leader of the Italian island, Don Vito Cascio Ferro, to organize the American underworld so that it would follow the orders of Don Vito. After Maranzano arrived in America, Don Vito was imprisoned by Italian dictator Benito Mussolini and would never see freedom again. This left Maranzano free, he thought, to pick up the boss of bosses mantle himself.
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At a celebrated meeting shortly after Joe the Boss's demise, informer Joe Valachi later reported, Maranzano outlined the new organization of the Mafia in New York. There would be five families, under five capos (that grand sentimentalist of the Mafia, Joe Bonanno, called them five Fathers): Luciano, Tom Gagliano, Joe Profaci, Vince Mangano and Maranzano. Maranzano was, in addition, establishing an added post for himself, that of boss of bosses. This produced some gasps from the crowd of gangsters. The man who had led the fight to end boss rule was turning about and making himself the new boss.
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Chances are if Maranzano had not been so insistent, Luciano and the others would have let him live somewhat longer. As it was Maranzano was murdered on September 10, 1931. With him died the title of boss of bosses.
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The first thing Luciano did on his ascendancy was cancel the position. Luciano knew that Maranzano had aims on the rest of the country and besides having Luciano on his death list, he planned to kill Al Capone, Frank Costello, Joey Adonis, Vito Genovese, Dutch Schultz and Willie Moretti, among others. Luciano knew that the new underworld would not be a strictly Italian setup as Maranzano visualized it, and he most certainly was not about to challenge Capone, although Capone for his part had no nationwide ambitions; he was having trouble enough conquering the Chicago North Side, among other districts, to think any bigger.
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Luciano and Meyer Lansky became the most important syndicate criminals of the 1930s. Within the Italian segment of their multiethnic national crime syndicate, important to Luciano as his power base, some of Maranzano's innovations were continued, such as the five-family arrangement in New York, with Joe Bonanno inheriting the essential elements of the Maranzano family.
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It could be said quite accurately that Luciano did rule as the de facto boss of bosses in part precisely because he refused the title. When he went to prison on a 30-to 50 year sentence on prostitution charges, Luciano left the affairs of his own family under the control of Frank Costello, with Joe Adonis assigned the nominal custody of syndicate matterswhich were more or less under the control of a National Commission of the five family heads and a few other crime bosses from other cities. However, Luciano told Adonis to "listen to Meyer." For all intents and purposes, then, organized crime had a Jewish boss of bosses in Lansky. However, Lansky's influence derived not from any bequeath of power but rather from general recognition of his "smarts."
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The constant search for a boss of bosses by the press nevertheless concentrated on Italians and settled for a while on Costello and, later, after his return from Italy, on Genovese. Genovese clearly wanted the title and from 1950 on he started a steady campaign to achieve it, first by convincing everyone that Willie Moretti, a Luciano-Costello loyalist, had to be killed because he was "going off his rocker." In 1957 Genovese tried but failed to have Costello murdered and then succeeded in having Albert Anastasia put down. It fact, some have asserted that the Apalachin Conference of 1957 was called to crown Genovese as the new boss of bosses, but this is untrue or, in any event, never came to pass. A police raid broke up the meeting, and strong evidence later showed the conference was sabotaged by an alliance of Lansky, Luciano (from exile in Italy) and Frank Costelloall three not present at the meetingand Carlo Gambino, who succeeded to head of the Anastasia family. According to statements attributed to Luciano, Gambino had gone there in case the meeting somehow proceeded, planning to denounce Genovese's ambitions and to refuse to hand him any envelope of money as a symbol of his authority.
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This did not stop the press from calling Genovese the boss of bosses, but if he was, his reign was to prove even less enduring than that of the unfortunate Maranzano. He was arrested and convicted on a narcotics chargewidely believed to have been arranged by the same quartet who stopped Apalachin. With Genovese tucked away, the press turned to Gambino as the new boss of bosses, and there is little doubt he became the most powerful crime leader not only in New York but also across the country. Certainly, his influence extended over some of the other crime families. He dominated the old Profaci family through Joe Colombo and eventually placed his favorite, "Funzi" Tieri, at the head of the Genovese family after Tommy Eboli, who inherited the throne on Genovese's death, was conveniently murdered.
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Law enforcement agencies have a keen interest in establishing a boss of bosses, especially if they figure they can bust him, so that they can take credit for dealing organized crime a mighty blow. That was what federal narcotics men claimed when they nailed Genovese; law enforcement officials figured they could do the same to Gambino but he died in 1976.
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After some casting about, Carmine Galante, the underboss to Joe Bonanno before doing a long stretch for narcotics smuggling, was next elected to become the
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