There used to be a restaurant in Niles called The Flame. On Caldwell just north of Oakton. Certainly still there in the 1970s. Don't know much about it's history otherwise.

But that's not far from Tam O'Shanter country club, which had heavy Outfit influence and gambling, as did Niles and the surrounding area itself until the 1960s when suburban population expansion made some of those suburbs bedroom communities where the voters would not tolerate such things, rather than little crossroads surrounded by farms (which served the surrounding area vice and gambling if the politicians were willing).

For example, Niles had a nice gambling/vice strip in the 1950s around Milwaukee Ave. Morton Grove did for years along Dempster, from easily the 1920s on, so the gentry from Evanston and the North Shore, who would not allow that sort of thing in their community, need only drive a few miles to partake of the forbidden fruit. In fact, I think at one time there were more slot machines in Morton Grove than people. To a lesser extent, probably also Skokie.

John Binder