Chicago Gang Violence History

Gangs have been classically viewed as a by-product of social disorganization, the weakness of traditional institutions, like the schools, to replace the lost primary networks of the traditional world. But race would profoundly shape the history and contours of Chicago's gangs. While other ethnic groups were on the ladder of assimilation, African Americans were crowded into the south side "Black Belt." As WWI brought more and more African Americans into Chicago to find work, tensions rose. In 1919 race riot broke out spear-headed by Irish gangs or "social athletic clubs." In the following years, African Americans would stay segregated, while European ethnic groups did not. Violence met attempts by Black families to move out of apartheid conditions into white areas. When Black families tried to move out they were rejected by the white community. The white community feared that if they let blacks into their neighborhoods that the violence would follow.

Another major gang leader was Al Capone which was responsible for the Valentines Day Massacre. The Valentine’s Day Massacre was a ghastly crime that has nothing at all to do with romantic day that it was named after, other than the date of February 14. The Valentine’s Day Massacre was the gangland slaying of members of the Bugsy Moran gang in a Chicago garage, attributed to rival gangster Alphonse (Al) Capone. It was on Valentine’s Day in 1929 that Chicago was marked with the gangland violence of criminal warfare. Called the ghastliest crime in Chicago’s history, the multiple murders were part of a gangland war between the Bugsy Moran Gang and notorious Al Capone, later dubbed “Public Enemy Number One. This is one of the many gang violence stories that chicagoans have to share about their city. Gangs have been affiliated since hundreds of years ago. Gangs started out to protect the neighborhoods and turned out to be the leading factor destroying them.