Joltin’ Joe DiMaggio Was An All-American Hero – But Some Say He Was In Deep With The Mob

The journalist was Richard Ben Cramer, and his 2000 biography of the New York Yankees superstar showed a side of DiMaggio that had remained hidden until its release. The New York Times was clear that this book would do a lot more than smear the hero. In reality, it would “tarnish the American myth.”

DiMaggio was well known for keeping secrets close to his chest. And when you learn about his alleged ties to the mafia, that’s not a surprise. When Cramer began his quest to pen the book – Joe DiMaggio: The Hero’s Life – he believed that the intensely private star would not be sharing anything with him.

The journalist was not willing to give up hope, though, as he explained in 2000 to The New York Times. He said, “I would vacillate between the naive assumption that when [DiMaggio] saw my smiling face perhaps he would relent and the idea that given enough time and obsessiveness, it didn’t matter if he spoke to me.”

Cramer was certainly obsessive, too. The author took five years to write the biography, and he’d pester DiMaggio for comment in that time. But Joltin’ Joe had other ideas and only once even gave the writer so much as a word – and not a kind one. Cramer told the story of what DiMaggio apparently said when he phoned the baseball star at his home to The New York Times.

Cramer reported, “Joe started screaming at me, ‘Why are you doing this to me? Why are you doing this to me?’ I said, ‘Joe, I’m not doing this to you. You’re part of American history.’ He said, ‘You’ve got to talk to my lawyer.’ And I said, ‘You keep telling me to talk to your lawyer, but he won’t return my phone calls.’ It was a train wreck – a divide we could not cross.”

One of DiMaggio’s close friends remembered another encounter. Podiatrist Rock Positano told The New York Times that Cramer had met DiMaggio at Yankee Stadium in 1996 – three years before the latter passed. He said, “Joe’s face flushed red. I thought he’d seen the devil. Joe said, ‘I’ve got nothing to say to you, Richard Ben Cramer.”

It turned out, according to Positano, that DiMaggio wasn’t quite as upset by Cramer’s pestering as he made out. In fact, it was quite the opposite! Positano told The New York Times, “He liked the fact the guy was hounding after him. He felt it meant he was still interesting.”

But even if DiMaggio did want to be “interesting,” he didn’t want to share much with people. When the star talked with a publisher about a frank memoir, something stood in the way of what promised to be a huge payday. According to The New York Times, the problem was that he just wouldn’t talk about being married to Marilyn Monroe or other private stuff.

In fact, DiMaggio had a carefully kept public image as a man of few words. He didn’t say much and instead let his career speak for him. And when the sporting legend did speak – for instance in commercials for Bowery Savings Bank and Mr. Coffee – he displayed personal style and warmth that defined how people saw him.

Still, Cramer wasn’t at all interested in that public image. No, the author had something deeper in mind. Cramer wanted to get to the person beneath the image. He told The New York Times, “The real Joe is far more interesting than the myth. The myth is enormous but essentially flat.”

So, Cramer undertook an unstinting pursuit of the real DiMaggio. The writer spoke to people who’d known him throughout his life. He told The New York Times “I saw to it that not a week went by when a friend wouldn’t call Joe up and ask him, ‘Who’s Cramer?’” Apparently, some of DiMaggio’s buddies received tens of calls from the man.

Eventually, Cramer was able to paint a detailed picture. And it’s no wonder that he was able to bring out allegations and rumors that were new – including discussion of DiMaggio’s alleged mob links. He described a man who despite becoming a national hero in the 1930s was actually a pretty gloomy guy.

DiMaggio had certainly earned acclaim. The sportsman spent 13 years starring for the New York Yankees, and both he and his team won everything. Among his personal triumphs were nine World Series rings, three American League MVP titles and the famed hitting streak of 56 games, which stands as a record to this day.

Away from the diamond, Joltin’ Joe hit the headlines for his love life. In particular, he was famed for his marriage to Marilyn Monroe. There’s no doubt that he loved her very much, but their connection was destined not to last. He had ideas about marriage that she didn’t share, and nine months later they were through.

But as Cramer would record, DiMaggio didn’t just give up on Monroe. In fact, they were apparently on the verge of remarrying when her life was cut short in 1962. It hadn’t all been plain sailing, though. Cramer alleged that she’d told her friend Ralph Roberts that DiMaggio had been physically violent to her.

Though Cramer had more explosive allegations – not least to do with DiMaggio’s connections with the mafia. On top of those, there were claims about prostitutes and bad parenting. And despite the Yankee Clipper being a rich man, Cramer argued that he had not liked to spread the dollars around.

The writer said that DiMaggio had made piles of money from selling on tickets that he’d received for free. The star would apparently ask for a freebie for something that he didn’t plan to go to and would then cash it in. And not just tickets: DiMaggio apparently loved getting a free car. One time, when the star was given a Cadillac by a Japanese supporter, he even asked if the tank had been filled.

And when DiMaggio did turn up for an event, he still apparently found a way to make a buck. For instance, he’d be in the crowd for special Oakland A’s games at the cost of an air ticket from Miami, where he officially lived. But he would regularly be in San Francisco – a short distance from Oakland.

The famed baseball star was keen on golf, so he’d often say yes to celebrity tournaments in that game. But DiMaggio would claim to have no kit or set of clubs, according to Cramer. So, he ended up with a garage that was chockfull of golfing equipment and clothing – a lot of it not even taken out of the packaging it came in.

DiMaggio doesn’t emerge from Cramer’s book with flying colors. Instead, he comes across as a bitter man who keeps very much to himself and is extremely keen on money. In 1989 when San Francisco was hit by an earthquake, DiMaggio was encountered by some journalists when leaving his home there. And he was carrying a trash bag.

Cramer picked up the story with The New York Times. He said, “Two of his closest friends… wanted to know if I knew [what he had with him]. So I finally said, ‘I heard he had this garbage bag full of cash.’ And one of them said, ‘That’s right. He called me to brag that he got out with his 600 grand.’”

DiMaggio’s desire to be left alone made him a “captive” of his lawyer Morris Engelberg when the former was suffering from lung cancer, according to the writer. Cramer claimed that the attorney had hidden away tons of memorabilia carrying the ball player’s signature so that he could make money from them.

Engelberg fiercely denied that story, telling the Tampa Bay Times in 2005, “Absurd. Over a 16-year period, I waived more than $5 million of agent fees, plus legal, accounting and other fees, which amounted to a significant sum of money. Why would I scam a few thousand dollars from Joe DiMaggio?”

But probably the biggest allegation of all was DiMaggio’s links with the mafia. Cramer claimed that he had been involved with organized crime both when he was playing and after his sporting career had come to an end. And in fact the mob had provided the reason that he was able to end his time in baseball.

Yes, DiMaggio could afford to quit the game despite the $100,000 he was paid every year – more than a million in today’s money. That’s because Frank Costello – one of the wise guys he knew – had created a “trust fund” for the player, according to Cramer. Amazingly, it was set up at the Bowery Savings Bank, which DiMaggio would help advertise.

Cramer claimed that Costello would regularly poke 200 bucks into the account for DiMaggio. But why? Well, the Yankee Clipper would apparently let himself be seen in one of Costello’s night spots. Each occasion DiMaggio visited a club such as El Morocco, the Stork Club or the Copa, he’d score the extra cash.

So, it’s no wonder that the mobster was particularly fond of DiMaggio. As Cramer described it to The New York Times, “Costello loved Joe, and he felt it was the gentlemanly thing to do – to put a couple of bucks in the Bowery for Joe’s retirement.” How very nice!

And Cramer claimed to The New York Times that DiMaggio went on to make even more cash from the Bowery Savings Bank. He said, “Of course, the irony of this arrangement is that years later, Joe did all those commercials as the spokesman for the Bowery. When he told us how safe your money was with the Bowery, he knew what he was talking about.”

To be fair, Cramer wasn’t just making this story up off the top of his head. He had many sources. And they included wise guys who had been in the know at the time. They told him more, too. DiMaggio allegedly had links to the mob from New Jersey. A couple of the names that he was connected to were Newark crime boss Richie “The Boot” Boiardo and key villain Abner “Longy” Zwillman.

And the connection to “Longy” brought Joltin’ Joe a hefty bonus, Cramer claimed. He told the Tampa Bay Times, “Longy had three boxes of cash, which he left at Joe’s house for ‘safekeeping.’ But when Longy was found hanging from his chandelier in West Orange, Joe kept the cash.” Well, the money stayed safe, at least!

And DiMaggio’s apparent links stretched even further. The FBI questioned him about why he’d been playing golf with Chicago kingpin Sam Giancana. The sportsman replied that it had just been a coincidental meeting, but Cramer said otherwise. According to him, “He wasn’t going to say that Sam G. was always good for a broad, or a payday in Chicago.”

Cramer claimed that DiMaggio certainly wouldn’t tell the FBI the truth, which was that they’d been buddies for a long time. The author said that this “was one thing the mob guys loved about Joe. He didn’t talk. And no one was ever going to make him talk. Why would the cops be bothering a hero?”

But was Cramer really reporting anything new? Well, his claims about DiMaggio’s mafia links hadn’t been made in a book before 2000. But nine years later author Ze’ev Chafets wrote that, “His connections to the Sicilian Mafia were a matter of New York gossip and speculation.” So, it may be that the star’s friendliness to the mob was not news to people around the Big Apple.

Chafets had an explanation for why no one shared the information. He said that if a writer had, “[they’d] be finished – washed up with DiMag, probably non grata with the rest of the Yanks – and maybe with the mob, too.” And he added for good measure that another mafia guy called Joe Adonis had “regularly supplied DiMaggio with hookers in every American League city.”

It was possibly no real surprise that DiMaggio was apparently cozy with the mob. The sport star’s father was an immigrant from Sicily, and the family supposedly had longstanding links to New York crime supremos the Gambinos. The Times Herald-Record claimed in 2002 that they had enjoyed “intermarriage [that] began in Italy more than 100 years ago and continued when they came to America.”

The two families would come together for a reunion in 2002. That united six generations – totaling over 150 people! And the Times Herald-Record noted, “Some of the DiMaggio cousins were looking for possible mafia types lurking about.” It was even thought that the feds might be in attendance, so at least the DiMaggio kin believed that the mob might have sent some people.

Rumors about DiMaggio’s links with the goodfellas get even darker, mind you. Some spread a story that he had become intrigued by the outlandish claim that the Kennedys had ordered Monroe to be killed. And in revenge, he’d had the president assassinated. A very tall tale, but it does show that people talked about the baseball star’s connections.

Cramer didn’t go that far, so perhaps he couldn’t find any good evidence for DiMaggio arranging hits. Though what did others think about the former’s book? Well, it was described by the USA Today’s reviewer as “muckraking.” At the same time, Larry King wrote in a column in the paper that it was “one of the most definitive stories of a life and times.”

We can only wonder what DiMaggio would have made of it. And he probably wouldn’t have told anyone – given his love of secrecy and desire to maintain his public image. As Cramer noted, “Joe’s ambition was… he wanted to be perfect, not at something but everything – to abide, in other words, as a god.” Well, perhaps in the end he was: an idol, but with feet of clay or – given the alleged mafia links – concrete.