(WBBM NEWSRADIO) — Harriet Marin Jones' grandfather died before she was born. When she was 17, her grandmother started talking about his significant place in Chicago history.
"I started doing research later in my life,” she says. “I started researching my grandfather's life. I went to the Library of Congress, to the Chicago Public Library. I found some articles from the Chicago Defender. I started doing interviews, and that's when everything changed.”
Edward Jones was a legendary African American who built a $25 million empire as the brains and brawn behind Policy, an illegal racketeering syndicate in the 1930s and ’40s.
"The Policy business was an illegal numbers game, which, at the time, was controlled by African Americans,” Jones says. “It later was taken over by the mob, but then became legal by the government and it later became the state lottery.”
Edward Jones at one point became the richest African American in the country. But he also went head to head with Al Capone's Outfit, which forced him to live on the run.
"This story is much better than any Hollywood film you could ever imagine. Everything is true. It's a great gangster film. It pours all the ingredients from the kidnapping, the jail, the success, the treason, the love story. It has all the ingredients that a filmmaker and a screenwriter dream of,” Marin Jones said.
The documentary she directed about her grandfather, King of Kings: Chasing Edward Jones, makes its world premiere at The Chicago History Museum on Wednesday.
"We are thrilled to debut you this in Chicago,” Marin Jones said. “It’s where my grandfather started his business. He turned this nickel-and-dime small business into a multi-million-dollar operation. It's where my mother was born. I couldn't think of a better place to make its world premiere at the Chicago History Museum.”
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