"It is 1921, and both Prohibition and bootlegging are in full swing. When Isaac Bell's boss and lifelong friend Joseph Van Dorn is shot and nearly killed leading the high-speed chase of a rum-running vessel, Bell swears to him that he will hunt down the lawbreakers, but he doesn't know what he is getting into. When a witness to Van Dorn's shooting is executed in a ruthlessly efficient manner invented by the Russian secret police, it becomes clear that these are no ordinary criminals. On a trail that leads from the ravages of post WWI Europe to the speakeasies of New York to the lawless streets of Detroit and Florida's lavish beachside resorts, Isaac tracks the footsteps of a criminal enterprise more ingenious and far-reaching than any he has ever known. He is up against a team of Bolshevik assassins and saboteurs, and they are intent on overthrowing the government of the United States. Packed with daring escapades and incredible heroics"--Provided by publisher

During Prohibition, while Al Capone was rising to worldwide prominence as Public Enemy Number One, the townspeople of Templeton, Iowa—population just 418—were busy with a bootlegging empire of their own. Led by the whip-smart and gregarious Joe Irlbeck, an outfit of farmers, small merchants, and even the church Monsignor together created a whiskey so excellent it was ordered by name: “Templeton rye.” However, a prohibition agent from the adjacent county named Benjamin Franklin Wilson was ardent in his fight against alcohol, and he chased Irlbeck for over a decade. But Irlbeck was not Capone, and Templeton would not be ruled by violence like Chicago. Gentlemen Bootleggers tells a never-before-told tale of ingenuity, bootstrapping, and perseverance, showcasing a group of criminals who embraced the American ideals of self-reliance, dynamism, and democratic justice. It relies on previously classified Prohibition Bureau investigation files, federal court case files, extensive newspaper archive research, and a recently disclosed interview with kingpin Joe Irlbeck. Unlike other Prohibition-era tales of big-city gangsters, it provides an important reminder that bootlegging wasn’t only about glory and riches, but could be in the service of a higher goal: producing the best whiskey money could buy. Bryce T. Bauer is a Hearst Award-winning journalist who has written for Saveur, the Daily Iowan, the Cedar Rapids Gazette, and other publications. He is coproducing and cowriting West Iowa Whiskey Cookers, a documentary on Prohibition-era bootlegging. He lives in New York City.

This extraordinary account of a struggling midwestern coal town profiles small-time bootlegger Kelly Wagle, whose mysterious career--and suspected involvement with two unsolved murder cases--had a profound and lasting impact on his community. In unraveling the process by which Colchester, Illinois, lost its grip on the American promise, John Hallwas reveals this remote corner of the Midwest as a true reflection of the quintessential American experience.

In Bootleggers & Baptists: How Economic Forces and Moral Persuasion Interact to Shape Regulatory Politics, economists Bruce Yandle and Adam Smith explain how money and morality are often combined in politics to produce arbitrary regulations benefiting cronies, while constraining productive economic activities by the general public. Yandle’s theory asserts that regulatory “bootleggers” are parties taking political action in pursuit of economic gain. Regulatory “Baptists” are parties participating in group action driven by an avowed higher moral purpose or desire to serve the public interest. By examining major regulatory activities including Obamacare, the recent financial crisis bailouts, climate change legislation, and rules governing “sinful” substances, Bootleggers & Baptists reveals that lasting regulations require moral and financial advocacy to survive the American political process. With countless regulatory initiatives on the horizon, this book is a must-read for all who are concern about over-regulation and government intrusion in our daily lives.

As a pharmacist turned lawyer turned master prohibition era bootlegger, George Remus is now remembered as one of the most notorious figures of the American prohibition. Even though he was a lifelong teetotaler, Remus built one of the nation's largest illegal liquor empires with little regard to disguises or secrecy. This biography tells the complete story of Remus' private life and public persona, focusing especially on the turbulent rise and fall of his bootlegging kingdom. It begins with an overview of Remus' early life and careers in pharmacy and law, and covers his bootlegging career, including his overwhelmingly successful early business ventures, his 1922 bootlegging conviction, his murder of wife Imogene (after she had a well-publicized affair with prohibition agent Franklin Dodge), and Remus' subsequent trial for her murder.

Christmas comes to Arkham Horror in this action-packed eldritch adventure full of secret whispers, haunted streets, and a lost actor falling through time Raquel Malone Gutierrez is running away, although she won’t admit that to herself. Suffering from hearing loss after an illness, the former music teacher wants to find a way to retain her independence, but only a wealthy relative offers any hope of that. Put to work in her aunt Nova’s Kingsport dance hall, Raquel stumbles upon a mystery when her new hearing aids begin picking up conversations that no one else can hear. As Christmas draws closer, Raquel realizes the voice comes from a hunted man lost in time. Now she must do everything she can to free him before the monsters chasing him can catch up and break through.

Bootlegger is about a Jewish immigrant who became a bootlegger at the age of 19 during Prohibition. By the time he was 24, the government claimed he owed $1.2 million in income taxes. He was a rarity in that he never used violence to achieve his wealth. After three of his breweries in Reading, Pennsylvania were closed down in 1928, he became a partner with Waxey Gordon, the foremost beer baron in the country. Their syndicate in North Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania controlled 17 breweries, according to the Prohibition Bureau. When real beer was legalized in 1933, Hassel became a legitimate brewer by placing a tax stamp on every barrel leaving his breweries. This was in direct opposition to the plans of the Luciano/Lansky forces whose plan was to retain control of the beer and liquor industries after Prohibition. Hassel was killed by mob hit men, setting off an investigation that ruined the mob's scheme. The mystery of who killed Hassel was not solved for almost seventy years. Hassel was not just another beer man who gained considerable wealth in the bootleg racket. He gave to numerous charities and financed a free loan society for the poor during Prohibition. The Hassel Foundation today gives grants totaling hundreds of thousands of dollars each year to worthy causes in the Philadelphia and Reading area.

This smart, sassy series introduces Deborah Knott, candidate for district judge--and daughter of an infamous bootlegger. Deborah's campaigning is interrupted when disturbing new evidence surrrounding a murder that has never been solved surfaces and she is implored to investigate.

This work is an accurate, wide-ranging, and entertaining account of the illegal liquor traffic during the Prohibition Era (1920 to 1933). Based on FBI files, legal documents, old newspapers and other sources, it offers a coast-to-coast survey of Volstead crime--outrageous stories of America's most notorious liquor lords, including Al Capone and Dutch Schultz. Readers will find the lesser known Volstead outlaws to be as fascinating as their more famous counterparts. The riveting tales of Max Hassel, Waxy Gordon, Roy Olmstead, the Purple Gang, the Havre Bunch, and the Capitol Hill Bootlegger will be new to most readers. Likewise, the exploits of women bootleggers and flying bootleggers are unknown to most Americans. Books about Prohibition usually note that Canadian liquor exporters abetted the U.S. bootleggers, but they fail to go into detail. Bootleggers and Beer Barons examines the major cross-border routes for smuggling liquor from Canada into the U.S.: Quebec to Vermont and New York, Ontario to Michigan, Saskatchewan to Montana, and British Columbia to Washington.

The generation that toiled through the Great Depression and won the Second World War has become known as -the greatest generation.- But not all of them qualified for that exaggerated epithet in the eyes of their own children. In this tender but unsparing memoir, Mary Cimarolli remembers a world in which the family home was lost to foreclosure, her father made his way by bootlegging, and school was a haven to hide from her brother's teasing. Her stories are about struggle and survival, making do and overcoming, and, ultimately, reconciliation. From her perspective as a child, she describes the cotton stamps and other programs of the New Deal, the yellow-dog Democrat politics and racism of East Texas, and the religious revivals and Old Settlers reunions that gave a break from working in the cotton patch. The colorful colloquialisms of rural East Texas that dot the manuscript help express both the traditionalism of the region and its changes under the impact of modernization, electrification, and the coming of war. Along with these regional and national trends, Cimarolli skillfully interweaves the personal: conflict between her parents, the death of her brother a few days before his sixteenth birthday, and her own inner tensions.