Background
Waxey Gordon was born on the Lower East Side of New York City to poor immigrants.
Waxey Gordon was born on the Lower East Side of New York City to poor immigrants.
He acquired a grade school education while belonging to a teen-age gang controlled by "Little Augie" Organsky and "Dopey Benny" Fein, a specialist in providing talent as sluggers in strikes.
Wexler started to accumulate a list of aliases, arrests, indictments, and imprisonments at an early age. In October 1905 he was arrested under the name of Benjamin Lustig and sentenced to Elmira Reformatory for grand larceny. Two years later he was again arrested for grand larceny, this time as Benjamin Lester, but was not indicted. In January 1908, however, he was sent back to Elmira for violation of parole. That August, in Boston, Wexler was convicted of petty larceny (as Harry Middleton) and sentenced to four months in the House of Correction. Hardly out of jail, he was sentenced in Philadelphia, again as Harry Middleton, to two years in the county penitentiary. On June 7, 1912, Wexler was convicted of disorderly conduct under the alias Benjamin Lustig but was given a suspended sentence. The same day he was again returned to Elmira for violation of parole. On January 10, 1914, as Benjamin Gordon, he and others were charged with the fatal shooting of Frederick Strauss - a city clerk who was an innocent bystander to a gang shoot-out. The homicide charge against him was dropped five days later. Marriage and parenthood did not, however, change his behavior. He was arrested for assault, under the alias of Harry Brown, in April 1914. The case was dismissed in May. In July 1915 Wexler was arrested, under his true name, for assault and robbery and was sentenced to two years in Sing Sing. Barely out of prison, he was arrested for felonious assault on March 16, 1917, and gave the name Harry Brown; he was released four days later. In June 1919 he was arrested as Harry Gordon for disorderly conduct; again the case was dismissed. Thanks to Prohibition, the many-named Wexler rose during the 1920's to become beer baron Waxey Gordon. On September 23, 1925, the United States Attorney, Buckner, conducted a raid against what he termed "the biggest bootleg ring in the country, " which was headed by Wexler. Despite much publicity, a worldwide manhunt, and indictments, nothing came of the charges. The New York Times commented on Apr. 28, 1933, that although Wexler was "often punished while an unimportant thief he enjoyed immunity when he became a big racketeer. " In the summer of 1931, in a move to curb intergang bloodshed, Wexler was named head of the bootleggers in the New York metropolitan area. "He was the one man with the brains, the engaging and popular personality, and nice sense of justice needed for an arbiter in their colossal, illicit ventures, " according to the New York Times of Aug. 3, 1931. By now Wexler was a millionaire: "I'd like to retire, " he said. "I can afford now to go into legitimate business. " Instead, he expanded his illegitimate business. That same year the chief of the federal narcotics bureau in the New York metropolitan area stated that Gordon "had replaced the late Arnold Rothstein as the mastermind of a nationwide narcotics ring. " As boss of beer and dope, Wexler became a prime target for the "gang busters. " To get at him, United States Attorney George Z. Medalie and later his successor, Thomas E. Dewey, decided to imitate the successful government prosecution of Al Capone on charges of income tax evasion. Gordon was charged with having had a net income of $2, 364, 000 in 1930 and 1931 while paying virtually no tax--$10. 76 for 1930. He was convicted and sentenced to ten years in prison. Upon his release from Leavenworth in 1940, having served eight years, Wexler announced that Waxey Gordon was dead, that Irving Wexler had been reborn, and that he was looking for a "good straight job. " He became a salesman for M and J Novelty Company in New York - but he did not stay out of trouble. In San Francisco and New York he was booked on vagrancy charges designed to drive him out of town - a procedure halted by a New York court that held the city had no rights to file such charges merely because of his criminal record. In January 1943, however, Wexler was found guilty of black-market operations in sugar and sentenced to a year in federal prison. Headlines in 1944 proclaimed "Waxey Was the Works in War Surplus Racket, " but nothing came of the charges. In November 1947 Wexler was accused of "criminally receiving stolen goods" but the charges were dismissed. In 1951 he was arrested with a "huge supply of heroin on a street corner, " according to the New York Post of August 3, 1951. He was sentenced under the Baumes Law, which stated that a fourth felony conviction must result in life imprisonment. One of Wexler's three previous felony convictions was for purse snatching in Philadelphia, a crime that had netted him $3. 75. Wexler died at Alcatraz Prison in San Francisco Bay, Calif. , having been transported to the West Coast to testify at the trial of a nationwide narcotics ring (involving twenty-three men and women) that he allegedly had masterminded. He was also to stand trial with ten others on narcotics charges.
In 1914 Wexler married Leah, the daughter of a rabbi; they had three children.
