
Speaker 3 (10:51):
You had the skulls, you had the bachelors, a lot of
other gangs, a lot of gangs.
Okay, let's say you live there,I live here, we all spades.
But one day somebody on yourblock of a big status, a big
homie on your block of a bigstatus, a big homie on your
block, after they call me bighomie.
So I'm going to say big homieon your block, say, listen, man,
I want to be like this.
(11:14):
And if he had the numbers, youwould join.
Whatever he came, whatever namehe came up with, the Pearls,
the Saigon.
You understand, these are a lotof brothers in the space, but
they turn over.
And we had the Xing Ling Nomads, we had the Savage Girls, we
had the Bachelors, we had theReapers, we had a majority of
(11:36):
Spanish gangs, but you know alot of us.
We fought each other in thebeginning and then there was an
alliance because we realized,you understand, that fighting
each other wasn't doing nothingbut killing each other.
And we all had one big enemythe white gangs.
And when I say the white gangs,and I say it wherever I'm at
and I say it in front of, and Isay it whoever, you understand
(12:00):
the white gangs.
We also fought their parents,the police and their mothers and
their fathers, because that'swhat it was.
We were on their block.
They all came against us, youknow.
So you know it was just asystemic racist thing at that
time.
A lot of people won't say itbecause a lot of people wasn't
(12:21):
exposed to it, but anybody whowent to these schools in the 70s
and 80s all the schools thatyou heard me say earlier they
knew what it was like to beblack and up in these
neighborhoods.
And you know you ever look atthat movie, the Bronx Tale.
Yeah, yeah, okay, that wassomeone's.
(12:41):
Do you know that there was a busthat used to come through
Arthur Avenue?
That came from Evander?
No, not Evander, roseville orEvander, I think it was
Roseville.
That's up there near WhiteCastle.
They used to come through there.
You know they had to change thebus because the white folks
over there and you can do yourhistory, go on Google and see
(13:01):
for yourself there was a numberof bus I can't tell you what it
was that used to come throughthere.
They had to change the buses.
I don't know if MTA changed itor the white community going
through Arthur Avenue.
They did not want the blackkids coming through their
neighborhood.
They literally changed thebuses.
So you know you guys are youngerthan me.
(13:21):
I'm going on 70 years old.
Damn.
Six months, I'll be damn,there's 70.
Damn.
But anyway, you know.
There's a lot of things that Iwas exposed to.
And to answer the brotherquestion me myself, I was never
affiliated with the NationalIf-Nam or the Black Panthers,
but when I became a member ofthe Black Spades it was taught
(13:44):
to us why the spades came about.
Speaker 1 (13:49):
Now.
So the spades came aboutbecause there was a race war,
you said.
Speaker 3 (13:54):
It wasn't so much of a race war.
Okay, when the spades cameabout in Soundview, it was about
protecting their communitythrough the drugs the heroin,
because back in the 70s it wasan drugs the heroin, Because
back in the 70s and 80s it wasan epidemic of the heroin.
But they also came togetherbecause we fought in these
schools.
There's a lot of times that Iwent up to Rosalind Evander, not
(14:17):
Evander Okay, I got to get itstraight, I'll get it.
But there's a lot of times wewent up to schools to fight
because we had friends andfamily.
We didn't know that we was, wedidn't know that we was changing
anything.
We just went up there toprotect our space, our friends,
but, but, but.
But today, as I sit and I talkto you, I realize it was a race
(14:41):
war.
And I'll say it was a race war,you understand.
And it was a race war becausethese schools did not want
blacks in it.
They did not want blacks, theydidn't want blacks at all.
But as time changed, you see how, as time will go on and go on,
blacks, a lot of blacks and alot of Hispanics came into these
schools and stuff like that.
They couldn't help to change,because over time come change.
(15:01):
But in the beginning we didhave to fight and there's a lot
of people you understand thatthe police don't say the news
don't say that was hurting theseschools when we were younger,
because we had to fight tosurvive in these schools.
So space didn't come aboutbecause we were trying to change
things.
We came about because we wentto fight and we were one of the
(15:27):
leading groups to go up to theseschools.
Now other groups wanted to, butwe went to almost every school
to fight because we had friendsand relatives and families in
all these different schoolsthroughout the Bronx.
Speaker 1 (15:42):
So I didn't know.
The space actually started inSoundview.
I had no idea.
So now that's some historyright there.
Hold on, oh, where's my bomb?
My bomb is.
Hold on, let me get the maineffect.
There we go, there we go.
Speaker 2 (16:01):
It sounded like the Warriors movie the way you
described it.
Speaker 1 (16:06):
Yeah, so what was your position in the spades and
how did you get that?
How did you get your like ifyou had a top position, if you
reached your top position, howdid you get there?
Speaker 3 (16:16):
Well, I can't lie to you, brothers, and we did a
documentary and the documentaryis three years in the making.
Why so long, don't ask me, butI let the world know and I let
you know.
I used to run.
The spades came around, draftedpeople.
I ran.
I was more afraid of my mamathan the spades.
(16:37):
I ran.
And one day they got comments,and I'm going to say it.
They got comments, since Everytime they would chase me.
And I'm going to say it.
They got comments, since Everytime they would chase me I'd run
this way and went straight tothe building and got in the
house.
So one day they put people infront of the building and they
chased me, but this time theyhad people in front of the
(16:58):
building and I couldn't get in.
And they caught me.
I was drafted into the space.
It wasn't something that I wokeup and said I wanted to be a
part of.
Speaker 1 (17:08):
Before you.
Before you continue, I justwant to let the audience know,
because normally the audiencethey're used to five percenters
more as a nation of Islam, thetiny it was a part of, or how
can I say is a part of, or Iwould say of, was a part of, or
how can I say is a part of, or Iwould say of, was a part of in
the past.
The black speeds.
(17:28):
The black speeds, the blackspeeds was a gang in New York
that came about around what?
What time period?
Speaker 3 (17:37):
They came about around the sixties, the late
sixties, all the way up to the,all the way up to the eighties,
yeah, up to the 80s.
Speaker 1 (17:46):
Now my audience, the Black Spades.
Later on, I'm going to say forlack of a better term for my
audience to get it kind ofmorphed into Zulu Nation.
Speaker 3 (17:59):
Well, yes and no.
Speaker 1 (18:02):
Let's not give them that yet.
Let's not give them that.
But basically, black Spades andZulu Nation has a history
together and Zulu Nation has agreat influence on hip-hop
culture in New York City.
That's like the foundation.
So just to let everybody know,bring everybody up to speed.
(18:22):
So now you said they chased youand then you got recruited.
No, they drafted you, theydrafted him.
Speaker 3 (18:30):
You know, usually when they wanted somebody they'd
go draft him.
He had to fight and all thatstuff.
But they chased me for abouttwo months and, you understand,
I didn't think they had commonsense because I did the same
type of running every day Zoom,zoom, zoom, left, right, zoom.
So when they finally caught methey said you ain't got to walk
(18:51):
no line, you drafted.
So I got drafted into the spaceand I started off as a member
like everybody else.
You understand, and PattersonProjects on 143rd was the
headquarters, the 14th Divisionof Black Space.
I understand my president'sname was John Jones, I was under
his leadership and I was therewith them for a while.
After a while, after about six,seven months, there was another
(19:14):
division called the 17thDivision of Black Spades.
They was on Brook Avenue.
They got into a big war withthe Latin gangs down there and
what happened was they had aclubhouse down there and this
was one time that the clubhouse,the Latinos, they just burned
the whole building.
So they got burned out.
So what they did was they movedinto practicing projects with
(19:37):
us.
Now they was a powerful,powerful.
The 17th Division was apowerful division.
When you say nutty people, allthe nuts that came from the nut
house was in the 17th Divisionwas a powerful division.
When you say nutty people, allthe nuts came from the nuthouse
was in the 17th Division.
So they joined up with us for awhile and then, after a while I
mean we did a lot of fightingwhen the 17th came about.
(19:59):
So what happened was thepresident of the 17th became the
supreme commander of, not ofall spades, but of the South
Bronx.
He became the supreme presidentof the South Bronx.
The spades were so big thatthat monk, who was supreme of
(20:21):
all spades, gave Coke the titleof Supreme of the South Bronx.
So now I'm in the 14th.
Now I had moved over.
I come out of Mount Haven.
Around that time I waspresident of the Mount Haven
chapter.
We had a chapter in Mount Haven, we had a chapter in Millbrook,
we had a chapter in Jackson, wehad a chapter up in Morehouses.
(20:43):
So we had these differentchapters and when the 17th came
in, instead of now doing allthese chapters, they just
combined one division.
We all became the 17th Divisionof Black Space and I was raised
by my mother.
(21:05):
No father would my mother andmy mother raised me.
You understand that words weremore powerful than guns, even
though guns kill.
You understand, but words youunderstand.
Words of men stick around.
They remember us when we killed, but they remember their words
the most.
Speaker 2 (21:26):
So I mean I knew it.
Speaker 3 (21:28):
I wasn't one of those brothers.
You understand that jumped upand wanted to fight all the time
and do this and do that.
And I'm not ashamed to say Ididn't want to fight.
What I do today is what I didback then.
So what happened was Coltbrought me into the main we were
all 17, but there's like a mainbody and he brought me into the
(21:49):
main body and he gave me atitle.
I became Supreme Spokesman ofthe whole South Bronx because I
was in the Supreme Division andhe made me spokesman.
That means that at that time hewould send me.
I talked to the police, Italked to any different gang
groups, whatever.
(22:09):
I was the person that he sentout and the reason why he chose
me because he knew that if Icame back and said we had to go
to war, he knew it was serious.
If I came back and said to himman, we don't need to fight
these brothers, we need to makean alliance, or we need to stop
this or we need to stop that.
He took it for gospel and hebelieved me because he knew my
(22:32):
mind wasn't set on destroying,my mind was set on building.
Knew my mind wasn't set ondestroying.
My mind was set on building.
So I became my last position inthe space.
I became spokesman of the SouthBronx through the 17th because I
came from a Supreme building.
It gave me that title.
I came from a Supreme division.
It gave me that title Supremespokesman of the South Bronx.
(22:55):
I did not speak for every state, only in the South Bronx area
where Coke was Supreme Presidentof the South Bronx.
But Coke was one of thosebeautiful brothers to where
people from Brooklyn, statenIsland, upper Bronx, they all
came and they all gravitated tohim because he was a nice and he
(23:16):
was a gentle giant but he wasalso a beast.
When he had to be a beast healso knew that if I had to fight
I'd fight.
There was no problem about mejust speaking and not fighting.
It's like he gave me thatposition.
So that was the position that Ihad as spokesman for the South
(23:39):
Bronx.
Speaker 1 (23:41):
Got you.
Got you Check, check, check.
Good answer, got it Thorough.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
Before you go, boy, ron, as I'm listening to your
story.
It's very deep and compelling.
There was a documentary Iwatched years ago called 80
Blocks from Tiffany.
Is it similar to that?
Does it get into the?
I can't say.
I recalled it.
You don't remember 80 Blocksfrom Tiffany?
It's about old gangs in NewYork they spoke about, you know.
Speaker 3 (24:05):
Well, you know, okay, I'm out of the South Bronx and
the original members and a lotof other divisions up in the
North Bronxx and you know thingslike that.
So a lot of times we all joinedtogether, we had monthly
meetings where we, where everydivision, came together.
That's why I could tell youthere was over 103 divisions in
(24:25):
the bronx alone and, um, we cametogether.
But a lot of us did a lot ofdifferent things and I'll
explain to that to you in aminute.
Because up, up, up, up, up, up,up, up, up, up, up, up, up, up,
up, up, up, up, up, up, up, up,up, up, up, up, up, up, up, up,
up, up, up, up, up, up, up, up,up, up, up, up, up, up, up, up,
up, up, up, up, up, up, up, up,up, up up.
(24:46):
Black Pearls and thePeacemakers you see that took
place up there.
That didn't take place.
Now we had a peace.
We was in St Mary's Park.
(25:06):
We had a peace meeting downthere, but it wasn't as popular
as the one uptown where thetreaties were signed, because
all the main divisions up theregot together and it was in there
for that peace treaty.
Now, when we was in St Mary'sGym down there.
We had the Bachelors, we had afew ghetto brothers, the Spades
(25:28):
At that time.
We had Black Magics, a fewother people.
We came together but we didn'thave a lot of press and a lot of
things like that down therecovering our things and they had
to press up there.
So when they had the peacetreaty, it was up there.
I wasn't a part of that.
We had our area, they had theirarea, but we came together if
those areas had to fight.
(25:49):
I was one of therepresentatives that put the
17th together with the educationof Sonny Carson.
I was sent to negotiate with afew other brothers.
This is the first time when Isat down with Champ and Wine.
Champ was the Supreme Presidentof the Tomahawks and Wine was
(26:15):
the Supreme President of theJolly Stompers.
And Sonny Carson has passed awaynow but he tried to bring the
gangs together for to puttogether his movie, which I
think y'all might have seen theEducation of Sonny Carson
classic we was in that and Icoached him to represent that
(26:35):
and I went and spoke and we wasin that and Coach sent me to
represent that and I went andspoke and I got us in that.
Also the Warriors when theysent me out as a spokesman and I
spoke for my area.
We got a lot of brothers in theWarriors but we got kicked out
of everything.
They kicked us out ofeverything.
We went to Brooklyn and we wentto fight Because you know it's
that macho stuff.
You ain't saying nothing to me,brother, you're going to talk
(27:00):
different and you know peopleare going to talk the way they
talk.
But because we came from theBronx and they was from Brooklyn
, we had to just it was a thingwhere we just going to let them
know where we come from.
So we got kicked out of.
To Sonny Costner we had somevery important roles but I think
more or less the producers werescared of us because there was
a scene where there was a hellof a big fight and only God
(27:23):
spared people life becausenobody was killed or really hurt
, but it was a lot.
It was a huge fist fight andwhen they sent us back to the
Bronx they did.
Don't bring them back, don'tbring them back, please don't
bring them back, don't bring himback, please don't bring him
back.
So that's when you know.
But we were in that, we were inthat and if they didn't kick us
out, I had a major speakingrole in that my brother Bo.
(27:45):
My brother Bo was playing oneof the brothers near Sonny
Carson and now the Warriors.
We just got that part.
We were just part of thescenery.
You see, we were part of thescenery because my godmother you
could also Google this Her namewas Marion Rose.
She was one of the first blackdistrict leaders in the South
Bronx.
(28:05):
She got us involved and I spokewith her project, even as a
black spade it was calledProject Justice, and I spoke,
spoke, I did a lot of speakingwith her.
Jose serrano, one of our firstum um district leaders too.
I she introduced me to a lot ofthese people, you understand,
(28:26):
when I was younger.
So she got us involved with alot of things as being one of
the first black district leadersin the south Bronx, you know.
So a lot of things came to herand she, of course, she brought
it to me being my godmother, andI got the spades involved.
Speaker 2 (28:43):
Okay, little boy.
Speaker 1 (28:44):
Okay, I want to Remember that right.
Yo we got Urban.
What is this?
Just the studios?
I have a question.
It was said that there werePuerto Ricans in the spades from
the beginning.
(29:04):
Is that accurate?
Speaker 3 (29:06):
Yes, it is.
Yes, it is.
Let me break it down.
You got to remember we camefrom NYCHA houses where black,
puerto Rican Chinese all livedtogether.
Because you was Puerto Rican,you didn't join the Puerto Rican
gang.
I was in one of the first PuertoRican gangs before I was a
(29:30):
black spade, you understand, andit was called the Green
Barrettes and they came out ofmy junior high school before I
became a black space.
I was only in it for aboutmaybe six or seven months, but I
was.
I was the only black thatdidn't understand a word of
spanish, and I still don't, butI knew when to run.
That's all I need to know.
(29:52):
And I knew when to.
You could tell by the languagewhen to fight and you could tell
by the language when to run.
And in the South Bronx, wherewe came out of I was in my haven
projects and we had white space.
We had a Chinese space Okay, Idon't know if Chet is still
(30:13):
alive, mickey is gone.
We had black space.
There was at least about 40, 50percent Latinos in the black
space the bachelors, that's anall Hispanic gang.
They had blacks.
So it wasn't like because youhad a Latino gang or you had a
(30:34):
black gang.
Now, we wasn't in the whitegangs, none of us.
So you can forget that.
But it's not like you was in ablack gang or a white gang that
you didn't have.
If you was in a Latino gang,you didn't have no blacks, or
you was in a black gang youdidn't have no Latinos.
All these gangs was mixed and wehad Puerto Ricans, we had
whites, matter of fact,soundview there was brothers
(30:56):
that was white, that came out ofSoundview Because you remember,
we coming out of NYCHA housing,we coming out where we grew up
before the gangs even came about, we growing up with friends who
were our next door neighbors.
Chad lived in my building.
Mickey, who was Chinese, liveddown the block.
They were Chinese.
In the black space there wasonly was Chinese lived on the
(31:17):
block.
They were Chinese.
In the black space there wasonly one white, but he still was
Chinese.
We had about four or fivewhites that came out of Mount
Haven.
That was in the black space.
We had a bunch of brothers thatwere Latinos that came out the
black space.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
You said 40-50% Latino.
Speaker 3 (31:36):
I would say 40-50% were Latinos.
That was in the black space, Idon't doubt it.
Speaker 1 (31:41):
I don't doubt it either.
Speaker 2 (31:44):
Grew up in the same community.
That's why I find it very oddwhen people try to say Latinos
were not part of hip-hop,especially Puerto Ricans.
That's BS.
Speaker 3 (31:51):
They were there, you know, when we go into hip-hop
I'm going to go into thatbecause that's a whole different
scenario but during the gangdays, every gang, every gang had
Blacks in it.
If you was Latino, they hadBlacks in it.
If you was Black, we hadLatinos in it.
And if you came from ourneighborhood, there was no
discrimination.
(32:11):
And even though we fought thewhite gangs gangs, we had white
people in our gang.
We had white boys in our gangsthat came out of my projects,
but they put on them jackets.
They fought like we fought.
So there was white boys.
You understand, I can't talkabout everybody else, but I will
(32:32):
say that there was whites.
When we had four whites thatcame out of my building in Mount
Haven on 143rd and WillisAvenue and when I was told we
had about one or two I'm notgoing to put numbers on it a
couple of whites that came outof Soundview.
So we did have these gangs wereintegrated.
Now we didn't have more PuertoRicans than we had whites in a
(32:57):
black gang, and the Spanish ganghad more blacks than they had
Latinos, but we were integrated.
Speaker 1 (33:05):
Right, gotcha, that's a check.
Now you became a spokesman forthe South Bronx.
Okay, now, what year was thisand what was the journey from
that point?
Speaker 3 (33:22):
Well, the journey from that point I got shot in
1972, 73.
72?
1972 I got shot and I became,spoke, took over and I became in
73.
So after that I mean everythingthat we talked about was doing
that journey I went, I went, Iwent away.
(33:43):
I went to jail in 1974 and Iand I did, I did one and a half
to three.
I came back home in 1976.
Speaker 1 (33:51):
What did you go to jail for?
Speaker 3 (33:53):
Oh boy, a number of things.
Uh, basically a number of bunchof weapons.
My thing was weapons andshootings.
When they say gang members wentto jail for robbery, you know
what their robberies was?
Speaker 2 (34:08):
What's that?
Speaker 3 (34:09):
It wasn't even taking your money, but taking another
brother's jacket, becausejackets was trophies to us.
So I had, I've had a number offirearms arrests and and one or
two robberies, but basicallyfirearms and um, today I filed
for a certificate of relief, youunderstand, so that, uh, I
(34:33):
could have my, my recordexpunged because of all the
things that I'm doing now and asof right now.
In the next four or five weeksI will hear if they grant my
request because I just today,just finished my investigation
Today and I just hope and praybecause I want to go into
(34:56):
politics, even at my age, and Iwant my fire on because I have
put together black spacesecurity services.
I can't put my name and stuffon a lot of papers right now
because it's woodwork, but oncethey have plunged my record,
I'll be able to put my name onall my creations.
Right now I have to go to otherpeople on my creations.
(35:16):
Right now I have to go throughother people, but when my name
is cleared I'll be able to putmy name on everything that I
create.
Speaker 1 (35:24):
Now you get out and you do a one to three, one and a
half to three, okay.
So now you did one and a half,yeah, okay.
And then you get out.
And then what's the next step?
Speaker 3 (35:38):
When I came home, the games was basically actually
the games was over.
You had a few diehards thatstill walked around when I came
home.
Now it was called Cruz and whenI came home, my little brother,
god bless his soul.
His name was Peanut.
He was in charge of theCasanova crew and I used to be
(36:00):
around him off and on, but Ididn't want to be around because
I just came home and I wasn'ttrying to be around them.
Young boys.
Then my same godmother, marionRose.
She came to me and you're goingto laugh at this one.
She came to me.
She said, tanya, I need you todo me a favor.
She brought this little skinnykid with her.
(36:20):
She said I need for you andyour people to protect them.
I said I'm not into that, nomore, I'm Godmother.
She said Tiny, you know, I knowyou.
You know, I know you.
She brought Grandmaster Flashto me.
That's who he was.
It was Grandmaster FlashBecause at that time that's when
(36:44):
they played music in the parksand they had little, they didn't
have a lot of, they didn't havemusic in the park and in the
houses and things like thatPeople was coming in, robbing
the sets and doing things likethat.
So she said to me I want you tolook out for him.
And this was 1976 when I metgrandmaster flash.
She said I want you to makesure that's when I came home and
I was home for a little bit.
(37:04):
I want you to watch this boyand protect him.
I never knew their relationship.
So at that time the casanovacrew was run by Peanut and at
that time and the Casanova crewwas one of the biggest Casanova
crew come from the space too,along with Zulus.
So most of the Casanovas werebaby space.
(37:25):
So we put them under our wingand we protected them.
We made sure he never gotrobbed and all that thing.
I wind up working withGrandmaster for Flash for about
when they went up, until I wentto Sylvia and they went to
Sylvia and I met him in 76.
They went to Sylvia in the 80s,late 80s, early 90s.
(37:47):
One of the two I was with Flashwhen he was three MCs him,
creole and his brother and thenit was the four MCs.
Okay, it was three MCs, fourMCs and then the Furious Five,
it was Melly Mel, his brother,kid Creole.
The three MCs it was three, nottwo, but three Cowboy, melly
(38:11):
Mel and Kid Creole.
Then they brought in Mr Ness.
Mr Ness came along when theywas in 18th Park.
Then came Raheem, and Raheemwas a part of the with Shah Rok.
He was part of Fearless Furious4.
I forgot what it was.
(38:33):
Please forgive me, but he waspart of Shah Rok and the team.
Then, all of a sudden, hejoined Flash and his team and
that's when they became theFurious Five.
Now you made a statement beforeabout Puerto Ricans and hip-hop.
I'm going to make thisstatement and I'm going to make
it a live statement.
There were Puerto Ricans inhip-hop, but it wasn't that many
(38:54):
.
You can count them CharlieChase, oc and there was Latin
Brothers.
But when you say hip-hop, therewas a bunch of kids.
There wasn't no race there andpeople will get offended.
There was more blacks thananything else.
So this wasn't a Latin culture,this was a Black culture.
(39:24):
But you got to remember thatLatinos hung out with the Blacks
.
We didn't have no Jamaicanmusic back then in our area.
You might have.
You went into a Jamaican area.
You heard it.
Okay, there wasn't a lot ofSpanish speaking groups going on
.
Now, when they start getting onthe Latin hustle and all that,
you start hearing more and moreand more.
But when you came to theseparties, then after a while some
parties played some Latin musicthey didn't know if somebody,
(39:46):
but these things was allBlack-coordinated.
When I say Black-coordinated,it wasn't like it was
orchestrated to just be blacks.
Anybody could have got it.
But it wasn't a lot of Latinosin MCs or DJs.
Yes, you had some Right now.
Charlie Chase, to me, was oneof the biggest ones, but I don't
(40:10):
think he made too many recordsor maybe didn't make a record,
but nobody pays him any mind,but he's one of the first
Latinos OC.
They had Spanish brothers, thatwas MCs, but this was basically
, like I said, a Black-orientedthing.
(40:32):
And I'm going to say this was ayouth thing and it didn't have
no color.
Yes, there was more Blacks thanPuerto Ricans, but this was a
youth thing and it didn't haveno color.
Yes, there was more blacks thanPuerto Ricans, but this was a
youth thing.
The youth put this together.
Now, when you came to thebreakdancing and when you came
to the graffiti, you still youhad black and Spanish.
Now Latinos started taking over, but you had a lot of blacks.
(40:55):
That was breakdancing.
Then all of a sudden, everybodygot involved.
You start seeing more Latinosthan blacks when it came to
breakdancing and things likethat.
And I heard you say a minute agowhere Africa Bambaataa, africa
Bambaataa, and I knew, as far asI was concerned, okay, he was a
Spade up from the South Bronx,not from the Soundview section
(41:20):
of the Bronx, and we didn'tfight together.
We didn't go to no warstogether.
He was all right with me.
He created the Zulu nation.
A lot of our Spade brothers, alot of my Spade brothers, were
with him.
Bam Barter put together adynamic organization.
(41:40):
I'm not going to go intoanything other than that.
I'll give him his credits ofputting together a dynamic
organization.
But back in the 70s theCasanovas and the Zulus all came
from spades.
They were the two most powerfulcrews.
Now we had the nine crews.
The nine crews was powerful andsome of the nine crews were
black spades.
(42:00):
Actually, brother, a lot of thecrews, the stick-up kids and
all that a lot of them came fromthe spades.
But the Zulus and Casanovaswere the two most powerful crews
in the South Bronx.
Zulus and Casanovas were thetwo most powerful crews in the
South Bronx and the Zulus wereBambata and Mario and Casanovas
(42:21):
was Flash, was never robbed.
Anytime there was any fighting.
We did it, zulus did it fortheirs, we did it for ours.
They were the two most powerfulcrews in the South and they
don't get the recognition.
Zulus get it, but Casanovasdon't get the recognition
because, you know, castellanosdon't get the recognition
because Flash has never beenrobbed and never been hurt and
these were.
(42:41):
We stayed with them up untilthey went to Sylvia Robinson and
we stayed with them for alittle while and they didn't.
I mean me and Flash got alongvery well.
You know, I got along with theMC's too.
We all had our own macho thing,but we all got along.
But Sylvia Robinson didn't wantthe Casanova crew because, see,
we got paid, we got paid, wegot paid and we got hired.
(43:06):
There's not a promoter andlisten to what I'm saying to you
there's not a promoter, a DJ,mc, graffiti artist,
breakdancers from the 70s thatdon't know who I am.
All my organization, theCasanova crew, and whether they
like me or they don't like me,they know who I am.
(43:28):
But that's back then and wemove forward.
And today we're doing biggerand better things.
And I still use the Spade namesbecause, like I said, my
brothers, our elders of theSpades, never created the Spades
to be a gang.
They never created it to be agang.
(43:53):
They wanted to be a group ofbrothers that came together that
protect their neighborhood,protect the sound room section
of the block, and fight.
We call it racism now, we callit racism to them too, but fight
the racism that was in front ofour eyes in our schools because
, like I said, a lot of said alot of brothers you understand a
(44:15):
lot of brothers.
You understand below 30, don'teven know the fight that took
place and how not only just theSpades, but other gangs, latino
gangs how they all had to gointo these schools.
I say we took a major rolebecause we fought in every
school.
Speaker 1 (44:32):
Every school.
I say we took a major rolebecause we fought in every
school.
Now I want to say this to UrbanXG Studios we have an email
it's the name of the show atgmailcom.
It's the name of the shownyptalkshow at gmailcom.
(44:54):
You can email us and we'll giveyou an hour to explain all of
this.
Another thing I want to say isthat we will soon have an
in-person podcast, and thatin-person podcast in the studio
we're going to have someonethere who's like, I would say, a
legendary martial artist namedJerry Fontenay, who's like a, I
would say, a legendary, uh,martial artist named jerry
(45:16):
fontenaz, who's also a breaker,so he would know, and he's
puerto rican, so he would knowthe history, you know, I mean.
Well, he's about to be 60 yearsold, so he's another generation
though, uh, but you know he, hewould be, he will, he'll.
I will have him explain all ofthat as well.
As far as, as far as breakdancing, because you said, uh,
(45:38):
breakers and, uh, you saidgraffiti artists.
Uh, to the.
To the guy in the chat yeah, um, go ahead, marion, my bad tiny
yeah, well, you know.
Speaker 3 (45:47):
If we're going back to the breakers and graffiti
artists, let me tell yousomething.
You know.
You know at first it was a lotof black but everybody got
involved with that, just like alot of Latinos, with the break
dancing, you know, and thegraffiti, you understand there
was a lot of.
I'm just trying to remember.
You've got to remember my mind.
I don't remember a lot of thesebrothers.
(46:07):
You're going back to the 70s,but we had a lot of.
We had Lava who, but we had alot of.
We had Lava who was a spade whohas passed away.
He was one of the biggestgraffiti artists.
We had Stay High.
You understand Stay High mustbe hit every rock, every bridge
in the city of New York.
Back then he became, he waspublic enemy number one to the
(46:31):
police.
He was going upstate hittingrocks places.
Just what is he doing up here?
Stay high was good.
So you know these greatgraffiti artists.
Today they do, they're doingtheir thing.
I stopped getting involved witha lot of things around about oh,
after I left Flash and whenthey went to Sylvia Robertson in
(46:54):
the 90s.
I just fade out from everything.
I really didn't believe in rap,okay, and basically, I was in
it, you understand.
I got my little.
I put them little brotherstogether, I polished them up and
I made them into one of themost powerful security groups in
the Bronx and we got paid.
But after we left Flash, Ididn't have no interest and I'm
(47:15):
not, you know.
I went on to a whole lot ofdifferent things, and it wasn't
until 2014 that I decided toleave the streets alone.
I came out the street late, butI decided to leave this alone,
leave that alone.
I never went back to jail,though, that's for sure.
(47:35):
So I haven't been to jail since1984.
I was 86 when I came home in 86, but my last arrest was 84.
I have not been arrested sincethen, so you know.
And then in 2014, I decided Iwas tired.
I was 50-something years old.
I was tired of the streets,tired of what I'm going through.
I've been with my wife for 44years.
(47:57):
She's a former correctionofficer.
She put up with my mess, I putup with my mess, my kids put up
with my mess.
I just woke up and said tomyself it's time I went back to
school.
I got my Bachelor of Artsdegree.
I went back for a little while,you understand Metropolitan
College, where I want to go backto to get my master's.
But between that I started amentoring program, TBS New
(48:21):
Direction, black Spades in a NewDirection.
I'm the president of BlackSpades Security Services.
I put the Black Spades SecurityServices together because a lot
of our young brothers andsisters don't understand, even
though they got records, theycan still work for a security
company.
They can't be a guard and noone can be a guard without a
(48:42):
license.
But there's things you can do.
You can drive a vehicle and goout and make sure people's on
their job.
You can't be a guard, but youcan do these things.
See, and this is things thatthat I've learned on my journey
of all, my journey of trying tobe successful in life.
And TBS new direction is a 501C three organization but we
(49:09):
don't get.
We don't get no money fromnobody because, see, I still
take my concept from the spadesas being one of the largest
street gangs in the city of NewYork.
Where we go where we want to go,I go into different places.
You understand how I met youcoming up there.
You understand the St Raymond'sChurch and doing here and going
there, I go where we need to goto meet people, to network, and
(49:33):
if I was getting funded byanybody, they don't want us to
go With the food.
You came out with us with thefood.
We was on Jackson.
We was on Reverend PoliteBoulevard on 77th Street.
We was in St Mary's.
We was in Mott Haven.
We was in Patterson Well, wewasn't in Mott Haven, please
forgive me, but we was inPatterson.
We was in Mitchell.
We was on Cypress.
(49:53):
We was on Reverend Polite.
We was up on 222nd.
We was giving out food whereverwe need to go, but when
people's giving you money, youcan't go nowhere but their
district and I want to be ableto work in the districts where
we needed boots on the ground.
Now, right now, we're workingwith a lot of different people.
(50:15):
I'm working with the Bangladesh.
I'm working with the Yemenis.
I'm working with the Africancommunity.
I'm working with the Church ofScientology, which a lot of
people consider them a cult.
I don't.
They got a lot of things goingon.
I don't know nothing abouttheir inner business, but I know
about their way to happiness.
I understand which I am anambassador for their way to
(50:39):
happiness.
I know about their drug-freezone, you understand, and their
human rights.
I've even been down to the UNto speak on human rights because
of them.
I work with the Yemenis, theBangladesh, the Africans.
Me and you met Brother Brownwith Sheikh Moussa Drummond.
Sheikh Moussa is an Africanthat was trying to put all the
(51:00):
gangs together but he had a few,and him and I stuck together
like white on rice because I'vebeen with him since 2000.
Oh my God, since 2017.
I've made more alliances.
I've worked with the Jewishcommunity.
You understand the Arabcommunity.
I've been places.
You understand that most of us.
(51:24):
I got brothers that come homefrom jail and they say yo, Tiny,
you doing this.
And I take them along.
They say, oh man, brother, wenever thought we'd be doing this
.
But, like I always told themand my mind has always been
moving, I've always beencreative.
My mother always said to meyou're very creative, you just
have to keep your mind going inthe right place, not the wrong
(51:46):
place.
And I've always wanted to workwith people.
I've always believed youunderstand, like I said earlier,
you understand words are morepowerful than guns.
Guns can kill you yes, they'repowerful, but words are stick.
You understand.
A gun can kill you, take yourlife, but words are stick you
with a person, no matter what.
When we think of Martin LutherKing, we think of I have a dream
(52:09):
.
Yes, we know he's dead, but wethink more of I have a dream.
Yes, we know he's dead, but wethink more of I have a dream,
and I'm not trying to be him oranybody else.
I want to be me, but I want tobe someone, and this is why I
brought TBS New Direction backthe Black Spades and the New
Direction.
I wanted to create the legacythat my elders tried to put
(52:31):
together but did not put there.
A lot of those elders are stillalive today.
A lot of them are principals, alot of them have very good jobs
, but, you know, they, they left.
They left things alone becauseof the positions that they're in
their hearts are still there,but they because now they got
big families and things likethat.
See, I didn't leave the streetsuntil, like, I was 57 years old
(52:54):
.
So I said to myself there's gotto be a better way Selling
drugs, taking drugs and all thatother good stuff.
You understand, it's got to bea better way, and that's why I
created TBS New Direction BlackSpades in a New Direction,
because now, since 2014 to theday I work with police.
(53:14):
You know I couldn't stand them.
I don't know and I tell them intheir face I couldn't stand
them.
I did the churches.
I don't care nothing about them.
But now I'm in the church, I'ma deacon in training, because
these are things that we lost.
Our communities have lost somany things.
When I grew up, we had thechurches that gave away food.
We had North Church you can goand play basketball.
(53:35):
We had all the gyms that youcan go into.
You understand there's nothingout there for our kids today and
everybody keep wondering whyour kids?
Well, now you know, since thevirus and you sit them down in
front of a TV.
They don't want to do anything.
Socialization is out becausenow games is in.
But look at the games.
It's all about killing.
Right, right, every game isabout killing.
Speaker 1 (54:00):
Right Now.
I don't mean to cut you off,but before we that's what I said
we need a part two and then weneed a part three.
So now, before we cut out, wehave some questions.
We have Rodney.
He says any books orpublications on Black Spade
(54:22):
history?
Speaker 3 (54:24):
As of right now.
No, we have a documentary thatwe're still trying to put
together.
It should have been out.
You understand I love thesister that put it together,
veronica Kitt.
She put together.
We showed it twice.
You understand, it's like threeyears in the making.
We're going on four and youknow I just did security with
the People's Film Festival thatshe's a part of and you know
(54:48):
it's like you don't cut off yournose to spite your face.
So I still work with her andshe's doing like we spoke.
She says she's trying to do it,she's trying to sell it, but
this documentary needs to comeout because it's like three
years in the making and while wesit back, we got other people
coming out with stuff.
But they need to learn thishistory because we speak a lot,
(55:11):
a lot of history of the Bronx inthat documentary.
So hopefully I pray and I praythat it come out because so many
of the brothers that was inthat documentary are dead today
and I pray to God that he let myeyes see it.
He let my eyes see it now.
Speaker 1 (55:28):
I want to now another thing real quick.
Uh, we got okay.
This person is just sayingBronx, Bronx.
Dell Projects is where theBlack Spades started.
Speaker 3 (55:39):
First Division Bronx, dell, soundview.
Now he's right.
As far as First Division, Idon't know Guru, and all of them
came from Soundview, from whatI know, Okay, because that's
where we had our meetings atSoundview, bronxdale was.
Now they might have put thefirst division because, see, the
(56:00):
elders didn't have divisions,the elders just came about as
there were seven powerfulbrothers, all karate, most of
them from Vietnam, most of themwas tired of the living
conditions of the project.
Now they might have what theFirst Division might have came
up.
That's where Bambolla's, fromthe Bronx River I'm not going to
(56:21):
say he's wrong, but Bronx River, bronxdale and Soundview.
To me, coming out of the South,bronx was the home of the space
and I was taught that Soundview,you understand, is our mother.
It was the mother of the spaceprojects and Bronxdale and Bronx
River gravitated on.
(56:42):
Now what division came out ofthis one or that one?
I couldn't tell them.
You understand.
God bless.
Soski, mike, crazy Mike, youunderstand.
Gumby, you understand all themdifferent brothers, blackie and
all of them.
I don't know what projects theylive in.
All I can tell you is that theywere my Spade brothers and they
came from up there, from thoseareas right right now.
Speaker 1 (57:04):
On that note, we will come back.
We will do another one of theseright here.
This is definitely needed inthe community.
We need interviews like this,the history and we got the
brother Tiny on for the BlackSpades history.
We need to know more about thatBlack Spades history, the time
(57:24):
periods.
You know the time periods inthe 60s, 70s, 80s, because now,
like in my mind as you'retelling me about Soundview,
right was the Black Spades andthen it went on to becoming the
Zulu Nation and then later onand now it's Sex Money, murder.
Speaker 3 (57:44):
Well, I don't have any information about the Sex
Money Murder.
Speaker 1 (57:49):
I know no no, no, I know, I'm just saying like how
the history changed.
Speaker 3 (57:54):
Oh, okay, the only history that I can give you.
Ok, sex money, murder I'veheard of, but the only history
that I know anything about isZulus and Black Spades and
Casanovas.
Because, see, first of all,casanovas, along with Zulus, are
in the history books, a lot ofhistory books.
My name is in a lot of historybooks.
I ain't getting no money for it, but they got it there.
(58:17):
But from Black Spades, when yousay the birth of a nation, the
Black Spades is the birth of anation of a lot of different
organizations Right For theBronx, exactly, the Black Spades
is the birth.
And you say Black Spades is thebirth of a nation of a lot of
different groups.
That's here in the South Bronxand I did not know that a lot of
(58:42):
our hip-hop brothers See, thisis how big Spades was.
I didn't know that Lovebug,starsky and a few other people
were all Black Spades.
Speaker 1 (58:51):
Hmm, hmm, that's some history right there Now.
On that note, we're going toclose out.
Thank you for coming out thisevening.
I really appreciate you.
We will see you in a fewminutes on another podcast and
we're out.
Peace you.
what's going on, everybody?
It's ron brown lmt, thepeople's fitness professional,
alongside my co-host mikey feverand this is a new yorker's
perspective mikey fever's in thebuilding.
Good to see you, brother mikeyfever.
Yes, he was out, man, he out.
Good to see you.
We got the brother Tiny in thebuilding.
Founder of TBS New Direction.
(00:30):
Tiny, I set you up this evening, man.
This is only part one.
This is only part one.
This is only part one.
We need a part two and we needa part three.
We need a part two and we needa part three.
So I want to start off, brotherTiny, I just want to let people
(00:50):
know how we met.
We met through the Brother Musa, sheikh Musa Dramik.
From what is it?
From Parkchester, right, yeah,from Parkchester, parkchester.
And you know it was all aboutsurrounding, like community work
and things like that.
And then, uh, I went to tiny's,um, uh, what was it?
(01:13):
Um, public safety dinner, right.
And then, oh, you remember that, damn, yeah yeah, you came.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
You came to the public safety dinner and you
also came to one of our um, Ithink it was one of our one of
our events Bookbag, or Christmasone of them.
Or New Year's, one of theevents we did.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
Yeah, it was a food give out, okay, yeah.
Speaker 3 (01:31):
Over there on Reverend Polite Boulevard.
Speaker 1 (01:36):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, Okay, yeah.
So I want people to know whoyou are, your history and things
like that.
So you, so you can run awaywith it.
Where were you born and raised?
Speaker 3 (01:51):
Well, first of all let me thank you, brothers, for
having me.
I was born in Harlem, in HarlemHospital.
I was born in Harlem Hospital,but I was raised up on 142nd
Street in Lenox Avenue before Imoved to the Bronx in the 50s,
early 60s.
(02:12):
Really, that's where I was born, the old Harlem Hospital, you
understand, on 135th Street, theold Harlem Hospital, yeah, yeah
.
Speaker 2 (02:24):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
And now so you move from 142nd Street, which is for
my hip hop fans.
That's Big L's block, that'sconsidered the danger zone.
Cam Ron is from over there andall that, max B.
Speaker 3 (02:40):
Well, you had a lot of good brothers that come from
over there.
You understand the Sickles, youunderstand the 143rd Street
crew.
I was young, you know, when Imoved out of there I went to
public school.
But a lot of these brothersfrom there that you have Lurch
and Bobby and all these otherdifferent brothers you
understand that grew up overtime.
You understand they got namesfor themselves one way or
(03:02):
another.
But Manhattan, money-makingManhattan, there's always
money-making Manhattan.
A lot of our good brothers comefrom that neighborhood.
But I had a young sister shepassed away now.
Her name was Patty.
She was born with musculardystrophy and in 115, where we
(03:24):
lived at in Harlem, right thereon the corner 115.
And we lived up on the topfloor and she couldn't walk so
we had to carry her up and downthe stairs.
So one year she got an inviteto the Jerry Lewis Telephone and
if I'm not mistaken which Idon't think I am Jerry Lewis
(03:45):
Telephone and if I'm notmistaken which I don't think I
am she was the very first blackfemale to be on the Jerry Lewis
Telephone with musculardystrophy and after hearing the
story of how she had multipleoperations and we had to carry
her back and forth up and downthe stairs.
It was the Jerry LewisTelephone people, whoever they
got in touch with they got intouch with.
(04:06):
They got us moved to the Bronxinto the projects on the first
floor.
This is when we came up toMonhaven Project and it's down
on 143rd Street, 143rd andAlexander Avenue, right across
the street from Patterson Houses, you understand, with tiny
yachts and all of that.
You know the brothers grew upthere.
You know I ran broccoli but wemoved there and that's where my
(04:31):
journey began.
You know I went to publicschool 49.
From there I went to ClarkJunior High School, where that's
where, you know, I understand,my journey at Clark Junior High
School really began as a member.
You know, my journey in ClarkJunior High School really began
as a member of the Black Spades.
You understand, like ourorganization is TBS that stands
for the Black Spades.
(04:52):
So my journey, my history, allstarted, you understand, from
junior high school, clark JuniorHigh School in the Bronx.
You know, and I was in thatschool.
You know, and I was in thatschool.
I got shot on Easter Sunday,okay real quick.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
You just said I just got shot.
Speaker 2 (05:14):
You just slipped that right through, like yeah, I
just got shot.
Speaker 3 (05:19):
Well, let me tell you something.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
What 16?
Speaker 3 (05:22):
I got shot in 1973 Easter Sunday.
I was selling papers out.
My grandmother lived, we livedon 142nd Street, my grandmother
lived on 145th Street and I hadfamily down there and that's
what kept me coming back andforth to Manhattan, even while I
was still in the Bronx.
And one Easter Sunday, 1973, meand my sisters and my cousins,
(05:47):
we were selling papers and I hadmy spade jacket on and one of
the brothers from the and Ithought I knew everybody down
there.
But you never know who youdon't know.
Found out later these peopleknew me, but we're not going to
go into that.
But anyway, he wanted to takemy jacket and I refused to give
(06:07):
up my jacket.
So I got and that's like 40, 50years ago damn.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
I have a question, though, right, how old were you?
Speaker 3 (06:13):
then I was um.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
I think I was about 16, 16, 16 years old yeah, I
have a question before, beforeyou got shot, before you wore
the jacket, what was the climatelike in the 70s?
We see it on television NewYork was run down.
Were you introduced to any?
Because on this podcast we wasasked were you introduced to any
(06:35):
school of thoughts like Nationof?
Speaker 3 (06:35):
Islam.
Well, when I was growing up,growing back to Harlem when I
was growing up, that's whenMartin Luther King was killed.
You understand, you know, a lotof our black leaders were
killed.
You know, and I wasn'tintroduced, my family didn't
have any history or any type ofrelationship to the Nation of
(06:59):
Islam and the Black Panthers.
It wasn't until I joined thespace that I was introduced to
the Nation of Islam and theBlack Panthers.
It wasn't until I joined thespace that I was introduced to
the Nation of Islam and theBlack Panthers.
The founders I'm not a founder.
I am one of the originalmembers from the 70s, but I'm
not a founder because thefounders came in the late 60s.
The founders of the BlackPanthers I mean founders of the
(07:21):
Black Space.
Their parents' roots come fromthe Nation of Islam and the
Black Panthers.
I mean founders of the Blackspace.
Their parents' roots come fromthe Nation of Islam and the
Black Panthers and that's howthe space was put together.
It was never, ever, ever, and Irepeat, ever, ever to be a gang
.
These brothers came, david, youunderstand David, you
understand Khalid.
(07:41):
You understand Bam Bam.
These brothers came together tomake a difference in the
community.
Oh, you understand Khalid, youunderstand Bam Bam.
These brothers came together tomake a difference in the
community Because, as you know,back in the 70s and coming into
the 80s, it was the dopeepidemic.
There wasn't no cracking andthat stuff.
This was all the dope, youunderstand, and you had your
little minor robberies, but notonly that.
A lot of people fail to hear,fail to realize.
(08:04):
In the 70s and 80s it was areal race war.
Now I'm going to call it a warbecause all the schools that's
up in the North Bronx, lehman,orlando, a lot of schools, high
(08:24):
schools that I'm speaking intoday, talking about Truman,
truman, and I'm living in theTruman area there ain't more
black people up here.
So we had a race war going onfor the schools.
It wasn't on the, you know, itonly spilled out on the street
if you came to the neighborhood.
There was a time we could notwalk on Fortin Road.
(08:48):
There was a time I live up inthe Co-op City area of the block
we couldn't walk up here.
And there's places up here nowthat still don't want you to
walk up here because of thecolor of your skin.
And these schools Roosevelt,you understand Roosevelt, the
bad, the Truman Kennedy allthese schools were white and
(09:11):
they did not want us.
And that's how black spacereally got a lot of their
reputation, because a lot of ourmembers and a lot of people
that we love sisters andbrothers and friends was going
to these schools and they wasgetting beat up and we used to
go to these schools and we usedto fight.
I mean, we used to fight.
Now, today people call itintegration.
We don't know who started it,we don't know.
(09:33):
We came in more and more andmore.
I'm not going to say that theSpades integrated anything, but
we came up there and put on ahell of a fight to let people
know who we were and that wewasn't going to stand tolerating
that nonsense.
So you know, that's how I wasintroduced to the Nation of
Islam and the Black Panthers,not to be a member, but the
(09:56):
familiarity of who they werebecause of the founders of the
space.
They never wanted us to be agang, they just wanted to stop
the robbery, stop the drugs intheir community up in the
Soundview section of the Bronx.
They had brothers that camefrom different parts of the
Bronx how they hang out beingblack Brothers just joined.
(10:17):
The next thing you know.
The next thing.
You know the numbers wasastronomical, you understand.
There was over 100,000 spadesin the Bronx alone 100,000
spades in the Bronx alone,100,000 spades.
That's wild Over 100,000 spadesin the Bronx alone.
You understand, we dominatedall five boroughs, but the Bronx
(10:39):
is the home Now.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
Wait before you go.
When the spades were aroundother, what other gangs were
around at that time?
Okay, you had.
Speaker 3 (10:51):
You had the skulls, you had the bachelors, a lot of
other gangs, a lot of gangs.
Okay, let's say you live there,I live here, we all spades.
But one day somebody on yourblock of a big status, a big
homie on your block of a bigstatus, a big homie on your
block, after they call me bighomie.
So I'm going to say big homieon your block, say, listen, man,
I want to be like this.
(11:14):
And if he had the numbers, youwould join.
Whatever he came, whatever namehe came up with, the Pearls,
the Saigon.
You understand, these are a lotof brothers in the space, but
they turn over.
And we had the Xing Ling Nomads, we had the Savage Girls, we
had the Bachelors, we had theReapers, we had a majority of
(11:36):
Spanish gangs, but you know alot of us.
We fought each other in thebeginning and then there was an
alliance because we realized,you understand, that fighting
each other wasn't doing nothingbut killing each other.
And we all had one big enemythe white gangs.
And when I say the white gangs,and I say it wherever I'm at
and I say it in front of, and Isay it whoever, you understand
(12:00):
the white gangs.
We also fought their parents,the police and their mothers and
their fathers, because that'swhat it was.
We were on their block.
They all came against us, youknow.
So you know it was just asystemic racist thing at that
time.
A lot of people won't say itbecause a lot of people wasn't
(12:21):
exposed to it, but anybody whowent to these schools in the 70s
and 80s all the schools thatyou heard me say earlier they
knew what it was like to beblack and up in these
neighborhoods.
And you know you ever look atthat movie, the Bronx Tale.
Yeah, yeah, okay, that wassomeone's.
(12:41):
Do you know that there was a busthat used to come through
Arthur Avenue?
That came from Evander?
No, not Evander, roseville orEvander, I think it was
Roseville.
That's up there near WhiteCastle.
They used to come through there.
You know they had to change thebus because the white folks
over there and you can do yourhistory, go on Google and see
(13:01):
for yourself there was a numberof bus I can't tell you what it
was that used to come throughthere.
They had to change the buses.
I don't know if MTA changed itor the white community going
through Arthur Avenue.
They did not want the blackkids coming through their
neighborhood.
They literally changed thebuses.
So you know you guys are youngerthan me.
(13:21):
I'm going on 70 years old.
Damn.
Six months, I'll be damn,there's 70.
Damn.
But anyway, you know.
There's a lot of things that Iwas exposed to.
And to answer the brotherquestion me myself, I was never
affiliated with the NationalIf-Nam or the Black Panthers,
but when I became a member ofthe Black Spades it was taught
(13:44):
to us why the spades came about.
Speaker 1 (13:49):
Now.
So the spades came aboutbecause there was a race war,
you said.
Speaker 3 (13:54):
It wasn't so much of a race war.
Okay, when the spades cameabout in Soundview, it was about
protecting their communitythrough the drugs the heroin,
because back in the 70s it wasan drugs the heroin, Because
back in the 70s and 80s it wasan epidemic of the heroin.
But they also came togetherbecause we fought in these
schools.
There's a lot of times that Iwent up to Rosalind Evander, not
(14:17):
Evander Okay, I got to get itstraight, I'll get it.
But there's a lot of times wewent up to schools to fight
because we had friends andfamily.
We didn't know that we was, wedidn't know that we was changing
anything.
We just went up there toprotect our space, our friends,
but, but, but.
But today, as I sit and I talkto you, I realize it was a race
(14:41):
war.
And I'll say it was a race war,you understand.
And it was a race war becausethese schools did not want
blacks in it.
They did not want blacks, theydidn't want blacks at all.
But as time changed, you see how, as time will go on and go on,
blacks, a lot of blacks and alot of Hispanics came into these
schools and stuff like that.
They couldn't help to change,because over time come change.
(15:01):
But in the beginning we didhave to fight and there's a lot
of people you understand thatthe police don't say the news
don't say that was hurting theseschools when we were younger,
because we had to fight tosurvive in these schools.
So space didn't come aboutbecause we were trying to change
things.
We came about because we wentto fight and we were one of the
(15:27):
leading groups to go up to theseschools.
Now other groups wanted to, butwe went to almost every school
to fight because we had friendsand relatives and families in
all these different schoolsthroughout the Bronx.
Speaker 1 (15:42):
So I didn't know.
The space actually started inSoundview.
I had no idea.
So now that's some historyright there.
Hold on, oh, where's my bomb?
My bomb is.
Hold on, let me get the maineffect.
There we go, there we go.
Speaker 2 (16:01):
It sounded like the Warriors movie the way you
described it.
Speaker 1 (16:06):
Yeah, so what was your position in the spades and
how did you get that?
How did you get your like ifyou had a top position, if you
reached your top position, howdid you get there?
Speaker 3 (16:16):
Well, I can't lie to you, brothers, and we did a
documentary and the documentaryis three years in the making.
Why so long, don't ask me, butI let the world know and I let
you know.
I used to run.
The spades came around, draftedpeople.
I ran.
I was more afraid of my mamathan the spades.
(16:37):
I ran.
And one day they got comments,and I'm going to say it.
They got comments, since Everytime they would chase me.
And I'm going to say it.
They got comments, since Everytime they would chase me I'd run
this way and went straight tothe building and got in the
house.
So one day they put people infront of the building and they
chased me, but this time theyhad people in front of the
(16:58):
building and I couldn't get in.
And they caught me.
I was drafted into the space.
It wasn't something that I wokeup and said I wanted to be a
part of.
Speaker 1 (17:08):
Before you.
Before you continue, I justwant to let the audience know,
because normally the audiencethey're used to five percenters
more as a nation of Islam, thetiny it was a part of, or how
can I say is a part of, or Iwould say of, was a part of, or
how can I say is a part of, or Iwould say of, was a part of in
the past.
The black speeds.
(17:28):
The black speeds, the blackspeeds was a gang in New York
that came about around what?
What time period?
Speaker 3 (17:37):
They came about around the sixties, the late
sixties, all the way up to the,all the way up to the eighties,
yeah, up to the 80s.
Speaker 1 (17:46):
Now my audience, the Black Spades.
Later on, I'm going to say forlack of a better term for my
audience to get it kind ofmorphed into Zulu Nation.
Speaker 3 (17:59):
Well, yes and no.
Speaker 1 (18:02):
Let's not give them that yet.
Let's not give them that.
But basically, black Spades andZulu Nation has a history
together and Zulu Nation has agreat influence on hip-hop
culture in New York City.
That's like the foundation.
So just to let everybody know,bring everybody up to speed.
(18:22):
So now you said they chased youand then you got recruited.
No, they drafted you, theydrafted him.
Speaker 3 (18:30):
You know, usually when they wanted somebody they'd
go draft him.
He had to fight and all thatstuff.
But they chased me for abouttwo months and, you understand,
I didn't think they had commonsense because I did the same
type of running every day Zoom,zoom, zoom, left, right, zoom.
So when they finally caught methey said you ain't got to walk
(18:51):
no line, you drafted.
So I got drafted into the spaceand I started off as a member
like everybody else.
You understand, and PattersonProjects on 143rd was the
headquarters, the 14th Divisionof Black Space.
I understand my president'sname was John Jones, I was under
his leadership and I was therewith them for a while.
After a while, after about six,seven months, there was another
(19:14):
division called the 17thDivision of Black Spades.
They was on Brook Avenue.
They got into a big war withthe Latin gangs down there and
what happened was they had aclubhouse down there and this
was one time that the clubhouse,the Latinos, they just burned
the whole building.
So they got burned out.
So what they did was they movedinto practicing projects with
(19:37):
us.
Now they was a powerful,powerful.
The 17th Division was apowerful division.
When you say nutty people, allthe nuts that came from the nut
house was in the 17th Divisionwas a powerful division.
When you say nutty people, allthe nuts came from the nuthouse
was in the 17th Division.
So they joined up with us for awhile and then, after a while I
mean we did a lot of fightingwhen the 17th came about.
(19:59):
So what happened was thepresident of the 17th became the
supreme commander of, not ofall spades, but of the South
Bronx.
He became the supreme presidentof the South Bronx.
The spades were so big thatthat monk, who was supreme of
(20:21):
all spades, gave Coke the titleof Supreme of the South Bronx.
So now I'm in the 14th.
Now I had moved over.
I come out of Mount Haven.
Around that time I waspresident of the Mount Haven
chapter.
We had a chapter in Mount Haven, we had a chapter in Millbrook,
we had a chapter in Jackson, wehad a chapter up in Morehouses.
(20:43):
So we had these differentchapters and when the 17th came
in, instead of now doing allthese chapters, they just
combined one division.
We all became the 17th Divisionof Black Space and I was raised
by my mother.
(21:05):
No father would my mother andmy mother raised me.
You understand that words weremore powerful than guns, even
though guns kill.
You understand, but words youunderstand.
Words of men stick around.
They remember us when we killed, but they remember their words
the most.
Speaker 2 (21:26):
So I mean I knew it.
Speaker 3 (21:28):
I wasn't one of those brothers.
You understand that jumped upand wanted to fight all the time
and do this and do that.
And I'm not ashamed to say Ididn't want to fight.
What I do today is what I didback then.
So what happened was Coltbrought me into the main we were
all 17, but there's like a mainbody and he brought me into the
(21:49):
main body and he gave me atitle.
I became Supreme Spokesman ofthe whole South Bronx because I
was in the Supreme Division andhe made me spokesman.
That means that at that time hewould send me.
I talked to the police, Italked to any different gang
groups, whatever.
(22:09):
I was the person that he sentout and the reason why he chose
me because he knew that if Icame back and said we had to go
to war, he knew it was serious.
If I came back and said to himman, we don't need to fight
these brothers, we need to makean alliance, or we need to stop
this or we need to stop that.
He took it for gospel and hebelieved me because he knew my
(22:32):
mind wasn't set on destroying,my mind was set on building.
Knew my mind wasn't set ondestroying.
My mind was set on building.
So I became my last position inthe space.
I became spokesman of the SouthBronx through the 17th because I
came from a Supreme building.
It gave me that title.
I came from a Supreme division.
It gave me that title Supremespokesman of the South Bronx.
(22:55):
I did not speak for every state, only in the South Bronx area
where Coke was Supreme Presidentof the South Bronx.
But Coke was one of thosebeautiful brothers to where
people from Brooklyn, statenIsland, upper Bronx, they all
came and they all gravitated tohim because he was a nice and he
(23:16):
was a gentle giant but he wasalso a beast.
When he had to be a beast healso knew that if I had to fight
I'd fight.
There was no problem about mejust speaking and not fighting.
It's like he gave me thatposition.
So that was the position that Ihad as spokesman for the South
(23:39):
Bronx.
Speaker 1 (23:41):
Got you.
Got you Check, check, check.
Good answer, got it Thorough.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
Before you go, boy, ron, as I'm listening to your
story.
It's very deep and compelling.
There was a documentary Iwatched years ago called 80
Blocks from Tiffany.
Is it similar to that?
Does it get into the?
I can't say.
I recalled it.
You don't remember 80 Blocksfrom Tiffany?
It's about old gangs in NewYork they spoke about, you know.
Speaker 3 (24:05):
Well, you know, okay, I'm out of the South Bronx and
the original members and a lotof other divisions up in the
North Bronxx and you know thingslike that.
So a lot of times we all joinedtogether, we had monthly
meetings where we, where everydivision, came together.
That's why I could tell youthere was over 103 divisions in
(24:25):
the bronx alone and, um, we cametogether.
But a lot of us did a lot ofdifferent things and I'll
explain to that to you in aminute.
Because up, up, up, up, up, up,up, up, up, up, up, up, up, up,
up, up, up, up, up, up, up, up,up, up, up, up, up, up, up, up,
up, up, up, up, up, up, up, up,up, up, up, up, up, up, up, up,
up, up, up, up, up, up, up, up,up, up up.
(24:46):
Black Pearls and thePeacemakers you see that took
place up there.
That didn't take place.
Now we had a peace.
We was in St Mary's Park.
(25:06):
We had a peace meeting downthere, but it wasn't as popular
as the one uptown where thetreaties were signed, because
all the main divisions up theregot together and it was in there
for that peace treaty.
Now, when we was in St Mary'sGym down there.
We had the Bachelors, we had afew ghetto brothers, the Spades
(25:28):
At that time.
We had Black Magics, a fewother people.
We came together but we didn'thave a lot of press and a lot of
things like that down therecovering our things and they had
to press up there.
So when they had the peacetreaty, it was up there.
I wasn't a part of that.
We had our area, they had theirarea, but we came together if
those areas had to fight.
(25:49):
I was one of therepresentatives that put the
17th together with the educationof Sonny Carson.
I was sent to negotiate with afew other brothers.
This is the first time when Isat down with Champ and Wine.
Champ was the Supreme Presidentof the Tomahawks and Wine was
(26:15):
the Supreme President of theJolly Stompers.
And Sonny Carson has passed awaynow but he tried to bring the
gangs together for to puttogether his movie, which I
think y'all might have seen theEducation of Sonny Carson
classic we was in that and Icoached him to represent that
(26:35):
and I went and spoke and we wasin that and Coach sent me to
represent that and I went andspoke and I got us in that.
Also the Warriors when theysent me out as a spokesman and I
spoke for my area.
We got a lot of brothers in theWarriors but we got kicked out
of everything.
They kicked us out ofeverything.
We went to Brooklyn and we wentto fight Because you know it's
that macho stuff.
You ain't saying nothing to me,brother, you're going to talk
(27:00):
different and you know peopleare going to talk the way they
talk.
But because we came from theBronx and they was from Brooklyn
, we had to just it was a thingwhere we just going to let them
know where we come from.
So we got kicked out of.
To Sonny Costner we had somevery important roles but I think
more or less the producers werescared of us because there was
a scene where there was a hellof a big fight and only God
(27:23):
spared people life becausenobody was killed or really hurt
, but it was a lot.
It was a huge fist fight andwhen they sent us back to the
Bronx they did.
Don't bring them back, don'tbring them back, please don't
bring them back, don't bring himback, please don't bring him
back.
So that's when you know.
But we were in that, we were inthat and if they didn't kick us
out, I had a major speakingrole in that my brother Bo.
(27:45):
My brother Bo was playing oneof the brothers near Sonny
Carson and now the Warriors.
We just got that part.
We were just part of thescenery.
You see, we were part of thescenery because my godmother you
could also Google this Her namewas Marion Rose.
She was one of the first blackdistrict leaders in the South
Bronx.
(28:05):
She got us involved and I spokewith her project, even as a
black spade it was calledProject Justice, and I spoke,
spoke, I did a lot of speakingwith her.
Jose serrano, one of our firstum um district leaders too.
I she introduced me to a lot ofthese people, you understand,
(28:26):
when I was younger.
So she got us involved with alot of things as being one of
the first black district leadersin the south Bronx, you know.
So a lot of things came to herand she, of course, she brought
it to me being my godmother, andI got the spades involved.
Speaker 2 (28:43):
Okay, little boy.
Speaker 1 (28:44):
Okay, I want to Remember that right.
Yo we got Urban.
What is this?
Just the studios?
I have a question.
It was said that there werePuerto Ricans in the spades from
the beginning.
(29:04):
Is that accurate?
Speaker 3 (29:06):
Yes, it is.
Yes, it is.
Let me break it down.
You got to remember we camefrom NYCHA houses where black,
puerto Rican Chinese all livedtogether.
Because you was Puerto Rican,you didn't join the Puerto Rican
gang.
I was in one of the first PuertoRican gangs before I was a
(29:30):
black spade, you understand, andit was called the Green
Barrettes and they came out ofmy junior high school before I
became a black space.
I was only in it for aboutmaybe six or seven months, but I
was.
I was the only black thatdidn't understand a word of
spanish, and I still don't, butI knew when to run.
That's all I need to know.
(29:52):
And I knew when to.
You could tell by the languagewhen to fight and you could tell
by the language when to run.
And in the South Bronx, wherewe came out of I was in my haven
projects and we had white space.
We had a Chinese space Okay, Idon't know if Chet is still
(30:13):
alive, mickey is gone.
We had black space.
There was at least about 40, 50percent Latinos in the black
space the bachelors, that's anall Hispanic gang.
They had blacks.
So it wasn't like because youhad a Latino gang or you had a
(30:34):
black gang.
Now, we wasn't in the whitegangs, none of us.
So you can forget that.
But it's not like you was in ablack gang or a white gang that
you didn't have.
If you was in a Latino gang,you didn't have no blacks, or
you was in a black gang youdidn't have no Latinos.
All these gangs was mixed and wehad Puerto Ricans, we had
whites, matter of fact,soundview there was brothers
(30:56):
that was white, that came out ofSoundview Because you remember,
we coming out of NYCHA housing,we coming out where we grew up
before the gangs even came about, we growing up with friends who
were our next door neighbors.
Chad lived in my building.
Mickey, who was Chinese, liveddown the block.
They were Chinese.
In the black space there wasonly was Chinese lived on the
(31:17):
block.
They were Chinese.
In the black space there wasonly one white, but he still was
Chinese.
We had about four or fivewhites that came out of Mount
Haven.
That was in the black space.
We had a bunch of brothers thatwere Latinos that came out the
black space.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
You said 40-50% Latino.
Speaker 3 (31:36):
I would say 40-50% were Latinos.
That was in the black space, Idon't doubt it.
Speaker 1 (31:41):
I don't doubt it either.
Speaker 2 (31:44):
Grew up in the same community.
That's why I find it very oddwhen people try to say Latinos
were not part of hip-hop,especially Puerto Ricans.
That's BS.
Speaker 3 (31:51):
They were there, you know, when we go into hip-hop
I'm going to go into thatbecause that's a whole different
scenario but during the gangdays, every gang, every gang had
Blacks in it.
If you was Latino, they hadBlacks in it.
If you was Black, we hadLatinos in it.
And if you came from ourneighborhood, there was no
discrimination.
(32:11):
And even though we fought thewhite gangs gangs, we had white
people in our gang.
We had white boys in our gangsthat came out of my projects,
but they put on them jackets.
They fought like we fought.
So there was white boys.
You understand, I can't talkabout everybody else, but I will
(32:32):
say that there was whites.
When we had four whites thatcame out of my building in Mount
Haven on 143rd and WillisAvenue and when I was told we
had about one or two I'm notgoing to put numbers on it a
couple of whites that came outof Soundview.
So we did have these gangs wereintegrated.
Now we didn't have more PuertoRicans than we had whites in a
(32:57):
black gang, and the Spanish ganghad more blacks than they had
Latinos, but we were integrated.
Speaker 1 (33:05):
Right, gotcha, that's a check.
Now you became a spokesman forthe South Bronx.
Okay, now, what year was thisand what was the journey from
that point?
Speaker 3 (33:22):
Well, the journey from that point I got shot in
1972, 73.
72?
1972 I got shot and I became,spoke, took over and I became in
73.
So after that I mean everythingthat we talked about was doing
that journey I went, I went, Iwent away.
(33:43):
I went to jail in 1974 and Iand I did, I did one and a half
to three.
I came back home in 1976.
Speaker 1 (33:51):
What did you go to jail for?
Speaker 3 (33:53):
Oh boy, a number of things.
Uh, basically a number of bunchof weapons.
My thing was weapons andshootings.
When they say gang members wentto jail for robbery, you know
what their robberies was?
Speaker 2 (34:08):
What's that?
Speaker 3 (34:09):
It wasn't even taking your money, but taking another
brother's jacket, becausejackets was trophies to us.
So I had, I've had a number offirearms arrests and and one or
two robberies, but basicallyfirearms and um, today I filed
for a certificate of relief, youunderstand, so that, uh, I
(34:33):
could have my, my recordexpunged because of all the
things that I'm doing now and asof right now.
In the next four or five weeksI will hear if they grant my
request because I just today,just finished my investigation
Today and I just hope and praybecause I want to go into
(34:56):
politics, even at my age, and Iwant my fire on because I have
put together black spacesecurity services.
I can't put my name and stuffon a lot of papers right now
because it's woodwork, but oncethey have plunged my record,
I'll be able to put my name onall my creations.
Right now I have to go to otherpeople on my creations.
(35:16):
Right now I have to go throughother people, but when my name
is cleared I'll be able to putmy name on everything that I
create.
Speaker 1 (35:24):
Now you get out and you do a one to three, one and a
half to three, okay.
So now you did one and a half,yeah, okay.
And then you get out.
And then what's the next step?
Speaker 3 (35:38):
When I came home, the games was basically actually
the games was over.
You had a few diehards thatstill walked around when I came
home.
Now it was called Cruz and whenI came home, my little brother,
god bless his soul.
His name was Peanut.
He was in charge of theCasanova crew and I used to be
(36:00):
around him off and on, but Ididn't want to be around because
I just came home and I wasn'ttrying to be around them.
Young boys.
Then my same godmother, marionRose.
She came to me and you're goingto laugh at this one.
She came to me.
She said, tanya, I need you todo me a favor.
She brought this little skinnykid with her.
(36:20):
She said I need for you andyour people to protect them.
I said I'm not into that, nomore, I'm Godmother.
She said Tiny, you know, I knowyou.
You know, I know you.
She brought Grandmaster Flashto me.
That's who he was.
It was Grandmaster FlashBecause at that time that's when
(36:44):
they played music in the parksand they had little, they didn't
have a lot of, they didn't havemusic in the park and in the
houses and things like thatPeople was coming in, robbing
the sets and doing things likethat.
So she said to me I want you tolook out for him.
And this was 1976 when I metgrandmaster flash.
She said I want you to makesure that's when I came home and
I was home for a little bit.
(37:04):
I want you to watch this boyand protect him.
I never knew their relationship.
So at that time the casanovacrew was run by Peanut and at
that time and the Casanova crewwas one of the biggest Casanova
crew come from the space too,along with Zulus.
So most of the Casanovas werebaby space.
(37:25):
So we put them under our wingand we protected them.
We made sure he never gotrobbed and all that thing.
I wind up working withGrandmaster for Flash for about
when they went up, until I wentto Sylvia and they went to
Sylvia and I met him in 76.
They went to Sylvia in the 80s,late 80s, early 90s.
(37:47):
One of the two I was with Flashwhen he was three MCs him,
creole and his brother and thenit was the four MCs.
Okay, it was three MCs, fourMCs and then the Furious Five,
it was Melly Mel, his brother,kid Creole.
The three MCs it was three, nottwo, but three Cowboy, melly
(38:11):
Mel and Kid Creole.
Then they brought in Mr Ness.
Mr Ness came along when theywas in 18th Park.
Then came Raheem, and Raheemwas a part of the with Shah Rok.
He was part of Fearless Furious4.
I forgot what it was.
(38:33):
Please forgive me, but he waspart of Shah Rok and the team.
Then, all of a sudden, hejoined Flash and his team and
that's when they became theFurious Five.
Now you made a statement beforeabout Puerto Ricans and hip-hop.
I'm going to make thisstatement and I'm going to make
it a live statement.
There were Puerto Ricans inhip-hop, but it wasn't that many
(38:54):
.
You can count them CharlieChase, oc and there was Latin
Brothers.
But when you say hip-hop, therewas a bunch of kids.
There wasn't no race there andpeople will get offended.
There was more blacks thananything else.
So this wasn't a Latin culture,this was a Black culture.
(39:24):
But you got to remember thatLatinos hung out with the Blacks
.
We didn't have no Jamaicanmusic back then in our area.
You might have.
You went into a Jamaican area.
You heard it.
Okay, there wasn't a lot ofSpanish speaking groups going on
.
Now, when they start getting onthe Latin hustle and all that,
you start hearing more and moreand more.
But when you came to theseparties, then after a while some
parties played some Latin musicthey didn't know if somebody,
(39:46):
but these things was allBlack-coordinated.
When I say Black-coordinated,it wasn't like it was
orchestrated to just be blacks.
Anybody could have got it.
But it wasn't a lot of Latinosin MCs or DJs.
Yes, you had some Right now.
Charlie Chase, to me, was oneof the biggest ones, but I don't
(40:10):
think he made too many recordsor maybe didn't make a record,
but nobody pays him any mind,but he's one of the first
Latinos OC.
They had Spanish brothers, thatwas MCs, but this was basically
, like I said, a Black-orientedthing.
(40:32):
And I'm going to say this was ayouth thing and it didn't have
no color.
Yes, there was more Blacks thanPuerto Ricans, but this was a
youth thing and it didn't haveno color.
Yes, there was more blacks thanPuerto Ricans, but this was a
youth thing.
The youth put this together.
Now, when you came to thebreakdancing and when you came
to the graffiti, you still youhad black and Spanish.
Now Latinos started taking over, but you had a lot of blacks.
(40:55):
That was breakdancing.
Then all of a sudden, everybodygot involved.
You start seeing more Latinosthan blacks when it came to
breakdancing and things likethat.
And I heard you say a minute agowhere Africa Bambaataa, africa
Bambaataa, and I knew, as far asI was concerned, okay, he was a
Spade up from the South Bronx,not from the Soundview section
(41:20):
of the Bronx, and we didn'tfight together.
We didn't go to no warstogether.
He was all right with me.
He created the Zulu nation.
A lot of our Spade brothers, alot of my Spade brothers, were
with him.
Bam Barter put together adynamic organization.
(41:40):
I'm not going to go intoanything other than that.
I'll give him his credits ofputting together a dynamic
organization.
But back in the 70s theCasanovas and the Zulus all came
from spades.
They were the two most powerfulcrews.
Now we had the nine crews.
The nine crews was powerful andsome of the nine crews were
black spades.
(42:00):
Actually, brother, a lot of thecrews, the stick-up kids and
all that a lot of them came fromthe spades.
But the Zulus and Casanovaswere the two most powerful crews
in the South Bronx.
Zulus and Casanovas were thetwo most powerful crews in the
South Bronx and the Zulus wereBambata and Mario and Casanovas
(42:21):
was Flash, was never robbed.
Anytime there was any fighting.
We did it, zulus did it fortheirs, we did it for ours.
They were the two most powerfulcrews in the South and they
don't get the recognition.
Zulus get it, but Casanovasdon't get the recognition
because, you know, castellanosdon't get the recognition
because Flash has never beenrobbed and never been hurt and
these were.
(42:41):
We stayed with them up untilthey went to Sylvia Robinson and
we stayed with them for alittle while and they didn't.
I mean me and Flash got alongvery well.
You know, I got along with theMC's too.
We all had our own macho thing,but we all got along.
But Sylvia Robinson didn't wantthe Casanova crew because, see,
we got paid, we got paid, wegot paid and we got hired.
(43:06):
There's not a promoter andlisten to what I'm saying to you
there's not a promoter, a DJ,mc, graffiti artist,
breakdancers from the 70s thatdon't know who I am.
All my organization, theCasanova crew, and whether they
like me or they don't like me,they know who I am.
(43:28):
But that's back then and wemove forward.
And today we're doing biggerand better things.
And I still use the Spade namesbecause, like I said, my
brothers, our elders of theSpades, never created the Spades
to be a gang.
They never created it to be agang.
(43:53):
They wanted to be a group ofbrothers that came together that
protect their neighborhood,protect the sound room section
of the block, and fight.
We call it racism now, we callit racism to them too, but fight
the racism that was in front ofour eyes in our schools because
, like I said, a lot of said alot of brothers you understand a
(44:15):
lot of brothers.
You understand below 30, don'teven know the fight that took
place and how not only just theSpades, but other gangs, latino
gangs how they all had to gointo these schools.
I say we took a major rolebecause we fought in every
school.
Speaker 1 (44:32):
Every school.
I say we took a major rolebecause we fought in every
school.
Now I want to say this to UrbanXG Studios we have an email
it's the name of the show atgmailcom.
It's the name of the shownyptalkshow at gmailcom.
(44:54):
You can email us and we'll giveyou an hour to explain all of
this.
Another thing I want to say isthat we will soon have an
in-person podcast, and thatin-person podcast in the studio
we're going to have someonethere who's like, I would say, a
legendary martial artist namedJerry Fontenay, who's like a, I
would say, a legendary, uh,martial artist named jerry
(45:16):
fontenaz, who's also a breaker,so he would know, and he's
puerto rican, so he would knowthe history, you know, I mean.
Well, he's about to be 60 yearsold, so he's another generation
though, uh, but you know he, hewould be, he will, he'll.
I will have him explain all ofthat as well.
As far as, as far as breakdancing, because you said, uh,
(45:38):
breakers and, uh, you saidgraffiti artists.
Uh, to the.
To the guy in the chat yeah, um, go ahead, marion, my bad tiny
yeah, well, you know.
Speaker 3 (45:47):
If we're going back to the breakers and graffiti
artists, let me tell yousomething.
You know.
You know at first it was a lotof black but everybody got
involved with that, just like alot of Latinos, with the break
dancing, you know, and thegraffiti, you understand there
was a lot of.
I'm just trying to remember.
You've got to remember my mind.
I don't remember a lot of thesebrothers.
(46:07):
You're going back to the 70s,but we had a lot of.
We had Lava who, but we had alot of.
We had Lava who was a spade whohas passed away.
He was one of the biggestgraffiti artists.
We had Stay High.
You understand Stay High mustbe hit every rock, every bridge
in the city of New York.
Back then he became, he waspublic enemy number one to the
(46:31):
police.
He was going upstate hittingrocks places.
Just what is he doing up here?
Stay high was good.
So you know these greatgraffiti artists.
Today they do, they're doingtheir thing.
I stopped getting involved witha lot of things around about oh,
after I left Flash and whenthey went to Sylvia Robertson in
(46:54):
the 90s.
I just fade out from everything.
I really didn't believe in rap,okay, and basically, I was in
it, you understand.
I got my little.
I put them little brotherstogether, I polished them up and
I made them into one of themost powerful security groups in
the Bronx and we got paid.
But after we left Flash, Ididn't have no interest and I'm
(47:15):
not, you know.
I went on to a whole lot ofdifferent things, and it wasn't
until 2014 that I decided toleave the streets alone.
I came out the street late, butI decided to leave this alone,
leave that alone.
I never went back to jail,though, that's for sure.
(47:35):
So I haven't been to jail since1984.
I was 86 when I came home in 86, but my last arrest was 84.
I have not been arrested sincethen, so you know.
And then in 2014, I decided Iwas tired.
I was 50-something years old.
I was tired of the streets,tired of what I'm going through.
I've been with my wife for 44years.
(47:57):
She's a former correctionofficer.
She put up with my mess, I putup with my mess, my kids put up
with my mess.
I just woke up and said tomyself it's time I went back to
school.
I got my Bachelor of Artsdegree.
I went back for a little while,you understand Metropolitan
College, where I want to go backto to get my master's.
But between that I started amentoring program, TBS New
(48:21):
Direction, black Spades in a NewDirection.
I'm the president of BlackSpades Security Services.
I put the Black Spades SecurityServices together because a lot
of our young brothers andsisters don't understand, even
though they got records, theycan still work for a security
company.
They can't be a guard and noone can be a guard without a
(48:42):
license.
But there's things you can do.
You can drive a vehicle and goout and make sure people's on
their job.
You can't be a guard, but youcan do these things.
See, and this is things thatthat I've learned on my journey
of all, my journey of trying tobe successful in life.
And TBS new direction is a 501C three organization but we
(49:09):
don't get.
We don't get no money fromnobody because, see, I still
take my concept from the spadesas being one of the largest
street gangs in the city of NewYork.
Where we go where we want to go,I go into different places.
You understand how I met youcoming up there.
You understand the St Raymond'sChurch and doing here and going
there, I go where we need to goto meet people, to network, and
(49:33):
if I was getting funded byanybody, they don't want us to
go With the food.
You came out with us with thefood.
We was on Jackson.
We was on Reverend PoliteBoulevard on 77th Street.
We was in St Mary's.
We was in Mott Haven.
We was in Patterson Well, wewasn't in Mott Haven, please
forgive me, but we was inPatterson.
We was in Mitchell.
We was on Cypress.
(49:53):
We was on Reverend Polite.
We was up on 222nd.
We was giving out food whereverwe need to go, but when
people's giving you money, youcan't go nowhere but their
district and I want to be ableto work in the districts where
we needed boots on the ground.
Now, right now, we're workingwith a lot of different people.
(50:15):
I'm working with the Bangladesh.
I'm working with the Yemenis.
I'm working with the Africancommunity.
I'm working with the Church ofScientology, which a lot of
people consider them a cult.
I don't.
They got a lot of things goingon.
I don't know nothing abouttheir inner business, but I know
about their way to happiness.
I understand which I am anambassador for their way to
(50:39):
happiness.
I know about their drug-freezone, you understand, and their
human rights.
I've even been down to the UNto speak on human rights because
of them.
I work with the Yemenis, theBangladesh, the Africans.
Me and you met Brother Brownwith Sheikh Moussa Drummond.
Sheikh Moussa is an Africanthat was trying to put all the
(51:00):
gangs together but he had a few,and him and I stuck together
like white on rice because I'vebeen with him since 2000.
Oh my God, since 2017.
I've made more alliances.
I've worked with the Jewishcommunity.
You understand the Arabcommunity.
I've been places.
You understand that most of us.
(51:24):
I got brothers that come homefrom jail and they say yo, Tiny,
you doing this.
And I take them along.
They say, oh man, brother, wenever thought we'd be doing this
.
But, like I always told themand my mind has always been
moving, I've always beencreative.
My mother always said to meyou're very creative, you just
have to keep your mind going inthe right place, not the wrong
(51:46):
place.
And I've always wanted to workwith people.
I've always believed youunderstand, like I said earlier,
you understand words are morepowerful than guns.
Guns can kill you yes, they'repowerful, but words are stick.
You understand.
A gun can kill you, take yourlife, but words are stick you
with a person, no matter what.
When we think of Martin LutherKing, we think of I have a dream
(52:09):
.
Yes, we know he's dead, but wethink more of I have a dream.
Yes, we know he's dead, but wethink more of I have a dream,
and I'm not trying to be him oranybody else.
I want to be me, but I want tobe someone, and this is why I
brought TBS New Direction backthe Black Spades and the New
Direction.
I wanted to create the legacythat my elders tried to put
(52:31):
together but did not put there.
A lot of those elders are stillalive today.
A lot of them are principals, alot of them have very good jobs
, but, you know, they, they left.
They left things alone becauseof the positions that they're in
their hearts are still there,but they because now they got
big families and things likethat.
See, I didn't leave the streetsuntil, like, I was 57 years old
(52:54):
.
So I said to myself there's gotto be a better way Selling
drugs, taking drugs and all thatother good stuff.
You understand, it's got to bea better way, and that's why I
created TBS New Direction BlackSpades in a New Direction,
because now, since 2014 to theday I work with police.
(53:14):
You know I couldn't stand them.
I don't know and I tell them intheir face I couldn't stand
them.
I did the churches.
I don't care nothing about them.
But now I'm in the church, I'ma deacon in training, because
these are things that we lost.
Our communities have lost somany things.
When I grew up, we had thechurches that gave away food.
We had North Church you can goand play basketball.
(53:35):
We had all the gyms that youcan go into.
You understand there's nothingout there for our kids today and
everybody keep wondering whyour kids?
Well, now you know, since thevirus and you sit them down in
front of a TV.
They don't want to do anything.
Socialization is out becausenow games is in.
But look at the games.
It's all about killing.
Right, right, every game isabout killing.
Speaker 1 (54:00):
Right Now.
I don't mean to cut you off,but before we that's what I said
we need a part two and then weneed a part three.
So now, before we cut out, wehave some questions.
We have Rodney.
He says any books orpublications on Black Spade
(54:22):
history?
Speaker 3 (54:24):
As of right now.
No, we have a documentary thatwe're still trying to put
together.
It should have been out.
You understand I love thesister that put it together,
veronica Kitt.
She put together.
We showed it twice.
You understand, it's like threeyears in the making.
We're going on four and youknow I just did security with
the People's Film Festival thatshe's a part of and you know
(54:48):
it's like you don't cut off yournose to spite your face.
So I still work with her andshe's doing like we spoke.
She says she's trying to do it,she's trying to sell it, but
this documentary needs to comeout because it's like three
years in the making and while wesit back, we got other people
coming out with stuff.
But they need to learn thishistory because we speak a lot,
(55:11):
a lot of history of the Bronx inthat documentary.
So hopefully I pray and I praythat it come out because so many
of the brothers that was inthat documentary are dead today
and I pray to God that he let myeyes see it.
He let my eyes see it now.
Speaker 1 (55:28):
I want to now another thing real quick.
Uh, we got okay.
This person is just sayingBronx, Bronx.
Dell Projects is where theBlack Spades started.
Speaker 3 (55:39):
First Division Bronx, dell, soundview.
Now he's right.
As far as First Division, Idon't know Guru, and all of them
came from Soundview, from whatI know, Okay, because that's
where we had our meetings atSoundview, bronxdale was.
Now they might have put thefirst division because, see, the
(56:00):
elders didn't have divisions,the elders just came about as
there were seven powerfulbrothers, all karate, most of
them from Vietnam, most of themwas tired of the living
conditions of the project.
Now they might have what theFirst Division might have came
up.
That's where Bambolla's, fromthe Bronx River I'm not going to
(56:21):
say he's wrong, but Bronx River, bronxdale and Soundview.
To me, coming out of the South,bronx was the home of the space
and I was taught that Soundview,you understand, is our mother.
It was the mother of the spaceprojects and Bronxdale and Bronx
River gravitated on.
(56:42):
Now what division came out ofthis one or that one?
I couldn't tell them.
You understand.
God bless.
Soski, mike, crazy Mike, youunderstand.
Gumby, you understand all themdifferent brothers, blackie and
all of them.
I don't know what projects theylive in.
All I can tell you is that theywere my Spade brothers and they
came from up there, from thoseareas right right now.
Speaker 1 (57:04):
On that note, we will come back.
We will do another one of theseright here.
This is definitely needed inthe community.
We need interviews like this,the history and we got the
brother Tiny on for the BlackSpades history.
We need to know more about thatBlack Spades history, the time
(57:24):
periods.
You know the time periods inthe 60s, 70s, 80s, because now,
like in my mind as you'retelling me about Soundview,
right was the Black Spades andthen it went on to becoming the
Zulu Nation and then later onand now it's Sex Money, murder.
Speaker 3 (57:44):
Well, I don't have any information about the Sex
Money Murder.
Speaker 1 (57:49):
I know no no, no, I know, I'm just saying like how
the history changed.
Speaker 3 (57:54):
Oh, okay, the only history that I can give you.
Ok, sex money, murder I'veheard of, but the only history
that I know anything about isZulus and Black Spades and
Casanovas.
Because, see, first of all,casanovas, along with Zulus, are
in the history books, a lot ofhistory books.
My name is in a lot of historybooks.
I ain't getting no money for it, but they got it there.
(58:17):
But from Black Spades, when yousay the birth of a nation, the
Black Spades is the birth of anation of a lot of different
organizations Right For theBronx, exactly, the Black Spades
is the birth.
And you say Black Spades is thebirth of a nation of a lot of
different groups.
That's here in the South Bronxand I did not know that a lot of
(58:42):
our hip-hop brothers See, thisis how big Spades was.
I didn't know that Lovebug,starsky and a few other people
were all Black Spades.
Speaker 1 (58:51):
Hmm, hmm, that's some history right there Now.
On that note, we're going toclose out.
Thank you for coming out thisevening.
I really appreciate you.
We will see you in a fewminutes on another podcast and
we're out.
Peace you.
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