Stories
Notorious
“Shanghai” Kelly’s Birthday Bash in the Barbary Coast
In the mid 1850's three ships sat stationary on San Francisco Bay with no crew on board. The captains of the ships had notoriously bad reputations, and the sailors around the town gave these captains a wide berth. The three captains desperate to get sailors onto their...
John Connolly – When the good guys go bad
From the bad guys to the really bad guys and what makes this bad guy bad is that he was supposed to be a good guy, a federal agent sworn to protect and serve. He protected and served probably one of the most notorious and controversial gangsters in history, James...
Jimmy whacks Whitey Whitehead in the Plaka Bar
Harold "Whitey" Whitehead was a native of Queens but knew many of the Hell's Kitchen crowd, he was 38 years and had curly brown hair and by all accounts he was "an arrogant prick". Jimmy Coonan knew him from drinking in his 596 bar in Hell's Kitchen, in fact Whitey...
Charlie & Carol Gasko Your Average Elderly Neighbors
Charlie & Carol Gasko, according to neighbors were nothing special just an average elderly couple living an average life less than a few miles from the Los Angeles office of the FBI. After two years crossing the U.S visiting Texas, Arizona & Wyoming the couple...
The Gopher Gang of Hell’s Kitchen
The Gopher Gang were one of Hell’s Kitchen’s most brutal gangs. They were given the name "Gophers" because they used to hide in the cellars of buildings in the neighbourhood. The Gophers formed in the 1890s and went on to rule the West Side between Ninth and Eleventh...
The Fatal Shooting of Beezy Garrity
In 1886 Danny Driscoll, who was co-leader of the Whyos gang was approached by 18 year old Bridget "Beezy" Garrity, who claimed she had been cheated by the owner of a bar operating within the Whyos territory in the Five Points in Lower Manhattan. Daniel "Danny"...
The Scissors Sisters – A Page From The Westies Book
In one of the more shocking crimes that has taken place in Ireland, the Scissor Sisters is definitely one that is high on the list, in fact Jimmy Coonan, Edward "The Butcher" Cummiskey, even the DeMeo crew would be proud of these sisters, it could also be included as...
River Pirates on the Hudson & East Rivers
From 1866 to 1877 river pirates terrorized the water of New York's rivers and harbor robbing cargo and what ever other goods they could from boats that were docked or coming in to port. Piracy in the waters of New York became so bad that the police eventually set up a...
The death of Jack “Legs” Diamond
Jack Diamond on trial for kidnapping in Rensselaer County Courthouse, Troy, on Dec. 16, 1931. Jack walked across the street each morning to the courthouse from the office of his lawyer, Abbott Jones, and basked in the adulation of the people of Troy who shouted Jack's...