BRAWLS WITH BARNETT MIRRORED ALI-FRAZIER
Holly (Our) Park
San Francisco, CA– If you were slipping off the edge of a cliff, only then could you realize what somebody goes through in a fight for their life. My toughest battle was not in a boxing ring. It didn’t occur when I was part of the San Francisco Police Dept. No my “life or death” moment was a street fight that Adelina Goss timed out at 28 minutes.
BARNETT THE BRUTE HAD NEVER LOST!
The fight was with the “neighborhood” tough guy, semi bully and friend Tony Barnett. Born in the south and 18 months older than I, Tony came here with mother, brother and sister. The thing I look back at now with astonishment was that his mother Eleanor never pushed school. White, good looking sans a front tooth, we met at 5 AM on a Sunday morning in 1971 as we were both delivering newspapers on adjacent routes.
WASN’T A SPEED READER BY ANY MEANS
Barnett suffered dearly from not being educated. And while a formal education wasn’t there, the smarts were as he could fix cars and appliances like Macgyver. Still, this father of one son was ashamed he could not really read. The educational shortcoming that was Tony Barnett, manifested into him being a drug addict for most of his adult life. You see, Tony couldn’t get a job because he couldn’t really fill out an application sans help he was too proud to ask for. I do remember once when he had a job fixing cars, that was the happiest Tony would ever be.
RECENT BIRTHDAY MADE ME THINK OF HIM
So when his 59th birthday passed July 16, I once again began to search for a childhood friend. Ten years ago, I went looking for him and missed him by just a few weeks as he left The City for Clear Lake, CA. I called the Lake County Sheriff’s Dept. Tuesday and got some chilling news, “Our last contact with him was 2/26,” said the dispatcher who continued, “That was a Coroner’s case.” End of conversation. It was now official, I had lagged on looking him up and now Tony Barnett was dead.
DOPE FIEND NEVER EVEN SMOKED WEED AS TEEN
What I found even more confounding is that when we went to places like the Spruce Drive In or the Geneva Drive In (The Exorcist), Tony would jump out of the car anytime Bobby Antonelli lit up something hand rolled. For like 19+ years, Barnett never did any Drugs. But once he got a taste, Tony rarely rebuffed an opportunity to go at it hard.
THREE “CORTLAND AVE” BOYS WITH MAJOR DOPE ISSUES
First in the neighborhood to go was Alton Singleton, one of two Black guys in our group, another lad who did no drugs until his 20s. Some Precita Park dealer shot him because Alton disrespected the guy’s mother. The second of our childhood lot to go was Ronnie Alvarez. They found him dead with his favorite appendage severed and stuffed in his mouth. Suffice to say, where I came from, hard dope usually resulted in a hard life.
LOW RIDERS JUMPED ME AFTER STREET WIN!
A few months after the “Life & Death” Barnett battle, the late President Derrick Ward of the S.F. Low Creations car club, sucker punched me after I had easily turned back the challenge of his top Lieutenant Jerry Greico. The attack left me bruised and battered. Having not seen Barnett since the big brawl, within an hour and unannounced, there he was icing down my face and hands for like two days. “Come Friday night (six days),” Barnett said, “You’re going to fight Derrick one on one.” With Friday night upon us, we waited for Derrick at the gas station. When he and his three car posse showed up, I was scared to death and wanted no part of ten guys.
BARNETT HELD OFF POSSE BY HIMSELF
As he swung a 1969 Firebird (that would later fall victim to Arson) into the gas station, I was shaking inside. Before we get out he says, “Don’t worry, I got your back. Just fight your fight, don’t worry about his boys.” And then Tony said something I’ll never forget while getting a jack out of his trunk. He didn’t threaten the Low Riders personally, Tony told them if anybody jumps in, “I’m destroying your cars.”
NEVER FELT “FEAR” LIKE THAT EVER!
But then Tony said something that he made sure everybody heard, “I was the baddest and you beat me. You can beat him.” In a fight where my bruised up face went untouched, Derrick ended up getting dropped like five times and suffered a broken orbital bone. I remember two chicks picking him up after hitting the cement a third and fourth time.
CLOSEST THING TO DEATH FOR ME
In closing, the first fight with Barnett was akin to Ali-Frazier III. When it was over, I’ll never forget what he said, “You got this one, but I’ll be back.” He would never beat me. Exhausted, I collapsed in Bobby’s room and dry heaved in a bucket for two hours.
MY FINAL MEETING WITH BARNETT
Last time I saw Tony, I remember going to his mom’s house circa 1991 and he was chain smoking unfiltered Camel’s. He had regressed since the days when I’d drop by in my black and white a few years earlier. And while I didn’t say anything, on a bulletin board in the kitchen was an old tattered article of San Francisco Chronicle writer Jack Fiske. The story was about me winning my fourth Golden Glove title. And while that I thought that was really cool 24 calendar turns ago, today it prompted an almost unbridled river of tears. Tony Barnett was never a reader and yet…
ONE TIME BUDDY & RIVAL NOW PUSHING UP DAISIES!
Almost four decades after our Ali-Frazier-like battles, (there were three in all) Tony Barnett is dead. Some say that is good news, to others it is not. Putting this all in perspective, there were about seven to ten of us growing up together and going to three different elementary schools in the Bernal Heights neighborhood (see gentrification). We hung out at Bobby’s. That being said, all there really is to say is, “Rest in Peace” Tony Barnett, for not only were you my childhood friend and my Joe Frazier, you also believed in “Petey” on at least one occasion when he didn’t.
Pedro “Petey” Fernandez
Note: Mr. Fernandez is an award-winning writer, TV commentator, radio talk show host, former San Francisco Policeman, licensed California Private Investigator and four-time Golden Gloves boxing champion, who also pens feature stories for the R & B band Tower of Power. Comments regarding this submission can be left below.
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LESSONS OF FIGHTING TO “NEAR DEATH”