The Parkey Sharkey Story

 
Parkey Sharkey

Parkey Sharkey, the terror of Palo Alto, with his taxi, about 1961.

Readers frequently assume that Parkey Sharkey was a fictional character invented by Paul Coates to fill his Saturday letters column. I recently found a copy of Sharkey’s pamphlet “Whiskey Road” on EBay and learned that everything he wrote was exactly like the letters to Coates – in fact half of “Whiskey Road” is Coates’ old columns.  “Whiskey Road” was not a particularly expensive book but it’s extremely hard to find. A vendor has listed a copy on Amazon at $156.

A page of “Whiskey Road” is on the jump. The whole pamphlet (40 pages) is more of the same. If there are any Daily Mirror readers who are interested in outsider authors, Sharkey is your man.

Parkey Sharkey, Whiskey Road

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About lmharnisch

I am retired from the Los Angeles Times
This entry was posted in books, Columnists, Paul Coates, Photography. Bookmark the permalink.

3 Responses to The Parkey Sharkey Story

  1. Native Angeleno's avatar Native Angeleno says:

    $156? This stuff is priceless. A little disorganized, but as a stream of consciousness, more than OK.
    Someone oughtta make a film noir out of this book. Martin Scorsese would know how to do it right. Right up his alley. The script is almost completely written. Parkey’s words the voiceover. Anyone know how to get in touch with him? Buy this property up! A b&w masterpiece waiting to happen.

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  2. fibber mcgee's avatar fibber mcgee says:

    Parkey Sharkey should not, of course, be confused with comedian ParkyerKarKus, the father of Albert Einstein (you could look this up. We don’t make this stuff up.)

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  3. Native Angeleno's avatar Native Angeleno says:

    Oops, sorry Fibber, you did make this stuff up, albeit accidentally(?).
    Parky KarKus was the father of comedian BOB Einstein and ALBERT Brooks. Not ALBERT EINSTEIN. E = mc2 did not compute in the KarKus household.

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