conspiracy of “no speak to nobody,” the traditional trademark of the Mafia, is rigidly enforced. Anyone who violates the code is certain to meet a swift and violent end, and the aggrieved members take their revenge by their own methods.
Although there’s been considerable intermarriage among Mafia families that gives the organization the specter of being a single far-flung clan, it seldom holds big meetings.
And when it did—it was the first time Mafiosi got together to talk things over in an open forum…
That meeting, held on the palatial hilltop estate of mobster Joseph Barbara in upstate New York’s serene, picturesque hamlet of Apalachin, degenerated into a colossal boner.
The infamous conclave finally gave credence and validity to the accumulating claims of one investigator after another that a supergovernment of crime—the Mafia—indeed exists.
That warning toll was sounded with electrifying reverberadons on a rainy November 14, 1957, when Empire State troopers, led by Sergeant Edgar Crosswell, and United States Treasury agents invaded Barbara’s mansion.
Crosswell’s curiosity was first aroused by a procession of sleek, expensive cars with out-of-state and out-of-country license plates sweeping up through the tiny community (pop. 280) to Barbara’s secluded fifty-three-acre estate.
At the first sight of the gray-clad troopers and Treasury agents in street garb, sixty-three impeccably tailored men deserted two hundred pounds of beef at the barbecue pit, grabbed their coats, and scrambled for the exits. The troopers managed to nail fifty-seven of them in different stages of flight—some at a roadblock, others tripping aimlessly on foot through the dense woods.
“The troopers on the raid had a field day when they went into the woods,” said Sergeant Crosswell. “All they had to do was find the guys wearing the pointed patent leather shoes and they knew they had Mafiosi.”
When taken in for questioning, and asked who they were, where they came from, and why they were in Apalachin, the fifty-seven trapped delegates answered that they’d come to visit a “sick friend”—Barbara—who, ironically, died just a few years later without a single Mafioso at his bedside.
While they gave their true identities, none of the fifty-seven mobsters revealed the real purpose of the convention. Each held tightly to the secret, true to the Mafia code of omerta: “talk and you die; keep your mouth shut and we’ll take care of you and your family…”
The state and federal officials became frustrated in their efforts to learn what the meeting was about, but they did learn one thing: the Mafia “grand council” apparently did meet periodically. Its purpose ostensibly was to deal with crucial problems and map ways of enhancing the organization’s holdings and wealth.
After Apalachin, the syndicate never let itself be caught in similar straits. If indeed they met again—and it’s believed they’ve had many conclaves in the years since—they were careful not to send out any more telltale smoke signals of their get-togethers, such as a procession of expensive, out-of-state cars all heading to the same place.
The chapters that follow are a powerful portrayal of America’s Mafia, shaped by the authors through research and investigation—as well as personal experience. We have chronicled in exacting detail every significant episode of the Mafia’s underworld activity from before the turn of the century to the present day.
August 4, 1919, was an unbearably hot, muggy day. The temperature reached 95 degrees at high noon—just the time two sinister-looking figures, dapper in Palm Beach suits and Panama hats, strolled off busy Flatbush Avenue and entered the Mount Olympus Restaurant, in the heart of downtown Brooklyn.
“Hello, my good friends,” a voice encumbered by a heavy Greek accent greeted the two men, who needed no introduction to many of Nick Colouvos’s gathering lunch crowd. Frankie Yale was one of the underworld’s fastest rising gang leaders; his squat muscular companion and chief lieutenant, Anthony “Little Augie Pisano” Carfano (also known as “Augie the Wop”) was equally well known.
“Here, let me give you a table near the big fan in the back where you will be cool,” Colouvos offered. The soft-spoken, personable restaurant owner had looked up to Yale as a hero since the dreary winter’s night in 1918 when a young boy, no older than ten, hawking evening and morning newspapers from a makeshift stand outside the restaurant. That night the stacks of papers were still piled high at an hour when they should have been depleted. It was indoor weather and the streets were deserted.
Nick watched as Yale went over to the boy, bought out his newsstand with a crisp fifty-dollar bill, and commanded him to “Go home to your mama.” Nick never forgot that episode. To the immigrant from a poor Spartan village who had known only poverty until he came to America and lifted himself up by his bootstraps by washing dishes, then working as a chef until he scraped enough savings together to open his own restaurant, the underworld hoodlum’s gesture to the newsboy was an example of true generosity.
He sat his guests down and took their orders, then went off into the kitchen to make certain the meals were prepared to Frankie’s and Little Augie’s satisfaction. Nick wasn’t his usual smiling, ebullient self, Yale remarked to Pisano. “Something is bothering him,” he said.
When Nick brought the food out and served it to his guests, Yale asked what was troubling him. Nick simply shrugged and said everything was all right. Yale didn’t believe him.
“Nick, something is on your mind, my good friend. What is it? Somebody bothering you? You having trouble with the help around here?”
Nick shook his head. “Nah, nothing like that. It’s a personal thing…”
His voice trailed off and Yale sensed a deep problem gnawing at Nick.
“Let’s go to the back room where we can talk,” Yale suggested. He stood up, dug a hand into his pants pocket, and pulled out a wad of cash. He peeled off a ten-dollar bill and dispatched Little Augie to fetch a bottle of Scotch from a nearby liquor store.
When Augie returned, the three retired to the back room. After the drinks were poured, Frankie and Augie settled back to listen to Nick’s plight.
Speaking with considerable hesitation, Colouvos managed to say, “It’s…my daughter…Olympia…You know her, Frankie…You gave her twenty dollars two months ago for her birthday…”
Yale knew the girl. She had an angelic face and long auburn curls that hung down her back. He also remembered that she was eight years old.
Nick explained that for the past several weeks Olympia was extraordinarily melancholy, often crying for no apparent reason, refusing to eat.
“This is not at all like my daughter,” Nick said. “We finally took her to the doctor, but he could find nothing wrong with her. He thinks she is going through a phase, but my wife and I just know something is not right.”
Lately the little girl was awakening in the middle of the night, screaming from nightmares. “I can’t see my child in tears,” Nick protested. “It depresses me. And worse, she
