tv documents america's story and on sundays, book tv brings you the latest in nonfiction books and authors. funding for c-span 2 comes interest these television companies and more including sparklight. >> what is great internet? is it strong? [ inaudible ] at sparklight, we know connection goes way beyond technology. from monday morning meetings to friday nights with friends and everything in between. but the best connections are always there right when you need them. so how do u know it's great sfwhnts because it works. we're sparklight, always working for you. >> sparklight with these television companies support c-span 2 as a public service. good morning, everybody. welcome to this session. i'm jeff you are bin, the

education director at the library and museum and on behalf of the fdr presidential library and museum i would like to welcome you to the 20th anniversary of the roosevelt reading festival. fdr planned for the library to be the reading institution for the study of the entire roosevelt era and the research room is consistently one of the busiest of all the presidential libraries. this year's group of authors reflects the wide variety of research done here and at similar institutions throughout the country. let me quickly go through the lay of the land here. we are going to talk for about 30 to 40 minutes or so and then there will be time to do questions and answers. we are in the c-span room so if you're going to ask a question we need you to come up to the microphone, don't ask the question until you get the microphone, ask the question and the author will respond. okay. we want to make sure that we get

the question on audio. and it is my pleasure to introduce our next author. david pietrusza is the author of many books including 1932 the rise of hitler, and fdr two tales of politics, betrayal and unlikely destiny. roosevelt sweeps nation, 1936 landslide and the triumph of the liberal idea -- ideal and "gangsterland," a tour through the dark heart of jazz-age new york city. he has appeared on morning joe, voice of america, history channel, american heros channel, espn, and npr and c-span. he has spoken at the fdr presidential library in the past at the john f. kennedy library and truman presidential unlibraries as well as grant's cottage state historic site, the national baseball hall of fame and museum, and various

institutions, universities and libraries and festivals across the country. he lives in new york state and here to talk with us about his recent book, is david pietrusza. [ applause ] >> thank you. i think the first question i often get about the book is, why -- first off, thanks to all the great people here for havino me. me. everyone is so nice and it's an event i look forward to, even when i'm in the speaking. i show up as a spectator, that's how much i like it. but anyway, why write a book like this if you are like a presidential historian and such? well before that i was doing baseball history and the book on the gangster and all-around underworld figure arnold rothstein. a couple years ago i got a call

from somebody i had been doing one of these things on cable tv where you argue about the events of rnthe day, and he said hey, m doing -- i do a radio show now about broadway, and could you come on and talk about arnold broadstein in times square. i said yes, i can because right after writing the book about arnold rothstein, now about 20 years ago, i had conducted -- i was hired to do a walking tour of times square. arnold rothstein's times square, okay, and because it's times square where you keep your hand on your wallet, i was stiffed on payment for that tour. but i kept all my notes and i could find them in the hobble that passes from my office.

and, so i thought, well, why don't i just -- i'll do the interview and maybe i can publish a little pamphlet. i tend to get carried away. and one of the reasons i could get carried away is because, unlike today's newspapers which leave out all sorts of details, particularly about crimes and criminals and locations, the newspapers then were just full of details and they had plenty of adetails to be full of, in e prohibition era in times square, and then i took the thing forward and did like a part two in the book about the upper west side which i was quite surprised to learn was really mobbed up back then because, you know, it's da direct shot from times square or the upper west side to where the action was in times square. so we -- the newspapers would tell you all the details and they would tell you not only the street that something occurred

on, they would tell you the street number and they would tell you the apartment number. i found a guide book which for 1920, which listed the addresses of famous people in the city, so it would tell you where under secretary of the navy franklin roosevelt lived, okay, imagine that in today's world. and so one of the things i said, i said, please, let me speak about this book. at the roosevelt reading festival.na i promise i will bring in politics front and center to that. because the -- we talk about intersectionality now in politics. and there's an intersectionality or overlap about this story and about how gangster-ism worked in the '20s in times square and so you've got the usual murderers

and shakedown artists and speakeasy and bootlegging but you have -- oh, you have politics. this is a big factor which plays into it. they need protection. it goes into sports where they are fixing certain sporting events. and it goes into the theater where every gangster appears to have a showgirl girlfriend and not all gangsters. not just gangsteres. maybe franklin roosevelt doesn't, but william randolph hearst certainly does. his first wife and then his second wife mary anne daly. you see this over and over again. you see often the plot lines of early 1930s movies seem fanciful and hackneyed are based on today's headlines or yesterday's headlines in that case. so with politics, the

cornerstone of the story is tammy hall. the democratic organization which runs everything really in new york ocity that time and for a long time which franklin delano roosevelt makes his reputation in the new york state as being a forceful opponent of. and with the most prominent tie-in to the violence and gore in this era -- area and in this era, is the tammini boss of the lower east side named tim sullivan. sullivan, intersectionality overlap, aside from running the lower east side and being a state senator and congressman, was also a partner in a west coast chain of all things. so he had an office for his chain at 1440 broadway.

so sullivan also protects up and coming young gamblers. one of whom is arnold rothstein and another is a guy named beansy rosenthal. rosenthal has a gambling house at 104 west 45th street, gets tired of being shaken down by a police lieutenant protected by sullivan called lieutenant charles becker. becker is one, mean, crooked cop. and rosenthal says do you know who i am? i am a protege of big tim and you're picking upon me, and i'm not going to take it where his gambling house is wrecked by the police. this happens one more time. and rosenthal -- this is a bad timing for tammini because manhattan at that point is one of those rare intervals when manhattan has a republican d.a. so he's going to go to the d.a.

and he's going to go to the press. trouble in river city. and becker and big tim sullivan, big tim sullivan, by the way, ironically,s is the father of the first gun control law in the united states, the sullivan act, okay, and also involved in the murder of beansy rosenthal which is the first drive-by shooting in the united states history. they sort of go by him after -- after hiring some killers through another gambler named bridgy weber, who had a farrow house at 102 west 42nd street, which is now a whole foods. okay. the one by bryant park. so rosenthal is no more. becker goes to the chair. the first. so many firsts in this case. the first and i think only cop

to go to the chair in the united states of america. so we have that. and -- but surviving this mess is arnold roth stein and rothstein, there are many, many sites one can visit that were associated with him in new york city, most notably the park central hotel, very near to carnegie hall. big hotel, is it ill still in b 200 west 56th street. he is killed in an upper room there by another gambler named george mcmahonist. that's my theory anyway. it was the d.a.'s theory as well, but not the jury's. but pretty much i think the fix was in there to let him go.

now rothstein was involved in, like i say, rum running, loan sharking, bootlegs, speakeasies. the great middleman of things. and one of the middlemen or -- well, there's an adjunct or a detour from the rothstein story, and he has a relative, a relative of his is a cousin and is married to a guy named george ringler. george ringler was a sort of -- he would get around in political he would get around in political he also worked for the "new york daily news" as sort of a photographer and a go-to guy and guy who would feed stories to the reporters and stuff like this. he showed up in the story as a fellow who served a summons

because there was an entertainer at this time by the name of frank timmy, a blackface entertainer, and you could -- you could listen to a recording of his act, not in black face, n youtube, one called frank tiny's first recording and the second is called frank tiny's second recording. it's remarkably funny. but as a person not so funny. and so he after beating up his beautiful girlfriend emma jean wilson, is accosted by a new york daily news photographer in times square and beats him up too, where upon george ringher will serve him with a summons on behalf of the beat up photographer. b ringler is connected to mary jane james walker, the corrupt

mayor of new york city removed from office eventually by governor franklin delano roosevelt and ringler so close to walker, he accompanies walker up to albany to argue his case and try save his office. but if you think ringler going up to albany is impressive, i will tell you what is impressive. we happen to have george ringler's granddaughter sitting in the front row. randy ringler. so you weren't expecting that, were you? >> [ inaudible ]. >> she's got -- she's got information which we're not going to discuss further. even though this meeting is hosted by the feds. okay. another politician who was involved in the rothstein story is maurice cantor.

he has an office at 152 west 46th street. he's the assemblyman on the upper upper upper west side somewhere past i think columbia university. okay. he's in there for a couple terms. he's rothstein's attorney at the end, fixing everything for him. when arnold rothstein is shot at the park central hotel and is dying at the polyclinic hotel, which, by the way, valentino died at and marilyn monroe was treated at, and when rothstein is dying, cantor produces -- shows up at the deathbed and says, "arnold, remember that will you asked me to prepare a few weeks ago and you never got around to signing?" i happen tto have it right her. sign here. this was contested by arnold's

relatives, but that's the sort of fellow that maurice cantor was and the sort of people that were often infesting politics at that time which is why tammini was about to collapse. they also had to vet arnold rothstein's papers, which randy may have with her, i don't know. she says no. was the 17th district of leader of tammini in manhattan, a guy named nathan burkean. the tammini guys were not dumb. burkean was the best entertainment lawyer in the country. he represented, you name all the stars of the silent era, name all the studios, he represented them all. he was hot stuff. he was good. oddly enough, his grandson, jonathan burkean, is now the congressional cochairman for the new york state republican party.

so the story never seems to end. bill fallen, another arnold rothstein lawyer, had been an assistant d.a. in westchester county, he was born right near the church of saint mary the virgin in times square, if you're ever in times square go see it, it's the hidden gem of times square it's beautiful. but he was -- he was -- he became rather disill lute, quite flamboyant, great jury fixer, et cetera, at the hotel bellclaire in april of 1926, a mystery woman burst into the room where he is and throws some form of acid into his face. remarkably, they get him to a hospital and not only isn't he not blinded, he's not even scarred.

but he's -- he is sort of the type of lawyer portrayed like in the musical "chicago." he is -- he is -- when william randolph hearst is bringing charges or when they are bringing jury charges against fallen at one point, he puts hearst s on trial. he says they're picking on me dothe hearst papers are pickg on me. you know why? because i have the secret birth certificates of the twins that was fathered by william randolph hearst and mary anne davies. there was no birth certificate. there were no twins. there were no children. he was acquitted. so those are the sort of people we're dealing with. last but not least t in the early 1930s, there's a judge, judge joseph crater, who goes to dinner at billy haas' chop house

on times square and steps into a taxicab afterwards and disappears. and is never seen again. this is one of the many, many, many corrupt judges in new york city at that time. a product of tammeneny hall, but connected to some pretty respectable names. he had been the secretary to senator robert wagner, the father of social security, in the wagner labor relations act. and then he moved on from that to being a supreme court judge. appointed to that position by governor franklin delano roosevelt. now there's some theories as to what happened to crater. none of them stand up to absolute proof. he may have been propositioned by legs diamond, who had a

grudge with him, had taken to coney island to have some sense beat beaten into hahim, and beat a b too much sense into him, and he was buried under the boardwalk. that's a theory. or that one of the things which i've talked about intersectionality or didn't talk about prostitution, that he may have gone to won of poly adler's infamous or famous brothels in the city and had not survived the evening in a different form. and was dumped in the hudson river. you pay your money and take your choice on what happened to him. speakeasies, are just everywhere, particularly in the west '50s. texas diamond is the most famous speakeasy operator hostess. movies made about her while she's doing this. helen morgan, who is a big

musical comedy star, stars in the original "show boat" and like a day after "show boat" opens her speakeasy is raided. okay. that's how commonplace this was. another big speakeasy operator is a guy named larry faye. faye operated a bunch of taxi cabs and he would send taxi cabs up to montreal and they would come back with booze and such like this and so he owned the el faye club on west 45th street and then later on, when he's sort of down on his luck operating the casablanca on -- casa planka on west 56th street and has to cut the employees' wages, the doorman shoots him dead. shoots him dead. he had 10 cents in his pocket when he died. crime does not necessarily pay.

he's also known for something else. before it was unpopular or before it was really popular in some places and really unpopular everywhere else, he would fest his speakeasies and taxi cabs with giant swastikas. okay. anyway, goodbye to larry faye. other speakeasy operators who you may have heard of are jimmy durant. arnold rothsteep has a crap game operating in the club durant and billy rose, billy rose was a great showman. he did that movie in the '50s with jimmy durant called "jumbo", and he was at one point married to fanny brice. he ran a speakeasy called the back stage club which he was propositioned by these them and those guys, i'd like to -- i'd like to buy a share of your

establishment, mr. rose. i'm not interested. it's raided by the cops, everything is smashed up. same thing happens again. finally he gets the message. it's really not a these them and those guys. he's doing it at the behest of arnold rothstein. rothstein gets a cut, police get a cut, everything like that. being married to fanny brice, okay, fanny brice had been married earlier to a guy named nicky anstein. if you remember the movie. what they left out in the movie, largely, was that nicky rnstein was a confederate and a great admirer of arnold rothstein. he was a con man in his own right. there were a lot government bonds back then. they were bearer bonds so you should cash them in. so if you got a shipment of

bonds coming up from wall street to a bank or something, it could be hit and then robbed and arnstein was involved in this, went on the lam at one point and got sick of being on the lam, turned himself in and arnold rothstein gave him advice. why don't you instead of just turning yourself in some boring way, they would have a police parade down fifth avenue every year year, why don't you get in a car and ride down in the police parade past the commissioner of police. he did. the police were not amused. he did go to levinworth. for bail money arnold rothstein provided that bail money to fanny brice. but he also said, because it wasn't just altruism, he said while we're here i have an importing business and you have

a new apartment, why don't you buy all your furniture from me, and he did and it was seriously, seriously overpriced. she was not amused. nor was a woman named anne nickles. anne nickles produced, wrote, a show in the 1920's called "ab's irish rose." the old plot, jewish guy marries irish girl. she -- got knows where the first of anything starts, but she had the first big hit with that. it was the longest running show in broadway history for a long time. it was a big hit, but it wasn't a first. and like all those broadway show musicals, movies in the '20s, it's like if we only can stay on the show is going to have legs. it's gonna be a hit. i believe in it. and she goes to arnold rothstein

for money. to keep it going. because rothstein actually financed the building of the theater on 42nd street. he would put the money up for just about anything if he could make money back. and he says, sure. i can lend you the money. and she says, do you want a piece of the show? no. i don't. i just want the money back with interest soon. on time. and also while you're here, you know, i'm in the insurance business. i would like you to take out in insurance policies on your life. with me as the beneficiary. this was common practice by him. she was not amused. if she -- if he had taken the original deal, he could have made a really big fortune on it as it was the only -- only cleared about $3,000.. but that's the sort of wheeling and dealing which was going on

there. as i said, a lot of show girls involved in these things. everybody had a showgirl, chorus girl, girlfriend. legs diamond did. when the marks brothers are on broadway, in their second show called s"the coconuts," harpo decides, i got a new gag. i'm going to try to catch groucho unaware and see if i can get him flat-footed and not know what to do on the stage. i'm going to have a blonde run across the stage and chase her, honking my horn. and well, actually groucho knows what to say. that's not the point of the story. the point of the story is afterwards someone says, harpo do you know who that chorus girl is associated with. no. that's legs diamond's current girlfriend. why don't you get another blonde. so he did.

but all those things would be going on in the -- they also make -- they also make a show called "room 349." that's the room number of where rothstein was killed at the -- what is now the neitherlander theater just below 42nd street. it's not a very good show. it lasts for a handful of performances. it's done very, very soon after his death. the names are changed, of course, to protect the guilty. what is remarkable is that his miss stress is in the show. a woman named ines norton. so these are indeed wild, wild times. sportses. there's a guy named -- a gangster who most people have forgotten but was big then. y his name was owen or ony the killer man. when you got a nickname in these circles like the killer, yes, he

did. away for about eight years or so. he comes out and becomes the bootlegging guy of the west side and also involved in sports with a couple of associates big bill duffy and frenchie. they promote a guy from italy called primo. big giants of a guy who can't box his way out of a paper bag but if you have friends like olny and duffy you will become heavyweight champion of the world because fights are fixed. in one case a friend is named george raft, the actor. the actor and before he became an actor was an associate of guys like only madden, but also, worked in texas speakeasy as

perhaps the foremost charleston dancer in america. see if you can find on youtube where he does a brief charleston. he's good. at one point, he is propositioned or asked by madden to go to eddie "big boy" peterson a fighter to throw a fight against carnarea. cand threaten him. doesn't want to threaten him, slips him a mickey and makes him shaky robefore the fight. this happens at the hotel on west 44th street which is the headquarters of lucky luciano. all these things connect and go around in circles and keep happening and happening. the jewel robbery, amazing, amazing numbers involved in the -- $305,000 in jewel robberies. 265 murders of showgirls, again, of having -- oh, one, one of the

showgirls is insured, the jewels are insured by arnold rothstein. but just before she's robbed and murdered, the policy lapses. okay. these are tough times. the tough times. and one of the jewel robberies in that $305,000 robbery, is a woman named buda godman. they rob something from a guy named harry glenby of the glenby hair net manufacturing fortune. big money in hair nets. she's involved in that. she gets caught and one of her associates commits suicide. she shows up in our story a couple decades before that when she comes in from chicago with a rich businessman. they check into the ensewno

hotel and the place is raided by detectives except they're not detectives, not detectives, this is a badger game, a blackmail operation and they want to shake this guy down for money. he says, i don't care. i'm not paying. she has to take it on the lam. she comes back into the city where she becomes the miss stress of one charles a.stono the owner after 1917 of the new york baseball giants. remember horace stonen moved the giants to san francisco. horace was a stock broker who was involved in an operation, type of operation called a bucket shop. what's a bucket shop? a bucket shop is when you go in and they say oh, you should buy copper and they know it's a stinker. they know it's overvalued and you give them the money and they

don't buy the stock. because they know it's a stinker, it's been inflated by rumors and going to go down and, in fact, then they may throw thadditional rumors and press reports in as to how bad the company is. and then they say oh, i think you should get out before it goes lower and return a little sliver of the money that you paid in and keep the rest of it. horace stonen was involved in that. and these sort of operations were protected by tammeneny hall and protected by arnold rothstein. you have all of those things going on as well. i think i'm about ready to be yanked off in terms of this. so there's much more. it's in the book.s and i'll be around later on to discuss anything you want. and to discuss anything you want to talk about now. to the microphone.

>> if there's any questions come on over and have at it. >> one. >> i guess my main question, and i'm guilty of it myself, is why are we so fascinated by such bad people? >> when you are baptized, the priest asks the infant, do you reject satan? do you reject the glamour of evil? evil has a certain glamour. that's why satan is so successful because -- because, you know, he doesn't come to you with someone who is repulsive to tempt you. he comes with all the showgirls, you know. he comes with the bubbly, the champagne, the good times, the '20s.

why the '20s? why do we talk about the '20s so much? they're a fun era. it's fun in a bad way. but as i like to say about sin, sin is like eating at mcdonald's. it seems like a good idea at the time, but you always regret it. next question. >> thanks very much. can you talk just a little bit about fdr's involvement with tammeneny hall how he maneuvered with them, around them, against them in his state ledge gislatu time and time as governor. >> back when they had united states senators elected by legislatures there was a deadlock. fdr is a big part of the deadlock. the democrats had majority in

the legislature which was unusual at the time and a deal is made eventually putting another democrat in. in the meantime, he, you know, gets a lot of am nety from tammeneny hall, but i think he's -- he's a dam good politician and realizes if you're not going to move to wyoming or somewhere, you better make your peace with tammeneny hall. so by the time of like the 1920 convention, he's already been a member of the wilson administration and he's learning the ropes more and more and also picked up a guy named louie howe who is going to say, cool it, franklin. you know. don't shoot all your ammunition here. you've got to live to fight another day. he's palling around with al smith at the 1920 convention. at some point he gives him a vote or two. smith becomes -- he really at that point becomes a protege of

smith. smith builds him up at the 1924 convention, 1928 convention. makes him the governor really, and when tammeneny dedicates a new wigwom or headquarters on union square, franklin roosevelt is there. he's not hands off anymore and he's appointing guys like judge crater to the bench. de hunt have to, but politics is the baart of the politics and y do what you do. i think he also appoints a particularly nefarious friend of walker to a judgeship around that time and probably many more atand then, you know, even when walker is going down, he's kind of careful as to not go too far and not, you know, get too inflammatory against him.

it's a balancing act. but once he's in the white house all the patronage goes to other people like laguardia or flynn in the bronx. thank you. >> thanks. >> yes. >> just a fun thing that if you can comment on is damian runyan was sitting with at lynndie's with arnold rothstein's all the time taking notes so his stories that people would have a lot of fun reading are actually based on all of these real life characters and in "guys and dolls" nathan was based on arnold rothstein and became mindy's instead of lynndie's and bet on the cheesecake instead of the strudel. he loved that and sports, that you will probably enjoy. >> you're seeing that now. at some point not too far into the lynndie story, there's a lynndie's at times square now

which is not related, but there were sort of two lynndies on opposite sides of broadway after a while. the first where arnold rothstein was, and he got the phone call into go to the park central hot, come on up, we got something to discuss, and by the way, i'd like to kill you. i don't think he wanted to kill him. i think it was some sort of accident. it was whatever. that's an interesting thing. was that ina mob hit? that was a mob hit, right. no! a mob hit blows your dam head off. it doesn't shoot you once in the stomach so you can wander down the stairs and be picked up by the police and go to the hospital. that's not professional. that's an amateur who does that. that's -- that's, you know, whatever. but at the other lynndies across from carnegie hall, these things go on in times square, at the park central, albert anna stacia in 1956 of murder incorporated

is killed in the barber chair there. also i think in 1956 or around that time, there's a crusading newspaper man who i met later d on, a guy named victor rozel if you remember him. he went after the unions' corruption hammer and tongs and one day he came out of a radio broadcast nearby, standing in front of lynndies, this is in the '50s, this isn't the roaring '20s, and a goon throws acid in his face. and he is not as lucky as bill fallen and -- but he goes on. the goon is killed by the mob. good. silence him. rozel goes on to continue writing a column for decades afterwards. and become head of an international newspaper

reporting association. as i say, i met him, and i looked into his face and saw those sunglasses which were covering the scars. and i do not admire those guys. thank you. [ applause ] i guess we adjourn to the lobby. >> indeed we do. you can have your book signed out there in the lobby. >> if you're enjoying book tv sign up for our newsletter using the qr code on the screen to receive the schedule of programs, book festivals and more. book tv, every sunday on c-span 2 or any time online at booktv.org. television for serious readers. ♪♪

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