The Big Con (22 page)

One of the most competent American managers is William H. Loftus (the Sleepy Kid) from St. Paul. He started as a pickpocket and had quite a reputation as a “tool” or “wire,” but never liked that form of the grift. He is always set apart in the minds of professionals because of his burning ambition to become a con man himself. He could not resist the atmosphere of the big store and traveled over the country, hanging around all the important stores and hobnobbing with the big-timers. For years he managed Lou Blonger’s stores in Denver. At one time or another, he worked for many of the big and successful stores. However, it appears that he never progressed beyond this post (when Van Cise raided the Blonger stores in Denver, Loftus was charged with being a steerer; however, I can find no verification for this from his contemporaries. The charge against Kid Duff in Denver named him as the “manager” for Blonger; according to my information, he was the ace insideman, while Loftus was the manager). “He was always hanging around the out-sidemen,” reminisced one of the ropers who knew him well, “trying to learn how to rope a mark and become an Upshaw. God, how you could burn him up when you called him the ‘manager’! That is just as far as he ever got in the grifting line, just a manager.”

Willie Loftus always took great pride in his boodle. When the play reached its height, he would have money all over everything, the counter, the shelves, and the
floor. Finally, he would call to a clerk, “Hey, George, get this stuff out of my way.”

“What shall I do with it?” asks the clerk.

“I don’t give a damn what you do with it,” Loftus would say, “sweep it out if you have to, but get it out from under my feet.” Loftus liked a boodle with quantities of new crisp bills in it. “I like to hear them squeech under foot,” he said. This boodle, properly handled, is what really rouses the larceny in the mark and makes him want to get some for himself. When the manager goes to pay the mark off, and stacks pile after pile of bills before him, it makes an impression which no mark ever forgets.

The shills or “sticks,” known collectively as “the boost,” vary somewhat with each type of confidence game and often with different types of mark. They add the final touch of authenticity to the big store. Most of the big-time stores use full-fledged professional ropers for shills; these ropers happen to be in town when the play is going on and are picked up at the hangouts by the insideman. They collect one per cent of the touch, or a liberal “consideration,” which is easy money, but many of them participate as much for the fun of seeing the mark given a lively play as for the commission. Each stick has one or more types of character which he can represent to perfection. From ten to fifteen are used on each play; they are selected just a few hours before the play by the manager or insideman, who instructs them how they are to dress and act. “We use mostly old ropers and professional grifters, with just a few young men thrown in,” says one insideman. “They win and lose big chunks of money like nothing at all. It makes a big impression on a mark to see some distinguished-looking egg lay down $100,000.”

The boost, generally speaking, is not permanent, but changes somewhat with each mark—though Charley Gondorff at one time maintained an almost permanent boost for his New York store. At the height of the big-con
games—1914–1925—New York was the center for much of the swindling activity which stripped thousands of marks of millions of dollars. At this time, the social and unofficial headquarters for big-con men was Dan the Dude’s saloon. “In New York City you could always get the best boost,” said John Henry Strosnider, who had a store there at that time. “All the con men hung out there. In the morning the managers would come in and pick out what they wanted. They would give the sticks the address of the store, tell them what to wear, and give instructions of what kind of boost they wanted. You could get any kind of a stick you needed in Dan’s scatter. Many of them made up like millionaires and some wore morning clothes and top hats. Old Man Eaton always wore a silk hat on the boost. He had a beautiful set of whiskers like Justice Hughes of the Supreme Court and was always in demand as a stick. A good boost is everything to a store.”

The board-marker, sheet-writer, caller and other clerical help are usually young grifters who are learning the game. They have little or nothing to say and go through the motions of working for whatever the manager chooses to pay them, sometimes straight one per cent like the rest of the boost. When they feel that they are good enough to try their hands at roping a mark, they get the permission of the insideman to play their victim and go forth on the road. Some, fortunate in having some big-time roper for a friend, are given special instructions by their friend and “turned out” by the big-timer. However, this is about all the training a youngster gets and this is perhaps the place to deny sensational statements often made by careless writers—and sometimes credited by those who should know better—to the effect that con men, pickpockets and others maintain “schools” where young grifters are turned out. Such institutions have long been the delight of fictioneers, but there is no reliable evidence to indicate that they ever functioned in the American underworld.

The tailer may serve as a lookout or doorman, and thus fulfill a double function. When he sees the roper approaching with the mark, he gives the office and the store starts operating. While the play is on, he keeps an eagle eye on the street in both directions to see that no one disturbs the play, that no traps are being laid to catch the con men in action. Most mobs use one or more tailers— men who follow the mark when one of the con men is not with him to see that he does not communicate with some wrong copper. In cities where the heavy-rackets flourish and where it may not be safe to let an unescorted mark carry a large amount of cash around, he follows at a discreet distance behind when the mark brings his money from the bank just to be sure that no one robs the victim. Also, where competition is keen, other ropers are wise and will spot a mark who has been tied up. If the con men who have him in tow leave him alone for long, another roper may slip in, tell the mark that he has been sent to take him somewhere else for the deal, then switch him over to another store. So the tailer must be on the alert to see that no harm befalls the mark. He is really a sort of bodyguard and is usually the only man around the store who is armed.

The big store functions only while the mark is in play. At all other times, it is “cleaned and stashed” and no con men are to be seen there. Only an empty suite of offices remains. The mob gathers there only by appointment. At all other times, it is scattered in as many directions as there are members, and each goes about his own business or pleasure. The mob is held together by loose but effective bonds; it has little formal organization.

When a con man arrives in a strange town, he knows or can find out where the “right spots” are. These are hang-outs
in the form of cigar stores, hotels, restaurants, bar rooms or brothels where con men know they can congregate free from molestation. Some hangouts specialize in one type of criminals, others cater to all types. Usually the heavy-rackets keep pretty well to themselves, while all types of grifters tend to congregate. Con men know where they will find their kind, and when they are not in the store, they usually keep to the company in the hangout, for it is not good for them to know too many legitimate citizens who might speak to them on the street when they have a mark in tow. Furthermore, con men know that if they visit the hangouts regularly they will eventually meet any other con men whom they may wish to see. Most hangouts of this type have a proprietor who is well aware of the fact that his place is a rendezvous for criminals.

If one con man wishes to locate another, he goes into a hangout and asks the bartender or the proprietor if, say, Harry Brown has been in recently. If the proprietor knows the questioner, he will tell him that Brown comes in and out, and that he will probably find him in later in the evening. If the proprietor does not know the newcomer, he says, “No. If he comes in, I’ll tell him you are looking for him. Who shall I tell him wants to see him?” The newcomer then gives his name and departs. When Brown comes in, the proprietor tells him that so-and-so has been in and Brown indicates whether or not he wants to see him. If he does, he makes an appointment through the proprietor so that when the newcomer returns he may find out when they can meet. If he does not, the proprietor discourages the newcomer. If Brown does not know the man who is hunting him, he gets a description of him and may sit in the back room so that he may get a look at him if he comes in again. If he distrusts him the newcomer never knows that he is there. If, on the other hand, the stranger asked for the Big Alabama, the proprietor might assume that he knew Brown rather well and would
be less cautious. But most big-con men know one another on sight and have no trouble finding one another when they want to get together.

The hangouts are often run directly or indirectly by a fixer, and thus they provide protection to grifters who are in a strange town. There is usually a private back room in connection with the place where only established professionals and “right” people are encouraged to congregate, and from which the general public is excluded. In this connection an old-timer recalls: “There were always thieves in Dan the Dude’s scatter, but no suckers [legitimate people] and no dicks. If a sucker came in and started to go back into the big room, some gee would stop him and say, ‘This is a private club. Are you a member?’ And if he went over to the bar to buy a drink, the beer glass would be about the size of a thimble and the whisky terrible. And the Mickey Finns were always ready for some punk grifting kid who thought he would crash the joint. They gave him one, then sloughed the donicker on him, and you should see him cop a heel out of that scatter.”

Dan the Dude was an unusually helpful fixer. He kept a large ledger in which a record of all touches was kept, as well as a list of promising prospects for all sorts of thievery and con rackets. Professionals in good standing were given information from this book whenever they needed it. So far as I have been able to determine, this was the only document of its kind ever kept by a fixer in a hangout.

In these hangouts the grifters “punch the guff” and “cut up old scores,” gamble, drink, carouse and mingle together socially. Here news is relayed rapidly and accurately, for each of these hangouts is a post in the so-called “grapevine” system of communication, and here con men are sure to meet their colleagues if they are in town. Almost every town in the United States has one or more of
these hangouts, and in the larger cities there are many. Most famous among old-timers in New York were Dan the Dude’s place at 28 W. 28th St., and Bob Nelson’s place on 8th Avenue. On the West Coast the hangouts were and are legion. In the middle West and South there are many places—impossible to name here because they masquerade under very respectable fronts—into which thieves from all over the world come for sociability and sanctuary.

Among those notorious places which can be named, John Ullman’s saloon in St. Joseph, Missouri, and Mike Haggarty’s place in Memphis stand out, as well as the two places maintained by a prominent Chicago fixer. In Toledo, Ohio, since the days of Brand Whitlock known among thieves and grifters as a “right” city, there were many hangouts, but the most popular one was run by John Singer, an old heavy-man. Modern big-con men also have their hangouts in hotel bars, cafèAs, and good restaurants in Miami, Daytona, New York City, Hot Springs, Reno, New Orleans and in all cities where the big stores are located. The hangout is becoming more and more high-toned while the old saloon is waning in popularity.

Individual con men live at the best hotels and travel first-class. Often they are known to the managers of the hotels where they stop, and these managers see that their mail is forwarded to them and that their friends get in touch with them. The managers who are friendly with the con men can rest assured that, in return for their courtesy, all bills will be paid and no patrons of the hotel will be molested. Con men are good spenders and their steady patronage is very advantageous to the hotel; furthermore, they all associate with celebrities and wealthy persons, and bring to the hotel quite a volume of profitable business. A high-class con man is careful not to be seen publicly in the company of small-time thieves or hoodlums, not because he is unduly snobbish, but because he feels
that it hurts his professional reputation. Hence the hotel manager knows that he will not bring into the hotel an undesirable class of criminals; he can meet these at the hangouts.

All mobs have certain systems of communication among themselves, including their professional argot which is more or less unintelligible to the outsider, and a system of signs and signals (called “offices”) which are somewhat standardized. For instance, if one con man sees another on the street and does not want to be recognized, he will give the office in the form of a slight, high-pitched cough or a signal made by tapping the closed hand casually against his mouth. That means “Don’t rap to me” and his friend will pass on without giving any sign of recognition. If one con man sees another with a stranger, of course he would not accost his friend without ascertaining if possible who the stranger is, for it is likely that his friend has a mark in tow. If one con man wishes to speak to another, or if he has a stranger with him and meets a friend whom he wants to join them, he “raises for him”—that is, he catches his friend’s eye and raises his hat slightly. In some con stores (monte and mitt stores, for instance) a member of the mob watches for a roper to come down the street with a victim, and if the roper “raises” as he approaches, the mob knows that he is going to bring the mark in. However, with the big con these appointments are usually well worked out in advance. In a city where there is a large tourist trade, the ropers may pick up marks right on the streets, strike up an acquaintance with them, and walk them around past the store. As they pass, they will “raise” for the insideman to meet them at a prearranged place to play the point-out for the victim. The lookout or doorman will report this fact immediately to the insideman. However, most big-timers prefer to work more cautiously and with greater preparation.