Where do I live? (Irving, Avon: rating, park, areas)

[Drover]

Here's a 20-year-old Trib article that defines Albany Park as going south to Irving Park Rd: Gangs A Fact Of Life In Albany Park - Chicago Tribune

Chi-town Native: As for who's feuding, I hear the Almighty Ambrose are trying to get a foothold in Albany Park and are not being greeted with open arms. You should probably ask Alacran though, he has his ear to the ground about stuff like that around here more than I do.

[Chi-town Native]

Originally Posted by Drover

Chi-town Native: As for who's feuding, I hear the Almighty Ambrose are trying to get a foothold in Albany Park and are not being greeted with open arms. You should probably ask Alacran though, he has his ear to the ground about stuff like that around here more than I do.

Bizarre. That's a hell of a stretch from their homebase:

ChicagoGangs.org Website

You guys still have Simon City Royals up there as well? Last I checked I think Albany was one of their few remaining pockets of influence.

[tomcho]

Originally Posted by Chi-town Native

Bizarre. That's a hell of a stretch from their homebase:

ChicagoGangs.org Website

You guys still have Simon City Royals up there as well? Last I checked I think Albany was one of their few remaining pockets of influence.

There are lots of Royals still up there, you can that cross/slashes graffiti quite often around Kimball and Irving.

[RingWalk]

There's a really great book about the Almighty Gaylords and by proxy the Royals and other gangs of tthe 80s called "Lords of Lawndale" by a guy named Michael Scott. (Not real name.) It's pretty raw and self-published but it's an interesting account of west Logan Square (I think that's the hood) from the perspective of a troubled white teenager in the 80s.

This was when the gangs were bad but not waste each other with uzi bad...still descended more from the stone cold greaser gangs than the drug pusher cartel variety.

[Drover]

Originally Posted by Chi-town Native

Bizarre. That's a hell of a stretch from their homebase:

ChicagoGangs.org Website

You guys still have Simon City Royals up there as well? Last I checked I think Albany was one of their few remaining pockets of influence.

Who knows. There are so many gangs scrunched together in Albany Park; and I suspect that whatever influence the Simon City Royals have left is by way of alliance with another gang or gangs that has since become more prominent. And God knows what interest the Ambrose have up in Albany Park but their graffiti is showing up. I'm not that familiar with gang "politics" but I would imagine the fact that they're such an alien presence is part of why the resistance to their incursion has been unusually strong and that this accounts for the rise in violence over and above the usual skirmishes between more established gangs whose territories are more well-defined.

[RingWalk]

I think all the gangs are either allied with either the People or Folk nations. At least that was the way it was in that book I mentioned.

Dumb asses.

[Chi-town Native]

Originally Posted by RingWalk

I think all the gangs are either allied with either the People or Folk nations. At least that was the way it was in that book I mentioned.

Dumb asses.

That's increasingly a meaningless phrase (it definitely was "the" big deal the 80s, the author had that dead right).

From what I read these days, massive incarceration of the old school gang leadership has actually led to a splintering of what passed for an org chart, so you have lots of smaller little cliques out there, allying when it makes sense from a profiteering angle.

[RingWalk]

Whenever I read about street gangs I think of this comedian I saw who said he grew up in a gang-infested neighborhood but learned to fight watching West Side Story.

I think that would be my plan if I ever ran into trouble with them..to do my jazz hands and start singing "When You're a Jet."

[cmcdonal2001]

Originally Posted by linicx

Now that you have read all the posts, may I say, welcome to Chicago's 1001 neighborhoods.

Hehe, thanks. Definitely a rambling (yet entertaining and informative) thread.

To throw a little more fuel on the fire:

West Town, Chicago - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

And yes, I do live on Cleaver.

[Drover]

And the Irving/Albany Park turf war rages on. 2 killed, 2 wounded in 2 separate shootings in the last 2 days: 3100 block of W. Montrose and 4000 block of N Bernard.

Chi-town Native, since you asked about them before, area residents have said the Royals are involved in a number of these incidents.