Free The Mob and the City by C. Alexander Hortis Page A

important and competent law enforcement agency. Since then, federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies have decimated the Mafia's ranks. Yet remnants of the Mafia continue to exist and continue to engage in many of the rackets that Hortis documents in this tome.
    James B. Jacobs
Warren E. Burger Professor of Law
New York University School of Law

Researching this book was terrific fun. The book was built on primary sources, so I must first acknowledge the archivists. I am particularly grateful to Leonora Gidlund, Marcia Kirk, Kenneth Cobb, and Dwight Johnson of the New York Municipal Archives; William Davis of the National Archives in Washington, DC; Michael Desmond of the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library; Keith Swaney of the New York State Archives; Ellen Belcher of the John Jay College of Criminal Justice; Mattie Taormina of Stanford University; George Rugg of the University of Notre Dame; Lori Birrell of the University of Rochester; Michael Oliveira of the ONE National Gay & Lesbian Archives; and Patrizia Sione and Kathryn Dowgiewicz of the Kheel Center for Labor-Management Documentation and Archives. Special thanks to Chris Magee for locating cases at the National Archives at Kansas City. I also appreciate the help of the staffs of the Enoch Pratt Free Library in Baltimore, Maryland, and the Library of Congress in Washington, DC.
    New and old friends contributed to this book. Christina M. Gentile was my Italian-language translator, and Ted Pertzborn was the graphics artist for the maps. I received support and assistance from Ryan Artis, John Binder, David Critchley, Josh Dowlut, Mario Hortis, Jacqueline Janowich, Meirong Liu, Will Meyerhofer, Arthur Nash, Lennert van't Riet, and Nathan Ward. I would also like to thank Greg Cross, Chris Mellott, and Colleen Mallon, my former colleagues, for allowing me to work part-time while completing the book. My agent Scott Mendel is the best consigliere anyone could have in the publishing world.
    Prometheus Books is a wonderful place for authors. Editor-in-Chief Steven L. Mitchell improved the book with his editing. Grace M. Conti-Zilsberger designed the beautiful cover. Thanks also to Brian McMahon, Lisa Michalski, Mark Hall, and Melissa Raé Shofner.
    My high school teacher Mr. Gerald Gerads first turned me on to history,and Professor Peter Rachleff introduced me to primary-source research. Professor James Jacobs of New York University School of Law, the nation's foremost scholar on the mob, started me on the path to this book back in 1998. He has been extraordinary generous over the years. This book could not have been finished without Thomas Hunt and Richard Warner. Tom Hunt contributed his eye for detail and shared sources from his own book DiCarlo: Buffalo's First Family of Crime . My honorary coauthor Rick Warner read the entire manuscript and offered invaluable suggestions.
    Above all, I thank my parents, Bati and Linda, Mom and Kent. They have shown me the meaning of unconditional love.







Nostalgia is…a rust of memory.
    —Robert Nisbet (1982)
    When they were struggling to survive in the 1910s, Joe Masseria, Charles Luciano, and Giuseppe Morello could scarcely have imagined that their lives would someday become a canvas for American popular culture. The Mafia has been the backdrop used to explore themes of family and immigration ( The Godfather ), America's coming of age ( Boardwalk Empire ), and suburban angst and mortality ( The Sopranos ). It is used to sell rap music ( Yo Gotti ), “reality television” ( Mob Wives ), video games ( Mafia II ), and even a mobster “lifestyle” magazine ( Mob Candy ).
    This rests on a thick layer of nostalgia. Perhaps the greatest myth about the Mafia is that its members were a special band of brothers, that they were “Men of Honor” who forged a loyal fraternity of goodfellows. Mobsters like Joe and his son Bill Bonanno have peddled such stories for decades. When people learn you are writing a book on the Mafia,