Episode 1: Meyer

in 1933 the gangsters of New York were riding high. After a decade of increasingly violent liquor wars, the criminal landscape had reached a relatively peaceful equilibrium. However, while the underworld was experiencing a golden age of good governance in the early ‘30s, legitimate, financial and political institutions were failing. Badly. This combination caused the end of Prohibition and the beginnings of serious investigations of our friends in the burgeoning mob.

By the late '20s childhood friends Charles "Lucky" Luciano and Meyer Lanksy were high ranking gangsters, running various profitable criminal schemes from their Lower East Side headquarters. However, the streets are always changing and influx of freshly arrived, old-school, Sicilian gangsters was going to upset the delicate power structure in New York, and create endless drama for our two boys from the Lower East Side, and unleash a river of blood. Like previous podcasts in this series, I relied extensively on "Boardwalk Gangster" by Tim Newark, "A Thinking Man's Gangster" by Robert Lacy and "Five Families" by Selwyn Raab

By 1920, two New York kingpins soared over other mobsters in terms of ambition, scope, and power. These two men, one Italian and one Jewish loathed each other, had diametrically opposed personal styles and business practices, but both took Meyer Luciano and Lucky Lansky under their wing and directly contributed to their later development of La Cosa Nostra. Like previous podcasts in this series, I relied extensively on "Boardwalk Gangster" by Tim Newark, "A Thinking Man's Gangster" by Robert Lacy and "Five Families" by Selwyn Raab

The system of organized crime that was to dominate the 20th century Criminal landscape was consciously created by two extraordinary men: Meyer Lansky and Lucky Luciano. These men would not only grow from the slums of New York to enrich themselves through crime, but also bring decades of order to the anarchic criminal world. While a young Meyer was clearly torn between educated respectability and criminal profit, his close friend and crimey Lucky Luciano was different. Lucky was always going to be a gangster.

Given his early years as a bookish Jewish boy from the Russian Empire, very few people would guess that Meyer Lansky would become a giant of the American underworld. This podcast examines Meyer Lansky's childhood and examines how a studious, well behaved kid became a ruthless young gang leader. I relied heavily on Robert Lacey's excellent biography of Meyer Lansky, "Meyer Lansky, The Thinking Man's Gangster" for most of the material. I also used "The Five Families" by Selwyn Raab for background.