The Alligators of Alligator Alley

My mother was attacked by a rooster near Alligator Alley. I of course remember that – she was in her 60’s, I was in my 40’s and my daughter Ana was a kid.

We were walking “the loop” – a 30-mile excursion into the Everglades off Hwy 41. At the time this two-lane highway was the only way to drive from Miami to Florida’s west coast.

We walked up to a little farmhouse to say hello, when from nowhere a rooster – claws first – attacked. Mom survived another 20 years.

So, Steve (A&C’s General Manager) and I recently drove down this memory lane. The alligators are fine; they don’t look endangered to me. We had just signed a lease on our newest store (#18) in Miami’s Little Havana. 

To celebrate the signing, I ordered alligator tail. It still tastes like chicken.

-Larry Adlerstein

Larry Adlerstein, Professional Artist

Yes, I sold a painting for $50—back when that was worth 70 or 80 dollars.

She was a neighbor from upstairs who sat with her red-stockinged legs on my kitchen table. I had just learned foreshortening at the Portland School of Art, and the answer is, “No.”

Also, I was reviewed by Edgar Allen Bean, art critic for the Maine Times. It was a group show at the Portland art building, a slightly converted scrap metal warehouse.

The former “Louis Mack Scrap Metal Warehouse” also housed my real day job, Portland Pottery Supply. Both businesses were housed in a 25,000 square foot brick building heated by one coal stove. Pretty perfumed Brenda almost single-handedly kept the clay from freezing in the Maine winter. Almost.

Edgar spent about 15 words on yours truly but the word that has stuck in my memory 20 or 30 years later is his description of my oil painting as “thick.”