Stringer's Books and Ephemera
Rare and Fine Books and Ephemera
X MARKS THE SPOT
(1930 Chicago Al Capone Magazine)
Chicago The Spot Publishing Co. c. 1930
400.00
First printing, second issue.
Condition for this magazine is better than very good but not quite near fine with a bit of soiling to the covers, some wear to corners and spine ends, a bit of darkening along the spine. With price label of 50c affixed to the front cover.
64 pages with numerous photos.
64 pages with numerous photos.
Magazine, 8 ½” x 11”.
According to a 1930 issue of “The Chicagoan”, a short-lived magazine modeled after The New Yorker that ran from 1926 to 1935, "It hadn't been on the stands long before robust-looking gentlemen with hats down over their eyes would appear, jerk their thumbs briefly at the display, and corner-lip to the frightened clerk the command: 'Off the stand'".
Published in 1930 with no mention of an author (Hal Andrews) this magazine became infamous right after publication. More than just an exposé of the Chicago gangsters this magazine was the first of many that depicted through photographs the demise of those inhabits of underworld life. “X Marks the Spot” refers to the then newspaper use of an “X” to mark the spot on a photo of where a gangster was found dead on some street or back alley. The makers of this magazine made a conscience choice to remove that “X” and show how many in this life ended up: dead, lying in a gutter, slouched over in some car, etc. It was first sold on the newsstands of Chicago, with a cover price of $1.00, quite a lot for the period, it quickly disappeared from the newsstands though, not from sales but from threats to the newsvendors, mostly from Al Capone’s goons. The author than chose to sell the magazine through mail order and took out ads in various detective magazines and lowered the cover price by covering the original price with sticker labels to 50cents, then 25cents. We have for sale here an issue with the 50cent sticker applied over the original $1.0o price.
The magazine is also an in-depth contemporary history of the Chicago underworld scene during Prohibition, from the beginning, the murder of Big Jim Colosimo, which allowed Johnny Torrio and Al Capone to take over his rackets, through the battles between Capone and the North Side Gang and others culminating in the murder of newsmen Jake Lingle (1930). There is quite a lot of coverage, of course, of the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre that took place February 14th, 1929, where seven men (all but one, members or associates of the North Side gang, the one, an optometrist, enjoyed hanging out with gangsters) were surprised by “police officers”, lined up against a wall and mowed down with machine guns and shotgun. The photos of this act, as one can imagine, are quite gruesome.
Published in 1930 with no mention of an author (Hal Andrews) this magazine became infamous right after publication. More than just an exposé of the Chicago gangsters this magazine was the first of many that depicted through photographs the demise of those inhabits of underworld life. “X Marks the Spot” refers to the then newspaper use of an “X” to mark the spot on a photo of where a gangster was found dead on some street or back alley. The makers of this magazine made a conscience choice to remove that “X” and show how many in this life ended up: dead, lying in a gutter, slouched over in some car, etc. It was first sold on the newsstands of Chicago, with a cover price of $1.00, quite a lot for the period, it quickly disappeared from the newsstands though, not from sales but from threats to the newsvendors, mostly from Al Capone’s goons. The author than chose to sell the magazine through mail order and took out ads in various detective magazines and lowered the cover price by covering the original price with sticker labels to 50cents, then 25cents. We have for sale here an issue with the 50cent sticker applied over the original $1.0o price.
The magazine is also an in-depth contemporary history of the Chicago underworld scene during Prohibition, from the beginning, the murder of Big Jim Colosimo, which allowed Johnny Torrio and Al Capone to take over his rackets, through the battles between Capone and the North Side Gang and others culminating in the murder of newsmen Jake Lingle (1930). There is quite a lot of coverage, of course, of the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre that took place February 14th, 1929, where seven men (all but one, members or associates of the North Side gang, the one, an optometrist, enjoyed hanging out with gangsters) were surprised by “police officers”, lined up against a wall and mowed down with machine guns and shotgun. The photos of this act, as one can imagine, are quite gruesome.
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