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Lords of the Levee is a 1943 non-fiction book by long time Chicago Tribune reporters Lloyd Wendt and Herman Kogan in one of three collaborations about the city of Chicago, focusing on its politicians "Bathhouse" John Coughlin and "Hinky Dink" Kenna, notorious alderman for the City of Chicago's lakeside First Ward. The book was reprinted in 1967 by Midland Press. In 1974, Indiana University Press published the book under the title Bosses in Lusty Chicago, along with a new introduction by Illinois Senator Paul Douglas. The book appeared under its original title in 2005 when it was reprinted by Northwestern University Press.
[edit] Excerpt
- "It was one of the most infamous havens for vice in the entire country, home to gambling palaces with marble floors and mahogany bars, to a mini-city of thugs and prostitutes and down-and-outers, to dives and saloons of every description and a few beyond description. In short, the First was a gold mine. In a city where money talked, it made boisterous Bathhouse John and the laconic Hinky Dink Kenna the most powerful men in town. This classic of Chicago-style journalism traces the careers of these two operators as they rose to the top of the city's political world."
[edit] See also
Gray Wolves of Chicago
