INVESTIGATIONS: The Jukebox Tune

"If you want to be in business tomorrow, you better go today and purchase your records at Lormar." That, testified a witness at last week's Senate McClellan committee hearings into jukebox racketeering, was the slogan of Chicago's Lormar Distributing Co.—and not even Madison Avenue could have sharpened its message. Chicago jukebox operators, anxious to stay 1) healthy and 2) in business, bombarded Lormar with orders; a rival wholesale record firm in one year lost $800,000, or 90% of its trade. Principal reason: Lormar's was the property of Charles ("Chuck") English, a Chicago hoodlum and acquaintance of top mobster Tony...

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