Plexus Publishing, Inc. News

GLOUCESTER TWP.  — The author of the book behind the popular HBO series “Boardwalk Empire” will compare the real Nucky Johnson of Atlantic City history to the fictional Nucky Thompson as portrayed in the series during his second appearance at Camden County College this year.

Nelson Johnson will present “Boardwalk Empire, Part II: Nucky Johnson is Back in Town and He Means Business” at 7 p.m. Nov. 29 in Civic Hall, which is inside the Connector Building on the College’s Blackwood Campus. CCC’s Center for Civic Leadership and Responsibility is presenting the event, which will include a question-and-answer session and a book signing.

“The award-winning HBO series ‘Boardwalk Empire’ attracts millions of viewers to a fictional version of Atlantic City fraught with violence and sex, which often embellishes the historical truth,” noted Center for Civic Leadership and Responsibility director John Pesda. “Nelson Johnson, a gifted writer and speaker, will return to Camden County College to set the record straight with a fact-based account of the city and Nucky Johnson’s role.”

Learn more at ‘Boardwalk Empire’ author to speak at Camden County College at NJ.com.

Martin Scorsese has won an Emmy for directing the series premiere of Boardwalk Empire, the primetime HBO drama based on Nelson Johnson’s Boardwalk Empire: The Birth, High Times, and Corruption of Atlantic City. 

In addition to directing the pilot, Scorsese is also an executive producer on the series. The pilot episode aired on September 19, 2010 and led to HBO’s almost immediate decision to pick up the series for a second season.

In an early interview about the series, Scorsese was was quoted:

To me, it’s as if we’re talking now about the 1980s or late 1970s. That was like yesterday to me. The 20s in my head were always very present because my parents always referred to it: the music, the people, the clothes. I know all the songs from that period; I know all the films. We knew it all. And so it was a natural transition. But you know I really was fascinated with the idea of working with Terry Winter and these guys, and taking these characters over 13 hours, developing them, developing their story, the complications of corruption in American politics.

Anthony Venutolo of The Star-Ledger covered the award for NJ.com.

Emmy Awards 2011: Martin Scorsese wins Directing for a Drama Series

Oscar-winning director Martin Scorsese has won Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series for the pilot of “Boardwalk Empire.”

The period HBO drama was adapted from Nelson Johnson’s best-selling non-fiction book “Boardwalk Empire: The Birth, High Times, and Corruption of Atlantic City.” It centered on real-life criminal kingpin Enoch “Nucky” Johnson. On the show, the central character’s name was changed to Enoch “Nucky” Thompson (Steve Buscemi). He portrays the Atlantic County Treasurer who rose to prominence during the Prohibition period of the ’20s and ’30s in Atlantic City.

The show is run by Emmy Award-winning screenwriter Terence Winter of “The Sopranos.” Other producers include Scorsese, Mark Wahlberg and frequent episode director Tim Van Patten.

Read the full story at NJ.com.

Jeff Vasser, president of the Atlantic City Convention & Visitors Authority announced today that historian Nelson Johnson will be honored with the Spirit of Hospitality Award at the 14th Annual Atlantic City Host Awards in May.

“Nelson Johnson has been a supporter of Atlantic City throughout its stages of evolution,” said Vasser. “His fondness of Atlantic City is not only evident in the fact that he’s been a member of the community for more than 30 years, but also in the two decades he spent researching and writing Boardwalk Empire, essentially a love letter to the city.”

The Spirit of Hospitality Award is given to an outstanding individual who has made a significant long-term contribution to the region’s hospitality and travel industry each year.

This year’s recipient, local attorney and now Superior Court Judge, Johnson is probably best known as the author of Boardwalk Empire: The Birth, High Times, and Corruption of Atlantic City. First published in 2002, HBO purchased the television rights to Boardwalk Empire and with, Terence Winters, Emmy Award-winning writer of The Sopranos, created the award winning TV series that first aired last September.  The HBO series stares Steve Buscemi as Nucky Thompson, based on the real-life Enoch “Nucky” Johnson.

Johnson has recently published a sequel to Boardwalk Empire which was released by Plexus Publishing, Inc. in November of 2010. His new book, The Northside: African Americans and the Creation of Atlantic City chronicles the story of Atlantic City’s Black community and its critical role in the transformation of Atlantic City from a quiet beach village into a national resort.  Plexus Publishing has made a sample chapter from The Northside available online.

Along with the Spirit of Hospitality Award, winners from 26 different categories will be announced in the gala event. Proceeds will benefit The ACCVA Foundation, a charitable organization created by the Atlantic City Convention & Visitors Authority.

The 14th Annual Atlantic City Host Awards takes place on Wednesday, May 11 beginning at 6:30 p.m. in the Ballroom at Atlantic City Boardwalk Hall. Registration and a cocktail reception begin one hour earlier at 5:30 p.m. Tickets for the event are $65. Individual tickets and tickets for tables of 10 are available. For additional information and reservations, contact Jacqueline Carole at (609) 449-7174 or jcarole@accva.com.

From: Shoring up the Boardwalk Empire, a black History Month feature.

When Judge Nelson Johnson wrote Boardwalk Empire, his history of corrupt Atlantic City, he certainly had no idea the Prohibition-era chapters would inspire the celebrated HBO series.

But he did know this: The chapter on the African American involvement in the creation of the resort - Chapter 3, titled “A Plantation by the Sea” - was destined to be the basis for another book.

“It became apparent if you remove the black experience from Atlantic City’s history, then the town never comes to be,” Johnson said in a phone interview from his chambers in the Atlantic County Civil Courthouse in Atlantic City.

“When you have two generations where 95 percent of the hotel workforce was African American, then how does this town ever develop as a regional, national resort unless you have the black experience?

“Intellectually this really bothered me,” he said. “I knew a single chapter wasn’t going to do it.”

The resulting book, The Northside: African Americans and the Creation of Atlantic City (Plexus Publishing, $24.95), appeared late last year and has sold about 2,500 copies. It is now in its second printing. Boardwalk Empire, published in 2002, has sold close to 100,000 copies, said Plexus publisher John Bryans.

As to Boardwalk Empire, Johnson said he was most gratified not by the HBO series, but by the fact that three colleges - Rutgers, Stockton, and Princeton - are using the book in urban history classes.

“I’m thrilled that these people who really helped me are still alive,” said Johnson, who plans no book tour but says he will never turn down a church, library, or school.

“When you have first-person accounts from people who experienced something, it’s like a piece of gold thread, you can tie together the story.”

Read the rest of By Amy S. Rosenberg’s Shoring up the Boardwalk Empire on Philly.com website.

The Richard Stockton College of New Jersey will confer an honorary degree, Doctor of Humane Letters, on Nelson Johnson, author of the books Boardwalk Empire and the followup, The Northside: African Americans and the Creation of Atlantic City.  The Northside focuses on the contributions of Atlantic City’s black citizens to the city’s growth and success and Johnson’s first book, Boardwalk Empire: The Birth, High Times, and Corruption of Atlantic City, is the basis for the award-winning HBO dramatic series of the same name.

The announcement was made yesterday at the meeting of the College’s Board of Trustees.

Nelson Johnson’s family has been in Atlantic County before the founding of Atlantic City itself.  A lifelong resident of Hammonton, he practiced law for 30 years and has been active in Atlantic City and Atlantic County civic matters during that time.  He was an attorney for the Atlantic City Planning Board at the time of the approvals for many of the city’s casinos; Johnson was inspired to make sense of the city’s history and to write an objective account.  The interviews, research and writing involved in his first book spanned nearly 20 years.

The honoree frequently stopped working on Boardwalk Empire to wrestle with how to handle the thorny subject of race in Atlantic City’s history.  He persisted, and the result was a chapter “A Plantation by the Sea” that inspired the powerful sequel. Plexus Publishing, Inc. has made A Plantation by the Sea- The Northside available for anyone to read online at TheNorthsideBook.com.

The degree will be conferred at Stockton’s spring Commencement ceremonies in May. Mr. Johnson will also deliver the speech prior to college seniors receiving their degrees.

Historian Nelson C. Johnson, author of “Boardwalk Empire,” has a new book called “The Northside: African Americans and the Creation of Atlantic City” (Plexus Publishing, 384 pp. , $24.95), which is a well-received history about the predominately black neighborhoods of Atlantic City. He spoke with Star-Ledger columnist Mark Di Ionno this past week about why the National Museum of African American History and Culture is important to all Americans.

Q: Lonnie Bunch, the founding director of the museum, wants exhibits that shows African-American history in keeping with the overall American experience, from the founding of the nation until today. Do you agree with that approach?

A: Yes. Without free, forced labor, the infrastructure, population and economy of colonial America would have developed at a crawl. If the slave experience were removed from our nation’s history … would the critical mass required to contemplate separation from England have existed? I think not. … Without free labor, the 13 colonies would have been very different.

Q: The history of the African-American middle class in the decades before the civil rights movement is somewhat of a lost story, overshadowed by the more dramatic events of the late 1950s and 1960s. Why is this era important?

A: This era is important because it was an age of “uplift,” critical to moving past the slave experience. The children and grandchildren of freed slaves had a sense of purpose to their lives like few people in our history. From circa 1880 through 1960, by and large, African-Americans had a “civic mind,” which understood the connectedness of their existence and a “sense of urgency” that propelled their advancement through education.

Read the rest of Mark Di Ionno’s talk with Neklson Johnson at Q & A: Nelson Johnson on the African-American museum at NJ.com

Before it was too late…

When Nelson Johnson finally finished “The Northside,” his in-depth history of Atlantic City’s black community, relief washed over him.

Not the type of relief a writer feels when meeting a deadline, nor the relief one feels when an exhaustive process is finally finished. For Johnson, author of the acclaimed “Boardwalk Empire,” it was as though he had beaten death. Not his own, but the mortal timeline of some of his books’ key contributors.

“All of the key people that helped me with Boardwalk Empire are dead,” Johnson said before launching into a list of the deceased. “So, when Sid Trusty died, I said, ‘Oh no, not again.’”

Trusty, a native of the Northside and unofficial historian of the city’s black community, convinced Johnson to write the book, insisting that the story had to be told, and told accurately.

Johnson said he wrote the book for people such as Trusty, to give them what they deserved.

He had originally tried to summarize the Atlantic City black community’s history in “Plantation by the Sea,” a chapter of his bestselling book-turned-television-series “Boardwalk Empire.”

Read the rest of Michael Clark’s article in the Atlantic City News.

BOARDWALK EMPIRE
by Nelson Johnson
Ebury Press, 312pp, £16.99
Review by Lee Randall

The Scotsman - Looking for two words to sum up Atlantic City, New Jersey? They’d ave to be “sea” and “sin,” especially when describing its heyday in the first half of the 20th century. Not only were normal rules of decorum suspended, even Federal law didn’t take hold: Prohibition never happened there. The economy was dependent on tourism, so the city pandered to visitors, and as one long-time resident said: “If the people who came to town had wanted Bible readings, we’d have given ‘em that. But nobody ever asked for Bible readings. They wanted booze, broads, and gambling, so that’s what we gave ‘em.”

As a lawyer for Atlantic City’s planning board in the 1980s, when applications for many of the casinos were being approved, Nelson Johnson - now a Superior Court Judge - grew fascinated by the resort’s complicated history. He spent 20 years fact-finding and interviewing eye-witnesses, a task he describes as “a race against death”. Many key sources were elderly and initially reticent. He was persistent, and the pay-off, Boardwalk Empire, benefits from the wealth of detail he unearthed or scrupulously verified. Johnson moves with a reasonable degree of grace between novelistic scenes and straightforward factual reportage. Many of these facts are so eye-popping that they require no further embellishment.

Read the rest of Lee Randall’s review at Scotsman.com News.

Atlantic County’s 24th annual MLK Commemorative Birthday Celebration Friday was January 14th at the County Office Building in Atlantic City. County Executive Dennis Levinson presented the annual Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. awards to two Atlantic County women.

Jacqueline McBride of Egg Harbor Township and Atlantic City native Turiya S. A. Raheem were recognized for upholding King’s principles who envisioned a colorblind society and strove to end racial segregation and discrimination through civil disobedience and nonviolence based on the teachings of Gandhi.

The awards ceremony on Friday featured a keynote address from Nelson Johnson, Atlantic County historian, and author of “Boardwalk Empire” and “The Northside: African Americans and the Creation of Atlantic City.”

The Hammonton resident’s latest book details the extraordinary impact of African-Americans on the city’s history from the early 19th century to its heyday.

“The Northside” was recently selected by Library Journal as a Black History Month sneak peek and “Boardwalk Empire” was adapted into a successful HBO series.

In addition, “The Northside: African Americans and the Creation of Atlantic City” recently joined five other nonfiction titles and four fiction books in a listing of Notable African American Titles released this week by the influential Publishers Weeky.

The Atlantic City Boys & Girl’s Club and the United Way of Atlantic City jointly present “Celebrating the Northside” on Feb 10. The event—held during Black History Month in recognition of the unique accomplishments and contributions of Atlantic City’s African American community—will feature live jazz along with art, photography, and history exhibits. It will also mark the public launch of the new book, The Northside: African Americans and the Creation of Atlantic City, Nelson Johnson’s remarkable sequel to Boardwalk Empire. The $25 admission benefits the two charities and includes a free book signed by the New York Times bestselling author.

For more information visit the United Way of Atlantic County