| HistoryText
| - Joseph, or Joey, Romita was born to Russian immigrant who ran away from the Soviet Union and were desperate to start a new life. His father was abusive towards him, and due to his heritage Joseph looked down upon by a number of his peers. In part due to tensions between Russian and Italian street gangs in his neighborhood. Because of all this he wanted to feel respected, and became seduced by the criminal lifestyle at a young age where he found himself looking up to crooks. His idol in particular was Silvio Manfredi, the criminal known as Silvermane who was on the rise at the time and considered a hero to his poor Italian community he had come from. Emulating the idea that through sheer force of will and cunning that the could make something of himself.
Because of that Joseph would eventually become a low-level thug for Silvermane's gang. He pretended to be Italian, taking up the name Joey Romita, in order not to be turned away due to his Russian heritage due to the deep cultural-centricism of the mafia organizations. Though brash, he was also crafty and managed to work his way up to being one of his chief enforcers. However, he would face consternation from his superiors for having a very flashy style and becoming a media personality that soaked in all the attention he could get.
However, tensions rose even further between he and the dons when he began recruiting metahumans like Sandman and Hydro-Man amongst his ranks. He beforehand had hired more minorities than usual but this was considered something greater. Metahumans were looked on with both disapproval, suspicion, and fear by his fellow crime lords. Rumors started to float around that he was accumulating them in order to carry out a massive coup of the organization. He denounced them, swearing utmost loyalty to Silvermane. Whilst the metahumans naturally provided him with greater power at his disposal as well as fear from his opponents, he sympathized with their sense of being ostracized, as he felt when he was young.
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