On the night of May 2, 1957, Frank Costello walked through the lobby of the Majestic Apartments at 115 Central Park West in Manhattan. He wore a tailored suit and a felt hat, and his eyes were calm. He nodded at the doorman and stepped toward the elevator. He never made it. A heavy-set man … Read more
MOSCOW — The most powerful man in the Soviet Union was preparing for bed on the evening of November 22, 1963, when the government telephone rang inside his residence on the Lenin Hills. Nikita Khrushchev, finishing his dinner and his evening mail, received the first fragmentary report that President John F. Kennedy had been shot … Read more
Dezember 1944, Ardennenwald in Belgien. Der Winter zeigte seine brutalste Seite. Amerikanische Infanteristen lagen in eingefrorenen Schützenlöchern, ohne Wärme, ohne Schutz. Männer verloren Finger und Zehen durch Erfrierungen. Manche starben an der Kälte, bevor die Deutschen überhaupt zum Schuss kamen. Die Versorgungslinien waren überdehnt, die Ressourcen knapp. Die Ardennenoffensive hatte gerade begonnen. Hitlers letzter verzweifelter … Read more
On September 16, 1931, at 3:28 p.m., three men walked into Apartment 211 at 1740 Collingwood Avenue in Detroit. They believed they were attending a peace conference. They came unarmed, trusting the men who had invited them. Fifteen seconds later, all three were dead. Blood pooled under a couch. Cigars remained clenched in dead hands. … Read more
Declassified transition records reveal that President Dwight D. Eisenhower deliberately restricted what John F. Kennedy was told about CIA covert operations before taking office, a decision that historians now link directly to the Bay of Pigs disaster and Kennedy’s subsequent wariness of the intelligence agency he inherited. The documentary trail, preserved in the Eisenhower Presidential … Read more
Declassified transition records reveal that President Dwight D. Eisenhower deliberately restricted what John F. Kennedy was told about CIA covert operations before taking office, a decision that historians now link directly to the Bay of Pigs disaster and Kennedy’s subsequent wariness of the intelligence agency he inherited. The documentary trail, preserved in the Eisenhower Presidential … Read more
Im April 1945 durchsuchten amerikanische Truppen in Süddeutschland ein Verwaltungsgebäude, das zuvor von Offizieren der Wehrmacht genutzt worden war. Das deutsche Personal war eine Woche zuvor geflohen, als die Nachricht von den heranrückenden Amerikanern eintraf. Zurück blieben Akten, Ausrüstung und persönliche Gegenstände. Ein amerikanischer Leutnant namens Robert Davidson katalogisierte die Funde. Es war Standardprozedur: Inventarisierung … Read more
Am 23. August 1944 standen General Pattons Panzer nur noch 30 Kilometer vor Paris. Die letzten deutschen Verteidigungslinien waren durchbrochen, der Weg in die Hauptstadt lag offen. Keine feindlichen Soldaten, kein Widerstand, nur leere französische Landschaft. Patton hätte bei Sonnenaufgang in Paris sein können. Doch genau in diesem Moment trat der französische General Philippe Leclaire … Read more
Bumpy Johnson stepped out of prison at 8:07 on a Thursday morning in Harlem. He wore a gray overcoat, carried no smile, and drew no crowd. Within hours, a murder was being pinned on him. The dead man was Sol Smile Levy, a neighborhood figure who handled money for clubs and kept things running smoothly … Read more
Chicago, September 14, 1986. A Sunday evening on Belmont Avenue in the city’s northwest side, outside a building where a bingo game was underway. John Fecarotta was 61 years old. He had spent his entire adult life inside the Chicago Outfit. A heavyset man, he collected debts and did the kind of work that never … Read more