Al Capone Does My Homework Read online

  I would also like to thank the National Archives in San Bruno for allowing me access to the files of Al Capone and Count Lustig. And Tim Wilson and the team of dedicated librarians at the San Francisco History Center, who have helped me find all kinds of arcane information, including whether or not the San Francisco Hospital of 1936 had an elevator. (I moved the scene to the stairwell. I wasn’t convinced they did.)

  Thank you to the team at Penguin who have helped me craft a trilogy of books from years of research and a billion wild ideas.

  Most of the credit should go to my editor, Kathy Dawson, who is both talented and tenacious. Thank you for all the time and energy you’ve put into helping me improve my work. Thank you for believing in me and in these books.

  A special shout-out to the Penguin book reps. They are the reason you are holding this book in your hand. Specifically I would like to thank: Ev, Biff, Sheila, John, Colleen, Steve, Alex, Todd, Jill, Doni, Nicole D., Dawn, and Nicole W.

  Special appreciation goes to my daughter, Kai, who shared her belly button storage technique with me, and my son, Ian, who reminds me that I can be altogether too helpful. And, most of all, I would like to thank my husband, Jacob, who supported my writing when it made absolutely no sense to do so.

  1 DUANE SWIERCZYNSKI, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Frauds, Scams, and Cons (Indianapolis: Alpha, 2003), 187

  2 www.uselessinformation.org. The only source for this is a website, so I’m not one hundred percent certain this is true.

  3 DUANE SWIERCZYNSKI, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Frauds, Scams, and Cons (Indianapolis: Alpha, 2003), 187

  4 DUANE SWIERCZYNSKI, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Frauds, Scams, and Cons (Indianapolis: Alpha, 2003), 187

  5 The New York Times, August 31, 1949. “Lustig, ‘Con Man,’ Dead Since 1947.”

  6 DUANE SWIERCZYNSKI, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Frauds, Scams, and Cons (Indianapolis: Alpha, 2003), 186

  7 Count Lustig’s file, National Archives, San Bruno, CA

  8 JIM ALBRIGHT, Last Guard Out: A Riveting Account by the Last Guard to Leave Alcatraz (Bloomington, IN: AuthorHouse, 2008), 103, 104

  9 JAMES A. JOHNSTON, Alcatraz Island Prison and the Men Who Live There (Douglas/Ryan Communication, 1999, 2001), 30

  10 ROBERT J. SCHOENBERG, Mr. Capone: The Real—and Complete—Story of Al Capone (New York: William Morrow and Company, 1992), 337

  11 MICHAEL ESSLINGER, Alcatraz: A Definitive History of the Penitentiary Years (San Francisco: Oceanview Publishing, 2003), 125

  12 MICHAEL ESSLINGER, Alcatraz: A Definitive History of the Penitentiary Years (San Francisco: Oceanview Publishing, 2003), 147

  13 MARK DOUGLAS BROWN, Capone: Life Behind Bars (San Francisco: Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy, 2004), 33

  14 RUSSELL FREEDMAN, Franklin Delano Roosevelt (Boston: Clarion Books, Houghton Mifflin Company, 1992), 56, 57