Glossary entry
A friend of ours
uh FREND uv ARZ
Definition
uh FREND uv ARZ
The formula used to introduce a made member to another made member. An associate, however trusted, is introduced as a friend of mine.
“He introduced him as a friend of ours, which told everyone in the room what they needed to know without a word being said about it.”
Two words carry the entire distinction. A friend of ours is a member and can be spoken to as one. A friend of mine is an associate — useful, possibly earning more than the members around him, and permanently outside.
The formula exists because the distinction could not be stated openly and could not be left ambiguous either. Discussing business with someone who turned out not to be a member was a serious error; asking directly was worse.
It appears throughout the DeCavalcante recordings of the 1960s, which is part of what made those transcripts so valuable. Joseph Valachi had described this vocabulary to the Senate in 1963 and been doubted. The tapes had the men using it among themselves, with no audience they knew about.