Wrong Way Light Bulb

THE STORY: As George Oppenheimer says: The action takes place in an apartment house in Brooklyn, well designed by Donald Oenslager, that is practically a slum. Harold Axman, the protagonist, is a young liberal of infinite good will who has inherited the apartment after the death of his grandfather...His tenants are a varied lot-a black woman and her militant son, a sexy Puerto Rican girl who shortly is sharing her landlord's bed, a gently humorous Jewish woman (not another Jewish mother, praise be) who knew him as a boy and uses this knowledge to get favors, a family of strict orthodox Jews-and at first they are filled with distrust of their new landlord. Little by little they begin to cotton to him, all except the black militant, filled with hatred of all whites, especially Jews. When the latter is arrested after the Jewish woman has been assaulted and robbed, a riot breaks out in the neighborhood, a Turkish bath which has been left to Axman burns down and people are wounded and killed. The militant, released from arrest, is triumphant at one more incident to call attention to his cause. Axman is beaten, eager to retreat from the scene of what he believes is his failure and to find a place free of hatred and strife. Mr. Spigelgass sensibly makes him realize that there is no such place in our world today, but he tempers his message with hope.Spigelgass, Leonard is the author of 'Wrong Way Light Bulb ', published 1969 under ISBN 9780822212805 and ISBN 0822212803.