Tips paid off

None more dear, perhaps, than' stock tips.

Both men have fared well with stocks over the years, but Piro got a head start, beginning his investment hobby in 1954 on his own. His patrons, he admitted, have helped.

"They are unusually great people, a higher echelon of people," Piro said. "They would give us tips and It tell us things to buy. Sometimes they would work out, sometimes not. You know how the marketis."

Piro, a high school graduate who never had the money or the time to go to college, said he came to rely on the investment advice of one particular "old-timer" who gave him this tip decades ago:

Only purchase those stocks you believe can grow with the country. Don't buy fly-by-night.

They have also done well with more recent advice.

"We got a hot tip for Viagra Galedrige said. "We found out that Pfizer was coming out with this pill to help all these poor old guys, and I said, 'That's going to be a real winner."