Murder of Officer Petersen

In honor of National Police Week, this post is in memory of Officer William Petersen (1893-1922) of Winthrop Harbor, Illinois.

Officer William Petersen on his Harley Davidson, circa 1922.
Courtesy of the Westerman Family. 

On Friday, January 13, 1922, William Petersen, a farmer and the only law enforcement officer for Winthrop Harbor, was killed while on patrol. 

As he stood in Art Christensen’s auto repair garage along Sheridan Road near the WI-IL Stateline, he observed a speeding vehicle. 

During Prohibition (1920-1933) bootleggers traveled through Lake County, Illinois along Sheridan Road from Wisconsin to Chicago. In addition to the vehicle going over the speed limit, Officer Petersen may have suspected the occupants of the "blue touring car" of being whisky runners. 

Petersen pursued the vehicle on his motorcycle (which he owned personally), chasing the car for five miles through Winthrop Harbor and the City of Zion. Just south of Zion near Sheridan and Yorkhouse Roads, local farmers: George Pavlik, Lyle Fast and Melvin Jordan heard the sound of approaching vehicles and watched the chase. 

As he drew close to the vehicle, Petersen yelled for the driver to stop. Just then a man wearing a Derby hat leaned out the back window with a shotgun and fired twice. Petersen was shot in the stomach, his motorcycle swerved into a ditch and he was hurled into a field. 

The "murder car" drove away, and the onlookers ran to assist Petersen, and to telephone authorities in Waukegan. 

Waukegan police said the register on Petersen's motorcycle showed that it had reached a speed of 72 mph in the chase.

Local farmer, George Pavlik (1898-1962) witnessed the murder of Officer Petersen.
 

Deputy Sheriff Wilson of Kenosha and his wife were driving to Waukegan when they happened on the scene. Petersen was placed in Wilson's car and driven to Victory Memorial Hospital in Waukegan (now Vista East) where physicians said he was dead before being placed in the deputy's car. 

Headlines in the Waukegan Daily Gazette, January 14, 1922. Newspapers.com

George Pavlik went with police to Chicago to review mug shots while authorities in Lake and Cook Counties launched a massive manhunt. 

On January 17, Petersen’s funeral was held in Kenosha at the Danish Lutheran Church where he and his parents attended services. It was the largest funeral the city had ever seen. Law enforcement officers from around the region attended, as well as friends, family, and World War I veterans with whom Petersen had served. He was only 28 years old.

On February 4, it was announced that three "foreigners" were arrested for Petersen's murder at Koller's Tavern at 1920 Allport Street, Chicago. The accused were John Bartole (driver of the car), Michael Radich and Ignatz Potz. Previously, three other men were arrested and released. 

The shooter, Ignatz Potz, a woodworker by trade and native of Hungary, was a member of a Chicago gang with plans to rob a bank in Kenosha. In a Chicago Tribune article, Potz claimed he was drunk on "moonshine" when the incident occurred, and that when someone in the car said they were being followed by a policeman: "I turned around and shot him. That's all I know. I was dazed for three days after that." 

Lake County jail where Potz was held for trial. The jail was built in 1895
Photo taken in 1952. Dunn Museum Collections. 

Potz was detained in the Lake County jail. Friends of Petersen from Benton and Newport Townships made plans for a lynching party to take justice into their own hands by going to the jail and forcibly removing Potz and killing him. When Sheriff Elmer J. Green got word of the men’s plans, he talked them out of it.

Potz was tried, found guilty and sentenced to death. The gallows were brought to Waukegan from Chicago for the hanging, which was to be held on June 16, 1922. Invitations “to witness the execution” were sent out by the Sheriff’s department. 

Invitation sent out by Lake County Sheriff announcing the execution of Ignatz Potz.
Private collection. 

As preparations were underway for the hanging, Governor Len Small, commuted the guilty man’s sentence to life imprisonment. The governor initially stated that "important alleged circumstances not hitherto brought out had come to his attention." 

During this time, Governor Small had his own troubles. He had been indicted for embezzling $600,000 from the state. On June 24, 1922, Small was acquitted of all charges, and later, eight jurors got state jobs. 

In 1928, Governor Small pardoned Potz, who was released. Potz left Illinois for Los Angeles, California where in the 1930s he was working as an iron worker. Later, in 1928, Governor Small was indicted for having sold an estimated 500 pardons. He never went to jail, but was voted out of office. 

Gravemarker of Officer William Petersen. Green Ridge Cemetery, Kenosha, WI. 

Photo by Kenosha County Genealogical Society. Findagrave.com

Through the efforts of Winthrop Harbor Deputy Chief Rick Concepcion, Detective Sgt. Jim Vepley and Officer Sharon Churchill, Officer Petersen was memorialized. The Winthrop Harbor Police Station has been dedicated in Officer Petersen’s honor. 

On May 13, 2002 Marshal William Petersen's name was added to the wall of the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial in Washington, DC.

Diana Dretske ddretske@lcfpd.org

Sources: 

"Police Seek Cop Slayers," Waukegan Weekly Gazette, January 14, 1922

"Motor Cop Slain in Chase," Chicago Tribune, January 14, 1922
"Three Arrested as Slayers of North Shore Cop," Chicago Tribune, February 3, 1922
"Auto Speeders Admit Murder of Motor Cop," February 4, 1922
"Pot Confesses Killing Motor Cop, Court Told," Chicago Tribune, March 31, 1922
"Reprieve Saves Potz, Due to be Hanged Today," Chicago Tribune, June 16, 1922
1930 & 1932 Index to Rigister of Voters, Los Angeles City Precinct (Ancestry.com)
"Len Small: Perhaps the Dirtiest Illinois Governor of Them All" by Stephan Benzkofer for the Chicago Tribune, June 19, 2011

Arnold Westerman, oral history
Virginia Pavlik Bleck, oral history

Besley Brewery of Waukegan

There has been a tradition of brewing in Lake County since 1851.

In that year, Antoni Schieb, George Brownwell and Fredrich Hangebrauch purchased an acre of land along the Plank Road (Belvidere Street) in Waukegan to start a brewery. Schieb's Brewery was in operation for one year, when it sold the land and improvements to Charles Scoffin of Racine, Wisconsin. At the time, Scoffin was a co-owner of the Gnadt and Green City Brewery of Racine. Like its predecessor, Waukegan's Scoffin and Green Brewery lasted only one year.

Portrait of William Besley (1808-1897) by J. Derome, circa 1887. Besley founded the Besley Brewing Company in Waukegan in 1853. Dunn Museum 62.3.8 

The run of bad luck ended when William Besley purchased the brewery. Besley (1808-1897) was born in Berkshire County, England where he learned the maltster's trade. He immigrated to Oakland County, Michigan in 1835, where he was a hotelier and worked as a maltster for a brewery.

In 1853, he came to Waukegan with the opportunity to purchase his own brewery. Besley enlarged the small, Scoffin and Green Brewery, and incorporated it as Besley's Waukegan Brewery. His sons would eventually join him in the business.

By the mid-1860s, the brewery's ales and porters had become so popular that more buildings were needed. Besley purchased land at Lake and Utica Streets along the Waukegan River, and contructed an ice house, malt mill, hop jack, storage cooler, barrel storage, cooper's building and main office.

Original location of the Besley Brewery, Belvidere Street, Waukegan. View circa 1880. Dunn Museum.

The original brewery on Belvidere Street was converted into a bottling house. Federal Law prohibited the brewing and bottling processes to be done in the same building. William Besley is shown in the photograph (above) in his carriage in front of the brewery on Belvidere Street. He was known for always having a white horse.

In addition to their porter and ales, the Brewery's yeast was popular with locals. Pails of yeast could be purchased for pennies at local stores to make buckwheat pancakes and baked goods.

Advertisement for Besley Brewery's "Good Yeast" available at Cory & Son's Store in Waukegan. Waukegan Weekly Gazette, December 15, 1855.  

Besley's Home Brew bottle from 1908. Dunn Museum 70.109.11. 

The thick plaster adhering to the bottle (above) suggests it was found inside a wall. This may be evidence of the long tradition of sealing beer bottles in the walls of new homes.

In 1871, the brewery opened an office in Chicago, indicating that the sale of Besley's brew reached beyond Lake County.

Besley Brewery on Lake and S. Utica Street, Waukegan, 1887. Dunn Museum.

A new brick brewery was constructed in 1887 at the Lake and Utica Streets site. When it was built, the building's construction date was on the facade, but later the date was changed to 1853 to reflect the year Besley began brewing in the city.

The brewery used water from Waukegan's springs, which it claimed contributed to the popular taste and gave the beverage curative properties. Local doctor, A.O. Wright wrote the brewery stating that "the nutritive qualities of the ale and porter... established for them a high place among the therapeutic agents of the day."

Besley Brewery advertisement, circa 1904. "Half & Half" was a mixture of porter and "beer" (lager). Poster of this ad is available for purchase through the Dunn Museum's Gift Shop. 

Besley also brewed beer. There is some evidence that the transition to brewing more beer occurred at the end of the 19th century with a change in immigration patterns. By the late 1800s, heavy industry along Waukegan's lakefront brought immigrants from Czechoslovakia, Italy and Germany, who preferred beer.

William Besley died in 1897. His health declined after slipping on the street and fracturing a hip. His sons continued managing the brewery after his death.

In 1905, Besley's grandson, Frank Besley, enrolled in the Seibel Institute of Technology in Chicago where he learned to use adjuncts in the brewery process. Previously, the brewery had prided itself on using the "choicest barley" and "best hops," but a shortage of barley in the 1880s forced brewers to adapt.

Page from Frank Besley's Seibel Institute notebook, 1905. Dunn Museum 62.8.39.

The brewery then made costly changes to remain competitive, but it was at the time when many Midwest towns were voting for temperance. Years before Prohibition went into effect in 1920, communities voted to go dry.

Photo postcard of William Lux (1889-1959), teamster for Besley Brewery with delivery wagon, circa 1906. Dunn Museum 2004.6.3

The Temperance Movement effected the distribution and sales of alcohol throughout the region. It forced brewers to bypass dry towns, making delivery more costly and complicated. 

About 1912, the Besleys sold the brewery to Thomas Snelling and other investors, who continued the operation. The real shock came in 1916, when pressure from temperance was just too much for the business. That spring Waukegan citizens, including women who had recently gotten the vote, voted for the town to go "dry." According to the Waukegan Daily Sun, the brewery could not operate "in a territory where it cannot sell its own product." Customers were shocked to read the headlines: "Besley Brewery is to Quit."

There would not be another brewery in Lake County until 1942 when the Zeman Brewing Company opened in Gilmer. It remained in business until 1964 when a tornado destroyed the building.

The county's first brewpub, Mickey Finn's, opened in Libertyville in 1993.

The Era of Illegal Vices

As early as the 1910s, the Chain O' Lakes region, particularly Fox Lake, were known for their drinking and gambling establishments.

Shown at right is a real photo postcard of the Ingleside Buffet, circa 1910. Mr. Coleman, the proprietor, is most likely the man standing behind the bar.

During Prohibition (1920-1933), the lakes region became a notorious hangout for Chicago mobsters, including Al Capone's and Bugs Moran's gangs. The Chicago Tribune reported it was “…worse than in the levee districts of the city.”

The situation in Fox Lake was in part due to Chicago’s efforts to “clean up” its vice districts, which caused those districts to re-settle in the suburbs. The Tribune article added, “Probably the most vicious resort is the Mineola Hotel. All of the hotels are supplied with slot machines.” The Mineola is shown in its heydey in this V.O. Hammon Company postcard, circa 1920.

The 100-room Mineola Hotel was built in 1894 by Chicago businessmen. It is the largest wooden structure in Illinois, and is on the National Register of Historic Places. It is still in use today as a restaurant and banquet facility.

In the late 1930s, Lake County's board of supervisors appointed a Special Prosecutor to deal with the illegal gambling problem. Shown in this News-Sun photo from May 9, 1939, is Special Prosecutor, Charles E. Jack, (right) watching as workmen demolish 80 slot machines and pinball games in the yards of the Diamond Lake Junk Company. The News-Sun reported, "The machines were seized in a series of raids... to drive gambling out of Lake County. Jack filed his final report, announced the county clean, and ended his duties yesterday."