The First Ward II: Fingy Conners & The New Century

THE FIRST WARD saga continues in the turn of the century story of infamous millionaire saloon-boss Fingy Conners and The Sullivan Brothers. Deprived of the very enterprise that made his vast fortune after his loss to laborers in the scooper's strike of 1899, Fingy Conners sets out on a path of retribution: scorched-earth revenge on the entire city of Buffalo by way of destroying its economy. Fingy schemes to control the entirety of the grain shipping and milling trade and moving it out of the country to Montreal, where he enjoys dual citizenship. However, Alderman John P. Sullivan has an ace up his sleeve. Based on actual events and the real people who drove them, The First Ward II documents the rivalry between dock-walloper turned wealthy politician Fingy Conners and two brothers who emerged from the Buffalo Orphan Asylum to claim political power: Alderman John P. Sullivan and Detective Sergeant James E. Sullivan. Their lives intersect with the giants of their day; cousin John L. Sullivan, humorist Mark Twain, Presidents William McKinley and Teddy Roosevelt, publisher William Randolph Hearst, and the Rainbow City: the 1901 Pan American Exposition.