Once Chicago sprung from its humble beginnings as a home to Jean DuSable, it incorporated as a city in 1837, and the city started to grow like a weed. A large part of that growth was made possible by the work of immigrants, specifically those from Germany and Ireland(in addition to those from Poland). The German immigrants formed a tight-knit community and moved into neighborhoods on the North Side. At this time, the Germans would work six days a week, leaving Sundays as their only day to relax and spend time with friends. A prime spot for this proved to be the local taverns, several of which popped up in the German area.
In 1854, Isaac Milliken became Mayor. Milliken declared himself a supporter of temperance(prohibition) and was criticized for it, and ended up losing the next election. His successor, Levi Boone(the great-nephew of explorer Daniel Boone) was also against alcohol, and he enacted a new ordinance that closed down the taverns on Sundays as well as raising the costs for a liquor license by 600%. The Germans felt slighted, and so they did the reasonable thing and started rioting.
On April 21, 1855, the tinder box burst aflame as swarms of angry Germans began streaming into the downtown area, all bent on converging upon the County Court House. To stem the tide of protesters, Mayor Boone ordered all of the bridges to be swung out to their open positions to cut off the downtown region(at this time, the bridges were not lifted as they are today, but instead they spun around on a central piling.) This tactic worked, but it also trapped some of the protesters on the bridges. In the end, one person died, a police captain from Hyde Park lost an arm, and 60 people were arrested. The next year, Boone was out of office and the city repealed the prohibition, learning the hard way to never get in between the Germans and their taverns.
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