Welcome to Litsy!

This long-lost autobiography of a woman who lived life with no regrets from the 1880’s to the 1960’s offers a rare look into the colorful criminal underworld from New York to San Francisco and every whorehouse, tavern, and mining camp in between. Dirty Helen, with the self-assurance of a defrocked debutante, takes you through her life and adventures. Demure, sweet, and wild teenage Helen flees from small-town Indiana to Cincinnati with her first of six husbands. She soon realizes that the traditional role of wife and mother isn’t for her. She meets cunning millionaires, bank robbers, detectives, and gangsters as she hustles her way through life. Her friends were everyone else’s enemies- Al Capone, Big Jim Colosimo, and Johnny Torrio all spend time with Helen as she bounces from adventure to adventure. It’s the true-life story of a woman who never said “No” and carved out an independent life that transgressed every societal boundary. Her life is a rarely seen look into the reality of a working-class woman who chose sex-work as a path to the good life.