Big Bill of Chicago

By Herman Kogan and Lloyd Wendt

Book Overview

Winner of 2006 Illinois State Historical Society Book Award-Certificate of Excellence

To some he was a humanitarian and builder. Others scorned him as a fake and friend of gangsters with "the carcass of a rhinoceros and the brain of a baboon." This rollicking history traces the rise of William Hale "Big Bill" Thompson, Chicago's famous reform mayor, from his upper class roots to his years as a teenaged cowboy, from his fame as a star athlete to the years as a master politician in a world where the ward boss ruled and whiskey for the voters cost a quarter a shot. Big Bill of Chicago profiles the whole brawling arena of city politics from the turn of the century to the Prohibition Era. It is a primer in the way American politics worked-and works-and a map along the countless winding ways even the dirtiest deal can lead to something great.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0810123193
• ISBN13: 9780810123199
• Release Date: November 2005
• Publisher: Northwestern University Press
• Length: 400 Pages
• Weight: 1.15 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 6.1" x 8.7"