North And South Side Gangs example essay topic

There was no 1920'S Automobiles There was no greater symbol of the 1920's than the automobile. The impressive leather coaching and customized interiors radiated luxury and prosperity. The relative ease of operation and reliability meant freedom. Beneath their hoods many of the cars exhibited impressively large engines, delivering speed and excitement.

The automobile was arguably the most important catalyst for social change in the 1920's, liberating Americans from often-restrictive home or neighborhood situations. Many women used the cars to save time in their daily domestic chores – in turn giving them more free time, in which they could educate themselves, or find a job. The younger generations loved the car as an escape from the chaperones. A juvenile court judge criticized the auto as a "house of prostitution on wheels,' due to the relatively large quantity of "inappropriate's ex occurring in the car. Businessmen, possessing a faster, more personal form of transportation, could live further from the city and subway stops. Consequently the suburb lifestyle began in places like Queens and the Bronx.

Rural Americans loved the car as a ride to town and the social circles. Automobiles had existed before the Twenties, but were expensive, unreliable, and generally only toys for the rich. What made the auto so influential in the 1920's was it's increased availability and dependability. Scientific management and the assembly line increased factory productivity and decreased cost, making the auto more affordable. By 1930 every 1.3 households owned a car, versus 44 households in 1910. Henry Ford was largely responsible for this movement, pioneering efficient production methods and striving to produce a reliable and practical car for the masses.

His legendary Model-T, produced between 1913 and 1927, was sold as low as $290, $2,900 today. Its successor, the Model-A, sold for as little as $460, $4,600 today. There was a movement in America to make Henry Ford president. However, there was also a large high-priced auto market. The Coolidge Prosperity fueled the prices of such monsters as the Locomobile Model 48, for $13,000, $130,000 today, and the 1929 Rolls-Royce Phantom, selling between $17-18,000, $180,000. These luxurious cars undoubtedly functioned as status symbols, transporting the occupants in a style that cannot be found today's automobiles.

Cinema Without question silent films dominated the 1920's film industry. These films fascinated and captivated much of the world, despite the often, by modern standards, poor production quality and lack of descent special effects, dialogue and hot soundtracks. Photography technology produced grainy, often blurry images that mercifully cleared toward the end of the decade. Dialogue was communicated through lip-reading and sparse titles.

The soundtracks consisted of mostly bland, ambient organ music. However, the absence of the modern film elements is exactly what made, and still makes, the silent films unique and compelling. Without the distractions of sharp, swift photography and stellar sound, more emphasis and attention was placed on the story. Silent movie audiences were forced to complete the picture and plot for themselves, to think and analyze in order to understand. Unlike most current movies, in which the audience watches in an essentially subconscious state, lulled into lethargy by the fast action and lucid plot, the silent films demanded attention. Although, it is doubtful the popularity of the 1920's film industry relied on plot line and substance.

It is more likely that the novelty, reality, and fantasy of the films motivated much of the movie patron population. The novelty of projected moving pictures certainly had to be a large attraction. Undoubtedly many patrons simply sat awe-struck beneath a large silver screen, staring with disbelief at the dancing, fighting and clowning actors. While moving pictures had been in constant evolution for decades, the huge feature-length productions of the 1920's must have astounded even the most cynical audiences. Movie theater environments, often luxurious and opulent, captured the essence of the decade and the film industry, and surely contributed to the novelty of attending a picture. Reality was a major element of the 20's films.

Unlike the playhouse or Broadway musicals which featured cardboard cities, false roads and prop cars, the moving pictures often depicted reality. Buster Keaton darts around a real steam engine in The General; Wings features real biplanes; Chaplin falls from real automobiles. To many, the movies must have been a sort of spectacle, or circus. For others, fantasy was the main attraction.

On screen, the movies provided spectacular romances, such as Pandora's Box and Phantom of the Opera, and action-packed thrillers, like Wings and Old Ironsides. The movie world was sometimes more interesting off-screen, with huge Hollywood scandals involving such big names as Roscoe "Fatty' Arbuckle and Charles Chaplin. 1928 marked the final year of the silent-movie domination. The popularity of The Jazz Singer, featuring Al Jolson, sent many studios and cinemas scrambling for sound systems, such as the Vita phone. The transition between silent and talking pictures proved difficult for many in the industry – especially for the cinema organ players. Actors and actresses who did not posses speaking skills were finished virtually overnight, as producers sought to catch the publics thirst for "talkies.

By the end of the decade, silent movies were quickly dying, and talking pictures overcame. Gangland The Chicago gangs were for the most part divided into the North Side and South Side gangs, with a tentative boundary drawn at Madison Street. On the North Side, Dan O'Banion was boss. A lover of flowers, he operated out of Scho fields Flower Shop. O'Banion was of Irish descent, and had an admiring wife. He did not engage in any prostitution rackets, presumably because of religious values, but did not hesitate to take advantage of prohibition by supplying the hard drinking and prosperous North Side population with plenty of alcohol, speakeasies, and gambling operations.

Under O'Banion were a loyal and deadly group of Lieutenants and soldiers. Leader of the South Side was "Big Jim' Colossimo. Colossimo made his career before prohibition, championing the prostitution, gambling and labor rackets. He earned a reputation as a prominent figure in high-society, owning the most elegant and chic restaurants in the city. However, as the Prohibition Era dawned on America, Colossimo was reluctant to enter the liquor rackets.

His manager, Johnny Torrio, urged him to change his mind; Torrio was eager to reap gigantic profits from the Prohibition opportunity. During this time, Frank Yale from New York sent to Colossimo a young Al Capone. Capone, escaping impending murder investigations in New York, embraced the Colossimo organization and became the right-hand-man of Johnny Torrio. Capone was installed as manager of the 4 Deuces club, a 4-floor speak-easy, gambling house, and brothel... Colossimo and Torrio continued to disagree about entering the liquor rackets. On May 11, 1920, Al Capone murdered Colossimo almost decidedly, with orders from Torrio.

The result– Torrio became boss and Capone his right-hand. The Torrio organization flourished in the bootlegging business, reaping profits not just from a thirsty Chicago, but from the entire nation. The rivalry and competition between the operations of Torrio and O'Banion grew; each eager to gain an edge in the lucrative industry. Although, the competition was relatively non-violent, due in large part to a man named Mike Merlo.

Merlo functioned as a liaison and negotiator between the two gangs. He was firmly anti-violence and succeeded in maintaining an effective peace, but tensions continued to build. In 1924, Torrio purchased a brewery from O Banion, which was promptly raided, presumably at the advice of the North Side. Torrio was sent to jail for close to one year and O'Banion refused to return the money. The South Side would not forget his double cross. On November 8, 1924, Mike Merlo, the admired liaison and negotiator between the two rival gangs, died of cancer.

The next day the South Side's Murder Twins, and Frank Yale murdered O Banion in his flower shop. Commented Capone, his head got to big for his hat. ' Undoubtedly, the Torrio double-cross contributed to O'Banion's early death. Following the murder, Jaime Weiss became boss. After his murder, Vincent Drucci took over; after his murder, "Bugs' Moran was boss, simply because there was no one else alive. Moran would lead the North Side out of the 1920's.

Moran was the target of the famed St. Valentines Day Massacre of February 14, 1929, but was not in the murder lineup because of a mistaken identity. Following Mike Merlo's death, the rivalry between the gangs became increasingly violent. As the South Side steadily wiped out most of the North Side gang, Torrio became a popular target for assassination. On January 24th, 1925, "Bugs' Moran, Jaime Weiss, and Vincent Drucci severely wounded Torrio in a failed assassination attempt. After the incident Torrio decided to distance himself from the gang's operations, in order to maintain his safety. Capone began running an increased share of the gang.

Weeks later, after the murder of South Side friend and ally Angelo Gonna, Torrio decided to leave gangland for Europe, granting complete control of the operation to Capone. The years following Torrio's retreat were especially brutal for Chicago. Gangs had an increasingly sophisticated and streamlined liquor industry, giving them a massive cash flow and a correspondingly vast network of bribed public officials. Vicious revenge cycles left hundreds dead. The powerful rackets cornered many laborers to forfeit their wages.

Gangland violence climaxed on February 14, 1929 – Valentines Day. Two Thompson Machine Guns gunned down seven men, six belonging to the North Side, in a North Side hangout, the S-M-C Cartage Company. The massacre was a Capone response to the North Side's hijackings of Capone's "Old Log Cabin' whiskey. Unfortunately for Capone, "Bugs' Moran, boss at the time, was not in the garage. However, the message was clear. Gangsters, it was said, had graduated from "murder to massacre.

' Prohibition had been created with the intention of providing a healthier, happier, safer, and more efficient America. However, as a direct result of the Eighteenth Amendment, the treasuries of Capone, O'Banion, Moran, and other city gangs or illegal organizations burgeoned. As their businesses grew and the profits increased, rivalry and competition became deadly, culminating on Valentines Day, 1929. The Prohibition Amendment provided the gangs with an opportunity to make vast amounts of money, and in turn increase their political influence. It can never be known to what extent the gangs control our cities, states, or country, but few will doubt that during Prohibition, the North and South Side gangs ruled Chicago. Music Known by some as the "Jazz Age,' the Twenties yielded some great jazz.

Jelly Roll Morton, Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, and Fletcher Henderson produced some of the most memorable jazz tunes. Often regarded as scandalous by rural, conservative America, jazz bands provided the soundtrack for the Cultural Revolution using for the first time – the saxophone. This instrument has been called the zeitgeist of the post war-age, and has been known to provoke close intimate dancing. The then shocking sound of the sax, coincidentally close in pronunciation to sex, made it a focus for the growing body of puritanical moralists, blaming it's sound for the increasingly rebellious younger generation. With recording improvements and the advent of national radio, the relatively new jazz sound quickly spread through and influenced America, realizing special prominence in the urban centers.

Many of the most sophisticated clubs, or speakeasies, featured famous Jazz Bands. Jazz for many soon became synonymous with hooch, intimate dancing and other socially questionable activities. But Jazz was not by any means the only genre of popular music. Al Jolson's ballads proved very popular, along with other early "crooners's uch as Gene Austin and Guy Lombardo. These voices among others wooed women with their sensitive lyrics and soft, slow sounds. Modern greats such as Frank Sinatra undoubtedly pay homage to the twenties.

Numerous Broadway numbers shared the charts with Jazz and "crooners,' including Helen Kane's "I Wanna Be Loved By You' and Fanny Brice's "My Man. Broadway was a major entertainment power; influencing culture in a way unimaginable in today's media and broadcast dominated society. However, the emergence of jazz and the surrounding culture gains the most attention. Musically, the Twenties were the Jazz Age.

Prohibition Alcohol has always been a part of American culture and society. In the seventeenth century the colonies were drinking heavily. Liquor was consumed in court, by both Judges and Jury, written off as a court expense. Some contest the revolution was fought mainly by half-drunken soldiers and fully drunken minutemen. Liquor was used in some rural communities as currency.

And the political world was, and forever has been, tied to the saloon. John Adams wrote: The worst effect of all [is that] these houses are become the nurseries of our legislators. An artful man, who has neither sense nor sentiment, may, by gaining a little sway among the rabble of a town, multiply taverns and dram-shops and thereby secure the votes of taverner and retailer and all; and the multiplication of taverns will make many, who may be induced to flip and rum, to vote for any man whatever. The nineteenth century saw the beginning of the total prohibition movement.

Leaders of this movement had made temperance and teetotalism fashionable among religious groups, and many wanted to be among the elite. Temperance societies began to form across the nation and carried the Puritanical message – pleasure is sin. In 1840 Portland, Maine became the first "dry' city. Eleven years later the Portland mayor persuaded the legislature to deem sale of liquor throughout the state of Maine illegal. Other cities and states followed Maine and Portland to the delight of temperance leaders. The new "scientific enlightenment' of the latter nineteenth century published various "facts' about drink, claiming that excessive drinking could lead to spontaneous combustion, that drinking often led to insanity, that grog led to neglected children, that booze robbed the family.

John Barleycorn became an increasingly unpopular figure. In 1893 the Anti-Saloon League was founded, soon to be led by power broker Wayne Wheeler who during prohibition would become a national figure and senator. Wheeler and others cultivated the temperance spirit, becoming largely successful in rural America. However nationwide prohibition was not yet a possibility.

Until the outbreak of World War I, with newfound, jingoist, fanatical nationalism many attacked the German breweries and alcohol at large. Liquor represented an impurity in America; something which retracted from performance at work, and lowered the soldiers alertness. On October 10th, 1919 the 18th amendment was passed by congress, named the Volstead Act, mandating that "No person shall manufacture, sell, barter, transport, import, export, deliver, furnish or posses intoxicating liquor except as authorized in this act. ' The necessary 36 states ratified the amendment on January 16th of the same year. Allowing for a year's adjustment, America went "dry' at the stroke of midnight, the morning of January 17th. During the following twelve years, ten months and nineteen days America entered an era of corruption, scandal, gangsters, smuggling, disillusionment, jazz, tabloids, wealth, normalcy, entertainment, fads, violence, xenophobia, Cultural Revolution, and, of course, bobbed hair.

To attempt to summarize this period would be impossible. As the story goes, however, Prohibition and America did not work. In the spring of 1933 Franklin D. Roosevelt made "real beer' exempt from the 18th amendment. By December of the same year, Utah was last necessary state to ratify the 21st amendment – repeal of prohibition – and on December 5th, alcohol was legal once more. Technology Technology in the 1920's functioned for much of America as a liberator. Electrical appliances, such as the iron, washing machine, and vacuum eased the home maintenance workload.

Telephones, along with the already well-established telegraph system allowed quicker, easier communications. The increasingly reliable and portable typewriters increased productivity. Automobiles, arguably the most important catalyst for social change in the 1920's, gave Americans a new freedom to leave the home, neighborhood, town, or state on a whim. And for the younger generations, still under parental supervision, the auto provided a mobile room free from chaperones.

These and other new and improved machines of the 1920's helped, above all, the domestic woman. Her role was still the traditional housewife, tending to the house and kids while the man brought home the money. However, as the workload for the domestic woman decreased – as she began to use commercial laundries, to telephone her shopping orders, to drive to the market – she had more free time in which to conduct her "own life. ' In many cases this meant finding a job.

While technology could not entirely liberate the 1920's woman from her restrictive social role, it directly helped. In the entertainment world, technology provided irresistible distractions. The radio, not itself a new invention, began to broadcast news reports, sports scores, and music. Improvements in sound recording methods and the phonograph made listening to records more enjoyable.

Movies, at first blurry and grainy, cleared – and by the end of the decade included synchronized soundtracks. The airplane and the daredevils who pushed their machines to the limits were heroes and major "ballyhoo' media events, the most notable being Charles Lindbergh. Many darker worlds benefited from new technology, helping in the evasion of law. Gangsters embraced the new Thompson Machine Gun, originally invented as a "Trench Broom' for World War I. Many Bootleggers powered their sleek "torpedo boats' with military aircraft engines, capable of up to 65 mph – an invention of Jimmy McGhee, a 1920's motor mechanic on Long Island, enabling them to outrun Coast Guard and Prohibition officials. Automobiles provided easy transport of hooch, and a speedy get-away. John Thompson and Warren Center developed Thompson Machine Gun, also known as Tommy Gun or Chicago Typewriter as a "Trench Broom' for World War I. The weapon is drum-fed, with interchangeable barrels.

Calibers ranged from. 17 Remington to 45-70 Government, and. 410 shotgun. A favorite of gangsters – later adopted by ill-armed police and federal agents. Police used. 22 barrels, more economical, while Gangsters used larger bullets...

45 Long Colt barrels, which could chamber and fire. 410 shotgun shells were popular. A 50-round drum could be loaded with. 45 hollow points and. 410 buckshot, alternating. Known as a "wall of lead.

' Utilized perhaps most notably in the St. Valentine's Day massacre. These guns are still available today, although only legal in semi-automatic form...