The Summer of Charlie Ponzi

by Noel Hynd

One sweltering afternoon late in June 1919, a thirty-seven-year-old clerk named Charles Ponzi, who was employed by a Boston, Massachusetts brokerage house, opened an envelope from Spain and made a startling discovery. The envelope contained a postal reply coupon, something Ponzi had never heard of. The coupon, which the writer in Spain had enclosed to cover the postal reply from the brokerage house, had been purchased in Madrid for the equivalent of one cent in U.S. currency. Yet it was redeemable at any post office or bank in the United States for five cents.Ponzi pursed his lips and looked off into space. Here, he decided, was something worthy of serious investigation. So began a unique story in the history of American crime, and so begins ‘The Summer of Charlie Ponzi,’ the newest novel by espionage and crime author Noel Hynd. ‘The Summer of Charlie Ponzi’ is based on the true story of the involvement and reporting of his father, Alan Hynd, in the infamous Ponzi case in 1919 and 1920.Boston in the years after World War One was a bustling, booming metropolis, the fifth-largest city in the United States. The Roaring Twenties were underway. Immigrants from all over the world poured into Prohibition-era Boston. So did young, first-generation American men and women anxious to seek their fortune. America, and Boston in particular, was a wide-open place, filled with crime, jazz, flappers, a new easy morality, and speakeasies. There were two great baseball clubs – the Braves and the Red Sox – and six daily newspapers. Newspapers were everywhere. There were newsstands at North Station, in front of Symphony Hall, in front of Filene’s, and in the streets of Charlestown, Southie and Dorchester. On the rare blocks with no newsstand, the hoarse, aggressive chant of newsboys filled the air. The Boston Post stood out among the daily papers. It was the fourth-leading morning newspaper in the country in circulation. There were many reasons The Post stood out, but one was city editor Eddie Dunn, the best newspaperman in Boston during the hard-drinking, two-fisted era of the 1920s. Eddie Dunn understood news, how to find it, get it, and sell it. By the end of 1919, Charlie Ponzi had hatched out his he would build his fortune on postal reply coupons and beat the banks in the money lending game. While banks were paying five percent per year, Ponzi promised investors fifty percent interest in forty-five days. He soon had people lining up at his office on School Street, practically throwing money at him. By April of 1920, Charlie Ponzi was taking in a $250,000 every day in cash as his pyramid scheme swept the city. The offices of The Boston Post were also on School Street. Inevitably, The Post and Ponzi took notice and measure of each other. In the summer of 1920, their worlds collided. When the Ponzi swindle became the biggest local story of the year, even bigger than Sacco and Vanzetti, Eddie Dunn threw every spare reporter onto the story. By this time, Alan Hynd, still in his late teens, had cadged a job as a street reporter for The Post. He had only a few weeks of experience, but Dunn assigned him to his team of top reporters covering the case.'The Summer of Charlie Ponzi' is the story of a young man covering the most brazen financial crime of the twentieth century. This hard-edged Jazz-Age tale is full of fascinating women and men drawn from the newsrooms, tenements, speakeasies, high social circles, financial boardrooms, streets, and sidewalks of Boston of the 1920s. Told in the young reporter’s sly acerbic voice, the tale is at times brash and hilarious, at times heartbreaking, frequently astonishing, and always riveting. *‘The Summer of Charlie Ponzi’ joins ‘Ashes from a Burning Corpse’ in the series “An American True Crime Reporter in the 20th Century.

379 pages, Kindle Edition

Published February 12, 2021

About the author

I've been a published novelist for longer than I care to admit, since 1976. I'm frequently asked, however, how I first got published. It's an interesting story and involved both Robert Ludlum and James Baldwin, even though neither of them knew it --- or me --- at the time.

My first agent, a wonderful thorughly perofessional gentleman named Robert Lantz was representing Mr. Baldwin at the time. This was around 1975. Balwin, while a brilliant writer, had had some nasty dealings with the head of Dell Publishing. Dell held Jimmy's contract at the time and he could not legally write for anyone else until he gave Dell a book that was due to them. Nonetheless, he refused to deliver a manuscript to Dell and went to Paris to sit things out.

The book was due to The Dial Press, which Dell owned. Baldwin was widely quoted as saying....and I'm cleaning up the quote here, "that he was no longer picking cotton on Dell's planatation."

The book was due to The Dial Press. The editor in chief of The Dial Press was a stellar editor who was making a name for himself and a fair bit of money for the company publishing thriller-author Robert Ludlum. A best seller every year will do that for an editor. Anyway, Baldwin fled New York for Paris. The editor followed, the asignment being to get him to come happily back to Dial. As soon as the editor arrived, Baldwin fled to Algeria. Or maybe Tunisia. It hardly mattered because Baldwin was furious and simply wouldn 't do a book for Dell/Dial. The editor returned to NY without his quarry. Things were at a standstill.

That's where I entered the story, unpublished at age 27 and knowing enough to keep my mouth shut while these things went down. I had given 124 pages of a first novel to Mr. Lantz ten days eariler. Miraculously, his reader liked it and then HE liked it. It was in the same genre that Ludlum wrote in and which the editor at Dial excelled at editing and marketing.

My agent and the editor ran into each other one afternoon in July of 1974 in one of those swank Manhattan places where people used to have three martinis for lunch. The agent asked how things had gone in Europe. The editor told him, knowing full well that the agent already knew. The next steps would be lawyers, Baldwin dragged into US Courts, major authors boycotting Doubleday/Dell, Dial, maybe some civil rights demonstrations and.......but no so fast.

Mr. Lantz offered Dial the first look at a new adventure/espionage novelist (me). IF Dial wanted me after reading my 124 pages, he could sign me, but only IF Baldwin was released from his obligations at Doubleday. I was the literary bribe, so to speak, that would get Jimmy free from Dial. It seemed like a great idea to everyone. It seemed that way because it was. Paperwork was prepapred and paperwork was signed. Voila!...To make a much longer story short, Dial accepted my novel. The editor instructed me on how to raise it to a professional level as I finished writing it over the next ten months. I followed orders perfectly. I even felt prosperous on my $7500 advance. He then had Dial release Mr. Balwin from his obligation. Not surpringly, he went on to create fine books for other publishers. Ludlum did even batter. Of the three, I'm the pauper but I've gotten my fair share and I'm alive with books coming out again now in the very near future, no small accmplishment. So no complaints from me.

That''s how I got published. I met Ludlum many times later on and Baldwin once. Ludlum liked my name "Noel" and used it for an then-upcoming charcter named Noel Holcroft. That amused me. I don't know if either of them even knew that my career had been in their orbits for a month 1975. They would have been amused. They were both smart gifted men and fine writers in dfferent ways. This story was told to me by one of the principals two years later and another one confirmed it.

Me, I came out of it with my first publishing contract, for a book titled 'Reve

Reviews

[Karen greer · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the best true stories I have read in a long time. So well written! Funny thing, I happened to watch a documentary about Bernie Madoff at the same time I was reading this book. The pure greed of people is truly amazing to me. These two guys just happened to get caught. Unfortunately they hurt so many people in their lives. I would advise everyone to read this book because there are lessons for all of us to learn. I will be reading more by this author. This was excellent

[Kurt · Rating 5 out of 5]

Noel Hynd's ‘The Summer of Charlie Ponzi’ is based on the true story of the involvement and reporting of his father, Alan Hynd, in the infamous Ponzi case in 1919 and 1920 Boston.

Noel Hynd is one of my favorites and go to authors. He is an amazing storyteller. I loved the ‘The Summer of Charlie Ponzi’ and could not put it down. The story is written in the first person of his father Alan and told in a coming-of-age tale. Young Alan leaves his childhood home of Trenton, NJ with some experience in the “circulation” side of the newspaper business. He travels to Boston to live with his aunt and uncle. Within in months he has landed a trial position at the Boston Post. He is a budding star at the age of seventeen. This book parallels his movements into adulthood while working the crimes of the day in nefarious Boston. He helps with on-the-scene reporting of the infamous Sacco and Vanzetti robbery of a shoe companies’ payroll. He is also witnessing the growing lines of people going to the investment business of one Charlie Ponzi right down the street from the Posts’ HQ. At night he frequents with his fellow Posties a speakeasy that plays an integral role throughout the book. I found Alans adventures just as intriguing as those of the famous grifter Ponzi. The book is full of good old fashioned leather shoe investigations and newsroom culture drama. Of course, Hynd will go into detail as Alan and the Posts veteran newsmen bring down Ponzi. I have read a couple of books on Ponzi and was familiar with his tail of deceit. But never from this angle — the behind-the-scenes news gathering. It is fascinating to witness the speed in which Ponzi’s grift unraveled. Want a fun and fascinating view of Boston culture at the dawn of prohibition era. I highly recommend Noel Hynd's ‘The Summer of Charlie Ponzi’. 5 stars+

[Sue E. Work · Rating 5 out of 5]

Interesting Book

Nonfiction books appeal to me rather than fiction, and this book in particular was of interest due to the recent news of “The Ponzi Scheme” being used to take millions from people. Noel Hynd is a terrific author ; the book was a fast read due to not bogging down into a lot of detailed narrative. I will look for books written by him.

[allan stearns · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ponzi is back in the headlines

A good fast retelling of a fool and his money being lost as a con man raked it in. The story is retold by 2022 fools who fell for it again with cash substituted by crypto. A game for the gullible and a crime that will play out for the simple perpetrator.

[David Marlow · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great read and very well written and researched

Enjoyed this book enormously. So well written and researched. Charlie was a charming cad who proved that crime did pay for quite some time!

[Linda Frank · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Summer of Charlie Ponzi by Noel Hynd is an amazing trip into the past. It is full of deception, crime and danger. It is such an exciting read you will not want to put it down. I won't give anything away because it is so good I don't want to give away any of the action. You will love it

[Peter Kastner · Rating 5 out of 5]

A delightful read full of detail about Boston post WWI and its people. Charlie Ponzi fooled everybody up to future president Calvin Coolidge. It took a focused newspaper a year to bring Ponzi down. Good story well told b

[Gary Acker · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hynd does an excellent job of catching the flavor of Boston in the early 1920's. The story is worthy and the narrative is clear. An enjoyable read.

[Ronnie Cramer · Rating 2 out of 5]

A novelized biography of the author's father Alan Hynd, a true crime writer from the mid 20th century. Loaded with invented dialogue and situations; definitely not my cup of tea.

[Mark Auman · Rating 4 out of 5]

It grab you and hangs on

I liked this book and it pulled me in.
Not the best thing I ever read, but it was fun to learn what the early 20th century was like. I was a fun read.

[Richard B. Seeley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Even though everyone knows about the Ponzi scheme story, having it told to you by an actual participant is amazing! I just couldn’t put it down. This is a MUST READ!