The Ridgewood Blog Brings a Free Market Laissez-faire Point of View to Local, New Jersey State and National Issues.
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Saddle River NJ, Last week’s episode of The Walking Dead had pizza purists yelling molto bene when the show delivered a reprimand to ignorant Pizza Hut eaters: Never, ever, put pineapple on a pizza.
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Saddle River NJ, The colorful bloom of spring always reminds New Jersey businessman Thomas Giacomaro of his first enchanted meeting with celebrated mystery novelist, Mary Higgins Clark.
Continue reading MARY HIGGINS CLARK: “HE’LL MAKE ME RICH AND FAMOUS!”
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East Rutherford NJ, It’s no wonder the American Dream megamall—dubbed “the ugliest building in the world,” by ex-Gov Chris Christie—is down in the dumps.
The 3 million-square-foot eyesore and retail fiasco is situated where the old NJ Meadowlands dump used to boil and fester fifty years ago. And for those of you who have a nose for remembering, the stinging odor of that swamp on Route 20 in East Rutherford still lingers.
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Ridgewood NJ, Former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie had scolding words last Sunday for his one-time ally and friend, Donald Trump.
“He actually told the truth by accident,” Christie said on ABC’s This Week, “he wanted the election to be overturned.”
Christie’s no stranger to liars and conmen. He came face to face with the best almost 20 years ago.
Continue reading CHRIS CHRISTIE AND HIS EXTRAORDINARY CON MEN
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Clifton NJ, the 88-year-old dilapidated Route 3 Bridge will finally be renovated to the tune of $143 million, the Department of Transportation announced last week.
Construction begins in two years…forty years after one of our local celebrities, Thomas “The King of Con” Giacomaro, busted up the guardrails during a mysterious, high-speed chase that made the newspapers.
The businessman tells the tale in his memoir, The King of Con, which is in pre-production for a docuseries to be filmed in North Jersey this year.
Sometimes all you can do is sit down and read a good book. There may have been an Arctic air blast that forced you indoors, or you may simply want some ‘me time’ for a few hours. But what makes a good book, and will it be the same thing for different people? In this article, we’ll be discussing 6 qualities that make a book extra special.
Casting for the new King of Con docuseries is underway and filming will begin this summer, so North New Jerseyites will be seeing those fold-up director chairs and movie lights soon.
For all you wanna-be actors, filmmakers need locals to be on camera “to give an authentic NJ ambience,” says one KOC producer, “and fill the diners, streets, and stores with real-life faces of the residents who live here.”
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Trenton NJ, in an effort to further incentivize movie, television and other digital media projects to come to New Jersey, a bill sponsored by Assembly Democrats Gordon Johnson, William Spearman and Raj Mukherji would expand the state’s film and digital media content production tax credit program. The legislation passed the full Assembly and Senate on Monday, by a vote of 65-12-0 and 31-2, respectively.
‘Tis the season to be immortalized!
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Saddle River NJ, One of our own North Jersey personalities, The King of Con’s Thomas Giacomaro—who grew up in Paterson before living a life of Koi ponds and Bentleys in Saddle River—
was once the inspiration for a Christmas character created by “Queen of Suspense” novelist, Mary Higgins Clark—also a Saddle River/Spring Lake resident until her death last year.
It was Christmas eve 2004 (Higgins’ birthday) when Giacomaro, who bilked Clark for millions after she invested in one of his companies, read Mary’s description of him in her holiday offering, The Christmas Thief.
In a case of art imitating life, Higgins’ lead character, Packy Noonan, was “a world-class scam artist whose offense had been to cheat trusting investors out of nearly $100 million in the seemingly legitimate company he had founded… Fifty years old, narrow-faced, with a hawk-like nose, close-set eyes, thinning brown hair, and a smile that inspired trust.”
Yup. That’s him all right. “The guy even looks like me,” says Giacomaro today, still a NJ local but now reformed and living life on the straight and narrow.
Mary was a tad more lenient on her fictionalized scam artist than a judge was with Giacomaro, who was sentenced to four months more prison time than her lead character:
Continue reading NOVELIST MARY HIGGINS CLARK WROTE NJ “KING OF CON” A FOREVER X-MAS PRESENT
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Newark NJ, the FBI confirmed Friday it searched a former landfill site under the Pulaski Skyway late last month, though a spokesperson for the Detroit field office, which has been leading the decades-long investigation into the disappearance of former Teamsters boss Jimmy Hoffa, said she couldn’t speak further because the affidavit is sealed.
Thomas Giacomaro aka The King of Con with Co-Author Natasha Stoynoff
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Saddle River NJ, the recent post of Chis Christie’s book signing at Bookends in Ridgewood brought to mind the former governor’s life as a U.S. Attorney. Christie prosecuted Thomas Giacomaro aka The King of Con.
Continue reading Former U.S. Attorney former Governor Chris Christie Once Prosecuted , “The King of Con”
