Anastasia's murder was the first gangland style rubout of a New York mob boss after the Mafia Commission was formed in 1931. It paved the way for the man for whom the crime family is still named, and was a main topic at a national mob convention in Apalachin, New York a month later. 

Until now, rival Colombo mobsters who hated each other had alternately taken credit for the 1957 killing. Early on, Crazy Joe Gallo (left) and his crew were said to have been at the scene. Many years later, Colombo boss Carmine (Junior) Persico (right) boasted to a relative through marriage that he had done the work.

No one was ever charged with any aspect of the murder plot. But there was no question that Carlo Gambino, who took over the crime family when Anastasia hit the floor, was behind the hit.

According to knowledgeable sources on both sides of the law, the killing was carried out by a three-man hit team selected by then-capo Joseph (Joe the Blonde) Biondo, who became Gambino's underboss and remained in the post until shortly before he died in 1966.

The primary shooter, sources said, was Stephen (Stevie Coogan)

Grammauta, then 40, a drug dealer who was convicted of heroin trafficking eight years later. Seemingly inactive for decades, Grammauta (left) emerged in the late 1990s as a Gambino capo, several years after John Gotti, who also took over the Gambino family through murder, was jailed for life.

"He never showed up at the Ravenite Social Club during Gotti's reign (when Gotti demanded that all his troops show up once a week), but he's now a captain," said one law enforcement official. 

Last year, the FBI began carrying Grammauta as the acting underboss of the family. Grammauta, 84, has been spotted at several Gambino family functions during the last two years, sources said, including a wake for soldier Liborio (Bobby Red) Crapanzano last March.

Stephen Armone, then 57, was the leader of the crew. The third member of the team, and the second shooter, sources said, was Arnold (Witty) Wittenberg, then 53, a drug dealer and long-time cohort of the mobsters.

All three men hailed from the Lower East Side.

Sources said that Armone's younger brother, Joseph (Joe Piney) Armone – an early member of the Dapper Don's plot to kill Paul Castellano three 

decades later – was selected for the hit but was nabbed on a drug charge and replaced by brother Steve.

Steve Armone was a pioneer drug dealer. He moved into the junk trade at the end of the Prohibition era, serving 28 months for a 1935 federal drug rap. He died of natural causes in 1960. Wittenberg died in 1978. 

In 1965, Grammauta and Joe Armone (right) were convicted of smuggling heroin from the Netherlands. Grammauta served five years in prison. When he got out, he virtually disappeared from the feds' radar screen, although the FBI listed him as a made guy in 1988. Joe Piney served 10 years, became a capo, an underboss for Gotti in 1986. He died in prison in 1992. Grammauta took over Piney's crew, later moving up to acting underboss, sources said.

The myth that Gallo was behind the Anastasia hit started where many tall tales begin – in a bar.

Sidney Slater, an associate of Gallo and his crew, told acquaintances that Gallo had acknowledged his involvement while they were hoisting a few about a week after the hit.

Slater said that as they talked about the killing in the bar, Slater wondered

aloud who had done it and that Gallo indicated himself, and four cohorts at the bar, Ralph Mafrici, Joseph (Joe Jelly) Gioelli, Frank (Punchy) Illiano, and Sonny Camerone.

"You can call the five of us the barbershop quintet," Gallo said, according to Slater.

The hit went down on Oct. 25, 1957, at about 10:20 A.M. Anastasia (left) was relaxing in chair No. 4 at the Park Sheraton Hotel barbershop in midtown Manhattan. His hair was being clipped while the shop owner, Arthur Grasso, sat and talked to him. In chair No. 5 was Vincent (Jimmy Jerome) Squillante, a close associate of Anastasia. A doctor was in the chair next to Squillante.

Two men walked in through the hotel lobby door. One strode up to Anastasia and opened up with a .38 caliber pistol. One shot went into the back of Anastasia's head and lodged in the left side of his brain. Two shots got him in his left hand. Another bullet went into his back at a downward angle, penetrating a lung, a kidney, and his spleen.

The second shooter fired a .32 caliber pistol. One bullet went through the right side of Anastasia's hip, and there also was a grazing wound to the back of Anastasia's neck. Anastasia lurched out of the chair and crashed to the floor dead.

Manicurist Jean Wineberger said the primary shooter was about 40 years old, 5'10" to 5’11", on the slim side, 175 to 180 lbs. He had blondish hair with

a pompadour, fair complexion, and was right-handed.

The second shooter, she said, was about 45 years old, 5'7", stocky build, medium complexion, and may have been Italian or Jewish. 

She said the two gunmen tried to run out onto the street, but the door was locked, so they exited through the hotel lobby – walking, not running. Squillante, who ran the family's private sanitation rackets, jumped up immediately, and said "Let me out of here," and left.  

Police found the murder weapons nearby, a .32 caliber Smith and Wesson long-barrel revolver and a .38 caliber Colt pistol, along the route the shooters used to easily get away.

Two years later, the Manhattan District Attorney's office reviewed the case and included in its summary a note that a subject had "identified Ralph Mafrici and Joseph Gioelli as the perpetrators of this crime." Gioelli was already dead; Mafrici, in prison on an assault and robbery conviction, was brought in for questioning and said nothing.

In 1973, Vincent (Fat Vinnie) Teresa jumped on the Gallo bandwagon in his book, "My Life in the Mafia." He said the Gallo brothers were part of a murder conspiracy run by Vito Genovese (right) and Carlo Gambino, (left) and the Gallos drove to Providence, Rhode Island to obtain

permission to use a New England associate as the lead shooter. Teresa's tale, like much of what he wrote, got little support from law enforcement.

In 1984, Persico put himself into the mix, although he surely did not intend for it to become public. A long-time adversary of the Gallo brothers, Persico resented the glory they got for carrying out the famous Anastasia hit, especially because he knew they didn't.

When Persico was on the run and hiding at Fred DeChristopher's home, he told his reluctant host that he had taken care of the feared Anastasia. "That fag Joey Gallo took the credit, but I hurt Anastasia," he said, thumping his own chest for emphasis, DeChristopher told the FBI.

Information that took a long time to surface now shows that Persico, like Gallo before him, was just blowing smoke. There probably was a bar in DeChristopher's home.