In the 1960s, future Genovese crime family boss Vincent “Chin” Gigante was known on the streets as a feared and vicious killer. An FBI informant described him in stark terms, saying Gigante was a cold-blooded, ruthless killer and that when he looked at you, it was like death staring you in the face. On September … Read more
Es ist eine der blutigsten und zugleich am wenigsten bekannten Schlachten des Zweiten Weltkriegs: Rund um die kleine Stadt Rschew, etwa 230 Kilometer westlich von Moskau, tobte vom Januar 1942 bis zum März 1943 ein erbitterter Kampf, der nach Schätzungen mehr als eine Million sowjetische Soldaten das Leben kostete, verwundete oder in Gefangenschaft führte – … Read more
On February 15, 1974, 25-year-old Mary Schlais left her Minneapolis apartment with a small cardboard sign reading “Madison. ” She planned to hitchhike to Madison, Wisconsin, then continue to Chicago for an art show. About three hours later, she was found dead in a snowbank roughly 90 miles away in rural Dunn County, Wisconsin. A … Read more
The morning after Gale Sayers accepted the George S. Halas Award, the trophy with Brian Piccolo’s name taped over his own, he brought it to the hospital and asked Joy Piccolo if he could have it buried with her late husband. Joy refused. She wanted to keep it. That trophy, with another man’s name pasted … Read more
Somewhere in America, an 86-year-old man is living under a name that is not his. His neighbors have no idea who lives next door. His mailbox carries a name he invented, and he travels with multiple forms of identification, none of them real. He has armed security. He wears sunglasses in every public appearance. He … Read more
Three gunshots rang out over the rooftop theater of Madison Square Garden on the warm evening of June 25, 1906. The victim was Stanford White, America’s most celebrated architect, the man who had designed the very building where he fell. The killer did not flee. Standing over the body, Harry Kendall Thaw, a Pittsburgh millionaire … Read more
In the winter of 1945, a private first class from Iowa warned his colonel that the forest ahead was too quiet. Eight hours later, men of the 87th Infantry Division were dying in the snow. Within two days, the warning reached the desk of General George S. Patton Jr., and a colonel with 30 years … Read more
Mickey Burke appears in Goodfellas for a single scene. She is the hostess wife in the living room, the woman who throws the party and delivers the gossip, present at the moment Karen Hill first understands she is not married to a regular man. That is everything the most important mob film ever made decided … Read more
In October 1818, a nine-year-old boy helped his father build a coffin in the forests of Indiana. The boy was Abraham Lincoln, and the coffin was for his mother, Nancy Hanks Lincoln. She was buried on a small, wooded hill a quarter-mile from their log cabin, and the boy walked behind the sled carrying her … Read more
In early 2024, a weathered cardboard container arrived at one of Boston's most prestigious historical institutions on a freezing Tuesday morning. Inside were 17 seemingly unremarkable items from a deceased collector's estate. Among faded tintypes and deteriorating cabinet cards sat what appeared to be just another Victorian family photograph. That single image would soon reveal … Read more