Prohibition - Down and Out | 5
American History Tellers
Audible
4.6 • 19K Ratings
🗓️ 7 March 2018
⏱️ 36 minutes
🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS
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Summary
Closing Time by Daniel Francis provides a good account of the border wars and smuggling across the northern border. Robert Rockaway’s article “The Notorious Purple Gang” details the gang’s origin as well as the Cleaners and Dyers War.
For information about the link between Prohibition and organized crime in Chicago, Gus Russo’s The Outfit and Get Capone by Johnathan Eig are invaluable sources. Al Capone’s Beer Wars by John J. Binder is a fantastic re-assessment of the period that sorts out some of the fact from fiction, in a highly mythologized period.
For more on the Increased Penalties Act, Michael Lerner’s Dry Manhattan, is a good resource used for this podcast, as is Daniel Okrent’s Last Call. Robin Room’s The Movies and the Wettening of America is the source for the section on Hollywood’s move away from temperance.
Kenneth D. Rose’s American Women and the Repeal of Prohibition provided insight into Pauline Sabin’s work, as did David J. Hanson’s comprehensive resource, Alcohol Problems and Solutions. The Washington Post’s recap of The Man in the Green Hat exposé is available here.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hey, prime members, you can listen to American history tellers add free on Amazon music. |
| 0:05.8 | Download the app today. |
| 0:07.0 | It's November 6, 1928, and in a hospital bed in Manhattan, a man is fighting for his life. |
| 0:19.1 | He's been shot in the stomach. |
| 0:20.8 | And despite the best efforts of surgeons at the hospital, his condition is clearly getting |
| 0:25.9 | worse. |
| 0:26.9 | His lawyers have gathered at his bedside. |
| 0:28.8 | You understand this is your last will and testament, Arnold? |
| 0:32.2 | Yes. |
| 0:33.2 | I want to make sure Inaz is looked after. |
| 0:36.0 | Carolyn can take care of herself. |
| 0:37.8 | Okay, it's done. |
| 0:39.8 | Inaz will get one sixth of the estate for a decade. |
| 0:42.8 | After that, it reverts to the firm. |
| 0:45.3 | Yeah, Inaz, the firm. |
| 0:47.9 | Hey, we'll need some witnesses here in partial ones. |
| 0:51.0 | Nurse, can you get one of the others to come over here quick? |
| 0:54.5 | The dying man is Arnold Rothstein. |
| 0:57.0 | He's 46 years old and one of the richest men in the city. |
| 1:01.0 | Two days earlier, New York City police had found him bleeding badly outside the park |
| 1:05.4 | central hotel. |
| 1:06.5 | We need you to ask Mr. Rothstein if he understands what he's doing and is of sound and competent |
... |
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