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- [00:00]
Don Wildman
Want to explore even more history? Sign up to History Hit, where you will discover history from around the world. From the American Revolution to prehistoric Scotland. There is plenty to discover. With your subscription. You'll unlock hundreds of hours of exclusive documentaries with a brand new release every week exploring everything from the ancient world to World War II. Just visit historyhit.com subscribe to bring the Past Alive
- [00:32]
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- [01:11]
Monica Reinagle
Hello, I'm Monica Reinagle, host of the Nutrition Diva podcast. Summer is here and with it the hot and sticky weather. A morning working in the garden or maybe on the golf course can leave you more depleted than you realize. And plain water isn't always the most efficient way to restore the balance. That's where Liquid IV comes in. It's so science backed. Formula is clinically proven to hydrate faster than water alone. Whether you're exercising, playing outside or simply surviving a summer heat wave, it's an easy way to stay hydrated. Shop now@liquidiv.com, liquid IV hydration that goes wherever life takes you.
- [01:47]
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- [02:09]
Monica Reinagle
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- [02:11]
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- [02:22]
Don Wildman
Welcome to downtown Chicago, Illinois circa 1925. Oh quick, get down. You okay there? Got all your pieces? Sure you do. Come on, let's move. We're in Chicago's notorious 19th Ward over here on the west side towards Taylor and Morgan. Little Italy they call it these days controlled by the Jenner brothers. There's six of those guys, all actual brothers, One of them, they say, is legitimately insane. But this is the Prohibition era, and the Jenner brothers guarantee the flow of bootleg whiskey for Johnny Torrio, Chicago's boss since 1920. Lately, though, things have been getting a little nasty. And by year's end, three of those brothers will be dead, Torrio gone, and his front guy, a New Yorker named Al Capone, will be well on his way to becoming America's most famous gangster, moving against Bugs Moran and Jaime Weiss, who both want a bigger piece of the action. Speaking of action, we got more company. Duck quick. Hi, folks. Welcome to American History Hit. I'm Don Wildman. It's always tempting to mythologize history, to pump stories up out of proportion, casting real events in a glamorous glow. If there is one realm of history especially prone to this, it's Chicago of the 1920s and the famous mobsters who illicitly ran the place. Or did they? What was Chicago really all about? Back in the torrid days of Tommy Gun hitmen and politicians on the take, did the average Chicagoan experience the terror of extreme violence? Was Chicago Mobland a fact of ordinary life? Well, we got a guy for this. Paul Durica is the director of exhibitions at the Chicago History Museum and a scholar, writer, and guide to all things Chicago history and culture. Hey, Paul. Great to meet you.
- [04:25]
Paul Durica
Thanks for having me.
- [04:27]
Don Wildman
The annals tell of a town twisted by corruption and held hostage by hoodlums. Really? And if so, how did this come to pass? I'm talking about the 1920s and the 30s in Chicago.
- [04:40]
Paul Durica
Well, you know, I would say that was true, but only if you considered your great grandmother a hoodlum. And what I mean is, when we think about the Prohibition era, not just in the United States, but across Chicago, you know, we tend to focus on figures like Al Capone. Right. He still remains probably one of the most famous people associated with the city of Chicago, apart from, like, Michael Jordan or Oprah Winfrey. But when you really kind of look at this history and what was going on on street level, it's a little bit more complicated. And in terms of people violating the Volstead act, that is, you know, making beer and spirits and selling them and so forth, you had the organized crime element, but you also had, like, a lot of everyday Chicagoans as scoff laws as well. In fact, we get that during this
- [05:31]
Don Wildman
era, but the reputation is that criminal organizations really kind of sliced and diced that town up and ran it. We're going to get into this in detail, but I'm just checking in on this. This general reputation. Is it. Are we in the realm of reality here?
- [05:44]
Paul Durica
To some extent. I mean, I think, you know, what you see happening in Chicago really during this era. So, you know, national prohibition starts in January of 1920, extends to 1933, is crime gets organized, right? So for prohibition goes into effect. I mean, you had, you know, groups of criminals, gangs, but they were kind of like. Only like a step up above, like a street gang. And then prohibition goes into effect, and they become almost like small businesses. They start to adopt a kind of structure. And you see that play out in different parts of the city. And so you get a really powerful gang that emerges on the north side, ostensibly led by a guy named Dino Banion. You get a gang that emerges on the south side of the city. Originally, there was a longtime criminal named Big Jim Colosimo who was in charge of that. He brings in some people from New York, including John Torrio and Torrio's sidekick, Al Capone, and they really kind of take control of the south side, and they also start expanding west as well, where there's other criminal elements. So the city gets kind of carved up into these areas of control and influence. And then starting around 1924, what had been a sort of fragile peace among these different groups devolves into violence. And that's when you sort of see particularly the south side gang really trying to make a move to take over the city as a whole. And even while all this is kind of happening, as I said, you still have these kind of like mom and pop people trying to just make some extra income by selling booze illegally.
- [07:19]
Don Wildman
I mean, the story really centers on the fact that this world's worst idea of prohibiting Americans from purchasing their own alcohol creates this engine for crime to then become organized, systematized, nationalized. I mean, it's unbelievable what happens in those 10 years that the Volstga act is in play. But the question remains, why Chicago at that time? What was strategic about that place? And why would everybody. I mean, that really has the reputation of this Prohibition period.
- [07:54]
Paul Durica
You know, I. From my perspective, I think, you know, Chicago emerges as such a center for the. What's this called? The bootlegging industry? Right, or the organized crime industry? For the same reasons that Chicago itself as a city kind of like grew and then leaps and bounds towards the end of the 19th century and into the 20th. And there's on one hand, its location. So it's like right there on Lake Michigan, but also connected to the Mississippi river through canals, but more Critically centered, the nation's railroad hub and becoming the center of the nation's, like, growing highway networks. Right, right. And so all of these different industries are based in Chicago. I mean, you think about organized crime, but you also think about the union stockyards, right at this time being the center of, like, meat production. So just as you know, you're getting raw materials coming into the city that then get produced into these various products and then distributed all across the country, Chicago's also, like, a really great hub for the manufacturing distribution of illegal booze as well. They're building on the same infrastructure. At the time Prohibition goes into effect, There are about 60 different breweries operating in Chicago, which is a good number. And those. They don't go anywhere. You still have all of the, you know, the vats, and you've got the breweries themselves. You still have the brew masters. And a lot of them just go to work for figures like Torrio and Capone underground and start producing beer. So I think it's really because Chicago was this center for industry and manufacturing, had this great infrastructure, had a good location, and then also just had a huge population of immigrants, too, for whom drinking was an important part of their cultural life. And all those factors, I think, contributed to it. And then you got to talk about this as well. In Chicago, you had a law enforcement and a political culture that was willing to sort of turn a blind eye to enforcing the Volstead Act. So, I mean, when you look at how much money the Capone gang spent just on, like, paying off people, it was a big sum, but that allowed them to kind of work with a degree of relative safety.
- [10:03]
Don Wildman
Right. And there's so many different factors here. Of course, it's not one thing or the other. It's. It's all of them together and.
- [10:09]
Paul Durica
Right.
- [10:10]
Don Wildman
As you say, economic injury booming out of the 19th century. Chicago is the place to be. I mean, that's why the 1892 World's Fair is there. It's. It's really an amazing engine of economic activity in so many regards. This is also prior to, and this goes for all over the country, the real federalization of institutions like law enforcement. I mean, we're still sort of an independent entity out there in Chicago. And so there's not the pressure that's going to be coming later as they start to use this organized crime as the reason to federalize law enforcement in America. When we're talking about the gangs you've already mentioned, Dino Banyan, this seems to come out of the immigrant population. Is that A fair generalization or why do we associate this with the Italians and the Irish and so forth?
- [10:56]
Paul Durica
It's partially true, like so much else with Prohibition. And I think it's a lot because of the way in which popular culture sort of depicts and embraces criminal elements and because of figures like Capone who are really into sort of self promotion and became sort of associated with this. But when you look at, like, let's just look at o' Banion's gang for a moment, right? You had. I mean, he was ethnically Irish, but born in the United States. So was one of his lieutenants, Bugs Moran. But then Jaime Weiss was a Polish immigrant. Another one of his associates came from a German family. The Germans and the Irish were two of the biggest ethnic blocs in Chicago. And so when you look at the north side gang, they weren't just the Irish gang pitted against the Italian gang on the south side. In fact, they were kind of coming from all the different communities that made up the city. And some of them had been. Their families have been in the US For a long time. And some of the more recent experience. And even when you look at the Southside gang and Capone, it wasn't like he just associated strictly with fellow Italians. There was like a, you know, a lot of different people who were his associates as well. So I think it's really kind of like. I mean, definitely Chicago was a city of immigrants, and you had a lot of people who were first generation immigrants who found their way into some of these gangs. But it's, I think, largely kind of pop culture that sort of helps to sort of shape our impressions of this era. And then also because, as I said, figures like Capone become so much larger than life that they become sort of like the sort of stand in for the archetypal gangster.
- [12:33]
Don Wildman
And it's so much the story of America through this period of centralization and conglomeration. You know, on the grain, you've got General Mills, you've got General Motors. Later on, all of this tendency in America to centralize things applies, of course, to organized crime, which eventually ends up with the syndicate and all these. These central families. At this time we're talking about, we're coming out of a period where these gangs are numerous, right? 20 to 40 significant gangs operating across all of Chicago. But again, as we move along, this begins to centralize under one or two figures, right?
- [13:08]
Paul Durica
That's correct, yeah. And I would say, you know, the real sort of architect of organized crime in Chicago is John Torrio. People know Capone But Torrio was the one who very early on realized there was a lot of money to be made in bootlegging, and there was no real point in wasting time fighting among one another. And so he really begins to create what you could call a sort of corporate structure and kind of builds out the gang, but then he's willing to kind of enter into alliances with figures like o' Banion just to kind of, like, maintain the peace and the Geniz on the west side and others. And it's not really until, as I said, like, 24, that things start to go south. And then Capone's much more ruthless. So, you know, if Torio's somebody who kind of builds his influence through alliances and sharing resources, Pone is much more likely to kind of just impose his will and, like, find different ways to, like, force out people he doesn't like to take over their territory. There's a guy in the north side named Roger Tuohy who's, like, running things on the far, far north side above the city. And, you know, Capone, a lot of people think Capone was basically involved in, like, framing this guy for a crime he didn't commit to get him thrown into the penitentiary. So Capone could, like, kind of absorb his operations. And it's like, tactics like that that you see until eventually it's basically the south side gang controlling the majority of what's going on in Chicago.
- [14:27]
Don Wildman
Yeah, and we're talking bootlegging, which, of course, was the big, big operation. But you also had gambling, loan sharking, racketeering of all sorts. Extortions, sex work, the brothels. All of that was happening within this organization. These organizations, yeah.
- [14:42]
Paul Durica
And a lot of those operations or, you know, crime predate Prohibition. But what's interesting is, like, Prohibition really kind of gives criminal outfits resources that they never had before, and so then everything just kind of gets taken to the next level. So. So, I mean, that's basically what they were doing prior to Prohibition is things like prostitution, labor racketeering, gambling, things like that. But they're able to make so much money and gain so much political influence and get so much protection from the police around bootlegging that it extends to their other operations. And then, you know, after repeal in 1933, they have to kind of like, shift back to some of that work, I guess you want to call it, because they don't have the lucrative benefits of selling illegal booze anymore.
- [15:31]
Don Wildman
I'll be back with more American history after this short break.
- [15:38]
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- [16:20]
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- [16:58]
Monica Reinagle
Hello, I'm Monica Reinagle, host of the Nutrition Diva podcast. Summer is here, and with it the hot and sticky weather. A morning working in the garden or maybe on the golf course can leave you more depleted than you realize. And plain water isn't always the most efficient way to restore the balance. That's where Liquid IV comes in. Its science backed formula is clinically proven to hydrate faster than water alone. Whether you're exercising, playing outside, or simply surviving a summer heat wave, it's an easy way to stay hydrated. Shop now@liquidiv.com Liquid IV hydration that goes wherever life takes you.
- [17:33]
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- [18:48]
Don Wildman
It was the Chicago outfit that was so started by Johnny Torio, is that right? And then taken over by Al Capone.
- [18:54]
Paul Durica
That's right, yeah. And then Capone, you know, it's perfect, right? He gets taken down for tax evasion, of all things, because he's, you know, making so much money but not reporting it. And then after him, you know, it passes through a couple other hands like Frank Nitti and a guy named Paul Rica are kind of two of the immediate successors. And they're the ones who start to try to bring it into more what we can almost call the contemporary era, where the focus becomes much more on gambling and labor, racketeering and things like that.
- [19:23]
Don Wildman
Oh, my God, it just keeps going. It's amazing when you start reading about this, which I was doing and prepping for this, the history of the Chicago outfit comes to the present day, frankly. I mean, it's so many different leaderships. It's pages after pages online as you look at who was leading who and who followed who it was. It's amazing. On one hand you have the Chicago outfit, which grows and grows and that's famous for Capone. But then there was also the Northside gang, which was Dino Banion and then Bugs Moran, right?
- [19:51]
Paul Durica
That's right. And they, you know, they never were as big or as influential as the Southside group. And they undergo like a whole, like series of leaders over time, mainly because they keep getting bumped off. So, you know, o' Banion's there at the beginning, but he's killed in November of 24. Jaime Weiss takes over, but he's killed in October of 1926. And then bugs Moran takes over, but a good portion of his gang is wiped out in February of 1929 in what is known as the St. Valentine's Day Massacre. And so they never really kind of have the same sort of power and influence as Capone's gang. But there still are like a thorn in Capone's side and they can create trouble for Them. And that persists even after the St. Valentine's Day massacre.
- [20:46]
Don Wildman
We have done on this series several shows about the Chicago mob. It's impossible not to. And it's such a popular subject matter. But this episode really is about life on the streets of Chicago. And how did these gangs and this factor in Chicago, you know, manifest as part of life in that town. Talk to me about the violence, especially in the middle 20s there, when things go wrong and there's fighting in the streets. That's what they make the movie is out of. That's what's been glamorized. The Tommy guns out the side of the car, the whole thing. How much was that any kind of reality in the streets of Chicago?
- [21:25]
Paul Durica
I mean, by and large, the violence was very targeted. So, I mean, if you were just somebody walking down the street or a pedestrian, you probably weren't in danger. If you weren't, like, involved in this world. That said, I mean, it happened kind of, like everywhere in all sorts of different environments, right? So depending on, like, where these criminal figures were. So, you know, behind me, Weiss, for example, is gunned down outside of Holy Name Cathedral, which is the seat of the Catholic diocese in Chicago. You didn't think somebody would, like, you know, be taking a lot of shots at him outside of a church. I mean, that just happened to be where he was walking by when they started to shoot him, shoot at him. Another guy, Jake Lingle, who is a reporter for the Tribune, and it comes out later that he has connections to organized crime. He's killed while he's, like, walking down, basically, to an Illinois Central train stop near what is today the. Well, back then, it would have been the Chicago Public Library's main branch. So people are getting killed, like, in all these different places all across Chicago, but they're always, like, targeted killings. And that's one thing to keep in mind. But I will say that, like, in terms of, like, the influence or presence of crime that's, like, everywhere in the city. For things that we've already, like, talked about, like, say you're part of a union in any number of industries in Chicago. There's a good chance that at this point in time, your union is beginning to become, like, mobbed up in some way. Or say, you know, you own a restaurant, you might be pressured to start carrying booze, say, from the Capone syndicate, or, you know, your local politicians or the cop on the beat who serves your neighborhood. They might be on the taken in some way, or you might even be living next to some of these People, I mean, you look at figures like Jack McGurn, who some people think was maybe involved in the St. Valentine's Day massacre. He was a gunman for capacity machine gun Jack McGurn. He lived in Oak park, which is a nearby suburb of Chicago, a place where Ernest Hemingway was born, where Frank Lloyd Wright had his studio. Frank Nitti lived in Riverside, Illinois, which was another beautiful suburb laid out by Frederick Law Olmsted, the guy, you know, the landscape architect responsible for Central park and fairgrounds at the 1893 World's Fair. All of which is to say is like, these people were just. They were like your neighbors, right? They were there associating with you. And so street violence was one thing, but I think more to the point, like, criminal elements were just everywhere and in every kind of aspect of daily life.
- [24:03]
Don Wildman
Paul, the violence of this period, mid-1920s, as you say, things had started to break up, and there was vying competition for territory, mostly because people were making a lot more money, right, than they ever expected, right?
- [24:15]
Paul Durica
That's right. I mean, it's really astronomical when you consider how much money people were making off illegal booze. I mean, we're talking, like, hundreds of millions of dollars and, you know, in the 1920s and into the early 1930s, and they're not paying taxes on any of this income. So that means, of course, that they want to really sort of protect their interests. And that leads to very, like, targeted acts of. Of violence. And that's really kind of what everyday Chicagoans are experiencing now. These hits might happen anywhere in the city. You know, Jaime Weiss is murdered outside of Holy Name Cathedral, which is the seat of the Catholic Church in Chicago. A Chicago Tribune reporter, Jake Lingle, who was corrupt, is gunned down as he's kind of walking towards an Illinois Central railroad platform right in the heart of Chicago's Loop, near the. In the public library branch. So these killings could happen everywhere, Anywhere. But they're really, you know, they're targeted killings. But what's true, though, is that the crime that grows out of Prohibition sort of like, reaches into every aspect of people's lives. Like, you could be working as a film projector, for example, in the theater, and your union has been incorrupted by people associated with Capone's syndicate. You could be a nightclub owner or a performer like Joey Lewis, and you want to move from the Green Mill, which is a famous jazz club that still exists to this day, to another jazz club. And, you know, Jack McGurn doesn't want you breaking your contract. And He's a bootlegger and he has an act of violence committed against you that nearly ends your career. Right. You could be somebody who wants to rely on your local alderman or the cop on your beat in your neighborhood, but this person's been bought off by organized crime. So there's a sense that even though the actual acts of violence might be very targeted, everybody's being affected by all the money and influence that's associated with the Prohibition era. And it's really kind of affecting every aspect of everyday life.
- [26:23]
Don Wildman
I have this factoid. Tell me if it's right. 1923 to 1930, there were roughly 500 to 700 gang related murders. Frequently drive by shootings and machine gun attacks. Is that a truthful fact?
- [26:36]
Paul Durica
Yes, I mean, it is. I mean, murder was out of control.
- [26:39]
Noom Advertiser
Yeah.
- [26:39]
Paul Durica
Again, you know, these were targeted killings. But I mean, there was something that people encountered like every day when they opened up the paper. And it was, you know, such a big problem that, like, a lot of the city's business leaders began to take an active hand in combating it because they knew they couldn't rely on a lot of the sort of political figures that were in power then and also only, you know, with the police as well. So it does become a major issue. And eventually it leads to, you know, prominent Chicagoans reaching out to the federal government to help them get a handle on this.
- [27:15]
Don Wildman
Well, one of the factors in this was the availability of the machine gun in the first place. Right. The tommy gun was something had been developed by. For World War I. It was never used in the numbers that they created it for. So suddenly there's that surplus out on the market, legally or illegally, and that becomes a very useful time. They called it the Chicago typewriter.
- [27:35]
Paul Durica
That's right, yeah. I mean, it could be used to fire off large number of bullets in a very short period of time. And really, also, you don't need to be a skilled marksman in using it. Right. So kind of, I mean, there were figures involved, like a Jack McGurn, who were, you know, a fairly skilled marksman. But for the most part, you could hire anybody to just kind of carry out contract killing. And also, you just had a much better chance of success using a weapon like the tommy gun, because you could just spray. And that's what, you know, they used in the St. Valentine's Day Massacre, for example, in February 1929. They had two shotguns, but they also had the tommy gun as well. And they just kind of like used it almost like a garden hose. Just kind of like spraying back and forth over the line of the seven men who were lined up there.
- [28:21]
Don Wildman
They were also very fond of bombing places. Yes, that was employed in many cases. And we're not even talking about just Chicago. Right. Cicero was a big suburb of Chicago that was dominated by the Capone.
- [28:34]
Paul Durica
That's right. I mean, we focus a lot on the city, but really, the crime that originated in Chicago kind of spread out through what we locals call Chicagoland, which are all above the suburbs. And in Cicero in particular, which is a Near west side suburb, the syndicate found a real fertile place to make money and to operate out of smaller community. They were able to pretty easily take over City hall and the police department. And also when a reform administration came in in Chicago, that's basically where the Capone Syndicate goes. So these moved to the near west side, continue operations as usual, wait until they're favored mayoral candidates back in City hall and in Chicago, and then, you know, start to come back into the city. You mentioned bombings, though, but. Yeah, I mean, that was a very popular way of trying to kind of coerce people into behaving the way they wanted. And then they would use, you know, bombings would often be used against businesses or political figures more as a warning than. Than anything else.
- [29:41]
Don Wildman
So were civilians caught in the crossfire often or was that. That's a rarity, right?
- [29:46]
Paul Durica
That's a rarity, by and large. I mentioned before the Chicago Tribune journalist Jack Lingle. And when he's first killed In June of 1930, there's a huge public outrage because the initial belief is that he is one of these civilians who's gotten caught up in this violence. But it comes out over time that he actually wasn't somebody who was just, like, reporting on organized crime in Chicago, but actually was associating with it. And even, you know, he was a. He was a gambler. He seemed to be paid off by certain elements of the Capone syndicate. And so, you know, it was actually a targeted killing and not just a random act of violence. So, by and large, targeted killings. Occasionally people who. Or bystanders get caught up in it, but that's very rare. Yeah.
- [30:38]
Don Wildman
I'll be back with more American history after this short break.
- [30:45]
Noom Advertiser
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- [31:24]
Monica Reinagle
Hello, I'm Monica Reinagle, host of the Nutrition Diva podcast. Summer is here, and with it, the hot and sticky weather. A morning working in the garden or maybe on the golf course can leave you more depleted than you realize. And plain water isn't always the most efficient way to restore the balance. That's where Liquid IV comes in. Its science backed formula is clinically proven to hydrate faster than water alone. Whether you're exercising, playing outside, or simply surviving a summer heat wave, it's an easy way to stay hydrated. Shop now@liquidiv.com, liquid IV hydration that goes wherever life takes you.
- [32:07]
Don Wildman
We've mentioned how profitable this was, but I want to put some numbers to these facts. The illegal breweries were producing millions of gallons of alcohol. Thousands of speakeasies were operating throughout Chicago. Five to 10,000 speakeasies at its height, say mid-20s. Estimates suggest the Capone organization generated tens of millions of dollars annually. And that is not in today's money. That's then, is that right?
- [32:31]
Paul Durica
Yeah, that's right. I mean, it was hugely lucrative, hugely extensive. And again, that's just like what organized crime is doing. So, you know, the most, I mean, we talk a lot about speakeasies, but the place where like most Chicagoans went to get a drink if they wanted it was potentially to, like, their neighbor's apartment. So throughout Chicago, you've got thousands and thousands of what are known as beer flats. And basically, if you knew how to do home brewing, you could make your own beer and sell it to your friends and neighbors and make a little money on the side. And those places were like all across the city, from the north side to the south side, all throughout the west side. You know, you had people making wine at their homes, you had people doing some distilling. And so you have that kind of underneath the more sort of popular and larger speakeasies and clubs. And then you have all the former bars, many of which claim that now they're serving soft drinks or they become ice cream parlors. But if you know somebody, they're often still serving booze as well and kind of meeting that local neighborhood need. And that's the big thing about Prohibition, right? It's like people didn't stop drinking. If anything, what the people who ended up studying this period of time realized, even, you know, as prohibition was still in effect, as it seems like drinking actually increased during the years that it was illegal. And there's also a big shift too, in that before Prohibition goes into effect, a place like a saloon, that's like a guys only kind of place. Right. It's like men who are doing most of the drinking. Not to say that women weren't drinking at this time, but not out in public and not in the same ways. Prohibition goes into effect, suddenly you've got men and women drinking sharing spaces like speakeasies. You've got older people, younger people. There's a letter to the Chicago Tribune of one guy who admits he enjoys a beer, but going into a neighbor's beer flat and seeing high school girls drinking beer there, it horrifies him because he's the older guy, he's fine with it. And so you kind of see the sort of breakdown in the sort of moral order around drinking. You think it's a bad thing. And that's all kind of brought about by prohibition going into.
- [34:41]
Don Wildman
Right. I mean, it just doubles down on the fact of how silly this was. Here's the crimes used to be things that most people wouldn't want to be. A part of the crime now is having a good time, you know, having a. Having a drink or getting drunk at a speakeasy. And so you have the public wanting in on this action, you know, and never mind them, the politicians and, and the businessmen, everybody gets involved because it's something that just a few years earlier everybody was involved in. And so now it's making a lot more money. And so everybody wants their piece of the action. It's really interesting how much of the bribery. And I'll tell you this, when I watch these movies and depictions of Chicago in the heyday of Prohibition, it defies explanation how they even dismantled this thing. I mean, it seems like everyone's in on the game. But is that true?
- [35:28]
Paul Durica
No. I mean, there were honest people and honest public officials. There's a mayor kind of at the beginning of the period and towards the end of it, named William Thompson. He's known as Big Bill. And he was very kind of comfortable with violating the Volstead Act. And in fact, if you've ever seen the Costner film or the Costner version of the Untouchables, when they're looking through the contents of the pocket, I think Frank Nitti, played by Billy Drago, they Find a card that has. Basically, it's the mayor's card. Thompson, I mean, he was a real historic character, but in between two of his terms, there's a reform mayor named William Deaver. And Deaver really does make an honest effort to try to clean things up. And that's when the Capone syndicate moves to Cicero. And there were honest police officers as well, honest police superintendents, figures like Morgan Collins. And then, you know, although it's largely fictional groups, prohibition agents like those led by Elliot Ness weren't on the take. So you do have them as a kind of countervailing force. But you're right, it's not enough to really kind of make a significant dent in this criminal enterprise. And it really comes down to repeal. And once there's no more money to be made, then a lot of it begins to or moves into different channels. Some of the political corruption, of course, still remains, but at least anything around bootlegging begins to disappear. I mean, it's really interesting to look at what's going on like December of 1932, because there's a new mayor in place named Anton Cermak, who succeeded Thompson. Franklin Roosevelt had been elected in November that year. It's clear that repeal is coming. So Cermak starts to lay the foundation for that, and he starts going aggressively after speakeasies and beer flats and things getting the city ready for when beer will be legal again. And the city can start issuing licenses and the city can start making the profit that the gangsters are. But you start to find going on in this period is like clones in prison. But as syndicate, they start dropping the prices on all of their products because they realize that legal beer is coming. It's right there on the horizon, and soon they're going to be in competition with it. So the only way they could keep making any money is if they undercut whatever the legitimate licensed saloons and bars are. And so it's. There's this kind of fascinating transition period. And it's really that. Right. It's. It's repeal and then regulation that starts to weed out some of the corruption. But then it just moves into different areas and different channels. Yeah, like gambling. Right.
- [38:05]
Don Wildman
And bribery. I mean, working on from the justice side of it, bribery is a. Is a localized thing as well. I'm sure not all precincts were involved in this and depended on the neighborhood you were in and how much money was available, I'm sure.
- [38:16]
Paul Durica
Right.
- [38:17]
Don Wildman
I have some facts here. Individual police officers might receive up to 25 to $100 per week, which is a lot of money in those days.
- [38:25]
Paul Durica
Very much so, yeah.
- [38:26]
Don Wildman
Yeah. And Capone had a whole system for this, of course. Spent millions of dollars annually on payoffs. Again, how many books must have had that written down in that they never found. You know, there's so much obvious stuff going on, but it's not until the feds get involved. That's why the Untouchables are such a famous story, and that's why the FBI becomes a more aggressive force in America. Really drawing out of what happened in Chicago was a lot of that, right?
- [38:54]
Paul Durica
Yeah, I mean, that's true. If you didn't have that sort of federal presence and oversight, and particularly going after Capone for federal tax evasion, you might not have been able to begin to kind of get a handle on this. And then, of course, just the act of Congress and then the 21st Amendment, I mean, that's really the kind of big thing that shifts everything.
- [39:19]
Don Wildman
There's just a wonderful phrase called Chicago amnesia that had to do with when they would want to prosecute a gangster. Say there was a tremendous stigma in Chicago about squealing and rats and so forth, and civilian witnesses were very hesitant to testify. And that's when the Chicago amnesia came in. I don't know. I didn't see anything. I don't know who they are. That's where the public played a role, didn't it?
- [39:42]
Paul Durica
That's true. And you see it play out time and time again. In fact, I was even reading today about woman who was secretly gathering information for the group of business leaders that was kind of opposing what was going on in the city, the Chicago Crime Commission. Within them, there was this group called the Secret Six, right, who were really kind of like, trying to kind of root out organized crime. And so they would actually pay people to spy on, you know, figures within the Capone syndicate. And there was this one woman, because of who she was and because of her kind of presence just in this environment, she could observe a lot, you know, take notes, kind of knew who all the different corrupt politicians were that were being paid off. But when time came for her to testify and give evidence, she just got out of town. She figured that possibly getting a prison sentence for any kind of contempt of court was better than going up against the Capone mob. And you see that sort of thing play out. And time again, so many of these figures would have charges brought up against them, only to have them dismissed when witnesses decided it wasn't in their interest to report what they said or what they saw.
- [40:58]
Don Wildman
So you are director of exhibitions at the Chicago History Museum, a fantastic museum, one of my favorite in the country. You must get this all the time. These questions about the Chicago mob and its defining element in the stories of at least 20th century Chicago. Does it ever get frustrating that this will not fade away, or do you feel like it's a worthy chapter of history that's really important to keep telling.
- [41:21]
Paul Durica
I think it's frustrating in that, I mean, Chicago is such an important part of the history of this country, and that's what people continue to focus on and not all of the other things with which the cities can be associated, which really kind of helped shape the 20th and even now in the 21st centuries. I will say, though, what's fascinating about this era is this kind of tension between the actual history. Right. Which when you look at it, it's much more complicated, much more interesting, because, as I said, so many everyday Chicagoans were sort of caught up in it. There's a good chance that if you live in an apartment in Chicago, you might be living in a beer flat or functioned as a speakeasy. Right. So that's really interesting. And played against the fact that there is this sort of, like, mythology associated with this era. Right?
- [42:17]
Don Wildman
Yeah.
- [42:17]
Paul Durica
And there's that sort of tension between fact and fiction is really, you know, for me at least, I find it really intriguing to explore and to learn about and to try to get at the heart of these legends and these myths.
- [42:30]
Don Wildman
I've played my own role in it as a TV host. I explore behind and underneath the Glen Mills Bar, which is a fantastic place to go for. For jazz and just a good time. But of course, we were. We were speculating on the tunnels that were underneath there and how they move the booze around. Whether it was true or not, we were just assuming and speculating because it was good tv, right?
- [42:50]
Paul Durica
Yeah. And at the Green Mill, there's a good chance those were just service, to be honest.
- [42:55]
Don Wildman
Yeah, exactly. But good enough for tv. Paul Dorica is the director of exhibitions at the Chicago History Museum. I place anyone who goes to Chicago has to pay attention to go see. It's a big place with a lot of really cool stuff in it. But certainly visit the Mobland exhibits, which I'm sure are numerous there. Thank you so much, Paul, for joining us. We really appreciate it.
- [43:17]
Paul Durica
Thank you.
- [43:20]
Don Wildman
Hey, thanks for listening to American History hit. You know, every week we release new episodes, two new episodes dropping Mondays and Thursdays. All kinds of content from mysterious missing colonies to powerful political movements to some of the biggest battles across the across the centuries. Don't miss an episode by hitting like and follow. You help us out, which is great, but you'll also be reminded when our shows are on. And while you're at it, share it with a friend. American history Hit with me. Don Wildman so grateful for your support.
- [43:55]
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