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Crime author makes appearance at the Boardman library
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Neighbors | Tim Cleveland.A crowd of approximately 30 people came to the Boardman library to hear a presentation by crime author Allan May.
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Neighbors | Tim Cleveland.Public Library of Youngstown and Mahoning County development director Debbie Liptak introduced crime author Allan May before his presentation at the Boardman library.
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Neighbors | Tim Cleveland.Crime author Allan May of Cleveland sat with his three books before his presentation at the Boardman library.
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Neighbors | Tim Cleveland.Crime author Allan May spoke at the Boardman library about the three books he has written about organized crime, including his newest, "The Sly-Fanner Murders: The Birth of the Mayfield Road Mob; Cleveland's Most Notorious Mafia Gang."
By TIM CLEVELAND
Local true crime fans were treated to an appearance by Cleveland’s Allan May on Oct. 22 at the Boardman library, where he spoke about his third and most recent book about organized crime.
“Tonight I’ll be talking about my new book, ‘The Sly-Fanner Murders: The Birth of the Mayfield Road Mob,’” he said. “It’s the first book I’ve released on the Cleveland organized crime scene. It’s kind of a different thing for me because the books I’ve done in the past have been a year-by-year, date-by-date chronology of organized crime in this area.
“This book [The Sly-Fanner Murders] focuses on a single event. It talks about a payroll murder that happened in Cleveland on New Year’s Eve day, 1920. It took 15 years for them to bring the culprits to justice.”
May’s prior two books were “Welcome to the Jungle Inn: The Story of the Mafia’s Most Infamous Gambling Den,” and “Crimetown USA: The History of the Mahoning Valley Mafia, Organized Crime Activity in Ohio’s Steel Valley 1933-1963,” both released in 2013, while his newest book was released this year.
May said his original plan for his first book was to collaborate with Rick Porrello, who has written several books about organized crime, including “To Kill the Irishman: The War that Crippled the Mafia,” which was made into a movie in 2011.
“I was going to work with Rick Porrello on a combined book about organized crime in the Mahoning Valley and Western Pennsylvania, but as I started getting more and more involved in the Youngstown end, we just came across so much material we decided it was going to take more than one book,” May said. “The Mahoning Valley end looks like it’s going to be a total of four books when everything’s done.”
May said his interest in organized crime goes back to his childhood.
“My interest started with seeing my first episode of ‘The Untouchables,’ so that dates me,” he said. “After reading about Elliot Ness and finding out more about him, the next step was following [Al] Capone and Chicago crime, then moving over to New York, the Mecca of organized crime.
“In doing that, I also found that Cleveland had a rich crime history. I started doing work on that.”
May’s process involves plenty of time spent doing research in libraries.
“My process is I spent hours and hours in the Cleveland Public Library, Cleveland State University, then when I was working on the books for the Mahoning Valley, I spent a lot of time here at the Youngstown Public Library on Wick Ave. and also at Warren-Trumbull County library,” he said.
When asked what advice he would give to would-be crime authors, May said, “Find out what it is you’re interested in and find out what you want to do with it, and then go ahead and do the research.”