Al Capone

Al Capone Perhaps the best-known gangster of all time, Al "Scarface" Capone was the most powerful mob boss of his era. He dominated organized crime in the Chicago area from 1925 until 1931, when he was imprisoned for federal income tax evasion. Alphonse Capone was born on Jan. 17, 1899, in a tough neighborhood of Brooklyn, N.Y. He attended school up to the sixth grade. His nickname, Scarface, resulted from a knife attack by the brother of a …

…was paroled in 1939. Suffering from syphilis that had begun to drive him insane, he was unable to run the Chicago mob. Capone spent the rest of his life in his Miami Beach mansion, where he died on Jan. 25, 1947. During the 1930s the business of organized crime was depicted by Hollywood in a series of bloody and violent movies. Callous as these gangsters were, their screen images still became heroes to countless numbers of youthful moviegoers.