1883 – Brooklyn, New York USA

Joey Bartaglio was from a poor family. Poppa labored at the docks each day unloading various crates by hand, and stacking them in wagons all day. Momma stayed home keeping a neat and tidy house, and cooking the meager meals that Poppa’s small pay could provide. There was never any money. Joey was fed, had a shirt on his back, and his old shoes had been repaired a few times, but at least he had shoes!
Joey loved to play marbles, and was quite good at it. He had a good size sack full of marbles he had won, but they were all ‘commies’, the brown clay marbles that were most common at the time. The rich kids across town could afford the colorful glass ones from Germany, but if Joey was ever going to have any of those, he would have to win them in a game for keeps.
Baxter Shay III also liked to play marbles, and he liked to show off his fancy glass ones to the less fortunate kids he played with. However, he would never play for keeps. He was a rich kid whose parents could afford sacks and sacks of glass marbles, but Baxter never wanted to part with them.
One day he was showing off his glass marbles and Joey saw one he just had to have. It was beautiful! White with stretched blue spots and white with stretched red spots and floating over the colors were sparkling silver looking flakes of mica adding a distinct glitter to the marble when the sun struck it.
Joey began begging, then haranguing Baxter to play a game for keeps, just for that one marble, but Baxter refused, repeatedly.
“Whatsa matta Baxta? Ya ‘fraid ya might lose a marble to a poor kid?” Joey taunted. “Ya ‘fraid I might be better’n you? Are ya chicken ta play for keeps against me?”
“I just don’t want any of those ugly clay marbles is all,” replied Baxter. “I know I can beat you Joey, you’re not as good as me. However, you have nothing I want in your marble bag.”
“OK,” said Joey as he dug into his pockets, “How’bout I put up this yo-yo against your marble?”
Baxter wanted a yo-yo and, thinking he could beat Joey, agreed to the game.

Joey kept his new glass marble wrapped up in a scrap of cloth in his pocket at all times. It was his pride and joy. He would show it to his friends and tell how he won it off Baxter with much embellishment of the truth, but his friends loved to hear his story, even though many of them were there to watch the historic event.
The months passed and one night, Joey put all the treasures in his pockets out on the small table in his room as Mamma was looking to wash his pants. The scrap of cloth fell open and the marble rolled off the table and onto the floor. Before Joey could catch it, it had fallen down a crack in the old wooden flooring of the house.
Joey was devastated. “Can’t we pull up the boards to get it back?” Joey cried to Poppa.
“I’m sorry my son,” Poppa said sympathetically, “This is not my house, I can’t pull up the floor for you. But, you are such a good player, just go win another Joey. Should be easy for you.”
“But I want THAT marble Poppa, THAT one is special to me,” cried Joey.


2003 – Brooklyn, New York USA

“Hey Hank, Lookit dis old glass marble I found under da floorboards in here!”
“Nice Joe! Lookit those colors, and da sparkles! I bet some kid was pretty frosted when he lost that jewel under the floor boards. It’s amazing the tings we find doing these renovations eh Joe?”
Joe was lost in thought, looking at the marble, wondering who it belonged to and how it came to be there.
“Huh? Yeah, Hank, yeah, amazing what we find in these old joints,” said Joe, as he wrapped up the marble in a scrap of cloth and slipped it into his pocket.