Thomas Hunt

Friend and colleague Justin Cascio has penned a book-length discussion of transatlantic family connections of Corleone, Sicily, mafiosi. In Our Blood: The Mafia Families of Corleone , now available through Amazon in hardcover, paperback and ebook editions, is Cascio's first book. The Mafia criminal society is traditionally viewed as a hierarchical organization, but Cascio argues that Mafia networks are largely based on kinship ties.  He has poured years of his research into this project. The publisher of the Mafia Genealogy website and a frequent contributor to Informer journal, Cascio is highly regarded as an underworld historian and genealogist. He notes that pivotal figures in Mafia history, including present-day mafiosi, have direct ties to one another and to the earliest recorded gangs in Corleone, Sicily. In addition to bloodline and marriage connections, some mafiosi also linked through the significant religious/family role of godparent.  Cascio discusses dozens of gan

Informer's October 2023 issue, Gangsters of New York's Lower East Side , is now available in seven formats (print and electronic magazine, hardcover and paperback book, Kindle and EPUB ebook, and audiobook). Contributors to the issue include historians Justin Cascio, Patrick Downey, Michael O'Haire, Steve Turner, Matt Ghiglieri. Visit Informer's website for more information. A dozen articles focus on aspects of Lower East Side gangland history:  End of the Whyos gang. Historic Photo: Bandits' Roost. John H. McGurk and Bowery's "Suicide Hall." The death and life of hoodlum/hero Monk Eastman. NYC's first Mafia boss? Italian gang chief with an Irish name: Paul Kelly. Sai Wing Mock and the New York "Tong Wars." Frank Lanza's New York firms may have been Mafia fronts. In search of "Johnny Spanish." Racketeering future was molded in young Meyer Lansky's neighborhood. "Death Avenue": Second Avenue, 1910-1924. 1964 n

Be especially kind to your ass today. (Sebastian - one of our two donkeys)  Since the middle ages, this date - January 14 - has been the "Feast of the Ass" on Christian calendars.  Not kidding. See: "Feast of the Ass." Note that donkeys, long the target of human abuse and ridicule, played significant roles in the Old and New Testaments of the Bible. (They are also nearly always present in the nativity scenes used in Christmas celebrations.) In Christian legend, the humble, thoughtful donkey not only carried Mary and newborn Jesus out of harm's way (the Flight into Egypt), it also carried adult Jesus into Jerusalem (the Palm Sunday tradition). Donkeys also were used extensively by Abraham and Moses. This was a deliberate choice, as there were horses, oxen and camels available. They were the ONLY form of animal exempted from sacrifice instructions in the Book of Exodus. The sacrifice of the first-born male domestic animal was mandated in Exodus, but it was sugges

We were treated to a special show about 7 a.m. on December 29, 2022. Rippled clouds near the Green Mountains horizon showed up as tightly packed layers of magenta and orange light, while pink cotton candy puffs filled the rest of the sky. A 14-second video, scanning the sky from northeast to southeast. Apparently, the spectacle wasn't limited to the Whiting area. TV news in Burlington shared dawn photographs taken around the state of Vermont.

 ... will find this the sort of thing they like." I attended a showing of Violent Night yesterday at the Majestic 10 Cinemas in Williston, VT (after a nice, quick meal at Bliss Bee). The movie is, well, not for everyone.  If you feel a solemn reverence for Christmas, you're not likely to enjoy it. From the early moment in which a woman marveling at a flying, reindeer-drawn sleigh is splattered by a downpour of drunk-Santa vomit, it is clear that this not a traditional holiday flick. There are some heartwarming, sensitive moments - plenty of them (mostly involving John McClane-like walkie-talkie communication between Santa and young Trudy Lightstone) - but the movie is basically a comedy bloodbath (set to an up-beat holiday soundtrack). A disillusioned Santa regains his holiday spirit as he dispenses brutal, gory justice upon a gang of very naughty home-invading thieves and saves a not-entirely-nice (except for certain members) family from an apparently deserved punishment. Th

I don't think I will ever again be able to listen to a wine description without laughing out loud. (Honestly, this was already a tough thing for me.) The Menu deliciously mocks pretentious cuisine, faddish "deconstructed" edibles and food journalism, while drawing a horror story out of kitchen enslavement to critics (and to much of the rest of restaurant-going society). I left the theater smiling, thinking and craving a double-cheeseburger.