American Jewish Gangsters beating up Nazis for fun and patriotism

In the 1960s there was a sitcom called Hogan’s Heroes, about the rollicking antics of allied prisoners in a German prisoner of war camp. No one ever escaped because they were having too good a time outwitting the dimwitted Germans. Now, Michael Benson has written Gangsters vs Nazis, the true story of American Jewish mobsters who delighted in beating up Nazis, disrupting their meetings, and unwittingly making those beatings safe for all Americans to join in. In just one year, 1938, they made it impossible to carry on and Nazism’s attempt to convert Americans faded to nothing.

The book is a remarkably lighthearted, fast paced and a delight to read. It takes almost nothing seriously, including itself. It is full of gangster slang like slammer, long naps and popped, that would do justice to a George Raft or Humphrey Bogart gangster film. The seemingly endless list of characters (it’s debatable to call them heroes) are all profiled in fascinating depth. It starts with their colorful nicknames, like Bugsy Siegel and Sparky Rubenstein, Tic Toc Tannenbaum, Ice Pick Willie Alderman, Longie Zillman and Blue Jaw Magoon. They ran a parallel mafia to the Italians and Sicilians, just as tough, just as vicious, just as colorful, just as skilled and just as successful. In fact, when needed, they worked together. It was respect, not competition.