When the Clock Broke: Con Men, Conspiracists, and How America Cracked Up in the Early 1990s

by John Ganz

Then there was Donald Trump, another arriviste who emerged from the outer boroughs’ squat, humble dwellings for the lower-middle class into the adamantine canyons of Manhattan. Less predator than scavenger or parasite, Trump took advantage of the openhanded giveaways to developers in the wake of the city’s fiscal crisis and feasted on the decaying hulk of the city. Trump Tower was built with the helpful assistance of S&A Concrete, a joint venture of the Genovese boss “Fat Tony” Salerno and Paul Castellano. The three men shared a lawyer in Roy Cohn, who generously provided his town house living room for a meeting between Trump and Salerno to work out the details of the contract. Trump quickly grew tired of building and engaged in an orgy of acquisitions beyond his means. By 1992, his empire had collapsed under the weight of unserviceable debt, a victim as much of his own prodigality as the recession in the real estate market. Appropriately, he ran aground in Atlantic City, a casino town past its prime. Meant as a bid for legitimacy and belonging in the city patriciate, Trump Tower became a favorite place of residence for organized crime figures. By the early ’90s Trump and his second wife, Marla Maples, had become the butt of jokes and tabloid fodder, apparently with their own encouragement. Negative attention was better than no attention. While Trump raged against the accused rapists in 1989, in 1992 he was giving press conferences offering a scheme in which convicted rapi...