Download or read book Mobsters In Our Midst The Kansas City Crime Family written by William Ouseley and published by . This book was released on 2011-03 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is the story of the rise and fall of Kansas City's longest-reigning mob boss, Nick Civella, and his powerful crime family, as told by the FBI agent who helped bring down Civella and his cronies. The book includes never-before-published detail of the crimes and investigations that led to the demise of Civella mob rule. The book also features 20 pages of archival photographs.
Download or read book Mobsters In Our Midst The Kansas City Crime Family written by William Ouseley and published by . This book was released on 2011-03 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is the story of the rise and fall of Kansas City's longest-reigning mob boss, Nick Civella, and his powerful crime family, as told by the FBI agent who helped bring down Civella and his cronies. The book includes never-before-published detail of the crimes and investigations that led to the demise of Civella mob rule. The book also features 20 pages of archival photographs.
Download or read book The Mafia and the Machine written by Frank Hayde and published by Barricade Books. This book was released on 2010 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The story of the American Mafia is not complete without a chapter on Kansas City, MO. The 'City of Fountains' has popped up in The Godfather, Casino and The Sopranos, but many aren't aware that Kansas City is key in the history of organised crime. Events unfolding in this city affected the fortunes of all the 'families' and shaped the entire underworld. In The Mafia and the Machine, author Frank Hayde ties in every major name in organised crime - Luciano, Bugsy, Lanksy - as well as the corrupt Kansas City police force.
Download or read book Open City written by William Ouseley and published by Leathers Pub. This book was released on 2008 with total page 373 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Open City is an historical work detailing and analyzing the birth and growth of an organized crime "family" in Kansas City during the first 50 years of the 20th Century. It began with a Mafia-like clan labeled the Black Hand, its roots planted in the secret crime societies of Southern Italy and Sicily - a band of extortionists victimizing the city's "Little Italy" community in the early 1900s. From modest beginnings, the development of the criminal outfit is traced through prohibition, its alliance with the Pendergast Machine, the roaring 20s, Home Rule, the wide open 30s, the birth of La Cosa Nostra, and hard times in the 50s. It is the story of Kansas City, politics, powerful and colorful mob bosses, gangland murders, racket activities, and courageous police officers and reformers. Book jacket.
Download or read book Covert written by Bob Delaney and published by Sterling Publishing Company, Inc.. This book was released on 2009-06 with total page 316 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In a riveting page-turner, NBA referee Delaney reveals the clandestine life he had led before becoming one of professional basketball's most respected referees. 16-page b&w photo insert.
Download or read book Storied Scandalous Kansas City written by Karla Deel and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2019-10-08 with total page 169 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Welcome to Kansas City—the best town this side of Hell. The Paris of the Plains. Home to the Wettest Block in the World. This collection celebrates a storied history of one notorious city. Meet the mobsters and victims, bootleggers, madams, political bosses and raucous entertainers who truly brought the party to the plains even during Prohibition. Witness the best parades, the wackiest costumes and the wildest scams. Kansas City’s sordid underbelly is full of surprises sure to delight and entice—the odd, macabre and delightful.
Download or read book Cigar City Stories written by and published by iUniverse. This book was released on 2012-09-28 with total page 86 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 1885, Vincent Martinez Ybor, a Spanish entrepreneur, purchased forty acres east of Tampa and built a company town of tall red-brick factories and small wood-frame houses for the workers. Over the next forty years, this community of cigar-makers from Cuba, Spain, and Italy grew into a thriving industry that made Tampa the Cigar Capital of the World. The urban renewal of the 1960s, however, struck a deathblow to Ybor City; thousands of cigar-makers homes and businesses were leveled by bulldozers, and an interstate highway stormed through the dying neighborhood. The narratives, reflecting a coming-of-age in this colorful community that no longer exists, speak of a kidnapping, a hold-up, a shark attack, a deadly duel, and a murder. A teenager comes to grips with his sexual identity, an activist mother resists Jim Crow laws, and an unexpected baby changes everyones life. In Cigar City Stories, author Emilio Gonzalez-Llanes presents a collection of short stories that provides a snapshot of this lost island in time. Julian stood on that raised platform in the middle of the factory floor, reading to the workers: Anna Karenina, War and Peace, Les Miserables, writings of Cervantes, newspapers, and the poems of Jos Marti. He didnt just read the words; he took on the voice and mannerisms of the characters in the novels, like an actor in the theater. Good performances were followed by the sustained thumping roar of two hundred chavetas, or tobacco knives, repeatedly striking the workers tobacco-cutting boards. from El Lector
Download or read book Mob Murder of America s Greatest Gambler written by Herbert Marynell and published by Createspace Independent Publishing Platform. This book was released on 2013-03-11 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Chronicles the rags-to-riches story of Ray Ryan, the Evansville, Ind., oil millionaire, who went on to gamble with H.L. Hunt and other high rollers, hobnob with celebrities in his El Mirador Hotel in Palm Springs, develop the Mount Kenya Safari Club with actor William Holden and a Swiss banker, only to fall victim to a car bomb on a beautiful fall day in 1970s Evansville.
Download or read book A Mob of His Own written by Dark Tony and published by Tony Dark. This book was released on 2008-03-01 with total page 528 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The true story of one of Chicago's most sadistic murderers who killed for power, money and pleasure. Sam "Mad Dog" DeStefano controlled the flow of money on Chicago's streets backed by the Chicago mob, he became a multimillionaire by squeezing the "juice" out of his victims. This book details the life of Mad Sam and describes the sick methods he used to kill. This book also explores Chicago's Italian mob and what was commonly known as the "juice" rackets, loan sharking, and shylocking. This book explains the rackets in full detail as well as the men who made a living at killing and destroying lives.
Download or read book Pendergast written by Lawrence H. Larsen and published by University of Missouri. This book was released on 2016-11-29 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: More than a half-century after the death of Kansas City's notorious political boss, Thomas J. Pendergast, the Pendergast name still evokes great interest and even controversy. Now, in this first full-scale biography of Pendergast, Lawrence H. Larsen and Nancy J. Hulston have successfully provided—through extensive research, including use of recently released prison records and previously unavailable family records—a clear look at the life of Thomas J. Pendergast. Born in St. Joseph, Missouri, in 1872, Tom Pendergast moved to Kansas City around 1890 to work for his brother James, founder of the Pendergast "Goat" faction in Kansas City Democratic politics. In 1911, Pendergast became head of the Goats, and over the next fifteen years he created a powerful political machine that used illegal voting and criminal enforcers to gain power. Following a change in the city charter in 1925, Pendergast took control of Kansas City and ran it as his own personal business. In the 1930s, he received over $30 million annually from gambling, prostitution, and narcotics, putting him in the big leagues of American civic corruption. He also wielded great power in the National Democratic Party and started Harry S. Truman on the road to the presidency. In this well-balanced biography, the authors examine Pendergast's rise to power, his successes as a political leader, his compassion for the destitute, and his reputation for keeping his word. They also examine Pendergast's character development and how his methods became more and more ruthless. Pendergast had no use for ideology in his "invisible government"—only votes counted. In 1937 and 1938 the federal government broke the back of Pendergast's machine, convicting 259 of his campaign aides for vote fraud. In 1939 Pendergast, who was believed to be the largest bettor on horse racing in the United States, was jailed for income tax evasion, and he died in disgrace in 1945. An insightful and comprehensive biography, Pendergast! will surely serve for years to come as the most thorough investigation of the life and infamous career of Tom Pendergast.
Download or read book Black Gangsters of Chicago written by Ron Chepesiuk and published by . This book was released on 2014-04 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Not as famous as Al Capone, but perhaps even more vicious, are John 'Mushmouth' Johnson, Jeff Fort and Larry Hoover from the Chicago underworld. Ron Chepesiuk reveals, for the first time, the stories of these African-American gangsters who were every bit as powerful, intriguing and colourful as the Windy City's more famous gangsters of the mid-to-late 20th Century. Each page is more exciting than the previous as Chepesiuk exposes never-before-known facts about the black gangsters who once ruled Chicago streets.
Download or read book Leaving Vegas written by Gary Jenkins and published by Createspace Independent Publishing Platform. This book was released on 2016-12-17 with total page 236 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Blackmail. Bombs. Hit teams and executions. Skimming of casino profits. Illegal sports gaming. These tactics were "business as usual" for members of the mafia in the United States in the 1970s. But a team of F.B.I. agents and Kansas City Police Department detectives decided, in those corrupt days, to take advantage of new court-ordered wiretap privileges to curtail some of the graft in that city. The result of those efforts was the end of the mob's domination of Las Vegas casino operations, the imprisonment of key players and the decimation of the mafia's influence in Kansas City, Chicago, Milwaukee and Las Vegas. An ex-cop from Kansas City was part of the team that tackled the mafia corruption. He compiled this account of the surveillance efforts by including verbatim wiretap transcripts that tell the story of those days in the words of the mob's key operatives themselves. Leaving Vegas takes you behind the scenes, detailing the drama from the point of view of the surveillance teams listening in on the conversations, as well as providing the flavor of the relationships between the mobsters. Prison sentences and an end to the bulk of the mob violence in Kansas City wrote a "happy" ending to this story. Jenkins provides plenty of context to this milestone investigation, as well as photos of the key players and surveillance locations.
Download or read book Watergate The Hidden History written by Lamar Waldron and published by Catapult. This book was released on 2013-06-01 with total page 816 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: While Richard Nixon's culpability for Watergate has long been established—most recently by PBS in 2003—what's truly remarkable that after almost forty years, conventional accounts of the scandal still don't address Nixon's motive. Why was President Nixon willing to risk his reelection with so many repeated burglaries at the Watergate—and other Washington offices—in just a few weeks? What motivated Nixon to jeopardize his presidency by ordering the wide range of criminal operations that resulted in Watergate? What was Nixon so desperate to get at the Watergate, and how does it explain the deeper context surrounding his crimes? For the first time, the groundbreaking investigative research in Watergate: The Hidden History provides documented answers to all of those questions. It adds crucial missing pieces to the Watergate story—information that President Nixon wanted, but couldn't get, and that wasn't available to the Senate Watergate Committee or to Woodward and Bernstein. This new information not only reveals remarkable insights into Nixon's motivation for Watergate, but also answers the two most important remaining questions: What were the Watergate burglars after? And why was Nixon willing to risk his Presidency to get it? Watergate: The Hidden History reexamines the historical record, including new material only available in recent years. This includes thousands of recently declassified CIA and FBI files, newly released Nixon tapes, and exclusive interviews with those involved in the events surrounding Watergate—ranging from former Nixon officials to key aides for John and Robert Kennedy. This book also builds on decades of investigations by noted journalists and historians, as well as long–overlooked investigative articles from publications like Time magazine, the Los Angeles Times, and the New York Times.
Download or read book Mafia Summit written by Gil Reavill and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2013-01-22 with total page 372 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mafia Summit is the true story of how a small-town lawman in upstate New York busted a Cosa Nostra conference in 1957, exposing the Mafia to America In a small village in upstate New York, mob bosses from all over the country—Vito Genovese, Carlo Gambino, Joe Bonanno, Joe Profaci, Cuba boss Santo Trafficante, and future Gambino boss Paul Castellano—were nabbed by Sergeant Edgar D. Croswell as they gathered to sort out a bloody war of succession. For years, FBI director J. Edgar Hoover had adamantly denied the existence of the Mafia, but young Robert Kennedy immediately recognized the shattering importance of the Appalachian summit. As attorney general when his brother JFK became president, Bobby embarked on a campaign to break the spine of the mob, engaging in a furious turf battle with the powerful Hoover. Detailing mob killings, the early days of the heroin trade, and the crusade to loosen the hold of organized crime, fans of Gus Russo and Luc Sante will find themselves captured by this momentous story. Reavill scintillatingly recounts the beginning of the end for the Mafia in America and how it began with a good man in the right place at the right time.
Download or read book Wide Open Town written by Diane Mutti Burke and published by University Press of Kansas. This book was released on 2018-11-29 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Kansas City is often seen as a mild-mannered metropolis in the heart of flyover country. But a closer look tells a different story, one with roots in the city’s complicated and colorful past. The decades between World Wars I and II were a time of intense political, social, and economic change—for Kansas City, as for the nation as a whole. In exploring this city at the literal and cultural crossroads of America, Wide-Open Town maps the myriad ways in which Kansas City reflected and helped shape the narrative of a nation undergoing an epochal transformation. During the interwar period, political boss Tom Pendergast reigned, and Kansas City was said to be “wide open.” Prohibition was rarely enforced, the mob was ascendant, and urban vice was rampant. But in a community divided by the hard lines of race and class, this “openness” also allowed many of the city’s residents to challenge conventional social boundaries—and it is this intersection and disruption of cultural norms that interests the authors of Wide-Open Town. Writing from a variety of disciplines and viewpoints, the contributors take up topics ranging from the 1928 Republican National Convention to organizing the garment industry, from the stockyards to health care, drag shows, Thomas Hart Benton, and, of course, jazz. Their essays bring to light the diverse histories of the city—among, for instance, Mexican immigrants, African Americans, the working class, and the LGBT community before the advent of “LGBT.” Wide-Open Town captures the defining moments of a society rocked by World War I, the mass migration of people of color into cities, the entrance of women into the labor force and politics, Prohibition, economic collapse, and a revolution in social mores. Revealing how these changes influenced Kansas City—and how the city responded—this volume helps us understand nothing less than how citizens of the age adapted to the rise of modern America.
Download or read book The Mob and the City written by C. Alexander Hortis and published by Prometheus Books. This book was released on 2014-05-06 with total page 349 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Forget what you think you know about the Mafia. After reading this book, even life-long mob aficionados will have a new perspective on organized crime. Informative, authoritative, and eye-opening, this is the first full-length book devoted exclusively to uncovering the hidden history of how the Mafia came to dominate organized crime in New York City during the 1930s through 1950s. Based on exhaustive research of archives and secret files obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, author and attorney C. Alexander Hortis draws on the deepest collection of primary sources, many newly discovered, of any history of the modern mob. Shattering myths, Hortis reveals how Cosa Nostra actually obtained power at the inception. The author goes beyond conventional who-shot-who mob stories, providing answers to fresh questions such as: * Why did the Sicilian gangs come out on top of the criminal underworld? * Can economics explain how the Mafia families operated? * What was the Mafia's real role in the drug trade? * Why was Cosa Nostra involved in gay bars in New York since the 1930s? Drawing on an unprecedented array of primary sources, The Mob and the City is the most thorough and authentic history of the Mafia's rise to power in the early-to-mid twentieth century.
Download or read book Toms Town Kansas City and the Pendergast Legend written by William M. Reddig and published by Franklin Classics Trade Press. This book was released on 2018-11-11 with total page 428 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. To ensure a quality reading experience, this work has been proofread and republished using a format that seamlessly blends the original graphical elements with text in an easy-to-read typeface. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.
