Day by Day 1925

A rundown of daily local and world events up to the current date of play.

January

4 – Dorothea Curley, second child and daughter of Mayor Curley, falls ill, reportedly with pneumonia. She begins to deteriorate, and the city keeps a quiet vigil for the sick girl.

-Patrick Gallagher turns 23.

5 - Wyoming inaugurates Nellie Tayloe Ross as the first female governor in the United States.

8 – Channing Cox takes the lone walk from the Massachusetts statehouse into the commonwealth, leaving the governorship to be taken over by his successor, Alvan T. Fuller.

10 – After struggling nearly a week against double lomar pneumonia, Dorothea Curley, age 14, rouses briefly to gaze upon and recognize her family assembled vigilantly at her bedside, then dies. All who knew her mourn her deeply, and she is buried in Calvary Cemetery.

-Martin Hoffman turns 37.

12 - Gang warfare in Chicago heats up when the remaining members of recently killed Dean O’Banion’s gang strike back against his alleged killers, firing at Al Capone’s car parked outside a restaurant. Capone, however, was in the restaurant, and the attack succeeds only in wounding his chauffeur, Sylvester Barton. Nonetheless, the brazen daytime attack shocks the city and Capone, who immediately orders a bullet-proof car.

-Harlan F. Stone moves to solidify his political control over the scandal-ridden BI, requiring its Director to report to the attorney general regarding his decisions on the Bureau as a whole, and to report to assistant attorneys general any developments concerning cases over which they have jurisdiction. In practices, this means that William Donovan, assistant attorney general over the Criminal Division, supervises Bureau operations.

15 - One of Al Capone’s bodyguards is found dead, dumped in the woods outside Chicago. He had been tortured with cigarettes and concertina wire before being shot five times in the head. The remaining members of O’Banion’s gang, now referred to as the North Side Mob, are suspected as the culprits. They are led by George “Bugs” Moran, Hymie Weiss, and Vincent Drucci.

-Tom F. Foley, Tammany stalwart, former Sheriff of Manhattan, mentor to New York Governor Al Smith and Senator Jimmy Walker, dies.

17 - D. Leigh Colvin of the Methodist Board of Temperance accuses the motion picture industry of making the 18th Amendment look “ridiculous” by highlighting the allure of drinking. Recent films such as Lights of New York, Queen of the Nightclubs, and Night after Night lend credence to his accusation.

18 - Gerald Chapman, the Gentleman Bandit, is finally recaptured in Muncie, Indiana. He attempts to shoot his way out of captivity, but is quickly subdued and cuffed. In addition to his gun, he carries $5,000 in cash, $3,000 in bonds, and two bottles of nitroglycerin. To prevent escape, he is immediately transferred to the Marion County Jail in Indianapolis where federal authorities take charge of his person. He is immediately indicted in Connecticut for the murder of Officer Skelly.

19 - Having served three and a half years in federal prison, Charles Ponzi is released on parole, only to be immediately rearrested by Massachusetts state authorities and charged with larceny.

-Following his arrest last November, accompanied by a raid of his home and businesses and the seizure of thousands of dollars worth of alcohol paraphernalia, a grand jury returns a two-count indictment against Seattle based “good bootlegger” and former cop Roy Olmstead, for associated charges surrounding the violation of the Volstead Act, and, thus, the 18th Amendment. The case appears to be largely based on evidence gathered from an extensive wiretap of both Olmstead’s home phone and his business phone, conducted by Prohibition agents.

24 - Chicago’s North Side Mob strikes again, ambushing John Torrio outside his home as he returns from shopping with his wife. Multiple shots are fired, leaving both Torrio and his chauffeur, Robert Barton, severely wounded. Witnesses report that “Bugs” Moran, after Torrio and his chauffeur had collapsed on the ground, approached Torrio, put his gun to Torrio’s temple, and attempted to perform a coup de grace, but that the gun misfired. Moran attempted to reload, but was forced to flee as police arrived on the scene. Several newspapers report the imminent retirement of Torrio, who will be returning with his family to Italy after serving his sentence for O’Banion’s brewery double cross the year before, and the apparent succession of Capone over Torrio’s Southside Outfit.

26 - In light of the mania over Florida real estate, Forbes magazine publishes an article warning that current Florida land prices are grossly inflated, based on the expectation of finding a customer, not on the actual value of the land itself. The press of potential buyers and the pace of the buying and selling is so thick a common anecdote makes the round of a native saying to a visitor, “Want to buy a lot?” and the visitor immediately replying, “Sold.”

30 - Floyd Collins, a famous pioneer cave explorer, is trapped while trying to discover a new entrance to a system of underground caves, a popular tourist attraction in Kentucky. Rescue efforts begin immediately, as friends discover him trapped just 150 feet from the surface and send down food and electric lights. He is pinned by a dislodged rock. Radio stations pick up the story and begin giving expansive up-to-date coverage on it.

-Eli Johnson turns 21.

February

4 - Still alive and still trapped by the rock, Floyd Collins has managed to keep himself living off the food provided by friends and sheer will. However, the thinness of the shaft leading to him and the fact that the rock can’t yet be pried loose keeps him where he is. The story has received significant national attention, and media crews, tourists, and onlookers descend on the site, creating an almost circus-like atmosphere, with even souvenir vendors making the rounds of the makeshift camp. The cave passage being used to communicate with and give food to Collins (newspaperman William Miller has already interviewed him through the passage as rescue efforts are underway) collapses in two places, cutting him off from outside contact. Henry Carmichael, the head of the rescue efforts, believes the passage previously used to be too dangerous and begins digging a shaft behind where Collins is to reach and free him.

8 - Ponzi is formally tried for larceny and convicted as a “common and notorious thief.”  He is sentenced to be imprisoned for seven to nine years. Pending appeal, Ponzi is released on $14,000 bail. He promptly disappears.

9 - Former Director of the Veteran’s Bureau Charles R. Forbes is convicted of conspiracy to defraud the U.S. Government, fined $10,000 (he is reputed to have embezzled upwards of $200 million) and sentenced to a prison term of two years.

17 - The rescue team in Kentucky is finally able to reach Collins, having dug a shaft to where he is trapped. However, he died several days previous from exposure and hunger. Still unable to remove his body, having come upon him on the front and not having any access to the rock pinning his leg to the cave, they fill in the shaft and conduct funeral services. The media cover had built to a fever pitch, but now, the story over, it dissipates. So far, it’s the biggest news story of the decade.

21 - The first issue of The New Yorker hits the stands. Created as a sophisticated humor magazine, it makes barely a splash, and is nearly forgotten by the summer.

24 - James Boyle turns 15.

28 - The Federal Corrupt Practices Act (first enacted in 1910), is amended, strengthening the law and making it more sweeping in its regulation of campaign finances nationwide. However, the amendments provide for no regulatory authority nor procedure for reporting, taking all the teeth out of the law, as failure to report finances has basically no consequence. Enforcement is left up to Congress, which rarely acts. Regardless, the law forces larger lobbying organizations, particularly those funded by the rich and not politically savvy, to disclose the origin and amount of the contributions they have received. One such organization, the Association against the Prohibition Amendment (AAPA), made up mostly of very wealthy, prominent industrialists, comes under fire from Prohibitionists when they disclose multiple, very high donations from prominent brewers and brewing trade associations. Any kind of effective anti-Prohibition political body remains to be seen.

March

1 – U.S. Customs Inspector Orville A. Preuster is blown apart by a car bomb attached to his starter in Niagara Falls, New York. His friend, in the passenger side, is blown clear by the explosion, receiving only surface injuries. The device used, a stick of dynamite attacked by its percussion cap to the starter, is clearly sophisticated and extremely dangerous. Suspicion immediately turns to Pasquale “Patsy Cronin” Curione, known bootlegger from the nearby town of La Salle, whom Preuster had recently arrested in an attempted bribery. Curione is brought in and grilled for two hours, but allowed to leave. The Niagara Falls City Council offers $5,000 for information leading to the arrest and conviction of those responsibly, and the local chapter of the KKK, of which Preuster’s brother is a member, offers $1,000 for the same. Law enforcement in the area mobilizes to punish those responsible. Preuster’s partner, Ellsworth Shaw, is immediately transferred elsewhere.

-Bridget Gallagher turns 43.

-Frank Boyle turns 53.

2 - The U.S. Supreme Court issues its decision in the case of Carroll vs. the United States. The case concerns the legality of a seizure made by federal Prohibition agents obtained by searching the vehicle, without a warrant, of a known bootlegger. The Supreme Court upholds the search and seizure, as legal under previous rulings regarding the ability to eliminate or hide contraband in a moving vehicle. It does, however, provide a new benchmark for deciding in practice when to secure a warrant, in that an officer justifying his search must prove probable cause for belief that the vehicle contains contraband, combined with a belief that the vehicle and the contraband could be removed from jurisdiction before a warrant is obtained.

4 - Calvin Coolidge is inaugurated for his second term as President of the United States.