Curious to hear all of your opinions here on this one.
I have always wondered something and I am going to throw it out there to see if you might be able to answer it or one of your contacts possibly would have an idea.

This question goes back over 60 years ago.



For the Appalachian meeting in Appalachian NY at Joseph Barbara’s estate here is my question:

How were all of those family leaderships invited and given the details of that meeting ahead of time?

No lower level informants seemed to be aware of the meeting ahead of time so law enforcement had no clue.

How long in advance did they tell everyone?

Obviously some would have had commitments that they changed to be there if there was not much notice.


This question leads to other questions and observations:

They obviously did not mail out an invite, and it is doubtful they gave details over the phone.

Did Vito Genovese or someone else send a 2 man team all around the country to personally give details and invites?

They may have had to give out maps and some written directions also because in 1957, the Dallas or California family for example is going to have a harder time finding a map to that small town and to Barbara’s property.

How did so many out of town mobsters know where those small town hotels were that they booked rooms in if they were not given instructions/directions?

In 1957, wiretaps on phones may not have been active, so maybe phones were used.


That is a lot of families that had to be notified.


I know there have been many mob meetings similar, maybe they knew every so many years this was happening.

Almost to the day, 1 year before, October 1956 Carmine Galante was stopped in Appalachian by police for a traffic violation, so maybe these guys met at the same place and same weekend each year and we never knew?


My feeling is they had this meeting every year the week before Thanksgiving, and it was at this same location for a period of years, so the families could have been notified 3-4-5 years earlier, and were probably notified face to face over however many months it took the team to travel around and notify/invite each family.


John LaRocca – Pittsburgh Boss at the time and one of his men who were not apprehended at the estate, booked a small airplane from a small airfield 1-2 days later and flew home.
This is documented by the FBI, (his hotel room was in his name, a call was placed from that same room to his home residence, and the people at the airfield identified him from photos as the guy who got on the plane to a Pittsburgh suburb) If he had never been to Appalachian before, how would he even have known they had a small airport?


I know from reading released FBI files on former Pittsburgh Boss Michael Genovese(after LaRocca) some of the topics that were discussed before it was broken up, building a network of hotels for example across the country, which Pittsburgh did their part in the 60s. (Files on deceased mobsters are very easy to get these days with the FOIA)

I wish we knew more about that meeting, too bad they didn’t get another couple hours into the meeting before it was busted

What is everyone’s thoughts on how this was planned and how everyone was invited?

I'll bet I'm the last person alive that at least met all 3 of the Pittsburgh people that went to Appalachian.
It's no secret that I spent a reasonable amount of time with Michael. He never discussed Appalachian, at least with me.
Phones were out of the question. My "guess" is that a couple of guys got on a plane, train or car and did the invite in person.

My question would be why choose an isolate estate instead as a big city like Las Vegas? The local police was alerted by the presence of so many cars with plates from various cities towards the Barbera property.Would be more easy to meet in a big las vegas hotel where was normal to see people from all the united states?
For me Vito send trusted men for sure using the airplanes and marked on a road map where the Barbera property was located.

If I remmber well Neil Migliore was the last witness

That, my friend, is a very reasonable question and I got no answer.

Some good questions here:


1. I think it was a domino effect ahead of time. The 5 families probably all spoke amongst themselves and then got word out to the other nearby families from their representatives in person. And then those families touched base with whoever was closest to them and so on. Keeping them off phones and putting nothing in writing so word wouldn't get out.

2. In those days I would imagine everything took a lot longer to travel then it does now. I'm thinking a few months-a year in advance.

3. And that answer sorta rolls into how would they know where to stay etc. I'm sure with enough notice, anyone coming from out of state had time to plan and research where the meeting place was and where to stay/transpo.

Which 3 have you met FOH? Obviously Michael. I know Michael and Mannarino were caught up in the mess in NY, but LaRocca and another got away, I think it was Frank Amato Sr who got away and flew back to Pittsburgh. I have so many FBI Files on the family downloaded I need to go through them to verify who it was that was all there. The FBI confirmed LaRocca was not in Pittsburgh during the conference, a phone in a local hotel called his house, and the local air port people identified Larocca and another guy from FBI photos, I cannot remember the 2nd guy but they booked a last minute private small plane to fly them back to Pittsburgh, it was actually either to Latrobe air port or West Mifflin. I need to go find that again.

I only met John and had a cup of coffee with Henry and Gabe. Henry always spoke very highly of Gabe. To the best of my knowledge only John, Gabe and Michael drove to Appalachian together. Does that mean Frank Amato Sr. wasn't there or at least met them at the hotel, maybe? John and Frank Sr were close and John "never walked in a room he didn't know how to get out of";-) That's were Henry learned it from and taught it to me :-)

Interesting and informative article about the Appalachin meeting, in case anyone is interested here is the link.
"In the fall of 1957, Joseph “The Barber” Barbara was given an order: Host 96 organized-crime kingpins at his home. He was smart enough to say yes."
https://www.google.com/amp/s/nypost...afia-summit-that-inspired-the-movie/amp/

FOH - I just found one of the locations in the files that show it was Amato and LaRoccoa who flew from a small airport 80 miles form Barbara's home 2 days after the Appalachian meeting back to Pittsburgh, flight #483 on Trans World Airlines.

No surprise as John pteached and what Henry taught me: "Never walk in a room you don't know how to get out of" ;-)

There are numerous pages showing Larocca and Amato being at Appalachian. Here are a couple paragraphs showing them flying out of the local airport, even identifying themselves to the airline what real names. And a mention how a call was made to Laroccas home the day after Appalachian.

Thanx - Good stuff!