Creating Fiction from History: 3/16/2022

John Schmitt was the newest member of the greatest rival to Al Capone’s organization, the O’Banion gang. Ole Gimpy himself had recruited him, so John Jacob, JJ for short, was feeling pretty good about his new position. The pay was pretty decent, though the work in Goose Island could get rather dicey at times. In fact, dicey was pretty much a daily occurrence for this third-generation Swede.

JJ was fresh out of the German military and had seen much action in what is now known as the First World War. Though his Homeland had officially taken a more or less neutral position during that strife, JJ, along with much of the nobility, had erred on the side of the Kaiser.

John Jacob joined the German Army in early March of 1918, only to be thrust almost immediately into the Kaiserschlact, also known as ‘The Ludendorff Offensive. This might’ve been called a last-ditch attempt by the Germans to gain a better foothold before the Yanks showed up!

Upon his return to friendlier shores, JJ was pretty familiar with the dangerous territory so the mean streets of Chicago seemed like a walk in the park compared to what he endured in the European Theater. When JJ walked his territory on the North Side of Chicago, there was always the chance of a stray bullet, but he had been conditioned to avoid such situations and so felt fairly safe wherever he roamed.

In 1926, when his boss was deceitfully gunned down by a rival gang whilst tending his own flower shop, JJ knew his number would be up relatively soon. Though he laid low for a while, JJ’s life was brought to a dismal end about three years later during the now infamous Valentine’s Day Massacre.