#24: Joseph "Joe the Barber" Barbara Sr., The Man Behind Apalachin (Part One)

The Gangland History Podcast: An Organized Crime & Mafia History Podcast

In this episode, we discuss Joseph Barbara Sr., the mobster who famously hosted the ill-fated Apalachin Mob Meeting in Apalachin, New York. In this first of a two-part series, we discuss the beginning of Barbara's mob career including:

• His birth in Castellammare del Golfo, Sicily, Italy
• His immigration to the United States in 1921
• His first jobs in and around Endicott, New York as well as Old Forge, Pennsylvania
• His introduction to the Pittston mob of Northeastern Pennsylvania (more famously called the Bufalino Crime Family)
• How we gets started in the rackets during the 1920s
• His relationship to top Pittston mob leaders Santo Volpe, Charles Bufalino (the uncle of Russell Bufalino), Angelo Polizzi, and more
• His involvement in up to four murders in the Northeastern Pennsylvania area in the early 1930s

Additionally, we located a long-buried photo of a young Barbara that we do not believe has been widely surfaced. Part Two will cover his ascension to leadership within the Northeastern Pennsylvania & Southern New York Mafia, and of course the events leading up to and after the Apalachin meeting in 1957.