A Casa De Familia

There has been many books and movies about the most well known gangsters and bootleggers from the prohibition era. We have all heard of Al Capone, Lucky Luciano, Dutch Schultz, Johnny Torrio to name a few. However there were smaller bootleg operations all over the United States that supplied booze to the people in every corner of the country. This story is about one such group that operated on the east coast in western Connecticut and Massachusetts.

As a kid, being brought up in an Italian family, I heard stories about goings on in the family during the the bootleg era and the early 1900’s. The older family members were reluctant to talk about it or even admit that the family was involved in bootlegging. While growing up, I heard bits and pieces of family history that even at a young age perked my interest in what went on in the family in those days. However the bits and pieces were so incomplete that it left large holes in the story. During a trip to Australia in 1997 I met with some older relatives that shed some light on the history of the family. While in Australia I wrote a 40 page newsletter about what I thought happened. I sent copies of this newsletter to each family household. Upon my return to the U.S. my sister showed me a copy of a 1924 Waterbury Connecticut newspaper detailing the killing of my grandfather. She found the newspapers in the Waterbury, Connecticut Library and resisted the librarians demands to leave because it was closing time, while she made copies of the newspapers. The articles in the newspapers supplied information that made the story a little more complete. Even with this information the story had many holes in it. I have written this story as a historical novel. Though the story is based on real events, and some real people, the majority of it is fiction. I hope you, as a reader enjoy the story as much as I enjoyed writing it. Joseph C. Marvici