GAMBLERS, GANGSTERS & THE GREAT DEPRESSION: UNCONVENTIONAL ORIGINS OF AN EXTRAORDINARY FATHER-SON BOND

What do Cliff Huxtable, Danny Tanner & Archie Bunker have in common? Besides being famous TV dads, they were all men who wanted to provide for their families. Their dream was to create a safe and stable home in which their families would prosper. But what if instead of living in a San Francisco townhouse, little Michelle Tanner took her first steps in a 1920s NYC hotel room? Or if Cliff Huxtable’s paycheck came from taking bets on horse races and scalped Broadway show tickets instead of his OB-GYN practice? Life may have not been so easy and carefree after all.

Ronald F. Probstein did in fact grow up in a Times Square hotel room during one of the more colorful and difficult periods in American history. His childhood was spent amongst gamblers and gangsters, bookies and betters, and his always optimistic father, Sid. A professional gambler, Sid dreamed of building a stable home for his beloved family but was drawn to the taste of an easy dollar on the fringes of the law. Sid’s life of scandal, success and, at times, shame is documented in his son’s newest book, Honest Sid: Memoir of a Gambling Man.
“My father did not orchestrate my intellectual development, nor guide my spiritual awakening,” shares Probstein. “He was the quintessential American dreamer who lived his life the only way he knew how, and who never, no matter how down on his luck he may have been, broke the bond of love he shared with his son.”
Honest Sid follows Sid Probstein through New York’s growth from a gas-lit 19th century city of push-carts and family neighborhoods to the growing megalopolis of the 20th century. During his days as a professional baseball player to his adventures with some of the city’s most notorious gangsters, Sid always managed to dream big and have faith in the bond of family.
Honest Sid showcases such themes as:

* The quintessential American dream of the 1930s

* An unconventional bond between father and son

* The trials and tribulations of a Depression-era New York City

* The Times Square & 8th Avenue scene during the 1930s

* An insider’s look at the NYC gambling and speakeasy scene

* How a childhood of horse parlors and transient hotels can turn into a lifetime of academic achievement and scientific excellence

Ronald F. Probstein was raised in the Times Square area of New York City where he spent his childhood days among the likes of gangster Champ Segal and heavyweight champ Joe Louis. By twenty, he had received his undergraduate degree from NYU and was working on a doctorate at Princeton where he rubbed elbows with Albert Einstein and John Nash. An honored scientist, he has played a principle role in many milestone scientific achievements in such areas as spacecraft and ballistic missile reentry physics, hypersonic flight theory and comet astrophysics. Probstein has been elected to the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the International Academy of Astronautics to name a few. A Ford Professor of Engineering, Emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Probstein has authored ten critically acclaimed scientific and technical books.

He resides in Brookline, MA with his wife, Irene. They have one child and three grandchildren.

Honest Sid: Memoir of a Gambling Man is available for purchase at Amazon.com, BarnesandNoble.com and iUniverse.com.