Product Description

If American crime had a golden age, it was between 1920 and 1940—the roller-coaster years when a rural nation became urbanized and the nineteenth century finally gave away to the twentieth. The same forces that reshaped society also changed the face of crime, and soon the Progressive movement that battled urban decay led to the unintended consequences of increased police and political corruption, drunkenness transformed from a working-class vice to middle-class rebellion, and organized crime was established nationally.
The Complete Public Enemy Almanac is the ultimate reference book for the gangster era, with many unique features:
• A highly original and revisionist history of the period, covering the entire nation
• A unique, unmatched collection of gangster and outlaw biographies
• Hundreds of illustrations and period photographs
• A full, first-ever crime chronology of the period
• Dozens of short features on everything from the shift from local to federalized law enforcement to the history of body armor and goofy schemes to deal with "motorized bandits"
• The origins and meanings of such terms as the "one-way ride," "X marks the spot," "the real McCoy," "G-Man," "Public Enemy," and many more
• Innovative lists, including the Chicago Crime Commission's "body count" of gang-style murders during the period
• New light on the St. Valentine's Day Massacre, the Kansas City Massacre, the deliberate killing of Pretty Boy Floyd, the mysterious death of Baby Face Nelson, and other events
• An exhaustive bibliography (including numerous short reviews) of every true-crime book published about gangsters and outlaws of the twenties and thirties
Meticulously documented, lavishly detailed, exhaustively researched, and written with an eye for the turths that have remained largely hidden, The Complete Public Enemy Almanac provides a reliable source of information about the violent and lawless era of the twenties and thirties.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #128111 in Books
• Published on: 2007-07-02
• Released on: 2006-07-02
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 669 pages

About the Author
William Helmer, a former senior editor at Playboy, is the author of The Gun That Made the Twenties Roar and is the coauthor of Dillinger: The Untold Story, Baby Face Nelson, and The St. Valentine's Day Massacre. He lives in Boerne, Texas.
Rick Mattix, an expert on the criminal gangs of the twenties and thirties, is a prominent researcher and consultant to authors and television documentaries. The coauthor of Thompson: The American Legend and Dillinger: The Untold Story (expanded edition), and author of numerous magazine and journal articles, he lives in Bussey, Iowa.

Customer Reviews

Mobster Reference Book
So far many of the names I've been reading in the newspapers are coming to life in this fun read! Just enough mayhem to wet your appetite for more! The format makes it easy to read and pick back up and I find myself using it as a reference book at this point as I'm going through various newspaper articles. I'm still in the process but am learning quite a bit about mobsters outside of the Chicago area. Must have for those getting started like myself!

Excellent Reference You Wont Put Down
I was given this book as a birthday present... This book is a must have for any organized crime geek... Its meticulously written in a straight forward manner. Covering a wide range of topics from Prohibition era gangsters like John Dillinger, Baby Face Nelson, and others like Al Capone and other wild gangsters of Chicago... Most of the focus is in the Chicago area and Outlaw Prohibition type bandits... It does have some dates concerning happenings in Detroit, Cleveland, New York, etc...

In the beginning of the book it has brief bio's of most of the major gangsters of the 1920's era... In the back it has two pages covering the dates various gangsters died... Over all its a well written book complete with other stories woven in with the almanac... This book is a must have for your organized crime library whether your just a mafia buff, amateur crime researcher, or just into reading about Prohibition era crime...

great reading
wonderful book.informative.makes good late night reading.i love reading about local gangsters/crimes.what an era!and this author really dug out the details.