The entrenchments built during the Siege of Cincinnati were seven miles long. In addition to the lines shown in dotted lines on this map of Covington and Newport, there were batteries of cannons on Mt. Adams and Price Hill on the Cincinnati side of the river. Cincinnati was ready to surrender when Gen. Lew Wallace arrived and declared martial law. He organized the defense of Cincinnati in three days. Map provided by Thom Guidi.
The Defense of Cincinnati: Map from 1864
Is your family represented among the men who joined the first Black Brigade in the Civil War?
Click this link to find out:
MUSTER-ROLL OF THE BLACK BRIGADE of CINCINNATI (genealogytrails.com)
I am just starting this great book. Your writing really puts me back in these times. A question perhaps for the group. Judge Northcutt really seems heroic in all he did to combat this. It's stated in page 40 that he died in 1947 at age 54. This was after losing his bid for re-election in 1940. He was working apparently on behalf of a client over gambling losing to a local club. Was his cause of death ever investigated? He seems so young. I hope there are streets, monuments and other ways to recognize his leadership, often seemingly alone, to defeat organized crime, whether local or Mafia.
“Judge Northcutt really seems heroic.”
I am just starting this great book. Your writing really puts me back in these times. A question perhaps for the group. Judge Northcutt really seems heroic in all he did to combat this. It's stated in page 40 that he died in 1947 at age 54. This was after losing his bid for re-election in 1940. He was working apparently on behalf of a client over gambling losing to a local club. Was his cause of death ever investigated? He seems so young. I hope there are streets, monuments and other ways to recognize his leadership, often seemingly alone, to defeat organized crime, whether local or Mafia.
Debbie Deem
“I caddied for mobster John Croft of the Beverly hills Country Club.”
Dear Mr. Bronson:
I recently read your excellent book about the corruption in Northern Kentucky. An interesting sidelight: I was 16 years old in 1961, and worked as a caddy at Ridgewood Golf Course. I caddied one day for a man who paid me $7.00, which was about twice what we were normally paid. I asked him if I could caddy for him again, and I began a daily job. His name was John Croft. I somehow learned he was a manager at the Beverly Hills Supper Club. There were several other golfers who joined him, but I only remember one name, Dubby Pollins (sp). I even caddied for his wife when some friends from Florida were visiting. Neither he nor his wife looked like my version of how people associated with mob crimes would look Like. On August 10th I caddied for him, and then never saw or heard from him again. So your book had an additional interest for me.
Bob Wiehe
Dear Mr. Bronson:
As 76 year old native of Ft Thomas and Campbell County, I found your new book to be of great interest and it somehow paralleled the events and people of my life.
I was raised adjacent to Highland Country Club and, as a youth caddied there for many of the characters in your book. My father, William Seibert owned the Ford dealership on 4th St in Newport from 1927 until 1955. In the military, I served at the White House during the Kennedy and Johnson years and later in the 1960's, served as a police officer and volunteer firefighter in Highland Heights, before being elected to City Council in Cold Spring in the 1970's. My wife's family built into Screw Andrews's newly constructed Sportsman's Club at 2nd and York from the Govt, and converted it into an auto radiator warehouse. I also ran a startup computer company out of that location. (You should have seen the escape plans that Screw had for that building!) Working long hours in downtown Newport had me bumping into many of your book's shady characters in restaurants, chili parlors, etc. at that time.
My wife and I frequently went to dinner and shows at Beverly Hills and felt very comfortable there. Jerry Kremer, the electrician who did much of the piecemeal wiring there, was a first cousin of mine and my half brother, Bob Ruberg, an attorney in Covington specializing in Commercial major airline cases, represented Dick Schilling's interests in the largest product liability case of the time.
As a volunteer fireman/EMT with the Cold Spring Fire Dept., the fire and cleanup duties there were times that I stored away deeply into the back of my mind, but it was good for me to read your accounts and I was saddened to learn of the coverup by the State of Kentucky. There has always been a nagging suspicion in the back of my mind about the cause of the fire and I now embrace that suggestion that they intended to torch it, but set the timer incorrectly, is probably the most plausible, given the history of the Club, the Syndicate and other fires that preceded Beverly Hills, during those days.
Thanks you for a most interesting read! I just couldn't put it down and read the whole book in one sitting! After my wife and family has had their turn with it, perhaps I'll get the opportunity to read it once again!
Don Seibert, Ft Thomas, KY
Peter -
I just finished your book Forbidden Fruit, and wanted to thank you for bringing back so many memories. I am a 69 year old retiree, and life-long Cincinnatian. Back in 1977, I was a news producer at channel 12 and worked closely with Nick Clooney, Kyle Hill and Howard Ain - all three of whom covered the BHSC fire the night it burned. I also worked closely with Kyle for an additional 26 years at Cincinnati Bell in Public and Employee Communications.
I had been to the BHSC maybe two times prior to the fire. Once for dinner and a Dione Warwick concert that I believe was in the Cabaret Room, and another time my family went there for dinner to celebrate one of my sister's college graduation. One of my lasting memory of the place was that when we went from the dining room to the Cabaret Room for the concert, it seemed like we were escorted through a series of narrow hallways which was like a maze. I have a pretty good sense of direction, but I remember thinking that by the time we got to the Cabaret Room, I felt like I had been blindfolded and turned around several times so as to lose my sense of direction - I could not figure out in my mind where we were and how difficult it would be to retrace my steps to get out of the building, if need be.
Couple of other comments: My family often went out to dinner on Sunday evenings to the White Horse, the Lookout House and the Town and Country (also on Dixie Highway) - we would take my grandfather because he liked to have a cocktail with dinner on Sundays and you couldn't get one in Ohio. Growing up, it was always a "big deal" to go to those restaurants for dinner.
I enjoyed the book! It's interesting but terribly sad. Thanks again.
-Joe Wright
Dear Mr. Bronson,
I could write you a five page e-mail but for your sake I'll keep it short. I just finished reading your Forbidden Fruit Beverly Hills book and it was fascinating. I don't usually buy books but get them at the library but I remembered what a good writer you were for the Enquirer so I made the purchase. I said I'll keep it brief so I'll just mention three things that really surprised me. #1. Kentucky Governor Julian Carroll was in on the cover up. Mr. Carroll controlling the Kentucky State Police and the investigation is terrible. #2.The biggest surprise to me is the connection between the murder of Keith Holliday and the fire at Beverly Hills. My twin brother and I were seniors in high school at the time and we were among the many who walked around searching for Keith. Wow - all these years later to hear the rest of the story. Our neighbor was a volunteer fireman who waded in the Hollidays' pool and he told my Dad way back then that the boy was put in there later. #3. As a devout Catholic I really am glad you included what the ordained reverend said about the spirit world. Most people don't know this biblical truth and it's great you included this explanation. Like I said I'll keep it short, thanks for all the hours and hours you put into writing this book. It's a good one. Take care,Rich Vennemann
Mr. Bronson:
Just finished your well written and researched book. Having grown up in that era as a teenager (80 yrs old) I have memories of those times and how wide open Newport was.
Also, My wife and I were supposed to be at Beverly to see John Davidson that fateful night however, our infant got ill and we postponed.. .
My wife, Judy (same age) also grew up in that era. around here..
Question: We both remember that her "Godfather" was Frank "Boggie " Burns who owned The Kentucky Club on the 600 block of Greenup St. Judy's mother was a waitress there at that time before she started her own Beauty Salon . Judy was young (5-10 ) but remembers being escorted to the "back room " in the off hours "winning" silver dollars at the tables. ie the fix was in with the table manager. . You mention the Kentucky Club in the book. Did your research reveal any other info about Boggie Burns ? We fondly remember Boggie even after all the cleanup and he even attended our wedding (1961 ) .
Thank you in advance, and congrats again on a well written book.
J.C Jenkins
PS- Has there been any interest in making a movie on all or part of your research ?
Peter
I finished reading your book yesterday, What a great book it was hard for me to put it down. I have read many books about the Beverly Hills Fire, and yours was the BEST , so well written and the complete real story of the fire, and what lead up to it.
You did a great job, a pleasure to read your work. Thank you again.
Dave Backer, Cincinnati Ohio — 79 years old
PS: the night of the fire we were living in Dunedin Florida, sitting in the driveway with neighbors, when someone yelled outside to put the radio on. I will NEVER forget that horrible night.
Peter:
I just finished Forbidden Fruit - it's a great read, thank you for doing it.
I grew up on the East coast, moved to Cincy in 1991. I had heard about "seedy" areas across the river, but never ventured over there. Sleep Out Louie's was still a bar on Second Street where Paul Brown Stadium is now, but I (and I would guess most) don't know of a connection to the real guy in Newport from decades earlier.
Questions for you - were the clubs that burned down (I think you said about 30 of them) insured? How could they be after all those fires and known mob influence? Did Schilling get paid for the Supper Club fatal fire? The way it was shut down and cleaned up so quickly leads me to believe a) there were a lot of politicians who knew it was coming and or had something to hide. The investigators never got a proper look at the site, so insurance adjusters surely could not have been satisfied. b) this time, the club was not rebuilt vs prior fires where the facility was rebuilt under new ownership (mob). Do you think the mob was "embarrassed" by the tragedy and just let it go after so many deaths? Has there ever been anything further discussed about the white liquid being painted on the walls? I wonder why they (assuming it was the mob) was interested again in Newport having moved on to Vegas a decade prior? Maybe the BHSC was doing so well they couldn't resist? And surprising Schilling wasn't charged with some kind of safety violations for lack of exits.
Hard to believe Chesley could turn what appears to be a clear case of arson into a class action suit about aluminum wiring.
Thanks and let me know what you think.
Bill
Peter,
Just finished your book “Forbidden Fruit “ and it is great – who knew there was so much corruption in N KY and the MOB – OMG. Tom read it first and would not tell me anything until I read it too ! The research that you did was amazing – I needed a mob flow chart to keep it all straight !
When we grew up we were forbidden to ever go to Newport for anything and now I know why…….
The fire information is really scary .
We had been over there a few months before that for Bobby Goldsboro and Tom said we were never going there again. He said it was beyond not safe and I remember we left early as to not get stuck in the crowd exiting. The inside hallways and the packing of patrons had him freaked.
Cheryl and Tom Popp
Mr. Bronson
I have just completed your book and may I say what an incredible read.
What a journey through history you have penned — spellbinding, even though it ends tragically.
Our nation and especially our own region has so many hidden secrets, it was enjoyable to discover some with you!
Thank you once again for shedding some light and sharing your hard work and dedication to an area and period of time that soon may be just another housing project, as we once again try to bury the evil past and “just make it go away .
Thank you once again for sharing.
Bryan “Coach” Burkholder
Peter,
After I retired from the airlines, I received my Master's degree from
NKU. Our historical project at the university was to arrange a display
of the "Beverly Hills Fire" at the Ft. Thomas Army Military Museum.
The museum still has memorabilia from the fire. I went to the fire to
help, but all I could do was scream at the kids, who were stealing
wallets from the dead male bodies on the hillside. I apologized to my
friend, Dr. Fred Stine, the Campbell County Coroner, for failing to
stop the looting. The horror exacerbated to the victims' families
because of the additional time it took to identify the bodies. My
failure will always haunt me.
I will include in my book, my NKU Practicum, and two new "NKU Tribune"
articles. Also, a chapter on Harrison County, (Cynthiana) KY, Sheriff
John Kitchen, my mother's father, fought the Syndicate's local liquor
trade.
Congratulations on your book!
Dick Challis
Peter: I just finished your book last night and all can say is it is a hell of a book! Congratulations! Thanks for signing it as well. Believe it or not, I had bad dreams last night! Boy! did that bring back memories. I got my start in radio there with the help of Larry Vincent sending me to WLWT for my job as a floor boy. Jerry Thomas
Peter,
We met briefly at Newport on the Levy when I purchased your book. I just finished reading it – a few thoughts and opinions and feelings.
I’m from Wisconsin, moved to Cincinnati in 1973, heard some of the history of Newport and surrounding area crime. After reading your book I realized I only had heard a fraction of what went on. Total lawlessness! Public officials and law enforcement and the public in general either gained financially or ignored it but did not do their jobs. The public apparently didn’t care enough to step up or were afraid to do so.
So sort of like it is in 2020 – some / many / most politicians are dirty! Follow the money and it will lead to the bad guys.
If there was one thing I credit my parents with is raising me to know what is generally considered the right thing, and to do the right thing. I tested it as most of us do, didn’t always do the right thing, but when confronted I admitted it, got punished, and accepted it.
If was very hard and emotional to read of the 1977 fire and deaths and cover up. My wife’s uncle (Keebler Vice President of Sales) and aunt were there that night. She had on a white dress, went down, and was located due to the white dress – lucky! Yes it was arson and overlooked for the most part.
I also have and have read “The Bluegrass Conspiracy” that you mentioned in your book. Same thing, slightly different geography, more of the same ignoring the crime for financial gain.
Anyway – if you got this far, thanks and know that I’m pleased to have found you and read your book.
John Zoellner
Got your Book Friday from Amazon... Just started reading it.. NOTE: Two names I know, Machine Gun Meldon & Screw Andrews... Meldon and his brothers (several were cops).. I grew up with his youngest brother Jim (Pidgy), and his one and only sister, Marie.. Pidge was 4 years older than me,, Marie was about a year older.. We all went to Holy Angels School in O'Bryonville.. That is where the Mother of the Meldons lived.. Bob Foppe married Screw's daughter, another O'Bryonville Boy... I saw her on many occasions.. She had a voice you could remember... I hosted an O'Bryonville re-union in 1981-82-83 & some after these years.. The first 2, we had about 350 people show up.
At one time Bob Foppe disappeared for 10 years.. NOBODY KNEW WHERE HE WAS ??? I thought the Gang gave him some concrete shoes to wear in Ohio River, as was the custom.. So they said.. Bob's Mother and my Mother were friends when they were young and single. The last time I saw Machine Gun Meldon was on the River Bank in California, Ohio.. He was sitting there alone drinking a 6 or 12 pack of beer. I sat down and had a beer with him. It was probably after 1981 ??? I think he had cancer at that time.. He and I talked mostly about old O'Bryonville. I remember one thing he said, "Mike Schoot went through Marine Corp on a Golf Scholarship".. :-))) Which was close to the truth statement.. Mike was the son of Roy Schoot, for many years the Caddy Master at Cincinnati Country Club. Most boys growing up in O'B were Caddys. I don't know the history of the early Meldon Family.. I know their Dad was killed in a vehicle accident, somewhere near Fairfax Ave. in Evanston.. He was on Fire Dept. at that time.. I think most of the children were young. Of course I had some (little) time in Newport. I was 18 in 1950. Some of my Buddies were a little older. One time I went with my cousin’s husband in the Cincinnati area to empty nickels from pinball machines. He was working for someone in Newport ??? He was quite active in Newport at that time, ie bartender, cab driver, etc. Pinballs were a big deal at that time. Newport was OK if you behaved yourself.
Thanks for listening to me... I am 88 years old now.... A lot of memories, not much else.. Live here in Peebles, Ohio with my second wife. First Betty died in 1999 after 43 years of me.. My second wife Betty and I have been together for 16 years.. Both will go to Heaven after putting up with me.. Good Luck on sale of your book. — Thomas McDonough
Peter, in the 70’s, I entertained business guests at Beverly Hills at least ten times.
On weeknights we saw John Davidson, Roger Williams, Ferrante and Teicher, Roberta
Sherwood and Connie Stevens. It was always crowded, by design. The attractions were low cost dinners ($9-$10.00) of chicken, meat, fish or pasta and nationally
recognized second tier stars (no Sinatra or Garland). Beyond the low cost food, there
was an excellent selection of steak or prime rib.
About 20 minutes before the performance, I would leave the dining room, pass a long line waiting to be seated in the Cabaret Room and approach the Captain with
two $20.00 bills visible. I handed him one of them and said I would lead a party of five
(myself included) five minutes before the performance. I told him he would get the other $20 bill then. After I led our party to the theater, the Captain directed two waiters who brought in an 18 inch wide table with a tablecloth and five light weight folding chairs from storage. We followed the waiters right up to the stage where my guests took the two closest seats. Other patrons on both sides of us had already been seated. We filled the aisle as did other guests behind us who also tipped for immediate seating. On its face, this arrangement was a great deal both for those who
only paid for the meal, or business people like us who didn’t mind a modest $8.00
per person cover charge (by tipping). The fatal flaw was that safety was ignored.
Even on a weeknight when only half of the 1000 seat capacity was present, the
exit aisles were filled. I have imagined myself in 1972, a healthy 30 year old, inhaling
black smoke in the dark and stumbling over my 55 year old boss who could not move
as fast as I. I probably would not have survived.
Your book Forbidden Fruit is excellent. You should write more often.
Sincerely,
Dick Rensing
The poster was provided by Mary Lee Oberhelman, whose grandfather owned the property before it was sold and later became the Beverly Hills Country Club. Her grandfather, H.M. Davis, was president of the Highland Silver Fox Ranch on the property in the 1920s. He died suddenly in 1928 of appendicitis, and the ranch house (blow) and 17 acres was sold to later become the Beverly Hills County Club owned by Pete Schmidt, that was burned in 1936.
“SILVER FOX INDUSTRY TO BRING WEALTH TO THE OHIO VALLEY,” The Cincinnati Enquirer reported in 1927. Silver Fox furs were in fashion and a single pelt could bring as much as $1,000, the paper reported, with “demand far greater than the supply.”
“That was my grandparents’ home that burned in 1936,” Mrs. Oberhelman said. “It was a big house with a living room that was 20 by 40 feet. It could easily be turned into a gambling club.” Her father always believed his mother was swindled out of the property by Newport gangland lawyer Charles Lester, she said. “That whole hill is just cursed.”
Mike Kunkel ran a furniture store in downtown Newport and furnished the casinos and nightclubs for the underworld. “You could always tell when the big boys were in town from New York or Chicago. They would meet in a backroom at Pompilio’s Restaurant. (Heavyweight Champion) Ezzard Charles had a club in Newport, the 323 Club. But the streets were safe. I could take $40,000 and walk it from my store to the bank without a worry. They took care of things and watched everyone.”
But Newport was not so safe for gangsters who stepped out of line, Kunkel recalled. “There was one guy shot down in the street. He was shot nine times and not one of the bullets was from the same gun. Now that was a hit.”
“May it please the court, we’d like to request that Circuit Judge Johnst Northcutt vacate the bench for the remainder of this case because of his demonstrated public bias and prejudice against the defendants, including but not limited to participating in a raid on one of the defendant’s place of business—”
“Motion overruled,” the judge interrupted, rapping his gavel. “You may take your seat, Mr. King.”
Covington attorney Bert King stacked his papers, aligned the edges carefully and took his time returning to his seat in the Kenton County courtroom, where he joined a flock of local lawyers lined up like birds on a telephone wire, representing Lookout House casino owner James Brink, former Chicago and Detroit mobster “Sleepout Louis” Levinson and a half-dozen others who operated, owned and managed gambling clubs in and around Covington.
It was May 1936, just a few months after the Beverly Hills fire that killed a 5-year-old girl. But the gangsters at the defendants’ table did not look troubled at all. They made a show of looking bored and unconcerned, leaning back in heavy oak chairs that could have all been carved from the same “hanging tree” at about the same time the courthouse was built.
Their underworld friends lined the front rows of the gallery behind the railing, hats and a few overcoats on their laps. They wore dark suits in charcoal and navy blue, just like any gathering of businessmen at the exclusive Queen City Club in downtown Cincinnati. But there was something hard to define, just a little bit out of place for a boardroom. The suits were too stylish, too sharp, too tailored. The chalk-stripes were too bold. Some didn’t even have the decency to take off their hats. And their faces had the unhealthy pallor of night people who don’t see enough daylight. It reminded Judge Northcutt of the coloring he saw regularly on the faces of prisoners who were hauled into court after a few weeks in the county jail. The bailiffs called it “jailface.”
There were also a few hard-eyed women in the crowd. They were pretty and fashionable, but again, something was just a little bit wrong. They were overdressed, with too much makeup, skirts too short, eyes red as if they had come directly from the smoke-fogged nightclubs. It was late spring, and the courtroom’s tall narrow windows poured in bright sunshine that warmed the courtroom and made the gangsters tug at their tight collars and shift uneasily as sweat trickled down their backs under silk shirts and wool suits.
“That’s rather an impertinence,” the judge added, lifting his chin to glare coolly at the gangland defendants and their lawyers. He recognized a few local celebrities in the crowd. Red Masterson. Screw Andrews. Pete Schmidt. Just like roaches when you turn on the lights, he thought.
Judge Northcutt wore a high-collared white shirt and black bowtie under his robe, making him look almost priestlike. He was 43, but looked uncommonly youthful for a judge, as clean-cut as his University of Kentucky yearbook picture. His short dark hair could have been parted with a ruler and was combed close to the scalp. He had worked for and supported Governor Happy Chandler, so the underworld gangs figured the new judge’s promises of reform were just the usual campaign mouthwash. But now the word on the street was that Chandler had given up trying to talk sense into Judge Northcutt, and Northcutt would not return the governor’s calls. Apparently, the man was actually serious.
“The state can call its first witness,” the judge said, turning to the smaller line of lawyers representing the Commonwealth of Kentucky.
“Elmer Ware,” the bailiff called. The master commissioner of the Kenton Circuit Court came forward and raised a trembling right hand as he swore to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. As he took a seat in the witness box, he somehow managed to look officious and nervous all at once.
Commonwealth Attorney Ulie J. Howard stood, buttoned his jacket over his vest, and wasted no time. “Did anyone from the Lookout House ever approach you about gambling?” he asked. The spectators leaned forward and the courtroom fell so silent that passing traffic could be heard through the foot-thick walls.
“Yes, sir,” Ware replied, straightening, looking more confident. “Ed Curd visited me three times.” He nodded toward one of the men at the defendants’ table. “He talked about the Lookout House and Judge Northcutt’s attitude. He said he had been told that everything was all right in Kenton County, so he invested $15,000 to develop the Lookout House into one of the most elaborate and finest night clubs in the United States, outside of New York and Chicago.”
“What else did he tell you?” Howard prompted, approaching the witness stand.
“He said that if Judge Northcutt would be reasonable in his conduct, we could all get along. He said he would go along with Judge Northcutt politically, and the club would be run quietly and without embarrassment to the judge.”
“Did he mention anyone else who is in the courtroom today?”
“Yes, he mentioned Jimmy Brink and said that if Judge Northcutt insisted on driving them out, he would be the heavy loser. He asked me to introduce him to Judge Northcutt, but I refused.”
After a few more questions, the defense declined to cross examine and Ware was dismissed. The prosecutor next called Justice of the Peace John L. Cushing, who backpedaled and stalled until he was finally cornered and forced to admit that he had approached Judge Northcutt on behalf of the gambling syndicate. He shot a look to Brink and shrugged as if to say, “I did my best.”
The judge leaned over toward the witness and interrupted: “Didn’t you say to me, ‘They want to know what you want. Political control or what?’”
Cushing was caught like a rabbit in a snare. “Yes, your honor,” he mumbled.
‘Machine guns were discussed’
B.H. Elierman of Covington testified next, and told the court that he had been asked to “persuade” Judge Northcutt “to let the Lookout House alone.” The mob’s messenger who asked him to help the judge “see the light” was a Kentucky State Trooper, he admitted.
Then Kentucky Constable J. C. Spicer testified about raids on the Lookout House: “The judge talked to us and told us he knew we weren’t afraid to arrest the people at the Lookout House. The judge offered to help us with warrants and get us anything we needed, including a machine gun.”
Again, Northcutt interrupted to clarify, acting as witness and judge. “Yes, let the record show that machine guns were discussed,” he said, “but I dismissed the idea as unnecessary.”
The case dragged on for weeks. Defense attorneys accused Northcutt of leading raids while carrying a gun. The judge insisted he had never left the car during a raid on the Lookout House, but did not deny being armed.
Finally, a permanent injunction against gambling at the Lookout House and other casinos in Kenton County was granted—and enthusiastically ignored. In June, Judge Northcutt had the Covington city manager, the police chief and the county sheriff in court. Each of them swore under oath, with his hand on a Bible, that they knew nothing about illegal gambling in the county.
During that court proceeding, a new attorney joined the defense table and objected strenuously to questions by the prosecutors. But when prosecutors and the judge challenged him and threatened to put him under oath, he refused to identify his client, then said he was only a spectator.
There was speculation that he came from Cleveland, or maybe Chicago or Detroit as a favor to Sleepout Louie, to keep an eye on the bosses’ interests, or maybe send a message to the judge. But cars with out-of-state license plates were not unusual in downtown Covington near the courthouse—not with so many nearby brothels and tiger blinds to entertain visitors.
Frustrated by see-nothing politicians and do-nothing police, Judge Northcutt impaneled a “Blue Ribbon Grand Jury” of handpicked citizens whom he hoped were untouchable by the mob.
“Every man, woman and child of sufficient intelligence to keep out of the fire knows that gambling is rife in the county and city,” the judge instructed them. “You will do nothing to minimize, whitewash, or evade the fixing of the direct and proper responsibility, if it is within your power, for conditions that have not merely become obnoxious, but putrid.
“If you fail, I shall not hesitate to say to you that you have done so, and other grand juries will be called who have the courage and will to drive these gamblers and their allies from the county.”
It was the first serious talk of reform in 30 years, since The Rev. Robert Nelson at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church had preached to Newport about driving out “the gambling element, whose profession is robbery,” and warned that “public morals are, to say the least, threatened with falling into destruction and disgrace,” earning “the contempt of every honest citizen.”
Eureka Lodge No. 7 of the Knights of Pythias supported Rev. Nelson with a resolution demanding “strict enforcement of the laws prohibiting lawlessness in our city.”
City leaders yawned.
But finally it looked like one judge might sober-up Newport’s wild sister, Covington. The long mornings and hot afternoons of witnesses and testimony were over. Now the day had come for the grand jury to report its findings.
Shooting on Monmouth Street
The brass-knuckle 1930s were long before Miranda rights and hands-off police questioning. They were the days when Cincinnati Detective Robert “Machine Gun” Meldon challenged a Newport mobster to a shootout in the street. Meldon waited with his trademark Tommy gun, which was invented in Newport by General John Thompson. The mobster never showed up, and Machine Gun Meldon’s legend grew with his list of kills.
In wide open Newport, mob gunman Albert “Red” Masterson was also racking up kills that were rumored in the dozens. One verified score was a Chicago hitman from the Al Capone gang, John Rosen, who came to town in 1935, shoved a gun into the ribs of a Glenn Hotel manager and told him to find Red Masterson.
The manager and Rosen took an elevator upstairs, but the Newport Enforcer was out. Rosen left and caught a cab.
The cab driver told police he was ordered by Rosen at gunpoint to follow a car and run it off the highway. He refused to run it off the road, but followed the car back to the Glenn Hotel on Monmouth Street, where Rosen “leaped out and attacked the other man, leaving his victim lying on the sidewalk,” the cab driver said.
Later, sitting in another cab at 609 Monmouth Street in Newport, Rosen finally spotted Masterson on the sidewalk, cursed him and called him out. Masterson walked up to the cab, yelled something that the newspapers translated to “Quit the fooling,” and began firing two .38s into Rosen. He kept shooting until Rosen was entirely dead.
In court, Masterson testified that he had seen Rosen reach for a gun. No gun was found on Rosen, but Masterson’s lawyer produced a witness who testified that he had reached into the cab while the gun smoke was still thick, took the gun from Rosen’s lap and ran off to throw it in the river. Detectives from Louisville and Columbus, Ohio, told the court that Rosen was a well-known gangster who had served time for only a small fraction of his crimes and killings. They described a mob hitman who got what was coming.
“Acquittal of the 29-year-old defendant on the murder charge came at 13 minutes to 3 o’clock yesterday afternoon, Friday the 13th, and only half an hour after the jury had withdrawn for its deliberations,” a newspaper report said.
The court ruled it was self-defense. Police said six of eight shots fired by Masterson hit Rosen. But the cause of death was “gambling war.”
Masterson was also wanted in Cincinnati for violating parole in Ohio by carrying firearms. But the Kentucky judge set bond at $2,000, which was easily posted by Masterson. He walked away. His lawyer was Daniel Davies, the same attorney who would represent Garrison, Whitfield and Diehm.
Eruptions of violence in the streets and burn-outs of bars and nightclubs by the mob were as common as cops on the take in those days. And bent cops were so common in the 1930s that one of the biggest brothels in the county was owned and run by a local marshal, while Newport’s police chief ran a casino.
But the “resort blaze” that made big headlines on both sides of the river in 1936 was different. It was not just mobsters killing each other. A little girl had been killed. The torching of Schmidt’s roadhouse had violated an unwritten code. Even crooked cops and a few gangsters wanted justice. There was no mercy to be found for men who would burn up a 5-year-old girl.
‘First time I ever killed a child’
It took the police just four days to track down two of them.
After interrogating the bartender Elrod, detectives learned that Edwin Garrison and Sidney “Chick” Diehm were both burned in the arson, and had been taken to Dave Whitfield’s café on York Street, which Whitfield had closed that night while Garrison and Diehm were given first aid.
Earl Fillhart identified Garrison’s mugshot as one of two men he saw at the roadhouse when he went to investigate the fire.
Garrison and Whitfield were arrested on February 7.
Whitfield said he had driven Garrison to a Covington doctor, Edward J. Nestley, and told the doctor that Garrison had been burned in a moonshine-still explosion. Garrison told the doctor it was a car wreck. The doctor apparently did not care which story was true or ask any questions. He gave Garrison some sedatives and followed up with a couple of visits over the next three days, without telling police.
When Garrison was finally found in the attic of a rooming house, thrashing and moaning in a fever of sweat, oozing burns and agony, police said he was half out of his mind.
“I see three people burning,” he raved. “I still see them, especially the little girl.”
He told the police, “It’s the first time I ever killed a child.”
He also boasted that he knew recently slain New York gangsters “Legs” Diamond and Dutch Shultz, and had been working at Shultz’s Coney Island Racetrack in Cincinnati. “Questioned about the blast and fire that is suspected of having its origin in a gambling war, Garrison kept his blistered lips tightly closed,” the Cincinnati Post reported on February 12.
Whitfield and Garrison were charged with arson, murder and robbery during a hearing that had to be held in a cell at the Campbell County Jail. Garrison was too crippled by burns to be moved from his jailhouse cot without being carried to court.
Police launched a manhunt for the third man, Chick Diehm. Detectives tracked him through Detroit and several states, then finally found him hiding out in an apartment on West 45th Street in New York City on March 23.
All three men were described as hoodlums and “police characters.”
Sidney Diehm, 34: For some reason, stories about Diehm showed no pictures of him. But he fit the “police character” portrait. He had been arrested for larceny a year before for trying to pay his bill at the Hotel Havlin in Cincinnati with a stolen adding machine. In 1927 he assaulted a federal prohibition agent “with intent to impede and obstruct justice.”
Dave Whitfield, 33: Whitfield stares from his mugshot with a direct, defiant gaze. His lower lip is thrust out over a dimpled double chin. His dark eyes are sad but lifeless. He had grown up in North Carolina and served in the Navy, then served three terms in prison for robbery, embezzlement and violation of federal liquor laws. In court he said he once was a partner with Pete Schmidt, whom he had known for 10 or 15 years, going back to Prohibition when they made bootleg whiskey on a farm Schmidt owned on Tippenhauer Road in Campbell County, Kentucky.
Edwin Garrison, 35: In a newspaper photo borrowed from police files, Garrison wears a white shirt, tie and jacket. His thin lips are tight, his face as blank and cold as a snowdrift. The irises of his eyes are washed out, making the penetrating dots of his pupils stand out like bullet holes in glass. He was also a graduate of the George Remus College of Criminal Knowledge, and had been part of Pete Schmidt’s crew. But lately he had been associated with the Meyer Lansky gang in New York. He was mathematics wiz who calculated racetrack odds. His police character friends called him “the human adding machine.”
Blog is an ugly word. It sounds like a job for Roto Rooter when Drano and Liquid Plumber can't get the job done. "The drain's backed up again -- looks like we've got another blog."
I had a blog as a columnist at the Cincinnati Enquirer, and there were many times when I wanted to call Roto Rooter to clean it out. Something about the camouflage of anonymity gives some knuckleheads "blog courage," which is like beer courage without the excuse of inebriation.
Before online blogs came along, a profanity saturated insult or threat of violence at least required a stamp. The threatening letters I got from the leper colony on Molokai (true) required several collectible stamps, and were so creative and colorful I shared them with the Tucson Citizen newsroom.
I wonder if online comments would not be so ugly if "blogs" had a more congenial name. Arguetorium. Idiotorial Colosseum. Carping Diem. Common Tater.
I long for the daily newspapers that had great names. In my career in Michigan, Arizona and Ohio I worked for The News, The Outlook, The Independent, The Review, The Republican Tribune, The Dispatch, the Tucson Citizen and The Cincinnati Enquirer. Readers loved them so much they had affectionate nicknames: The State Urinal (Journal), the Unconcerned Citizen, the Inkwire, the Daily (Red) Star.
My favorite newspaper name was unfortunately fictional, from National Lampoon: The Dacron Republican-Democrat. Of course, that's an impossible name for a modern newspaper. At least the "Republican" part. Which may help explain why many of those great newspapers have folded.
"No good deed goes unpunished."
I used to keep that blue-collar quote on a three-by-five card in my cubicle in the Cincinnati Enquirer newsroom, next to my "Reagan on Rushmore" button and a Gary Larson cartoon of a dog wearing "cement overshoes" being dropped off a bridge by two mobsters who said, "He bit the hand that feeds him."
"No good deed goes unpunished" seemed to describe an unusual number of management decisions.
For example: I would choose a letter from a stack of hundreds to publish in Letters to the Editor. We would shorten it to fit our guidelines and clean up bad spellings and fractured grammar. Then the next day I would get a call: "You took out my favorite part!" I finally started warning readers that we had an uncanny talent to find their favorite paragraph in a letter to the editor... and remove it.
Another example was on one of the Enquirer's anniversaries, when we announced that we would make the daily paper smaller -- as a "birthday present" to our loyal subscribers.
This is how my boss probably felt.
One year when we ran our annual August stories about heatwave suffering and deaths in the poorest neighborhoods, I bought a couple of air-conditioners and enlisted the help of some local ex-cons at a halfway house to deliver and install them (Thank you, Mike Howard) for two families in sweltering subsidized housing. The air-conditioners cost about $300. The cost of the dog that bit me: Ouch! The look on that elderly couple's faces as they stood in front of the cool blast of air in a room that felt like 106 degrees: Priceless.
When I wrote a column about it, I was warned by the editor in chief: Never, ever do anything like that again.
It didn't stick.
OK, so I watch way too much TV. And I have noticed that the so-called pundits are like the meteorologists: they never get fired no matter how many times they are spectacularly wrong.
They also seem to work from a the same dictionary of Buzzwords for Any Occasion, which is thinner than Bill O'Reilly's Book of Conversational Manners. (I think it's called "Killing Courtesy.")
So I dare you to try the Fox News/CNN Challenge: Turn on any shout show and try to listen for five minutes without hearing:
"At the end of the day..." This tired, geriatric phrase is older than George Will's quill pen that he lifted during the signing of the Declaration of Independence. It's pure filler, a phrase of foam packing peanuts from the Smithsonian Museum of Government Weasel Words. What's wrong with, "In summary," or the most welcome word at every public speaking occasion: "Finally..." Better yet, if that's all you have to say, just stop talking before you say something even more hackneyed and stupid such as "that being said."
"Look..." When someone starts a sentence with "Look..." I immediately "look" for another channel.
"Optics." This one is the 100-proof, distilled spirit of the Washington culture. "Optics." What they mean by "bad optics" is that it looks bad. Never mind the truth or the facts. Everything is appearance. It could be wrong or right, but what matters is the "optics." When so-called journalists use words like "optics," that's a warning sign that they have been hopelessly brain damaged by too many rides on the D.C. spin machine. Please. To paraphrase the redneck test: If you say "bad optics" to describe a felony stupid Washington scandal, you just might be a punditiot, way past your sell date.
... And the Ron Burgundy-Ted Baxter Award for Broadcast Balderdash goers to:
"Double down." If Washington is Hollywood for homely people, TV news is apparently Las Vegas for losers. During the past year the pundits have lost every bet they've made, but they still "double down" like five-martini drunks blowing the college fund at Caesar's Palace. No news analysis or discussion is complete without at least one mention that someone has "doubled down," which in ordinary English means "said something twice that I disagree with," or, "refused to be bullied by media attacks."
One of these nights I will hit the five-fecta and Chris Mathews or Charles Krauthammer will say: "Look, at the end of the day, having said that, they will double down on bad optics." Which, come to think of it, is a pretty good description of the Washington media.
My "rescue" roadster, a 1977 MGB, aka "Sooper B"
This is how it looked when I bought it. Love at first fright.
I started restoring this LBC (Little British Car) in 2006. Now almost 11 years later, I have skinned hundreds of knuckles, expanded my vocabulary in the wrong direction and replaced every part that could fail -- except the ones that are waiting for the right opportunity. And I am still working on it, of course. Because British cars are never finished. They're just "resting."
I've had the engine out more times than I want to remember. Skinned knuckles heal, but the moment you find out you have to pull an engine for the third time can leave permanent scars on that part of the brain that feels pain and attraction to old British cars. The day I discovered that the parts company sent the wrong flywheel still grinds me like the new $175 starter that cranked and cranked in futility because the $400 Italian alloy flywheel was several millimeters out of reach.
1970s styling with the latest mechanical technology... from 1955
With help from my mechanical Kung Fu "master" Sam Smyth, I apprenticed as a grasshopper grease monkey and learned the art of pulling wrenches... and occasionally throwing them. For some reason, they seem to go farther when accompanied by a blue cloud of curses that hang in the air like oil-burning exhaust.
A stock MGB has about 80 horsepower. Hardly enough to get out of its own way. But if feels and drives "Safety Fast," as the slogan went, because it is as close to the ground as a roller skate and corners like a carnival ride. This one is not new, but it is improved beyond recognition. It's supercharged and re-bored for "Holy bleep" giddyup. It has a tuned exhaust, performance cam, alloy intake, aluminum pistons, high-performance suspension, stiffened anti-sway bar and blah, blah, blah car guys can get really boring talking about this stuff.
I went through almost as many dollars as dumb mistakes. Sam: "I told you to put a rag in the end of the exhaust pipes when you pull the manifold. You dropped a screw in there, didn't you, dumb----. Now you have to pull the whole exhaust system off. Again."
But on a warm spring day, when I unzip the back window, put down the top and cruise the scenic farm country that frames the licorice twisty back roads of rural Clermont County in the Land of Goshen, all is forgiven.
CINCY MAGAZINE, April -- Sleepy little Felicity is so small it doesn’t even have a stoplight. So it must have felt like an invasion when a convoy of cruisers from the Clermont County Sheriff’s Department brought a task force of undercover narcotics officers, K-9 teams and detectives to bang on doors and haul away 13 suspects running a heroin network and meth lab.
“The undercover agents took one of them right out of our restaurant,” says Don Larrison, owner of the village gathering place, the Feed Mill. Most of Felicity cheered, he says. “Oh, yes, it was quite a bit of excitement.” Read more.
The 1977 Beverly Hills Supper Club fire lit the skies over Cincinnati
CINCY MAGAZINE -- A conspiracy to cover up the most deadly crime in Kentucky history sounds like a topic for the Tinfoil Hat Society—unless you know the local underworld history...
Busboy David Brock says he was too scared to tell police what he had seen in 1977. “Anyone who would kill that many people wouldn’t think twice about me.” But since a reunion in 2002, when survivors compared notes about mysterious “maintenance men,” threats and arson, he has been tenacious. Read more.
The newspaper industry had another death in the family on Valentine's Day. Decency was killed by the Wall Street Journal in a front-page story about an obscene YouTube star, who was quoted saying that "Context f---ing matters." Except that it was spelled out, letter for letter.
Yes, context matters. This kind of thing is callously common on cable TV. But newspapers always maintained higher standards. There was a time when even the "C-word" (crap) was not allowed in a newspaper because we knew that we were a guest in the home of each subscriber, and guests do not wipe muddy words on the carpet, belch profanity at the breakfast table or barf locker-room language in the living room.
If anyone cared about the murder of common decency by one of the nation's great newspapers, it was hard to tell. I couldn't find any complaints or comment about it on the web.