Tag Archives: 47th street

Tis the Season BET ON CRAZY

My boss at the diamond exchange hailed from Brownsville, one of the toughest neighborhood in Brooklyn and those streets bred its own language. For years Manny greeted Christmas shoppers to his diamond store with the phrase ‘there is no season for giving’. His son Richie Boy tried on many occasions to explain that he was […]

THE VALUE OF IGNORANCE by Peter Nolan Smith

The 2013 Christmas season had been a disaster on 47th Street. Back in the 1990s I usually sold close to a quarter of a million in jewelry and my commissions provided a healthy six-month cushion for the winter, however in 2013 my sales from Thanksgiving to the Winter Equinox totaled less than $25000. After Xmas […]

The Bliss of Fake Bling

Tiffany’s on 5th Avenue has a very special return policy for its jewelry. “Go down to 47th Street to sell it.” Many other people seek to transform jewelry into cash on the busy block between 5th And 6th Avenues. Some are in possession of estates or family heirloom. A few are thieves, but many are […]

Chuck Norris Ain’t Shit

The other day a young woman entered our diamond exchange to sell a diamond ring. I examined the goods. The stones were poor quality, but I saw about $500 in it. “Come with me.” I sherried her over to my friend. Eddie needed the business and I owed him $200 from a sale in early […]

LOVE YOU LONG TIME – CHAPTER 1 by Peter Nolan Smith

In the summer of 1986 I shared my bed with a raven-haired flamenco dancer from Madrid. In late August Elana’s boyfriend called from New England in late August. She left for Gloucester the next day. My elderly Puerto Rican neighbor cursed me in Spanish. The Honduran super translated Mrs. Adorno’s words to inform me that […]