Floor 3

Birth of the Mob

The origins of the Mob in America can be traced to the urban ghettos of the late 19th century, where Irish, Italian and Eastern European Jewish immigrants struggled to survive amid poverty, overcrowding and discrimination. These immigrants could get only th...

A Tough Little Town

The Mob did not create Las Vegas. That credit goes to railroad builder William Clark, who created the original townsite in 1905 at the halfway point of his rail route between Salt Lake City and Los Angeles. Clark sold lots, and a town sprouted up beside the...

Prohibition

The 18th Amendment to the Constitution, which banned the manufacture, distribution and sale of alcohol in America, took effect in 1920. Temperance advocates celebrated Prohibition, but so did savvy members of organized crime. Recognizing that many people st...

St. Valentine’s Day Massacre Wall

A commercial garage on the north side of Chicago was the setting for the most horrific shooting in Mob history, the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre. On February 14, 1929, seven members and associates of George “Bugs” Moran’s bootlegging gang were lined up agai...

Massacre Evidence

After the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre on February, 14, 1929, one of the nation’s foremost forensic scientists, Dr. Calvin Goddard, was hired to examine the ballistic evidence. Goddard compared the bullets collected from the crime scene with test bullets fi...

The Feds Fight Back

As the Mob prospered during Prohibition, law enforcement agencies found themselves overmatched by the clever and violent crime syndicates. New legal powers and more firepower were needed to combat this growing threat. The Bureau of Narcotics took on the Mob...

Follow the Money

Mob bosses rarely paid a price for their thieving and murderous acts. Witnesses often were afraid to testify, and jurors were paid off to ensure “not guilty” verdicts. But if mobsters didn’t pay their income taxes, they could run into big trouble. Just ask ...

The Tentacles Spread

After Prohibition, the Mob needed new criminal opportunities to exploit. It found plenty. Sports fixing, illegal gambling, drug trafficking and Hollywood extortion schemes were just some of the rackets that helped transform America’s bootlegging gangs into ...

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