When the Rackets Reigned

Taggert, Ed

ISBN 10: 0595500277 / ISBN 13: 9780595500277

Published by iUniverse, 2008

About this Item

Clean and tight, with no markings or signs of use. The jacket has light shelfwear, but it is now protected by a mylar Brodart cover. Fast shipping, with tracking number protection. ; 9.4 X 6.3 X 1.4 inches; 376 pages.

Seller Inventory # 41307

Bibliographic Details

• Title: When the Rackets Reigned
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Publication Date: 2008
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0595500277
• ISBN 13: 9780595500277
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: First Edition; First Printing.
• Condition: Fine
• Dust Jacket Condition: Very Good+

About this title

Synopsis

At the Kefauver Committee hearings in the U.S. Senate in 1951, it was revealed that organized crime was extending its tentacles into Reading, PA. Five years later, after a new Democratic administration took over in the city, the IRS launched a campaign to collect taxes from gambling machine operators. Two years after that the federal Alcohol and Tax Unit raided a huge still and IRS agents completed investigations of two large numbers banks. After President Kennedy signed into law interstate gambling legislation in 1961, J. Edgar Hoover sent 100 FBI agents into Reading to arrest more than 100 gamblers in a large craps casino. Year after year local law enforcement looked the other way as racketeers took over the city. A bookie working for the Philadelphia Mafia was murdered in Reading before testifying at a grand jury hearing. The local mob kingpin, Abe Minker, was eventually convicted and imprisoned, as was Mayor John Kubacki. The war raged for six years before organized crime lost its control of vice in Reading.

About the Author

Ed Taggert was in the newspaper business for 40 years, retiring as editor of the Reading Times and Reading Eagle. Since then he has written two nonfiction books, His Long Day in Court and Bootlegger. Born in Philadelphia, he served in World War II, and graduated from Pennsylvania State University.