William L. Riordan, a newspaperman for the New York Evening Post, interviewed George Washington Plunkitt and preserved his philosophy for posterity. He recognized in Plunkitt an exceptional frankness that set him apart from his fellow political bosses. In Plunkitt of Tammany Hall Riordan admits readers into an area of life that mystified middle-class Americans at the turn of the twentieth century.

Peter Quinn is a former speechwriter for Mario Cuomo and the author of Banished Children of Eve: A Novel of Civil War New York.