Crusaders, Gangsters, and Whiskey

Prohibition in Memphis
Erscheinungsjahr 2021
ISBN: 978-1-4968-3453-9
Verlag: University Press of Mississippi

Buch, Englisch, 312 Seiten, Paperback, Format (B × H): 152 mm x 229 mm, Gewicht: 509 g

Prohibition, with all its crime, corruption, and cultural upheaval, ran its course after thirteen years in most of the rest of the country-but not in Memphis, where it lasted thirty years. Patrick O'Daniel takes a fresh look at those responsible for the rise and fall of Prohibition, its effect on Memphis, and the impact events in the city made on the rest of the state and country.

Prohibition remains perhaps the most important issue to affect Memphis after the Civil War. It affected politics, religion, crime, the economy, and health, along with race and class. In Memphis, bootlegging bore a particular character shaped by its urban environment and the rural background of the city's inhabitants. Religious fundamentalists and the Ku Klux Klan supported Prohibition, while the rebellious youth of the Jazz Age fought against it. Poor and working-class people took the brunt of Prohibition, while the wealthy skirted the law. Like the War on Drugs today, African Americans, immigrants, and poor whites made easy targets for law enforcement due to their lack of resources and effective legal counsel.

Based on news reports and documents, O'Daniel's lively account distills long-forgotten gangsters, criminal organizations, and crusaders whose actions shaped the character of Memphis well into the twentieth century.

Autoren/Hrsg.

O'Daniel, Patrick

Fachgebiete

• Sozialwissenschaften Politikwissenschaft Politikwissenschaft Allgemein Politische Theorie, Politische Philosophie
• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Weltgeschichte & Geschichte einzelner Länder und Gebietsräume Geschichte einzelner Länder Amerikanische Geschichte
• Sozialwissenschaften Soziologie | Soziale Arbeit Soziale Gruppen/Soziale Themen Soziale Fragen & Probleme

Über Autor(innen)

Patrick O'Daniel isexecutive director of library services for Southwest Tennessee Community College. He is author of When the Levee Breaks: Memphis and the Mississippi Valley Flood of 1927; Memphis and the Super-Flood of 1937: High Water Blues; and Historic Photos of Memphis. He has published articles in West Tennessee Historical Society Papers.