You couldn't make it up dept no.83 - Brothers under the skin

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Al Capone's oldest brother, Vincenzo (who took the name of an early Western movie star, Richard Hart), became, quite independently of his younger brother, a frontier lawman in Nebraska. The same opportunity made both brothers: while young Al went to Chicago and swiftly grew rich on Prohibition smuggling, his brother went to Homer, Nebraska, enlisted in the police when it was being expanded under the impact of Prohibition, and swiftly became an ideal frontier lawman. Brave, clever, and incorruptible, a deadly shot with a gun (he was a decorated and highly promoted World War One veteran), he was employed to keep whiskey off various Native American reservations, and gained their trust by learning their languages and habits. He actually became town marshall for Homer, to complete the all-round real-life John Wayne story. He was, however, still Italian enough to acknowledge his family, and in the late forties he revealed his identity to his wife and son and allowed his son to take part in a family reunion and meet his grandmother - and his famous uncle (who, alas, was by then a syphilitic wreck). Family links even managed what probably no other consideration could have: Capone/Hart, apparently in financial trouble in the last years of his life, accepted a little financial help from his brother Ralph, apparently without bothering that Ralph had been in Al's paybooks in the days of his glory.

Al Capone himself started out in life as an accountant - a skill that helped him greatly as he built his booze empire in Cicero and points north.

Comments

[jordan179.livejournal.com]

I can see why having Al Capone as a baby brother might be something that an honest lawman would want to hide! :)

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As I heard it, at first he had no idea of what had happened. He had left the family when Al was still a child, and fought in WWI (where he managed to be promoted form private to lieutenant!) and gone West in search of adventure. Even his taking a different name was not due to wanting to hide anything, but to his admiration for the actor Richard Hart.

[jordan179.livejournal.com]

I'd bet that when Richard found out, he avoided Al for a long while, because both of them must have realized that their Worst Nightmare might be each other. I mean, a confrontation when both were active in their careers could have meant (literal) fratricide!

[fpb.livejournal.com]

Likely enough. Al did not stick to Cicero, and travelled a lot around America, but always to large towns with expensive hotels (and useful safe houses); Vincenzo/Richard, on the other hand, seems to have had a real predilection for the open air and from 1920 on rarely saw a larger town than Homer (current population, 570). So their tastes would have made pretty sure they would not easily meet. Even so, I dare say that it was not a coincidence that Richard did not allow his family to know, nor arrange a family reunion, until Al was defanged and wrecked by syphilis.

As one of the sites I consulted points out, "It seems unbelievable that the two brothers, Richard Hart and Al Capone, could have lived such remarkably different lives on opposite sides of the law. Yet when you look at the qualities that made each of the two brothers successful in their own milieu, fraternal similarities are visible: intelligence, initiative, risk taking, strength of will and purpose, persistence and conviction, and the ability to lead and persuade others." Also, a complete absence of Italian or Sicilian chauvinism - Al's gang was full of Jews and others whom he hired purely on ability, and his Irish enemies hated the fact that he engaged and paid richly black jazz musicians. At the same time, Richard was making himself popular with reservation Indians by learning their languages and their ways.

[headnoises.livejournal.com]

In geek speak:
both were lawful.

Just one was lawful good, one was lawful evil....

[fpb.livejournal.com]

Oh, and if you read the famous interview with Claud Cockburn, you will find that Al regarded himself as a patriotic American.