Yasmin Tirado-Chiodini

Do you know who Samuel Langhorne Clemens is, Antonio?_ Bessie asked.__o, chood I?_ he said. __e is best known as Mark Twain, the author of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer,_ she said.__ have herd of the story, but I hav not red the booc,_ he said.__ell, you should read it,_ she said. __t is excellent reading. An American classic. Mark Twain worked in Schoharie for a while,_ she said.__s that so?_ he said.__es, he worked as a brakeman on the Schoharie railroad station on Depot Street the winter of 1879, three years after he wrote his famous book,_ Bessie said.__hy would he do that, a famos author?_ Antonio asked.__ self-published author, I should add.

Antonio__ will was cursed. Not once, but twice.

There is always hope for a reprieve, my friend,_ Stielow said. __ou have to get the governor to pardon you if the courts fail on you. This is an unlikely thing, although possible. The last thing you hold on to __il the last second is hope. Hope is what keeps us doomsmen sane, for the most part. A miracle.

The Porto Ricans at Harvard University believe that the crime was a horrible one and it should be punished, but death penalty would add to, and not detract from, its horrors,_ the Harvard students wrote. One of the student signatures on the letter was by Pedro Albizu y Campos who would later become a Puerto Rican promoter of ideals for the island__ independence from the United States.

The United States media is advocating for the country to go to battle with Spain and take over Cuba and Puerto Rico to gain advantage over the Atlantic,_ said Manuel. __hey have swayed public opinion. I would not be surprised that the countries go into war, and we are caught in the middle.

¡Hundieron el Maine!_ said Manuel to his wife Etervina, as he read the newspaper on February 16, 1898. __hey sank the Maine!

¡Zape! (Shoo!) Go away, go away, espíritu maligno (bad spirit)!_ they sang. __o back to where you came from!__he festive musical celebration combined the prayers and songs with expressive dancing to the rhythm of percussion and string instruments, which accompanied the child__ ascent into heaven, where she would become an angel. Women, men and children ate, drank, prayed, sang and danced. They also played games like la gallina ciega (the blind chicken) where children tried to escape the touch of a blindfolded child who would walk around trying to feel for them. Whoever she touched was disqualified from the game. The baquiné lasted throughout the night. In a time when so many children perished to disease, this was a way for the child__ loved ones to say good-bye and endure the painful loss. But when all were gone, the crude reality set in. Manuel will never forget the image of those poor parents, devastated, sitting alone right next to the altar where their child lay dead, weeping desperately at her loss.He prayed for Ana__ soul. He prayed for those parents.And he prayed that he would never have to suffer the agony of losing a child.

Pardon me for this resolution _ I know that this will be a disgrace that I bring to my people, but I cannot help it. Love is the blame for it. I go in peace ... pray for me ... good-bye all.

Antonio could not stop thinking about Dean Fiero__ words during his welcoming speech, __ook to your left; now to your right. One of you will not be here in 1915!_ These words were used to intimidate freshman law students to draw their attention to the importance of being diligent in their forthcoming studies. They still are.

And then there was nature__ music. The small frog the locals called coquí was a treasured new sound, a lullaby sung by the chanting Puerto Rican native species. Sometimes, while he lay in bed awake at night, Manuel tried to imitate the sound of the little frog. He tried to sing it at first. But then he realized he could get the sound just right by whistling it. __oquí! Coquí!_ Manuel whistled. He improved his coquí whistle every day, until he sounded just as the little frog. People in town laughed at Manuel practicing his coquí sounds. Sometimes they could hear his whistles from outside the store, as though Manuel was carrying out a conversation with the small creatures.The tiny coquí sang through the nights and soothed Manuel__ sleep, keeping him company and reminding him that he was not alone.

THEY CALLED HIM __once de León_ because he acted as though he could conquer anything and anyone. He enchanted every young woman that came his way with piropos (pick-up lines) and clever sweet talk. __as spring started? I just saw the first flower!_ Antonio whispered as he walked by a group of blushing young ladies, tipping off his white Panama hat as a silent __ow do you do?_ He was never at a loss for words. __hat are you doing out this morning? Don__ you know that stars only come out at night?_ was one of his favorite lines. And he had many. On a good day.

What you are about to witness is a blot upon the civilization of the twentieth century."- Sing Sing Deputy Warden Spencer Miller, Addressing Antonio Pontón__ execution witnesses on January 7, 1916

As the children left, Antonio shifted his gaze towards his father and gently waved at his family, while they returned the gesture.With half a smile and a tight lip, Antonio__ green eyes spoke, __diós_ (__ood-bye_).Then, he turned and walked towards the green metal door of the steam cargo vessel that swallowed him away.

In Sing Sing Prison, in a ghastly white room stands a chair. Its parts are heavy joinings of oak, riveted and screwed together; its strong legs fastened to the floor with teeth and claws of steel. It bites into the marrow of men with fangs of fire. For this is the faldstool of bloody human justice, the prayer-chair of man__ vengeance upon man. Into it are strapped ... men who have killed other men. In it, for a high moral purpose, erring human lives are shocked across the barrier into night and the grave. - Edward H. Smith (1918)

What to do now, Father? I am going to die like a killer, and I do not even remember killing.___ou can pray, my son. You are in the hands of God now,_ said the good priest.

¡Ay, las faldas!_ (__h, the skirts!_) he sighed, shaking his head and winking with a mischievous smile. While admitting women were his __chilles heel,_ Antonio, as many young men of the times did, also disclaimed responsibility, as though he had no control over his behavior or desires. Loving the opposite sex was __he natural thing to do for a man,_ he thought.

Dear Governor Whitman, _ Our father is not a simple criminal. _ He was harassed by more ideas than his mind could stand. _

No person _ shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law _- Fifth Amendment, United States Constitution