The kid from Hoboken : an autobiography / by Bill Bailey ; edited by Lynn Damme.

Book one: I. Jersey City genesis -- II. Crime, school, and church -- III. The altar boy - disaster -- IV. The war and Uncle Harry -- V. Hoboken - drama and petty larceny -- VI. Hell's kitchen -- VII. Confirmation and other hustles -- VIII. Introduction to "honest labor" -- IX. Maiden trip to the sea -- X. A morgan line, a New Orleans whore -- XI. From stowaway to jailbird -- XII. Riding boxcars -- XIII. On the bum in Dixie -- XIV. The education of a hobo -- XV. Different jungles, different people -- XVI. A dinner on the house -- XVII. At last, California! -- XVIII. San Francisco -- XIX. Going home --

Book two: I. Booze and petty larceny -- II. The tombs - the trial, the prison -- III. A prison riot -- IV. Trip on the hungry ship -- V. Conned by a whore and a company lawyer -- VI. Case of the tragic stowaway -- VII. Join the Communist party -- VIII. Busted again -- IX. The strike aboard ship -- X. "Baltimore Soviet" and west coast strike -- XI. Organize in Norfolk -- XII. Studying Marxism, falling in love -- XIII. Mediterranean adventures -- XIV, Ripping the swastika off the bremen -- XV. The SS California strike -- XVI. A beating by Baltimore cops -- XVII. All kinds of solidarity on a dollar line ship -- XVIII. The 1936 Pacific Coast Maritime Strike -- XIX. Assignment in Hawaii -- XX. Plantation strike in Maui -- XXI. Journey to war in Spain -- XXII. Somewhere in Spain --

Book three: I. The lonesome ride home -- II. Go east -- III. The war years on New York, part one -- IV. The expendable -- V. Dancing on Broadway -- VI. The war years in New York, part two -- VII. The problem characters -- VIII. Wagons west -- IX. The ticket -- X. Cape Grieg -- XI. The big ticket -- XII. The PT boat -- XIII. The bomb -- XIV. The party under attack -- XV. Selling the war -- XVI. Some knew him as a liberal -- XVII. "God bless you all" -- XVIII. The black gang news -- XIX. Pacific Gas and Electric Company -- XX. The UnAmericans -- XXI. The big chill -- XXII. The do-gooders-- XXIII. Amen -- XXIV. Et tu, Brutus.

"Bill Bailey was born in Jersey City and grew up in Hoboken and New York's Hell Kitchen. He went to sea in 1929 and maintained a career in the Merchant Marine until he was "screened out" during the McCarthy era. He fought with the Abraham Lincoln Brigade in the Spanish Civil War and organized workers in New York, Virginia, California, and Hawaii. In 1953 he began work as a longshoreman, retiring in 1975 to write, lecture and appear in documentary and feature films." -- back cover.