Extended Network Banner made with MyBannerMaker.com! Click here to make your own!Early life
Benjamin Siegelbaum was born in Brooklyn, New York, to a poor Austrian Jewish family, one of five children. As a boy, Siegel joined a street gang on Lafayette Street in the Lower East Side and first committed mainly thefts, until, with another youth named Moe Sedway, he devised his own protection racket: pushcart merchants were forced to pay him five dollars or he would incinerate their merchandise on the spot.During adolescence, Siegel befriended Meyer Lansky, forming a small gang whose criminal activities expanded to include gambling and car theft. Siegel reputedly also worked as the gang's hit man whom Lansky would sometimes hire out to other gang bosses. In 1926, Siegel was arrested for raping a woman who had turned down his advances in a speakeasy, but Lansky coerced the victim not to testify.In 1930 Lansky and Siegel joined forces with Charles "Lucky" Luciano. Siegel became a bootlegger and was also associated with Albert Anastasia. Siegel was used for bootlegging operations in New York, New Jersey and Philadelphia. During the so-called Castellammarese War in 1930-1931, they fought the gang of Joe Masseria; Siegel reputedly had a hand in Masseria's 1931 murder in Coney Island and later had a part in the formation of Murder, Inc. In 1932 he was arrested for gambling and bootlegging but got away with only a fine. Lansky and Siegel were briefly allied with Dutch Schultz and killed rival loan sharks Louis and Joseph Amberg in 1935.[edit] To California
In 1937 the East Coast mob sent Siegel to California to try to develop syndicate gambling rackets in the West alongside Los Angeles mobster Jack Dragna. Siegel also recruited Jewish gang boss Mickey Cohen as his lieutenant. Siegel used syndicate money to set up a national wire service to help the East Coast mob quicken their returns.Siegel married his childhood sweetheart Esta Krakow, sister of hit man Whitey Krakow, on January 28, 1929. He eventually moved her and their two daughters to the West Coast after his bosses had sent him there, but kept them in the dark about his many extramarital affairs. Four of his mistresses were actresses Ketti Gallian, Wendy Barrie and Marie "the Body" MacDonald, and Hollywood socialite Dorothy DiFrasso. With the aid of DiFrasso and actor friend George Raft, Siegel gained entry into Hollywood's inner circle and is alleged to have used his contacts to extort movie studios. He thereafter always lived in extravagant fashion, as was his reputation, and on his tax returns Siegel claimed to earn his living through legal gambling at the Santa Anita racetrack near Los Angeles.Siegel became enamored with a sharp-tongued moll and courier, Virginia Hill. They began a torrid affair. Hill helped Siegel establish contacts in Mexico. The Alabama-born Hill was wealthy in her own right and had bought a mansion in Beverly Hills from Metropolitan Opera baritone Lawrence Tibbett, where Siegel frequently stayed. Hill became Siegel's paramour. Later, there were rumors that they had secretly married in Mexico. Their affair, however, did not keep Siegel from continuing his compulsive womanizing. Hill's reaction to Siegel's infidelities is unknown, but the long-suffering Esta finally reached her limit; she went to Reno and obtained a divorce in 1946.On November 22, 1939, Siegel, with his brother-in-law Whitey Krakow and two others, killed Harry Greenberg, who had become a police informant, on the orders of Murder, Inc. boss Lepke Buchalter. Siegel was arrested and tried for the murder (by that time, he had also killed Krakow). He was acquitted, but newspapers referred to him for the first time by his nickname "Bugsy." Siegel was not pleased, especially when his gangland past was revealed.Benjamin "Bugsy" Siegel was one of the most feared hit men during the early part of the century. He teamed with his close friend Meyer Lansky to form Murder Inc., a band of assassins for hire who worked closely with “Lucky†Luciano. Siegel was one of the assassins of Joe Masseria during Luciano's takeover of the New York mob in 1931. In 1937 he was sent to California to oversee the national crime syndicate's interests there, and became involved in gambling, drug trafficing, and blackmailing. He is known as the “Father of Las Vegas,†having built the first multimillion-dollar hotel and casino there in 1946, the Flamingo. Unfortunately for him, to fund the project he skimmed off profits belonging to Luciano and Lansky. Bugsy was found dead from five gun shot wounds to the head at his Beverly Hills home in 1947.
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