So it must have been my junior year (‘68) and I had this old Karmann Ghia (Volkswagen sports car...lol!) that could no way pass MA Yearly car inspection. It had rusted out wheel wells and the floor boards were a little soft in areas. My dad was an insurance adjuster and found me the car and I paid all of $300 for it. Money was real tight back then! At least it ran!
So who better to help me out than Joe Wetnick! Joe said he could take care of it for me so I tossed him the key. Well he was gone a few hours and when he returned there was a newly minted inspection sticker gleaming on the wind shield!
So at the time a normal inspection sticker cost $5 so I handed Joe a $5 bill. He looked at me with a smile and said “that inspection cost $25, don’t you know I had to use my special sources!”. So I handed over two more $10 bills...lol!
That day I learned Joe had “connections” but I never dared ask who or what they were! Bob Keenan
Sigma Pi Cooks. I lived in the house from the fall of '66 to the spring of '69. My hazy memory thinks that the cook before Joe W was Jim Jennings. He was hired, cooked some decent meals for a week, got his paycheck, and was never seen again. I recall that his signature dish was the "Jim Jennings Barfee", something resembling chili. Please correct/amplify my recollection. Joe Doran '69
The story that I have heard from Roy Lindblad ('72) was that Roy found boxes of food and other supplies in the pantry that were provided by Wetnicka under a kind of T&M arrangement. The stuff in the boxes had the prices labeled which told what Joe paid. Roy looked at the invoices from Wetnicka and discovered that Joe was marking them up exorbitantly. This led to Joe being released. Paul Exner '71
Wenicka story: he saved my a$$ one time. It was probably about 1971 after I graduated and I was dating a lady that lived in Westfield, west of Springfield. I decided to skip the Mass Pike and take the scenic route back to Worcester. As I went through Brookfield (is that where Wetnicka lived?) I was going maybe 70 and I realized that was way too fast for beautiful downtown Brookfield. I started to hit the brakes, then oops, too late, on a side street is a cop. Sure enough, lights it up and pulls me over. He was pissed. Yelling at me for going 70 in a 30 zone. He was going to haul me in.It was a long shot, but I told the officer that I had just left Joe Wetnicka's house (lie). That got a reaction. He calms down. "YOU know Joe Wetnicka?" "Ya, he's the chef at the fraternity in Worcester I lived in." "OK, hold on." He goes back to his cruiser, and I have no idea what happened while he was in the cruiser. I can only speculate, maybe radioed HQ, they called Wetnicka? Anyway, he walks back, and in a calm voice, "OK, get going, but SLOW DOWN." Thank you Joe Wetnicka. I think Wetnicka had dirt on every cop and politician in central MA. Peter Billington '70
