Here are some more interesting snippets from, “King Of The Cats”:

On Hazel Scott’s (Adam Clayton Powell’s 2nd wife) Run-In With Gangster Bugsy Siegel: “Scott was, however, one of the first Blacks to get work in Las Vegas, along with Sammy Davis Jr., and Nat King Cole. She took her pride to the desert. A gangster- at the time she didn’t know he was a gangster- once spotted her in a Las Vegas lounge, relaxing. ‘Get out of here,’ the gangster said. Scott wouldn’t budge. ‘What are you going to do, kill me?’ she replied…Bugsy Siegel left the proud woman alone.

On Jackie Robinson’s Connection To New York Politics: “Jackie Robinson was a community affairs adviser to Rockefeller [New York’s Republican Governor].”

On James Meredith’s Connection To New York Politics: “Then, in what they concluded was a brilliant stroke, the Republicans decided to extend full backing to a young Columbia Law School student who was also an army veteran: James Meredith. Meredith represented both tragedy and hope in America. He had been forced to walk a gauntlet shielded by federal marshals at the University of Mississippi, which he integrated in 1962. Then, on June 6, 1966, while embarking on a voting rights march in the South, he was shot. Moving north, to New York City, Meredith entered Columbia Law School. He was a shy young man, and painfully aloof; the latter attribute gave acquaintances the feeling that he was either a stark visionary or had suffered unbearable mental stress which had permanently marked his personality.

‘The Republican Party made me an offer: full support for the seat, in every way, everything,’ recalled Meredith. Meeting in the comfort of swank hotel rooms with men sent by Rockefeller himself, Meredith found the overtures inviting; victory was made to look, and sound, quite possible. Access to the state’s top Republicans gave him a heady feeling: ‘I didn’t deal with details, and I didn’t deal with people who didn’t matter.’ He announced his candidacy.

Harlemites knew little of James Meredith; his presence had not been felt in the community. His currency as tragic hero meant nothing to local people, who saw him as a dupe of the Republicans…Pummeled with criticism from both Harlemites and national organizations such as SNCC and CORE that were sympathetic to Powell, Meredith was forced to retreat within a week’s time to rethink his position.”

On Columbia University’s Early Gentrification Of Harlem: “When Columbia University began moving into Harlem, taking over buildings and dislocating the poor, in the spring of 1968, it ignited angry student demonstrations. Administration buildings were stormed; students were handcuffed and paraded off to jail. It was the kind of demonstration made for Powell’s politics. He called meetings in his church basement and delivered a paper attacking the administration: ‘The Massacre of Harlem by Columbia University.'”

Adam Clayton Powell & The New York Knicks: “The Knicks were a uniquely synchronized team, a team of players like Bill Bradley and Walt Frazier, Willis Reed and Dick Barnett. They were a group of individualists who had managed to put the concept of team first. And Adam Clayton Powell admired their savoir-faire. The attraction was mutual: the Knicks adopted Powell as their un-official chaplain. They played their home games at the Garden. It was the new Garden, as opposed to the old Garden, scene of so many of Powell’s own triumphs- of the big war bond rallies, the freedom rallies, the rallies where his voice thundered, rallies that sent New Yorkers into the streets talking up his name. So there he would be after Knicks games, in the locker room, cigarette in hand, looking up at the huge bodies as if they were sequoia trees, patting individual players on the back. ‘They treated him like a king,’ said William Epps.”