A "must do.." - Frommer's 2009

This exciting and popular walking tour covers 150 years of crime and vice in NYC. Trace the steps of criminal legends like Al Capone, Lucky Luciano, Meyer Lansky, and Bugsy Siegel -- who earned their criminal stripes on the streets of the Lower East Side -- and explore the roots of organized crime in America.

Dissect the myths and learn about how the Italian Mafia was established in America; visit the sites of Black Hand headquarters, Prohibition era speakeasies, shootouts and assassination attempts, and the homes and headquarters of some of the most powerful and infamous criminals in American history.

This tour examines the birth of organized crime in America and provides insight into the often overlooked early days of the nation's criminal heavyweights. How did Lucky Luciano rise to power? How did Meyer Lansky meet Bugsy Siegel? How did the Five Families of the American Mafia originate? Some of the sites visited and discussed include the headquarters of Paul Kelly's notorious Five Points Gang, the gang responsible for breeding the likes of Al Capone, Johnny Torrio, Lucky Luciano, and hundreds more; the home of their rivals, the Jewish Eastman Gang; the home of prohibition era's "Boss of Bosses"; the childhood homes and teenage haunts of Lucky Luciano, Bugsy Siegel and Meyer Lansky; the headquarters and hang outs of John Gotti;  and so much more.

The tour is conducted by Eric Ferrara, co-founder of the Museum of American Gangster at 80 St. Marks Place.

Eric is also a published author, executive director of the Lower East Side History Project and founder of the East Village Visitors Center. He is a fourth-generation, native  New Yorker whose family immigrated to Little Italy from Sicily in the 1880s. Eric is the official Historian of the E.4th Street Cultural District, (the only official cultural district in Manhattan), a licensed tour guide, educator at Brooklyn College, and consultant on several movie, tv, and media projects world wide.

Eric's new book, A Guide to Gangsters, Murderers and Weirdos of New York City's Lower East Side, based on the tour, is published by The History Press.  He provides first-hand accounts combined with over four years of researching original source material, public records, archived articles, personal interviews, police department records, and published accounts.