Salvatore Lucania
A.K.A
Charlie "Lucky" Luciano

Charlie Lucky Luciano was born Salvatore Lucania in a small town outside Palermo, Sicily, Lercara Friddi, November 27, 1897. His parents moved into the Lower East Side on Fourteenth Street of Manhattan where Luciano attended school for a brief time. He tried his hand a honest living delivering hats for a Jewish merchant named Max Goodman. Although his parents were very loving towards him, his brothers and sisters, Luciano found comfort with Goodman. Giving him a good job and showing him how a middle-income family lived as opposed to his lower-income family, Goodman opened Luciano's eyes to a whole different side to life -- a prosperous life. Goodman also opened a door for him that stuck with Luciano for the rest of his life: the ability to make money with a legal front. Luciano started delivering dope for a local pusher when he was eighteen, hiding the heroine in the hat bans of deliveries he was making for Goodman. Luciano was soon arrested and sent to Hampton Farms, a state facility for youths. After being released from prison, Luciano decided to change his first name to Charlie because he felt that Salvatore, or "Sal" was a girls name, and having been in prison, Luciano had earned the right to be tough.

Soon Luciano would take up with the Five Points gang where he would meet a slew of future crime bosses: Jonny Torrio, Al Capone, Frankie Yale. Because Luciano had kept the code of silence during his trial and prison sentence, the Five Pointers would take to him quickly, realizing his ability for leadership and organization. The neighborhood he grew up in, Luciano also met street kids from other ethnic backgrounds, such as Benny Siegle and Meyer Lansky from the Bugsy and Meyer Mob. Luciano first met Lansky when, in school, he would take pennies from the Jewish kids for protection money. When Luciano approached Lansky about payment, Lansky told him to "fuck off."

"Well I started to laugh. I patted him on the shoulder and said, 'Okay, you got protection for free.' He just pulled away and yelled, 'Shove your protection up your ass, I don't need it!' Believe me, I found out he didn't need it. Next to Benny (Bugsy) Siegle, Meyer Lansky was the toughest guy, pound for pound, I ever knew in my whole life, and that takes in Albert Anastasia or any of them Brooklyn hoodlums or anybody can think of."

This began Luciano's long partnership with Lansky and together with Frank Costello and Benny Siegle, they would begin robbing houses and doing other stick ups. But their days of doing heists and stick ups would end in 1919 with the United States Government passed what would caused tremendous growth in wealth and prosperity the Underworld had ever known, the Eighteenth Amendment, or the Volstead Act. The Prohibition Era had begun and Lucky Luciano and his coalition were right in the middle of it.

Out in Chicago, Jonny Torrio and Al Capone began a bloody war over the sale of Prohibition alcohol. First they fought with the Irish mobs for control of liquor sales and then they began to fight amongst themselves. After an attempt on Torrio's life by Capone, Torrio, the elder statesman of the mob decided to retire and return to New York City, leaving Capone to be king of vice in Chicago. But all those who were involved in the rackets knew that to be king of New York was the real prize, and that is what Luciano set his sights on. But he was still young in 1920, only twenty-three, Lansky barely twenty and Siegle still younger than that. Costello was the oldest out of the crew but only by a couple of years. Their enormous plans would have to wait until their limited experience could catch up.

The coalition began to make connections during this time that would continue to pay off until the end of Prohibition such as Guisseppe Doto (Joe Adonis), "Waxey" Gordon of Philadelphia and Arnold Rothstein, the man who fixed the 1918 World Series. With these connections, Luciano and his partners were running an empire of bootlegging -- plants, distilleries, trucks, warehouses, all for the sale of illegal alcohol. In his biography, Luciano is quoted as saying:

"I'll bet in the days when me and my guys got our whiskey business together, we had a bigger company than Henry Ford...We had exporters and importers, all kinds of help that any corporation needs, only we had more. And we had lawyers by the carload, and they was on call twenty-four hours a day. Guys always told me later that I should've put my brains to runnin' a legit business and I'd have been a tremendous success. But I wouldn't've enjoyed it like what I was doin'."

It seemed that Luciano had all his bases covered, but he'd forgotten one important factor -- the existing Dons of New York, Joe "The Boss" Masseria and Salvatore Maranzano. Both of these "Moustache Petes" fought for power in New York and both saw the rising profits that Luciano and his band were collecting. They wanted a piece of the profits, but the coalition had agreed they would give up nothing for the Dons. The Dons were already getting fat off of profits for controlling "all the luxuries of Italian life." From artichokes to olive oil, there was no room for anyone else to get into the rackets in those areas. With the distribution of illegal alcohol, Luciano had found an avenue of money that the Dons wanted, and wanted him to run. They both recognized his ability to organize and lead others and both desired that he join their side in the fight for control over the city. But Luciano waited. He didn't want to make decisions in a vacuum, especially decisions that would affect the rest of his crew. Luciano realized that after time he would have to join one of them, but not until it was the right thing for both him and his crew. Luciano did know that no matter what the final decision was, he wouldn't follow either of these Dons for long. Both were too old and stubborn to realize the power in partnerships. Both Dons felt it was bad for business to associate with anyone other than Sicilians. Being that most of his crew were not Sicilian (Lansky, Siegle and a new addition in Louis "Lepke" Buchalter, Costello was Calabrian, and Vito Genovese and Adonis were Neopolitans), Luciano was not about to give them up as allies, especially since he knew their worth. All were very smart and ruthless, and to Luciano, worth more than all the Dons' assets put together.

Eventually Luciano would make the decision to join Joe The Boss. The decision was based on what the group felt was best. At the time Masseria was the more powerful of the two Dons and there was no clear sign that Maranzano would ever top Masseria even in the coming Castellemmarese War. But Luciano's decision to join Masseria became threatened. The deal Luciano had made with Masseria was that he would join forces with him, work for him, but that the liquor business was a separate profit to be had by Luciano and his crew. For six months Luciano dedicated himself to modernizing Masseria's empire. He utilized techniques he applied with Lansky, implementing strict rules and regulations with all the organizations under the Masseria umbrella. He organized careful planning of all jobs, and began to figure out new ways to overtake olive oil and cheese markets within New York. But no matter what he did, Luciano could never please Masseria. He also realized, after he began his alliance with Masseria, that the Old Don was not as powerful as everyone thought:

"Then I got serious and I said to 'em, 'I wanna admit somethin'. I was wrong when I figured that Masseria could win a war with Maranzano. Not a chance. He's too fat, too old, and behind all that hard front there's nothin' left but a soft brain. It's only a matter of time, so let's use it the best way we can."

Luciano would continue to work for Masseria but he and the rest of the group began to realize Masseria's lack of power. During a meeting, Luciano turned to Lansky and asked his opinion on what to do. Lansky pointed out that it was time to turn towards Maranzano, who was gaining more and more power. The group, especially Benny Siegle, became upset with this decision, for no one like Maranzano. But is was Lansky that cleared up what the bottom line to any decision was.

"'There you go again,' Siegle said, 'always tryin' to beat the odds. What the fuck do you think you are, some guy with a crystal ball? Between Masseria and Maranzano, it's not even six to five. Go ahead, wise guy, you pick the winner.'

'I picked the winner a long time ago,' Lansky said. 'Charlie Luciano. All we have to do is eliminate the two roadblocks and from then on, Charlie sits on top. That's what we want, isn't it?'"

A few years earlier, Maranzano had approached Luciano to join him, using the "fatherly" approach. Maranzano was an educated man and considered himself something of a king in the underworld and treated all those under him with a certain amount of contempt. Luciano couldn't stand this attitude and felt insulted that Maranzano spoke to him with terms such as "son" and other affectionate terms.

"He put his arm around me and he says that his name is Salvatore, like mine, that I'm his namesake, the 'young Caesar.' Then he starts quotin' Julias Caesar to me, in Latin, for chrissake. If he had somethin' nice to say to me, why the hell couldn't he have said it in English? So I told him that, and he started to laugh. And I'll never forget what he answered. He said, 'My son, words of praise are only meant for the great, and you will do great things.' Shit. I could've spit in his face."

When Luciano first turned down Maranzano's bid for loyalty, he knew that the Don took it as an insult and wouldn't forget it. Luciano, after deciding that Masseria was the wrong choice, went to Maranzano for protection because if Masseria ever found out he was looking to take over, Masseria would have Luciano killed immediately. Luciano was left out in the open, and Maranzano took full advantage of it. Maranzano set a trap for Luciano requesting that if he wanted protection and to join forces with him, he must kill Masseria himself to stop this war and that so that Maranzano could be the Boss of the underworld. Luciano refused, because "one cannot kill the leader personally and then succeed to his throne" -- and that didn't fit into Luciano's scheme of taking over the underworld from the Mustache Petes. When he refused, Luciano was taken for a "ride."

There are many different stories about the ride that Luciano took. There are reports that state it was other gangsters in the Irish mob that took Luciano and beat him; other say it was police officers looking for a pay off; or federal officers who had discovered him waiting for a shipment of whiskey and narcotics; or it was a cop, the father of a girl Luciano had gotten pregnant. The following is the story related in the "Last Testament of Lucky Luciano":

Luciano awoke to being hung from a pipe from his hands. He was punched, spit on, even had cigarettes burnt into his skin. Maranzano tried to beat Luciano into agreeing to kill Masseria, but no matter what they did to him, he refused to do it. Maranzano called for a pause in the beating and approached Luciano, and kept telling him the beatings would continue until he died unless he agreed to kill the older Don. Just then, Luciano had a sudden burst of energy and kicked Maranzano in the groin. Falling to the ground, Maranzano yelled out for the other men to kill Luciano that instant. But before they could do so, Maranzano grabbed a knife from one of his men and cut Luciano's face, "severing the muscles across his right cheek to the bone. Luciano would bear the scars to his death, and would forever have a slightly drooping right eye that gave him a sinister look."

Maranzano's men cut Luciano down and tossed his slumped over body into the back of a car, drove out to Staten Island and dropped what they thought was Luciano's dead body along the river. Moments later, a police cruiser picked Luciano up, realizing who he was and the beating he had taken, they rushed him to the hospital. When the police questioned him on who had done this to him, Luciano refused to give an answer. He claimed that he had no enemies. Being the only gangster in recorded history to survive a "ride," Luciano earned the nickname "Lucky" and it would stick with him for the rest of his life.

It was a few weeks before Luciano was ready to leave the hospital, but in that time he began formulating the plan that would rid the Underworld of the old school Dons and place himself and his young turks in power. Luciano knew that both Dons would have to go, it was more a matter of figuring out how to have them kill themselves off. During that time, the Castellemmarese War was at its bloodiest. Soldiers on both sides were being killed daily, and Luciano knew that this type of bloodshed would lead to too much attention and the authorities would be forced to take action, like in Chicago. Finally Luciano played his hand.

The early syndicate decided that taking out Masseria first was the right plan of action. Six months after the sever beating, Luciano sat in a Coney Island restaurant with Joe the Boss, discussing Luciano's plans to defeat Maranzano. Masseria was ecstatic about the plans and was pleased with his top lieutenant initiative and drive for power. At around 3:30pm, the restaurant was empty of other customers and Luciano requested from the owner a deck of cards so that he and Masseria could play.

After only one hand, Luciano excused himself to use the bathroom. Seconds later, a group of four men (Ben Siegle, Albert Anastasia, Vito Genovese and Joe Adonis) entered the restaurant and sprayed six bullets into Joe the Boss and then left. When the police finally showed up, they questioned Luciano as to where he was during the shooting.

"When the cops come, naturally they wanted to know whether I seen what Happened. I said no, I didn't, and I didn't have no idea why somebody would want to kill Joe. They asked me where I was when it happened -- and every newspaper printed that I said, 'As soon as I finished drying my hands, I walked out to see what it was all about.' That's an absolute lie. I said to them, 'I was in the can takin' a leak. I always take a long leak.'"

Next on the list was Maranzano. This challenge would be more difficult. Now that Masseria was out of the way, Maranzano had assumed all power of the underworld, he declared himself the Boss of Bosses in a banquet held in New York City. Maranzano developed sections of power, "families," and put Luciano as head, or capo, of the more power family in New York, what remained of Masseria's territory, and would supervise the whole underworld under Maranzano. Tom Gagliano would take over the former Reina territory; Joe Bonanno, Joe Profaci and Vincent Mangano would take over the last three remaining territories. This set up of "families" now included people from all over the country, including Los Angeles, Kansas City and even down to Florida. With this structure in place, Maranzano would be the top person in charge of all the country, and in his mind, virtually untouchable.

But what Maranzano didn't know was that all the underbosses and capos he had appointed had already given their loyalty to Luciano. They empathized with Luciano and his ideas and were willing to help him plot to remove the new Boss of Bosses.

On September 9, 1931, after months of careful planning, Luciano set in motion the assassination of Maranzano. Having found out that soon he, along with other members in the newly established five families were going to be killed, Luciano spread the word that the hit was happening soon. The next day, Luciano, along with Vito Genovese, got a call from Maranzano to come over to his building for a meeting. At this meeting, Luciano and Genovese were to be killed by a hired hitman (Mad Dog Cole).

But Luciano had already devised a plan to kill Maranzano. Knowing that Maranzano was being sought after on tax evasion and other crimes, Luciano set up for four men, supplied by Lansky so that they wouldn't be recognized, to dress up as federal agents. This way, they could get close to Maranzano without any suspicion of who they were. The four men entered into Maranzano's office in the Grand Central Building at Park Ave. and Forty-sixth Street, lined up six body guards, the secretary and Tom Lucchese against the wall and requested to know who Salvatore Maranzano was. Maranzano was pleased to cooperate on instructions from his lawyer with the federal agents, so he identified himself and asked how he could help the "agents." Then, two of the men dragged Maranzano into his office while the other two stood watch over the six body guards. While in the office, the two men stabbed Maranzano six times and then finally unloaded their guns into his body, leaving him bloody and dead on his desk.

Realizing what had happened, the six body guards fled the scene, more out of fear of being associated with Maranzano's death than their own.

Luciano and Genovese never showed up for the meeting.

After the assassinations of the old Dons, everyone, though formally declining the, considered Luciano the Boss of Bosses -- even the authorities. Soon after, Luciano adopted the idea of families, Maranzano and with the help of Lansky developed the Commission. It was filled with members of organized crime. All the members of his original band sat on the board, but the decision was made that only the Sicilians would have the ability to vote. This decision was not made by Luciano, it was made by Meyer Lansky. Lansky knew that Luciano wielded more power and respect than he did, so he helped Luciano decide that it was better to have a united crime syndicate run by Sicilians, while he and other Jewish members sat as counsel to the meetings. It was called Unione Siciliano, no longer the Mafia of the Mustache Petes. This union would encompass all sects of crime. Luciano figured there was no reason for individuals to fight over territory or profits -- there was enough to go around for everyone.

From 1931 to 1936, Luciano lived the life of a king. Everyone wanted to be near him -- politicians, people in the entertainment business, doctors, lawyers. Knowing a big time gangster in the 1930's was the "in" thing to do and Luciano was at the top of the list. Knowing that his new stature in the Underworld gained him more attention than what anyone really wanted, Luciano became somewhat reclusive -- spending most of his time hidden in his hotel room most of the day with a girl supplied by one of the various madams he knew and not appearing until the night time. When he did, Luciano would be dressed like a conservative banker -- a very well dressed conservative banker. He would then go out to a favorite restaurant (the Villanova) surrounded by entertainers like Jimmy Durante or Bobby Clark. He would be joined by others in organized crime at the restaurant -- Tommy Lucchese, Albert Anastasia, etc. After dinner he would enjoy some ice cream and then send his dinner guests home so that he and the others could get down to business. They would head up town to the Claridge Hotel or to rented offices on Broadway and Fifty-first Street. After midnight was the only time that people seeking the audience of Lucky Luciano could get and they had to come to these offices.

"...for permission to open a policy drop, run some handbooks, operate pinballs or slot machines, or juke boxes, put money on the street as loan sharks, have plans for a fur or jewelry heist checked. They would wait in the outer office until summoned inside for a brief talk with the boss, for his approval or rejection."

This life of leisure didn't last too long for Luciano though. In 1936, he was brought up on charges of running a prostitution ring that spanned the entire city of New York. Thomas E. Dewey, the New York City District Attorney (the man Luciano had once saved from being assassinated) was now coming after him. At first Luciano wasn't concerned, claiming that he had nothing to do with prostitution -- that being one racket he actually didn't have anything to do with. But the prosecution had many witnesses and, as Luciano's lawyer stated, the indictment against him was not made out of nothing. There were enough witnesses that claimed Luciano was personally involved in collecting the money from prostitutes and strong arming many of the pimps into paying protection money for themselves and their whores. But Luciano still didn't believe that any case surrounding prostitution could work.

"Regardless of what Polakoff said, I had a feeling that Dewey's case against me couldn't possibly be built around prostituion. Everybody in New York -- the cops, the D.A.'s office, even the politicians who wasn't in our bag -- knew me well enough to know I couldn't be involved in nothin' like that, not even indirectly."

But Dewey did have a case and he did make it stick. Witness after witness, pimps, desolate hookers, other small time gangsters, all testified that Charlie Lucky Luciano was the top pimp in all of New York City. Luciano was convicted and sentenced to thirty to fifty years in prison -- and not just any prison. Dannemora, the Siberia of organized crime.

While in prison, Luciano spent most of his time trying to figure out a way out. He knew that most of the people that came to the stand had lied about his involvement in prostitution and he also knew that Dewey and his office had manipulated the witnesses into testifying against him, he just needed to prove it. After the trial was over, most of the witnesses (especially the prostitutes) had been shipped away to Europe, where they were given monthly bankrolls to survive -- a promise made by Dewey in exchange for their testimonies. But, after a while, this bankroll became thinner and less frequent, making it hard for the prostitutes to live the good life. Luciano found this out, and with his lawyer, tried several times to get them to recant their statements in court or at least admit what had taken place. After a few years, it happened. The prostitutes, along with other witnesses recanted, on paper, their statements and explained what Dewey had offered them, and how Dewey had threatened them into testifying against Luciano. It seemed there would be no way for any court to keep Luciano in jail after this, but it didn't change anything. The judge ruled it insufficient evidence and threw Luciano's hopes of getting free out the window.

On December 7, 1941, the United States was brought into World War II with brutal force. The entire country had begun to rally behind their government and armed forces in an effort to defeat the Axis powers of Europe -- even organized crime figures. Since many of these men had been shipped out of their native land at a young age, either by force to avoid death or out of economics, they felt a strong loyalty to the U.S., especially Luciano. About six months into the war, Luciano had been reading the papers and talking to Lansky about the waterfronts and how worried the Naval Department was spies and German U-boats sinking U.S. boats right in the harbor. Luciano had come up with a plan to get himself out of jail and be able to help the war effort. Luciano had to find something that was front page news and had to do it quickly. Then, it finally came.

"Costello got in touch with me right away. Albert had worked this idea out with his brother, Tough Tony. Albert said that the guys from Navy Intelligence had been all over the docks talkin' to 'em about security; they was scared to death that all the stuff along the Hudson, the docks and boats and the rest, was in very great danger. It took a guy like Albert to figure out somethin' really crazy; his idea was to give the Navy a real big hunk of sabotage, somethin' so big that it would scare the shit out of the whole fuckin' Navy."

The sabotage that Albert and his brother Tony were talking about was the sinking of a ship in the West Side Manhattan port -- the French luxury liner, the SS Normandie -- a ship that was being slated to be turned into a troopship for the Allies. Luciano thought it was a great plan. It would get the attention of Naval Intelligence and wouldn't truly affect the war effort since the ship was no where ready for war. The plan was set in motion. Within twenty-four hours the SS Normandie was gutted and wrecked. Naval Intelligence was charged preventing anything like this to happen again, since it was obvious that German spies had done this. That is when the U.S. Government turned to organized crime for help and began the idea of "Operation Underworld." Naval Intelligence officers, working out of their headquarters in Manhattan, went directly to Joseph "Socks" Lanza, the czar of the Fulton Fish Market, for help along the docks. But, the illustrious Joe "Zox" could only help the Naval officers so much. There were some areas that were blocked to him, especially by Tough Tony. Luciano personally setup this blockade, forcing the Naval officers to come to him for help. Luciano agreed, but only if it meant that it would reduce his sentence. That's when Naval officials sought out the D.A.'s office for this favor. Since it was a matter of national security, there could be no way that the D.A.'s office could refuse, even if Dewey was still the D.A. But Luciano wanted too much -- to be paroled and set free for the obvious reason of picking up the reins of control to organized crime. Dewey agreed to parole, but only after Luciano agreed to be deported to Italy. Luciano agreed to this deal, figuring that at least he would be free, not realizing the problems that he would face in the years to come.

So, the deal was set. All along the docks, the longshoremen were to help the Naval Intelligence officers with securing the harbor against any German spies or U-boats, all on the say so of Lucky Luciano.

When the war ended, Luciano waited for his parole hearings. On V-E day, May 7, 1945, a petition for executive clemency and freedom for Luciano was sent to Governor Dewey -- having been elected with the help of Luciano. On January 3, 1946, Charles Lucania was set free once again, on the stipulation that he never set foot on U.S. soil ever again. On February 2, a month later, Luciano stepped out of jail and was driven directly to Ellis Island for deportation. Charlie Lucky Luciano would never set foot again in New York City, a place where he lived as a king. "That week of waitin' was real rough for me. I kept sayin' to myself, 'Fuck 'em all. I'll be back.' I swore I'd figure out some way to change the deal."