Chicago to Springfield:: Crime and Politics in the 1920s (Images of America (Arcadia Publishing)) by Jim Ridings Read Free Book Online Page A

wielded by Al Capone and his chief lieutenant, Jack Guzik. You know the story of other criminals pardoned by Small, not by scores but by hundreds. You even know that when Small left the executive mansion, the $25,000 silver set that had been donated by former Gov. Lowden was not found by Gov. Emmerson, and you know that it has not been returned.” (ALPLM.)
    Pictured above from left to right on New Year’s Eve 1923 in the governor’s mansion are Gen. Carlos Black, Governor Small, Ida May Inglesh, Lt. Gov. Fred Sterling, Speaker of the House David Shanahan, Secretary of State Louis Emmerson, treasurer Oscar Nelson and wife, and superintendent of public instruction Frank Blair and wife. Below, Small relaxes with friends at the Sims Ranch in Michigan in 1927. (Both ALPLM.)

    Small frequently railed against rich tax dodgers. But the Chicago Daily News discovered Small declared to the assessor in 1920 only three Holstein cows valued at $90 when he really owned 50 cows worth $20,000. Pictured here is part of the herd on his Kankakee farm. Small also swore to having just $1,000 in the bank and personal property totaling $4,485. And Small paid no income taxes on the interest money from the Grant Park Bank, leading the newspaper to ask, “Who are the rich tax-dodgers?” (JR.)
    Pictured here from left to right are Sandy and Mrs. Fyfe, Governor Small, Dr. John Dill Robertson, and Ike Volz. (ALPLM.)
    Gov. Len Small is pictured at right with his grandson Len H. Small in the 1920s. Len H. became publisher and built the Kankakee Republican Printing Company (now Small Newspaper Group) into a chain of respectable newspapers. Below, Governor Small signs a bill. (At right, ALPLM; below, KCMPC.)

    Governor Small is seen here addressing a crowd and enjoying a ball game with Mayor Thompson. (Both ALPLM.)

    Small poses above at a bill signing in 1928. Below are, from left to right, Big Bill Thompson, Sen. William E. Borah of Idaho, Len Small, and Sen. C. Wayland Brooks. (Both ALPLM.)

    Pictured above from left to right are Leslie Small, his wife Grace, son Burrell, Governor Small, Ida May Inglesh, Arthur Inglesh, and Len H. Small. At left is the official portrait that Governor Small used continuously for the last 20 years of his life. (Above, ALPLM; at left, JR.)

Four
THE GOVERNOR AND THE COLONEL
    PUBLISHERS AND PARTISANS
    Len Small hated the Chicago Tribune, and the Tribune returned the feeling. Here is an excerpt from an April 5, 1923 editorial:
    Len Small was made governor by Thompson and Lundin when their control over Chicago was tightest. Small is even worse than either Thompson or Lundin. He has always been bad. Twenty-five and thirty years ago, his connection with the corruption of public institutions such as the Kankakee insane asylum was notorious. He always has been notorious.
    Temperamentally, he is timid, but he is so unscrupulous that his lack of principle gives him the appearance of audacity. When he was shaking in his boots for fear a Lake County jury would send him to the penitentiary, he was amazing some of the stoutest rascals in the state by his boldness in offering voters the bribe of good roads in exchange for legislators who would protect him.
    He is not guided by courage, shrewdness or strength, but by his lack of principles. He is stupid, and his stupidity plus his indifference to public decency allows him to do the outrageous things for which any governor ought to be impeached.
    He was a public nuisance when he was a little grubbing downstate politician, picking up offices which would allow him to control coal contracts for an institution, levy an assessment on poorly paid institution employees, and gather in nickels and dimes where he could find them.
    He had been a small minded, realistic gangster, but aping Thompson, he tried to be a flannel-mouth and to spout phrases regarding the people and the profiteers.
    His whole political life has been one of profiteering at the expense of people who pay taxes, and even now he