Question of the Day - 14 February 2024

The two most famous Jewish organized-crime figures who were involved in Las Vegas in the '40s, '50s, and '60s were Meyer Lansky and Benjamin Siegel. In fact, they were childhood friends from the mean streets of the Lower East Side of Manhattan, though Lansky was three years older (born in 1902 in Belarus) and Bugsy was a native New Yorker.

Lansky, known as the Mob's accountant, was at the very very top of the organized-crime hierarchy, along with Lucky Luciano, Frank Costello, Vito Genovese, Carlo Gambino, Tony Accardo, and of course Vito Corleone.* Lansky is credited, in large part, with the development of the nationwide crime syndicate in the United States, starting in the 1920s, by consolidating Jewish participation in the Italian Mafia and running a gambling empire that stretched from England to the Bahamas, Cuba, and Las Vegas.  

Bugsy Seigel needs no introduction. He was a lady's man and a vicious killer; he got in way over his head as the developer of the Flamingo Las Vegas. The conventional wisdom is that he was rubbed out by the mob, with his old friend Lansky's permission, when he brought too much heat onto himself and his associates in Vegas. However, more recent evidence suggests that his hit was ordered to protect another Jewish mobster, Moe Sedway, whom Siegel was planning to whack. (You can read that whole tale in a 2017 QoD.)

Who was Moe Sedway? He'd grown up with Lansky and Siegel in New York and had served the interests of Lansky and the mob in Las Vegas starting in the mid-1930s. You can read about him in the linked QoD; he features prominently in the updated story about the assassination of Bugsy Siegel, if it's to be believed. 

Another Moe (short for Morris), Moe Dalitz, was a leader of the Mayfield Road Gang in Cleveland during Prohibition. He got involved in Las Vegas casinos in the 1940s and was the money and power behind the Desert Inn, which opened in 1950. Dalitz was perhaps the most successful major mobster in making the transition from ganghood in the east to legitimacy in southern Nevada, though there were, to be sure, a number of bumps along the way. Still, he wound up as a respected elder, especially in the Vegas Jewish community, and died of heart and kidney failure -- in other words, natural causes -- at the age of 89. 

Gus Greenbaum was yet another childhood friend of Lansky's in New York. He became associated with the Chicago mob and moved to Phoenix to run the race wire on behalf of the Outfit. From there, he was transferred to Las Vegas in the late 1940s and managed the El Cortez for the short time the mob owned it in preparation for the Flamingo. Along with Moe Sedway, Greenbaum took over the Flamingo mere minutes after Bugsy was shot. He, his wife, and his wife's sister came to bad ends, which you can google if you're into gore.  

Carl Cohen was a Dalitz associate from Cleveland. He followed Moe to Vegas and was installed as the casino manager of the El Rancho Vegas, then moved to the Sands when it opened in 1952. Like Dalitz, he was successful in legitimizing himself; he was hired by Kirk Kerkorian as a senior vice president of the MGM Grand (later Bally's, now Horseshoe). Cohen is also remembered for punching Frank Sinatra during an altercation at the Sands in 1967; Sinatra needed dental work afterwards. 

Jack Entratter was Carl Cohen's main partner at the Sands. He'd been a bouncer at the Stork Club and manager of the Copacabana Club in New York, so he was connected not only to the mob, but also to the most popular entertainers of the day. He was instrumental in turning the Sands into the home of the Rat Pack.  

We'll continue this in Part 2 tomorrow.

*Just kidding about Vito Corleone. Corleone, Mario Puzo's Godfather, was a composite character based on Carlo Gambino, Frank Costello, Joe Bonanno, and Joe Profaci. In addition, the name of the character Moe Greene in the movie was a combination of Moe Sedway and Gus Greenbaum, though he was based on Bugsy.