Murdered Midas
A Millionaire, His Gold Mine, and a Strange Death on an Island Paradise
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Murdered Midas
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Narrated by:
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Stephen Graybill
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By:
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Charlotte Gray
About this listen
A gold mine. A millionaire. An island paradise. An unsolved murder. A missing fortune. The story of the infamous Sir Harry Oakes as only Charlotte Gray can tell it.
On an island paradise in 1943, Sir Harry Oakes, gold-mining tycoon, philanthropist, and "richest man in the Empire", was murdered. The news of his death surged across the English-speaking world, from London, the Imperial center, to the remote Canadian mining town of Kirkland Lake, in the Northern Ontario bush. The murder became celebrated as "the crime of the century".
The layers of mystery deepened as the involvement of Oakes' son-in-law, Count Alfred de Marigny, came quickly to be questioned, as did the odd machinations of the governor of the Bahamas, the former King Edward VIII. Despite a sensational trial, no murderer was ever convicted. Rumors were unrelenting about Oakes' missing fortune, and fascination with the Oakes story has persisted for decades.
Award-winning biographer and popular historian Charlotte Gray explores, for the first time, the life of the man behind the scandal, a man who was both reviled and admired - from his early, hardscrabble days of mining exploration, to his explosion of wealth, to his grandiose gestures of philanthropy. And Gray brings fresh eyes to the bungled investigation and shocking trial in the remote colonial island streets, proposing an overlooked suspect in this long-cold case. Murdered Midas is the story of the man behind the newspaper headlines, who despite his wealth and position was never able to have justice.
PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.
©2019 Charlotte Gray (P)2019 HarperCollins PublishersListeners also enjoyed...
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Story4 out of 5 stars 37
In A Bright and Guilty Place, an exhilarating tale of murder in L.A., Richard Rayner finds the source of the city's darkness in real-life events that unfolded in the 1920s, when the booming early years of L.A. started to shade into the Depression, and the city of sunshine revealed the hidden darkness and corruption at its heart.
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1 out of 5 stars
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Didn't hold my interest
- By Hopesurvives on 11-03-17
By: Richard Rayner
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"The Rest of Us"
- The Rise of America's Eastern European Jews
- By: Stephen Birmingham
- Narrated by: Mel Foster
- Length: 18 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 37
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 34
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 32
The wave of Eastern European Jewish immigrants who swept into New York in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries by way of Ellis Island were not welcomed by the Jews who had arrived decades before. These refugees from czarist Russia and the Polish shtetls who came to America to escape pogroms and persecution were considered barbaric, uneducated, and too steeped in the traditions of the "old country" to be accepted by the more refined and already well-established German-Jewish community. But the new arrivals were tough, passionate, and determined.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Book 3 of 3
- By Etoile NEOhio on 11-15-22
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H. H. Holmes
- The True History of the White City Devil
- By: Adam Selzer
- Narrated by: David Bendena
- Length: 17 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 275
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 238
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Story4 out of 5 stars 236
This is the first truly comprehensive book examining the life and career of the murderer who has become one of America's great supervillains. It reveals not only the true story but how the legend evolved, taking advantage of hundreds of primary sources that have never been examined before, including legal documents, letters, articles, and records that have been buried in archives for more than a century.
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5 out of 5 stars
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The truth
- By Anna Fluellen on 09-08-17
By: Adam Selzer
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The Bourbon King
- The Life and Crimes of George Remus, Prohibition's Evil Genius
- By: Bob Batchelor
- Narrated by: Joe Barrett
- Length: 13 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 42
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 39
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 38
October 2019 marks the 100th anniversary of the Volstead Act, which put the enforcement teeth into Prohibition. But the law didn't stop George Remus from cornering the boozy, illegal liquor marketplace and amassing a fortune that eclipsed $200 million (the equivalent of $4.75 billion today). As eminent documentarian Ken Burns proclaimed, "Remus was to bootlegging what Rockefeller was to oil." Author Bob Batchelor has unearthed a treasure trove of untapped historical archives to cover the life, times, and crimes of the man who ran the largest bootlegging operation in America.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Disappointing
- By Amazon Customer on 06-02-20
By: Bob Batchelor
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The Patient Assassin
- A True Tale of Massacre, Revenge, and India's Quest for Independence
- By: Anita Anand
- Narrated by: Anita Anand
- Length: 10 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 48
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 46
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 46
The “compelling [and] vivid” (The New York Times Book Review) true story of a man who claimed to be a survivor of a 1919 British massacre in India, his elaborate 20-year plan for revenge, and the mix of truth and legend that made him a hero to hundreds of millions.
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4 out of 5 stars
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more interesting history
- By Autodidact on 09-07-19
By: Anita Anand
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The Case of the Murderous Dr. Cream
- The Hunt for a Victorian Era Serial Killer
- By: Dean Jobb
- Narrated by: Steven Crossley
- Length: 9 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 136
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 117
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Story4 out of 5 stars 117
In the span of fifteen years, Dr. Thomas Neill Cream murdered as many as ten people in the United States, Britain, and Canada, a death toll with almost no precedent. Poison was his weapon of choice. Largely forgotten today, this villain was as brazen as the notorious Jack the Ripper. The Case of the Murderous Dr. Cream exposes the blind trust given to medical practitioners, as well as the flawed detection methods, bungled investigations, corrupt officials, and stifling morality of Victorian society that allowed Dr. Cream to prey on vulnerable and desperate women.
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2 out of 5 stars
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Hard to Follow
- By Jessica on 08-26-21
By: Dean Jobb
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Mengele
- The Complete Story
- By: Gerald Posner, John Ware, Michael Berenbaum - introduction
- Narrated by: Bruce Mann
- Length: 15 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 141
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 122
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 122
Based on exclusive and unrestricted access to more than 5,000 pages of personal writings and family photos, this definitive biography of German physician and SS-Hauptsturmfuhrer Josef Mengele (1911-1979) probes the personality and motivations of Auschwitz's "Angel of Death". From May 1943 through January 1945, Mengele selected who would be gassed immediately, who would be worked to death, and who would serve as involuntary guinea pigs for his spurious and ghastly human experiments (twins were Mengele's particular obsession).
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1 out of 5 stars
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ONE OF THE WORST BOOKS I HAVE EVER READ
- By PAUL on 08-02-20
By: Gerald Posner, and others
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The Queen
- The Forgotten Life Behind an American Myth
- By: Josh Levin
- Narrated by: January LaVoy
- Length: 12 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 239
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 202
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 200
In this critically acclaimed true crime tale of "welfare queen" Linda Taylor, a Slate editor reveals a "wild, only-in-America story" of political manipulation and murder (Attica Locke, Edgar Award-winning author). Part social history, part true-crime investigation, Josh Levin's mesmerizing book, the product of six years of reporting and research, is a fascinating account of American racism, and an exposé of the "welfare queen" myth, one that fueled political debates that reverberate to this day.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Very compelling story!
- By Marilyn on 06-24-19
By: Josh Levin
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Tokyo Underworld
- The Fast Times and Hard Life of an American Gangster in Japan
- By: Robert Whiting
- Narrated by: Oliver Wyman
- Length: 12 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 77
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 64
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 64
In the ashes of postwar Japan lay a gold mine for certain opportunistic, expatriate Americans. Addicted to the volatile energy of Tokyo's freewheeling underworld, they formed ever-shifting but ever-profitable alliances with warring Japanese and Korean gangsters. At the center of this world was Nick Zappetti, an ex-marine from New York City who arrived in Tokyo in 1945 and whose restaurant soon became the rage throughout the city and the chief watering hole for celebrities, diplomats, sports figures, and mobsters.
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5 out of 5 stars
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A Man with a fork in a world of soup
- By Kindle Customer on 09-01-20
By: Robert Whiting
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The White Devil's Daughters
- The Women Who Fought Slavery in San Francisco's Chinatown
- By: Julia Flynn Siler
- Narrated by: Nancy Wu
- Length: 10 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 36
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 32
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 32
During the first hundred years of Chinese immigration - from 1848 to 1943 - San Francisco was home to a shockingly extensive underground slave trade in Asian women, who were exploited as prostitutes and indentured servants. In this gripping, necessary book, best-selling author Julia Flynn Siler shines a light on this little-known chapter in our history - and gives us a vivid portrait of the safe house to which enslaved women escaped.
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2 out of 5 stars
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Well researched
- By Qats reads on 08-05-19
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Fall
- The Mysterious Life and Death of Robert Maxwell, Britain's Most Notorious Media Baron
- By: John Preston
- Narrated by: Simon Bubb
- Length: 11 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 122
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 103
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 102
In February 1991, Robert Maxwell triumphantly sailed into Manhattan harbor on his yacht, the Lady Ghislaine, to buy the ailing New York Daily News. Taxi drivers stopped their cabs to shake his hand, children asked for his autograph, and patrons of the hottest restaurant in Manhattan gave him a standing ovation while he dined. Ten months later, Maxwell disappeared off that same yacht in the middle of the night and was later found dead in the water. As John Preston reveals in this revealing biography, Maxwell’s death was as mysterious as his remarkable life.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Don't make men like this anymore
- By Sylvia on 04-06-21
By: John Preston
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A Brotherhood Betrayed
- The Man Behind the Rise and Fall of Murder, Inc.
- By: Michael Cannell
- Narrated by: Gary Galone
- Length: 12 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 53
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 48
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 46
In the fall of 1941, a momentous trial was set to begin that threatened to end the careers and lives of New York’s most brutal mob kingpins. The lead witness, Abe Reles, had been a trusted executioner for Murder, Inc., the enforcement arm of a coast-to-coast mob network known as the Syndicate. But the man responsible for coolly silencing hundreds of informants was about to become the most talkative snitch of all. In exchange for police protection, Reles was prepared to rat out his murderous friends, from Albert Anastasia to Bugsy Siegel....
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4 out of 5 stars
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History from the bottom up
- By Mark on 12-12-21
By: Michael Cannell
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The Best New True Crime Stories: Small Towns
- By: Mitzi Szereto - editor
- Narrated by: Holly Palance, Phil Thron
- Length: 8 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 55
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 50
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Story4 out of 5 stars 49
Whether in Truman Capote’s detailed murder of the Clutter family or Ted Bundy’s small-town charm, criminals have always roamed rural America and towns worldwide. Featuring murder stories, criminal case studies, and more, The Best New True Crime Stories: Small Towns contains all-new accounts from writers of true crime, crime journalism, and crime fiction. And these entries are not based on a true story - they are true stories. Edited by acclaimed author and anthologist Mitzi Szereto, the stories in this volume span the globe.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Crime in other countries is not my cup of tea.
- By Brenda on 01-03-21
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The Wrong Man
- The Final Verdict on the Dr. Sam Sheppard Murder Case
- By: James Neff
- Narrated by: Charles Constant
- Length: 15 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 45
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 43
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 43
At 5:40 a.m. on July 4, 1954, the mayor of Bay Village, a small suburb of Cleveland, Ohio, received a frantic phone call from his neighbor Dr. Sam Sheppard. The news was too terrible to comprehend: Marilyn, Sam's lovely wife, was dead, her face and torso beaten beyond recognition by an unknown assailant who had knocked Sam unconscious and escaped just before dawn. In the adjacent bedroom, Chip, the Sheppards' seven-year-old son, had slept through the entire ordeal. Almost immediately, the police began to suspect Sam Sheppard.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Outstanding! But troubling
- By Tyree on 09-26-22
By: James Neff
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The Plaza
- The Secret Life of America's Most Famous Hotel
- By: Julie Satow
- Narrated by: Jefferson Mays
- Length: 11 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 291
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 256
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 256
The Plaza is the account of one vaunted New York City address that has become synonymous with wealth and scandal, opportunity and tragedy. With glamour on the surface and strife behind the scenes, it is the story of how one hotel became a mirror reflecting New York's place at the center of the country's cultural narrative for over a century.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Don't need your politics, Julie
- By Debra Noe on 03-29-20
By: Julie Satow
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The Ground Breaking
- An American City and Its Search for Justice
- By: Scott Ellsworth
- Narrated by: Adenrele Ojo
- Length: 10 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 50
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 41
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 41
Over the course of less than 24 hours in the spring of 1921, Tulsa’s infamous “Black Wall Street” was wiped off the map - and erased from the history books. Official records were disappeared, researchers were threatened, and the worst single incident of racial violence in American history was kept hidden for more than 50 years. But there were some secrets that would not die. A riveting and essential new book, The Ground Breaking not only tells the long-suppressed story of the notorious Tulsa race massacre.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Excellent book on the Tulsa Massacre
- By vivabooks on 08-15-21
By: Scott Ellsworth
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The Sugar King of Havana
- The Rise and Fall of Julio Lobo, Cuba's Last Tycoon
- By: John Paul Rathbone
- Narrated by: Simon Vance
- Length: 8 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 77
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 59
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 59
Fifty years after the Cuban revolution, the legendary wealth of the sugar magnate Julio Lobo remains emblematic of a certain way of life that came to an abrupt end when Fidel Castro marched into Havana. Known in his day as the King of Sugar, Lobo was for decades the most powerful force in the world sugar market, controlling vast swaths of the island's sugar interests.
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4 out of 5 stars
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VERY INFORMATIVE
- By Terry on 03-26-12