Boxing was legalized as a public sporting event in the Twenties, but illegal boxing started across the country in the previous century, not even weakening once professional boxing had a hold on America. By the Forties, the mafia had its hands deep into the professional boxing circuit, influencing matches and promoting venues all around the tri-state area. The mafia has a secret circuit of bare-knuckle boxers and back-street brawlers. Illegal boxing requires payoffs for the space, police, and referee. It is therefore most often organized and promoted by members of the mob. Clubs, warehouses along the docks, and any other place that can fit a few hundred people are used. There are also many of these battles royale without the mob’s direct influence, mostly among the immigrants. These fights are mostly back-street brawls with heavy betting. Promotion is done through word of mouth along the streets. Since most of the combatants involved are those about whom the police do not generally care, turning a blind eye is easy, especially when officers and detectives are directly involved in the betting. The winner of a match typically gets half the take. A Warehouse Boxing Match
The Brovage Meat-Packaging Company factory and warehouse, on the corner of Dock and Water Streets in Brooklyn, has become one of the major venues for bare-knuckle boxing. The workweek is from Monday to Thursday with ten-hour shifts, so Friday-Night boxing is always on the slate. The prime mover and shaker in this set-up is packing manager and ex-boxer J. J. Forziello, who pays the owner of the warehouse a percentage of the take to look the other way on the weekends. J. J. Forziello (Fight Promoter/Ring Manager)
J. J. runs the whole affair with iron-clad precision to preserve the lives of the boxers, while giving the high-paying customers the best show. He was a professional boxer in the Thirties, but lost most of his hearing early in his career and dropped out to preserve the rest. Now in his forties, J. J. uses hand signals, colored flags, and handwritten notes to stay on top of the chaos.
At first, J. J. tried to have a series of bouts one night per month, all bare-knuckle style and funded through the bets of immigrants from around the docks. Then he was approached by some shady characters with a favor to ask—make Antonio Guigale happy.

	fitness			awareness			creativity			reasoning			influence
	4			3			1			2			2

Skills: athletics 7, brawling 6, gambling 5, streetwise 4, negotiation 5, street cred 6
Gimmicks: gangster contacts, prestige, sure-footed, quick, toughness, poor hearing, reduced stamina Antonio Guigale (Old Country Mogul)
Antonio Guigale is a rich, elderly gentleman from Nice, Italy. While he is not a member of the mob, his contributions to the Italian-American businesses of New York City have ensured their respect for him. He loves to watch fights and finds the professional boxing ring impersonal and unsatisfying. He came to one of J. J.’s impromptu matches and asked his driver to bring him back the following week. In an effort to keep him entertained, the mob bosses offered J. J. extra funds, with no strings attached, to have matches every weekend.

	fitness			awareness			creativity			reasoning			influence
	2			1			3			3			3

Skills: finesse 4, investigation 5, design 6, prose 4, commodities 7, etiquette 5, negotiation 8, composure 6
Gimmicks: academic contacts, gangster contacts, medical contacts, prestige, multilingual, wealth, intuition, dark secret, weak All matches continue until a participant cannot return to his feet after a hit. Although primarily bare-knuckle matches, several professional boxers have been occasionally asked to participate. Gloves are only used during these special events. The contestants are decided in advance for the first four weekends of the month. Any month with a fifth weekend means that anyone can come forward and try to claim a prize. After the initial entry fee of two dollars, participants are encouraged to bet on the outcome of each individual match that night. On prepared matches, the spectators are permitted to bet whatever they can afford and receive double should they win. For betting on the underdog, they receive three to one odds. On amateur nights, when all the participants are unknown, the bets are strictly kept double or nothing. Out of the moneys collected from a single match, the winner receives half and the rest is put back into the pool. Well-known fighters can draw more money, but the pay-out is much less. On amateur night (the fifth Friday of any given month), any gentleman can step out of the audience and fight as the underdog. If he wins, J. J. considers taking him on as a regular. If a stranger wants to fight on any other night, he is usually told to come back on Friday or to get lost. J. J. may relax this rule if the newcomer is well-known in the boxing or mob circuit. The ring is a bare piece of floor twenty feet by twenty feet in size, with chairs and boxes arranged around the perimeter. Four large crates block the corners, and the bookies sit on each of the boxes to take bets. J. J. uses numbered slips of paper, white for bets on favorites and red for bets on the underdogs, to keep things as honest as possible for the four matches slated in an evening. The four bookies write the amount of the bet in a corner and money is doled out to the winners at the end of each match to reduce the chances of cheating. Two of the three are skilled in rudimentary first aid. Bookies (4)

	fitness			awareness			creativity			reasoning			influence
	3			3			1			3			2

Skills: athletics 5, brawling 4, gambling 5, streetwise 5, street cred 4, composure 3
Gimmicks: jack of all trades Four in-house fighters appear every week and two show up twice a month. Three of them work for Brovage Company and help J. J. clean up after the crowd leaves. Simon Karanov (Packer/Weekly Fighter)

	fitness			awareness			creativity			reasoning			influence
	4			2			1			3			2

Skills: brawling 5, streetwise 5, performance 4
Gimmicks: eloquent, quick, lecherous Jan Van Schoonhoven (Packer/Weekly Fighter)

	fitness			awareness			creativity			reasoning			influence
	3			3			1			2			3

Skills: brawling 4, finesse 4
Gimmicks: street contacts, alluring, sure-footed Cornelius Legg (Packer/Weekly Fighter)

	fitness			awareness			creativity			reasoning			influence
	3			3			2			1			2

Skills: brawling 6
Gimmicks: musclebound, toughness Dominick “Dead Man” Murray (Fighter)

	fitness			awareness			creativity			reasoning			influence
	4			3			1			3			1

Skills: brawling 5, firearms 5, streetwise 5, composure 3
Gimmicks: ex-con, legally dead, fugitive, multilingual Sam Westfall (Ex-Cop/Occasional Brawler)

	fitness			awareness			creativity			reasoning			influence
	3			2			2			2			3

Skills: brawling 4, firearms 6, gambling 5, interrogation 5, investigation 4, streetwise 5, street cred 4, composure 3
Gimmicks: police contacts, intuition, ugly, alcoholic Nicky “Babyface” Wilmoth (Wealthy Son)

	fitness			awareness			creativity			reasoning			influence
	2			2			2			4			2

Skills: athletics 4, brawling 4, gambling 5, design 4, prose 6, academics 5, etiquette 4, seduction 4, composure 3
Gimmicks: academic contacts, wealth, eloquent, toughness, tolerant, dark secret, paranoia Written by Jennifer Schoonover.