My mom is from St. Louis and its because of hearing stories about the St. Louis family that I became interested in the mafia. While I know they are nothing like the families in NYC or Chicago, they were actually very powerful in their own right. The family had control of several of the unions and and also had a lot of power at numerous large markets throughout the city. Their main base of operations was "The Hill"' which is a predominantly Italian section of town. My mom's cousin was married to Joseph Scalise, who was a pretty influential guy and was known as "Torch Boy" due to the fact that the family used him as a sort of in house arsonist. My uncle's father-in-law was in some way associated with the family, though he says he never asked any questions about that aspect of his life. He was employed by the brewery as a delivery driver but in all actuality he did very little driving. He spent most of his days at Soulard Market, which was known to the locals as being mafia controlled. Today their does not seem to be much going on. My uncle has a friend who is a former detective and according to him the only action going on is a few guys who own a couple of bars or clubs.