GROUP 16

1932
Tania Guerra Tong Wu
Ángel Molero Eralp Odaman
 LIFE IN
NEW YORK CITY
&
ROOSEVELT ISLAND
THE CITY
Pictured: A laborer works on the
frame of the Empire State
Building, 1930.
THE GREAT
DEPRESSION
• Severe worldwide economic
depression during the 1930’s Traders work on Wall Street in October
Washing place in a New York slum
during the Great Depression, 1931
1929.

• Started in the United States after a

major fall in stock prices in
September, 1929

• Stock market crash if October 29,

1929  Black Tuesday

• Unemployment in the U.S. rose to 25%

• Hoover’s measurements to combat
depression were based on
voluntarism
Angry crowds gather outside lower
Manhattan's Bank of United States
following its devastating collapse, 1931.
A large group of people wait on a food
line, 1932.

Laborers taking their lunch break on a

steel beam atop the 70-story RCA building
in Rockefeller Center, more than 800 feet
above the street, on September 20, 1932. An unemployed man lies down on the
city docks, circa 1935.
 THE
PROHIBITION
ERA
Flushing of alcohol in 1920
• January 17, 1920-1933

• 18th Amendment to the United

States Constitution

• Illegal to manufactue,
transport or sell alcoholre

• Very high demand led to illegal

contraband
Revelers toast the end of Prohibition Anti-Prohibition protest in NYC
• Mafia took advantage of
prohibition, generating
millions in profits.

21 Club Hudson River during prohibition

 THE MAFIA
• American/Italian-American
Mafia  “Cosa Nostra”

• Also Jewish and Irish

Fights and altercations between mafia
members and groups were common
• Italian neighbourhoods or
ghettos Jack ” Thompson”

• End of the 19th century

• Rise of power during prohibition

A casual reunion between members

Murder, Inc.

FBI chart of American mafia bosses A New York City police officer standing in
across the country in 1963 front of the drugstore where gangster
Vincent Coll was murdered.
 PRISON AT
WELFARE ISLAND
THE MOMA EXHIBITION

&

RADIO CITY BUILDING

THE MOMA EXHIBITION

• Bullet point
• Bullet point
– Sub Bullet

Radio City plans

 RADIO CITY
• Opened the 27th of December 1932
Radio City plans The building on the first years
• Showplace of the Nation

• Art Deco masterpiece of elegance and

grace constructed out of a diverse
variety of materials

• The brainchild of the billionaire John

The inside
A show playing in the 1930’s D. Rockefeller, Jr.

• In partnership with the Radio

Corporation of America (RCA) and
designed by Donald Deskey

• Geometric ornamentation is found

throughout the theater

• In its first four decades, Radio City

Music Hall alternated as a first-run
movie theater and a site for gala stage
shows.

Radio City plans

JOSEPH RAO
JOSEPH RAO “TOUGH JOEY”

• March 12, 1901 – May 10, 1962

• New York mobster

• Both a rival and an associate mobster

to Dutch Schultz

• Married to Lena Stracci, with whom he

had a daughter and 2 sons

• Involved in drug trafficking, policy

banking and running slot machines in
Harlem

• In 1932 he was convicted for

corruption and sent to the city
penitentiary on Welfare island
NEW YORK CITY BIBLIOGRAPHY
ROOSEVELT ISLAND
• Berdy Judith, The Roosevelt Island Historical Society. 2003. Roosevelt Island, Arcadia Publishing
• Marilyn D. McShane, Frank P. Williams. 2 ago. 2004. Encyclopedia of American Prisons . Routledge

PROHIBITION
• Jack S. Blocker, Jr (February 2006). "Did Prohibition Really Work? Alcohol Prohibition as a Public Health Innovation ". American
Journal of Public Health. 96 (2): 233–243.
• Encyclopædia Britannica. August 3rd, 2018. Prohibition. Encyclopædia Britannica, inc.
https://www.britannica.com/event/Prohibition-United-States-history-1920-1933
• Kansas Historical Society. 2014. Prohibition. https://www.kshs.org/kansapedia/prohibition/14523

MAFIA

THE GREAT DEPRESSION

MOMA EXHIBITION

RADIO CITY
• Radio City Music Hall Official Website, https://www.msg.com/radio-city-music-hall/history

JOSEPH RAO
• Giancana, United States Treasury Department, Bureau of Narcotics ; foreword by Sam (2007). Mafia : the government's secret file
on organized crime (1st ed.). New York: Collins.
• "Rao Tells Court of Power in Jail" (PDF). New York Times. February 2, 1934. Retrieved 22 November 2011.
• "Rao, Gangster Chief, Jailed for Extortion" (PDF). New York Times. February 20, 1932. Retrieved 22 November 2011
• "Welfare Island Raid Reveals Gangster Rule Over Prison" (PDF). New York Times. January 25, 1934. Retrieved 22 November 2011.