Arnold Rothstein

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Arnold "The Brain" Rothstein (born January 17, 1882 in New York City , † November 4, 1928 ibid) was an American businessman , notorious gambler and mobster , who is attributed to the Kosher Nostra . In the United States, he is considered one of the most important figures of organized crime , since it decisive influence as a mentor to Meyer Lansky , Lucky Luciano , Frank Costello has exercised and others. He gained general fame during his lifetime through his involvement in the " Black Sox Scandal " of 1919, as he was seen as the man behind the postponed season of the 1919 baseball league.

Life

Early years

Arnold Rothstein was born into a wealthy Jewish family; his father Abraham Rothstein was a respected businessman. The mathematician Rothstein developed an early interest in illegal business activity, while his older brother became a rabbi . He was already involved in gambling during his school days and left school at the age of 16. For some time he worked as a traveling salesman and then chose pool halls as his favorite places to stay. At the age of 20 he began to deal intensively with sports betting and bet on horse races , baseball games , boxing matches , but also on the outcome of elections.

His nickname “ The Big Bankroll ” has its origins in this time when he carried around a thick wad of money consisting of 100 US dollar bills. In 1909 he married the actress Carolyn Greene . In 1910 he moved to the Tenderloin district of Manhattan .

Sports betting

In 1914 Rothstein changed sides and became a bookmaker himself ; that is, he himself offered bets in his own betting shop. He was intensely involved in sports betting, especially horse racing . He appeared as an investor in a racing series on the Havre de Grace in Maryland . Even then it was suspected that he had manipulated numerous bets in his favor, as he had a wide network of informants. At the age of 30 he had already become a millionaire in this way .

Chicago White Sox

His penchant for manipulating sports betting culminated in 1919. Apparently, Rothstein had manipulated the World Series of the American Baseball League by bribing members of the Chicago White Sox team. In Chicago , he had to testify before a grand jury , where he appeared as an innocent businessman who was worried about his reputation. Since nothing could be proven, the trial was the only trial he faced. Apparently Rothstein had used Abe Attell as a straw man , from whom he now distanced himself.

Rothstein then withdrew from this business because he saw his potential business partners as unreliable. So he didn't go into a similar deal with Joseph "Sports" Sullivan .

"If a girl goes to bed with nine guys, who's going to believe her when she says the tenth one's the father?"

"If a girl went to bed with nine guys, who will believe her when she says the tenth is the father?"

- Arnold Rothstein

Travers Stakes

Rothstein owned a racehorse called "Sporting Blood" that won the Travers Stakes in 1921 under strange circumstances. Apparently he had manipulated the bet that originally stood 3: 1 for "Sporting Blood" and Rothstein bet $ 150,000 on his own horse, as he knew that the second favorite "Pudery" had foot problems. When "Pudery" was surprisingly deleted from the start list shortly before the start, his horse could no longer take victory. A manipulation of Rothstein could never be proven, however, and he achieved a betting profit of over 500,000 US dollars.

alcohol

Rothstein invested early on in alcohol smuggling, but also in drug trafficking. During the alcohol prohibition in the USA, he ran a number of so-called “ speakeasies ” (whispering bars), in which alcohol was served as an open secret. As a serious businessman, however, he stayed in the background and looked for straw men and actors for these business areas. In this way he became a kind of mentor for Meyer Lansky , Jack "Legs" Diamond , Charles "Lucky" Luciano and Dutch Schultz . The original contact is said to have come about through Frank Costello . Rothstein had numerous nicknames such as "Mr. Big ”,“ The Fixer ”,“ The Man Uptown ”and“ The Brain ”, who described his role as an influential financier and determiner in the background.

He mediated disputes between the New York gangs; his office was Lindy's Restaurant between Broadway and 49th Street in Manhattan . He initiated the Broadway mob of Lucky Luciano and Meyer Lansky and formed the Seven Group beyond New York City.

The end

On November 3, 1928, Arnold Rothstein was shot in the Park Central Hotel and died the following day in the Stuyvesant Polyclinic Hospital in Manhattan. According to an underworld legend, the background is supposed to be a three-day poker event in which Rothstein lost US $ 320,000 but subsequently refused to pay his gambling debts. The player George "Hump" McManus was arrested for the murder, but later acquitted (McManus himself confessed the murder of Rothstein independently to two people, Hawk McGee , an employee, and McManu's old companion Alvin C. "Titanic" Thompson ). Another theory is that Dutch Schultz had Rothstein murdered in revenge for having had Joey Noe murdered by Jack Diamond. Rothstein was buried in Union Field Cemetery in Queens .

estate

Rothstein's illegal activities were taken over by Frank Erickson , Meyer Lansky , Bugsy Siegel, and other bullies. Rothstein's death also marked the decline of Tammany Hall's political corruption and the rise of Fiorello LaGuardia as Mayor of New York. In particular, Dutch Schultz and Lucky Luciano were targeted by the LaGuardia prosecutor Thomas E. Dewey . His work led indirectly to the death of Schultz and directly to the conviction and subsequent deportation of Luciano.

Ten years after Rothstein's death, his surviving brother declared the remaining businesses of Arnold bankrupt .

Adaptations

literature

  • Rich Cohen: Tough Jews: Fathers, Sons, and Gangster Dreams , London: Vintage 1999; ISBN 0-09-975791-5 * Eisenberg, D., Dan, U., and Landau, E. (1979). "Meyer Lansky: Mogul of the Mob." New York: Paddington Press. ISBN 0-448-22206-X , ISBN 0-7092-0151-6
  • Donald Henderson Clarke, Donald: In the Reign of Rothstein , New York: The Vanguard Press 1929.
  • Leo Katcher: The Big Bankroll. The Life and Times of Arnold Rothstein , New York (1959/1994) .; Da Capo Press ISBN 0-306-80565-0
  • David Pietrusza: Rothstein: The Life, Times and Murder of the Criminal Genius Who Fixed the 1919 World Series , New York; Carroll & Graf 2003. ISBN 0-7867-1250-3
  • Selwyn Raab: Five Families: The Rise, Decline, and Resurgence of America's Most Powerful Mafia Empires , New York 2005: St. Martin's Press ISBN 0-312-30094-8
  • Carolyn Rothstein (with Donald Henderson Clarke) (1934), Now I'll Tell , New York; Vantage Press.
  • Nick Tosches: King of the Jews. The Arnold Rothstein Story , London 2005; Hamish Hamilton ISBN 0-241-14144-3

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Arnold Rothstein and Baseball's 1919 Black Sox Scandal (English)
  2. ^ The Big Fix: Arnold Rothstein rigged the 1919 World Series. Or did he? , Legal Affairs, March-April, 2004 (English)
  3. ↑ In Room 349  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (English)@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / jcgi.pathfinder.com  
  4. ↑ Tammany's Rothstein  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , Time December 16, 1929@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / jcgi.pathfinder.com  
personal data
SURNAME Rothstein, Arnold
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Brain, the (nickname)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American businessman and mobster
DATE OF BIRTH January 17, 1882
PLACE OF BIRTH New York City
DATE OF DEATH November 4, 1928
Place of death New York City