Many people helped to make this book a reality. Andrew Wylie, my literary agent, believed in the idea from the start, and he has my deepest thanks for all he has done. At the Wylie, Aitken & Stone office, the indefatigable Deborah Karl has been a mainstay throughout. Thanks also to Sarah Chalfant, Bridget Love, and to Gillon Aitken in England.
At Simon & Schuster, Michael Korda, my editor, gave me the encouragement and support necessary for a project of this scope. I would also like to thank Eric Rayman for his legal counsel and Gail Winston. Chuck Adams has been meticulous in preparing the manuscript. At Macmillan London, Roland Philipps, Felicity Rubinstein, and Catherine Hurley brought their enthusiasm to this book.
My search for the real Al Capone took me from Chicago to Miami; Los Angeles; San Francisco (Alcatraz); Cleveland; Brooklyn; Washington, D.C.; Nebraska; and several cities in Michigan. I went in search of government files and records, little-known books and periodicals, historic sites, and most importantly, people who had known, were related to, or had done business with Capone.
Interviews form a crucial part of this book. I conducted more than 300 of them, talking with certain individuals as many as a dozen times. Some of the most intriguing and productive encounters occurred in the summer of 1991, when I traveled to Lansing, Michigan, to talk with members of an extended family about the Al Capone they had known. It was the first time they had ever discussed him with an outsider, the first time they revealed closely guarded, cherished family secrets. Throughout their lives they feared the stigma of close association with Capone, but it became strikingly apparent that the Capone they described with such vividness and affection was almost unknown to the world at large.
In the following months, I met with other members of this family in locations as different as a diner on a bleak, windy highway outside Chicago Heights and a lavish home in Southern California. At their request, I have given pseudonyms to this group of individuals. They include: Giovanna Antonucci, Grazia Mastropietro, Sam Pontarelli, and Anthony Russo.
Later that summer, I found myself sitting across a kitchen table from Al Capone’s nephew, Harry Hart, in Homer, Nebraska, where I heard still more about the unknown side of Capone. Homer—pop. 560—doesn’t appear on the maps they give out at car rental counters. I doubt its dusty, abbreviated main street has changed much in half a century. As I pulled up to Harry’s house in my rented car, his son and grandchildren were leaving. The interior was immaculate, adorned with church and scouting awards. As the afternoon gave way to evening, this reserved and gentle man proceeded to tell me whatever he could about the incredible career of his father, Richard “Two-Gun” Hart (born Vincenzo Capone), who was Al’s oldest brother, and about Uncle Al himself. Over tall glasses of iced tea, Harry produced photographs, letters, and yellowed newspaper clippings documenting the life of “Two-Gun”: a legendary marshal, presidential bodyguard, and Prohibition agent. All the while, his younger brother was the largest bootlegger in the country. Listening to Harry, I began to realize that Al Capone was a character far more rich and strange than I had previously imagined. It was evident that the Capone family contained vast potential for both good and evil.
I am equally grateful to all the other individuals who generously shared their recollections and put up with my frequent prodding for more information and elucidation. They include: Mike Aiello, Myrl E. Alexander, Jim Bacon, William Balsamo, John Bean, Tony Berardi, Philip R. Bergen, Barbara Botein, Jim Brindisi, Rio Burke, Irving Burstein, Harry Busch, Jackie Cain, Mona Pucci Clemens, Max Allan Collins, Lou Corsino, Jack Cranall, Sharon Ness Darkovich, William Dale Dunlap, Jack Foyle, Dolly Gaiter, Michael Graham, Dick Grose, Harold Hagen, Dr. Richard Hahn, Joyce Hart, Harry Hart, William S. Hart, Kenan Heise, William Helmer, Milt “Judge” Hinton, Mona Hinton, Art Hodes, Charlie Hopkins, Henry Jacoby, Louise Jamie, George E. Q. Johnson Jr., Nate Kaplan, Marion Hopwood Kelly, Gera-Lind Kolarik, Donald Knox, Roy Kral, Bill Lambie, Andrea Andrews Larkin, Corinne Lawson, Mark Levell, Raymond Longwell, John Madigan, Jonathan Margolis, Virginia Marmaduke, Terence F. MacCarthy, Dr. Victor McCusick, Rebecca McFarland, Alan McKee, Henry Morrison, George Murray, Richard Van Orman, John Pegoria, Stanley Pieza, Nicholas Pileggi, Rick Porrello, Leslie L. Potts, Maxine Pucci, William F. Roemer Jr., Mike Rotunno, James L. Simon, Lloyd Wendt, Robert St. John, Henry A. Schaefer, Walter Spirko, Al Sutton, Walter Trohan, Dr. Thomas Turner, Vern Whaley, Al “Wallpaper” Wolff, and Artha Woods.
A significant number of other individuals talked with me off the record, and they also have my thanks.
Documents pertaining to Capone’s life and career proved abundant, thanks in part to five decades of press scrutiny, Senate hearings, FBI investigations, court records, prison files, wiretaps, and loquacious informers. At times I was nearly overwhelmed by the sheer quantity of detailed information available on Capone in particular and the supposedly secret subject of organized crime in general. Would that we were as well-informed about the inner workings of some of our legitimate institutions.
Because of the federal government’s extensive surveillance of Capone and his family, he proved well suited to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) inquiries. In many cases, I have been the first to draw on these documents for publication. The following government agencies provided information to me under this act:
In Washington, D.C., the Federal Bureau of Investigation made available approximately 2,500 pages of documents from their permanent file on Al Capone, as well as their files on Frank “The Enforcer” Nitti and Eliot Ness. My thanks to J. Kevin O’Brien and Gerry Brovy of the FBI’s Records Management Division for their cooperation with my numerous requests for copies of these once confidential dossiers. At the Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Division, Johnnie Nix, Edwin R. Ward, and Bill Woolf of the FOIA/Privacy Section supplied a transcript of the tax trial of Al Capone; Shelley Davis, the IRS historian, contributed additional material. At the Department of Justice, Pamela Jones and J. Brian Ferrel of the Tax Division cheerfully supplied extensive documents pertaining to Al Capone and his associates. I also wish to acknowledge the Great Lakes Region branch of the National Archives and archivist Donald W. Jackanicz for access to additional documents pertaining to Al Capone’s tax trial, and Vicki Herman, the librarian of the Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms in Washington, D.C., for information on Eliot Ness.
I found federal prison files for so-called “Notorious Offenders” especially valuable because they contain detailed and reliable medical, biographical, and psychological information on their subjects, as well as correspondence, parole proceedings, and even a comprehensive list of the inmates’ visitors. At the National Archives and Records Administration in Washington, D.C., Sue McDonough provided the extensive “Notorious Offenders” prison files for Frank “The Enforcer” Nitti and Jack “Greasy Thumb” Guzik. The National Archives Trust Fund Board in Atlanta, Georgia, furnished the “Notorious Offenders” file on Ralph Capone. John W. Roberts, the archivist of the Federal Bureau of Prisons in Washington, D.C., went to great lengths to locate Al Capone’s prison file; my thanks to him for all his help.
In addition, I wish to extend thanks to a number of institutions in and around Chicago, where I conducted much of the research for this book. The Chicago Historical Society proved to be an exceptional resource, and I am grateful to its staff, including Eileen Flanagan, Russell Lewis, Archie Motley, and Corey Seebohm, for their assistance with my studies of the intertwined subjects of Capone, organized crime, Chicago history, and Prohibition. I also wish to thank the Newberry Library, the Regenstein Library of the University of Chicago, the Chicago Public Library, the Chicago Heights Public Library, and the Chicago Museum of Broadcast Communications. At the Chicago Crime Commission, Jeannette Callaway and Jerry Gladden patiently answered my questions and provided access to their archives. Joseph Saccomonto of the American Police Center and Museum furnished photographs and other information. Terence F. MacCarthy, the executive director of the Federal Defender Program and a defense lawyer for Al Capon
e in the ABA’s 1990 retrial, supplied documents from the original hearing as well as a cogent analysis of it. Bryan Goggin and Jerry Sciaraffa led me to Cook County court documents pertaining to Capone’s early criminal career. The Italian Cultural Center in Stone Park, Illinois, graciously provided access to its oral history project documenting the experiences of Italian-Americans in Chicago, and Professor Dominic Candeloro added perspective. In St. Joseph, Michigan, Bea Rodgers of the Maud Preston Palenske Memorial Library assisted. Special thanks to Douglas Bukowski of the University of Illinois for sharing his copy of the FBI files on Al Capone with me. Mark Levell acted as my guide to the grave sites of Capone, his family, and several of his victims. My appreciation goes to the staff of the Omni Ambassador East Hotel, where I stayed during my research trips. I must also acknowledge the assistance of the Merry Gangsters Literary Society, whose members provided countless leads and companionship that warmed the winter weeks I spent in Chicago.
The apparent “success” of Prohibition in the 1920s had the bitterly ironic effect of making the rise of bootleggers such as Al Capone not just possible but inevitable. The Temperance and Prohibition movements generated an extraordinary outpouring of material: journals, broadsides, and privately published memoirs. In my search for the lost literature of Temperance, I was fortunate to visit the National Headquarters of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union in Evanston, Illinois. There Rachel Kelly, the president, and Alfred Epstein, the librarian, generously permitted me access to the unique trove of Temperance and Prohibition literature in the Frances E. Willard Memorial Library. Thanks also to the Evanston Historical Society, where Mark Burnette furthered my understanding of Evanston’s place in the annals of the Temperance movement.
In New York, I am grateful for the assistance of the staffs of the New York Society Library; the Police Museum of the New York Police Department; and the Othmer Library of the Brooklyn Historical Society. At the Museum of Modern Art, Mary Corliss furnished stills from movies inspired by the Capone legend. On Staten Island, I furthered my research on the Italian-American experience at the Center for Migration Studies, whose librarian, Diane Zimmerman, helped me to make the best use of the collection.
In Cleveland, where the records of Eliot Ness’s career are located, I wish to thank Artha Woods, clerk of council, and Martin Hauserman, archivist of the Cleveland City Council, for their help. Ness’s papers, including thirteen of his personal scrapbooks, are to be found at the Western Reserve Historical Society, where Kermit J. Pike, Anne Sindelar, and Barbara Henritze offered guidance to this revealing material. My thanks as well to the Cleveland Police Historical Society and its curator, Anne T. Kmiek, and to Rebecca McFarland of the Rocky River, Ohio, Public Library.
Other archives across the country furnished additional information. I wish to acknowledge the assistance of Dwight M. Miller and Jennifer Pederson of the Herbert Hoover Library in West Branch, Iowa; Nancy McCall and the Johns Hopkins Medical Archives; Joan Ferguson of the Nebraska State Historical Society; Nancy Neumann of the Sioux City Public Library; Kathy Scheetz of the South Sioux City Public Library; Erica S. Toland and Irene Stachura of the San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park (Alcatraz Island); Pamela D. Arceneaux and Carol Bartels of the Historic New Orleans Collection; Widener Library (Harvard University), and the New York City Department of Records and Information Services. In Baltimore, Marion Elizabeth Rodgers, a biographer of H. L. Mencken, alerted me to material in Mencken’s papers concerning Capone, and Averil J. Kadis of the Enoch Pratt Free Library provided the relevant documents. In addition, I wish to acknowledge the Baltimore Sun library; the New Orleans Times-Picayune library; Broward County, Florida Vital Statistics Office and Court Archives; Dade County, Florida Records Library; the Miami Dade Public Library; and the Historical Society of Southern Florida.
Several research assistants made significant contributions to this book. Sarah Koenig tracked down leads in Chicago, San Francisco, and Miami. Kathy Cantor located documents in Chicago, as did Dave Auburn, who also visited Capone’s backwoods retreat in northern Wisconsin. Ken Lauber, Erin Donovan, and Lesley Alderman transcribed my tape-recorded interviews. Bryan Hammond sent material from London. Lea Saslav located elusive books. Three resourceful genealogists pieced together the complicated and far-flung Capone family tree: Marsha Saron Dennis in New York, Steven W. Siegel in New York and Miami, and Kay Ingalls in California. It was Marsha who noticed that an oft-reproduced draft registration for Al Capone actually belonged to another man with a similar name, and who then located the correct document. Once again, Susan Shapiro proved to be an invaluable researcher, host, and sounding board. My profound appreciation for all she has done.
Other individuals, friends, and family members contributed to this book in a variety of ways. Sidney Abrams, my father-in-law, came through with several vital leads; both he and my mother-in-law, Bernice Abrams, provided generous hospitality during my visits to Cleveland to conduct research on Eliot Ness. Thanks also to Scott Anderson; William Balsamo for his running commentary on the Brooklyn underworld; Edward Baumann; Irwin and Cecile Bazelon; my brother John Bergreen for photographic reproductions; Jon Binder; Max Allan Collins for sending his colorful Eliot Ness mystery novels; Lou Corsino for the wide-ranging tour of Chicago Heights; Sharon L. Darkovich; Nathaniel Deutsch; Daniel Dolgin for his wisdom and legal advice; Alexandra Dworkin; Dr. Ron Dworkin; my sister-in-law Joan Freeman and her husband Robert Alden for their hospitality in Los Angeles; Gerry Greenbach of Two Bunch Palms in Desert Hot Springs, California; Charles Halevi; Maureen and James Houtrides for their detailed knowledge of Brooklyn; Tom Hollatz; George E. Q. Johnson Jr. (the son of the U.S. attorney who prosecuted Al Capone) for providing several hundred pages of documents from his personal collection relating to the tax trial; Anne Johnston; Gera-Lind Kolarik for the tour of those former Capone strongholds, Berwyn and Cicero, Illinois; Don Kurdziel; Steve Kurdziel; Gene Lees, for his knowledge of jazz in the Capone era; Eric Levin; Richard C. Lindberg; Matthew Luzi, for sharing his expertise on the history of Chicago Heights; James T. Maher, who was always there with a kind word and thoughtful advice; Lieutenant Monty McCord of the Hastings, Nebraska, Police Department for material about Richard “Two-Gun” Hart; Vivian and Lloyd Moles; John O’Brien; J. David Roellgen; Barney Rosset; Rich Samuels; Bruce Stark and Costa Rodis of Computer Tutor for hi-tech help; Tom Stroobie; Ion Trewin; and Ned Whelan.
Dr. Jack Shapiro contributed a great deal to my understanding of Capone’s syphilis as well as the social climate surrounding the disease. Capone’s cocaine habit, an important aspect of his life in the 1920s, had been overlooked until Dr. Shapiro examined the medical records and brought it to my attention. My thanks to both Dr. and Mrs. Shapiro, as well, for their hospitality during my stay in Michigan.
I also wish to acknowledge the contribution of Monte McLaws, who has spent years researching the life of Al Capone’s oldest brother, Richard “Two-Gun” Hart. When ill health caused him to abandon the project, he contacted me and generously offered to share his research; my sincere appreciation to him and his wife, Emily, for doing so.
Special thanks to Bill Roemer, author of Roemer: Man Against the Mob and one of the best-informed people around on the subject of organized crime. Since Bill served as an FBI agent in Chicago with considerable distinction for many years, he was the only person I dared ask the probably ridiculous but possibly vital question: Is there any danger in writing about Al Capone today? Drawing on his experience, he said, he was 90 percent certain I would be safe. I intend to hold him to those odds.
My wife, Betsy, and our children, Nicholas and Sara, sustained me throughout the years I worked on this book and have contributed much to it. For all this I owe them more than I can say.
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Notes on Sources
Abbreviations for archives and frequently cited sources:
Archives and Other Collections:
CCC
Chicago Crime Commission. Chicago, Illinois.
CHS
Chicago Historical Society. Chicago, Illinois.
GEQJ
Personal Collection of George E. Q. Johnson, Jr. Chicago, Illinois.
HHL
Herbert Hoover Library. West Branch, Iowa.
MC
Mencken Collection, Enoch Pratt Free Library. Baltimore, Maryland.
MM
Personal Collection of Monte McLaws. Salt Lake City, Utah.
NAGL
National Archives and Records Administration—Great Lakes Regional Office. Chicago, Illinois.
WRHS
Eliot Ness Collection, The Western Reserve Historical Society. Cleveland, Ohio.
Files Obtained Through the Freedom of Information Act:
FBI-AC
FBI Permanent File for Alphonse Capone. FBI, Washington, D.C.
Capone Page 90
