Rube Yelvington - Fifty Golden Years
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Organized Crime Articles |
From: Rube Yelvington [mailto:Rube@Yelvington.com]
Sent: Fri 6/13/2008 8:44 AM
To: Patterson, Martha H
Subject: Re: Question regarding our East St. Louis history and culture project
I have prostate cancer and it has entered my bones, a terminal phase. I
am not bedridden. The cancer does sap my energy, but my pain killers
work. Beginning Monday for two weeks and three days I will have daily
radiation treatments. I am 83 years old, and I have forgotten a lot. I
have had a colorful (double meaning -- I can't spell entendre) ) past
both as a reporter and editor during the tumultuous days following the
collapse of the color line ostracizing the "South End," sit ins and b
urn outs, and the end of a society protected (yes protected) by Frank
"Buster" Wortman and the gangsters of the first Chicago Mayor Daley
era. I would be glad to try to help. Charles Baugh, a friend since
school days, says he would like to "sit in" and perhaps help. He too is
seriously ill. Seems to happen as you grow older.
You might Google Buster Wortman and learn a bit about gangsters and East
St. Louis. And if you can, find files on the hearing conducted by Sen.
Estes Kefauver in St. Louis, in the '40s, including the gambling joint
within sight of City Hall which had a recreation area for teen-agers
(white, of course) on the second floor. Paul Simon, the later Sen.
Simon known as Mr. Clean among all politicians, testified at that
hearing, when as a cub reporter I wrote "color" and gained a lot of
information about links between the police forces, politics and
organized crime. When the blacks finally came into power, they enjoyed
the path of the whites who preceded them.
Rube
