BUMPY JOHNSON'S WIFE SPEAKS ON FRANK LUCAS...SORRY NO PHOTO !

According to Mayme Johnson (Bumpy Johnson's widow, 2nd photo) drug lord Frank Lucas (American Gangster) was little more than a flunky to Bumpy Johnson (above), and a flunky whom Bumpy never fully trusted. Frank -- Bumpy, said -- was a liar, and it’s easier to trust a thief than a liar. A thief, Bumpy reasoned steals because he needs money; a liar lies for the hell of it.

When I heard that Lucas wrote a magazine article a few years back claiming that he was Bumpy’s right hand man, and that Bumpy died in his arms, I was upset. He lied.

Now I understand that there’s a movie coming out starring Denzel Washington called “American Gangster” which tells the life of Frank Lucas and will perpetrate that lie. I’m now furious.

Now why would Frank tell such a lie? Because he figures that since Junie Byrd, Nat Pettigrew, Finley Hoskins and Sonny Chance have all died, there’s no one alive to reveal the fact that he’s lying. Maybe he’s figured I’m dead, too. Well, he’s wrong – I’m 93, and old – but I’m still kicking (not as high as I once did), and I have all of my mental faculties.

There have been legends, myths, and rumors flying around about Bumpy for decades, and I’ve never spoken to confirm or deny any – even when the movie “Hoodlum” was released in 1997, and contained all kinds of factual errors about the man I love. But now I’ve finally decided to speak out. To set the record straight. To tell the truth and damn the devil. To let the world know about the real Bumpy Johnson.

Harlem Godfather: The Rap On My Husband, Ellsworth “Bumpy” Johnson will be the first complete biography of a man who for years was Harlem’s best kept, and most cherished secret. While most of the world is familiar with -- and fascinated by -- the organized crime organizations of the Italian, Irish, Jewish and Russian communities, this will be a rare glimpse into the organized underworld of African Americans.