St Valentine’s Day Massacre Wall, courtesy The Mob Museum/ Jeff Green; file photos courtesy of the Chicago History Museum)
THE MOB MUSEUM PARTNERS WITH CHICAGO HISTORY MUSEUM,
CHICAGO 00 PROJECT TO RECOGNIZE 90TH ANNIVERSARY OF ST. VALENTINE’S DAY MASSACRE, THURSDAY, FEB. 14
Free Museum Admission Offered for Nevada Residents, Buy-one Get-one Admission for Non-residents from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m.
The Mob Museum, the National Museum of Organized Crime and Law Enforcement, will commemorate its seventh anniversary with a one-day-only special opportunity on Thursday, Feb. 14, presented in partnership with the Chicago History Museum. The event coincides with the 90th anniversary of the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre. For the first time, all visitors to the Museum will have the opportunity to experience The Chicago 00 Project’s virtual reality experience dedicated to the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre, courtesy of a grant from the Union Pacific Foundation. In addition, Nevada residents will receive free admission and non-Nevada residents will receive buy-one, get-one admission all day beginning at 9 a.m.
“From the day the Museum opened, on February 14, 2012, the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre wall and related ballistics evidence have been among our most important artifacts. Because of these objects, the Museum stands uniquely positioned to tell this story,” explained Jonathan Ullman, president and chief executive officer, The Mob Museum. “We are delighted to partner with The Chicago 00 Project, a collaboration between the Chicago History Museum and Professor Geoffrey Alan Rhodes of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, to bring this new, technologically enhanced, historically rich insight into the Massacre to our visitors.”
Released in February 2017, this award-winning VR experience transports audiences to the exact spots where the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre events unfolded by superimposing images from then and now in virtual reality. Audiences can use their smartphones and wear Google Cardboard VR Goggles or use the Museum’s latest technology, Oculus Go, on YouTube’s 360 channel to be immersed in the site. A narrator tells the story of the massacre while giving a virtual tour of five sites and more than 30 historical photos and documents from the Chicago History Museum’s archive. It provides eye-opening insights into the infamous Feb. 14, 1929 event, when Chicago police discovered the bodies of seven men, all shot in the back and riddled with bullets in a northside garage. The site and men were associated with the Prohibition-era bootlegging gangs, then led by Al Capone and Bugs Moran. The gruesome photographs of the scene ran on the front page of newspapers across the country and were some of the most influential crime photos in American history. The photos collected here—some well-known, some rare—tell this familiar Chicago story in a new and compelling way.
“The Chicago History Museum is pleased to work with The Mob Museum to mark the 90th anniversary of the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre,” said John Russick, vice president, interpretation and education, Chicago History Museum. “The Chicago 00 virtual reality experience of the Massacre was designed to offer users a unique, immersive and visceral encounter with this terrible event, which helped shape the country’s attitudes toward Prohibition and led to the prosecution and eventual incarceration of Al Capone.”
The Chicago 00 Project was created to produce and publish a series of site-specific, interactive, immersive multimedia experiences designed to showcase the Chicago History Museum’s film, photo and sound archive and share Chicago’s stories in new and unique ways.
“All Chicago 00 new media projects were inspired by our team’s fascination with historical images,” said Rhodes. “The news photographs of the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre are shocking–even today. Those pictures were hugely influential. Placing them into the actual site gives people a fresh way to see these astonishing images for what they are. The early 1900s filmmaker, D.W. Griffith, predicted that someday film technology would create experiences of history unlike anything that had come before. Maybe virtual and augmented reality are that prediction realized.”
In addition to the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre Wall and the Chicago 00 experience, Museum guests can see other permanent exhibits related to the Massacre. Other artifacts include ballistics evidence recovered from the scene and original coroner’s documents concerning the victims and reports prepared by pioneering forensic scientist, Calvin Goddard.
For more information about the Museum, call (702) 229-2734 or visit themobmuseum.org.
ABOUT THE CHICAGO HISTORY MUSEUM
The Chicago History Museum serves as a hub of scholarship and learning, inspiration and civic engagement. The Museum has dedicated more than a century to celebrating and sharing Chicago’s stories through dynamic exhibitions, tours, publications, special events and programming. Located at 1601 N. Clark Street in Chicago’s historic Lincoln Park neighborhood, the Museum collects and preserves millions of artifacts, documents and images to help audiences connect to the city and its history. To learn more visit chicagohistory.org and follow us on Facebook and Twitter. The Chicago History Museum gratefully acknowledges the support of the Chicago Park District on behalf of the people of Chicago.
ABOUT THE CHICAGO 00 PROJECT
The CHICAGO 00 Project is a collaboration between the Chicago History Museum and filmmaker, Geoffrey Alan Rhodes to create a series of new media products that activate the Museum’s archive. Exceptional examples of historical film, photos and sound are combined with present-day sites to tell historical stories. Experiences are published and shared for free through augmented reality and virtual reality apps, 360 VR videos and Google Streetview panoramas. To learn more visitchicago00.org.
ABOUT THE MOB MUSEUM
The Mob Museum, the National Museum of Organized Crime and Law Enforcement, a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization, provides a world-class, interactive journey through true stories—from the birth of the Mob to today’s headlines. The Mob Museum offers a provocative, contemporary look at these topics through hundreds of artifacts and immersive storylines. Whether you like it or not, this is American history. It debuted a major renovation in 2018, including a Crime Lab, Use of Force Training Experience, and Organized Crime Today exhibit as well as The Underground, a basement-level Prohibition history exhibition featuring a speakeasy and distillery and sponsored by Zappos. Since opening in 2012, The Mob Museum has accumulated numerous accolades, including being named one of TripAdvisor’s “Top 25 U.S. Museums,” one of Las Vegas Weekly’s “Twenty Greatest Attractions in Las Vegas History,” one of Hotel.com’s Top 7 “Travel Brag Landmarks,” one of USA Today’s “12 Can’t Miss U.S. Museum Exhibits,” “A Must for Travelers” by The New York Times, one of “20 Places Every American Should See” by Fox News and Budget Travel magazine, “Best Museum” by Nevada Magazine and is a multi-year winner of the Las Vegas Review-Journal’s “Best of Las Vegas” rankings. The Mob Museum has been awarded accreditation by the American Alliance of Museums, the highest national recognition afforded U.S. museums. General admission is $26.95 for adults ages 18 and over with special pricing for online purchase, children, seniors, military, law enforcement, Nevada residents, and teachers. The Museum is open daily; visit the website for up-to-date operating hours. For more information, call (702) 229-2734 or visit themobmuseum.org. Connect on Facebook at facebook.com/themobmuseum or Twitter @themobmuseum.