In the Godfather Garden
244 pages, 6 x 9
42 illustrations
Hardcover
Release Date:01 Apr 2013
ISBN:9780813560618
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In the Godfather Garden

The Long Life and Times of Richie "the Boot" Boiardo

Rutgers University Press
In the Godfather Garden is the true story of the life of Richie “the Boot” Boiardo, one of the most powerful and feared men in the New Jersey underworld. The Boot cut his teeth battling the Jewish gang lord Abner Longy Zwillman on the streets of Newark during Prohibition and endured to become one of the East Coast’s top mobsters, his reign lasting six decades.

To the press and the police, this secretive Don insisted he was nothing more than a simple man who enjoyed puttering about in his beloved vegetable garden on his Livingston, New Jersey, estate. In reality, the Boot was a confidante and kingmaker of politicians, a friend of such celebrities as Joe DiMaggio and George Raft, an acquaintance of Joseph Valachi—who informed on the Boot in 1963—and a sworn enemy of J. Edgar Hoover.

The Boot prospered for more than half a century, remaining an active boss until the day he died at the age of ninety-three. Although he operated in the shadow of bigger Mafia names across the Hudson River (think Charles "Lucky" Luciano and Louis “Lepke” Buchalter, a cofounder of the Mafia killer squad Murder Inc. with Jacob “Gurrah” Shapiro), the Boot was equally as brutal and efficient. In fact, there was a mysterious place in the gloomy woods behind his lovely garden—a furnace where many thought the Boot took certain people who were never seen again.

Richard Linnett provides an intimate look inside the Boot’s once-powerful Mafia crew, based on the recollections of a grandson of the Boot himself and complemented by never-before-published family photos. Chronicled here are the Prohibition gang wars in New Jersey as well as the murder of Dutch Schultz, a Mafia conspiracy to assassinate Newark mayor Kenneth Gibson, and the mob connections to several prominent state politicians.

Although the Boot never saw the 1972 release of The Godfather, he appreciated the similarities between the character of Vito Corleone and himself, so much so that he hung a sign in his beloved vegetable garden that read “The Godfather Garden.” There’s no doubt he would have relished David Chase’s admission that his muse in creating the HBO series The Sopranos was none other than “Newark’s erstwhile Boiardo crew.”
Richard Linnett’s riveting, eloquent account of a larger-than-life man, his family, and an era is testimony to the truism among crime writers that nothing we create can ever equal reality—a page turner. Katherine Hall Page, award-winning author of the Faith Fairchild mystery series
'In the Godfather Garden is a compassionate and remarkable story. This is a deeply-researched and beautifully written tale of a true-life character, straight out of classic tragedy.' Scott Wallace, author of The Unconquered: In Search of the Amazon's Last Uncontacted Tribes
A fascinating and often riveting book about Richie 'the boot' Boiardo and his exploits with an amazing cast of characters from the annals of organized crime in New Jersey … This is an excellent book, and highly recommended for anyone with an interest in organized crime. The Historian
RICHARD LINNETT was born in Newark, New Jersey and was educated at George Washington University and Columbia University Graduate School of the Arts. He is the co-author, with Roberto Loiederman, of The Eagle Mutiny, the true story of a mutiny on an American ship during the Vietnam War and its tragic aftermath.
 
Contents

The Garden ix
Acknowledgements xi
Prologue: They Got Me, Joe 1

1 Diamond Ritchie 11
2 The Longy War 26
3 I'm no Crybaby 45
4 Fortune Son 57
5 Jerry 65
6 The Club Fremont Incident 85
7 Castle Cruel 100
8 Loose Lips 113
9 The Old Gang of Mine 124
10 Cause for Indictment 134
11 The Italian Way 142
12 On the Jolly Trolley 154
13 The Mafia Exists! 162
14 This Thing of Theirs 171

Epilogue: The Curse 182
Timeline 191
Cast of Characters 195
Notes 203
Selected Bibliography 227
Index 231
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