“The Black Hand” Murder in gravesend
On hundred years ago today … Antonio Catalano was murdered in Gravesend, Brooklyn, and the papers were quick to finger the Black Hand for the hit
The Daily News, 1 September, 1920. Newspapers.com.
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According to Louis S. Warren:
At the turn of the century, the imprinting of a black hand print on threatening messages--extortion demands, ransom notes, and so forth–was a pervasive practice among criminals, mostly but not entirely in Italian communities…. American commentators used the term "Black Hand" as a euphemism for virtually all Italian immigrant crime until the 1920s, when it was succeeded in official parlance by "Mafia."
WRITTEN BY JONATHAN GOLDMAN, SEPTEMBER 2, 2020.
TAGS: crime, organized crime, Brooklyn, extortion