Died Bronx, NY, c1951.
Gagliano entered the U.S in spring 1905 and settled in East Harlem. He found early employment in a feed business. He was naturalized a citizen in the summer of 1915, while residing near the intersection of East 108th Street and First Avenue, and he traveled abroad in the summer of 1920.
It appears likely that Gagliano was associated with the Morello-Terranova Mafia in East Harlem. He later became a member of Reina's Bronx-based underworld organization. In the later 1920s, Reina and Terranova became rivals.
As trouble between Joe Masseria and the Brooklyn Castellammarese Mafia began in 1930, Reina's organization was divided. Reina outwardly sided with Masseria but his sympathies were with the Castellammarese. Reina's Feb. 26, 1930, assassination, probably at the hands of Masseria men, caused Gagliano, Tommy Lucchese and much of their organization to give their support to the Castellammarese.
Gagliano and Lucchese appear to have cooperated on the 1930 assassination of Joe Pinzolo, a Masseria puppet installed as Family leader after Reina's death.
Gagliano was officially recognized as boss of the old Reina group after the war ended in 1931. Lucchese served as his underboss until about 1951. Gagliano is presumed to have died of natural causes in that period. (The date of Gagliano's death is not certain.)
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