Bad Seeds in the Big Apple: Bandits, Killers, and Chaos in New York City, 1920-1940
Patrick Downey
"I didn't have anything better to do. That's why I went around bumping off cops." So said Francis "Two-Gun" Crowley after shooting it out with dozens of policemen in the most spectacular siege in New York City history. For ninety minutes, authorities poured hundreds of bullets and chucked tear-gas bombs into the gunman's fifth-story apartment as thousands of people swarmed below, watching the drama unfold. Finally, bleeding from several wounds and choking on the gas, the nineteen-year-old desperado surrendered, bringing an end to a three-month-long crime spress that included two murders.
Crowley was just one of a vast number of outlaws — male and female — who terrorized New York City in the years between World Wars I and II. The lawlessness during that era was unprecedented in American history.
Bad Seeds in the Big Apple is the first book to profile New York City's notorious bandits, gunmen, and desperadoes of the Prohibition and Depression eras. While numerous books have been written on the city's organized-crime scene, this book completes the picture by introducing readers to infamous New Yorkers such as Richard Reese Whittemore, leader of a gang of jewel thieves; extortion queen Vivian Gordon; bandit and Sing Sing escapee James Nannery; Al Stern and his gang of kidnappers, the men behind the ill-fated 1926 Tombs Prison break; the marauders behind the 1934 Rubel Ice Plant armored car robbery; and dozens of other law breakers who have never before been covered in book form. Patrick Downey also includes a fresh look at a few characters of the era who have received individual book-length treatments.
| PATRICK DOWNEY has been studying New York City's early-twentieth-century crime scenes for more than fifteen years. He has written articles on the Big Apple's gangster past for newspapers, spoken on the subject at the Museum of the City of New York, and has designed and led a walking tour that highlights criminal landmarks in conjunction with the museum. |
$24.95, Hardcover
ISBN-10: 1-58182-646-6 (Hardcover)
ISBN-13: 978-1-58182-646-3 (Hardcover)
Hardcover Currently Available
