As we continue our exploration of the story of the house at 405 Willow St., this week we turn to one of the most memorable events in the house’s history: the time when bootleggers attacked the elder Judge Reardon and his family, leaving marks on the house that are still visible today.
The 1941 obituary of Judge Reardon twice mentions this incident, in these words:
“Forceful in his enforcement of the law, rugged in prosecution of criminals, stories are told to this day of Attorney Reardon’s activities as prosecutor; and of bullets that were fired at him thru the windows and doors of his home one night. . . Among all the word darts and actual bullets fired at him in his life, none cut him so as did the death of Danny; and it is beside Danny that he will be buried next Monday noon.”
More recently, Rob Clifton spoke to the late Judge William J. Reardon Jr. (1922-2007) about the Reardon family’s years of ownership of and residence in 405 Willow St., and in particular heard the story of how criminals shot up the house in an attempt to kill or at least frighten Judge Reardon Sr. and his family. Clifton then included some of Judge Reardon’s recollections in his book “Pekin History: Then and Now”, as follows:
“In 1915 William Reardon bought the home for his bride, who dreamed of living in the home many years prior to moving in. William prosecuted several cases during the prohibition era. This made him a target for the rogue criminals that didn’t agree. On New Year’s Eve about 1924, a car stopped in front of this home and the riders inside started firing. The next day William Reardon Jr. says someone came back again firing through the east kitchen window just missing him and his mother. William was 18 months old at the time. There is still evidence of the shooting in one of the pillars outside.”
The first of these two attacks on the Reardon family took place in the early morning hours of New Year’s Day, 1 Jan. 1924. The second attack was also on New Year’s Day, taking place during the evening. But the Reardon home was not the only target of the criminals, because they also drove by the home of Judge Reardon’s colleague Judge Jesse Black Jr., who along with Reardon was working as a special counsel investigating and prosecuting organized crime in Tazewell County.
The Pekin Daily Times reported on these attacks on the Reardons and the Blacks on page 8 of the 2 Jan. 1924 edition of the newspaper, as we see here:
Here’s a transcription of the full Daily Times article:
FIENDS FIRE INTO ATTORNEY’S HOMES
Pay Second Visit to Reardon Home Early Last Evening
There appears to be but slight clews to the identity of the fiends, who on Monday night made a dastardly attempt to kill attorneys W. J. Reardon and Jesse Black, and members of their families, and who last night made a second attempt to kill members of the Reardon family.
Five shots were fired at the Reardon home, Monday night about 1 o’clock, striking within a radius of a few feet of the front door of the home. One of these shots passed through a window and inbedded intself (sic) in a pillar in [the] front room of the house, another through a panel of the door. The shots were fired from am automobile, which sped west on Hamilton street, and were heard by many people in the neighborhood. Little attention was however paid to them at the time, people thinking that the shooting was being done by New Year eve celebraters.
The Second Attempt
The three shots fired last night in the second attempt to kill members of the Reardon family, were fired from a car going north on Fourth street and were fired at the rear room or kitchen of the home, where the members of the family were at the time. One shot passed through the sill of a window on the west side of the home and was picked up inside of the room.
The attempt to kill Judge Jesse Black and members of his family, Monday night, occurred at 12:30 o’clock, a short time before the bandits shot up the Reardon home. Judge and Mrs. Black and Mrs. John Fitzgerald were sitting in the dining room of the Black home, where a succession of shots rang out and the crash of breaking glass in the front of the house startled them.
Stood Close To Door
Rushing to the front of the house and turning on the lights Judge and Mrs. Black discovered that two bullets had passed through the glass of the outside door and two through the vestibule. The two shots which punctured the wood of the vestibule door, struck the dining room door at the end of the vestibule, but they had spent their force and did not pass through this door. Another shot tore through the house and loged (sic) in a victrola after shattering plaster and woodwork.
A car was seen pulling away from the Black home and foot tracks in the snow showed that the would-be assassins stood within twenty feet of the door when the shots were fired.
Attorneys Reardon and Judge Black have been employed as special counsel in the cases of hi-jackers and bootleggers and it is thought that the fusilades (sic) of shots fired into their home was the work of some of those persons whom the attorneys have antagonized, during their work as special prosecutors in liquor gang trials in the county and circuit courts.
As Clifton noted, there is still evidence of the shooting in one of the pillars of the house’s porch. A comparison of this detail from Clifton’s 2004 photograph of the house to a photograph of the same pillar taken this year shows that the bullet damage has been repaired.
Next week we will tell the story of the other members of the Reardon family who called this house “home” by sharing the obituaries of Judge Reardon Sr.’s widow Marie and their three children Mary Ann, Danny, and Judge Reardon Jr.
