The story of Paulie Gibbons’ life typically begins with his death– on the streets of Beverly Hills on May 3, 1946– punctuated by an “amusing” anecdote about his funeral. But Gibbons’ had a long criminal career in Los Angeles dating back to his youth in the bootleg era.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt was elected president in November 1932, defeating the 1-term incumbent Herbert Hoover, who four years earlier had won in a landslide partly on a platform of retaining the Volstead Act. Since then his failed economic policies had sent the stock market into a tailspin and plunged the country into an economic depression. Millions of Americans were out of work and couldn’t even legally drown their sorrows. After his inauguration March 3, 1933, Roosevelt wasted no time in making good on his campaign promise to repeal national prohibition. Continue reading
In June 1925, 23-year old LAPD officer “Eddie” Edwards went to see a man about a dog. It changed his life forever. The man was Frank Cornero, brother and chief lieutenant of “Bootlegger King” Tony Cornero and Edwards was there to arrest him. Continue reading
J. H. Graham 