An immigrant. A Jewish mother. One of the most notorious organized crime bosses of the 19th century.
The third in-person installment of Hadassah Magazine’s popular One Book, One Hadassah series on January 26 in West Palm Beach, Florida, focused on a woman who held all of these titles and more.
Fredericka "Marm" Mandelbaum, the subject of The Talented Mrs. Mandelbaum: The Rise and Fall of an American Organized-Crime Boss, an in-depth yet lighthearted historical nonfiction book by author Margalit Fox, “was simultaneously there and not there,” like so many figures in women’s history, Fox told the 350 in-person and 370 virtual attendees of the program.
“Although we have predominantly dealt with fiction, this time we’ve been transported to a time and place in American history that probably was not all that familiar to you. I know it wasn’t to me,” said Ellen Hershkin, chair of the magazine and Hadassah national president from 2006 to 2010, in introducing the program. “Yet I found myself mesmerized by such a character, and I do mean character. As Mrs. Mandelbaum, talented or not. Who would have thought that such a woman would become an American organized crime boss?”
“Hadassah is proud to bring you books by authors who have the ability to take us on journeys we might not have found ourselves otherwise,” Hershkin said.
Lisa Hostein, the executive editor of Hadassah Magazine who interviewed Fox, noted that the book is not only a biography of Mrs. Mandelbaum, but a look into the history of the Gilded Era, the New York immigrant experience, the emergence of bank robberies, organized crime and the department store.
“Margo, as a long-time obituary writer, you’re used to writing about people's lives and eloquently so and their stories and their histories. So how did you find this particular woman and what inspired you to write a whole book about her?” Hostein asked.
“A great many books on New York City history or on 19th-century crime mentioned her in passing,” Fox said. “They’ll say, ‘Oh by the way, in the mid-19th century there was this nice Jewish mother of four named Mrs. Mandelbaum and she started and ran and presided for 25 years over the biggest organized crime syndicate in America. End of story’. Well, excuse me, but that’s the beginning of the story, and for me as a journalist, coming across her name from time to time in the literature, I had to answer that essential question that makes one’s Ashkenazi hair stand on end, no small trick. And the question was, how could this be?”
Fox went on to talk about her research process — Mrs. Mandelbaum knew better than to commit her activities to paper so the author had to rely on other records to tell her story.
She also talked about what life was like for Mrs. Mandelbaum when she first came to New York as a German immigrant in 1850 and how, with no real way to make a living in “polite society,” she first turned to peddling and then worked her way up until bank robbers and jewelry thieves were reporting to her.
“For her part, she was clearly very smart,” Fox said. “She really had a good sense of the economics of commerce, what the market would bear.”
A number of historical forces converged to help her: the advent of the department store, which provided ample opportunity for women shoplifters; the greenbacks that flooded the market in the 1860s to finance the Civil War made bank robbery a viable underworld occupation for the first time, and the rise of the American bourgeoisie, a new middle class looking to buy high-quality goods at lower prices in order to keep up with their neighbors.
“Who knew that America’s first great organized crime lord and business visionary was a nice Jewish mother named Mrs. Mandelbaum?” said Hershkin in closing the program. “Now, we all do.”
“It’s a real honor to highlight Jewish female authors like Margalit Fox and bring them and their work to our audiences,” Hostein said. ”Lifting up these authors these days is more important than ever, and judging from the enthusiastic feedback I received after this program, it’s clear that our members appreciate the importance. We look forward to bringing more wonderful authors and their stories to our community.”
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