Be as it may, Lucky knew his days were numbered. So he set out to do something completely unprecedented, at least for a Boss, the writing of his memoirs. Having old contacts in Hollywood, Lucky was soon contacted by renowned film producer Martin A. Gosch. After sizing each other up, both men agreed on a book and film but with one stipulation. The publishing date needed to be at least ten years after Lucky’s death. Lucky still had many dear friends he did not want to harm. Guys that were still in the life, loyal and trusted soldiers like Tommy ‘Three Finger Brown’ Lucchese, Frank ‘Prime Minister’ Costello, and Carlo ‘Don Carlo’ Gambino.
Soon after finishing his book, Lucky felt obligated to warn his associates of its existence and publishing. Lucky mailed a copy to Lansky and asked for a vote to have it published as stipulated. Word soon came back that publishing the book would be unhealthy to Luciano’s life. The threat, albeit a thin one, was taken very hard by Lucky and he was quickly back at the hospital suffering from chest pains. Lucky knew he would soon be dead, but still yet, he felt the mafia denial was an affront to his very being.
Looking to stick around a little while longer, Lucky gave up publishing his book, instead, he secretly advised Gosch to publish the book anyway but as previously instructed. Lucky also signed off on film rights if Gosch decided to make a movie out of the book. Gosch, realizing the state of his friend and book collaborator, decided to fly out to Naples to meet with Lucky.
It was a brisk Friday evening in January 1962. Gosch’s plane had already landed and Lucky met Gosch on the tarmac. Both men shook hands and exchanged pleasantries inquiring about each other’s health. As the men walked back to the terminal, Luciano instinctively reached for Gosch’s arm as he felt the excruciating chest pain which could only be a heart attack. As Gosch struggled to keep Lucky’s body upright, Luciano was struggling to breathe and he quickly slipped through Gosch’s hands onto the ground, paralyzed from the radiating pain. As Gosch fumbled to find Lucky’s nitroglycerin pills, people started to gather around Luciano’s lifeless body. It was too late. Within a few minutes of the heart attack, Salvatore ‘Charlie Lucky’ Luciano was dead. He was 64 years old.
The news quickly spread around Italy and the world, the Godfather of the mafia was dead from a heart attack. Lucky always knew he would wind up on a “cement slab”, as he would tell his cohorts early on in his career. He was right. Lucky led a life of crime but also one of pain, celebrity, violence, and instability. The funeral that followed would rival those of presidents and heads of state. Lucky was revered in death as much as he was when he was alive. Most historians credit him as the man who brought the Sicilian Mafia to America. And in a sense, he did, but it was a business model that would etch his name into the history books.
Lucky was a gangster and a Mafioso through and through there’s no denying that. However, he was also a decent human being. While I don’t defend nor condone his chosen career, an explanation is merited at this point.
There were hundreds of occasions where Lucky would receive people in his Naples apartment, the California, and his business offices and render aid in the form of money and favors to poor and financially strapped families. In the mafia Lucky dealt with people of an animalistic nature. People who you’d never want to meet under any circumstances. It takes a special kind of person to kill another human being. A simple stare from these types can evoke fear even in the toughest of men. But it was precisely this type of person that Lucky also had an impact on.
At Charlie’s funeral there was a man, to the casual observer an obvious American, who stood and quietly wept next to the coffin. As the man wiped clear his eye glasses, the man standing next to him, in a barely audible broken english voice questioned him. “Did you know Mr. Charlie Lucky?” The American man explained that he did indeed know Lucky. It was the next sentence that would stun the man asking questions. “I was sent from the U.S. to kill this man, but how could I kill a man who gave me a roof, and helped me when I needed it most?” At that point, the man quickly agreed and rejoined his group, leaving the grieving American man mourn. Soon thereafter, this American gangster went back to the U.S. and left the life.
the beginning, Lucky knew he would eventually ascend the ladder of mafia success. He also knew the pitfalls and the shortcomings of being the boss of bosses. Lucky lived the life, and died not at the hands of another Mafioso, but at the hands of father time.
http://www.mobbedup.com/There was a also a rumour that Lucky was poisoned....heres some newspaper articles....
http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=2202&dat=19620210&id=qIElAAAAIBAJ&sjid=2fIFAAAAIBAJ&pg=919,1108962
http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1350&dat=19620210&id=uxxPAAAAIBAJ&sjid=ewEEAAAAIBAJ&pg=7336,4781853
...and a dismissal...
http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1350&dat=19620607&id=VLxOAAAAIBAJ&sjid=MgEEAAAAIBAJ&pg=5218,5441406
