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TIME: Almanac of the 20th Century
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TIME, Almanac of the 20th Century.ISO
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1920
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20nat.7
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<text>
<title>
(1920s) The Gangsters
</title>
<history>
TIME--The Weekly Newsmagazine--1920s Highlights
</history>
<link 01946>
<article>
<source>Time Magazine</source>
<hdr>
The Gangsters
</hdr>
<body>
<p> [Prohibition greatly encouraged the growth of crime in the
1920s: it took considerable ingenuity, organization and teamwork
to supply the huge amounts of illegal alcoholic beverages--especially beer, which required trucks for efficient transport--to America's large
less openly. Various ethnic groups, "families" and clans,
including of course the Sicilian Mafia, and also Irish, Jewish
and Polish gangs, vied with one another for control of the
liquor trade, as well as gambling, prostitution and protection
rackets. But in this era, no gang was more colorful, more
powerful, more violent or bloodthirsty than that of the
Neapolitan-born Chicago Crimelord Al Capone.]
</p>
<p>(OCTOBER 11, 1926)
</p>
<p> Twins, notable since the oozy dawn of civilization, are Crime
and Corruption. They frolic now from Shanghai to Paris,
unashamed. Occasionally they rear their heads up into the light
and scare some, shock others. Sometimes they pop up in
Washington, but their favorite modern playgrounds are in
manufacturing cities where sprawling factories belch and
whistle, where grimy alleys creep between frame hovels, where
workingmen need stimulation Saturday nights.
</p>
<p> However, there is one town which has recently raised the
visceral tension of the righteous about once a month. That town
is Cicero, Ill., a Utopian nook for the twins. Here on the
western fringe of Chicago is a polyglot population of 62,000--Irishmen, Italians, Sicilians, Slavs and many another
tribe. The Western Electric Co. employs thousands of them; other
industries are near and plentiful. But it is to the gangs of the
Bad Lands that Cicero owes its headline glamor. Up and down its
streets, fiery Sicilians and raucous Irishmen playfully squirt
machine guns at each other. On other days they go zooming into
Chicago with truckloads of beer. And then, when the day's labors
are done, they have their 60 "soft drink parlors," their
brothels, and their roulette wheels.
</p>
<p> The Bad Lands have their king, "Scareface Al" Capone, alias
"Alphonzo Brown," who has been on the throne since 1922.
"Scareface Al," except for the old razor gash on one side of his
face, might easily be mistaken for a fat prosperous baker. King
Capone does not bake. With his brothers, Ralph and James, he
keeps the beer route flowing and the political machinery of
Cicero running.
</p>
<p> Cicero has written history under the Capone regime. There was
the story of a young able newspaper editor who refused to leave
town. So, members of the Capone gang beat him up at a busy
street corner, and kidnaped his brother for a few days. There
was the killing of Assistant state's Attorney William McSwiggin
last April, a crime that has not yet been solved. Then, a
fortnight ago, a black armored car roared down Cicero's main
street, spattered the Hawthorne Hotel with machine gun bullets,
but missed King Capone who was standing on the front porch.
After such events, "Scarface Al" puts on his light tan shoes,
picks up his cane, leaves town.
</p>
<p> Industrialists decided several months ago that the performance
and side-shows of King Capone's regime were interfering with
both the efficiency and nerves of their workers. Two vice
presidents of a corporation were dispatched to Washington to
appeal to the Federal Government. Secret Service agents returned
to wander around Cicero's grimy nooks. Suddenly, last week, a
Federal grand jury indicted "Scarface Al" Capone and his
brother Ralph; Joseph Z. Klenha, president of the town of
Cicero; Ted L. Svoboda, chief of police, and 75 others, for
conspiracy to violate the Volstead Act. Federal agents say they
have evidence that the gangsters profited $15,000,000 by their
liquor business in three years.
</p>
<p> And after the trial of the Ciceronians is over, the famed
twins will again return to their nooks, unashamed, unafraid. If
Cicero becomes too tame a playground, there are other places...
</p>
<p>(FEBRUARY 25, 1929)
</p>
<p> It was 10:20 o'clock on St. Valentine's morning. Chicago
brimmed with sentiment and sunshine. Peaceful was even the
George ("Bugs") Moran booze-peddling depot on North Clark
Street, masked as a garage of the S.M.C. Cartage Co., where
lolled six underworldlings, waiting for their breakfast coffee
to cook. A seventh, in overalls, tinkered with a beer vat on a
truck.
</p>
<p> Into the curb eased a car, blue and fast, like the Detective
Bureau's. Through the office door strode four men. Two, in
police uniforms, swung sub-machine guns. Two, in plain clothes,
carried stubby shotguns.
</p>
<p> The gangsters in the office raised their hands. Their
visitors marched them back into the garage, prodding their
spines with gun muzzles. Tin coffee cups clattered to the stone
floor. Snarled orders lined the six gangsters up along the north
wall, their eyes close to the white-washed brick. The visitors
booted the overalled mechanic into the lien and "frisked" away
hidden guns.
</p>
<p> One of the men at the wall said: "What is this, a..."
</p>
<p> "Give it to 'em!" was the answer. The garage became a
thunder-box of explosions.
</p>
<p> From the four guns streamed a hundred bullets. Only eight of
them ever reached the brick wall behind the seven targets. One
man, all blood, tried to crawl away. A volley at six inches
ripped away his head above the ears. The others toppled over
into the careless postures of death.
</p>
<p> A Mrs. Alphonsine Morin, across the street, saw two men, hands
over head, walk out of the garage, followed by two uniformed
policemen with leveled guns. Obviously a raid and an arrest. She
watched captors and captives enter the blue car, which flashed
down the street, passed a trolley on the wrong side, melted away
in traffic.
</p>
<p> Real police came jostling through the gabbling crowd that
quickly collected. They counted the neat row of bodies by the
wall--six dead, one dying. It was a record, even for Chicago.
</p>
<p> "Bugs" Moran, the proprietor of the garage, was not among the
dead.
</p>
<p> Gangster Capone was reported to be lolling innocently in
Miami Beach, Fla, on St. Valentine's Day.</p>
</body>
</article>
</text>