{"product_id":"ponzis-scheme-isbn-9780812968361","title":"Ponzi's Scheme","description":"It was a time when anything seemed possible–instant wealth, glittering fame, fabulous luxury–and for a run of magical weeks in the spring and summer of 1920, Charles Ponzi made it all come true. Promising to double investors’ money in three months, the dapper, charming Ponzi raised the “rob Peter to pay Paul” scam to an art form. At the peak of his success, Ponzi was raking in more than $2 million a week at his office in downtown Boston. Then his house of cards came crashing down–thanks in large part to the relentless investigative reporting of Richard Grozier’s Boston Post. A classic American tale of immigrant life and the dream of success, Ponzi’s Scheme is the amazing story of the magnetic scoundrel who launched the most successful scheme of financial alchemy in modern history.“This is the first full nonfiction account of the Ponzi scheme, and Mitchell Zuckoff . . . has made it as agreeable as the ‘smiling, cane-twirling banty rooster of a man’ behind it. . . . A history that is both solid and entertaining.”\u003cbr\u003e–Chicago Sun-Times\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“In his charming book . . . Mitchell Zuckoff vividly recounts the story of Charles Ponzi [with] impressive research and elegant writing.”\u003cbr\u003e–Boston Sunday Globe\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Thanks to Mitchell Zuckoff . . . who has given Ponzi exactly what he deserves: a thorough account of his life and a candid but sympathetic portrait.”\u003cbr\u003e–The Washington Post Book World\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Zuckoff’s biography of this charming rogue . . . provokes our wonder precisely because his subject is so brazen–and yet so naively captive to his own illusions.”\u003cbr\u003e–The Wall Street JournalMITCHELL ZUCKOFF is a professor of journalism at Boston University. He is co-author of Judgment Ridge,\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003ewhich was a finalist for an Edgar Award, and author of Choosing Naia, a Boston Globe bestseller and winner of the Christopher Award. As a reporter with The Boston Globe, he was a Pulitzer Prize finalist and winner of numerous national honors, including the 2000 Distinguished Writing Award from the American Society of Newspaper Editors. He lives outside Boston with his wife and two daughters.Chapter One\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"I'm the man.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe huge blue car moved slowly through the crooked streets of the old  city, its owner sitting on the wide rear seat, his bottom comforted by  deep, horsehair-filled cushions that absorbed the bumps from the uneven  cobblestones. Heat and sunlight bounced off the brick and granite  buildings, baking the Locomobile limousine and broiling its passengers.  The morning air bristled with the hint of a developing thunderstorm.  When the skies broke loose it would be a welcome relief from the weeks  of summer heat that had made downtown Boston ripe with the smells of  horses, fish, fruit, fresh-cut leather, and tight-wound rope, all  seasoned by salt from the nearby harbor.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAt the wheel of the hand-polished Locomobile was a young Irish  immigrant named John Collins, wearing the hat and brass-buttoned  uniform of a newly created job: motorcar chauffeur. His boss, an  Italian immigrant, had taken delivery of the dazzling vehicle only  three weeks earlier, paying a thousand dollars in cash above the  $12,600 list price to spirit it away from the New York financier for  whom it had been custom-built. For the same price a man could own  twenty Model T's, with enough change to buy a modest house. But what  was the point of that? In 1920, the Locomobile was the most expensive  car in America, dripping with luxury, from its sterling-silver trim to  its crystal bud vases. Purring, glistening Locomobiles filled the  garages of Carnegies and Vanderbilts, and General John J. \"Black Jack\"  Pershing, commander of American forces in the Great War, had shipped  his to France for use as a staff car. The executives at the Locomobile  Company of America understood that exclusivity appealed to the elites.  They had positioned their automobile in direct opposition to Henry  Ford's backfiring rattletrap of the masses. The company's ads, with the  look of engraved invitations, stated that Locomobiles were built by  hand \"in strictly limited quantities because the making of any  pre-eminently fine article is impossible on a large scale.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn the short time he had been driving the car, Collins had learned well  the daily twelve-mile route that began at his boss's gracious home in  the historic suburb of Lexington, less than a mile from the site of the  first skirmish of the Revolutionary War. From there, they rolled east  through working-class Arlington and Somerville, into tony Cambridge,  across the Charles River, then down Tremont Street to a nondescript  building on School Street, less than a block from Boston City Hall.  Occasionally there would be detours, most often to a bank, and the boss  would use the one-way intercom from the back seat to relay the new  directions to Collins. But on this day-July 24, 1920-it was straight  from home to office.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eCollins slowed as he turned down School Street and saw what awaited  them: a mob of several hundred men and women, crowded together hip to  hip, chest to back. Viewed from above, it looked like an abstract  mosaic of straw boaters and colorful felt cloche hats, punctuated by  the dark crowns of a few bowlers. Some in the throng had brought  bewildered children, who cried or whined as they struggled to avoid  being trampled underfoot. The street was alive with electricity  unrelated to the gathering thunderclouds. It came from the horde  itself. Each member was a charged electron jittering in a magnetic  field created by the man in the back seat of the Locomobile.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe street normally would have been all but deserted on a sultry  Saturday in late July. But this was no ordinary day. When the crowd saw  the limousine turn down the street they pressed toward it, half in  reverence and half in mindless desire. They parted to allow Collins to  steer toward the curb in front of the Niles Building, at 27 School  Street, the modest home of his boss's extravagantly immodest firm, the  impressively named Securities Exchange Company.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e From his perch in the back seat, Collins's boss could see that some men  in the street were holding copies of that morning's Boston Post. The  banner headline trumpeted a victory in one of the America's Cup races  by the American yacht Resolute over its British challenger, Shamrock  IV. At a time when anything seemed possible except a legal drink of  whiskey, elite sports like yachting and golf had captured the public  imagination.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIf one subject interested Bostonians more than rich men's sports, it  was the prospect of becoming rich themselves. Undeniable evidence could  be found in that morning's Post, just below the yacht race story. On  the left side of the front page, in bold black letters, was the  headline that had filled School Street to bursting:\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eDOUBLES THE\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMONEY WITHIN\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTHREE MONTHS\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA Post reporter had visited 27 School Street a day earlier and acquired  a basic understanding of how the Securities Exchange Company claimed to  create spectacular profits for its investors. The unbylined story even  described the Locomobile limousine and the boss's Lexington home, which  was \"furnished with the best\" and \"does not give the impression of  nouveau riche either, for the fine Italian tastes of the owner fixed  that.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe man who owned the fine home, the flashy car, the Securities  Exchange Company, the adoration of the people on School Street, and  anything else he cared to buy was named Charles Ponzi.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eReading the Post story that morning, Ponzi could chuckle with  appreciation of his good judgment in granting the reporter access to  his office and home. He had handled the interview himself, but from now  on he would rely on advice from a publicity man he had just hired, an  ex-reporter named William McMasters. At first, Ponzi had been skeptical  about publicity-he had not needed much to achieve success that  approached his wildest dreams-but his gentle treatment by the Post made  it seem as though every card he turned would be an ace.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe front-page Post story eclipsed two previous stories Boston papers  had printed about him and his business. The first, six weeks earlier in  the Boston Traveler, had described his company in flattering terms but  never mentioned it or him by name. Still, word had spread as to the  identity and location of Ponzi's operation, and hundreds of thousands  of dollars had poured in during the weeks that followed. The second  story, three weeks earlier in the Post, had been a brief item about a  million-dollar lawsuit filed against Ponzi by a furniture dealer. That,  too, had helped. The fact that he was rich enough to be sued for a  million dollars had attracted swarms of new investors.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe brief account of the enormous lawsuit had piqued the interest of  the Post's young acting editor and publisher, who had ordered the  follow-up feature story that appeared this day. In it, the Post  reporter printed Ponzi's comments at length and without challenge, as  though Ponzi had delivered them with his hand on a Bible. During the  course of several hours of discourse, the thirty-eight-year-old  entrepreneur had offered a condensed, sanitized version of the  seventeen years since he had emigrated from Italy. Then Ponzi had  explained his business in broad, confident terms, telling how it was  built on a modest and unlikely medium: International Reply Coupons,  slips of paper that could be redeemed for postage stamps. He'd  described his company's growth-from pennies to millions of dollars in  seven months-and had boasted of the opening of branch offices from  Maine to New Jersey. The reporter had filled a notebook with Ponzi's  comments and played the notes back to Post readers as clear and sweet  as a song from a Victrola.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ePonzi had capped the interview with a priceless assertion, and again  the reporter had obliged him by printing it: \"I get no pleasure out of  spending money on myself, but a great deal in doing some good with it.  Always I have said to myself, if I can get one million dollars, I can  live with all the comfort I want for the rest of my life. If I get more  than one million dollars, I will spend all over and above the one  million trying to do good in the world. Now I have the million. That I  have put aside. If my business closed tomorrow I am sure that I will  have that amount on which to make myself and family comfortable for the  rest of our days.\" If anyone doubted how secure Ponzi felt, the story  continued: \"Ponzi estimates his wealth in excess of $8.5 million.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWith a maestro's touch, Ponzi had struck a perfect balance among the  forces competing to control the new American identity: altruism and  avarice. Now that he was all set, he insisted, he had no need for more  investors. But he would continue accepting their money out of the  goodness of his heart, so they could join him and his family in  savoring the finer things in life.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIf there was any reason for the people of Boston to be suspicious of  Ponzi, they would not find it in the morning Post. The story read with  all the confidence of the advertisements the paper ran that promised  disappearing dandruff to wise buyers of Petrole hair tonic, or  \"sunshiny\" stomachs courtesy of Goldenglo tablets, or relief from  chronic constipation in a tin of Fruit-a-Tives.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe closest the story came to skepticism was to mention that federal  and state authorities had looked into Ponzi's extraordinary investment  plan. But the reporter defused that land mine in a single sentence,  writing, \"The authorities have not been able to discover a single  illegal thing about it.\" Ponzi could not have hoped for a more sterling  endorsement.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAdding to Ponzi's delight, below the front-page story was an ad for a  prominent local bank, the Cosmopolitan Trust Company. The bank was  trying to drum up new deposits by guaranteeing a generous interest  rate: 5 percent a year, compounded monthly. To Ponzi, the ad was a  divine gift. For months he had been comparing his promised rate of  return-50 percent in forty-five days-to the paltry sum paid by banks.  Here was the same comparison on the front page of the Post, the  self-proclaimed \"Great Breakfast Table Paper of New England.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA working man with one hundred dollars to invest, reading that day's  Post over a bowl of Grape-Nuts, faced two choices of seemingly equal  reliability but vastly different outcomes. Even in the margins of his  newspaper, he could calculate that depositing his hundred dollars in  the Cosmopolitan Trust Company would yield him an annual profit of five  dollars and change. That was assuming the bank did not fail in these  days when federal insurance for deposits was barely a whisper of an  idea. Or he could entrust his hundred dollars to this Charles Ponzi  fellow and watch it multiply over and again during the same year.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIf he reinvested his hundred dollars plus interest after each  forty-five-day period, he would walk away with more than twenty-five  hundred dollars after a year. If he let it ride for a second year, he  would pocket more than sixty-five thousand dollars. It was an  unimaginable sum at a time when the average U.S. income was about two  thousand dollars, the president of Harvard University was paid six  thousand dollars, a Men's Ventilated Raincoat could be ordered from the  Sears catalog for less than twelve dollars, a can of codfish cakes for  a family of three cost twenty-five cents, and the newspaper he held in  his hands cost two cents. Only a fool would choose the bank's interest  over Ponzi's.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHaving read the Post and done the math, would-be investors had begun  assembling on School Street long before the Locomobile had even started  the trip from Lexington. They came from all corners of Boston and  beyond, a miniature League of Nations, with immigrants brushing  shoulders with Brahmins, Italians mingling with Spaniards, Irish  alongside English, Greeks chatting with Poles. Among them were Swedes,  Frenchmen, Jews, blacks, and Portuguese, new and old Americans. Kitchen  maids stood alongside businessmen, office boys squeezed against society  matrons. It was the one place in the tribal city where the only  denomination that mattered was engraved on the bills clutched in  investors' hands.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBookbinder Arthur Case of the city's Dorchester neighborhood was ready  to invest a whopping three thousand dollars, just a week after his  wife, Clara, had put in one thousand. Their neighbor, candy-factory  worker William Hoff, emptied his wallet and came up with seventy-eight  dollars. Boston florist Philip Feinstein was ready to place eleven  hundred dollars in Ponzi's hands, while Patrick Horan had stuffed  sixteen hundred dollars into his billfold. Benjamin Brown intended to  add six hundred dollars to the six hundred he had deposited just four  days earlier. Stable worker Timothy Donovan of suburban Somerville and  Alfred Authoir of nearby Cambridge each expected their fifty-dollar  investments to grow into seventy-five dollars by the first week of  September. Print shop foreman Percy Stott of Methuen had made the  thirty-mile trip to Boston for the third straight day, this time to add  one hundred dollars to the two hundred he had already invested.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eLuggage shop owner Joseph Pearlstein came bearing not cash but a note  signed by Ponzi that would allow him to collect fifteen hundred  dollars. He had heard about the Securities Exchange Company from none  other than the lovely Rose Gnecco Ponzi, who had stopped at his  Dorchester store the first week in June. She had come by to purchase  new bags for a trip she and her husband, Charles, were planning to  Italy, to visit his mother. Rose Ponzi had proudly described her  husband's remarkable financial skills to the luggage vendor, and  Pearlstein had been so impressed he had invested one thousand dollars.  Now his note was due, so Pearlstein was in line to collect his original  stake plus his five-hundred-dollar profit. But he would not invest  again. Reluctant to press his luck, Pearlstein was satisfied with one  spin of the wheel.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe crowd also included a fourteen-year-old boy in short pants named  Frank Thomas. He earned $7.20 a week running errands, and he was eager  to invest ten dollars with Ponzi. Charlie Gnecco of Medford, six miles  away across the Mystic River, was there for his fourth and largest  investment of the month, one thousand dollars. And why not? His baby  sister, Rose, was happily married to the man in charge of the whole  operation. If she had faith in Ponzi, well then, Charlie Gnecco did,  too. Carmela Ottavi of nearby Chelsea brought two thousand dollars to  add to the six hundred she had invested twelve days earlier. Ponzi's  chauffeur, John Collins, had already thrown in five hundred. Watching  the crowd from the front seat of the Locomobile, he resolved to add  seven hundred more.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhile some had come because of the Post story, others had heard from  friends and relatives of the profits to be found on School Street.  Although the Post seemed to have only just discovered the Securities  Exchange Company, the streets of Boston had been buzzing about it and  Ponzi for months.[quote] --The New York Times","brand":"Random House Trade Paperbacks","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46301235511525,"sku":"NP9780812968361","price":20.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780812968361.jpg?v=1767734950","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/ponzis-scheme-isbn-9780812968361","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}