Al Capone and the 1933 World's Fair

The End of the Gangster Era in Chicago

William Elliott Hazelgrove

• Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
• Year: 2017
• eBook ISBN: 9798765171899
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: North American History
• Index: Social Sciences

Al Capone and the 1933 World's Fair: The End of the Gangster Era in Chicago is a historical look at Chicago during the darkest days of the Great Depression. The story of Chicago fighting the hold that organized crime had on the city to be able to put on The 1933 World's Fair.

William Hazelgrove provides the exciting and sprawling history behind the 1933 World's Fair, the last of the golden age. He reveals the story of the six millionaire businessmen, dubbed The Secret Six, who beat Al Capone at his own game, ending the gangster era as prohibition was repealed. The story of an intriguing woman, Sally Rand, who embodied the World's Fair with her own rags to riches story and brought sex into the open. The story of Rufus and Charles Dawes who gave the fair a theme and then found financing in the worst economic times the country had ever experienced. The story of the most corrupt mayor of Chicago, William Thompson, who owed his election to Al Capone; and the mayor who followed him, Anton Cermak, who was murdered months before the fair opened by an assassin many said was hired by Al Capone.

But most of all it's the story about a city fighting for survival in the darkest of times; and a shining light of hope called A Century of Progress.

Table of contents

• Contents
• Forty Years Later
• Acknowledgments
• Chapter One. Chicago, May 27, 1933
• Chapter Two. Valentine’s Day, 1929
• Chapter Three. Chicago’s Second World’s Fair
• Chapter Four. WAMPAS Baby Star
• Chapter Five. Public Enemy Number One
• Chapter Six. The White City
• Chapter Seven. Bootlegging
• Chapter Eight. The Big Man
• Chapter Nine. The Big Fellah Comes Home
• Chapter Ten. The Perfect Storm
• Chapter Eleven. Financing a Fair
• Chapter Twelve. The Untouchables
• Chapter Thirteen. Birth of the Nymph
• Chapter Fourteen. Death in the Underground
• Chapter Fifteen. Breaking Ground
• Chapter Sixteen. The Secret Six
• Chapter Seventeen. The Modernists
• Chapter Eighteen. Lady Godiva
• Chapter Nineteen. Horatio Alger Returns
• Chapter Twenty. The Design
• Chapter Twenty-One. The Secret Six Get to Work
• Chapter Twenty-Two. Beginning to Build the Rainbow City
• Chapter Twenty-Three. Gold Diggers
• Chapter Twenty-Four. Meeting Al Capone
• Chapter Twenty-Five. Water, Electric, and the Sky Ride
• Chapter Twenty-Six. One Hundred Thousand
• Chapter Twenty-Seven. The Depression Fair
• Chapter Twenty-Eight. Nymphs
• Chapter Twenty-Nine. Springtime in Chicago
• Chapter Thirty. The Sky Ride
• Chapter Thirty-One. The Trial of Al Capone
• Chapter Thirty-Two. Color and Light
• Chapter Thirty-Three. The Plea Bargain
• Chapter Thirty-Four. The Temple of Womanhood
• Chapter Thirty-Five. The Bad Plea Bargain
• Chapter Thirty-Six. Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fair
• Chapter Thirty-Seven. Hayseeds
• Chapter Thirty-Eight. The Gaseous Tube
• Chapter Thirty-Nine. The Trial of Al Capone
• Chapter Forty. The Disposable Fair
• Chapter Forty-One. Verdict
• Chapter Forty-Two. Racing the Clock
• Chapter Forty-Three. Capone on Ice
• Chapter Forty-Four. Lady Godiva Again
• Chapter Forty-Five. Death of the Untouchables
• Chapter Forty-Six. A Day at the Fair
• Chapter Forty-Seven. Sex at the Fair
• Chapter Forty-Eight. A Century of Progress
• Chapter Forty-Nine. Rags to Riches
• Chapter Fifty. End of the Fair
• Epilogue
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index
• About the Author