Illegal Of The Day Illinois-Chicago 4

Return to Index Gallery Index Read Responses

The Chip Board Archive 21

OK, here we go on a brand spanking new year of “Illegal Of The Day” posts. Once again “Happy New Year.”

I mentioned I was looking for this JML hub in my Hawaiian Club-Jason Lee-Chicago “Illegal Of The Day” post. It was credited on Ed Hertel’s site as the Hawaiian Club. This is an incorrect listing as I found out. In my research I sent for the Mason record card on it. It came back something completely different and I started my quest to find the chip. After emails to many long time illegal old timers without finding it, I made several different posts on the BB. Finally got one thanks to Robert E. This chip is apparently scarce. Even Dave Brown, our resident Chicago expert does not have the chip. Anyone else out there have one?

Once again we are looking at chips that are over 70 years old and ties all the way back to Al Capone’s The Ship in the 1920’s and later The Rock Garden.

Enough of that:

History and newspaper articles from:
Rich Hanover’s site:

http://www.oldpokerchips.com/NonNevada/JoeMiller.htm

He has a set of Joe Miller 885 Club Crest & Seals: that are absolutely beautiful.

JML
Joe Miller
885 Club
885 Rush Street
Chicago, IL
Chips delivered in 1934

The 885 Club was a Rush Street nightclub...885 Rush. Rush street was the nightclub district downtown. In prohibition days it was a speakeasy operated by Julius "Dolly" Weisberg. Around 1935 it was taken over by Joe Miller, who was an early manager of Capone's big gambling casino in Cicero, The Ship back in the 1920s. The Ship became the Rock Garden in 1934 which is better known to chip collectors, but really was never the big deal that The Ship was. It was mainly testimony about profits from The Ship that put Capone in prison.

The 885 Club was really more of a mainstream nightclub, with fine food and dancing. It was one of the places to be on New Year’s Eve. I'd expect the gambling would have been in an upstairs room and unknown to most of its patrons. By the 1950s it had deteriorated into a dumpy tavern with games of "26" at the bar.

Chicago Tribune 22 May 1933