"Joe Sent Me"

Excerpts from the Chicago Tribune:

"Even as the 18th Amendment went into effect at 12:01 a.m. on this date (17 January 1920), only the naive really thought Prohibition would do away with alcohol consumption."

"By 1924, there were 15 breweries in the city going full steam and an estimated 20,000 saloons."

"These speakeasys (a term meaning "speak softly when ordering") and the gangs that supplied them operated more or less openly, because William Hale "Big Bill" Thompson, who was mayor during much of Prohibition, was a master of the broad wink. His police chief, Charles Fitzmorris, complained that "60 percent of my police are in the bootleg business."

"Customers would mutter a code phrase at the door ("Joe sent me"), undergo peep-hole scrutiny and then join the crowd inside. Women, previously relegated to a side entrance at most drinking establishments, could enter these illicit saloons through the same door as the men, risking neither arrest nor a sullied reputation."