This is the second installment in a brand new Button Guys series called Homes & Lifestyles of the Underworld.
We thought it would be interesting to delve a bit into the personal lives of some of the gangsters and racketeers we’ve all heard and read about over the years, many of whom were notorious fellows back in their day.
Where did these men live? What types of neighborhoods were they drawn to? What types of homes could they afford, and did they choose for themselves and their loved ones? Who lived in mansions? Who lived in hovels? Who was wealthy? Who was not? Who displayed an ostentatious show of wealth? Who lived quietly and conservatively?
Let’s take a good look, shall we?
This particular edition of Homes & Lifestyles of the Underworld focuses on one of the oldest and most successful Cosa Nostra networks to ever operate within the United States — the Rosario Bufalino Family.
Roots
Headquartered in the “Anthracite Coal Region” of Northeastern Pennsylvania, what later became widely referred to as the “Bufalino Family” originally started out under the leadership of a cagy old-world mafioso by the name of Santo Volpe who is generally credited with having been the founding father and first “Capofamiglia” of this storied Pittston-based Mafia clan.
Dubbed the “King of the Night,” Volpe, with the assistance of his lifelong friend and ally, Stefano LaTorre, organized what was to become a low-keyed but powerful and very successful Family largely staffed by a membership drawn from their native village back in Montedoro, Sicily.
The clan originally operated in six or so counties located within the Anthracite Region, including Luzerne, Carbon, Columbia, Lackawanna, Northumberland, and Schuylkill. But as the years passed, the Family also expanded their power and influence into nearby New York State after Family capodecina Giuseppe Barbara Sr. relocated to the City of Binghamton and established what was to become a very powerful faction there.
By the late 1940s-early 1950s, the Family had also established an important toehold in New York City — specifically Manhattan’s Garment District — which became vital to the Family’s vast garment-racketeering operations.
Internally Peaceful
Amazingly, this particular Mafia clan operated for over a century as one of the quietest and most internally peaceful and financially successful Cosa Nostra borgatas in the nation.
Maybe even more amazingly, throughout their existence, it appears the Bufalino Family also enjoyed a minimal amount of internal dissension among their rank-and-file soldiers and associates. The membership seems to have worked well together and in steady lockstep with the leadership.
