All-American Mafioso: The Johnny Roselli Story

By Charles Rappleye

Book Overview

No Synopsis Available.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0385266766
• ISBN13: 9780385266765
• Release Date: August 1991
• Publisher: Doubleday
• Length: 380 Pages
• Weight: 1.66 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.4" x 6.6" x 1.4"

Customer Reviews

John "Handsome Johnny" Roselli, AKA.

For one thing, I did not know that his real name was Filippo Sacco, and that he ended up in Boston upon entering the United States and that he lived in the same time frame as the Sacco and Vendetti case. I wonder if all the resulting publicity of that case and its connotations had any influence of his decision to go through his life under an assumed name??? One mistake made by the Authors on page 120: Frank Hague was not the Mayor of Newark, he was the long running Mayor of Jersey City and the Boss of Hudson County Democratic politics in the Era of party machine politics. There was another error of note that escapes me now, but it is of a similar caliber. When I remember I'll edit this review to make mention. Also, after reading this, I am still left baffled by the decision of the Chicago Mob to replace one as urbane and sophisticated and gentlemanly as John Roselli with the likes of Anthony "Tony the Ant" Spilotro; a crude, common 'street thug' and insert someone of his character to such an important position to the Mob. Was the talent running thin??? Very few Mobsters are known for their intelligence, and the ones who are, are always in positions of power and leadership, such as "Handsome Johnny", who carved out for himself a position that inserted the Mob's control and influence into the trade craft Unions of Hollywood; to guard the Mob's interests in Las Vegas; and to lend itself and it's tradecraft 'muscle' to the machinations of the CIA and of the Government of the United States. In all my reading of the Mafia; the CIA; of Watergate; and of the Bay of Pigs, one name inserts himself into all: David Sanchez Morales, "El Indio". I remember now, not so much an error, rather an omission. On pages 164-165, the attempt on Frank Costello on May 2, 1957, the shooter is described accurately but not named: The shooter was Vincent "Chin" Gigante, then a recent member of Vito Genovese's Family who later became a Don himself, known as the "Oddfather" in the New York press. And another thing, I'll say that Las Vegas was a better run place under Mob control then it'll ever be by the Corporations, who continually "Nickel and Dime" their customers to death. When the Mob ran Vegas they treated their customers with respect and gave personal service because it was in their interest for them to come back. Say what you will about Santo Traficante, Jr., he and Meyer Lansky insisted that the games that they ran were "Square", no cheating or rigging was allowed. Any hint of that under Mob control would empty their Casinos. Period. Unlike today's corporate run house of cards. I would've like to have been in Las Vegas during the 1960-70s, than in 2017 for my Niece's destination Wedding.

Not bad

ALL-AMERICAN MAFIOSO is a well-researched biography of legendary mobster Filippo Sacco, better known by his alias: John Rosselli. This book gives good insight into his obscure background and career in the underworlds from Boston to Los Angeles, and from Chicago to Havana, Cuba. It includes a vast "Notes" section with bibliography, which is always a plus when considering the validity of a research book. Obviously, the authors give you a chance to double-check them if you desire to do so. They had access to hundreds of government documents, FBI files, police files, court documents, interviewed countless people on both side of the law, and dug up contemporary newspaper and magazine articles to insert some nastalgic filler into their pie, turning this book into a nice three-course meal in which by the end of it you are full and satisfied. Very nicely written and well-edited. The majority of books today in the organized-crime genre are filled with typos and grammatical errors. I tend to notice them, and I noticed few, if any, in this book. Those kind of editing errors are always a turn-off for me when I read a book. The reader will be additionally impressed with all the rare, never-before-seen photos the authors were able to obtain, one of which is a photo of Rosselli at the age of eight, which I assume they obtained when they interviewed members of Rosselli's family, such as his sister. All in all, I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to know about John Rosselli and his Hollywood, government, and gangster pals; the glamorous Los Angeles movie scene of yesteryear; and the CIA/Mafia plots to assassination Cuban dictator Fidel Castro in the early 1960s, in which Rosselli played a major part -- and this is not speculation on the part of the authors, this is a documented fact confirmed by various government officials over the years and thoroughly investigated by a congressional committee in the late 1970s. I don't think anyone who wants to know about Johnny Rosselli, truly a gangster's gangster, will be disappointed when they finish reading this book.

An Eye-Opener

This book's advantage over similar titles is the sheer number of historical insights it offers about four American cities (Chicago, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, and Washington, DC) simply by tracing the extraordinary life of one man, racketeer Johnny Rosselli. Want to know how the Chicago mob hijacked the Hollywood union movement in the 1930s? Or how the Kennedy administration reached out to mobsters to assassinate Castro in the 1960s? You'll find the answers, and much more, in a few hundred lucid, well-researched pages. Many of the same stories appear in Gus Russo's *The Outfit* and *Supermob*, for example, but the extra detail there doesn't always pay its own way, and Russo's conclusions frequently stretch the evidence he presents. Like Russo's more exhaustive (and exhausting) work, *All American Mafioso* shows how interdependent the worlds of organized crime, business, and government could be in mid-century America. Rosselli's grisly murder--he was dismembered and stuffed into an oil drum off the Florida coast after his Senate testimony--also shows how ugly the results could be. Highly recommended.