Mobsters who embraced their nicknames

Leonetti hated Crazy Phil.
Scarfo hated Little Nicky.
Casso hated Gaspipe.
Sal Avellino was nicknamed "The Golfer" which wasn't intended to be flattering.
I'm going to go out on a limb and say that Carmine Persico didn't like "The Snake" nickname that was bestowed on him.

On the other hand, Sammy Gravano seemed to embrace "The Bull".

What about Vincent Cafaro. Was he called "Fish" because he shared Uncle Jun's predilection for cunnilingus?

The Chin ofcourse, or isn't that considered a nickname but more an abbreviation of the man's name?

And I also think Lucky Luciano's friends called him Charlie Lucky and he didn't mind, I think I read that in one of his bio's..

Other than that I really can't recall any other on the top my head..

Joe Bonanno hated Joe Bananas but his son Salvatore preferred to call himsrelf Bill.

Joe Bonanno hated bananas because was a mangling of his surname,his son choose Bill because was more american that salvatore.
Carmine Persico hated snake because was given to him when passed to the Gallo faction that was losing to the Profaci faction that was winning, he preferred to be called Junior.

Gravano was pleased with his nickname because he was given by an old made man after he beated a guy that was stealing his bicycle; the made man said, "who have here? a small bull ?

Salvatore Lucania that changed his name to Charles Luciano, earns the nickname Lucky in 1926 after he was kidnapped, hung on a meat hook, tortured and left for dead, but Luciano wasn't dead and succeeded in crawl out and call for help.
This left him with his left eye half closed and the nickname that made him famous.

I think that Genovese liked to be called Don Vitone,or Gotti the dapper don or better the teflon don.

Wasn't Gotti also called "Chief" and he loved it?

Yup, he ate that shit up. And Chin isn't a good example because guys got beaten and even killed just for saying that nickname.

The Feds and Cafaro weren't lying about his instructions to subordinates to rub their chins as the only way to make reference to him. But that Aunt Julia stuff was bullshit.

The Westside was always quick to throw you a beating if you threw someone's name around to begin with. Guys like Patsy would do it personally if you dropped his name willy nilly.

I wonder if Junior inherited his interest in Native American culture from his father.

And I wonder if Willie Boy Johnson's friendship is the reason behind that interest.

correct Bean

Everyone here knows Pizzaboy speaks truth, and needs no one to vouch, but I saw this a few times. Even in casual conversation they stuck to this rule.




Stymie D'Angelo found his nickname funny so i guess you could say he embraced it. It came from a mistake which everyone got a big kick out of. When he was young he was short and chubby, and another kid meant to say he looked like Spanky from the Little Rascals, but the kid mixed up Spanky and Stymie. For those of you too young to remember, Stymie was a little black kid in a derby hat. Anyway, Stymie stuck, and that became his nickname for the rest of his life, and everyone called him that.


Huck Carbonaro was always called Huck, by everyone, even his own family including his wife. So I would say he embraced it as well.

There's a little thing about Sammy that always irritates me. Guys that knew him called him Sammy Bull, no one used the 'the' in the middle.

Lots of 'mob nicknames' are bullshit, stuff for the papers, and lots of times the papers are wrong. But Italian Americans do have a tendency to give nicknames to each other.

gotti was known as johnny boy or the handsome guy. Being the egomaniac he was he loved that

Sammy Bull is the way Sammy says it in books and mob docs but "Sammy The Bull" is the form it has taken in the pop culture lexicon.

Sammy himself has marketed himself that way.

Re: The Chin thing. Yes. Joey Massino took a page out of his book and had subordinates refer to him as "The Ear".

Personally I think "The Chins" might have been more apt.

I don't think nicknames are exclusive to Italian Americans. I think it's an inner city thing. Blacks and Hispanics have nicknames as well. Suburbian kids don't seem to have that nany nicknames

I speak for the neapolitans,that using the "strangianome" a kink of nickname that maybe was given to a an ancestor and remains to all the family,for example my family strangianame is "e'capuzziell" but only the old people from my city say to me "you're the nephew of ***** è capuziell."

Maybe this is the reason because the italian americans likes so much to give nicknames.

Not us. We were far from the city and we all had nicknames growing up. My Great Grandfather gave everyone a nickname whether you liked it or not.

^^ That's what my experience has been. Lots of nicknames come from childhood and from inside the family. And they aren't always flattering

Which is why I grew up with people nicknamed things like Stinky, Beef (he was fat), Chubs, Goo, Toots, etc.

[video:youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=de9toBiFpnE[/video]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=de9toBiFpnE

You blabbermouth [BadWord]! <pie to the face>

pretty good wheels

Thank you Bronx

only benzinahursta knows it was sammy bull, no "the"

Dykerheightsa, but it's all the same, or used to be anyway. Daddy was from 17th and 78th, so I'm Bensonhurst by blood

Now I'm in suburban hell...joisey. I miss Brooklyn, but my Brooklyn no longer exists.

correct that nabe is just a memory..how old is your father

He's 69

did he go to utrecth,play any sports or gamble like the rest of us

He went to Utrecht, played football there, rode motorcycles with the other guys in the neighborhood, definitely a hell raiser. A real product of that environment.

Are you in that age group?

so he was sammy's age, did he have a sportster.. those were fun time's. im close to that age group..did you go to 201

Yes, he had a green sportser.

I didn't go to 201, but I lived close to it. From 7th grade on I went to Hunter in the city. Before that I was at 176.

there was about 10 guys who rode together..not me..but knew all of them

They were some crew. Lol. All crazy.

Did you hang out at Doc's?

played cards next door,sure

Bad boy, lol.

I remember there was a club up the street from Doc's too. Closer to 16th ave, on the same side of the street as Doc's. I was a small kid then though, so it must have been in the 1970s. It was gone long before Doc's closed though.

How about Shellack Head?

Please can you tell what year Doc's was opened and what crew hung out there?Thank you very much in advance

gravano

I think that came from the Frank & Fritzy wiretaps, they used to refer to him as "How's your Aunt?"

Correct. But but it wasn't a regular thing throughout the entire family like the hand gesture. In other words, that's something they came up with amongst themselves. And you have to realize that Fritzy was on Vince's shit list for years because of that dead cop. Now, Fritzy is a very well liked guy. But it's a miracle that Vince gave him a pass on all that.

Yup, exactly...I'm surprised *rubbing my chin* never got pressed by the others families to whack Giovanelli?...Gigante must of really loved that guy.




Hope you're hanging in there, PB.

Tony Accardo like his nickname joe batters or JB after Al Capone name him that after Tony killed two guys with a baseball bat

Thomas Lucchese never liked his "Tommy Three-Finger Brown" nickname because of a work-related injury that amputated his right thumb and index finger in his teens and because Mordecai Brown, a baseball pitcher, at that time had a similar injury. While being booked for auto theft in 1920, a cop nicknamed him Three-Finger Brown, a name which he hated, similar to Joe "Bananas" Bonanno, who preferred to call himself Don Peppino. I remember reading Selwyn Raab's "Five Families" where Tony Corallo once referred to Lucchese as Tommy Brown in a wire-tapped convo with his men.

I'm sure Lucchese preferred to use "Tommy Brown" as an alias over "Three-Finger Brown"

Ricca "The Waiter"

Jackie D'Amico hated his.

He got rhinoplasty.

Moe is that a fact D'amico got a nose job? What a vain dude even for that life

The Gotti syndrome is still affecting Jackie nose

Good looking sal vitale loved his, but he's far from good looking.

Lil Al D'Arco was given the moniker Professor after Gas thought lil Al didn't sound good given his status

No idea if Boobie liked his or where it came from

Like "Sammy bull" nobody called nick caramadi Nicky the crow. Simply "crow" or Nicky crow

Correct. But a lot of black and hispanic nicknames are self proclaimed whereas italians are usually given their nicknames based upon appearance, an incident that occurred, or simply something that started as an inside joke.

I also think it was the times after about late 80's I don't hear them being given out and or being used ...

Lawrence Merlino (Yogi) was introduced to me as Yogi and many in this area called him by his nickname . Never asked if he liked it never asked where he got it .., just did not do shit like that back in the day ..

Now days people ask everything.....

Yeah D'Amico had a "roman" nose and got surgery to correct it.