On the last day my brother Jeff was here for a Christmas visit, we decided to go to Congressional Cemetery. He had never been there, and I think he enjoyed seeing it. The weather was pretty good, so we spent about an hour walking around. One of the more interesting gravesites is that of former FBI Director, J. Edgar Hoover. It is surrounded by a fence. It includes other members of his family.
A very interesting tidbit is that the grave of Clyde Tolson is very close, although not next to Hoover's. Tolson was Hoover's second in command and they did everything together, including vacations and dinners. Of course, that has led to speculation that they had a sexual relationship. I don't think anyone knows for sure, but Tolson was the beneficiary of Hoover's estate. Tolson's gravesite is very modest:
We didn't know it at the time, but visiting Hoover's grave kind of set the tone for the day.
After breakfast at a neighborhood place, The Banana Cafe, we headed to the Newseum by Metro. One of the featured exhibits is "Inside Today's FBI." So, we got another dose of the FBI. This exhibit is definitely worth seeing. Jeff was particularly interested in the exhibit that included the cabin of the Unabomber Ted Kozkinski.
We came home and had a simple dinner at my house and watched "Sixty Minutes." Amazingly, the topics covered were about mobsters. I didn't know that in advance. There was a piece on Whitey Bolger and how the FBI tracked him down. Then one about the fall of the Gambino crime family, including John Gotti, Jr; I was really impressed with the story about a Cuban American FBI agent who posed as an Italian and infiltrated La Cosa Nostra. His cover was really never exposed, but when he witnessed one mob guy bash another with a candlestick in Bloomingdale's, he didn't jump in and continue the violence. The FBI was worried about him, and pulled him off the case. However, they had enough evidence by that time to arrest Greg DePalma and 31 others. He doesn't seem to be worried about the publicity and whether the mobsters will come after him.
Jeff and I sat back and reflected that we had experienced a real "FBI Day."
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