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Steel City Vice

@steelcityvice.com
24 followers 25 following 17 posts

Finding and telling the stories about the Ohio River Valley's organized crime history. Curated by @davidrotenstein.bsky.social. Lucky number: 805. steelcityvice.com

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Steel City Vice @steelcityvice.com · 24/11/2025
Steel City Vice is now @covertnky.com. New home base, new and expanded content and same historical themes.
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David Rotenstein, Curator, Shrouded in Secrecy Archives @davidrotenstein.bsky.social · 19/11/2025
I am proud to live in a neighborhood with a corner bar that has a history corner featuring docs/pix describing a century of vice activities that took place there. Featured: a 2001 DEA report documenting a raid there. Named, a bartender named "Linda, LNU" (last name unknown) and oxy dealer Jeff. 🗃️
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Steel City Vice @steelcityvice.com · 12/11/2025
Of course there was a long-lived gambling club in Covington, Kentucky, called the Press Club. Gambling arrests began in the 1940s and continued under new ownership & a new name (New Press Club) for another 25 years!
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Steel City Vice @steelcityvice.com · 12/11/2025
No matter how hard city leaders and local residents try, they can't whitewash Covington, Kentucky's, underworld history. linknky.com/culture/2025...
linknky.com
Covington hides some of its gambling history
Covington’s 514 Club, once a mob-run casino, loses its historic sign amid debates over preservation and city oversight.
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Steel City Vice @steelcityvice.com · 05/11/2025
Was crooked attorney Charles Lester (played by actor Wallace Shawn) who represented mobsters on two CBS dramas based on a real-life crooked attorney Charles Lester Jr. who represented mobsters in post-Prohibition Northern Kentucky? 🗃️
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Steel City Vice @steelcityvice.com · 04/11/2025
Get to know a little bit about how two Northern Kentucky cities with deep mob ties tackle their complicated histories: Newport and Covington. linknky.com/culture/2025...
linknky.com
Is Northern Kentucky's vice history good for business?
How Covington and Newport face their mobbed-up pasts—from bootlegging to vice—and what history means for Northern Kentucky today.
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David Rotenstein, Curator, Shrouded in Secrecy Archives @davidrotenstein.bsky.social · 03/03/2025
Pittsburgh's Vice Queens: Bootlegging Bubbies & Roadhouse Madams. A free program April 10, 2025, in the Penn Hills Library's True Crime Week. Registration and program info: pennhills.librarycalendar.com/event/true-c...
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David Rotenstein, Curator, Shrouded in Secrecy Archives @davidrotenstein.bsky.social · 03/03/2025
Spring is just around the corner. You know what that means? Mob history walking tours! steelcityvice.com/south-side-b...
steelcityvice.com
South Side by the Numbers
South Side by the Numbers is a stroll through South Side Flats mob history. Visit the spots where the action was decades before the steel mill closed and brunch menus replaced numbers slips. Betwee…
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Steel City Vice @steelcityvice.com · 14/11/2024
A new kind of trivia game: guess the mobster by his criminal case card!
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Steel City Vice @steelcityvice.com · 30/09/2024
We had a lively group of South Siders on last weekend's South Side by the Numbers walking tour. We paused in front of the former Lotus Club for a group photo. 📸 by Laura Hussey via Ashley Cortazzo.
Walking tour participants pause in front of the former Lotus Club on Pittsburgh's South Side.
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Steel City Vice @steelcityvice.com · 10/09/2024
There's lots more than mob history to see & hear on the South Side by the Numbers walking tour. Learn about life in the South Side during the 20th century where millions of workers had to take second & third jobs to make ends meet in buildings like this one. Tour info link in the comments.
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Steel City Vice @steelcityvice.com · 03/09/2024
How numbers gambling developed in Pittsburgh's Hill District. steelcityvice.com/2024/09/03/h...
steelcityvice.com
How numbers gambling took root in the Hill District
For much of the twentieth century, numbers gambling defined much of the Hill District’s economic and social landscapes. The street lottery immortalized in August Wilson’s plays and Hill District oral ...
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Steel City Vice @steelcityvice.com · 01/09/2024
New fall dates announced: South Side by the Numbers organized crime walking tours. Registration links go live next week for Sept. 28, Sept. 29, and Oct. 19. Join award-winning writer and historian David Rotenstein on a trip through the South Side's vice history. steelcityvice.com/south-side-b...
steelcityvice.com
South Side by the Numbers
South Side by the Numbers is a stroll through South Side Flats mob history. Visit the spots where the action was decades before the steel mill closed and brunch menus replaced numbers slips. Between 1...
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Steel City Vice @steelcityvice.com · 06/04/2024
There is a “Pittsburgh True Crime” panel at this year’s Greater Pittsburgh Festival of Books May 11. There will be some familiar names and faces. events.humanitix.com/pgh-true-crime
events.humanitix.com
PGH True Crime Panel | Humanitix
Richard Gazarik, Paul Hodos, Jason Kirin will be at the Greater Pittsburgh Festival of Books!
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Steel City Vice @steelcityvice.com · 15/03/2024
Spring means it's walking tour season.
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Steel City Vice @steelcityvice.com · 09/01/2024
In 1933 bank robber Willie Sutton spent a little time in Braddock, Pa. What made the biggest impression on him during his brief stay? Numbers gambling, of course. wordpress.com/post/steelci...
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Steel City Vice @steelcityvice.com · 27/12/2023
Historically, newspapermen were immune from getting whacked by contract killers. Historically.
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Steel City Vice @steelcityvice.com · 24/10/2023
One cold winter morning a Pittsburgh preacher took on vice among his flock. He ended up making headlines around the nation. steelcityvice.com/2023/10/24/t...
steelcityvice.com
The Preacher vs. the Numbers Racketeers
Rev. William R. Pankey delivered his most memorable sermon on Sunday March 8, 1937. It was a cold late winter morning, but his message was on fire. The Baptist preacher had lots to work with: gambling...
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Steel City Vice @steelcityvice.com · 13/10/2023
Did this Sept. 1939 prizefight change the course of organized crime history in Pittsburgh? Follow @yinzervice.bsky.social on Bluesky for some clues next week.
NYT headline, Conn vs. Bettina fight
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