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Fools%u2019 Journey32tic elevator suspended by ropes, and a large ballroom, yet it wasn%u2019t very energy efficient. Family lore says it took the equivalent of a railroad-car full of coal to heat the place in a typical winter. Dad%u2019s family was well-respected in the community %u2014 they were Roman Catholics and three of the five daughters became nuns. In 1914, my grandfather John tried his hand at politics by running for Indiana State Treasurer on the Progressive ticket, but he garnered less than 15% of the vote. One of my cousins, who was 33 years older than me, and knew our grandfather, said it was probably a good thing he lost because he was a poor businessman. Prior to Prohibition, John was a Trustee in Indiana%u2019s Anti-Saloon League. But he was primarily against liquor for his workers, and regularly indulged in alcohol in the privacy of his own home. He died about a year before the start of the Great Depression when my dad was a teenager %u2014 leaving a great many debts %u2014 and the 1,875-acre family farm was eventually lost to creditors. We have, enshrined in a scrapbook, a series of sad, stark, black-and-white photos that Dad took from the upper windows of the house on a cold and snowy January day in 1930, showing all the family%u2019s furniture and possessions spread out in the yard for public auction. The advertisement for the sale listed such items as 1 black horse, smooth mouth, blind; 25 Duroc sows; 5 John Deere single-row cultivators with new shovels; 2 ice saws; 1 mahogany davenport; 5 oak bedsteads; and 1 kid%u2019s slide. Almost everything the family owned was put on the auction block.After the sale, the house and farm languished in the hands of the Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Company until 1942, when the property was sold to Louie %u201cLittle New York%u201d Campagna, one of gangster Al Capone%u2019s favorite bodyguards. According to Fowler%u2019s newspaper, the Benton Review, the selling price was $100,000 or $125 per acre. Louie, who slept on a cot outside Al%u2019s suite at Chicago%u2019s Lexington Hotel with two automatic pistols, didn%u2019t get to enjoy his farm for long. He was indicted in 1943, along with Frank Nitti (who committed suicide just before the trial) and several other Chicago mobsters, for conspiracy to scam over a million dollars from the motion-picture industry. Louie spent his later years either in jail, on parole, out on appeal, or under subpoena,