On April 5, 1956, the labor columnist of the Daily Mirror, Victor Riesel, and his secretary left Lindy's restaurant at 3:00 in the morning. As they walked to Riesel's car, parked in front of the nearby Mark Hellinger Theater, a small-time hood named Abraham Telvi materialized out of the shadows and threw a vial of sulphuric acid in Riesel's face. It got him straight in the eyes.
Riesel was a hard-hitting foe of organized crime, Communists, and toughs in labor unions (his father had been crippled for life by ILGWU goons), and his column appeared in 193 newspapers. In 1956 he was working closely with the New York Attorney General in an ambitious assault on the city`s rackets.
His blinding created an uproar. "It is a return of the Al Capone era" thundered the Mirror. "It is the simple, bald determination on the part of the underworld to have its own way and maintain its fabulously profitable rackets by terror and death, and in defiance of the law." It concluded, "The scum who plotted this cruel attack may rob a man of his eyes but not of his vision."
It was eventually determined that New Jersey racketeer Johnny Dio, a prime target of Riesel and the Attorney General, had hired Telvi to make the attack. He was never prosecuted, but in July, Telvi was found shot dead on Mulberry St. He had been paid a few hundred dollars for the acid attack but had later decided it was worth $50,000.
Riesel's column continued to be written by his staff until he was able to return to work. He continued to report on labor for decades.
Photo: Riesel in the hospital on April 6. Anthony Camerano for the AP via the NY Daily News
