William J. McCormack (businessman)
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William J. McCormack (1890 - 196?) was a successful New York City businessman of the first half of the twentieth century. Starting as a penniless “wagon-boy” delivering grocer’s produce on the West Side docks, McCormack founded Penn Stevedoring, one of the most important produce handlers in the United States. For almost 30 years, McCormack would be known as “the mysterious ‘Mr. Big’ of New York City’s waterfront” [1] Details of McCormack’s longstanding relationship with International Longshoreman’s Association President Joseph P. Ryan and various underworld associates were revealed in a series of articles for the New York Sun by Malcolm Johnson entitled “Crime on the Waterfront.” These articles along with the subsequent 1953 Waterfront Crime Commission hearings provided the factual background for Elia Kazan's classic 1954 film "On The Waterfront."[2]
Early Business Ventures
In 1920, McCormack founded the United States Trucking Company. While McCormack served as the company’s vice-president, Alfred E. Smith became the board chairman, an appointment that made good political sense, since Smith had served as New York’s Governor from 1918-1920 and had powerful ties to Tammany Hall. In 1927 McCormack sold his interest in United States Trucking and entered the sand and gravel business by obtaining an interest in the United Sand and Gravel Company owned by Bronx Sheriff Robert L. Moran (Politician) and former Assistant District Attorney, Edward J. Chapman. McCormack was the godfather to Mr. Moran’s son, Peter Eugene. Three years later, McCormack founded Penn Stevedoring.
Chairman of the Licensing Committee of the State Athletic Commission
McCormack grew up on the brawling West Side docks and had been a fight promoter early in his career. According to McCormack’s godson, McCormack once punched-out Gene Tunney, the Heavyweight Champion of the World, in front of The 21 Club in a dispute over Mr. Tunney’s wife, Polly Lauder Tunney. In 1923, Alfred E. Smith was re-elected to the governorship and upon his return to Albany, Smith appointed McCormack Chairman of the Licensing Committee of the New York State Athletic Commission. Prior to reorganization, the Committee ran boxing in New York and the commissionership was a powerful appointment coveted by Tammany boyos.[3] McCormack may have abused that power, for on January 30, 1924, not long after his appointment he resigned under mysterious circumstances. Speculation was that Governor Smith had forced him out when allegations surfaced that McCormack had extorted $81,500 from promoters before he would grant a license for the Jack Dempsey – Luis Firpo fight in New York City. In 1953, under oath, McCormack dismissed the charge as an “alcoholic’s dream” and, although McCormack was never formally charged, the alleged extortion was one of the many questionable practices that would plague the athletic commissions and the boxing profession.[4]
Later Business Ventures
McCormack was also a partner with the politically hefty Sam Rosoff in a number of contracting and bus ventures, including the Fifth Avenue Bus Company. “Subway Sam” arrived in New York from Russia by himself and sold newspapers under the Brooklyn Bridge before becoming a construction millionaire by age 30. The story is told, that McCormack and Rosoff got their starts in a unique partnership. Rosoff had a contract to remove all the cinders and ashes from city buildings, including schools and McCormack had a contract to pave city streets. Rosoff would dump the cinders on an empty lot on the West Side, where they would be picked up by McCormack’s trucks and used to pave the city’s streets. [5] McCormack also operated New York’s biggest chain of independent filling stations and in 1944 he incorporated and became president of the Morania Oil Company which, in 1952, sold the city $2.25 of its 42.5 million purchases of gas and oil. He also owned a contracting company, a barge company, a dredging company and ran an Illinois race track.[6] His largest enterprise, the Penn Stevedoring Company, unloaded all the freight brought into the city by the Pennsylvania Railroad, principally all the fruit and vegetables freighted daily into the metropolis. For many years, in effect, McCormack acted as the agent of the Pennsylvania Railroad in New York politics and he had become something of an expert in labor relations, acting as a strike mediator for three New York mayors. On the waterfront, where flash-strikes were common, McCormack’s companies were struck only once.[7]
Crime on the Waterfront
McCormack was paternalistic toward his men, powerful in politics and wielded an enormous influence over Joe Ryan, the President of the International Longshoreman’s Association. Ryan did the bidding of McCormack and the shipping companies, providing the labor peace they craved in exchange for financial gain. And all the while, the men in his union suffered low wages and underemployment that made them vulnerable to loan sharking and extortion from hiring bosses. Ryan, McCormack and their underworld associates, pocketed millions of dollars from bribes, protection rackets and stolen merchandise. But their rule went unchallenged for decades because the men of the waterfront held firm to an "Irish code of ¬silence."[8] In 1949, the New York Sun published a 24-part series of articles by Malcolm Johnson, "Crime on the Waterfront." The series won the 1949 Pulitzer Prize for Local Reporting and the stories detailed the widespread corruption, extortion, and racketeering on the waterfront. The result was the establishment in 1953 of the Waterfront Crime Commission of the Port of New York. When McCormack was called before the Commission to establish his role in labor racketeering, he denied knowing anything about the theft, loan-sharking, gambling, union corruption and other evils associated with the docks, but he was not a particularly credible witness. During the five years prior to 1953, McCormack and members of his family had made payments to unknown parties totaling $984,908, none of which could be accounted for by business receipts or invoices. Moreover his dock employees, although members of the International Longshoreman’s Association, earned fifty cents per hour less than other dockworkers and the conclusion was that these payments had gone to labor racketeers.[9] The details of McCormack’s relationship with International Longshoreman’s Association President Joseph P. Ryan and various underworld associates provided the factual background for the 1954 film "On The Waterfront."[10]
Transit Mix Concrete
McCormack also owned several concrete companies, including Transit Mix which, as one of only two concrete plants located within the city, provided millions of tons of concrete for public and private construction projects including: the United Nations, Guggenheim Museum, Lincoln Center, 1969 Worlds Fair Grounds in Flushing, the Cross Bronx, Major Deegan and Long Island Expressways, the TWA Flight Center at JFK Airport designed by Eero Saarinen, the Whitestone, Throgsneck and Verrazano Narrows bridges and the World Trade Center. After his death, Transit Mix was left to McCormack’s daughter who sold the corporation to Edward J. Halloran, the owner of the Halloran House Hotel on Lexington Avenue and 49th Street. In 1986 Halloran and Transit Mix were indicted, along with Anthony Salerno and other members of the Genovese Crime Family, for bid rigging, extortion, gambling and murder conspiracies.[11] Mr. Halloran disappeared under mysterious circumstances in 1998 and remains missing to this day.[12]
References
- ^ Mr. Big Becomes Less Mysterious, Life Magazine, February 9, 1953.
- ^ James T. Fisher, On the Irish Waterfront, 2009.
- ^ Robert A. Caro, The Power Broker, 1974.
- ^ Jeffery T. Sammons Beyond the Ring, The Role of Boxing in American Society , 1990.
- ^ Daniel Bell, The End of Ideology: On the Exhaustion of Political Ideas in the Fifties, 1960.
- ^ Mr. Big Becomes Less Mysterious, Life Magazine, February 9, 1953.
- ^ Daniel Bell, The End of Ideology: On the Exhaustion of Political Ideas in the Fifties, 1960.
- ^ Edward T. O’Donnell, Pier Pressure: A Tough Fight Against Corruption and the Movie that Tried to Capture it All, Wall Street Journal, September 8, 2009.
- ^ “Mr. Big Becomes Less Mysterious, Life Magazine, February 9, 1953.
- ^ James T. Fisher, On the Irish Waterfront, 2009.
- ^ Arnold H. Lubasch, Reputed Mob Leader Among 15 Indicted on Racketeering Counts, The New York Times, March 22, 1986.
- ^ Selwyn Raab, Ex Hotel Owner With Former Ties to Mobsters Disappears, The New York Times, October 30, 1998.