Island of Vice: Theodore Roosevelt's Quest to Clean Up Sin-Loving New York by Richard Zacks

Description

In the 1890s, young cocksure Theodore Roosevelt, years before the White House, was appointed police commissioner of corrupt, pleasure-loving New York, then teeming with 40,000 prostitutes, illegal casinos and all-night dance halls. The Harvard-educated Roosevelt, with a reformer’s zeal, tried to wipe out the city’s vice and corruption. He went head-to-head with Tammany Hall, took midnight rambles looking for derelict cops, banned barroom drinking on Sundays and tried to convince 2 million New Yorkers to enjoy wholesome family fun.
 
The city rebelled big time; cartoonists lampooned him on the front page; his own political party abandoned him but Roosevelt never backed down. Island of Vice delivers a rollicking narrative history of Roosevelt’s embattled tenure, pitting the seedy against the saintly, and the city against its would-be savior.

Editorial Review

Amazon Best Books of the Month, March 2012: Those living in New York City today may be surprised (or not!) to read about the state of their city in the 1890’s; overrun with prostitution, gambling, boot liquor and Tammany Hall, NYC was known as the “Island of Vice.” Enter the ever-ambitious Theodore Roosevelt, years before he became president, who stepped-in as the NYC Police Commissioner and made it his mission to clean up the city. Richard Zacks’ enthusiastic account of this period is a fun read—an adjective rarely used to describe history books. It would be difficult to invent a cast of characters as exuberant and flawed as those involved here, and Zacks brings them all to life with ease. He clearly enjoys the subject, elevating this well-researched book into something memorable. –Caley Anderson

A Look Inside Island of Vice

Thompson Street Bar Photo: Jacob Riis called this Thompson Street joint “a downtown morgue.” (Jacob Riis. Museum of City of New York [90.13.4.165])	The Bowery Photo: The Bowery, under the shadow of the elevated train tracks, bustled at night with colored lights and cane-swirling barkers in places such as the Lyceum Concert Garden. The joint then featured a minstrel show and cake walk. (The New Metropolis by E. Idell Zeisloft (1899) p. 518.)	TR at desk Photo: Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919), sworn in as police commissioner on May 6, 1895, soon decided to try to enforce every law on the books and every rule for police conduct. “New York has never been so shocked and surprised in all its two hundred and fifty years of existence,” commented one observer. (Theodore Roosevelt Collection, Harvard College Library (560.22-001))