Page 63 - Too Much and Never Enough - Mary L. Trump

soon as possible. Linda was stunned. That Freddy would give up everything he’d worked for after only four months made no sense at all.
In fact, TWA had given him an ultimatum: if he resigned, he could keep his license; otherwise, it would be forced to fire him as a result of his serious alcohol problem. If Freddy got fired, he’d likely never be able to fly again. He chose the first option, and with that their life in Marblehead was over. Just after Labor Day, the three of them moved back to the corner apartment on the ninth floor of the Highlander in Jamaica.
But Freddy hadn’t entirely given up on a flying career. Maybe, he thought, if he started with smaller airlines with smaller planes and shorter, less stressful routes, he could work his way back up. While Linda and Fritz settled in, Freddy went to Utica, a small city in upstate New York, to work for Piedmont Airlines, which flew commuter routes in the northeast. That job lasted less than a month.
He moved to Oklahoma and flew for another local airline. He was there when Fritz celebrated his second birthday. By December, he was back in Queens. His drinking was out of control, and he knew that he could no longer hack it as a pilot. The only self-made man in the family, Freddy was being slowly, inexorably dismantled.
Less than a year after it had begun, Freddy’s flying career was over. With no other options, he found himself standing in front of his father, who sat in his usual spot on the love seat in the library while his oldest son asked for a job that he didn’t want and Fred didn’t think he could do.
Fred reluctantly agreed, making it clear that he was doing his son a favor.
And then one more glimmer of hope emerged. In February 1965, Fred acquired the site of Steeplechase Park, one of three iconic amusement parks in Coney Island that had been in operation since around the turn of the twentieth century. Steeplechase had outlived its two rivals by decades: Dreamland had been destroyed by fire in 1911, and Luna Park, also struck by fires, had closed in 1944. Fred owned a building complex and shopping area named after Luna Park not far from the original site. Steeplechase continued operations until 1964. The Tilyou family had owned the park from the beginning, but several factors—including high crime and increasing competition for entertainment dollars—had persuaded them to