Manhattan Mafia Museum set to open

The Mafia and Organized Crime has long been a part of the nations culture and over the years has created mob buff”s galore. From The Godfather to The Soprano’s people have been thrilled by the life and times of real life and TV character gangsters. Now the Mafia is set to have its very own Mob Museum.

The new Mafia Museum can be found in a the building at 80 St Mark’s Place in East Village of Manhattan. The building was an old school speakeasy that was owned by a gangster named Walter Scheib. Now the once used speakeasy will be the home of the museum on the American Gangsters. The building was a Butcher Shop in the front and people could enter the business then go into the alley and down to a back door leading into the speakeasy club in its heyday.

The Otway family purchased the building from Scheib 46 years ago and opened a theatre there. Until now when Lorcan Otway got inspired to convert it into a mafia museum. The first year that the Otway family owned the building , Lorcan’s father discovered two locked safes and called in Scheib to open them up to view the contents. In the second of the locked safes they found approx. 2 Million in gold currency which adds to the experience of the new museum now as there is a mystery surrounding all the money.

Viewers going to the mafia museum will also be able to see replica’s of the Thompson machine guns or “Tommy Guns” used by prohibition era gangsters , many newspaper articles on gangsters from Al Capone to Jack “Legs” Diamond, a real life prohibition era beer cooler where the speakeasy’s illegal alcohol was stored and much much more. The museum should be a very interesting stop for mafia buff’s from around the world and is set to open up to the public on March 7, 2010. Can get more information on the mob museum at the following website : AGNYC.org