Isadore Gold, 78; Gambler, Fast Talker with No Regrets

In my last blog entry, I mentioned the only honest obituary I’ve ever read was that of Isadore Gold. Tomorrow is the tournament, and I will perhaps analyze it over the weekend. But until then, I’m too busy to find something insightful to say, so I’m going to pass along that obituary.

Enjoy!

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ISADORE GOLD, 78; GAMBLER, FAST TALKER WITH NO REGRETS

Tom Long, Globe Staff. Boston Globe. Boston, Mass.: Nov 16, 2002. pg. F.13

Isadore Gold, 78, was a gambler. He bet on baseball games, football games, card games, and jai alai. He even tried to place a bet on which day he would die. He would have won if he had bet on Wednesday in Falmouth Hospital.

Mr. Gold, sometimes known as "Bosco" or "Goldie," was a regular at Rockingham Park in Salem, N.H., and Suffolk Downs in east Boston. He was the elderly gentleman wearing the black scally cap, cheering the horses down the home stretch with a cigarette in one hand and a rolled-up racing program in the other. In his cap and black cashmere coat, he looked like a character out of "The Sopranos".

Weekends, he sat happily in front of the television set in his Buzzards Bay home, remote control in one hand and a cigarette in the other, clicking from station to station, keeping track of the games he had bet on.

He gambled relentlessly but was "seldom visited by Lady Luck," according to his daughter, Cheri Lindsey, the proprietor of Lindsey's Restaurant in Wareham. She said he recently tried to bet her which day he would die, but she declined the bet.

Mr. Gold always got lucky when he sat down to play cards. "That's because he always cheated," said his daughter.

His longtime friends Dennis Frawley and Hank Tartaglia concurred. Tartaglia remembered a card game upstairs over the Ward One Club in Brockton, which Mr. Gold once owned: "I started playing and realized Izzy was cheating so I dropped out.

While I was walking downstairs I saw an off-duty police officer go up."

Several hours later, Tartaglia encountered the policeman again. The officer said he'd lost a bundle, so Tartaglia pointed out that Mr. Gold had been cheating. The police officer went back upstairs.

"He didn't arrest him," said Tartaglia, "but he had to give the money back."

Mr. Gold was born in Brockton. He was a childhood friend of boxing legend Rocky Marciano and traveled widely with the heavyweight champ.

For a time he was even employed by the boxer. His daughter wasn't quite sure what he did but said it probably involved "collections." "He was a funny guy, and he was fun to be around," said Tartaglia. "When Marciano was training, they'd bring Izzy in to keep him a little loose so he wouldn't kill someone."

A Navy veteran, Mr. Gold was an accomplished artist who, for a time, worked on movie sets in Hollywood. Later, he was a carpenter and painted murals in Brockton-area restaurants and nightclubs.

"He'd take the deposit for a job, go to the track, and wouldn't return to work until he'd blown all the money," said his daughter.

Sometimes that was more than a month later.

Mr. Gold recently went to the jai alai arena in Newport, R.I., to place a few bets with a friend. The duo lost all their money and couldn't afford gas money or a hotel for the night. Undaunted, Mr. Gold disconnected a wire on his car, called AAA, and rode in the tow truck as his car was towed to his home in Buzzards Bay.

"He was just an old con man," said his daughter, "but he was just cool enough to stay out of jail."

Consider the story of his "magic whistle." Many years ago, Mr. Gold took a rookie bettor to the track and brought along a whistle. He looked on the racing program and found a horse that was a "closer," known to race to the lead down the home stretch. He told his associate the whistle was magic and blew it just as the horse made its winning charge. He repeated the process a few more times before selling the man the whistle for $5,000. When the man realized he'd been taken, he went to the police.

"Izzy had to do a lot of fast talking," said Frawley, "but after paying the $5,000 back he was let off the hook."

"He wasn't the kind of dad who sat around the fireplace," said his daughter.

Before he started wearing his scally cap, Mr. Gold wore a toupee. Never an early riser, Frawley remembered meeting him for breakfast at noon one day. As Mr. Gold leaned over the table, his toupee fell into his soup. "He didn't blink an eye," said Frawley. "He just scooped it up and put it back on."

Even after he was diagnosed with lung cancer, Mr. Gold refused to give up cigarettes. When told he could no longer smoke because he was breathing with the aid of bottled oxygen, he had the oxygen removed. When his daughter took him to task, he sang his rendition of "My Way."

"I traveled. I had every broad I ever wanted and I went to the track whenever I wanted to," he said to her. "I have no regrets."

Along with his daughter, he leaves a son, William, of Wareham; two sisters, Ann Gevetoff of California and Martha Yakus of Quincy; a brother, Ben, of Worcester; and two grandchildren.

A service will be held at 1 p.m. tomorrow in Stott, Chapman, Cole & Gleason funeral home in Wareham.

His daughter said she intends to deck her father out in a new scally cap, then place a TV remote in one hand and a racing program in the other for the viewing, which will begin three hours before the ceremony. His remains will be cremated and she hopes to scatter his ashes at Rockingham Park.