Extra! Extra! DDS Price Are Due To Extortin’ From Hinman!

Everyone on the main drag knows that Zip Jacobs can keep a secret. They call me Zip for how fast I can get the dish and for how I keep it zipped if it’s gotta stay that way. But when the boss Ol’ Iceman Hanlon assigned me to get to the bottom of the DDS price jumps, I knew this was gonna be something that all the folks have to hear! Everybody knows that this whole business is a load o’ hokum, but the Big Cheese said we need solid proof to manacle Valentino Vinoccini, the head o’ DDS. There’s always been whispers that that fella’s dirty, but he feeds half this city. If we wanted to nail this gent, I needed to go deep for the real dish.

I had a contact inside Foco, a real upstandin’ dame with a nice demeanor and even nicer gams. She got me an interview with the man himself, Valentino Vinoccini. I started him with the softballs, asking him how his doll of a wife Sofia ‘Ma’ Thayer was doing. How are the kids, how’s the weather, all that jazz. Then, quick as a two-step in the club, I started hittin’ him hard.

“How do you explain these horsefeather price shifts, Vinoccini?!” I asked, “You know hardworkin’ Dartmouth folk ain’t got that kinda moolah anymore!” 

He just took a draw from his Cuban and gave that low, knowing chuckle of his, “I won’t bore a reporter like yourself with the details, but just trust that this is how things have gotta be for the moment.” But there was something behind that spiffy suit and smile; a dark look. Fear, maybe? Call it a hunch, but after 20 years in this game I’ve learned to trust my hunches.

“Come on, Valentino, this is off the record. A bull session, just you and me, bud. You know you can trust Zip Jacobs to Zip it up, just point me in the right direction and you won’t get no heat, honest!” But he just kept giving me the runaround until my time ran out. So I resolved to sneak into Foco that night and find out the real what for!

I found I wasn’t alone in my midnight expedition, though. Droves of gents and dames were piling into the building faster than a Roadster, all o’ em with their heads real low. They were dressed all nice-like, too, so I made a quick change of clothes and sidled up with some of the young men out toutin’ their swank. I had no idea where we were headed, but I kept my head low. We went through the door, past the jalopy of a dining hall, and eventually down the stairs… to the basement. All that’s down there now is the new Hinman HQ, run by kind ol’ Alfonso Spinazzola! But as hushed chit-chat was exchanged and we were ushered behind the piles of packages, I realized that Hinman’s been running a bonafide hooch factory behind everyone’s back! Bootleg Keystone being passed around left and right to ‘22s and ‘26s alike, I mean, the site was a dynamite denial of Prohibition!

Zip Jacobs never lets himself get distracted, though, folks. I warded off the giggle water and dames wanting to dance and made a beeline straight through the folks doin’ the grapevine. This speakeasy gave me the heebie-jeebies for sure, but it didn’t tell me why DDS’s prices were rising. My sniffer always knows when there’s dirt nearby, though, and it led me right to a closed door. When I tuned out the swinging music, I could hear yelling from inside. Quiet as a diskless gramophone, I cracked the door open just a smidge. Inside was the head honcho of Hinman, Alfonso Spinazzola himself! He was standing up and screaming like a screw, and just opposite him was Valentino Vinoccini, now looking like a scaredy little goose!

“You’re getting everyone spifflicated in the basement of MY dining hall and you won’t share the profits? You’re already bleeding me dry, Alfonso!” Valentino shouted desperately.

“The boys told me you’d be good to shelter us after the Hop got raided,” Alfonso scoffed, “You had to know that when the boss comes to stay, the boss takes his cut.”

“The people are asking questions now, boss! I’ve got this reporter inching down my wazoo and if he finds out about our operation-”

“Then he’ll disappear just like everyone else that tries snooping!” shouted Alfonso, brandishing his tommy-gun. He aimed it at Valentino. No chuckles in sight for the head of DDS now.

“You’ll end up on the wrong end of my barrel if you keep questioning things, Valentino. Keep the prices high and swipe values low if that means I get my dough. You’re our earner, you gavone, this is your job! I own this town, ain’t nobody gonna do anything about our operation here.”

I’ll tell ya, I was outta there before you could say “meatballs”! Spinazzola’s dirty too? And the price raises are to fund his little mafioso operation?! This could be the biggest story of the 20’s! I was gettin’ some funny looks as I lickitysplitted outta the club, and some big fellas that were prolly Alfonso’s enforcers started reaching under their zoot suits. Of course, of course, who wouldn’t recognize Zip Jacobs?! Look, I’m a muckraker who’s not afraid of a lil’ scrabble n’ scram, but I’m not abouta get kablammed into next week! So I just zipped right outta there like a fly boy! I wasn’t no scaredy cat, honest. I already got the dig I needed on Vinoccini and Spinazzola. 

I’m stayin’ with a pal now. My house prolly ain’t safe anymore… don’t know if things’ll ever be copacetic again. But this story’s gotta go out. Alfonso Spinazzola may think he’s untouchable, but Zip Jacobs ain’t zipping away mob extortion! Spinazzola’s right when he says he probably owns this whole town, though. I can’t be sure how many folks have their mitts in his business. That’s why this article’s going out without anyone seeing it, not even Iceman. I could have published this anonymously, but with a story like this, you oughta hear it outta the horse’s mouth. Oh, well, you folks might not hear from Ol’ Zip Jacobs again after this, but now you know the truth. Don’t let them win, Dartmouth. They can’t torpedo all of us if we reject their crooked scam! Zip to it, ya dewdroppers!

— C.T. ’26