For Sale: Al Capone's House

By Prescott Carlson in Miscellaneous on Dec 26, 2008 5:45PM

The fascination with Al Capone carries on. The Tribune is reporting that the home at 7244 S. Prairie Avenue where Capone lived with his family while rising through the ranks to fortune and infamy is going up for sale. The current owner, Barbara Hogsette, has lived in the house for 45 years and when she first bought the home in 1963 it was because she liked it, not because of who had lived there:

[Hogsette] knew little and cared even less about its history. But its walls were sturdy, and there were enough bedrooms for the single mother to raise her son and still have rooms to rent out. The exterior of the six-bedroom, split-level remains virtually identical to the place Capone called home. Much of the interior is original, too, with detailed green and white tile in the front entrance, dark hardwood floors and narrow hallways.

The home features a large basement with a crumbling wine cellar that, on the day Hogsette moved in, contained one of the few relics from the Capone days: a long table and two old phones believed to have been part of the gangster's bookmaking operation.

The house found itself in the middle of controversy in 1989 when the National Register of Historic Places pondered making the house an official historic landmark. Members of Italian-American groups said "the designation would honor a vicious criminal" and the landmark status was never granted.

After Capone's imprisonment in 1931, his mother continued to live in the house until her death in 1953. The estimated market value of the house is $450,000, history included.

Photo from Google Maps. Here's a more historical photo of the place.