Chronicles of Events and Biographies Related to the American Mafia
The Genovese crime family is one of the “Five Families” of New York and one of the most powerful organized crime families in the nation. Only the Gambino and Chicago Outfit are larger in terms of made men and associates. The family was founded after Charles Lucky Luciano in the 1930’s but was renamed after…
Nicolo Terranova was born in Corleone Italy in 1890. When he was two years old his family, including his brother’s Ciro, Vincenzo and four sisters immigrated to the United States. They arrived in New York on March 8, 1893 joining their step brother Guiseppe Morello who arrived six months earlier. The Terranova family stayed in…
Greg Scarpa, Sr., was born on May 8, 1928 near Venice, Italy and immigrated to the United States with his parents and brother Salvatore at a young age. The 1950’s were a busy time for Scarpa. He married Connie Forrest and had four children, maintained a relationship with girlfriend Linda Schiro having two more children,…
The Gambino crime family is the most publicized family of the American Mafia. It’s one of “Five Families” based out of New York that dominates organized crime in the United States. The Gambino family got its name from previous boss Carlo Gambino who controlled the family from 1959 until his death in October 1976. The…
Thomas Anthony DeSimone was born on May 24, 1950. He was an Italian- American mobster that worked as an associate of the Lucchese crime family of New York and was one of the real-life goodfellas. Tommy or “Two-Gun Tommy” because he always had two guns, had three siblings, a sister named Delores and two brothers,…
The Chicago Outfit is that city’s branch of the American Mafia. Its modern organization dates to the beer wars of Prohibition and its most notorious leader, Al Capone. It has a seat, along with the Five Families of New York City, on the Commission that governs the Italian mob in America. The Outfit’s roots reach…
Anthony Strollo, most notably known as Tony Bender, was born June 18, 1899 in New York City. He had two brothers, Emilio and Dominick. His playground as a young man was Manhattan, where he worked as bootlegger and enforcer for Joe Masseria. Early in his mafia career Strollo earned a reputation for switching sides when…
“Machine Gun” Jack McGurn was an Italian-American born in Licata, Sicily population 39,000 on July 2, 1902. His birth name was Vincenzo Gibaldi; however he had other variations such as Vincent Gebardi, and Vincenzo Demory. At four years old he and his mother, Giuseppa Verderame, just 24 years old according to the ships manifest arrived…
Giuseppe “Joe the Boss” Masseria was born on January 17, 1886 in Menfi, Sicily although he lived most of his childhood in Marsala. Masseria had no siblings, and his father was a tailor by trade. Masseria immigrated to the United States in 1903 at the age of 17 to avoid a murder indictment in Italy….
Meyer Lansky, one of the great Jewish mobsters, ran gambling in much of the United States and helped build the National Crime Syndicate that ran organized crime in the 1930s and ‘40s. He was known as the “Mob’s accountant,” and he ranks as one of the most powerful gangsters in history. Lansky, a Jewish immigrant,…
Giovanni “Papa Johnny” Torrio ran Chicago’s Mafia in the 1920s, building it from a prostitution racket into an illegal liquor empire. His feud with Irish-American bootleggers led to the worst violence in the history of American organized crime and paved the way for Al Capone. Later in his life, Torrio helped create the Commission that…
Roy Albert DeMeo was born on September 7, 1942 in Bath Beach Brooklyn to working class Italian immigrants. In 1959 DeMeo graduated from James Madison High School with an accomplished loan shark business bringing in hundreds of dollars each week. After leaving James Madison High School DeMeo married and fathered three children. He also continued…
Joseph M. “Joe Cargo” Valachi ranks as one of the most notorious Mafia informants, the first mobster to acknowledge, in public, on television, under oath, that Cosa Nostra is real. Long before Sammy “The Bull” ratted out John Gotti, Valachi’s turncoat testimony gave a face to a Mafia the public knew nothing about. Joseph Valachi,…
Genovese was a ruthless boss who ruled with an iron fist, but his grip began to loosen throughout the 1960s. He was sent to prison for 15 years in 1959 on what were thought to be trumped-up heroin charges, and though he maintained technical control of his family, a panel of three other men made…
Giuseppe “Joe” Profaci was born on October 2, 1897 in Villabate a province Palermo, Sicily. His life as a child is mostly unknown but he is suspected of having been associated with the Sicilian mafia and spent one year in a Sicily prison on theft charges. On September 4, 1921 Profaci boarded ship bound for…