Ivy League, You are correct. In the old days, The Outfit never had a making ceremony. In Fact, Giancana thought it was silly and even made fun of it on an F.B.I. secret recording. A man was considered made with a handshake, party thrown in his honor, and most importantly, being PUT IN CHARGE OF SOMETHING. Everyone knew that this man had basically risen from a soldier to a made guy. Made guys are in charge of things and have soldiers who work under them. Joey Auippa, introduced the making ceremony. If the Outfit, in 1975, had 240 or so guys who actually BELONGED to one of the 6 crews, maybe 25%, or 60 let's say, were made guys. The Outfit has downsized to 4 crews. The Outfit was NEVER divided into 2 groups. The Outfit is ONE group of 4 Street Crews, much like a Cartel. The dominant Group is Elmwood Park. The other 3 Crews are partnered in one way or another with Elmwood Park. John DiFronzo, Pete DiFronzo & Marco D'Amico all belong to Elmwood Park. Joe Andriacchi is more associated with the Grand Ave. Crew since Joey Lombardo is gone. Andriacchi and Lombardo are cousins. Also, Grand Ave. is almost an extension of Elmwood Park, (even though it is a different Crew), because Both DiFronzo's, Lombardo & Andriacchi all came from Grand Ave. In the final tally, The Grand Ave. men ended up dominating the Outfit over the Taylor St. men (Giancana's old Crew) when Auippa (Cicero) took over with Cerone ( Elmwood Park) in 1970. Cerone & Accardo also both came from Grand Ave. Auippa was born and raised in Melrose Park.

Did New York have Chicago changed the ceremony?

No. Joey Auippa, who was very traditional, started using the formal ceremony.

I believe Aiuppa initiated the ceremony right around the time he allowed the East Coast families to take over AC as long as they stayed away from Vegas. Perhaps it was a way to legitimize the Outfit in the eyes of east coast families or perhaps it was a way for Aiuppa to gain more loyalty.

In reality, the Outfit was much less of an ethnic gang. Still dominated by Italians but by the 1980s or so you didn't have as many guys active who could actually speak Italian fluently or understand what the fuck was being said.

The guy on WGN, RIchard Lindberg, is not very good with facts or data.

If you look at his books--which are actually a great concept--"Return to the Crime" and "Return Again to the Scene of the Crime" on Amazon, you will see readers raking him over the coals for countless factual errors.

"It's estimated that there are between 200-400 made members of the Chicago Outfit today."

Uh... by whom? I've never heard that number in my life!

When they asked this guy to talk about this he should have said "I don't really know much about that. Sorry."

Johnnynonos, I agree with you 100%. The Chicago Outfit is structured differently than New York and years ago didn't have the East Coast pricking your finger Ceremony. New York and Chicago are like two Companies in the same business that are organized differently and actually have some philosophical differences about a few things. The Outfit NEVER had over 75 made members EVER in their entire history. At their peak in the early 1960's, there were about 75 made guys and 225 soldiers. Soldiers are NOT made guys in Chicago. They work for the made guys and assist them in doing 'BUSINESS' with the street associates ( 25% street bookies, bar owners with poker machines etc.) People should stop talking about the Outfit like it's a carbon copy of a New York Family, stop comparing it to a New York Family, and shut the fuck up and truthfully say 'I'm sorry but I really don't know much about Chicago only that it's different than New York'. That is an answer I can respect.

Sounds about right. People tend to really inflate things for some reason. I don't know why. Guess it's just like "fish stories."

I am interested (less so than I once was, but still interested) in the Outfit, not really a "fan" or anything, and I don't find it less interesting if there are currently 20-something made guys or 50.

In fact I find it more interesting these days because it is something that in my opinion is an artifact of another era that is essentially on its death bed.

I would love to get in DiFronzo's or Lombardo's brain and hear EVERYTHING they know... that would really be interesting! They could tell you virtually the entire history of the Outfit from a true insider's perspective.

But... it will probably never happen.

On some level I think most of these people are extremely, extremely ashamed of what they've done. So no one in the end really tells the whole, entire, ugly story.

I've been traipsing around this board for close to a week now. Some of the responses from members here are absolutely laughable at best.

This ivyleague miscreant is the very last person anyone should be taking seriously in regards to the Chicago outfit. The same goes for this jonnonos character. Someone posted on the city data website under the same name. Sounds like the classic brown nosing clown that parks outside of Bridgeport & Grand Ave hangouts, hoping to see a murder or something heh. And when it doesn't happen, well, the outfit is obviously on it's death bed. You can actually run into some serious trouble messing around like that, hopefully you've let up. And I'm convinced that both of these fools may be, in fact, be employed by some Outfit guys, and commissioned to go around to various gangster enthusiast fan websites, derailing myths that the Outfit is in full swing LOL. Their claims are that ridiculous.

All kidding aside, the Outfit is set up the way it is so as to confuse grubby snoop types a la ivyleague & johnnynose. And it's worked beautifully.

In regards to the outfit & it's current state, there are well over half a million Italians within the greater Chicagoland area. Places like East Bridgeport, downtown Berwyn, the streets of Lombard, and especially the nightlife strips along grand & Harlem in Melrose/elmwood park, ripe with pool halls & social clubs that cater specifically to Italians in their 20s/30s, are breeding grounds for younger Italian men looking to get into organized crime. Folks like Marco D'Amico & Tootsie, etc are irrelevant in the street game. The Outfit has plenty of up & comers, believe it.

elmwoodparker & a few others seem to be the only ones with their heads on straight, and not some hermit from Utah with high speed internet & a propensity for scouring bogus ipsn documents. It's actually a wonder this ivyleague fella hasn't been banned yet. He/she seems like the primary fire starter around here, and yet someone else is always to blame.

Anyways, on topic, elmwoodparker I will disagree with you on one thing: Jimmy I is a Cicero man (not Chinatown) through & through, and is the top guy down there, second in seniority throughout the entire org only to JD.

He should have learned in that week that we won't accept flaming on the board. One post, and *POOF*, he's gone!

If you can't act civilly to other members you'll follow this guy.

mikesugarshack, I accept your word on Jimmy I. I wasn't sure if he was with 26th St. or Cicero. He seemed to be connected to both. Jimmy I is a big heavy. No question. The Outfit rewards guys like that when they do their time. Solly D. is another one. Anyway, thank you for your kind words. I was only trying to educate some of these people, in particular, about the past concerning the Structure of the Outfit and how it was different than New York. Wouldn't you agree that in Chicago there is a difference between Soldiers who belong to the Crew and Associates who do 'Business' with the Crew like the 25% street books or the bar owners that have poker machines? Those guys are associates. The guys who collect and work the phones on the inside are soldiers who belong to the crew working under made guys. I think this guy Ivy is a little sick in the head and really doesn't know shit about Chicago.

You just kicked off an active Chicago guy, u realize that lol?

Jimmy I is actually a Taylor Street guy who worked for Torello and Ferriola and the Cicero crew in the 70s and 80s. He was working with the Caruso's when he got out of prison in the 1990s and remains close with Toots and Bruno, though I agree he stayed a Cicero guy and was working with the Spanos in early 2000. Following his last prison stretch, I believe he returned to Cicero who 26th Street reports into. 26th Street to Cicero is like Grand Ave is to Elmwood Park.

Not active anymore.

LOL. That guy got knocked down.

For the record, I have never parked outside Bridgeport or Grand Ave. "waiting for a murder to happen."

If I had, I would still be there.

Anyway, this person's one assertion of "substance" is patently ridiculous. "There are more than half a million Italians in Chicagoland, so the Outfit must be size x."

According to that "logic," we must have an enormous IRA contingent as well. Probably between 50,000-6,000,000 "made guys" I would guess.

It's good these threads are strictly monitered. The Outfit fanboys--grown men who for whatever reason have their self-esteem tied up in their worship of the mob--have destroyed other organized crime forums with the apoplectic spasms of vitriol they unleash whenever someone denigrates the power of their all-powerful mob!

BTW Sugarshack, Sam Giancana was a scrunch-faced psychopathic f***kin' loser who wouldn't have cut it as a bowling alley manager in the real world.

Momo was a fuckin pinsetter!!

Weak and obvious trolls.

Hahhahahahaha...totally. Actually he took an IQ test in prison and he was borderline mentally disabled. True story. I think he scored less than 90, which at the time classified him as an "imbecile."

His great skill seems to have been killing people indiscriminately.

Anyway, a lot of these odd Chicago posters who worship the Outfit absolutely worship Sam Giancana. It is kind of funny, really. They sit around talking about him like he's Paul Bunyun!

The jealousy from fly-over state posters is really laughable at this point. Each one has a giant chip on their shoulders obvious to anyone. Maybe there is an Olive Garden at their closest mall...maybe Goodfellas is on TNT again...any little excuse to jump to the internet to talk tough.

I though NoNos was a Chicago guy?

And I'm just breaking balls, same as you always do at the expense of New York. But if it makes you feel any better, I personally feel that most wiseguys are morons. Whether they're from New York, Chicago or Timbuktu.

I'm from Chicago and I'm interested in the Outfit, I've just noticed that some of the Chicago posters on here, and in other forums, have a near fetish worship of Sam Giancana, and take it very, very personally if anyone is of the opinion that the Outfit is less than an omniscent, all-powerful criminal organization.

I think we're all on the same page.

IQ tests, especially back then, were notorious for being culturally biased. Carmine Galante scored even lower. I seriously doubt either one had an IQ that was below average. If they were to take a morality test they'd score low and high on a psychopathy test. They are evil criminals, case closed. My only interest is historical. Anyone who looks up to Mafiosi as some sort of role model has serious moral problems him or herself.

I was just going to post that Faithful1 about Galante scoring a similar IQ number in prison. Both Galante and Giancana were not imbeciles. Homicidal psychopaths, yes, but neither was an imbecile. Though i admit i did laugh when i read that in Galantes Fbi file.

I know, I know.

Plus the test was while he was in juvy, so he probably just half filled it out, not really caring about it.

Probably.

How could you say that about Momo? The man was a genius...no fuck he was a GOD!

LOL! You guys are too much. Remember when RFK told Giancana he "giggled like a little girl"? You know Momo would of just loved to put an icepick into Kennedys head.

It's like the old SNL skit on Bill Brasky.

If you are really from Chicago then you should stick with us my friend. Outfit guys are flocking to these boards right now and we should keep them coming.

What the fuck is this "us" shit? You have some agenda here?

Anyone is welcome AS LONG AS THEY BEHAVE AND FOLLOW BOARD RULES. Your other Chicago friend, just gone, is an example of the treatment anyone flaming will get.

I really only read/respond to the threads when there is something interesting to talk about, which given the current state of the Outfit is almost never.

I sort of reached my limit with my interest in the historical stuff.

I hope more Chicago guys do come to the board, if they have anything interesting to say.

jonnynonos, Talk about fetish. Look at the profile of Ivy league. He has pictures of all these New York mafia guys on his profile like he worships them. I stopped arguing with Ivy because he doesn't really know shit about the Outfit. He only knows what he reads on the internet. In 1997, the feds said that the Outfit had 70 made members with 3 street crews and 700 to 1200 associates! Then in 2007, the feds said there were 28 or 30 made guys with over 100 associates. Okay, I can understand where the made guys total went down, but WHAT HAPPENED TO THE 700 TO 1200 ASSOCIATES THAT THE FEDS SAID WERE WITH THE OUTFIT 10 YEARS EARLIER???? THEY ALL DISAPPEARED OVER NIGHT???