Much of the Valachi-focused 2024 issue of Informer is already in place. There's still about a month to go before the articles deadline of Aug. 30 and two months before the advertising deadline of Oct. 1. The issue will be released on or before Nov. 1. (It looks like this will be a very hefty issue.)
Caution: Video below contains still news images of scenes of gangland violence.
Joseph Valachi described his Mafia induction ceremony to a Senate subcommittee. His testimony was broadcast on television in the autumn of 1963. (Video has been edited.)
"This is my doom. This is the promise I'm breaking...
Even if I talked, I should never talk about this.
And I'm doing so."
Joseph Valachi is the focus of the next issue of Informer, scheduled for release in November of 2024.
Sixty years ago...
In May 1964, the FBI distributed to its field offices an English translation of an early version of Nick Gentile's personal Mafia history, Vita di Capomafia. (This version apparently was from a manuscript prepared by Gentile many years before an edited and updated Vita was published in Italy near the end of 1963. See our October 2020 issue for more information.)
Perhaps inspired by that informative Gentile work, the U.S. Department of Justice in June 1964 persuaded its Mafia informant Joseph Valachi to begin writing his own autobiography. Valachi penned a revealing and often bitter memoir of more than a thousand pages, which he called, The Real Thing.
Informer's autumn 2024 issue will focus on the personalities, events, locations, murders and betrayals in the treacherous world of Joseph Valachi.
The issue release is scheduled for Nov. 1, 2024. The articles submission deadline is Friday, Aug. 30, 2024. The advertising deadline is Oct. 1, 2024.
If you're interested in contributing your work to this issue or in purchasing an advertisement, let us know as soon as possible.
