Grey: 2040 books

Bruno Giacomelli was a promising Formula 2 World Champion who came into F1 in the late 1970s. Driving for Ford-McLaren and later Alfa Romeo observers were impressed by how fast the Italian driver from Brescia was on the track. Giacomelli was joined at Alfa first by Andrea de Cesaris and later Mario...

Richie Ginther like his fellow Californian, Phil Hill, was a Formula 1 driver of significance in the 1960s. Both were from Granada Hills, California. Hill won the 1961 World Championship of Formula 1 Driving in 1961 while Ginther's one and only F1 victory came at the Mexican Grand Prix, driving...

Noel Francis caught the eye of Broadway producer Florenz Ziegfeld after she came to New York City from her native Texas. Noel soon appeared in the Ziegfeld Follies of 1925. Then with help from Ziegfeld she started acting in motion pictures. She signed with Fox Films. In the early 1930s she became...

Mario de Araujo Cabral became Portugal's first Formula One driver when he qualified for the Grand Prix of Portugal in 1959. His name was soon blackened by an incident when he pulled onto the track at Monsanto in front of F1 great Jack Brabham. The incident has been linked with Cabral ever since. A...

Wally Butts and Bear Bryant were two legendary coaching figures in the Southeastern Conference. An Atlanta insurance man claimed to have been connected to a telephone conversation between the two coaches while he was trying to call a friend on business in Atlanta. The Saturday Evening Post published...

Albert Anastasia met with Louis Capone, Pittsburgh Phil Strauss and others before calling out a hit on Joseph "Tough Joe" Amberg on September 30, 1935. One of four brothers Amberg was perhaps the most dominant Jewish Mafia figure in Brooklyn at the time. He was slain in execution style in a garage...

John Delutro was a Gambino family soldier who was indicted by federal agents for heroin and cocaine trafficking in December 2000. Delutro was one of six mobsters from four different New York crime families to be indicted. Delutro, the son of Gambino soldier Anthony "Tony West" Delutro, is...

In June 1935 the New Jersey State Police recovered a virtual arsenal of weapons from a Mountain View gangster hideout. Among the stash were tear gas bombs, a sub machine gun used to kill Mad Dog Coll in February 1932, stolen cars, pistols, great quantities of ammunition, other weapons, etc. Of the...

Raymond Wean was a burly man. On one occasion an FBI agent trying to arrest was prevented from placing handcuffs on his thick wrists. A driver for a trucking company, he became a Bonanno Mafia family enforcer. As a prisoner at the Manhattan Correctional prison Wean had served as a trusty. At this...

Eugene Boffa was a La Cosa Nostra associated who was convicted of labor sharing under the Racketeering Influenced (RICO) Act. Along with Chandler Lemon he operated a labor sharing service that bilked workers of money and benefits. He was sentenced to twenty years in prison and fined $250,000. Boffa...

Murray the Camel Humphreys was a sophisticated Mafioso, the only Welsh mobster of his era. He ascended into the upper echelons of Al Capone's Chicago Outfit. He was given charge of managing the criminal organization when the Mafia boss was imprisoned in Atlanta, and later Alcatraz. Humphreys...

Luigie LoBue was a Genovese soldier who was closely connected to the French Connection multinational drug syndicate. Masterminded by mobster Charles "Lucky" Luciano, the criminal organization flourished in the 1950s and early 1960s. LoBue was linked to heroin smugglers who brought illegal...

My e-book looks at the murder of John James Barbera, a Buffalo fruit merchant whose father also sold fruit at the Chipppewa Market. Barbera was murdered in April 1938 while reading a newspaper in Genco's Tavern on Niagara Street in Buffalo. There were numerous others murdered over the years in...

Francesco Cucola was known as the Artichoke King during the mayoral administration of Fiorella LaGuardia. In the 1930s he was half owner of a large New York City produce company. In response to this burgeoning monopoly Mayor LaGuardia had prohibited the sale of small artichokes. Years later Cucola...