Machine Gun KellyThe 1920s otherwise known as the Roaring Twenties were the era of Prohibition that outlawed alcohol and the era of gangsters like Al Capone and Machine Gun Kelly. If it wasn't for the alcohol ban I would probably be out of work and very poor. I would go back to my farm in Tennessee, where I grew up shoveling cow shit and arguing with my drunken father every night. I took the first opportunity Kelly gave me to return to Chicago with him, taking full advantage of gang life. July 1933 was a very eventful month for me and the rest of the Machine Gun Kelly gang. My name is John Hand, famously known as "Hand Gun Johnny", a name Kelly gave me when I became his right-hand man. Kelly had made a name for himself robbing small banks and smuggling alcohol, but he always wanted more, or his wife wanted more. The boys and I always joked about how Kelly's wife, Kathryn Kelly, had always been the mastermind behind all our robbery and smuggling schemes. This plan, whether Kelly or Katherine planned it, was like nothing else we had done before. Kelly has had us watch this man over the last month, what time he leaves his house, what time he gets to his house. We had to know what time he went to bed and what time he was mostly alone in his villa. His name was Charles Urschel, a rich magnate and businessman but for us it was just a way to get money. James Connor and I accompanied Kelly when he plotted to break into the rich man's house and kidnap him for ransom. It was a very quiet night, with a light breeze. It was like I could sense the nervousness on my partner's face, but for Kelly I saw nothing. Just the cold, hard, terrifying look that was always on Kelly's face, unless he was with his wife. We waited… middle of paper… hole.” Aside from the harsh conditions the warden subjected us to at times, life wasn't that bad at Alcatraz. Kelly's cellmate said he would become depressed when he received mail from his family and that he would regret all the crimes he had committed to get himself locked up here. I didn't believe him until I got a job in the post office. I constantly saw letters from Kelly sent to Urschel begging him to plead his case, I never saw a response to Kelly's letters. No one knows the exact reason, but Kelly was transferred back to Leavenworth in 1951 leaving me the keys to his large cigarette business. I never heard from him after the move. He supposedly died of a heart attack in 1954. All the gangs and crimes we committed over the years were due to the alcohol ban and the "Prohibition Era" as they call it. We simply called them the Roaring Twenties.