Confident. Incorrigible. Bully: Little Donny was a lot like candidate Donald Trump
the Trumps’ house on Midland Parkway was distinct, if not for its size then for what it suggested about the wealth of its builder, Fred Trump.
“No one had individualized license plates in those days,” said Ann Rudovsky, who grew up nearby. “Everyone talked about the Trumps because of the house and the cars.”
.. Unlike most families in the neighborhood, the Trumps had a cook, a chauffeur and an intercom system.
..
Fred Trump, with his thick mustache and hair combed back, was a stern, formal man who insisted on wearing a tie and jacket at home. A conservative Republican who admired Barry Goldwater, Fred Trump and his wife forbade their children from cursing, calling each other by nicknames and wearing lipstick.
.. “Donald was known to be a bully, I was a little kid, and my parents didn’t want me beaten up,”
.. “He had a reputation for saying anything that came into his head,” said Donald Kass, 70, a retired agronomist who was a schoolmate. When Trump misidentified Rocca, the pro wrestler, Kass recalled, “We would laugh at him and tell him he was wrong, and he’d say he was right. The next time, he would make the same mistake, and it would be the same thing all over again.”
.. As a second-grader, he wrote, he “actually” gave his music teacher a black eye because “I didn’t think he knew anything about music, and I almost got expelled.”
.. Near the end of seventh grade, Fred discovered Donald’s knives and was infuriated to learn about his trips into the city. He decided his son’s behavior warranted a radical change. In the months before eighth grade, Fred Trump enrolled Donald at the New York Military Academy,
.. Fred Trump’s decision was “a very severe response to a kid who hadn’t gotten arrested and wasn’t involved in drinking and drugging. He was essentially a smart aleck.”
.. Dobias, who died recently, would smack his cadets with an open hand if they ignored him, students recalled. He set up a boxing ring and forced students with poor grades and disciplinary problems to fight each other.
.. Dobias said he recognized in Trump an innate drive: “He wanted to be number one. He wanted to be noticed. He wanted to be recognized. And he liked compliments.”
.. By senior year, Trump was known for bringing stylish women to campus and showing them around. “They were beautiful, gorgeous women, dressed out of Saks Fifth Avenue,” recalled classmate George White.
.. Amid the pageantry, Donald noticed that no one paid homage to the bridge’s 85-year-old Swedish designer, who had traveled from Europe for the occasion.
“I realized then and there that if you let people treat you how they want, you’ll be made a fool,” he later told a reporter. “I realized then and there something I would never forget: I don’t want to be made anybody’s sucker.”