Arnold Rothstein's Last Bet: The Election Of 1928

image above is from cards issued to accompany the film Eight Men Out an excerpt from the six for five blog

Eighty years ago, on the evening of November 4, 1928, Arnold Rothstein sat at his favorite table at Lindy’s, a delicatessen located between 49th and 50th on Broadway. It was a modest, almost unassuming place, even with its renowned world famous cheesecake. But it held a certain allure with the varying denizens of the Great White Way, and some of its more popular customers included Al Jolson, Harpo Marx, Walter Winchell, and stage performer Fanny Brice, who went so far as to have the cheesecake flown or driven to her during her out of town appearances. The 1920s was known as the ‘Deli Decade’ in New York, mostly Jewish owned, and Lindy’s, which opened in 1921, was the place to be. Rothstein held court there and used it as a defacto office; conducting business over coffee and cake, jotting down numbers in his famous little black books, and took his calls. If he wasn’t at Lindy’s, his table would sit vacant, rarely occupied by anyone else, and never after 9 pm. Rothstein spent part of the evening taking bets on the Presidential election, which was two days away. New York’s famous and beloved reformer State Governor, Alfred E. Smith, Democrat, was up against Hebert Hoover, Republican. Rothstein had his money on Hoover.

He won the bet, but.....