stormtroopers they were. But some weekends, when they were sure everything was under control on their home turf, they’d ride in to Wildwood and clean house. Word of those raids traveled fast and far.
In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Nazi skinheads and SHARPs were waging serious turf warfare all up and down the Eastern Seaboard. Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, and New Jersey were home to enormous crews on both sides of the race issue. The Eastern Nazi Alliance owned Jersey from Camden to Newark. After the collapse of The Uprise, our South Street crew started unifying all the Nazis in Southeastern Pennsylvania. The Axis Skins ruled central Jersey like a gulag. And Nazi crews in Baltimore, DC, and Virginia Beach were pushing the new era of white supremacy closer toward the Old South.
Of course, damn near every town that had even one Nazi also had a SHARP, and the tension between those two lone wolves is how the rival crews were born. Kind of like how it happened with Jimmy and me at Furness. Jimmy wasn’t a Nazi at all when he slammed that cafeteria tray into those black kids’ heads; he was just my cousin and loyal friend. So when he saw me outnumbered and in danger, he jumped in on my side. That made him a Nazi to everybody in that cafeteria, and, when I look back on it, that made him a Nazi to me and to him, too. SHARPs had the same thing happen the first time they got into a fight with Nazis. If they had buddies loyal enough to jump in and help them, those buddies became SHARPs the second that fight was over. Once you bleed for a cause, you may as well sign up.
By summer of 1990, guys were bleeding on both sides, from New York to Richmond. The more Nazi crews that sprung up on the East Coast, the more SHARP crews sprung up, or tightened up, to counter them. In a lot of parts of the country, SHARPs weren’t very organized. Then again, neither were Nazis. Most
American Sharpie crews were loose knit groups of guys who were proud of their working-class roots, into Ska, and wished like hell they’d been born in England. In some places, the SHARPs were only a “crew” because they liked the word; it was British.
But in some areas, the SHARPs were more organized. The tightest Sharpie crews I ran into hailed from Delaware, Manhattan, Baltimore, and DC. There were SHARPs in pockets around Jersey and SHARPs on South Street in Philly, and a few dudes in those crews were hardcore fighters. But it was the Delaware, Manhattan, Baltimore, and DC SHARPs we really had to watch out for. They would’ve denied they were a “gang,” but they fought like gangsters.
With the Axis Skins’ blessing and our own boys from Pennsylvania on call if we needed them, Matt and I laid claim to the Wildwood boardwalk for the white supremacy movement and became its round-the-clock security guards. We were only there a couple weeks when the inevitable happened: some kid on vacation from Baltimore went home and talked about his trip, and the Baltimore SHARPs caught wind there were Nazis in Wildwood.
Fifteen of them showed up on a Friday night. Fifteen of them versus Matt and me, who combined couldn’t top 300 pounds, and two Richie Rich suburban Nazis who happened to be on the Shore with their parents. The four of us were sprawled on the benches of the Douglas Fudge Pavilion when the Baltimore Sharpies materialized out of the never-ending parade of tourists. Fifteen versus four, assuming the two dudes from the suburbs knew how to fight, which we didn’t know because we’d just met them.
“This is our boardwalk,” I said, without bothering to stand up.
The leader of the SHARPs moved nearer the entrance to the pavilion, but he didn’t step inside. He jutted his chin out, trying to look tough, knowing he had us outnumbered. But numbers alone don’t always add up; there was no way that dude
was going to risk stepping too close until he knew for sure who we were.
“Are you Axis?” he asked. That still cracks me up. Fifteen SHARPs from
In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Nazi skinheads and SHARPs were waging serious turf warfare all up and down the Eastern Seaboard. Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, and New Jersey were home to enormous crews on both sides of the race issue. The Eastern Nazi Alliance owned Jersey from Camden to Newark. After the collapse of The Uprise, our South Street crew started unifying all the Nazis in Southeastern Pennsylvania. The Axis Skins ruled central Jersey like a gulag. And Nazi crews in Baltimore, DC, and Virginia Beach were pushing the new era of white supremacy closer toward the Old South.
Of course, damn near every town that had even one Nazi also had a SHARP, and the tension between those two lone wolves is how the rival crews were born. Kind of like how it happened with Jimmy and me at Furness. Jimmy wasn’t a Nazi at all when he slammed that cafeteria tray into those black kids’ heads; he was just my cousin and loyal friend. So when he saw me outnumbered and in danger, he jumped in on my side. That made him a Nazi to everybody in that cafeteria, and, when I look back on it, that made him a Nazi to me and to him, too. SHARPs had the same thing happen the first time they got into a fight with Nazis. If they had buddies loyal enough to jump in and help them, those buddies became SHARPs the second that fight was over. Once you bleed for a cause, you may as well sign up.
By summer of 1990, guys were bleeding on both sides, from New York to Richmond. The more Nazi crews that sprung up on the East Coast, the more SHARP crews sprung up, or tightened up, to counter them. In a lot of parts of the country, SHARPs weren’t very organized. Then again, neither were Nazis. Most
American Sharpie crews were loose knit groups of guys who were proud of their working-class roots, into Ska, and wished like hell they’d been born in England. In some places, the SHARPs were only a “crew” because they liked the word; it was British.
But in some areas, the SHARPs were more organized. The tightest Sharpie crews I ran into hailed from Delaware, Manhattan, Baltimore, and DC. There were SHARPs in pockets around Jersey and SHARPs on South Street in Philly, and a few dudes in those crews were hardcore fighters. But it was the Delaware, Manhattan, Baltimore, and DC SHARPs we really had to watch out for. They would’ve denied they were a “gang,” but they fought like gangsters.
With the Axis Skins’ blessing and our own boys from Pennsylvania on call if we needed them, Matt and I laid claim to the Wildwood boardwalk for the white supremacy movement and became its round-the-clock security guards. We were only there a couple weeks when the inevitable happened: some kid on vacation from Baltimore went home and talked about his trip, and the Baltimore SHARPs caught wind there were Nazis in Wildwood.
Fifteen of them showed up on a Friday night. Fifteen of them versus Matt and me, who combined couldn’t top 300 pounds, and two Richie Rich suburban Nazis who happened to be on the Shore with their parents. The four of us were sprawled on the benches of the Douglas Fudge Pavilion when the Baltimore Sharpies materialized out of the never-ending parade of tourists. Fifteen versus four, assuming the two dudes from the suburbs knew how to fight, which we didn’t know because we’d just met them.
“This is our boardwalk,” I said, without bothering to stand up.
The leader of the SHARPs moved nearer the entrance to the pavilion, but he didn’t step inside. He jutted his chin out, trying to look tough, knowing he had us outnumbered. But numbers alone don’t always add up; there was no way that dude
was going to risk stepping too close until he knew for sure who we were.
“Are you Axis?” he asked. That still cracks me up. Fifteen SHARPs from
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