The Redemption of Uncle Richard "Boss" Croker, The Lion of Manhattan
Irish Immigrant to Tammany Boss
by
Mary Vigliante Szydlowski
Genre/s
Biography / Memoir
Publish Date
April 15, 2024
Short Description
The Redemption of Uncle Richard is in part, an overview of Ms. Caton’s family lineage that focuses on the history of this intriguing and colorful individual.
After decades of working on her family genealogy, Ms. Caton discovered Richard Croker, Tammany Boss, was indeed her great, great, grand uncle, immigrating to the United States from Ireland. She found during her extensive research, many redemptive qualities in this so-called “crime boss”, as she found many of the historical summaries depict him for his negative influence and corruption of New York politics. However, this book investigates and illustrates his character in depth, and ultimately finds him to have some significant endearing attributes while it dives head on into his personal life and his political career.
This biography begins in Ireland, way before Richard and his parents immigrated to the United States and continues throughout his tragedies and triumphs both and out of the spotlight.
Ms. Caton was fascinated to learn about the evolution of our political structure here in the United States and how that structure, in many respects, has modeled the past as well as changed very little from the designs of these formative Tammany bosses, one of which is this Uncle, Boss Richard Croker, The Lion of Manhattan. www.nfbpublishing.com
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Book's Awards
Description
As I read one of the only books written about my uncle, Richard Croker, written in 1901 by Alfred Henry Lewis, I noted the authors empathy and sensitivity to this man, as he was alive when Lewis interviewed him an ultimately, when book was written. It was evident in his book that judging a person’s actions is really not fair without judging their personhood. If we and google reduce them to the villain, then we really never get the understanding of the full human being. I wanted to find the good in any malicious actions that may have occurred and I did discovered a lot within Richard Croker’s life, thus my title being, “ Redemption.” I figure, at this point, I can clear up some mis- information about his character while exploring what life was like during his lifetime. I am here to uncover his full character as well as his political antics so we can all receive a complete vision of who Richard Croker really was. I have penned the title,”Redemption”, because of this overarching theme of this book.
This memoir explores the historical journey of the life and times of The Croker ancestry, an immigrant family from Cork Ireland, who begin their lives, first, in the slums of New York City and how Richard and his siblings, including my great grandmother, maneuvered through life as new Americans while weaving in and out of life in honesty and in some cases, corruption.