The vapors : a southern family, the New York mob, and the rise and fall of Hot Springs, America's forgotten capital of vice
(Audiobook CD)

Compact discs.

Title from web page.

Performed by George Newbern.

Back in the days before Vegas was big, when the Mob was at its peak and neon lights were but a glimmer on the horizon, a little Southern town styled itself as a premier destination for the American leisure class. Hot Springs, Arkansas was home to healing waters, Art Deco splendor, and America's original national park, as well as horse racing, nearly a dozen illegal casinos, countless backrooms and brothels, and some of the country's most bald-faced criminals. Gangsters, gamblers, and gamines: all once flocked to America's forgotten capital of vice, a place where small-town hustlers and bigtime high-rollers could make their fortunes, and hide from the law This is the extraordinary story of three individuals, spanning the golden decades of Hot Springs, from the 1930s through the 1960s, and the lavish casino whose spectacular rise and fall would bring them together before blowing them apart.

Describes the history of Hot Springs, Arkansas. The author plots the trajectory of everything from organized crime to America's fraught racial past, examining how a town synonymous with white gangsters supported a burgeoning black middle class. He reveals how the louche underbelly of the South was also home to veterans hospitals and baseball's spring training grounds, giving rise to everyone from Babe Ruth to President Bill Clinton.