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shop is selling these terrible obscene buttons.”

So Dina says, “What's the button say?”

And he flushes red; the captain is obviously very upset at the question. Dina says, “What's the button say?” The captain looks around and he says, “Santa sucks.” (laughs) Nobody moves a muscle; nobody smiles; nobody gets upset. Dina then says, “Well, that's a matter for the churches. That's not for us. We don't get involved in that.” (laughs) So he is flabbergasted, and he leaves. And then Dina says, “He just wants to get our minds off the corruption.” It was a very corrupt precinct at that time.

So that's the story of the MacDougal Area Neighborhood Association.

There are a couple of details. First of all, on this coffee shop issue: is it so that initially there were young people that opened up some of these coffee houses, and the police harassed them to some extent, and then another group seemed to take over ownership.

I'll tell you how it came about. The coffee house phenomenon started about 1960. Figaro was one of the best of that genre and of that era, and it's a pity that it no longer exists at the corner of MacDougal and Bleeker. It was a very nice place.