The Don of Silicon Valley
Joe Cerrito died on September 7, 1978, from a heart attack at age 67. He was a successful businessman in…
Joe Gallo’s ‘Crazy’ celebrity status
Though Joseph Gallo was only in his early 40s when he was gunned down, his status in American popular culture…
‘A shiny mark of incorruptibility’
Good stories usually have five key elements: a likable protagonist who selflessly rises to the occasion; a malevolent antagonist seeking…
The life and death of Joe Colombo
Three rounds from an assassin’s gun all but silenced Joseph Colombo, one of the Mafia’s most publicly vocal bosses. Although…
Joe Friday tackled the Los Angeles crime syndicate
William H. Parker, a hardnosed police chief in midcentury Los Angeles, did not want organized crime in his city. In…
The seedy side of Mob life
George V. Higgins, a former New England journalist and federal prosecutor who achieved acclaim as a novelist, disliked being pigeonholed…
Eighty years ago, Ciro ‘The Artichoke King’ Terranova ‘died of a broken heart’
Eighty years ago last month, one of Mob history’s oddball characters crossed into the great gangland netherworld. Ciro “The Artichoke…
Excerpts from “The Chronicles of The Last Jewish Gangster” by Myron Sugerman
The history of the Mob and the history of Jews in America are intertwined, and it’s a history that Myron…
Ten years ago, epic ‘Family Secrets’ trial crippled the Chicago Outfit
The historic “Family Secrets” trial began 10 years ago in Chicago, finally bringing to justice several top Midwestern mobsters responsible…
Seventy years ago today, Bugsy Siegel’s storied Mob life came to an abrupt end
It is important to our Museum and to me as the resident historian that criminals and their criminal acts are…