Synopses & Reviews
History remembers Arnold Rothstein as the man who fixed the 1919 World Series, an underworld genius. The real-life model for The Great Gatsby's Meyer Wolfsheim and Nathan Detroit from Guys and Dolls, Rothstein was much moreand lessthan a fixer of baseball games. He was everything that made 1920s Manhattan roar. Featuring Jazz Age Broadway with its thugs, speakeasies, showgirls, political movers and shakers, and stars of the Golden Age of Sports, this is a biography of the man who dominated an age. Arnold Rothstein was a loan shark, pool shark, bookmaker, thief, fence of stolen property, political fixer, Wall Street swindler, labor racketeer, rumrunner, and mastermind of the modern drug trade. Among his monikers were "The Big Bankroll," "The Brain," and "The Man Uptown." This vivid account of Rothstein's life is also the story of con artists, crooked cops, politicians, gang lords, newsmen, speakeasy owners, gamblers and the like. Finally unraveling the mystery of Rothstein's November 1928 murder in a Times Square hotel room, David Pietrusza has cemented The Big Bankroll's place among the most influential and fascinating legendary American criminals. 16 pages of black-and-white photographs are featured.
Synopsis
The model for The Great Gatsby's Meyer Wolfsheim and Nathan Detroit in Guys and Dolls, Arnold Rothstein was much more than a fixer of baseball games. He was everything that made 1920s Manhattan roar. Transporting readers onto Jazz Age Broadway with its thugs, bookies, denizens of the racetracks, showgirls, political movers-and-shakers, and sports stars, here is the biography of the devilishly beloved gangland dandy who reigned supreme when the fast buck ruled and violence stalked the streets of Gotham. David Pietrusza unearths the canny way Rothstein fixed the 1919 World Seriesplaying all sides off one another so that he alone could not loseand unravels the mystery of his November 1928 murder in a Times Square hotel room. A masterful portrait of a Roaring 20s legend filled with fascinating photographs, Pietrusza's award-nominated Rothstein cements the place of "The Big Bankroll" as the godfather of organized crime in America.
About the Author
David Pietrusza or edited over three dozen books. His Judge and Jury: The Life and Times of Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis captured the 1998 CASEY Award. He was an editor of Total Baseball, the Official Encyclopedia of Major League Baseball. Pietruszas most recent book, Ted Williams: My Life in Pictures, was written with Ted Williams. He lives in upstate New York.