The garage where seven North Side Gang members were shot on February 14, 1929 was demolished in 1967—the lawn that replaced it is said to unsettle dogs and passersby alike
2122 N. Clark St, Chicago, IL 60614
Research updated June 2026
Age
All Ages
Cost
Free
Public sidewalk; no admission. The site is a small lawn belonging to the Margaret Day Blake senior apartments.
Access
Wheelchair OK
Flat sidewalk in a Lincoln Park residential and commercial block
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1929 · St. Valentine's Day Massacre · Chicago Prohibition Gang War · Al Capone / Chicago Outfit · North Side Gang
The seven men who died at 2122 N. Clark Street on the morning of February 14, 1929, were members and associates of George 'Bugs' Moran's bootlegging operation. They had gathered at the SMC Cartage Company garage, which served as a distribution point for the North Side Gang. At approximately 10:30 a.m., gunmen entered the garage—two dressed as police officers—and shot all seven against the north interior wall.
The victims: Albert Kachellek (using the alias James Clark), Moran's second-in-command; Adam Heyer, the gang's bookkeeper; Albert Weinshank, an operations manager; Frank and Peter Gusenberg, enforcers; Reinhardt Schwimmer, a gambler with no formal gang affiliation who happened to be present; and John May, a mechanic who worked for the gang. Frank Gusenberg survived briefly; when police asked who shot him, he said, 'Nobody shot me.' He died three hours later. Moran himself was not present, having arrived late.
No one was convicted for the killings. A 1935 confession by Byron Bolton implicated Fred Goetz, Gus Winkler, Fred Burke, Ray Nugent, and Bob Carey as the shooters, with the planning attributed to Al Capone's organization. Capone was in Florida at the time. The Chicago Police Department was never able to build a prosecutable case. The garage was sold, used for various purposes, and eventually demolished by the Catholic Bishop of Chicago in 1967. The Chicago Housing Authority built the Margaret Day Blake senior apartments on the site. The interior brick wall against which the victims were shot was sold in pieces; 300 bricks are now displayed at the Mob Museum in Las Vegas.
Sources
The most consistent and independently noted paranormal account at the massacre site involves dog behavior. Chicago ghost tour operator Tony Szabelski, one of the more frequently cited sources on Chicago haunted locations, has documented reports from dog owners whose animals refuse to approach or visibly react to the lawn at 2122 N. Clark. The explanation offered in ghost tour lore connects the behavior to John May's German shepherd, Highball, who was tied to a truck inside the garage during the shooting and found alive, and reportedly traumatized, when neighbors investigated the noise.
The neighboring property at 2120 N. Clark has generated separate poltergeist-type reports, with the owner describing objects falling from shelves and surfaces. Ghost City Tours' Chicago itinerary includes both the massacre site and the adjacent property as a combined stop. CBS Chicago covered the site's paranormal reputation in 2023, relying primarily on Szabelski's documentation of accumulated visitor reports.
Auditory claims—voices, sounds consistent with gunshots—are part of the documented folklore, reported by passersby on Clark Street. The Las Vegas Mob Museum, which holds 300 of the original garage bricks, has separately reported that staff there sometimes hear what sounds like gunshots and men falling. The bricks themselves became a focus for a 'cursed object' narrative after the garage's 1967 demolition: collectors who acquired bricks reported unusual misfortunes, and the story circulated widely enough that several owners returned or discarded their acquisitions.
Notable Entities
The SMC Cartage Company garage at 2122 N. Clark was demolished in 1967. A small lawn and parking area for the Margaret Day Blake apartments now occupies the property. No historical marker or plaque has ever been installed. The Chicago Pizza and Oven Grinder restaurant across Clark Street occupies the building from which Capone's lookouts monitored the garage.
Every HauntBound history is researched from documented sources. We clearly separate verified historical fact from paranormal folklore.
Kansas City, MO
On June 17, 1933, gunmen ambushed a federal law-enforcement party in the south parking lot of Kansas City Union Station, killing four officers — including FBI Special Agent Raymond Caffrey — and the prisoner they were transporting, escaped bank robber Frank Nash. The FBI attributed the attack primarily to Vernon Miller and, controversially, to Pretty Boy Floyd and Adam Richetti. The killings outraged Congress and directly prompted legislation granting FBI agents the permanent authority to carry firearms and make arrests.
Chicago, IL
The Second Regiment Armory stood at 1058 W. Washington Boulevard in Chicago's West Loop. On July 24, 1915, the SS Eastland capsized in the Chicago River less than a mile away, killing 844 people — the deadliest single-incident loss of life in Chicago history. The armory served as the primary temporary morgue for the disaster, housing the bodies of approximately 600 victims for identification. The building was later converted to use as a television production facility and became Harpo Studios in 1990, where the Oprah Winfrey Show taped until 2011. Harpo Inc. sold the property in 2014; the building was demolished in 2016 to make way for McDonald's corporate headquarters, which opened in 2018.
Chicago, IL
Herman Webster Mudgett, operating under the alias H.H. Holmes, constructed a three-story building at the corner of 63rd and Wallace Streets in the Englewood neighborhood between 1887 and 1892, during the buildup to Chicago's 1893 World's Columbian Exposition. Holmes used the building for insurance fraud, credit schemes, and, by his own confession, murder. The structure was demolished in 1938 and replaced by the current United States Post Office.