Скачать или смотреть Frank Lucas took over Harley after Bumpy Johnson's death in 1968—the scheme that brought heroi...

July 7, 1968. At 3:47 a.m., Ellsworth Raymond Johnson—the man Harlem knew simply as Bumpy—collapsed on the floor of Wells Restaurant, on the corner of 145th Street and Seventh Avenue. A sudden heart attack. At 62, the king of Harlem fell without warning, without a declared successor, without a criminal will. And when the sun rose that summer Monday, the streets of New York’s most famous Black neighborhood woke up orphaned.

The body was still warm when the first moves began. At the funeral, held four days later at Abyssinian Baptist Church, more than a thousand people attended. They wept for a legend. But amid the tears were calculating glances, restless hands in the pockets of expensive suits, discreet whispers in the church pews. Bumpy’s death was not merely the end of an era. It was the opening of hunting season. And the trophy was all of Harlem.

For nearly four decades, Bumpy Johnson had ruled the neighborhood’s underworld with an iron fist wrapped in velvet. He was not just a criminal. He was a street statesman. He protected local businesses, funded schools, paid widows’ rent, and broke the legs of anyone who dared sell drugs near playgrounds. Under his command, there was order. There were rules. The Italian mafia respected boundaries, corrupt cops knew exactly how much they were to receive, and small-time operators knew their place in the hierarchy. Harlem was a kingdom, and Bumpy was its philosopher king.
But now the throne was empty.