As best as can be ascertained-B. wrote: ↑Wed Mar 14, 2018 6:34 pm Madison was its own distinct family, with members from the same area of Sicily as the Milwaukee membership. They were very much like small Sicilian coscas pre-1960s. They had their own administration, but seem to have operated under some amount of direction from Milwaukee. They also seem to have only been marginally involved in crime, as most of their leading members were heavily involved in the cheese business, which took up most of their time.
Madison, Wisconsin started out as a loose band of Italian bootleggers who organized under Benedetto DiSalvo, who later FBI informants tagged as the first LCN boss in that city. After the murder of Capone rival Giuseppe Aiello in Chicago in 1930, many of Aiello’s supporters fled the city with some settling in Milwaukee. This included the cousin of Giuseppe Aiello, Joe Aiello and Carlo Caputo. Both Aiello and Caputo were said to have been “made” in Milwaukee and then settled in Madison in 1935 and worked under DiSalvo. Sometime in the 1950s DiSalvo handed over the reins to Caputo and Aiello then became Caputo’s underboss.
Rockford, Illinois also started out as a loose band of Italian bootleggers who split into two factions- Musso and Giovingo. A Milwaukee informant stated that Rockford’s first official boss was Tony Musso and that while Musso was in prison, Filippo Caltagerone was “acting boss.” The only time Musso spent in prison was from February 1931 to September 1932 for liquor conspiracy. This means that Musso was designated as boss at least by February 1931. The Giovingo faction would lose Joe Giovingo to murder in August 1930 and head of that faction, Paul Giovingo, would be murdered in February 1933.
Springfield, Illinois also was a wide open bootlegging city in the 1920s and 1930s. Salvatore Zito first came to the United States from San Giuseppe Iato, Sicily in 1907 and stayed briefly in Frankfort, New York before moving to Selma, Alabama for a time. His brother Frank immigrated to Selma in 1910 and then both brothers were in Springfield, Illinois by 1914 when Salvatore was arrested for sending Black Hand extortion letters. In 1915 Frank Zito and John Cavallaro were charged with the murder of Sam Billicci but they were found not guilty. Two other brothers, Anthony and Joe, settled in Springfield around 1923 with Anthony staying and Joe moving to Rockford in 1930 aligning himself with Tony Musso and eventually becoming consigliere. Three other brothers, Carl, Pietro and Filippo remained in San Giuseppe Iato with reports stating that Filippo had been a longtime influential member of the SGI family. Several sources later stated that Frank Zito had organized the Springfield family sometime around 1931 and remained its boss until his death in 1974.
