Supermob: How Sidney Korshak and His Criminal Associates Became America's Hidden Power Brokers [Hardcover]

Gus Russo (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 5, 2006 | ISBN-10: 1582343896 | ISBN-13: 978-1582343891 | Edition: First edition.

Investigative reporter Gus Russo returns with his most explosive book yet, the remarkable story of the "Supermob"--a cadre of men who, over the course of decades, secretly influenced nearly every aspect of American society. Presenting startling, never-before-seen revelations about such famous members as Jules Stein, Joe Glaser, Ronald Reagan, Lew Wasserman, David Bazelon, and John Jacob Factor--as well as infamous, scrupulously low-profile members--Russo pulls the lid off of a half-century of criminal infiltration into American business, politics, and society. At the heart of it all is Sidney "The Fixer" Korshak, who from the 1940's until his death in the 1990s, was not only the most powerful lawyer in the world, according to the FBI, but the enigmatic player behind countless 20th century power mergers, political deals, and organized crime chicaneries. As the underworld's primary link to the corporate upperworld, Korshak's backroom dominance and talent for anonymity will likely never be equaled. And as Supermob proves, neither will his story…

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Veteran investigative author and organized crime expert Russo's magnum opus is a compelling look at one of the last century's major power players: Sidney Korshak, a "sphinxlike operator" who, despite pulling the strings of politics and industry, remained invisible to the general public. With great detail (some of it extraneous), Russo traces the amazing course of Korshak's life—from his childhood on Chicago's Jewish West Side to his role as a mouthpiece for the Windy City's Mafia leaders and, eventually, as a major league fixer who brokered labor truces and other deals for politicians and Hollywood moguls (Korshak died, aged 87, in 1996). The list of his clients and associates reads like a who's who of the last 50 years, including Ronald Reagan, MCA president Lew Wasserman, hotelier Conrad Hilton and cosmetics king Max Factor. Russo's extensive research is amply evident, and he has made use of recently disclosed records to paint a fuller picture than predecessors such as Seymout Hersh and Brian Ross were able to. His conclusions about Reagan—such as that he sold out the actor's union—in particular are likely to create controversy, although similar ones were drawn in Dan Moldea's Dark Victory 20 years ago. This worthy addition to the genre is marred only by some sensational claims concerning Reagan that lack adequate documentation. B&w photos. (Sept.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

Russo is the acclaimed author of three previous books on organized crime, including The Outfit: The Role of Chicago's Underworld in the Shaping of Modern America (2002). This thoroughly researched investigative report profiles the hidden power brokers behind the Mob's dominance of Chicago and Los Angeles throughout the second half of the twentieth century. Most notable is Sidney Korshak, known as "the Fixer," who was called the most powerful lawyer in the world by the FBI. A force behind the careers of numerous celebrities, and with connections to politicians from Henry Kissinger to Ronald Reagan, Korshak brokered some of the largest and shadiest deals in Hollywood from his private table at the Bistro restaurant in Beverly Hills. As point man for the Mob, he oversaw land grabs from interned Japanese Americans during World War II, helped create the casino monopolies in Las Vegas, and facilitated Mob domination of the film and music industries. With a colorful cast of characters and more clandestine activity than a spy thriller, the book delivers some of the juiciest Hollywood details unearthed yet. David Siegfried
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 592 pages
• Publisher: Bloomsbury USA; First edition. edition (September 5, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1582343896
• ISBN-13: 978-1582343891
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.2 x 2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (29 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #515,144 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

For over twenty years, Gus Russo has been an investigative reporter, author of six non-fiction books, and writer and/or producer of many national and international documentaries for major networks. His books have received Book of the Month Club and History Book Club Featured Selections, three have been optioned for films, and one, "The Outfit," was a Pulitzer nominee. His October 2008 book, "Brothers in Arms: The Kennedys, the Castros, and the Politics of Murder," was named Winner of the 2008 History Prize by the New York Book Festival. April 2011 will see the publication of his memoir, "Boomer Days."

Russo has worked an investigative reporter for PBS' Frontline series, as well as ABC News Special Reports with Peter Jennings (Dangerous World: The Kennedy Years, and JFK: Beyond Conspiracy), Dan Rather's CBS Reports, and Jack Anderson Specials; he has been a consultant for programs such as Sixty Minutes, Sixty Minutes II, and Eye To Eye with Connie Chung; as well as documentary productions based in England, France, Germany, Japan, and Mexico. Russo has appeared on countless radio and TV programs, including NPR's Wait, Wait...Don't Tell Me!, The History Channel (numerous shows), A&E's Biography (Jack Ruby), Hardball with Chris Matthews, MSNBC's Nachman, and Dan Rather's 1993 special Who Killed JFK? Russo has been a research consultant to numerous writers, including Seymour Hersh, Gerald Posner, Anthony Summers, and Laurence Leamer, and has written for The Baltimore Sun, The Nation, The Washington Post, Book Forum, American Heritage, The Huffington Post, and for two years was a regular contributor to the health-related website Healthlynx.com. Russo recently produced and co-wrote a documentary feature film, "Generation 9-11," for Germany's WDR and Academy Award-winning director Nigel Nobel.

In another life, Russo was a professional musician, composer, bandleader, and private instructor. In that incarnation, he played with, or in tandem with, many well-known acts including John Phillips, The New Mamas and Papas, Phoebe Snow, Michael Murphy, The Byrds, Livingston Taylor, Poco, Mary Travers (Peter, Paul and Mary), Commander Cody, and Firefall (w/ Rick Roberts). Russo the musician also wrote commercial jingles and low-budget film scores ("Basket Case," "Brain Damage," etc.)

He currently feeds his musical passions as leader of the Baltimore-based sextet, "String Theory," which features ditties by Django Reinhardt, Johnny Mercer, Dan Hicks, and Nat King Cole.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Myth, October 28, 2008

By 

Scott A. Kallick "Pugwash" (Pittsburgh) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Supermob: How Sidney Korshak and His Criminal Associates Became America's Hidden Power Brokers (Hardcover)

In Bob Evans iconic Hollywood autobiography "The Kid Stays In The Picture", frequent mention was made of his mentor, who he would refer to as simply "The Myth".

The Myth bailed him out of situations in his life caused by his own self-destructive behavior, and also "fixed" situations for him by getting him certain actors to star in his Paramount movie vehicles.

It turned out this mythic fixer cut his teeth with Al Capone, and became a central figure in the emergence of the Mob. Sidney Korshak became the conduit between the Jewish cerebral approach to organized crime, and the Italian approach, which was more muscular.

Theodore Roosevelt was often quoted as saying "Walk softly, and carry a big stick."

This was an accurate description of Sidney Korshak. Almost anonomous outside of his massive sphere of influence, Korshak bridged the power of the unions, knew and influenced Presidents Truman, Nixon and Reagan, and insured vast sums of wealth for many of the biggest underworld figures of the 20th century.

Along the way, Korshak earned millions and invested huge sums of money in real estate ventures in Las Vegas, and around the World. Born a first generation American in a Jewish section of Chicago, Korshak radiated a quiet toughness that served him through the upper strata of business and down through the lower tiers of gangsters.

This a fascinating look at a complex character whose reach gravitated into the farthest reach of our society, as bad money became legitimate, and amoral gangsters assimilated into the mainstream business fabric of our society.

Russo comprehends this transformation and grasps Korshaks character.

This is highly recommended reading for anyone trying to get an understanding of the 20th century mob.

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Peek Under the Covers, November 13, 2007

By 

Douglas Doepke (Claremont CA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Supermob: How Sidney Korshak and His Criminal Associates Became America's Hidden Power Brokers (Paperback)

America loves mob melodramas, guys getting whacked because they crossed somebody or other. No one much cares whether the culprits get caught since it's all part of the underworld game. No one in authority much cares either, that is, until some hoodlum tries to beat his income tax after the gov't has demanded its cut. Then the bloodhounds of the IRS come calling and the careless capo gets a federal number.

Economists call the early stages of capital accumulation "primitive accumulation". Few academics may call 20's style bootlegging primitive accumulation, but illegal whiskey sure raised a lot of money for the Capone-led Chicago gang. And like most rising business ventures, much of that money was used by astute managers such as Murray "The Camel" Humphreys to buy influence into the over-world of politics and law. What does it matter if the money's dirty, since it's still money, as any number of corrupted Illinois officials shows.

But what happens when even a big city like Chicago becomes too small for the sums flowing into gangster coffers. Well. if you're a wizard like Humphreys, you start looking for new opportunities, especially where there is little or no competition. You also look for somebody who can pass for respectable, since you're past the primitive stage and now have the money to go legit. Enter attorney Sidney Korshak, discreet, smooth, and, above all, a protege of Jake Arvey, Chicago's master ward healer and political go-between. As Russo's lengthy account shows, the mob could not have made a better choice.

Horace Greeley's famous directive was to, "Go West, young man," and that's just where Korshak took the mob money and contacts, helping to turn dusty Las Vegas into the underworld's Glitter Gulch, and Los Angeles real estate into a permanent citadel of mob influence. Along the way, he picked up such powers in their own right as MCA's talent impresario Lew Wasserman and Democratic party power-broker Paul Ziffren, along with numerous union bigshots. Together, theirs was an underworld shadow cast across two big states with a network of contacts reaching all the way to the nation's capital.

But muscling in at the top means knowing how to cut deals with others at the top. Here Korshak proves to be the guy to go to whether the public knows his name or not. Want top talent for your TV show, see Sid; want no union trouble at the studios, see Sid; want a good deal on a tax scam, see Sid; want a big donation for a charity fund-raiser, yeah, see Sid. And all the time, there's the whispering in the background about the guy's connections with other guys, guys with guns. But then, isn't Sinatra's Rat Pack a really cool bunch of Hollywood swingers. Yeah, just ask the public or even President Kennedy.

To me, it's not a pretty picture, all the way from the yawning silence of the LA Times to the hobnobbing with Pat Brown and Ronald Reagan, plus a Hollywood establishment that could apparently care less. Scattered investigations go nowhere, while whistle-blowers like Steve Allen get black-balled for their civic duty. But then, maybe this is just another success story of primitive accumulation working its way to the top and learning to get along, even as the top learns to get along with them. I believe it was Victor Hugo who said that behind every great fortune lies a great crime. Maybe then, the Chicago mob was just more obvious than those others like old Joe Kennedy, an Irish bootlegger reborn into the white-collar world despite the sinister origins. Disturbing or not, the book is well worth the read.

As a general reader, I'm in no position to gainsay any of Russo"s facts, so I try to keep an open mind toward detractors. It's vital, however, that critics not simply denounce the work in unsubstantiated fashion. Chapter and verse should be cited in order to gain credibility. Of course, the text casts aspersions onto a number of prominent and reputable people, which places a heavy load on both the book and its detractors. Nonetheless, if Russo has to follow the rules, so should the critics.

17 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good Pile of Research Notes but not a Book, January 12, 2007

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Reckless Reader "Just Read" - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Supermob: How Sidney Korshak and His Criminal Associates Became America's Hidden Power Brokers (Hardcover)

Russo's huge discombobulated collection of random research notes is a nice example of how difficult it is to figure out who really runs anything in America. He has clearly investigated the Chicago Mob and its connection to the growth of the Los Angeles and the Las Vegas economies with the greatest diligence.

But he has made little sense of it all. His notes go from topic to topic, more or less in chronological order, but there are gaping holes in every story where he could not find out what happened because no one wrote anything down ( on purpose....you don't leave trails of your law breaking....), and where he just gets lost and confused.

Time and again, he tells the same stories, with facts that differ a bit each time, probably because the FBI files, or trial transcripts, or oral histories, differ --- to his credit, he 'sources' everything, so you know where each alleged "factoid" came from, but knowing how inaccurate FBI files can be about anything, reporting every ridiculous rumor an agent hears, and knowing how peoples' memories can 're-shape' events recalled decades later, one is left with more questions than answers about just how the Chicago Mob 'washed' their money by first investing in the Democrats in California, and then later in Ronald Reagan and the Republicans.

Perhaps someone will one day take all these notes and try to figure out what they mean. In other words, perhaps someone will take the next step of sifting through this pile, separate the rumors, legends, and just good stories from real facts, the chaff from the wheat, and analyze just why we should know all this and how/why it may matter to us now.....

Sidney Korshak was obviously a guy who could "fix" a lot of problems, but there's no real insight into his role in modern labor history, his role in Kevin Starr's California history, his real role even in Hollywood history....he's a good subject still waiting for a good biographer.

Or perhaps the point of this whole pile of notes is that no one can ever tell the story because the players are gone now, and they covered up their story so well that this is the best we can get--- half stories not well told with big holes in them.

(For example, ---- he suggests that Circuit Court Judge David Bazelon had something to do with Japanese farms being expropriated by the government and then by white California farmers after Japanese internment, but then he just tells about 2 or 3 pieces of property, mostly German/Axis property, and we really learn nothing about 99.5% of the Japanese land and what actually happened to it and what Bazelon really did or didn't do...this stuff is all available in property records etc...but Russo didn't go the length...

etc...Obviously this could go on and on. The point is simple --- interesting bits and pieces lying in a heap don't equal any kind of edifice worth walking thru.

Think twice before even starting into this --- read it as a collection of somewhat collected anecdotes, not as a tightly woven well reasoned analysis of much of anything....