Paul Durica

speaker

288 appearances 1 recordings 1 series first heard Jul 2026 last heard 27 Jul

Paul Durica’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

Trend

recordings per month · last 12 months

Recordings per month over the last 12 months — 1 in all, peaking in Jul 2026 with 1.

Appearances

newest first · ▶ plays the moment

American History Hit · Life in Mobland Chicago · 27 Jul 2026 podcast

So you do have them as a kind of countervailing force, but you're right.

It's not enough to really kind of make a significant dent in this criminal enterprise.

And it really comes down to repeal.

And, you know, once there's no more money to be made,

You know, then a lot of it begins to or moves into different channels.

I mean, some of the political corruption, of course, still remains.

But like at least anything around bootlegging begins to disappear.

I mean, it's really interesting to look at what's going on, like December of 1932, because there's a new mayor in place named Anton Cermak who succeeded Thompson.

Franklin Roosevelt had been elected in November that year.

It's clear that repeal is coming.

So Cermak starts to lay the foundation for that.

And he starts going aggressively after speakeasies and beer flats and things, getting the city ready for when beer will be legal again.

And the city can start issuing licenses and the city can start making the profit that the gangsters are making.

But you start to find going on in this period is like clones in prison, but it's syndicate.

They start dropping the prices on all of their products because they realize that like legal beer is coming.

It's right there on the horizon.

And soon they're going to be in competition with it.

So the only way they could keep making any money is if they undercut whatever the legitimate license saloons and bars are.

And so there's this kind of fascinating transition.

Period.

Showing 241–260 of 288 · page 13 of 15