A Mobster in Cement Shoes Surfaces at The Battery

Bo Weinberg sleeps with the fishes. A former lieutenant of the notorious bootlegging gangster Dutch Schultz, Weinberg was made to disappear after the Schultz and Charles "Lucky" Luciano factions went to war. Turns out, Weinberg's fate wasn't all that rare.

After a giant octopus attack on the Staten Island Ferry in 1963, search-and-recovery divers found more than 30 victims of New York's organized crime syndicates beneath the waves of New York Harbor. Preserved by the cold, polluted waters, every victim had one thing in common: their "cement shoes."

To honor these victims and mark the site as a point of historical significance, a memorial using Weinberg's likeness was erected at The Battery in 1983. Lost during renovations in the mid 1990s, the monument was recently rediscovered and can now be seen on display. But, we think the sculpture also looks a little like someone we know....

Staten Island-based sculptor Joseph Reginella has been crafting monuments to NYC Urban Legends since 2016 and this piece, Watery Graves, is his latest creation. When sculpting this memorial, he used his own face as a reference.

To mark the 10 year anniversary of his urban legends project, Reginella wanted to call back to the very first piece in the series, a monument to a giant octopus attack on the Staten Island Ferry. Other hoaxes Reginella has memorialized include a tugboat UFO abduction, a bootlegging bulldog, the man who introduced rats to NYC, and last year's monument to a Disco Civil War.

Each sculpture in the series is given an elaborate and fantastical backstory that is based in just enough true New York City history and pop-culture references to make you scratch your head.

"A lot of people buy it," Reginella told Untapped New York when we met him at The Battery to see the sculpture in person and watch people react to it. "I heard a guy mumble out loud 'That can't be.'"

The sculptor has been playing with the concept for this piece since the early 2000s when he launched a toy line called Toxic Teddies. One of the bears featured in this not-for-kids set was "Blabba Bear," a teddy bear figurine that clearly said too much.

"The harbor is always mysterious," Reginella said, "What could be down there? A giant octopus, some old mobsters, lots of garbage?"

As a special anniversary sculpture, Watery Graves is also the largest in the NYC Urban Legends series, measuring around five and a half tall, plus the pedestal. Despite its size, the whole thing can still be disassembled and put onto a handcart. Like all of the statues before it, this one travels from Reginella's studio in Staten Island to Manhattan via ferry, so it needs to be portable and light enough for the artist to move himself.

Reginella began working on Watery Graves in January. He walked us through the time consuming process: "The whole thing is sculpted out of Styrofoam, then I add clay for details, then a silicone mold, then a method called cold-cast bronze which is a resin with bronze powder in it to give it a shine." Since this piece was so large and the mold so heavy, he had to build a special contraption to hold it up while it was cast.

"Children are drawn to this one and I knew they would be, so all of the appendages are reinforced with steel and there's two inches of plywood inside," Reginella said, "I made it super bottom-heavy because I anticipated children climbing on it and they do."

"I wanted to have the sediment littered with garbage so I went with some classic New York City icons," Reginella said. Look closely and you'll find a Statue of Liberty figurine, a smashed Greek coffee cup, and a crushed beer can.

All of the small details, from fishes swimming around the body to the wavy folds of his jacket and his floating arms and tie give the illusion that the figure is suspended in the water, anchored to the floor by that bucket of cement at his feet.

When we met Reginella at his Disco Civil War sculpture last year, he alluded to this year's piece being the last in the NYC Urban Legends series. "This is really labor intensive. It's a lot of planning and I always have other jobs and this turns into kind of a second job," he explained. But, he might not be done just yet.

"I think I'd take at least a year off, but I can go home today and see something and think, 'Wait, I have to do that!' It's a creative outlet."

Your best chance to spot the sculpture is on Saturday and Sunday mornings along State Street, just outside the entrance to The Battery near the SeaGlass Carousel. Reginella brings the sculpture out sporadically until the weather gets too cold. Let us know if you spot Watery Graves by tagging us @untappedny and @joe_reg_sculpt on Instagram!