In July 1993, a young Brooklyn gang leader named Paul Gulino walked into Anthony Sparzo’s social club in Bath Beach and did something no one in the room expected. He put his hands on Sparzo and pushed him. Sparzo, known as “The Old Man,” was a senior captain in the Bonanno crime family, a man … Read more
Lady Godiva, the 11th-century Anglo-Saxon noblewoman whose name became synonymous with a daring ride through Coventry, was far more than the legendary figure who defied her husband to ease the burden of taxed townspeople. The tale, first recorded in the 13th century, tells of how she rode naked through the streets, veiled only by her … Read more
On the morning of Friday, October 9, 1953, a light rain had just stopped falling over Harlem. The sidewalks of Seventh Avenue gleamed under a gray sky as the shops near 132nd Street opened their doors. It was an ordinary morning, the kind Harlem had seen thousands of times before—except for what would come of … Read more
In the summer of 1948, two mob soldiers from Lower Manhattan walked into Harlem and made a fatal miscalculation. They humiliated a 12-year-old shoe shine boy on 125th Street, kicking over his box and scattering his coins while laughing. What they did not know was that Ellsworth “Bumpy” Johnson watched the entire incident from the … Read more
In 1973, a 29-year-old Black man from North Carolina vanished with $20 million in cash, leaving behind a wife, three sons, a Staten Island mansion, and a drug empire spanning 21 states. The FBI offered a $20,000 reward for his capture, the highest since John Dillinger. More than five decades later, the bounty remains uncollected, … Read more
On September 16, 1935, a white mob enforcer named Mickey Doyle walked into Harlem’s Cotton Club and slapped Bumpy Johnson across the face in front of roughly 200 witnesses. The crack echoed through the room, silencing every conversation. Johnson, the enforcer who controlled the neighborhood’s numbers rackets from 110th Street to the Polo Grounds, did … Read more
Paul Castellano was under federal indictment in the government’s case against the leadership of New York’s five Mafia families, known as the Commission. He was also on trial and out on $2 million bail in a car theft and murder case when his life came to a violent end. Born Constantino Paul Castellano on June … Read more
It starts with a single lever. In 1895, a German mechanic named Charles Fay built a simple mechanical device in his San Francisco workshop: three spinning reels, a payout tray, and a lever on the side. He called it the Liberty Bell. Drop in a nickel, pull the lever, and hope three bells line up … Read more
Vito Genovese rose through the American Mafia as a childhood friend and longtime associate of Lucky Luciano, eventually taking control of the crime family that would be renamed in his honor. Born in Resigliano, a frazione of Tofino in the province of Naples, Italy, on November 21, 1897, Genovese immigrated to the United States with … Read more
For 38 years, Esteban was convinced he lived across the street from a monster. At least, that was what the heavy wooden door to the basement of Marcos Herrera’s house suggested, a door secured every night with three solid bolts, as if the world outside could never be allowed to see what the dark cellar … Read more