06:32

[Music – Did You Mean It? By Jack Hylton, Album The Great British Dance]

Section 2 – History & Historiography

[Music Fade Out]

06:48

When stories typically cover this period, it is always from very few particular angles, that while fun and fascinating do not fully explore the era.  The predominant tales cover Prohibition, gangsters, and the Great Depression mostly through the poorest or middle class existence and only a few of the top financial losses.

The banking and financial history is relatively nameless to the average person.  I’m sure heavy business and financial historians, advisors, and enthusiasts can recognize the names.  But the names seem to be more the specialists who give us the theory and explanations not the participants.  John Maynard Keynes and John Kenneth Galbraith are good references.  We know the politicians – Hoover, Roosevelt, Jesse Jones, and others who guided the nation through the troubled times.  Their failures and triumphs.

07:37

In contrast, we readily know the names of gangsters.  Anyone can name plenty of those, often even with only one name – Capone, Bugsy, Costello, Babyface Nelson, Bonnie & Clyde, Lansky, Lucky Luciano,…  Only a handful of federal agents join in the recognition and that being primarily Agent Eliot Ness and his Untouchables.  The crime lords involved in bootleg & liquor were the Robin Hoods of the 20s, yielding as they get arrested to the later bank robbers that will become more prevalent in the 30s especially during the banking crisis of the Great Depression.

But there are huge societal shifts and transitions occurring between these two eras.  An overlap that affects everyone and around the world.  There is no one pocket unaffected or completely immune.  An individual may not be directly involved, but maybe their neighbor, friend, or family member indirectly somehow, some way likely will be.

08:35

As the era of Prohibition still reigns, the three major crimes are bootlegging, gambling, and prostitution.  Crime is rampant and all over the newspapers.  As I comb through articles covering whatever topic, I run across snippets of bank robberies, gangsters, and now prostitution.  I am constantly going off on little tangents, amused, as stories crossover and unravel.  Sometimes accidentally and at others while rooting out and/or verifying a detail or fact.  As I was finishing the last episode, I saw articles relating to crime and prostitution already knowing the next episode would be of Huntington’s first time as detailed in his biography Squandered Fortune.

09:16

From one Munster, Indiana article, there are the list of fines and sentences from one court day in East Chicago.  Two for petit larceny – $25 & 6 months on a penal farm. Concealed weapon $5 and reckless driving $1 plus for both costs.  Two Violating state liquor $100, one got 30 days in county jail and the other 45 days on a penal farm.  Two women for prostitution – $10 and 10 days in county.  Another keeping a house of ill-repute, $10 and 90 days on a penal farm.  Adjusting for inflation, $10 and $100 in 1930 equate to $164 and $1640 in 2021.

09:58

There wasn’t only a concern about lawbreakers but those enforcing the law as well.  Plenty of tales of police corruption were also rampant.

Particularly, the plain clothes division – the detectives who investigate bootlegging and prostitution, were considered the most corruptible.  Many police initially resisted taking the position out of uniform because the long associations with bookmakers, pimps, runners, and prostitutes wasn’t considered respectable.  Particularly married men avoided such assignments.  Going back as far as when Theodore Roosevelt served as police commissioner back in the mid-1890s, the plain clothes detectives were problematic, and Roosevelt could do little to change the dynamics.  By 1929 and 1930, the situation had definitely not improved.

10:43

When 27 year old Eliot Ness takes on the special investigation of Al Capone in late 1930 Chicago, Ness assesses different Prohibition agents records then pulls together a team of 6-10 uncorruptible agents known as the Untouchables. 

10:59

Meanwhile New York’s Vice had to contend with its own scandal about police corruption.

In November-December 1930 at the New York’s Women’s Court, self-proclaimed stool pigeon “Chile” Mapacto Acuna appeared on the witness stand detailing his involvement with New York Inspector Ryan on several investigations into prostitution that resulted in bribery and blackmail.  In court, Ryan denied the charges, but Acuna detailed his rise from dishwasher to “vice falcon” for the special squad. 

Acuna would collect information on select women who would then be targeted by the police for bribes and payoffs.  He covered 150 houses and claimed at least 40 women were innocent. In August 1929, the police turned against him and arrested him, after which he squealed.  During the trial, Acuna received $7 a day in pay as a witness and had 6 police bodyguards referred to as the “Chile Squad.”   One was promoted while on duty.  Women were barred from hearing the testimony, while the men present averted their eyes away from the informant.

12:01

More acceptable public terms for brothel or whorehouse were disorderly houses and houses of ill-fame.  Chile Acuna estimates at least 1,000 disorderly houses operate in the Greater New York area with many having “police protection”.

The results of the trial by early 1931:

-5 former Vice Squad members were sent to Sing Sing

-15 more went to trial for perjury

-14 were dishonorably dismissed after departmental trials

-21 were awaiting similar trials

-300 Vice Squad officers were transferred to regular patrol duty

-2 stool pigeons were under indictment and fugitives

-2 bondsmen were convicted and sent to jail

-3 judges were removed from Women’s Court

-4 magistrates resigned

-2 magistrates removed from the Appellate Division

-The whole personnel of the Magistrates’ Courts had been transferred during the general shakeup

12:52

Chile would write a book “Women for Sale” in 1931.  He would thank Governor Franklin Roosevelt for pardoning the framed women and several among others in aiding in the investigations and righting the wrongs, including Lieutenant Joseph Kennedy (not sure if the actual Joe Kennedy or family member – ages and professions don’t line up so this might only be a random coincidence in name).

13:15

In his book, Acuna detailed his upbringing as the son of a very rich man, a blueblooded aristocrat in his home country – Chile, hence his nickname.  He remarks how he had the standard opinions of the rich towards the poor.  How they were a bit lazy or not too bright to be in their situations.  They just needed to be more industrious in their decisions. 

13:36

He wanted to move to the U.S. against his father’s wishes, so Acuna sold off his stakes in some wine country given to him by his grandmother.  He moved to New York with several thousand dollars and had a good life until the money ran out and so did his friends.  Unwilling to call his father for help as that would require him returning home, Acuna hocked what he could and struggled to find suitable employment he had always thought would be readily available but wasn’t.

14:02

Wandering the streets one cold January night, he found a sign for a dishwasher and went in.  Having served in the military, he felt prepared for more K.P. type duties if it meant eating.  The owner hired him that night.  Chile would rise up to counterman and waiter, then found the love of his life another immigrant the beautiful blonde Sonya.  They would move to Washington, D.C. but return to New York in the mid-1920s.  By then, Chile struggled to make ends meet in the more costly city with a wife and child.  One night, a policeman asked him about any brothels, and Chile told him about two locations he had heard about.  The policeman returned later giving Chile $50 for the information.

14:44

That led to him getting involved as an informant.  Chile saw himself as partially being Sherlock Holmes.  He often remarks with pride his adjustment to the harsher realities of life and taking them on and relatively succeeding.  He acknowledges most of his rich friends born into wealth like he was have no skills nor endurance to undertake the harsher survival realities of the poorer working classes.  He talks with great pride of his hard work and ability to adjust to his circumstances.

15:11

An interesting and prescient thought as the world begins to tumble down around everyone.  Circumstances are changing, and in a matter of weeks in our storyline the world will plunge deeper into what we all recognize as the Great Depression.