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Here you have the first actual photo-
graphic story ever published of the
world famous beer wars of Chicago
Gangland. It begins with the
murder of "Diamond Jim" Colo-
simo at the dawn of prohibition,
and it continues on up through the years, death by death, until the killers of Gangland finally gradu-
ated from murder to massacre on St. Valentine's day, 1929, and more recently hit one below the belt
by assassinating Alfred "Jake" Lingle, a newspaper reporter. ^ With the country-wide publication of
the massacre photograph, public indifference to Gangland's crimes came to an abrupt end. The work
of destroying organized crime in Chicago began determinedly, coldly, sternly. To use a phrase borrowed
from Gangland, the exponents of the "gat" and the machine gun are today being "pushed around" by
fcency and Integrity, and they must surely fall into the abyss of oblivion. ^ What has brought about
uprising? More than any other single factor has been the wide and unceasing publicity given to
Gangland's activities, t It was this fact that gave the authors the idea for this book. Newspaper
reporters of long Chicago police experience, they realized that any book showing the criminals of Booze-

!dom MS they really are would necessarily be one of brutality and blood and horror. Only in such a
Book could it be done. ^ X Marks The Spot is the result. In its terrible Truth, this book will become
bf tremendous value in obliterating gangsters from the Chicago scene. The publication of death
pictures in newspapers is becoming more common every day. Editors have at last realized the terrific
torce a death picture can exert, particularly in driving home the lesson that the underworld has present
day civilization in its grip. ^ The ultimate good of the death picture far outweighs the shock that it may
have on a certain delicate emotional segment of the newspaper readers. A famous New York news-
paper editor commenting in Editor & Publisher recently on the publication of the Valentine massacre
picture, declared that "it was a more powerful example of the defiance of law and order by the under-
world than could be drawn by twenty-five columns of editorials." f In Chicago the tendency to pub-
lish death pictures, particularly of slain gangsters, :s definite and growing. And the result is the pass-
ing of the gangster. It is interesting to speculate on what the effect might have been on crime in Chicago
if this tendency had manifested itself on page one four or five years ago. Jf X Marks The Spot publishes
those pictures for the first time. The body of the gangster which was blotted out and an X substituted
is restored as the camera saw it. You have read the story in countless volumes, now, for the first time
you can see it. You will see Chicago crime "put on the spot."

"HIS FAVORITE POSE

Here is an excellent likeness of Alphonse Capone, the Big Boy of
Chicago Gangland, and the greatest gangster that ever lived. JVhen
King Al poses for a photograph ivhich isn't often, he always turns
his right cheek to the camera. The left one is disfigured by an ugly
scar. Legend has if that Capone was struck by a machine gun bullet
when he was a soldier in France.

When you look at organized crime in Chicago
you first see Alphonse Capone. aptly and accu-
rately described by his vassals of the underworld
as the "Big Fellow." You may be sure he is that
to them. Gangland's phrases are as full of mean-
ing and as expressive as they are curious and
original, and to be the Big Fellow is to be king.

Capone's rise to his present position of un-
disputed leadership has been swift, remarkable
and inevitable ; and the complete story of the beer
wars of Chicago is his story, his biography. Other
more picturesque figures have emerged from the
shadowy realm of Gangland since prohibition and
the Volstead Act threw it into bloody strife. Dion
O'Banion stands out a gaudy figure, and so does
"Little Hymie" Weiss, both of whom challenged
the rule of Capone for a short violent time, and
they looked like Big Fellows while they lasted,
but they didn't last. Today it is quite plain that
nothing either of them ever achieved in Gangland
history possessed finish and perfection in the same
degree as did the deft and artistic method by
which they were eliminated and laid away.
O'Banion and "Little Hymie" and all the others,
living and dead, are but thrilling paragraphs and
chapters in the rise of Capone. With each suc-
cessive death Capone stepped on closer to the
position where Gangland was compelled to call
him the Big Fellow.

Whether you like it or not, and probably
you don't. Capone has become a figure of na-
tional and even international
interest. Reach for your daily
newspaper, and you'll find him
duly chronicled along with
Lindbergh, Will Rogers, Henry
Ford, William Scott ^IcBride,
Bishop Cannon, Charlie Chap-
lin, John Gilbert and all the
others who romp daily across
the front page.

At thirty-three his position
has become so firm and secure
as the Big Fellow of the under-
world that his vast affairs move
machine-like even when he

of becoming
can't be on the job. When the Philadeli^eir t'-ucks
gathered him in and laid him away in a ''^ ' "
in the county jail in 1929 his henchmen, (..^.g g^.
to him and trained in his methods carried cWer in
when he was freed and had returned to Chi*?^^'^
there was a great celebration in Gangland in hoign!!
of the Big Fellow. From every province of ft's
underworld came representatives to a great meet*
ing and when it was over they all departed to
their rackets crying "All for Al, and Al for All."
With no intention of eulogizing him, Capone
unquestionably stands out as the greatest and
most successful gangster who ever lived. What is
significant is that he is really a gangster, as much
so as the celebrated Monk Eastman and Big Jack
Zelig of New York. As a youth he was himself
a member of their notorious Five Points gang,
and the diflference between him and all other gang-
sters is that he is possessed of a genius for organ-
ization and a profound business sense. It was
Edwin A. Olsen, United States District Attorney,
who stated in 1926 that Capone operated on a gross
basis of $70,000,000 a year which takes in only
his illicit liquor business. What he profits from
his prodigious gambling and vice syndicates can
only be a speculative matter.

This book looks at King Al purely from an
objective standpoint. What goes on under his hat,
or under the hat of any of his ilk, is a profound
mystery as far as this book is concerned. And, aS'
Capone's public utterances have been few and
brief, they have been of little service in revealing
his mental pi'ocesses. Neither is this book inter-
ested in the conditions which have made him a
supreme sniffler of law and order.

But he is a glamorous figure, an actual part of
the American scene. Legends already are springing
up around him, fiction writers have found him the
inspiration for a vast production of current litera-
ture. The magazine stands are aflame with under-
world stories and Gangland stories about the man
with the gat who wears a tuxedo and has a liver-
ied chauff'eur. Over in England Mr. Edgar Wallace
has just evolved another thriller, this time in
dramatic form, from material hastily gathered
during a visit to Chicago. The
visit included a crime tour of
_ the city with Commissioner

|!^^3^ Stege of the detective bureau

at his side calhng out the spots.

And so this book will take
you along the journey traveled
by Mr. Capone in reaching his
present height. It will show
you What and When and How
and Where, but not Why. Ca-
pone is the world's outstanding
gangster and for that reason
well worth writing about and
looking at. Let's have a look.

- - -"

[3]

(apon e s

^underworld

DEBUT

"... ello. Iss dis the Beeg Jim Colosimo who is spik ?
... I am ver' glad. Dis iss lettle Jimmy. I am jus callin'
you to tell you that I am goin' to keel you someday . . .
I don't know just when it will bee, but it will come.
Goobye."

The telephone clicked and "charming" Vincenzo Cos-
mano, perhaps the most perfect type of killer ever pro-
duced by Gangland before prohibition and the machine-
gun era, had cordially announced to "Big" Jim Colosimo,
Chicago's first great underworld king, that the "finger was

^-on him."

In the picturesque argot of the half-world to put the
finger on a man is to mark him for death. "Big" Jim

, Colosimo had had many fingers put on him, but never
before had the knowledge affected him like this. It had

i come at a time when everything seemed going wrong,

' and he trembled and began to perspire.

Verging on emotional stampede "Big" Jim got in touch
with his lieutenant, Johnny Torrio, who, for three years

, , had been handling these matters in a relentless and high-
handed manner. When Colosimo had brought Johnny out
from New York to be his body guard, he had been able to
enjoy a measure of peace and security. The black-handers

L Jiad been beaten back; now again their sinister corre-

B^spondence appeared in his mail. "Big" Jim didn't admit

[ it cT himself, but he was afraid. Johnny Torrio knew that
"Big" Jim was afraid when, on that morning, he called

' and said to him, "Johnny, perhaps you would like to

,* have another good man to help you ? " And Johnny under-

^ stood and said, "yes."

- And so "Big" Jim left Chicago a few days later for New

York. Shortly after he returned bringing with him two
burly Italians, both of them young men and graduates of
the celebrated Five Points Gang of New York, an organi-

1 zation of which Little Johnny Torrio was an alumnus.
One of these men was a quiet, furtive chap who called

' himself Alphonse Capone, and the other was Frankie Yale.
Alphonse had come to stay; Frankie
would leave just as soon as he had

' finished a special assignment. Well,
the special assignment had to do
with Signer Cosmano, the boy who
always called his shots.

A few days later a big automo-
bile whirled round a corner at high
speed. On the corner Jimmy, fool-
ishly enough stood taking the air.
There was a terrific roar, and
Little Jimmy fell to the cement.
his body full of lead. Writhing in
pain he was taken to the hospital
by the police, who camped outside
his door, intending to grab him if
death didn't, and death didn't. But,
neither did the cops.

Little Jimmy was a Sicilian and
he had many Sicilian friends who
thought well of his talents and
were distressed that the law might
store him away. In desperation
they took the matter up with one
"Big Tim" Murphy, a powerful
union official and underworld char-
acter from the "back-o-the-yards"
iistrict.

'.•4

Meet Mr. Ike Bloom, manager of "The Mid-
Hig'lit Frolics" a popular whoopee joint in
Chicago located just around the corner
from Colosimo's cafe. Ike was an
friend of "Big" Jim Colosimo.

j [4]

"What can we do for Little Jimmy?" implored the
agitated Italians. Mr. Murphy was silent for several
minutes thinking. Then he said curtly and without a
smile: "Go up and take him." And they did.

And there you have the debut in Chicago of Alphonse
Capone who was to rise to a towering position as the
"Big Fellow" of the underworld in less than a decade. A
great many of the local citizenry will tell you today that
the debut of Capone together with the advent of prohibi-
tion was the worst "break" sustained by Chicago since
the great fire.

His first job then was that of a body guard for Colosimo.
In order to better understand him it is necessary to examine
the new background in which the vice lord had established
him. "Big" Jim laid the foundations upon which Capone was
later to build his mighty undei-world empire. At the time
of young Capone's arrival Colosimo was the master of
the" notorious old levee district. His principal interests
were syndicated vice, syndicated prostitution and syn-
dicated gambling, a fact unknown by many who believe
organized crime to be a recent phenomenon in Chicago.
Colosimo's first appearance in the old levee district had
been twenty years before when he was only seventeen
years old. His first job was as a street-sweeper. It was
the cleanest he ever held. More cunning than intelligent,
something of a fist fighter and, above all, peculiarly
talented in the art of making friends, young Colosimo
soon became immensely popular with his countrymen who
represented a majority of the population. The politicians
in the old levee soon found Colosimo and marked him for
their own. Smart "wops" like him were much in demand
to keep political machines running smoothly. From then
on young Colosimo's rise in the underworld was rapid.
The step from street-sweeper to bawdy house proprietor
had been easy and within a few years he had gathered in
a half-dozen such places together with a few gambling
dives and two cafes. The secret of it all was that he could
sway the voting population at will. Politicians curried his
favor, the big shots among them soon heard Colosimo
telling them, instead of asking them. No one dared molest
the brothels, the gambling hells and opium joints owned
or controlled by him, and as early as 1915, the year he
summoned Johnny Torrio from New York, he had become a
law unto himself, a maker and breaker of political aspira-
tions, a man of countless friendships and, alas, of countless
enemies.

As he acquired wealth the black-handers began to tor-
ture him with their demands and threats. Torrio, as we
have said, was effective in dealing with these sinister
groups, and he not only brought a measure of content and
security to "Big" Jim, but his presence in the underworld
seemed to cause another wave of prosperity to sweep over
the underworld domain. "Big" Jim's evil business interests
began to expand. Vice and crime
crept slowly into new territory,
principally the great steel and in-
dustrial centers of the South Side.
With the adept Johnny at his
side plus the heaviness of advanc-
ing age, Colosimo began to mani-
fest symptoms of indolence. Feel-
ing safe once more from stray bul-
lets and powder bombs, he took
things easy. Important matters
were left entirely to capable John-
ny. Colosimo did not stir himself
even in the great reform period
when the battering ram of public
sentiment began tearing wide holes
in the old levee district. But Johnny
took care of matters pretty well,
and continued to operate by the
simple expedient of retiring into
the buffet flat and the call house.

Colosimo was plainly in decline,
and his inactivity was regarded
with a cold eye by his companions
and the politicians. Lassitude took
firmer hold on him as the days
passed, and Colosimo spent most of
his days just sitting in his huge
ornate cafe dreaming contentedly.

old

People began to talk, and what they said, in effect, was
that Colosimo wasn't really so hot after all and that the
real smart guys, the brains behind the throne were really
Johnny Torrio and that relentless aid who was always
with him, Alphonse Capone. And they were right.

The Golden Era. otherwise known as prohibition, went
into effect on July 30, 1919. It made a swell law to break,
the very best one on the book. Torrio and Capone were
just pushing Colosimo into this highly lucrative business
and showing him some excellent methods by which the
law could be smashed when the end came for him.

This unhappy event brings us back to Colosimo's tend-
ency to take life easy, to keep his eyes closed. It takes
us to his cafe which operates to this day at 2126 South

onfofthe'lTer ^^ '^'"'^ requires that v^'^^S
one of the loveliest women who ever had the j,g,. fjjdn't

to have her name mentioned in connection with "
world. Miss Dale Winter, church singer, musica
star, and, for a few days, Mrs. Jim Colosimo. 'ss, eni-
The underworld lord found Miss Winter a s?^*^'' '"
actress, ambitious to further her vocal studies, and \ have
to sing in his cabaret in order that she might make ei.'?^*''
money to realize her dream. Her appearance in his '?"]'
was a disagreeable sensation in the undenvorld. Obviou*'^
she didn't belong there and what did the king mean £*
thus associating with respectability?

But Colosimo was more than interested in the beautiful
singer who stood nightly beside the piano and the orchestra
and sang to panders, dope peddlers, bootleg-
gers, thugs, and plug uglies. Colosimo was
in love with her and, for the first time in his
life, decent impulses began to stir in his
curious and contradictory nature.

The presence of Miss Winter in Colosimo's
cafe had its effect, for the gentry of the
underworld who had used it for years as
their favorite rendezvous began to absent
themselves as vermin before an extermi-
nator. She seemed to renovate the place by
her very presence and, more important, she
seemed to renovate Colosimo himself. More
and more absorbed did Colosimo become in
his love for the tiny flower of a woman.
He had broken definitely with his wife, de-
spite the importunities of his friends and
countrymen.

Under the delicate hand of Jliss Winter
the cafe, once a perfect example of what
money without taste can perform, was trans-
formed into a place of beauty. It became
a popular and delightful place in which to
spend an evening after the theater. The
food was excellent, the music good and the
singing of Miss Winter, the hostess, mar-
velous.

A decent element soon occupied the tables
and chairs where once the denizens of the
underworld were to be seen, and Colosimo's
Cafe became a show place, visited by many
celebrities including Enrico Caruso, the great
tenor, Florenz Ziegfeld. and opera singers
from the Chicago Civic Opera Company.
The reputation of Colosimo's Cafe extended
far and wide, and it became one of those
places in Chicago you simply couldn't afford
to miss seeing.

A rare photograph of "Big" Jim Colosimo and
his wife, Dale 'Winter, taken shortly after their
marriage. Note the laced shoes. Colosimo,
over-lord of the Chicago underworld for twenty
years, engaged Capone as his body guard when
Alphonse wag only a youngster.

[5]

"Big" Jim Colosimo as the photographers and police found him a few minntes after an expert Uller
deposited several bullets in his head. The assassination took place in Colosimo's ornate cafe.

Colosimo changed too, but not so definitely as did the
cafe. Dale Winter, devoutly in love with him, worked
long and assiduously to make a fine gentleman out of him
and she did wonders, considering the material. But even
in riding togs, in evening clothes, "Big" Jim retained some
of the odor of the underworld.

The transformed Colosimo lost caste with the under-
world. It was plain that the king had gone wrong, and in
the dumps and dives honeycombed throughout the old
levee district there were whispers that the finger was again
on Colosimo. And it was. And this time neither Little
^/Johnny nor Capone could avail him anything.

On March 29, 1920, Colosimo divorced his wife, Victoria,
and on April 16 he was married to Dale Winter. The cere-
mony was performed in Indiana and the undenvorld lord
vrith his bride went honeymooning at an Indiana resort. The
newspapers smoked with the story of his marriage and there
was a great flare of excitement, except of course in the
underworld. Colosimo's new found happiness lasted how-

ever only twenty-five days. He met his doom on May 11,
shortly after he and his bride had returned to Chicago.

Death came mysteriously and suddenly in the lobby of
his cafe on a sultry afternoon whither he had gone hur-
riedly in response to a mysterious telephone message. The
mystery of his assassination has not been solved to this day.
Thirty persons were questioned at the time and among them
were Capone and Torrio. It was all a waste of time, even
the long session the police held at headquarters with Little
Jimmy Cosmano who came forward voluntarily. Miss Win-
ter dropped out of the underworld at once without making
any claims even to the estate of her husband.

And so King Colosimo who was growing respectable
came to an inevitable end. Johnny Torrio stepped forth.
As Johnny had eclipsed his boss, soon too was Capone to
eclipse Torrio. The end of Colosimo, you might say, was
the beginning for Capone. He and Torrio began doing
things in a big way as we shall see.

[6]

BEEK FKONT

Johnny Torrio and Al Capone soon had the prohibition
law looking silly. All the power built up by "Big" Jim
Colosimo over a period of twenty years was inherited or
appropriated by them and, in their hands, it became an
excellent instrument with which to make the city all wet.
Under Colosimo the politicians had done business with the
dapper Johnny and they had put him down as a "right
guy," and so Johnny had no trouble in placing large hands-
ful of dough here and there where it would mean some-
thing. As for personnel, Johnny and Al could muster a
small army of pimps, panders, thugs, come-on men,
bouncers, pick-pockets and other vermin already employed
in the dives and bawdy houses owned or controlled by
them. This t-alented array was available at a moment's
notice to exert themselves in the beer cause, provided, of
course, the beer belonged to Johnny and Alphonse.

The next step in the beer scheme was to acquire a few
breweries. Johnny laid hold of two or three, but they
weren't enough. He went shopping again, this time north-
ward to the Gold Coast where respectability slumbered.
At the magnificent residence of a respectable gentleman,
ostensibly a retired brewer, Johnny presented his proposi-
tion, emphasizing his political pull, and, most of all the
fact that if he, the ex-brewer, would contribute the half-
dozen or more idle breweries o\\Tied by him, nobody need
know a thing about it. The ex-brewer could retain the
"ex" as far as the straphangers would ever know for, in
case of any trouble, Johnny would take the rap.

While Johnny was forming this famous partnership he
was not a little dismayed to learn that two other ambitious
gentlemen who were not at all averse to turning a hot
dollar here and there in the new racket had got a running
broad jump on him. These were Frankie Lake and Terry
Druggan, products of the Old Valley District, who were
to become famous in the annals of Gangdom as the Damon
and Pythias of the beer barons.
Buddies as boys, they had got
their early training under the
tutelage of the notorious Paddy
"The Bear" Ryan and had be-
come adept as wagon thieves,
which is to say they could pry
merchandise loose from trucks
and deliverj- vans while these
were in motion. When the Golden
Era of proliibition dawned
Frankie had become respectable
and was holding down a job of
putting out fires as a city fire-
man. At the time Torrio, with
only one or two beer manufac-
tories of his own, was tiying
to annex enough to make a good
showing, Terry and Frankie
were operating as many as six
or seven. Their first brewery
had been acquired through one
Richard Phillips, a partner in
Colosimo's Cafe aft3r the death
of "Big" Jim. From the afore-
mentioned ex-brewer they had
acquired a little later the Gam-
brinus. the Standard, the Hoff-
man, the Keiffer and the Stege
Brewing Companies.

And so Frankie and Terry
must be remembered as the boys
who administered prohibition in
Chicago its first swift kick in
the hip pocket. They produced
the first barrel of amber after
Volstead and they owned the
first trucks and vans that moved
over the streets. Thev were

One of the few photograplis in existence of Johnn;
Torrio, successor to "Big" Jim Colosimo. This one was
ta^en shortly after Torrio had found Gangland toe
tough for him. A settled chill in his feet inspired him
to scamper off to Italy where he could be out of
range of the automatics and machine guns of "Iiittle
Hymle" Weiss.

smart, too, and were horrified at the prospect of becoming
embroiled in any rough stuff. When one of their tracks
was appropriated, as occasionally happened, they didn't
oil a gat or reach for a machine gun.

When the toughest beer-runners in the business, em-
ployees of theirs, wanted to explode an automatic over in
the O'Donnell territorj-, Terry and Frankie would have
none of it. "Klondike" O'Donnell bought most of his beer
from them an^'^vay, so why not let him steal one occasion-
ally. "What the hell," chorused Terry and Frankie, "It's
only one load anyhow, so why bother about it. We'll just
draw a lot of heat on ourselves if we rap those guys.
Let 'em get away with it this time." And so no blood was
shed for which Frankie and Terry were responsible. They
continued on pleasant terms with "Klondike" O'Donnell,
and shook hands with him when he backed up his trucks
to their breweries and bought his beer for distribution.
Even when the war broke out Terry and Frankie made
desperate efforts to preserve neutrality, and in a measure
succeeded.

Torrio's vast political drag under the administration
was a convincing argument, and he induced the ex-brewer
to sign on the dotted line, stipulating however that he
was to retain the title of "ex" which meant that Torrio
was to be the front. He would remain incognito behind
Torrio's coat-tails should there be any trouble. It will
be interesting to tell you that there was trouble and a
long time later the ex-brewer was yanked from behind
the aforementioned coat-tails. It required the combined
efforts of two great newspapers to perform this feat,
however. One of them, an afternoon newspaper, appeared
one fine day with a mystery thriller in which the where-
abouts of the ex-brewer was suggested although his
name was not mentioned. This so iiTitated the Chicago
Tribune that Mr. Joe Stenson was unceremoniously un-
covered and tossed roughly right out onto page one where
he was well fried on both sides.

But to return to earlier and happier days for Mr.
Stenson, it may quite possibly be that he regarded the
partnership with Johnny Torrio with misgivings and a
sinking heart. Johnny had an unsavory reputation, and
Mr. Stenson might have had an impulse to tell Johnny to
go straight to our beautiful
lower regions. Instead of thus
speaking however, he did the
next best thing which was to
stipulate that there was to be
no gun-powder competition be-
tween him and the Druggan-
Lake interests. Torrio acquiesced
and all gentlemen, Frankie,
Johnny, Terry, and Joe, walked
hand in hand up to the beer
front.

Before long a score of brew-
eries were operating day and
night as in the good old days.
Hoodlums, armed with auto-
matics, sawed-off shot guns and
other weapons, aided sometimes
by the police guarded great con-
voys as they rumbled over the
cobble-stones. So rapidly were
they brought up to the beer
front that Chicago soon found
itself dotted with seven or eight
thousand speakeasies, and the
customers were lapping 'em up
at twenty-five cents a stein,
proving again that the public
pays and pays and pays. Access
to these thirst clinics sometimes
involved short walks down alleys
and the presentation of creden-
tials, but more often all that
was involved was a thirst and a
quarter.

Johnny and Al charged fifty
dollars a barrel for beer and
protection, the latter item being
most important because no

C7]

33 sy afen
es wiffhou

speakeasy ofen exist for fifteen
minutes wiflhout full knowledge
and consent) of the police captain
in whose precinct it may be lo-
cated. And Johnny and Al, great
contributors to the administra-
tion's war chest, were in a posi-
tion to sell protection. They
soon had the entire city mapped
out in a systematic way, with
certain definite territories al-
loted to the various groups. Pun-
ishment came swiftly to those
who were unwise enough to vio-
late any of the rules, for Johnny
and Al established their own en-
forcement agencies, and there
were skull-cracking crews, beer-
ininning contingents, and regular
staffs of killers. It was a great
system, and when Johnny or Al
told you to "laugh that one off"
you didn't laugh. Even when the
organization was operating with
a maximum of smoothness and
order there was always a little
killing or beating up job to be
taken care of, and Johnny and
Al had it done as a routine
matter. But despite all this per-
fection of organization the busi-
ness was getting tougher every
day, and Little Johnny looked
upon the tell-tale signs with mis-
givings. His booze syndicate was
causing him more trouble every
day, and he began to wonder if
someday these persistent little
flares of revolt might not grow
into a consuming conflagration.
The booze business had brought
him into contact with a different
breed of tough guy from the pimp and the pander and
the pickpocket associated in the vice business. An occa-
sional murder was all right, but the casualties brought on
by this new business were too many. Johnny's weekly
payroll, estimated at more than $25,000, included a breed
of individual who had personal courage and plenty of it.
Burglars, second story men, safe-crackers, sluggers for
labor unions, had gone into the liquor business feeling
that it afforded them a chance to go straight for the first
time in their lives. The obvious rewards lured them to a
frenzy comparable to that of the adventurous spirits who
joined the gold rush of '49. Johnny knew that the money
they were making was bad for them, but there could be
no salary reductions. A hoodlum with a thousand bucks
loose on the community was a dangerous man, especially
when he went out to play.

Alas, Johnny saw that conditions were not the same
as in the old days, when he could slap a pimp in the face
with his fist and get away with it. Let him try that stuff
on such vassals as Dion O'Banion over on the North Side,
or Frankie MacEarlane and his barb-wire kid brother,
Vincent, or Joe Saltis, or Lefty Koncil, or "Little Hymie"
Weiss, or Schemer Drucci or Red Hoban. Oh yes, let him

The Bie Boy doesn't seem to be disturbed If you believe
the smile on his face in this picture. It was snapped
down in Miami, Florida, just after he had bounced out
of a courtroom. "It's persecution, not prosecution,"
says Al.

forget himself with those lads!
Except for the O'Donnell
gang on the South Side, led by
the astute "Spike" O'Donnell,
the underworld realm seemed
fairly content under the iron
rule of Johnny and Al. Their
toughest lieutenant, Dion O'Ban-
ion, operating on the North
Side, seemed to be a "right guy,"
but Little Johnny secretly ex-
pected a break with him any
day. The powerful Genna broth-
ers over in Little Italy were a
surly, vain-glorious lot but still
loyal. Joe Saltis and Frank Mac-
Earlane also on the South Side
were desperate babies and had
already caused Torrio much em-
barrassment with the loop poli-
ticians with their battles against
the O'Donnells. The newspapers
had sizzled with accounts of the
killing of Jerry O'Connor, one
of "Spike's"boys, which had hap-
pened on September 7, 1923. Of
course Jerry had to go; he had
been raising too much hell with
good customers and that was
why Torrio's tough boys put him
in a horizontal position during
a surprise affray in the saloon
of Joseph Kepka. It was too bad
that "Spike" had been missed,
for the shooting of Jerry seemed
rather to intensify matters.
Torrio regretted, for business
reasons, the slaying of George
Bucher and George Meeghan.who
were O'Donnell men, but then it
couldn't be helped. They had
been talking too much about re-
vealing the slayers of Jerry, so there was more banging
and these boys folded up in death after a cloud of lead
had cracked into their automobile. That was on September
17, and Torrio had a most uncomfortable time of it when
a few weeks later the state's attorney, Robert E. Crowe,
brought about the indictments of Frank MacEarlane,
Thomas Hoban and Danny McFall. But the most disturb-
ing murder was that of Thomas (Morrie) Keane, on
December 1, 1923. "Morrie" and a companion beer-runner
William "Shorty" Egan, for "Spike" O'Donnell were re-
turning from Joliet with a truck load of beer. "Spike"
had been backing his trucks up to the breweries of Frankie
Lake and Terry Druggan, both Torrio boys as we have
seen, but the $45.00 price was too high, and Keane and
Egan, were merrily returning to Chicago with seventj^
barrels of brew from a brewery which "Spike" was trying
to purchase when they were hi-jacked. Ordered to get
into an automobile, Keane and Egan dutifully did so.
They were bound securely and sat in the rear seat for a
few minutes as the car speeded down the lonely highway
wondering at their fate. Suddenly they got it. One of the
men in the front seat, believed to have been Frank Mac-
Earlane, turned round, and emptied an automatic into them.

FOI.ICE BTTII.SINGS IN CHICAGO

Maxwell Street Station.

Detective Headquarters Old Criminal Court Building The New Criminal Court Building.
[8]

They were then tossed out into a ditch,
in a locality known as Beer Cemetery.
Keane was dead probably before he hit
the earth, but Egan, with half a dozen
wounds, crawled for miles crying for help.
Finally he got into the Palos Park Golf
Club just at dawn. Believinar himself dy-
ing Egan told the only employee there
at that hour that he was a bootlegger in
the sen'ice of "Spike" O'Donnell. Mac-
Earlane was arrested and held in a hotel
for a few days before being released.
Under pressure, however, indictments were
returned in which were named Joe Saltis.
Willie Channel, Johnny Hoban, Ralph
Sheldon and Willie Niemoth and Mac-
Earlane. Incidentally they were tossed
into the wastebasket four months later.

All this was bad business and Torrio
shuddered to think of the future with all
of these tough boys doing their stuff.
Johnny made no public estimate, but if
he had it is doubtful if he would have
fixed the number of gangsters to bite the sawdust in the
ne.xt couple of years at more than 300.

"Spike" O'Donnell could not be brought into the fold,
although peace was offered him. "Spike" had come from a
fighting family back-o-the-yards district and had a few
friends in the city hall himself, but his drag was puny
and insignificant compared to that of Little Johnny. But
he would not be brought to terms, and for a long time
this word could be heard in Gangland: " 'Spike' O'Donnell
will never make another dime in the racket. He's ruined
everybody else, and now they're going to gang against
him."

In the investigations that followed the murder of Keane,
charges were made that the police were persecuting "Spike"
and his bovs, while the Torrio mob went undisturbed. But

George Meegban, early casualty
Sontb Side Beer Wars.

"Spike" had some influence, and, although
he and his brothers were arrested and
jailed several times, and two of them in-
dicted, there was to come a change in
their fortunes. As we have seen the great
factor in Torrio's power was the vast politi-
cal influence he wielded, but in 192.3, the
people of Chicago, becoming bored with
William Hale Thompson, blew him out of
office, placing in his stead William E.
Dever. This brought panic to the under-
world; the vast system was shot to pieces;
no speakeasy proprietor knew just
whether he was "in" or "out"; Torrio
worked desperately and frantically to
"fix" the situation, and he went about
with great handsful of dough in an effort
to bring order again to his realm: he was
only partially successful.

This change in the administration and
its consequent disaster to Torrio's machine
gave "Spike" O'Donnell the break he
needed, and he again instituted terroristic
proceedings in the realm of Torrio. His particular field
was that controlled by Joe Saltis and Frank MacEarlane.
Saltis and MacEarlane, now that Torrio's power was a
doubtful quantity, operated on the South Side for them-
selves. As a matter of fact conditions were so precarious
that every man or rather every gang realized that until
Torrio could "fix" things, every man was for himself.
Torrio was working to bring about the fi.xing, but he
realized that he was up against the greatest job of his
vicious career. Over on the North Side Dion O'Banion and
his inseparable companion, Samuel "Nails" Morton were
growing in strength and power, and Torrio could see that
unless he could get a better grip on his connections, there
would be trouble from that source. At this period the
government annoyed Torrio by "knocking off" a brewery

The Samon and Pythias of Boozedom and their playgrounds. (1) A typical "Valley" district scene where Terry Omggan
and Prankie rose to fortune in the beer business. (2) Franbie and Terry themselves. (3) In manufactories like this one,
the Beer Barons made it for $3.50 a barrel and sold it for $45. (4) Where "Spike" O'Donnell used to appear with his trucks.

£9]

ft. .-w •-m '

from time to time. In October, 1923, he was fined for
illegally manipulating a brewery transfer, and the strain
was too much on his over-taxed nerves. Incidentally it was
in this period that Mr. Joe Stenson, aforementioned, was
shocked to find his name and address published on page
one of the newspapers.

The harassed Torrio began now to show definite signs
of weakening. Instead of remaining on the job at this
period as he had planned, he decided to tiks a vacation.
And, for the next six months he was out of the city. Part
of his vacation was spent in Europe and in Italy, the place
of his birth. In Italy he purchased a great villa for his
mother.

He returned in March. This period marks the date of
his decline, just as it marks the beginning of the rise to
power of his lieutenant, Al Capone. As Torrio had grown
superior to Colosimo, so had Capone grown superior to
Torrio. It is extremely doubtful that Torrio would have
bothered to return to Chicago if he had known what awaited
him. The beer war was about to begin. Blood was to be
poured into the beer. The shooting that can still be heard
round the world was to break out in the Beer War.

BEEK

jm^i

The "heat" in Chicago during those days of cold Mai'ch,
1924, was intense for all gentlemen of the gat and the
machine gun. When Johnny came slinking home there
were no processions or celebrations in honor of the event.
Matters in the Torrio-Capone camp were too grave for any
display. Newspapers were smoking with propaganda
against their rule. "The man with the gat" must go,
they cried; Chicago must wrench itself free from the grip
of crime. The attitude of Mayor Dever was conducive to a
cleanup. His chief of police, Morgan A. Collins, was a fear-
less man of the highest integrity. He was anathema to
Torrio, w^" 'Se strongest point of political contact was in
the state's 'attorney's office.

Immediately after his return to Chicago Torrio sum-
moned his adherents to a meeting place in the Metropole
Hotel on South Michigan Boulevard, where the most im-
portant matter discussed was that of holding their own
in Cicero whither Torrio had moved headquarters some-
time earlier by comparatively peaceful methods. Cicero,
a western suburb, soon found itself completely over-run
by the underworld element. Torrio made it the base of his
gambling and beer-running interest, and the town leaped
into national fame as one of the toughest spots on earth.

Ingress into Cicero had not been entirely without diffi-
culty however, for now they encountered the West Side
O'Donnells, also Valley boys with Terry Druggan and
Fi'ankie Lake, who looked with envious eyes upon this
territory. The squabbles between the Torrio-Capone and
West Side O'Donnells were of comparative unimportance
however until late in 1925 when William McSwiggin, an
assistant state's attorney was murdered one evening when
spending an evening with the O'Donnells. But there were
frequent disturbances, splitting of skulls, bombing af
speakeasies, and general trouble over customers. Another
obstacle in the path of Torrio was Eddie Tancl, a native
of Cicero, who dabbled in the illicit liquor traffic and was
the proprietor of a cabaret in Cicero. Eddie regarded the
advance of the O'Donnells and the Capone-Torrio outfit
with hostile eyes, and he was to die for his unfriendliness
a few months later.

On the eve of the Cicero election a second meeting of
the Torrio-Capone gangmen was held, this time in the
Four Deuces Saloon, 2222 South Wabash, owned by Capone.
Every-ready Al stepped forward with the request that the
business of swinging the election be placed in his capable
hands. And it was. The election became a riot, the day
was saved for Gangland, but Al lost his kid brother Frank
Capone, in the smoke of a pistol battle with the police.
The particular bullet which ended young Capone's career

came from a weapon owned and wielded by Sergeant
William Cusiack, of the Chicago Police force.

Gangland mourned the passing of Al's brother the
next day, instead of celebrating their technical victory
at the polls. Torrio with others important in the high
councils of his organization visited at Capone's home.
Every one of the 123 saloons in Cicero locked its doors
by order of his majesty, Johnny, and it was the dryest
day in the history of the town, before or after prohibition.

The slaying of Capone together with the hell raised
generally during the election, inspired another cyclone of
words from the public officials, particularly from State's
Attorney Robert E. Crowe. Inquests and investigations
tripped up as usual. Alphonse himself testified at the
inquest, but after some curious sign language between
him and Charles Frischetti, companion of Frank at the
time of his death, Alphonse suddenly suffered a loss of
memory.

Despite this technical victory, Torrio found conditions
in his realm growing increasingly unpleasant. A month
after the election another one of his breweries was knocked
ofi' and, surprisingly and significantly enough, this time
it was done by Chief of Police Morgan Collins and Captain
Matthew Zimmer. The brewery was the Sieben Brewery
on the North Side. The police attack on it was one of the
most beautifully executed jobs which ever a gangster
looked upon with dismay. Nobody except the leaders,
Collins and Zimmer, knew what was going to happen,
hence there was no tip-ofi". With their uniformed men
wondering where and what, Chief Collins and Captain
Zimmer led them after midnight to the big brewery where
they swooped down on men guarding thirteen truckloads
of beer, ready to be convoyed through the streets. The
convoy, composed of gang leaders, was arriving in auto-
mobiles, and, as each automobile deposited its cargo of
gangsters, the police gathered them up. It was a great
aggregation and made a swell "who's who" of Gangland.
All the big shots were there. King Torrio, Dion O'Banion,
"Three-Gun" Louie Alterie, Hymie Weiss and others.

State's Attorney Robert E. Crowe was the logical
public official to receive this prize, but, significantly enough
Chief Collins delivered it instead to United States Attorney
Olsen, a great pain in the neck to all gentlemen of the
underworld. When asked why, this ace of policemen,
responded vagely that . . . Attorney Olsen had promised
prompt cooperation, and despite the fact that it was a
police raid, pure and simple, the government was to do
the prosecuting.

A curious thing about gangsters is that they never
venture out of doors without first "heeling" themselves
with plenty of money. Angelo Genna, whose gaudy career,
was to end in a few months, was "heeled" to the extent of

Sergreant William Cusiack, of the Central Police Station, one
of the outstandings foes of grangrsters. Serg'eant Cusiack fougrlit
in the battle of Cicero and won a great victory by eliminating'
Frank Capone from this life.

[10]

$30,000 when the coroner went
through his pockets as he lay dead in
a basement room whither he had fled
from police. But King Torrio, on this
occasion, strangely enough only carried
about S23,000 in cash, but it was enough
to bail himself and his companion,
James Casey, out of custody. O'Banion,
caught short remained in jail until pro-
fessional bondsmen. William Skidmore
and Ike Roderick, long associated with
gambling and vice in Chicago, could
rise earlier than their wont and pry him
out with the requisite So, 000.00. Wonder
was expressed at the time over the fact
that Torrio had not peeled off the
S.5.000 for Dion. Later events proved
that the flamboyant Irishman was in
extremely bad odor with the king, and
the Sieben fiasco served to bring their
long association to just about the break-
ing point. O'Banion, walking out of the
Federal building with Skidmoi'e and
Roderick, spoke in no uncertain terms
of this man who supposedly told him
what was what. "He's a god-dam
double-crossing wop," exploded Dion,
"and he's turning yellow all over."
O'Banion explained that Torrio had

Jerry O'Conner

bailed Casey out of jail in order to have
a body guard en route home. It was
quite plain that O'Banion was in revolt.

For the next few months Torrio en-
gaged himself in Cicero where matters
were far from ideal. The O'Donnells
were helping themselves to a lot of his
customers, Eddie Tancl was defiant to
all propositions and overtures, and. on
top of it all, the Genna brothers over in
Little Italy were whispering at the top
of their voices that O'Banion was con-
tinuing his efforts to "muscle in" on
their territory. Elsewhere in his realm
was sporadic warfare. Joe Saltis was
having a great time with "Spike"
O'Donnell's marauding bands of hi-
jackers, terrorists and killers. Gang-
sters were being taken for "rides" from
which there was no return, saloons and
roadhouses were being bombed with in-
creasing regularity. Torrio probably
shed no tears during this period when
he learned that Walter O'Donnell, was
arrested and charged with the murder
of Alfred Dickman. Waltsr, brother of
"Spike" virtually clubbed Dickman to
death with his fists.

rr^tjer) Jerry OConner, owner of the deserted g^mhling jDint in which Patrick Kin? was killed (l""" P^^^°>- . "F^*
'^ Valentine Massacre.

[Hi

Even the happy and carefree Terry Druggan
and Frankie Lake took it on the chin during this
troubled period. Having been enjoined by Federal
Judge Wilkerson from operating one of their brew-
eries this inseparable pair said "Oh, Yeah" and
proceeded to remove large quantities of amber
fluid therefrom. One night a squad of prohibition
officers descended upon them and Damon and Py-
thias were brought up before the judge and he told
them to go to the county jail for a year. Losing an
appeal to a higher court Frankie began serving the
sentence, but Terry couldn't see it that way. He
set out blithely for California where, months later,
he was gathered in and returned to Chicago. He
walked through the portals of Sheriff Peter B.
Hoffman's lodging house in November.

At this time spies from the North Side reported
that O'Banion, in addition to violating the terri-
torial rights of the Genna brothers, was "running
off the chin" on the subject of 'Torrio's power.
O'Banion's slogan at this time seems to have been
"To Hell With Torrio." The Gen-
nas were summoned and methods
devised to punish the revolting
vassal.

After the Cicero election riot. Man
In the cap is Charles Frischetti,
companion of Frank Capone, (upper
rig'ht) who was killed in a gran
battle with police. Frank was a
brother of King- Al.

Smiling "Spike" O'Sonnell's g'ang' of hoodlums before Joe Saltis beg-an thinning them out. (1) "Spike" O'Donnell and Chief

WUllam Shoemaker, (2) Attorney Frank McDonnell, (3) VTalter O'Donnell, deceased, (4) Gimp Rosenbaum, mlssingr,

(5) "Spike" O'Donnell, (6) James Bucher, deceased, and "Steve" O'Donnell. The tin-can object is one of "Spike's" cars.

[12]

Bid Shot

Ldhd
ITTLE

Shot

BIO SHOT AND I.ITTI.I: SHOT

Here's an interesting study in elimination as practiced by the killers of Gang-land. Eddie Davis (above) a small-time gang-
ster, apparently was punished for his many sins on the spur of the moment, as he stood in a thirst clinic hoisting a beer.
On the other hand the e l i mi nation of Myles Canavan (below), big shot gambler, came as the result of long and careful plan-
niag. "They" finally caught up with Myles one evening behind his luxurious apartment house on the south side of Chicago.

11^

I
I

[13]

'*■»■'

BAN ION of

\s\o\s dnd

po/ie/

The underworld lost its most fantastic and picturesque
personality and Johnny Torrio lost his most persistent
pain in the neck on the morning of November 19, when
Dion O'Banion's body, heavier by six balls of lead, fell
crashing among the chrysanthemums of his little flower
shop at 738 North State Street. This flower shop, inti-
mately connected \\ath some of the most thrilling chapters
in the long and bloody story of Boozedom, stands intact
today, and the proprietor, William Schofield, stands many
customers on the spot where O'Banion fell while he takes
orders for flowers. O'Banion, in partnership with Schofield
and Samuel "Nails" Morton, used the little shop as a
blind for his prodigious criminal activities.

A glad hand artist, an expert at throwing the bull,
this paradoxical mixture of ferocity and sentimentality
stepped high wide and handsome through the shadowy
realm of the underworld for a dozen years, cracking safes,
shooting up saloons, terrorizing polling places, figuring in
newspaper circulation wars, hi-jacking liquor and thumbing
his nose at public prosecutors.

His ability to thumb his nose at public prosecutors,
ascribable to his own more or less valuable services to
certain North Side political leaders, first attracted the
attention of Johnny Torrio when Johnny was looking about
for breweries and talented gentlemen to aid him in what
was a new and inviting racket.

O'Banion, a typical neighborhood gangster from boy-
hood, had assembled a formidable gang in the persons of
such men as Samuel "Nails" Morton, Louie "Three-Gun"
Alterie, "Little Hymie" Weiss, George "Bugs" Moran,
Schemer Drucci, George and Pete Gusenberg and other
lesser individuals. Torrio and O'Banion came to an under-
standing and O'Banion's territory was established on the
North Side. Presently he had, to use his own expression,
stepped up into the bucks. O'Banion's power resulted from
the application of methods quite unlike those of Johnny
Torrio and Capone. His realm was built on friendship,
with pecuniary considerations secondary. O'Banion de-
pended upon his pals, and his pals depended upon him.
His death however proved conclusively to the interested
spectator, that the almighty dollar furnishes a stronger
basis for the relations between organized crime and ma-
chine politics than brotherly love. O'Banion was ever-ready
to aid and protect anybody in his neighborhood and he
knew everybody. The poor looked upon O'Banion as a great
and good man, and he never forgot them. Across the street
from his flower shop stood Holy Name Cathedral in which
O'Banion had been an altar boy. Samuel "Nails" Morton
was one of O'Banion's closest friends from boyhood. Mor-
ton was dubbed "Nails" when quite a lad because he was
that hard. "Nails" served in the World War and emerged
with several decorations for bravery and a commission.

Sammy was a great influence on O'Banion's intellectual
development, if any. He took his blustering buddy by the
hand and led him down the booze trail to prosperity and
big dough before Torrio completed the job. In the little
floral shop together these two men sat among the carna-
tions and the lilies and plotted such booze robberies as the
removal of 5,000 gallons of excellent liquors from the
Royal Drug Company on forged permits. Ah! What a
swell job that was! Six unifonned policemen aided in the
work of loading the liquor onto trucks, and, when the
last quart of Old Taylor had been gathered in, Sammy gave
the signal and the cops blew whistles and you and me,
scurring down the street in our Model T stopped with
screeching brakes, while Sammy and O'Banion moved out
> into the traffic. A great yowl, heard all over town, resulted
I from that job. The permits had looked all right enough,

and they had read all right, but, too late, somebody dis-
covered that they were phony.

"Nails" taught O'Banion to wear dinner jackets and
to live in fine hotels and how to use his knife and fork
and to be a gentleman. He is given credit for also teaching
the blustering Irishman that political pull is more potent
tor a racketeer on occasions than pistols. "Get the politi-
cians working for you" was a complicated principle which
Samuel pounded into O'Banion's head. It is said that
"Nails" invented the famous phrase "take him for a ride"
by which is meant that traitors, spies, squealers and stool
pigeons, were disposed of by being placed in the front
seat of an automobile and shot by somebody in the rear
seat. Curiously enough "Nails" himself was taken for a
ride one Sunday morning, only it wasn't that kind of a ride.
"Nails" in riding togs was en route from a stable one
Sunday morning to Lincoln Park for a canter. The horse,
not knowing what a tough guy "Nails" was, became unruly
before they reached the bridle path and "Nails" was thrown
violently to the pavement. 'The horse then stepped on
Mr. Morton's head. A few hours later, legend has it, Louie
"Three Gun" Alterie, again rented the horse, rode it to a
remote spot and then pumped a bullet into the horse's head.

A new story used to appear every day about O'Banion's
loyalty to a pal, his bravery, his great love for gun play,
his love for his mother and wife, and his "Robin Hood"
methods. Here is one on the "pal" theme. In the days
before the Golden Era of prohibition O'Banion was not at
all averse to sensational holdups. Once he and his mob
planned to "take" a certain race track which was about
to open, on the West Side. Wind of this came to the pro-
moters, one of whom knew a newspaper man who was
friendly with O'Banion. All being native Chicagoans,
instead of informing the police, the promoters went to the
newspaper man. O'Banion was called by telephone and
the newspaper man said, "Say Deany, I want you to do a
favor for me." It was okey with O'Banion, even when the
newspaper man informed him that the favor meant assem-
bling some of his boys and working as a guard over the
till at the race track. Sure enough on the day of the race,
O'Banion with a gang of his hoodlums, all armed, stood
around the box oftices ready for war if anybody attempted
to spring anything. Later O'Banion learned from the
newspaper man that a fast one had been put over on him
but he received the news with great relish.

It will serve to illustrate the important position
O'Banion occupied to mention a party given in his honor
several days prior to his death. The hosts included the
commissioner of public works, the county clerk, half a
dozen police lieutenants, and the chief of detectives,
Michael Hughes. A diamond studded watch was presented
to O'Banion on this occasion. When news of the party
got out, there was a great noise and Detective Hughes
explained that he had come to the party thinking it was
to be given in honor of another, Jerry O'Conner, secretary
of the Theater Janitors' Union. "I was framed," said
Hughes, "and I got out as quickly as I could."

The unwillingness of O'Banion to take orders from
Torrio, plus his ambition to extend his activities into
forbidden territory brought about his break with Torrio
and — his sensational and sudden death. It is likely that
Torrio took O'Banion under his wing as a matter of policy.
Torrio put as many boards in his political fence as he could
lay hands on and O'Banion represented a wide plank on
the North Side. But O'Banion's flamboyant style was irri-
tating to Torrio, and he felt that O'Banion would bring
trouble into the realm with his high-handed methods. Torrio
was a business man first and a gangster second. O'Banion
was a gangster. Torrio would rather bribe a policeman
than kill him. O'Banion would rather bribe him too if
he didn't want too much. Two policemen once appropriated
a truck load of beer belonging to O'Banion and Torrio.
They demanded $300 to release it. When he was told this
over the telephone by one of the beer-runners, detectives
listening in on a tapped wire, heard him say, "Oh, to hell
with them guys. I can bump 'em off' for half that much."
Later, the same voice, told O'Banion that Torrio in the
meantime had instructed that the cops be paid the money.
"We don't want no trouble," Torrio had said. And there
you have the essential difference between Torrio and
O'Banion. One didn't want trouble; the other was always
looking for it.

[14]

O'Banion first began straining the ties that held him
to Torrio by muscling in on the territory allotted to the
Genna brothers on the West Side. Warned repeatedly
he continued to defy them. O'Banion believed in free
speech. He talked often and loudly. He liked to sing too,
and no doubt regarded his alley tenor as something quite
fine and beautiful. The most injudicious remark he ever
made in his long and useless life was directed to Torrio
and his Italian henchmen. "To hell with them Sicilians,"
he said when warned directly from headcjuarters to stay
out of the Genna territory. "You (meaning Torrio) have
got your ideas, and I got mine. We'll quit."

And so the inevitable happened. The finger was put on
O'Banion, and they killed him and now, six years later,
his pals are still trying to avenge him. The death of
O'Banion brought more attention to Chicago's underworld

The "It" boy of Gang-land, Dion O'Banion. and
his wife. This is a rare picture of Boozedoui's
personality boy, taken on the day of his inarriagre.
(Upper right) X niarSs the spot where O'Banion
was killed in his little flower shop on North State
Street. (Lower photo) Crowd ontside the floral
shop just after O'Banion's assassination.

and the beer wars than any other dozen deaths.
Whereas the other victims of the warfare reached
page one of the local prints, O'Banion's murder and
funeral filled the wires of the press associations and
landed on page one of the newspapers all over the
country.
O'Banion was standing in the center of the flower shop
busily engaged at the pious business of trimming roses.
In the rear of the shop a Negro porter, William F. Crutch-
field, was unpacking a crate. Crutchfield later testified
that O'Banion had just called to him to sweep up a litter
of flower petals at the front of the shop. Fortunately
William delayed, probably thus saving his life. For, just
as O'Banion uttered these words, three men entered the
front door. Crutchfield relates that he heard O'Banion
greet them with, "Hello, you boys from Mike Merlo's?"
As he uttered these words O'Banion, holding a large pair
of shears in one hand, walked toward the three men, one
hand outstretched. One of the men, in answer to the
greeting, said that he was from .Mike Merlo's home. Merlo,
an Italian political leader, had just died and it is assumed
that O'Banion expected these men there for the purpose

[15]

Outstanding- members of Slon O'Banion's North Side g-an^ as they looked in the i^ood old days when O'Banlon flashed a g-at.
(1) Georg-e "Bngfs" Moran, present leader, (2) "Iiittle Hymle" Weiss, killed. (3) Dapper Dan McCarthy, still up and abont.
(4) Iiouie "Three Gun" Alterie (sometimes called State and Madison Street Alterie) now living- on a ranch in Colorado.

of buying flowers for the funeral. As he reached to shake
O'Banion's hand, his companions whipped out revolvers and
began firing at O'Banion. The porter relates that there
were five shots in rapid succession, then a short pause,
and a sixth shot. The sixth shot, fired into O'Banion's head
at close range after he had fallen, was extra good measure
just to make sure.

Crutchfield relates that he tore out into the front room
at top speed, just in time to catch a glimpse of the fleeing
assassins. An automobile awaited them, they jumped in,
sped to Ohio Street, turned West and disappeared into the
maize and blur of traffic. To this day no one has ever
caught up with that car.

Earlier in this book it has been related that when
Al Capone came to Chicago he was accompanied by Frankie
Yale, of New York. Frankie, a tough killer from the Five
Points gang, frequently came to Chicago on contract kill-
ings. He was adept. So proficient was he as a murderer
that he did a lot of it on the side, probably just to keep in
practice as he didn't need the money. Anyhow, if you came
well I'ecommended, you could buy Frankie's services. All
you had to do was to point out the guy you didn't want
and slip Frankie the dough.

We bring this up because a lot of the "wise" money main-
tain to this day that the tall, heavy-set individual who
■walked up to O'Banion, hand outstretched, was Frankie
Yale. Frankie was detained by the Chicago Police a few
hours later as he was about to board a train bound for

New York. But Frankie had a good alibi. He became a
part of the wall of silence against which the words of the
police banged in vain. Other parts of this wall, incidentally,
were Alphonse Capone and Johnny Torrio. Chief of Police
Morgan Collins, explaining why no solution of the murder
was forthcoming, stated that O'Banion had been responsible
for at least twenty-five deaths in his short career, and that,
as a result, a great many people appreciated the fact that
he had been put out of the way. Certain it is that the police,
including Mr. Collins, wept not over O'Banion's bier. But
other thousands did. His funeral set a high mark for
those that came after. Nothing had been seen in Chicago
quite like it since the final obsequies -were made for "Big"
Jim Colosimo, when the business of laying him away drew
out so many judges and politicians that the affair took on
the external aspect of a political pow-wow. O'Banion's
funeral scandalized the public. The cortege was made up
of twenty-four automobiles all loaded with flowers, one
hundred twenty-two funeral cars, and with private cars
stretching for blocks. As it -wended its way through the
streets toward the cemetery a squad of police on motor-
cycles cleared a path through traffic. The grief-stricken
survivors of the O'Banion gang who had been crying their
eyes out for days, could hardly -wait until the services were
over and the $10,000 casket dropped into its hole, in order
that they might devote themselves to avenging lovable
Dion's death. Louie Alterie, quite beside himself, made a
particularly hot remark and one that burned official ears.

[16]

"I invite the slayers of my pal to shoot it out with me,"
cried Louie. "They can name any place, even State and
Madison Streets."

Louie who was, as you might infer from this, quite a
loud noise, was discovered a few weeks later in the Mid-
night Frolics' Cafe by Captain Stege of the Detective
Bureau. Louie was in his cups and somewhat louder than
usual so you can estimate just how loud he must have
been. At any rate Captain Stege went up to him and
slapped his face.

Let us rush to add however that despite this humiliation
which he took without any retaliating gesture, Louie was
really a tough guy. He was smart enough to know how-
ever, that it just wasn't his play to slap back.

EDDIE TANCL

BITES THE

idwduxt

The flowers on O'Banion's grave had hardly withered
and dropped away from their tinsel frames when another
picturesque tough boy of the underworld bit the sawdust.
He was Eddie TancI, a native son of Cicero whose place
of refreshment, the Ha^^thome Inn was highly popular
with his Bohemian countr>"Tnen. They assembled in
droves there to lift a few and to hear thick-necked
Edward discourse authoritatively on the refined pro-
fession of prize-fighting in which he, in his salad days,
had been engaged with moderate success. The Hawthrone
Inn dispensed more beer probably than any fifty of the
1-50 other thirst clinics in Cicero which was why the
O'DonneU boys lay awake nights thinking up ways in
which Eddie could be induced to become a stop on their
beer-runners' rounds. Eddie however had reluctantly signed
up with Johnny and Al, both of whom he regarded with
hatred and as tyrants in his own realm. But Johnny and
Al had told Edward that he could either buy their stuff or
else and so he bought.

"Klondike" O'Donnell, leader of the horde had been
quite successful in pushing himself into the preser\-es of
Al and Torrio during the political depression in Gangland,
a fact largely ascribable to the talents of the toughs who
called him boss. Most of them, like "Klondike" himself,
had been labor racketeers before prohibition, and weren't
exactly foreigners to Rough Stuff. Some of "Klondike's"
boys who were healthy and feeling well at this particular
period included his brothers Myles and Bernard, Fur
Sammons. James Doherty, Thomas Duffy, Mike Quirk.
Johnny Ban-y and "Rags" McCue. Also, most of
these boys are now departed this vale of tears but my,
my. what hell they raised before lea^-ing. All of them
were tough, but William "Klondike" was tough enough
to hold the leadership, although there were times when he
had to demonstrate the fact in grisly emphatic ways.
There was the sad case of "Rags" McCue who had worked

long and faithfully for "Klondike" hustling beer out in
the warm Cicero country where a machine gun bullet
might have found him any minute. When "Rags" wasn't
working he liked to plaster himself with whisky in evil
places. Once, on a bender, he found himself with about
§1,600 in collections which he had not yet turned over to
"Klondike." After the party, which was of several days
length, "Rags" reported for work, broke but hostile. He
had "spilled" the grand, but what of it? William saw his
duty quite plainly. "Rags" must be punished, just as a
lesson to his fellow tribesmen. And so "Klondike" whaled
in and when he had finished "Rags" was bleeding and help-
less. Both arms were broken. Several days later "Rags"
appeared at headquartes with his arms in casts. The sight
touched William and James Doherty so deeply that they
inveigled him into an automobile and took him for a ride
and "Rags" never came back. Nice fellows. Four of his
henchmen finally became so tough that "Klondike" had to
dispose of them in the usual way as we shall see in due
time. At this period however he had them pretty well
under his thumb.

"Klondike"had just about lost patience with Eddie Tancl.

The tubby little Bohemian wouldn't listen to reason,
threats, pineapples, or gunpowder. One night as William lay
awake trying to find an idea which would bring Eddie around,
two of his prized henchmen, James J. Doherty and Myles
O'Donnell, dropped into the Hawthorne Inn for a beer. Eddie
greeted them affably enough and motioned them to a table
which, from his vantage point behind the bar, he could
cover with a sharp and alert eye. After about two hours
and twelve or fifteen "shells" of the amber fluid, plus
several "shots" of whisky, their voices had developed
from quiet, gentlemanly, well-modulated tones into what
we shall describe as rather loud noise. Eddie, himself,
catching the gala spirit and not altogether without a little
glow induced by the small ones he had been having with
the customers all evening, came over and sat down with
Jimmy and Myles. Well, there were a few more drinks,
compliments of Eddie, when the conversation drifted into
plain shop talk. Jimmy and Myles insisted on deploring
the fact that Eddie was getting his stuff from the "grease
ball" meaning Mr. Capone or Mr. Torrio.

Maybe Eddie tried politely to change the conversation
for they sat there for a long time; but the old subject
would return, and, just as the bleak country was growing
into rugged outline against a tinted sky, the Sabbath day
at Cicero was heralded by a succession of revolver shots.
If you had been strolling down the street that morning
at that time you would presently have seen two young
men, rushing out from the Hawthorne Inn, cursing and
brandishing smoking revolvers, and, a few seconds later
you would have beheld another individual as he staggered
determinedly out of that door. You would have watched
Eddie Tancl, more dead than alive, trying to over-take
those men, and. horrified you would have watched the little
ex-prize fighter's steps grow slower and slower until fin-
ally they would move no more — even for a guy as tough
as Eddie Tancl.

All of Eddie's shots however did not go awry. A few
minutes after it was all over Mr. O'Donnell discovered to
his intense surprise that several slugs of lead were imbedded
in his tough person, and he was forced to hold long and
serious sessions with a surgeon, for many months to come.

The murder of Eddie Tancl was good news to Johnny
and Al. although the crude method by which he was dis-
patched probably illicited contemptuous sniffs from them.

BATTIiE 7IEI.DS IIT CICEBO

The Ship

Mr. Snffey'8 Thirst Clinic Cicero Inn

[17]

Hawthorne Smoke Shop

Capital Cafe

. . . My, my, what a tough guy was Eddie Tancl! Eddie bnsted more skulls than John Ii. Sullivan, Bob Fltzslmjnons, and

Jim Corbett combined. VThen Capone and "Klondike" O'Donnell came to Cicero, however, the first fighting' period came to an

end, and you see in the photograph Mr. Tancl as be appeared in the ring, in his saloon, and in the morgnie.

The O'Donnells and the O'Banions and their breed never
could learn murder nicely and cleanly. They lacked style
which, incidentally, was extremely fortunate for Johnny
and Al although maybe they didn't see it that way.

The murders of two beer barons, O'Banion and Tancl,
in the space of a few days was too much gunpowder for
the town to take in one dose, and to reduce and soothe
the ensuing high temperature of public indignation Messrs.
Doherty and O'Donnell were indicted by one of Mr.
Crowe's grand juries. The public was assured that these
desperadoes would hang. Mr. Crowe pointed to the fact
that he had assigned his ace assistant, the "hanging
prosecutor" to the case. The assistant's name was WilUam
E. McSwiggin.

But there was other gunpowder to be sniffed, this time
out on the South Side where the Saltis-MacEarlane and

"Spike" were still having at each other on every possible
occasion. Several pot shots had been taken at "Spike"
and he had missed death so narrowly but so neatly so
many times that already the feature writers were making
something of the detail. To return the compliment, "Spike"
and some of his boys had unsuccessfully tried to do away
completely with Mitters Foley, one of Joe's outstanding
hard boys. Frankie MacEarlane, finding the town too
quiet for his tastes, had gone over into Indiana, where he
had got himself indicted for the murder of a roadhouse
owner who had done business with "Spike." But Frankie
"beat the rap" after a complicated trial. On December
19, two weeks after Tancl's death, the Saltis mob revenged
themselves plenty for the attempt on the valuable life of
Mr. Foley. They killed two more of "Spike's" boys, Leo
Gistinson and Jack Rapport.

CIS]

EXIT

MrTorrio

We now come to the last days of Johnny Torrio, the
Big Boy who wasn't quite big enough. His song and dance
are just about over, and we shall see him presently as he
bounces out of his own show, leaving the spotlight entirely
to Al Capone who is plenty big, and growing bigger.

After paying his respects to the memory of Dion
O'Banion by slinking after midnight into the North Side
funeral parlor where the body lay awaiting burial on the
morrow, Johnny returned to his bungalow on the South
Side with a feeling of uneasiness as to the success of his
plans for bringing peace and quiet to gun-shot Gangland.
The grieving survivors who had sat around the room in
which O'Banion's coffin stood heavily banked with flowers
seemed deliberately to ignore him as he had stepped fur-
tively into the room. Maybe they resented the fact that
Casey and another body guard of swarthy-complexion
were with him. At any rate Johnny, awkward and un-
comfoilable, had mumbled some asininity to the eifect that
it was tough that "Deany" had to go, and then had bowed
out. Johnny knew his visit had been a complete flop.
He had kidded no one, not even the pompous politicians
whom he had met there and who had seemed as uncomfort-
able as he, although for entirely difl'erent reasons. His
own floral offering, a modest wreath which read simply
"From Johnny" had been booted out into the
alley, and Al Capone's gaudy tribute too had
been kicked to pieces. The spies had rushed
to him with this information. Not a single
word had been exchanged between him and
those chief mourners. But there had been a
reply, louder than words. It glittered from the
eyes of "Little Hymie" Weiss, and Louie Al-
terie and "Bugs" Moran, and Vincent Drucci,
and Leo Mongoven, and Frankie Foster and
all the rest of that surly mob. What it said
to Torrio's presence at O'Banion's wake was
this: OH, YEAH?

The ancient cynicism that every man has his
price had been cherished and worked for a
it was worth by Johnny Torrio during his long
and successful career as an underworld leader.
But keen as was his understanding of human
nature, until right now he had never understood
so poignantly that alliances formed by Dion
O'Banion had been built on something stronger
than a bankroll. It was
friendship, loyalty and affec-
tion. In his ability to inspire
affection from his thugs and
murderers O'Banion had never
been equalled by any leader
in Gangland, although Capone
himself was later to sur-
round himself with a group of
loyal and devoted henchmen.

The murder of O'Banion
had struck deeper than Torrio
had expected, for nov.' the
heart of every follower of the
amazing Irishman burned
with a consuming fire of re-
venge, and the result of it
was the spectacular elimina-
tion of the Gennas and the
precipitate flight of Torrio
himself to the safety of a
jail cell.

Meet "Iilttle Hymle" Weles, successor to Dion O'Banion,
In the days when he was a mere bank rohher and touerh
guy. "Iilttle Hymle" possessed a hlow-torch personality
as yon ought to be able to see from this photograph.
"I'll kill you for this," was only part of what he said
when this picture was being made.

And now we come to the little blow-torch who stepped
up to leadership in the North Side gang. At the grave
"Little Hymie" Weiss had wept and vowed revenge, and
had said that there would be no leader. "We'll just carry
on as one gang," he had said. Of course thi.s was apple-
sauce. Every O'Banion successor knew that "Little Hymie"
was something of an extraordinary fellow, brainy and
with "guts" and that whatever he might say would go.

Well, "Little Hymie" lost no time in getting into
action. A few hours after the funeral he inaugurated the
first of what was to be a long series of punitive expedi-
tions into the preserves of Torrio and Capone and the
doomed Genua brothers. To the end of his days he always
referred contemptuously to them as "grease balls," a phrase
he persisted in using even when discussing them with
O'Banion. It was Weiss who was the neculi of revolt in
the first place, for he nourished a deadly hatred for the
Italians which he could ill-conceal. Legend has it that
he ordered an expedition of vengeance into Capone-land
immediately on his return from the cemetery and before
the tears had vanished from his eyes. The tale is probably
apocryphal, but "Little Hymie" was capable of impulsive
action. It was his ability to get things done in a hurry,
that enabled him to swell the profits of his gang until
they were all enormously wealthy. In many respects this
sardonic Pole was Gangland's most amazing personality
and, had he lived he would surely have become the Big
Fellow. Weiss was a man of tremendous courage despite
his slight stature. He was capable of unbelievable rages,
and long periods of moody silence. From the floral .shop,
above which he had elaborate offices, he could stand on the
spot where O'Banion had fallen, and, looking through the
huge plate-glass window, see the beautiful facade of
Holy Name Cathedral and the famous corner-stone which
read :

At the name of Jesus every knee should
Bend in heaven and on earth.
For long periods he would gaze moodily at it and then,
turning suddenly on his heel shout a
blasphemous order which would send
his henchmen scampering into action.
"Little Hymie" who had a premoni-
tion of an early death, once said that
although he didn't expect to live
long, he did expect to live long
enough. His premonition was a good
one, for he was to live but twenty-
two months and fifteen days, count-
ing from O'Banion's death.

For more than forty days "Little
Hymie" failed to find an opportunity
to take a shot at either Signor Ca-
pone or Torrio, although he ^nd
his men toured their territory almost
constantly. And they toured in the
finest automobiles that money could
buy, and every automobile was
equipped like an arsenal. On January
12 spies in the Capone terri-
tory whispered to "Little
Hymie" that the "grease-
ball" was pruning himself in
front of his hotel, the Haw-
thorne Arms. Eleven power-
ful limousines and touring
cars glided by the hotel, and
from every one of them came
a volley of gunfire. But no
one was injured, except an
old lady who was passing and
a small boy, neither seriously.
It is said that Al sent $5,000
in bills to the old lady. Every
building in the block, how-
ever, was sprinkled with lead
and neitherTorrio nor Capone
had to scratch their heads
to think who might have
made the attack. Hymie had
failed, but he still had about
19 months more to live. He

[19]

Here is the car in which Johnny Torrio and Mrs. Torrio rode as they were being fol-
lowed and fired upon by Cfeorgfe "Bug's" Moran, "Little Hyniie" Weiss and Schemer Druccl,

got busier than ever, and on January 24, 1925, just twelve
days later, he and George "Bugs" Moran who were cruising
on the South Side, spotted Johnny Torrio and Mrs. Torrio,
his Irish wife, driving down the Boul Mich in their limou-
sine with a chauffeur at the wheel. This was sweet! George
and Hymie, instructed their chauffeur, "Nigger" Pellar,
not a Negro, to make for the "grease-ball." The automobile
darted crazily in and out of traffic in an effort to get into
a position to "let him have it" but Johnny, who had
become cognizant of their presence, was trying to escape.
He kept well in front until his automobile finally drew up
in front of his little bungalow at 7011 Clyde Avenue, a few
blocks from Chicago's aristocratic South Shore Country Club.
Johnny jumped from the car, literally dragging his wife
out after him. But the savage gangsters were upon him
before he had taken a dozen steps. A dozen shots or more
were fired. George Moran, afraid he might miss, had placed
himself on the running board, and, as the car slowed down
he leapt out and, with a gun in each hand, poured lead
at the underworld lord. Torrio fell to the cement walk.
People were beginning to appear on front porches, heads
were sticking out of the windows of apartment buildings.
The killers, believing that Torrio was dead, made away
at top speed, taking a corner on two wheels.

But Little Johnny Torrio was not dead. As
his hysterical wife bent over his prostrate body,
he opened his eyes and moaned for a doctor.
When one came Johnny again brought himself
to consciousness long enough to whisper that
the wounds be cauterized. Little Johnny thought
of everything. Half-dead and in agony he could
remember that the balls of lead which burned
in his body might have been rubbed with garlic
and that, though the bullets themselves might
not kill him, the poison from lead and garlic
would. "Cauterize it! Cauterize it!" he moaned
everytime he could bring himself up to the
marginal of consciousness, and, all the way in
the ambulance to the Jackson Park Hospital, the
attendants heard this order again and again.

And, as they took him in the hospital on the
stretcher. Little Johnny had another bright idea,
proving again that he could think of everything.
The idea this time was that he be placed in a
room away from a window, and far removed
from a fire escape. Later he insisted that his
own body guard be increased. And it was.

Gangland's favorite

Undertaking parlor

— a prosperous

business.

The newspapers blazed with the
story of the attempted assassination.
The police came to Johnny's bedside
with questions and so did representa-
tives from the office of the "state's
attorney. "Who did it," they
asked, wasting good breath, for
Johnny, coward though he was at
heart, would not violate law No. 1
in Gangland's code, namely that you
must never squawk to a policeman.
But they persisted with the question-
ing. "Don't you know who they were,"
asked John Sbarbaro, an assistant
state's attorney. "Oh, hell," replied
Johnny in exasperation, "Of course I
know, ril tell you later." But he never
did. Neither could Attorney Sbarbaro
prv anv information from Capone nor
from Mrs. Torrio. "Why should I tell,"
replied Mrs. Torrio "It wouldn't do
any good." Mrs. Torrio knew her Chi-
cago. The amiable Al who stood out
in the corridor of the hospital room
parrying questions with reporters
found it more difficult to repress him-
self, and once, his emotions bubbled
over. "The gang did it, the gang did
it," cried Al impulsively and then,
as if to kick himself, snapped his
mouth shut. When reporters pressed
him after this, he too said "I'll tell
you later." And he did, but in a curi-
ous way as we shall see.

A small boy who had witnessed the
shooting of Torrio was shown a picture, taken at the
funeral of O'Banion, and he pointed out George "Bugs"
Moran as one of the assassins. George, along with other
gangsters, was gathered in and again identified by the boy
who picked him out from a group of men. Eventually
Moran was released on $5,000 bonds (small change to
Gangland) and nothing came of the case.

"Little Hymie" had failed to get the "grease-ball" but
his attempt had not been in vain. Though he had not
killed Torrio, he had killed Torrio's career. What's more
he had caused the complexion of Signor Torrio to turn
a definite yellow. He had had enough, quite enough. When
his wounds had healed, Torrio left the hospital by a side
entrance. A vast body guard engulfed him. Torrio had
thought of a way by which he could keep clear of any
more attacks from "Little Hymie" Weiss. Torrio thought
of everything. This time he thought it would be fine if he
could go to jail and let the law protect him. You will
remember that Little Johnny and O'Banion were arrested
together one cold morning in front of the Sieben brewery ?
Well, there was a Federal "rap" awaiting Johnny on that,
and he had decided that it would be useless and wonderful
not to contest it further. Indeed, he induced the authorities
to let him begin serving his year's sentence on February
7, instead of February 27, the date set by the
government originally. And so Little Johnny
crept into a jail cell and he "selected" a jail as
far away from Chicago as possible. It was in
Waukegan, Illinois. The doors of his cell slam
shut and we shall see him no more.

Johnny Torrio, the boy who had been known
on the old east side of New York as "Terrible
Johnny" was terrible no longer. He had had
enough. What kind of a life did Johnny lead in
the Waukegan cell ? He asked and received an
"inside" room, and he contrived to lay himself
down at night in such a position as to make him
inaccessible to the naked eye (and the garlic
bullet from the outside). At the end of his sen-
tence, ten months later, he dropped completely
out of sight and nothing has been heard in
Chicago of him since. One rumor has it that
he is somewhere in New Jersey, another that he
is in Italy. Our guess is that he is in Italy.
It is farther away from Chicago's Gangland.

[20]

THEME ford

OPERA

Let us now regale ourselves with a performance of
Chicago's most famous municipal comic opera, otherwise
known as the Cook County jail sentence of Terry Druggan
and Frankie Lake. It will be remembered that Terry and
Frankie had been assigned to the custody for one year of
Sheriff Peter B. Hoffman by Federal Judge James Wilker-
son. Well, they have, at this time, been serving that
sentence for several months.

How are the merry alchemists who made a million
dollars or more over there in the old Valley District bearing
up under this affliction ? Are they languishing in cells,
wondering if the long dull hours will ever pass? Are
they trying to endure the teri-ible monotony of existence
by scrubbing the long marble corridors and offices of this
municipal institution?

Don't be silly! Terry and Frankie have been granted
special privileges by Sheriff Hoffman and his warden, Mr.
Wesley Westbrook. It is true that they must undergo the
nuisance of answering roll call every morning, but from
then on their time is their own and they may come and
go as often as they please. Everything was plenty dandy
for these princely inseparables until Mr. Druggan, who
always had a hasty temper anyway, made one of the
gravest errors in his career. Mr. Druggan smacked a
newspaper reporter on the nose for making a wise-crack
about these privileges, and the newspaper reporter hit
him right back with a newspaper article which precipitated
a great big investigation in which Sheriff Peter B. Hoff-
man was probed and pryed, and pryed and probed and the
prying and probing was done by none other than Federal
Judge James Wilkerson.

When Chicago was first informed of these "special
privileges," Sheriff Peter B. Hoffman went out and bought
himself a false-face of indignation and surprise. And then,
publicly and on page one, he fired Mr. Westbrook, his
old friend and warden. So grieved was Mr. Westbrook that,
in Judge Wilkerson's courtroom, he broke down and told
all, which was plenty. The theme song of his testimony
was a waltz to the effect that "the sheriff is to blame."

According to Mr. Westbrook the Sheriff was greatly
exercised over the fact that poor Terry and Frankie had
to serve a jail sentence at all and he set out, therefore,
to make it as easy as possible for them. Special passes
at first were issued to friends of the two liquor lords and
the jail was an open house to them most of the time. The
ex-warden said that Sheriff Hoffman sent word to him that
Terry was to be permitted to transact his business while
in jail. Other prisoners were not permitted to transact
business of course, but, according to the Sheriff, Terry was
a fine fellow and lots of men worse than he were running
loose around town.

"How did you do it?" asked attorneys when Terry
and Frankie were put on the stand. "It was easy," testi-
fied Frankie, "we paid for it and we paid plenty." When
Frankie said this Judge Wilkerson ordered the arrest of
Mr. Westbrook, Hans Thompson, former jail guard who
also had been fired, and Henry Foerst, who was secretary
to the Warden. It was to these officials, said Frankie, that
much money was paid and often.

Thompson, sitting in the courtroom at the time, readily
confirmed Frankie's story. "Everybody else got his and
I got mine," he said naively. Frankie went on in greater
detail. He said that he and Druggan paid $2,000 a month

for quarters in the jail hospital which are more desirable
quarters than the ordinary cell. The beer barons placed
$1,000 in an envelope on the 16th and tiie last days of
each month and left the envelope in a certain room. Then
they walked out.

"Once I peeked," testified Frankie, "and I saw Warden
Westbrook come in and help himself to the dough." Frankie
said that each and every privilege cost them plenty. He
said that he paid $100 for permission to attend the funeral
of his sister; that it cost him $1,000 to get out of jail
for "good behavior" several months before his sentence
expired.

Terry and Frankie insisted that neither of them had
ever paid any money personally to Sheriff Hoffman, but
their gallant gesture didn't mean a thing. Judge Wilkerson
regarded the hospitality of Sheriff Hoffman as being in
comptempt of court and in a crisp way of his he consigned
Sheriff Hoffman to a jail cell for thirty days — without
privileges.

The sentence seemed a light one, but it was a sentence
of death to Mr. Hoffman as a politician. He entered the
jail cell in due time and he has not been heard of around
this town since.

Messrs. Druggan and Lake on the other hand sallied
forth from the courtroom to freedom and increased riches.
Although the production of beer on a vast scale as had
been practiced in the old days had become an uncertain and
perilous business, they had already made enough money to
enable them to live in luxury. But, once a racketeer always
a racketeer, and Terry and Frankie were presently trying
to find outlet for their vast talents in the gambling racket.
Terry who had acquired himself a beautiful estate in the
North Suburbs amused himself with a stable of horses. In
June, 1927, betting in Illinois was virtually legalized in a
statute approving the pari-mutual. In July Mr. Druggan
attracted some attention to himself by rushing into court
seeking injunctions against several race tracks.

Terry charged a conspiracy to monopolize racing in
violation of the Interstate Commerce Law in the shipping
of race horses, but by the time the petition came up fo*
argument the racing season was over and the matter was
dropped. Terry's move was one of the many incidents
which presaged the great gambling war, of which you shall
presently hear. Except for this mad rush for the protec-
tion of the law — a pronounced characteristic of the true
gangster — Mr. Druggan and Mr. Lake were comparatively
quiet after their sensational appearance as comic opera
stars.

The business of manufacturing beer had pretty well
petered out. But Terry and Frankie should worry! As we
have seen they had jumped into the business at the begin-
ning. By the time the "heat" from the law was settling over
the town, these princely inseparables had made enough
money to cause the government to attack them from another
angle". Consequently, they are now worrying about the
income tax men, and are now facing trial for income tax
violations. Terry and Frankie will go down in the records
as the Damon and Pythias of Gangland but at this writing,
alas, alas, trouble had come between them, and they are
so mad at each other that they do not speak on the street.
A red-headed mama, it is said, had brought the inseparables
to a parting of the ways.

This was revealed recently when Captain William F.
Waugh asked leave of Federal Judge Wilkerson to with-
draw as counsel for Frankie Lake in the income tax
troubles. The Judge appeared surprised.

"Oh, they're not the good friends they used to be,"
explained Captain Waugh.

Frankie pulled what Terry regarded as an unforgivable
offense to their long friendship when he was arrested at
a tea dance in company with the aforementioned red-headed
mama. Frankie carried the customary gat.

"If you haven't got any more sense than to put yourself
in the coppers' way, inviting arrest and causing all of this
bum publicity for both of us, we're all through. You might
just as well get a soap box and dare the cops to pick you up.

Lake is now in Detroit, doing well in the ice business.

[21]

LITTLE HYMIE

WIPE5 OUT

QimAS

"Little Hymie" Weiss had got off to a flying start by
eliminating Johnny Torrio and he still had about nineteen
months left in which to besmear the town with blood, before
the "Big Fellow" Alphonse Capone, was to blast him into
eternity. Capone, however, who could always appreciate
a good man had come to admire fei'ocious "Little Hymie"
despite all the nasty things he had said and done; and,
as one of his first royal acts, offered pardon to Weiss
if he would promise to behave himself and return to the
fold. While "Little Hymie" was considering the Big
Fellow's proposals, the Big Fellow was having a tough
time of it right in his own home precincts.

A courageous editor of a Cicero newspaper had under-
taken the ambitious project of relieving his town of the
presence of King Capone and his numerous business activ-
ities. He used pitiless publicity which, true enough, is a
swell weapon. The editor, Mr. Arthur St. John, made one
grave error however. He neglected to acquire the services
of a few platoons of infantry. For some time his paper
appeared regularly with fine attacks upon King Capone
urging the good people of Cicero to get behind the cam-
paign and push. Mr. St. John's immediate rewards were
rather terrible. One fine afternoon early in March, some
tough gentlemen who had warned him repeatedly to keep
his mouth shut, picked him up and went off with him.
When he returned to his friends a few days later, they
could hardly believe he was the same man, for Mr. St.
John had been severely beaten in all visible places. This
treatment inspired another throaty yell from Mr. Robert
E. Crowe, but why go into it? He ordered that King
Capone be haled before him forthwith which was done.

The king came down to the Criminal Courts Building
in the style that befitted his exalted position. He appeared
in a new automobile, the like of
which had never been seen before
on the streets and boulevards of
the fourth metropolis of the world.
It weighed about seven tons, four
tons more than your automobile,
its windows were fitted with bullet-
proof glass, and it was plastered
with large sheets of armor-plate.
Mr. Capone still uses this dis-
guised tank whenever he is in
Chicago. To those of us who did
not know at this time that King
Capone was offering peace to
Hymie Weiss, the big automobile
was taken as overt proof that Ca-
pone intended to stay on his
throne and to hell with those who
didn't like it.

King Capone's call on the
state's attorney came to nothing.
So did his overtures for peace.
The peace proposal had been made
at a banquet held in a famous
restaurant just off Wacker Drive
which still operates under the
same Italian name. It was pro-
posed that Gangland should be
divided in half with Madison
Street the dividing line. For a
couple of months "Little Hymie"

who had certain definite misgiv- -Mike" Genna, toughest

ings as to the sincerity of King saying- a mouthful. His
Capone's peaceful impulses, be- to Idck an ambulance

Angrelo Oenna, youngest of the G-en-

nas, and the first to he murdered by

the North Side gangsters.

haved himself and
strictly observed the
terms of the pact.
He was busy any-
way, with the gov-
ernment who had in-
sisted on his stand-
ing trial in the Fed-
eral building on a
booze charge. With
him on the same
charge was Dapper
Dan McCarthy, a
member of his gang.
During the process
of this trial "Little
Hymie" discovered
that the peace ban-
quet had been merely
an attempt to throw
him off his guard
and the discovery
brings us to ac-
([uaintanceship with
two of the most sin-
ister figures who
have ever skidded

across blood-streaked Gangland. Signer John Scalice and
Signer Anselmi. Killers de lu.xe, these men had
been summoned from far off Sicily by Mike and Angelo
Genna shortly before the death of O'Banion. How long
they had been in town is not certain, but "Little Hymie"
discovered them one day during the progress of his trial
up there in the Federal building. A member of "Little
Hymie's" gang — they were all in the courtroom —
noticed a stool pigeon for the Capone gang in earnest
conversation with two strangers — Scalice and Anselmi.
The stool pigeon was "fingering" every North Side
gangster in the courtroom. Why did these two strange
Italians appear so interested in learning the iden-
tities of the Weiss henchmen ? The observant North Side
gangster hurriedly dispatched another one of his com-
panions down stairs and outside to determine whether or
not any of the Capone boys were about. Sure enough,
outside the gangster came upon Al's big armor-plated
Lincoln parked around the comer on Adams Street. He
examined the car quickly and found that it was well-
stocked with sawed-off shot-guns and other artillery. In a
few minutes Scalice and Anselmi,
together with a chauffeur who had
sprung up from somewhere, got
in Al's car and drove away.

All this meant but one thing
to "Little Hymie" — war. He soon
determined that Scalice and An-
selmi spent a great deal of their
time in Cicero, although they ap-
peared to be body guards for
Mike and Angelo Genna. "Little
Hymie" resumed his expeditions
into the Genna territory; he began
"absorbing" speakeasies which be-
longed to the arrogant brothers.
For several weeks Gangland was
comparatively quiet, except for an
unimportant and mysterious"ride"
murder here and there. The South
Side O'Donnells were still battling
Messrs. Saltis and MacEarlane on
occasions and there was much
muscling and double-crossing in
every quarter. "Spike" O'Don-
nell's greatest personal blow came
on April 17 when his foolhardy
brother, Walter, was mortally
wounded during an attempt to
terrorize and hold-up a roadhouse
in the Saltis country. Walter died
on May 9.

Every police official in Chicago
as well as those "in the know"
looked forward to an unprece-

of the Gennas, which is
last act in this life was
attendant in the face.

[22]

Anthony Genna the "fix"
Genna brothers.

for the

dented display of
fireworks from
Gangland any day.
It came on May 26.
Angelo Genna, out-
standing of the six
Genna brothers, was
the first to die.
Angelo who had
built up an "alky"
business on the
West Side in Little
Italy, enjoyed pro-
tection from the
police, particularly
from the police of
the Maxwell Sta-
tion in his district.
He had once staged
a great party in a
loop hotel attended
by State's Attorney
Robert E. Crowe
and four of his de-
tectives. Other pub-
lic officials had at-
tended, including a
judge of the superior court. Crowe made the principal
address to the sleek Italian gangsters, many of whom are
now dead. Sticky with wealth, and power the Gennas were
a ghastly mob at the time O'Banion and his boys began
to push them around, and they strengthened their ties
with Capone as well as smuggling a number of their
countrj-men into Chicago purely for killing purposes. An-
gelo had married a daughter of a prominent Italian and,
foolishly enough, had established her in a beautiful apart-
ment far up north on Sheridan road. Angelo was
driving from this apartment westward over Ogden Avenue
in his long powerful "sport" model automobile on May
26 when an automobile containing four men darted along
side his machine and deposited a dozen or more slugs
into his body, killing him instantly. Angelo was given a
great funeral, greater even than O'Banion had been given.
More flowers, more politicians, costlier casket. It may
have been that the remaining Gennas wanted to impress
"Little Hymie." K so, the gesture was futile.

"Little Hymie" continued his forays into the Genna
country around Taylor Street, determined to wipe out the
entire mob. Illustrative of his courage and recklessness a
police squad came upon him and George "Bugs" Moran
one evening as they strolled nonchalantly dowTi Taylor
street. "Wliat are you birds doin' here?" asked one of
the friendly officers; "don't you think its pretty hot over
here for you?" A volley of oaths greeted the query.
"Hell no," declared Moran, "I wish one of these 'wops'
would show himself. I'm nuts to blow off some grease-
ball's head."

Well, the next Genna to die
was Mike, most ferocious of
them all which is sajing a lot.
He departed this life on June
13, 1925, just eighteen days
after Angelo became defunct.
Along with the two masters of
murder, Scalice and Anselmi,
Mike was touring about his
domain looking for "Little
Hymie" and Moran who were
i-eported in the neighborhood.
Somewhere, the spot has never
been marked, there was an en-
counter in which, apparently,
the North Side men got the
worst of it. At any rate Mike
and his murderers sped on at
a terrific pace, thinking that
they were being pursued when,
as a matter of fact, Hymie and
"Bugs" retired to their o\\-n
preserves, possibly with a
wounded henchman in their

Death Corner in Chicag'O — Milton and Oak Streets. At

least fifteen gr^ngrsters have been put on the "spot" at

this corner.

automobile. But the most ferocious of all the Gennas
raced on at crazy speed. The pavements were wet and
slippery for there had been a sudden downpour early that
morning. As their automobile shot down Western Avenue
at Forty-Seventh Street, Mike was recognized by Detective
Michael J. Conway, who, with two other officers, sat in a
parked automobile. They pursued the automobile, with
gong sounding and hora roaring. At 59th Street, a truck
turned directly into the path of the on-coming Genna
automobile, now going faster than ever, and there was a
terrific screeching of brakes as Mike attempted to avert
a collision and death. His automobile swerved around like
a top and then skidded into a concrete lamp post, com-
pletely wrecking the machine. At this moment the police
drew "up. "What's the big idea," demanded Officer Olson,
leaping out of the automobile, "didn't you hear our gong?"
For answer there was a roar from the revolver of Scalice
and Anselmi, and the top of Officer Olson's head was blown
off, and an aged mother who was deaf and four young
brothers were left to mourn him.

Almost before
the officers could
draw their revolv-
ers there was a
second blast and
Officer Walsh died;
a third blast and
Officer Conway,
terribly wounded,
fell to the pave-
ment. Scalice and
Anselmi began to
run down the street
which by this time
was filled with hor-
ror-stricken people.
Mike Genna fled
in a different di-
rection across a va-
cant lot.

Officer Sweeny
selected the Genna
to pursue, and
across the lot he
went, firing his re-
volver every few
paces. Sweeny was
gaining on the sav-
age Genna when
suddenly Mike

turned in his tracks, took careful aim and pulled the
trigger. Fortunately for Sweeny the cartridge did not
explode, and Mike turaed to resume his flight. Sweeny now
stopped and took aim, and a bullet tore into Genna's leg,
severing an artery. Genna, bleeding to death, continued to
run, leaving a trail of blood behind him. He jumped over
a fence and rushed for the doorway of a basement into
which he disappeared. In the meantime unexpected help

had come in the person of
Officer Rickett who had been
passing on a street car and
had seen the running battle.
Both officers dashed into the
basement. Mike lay in the
darkness of a comer. More
dead than alive he raised his
weapon, pointed it at the men
and again pulled the trigger.
There was an explosion this
time but the man was dying
and his aim had been unsteady
and the bullet went wild.
Death had Mike Genna in his
cold grip by the time two am-
bulance attendants arrived
with a stretcher to bear the
wounded bootlegger off to a
hospital. As they laid gentle
hands on him, Mike again
brought himself to conscious-
ness. With a great and last
effort, Mike raised his leg and

Pete Genna, one of the two living-

Genna brothers. He isn't in Chlcaero

however, for he was chased out of

town by "Uttle Hymie" Weiss.

[23]

WHOOPEE SPOTS IN CHICAGO NIO-HT I.IFE

The Wigwam

Hawthorne Hotel Midnight Prolics

Cotton Club

Green SUll

kicked one of the men in the face. "Take that you bastard,"
said Mike. And thus died the most ferocious of the Gennas.

Meanwhile Scalice and Anselmi raced on, down streets,
througli alleys, beneath elevated railway structures. A
mob followed them and the mob grew in numbers every
block and Scalice and Anselmi knew there was no escape
for them. When they were arrested they had turned into
a clothing store. They offered no resistance as they were
led out of a building into a squad car. You may be sure
that the reception these terrible men received at the nearest
police station was one that Scalice and Anselmi carried
with them for a long time. Indeed, the only punishment
Scalice and Anselmi really ever received at the hands of
the law was administered during those few hours as guests
of the police.

The deaths of the police oflicers inflamed the public
as none of the crimes of Gangland had ever before inflamed
it. What Mr. Crowe said this time was that Scalice and
Anselmi ought to be taken out and hanged by the neck
without the formality of a trial. As events proved, this
would have been a swell thing, not only for< Scalice and
Anselmi but for Mr. Crowe and for the Maxwell Station
police. For during the long and futile trial of Scalice and
Anselmi, an attorney for them was to rise to his feet one
day and, flourishing a little red note-book in his hand,
shout: "I have here, the names of the policemen that Mike
Genna paid every month. Two hundred of them belonged
to the MaxAvell Street Station, two squads came from
the central office, and one from the state's attorney's oflSce."
Well, the defendants were acquitted eventually. A detailed
story of the long and laborious legal machinations would
require more pages than are to be found in this book.
It is interesting to note however that all the "alky" cookers
in the Maxwell Street district rallied to their defense,
feeling, as they did, that their countrymen were being
discriminated against. A vast fund was collected. Strangely
enough the collection of this fund was a great factor in
finally wrecking the Genna rule altogether, for there was

much double-crossing and pocketing of funds and the
"alky" cookers finally began to war among themselves.
It was all very fine for "Little Hymie" to look upon, and
all very sad for King Capone to look upon.

The burial of Mike Genna was a great spectacle, and
one of the last. The public became bored with it all, and
twenty-five days later another automobile, equipped with
a police gong (Hymie Weiss had thus equipped one of
his machines) drew up to Anthony, youngest of the Gennas,
who stood unsuspectingly on the sidewalk, and killed him
neatly and without undue waste of ammunition. The last
rites were performed hurriedly, ominously and without dis-
play. Only a few mourners were there; wild-eyed men and a
dozen or more crying women and children. And Tony was
buried at night.

The Gennas now saw the hand of doom stretching
into their domain. Jim Genna, panic-stricken disappeared.
It is said he returned to Italy. Five years later, as we
shall see, he was again to return and his presence again
drenched Gangland with blood. Only one Genna remained,
who to this day is occasionally caught in the police drag-
net; and is led out at the regular show-ups along with
the pickpockets, bums and unimportant characters to be
laughed at.

Amid all this chaos King Capone was compelled to
permit the killing of three "alky" cookers who had thought
the demoralized state of afi'airs in Gangland would enable
them to get away with some effective and profitable double-
crossing. The penalty for this unpardonable offense was
first paid by Tony Campagnia on July 10; five days later
Sam Lavenuto and James Russo kicked in. Sam was
murdered in the forenoon; James got it after lunch.

The swift punishment meted out to these insignificant
henchmen brought more terror to the "alky" cookers and
the beautiful result of it all was that for a long period
lasting until well into the New Year, 1926, the disturbances
in Little Italy were few and unimportant.

HOLEES, HAUNTS AND HEADQUABTEBS 07 FAMOUS
CHICAGO GANGSTERS

left to right: The Bednzi Hotel, frequented by "Little Hyliue" WeisB

and Druccl; Metropole once headquarters for Capone gang, and the

Iiesington Hotel, present headquarters.

[24]

TWO

A\EET

"Little Hymie
wrought to the

Weiss was proud of the havoc he had
grease-balls. More confident of his
strength now than he had ever been, he devoted himself
to drumming up more business, to tightening his forces
and to adding more and better murderers to his gang.
During this period he enlisted the services of the infamous
Gusenbergs, Pete and Frank, who were to die a few years
later in the Valentine Massacre. Frankie Foster, a dapper
chap was also a new member, as was Terrible Teddy New-
berry, the big bourbon boy. At the same time "Little
Hymie" spent a great deal of time trying to woo Big Joe
Saltis and his mob away from their loose-connection with
Capone. "Little Hymie" knew such an alliance would be
a mortal blow to Capone, and so he picked out the precise
psychological moment in which to effect so desirable an
alliance. Joe was having a tough time of it out south. Mac-
Earlane was too restless to confine his activities to the
South Side, and the O'Donnells continued to make inroads
into their domain.

When Big Joe began turning an attentive ear to the
seductive proposals of "Little Hymie" the germ of discon-
tent within his gang developed into open revolt. Ralph
Sheldon, tubercular but tough, favored remaining with the
Big Fellow, and a complete break followed just about the
time Angelo Genna was living his last days. Sheldon
seceded taking with him such formidable gorillas as John
"Mitters" Foley, Danny Stanton, Big Karl Bates, Hugh
McGovern, William McPadden, Frank De Laurentis, John
Tuccello, Danny McFall, Ed Lattyak, Hillary Clements,
Benny Butler, Stink Bomb Donovan and others, most of
whom are now dead.

Big Joe now had two tough gangs to battle besides the
possibility of having the Sheldon forces augmented by
killers from the Big Fellow's staff. Frankie MacEarlane.
worth a hundred ordinary gangsters, still remained loyal

to his Polish chief however, although Frankie looked upon Big

Joe's association with one John
"Dingbat" Oberta with marked

disfavor. He didn't mind the

fact that Pollack Joe liked to

read a book occasionally and

went in for grammatical nice-

ites and never let go by an op-
portunity to correct his choice

and original English. Every-

time Frankie would say some-
thing like "to hell with them

bums, they ain't got no guts,"

Joe would hasten with rebuke

"Don't say 'them bums' Frankie

and don't say 'ain't got no'."

Frankie could endure this, but

John "Dingbat" O'Berta who

wore spats and played golf and

talked like a book, was too

much, and Frankie was sure

that "Dingbat" was a wrong

guy. It may be that Saltis was

attracted to "Dingbat" not so

much for the reason that he

was a Pole as that he could

make fine political speeches at

gatherings back-o-the-yards,

and looked like a gentleman

whether he was or not. Except

for the sniffling at "Dingbat"

however, affairs were fairly

well ordered in Joe's camp.
The first casualty in the

new shake-up along the South

"Gentleman" Joe Saltis noc louKing- for "Spike" 0*Don-
nell. Joe has a well-trained smile. It does its stuff on
all occasions — even when Joe is exploding' cartrldg'es In
the direction of gentlemen he doesn't care so much for.

[25]

Side beer front was George "Big Karl" Bates a Sheldon
man. In addition to taking his life, the Saltis killers also
helped themselves to his sizable bankroll of .$2,000. The
next month, August, another Sheldon "traitor" died at the
hands of the Saltis' killers. He was William "Buddy"
Dickman, a close friend of Bates. Buddy's life was particu-
larly desired. He had been close to Big Joe Saltis and he
knew too much to live. Saltis lived in terror that Buddy
would squawk, sooner or later.

And so, as you can see, affairs were going nicely with
Polaek Saltis and Frankie MacEarlane. For a few weeks
they took things easy, except for one more unsuccessful
attempt on "Spike" O'Donnell's life. In this affray, staged
in front of the O'Donnell home during the luncheon hour,
the O'Donnell automobile was reduced to the outward aspect
of a battered tin-can. October 4, 1925, a spectacular attack
was made on the Sheldon headquarters in the Ragan Colts'
Athletic Club, a notorious spot for a quarter of a century.
Hundreds of bullets were f^red, but none of the Sheldon
hoodlums were injured, although a hangeron Charles Kelly,
was killed. A few days later indefatigable Joe added
another scalp to his belt, this time it was his old employee,
Ed Lattyak, a Sheldon gangster. During this pleasant pe-
riod the alliance between Big Joe and "Little Hymie" was
completely effected, and two of Chicago's toughest Poles
now strode, arm in arm, across the realm of Boozedom,
shouting "Kosciusko here we come!" To celebrate the fact,
the Saltis boys, staged a great robbery at the International
Harvester Company's offices, and so great was public indig-
nation that the police, armed with search-warrants, set out
in the back-o-the-yards district looking for Mr. Saltis.
While they were looking Joe and "Dingbat" helped them-
selves to another pot shot at "Spike" O'Donnell on October
16. Three days later they gathered in one of "Spike's" men,
Pasquale Tolizotte and took him for his last ride. A month
later both gangs staged a free-for-all battle on a busy
street and, for the first time, Joe came out with an O'Don-
nell bullet in one of his broad shoulders and, for almost two
weeks, Joe settled down to inactivity. On December 3
matters continued and the Saltis gang murdered two more
"traitors" just for practice. The life of one of the victims,
"Dynamite Joe" Brooks, was rumored to have been de-
manded by the chief Saltis bomber, "Three-Finger" Pete
Kunski out of professional jealousy. "Three-Finger" Pete
was a rare bird and most efficient in blowing away the
speakeasys of those who did not use Saltis beer. It is sad
to relate "that Pete himself came to an end in keepmg with
his profession. He always carried a tube of nitro-glycerin
in his vest pocket (although against orders) and one day

while running away from an-
other fuse, he stumbled and
fell. There was a loud explo-
sion and they couldn't find Pete
anywhere. Finally some one
discovered a hand two fingers
of which were missing. It was
"Three-Finger" Pete. However,
the other victim to die with
"Dynamite Joe" Brooks was
Edward Harmening, an inde-
pendent operator who had been
shining up to the Sheldons.

If you think that this i-s war
you ain't seen nothing yet. The
shooting was yet to begin in
earnest. Joe and Frankie could
not sleep well at night because
of the fact that they knew their
pet hatred, John "Mitters"
Foley, was well and healthy.
John "Mitters" however was a
deft duck and he was to live
for a long period before their
bullets found him. In the mean-
time a New Year, 1926 had ap-
peared on the calendar. Over
in* Little Italy Samuzzo Ama-
tuna, an ambitious chap, was
trying to rally the old Genna
forces. This, together with the
grafting of the collectors of the
Scalice and Anselmi fund,
brought another flare-up.

meet

^CURN

The once powerful and blood-thirsty Genna brothers
were now only a bloody memory in Little Italy, but the doom
which had hovered over them had not been dispelled by
successive blast of gunfire. It remained, casting its long
and sinister shadows over that accursed domain, in the
persons of John Scalice and Albert Anselmi, still in the hands
of the jailers, and still being tossed from one court to
another by adept attorneys who were being paid for every
appearance at a bar of justice and ready and anxious to
make as many appearances as possible. The "alky" cookers
over on the West Side were paying and paying and paying.
Even honest men over there were contributing to the bot-
tomless fund in order, so the "collectors" said, that no
ignorant helpless man of Italian blood might be discrimi-
nated against because of his nationality. Ah! What a
grisly crew these collectors were. Henry Spingola, a
brother-in-law of the Gennas who kept himself clean
through a long and honorable legal career despite his
relationship with the Gennas, soon found out that he was
paying thousands of dollars to blackmailers, extortionists,
bombers and killers, and that he had been unwise in con-
tributing at all. Henry decided that he would play no more
with Orazzio Tropea, known pleasantly as "The Scourge,"
or Vito Bascone, or Eddie Baldielli, "The Eagle," or Tony
Finalli. And so Henry Spingola, despite the utmost precau-
tions he took with his life, was placed on the spot, which
is stepping into a coffin. His murder on Januray 10, 1926,
focused attention again on troubled Little Italy and two
weeks later, before the police had assembled a plausible
theory, Chicago strap-hangers gasped at front pages smok-
ing with the murders of Augustino and Antonio Moreci,
wealthy and respectable Italians.

All this had been forseen by the Italians of integrity and
wealth on the West Side who understood far better than
the police the methods of their conscienceless countrymen,
and they had taken steps to combat it in their own way.
And this brings us, for the first time, to a sleek, athletic,
well-mannered little Italian named James Gebardi, the son
of an "alky" cooker who had been murdered long before by
Signor Tropea, "The Scourge." Young Gebardi, at that
time, spent most of his time around the Maxwell Police
Station where he was plenty
efficient with his fists and
often appeared in the West
Side boxing shows as an
amateur. A few days after
his father had been placed
on the spot young Gebardi
appeared at the station in a
highly emotional state with
a letter, written in Italian
and signed with the dreaded
black-hand. The letter ad-
vised Young Gebardi, whose
popularity with the police
was looked upon with dis-
favor by certain of his
countrymen, to rid the town
of himself, to disappear;
the penalty would be death
if he failed to obey. Lieu-
tenant William Stapleton
advised the terrified Gebardi
to go away for a while. And
Gebardi went away, adopted
another name, and became
a professional prize-fighter.

Mr. Peter Fullazi, a

But now he was back. He was prosperous. He
drove a fine Cadillac automobile, and he called himself Jack
McGum. Where had the money for all this "front" come
from ? One of the wealthy and influential Italians was be-
hind Jack now. This individual whom we shall not name
had revealed to Jack the name of his father's slayer, and
Jack quickly agreed to the proposals held out to him.
And so, on February 15, the long and terrible career of
Orazzio Tropea came to an end. He fell on the spot where
McGurn's father had died, and on the same spot where
suave Henry Spingola had come to his unhappy end. In
quick succession three other "collectors" died. On February
21, Vito Bascone walked to the spot which had been marked
for his death. On February 23, Eddie Baldielli, known as
"The Eagle" met a similar fate, and on March 7, Tony
Finalli was murdered.

Thirteen days later another ambitious Italian's death
that of Samuzzo "Samoots" Amatuna, interrupted the effi-
cient reprisals against collectors for the Scalice-Anselmi
defense fund. Samoots had lived long and had prospered
as an overseer of the "alky" cookers in the employee of the
Genna brothers. He had mourned the old days when his
employers were alive and for several months preceding
his death had been busy in a grim effort to rally the sadly
depleted "cookers" and to again stabilize the "alky" busi-
ness. Everything was going smoothly when an earlier sin
found him out. Samoots had hi-jacked a truck load of booze
belonging to "Klondike" O'Donnell. The booze, billed as
paint, had, in turn been re-hijacked by two tough youths
who loafed around Bootleggers Corner in the Valley District,
and the rage of Samoots knew no bounds. For months he
talked at the top of his voice on all occasions about what
he would do to Wallie Quinlan and Bummy Goldstein,
neither of whom belonged to any certain gang organization.
On March 19, Samoots dropped into his favorite barber
shop where he spent a great deal of time. Samoots was the
Beau Brummel of Little Italy and many amusing tales are
told about his fastidiousness and his sartorial splendor;
he owned more suits of clothing than the King of Spain,
he had a great passion for socks and shirts and often made
a great nuisance of himself by insisting on supervising the
laundering of them. A dozen customers lounged in chairs
while Samoots, lying back in the chair, garrulously in-
structed the barber as to how the shaving should be effected.
When the towel was spread over Samoots' visage two men,
Wallie Quinlan and IJummy Goldstein, stepped into the
room and quickly seated themselves near the door. Samoots
arose presently from the chair, stepped to the hall-tree and
was busily engaged with a gaudy tie when, through a
mirror, he saw his enemies. But it was too late, and before
Samoots could reach for the gun he carried in an especially
created, leather-lined pocket, Bummy and Wallie let him
have it. And Samoots, fell dying to the floor with two
bullets in his body. He died before he could get the
correct knot in his tie. A few months later, Quinlan and
Goldstein were killed.

With the elimination of
Samoots from the scene the
"alky"cookers lost their best
chance of a restoration of
the Genna house, unless Pete
or Jim should return which
seemed extremely probla-
matical especially now. The
last of the vicious horde of
"collectors" to die at the
hands of the smartly
dressed killer was Joseph
Nerone, known as Spano the
Cavalier, whose name had
been whispered by Anthony
Genna before he died. The
police had been looking for
"The Cavalier" ever since
they had overheard that
whisper, but when they
found him he was cold and
dead on a marble slab in
the morgue, and an X
marked the spot where the
new homicide artists had

„ . ^ , found him.

booze collector, cashes in.

[2C1

^^killedN

M^SWIdOINr

The scene now shifts to the West Side where "Klondike"
O'Donnell and his horde of homicidal hoodlums, inspired
by their elimination of Eddi Tancl. have been continuing
a sporadic but ruthless warfare against the growing power
of King Capone in Cicero. To the "Big Fellow" it is appar-
ent that drastic action must be taken against these enemies
who are now reported to be trying to rob him, not only of
his liquor customers, but of his political protection.

At this tinie police were confronted with what the news-
papers called the Beauty Shop Mystery. This institution of
beautitication at 220S S. Austin Ave. in Cicero was bathed in
machine-gun tire on April 24, 1926. and Miss Pearl Wilson,
the proprietress, could not. for the life of her. explain to the
police why such a thing could have happened. The police
wondered whether or not a new racket had started, say a
beauty shop war. when their attention was attracted to an
automobile which was parked around the comer. On tracing
its license it was learned that it had been registerd by one
John Burns. This was one of the numerous aliases em-
ployed by James "Fur" Sammons. and so a hunt for him
was made but without success. It was even rumored that
"Fur" had been terribly wounded in the machine-gun fire
and either dead or in the hands of one of Gangland's physi-
cians — men who treat wounded gangsters for a price and

(1) WUliam "Klondike" O'DoimeU looking' pleasant before a can;

(2) Buildingr in wlucU was located a beauty shop which stopped ui
Intended for "Pnr" Sammons. one of "Klondike's" henchmen. (3)

another "Klondike" O'Oonnell ace.

do not notify police. If their patient dies his gang dis-
poses of the body. But "Fur" could not be located and
finally the police ceased to look for him and the incident
of the Beauty Shop Mystery was abandoned as insolvable.
During these days there were rumors that political
protection in Cicero was about to shift from Capone to the
O'Donnell gang, a rumor which was worked for all it was
worth by "Klondike" in his sales talks to the roadhouse
owners and dive keepers. To some of them the rumor
took on the aspect of truth when it was reported that
William McSwiggin, ace prosecutor, in the office of State's
Attorney Robert E. Crowe had been seen frequently in
Cicero in company with members of the O'Donnell gang,
two of whom, curiously enough, he had unsuccessfully pro-
secuted for the murder of Eddie Tancl. Other old-timers
in Cicero scoffed at this however and pointed to the fact
that McSwiggin was merely out in Cicero having a good
time, some of the O'Donnell gangsters had been his class-
mates in high school. Anyway it was strange that a public
official should chum around with the undenvorld gentry,
and it certainly was embarrassing to Al Capone, the Big
Fellow whatever the reason for it might be. The good
people of Chicago who did not know of these strange asso-
ciations between hoodlums and prominent public officials,
were, therefore profoundly shocked when, in the early
street editions, of the morning newspapers they read that
William H. McSwiggin was one of three men killed by
machine-gun bullets in front of the saloon of John Madigan
at 5613 West Roosevelt road. The other two victims, his
companions were James Doherty and John Duffy, the men
he had tried for the murder of Eddie Tancl.

In this murder the public saw a climax to the killings
of Gangland, and the question "Who Killed McSwiggin"
was on the lips of every strap-hanger for weeks. Indigna-
tion and excitement were intense. Demands for an answer
to the question persisted and. in the endless columns of
newspaper space devoted to the murder, a vast number of
different theories were advanced and discussed in detail.
One of the stories related that as "Klondike" O'Donnell,
his brother. McSwiggin, Doherty, and Duffy rode into
Cicero a Sicilian, standing in the shadows of a building

they had passed, raced to Ca-
pone's headquarters, where the
Big Fellow was at dinner.
He listened to the messenger's

news as he ate and. when he

" had finished, he calmly walked

to the rear of the hotel, took
out the machine guns from a
closet, and went out, followed
by three men.

An eye witness to the mur-
der, said that a great automo-
bile sped past the four men as
they walked out of the road-
house and that "fire spit out
of what seemed to be a tele-
phone mouthpiece projected
through the rear curtain."
McSwiggin fell mortally
wounded at the first blast,
while Duffy and Doherty
walked for some distance be-
fore they fell in pools of their
blood. More than two-hundred
bullets were fired. "Klondike"
pulled McSwiggin's body into
his automobile and had it taken
to the O'Donnell home, but
later it was again placed in the
oar and taken and dumped on-
to a spot in a street of a suburb
adjoining Cicero so, as "Klon-
dike" later explained, that no
one would know that McSwig-
gin was with gangsters.
Another storv has it that
•Klondike" had paid $40,000 to
McSwiggin and wanted to get
it back again.

"I know who killed my son,"
said Sergeant Anthony Mc-
Swiggin, of the Chicago police

tile Detective Bureau.

achuie grun bullets believed

Three-finger" Jack White.

[27]

>%.«.V«.. . > 1 t.-'mr^TM/t M m ^ ■

A Qangrland Victim — William E. McSwig-gin, assistant state's attorney, as he looked wben earning' his repntatlon as
"the hanging- prosecutor." He was shot by machine g^n ballets while In company with members of the O'Donnell mob.

department, shortly after the long series of investigations
had begun into the mystery: "It was Al Capone, together
with three of his henchmen, Frank Rio, Frank Diamond,
and Bob McCullough." Sergt. McSwiggin was positive.
He had inside information, he said, which he had given
to the authorities. Two material witnesses were also named,
Edward Moore and Willie Heeney. Moore proved, however,
that he was in the loop, and nothing of value was gained
from questioning Heeney.

But the dead man's father's charges inflamed the public
still more, and the question "Who killed McSwiggin?" was
now linked with another one, "Where is Capone?" But
Al was nowhere to be found. The atmosphere was entirely
too much for him, and, shortly after the first smoking
headlines announcing the murder appeared, Alphonse was in
his great armor-plated automobile, speeding over the high-
ways to a secret hide-out somewhere in Indiana.

But he came back. He came back a few days later in a
grand manner which must have been impressive to "Little
Hymie" Weiss. Capone dictated the terms by which he
would surrender to the detectives from Mr. Crowe's office,
and he was met at the Indiana state line. Capone is not
a great talker, but he says plenty when the public is occa-
sionally favored with his utterances. And this time it got
dynamite.

"Of course I didn't kill McSwiggin," he said. "Why
should I? I liked the kid. Only the day before he got
knocked off he was over at my place and when he went
home I gave him a bottle of Scotch for his old man. If
I'd wanted to knock him off, I could have done it then,
couldn't I? We had him on the spot. I'm no squawker,
but get a load of this. I paid McSwiggin and I paid him
plenty, and I got what I was paying for."

Mr. Capone's precipitate flight had looked bad but he
had a good answer for that question, too. "I was afraid
that some saphead copper would plug me on sight, just to
get himself promoted." Capone was released three days
after his surrender. At this time it was reported that
"Fur" Sammons, having fallen out with "Klondike," had com-
mitted the murders out of revenge. And so, one day, "Fur"

limped into Crowe's office on crutches. "See these legs,"
he said, pointing, "Well, I was over calling on my 'sweetie'
at the Beauty Parlor, when some of these 'grease-
balls' let me have it." The McSvidggin murder continued a
mystery, but the mystery of the Beauty Shop shooting
had been solved.

As an aftermath of the McSwiggin murder there were
a series of raids in Cicero with such outstanding haunts
of vice being temporarily knocked off as "The Ship," "The
Stockade," and "The Hawthorne Smoke Shop," all Capone
institutions. Despite this gesture on the part of the police
the McSwiggin case pointed very definitely to the fact the
Big Fellow of Gangland was not "Little Hymie" Weiss,
or William "Klondike" O'Donnell or any of the others. The
Big Fellow was Al Capone. "When I wanted to open a
saloon in Cicero," said Harry Madigan, owner of the saloon
in front of which McSwiggin fell, "I got a visit from Al
Capone. He told me I couldn't go into business there. But
I finally got some political pressure myself and opened
up anyway. Al came around shortly after and told me
that I would have to buy my beer from him, and not the
O'Donnells. So I did."

King Al could see the handwriting on the front pages
however, and he knew that peace in Gangland was about
as desirable to Chicagoans as good beer.

The O'Donnells have been going great guns except
for one Federal "rap" which they could not beat in
the courts. This concerned their disasterous raid on
the Morand Government Warehouse in the Valley, their
old stamping ground. The warehouse contained thousands
of barrels of excellent whisky and it was James "Fur"
Sammons who conceived the bright idea of siphoning it
with a hose. And so one night, a watchman making his
rounds, discovered that bars on a window of the second
floor had been cut and that through a small rubber hose
of great length now lying on the ground, thousands of
gallons of the precious liquid had been siphoned. He gave
the alarm. When Pat Roche, ace of the investigators,
surveyed the scene, he gave instructions that the equip-
ment should not be disturbed and that the matter was to

[28]

be kept quiet. Pat knew that the raiders would return.
They did. And, as Johnny Barry who was in a room some
distance away, fitting a rubber tube into barrels, gave
r^vo jerks on a rope, "Klondike" and "Fur" Sammons, in
the warehouse, began to pump and the whisky began
to move. And Mr. Roche gathered all three of them into
his automobile and drove them to the Federal building.
The turmoil resultant from McSwiggin caused him to
abandon all plans to break up the Saltis-Weiss alliance.
Ralph Sheldon lost two more of his gangsters on April 5
in Frank DeLaurentis and John Truc^cello, and had obtained
promises from King Al that reinforcements would be sent
up to the front when the McSwiggin murder caused a
change in Capone's plans. But he was too busy to step
out as a diplomat for a long time and in the inter\-al the
conflict continued. On the West Side the field was more or
less clear, for "Klondike," Sammons and Berry went to
jail for the booze robbery. Each had a two-year tag on
him. Hymie Weiss was busy aiding Saltis whenever
possible and in trying to get a shot at Capone. Hymie's
gangsters killed a Genna "alky" cooker, J. Cremaldi by
name, who was crazy enough to appear on the Gold Coast

with his product. On July 20 Sheldon's men made an
unsuccessful attempt to kill Vincent MacEarlane, tough
younger brother of Frank, and on July 23, made another
attempt. The bullets again missed Vincent, but Frank
Conlon, a Saltis chauffeur, was killed. The murder was
committed by "Mitters" Foley and the Saltis gangsters
were wild with rage. At this time Mr. Sheldon made a
public statement to the effect that if Joe Saltis dared
harm a hair of Mr. Foley's head, he, Mr. Sheldon, despite
his weakening condition due to tuberculosis, would surely
murder Mr. Saltis. And so, on August 6, three days later,
Mr. Foley was killed. The public began to wonder whether
or not the South Side beer war, like the babbling brook,
was going to run on forever. Well, as a matter of fact, it
was. But King Capone, beginning to get the view-point
of Johnny Torrio, stepped forth as a peace-maker. The fact
that Joe Saltis, Lefty Koncil, John "Dingbat" Oberta and
Big Earl Herbert, were now in a lot of legal "heat" having
been indicted for Foley's murder was prima facie evidence
of the Big Fellow's sincerity. Even "Little Hymie" Weiss
believed that Capone meant it when he went about saying
"we don't want no more trouble."

"Dynamite Joe" Brooks and Edward Harmenlng', member! cf the Balph Sheldon g'angr after Prankle MacEarlane and Jo«
Saltli had finished with them. Kote that Gang-land kUlers aim at the face. In this job only one bnllet mlsaed its mark.

[29]

^A^BIC FELLOW

£. TURNS

S DIPLOMAT

.4t the name of Jesus every knee should

Bend in heaven and on earth.
And so King Al, the Big Fellow stepped forth as an
emissary of peace. Unfortunately for prosperity in Booze-
dom he flopped. Except for one unfortunate little shooting
affray involving Vincent "Schemer" Drucci, one of "Little
Hymie's" most highly prized aids, Capone's efforts might
have been unsuccessful. We hurry to the facts. The
Schemer, paradoxically enough, went in for paintings and
good music and beautiful things. It was passing strange
how this esthetic hoodlum who wept copiously at the
Civic Opera could top off an evening in company with his
dynamic little chief and George "Bugs" Moran whose
artistic sensibilities had developed no further perhaps
than Mutt and Jeff. For in their company the Schemer
was often called upon to torture a stool pigeon, or in-
veigle a traitor to the cause into the front seat of an
automobile for a long, long ride. But the Schemer could
do it. And how! It was he who represented the class of
the Weiss mob, just as the aristocratic touch in the good
old days when O'Banion held sway was provided by Samuel
"Nails" Morton before he fell off his horse. The Schemer
was largely responsible for the fact that "Little Hymie"
was induced to move into more pretentious quarters on
Diversey Boulevard, although headquarters still remained
above the Schofield Flower Shop.

One sultry August afternoon "Little Hymie" and the
Schemer, dressed in the correct mode, strolled nonchalantly
down the Boul Mich. As they were passing the Harvester
building whom should they meet but two of Capone's
children, Frankie Rio and Tony "Molps" Volpe. Now when
gangster meets gangster, the result is that gats fly out of
pockets especially made and leather-lined to hold them,
and that is exactly what happened on this summer after-
noon. Many shots were fired, and many, many people out
there on the world's most regal street, some of them
visitors to Chicago, were thrown into fearful panic. And
those who were visitors
went back to Muscatine,
and Valley Junction and
Des Moines and New
York and told every-
body that what the
papers said about Chi-
cago was true and even
worse. But nobody was
killed or wounded.

The only result of
the bloodless affray was
that Capone's peace
conference didn't mean
a thing. It was held
shortly after the battle,
and all the Big Shots
were there — Joe Saltis,
Frankie MacEarlane,
Ralph Sheldon, Hymie
Weiss, Vincent Drucci,
Capone and some of his
lieutenants, "Klondike"
and Myles O'Donnell,
and amiable "Spike"
O'Donnell from the
South Side. Gats were
parked outside vdth the
top-coats as per agree-
ment, all enmity was
forgotten, whoopee was

Joe Saltis ana his aid, "lefty" Koncil with attorneys, at time of their fam-
ous trial for the murder of John "Mitters" Foley. They were acquitted.
It was reported that "little Hymie" Weiss chased two witnesses to Mon-
tana. 'W. W. O'Brien attorney shot with Hymie Weiss. On the right,
Frank MacBonnell, another attorney.

made, jokes were cracked about the "soup" on the menu
and the "pineapple" dessert, and a police official, there by
special invitation, gazed on in amazement.

Capone made the speech of the evening. What he said
has not, unfortunately, been preserved for posterity, just
as he delivered it, but the wise money had it that the Big
Fellow's words were freighted with sincerity on the "we
don't want no more trouble theme." "Little Hymie"
listened sullenly, remembering how Frankie and Molps
Volpe had behaved themselves only a few days before.
It was "okey" with "Little Hymie," this peace idea, but
he put forward one stipulation which the Big Fellow alone
heard. It was that Frankie Rio and Volpe be placed on
the spot where "Little Hymie" might transform them into
corpses. The conference ended without any of its repre-
sentatives being aware of what"LittleHymie"had demanded
and what the Big Fellow had replied. They learned later.
He said, "I wouldn't do that to a yellow dog."

And so there was no peace in Gangland, and "Little
Hymie" was marked for death. He was soon to be pushed
aside. His murder represents perfection in the art. It
was the most masterfully planned and executed of any of
Gangland's crimes including even the Valentine Massacre
which was to come after.

"Little Hymie" set out however to get the Big Fellow
first and a few days after the ill-fated conference, he and
"Bugs" Moran made an unsuccessful attempt to destroy
Capone on South Waba.sh Avenue near the Four Deuces
Cafe whither they had trailed him from Cicero. Capone
got away, miraculously enough, although his chauffeur, "Tony
Ross died behind his wheel. "Little Hymie," bitterly dis-
appointed, returned to the little flower shop and was
moodily silent for a long time. He stood on the spot in
the flower shop where O'Banion had died and, gazing
through the huge plate glass window, stared at the in-
scription in stone across the street:

At the name of Jesus every knee should
Bend m heaven and on earth.

Another surge of energy a few days later inspired
another desperate effort, this time in the very heart of the
Big Fellow's country. For the second time a cavalcade
of glistening motor cars passed slowly by the Hawthorne
Hotel while machine guns poured hot lead into buildings
and windows and furniture. No bullets found lodgment
in the hated Capone gangsters however.

"Little Hymie" was too busy these days to be bothered
by the old premonition that he would come to an early
and sudden end. His gang was growing in numbers and

in dollars and in pres-
tige. Gangland looked
upon him in admiration
and amazement. So
great was the respect
with which he was held
that to some he twas
really the Big Boy in
brains, class and cour-
age. So many hoodlums
wanted to go along with
him at this period that
there was a waiting
list; the wealthy Italian
on the West Side who had
backed Jack McGum,
now fearing reprisals
from the Big Fellow
bought his ambitious
protege a job as one of
Hymie's chauffeurs. It
cost $25,000. Unfortun-
ately for"Litt!e Hymie"
most of his time at this
period was spent in try-
ing to prevent the law
from catching up with
his ally. Big Joe Saltis
who with Lefty Koncil,
was being tried for the
murder of John "Mit-

[30]

ters" Foley. John "Dingbat" Oberta, origin-
ally indicted along with papa Joe had man-
aged to prove an alibi and he was not tried.
So busy was "Little Hymie" with lawyers
and witnesses and jurors these days that
neither he nor any of his henchmen knew
that in the ancient old stone house just north
of his flower shop two swarthy-complexioned
men had engaged a room from whose cur-
tained window they could observe all that
took place in the street below them. Neither
did "Little Hymie" know that, around the
comer at Xo. 1 West Superior street another
front room had been engaged, also by a
swarthy-complexioned young man whose
only luggage was a beautiful golf bag. From
behind the curtain of this front room this
lonely "golfer" could look squarely upon the
rear entrance of the flower shop. The dis-
tance on a golf course would have been only a short chip
shot with a spade mashie.

"Little Hymie's" time had come. It was October 11.
1926, just twenty-two months since his beloved pal, Dion
O'Banion had died there among the flowers. Big Joe Saltis
and eel-like Lefty Koncil last saw their friend and ally
late in the afternoon after a long and tedious day spent
trying to select a jury. "Little Hymie" held a whispered
conference wth Saltis and then, shaking hands, left the
courtroom in company with W. W. O'Brien, the Saltis
attorney. With them were two of Hymie's men, Patrick
Murray and Sam Pellar. Benjamin Jacobs, an investigator
for the attorney also climbed into the big motor car out-
side the county building.

Pellar, who drove the car, parked it on Superior Street,
just south of the cathedral. The four men tumbled out
and started towards the flower shop. They had taken only

Red" Dan^herty in repose on a
slab in the county morgme.

a few steps when the quietness of the street
was suddenly destroyed by the harsh and
deadly rattle of a machine gun. "Little
Hymie's" twenty-two months of vengeance
came to an end before he knew what was
happening, for the men behind that curtain
at 742 North State street had projected their
fire at him, and the first bullet went straight
into his heart. "Little Hymie" fell face
downward in the gutter without uttering a
word. Pat Murray also died on the pavement
a few steps in front of his chief, but the
other three escaped although O'Brien was
terribly wounded. In agony he climbed the
stairs of a nearby building and collapsed in
a doctor's office. Pellar and Jacobs were also
wounded.

Thirty-eight shells had been fired, and
those bullets which did not find lodgment
in human bones and flesh, flattened out against the old lime-
stone comer of Holy Name Cathedral. The impact was so
terrific that a large hole in the inscription crumbled away,
destroying the sense of the famous Biblical inscription, and
to this day people who never heard of Dion O'Banion or
"Little Hymie" often pause before the facade of Holy Name
Cathedrai and wonder why the corner-stone reads thus:

ei'ery knt'f should

. . . /leaven and on earth.

The two men in the old stone structure at 742 North
State street escaped in the turmoil their fire caused; and
so did the "golfer" around the comer at No. 1 Superior.
He left behind him his golf bag. The janitor could find
no golf clubs, but he found a long automatic shot-gun.

The killing of "liittle Hymie" "WeiBs, Gan^land's most perfect ezecntion. (1) "Ztittle Hymie" as he appeared wlie.-
lientenant of Dion O'Banion. (2) Iiooking North on State Street, with white lines showinar line of machine grnn fire fr^
the rooming' house which killed "Little Hymie" and his chanSenr as they and three other men alig'hted from an antomo
and started walking towards 'Welss's headquarters in the William F. Schofield Plower Shop (3). Photograph in the li
left corner (4) shows the corner stone of the Holy Name Cathedral after it was hit hy some of the ballets which

Weiss. (5) I>air of the kiUers.

[31]

, forgottei

/'a II @ ti It i iTi €>

mdssdcre

The World Famous Gang-
laud Slaying* on St. Valen-
tine's Day, 1929, in which
seven members of Creorg'e
"Bug's" Moran's mob were
lined up against a wall in a
garage and mowed down by
two machine guns. This
picture shows two views.
The victims, reading from
right to left, are James
Clark, Johnny May, Adam
Hyer, Doctor Reinhardt H.
Schwimmer, and Pete Gusen-
bcrg. The other victim,
Frank Gusenberg, was alive
when police arrived although
he had twenty-seven bullets
in his body, and was taken
to a hospital where he dief'

PRUCCI ,

wedrf me

C ROWN

The artistically efficient homicide of Hymie Weiss drove
home to every ambitious hoodlum in Chicago the grim
lesson that the man of destiny among them was Alphonse
Capone, and that the best possible life insurance was a
reserved seat on his band wagon. The prestige of the
North Side gang vanished like puffs of smoke in a wind-
storm when news of his demise was blazoned across the
town. Vincent "Schemer" Drucci bowed apparently to
the inevitable for when King Al suggested that another
truce be held he was smart enough to acquiesce. But the
Schemer had mental reservations as we shall see.

The meeting took place in the Morrison Hotel on
October 21, 1926, and the size of the representation was
in itself a tribute to Capone. The Big Fellow himself was
not there, but the terms which were laid down by
Anthony Lombardo and Maxie Eisen, the eminent
Jewish racketeer, had come from him, and you may
be sure that no stipulations were made this time.
Even "Klondike" O'Donnell was represented. His delegate
was instructed to say yes to everything and not to sit
around with his fingers crossed either. Unfortunately
Joe Saltis, still in jail awaiting the verdict on the charge
of murdering Mitters Foley, could not get a leave of
absence, but he was represented by the Schemer and
George Moran. Ralph Sheldon was there, and so was
Edward "Spike" O'Donnell. Tony Lombardo, a big shot
in the Unione Siciliane, an important Italian political
organization, represented Ca-
pone as did Maxie Eisen,
the eminent Jewish racketeer
and stink bomb thrower. Lom-
bardo laid down the territorial
lines. Drucci and Moran were
- presented with the entire North
Side, limited on the south and
west by the Chicago river, on
the east by Lake Michigan but
extending north as far as the
Arctic Circle. The South Side was
equally divided between "Spike,"
Sheldon and Saltis, but don't
you believe a word of it. No
peace pact in history has ever
stifled a congenital homicidal
impulse, nor did this one. The
League of Nations itself could
not alleviate the sad condition
of affairs along the South Side
beer front where, incidentally,
a few days before the confer-
ence, Mr. Saltis had ordered
the dynamiting of one of his
customer's saloons because the
proprietor, Mr. Joseph Kepka
had refused to help Joe pay
W. W. O'Brien's legal bill.

Another swell homicidal
impulse, wearing smiles and
saying yes all over the ban-
quet hall, was Schemer Drucci,
but it was destined never to be
given another good play.

On November 9 the terror-
ized jurors announced that
Saltis and Lefty Koncil were
not guilty of murdering Mit-
ters Foley and Big Joe went
home to fall into numerous

Hymie"

:^^J.

Vincent "Schemer" Drucci, successor to "I^ittle
Weiss as leader of the North Side Gan?. This is an early
photogrraph of the opera-lovlnf hoodlum, taken after he had
spent a tong-h nlgrht In a jail cell.

[34]

huddles with John "Dingbat" Oberta, as well as to read
his mail. There was an interesting letter from relatives
of Hillary Clements, the Sheldon gangster, who had been
missing several months, and Joe w^s implored to mark
the spot where he had left the body so that it might be
given a decent burial. But it was not until five weeks later
that the body was found and, would you believe it, the
spot was a vacant lot behind the house where Hillary's
survivors lived.

Gangland ushered in the new year, 1926, by removing
one John Costenaro, a Sheldon beer customer, from the
scene and, so far as this reporter can determine Mr. Cos-
tenaro has not yet been found. Efforts to completely do
away with Theodore Anton were not so successful. Theo-
dore, known as "The Greek," owned the Hawthorne Arms,
headquarters of the Big Fellow. Theodore had been a
pretty tough guy in his day and had come to the Capone
gang with a creditable career in the prize ring to recom-
mend him, but as the years rolled on something happened
to him, and he made a big nuisance of himself by de-
veloping the evil of his ways and the ways of his com-
panions and tenants. Anton earned sweetness and light
to the point of hinting that he was through with sin and
vice and that Capone's lease on the building would not be
renewed. And so Anton the Greek was soon missing
roll-call around the Hawthorne Arms Hotel, and, a long,
long time afterward his body, or w^hat was left of it, was
removed from a hole of quick-lime in a vacant lot in
Burnham, Indiana, near the backyard of Johnny Patton,
Burnham's boy mayor and a good friend of aI Capone*

On the South Side, believe it or not, Edward "Spike"
O'Donnell was accused of having designs on Joe Saltis,
Lefty Koncil and their blue-eyed boy, John "Dingbat"
Oberta, the eminent ward committeeman. Whether true
or not, Koncil and Charles "Big Hays" Hrubec, were fired
at on March 11 as they were touring in "Spike" O'Donnell's
territory. "Lefty" and Hrubec jumped out of the car and
were running at top speed for shelter in an apartment
house lobby, when, overburdened by bullets, they collapsed
in death. "Spike" O'Donnell did this foul murder," said
Joe Saltis to newspaper reporters, "I am not in the beer

racket." On the day of his re-
lease from the county jail,
"Lefty," who was a rather
nasty-tempered little fellow,
snarled on page one that he
had been pushed around long
enough by certain persons on
the South Side and that he
himself intended to go in for
pushing in a big way.

Meanwhile Vincent Drucci,
as leader of the North Side
gangsters, had not been com-
pletely paralyzed by the peace
conference. He had, indeed,
been quite busy following Al
Capone around, a privilege he
had reserved mentally during
the meeting and everywhere
the Big Fellow went the
Schemer was sure to follow.
When he went to Hot Springs,
Arkansas with a large body
guard to rest up for the ap-
proaching mayoralty election
in Chicago he did not know it,
but the Schemer went along,
too, taking with him numerous
sawed off shut-guns, auto-
matics and other instruments
of warfare. In Hot Springs the
"Schemer" made an unsuccess-
ful attempt to murder the Big
Fellow, but it was done so
quietly that news of the affray
reached the newspapers only
by leakage.

When King Al returned to
Chicago late in March the at-
mosphere was considerably
mixed with gunpowder and

Soh«™.. w.= >, , t,'^„^?"*'\^"" * ^^""^ "'^ ^^ ^°'^^ S'«^ l«*d"- <^PP" Pl'Oto) The automobUe In which the
Schemer was shot while bem| taken to a courtroom by police. (2) Commissioner John Steg-e examining revolver which

Sergeant Healy (left) need to Mil Drucci. (3) Drncci In the morgTje.

political applesauce. William Hale Thompson, silent four
long years, had come out again, this time squarely against
King George of England. Recognizing Thompson a swell
skyrocket on which to shoot his own star skyward Capone
cheered to the extent of $200,000. Well, King George lost
a great battle to Big Bill and to the Big Fellow. Chicago
again became as wide open as it was in the good old days

of Johnny Torrio; Capone, cooped up in Cicero by Mayor
Dever for four years, again marched triumphantly into
the Loop. Ever>-thing was going beautifully for the Big
Fellow. Even the problem of doing something about
Schemer Drucci had been wiped out of his mind, for, on
the eve of the election, the Schemer was shot and killed
as he rode from the Detective bureau to a North Side

[35]

k\Wlf/j * •.4.V«"»'#'/.# •..^vT »• Tm.'^w^-m.-

courtroom in a squad car in custody of
three detectives.

Tragically enough for the Schemer
one of these detectives was a hard-boiled
sergeant named Daniel Healy. It was
Healy who had picked up the Schemer
and one of his henchmen, Henry Finkel-
stein, as they stood sunning themselves
on Diversey Boulevard. Picking up
hoodlums was a passion with Sergeant
Healy who thought that it brought him
good luck. Once he had walked into a
South Side saloon and helped himself
to an automatic belonging to Joe Saltis.
The automatic was in Joe's coat and
Joe had the coat on at the time. "Oh,
you're a tough guy, with a gun, eh?"
inquired Mr. Saltis. Sergeant Healy
offered to return the weapon but Joe,
wisely enough, flatly refused. At any
rate no sooner had Sergeant Healy de-
posited Drucci and Finkelstein in a jail
cell, than an attorney appeared with a
writ of habeas corpus. Out came Drucci
and his henchman, and into the squad
car, enroute to the courtroom. Drucci
occupied a rear seat, with Sergeant
Healy and one other officer. Finkelstein
sat with the driver. Enough different
stories have been told about what hap-
pened during the next five or ten min-
utes to stretch from the Rienzi hotel on
Diversey Boulevard to Melrose Park.
However, it is not important after all
these years what Mr. Drucci said to Mr.
Healy and what Mr. Healy said back
to Mr. Drucci, for the altercation came to a tragic end when
a bullet from Mr. Healy's revolver buried itself in Mr.
Drucci's heart. Instead of going to a courtroom the squad
car turned right around on the spot and proceeded to the
county morgue where Mr. Drucci's body was propped up on
a marble slab.

Of course there was a great hue and cry from the
family and from the surviving members of the Schemer's
gang, all of whom had become experienced in surviving
by now. Crying murder, murder, murder they rushed
to hire attorneys to see that justice was done, justice in
this case being the prosecution of Mr. Healy. At the
coroner's inquest a few days
later four prominent criminal
lawyers spat many mouthfuls
of choice interrogations against
a simple story related from the
stand by Mr. Healy. In effect
it was that Mr. Drucci had
called him a punk copper and
had reached for Mr. Healy's
gun, but Mr. Healy having a
longer reach, got there first.
And Sergeant Healy went back
to his job of picking up hood-
lums just for good luck. The
smart big city boys bespoke
themselves out of the corners
of their mouths that Sergeant
Healy would get his in a very
short while, but at this writing
he is still up and about arrest-
ing hoodlums over in the tough
Valley district "just for good
luck."

The funeral of the Schemer
was no shabby affair judged
by upper-world standards, but,
judged by the standards of
Gangland it was a terrible flop.
Whereas the last tributes to
Messrs. Weiss, O'Banion,
"Nails" Morton, Angelo Genna
and Samoots Amatuna had
been complete sell-outs with
not even standing room, the
final rites for Schemer Drucci

Here Is Big' Tim Murphy, Chicagro's
premier racketeer, and author of the
luscious campaigrn slogan: "Vote for Bi^
Tim Murphy — He's a cousin of mine."
Big' Tim was slain in a eramblin^ war,
recently climaxed with the assassination
of Alfred "Jake" Iiingle, racketeer news-
paper reporter.

(1) Balph Sheldon, forced by tuberculosis to retire as
leader of the South Side gang. (2) John "Mltters" Foley,
shot to death by Joe Saltis. Foley, a Sheldon g'angster,
was "a pood boy" said his mother, "what if he did sell a
little beer sometimes."

[36]

were played to empty seats. No politi-
cians wept copious tears over him; or
bent over his casket to kiss him as had
been done for Samuzzo. In the com-
paratively short parade to the cemetery
you couldn't find a single automobile
draped, as at the Weiss circus, with
cloth signs urging you how to cast your
ballot. Already decent folk had become
weary of these displays, and the police
had announced that squads would be
in attendance to seize gangsters. But
Al Capone was there. And so was
George "Bugs" Moran, and Maxie Eisen,
Frank and Pete Gusenberg, Potatoes
Kauffman, Dapper Dan McCarthy, Jack
McGurn, "Dingbat" Oberta, Frankie
MacEarlane and Mr. and Mrs. Joe Saltis.
Mrs. Drucci was consoled by Mrs. Dion
O'Banion. The Big Fellow derived a
great wallop of the fact that here was
one of his enemies for whose death he
would not be blamed, and he came fear-
lessly, even blithely. There is no record
however that Alphonse wept any tears
on "Bugs" Moran's shoulder because of
their mutual loss. The Big Fellow was
getting all the breaks just now, and he
was sitting pretty on top of the under-
world. One fine morning the Big Fellow
discovered that he had become famous.
His position had made him quite -visible
to the great naked eye of the public.
For a time this attention may have
tickled his vanity, but there is "heat"
in the great naked eye of the public,
no matter whether you're a king prizefighter, king
aviator, king movie actor, king author or just plain
governmental king this "heat" grows unbearable at times
and you will find yourself running everytime you see a king.
You run for the sole reason that you want privacy, you
want to live your own life. Now when King Al began
ankling it away from the following crowds he had two
reasons. (1) To live his own life and (2) to live.

When King Al found himself in the Loop District after
walloping King George at the mayoralty election he looked
around carefully and was amazed to see that a lot of

little gamblers were doing a
great big business without hav-
ing a king who had a standing
army. This condition was ob-
served simultaneously by
George "Bugs" Moran and
Barney Bertsche. In their de-
• ' sire to levy tribute from these
little gamblers, Messrs. Capone,
Bertsche, Moran and, a little
later, the nine or ten Aiello
brothers of the North Side,
ushered another period of war-
fare into Chicago.

At the same time Bertsche,
Moran and the Aiello boys
further developed the scope of
this growing crime syndicate
by hooking up with Jack Zuta,
over lord of a chain of vice
resorts on the West Side. Jack
and his chief lieutenant, Solly
Vision, had been having a
rather tough time of it all by
themselves owing to the close
proximity of several of their
pleasure institutions to similar
dives owned and operated by
"Monkey-Faced" Charlie Gen-
ker, and another choice char-
acter, known as Mike de Pike
Heitler.

Mike de Pike had definite
Capone connections while Mr.
"Monkey-Faced" Charlie,

!•• ^ m -_ W"^'"

Theodore Anton, owner of the Hotel In which Capone eBtahUshed headquarters, as ^^^^\°°^^^J^^^^^^\JX^^^t7^^^,
to eet somewhere with his flats. (2) Anton in one of his few courtroom appearances. (3) ^^'^"V^if Lt^^lTo «t^t of
body was found after a Ion? search. It was buried in quick-lime. Anton made a nuisance of himself trylns to get out of

the Backet.

strangely enough, operated on his own — a strange and
inexplicable fact. "Monkey-Faced" Charlie had been an
operator for many years, and maybe they tolerated him
purely for sentimental reasons. It will be interesting to

note that "Monkey-Faced" Charlie was a bosom friend of
Julius Ro.senheim, the well-known informer, who now,
alas, is with us no more.

[37]

PIN EAPPLE
PERIOIJ

In the warfare for control of loop gambling the great
discovery was made by King Capone and Messrs. Bertsche,
Moran and the Aiello brothers that, although pineapples
are not indigenous to Chicago, they flourish as niarvelously
here as do potatoes in Ireland, if, of course they are culti-
vated properly. The laboratory experiments of these rival
gang mobs may be said to have been made during their
efforts to form a gambling syndicate of the Loop gambling
joints and, having formed it, to gain utter and absolute
control. The small fellow who ran a little game behind
the counter was extremely averse to paying levy either
to Al or Moran. This and other ramifications including
the protracted abdication of the reigning gambling king,
all too involved to be discussed here, brought on the great
pineapple period. A pineapple, if tossed into a building
properly, will make an insufferably loud noise. Windows
bounce out of their frames, entire walls keel over,
people scramble about in terror and the owner or
proprietor of the building, surveying the ruins, re-
marks, "Well, well, I can't imagine who should have done
such a thing to me, or why." But you may be sure that
he is telling a big lie. It was just this sort of thing that
began happening to the gamblers who cried robber when
invited to join the syndicate, being formed by the Big
Fellow and the North Side mob. So prevalent did pineapple
cultivation become that the joke mongers the country over
soon began using the word pineapple as a synonym for
Chicago. Another reason was responsible for the fact that
the Aiello brothers, of whom there are nine, began playing
around with Moran and his new buddies, the Bertsche and
Zuta mob. The Aiellos, long respectable merchants, de-
voutly desired control of the Unione Siciliane, a powerful
Italian organization which at this time was under the
leadership of Anthony Lombardo, who, as we have seen,
had stepped out as an ally of Capone and had represented
him at the peace conference following
the demise of "Little Hymie" Weiss.
And there, roughly sketched, you have
the new scenery which appeared on the
underworld stage following the re-elec-
tion of William Hale Thompson. With
"Bugs" Moran behind them, the Aiellos
felt that the Big Fellow might be effi-
ciently opposed, and when they ap-
pi-oached Mr. Bugs he took the matter
under advisement and spent several days
thinking it over before he acquiesced. Big
George Moran must have deplored the
sad condition of affairs in his once proud
mob which compelled him to align him-
self with an Italian organization. For
years Bugs allowed himself to be widely
quoted as saying that his first principle
was never to let an Italian racketeer
get behind him either in an automobile.
a short saunter down the street, or in a
business enterprise.

The underworld began to whisper
early in 1927 that more and bloodier
warfare was imminent. Meanwhile Capone
had been attending to established busi-
ness as usual and on July 27, one of his
new competitors in Burnham paid for
his usurpation with his life. At the same
time he began muscling in on the
Near North Side beer and alcohol busi-
ness, thus violating the terms of the

Ike Boderick, professional bonds-
man. It was Ike who bailed Dion
O'Banion out of a jail cell follow-
ing' the famous Sieben brewery raid.

[38]

peace pact. A hoodlum of proven talent, Claude Maddox,
was placed in charge of operations, and the first blow
struck by the outraged Northsiders came on August 10,
when Anthony K. Russo and Vincent Spicuzza came to a
tragic end. But Capone was king and the unattached
"hoods" were flocking to his standards. Others were
deserting less powerful leaders and were casting their
fortunes with him. One of these, at this time, was Jack
McGurn. who had found himself tempermentally incapable
of association with such men as Moran, Pete and Frank
Gusenberg, Leo Mongoven, Barney Bertsche, Teddy New-
berry and most of the others. King Capone admired Mr.
McGum and saw great possibilities in him. Two other
gentlemen of the underworld, now famous, now devoted
their services to him. They were John Scalice and Albert
Anselmi, free at last from courtroom appearances, and
ambitious to get into action. The Big Fellow's criticism
of the new alliance on the North Side was first made
in October when several automobiles, all equipped with
machine guns, visited the Aiello headquarters which were
in a small bakery on Division Street and deposited several
hundreds of bullets all over the place, without, however,
causing any casualties.

The Aiello-Moran-Bertsche-Zuta mob now began to
make nuisances of themselves in a big way. An ambush was
laid in the Atlantic hotel in the loop. From their front
room the killers "covered" a cigar store across the street
in which the Big Fellow occasionally made appearances.
Luck was with him or else his lookouts were niarvelously
efficient for the Aiello killers upstairs were surprised one
afternoon to find themselves trapped by the police. On
the same day another ambush was uncovered, this one
across the street from the residence of Tony Lombardo.
Eleven Aiello boys including the leader, Joseph Aiello,
were soon fuming in jail cells while lawyers flew about
trying to obtain writs of habeas corpus. While still guests
at the detective bureau an observant officer spotted three
men loitering in front of the bureau and seized them.
They were all Capone men, Louis "Little New York"
Campagnia, Frank Beige and Sam Marcus. All earrie 1
light artillery and were waiting, merely to offer cond
Icnces to Joe Aiello and his boys. These incidents tj
gether with sporadic warfare in the Loop gambling countr;
brought more and more "heat" upon the Big Fellow. Hi
had bec'ome the favorite person to blame for everything
and now the position became increasingly intolerable. Bu
an election was coming on, a typical Chicago elect'.O'
and Capone could not yet shake himself away from tl
city. Chicago was stirring, the pent-up feeling again
the Crowe-Thompson machine, was about to vent its wrai i.
The atmosphere buzzed with prophecies
as to what would happen at the polls
when Judge John A. Swanson got through
with State's Attorney Robert E. Crowe,
and when Louis Emmerson was done with
Len Small. Crowe and Governor Small
had been in office for seven and one-half
years, and defeat was to over-take them.
During the campaign Chicago produced
a bumper pineapple crop, and the fruit
was dirt cheap. Senator Deneen and his
candidate for the state's attorney's
office. Judge Swanson, both received
pineapples at their homes on the same
evening. Other persons who were not ne-
glected include Ex-judge Barney Barasa,
Municipal Judge John Sbarbaro, Larry
Cuneo, brother-in-law and secretary to
Crowe, and Morris Eller, political boss of
the Valley District. At this time you will
be interested in knowning that the Gusen-
bergs, Frank and Pete, spotted their old
playmate. Jack McGum, driving on the
North Side. They trailed to a cigar store
in the McCormick hotel, a short block off
the Boul Mich on the Near North side.
When they entered, cautiously, and with
hands gripping gats, they found their
quarry busily talking in a telephone
booth. Now telephone booths, even in
Chicago are not made with bullet-proof

*• • •' •. • a.

glass, so Frank and Pete let Jack have it, and when
they had reduced him to a crumpled position on the
floor of the booth with blood streaming from his
head and face, they bowed themselves out. But Jack was
not dead, although well punctured. When the police called
on him at the hospital, he told them that he did not know
who had shot him or why, but that he would try his level
best to find out just as soon as he could get around to it.
The election was held in a great cloud of smoke and
with the better element weai-ing gas-masks at the polls.
Judge John A. Swanson jumped out of the ballot boxes far
in front of State's Attorney Crowe, and Mr. Thompson's
machine was reduced to a feeble, sputtering
condition. Agitation against gang anarchy
continued with increasing gusto, a fact
which inspired King Capone to depart on a
long-needed vacation and when the press
associations carried back stories to Chicago
from Los Angeles, telling how detectives
were pushing the Big Fellow around, one
of the Chicago police officials declared that
at last Gangland was beginning to disinte-
grate, and that its king was a homeless
wanderer. The police then turned their at-
tention to the sad case of Mr. Ben Newmark,
formerly an investigator for State's Attor-
ney Robert E. Crowe, but now using his
knowledge of the underworld to do a little

muscling. Alas, alas, he didn't last long, for he was out
on the South Side where sweetness and light had not yet
penetrated. Election or no election, the boys on the South
Side continued sporadic warfare, and so one day as Mr.
Newmark sat in the front room of his little bungalow in
front of a window reading a newspaper, two men and a
machine gun got upon a soap box, took careful aim (at
about four feet) and there was a loud report and that
was the end of the latest South Side muscle. For two
months it was quiet on all fronts, but on June 26, the
newspapers duly chronicled the fate of Big Tim Murphy,
politician, racketeer, labor leader, robber and jail bird.
This famous character whom you really
ought to know better than you can know
him here had been given one of the numer-
ous vice-presidencies in the Capone gang,
just before the Big Fellow left on that vaca-
tion. Big Tim's duties lay mostly in the
gambling field. One of his most ambitious
ventures, a gambling house far out on Sheri-
dan Road, which he had promoted in con-
juction with Nicky Amstein, had been
knocked off and Big Tim, who had been out
of Fort Leavenworth for only a short while,
saw the need of making some good con-
nections in a hurry. He seemed to have
lost touch with the right guys during those
prison years, and so he went over with the

O'SAITION'S OLD GANG AS THEY LOOK TODAY. The dapper boy in the tipper center is Joe Aiello. head of the Uuione
Siciliane. On the upper left we have Leo Mong'oven, body g"uard to Georg-e "Bug's" Moran, who, at this writing" had been
missing' for several weeks and was believed by some to have been taken for a ride. On the upper rig'ht we have Georgfe
"Bugs" Moran, North Side leader. (1) "Potatoes" Kanffman (2) Barney Bertsche and (3) Jack Zuta.

Big Fellow, thinking himself again securely "in." Un-
fortunately Big Tim no longer lived out in his beloved
back-of-the-yards district. His place of residence now was
a charming little bungalow on the North Side, in pleasant
Rogers Park. It was within cap-pistol hearing of another
bungalow in which resided Joe Aiello. One warm June
night the front door-bell of the Murphy domicile began
to ring and ring and ring, and Big Tim, who was taking
a nap, got up sleepily and went out. Nobody was there,
except a couple of bullets and so the author of the priceless
line, "vote for Big Tim Murphy he's a cousin of mine"
rolled down the concrete steps a dead man.

Capone had left the management of his empire largely
in the hands of Frank Nitti, known as the "enforcer" and
Harry "Greasy Thumb" Gusick, convicted pander who
had charge of a choice killing squad. Harry was ably
assisted by Hymie "Loud Mouth" Levine. These boys suc-
ceeded in convincing Mr. Aiello and Mr. Moran that they
could not prosper in Chicago unless drastic measures were
taken to get a strong hold somewhere. There is a tale,
probably apocryphal, that Joe and "Bugs" negotiated
at this time for the services of the eminent Frankie Yale,
whom we have met before. At any rate Frankie's greatest
mistake of his long life was in aligning himself with the
Aiello-Moran gang, for his punishment came on July 2,
1928 in New York. The mystery of his death still intrigues
the New York police and, every time a Capone man drops
into New York to see a tight or start one, the detectives
push him off to jail and ply him with questions concerning
the sad fate of Dion O'Banion's pet hatred. On the night
of Frankie's murder detectives established the fact that
three long distance telephone calls had been made from
the New York home of the mother of a Capone gangster,
Louis "Little New York" Campagnia, to Chicago. One
was to the Hotel Metropole in Chicago, known at that
time as the headquarters of Frank Nitti, another was to
the home of a prominent Chicago citizen and the third to a
certain garage in Cicero. With these clues you can write
your own thriller.

The Aiellos' felt terribly about losing Frankie and they
felt more terrible on July 25 when one of their own boys

was murdered. He was Salvatore Canale and he was killed
in front of his home one hot summer evening. But the
Aiello mobsmen continued to tug away annoyingly at the
Capone outfit, terrorizing alky cookers, throwing pine-
apples here and there, and taking pot shots at any Capone
gangster they could find. It was not until September 7,
1928, however, that they succeeded in making a really
important killing. The victim was Tony Lombardo, Capone
lieutenant, and head of the Unione Siciliane and the manner
in which he was eliminated was inexpressibly daring. The
scene of his assassination was in front of Raklios res-
taurant on Madison street, just west of Dearborn and little
more than a block from State and Madison streets, the
world's busiest corner. The time was 4:20 P. M. Countless
thousands of busy loop workers scurried about the streets,
for it was nearing the rush hour and the loop was soon
to be emptied of the ofliice workers.

At 4:15 the immaculate Tony with his body guards,
Tony Ferraro and Joseph Lolardo, left the offices of the
Unione Siciliane in room No. 1102 Hartford Building, 8
South Dearborn Street. Next door, it may be said, Tony
maintained an office of the Italian-American plan, a private
loan bank. Walking North they turned west on Madison
street and had not proceeded more than fifty feet when a
group of men detached themselves from the crowd and
quickly formed a circle around them. Shots rang out and
when the police could establish a semblance of order in the
panic-stricken crowd, they saw Mr. Lombardo, face in the
gutter, lying in a pool of his own blood. Ferraro lay dying
a few feet away. Lolardo was captured a block or more
away as he darted into a shoe store. "I was pursuing one of
the killers," explained Joe, "and I would have caught him
if you hadn't butted in." Joseph however denied that he
was with the slain men or that he was Tony's body guard.
"I just happened to be passing," he explained. Still the
police held heavy hands on him and they were still trying
to pry information from him regarding the Mafia King
when an attorney appeared. "Lolardo was an innocent
bystander," the attorney declared, "and unless he is imme-
diately released I will file a petition for a writ of habeas
corpus." One line of questioning was that Lolardo him-

AIi CAFOITII'S BIG SHOTS. (1) FranUe Romano, alias Diamond. (2) Joe "Feppi" Genaru. lu cliai^c ul Cain n.^ operations
in the Calumet District. (3) Rocco Fanelli, who, In Iiondon, declared that a dollar in Chicago was more powerful than
any police broom. (4) The boy iTith the smile is "Molps" Volpe, the boy wonder of Gangrland. (5) Al Capone. the Big: Fellow.

[40]

r ■^-•_Wa^

•*-*>'• ■__ - '«

Tony Iionibardo. Kingr of the Mafia,
and a lieutenant for Alpbonse Capone.
(Iieft) ISadison and Dearborn Streets
where Zionibardo was assassinated one
summer afternoon.

self had put his companions on the spot. At the same time
a report was cuiTent that King Al, en route to Florida,
had dropped in town and was hiding somewhere in Cicero.
A choice dab of apple-sauce had it that he lay in deadly
fear of assassins. If Capone was afraid of anj-thing it
was the great eye of the public.

The murder of Tony Lombardo, King of the Mafia, was a
great sensation, for at that time it stood out as the most
daring crime yet committed in Chicago by gangsters. The
Underworld was quiet for a few weeks while Tony was
being laid away. To the alky cookers for the Capone
gang who lived in the so-called Aiello-Moran district Lom-
bardo's death was a great calamity. Aiello would assume
control of the Unione Siciliane, they believed, and he
would surely begin a war of extermination among them.
And so, while Lombardo's body lay in its casket, the ter-
rified Capone henchmen began a quiet but quick e.xodus
from the district bounded by Division street, Chicago
avenue, Sedgwick and Larrabee streets. Signor Xitti, the
"enforcer" could not stem the wave of Italians who scurried
back to the old Genna district, and Signor Aiello looked
upon the spectacle and found it good. The Capone gang
held several huddles with the result that further action
was ordered on the principle that the best defense is a
swell offence. To the dismay of Signor Aiello he did not
become successor to Tony Lombardo as head of the Unione
Siciliane. Somehow that coveted position again came into

the hands of a Capone man — Pasqualino Lolardo, elder
brother of Joseph Lolardo, the body guard of Lombardo.
At the same time Mr. Nitti, acting under instructions
which continually came to him from the roving Big Fellow,
dispatched more muscle men into the Aiello temtory.
Some of the men who were immediately under the leader-
ship of the new Mafia King were such talented thugs
and pistoleers as John Scalice, Albert Anselmi, Claude
Maddox, alias Johnny Moore, who had graduated from the
Egan Rats mob of St. Louis, Tough Tony Caprezzio, strong-
arm artist de luxe, and Murray Humphreys. Headquarters
for this dangerous Capone group were in a dingy and
squalid little dive, pleasantly known as The Circus, located
at 1651 North Avenue. For a long time Pasqualino directed
these boys in a campaign of terror. Alky stills were bowled
over by the dozen, soft-drink parlors on the Near North
Side were bombed with such regularity that it sounded
like the Fourth of July in Ankeny, Iowa. Life became a
misery for those unfortunates who had aligned themselves
under the so-called protection of Joe Aiello, George "Bugs"
Moran, Barney Bertsche and Jack Zuta. Pasqualino raised
so much general hell on the Near North side that these
terrified Italians who had fled the district following Lom-
bardo's death now began moving in again. Well, now what
do you think Mr. Aiello did about this? You are right,
for on January 2, 1929, a second Mafia King was placed
beyond the aid of attorneys and legal writs.

[41]

Fasqnalino Iiolardo, BuccesBOT to Tony Iiombardo, as he was found In hlB apartment after entertaining- three

Note the Bourbon and the wine.

■friends.'

When the police were summoned to the Lolardo home
after an uncommonly long time, they found the Mafia King's
body lying in a luxurious front room. His face had been
shot away and he could hardly be recognized. Except for
a beautiful velvet pillow which she had tenderly shoved
under his head the body, said the widow, had not been
touched. She did not talk very much, but the little table
in the center of the room with its half-empty glasses of
whisky spoke eloquently on the circumstances of the
man's death.

With his wife Lolardo had returned to their home from
a loop shopping tour at 3 o'clock in the afternoon. At
the entrance to the stairway leading to their flat, a cheap
and dismal looking place outside, they were met by three
men whom the widow said she had seen many times for
several years. She did not, however, know their names.
All went upstairs and Mrs. Lolardo spread a lunch for
the three men who departed at about 3 o'clock. Five
minutes later however there was a knock on the rear
door. Mrs. Lolardo was in the kitchen ironing at the time
and she did not get a good look at them, she said, when
they were admitted by her husband. For half an hour
or more the \isitors made whoopee and there was much
clinking of glasses, joking and loud laughing. And then
at 4 o'clock, according to Mrs. Lolardo, the gun-play started.
There was a scramble for the door and when Mrs. Lolardo
walked into the front room she found herself a widow.
The pillow was slipped under his head and the widow went

to answer the door-bell being rung by her sister-in-law,
Mrs. Joseph Lolardo, wife of the well-known body guard.

Anna Lolardo, the sister-in-law,telephoned a funeral par-
lor for an ambulance and the attendants came, took one look
at Mr. Lolardo and summoned the police. During the ques-
tioning of Mrs. Lolardo it was finally extracted from her
that she had really got a good look at the last visitors and,
when a picture of Joe Aiello was pushed in front of her
face, she nodded that one of the visitors was he. While
she was still in custody an eff'ort was made to find Mr.
Aiello but it was unsuccessful, although eighteen or twenty
of his henchmen were gathered together from the dives,
pool-halls and bakery on the North Side. All were paraded
before the widow but she recognized none of them as her
husband's guests. Resolute attempts were made to solve
this murder, and it will be important to remember that
wires were tapped at several places and that Mr. Joseph
Lolardo was heard to say that he would get even with
a certain mob. The murder was never technically solved,
although it was established that Mr. Lolardo's visitors
were not all Italians.

The death of Lolardo again brought moving day to the
Capone alky cookers on the Near North Side. It also
brought control of the Unione Siciliane to Joe Aiello and
what appeared to be a rosy future for his allies. It also
brought a fierce and deadly determination to the hearts
of the Circus mob to avenge themselves. A few weeks
later the Valentine Massacre happened.

[42]

/AASSACRE

We come now to the bloody exercises in which Gang-
land graduates from murder to massacre. The exercises
are to be held in an unpretentious little brick garage at
2122 North Clark Street behind whose well-concealed front
entrance George "Bugs" Moran has established a whisky
depot in charge of which he has placed two of his toughest
and most capable lieutenants, Frankie and Peter Gusen-
berg. Whisky ti-ucks are kept here when not in use.
Johnny May, a first-class automobile mechanic, toils over
them when they are off the road keeping them in tip-top
shape mechanically. The garage is an ideal place in which
to hold Gangland's graduating exercises, a fact which had
been established months before, and, since that time the
gentlemen who are to perform the exercises have been
awaiting the signal which will inform them that the most
important North Side gangsters are on the spot and their
time has come.

Since December 18 the "observers" who are commis-
sioned to make this signal have sat patiently behind tat-
tered lace curtains in two front rooms of the boarding
house upstairs immediately across the street. It is now
February 14, 1929, and finally one of the many ruses
employed by the masters of ceremonies has succeeded for
the big shots of the North Side gang are assembling in
the whisky depot. Pete and Frank Gusenberg are first to
slip into the little door. Johnny May, the mechanic comes
a few minutes later. Adam Heyer and James Clark turn
into the door with Dr. Reinhardt H. Schwimmer, the
physician with the hoodlum complex. The "obsers'ers"
glance nervously at their watches, mumbling a few words
perhaps about the failure of George "Bugs" Moran to
keep this rendezvous. At this time they bend forward to
see still another caller entering the garage. He is Al Wein-
shank, the small-time bootlegger who has stepped in to buy
some "goods" for his "respectable" little speakeasy at
4207 Broadway. Al has his big police dog, High-ball with
him. The "observers" are chagrined because George "Bugs"
has not arrived, but believing that he will be along at any
moment, decide to make the long-awaited signal. One of
them slips away to a telephone. End of scene one.

It is now shortly after 11 o'clock — about fifteen minutes
since the telephonic signal was made. A youth, George A.
Brichet, loitering at the mouth of the alley behind the
garage, obser%-es a "squad" car glide noiseless up to
the rear entrance and stop. Three men are in the car.

two of them are in the uniform of policemen. Each carries
a large box-like contraption wrapped roughly with news-
papers. Curious young Brichet thinks that he is about
to witness a raid, the first one he has ever seen in his life,
and he races around to the front entrance, just in time to
see what appears to be another "squad" car stop in front
of the garage. Another group of armed men enter. Young
Brichet pauses. He would like to "bust" right in after
them, but the chauffeur of the big Cadillac growls at him
to move on. Hurrying northward the youth selects a spot
several hundred feet away from where he can at least
steal glimpses and, maybe, when the "pinch" is made there
^\^ll be a crowd and he can slip up to the entrance again
when the "cops" bring 'em out. End of scene two.

Inside the garage six men are all busily engaged in a
conversation. Two of them sit on a little bench in the
comer. Four are standing a few feet away. Johnny May,
the mechanic, is do\\Ti there under the truck tightening
its bolts. High-ball, the great police dog, is leashed to a
wheel of the truck and, from the six or seven feet of free-
dom thus accorded him, he barks and leaps playfully
around.

The telephone rings sharply in the little office which
is built directly in front of the window, thus obstructing
the rear %new "from people passing along the street. One
of the men turns and walks rapidly into the office. Presently
he comes back again, saying that Al Weinshank is wanted
on the wire. Weinshank speaks repeatedly into the mouth-
piece, but there is no answer. He clicks the instrument
impatiently and. finally the operator informs him that the
party hung up. Weinshank, a little mystified, returns to the
floor. Gangland has placed seven men on the spot, and
the graduating ceremonies are about to commence.

A door-knob turns. The men in conversation turn to
look. Two "policemen," one holding a large package, walk
easily toward them, followed by two men in street garb —
probably "dicks" think the men who are on the spot. A
few seconds later and the rear door swings open and t\vo
more men enter. Hard-boiled Pete Gusenberg begins to
snarl. Frankie makes a wise-crack. Just another goddam
raid by some punk coppers. How'd they get here. Some-
body is going to get a swell ride for this bum rap. Oh,
well fortunately there's nothing in the joint now. That's
one good break.

The intruders quickly tear newspapers from their
"packages" revealing two machine-guns, and now, perhaps
for the first time it dawns upon these six men here that
this is no time for defiant words or -wise-cracks. It may
be even that Frankie and Pete or one of the others recog-
nize some of these men beneath their coppers caps and
uniforms, and that with recognization comes swift and
awful realization that their hour has come at last.

There is a command from one of the intruders, empha-
sized perhaps by a choice bit of blasphemy. Defiantly the
two men who have been sitting on the bench rise slowly
to their feet. All turn round, hands raised heavenward,
to the wall. At this moment Johnny May, is spotted
lying beneath the truck. Another command and an oath

Four of the seven Victims of the Valentine Day Massacre. (Left to right) James Clark, Albert Weinshank, Frank QuBen-

berg and his brother, Fete Onsenberg.

[48]

brings him scrambling- to his feet and he too takes his
place in line. High-ball is no longer barking. Now he
leaps ferociously at the intruders, his white teeth showing,
but alas Al Weinshank has tied that leash too securely.
It all happens in a few minutes and yet there has been
ample time for Pete Gusenberg, standing at the right of
the line, to realize that this is a mission of murder, and
that his only chance to beat back death is the little auto-
matic revolver in his hip pocket. With a fierce cry and an
oath his hand drops like a plummet to that hip pocket,
and his fingers are just closing upon the butt of it when
the address of the graduating ceremonies commences. It
is delivered quickly, artistically, and with masterful effec-
tiveness. Approximately 150 bullets pour from those ma-
chine guns and only a few fail to find lodgment in the
doomed men standing there against the white-washed wall
of brick. With the first outburst of fire the doomed men
begin to scream and curse, but the steady rattling stream of
lead plays upon them so expertly that only one moves out
of line in an effort to escape. The steel "bullets tear into
the heads of these men, splintering skulls, splattering
brains. Except for the man on the end who had tried to
escape and collapsed on a chair in grotescjue posture,
they fall to the floor in the order in which they had stood.
Now that all are lying on the blood and grease streaked
floor, a second stream of death plays over them, again
tearing into bone and flesh.

Six or seven minutes ago Arthur Brichet had been
ordered to move along. Now, standing against the wall
of the building two or three hundred feet away, he can
hear a low rumble from within the garage. Presently
the group of "policemen and detectives" emerge casually
from the building, step into the automobile, and are driven
smoothly away towards North Avenue. He sees the
"squad" car weaving in and out of the traflic traveling
rapidly, but not too rapidly. He walks toward the garage.
He can hear the loud continuous barking of a dog. End of
scene two.

Mrs. Jeanette Landsman, who lives at 2124 North Clark
street which is just next door to the garage, hears rattling
gun-fire, voices of men screaming and swearing. She
rushed down stairs to the sidewalk and peers through the
window of the garage, but, because of the office cannot
see what has happened behind. She is afraid to enter. At
this moment a pedestrian passes. She turns to him, saying
that she heard shots in there. "I'll see if anything's
wrong," says the man smilingly. And, in a most un-
Chicagoan like manner, steps into the garage. A few
seconds later he bursts out again, shaking, his face ghostly
white. He can scarcely speak. "There's dead men all over
the place," he finally cries as he runs away shouting "I'll
call the police."

And the police come. In horror they pause before the
shambles. Both officers have seen service in the World
War but there is something about this sight that
is inexpressibly more awful than war. In the dim-
ness of the room their eyes fall upon the figure of a man
crawling upon his hands and knees across the floor. Re-
covering from their first shock they now rush to his aid.
It is Frank Gusenberg.
More dead than alive
he mumbles something
pretty strange for
him. It is that he
hopes no one will ever
suffer as he suffers.
The officers, realizing
that Frank is dying,
ply him with questions
as they move him
carefully towards the
door, but Frank is
true to the code of
the half-world in
which he has lived so
long and he will say
nothing . . . Squads
of police and detec-
tives appear in auto-
mobiles, horns honk-
ing, gongs clanging.
Taxi-cabs draw up

and photographers and newspaper reporters pour out. The
street becomes jammed and the Clark and Broadway street
cars are stalled in long lines in the narrow street. Up-
stairs behind the little frayed lace curtains the masters
of ceremonies sneak out and downstairs and, singly, dis-
appear into the surging crowd. Their job is done and done
well. The ceremonies are over. In a morning newspaper
office far away in the direction of the Loop District, a re-
write man who has heard the first story of this holocaust,
sits himself calmly at a typewriter and begins a matchless
story. He taps out the story in a single line, namely that
Gangland has graduated from murder to massacre.

AFTERMATH

Map showing route believed to have been traveled by automobile carrying-

Valentine Massacre killers from g-arai^e, in which their automobile was later

found, to 2122 Mortb Clark Street, scene of the slaying. (Insert) Front view

of 2122 North Clark Street.

The whole world reeled before this one in horror and
unbelief. Newspapers everywhere published the amazing
crime and the Valentine Massacre of Chicago was di.scussed
in the far corners of the earth. Defenders of Chicago's
reputation looked on the atrocity helplessly and in dismay.
Here was a crime which even the cynical Chicagoan could
not dismiss with a superficial gesture. It seemed absurd
now to say that since Gangland murdered only those who
belonged to (langland why bother about it? George "Bugs"
Moran disappeared shortly after the crime but before he
left one newspaper obtained one crisp comment from li'i:..
It was this: "Only one gang kills like that — the Capone
gang." This line was carried over the wires to Al Capone
who was in Florida and he had one all ready for it. "They
don't call that guy 'Bugs' for nothing," was what the Big
Fellow said.

With each successive smoking edition of the Chicago
newspapers for a solution of the crime and punishment
for its perpetrators swelled in bitter intensity. Thoughtful
persons filled column after column with suggestions as to
how the said conditions which made such a thing possible
might be remedied. Not since the unsolved murder of
McSwiggin, the "hanging prosecutor" from the state's
attorney's office, had public indignation developed such a
temperature. William E. Russell, commissioner of police,
commanded to run the murderers to earth, summoned
Deputy Commissioner of Detectives John Stege home from
a vacation to work on the case. Commissioner Stege at
that time was spending a vacation in Florida and Cuba
vrith a group of friends among whom was included Alfred
"Jake" Lingle, veteran Chicago Tribune police reporter,
who was later to be put on the spot by Gangland.

During the relent-
less series of investi-
gations instituted by
Commissioner Stege
every Capone gang-
ster in Chicago was,
at one time or another,
haled into detective
bureau headquarters
and passed in review
before eye-witnesses
whose names were,
for a long time, with-
held from the public.
Three men were posi-
tively identified. Jack
McGurn, and John
Scalice. At the same
time one of the eye-
witnesses identified,
Fred Burke, notorious
criminal, from a pic-
ture in the rogues gal-

^IMiM^^^fc WC.

OQDDW
DOODn

Li
•J u d1] „ [ji

DnQODD

nllnnnn

[44]

lery. Burke did not confine his
activities to any one gang or city.
Formerly a member of the notori-
ous Egan Rats of St. Louis, Burke
had been a machine-gunner with
the American Expeditionary Forces
during the World War, and was
wanted in five American cities for
as many murders at the time of
the Valentine Massacre. This choice
criminal is still at large. Shortly
after the massacre he narrowly
escaped capture in Benton Harbor.
Michigan, where he posed as a re-
spectable citizen. When his little
bungalow was raided, after the
precipitate flight of Mr. Burke,
police discovered three machine
guns and several hundred bullets.
In escaping Mr. Burke shot and
killed a traffic cop who wanted to
bawl him out for running through
a traffic light. Incidentally the re-
ward for his capture now stands at
the substantial total of §100,000.

Arthur Brichet, the boy who
was told to move on. identified John
Scalice and Jack McGum as did
one woman eye-witness and both

were eventually indicted. McGum was arrested in a room
in the Stevens Hotel where he was holding gala with a
sinuous blonde, Louise Rolfe, now kno\\Ti to fame as the
"blonde alibi." No machine guns were in Jack's luxurious
quarters, but he was not entirely without protection for
over on the bureau within convenient reach was a .45
automatic pistol and a .32 revolver. The woman who iden-
tified Jack also said that she had seen him before with
a number of men who played around the Circus Cafe on
North Avenue.

As you might expect when the police finally came upon
John Scalice he was with his old partner, Albert Anselmi.

Johnny Suave "Ding'bat" Oberta, at left, with his
body g-aard. Sammy Malag'a, holding' an athletic
trophy. The "Dingbat" and Sammy were insep-
arable in life and when Oberta was found dead
in his automobile the police looked around for
Sammy. Sure enough there he was just a few
feet away, his body floating in a small stream.

Two women identified John, but
they couldn't remember having ever
met Mr. Anselmi before. The case
against Jack McGurn eventually
was nolle pressed. As for Scalice
a sad but inevitable fate overtook
him before the day scheduled for
his court appearance and. would
you believe it, he was in company
at the time with his old partner,
Albert Anselmi. These two boys
were always together. We shall re-
turn to them at the proper time.

Seven days after the Valentine
Massacre the police discovered one
of the automobiles which had trans-
ported one group of the '"execu-
tioners" to 2122 North Clark Street.
Discovery was made in a garage in
the rear of 1723 North Woods
Street, three blocks from the Circus
Cafe. The "massacre car" had been
dismembered with a blow-torch,
gasoline had been poured over the
parts and then set afire in an effort
to destroy all identifying marks. It
was definitely established with the
discovery of the automobile that it
had been "faked" to resemble a
police squad car. The garage had been rented several
days before the massacre, and, according to the o'wner,
the renters, three men, gave their addresses as the Circus
Cafe. An exhaustive investigation from the automobile
angle of the Valentine horror which took many months
finally left detectives with nothing more than a number
of fictitious names.

A raid made on the day following the massacre found
the Circus Cafe not open for business. Doors were locked,
tables overturned and Messrs Maddox, Capprezzio, Hum-
phreys and Rocco Belcastro, the big bombing boy, were
nowhere around.

Three months later, however, when public temperature
had dropped a few degrees, these choice gentlemen ap-
peared at detective headquarters where they suffered them-
selves to be interviewed by reporters and Cp^jnTiibsiuiifcr
Stege. All had nice, detailed stories as to their movements

(1) Johnny G-enaro, one of Capone's adept bomb tosiers, fell out with another Capone bomber, James Belcastro, and
Johnny was put on the spot. In the hospital Johnny violated Oangland's code by "squawking" that Belcastro engaged
two killers to do the dirty work. (2) Julius Bosenheim, an Informer of rare touch, met a fate common to all gentlemen
of the underworld who whisper and squawk and inform into the ears of the "wrong guys." Official attention has again been
focused on the life and activities of Mr. Rosenheim, since the murder of Jake Iiingle.

[■!--l

nothing
several mo
Stege the
O' Banion
very plainly,
time, sufFerin
"flu." This

on the morning of February 14, 1929 and, after kindly and
smilingly posing for photographs, they departed.

Where was George "Bugs" Moran on the day his gallant
lieutenants were put on the spot? And how did it happen
that George himself failed to show up at 2122 North Clark
street ui response to the invitation that it would be to his
advantage as a truck load of hi-jacked liquor would be
offered Spr sale. All these questions were asked on every
hand befM-e the bodies of his men had been removed from
the blood \iid grease on the cement floor. Well, there was
tihg about the answer when it fina41y came,

later. Sitting in the office of Commissioner

who held the throne once occupied by Dion

Little Hymie" Weiss, said

at he was at home at the

with a light touch of the

ed bad for those roman-
ticists who had\ argued that "Bugs" act-
ing on a hunch, had remained away from
the spot at the last minute, and that.
as a matter of fact he was one of the
hundreds who packed the narrow street
in front of the garage when the perfo-
rated bodies of his men were discovered.

Moran left Chicago a few days later
for Canada and did not return for sev-
eral months. One day he suddenly ap-
peared at the detective bureau, pro-
tected by his lawyer. "Bugs" is very
self-conscious and nervous when in this
institution, but he had obviously care-
fully prepared himself for the ordea'
of saying yes and no. It may be inter-
esting to record that, when asked con-
cerning his relations with Pete and
Frank Gusenberg and all the other vic-
tims. Moran replied: " I didn't have
nothing to do with those guys. I wasn't

ever in that garage in my life; it looked too much like the
floral shop to me."

A day or so later Joe Aiello also appeared at the bureau
concerning a little matter of murders — the murder of
Lolardo particularly. "Chief, two years ago de Chief
O'Connor, he tell me to get out of town," said Joe, "and
I go, efen though I never do nothing wrong. Chief, I
like your Chicago. I wanta live here and be a respectable
man in my bakery." Before Joe left, he denied ever having
met anyone by the name of Moran.

One thing is certain. The police did not particularly
grieve over the passing of the Gusenbergs, Pete and Frank.
These boys had been raising hell in Chicago for many years,
and while news of their violent deaths
did not exactly inspire rousing cheers,
the remarks made several days after
the massacre by Chief of Detectives
John Egan concerning the average life
of the gangster may not be interpreted
as coming from a saddened heart. "The
average life of the Chicago gangster,"
said Detective Egan, "is about 30 to 31
years, and that rate Pete who was about
36, had lived five or six years beyond his
allotted time. Frank Gusenberg who
was 38 years old, was about seven or
eight years over-due at the morgue.
They must have been mighty careful
of themselves to last as long as
they did.

Chief Egan said that Clark, being
32, was a year or two late, while Al
Weinshank had his coming to him for
the past four or five years. Johnny May,
said Chief Egan, was bumped off right
on schedule, and Adam Hyer who was
only 29, got cheated out of a year.

(Upper photograph) Domlnck Aiello,

minor member of the Korth Bide gang',
ance of Domlnck Aiello.

(I^ower photograph) The last public appear-

ed]

loo DAYS and

wheto is

Mr. Saii\s

"Pollack" Joe Saltis lost a gi-eat deal of prestige
in Boozedom in 1928 when he submitted to capture
and was "settled" in the Cook County jail for two
months on a chai-ge of violation of the liquor laws.
The feat of clamping a beer baron in the "can"
was not accomplished with all the ease of falling
off a log, however, for Mr. Saltis made himself
scarce except to his beer clients for 139 days, by
actual newspaper count, before he was finally ap-
prehended. The newspapers made a great deal of
noise about the search for 'Sir. Saltis and, every
daj^ for 139 days, you could open up your newspaper
and see in very large type the numbers 102 days
and no Mr. Saltis or 103 days and no Mr. Saltis
and so on and on up until the day Joe was brought
in mumbling "I'm out of the beer racket, and this
is a bum rap." The public took a great deal of
interest in the newspaper count, which, until the
Dempsey-Tunney fight was looked upon as the
longest count Chicago had ever seen. It had all
the wallop of a serial story with the hot stuff
continued until tomorrow.

When Joe was emptied from the jail cell he
made straight for the flower shop in the back-of-
the-yards district where his affairs were being
ably directed by his lieutenants, amiable John
"Dingbat" Oberta and Paddy Sullivan. Joe was in
a tranquil condition of mind for the next few
weeks, but panic struck him and the "Dingbat"
when they came upon a newspaper story which
said that all hoodlums in
Chicago were to be submitted
to a mental test. If found of
unsound mentality, as most
assuredly they would be, sug-
gested the story, they would
be confined for treatment. Joe
and the "Dingbat" may not
have been afraid of machine
guns, pistols, automatics and
pineapples, but words like psy-
chology, phychiatry, psycho-
pathic, were monstrous and
inexplicable terrors, and their
first quarrel is said to have
been precipitated when the
"Dingbat," who pretended to
be book-learned couldn't rattle
off a definition of psycho-
paresis. But Little Johnny re-
stored himself in his boss's
estimation when he hit on the
scheme of having their own
personal psychiatrist examine
them and give them a certifi-

Prankie Bio, body fuard of the Blp Fellow,
Alpbonse Capone. Frankle was arrested in
Philadelphia with Al and sentenced to a year's
imprisonment in jail for carrying concealed
weapons.

cate of high and normal intelligence. And so, a
few days later, Chicago was treated to the spec-
tacle of "Pollack" Joe and Johnny "Dingbat"
Oberta in the office of the police commissioner
proudly waving certificates of mental health. "We
won't have to play with no blocks," said Johnny
and Joe as they walked away, and then, catching
himself, he said, "I mean we won't have to play
with any blocks." Safe from confinement in the
"bug" house Joe and Johnny and their henchmen
now began to look around for Edward "Spike"
O'Donnell. Joe hadn't had a shot at "Spike" for
many months and the strain was telling on him.
Besides rumors were reaching Joe that "Spike"
was about to make a great beer offensive and had
surrounded himself with a formidable gang of
muscle men. One of them, strangely enough was
the redoubtable Frankie MacEarlane and his kid
brother, Vincent. The underworld gossiped for a
long time about the split between Saltis and Frank
who had been pals from the very beginning. The
truth was that MacEarlane could no longer endure
the nasty-nice "Dingbat." As we have seen Mac-
Earlane was at heart a bank-robber and, just to
keep in practice, used to wander around knocking
over a safe here and there. When Saltis was in
jail the "Dingbat" tried to clamp down on Frankie,
telling him that he would spoil the real dough for
all of them if he persisted in the bank-busting
tendency. "Aw, hell," responded Frankie, "It
takes real brains to hoist a bank. And to hell with
this Sunday School outfit. I'll make some real con-
nections." The fact that his boss, Saltis, was in
jail was proof enough to Frankie that he was in
with a wrong bunch of guys.

Saltis saw no real obstacle from the Sheldon
mobsters who. it was then being rumored, were
having internal trouble. Sheldon, suffering from
tuberculosis aggravated by constant breathing of
gun-powder, was ordered by his physician to seek
strength in the purer atmosphere of Arizona. He
did so, leaving his mob in
charge of Danny Stanton, an
arrangement which was
okeyed by the Big Fellow, Al
Capone. Stanton, a former
member of the "four horse-
men" group of taxi-cab slug-
gers which also included John
"Mitters" Foley, had for his
right hand men, Hugh "Stub-
by" JIcGovern and William
"Gunner" MePadden, both
tough boys de luxe who had
been brought up from baby-
hood in the famous Ragan
Colts gang. At this time Joe
Saltis, finding it difficult to
buy beer elsewhere and im-
possible to manufacture it,
made connections with the Big
Fellow. King Capone wel-
comed Big Joe but told him
to behave himself and to stay
out of Danny's territory.

[47]

Not ijassed out, bnt passed on. WllUam "Qnnner" McFadd«n, an ally of Oanny Stanton, was killed In the famous Granada
Cafe on the eve of the New Year, 1929, by Oeorge Maloney, killer de luxe for Michael "Babs" Qnlnlan, bonrbon baron.

As Joe was therefore able to concentrate on
"Spike" O'Donnell, while Danny Stanton's mob
enjoyed peace and prosperity until another gang,
headed by Michael "Bubs" Quinlan and George
Maloney, moved up to the beer front, doing a spe-
cialty business in Canadian whisky. "Bubs"
Quinlan first came to underworld attention as a
body guard for Tommy Tuit, notorious South Side
gambler, while Maloney, a killer of great capabil-
ities, had been in business for himself for many
years. He would work for any individual or any
organized gang, and his services were always in
demand. Maloney carried two revolvers, both of
.38 caliber, in leather-lined pockets. Maloney is
said to be the first Chicago gunman to saw off the
barrels of revolvers of .38 caliber. With the pos-
sible exception of Frankie MacEarlane, Maloney
was Chicago Gangland's most terrible killer. Ma-
loney, unlike MacEarlane, had a touch of dash and
romance about him, and already legends have
sprung up about his deeds and his strange and
paradoxical personality.

Meanwhile Saltis, wearying of the routine of
life on the South Side, was spending more and
more of his time in Wisconsin where he had pur-
chased a great estate. The "Dingbat" had proven
himself a capable lieutenant and Joe came to Chi-

cago seldom and then only in emergencies. On
October 11, 1928, while Joe was in Wisconsin, the
first outbreak of gunplay took place between
"Dingbat" and the O'Donnell mob. Little Johnny,
his body guard, Sammy Malaga, and a member of
his mob, George Darrow, were parked near
"Spike's" home in an automobile. What saved
"Spike's" life on this occasion was the timely
arrival of the police. "Spike," jumping out of his
car, had tackled Darrow and was holding him
when the police squad car came up. Oberta and
Malaga took to their heels after firing several
shots, and the police arrested both "Spike" and
Darrow. Both were charged with disorderly con-
duct when it became plain that "Spike" would not
charge Darrow with attempted murder. They paid
fines and "Spike" climbed onto a soap-box to an-
nounce formerly his re-entry into the beer racket,
an announcement which came as a staggering sur-
prise to most Chicagoans, including the police,
who did not know that "Spike" had ever been out
of it. And, as a matter of fact, he hadn't. "Yes
sir," said Spike, "I'm now in the beer racket. I've
got a bunch of blue-eyed Irish boys who won't
stand any pushing around either. A lot of guys
had better wise up to themselves and lay off"."
And with that "Spike" returned to his blue-

[48]

Hu^h "Stnbby" McGovem, companion of McPadden, was also shot and killed by Maloney during- the New Year's celebra-
tion. Maloney was arrested on the spot with a smoking- pistol, but, despite this fact, he was acquitted. Several hundred

merry-makers were unable to identify Maloney as the killer.

eyed Irish boys, most of whose names had inci-
dentally "ski" appended to them. His companion
in jail for disorderly conduct, George Darrow, re-
turned to the South Side and met violent death nine
days later. Not because he needed the money but
because his was an exuberent nature brimming
over with vitality and needed expression, George
occasionally regaled himself by a "stick-up" or a
road-house hold-up and on this occasion he was
efficiently shot and killed. Meanwhile the Stanton
gang was doing a little shooting with the Quinlan
gang which had been prospering via the muscle
route into the Stanton preserves, and on October
14, 1928, a stray machine gun bullet intended for
"Bubs" reached instead his companion, Ralph J.
Murphy, a bartender, and Murphy was killed in-
stantly. The machine gun was operated by Hugh
"Stubby" McGovern, standing in the basement of
a house across the street. From that day on Mr.
McGovern was a marked man for George Maloney,
the boy with the sawed off .38 set out for him.
While George was "tailing" McGovern, the atten-
tion of the police was directed to a sensational
unsuccessful attempt made by Leo Mongoven and
Frank Foster, North Side gangster, to shake-
down an ex-racketeer, Abe Cooper, who had be-

come a broker and had gone straight. Abe with-
stood the shake-down and was being hustled
into an automobile, parked on LaSalle Street in
the loop, for a "ride" when, suddenly he whipped
out a revolver and began firing. Frankie disap-
peared into the crowds, but Leo. seriously wounded,
fell to the pavement. The incident stands out as
an excellent example of what happens to gang-
sters who attempt to quit and become respectable.
Cooper was one of the few who was able to enforce
his new standing but it took his old trusty "gat" to
do it. Quiet in Gangland for a period. On Decem-
ber 29 George Maloney, still trailing, "Stubby"
McGovern, dropped into the Granada Cafe, a fam-
ous South Side night club and, would you believe
it, across the room he spied McGovern and William
"Gunner" McPadden, making whoopee with the
aid of two young women. George figured that he
had spent enough time looking for "Stubby" and
that he would finish the job now and to hell with
the hundreds of merry-makers there assembled.
George got to his feet, walked slowly over to Mc-
Govern's table and, shooting from his pocket, fin-
ished "Stubby" with two bullets. He then directed
that famous .38 toward Mr. McPadden and he too,
with two bullets in his body, went skidding out

[49]

k%.V.V#..'. . ^ l*>'V*'#/j t A K.«-* • r-M • v.mi w ^ >.

^"^frt". ^^^^/"^''^"^'^^""^ Anselmi. two of Gangland's most sinister tgrxres. Imported to this country by Mike Genna thev
Tutlon they aUUd ^hems'e'lve Z\' r"" ''""» '" """^^ ""''= ^"^ *"° policemen were killed, rinllfy rele^ed from prose^
tw^.,.t^h , ^'^^^^l'^^ f^^" Capone. Rumors had it that they dreamed of killing the Big Fellow with the result

that they themselves were put on the spot. (Lower picture, X marks the Spot where ^hey were found deTd in an a"to*

mobile on the Indiana State line.

onto the dance floor, very much a dead man. By
this time the noise had attracted the attention of
a policeman outside, Officer Timothy Sullivan, who
had been detailed to the Granada to look for auto-
mobile thieves. Timothy came puffing into the

cabaret just in time to see Maloney, huddled be-
hind an over-turned table, gently depositing his
.38 on the floor. Officer Sullivan took possession of
both Mr. Maloney and the .38. "It ain't mine,"
said George, indignantly. "I never saw it before.

[50]

Peter "Bummy" Goiastein and Ub inseparable companion, Walter Quinlan, came to an end quite in keepingr with their
rcti^ties^hi-iackers terrorists, muscle-men and murderers in the famous old Valley District. "Bummy" was efficiently
ui^Iled as this Bhotl-raph Aphically chronicles, in a drug store in the Valley which he owned as a blind for his more
^emune^aUve but more dan^r^^s activities. •■Wallie" who was tried and acquitted for the murder of Paddy "The Bear" Ryan
bo?s Of thJ old Valley Ganff in pre-Volstead days, finally came to a full stop in a saloon shortly after he and "Bummy
had murdered Samuzzo "Samoots" Amatnna, Genna lieutenant, in a barber shop.

I heard the shooting and jumped behind this table
for protection.'" A few days later Mr. Maloney
regained his freedom on bonds and, just outside
the county jail, met his boss, Michael "Bubs" Quin-
lan who shook hands and gave George a fresh .38.
all nicely sawed-off and loaded. Now Maloney and
"Bubs" 'devoted themselves to a search for other
members of the Stanton gang, one of whom was

the deceased McGovern's tough brother, Michael,
who was reported to be living only for revenge.
On March 20, 1929, three months later, "Bubs" and
Maloney, driving in an automobile, came upon
Danny Stanton standing on a corner talking with
two friends, Raymond and William Cassidy, not
hoodlums. They stood in front of the home of
Miss Jewell Webb, Raymond's sweetheart. Well,

[51]

Johnny "Ding'ljat" O'Berta and his body-g-aard Sammy Malag-a left a roadhouse late one nig-ht with a "friend" sitting-
in the rear seat of their limousine. O'Berta g-ot it first in the back of the head. Sammy tried to run away but he was
"plug-ged" and his body thrown into a small creek. (Picture on opposite page.) Willie Niemoth is believed to have been the
"friend" sitting in the rear seat. Niemoth is now in Baltimore where he was convicted and sentenced for a bank robbery.

[52]

Sammy Malaga body rnard to Oberta. attempted to get away from tHe killer in the rear seat of their automobUe. He
Sammy majag^a. ooay „u ^,^^^ ^^^^ .^ ^^ ^^^ phctographs seem to indicate.

the shooting began, and Raymond Cassidy fell to
the side-walk dead, victim of a bullet intended
for Stanton. This dreadful marksmanship gave
credence to the belief that Quinlan must have
done the shooting, because Maloney had never
been known to miss his man. Neither "Bubs" nor
Maloney was arrested for this murder, but it in-

spired voung Michael McGovern to more serious
eiforts to avenge his brother's death. How many
attempts he made to kill Maloney will never be
known, but he made several. One occurred on
July 6, 1929, and was partly successful, for, when
Alaloney went on trial for the murders of McPad-
den and McGovern, he moved about on crutches. He

C53]

Frankie MacEarlatie, Gangrdom's most ruthless killer. Once

a member of the Saltis mob, Frankie is now reported hustllner

beer for "Spike" O'Oonnell. a Saltis enemy.

was in a greatly weakened condition, but the trial
didn't last long. No witnesses could be produced
who had seen Maloney and the .38 together, and
he was acquitted. Although Maloney li\ed longer,
he did not make any more public appearances with
his .38, so we will bring his career to a close here.
Early in 1929 he was sent to a hospital as the
result of an automobile accident, in which he had
attempted to knock an interurban train oflt' its
track. In the hospital he contracted pneumonia,
an enemy which no .38 could beat back no matter
how deftly handled, and George Maloney, killer de
luxe, died on May 6, 1930, at the age of 38.

While "Bubs" and Maloney were regaling the
South Side with gun-play, William "Klon-
dike" O'Donnell was carrying on the West Side
tradition for toughness. "Klondike," as we
have chronicled, had surrounded himself with
men so tough that he frequently saw fit to con-
vince tljjem that, while they were tough, he was
much tougher, very much tougher. At this period
"Klondike" was particularly troubled over the out-
side activities of George "Red" Barker, Mike
Reilly, George Clifford, Frank "Si" Cawley and
Thomas McEUigot. Barker, a slugger for union
officials in Chicago labor wars, had served a peni-
tentiary sentence for his activities as a fist-slinger
and terrorist. On his release he joined the "Klon-
dike" mob and found beer-running child's play. With

plenty of extra time on his hands "Red" conceived
the idea of appropriating a few unions for himself,
an idea which he disclosed to the other afore-
mentioned four, who were enthusiastic. Presently
these five very tough boys had ousted the officials
of the coal teamsters and hikers union, and were
now laying plans for appropriating control of the
Mid-West Garage Owners' Association. This in-
volved driving out Dave Albian, alias "Cock-eyed
Mulligan." It was a hard job but they did it. A
certain garage owner decided however that he
would not get upon the Barker bandwagon, and
one night while "Red" and his playmates were
gunning for the recalcitrant one, they shot a gar-
age attendant to death and severely wounded a
policeman who had interferred. Eventually George
went back to the penitentiary, not for the murder
and shogting.but for violating his parole by leaving
the state. He had fled to California. Well, with
"Red" in Joliet, "Klondike" fell into a huddle over
the matter and decided that now would be a good
time to show "Red" how tough he was. He became
determined on this course following the crazy
murder on March 15. 1929, of William J. Vercoe
by George Clifford. The murder occurred in the
Pony Inn, 5613 West Roo.sevelt, scene of the Mc-
Swiggin assassination. Vercoe, known as "a clown
for the hoodlums," loved to recite blood-and-
thunder verse for the amusement of his gang-ster
friends. On this occasion, Vercoe, well-plastered,
stood at the bar reciting a certain verse in which
one line was "You're a coward." When Vercoe
came to this he unwittingly pointed to Mr. Clifford,
who with Mike Reilly was drinking at the bar, and
Mr. Clifford cried out, "who's a coward?" and
before Mr. Vercoe could say "I didn't mean you,"
Mr. Clifford had shot and killed Mr. Vercoe. Well,
this was too tough, and on April 14, 1929, Clifford
and his bosom pal, Mike Reilly, went on a long,
long ride. Their bodies
were dumped in the alley
behind theHawthorneHotel
in Cicero. On May 29, 1929,
somebody else beat them to
Thomas McElligot. He
was killed in the basement
of a Loop saloon. On Sep-
tember 4, the end came for
Mr. Frank "Si" Cawley,
who was also taken for a
ride. George "Red" Barker,
released from the peniten-
tiary later on, was a very
much convinced man, and
he is still believed well and
healthy as a devoted "Klon- ^ whoopee jomt aii

dike" henchman. plastered.

1'.

[541

.-^■» ■ _ - •••'

ALanJ
for ALL

The authoi's of this pleasant naiTative have
introduced you from time to time to their favorite
enl men of Gangland — John Scalice and Albe'-t
Anselmi who. you will remember, were imported
to Chicago from Southern Italy in 1925 by the
Imperial Genna brothers. Scalice and Anselmi.
grim and mirthless fellows, were a perfect defini-
tion of the word sinister. You would have been
uncomfortable sitting in the same Yale bowl or
Soldiers' Field with them — more uncomfortable
than walking down a dark alley at midnight with
"Little Hymie" Weiss or Schemer Drucci. On May
8, 1929. the sensational long run of the terrible
drama called Scalice and Anselmi came to an
abrupt end. Pumped full of bullets, burned and
beaten, their bodies were found in a lonely stretch
of countiw in the bleak Indiana state line district.
Scahce and Anselmi with one, John Ginta. a Ca-
pone gangster, had been taken for a terrible ride,
and one of the stories at the time had it that John
and Albert had plotted to over-throw the Big Fel-
low himself. A coup was planned. Capone was to
be seized at a given signal during a banquet held
somewhere in Chicago. You can easily imagine
what Scalice and Anselmi planned to do with
him. The banquet began. The signal was given.
All Capone henchmen ai'ose but. instead of seiz-
ing the Big Fellow, they took possession of
Scalice and Anselmi. Capone, it is said, did not
believe the story of the treachery of these men
until, sitting there behind the spaghetti, he wit-
nessed the signal.

Eight days after the long, long ride of Scalice
and Anselmi, the Chicago newspapers sizzled with
the story of the arrest of Al Capone and his
aide-de-camp. Frankie

Rio. in Philadelphia
charged with carrying
concealed weapons. The
arrests were made by
detectives who had met
Capone in ^liami where,
by this time, he had
purchased and improved
to suit his own peculiar
needs, a vast estate.
There was more sizzling
when a day or so later,
AI and Frank, were
consigned to a county
jail cell for one year.
Along with the tidal
wave of economiums on
the efficiency of the
Philadelphia police and
courts, came the inter-
esting current of ru-

Balph Capone, older brother of Al Capone. as he appeared with
his attorneys recently during" his trial and conviction for an
income tax fraud. Balpb was sentenced to three years in the
penitentiary.

mor that King Capone had placed himself on
the spot for the Philadelphians in order that he
might have the comfort and security of a jail cell
until the Valentine Massacre probe, investigation,
"heat" or what have you had gone the way of
most Chicago probes and investigations of Gang-
land's crimes. Public temperature was so high at
this time that Capone did not want to be foot-loose
anywhere, and he probably got the idea of going
to jail from his old master, Johnny Torrio. But
even in prison, whither he was consigned for one
year, Capone could not entirely escape from the
stench of the \'alentine Massacre. Three months
after his conviction the prison authorities began
receiving letters from a garrulous and somewhat
foolish lady addressed to the Big Fellow. In the
course of prison routine these letters were opened
and. because of the sensational nature of their
contents, sent to State's Attorney John A.Swanson.
The letters were written by Mrs. Frank Beige, re-
cently wed. Her husband was sometimes described,
correctly or incorrectly, as the Big Fellow's per-
sonal executioner. Beige may have been expert
at handling a machine gun and in putting an
enemy on the spot, but he was a terrible dub at
handling women, particularly Mrs. Beige. Any
way. without his knowledge. ^Irs. Beige, rambled
on and on something after the following manner :

"You know what Frank has done for you. He's got
to get out of town pronto for the other mob are wise.
His life isn't safe here. So you got to get us $10,000 in
cash and do it quick."

Of course the Big Fellow never saw the letter,
a fact which never occurred to the naive Mrs.
Beige. When no reply came to this one. she wasted
more paper and wrote on the following:

"I'm asking you for the last time to send that $10,000
and get it to us fast. Frank's sick of you leaving him
to hold the bag. He can't get out of town without the cash
and he can't stay here without being taken for a ride.
You kick across or Frank will go to the police and spill
what he knows. Remember: everything."

In thus talking out of turn Mrs. Beige made
a great many wild and reckless statements about

what Frank thought
and would do. Frank,
as a matter of fact, did
not know how little
wif ey was trying to help
him along. When the
Big Fellow failed to kick
in the $10,000 she again
addressed him:

"All right. Y'ou're just
as good as putting Frank
on the spot, by leaving us
stranded here. Well, how'U
you like getting the finger
on yourself? Frank's going
to tell everything he knows.
He remembers fifteen shoot-
ings he did because you
ordered him to do them.
He's going to tell just who
killed McSwiggin for a
starter. And he's going to
tell about why you had him
bump Ben Newmark — be-

[55]

Frank' Del Bond, believed to have slain three
Capone g-ang-sters In a saloon in the famous Easter
Day massacre of 1930. Arrested as a suspect be
was indicted largely on the testimony of Chlcaifo's
ballistic expert, who said that a pistol found in
Del Bond's room was the one which fired the
fatal bullets. In this picture Del Bond is belnir
questioned by Coroner Herman IT. Bundesen.
Iiower photograph shows police looking* at the
spot where the bodies were found.

cause you'd heard that
Ben wanted to steal your
racket and had put up a
cash offer to the man that
got you. Yes, and then
he's going to tell about
your sending him to New-
York, along with others to
let daylight through
Frankie Yale. Of course
he's going to sing about
that Valentine day affair
And how are you going to
like that Mr. Al Brown."

Of course Mrs.
Beige was required to
come to Mr. Swanson's

office, where, confronted with these letters, she
continued in an even higher crescendo with the
result that she was kept in semi-custody by
detectives for fear that something might hap-
pen to her. Her husband was eventually arrested
and held for three days. Strangely enough no
lawyers came forward to attempt his release. But
Frankie Beige stood up and took it on the chin,
which is why, maybe, that he's still a member of
Capone's gang. What he said in response to ques-
tions was, in effect, that his wifey was just trying
to make some easy dough, by shooting off her
mouth. Mr. Beige had never met Mr. Capone and
Mrs. Beige was crazy when she said that he used
to sleep out in the corridor of Capone's room in
the Hotel Metropole until relieved by another
guard, Louis "Little New York" Campagnia.

Capone and Frankie Rio did not return to
Chicago until March of 1930. During the interval
little of importance occurred in the Big Fellow's
realm either as regards business or blood-shed.
His affairs seemed, indeed, to prosper while those
of his enemies, the Aiello-Moran outfit, seemed to
be afflicted by an evil fortune. The "Enforcer"
of the Big Fellow's business, Frank Nitti and
Hymie "Loud Mouth" Levine held forth from
headquarters in the Lexington hotel, deciding vdth
finality who should be killed, who should be
bombed, whose trucks should be hi-jacked. One of

the more sensational, though unimportant, affrays
during the lull was between Tommy McNichols
and Jimmy "Bozo" Schupe, small time West Side
bootleggers. On July 31 Tommy and Bozo held
a duel on Madison street. Tommy standing on one
side and Bozo on the other. They killed each other.
James Walsh, a beer-runner, was murdered in De-
cember by Charles "Babe" Baron after a prize-
fight at which Walsh, during an altercation, slapped
"Babe" with his fists. Two days later the body of
Patrick King, criminal of sorts, was found in the
deserted gambling joint owned by Terry O'Connor
on South Wabash Avenue. On January 27, 1930,
Johnny Genaro, a grade "C" bomber for the Ca-
pone outfit, was put on the spot by James Belcas-
tro, another Capone bomber, but did not die. John-
ny and Belcastro have since made up and are
getting along nicely, according to reports. If you
hear any loud noises it may be Johnny and Jimmy.
On February 3, 1930, Joseph Cada, companion of
Jimmy Walsh on the night Walsh was killed, was
shot to death in his automobile near the Green
Mill Cafe, a famous whoopee joint where inciden-
tally, at that time, Texas Guinan was holding
forth. The next day Julius Rosenheim, supposedly
an informer, was filled with bullets and dumped
into a snow bank near his home, and all was quiet
until February 24, when Frankie MacEarlane, in
a hospital under an assumed name, was be-set by

[56]

_• •• • •'

Frank Hitchcock, the Barnham bootleg'g'er who tried to operate "on his ovm" was found slain in the rear of the home of
Johnny Patton. the "boy mayor" of Bnrnham, and a close friend of Capone.

three "rats" (as he called them) as he lay in bed,
one foot propped high in the air in a cast. Frankie
chased them off with a couple of .45's he had man-
aged to conceal from the authorities. How did
Frankie get his foot all shot up. and how did he
get in a hospital for treatment without the shoot-
ing getting into the papers. Ti-ue enough the hos-
pital authorities reported that they had a patient
suffering from an accidental shooting. But, when
the police came to look over the patient, they didn't
recognize Mr. Frankie MacEarlane.

"Who tried to kill you?" asked the police after
the shooting. Frankie looked at his questioners
in great disgust. Instead of answering directly he
began a volley of oaths, half to himself. "Can
you imagine the rats trying to get me — me.
Frank MacEarlane 1" And then, looking toward
the police, he added: "You'll find 'em in a ditch
some of these days." The assailants of MacEar-
lane had climbed a fire-escape to get into his
room. While Frankie was in the Bridewell hospi-

tal, where the police took him on a charge of
disorderly conduct, the Gangdom and political
circles were startled to read in the morning papers
of the passing from this life of Johnny "Dingbat"
Oberta, on March 6, just ten days after the at-
tempt to kill MacEarlane. Oberta was not found
in a ditch, however, although his body guard,
Malaga was removed from a water-filled ditch.
Willie Niemoth, a member of Saltis mob, at that
time sought for complicity in a bank robbery in
^Maryland, was reported to have done the job for
MacEarlane. Another suspect. "Big Earl" Her-
bert, also a Saltis mobster disgruntled over the
authority of the "sneaking nasty-nice Dingbat"
was suspected of having done Frankie a good turn.
During his questioning Herbert deplored the fact
that "Dingbat" insisted on going about in a limou-
sine. "He should have got himself a roadster,"
said Big Karl. "Why so?" asked Commissioner
Stege. "Oh, so that his friends couldn't ride behind
him," replied Herbert.

Wslliam Didcman, once a member of the Saltis g'ang- was reg^arded as a traitor becanse he deserted to the Sheldon mob.

Here's how they punished him.

[57]

*»•»•••.#/."."",• A. !'••''•'#'-* * •.^Vk'A'r'^ » u.^^ • w ■

What have

you got on ^
ifiie Chief f

Alphonse Capone, released from a Philadelphia jail, set Chicago on its ears, when he appeared unheralded in the office of
John Stege, Commissioner of Detectives, and blandly Inquired if he was wanted for anything. Capone with his attorney
was then escorted to the Federal building- where the same question was put to the United States District Attorney.
On the same night Gangdom banqueted the Big Fellow and the slogan was made "All for Al and Al for All."

L58]

>J»m

^ata

While small armies of
newspaper reporters,
movie-tone representa-
tives and other chron-
iclers of the merrie
tayles of the day camped
outside the prison from
which Capone was to be
released in March, the
Big Fellow contrived
with the aid of the prison
authorities to slip away
unobserved. There was a
gi-eat hue and cry all over
the land. What had hap-
pened to the king of the
underworld? Had the
gangsters bumped him
off — yet? Where was he
hiding? Certainly he
couldn't remain undis-
covered for vei-y long.
The Big Fellow was too
big. Would he return to
Chicago? The authorities
hadn't asked him about
that Valentine dav affair
yet? "He's not in Chi-
cago, nor will he be," said
Deputy Commissioner of
Police John Stege. "I've
given orders to arrest
him on sight and throw
him in the can. If he
comes here there won't
be a moment's peace for
him, and he knows it." Four days pass.

"Hello, chief, what have you got on me?" well,
well, I'll be damned, if it isn't the Big Fellow
himself, right here in Chicago, sitting in the office
of Mr. Stege. With him were a couple of lawyers,
a group of politicians but no visible body guard.
After a time the Commissioner permitted the re-
porters and photographers to pour in. The Big
Fellow sat and smoked a cigar while they plied
him with questions, most of which elicited merely
a cold look from him.

Commissioner Stege accompanied Capone to
the office of the United States district
attorney where the same questions
were asked by the Big Fellow, and
apparently, received the same re-
sponse as from Mr. Stege, for the Big
Fellow went free. The reporters tried,
but failed apparently to keep up with
him, for he disappeared. A few days
later it was i-eported that King Ca-
pone's return to Chicago had been
principally to effect lasting peace in
the half-world, and that every mob-
ster of importance in the city includ-
ing the Moran-Aiello mob, had been
represented at a famous banquet and
truce, where again pacts were made
and agreements effected. Exactly
what transpired at this famous meet-

(Upper photograph) Gangrlacd's most famous widow, Mrs.
riorence O'Berta, married the "Dingbat" after the murder
of her first husband. Big: Tim Murphy. Now she mourns the
passingr of the "Dingbat." (lower) The blonde Alibi of Jack
McGurn. Iiooise Rolfe was arrested in a room in the Stevens
Hotel with Jack Mc&urn, believed to have operated one of the
machine guns which mowed down seven North Side g'ang'sters
in the Valentine Day Massacre.

Restaurant at 2222 South Wabash

Avenue, once a saloon and brothel

owned by Alphone Capone.

ing will never be known
unless the Big Fellow can
find time enough some
day between his Miami
court appearances to dic-
tate his memoirs. These
undoubtedly would make
excellent reading and
would probably reveal the
Big Fellow as much less
of an ogre and bugaboo
than he is generally re-
garded. The Big Fellow-
might turn out to be not
quite so big, and maybe
others you never heard of
would gi-ow and grow in-
to the craziest propor-
tions you could imagine.
Certainly the Big Fellow
frowns on a big casualty
list in the ordinary course
of operation, and who
can say that at the fam-
ous truce and party he
did not insist that there
be only one or two bomb-
ings per week, or one
killing per gang every
thirty days? Also that
these measures be taken
when all other less vio-
lent ones, had failed?
Business is business,
whether grocer or boot-
legger and King Al is no
grocer. At any rate the representatives who
attended the Big Fellow's banquet went away
with some new ideas in their heads, and a slogan
on their lips, ALL FOR AL, AND AL FOR ALL.
Within a few days the Big Fellow had disappeared
again to turn up finally in his palatial home in
Miami, Florida, where he has remained to this
writing. Much of his time is spent resisting the
authorities in their indefatigible attempts to bring
about his retirement from the community.

For months Gangland was more quiet than it
had ever been and then, over on the North Side
came rumors of dissention in the
Moran ranks. Teddy Newberry, first
lieutenant of Moran in charge of the
bourbon brigade, became embroiled in
a squabble over profits. Teddy com-
plained that he wasn't being "cut" in
according to his deserts, and "Bugs"
was unable to effect a settlement.
One fine summer day Teddy told
Moran to go to hell, and a few days
later Teddy discovered an attempt
was being made to kill him in his
apartment on Pine Grove on the
North Side. A few days later Benny
Bennett a tough boy just out of New
York received a telephone call, sup-
posedly from a spokesman for "Bugs"
to meet him at a certain place, and

[59]

»^\».*.*»^.*."«~^ ^'I'aV/l * •-^V«'«'^'^ * •-V^ • • »#.t •-»' »

Benny hasn't been seen or
heard from since the tele-
phone rang. On November 17,
the body of Johnny "Billiken"
Rito, a Newberry bourbon
hustler, who had formerly
-v.'orked for the Gennas, was
found floating down the Chi-
cago river. The manner in
which "Billiken" had been dis-
posed of was unusually horri-
ble, for he had been thor-
oughly chopped up and the
pieces bound together with
hay-wire. TheNdisappearance
of Bennett together with the
later absence of anot~l}er New-
berry aid, Harry Higgilis who
hailed from St. Paul, gave
credence to the grim rumor
that Gangland killers, seeking
to destroy the corpus delicti,
had established a crematory
somewhere on the Near North
Side where business competi-
tors and disgruntled gang-
sters were incinerated into
the ashes of oblivion. Ah, a
new spirit in Gangland ! Who
said that killers have no imagination? \At this
writing New York friends of Benny BenAett are
running around town with long faces offering re-
wards for word of their missing playmate who
would come out west. Newberry eventually
stepped into the Capone inner circles, taking with
him Signor Frank Citro, he of the motionless
eyes and expressionless face, better known as
Frankie Foster. "AJl we ever got from 'Bugs'
was a reputation," explained Teddy and Frankie.
Well, the war was on again. Moran and the
Aiellos pressed northward into the great road-
house and summer resort area in the Northwest
suburbs.

The first shot in the new war, noW going, was
fired on May 31, and the victim, Peter Plescia, an
Aiello organizer and collector, fell dead in the
mouth of an alley. On May 31, PhiUip Gnolfo,
former Genna killer had been a pall-bearer at
Angelo's funeral, was slain in his automobile. A
few hours later on the same day two more Aiello
boys bit the bricks — Samuel Monistero and Joseph
Ferrari. On June 1 came deadly reprisals in the
sensational Fox Lake Massacre. Four men and a
woman, Mrs. Vivian Ponic McGinnis, wife of an
attorney, sat around a table in a roadhouse. Sud-
denly one of the men, turning his head saw a ma-
chine gun pointed towards him. He got up and be-
gan running. The rattle of the machine gun began
and he went down, as did two of his companions.
The woman was seriously wounded. One of the
victims was Sam Pellar, who, you will remember
used to work as a chauffeur and handy man for
"Little Hymie" Weiss and was walking across the
street with his boss on the famous day that "Little
Hymie" fell before machine gun fire. Joseph
Bertsche, brother of Barney Bertsche, was another

Willie Niemoth and Frankie MacEarlane may
have been important cogrs in Joe Saltia' beer ma-
chine but they were bank robbers under the skin.
Niemoth was seized In Chlcagro recently and hur-
ried under heavy g^ard to Baltimore, Maryland,
where he was convicted in short order of com-
plicity in a pay roll robbery three years ag'o.
Niemoth is believed to have slain Johnnie "Ding'-
bat" Oberta as a personal favor for McEarlane.

victim as was Michael Quirk.
George Druggan, brother of
the famous Terry Druggan
was terribly wounded and he
is at this writing in a hospital
fighting for his life. A few
hours later in Chicago Thomas
Somnerio, Capone leader, was
strangled to death and his
body flung in an alley on the
West Side. One of the mourn-
ers for Mr. Somnerio was a
Gangland Queen, Margaret
Mary Collins, who had been
the sweetie for five other
gangsters, all departed. Some-
body put Somnerio on the
spot, and it was said that a
woman had done it. More hor-
ror was produced by Gangland
four days later when a river
tug churned up the hay-wired
body of Eugene "Red" Mc-
Laughlin. Aloysius Kearney,
hard-boiled gangster doing a
specialty business in labor
racketeering, became the cause
of another murder mystery
V when his bullet-ridden body

\,was discovered on the morning of June 9.

Kearney had been a friend of "Red" McLaugh-
lin and an unsucce.ssful eff"ort was made to find a
connection between the murders. From bills in
his pocket it was disclosed that he was a collector
for the National Garage Owners' Association. It
was this association which, a few weeks before,
had inspired criticism from the then Commissioner
of Police, William Russell and Col. Robert Isham
Randolph, president of the Chicago Association
of Commerce, for waging a campaign to have all
automobiles found parked at night without lights
towed into garages. The cost would be $5.00 to
the car owners — a pleasant racket which, strangely
enough, didn't go over. Samuel Maltz, president
of the association, questioned by police said:
"I'm strictly a business man. There is no racket-
eering or hoodlumism connected with my organi-
zation. I didn't know Kearney very well. He had
worked for me only for a week. I was paying
him $40 a week to collect bills. Don't give me
any hoodlum talk. I'm a business man and don't
go for that." It was becoming warmer and warmer
in Chicago's loop at this time for those gentlemen
of the gat. Jail sentences instead of the customary
fines were being handed out. As a result of this,
hoodlums hit upon a practice of parking their auto-
matics in cigar stores, speakeasies and other places
just outside the loop while transacting business.

Wbat the no loop parkins' law means to g-angfsters.

[60]

■ •^••.•»».- • - - »*-*-^'» • • '^ '• <

••^«

Udk

LINdLE

The elimination of Racketeer Aloysius Kearney
on the morning of June 9 was hot stuff and it
sizzlea on the front pages of all the newspapers
up until 1 o'clock — the hour when Alfred (Jake)
Linglej, Big Shot police reporter for the Chicago
Tribune, was assassinated in the midst of a
crowd in a subway station, just off Michigan
Boulevard.

After this Racketeer Aloysius Kearney's de-
mise ivas relegated to the inside pages or even
kickec out of the papers altogether. Compared to
the murder of a newspaper reporter, the murder
of a r4cketeer was absolutely insigpificant. Are not
rackelJeers knocked off every day in Chicago? Now
who h id eyer heard of a newspaper reporter being
put oil the spot ?

Well here it was at last. City editors all over
the land looked at the flashes and tOld themselves
that Gkngland had at last stepped over the dead-
line. Tpe underworld at last had tried to intimi-
date the upperworld ! What would those cynics
say now — those cynics who were always coolly
pointing out that gangsters never killed any ex-
cept gangsters? The murder of Reporter Jake
Lingle, thoiight the city editors, would surely in-
spire Chicago now !

Well, i there you are. It seemed obvious — as
obvious as a bill-board that debonair Jake Lingle
was murdered for only one reason — that he was a
newspapei I reporter full of the low-down. It
seemed to'i/a tearful and sympathetic public that
Jake Lingle was just another ordinary news hound.
A good news hound of course, a first class one,
but still just an ordinary police reporter — one of
those seedy-looking chaps who plays cards up
in the press room, and comes down to work every
day with the ancient query — "What's doing
chief?"

And so, with determination in their hearts to
call this terrible threat from Gangland, they
buried Jake Lingle — the martyr. It was a marvel-
ous funeral. It was greater than the defiant
funeral the underworld had thrown for amaz-
ing Dion O'Banion. It was greater than the laying
away of "Little Hymie" Weiss or Schemer Drucci
or Mike Genna or "Dingbat" Oberta. It was greater
in every way, but it was greater most of all be-
cause it was a funeral on which the church did not
turn thumbs down. In that one respect Gangland
was terribly eclipsed. Jake Lingle, the reporter
was buried by the Church. Gangland could not
ignore that.

The funeral was held on June 12 from the home
of the "martyred reporter," at 125 North Austin

"UNorpiciAi. CHIEF OP FOi-ici: op Chicago?" — This is

the way Alfred (Jake) Jiingle, reporter for the Chicago Tribune
for eigrhteen years, has been described since his assassination
on June 9 in a subway just off Randolph Street and Michigan
Avenue. An investigation now under way may determine
whether this sinister charge is true or not.

Avenue. One newspaperman who went there to
weep as well as to write said that it was more
befitting a field marshal than a modest newspaper
man. Jake lay in a silver-bronze casket — better
than the caskets in which Frankie Yale and Schemer
Drucci had reposed. It was flanked by floral crosses
and lighted candles and draped with an American
Flag. Flowers ! Flowers ! They were everywhere !
Jake would have liked that, for he loved flowers
and when he lived always had them in his lapel
and in his rooms. A police reporter who loved
flowers !

But the most impressive touch of all — a touch
which had never graced the funeral of an under-
world king — was the long, long procession of
policemen which marched in the funeral. There
were cops everywhere, everywhere. They rode on
horses, they marched solemnly in line, white-
gloved, swinging their sticks. And behind them
in beautiful symmetry came representatives from
the fire department. Behind the fire department
came the bands ! What racketeer in heaven or in
hell could boast that a band had marched behind
his mortal remains? But Jake had four Great
Lakes Naval bands and three bands from as many
posts of the American Legion. And Jake, the
reporter who had been murdered by Gangland,
also had a military escort.

[61]

.A'

PUT ON THE SPOT— Alfred (Jake) Linffle, Tribune reporter, was shot down in a subway, just off Randolph Street and
Michigan Boulevard at 1 o'clock in the afternoon as he, with a blDnd yoath, were hurried along with a crowd towards a
train bound for the races at Washington Park. The "blond" youth stepped back a few ^ces, whipped

volver, shot Jake in the head, killing him instantly.

out a snub-nosed re-

r62]

iiniir r

tSu&iTJ

The terrible truth that the bloody hand of Gang-
land had struck below the belt this time came
upon those who saw the two beautiful little chil-
dren of Jake Lingle as they tried to play in the
sunshine on the front lawn. Big Shots from the
upperworld came to pay respects to Jake — Ai-thur
W. Cutten, the stock broker who could lose 15
million in a day, and Oscar E. Carlstrom, the
attorney general, and Samuel A. Ettelson, the
corporation counsel, who was said to be the power
behind the throne in Chicago municipal affairs,
KBd a small army of the toilers from the staff
of the Tribune where Jake had worked for eighteen
years. William Russell, commissioner of police,
headed the pallbearers. Jimmy Murphy, veteran
reporter, lifted his hands to the casket as it was
borne out of the flower-filled room, as did Eddie
Johnson the ace "photog" for the Tribune. The
long funeral cortege formed at Garfield Park and
Central Park Avenue and moved impressively
down Jackson Boulevard to Our Lady of Sorrows
church. Pageantry of flags. Muffled drums I Ah 1
Let Gangland see this and tremble! The casket
bearing Reporter Jake Lingle was lifted from the
hearse and borne into the church. Attention! The
etachment of Illinois naval reserves led by Capt.
Edward Evers and Lieutenant Commander Elmer
Carlson stiffened ! So did the Legion units, the
Peoples Gas, Commonwealth Edison, Board of
Ti-ade and Medill-Tribune posts, each in brilliant
uniform. The Very Rev. Jerome Mulhorn, a close
friend of this reporter whose friendships were end-
less celebrated the requiem high mass, and when
the services were over the military escort again
formed. Led by the mounted police the escort
marched again down Jackson Boulevard to Garfield
Park to disband. The funeral cortege proceeded
on the Mount Carmel, where the sailor
lads, standing at the grave of Jake
Lingle. tlie reporter, fired a salute. A
naval bugler sounded taps, and that
as the burial of Jake Lingle — re-
porter.

Reporter? Yes. indeed a reporter,
but what else? The clods of freshly
turned earth on Jake Lingle's grave
had scarcely dried and crumbled to
dust when Jake Lingle, the reporter,
scrutinized on page one, began to turn
into Jake Lingle, racketeer. Tragicafly
enough, it became increasingly appar-
ent that suave Jake Lingle, for eigh-
teen years a reporter in the shadowy
realm of Gangland, had himself been
touched by the shadows.

That "martyr" funeral had been
held too soon — three days too sopt.
,t soon became apparent as the findVi-
al affairs of the sixty-five dollai' a
week police reporter were spread out
under the big headlines that Jake
Lingle's funeral belonged to Gangland.

Alas ! Alas ! The better element thig^-time had
given a racketeer a funeral — and the swellest of
them all!

It seemed incredible and yet the facts elo-
(luently told that it was true. In less than three
years the sixty-five-dollar reporter — a salary com-
mensurate with his ability, his newspaper said —
had deposited to his personal account approxi-
mately $60,000. An appalled and fascinated pubUc
— fascinated because it was felt that now the
mystery of Gangland was about to be dispelled —
saw, under those headlines, the amazing story
of the murdered reporter's frenzied stock market
speculations — how, in 1929, he had run up a paper
profit of $85,000. His stock market flights with
his friend, the police commissioner, Wifliam F.
Russell ! . . . The diamond belt — a gift from A]
Capone. Could it be true that he had been a friend
of the Big Fellow? Well, well, well! Now there
was the time during the McSwiggin case when
they had the Big Boy in custody over there in
the state's attorney's office, and the Big Boy would
take no food — except what Jake Lingle went out
and got for him. Of course he was a friend of
Capone.

A great moral outcry ! Imagine a newspaper
man, working for a nominal salary, on assignments
necessitating association day after day, week after
week, year after year, with men whose pockets
were stuffed with money, who could betray his
newspaper, who could fall before temptation. Oh,
well, the moralists have it !

As an aftermath of this discovery that

JAKE I.INCI1I: BURIED WITH MILITARY HOKORS. The funeral of
"Jake" Iiing^le, Chlcagro Tribune reporter, slain by Gangsters, was one of
the most impressive ever held in Chicagro. One newspaper described it as
be&ttingr a Field Marshal. Iiingrle was buried a martyr. Since the funeral
an Investiifation has disclosed that he was murdered, not because he
was a reporter, but in spite of It.

[sa]

■1

7*»'*!*A ^♦A^^/.V-'Vi'.'WV/. « kX'fcV/'v* iAV»'«VV».*A*>«-' /.«»«%» » -

Jake Lingle, reporter also was
Jake Lingle racketeer, and,
to borrow a phrase, the un-
official chief of police of Chi-
cago," the Commissioner of
Police, William Russell re-
signed his job. So did Deputy
Commissioner of Detectives,
John Stege. the brave and
dauntless fellow who had
slapped Louie (State and Mad-
ison Street) Alterie in the
face. The righteous demanded
that they resign. A new com-
missioner. Captain John Al-
cock was appointed. Mayor
Thompson told him to run the
crooks and the gangsters out
of town, and he began by
raising hell with the police de-
partment. Another shakeup
Deputy Commissioner Norton, ably assisted.
States Attorney John A. Swanson commissioned
Pat Roche, famous federal investigator, to solve
the Lingle murder.

The investigation looked good in its early
stages but later developments indicated rather
plainly that some of the many resolutions which
many organizations had passed concerning Jake's
high moral character were rather premature.

It was found that the .snub-nosed .38, with
which the racketeering reporter had been assassi-
nated, had been purchased months before by our
old acquaintances, Frankie Foster and Teddy New-
berry, the disgruntled Moran henchmen who had
deserted to enlist under the banner of the Big
Fellow.

Foster was apprehended in Los Angeles,
whither he had fled two days after the murder
with a naive e.xplanation '.'This town's too hot for
me." During the investigation Jack Zuta, the
Moran lieutenant, was taken into custody and
questioned at the detective bureau. When his in-
quisitors were done with him, he strolled up to
Lieutenant George Barker, who had arrested him,
and said, "They'll kill me before I can get to
Madison Street. You brought me here, now take
me back."

a great

Alphonse Capone. the BigT Fellow of Qangrland
taklngr It easy in Florida where he has
estate.

His subordinate

"Oh, I'll take you as fm^
Madison," said Barker, and
they started — Zuta in the rear
seat accompanied by Solly
Vision, with Albert Bratz in
the front seat.

Zuta had good grounds for
his fears. Bullets soon started
to fly about brilliantly lighted
State Street, a street-car mo-
torman was killed, an innocent
bystander wounded, but Mr.
Zuta slipped away unhurt, as
did the attacking automobile
with the aid of a smoke screen.

Jack Zuta was, however,
living on borrowed time, and on
August 1st he was shot to death
where he had been hiding since the State Street
episode at a resort hotel on upper Nemahbin lake,
near Waukesha. His lieutenant, Solly Vision, has
not been seen or heard from, and it is rumored
that he also has been .slain. Papers taken from
Zuta's clothing indicated that boozedom's profits
are stijl good as indicated on a balance sheet of
July 23. 1930, which showed a profit of $35,225.00.
Albert Bratz, in who.se home Zuta had been hiding
and who.se automobile Zuta had been using, has
abo disappeared. Zuta's connection with t
Lingle slaying i.s still a mystery as far as the publ
IS concerned. Chicago police intimate that Zuta's
death might have been due to the Capone gangs
intention of taking control of the north side booze
territory of the Moran gang and some significance
was attached to the recent return of Alphonse
Capone to Chicago.

"Who Killed Jake Lingle and Why?" is as
big a mystery as ever. Maybe it will eventually
take its place up there with the other Big Question,
"Who Killed McSwiggin and Why?"

ERKiTUJI: Since the printing of the Chapter on
McSwiggjn, the authors have learned that Harry Madigas
former twner of the saloon in front of which William
McSwiggin was killed, has been incorrectly quoted on page
28 regarding his relations with Al Capone.

.-.■••"-.•

"NOW I'LL TELL ABOUT IT"

By HAL ANDREWS

Author of'X MARKS THE SPOT"

(FOR SALE AF^ltR JUNE 1. -933)

^^Hl '*T."'* *"' '"'"'" •' "^ ^'^''s The Spot" put his name on
■•fcook? There *er« reasons, many of them. Now, three jears after
i^ aopsarance. the auioor. re.aaung his identity, tails wn,. Mia storv
•«» kis world -ramoii$ book in humari interest. How »«, .'i rocaived bv
I iwbl.c, the refornoers. the critic;,, ,„ F.ar,,--. in -..y:2nU io A^.,'
mc,,i a gangster learn hia kter.ri.T?' These an^ evw* i<u«s<;a„ -
WMci yourself are artswerej in "ivow io Ts.'i About it" In' an'
to coMect the narr.es ari^ addr* ■. .3, ,,.^^ ,,,^ ,„., ., ^ .

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