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Kewpie Rich, whose bookmaking enterprise grossed him about $4,000,000 a year, according to witnesses, complained that he had been in the U.S. since he was seven, having come from Russia, but he had never been able to get U.S. citizenship. It was the business he was in, Kewpie explained. "Do you value American citizenship above your business?" Kefauver asked. "Oh, no sir," replied Kewpie. "They won't let me."
Nix on Pix. Bookie Carroll, whose gross annual take is said to be at least as big as Kewpie Rich's $4,000,000, was saved to top the proceedings, like the maraschino cherry on the sundae. Carroll had "retired"* from business last July, soon after the Kefauver crime investigation got under way. Wearing dark glasses and. a deep tan, he marched into the hearing room and served an ultimatum: "I am willing to testify, but not while this is being televised. The whole proceedings outrage my sense of propriety."
It was a sentiment that might have struck a sympathetic chord under other circumstances. But exasperated Senator Kefauver replied that he was not going to make an exception in Carroll's case; TV was no different from press or radio coverage. "I won't testify," Carroll insisted, "until the television goes off." Carroll soon departed, carrying his sense of propriety with him. Kefauver ended the hearings and left town, full of plans to bring contempt action against Witness Carroll. The stricken gambling community slowly began to recover from the ravages of disease.
* In the glossary of bookies, an indefinite verb meaning, loosely, to move to another location with the least possible interruption of business.