Should Al Capone be remembered as Gangster #1? Define – ‘gangster #1’

Source A His individual acts of charity were many. He paid the hospital bills of a woman bystander wounded in a street gun-battle and it was the Capone gang who set the first soup kitchens and block restaurants for the distribution of free food on Thanksgiving day From a revisionist history of Prohibition, Alexander Baron, 1995

Al Capone speaking in the 1920s Source B If people didn’t want beer and wouldn’t drink it, a fellow would be crazy for going round trying to sell it. I’ve seen gambling houses too and I’ve never saw anyone point a gun at a man and make him go in. I’ve always considered it a public service to provide decent liquor and fair gambling. Al Capone speaking in the 1920s

Source C: Al Capone Mugshot

Source D People in Chicago back then looked on Al Capone as a Robin Hood – He helped the poor. My uncle worked for him. He had a dry cleaning and pressing place, and Capone used it as a headquarters for selling alcohol…Capone sold the alcohol to my uncle for $12 a gallon and we’d sell it to people for $18 a gallon. Milt Hilton from a book ‘Memories of Al Capone’

Source E: ‘Big Al’s soup kitchen’ Chicago 1930 Source E: ‘Big Al’s soup kitchen’ Chicago 1930. Set up for unemployed workers by Al Capone

Source F: The front page of ‘The Chicago Daily News’ newspaper about the St Valentine’s Day massacre

Source G: A film poster for ‘Al Capone’ (1959)

Source H: Capone controlled the mayor ‘Big Bill’ Thompson and senior police officers, and fixed local elections. In Chicago, he controlled speakeasies, bookmakers’ joints, gambling houses, brothels, horse and race tracks, nightclubs, distilleries and breweries. He drove around in a bullet proof Cadillac, which always contained his bodyguards who were armed with machine guns. Capone had more than 200 of his rivals killed in the years 1925 – 1929. There were no convictions for any of these murders. From a WJEC school textbook (2010)