{{Short description|American businessman and mobster (1880–1955)}} {{tone|date=July 2011}} {{Infobox person | name = Charlie Wall | image = | caption = | birth_name = Charles McKay Wall | birth_date = {{birth date|1880|3|10|mf=y}} | birth_place = Tampa, Florida, U.S. | death_date = {{Death date and age|1955|4|18|1880|3|10|mf=y}} | death_place = Tampa, Florida, U.S. | death_cause = Beaten and bludgeoned to death | other_names = "The Dean of The Underworld" | occupation = Racketeer, political figure, money launderer, mafia associate | spouse = | partner = | parents = John P. Wall (father) | children = }} thumb|Charlie Wall was the son of John P. Wall. He was Tampa's first well known crime boss, and rivaled the Trafficante Family. He was bludgeoned to death in his Ybor City, Tampa, home and had his throat slit as a result. Known as "The White Shadow".
'''Charles McKay Wall''' (March 10, 1880 – April 18, 1955)<ref>Charlie Wall's tombstone</ref> was an American businessman, mobster, and political figure who was a rival to reputed mobsters Santo Trafficante Sr. and Santo Trafficante Jr. His parents were John Perry Wall and Matilda McKay, daughter of former Tampa Mayor. Wall rapidly gained status within the criminal underworld from his early endeavors in the operation of several gambling, prostitution, and illegal numbers rackets. He was beaten with a baseball bat, his throat slit and killed, on April 18, 1955. He was buried in Tampa's Oaklawn Cemetery .<ref name=":0">{{Cite book|last=Deitche|first=Scott M.|url=http://worldcat.org/oclc/226152404|title=Cigar City mafia : a complete history of the Tampa underworld|date=May 2005|publisher=Barricade Books |isbn=1-56980-287-4|oclc=226152404}}</ref>
==Early life== {{no sources section|date=May 2025}} Charles McKay Wall was born on March 10, 1880, in Tampa, Florida, to John Perry Wall, a local physician and former mayor of the city, and Matilda McKay Wall, a daughter of the prominent McKay family. He was allegedly abused by his stepmother, and Wall developed mental health issues. There was an unverified and inaccurate rumor that he shot his stepmother, the third wife of his father. On June 19, 1895, he got into a row with the old family cook, and shot her in the head with a revolver. She sustained a minor fleshy wound, and Charlie was arrested and locked up. He was sent to military school, despite showing promise as a student. He was expelled from the school, due to visiting a brothel. He was arrested several times in 1905 for fighting, using abusive and profane language, and running a gambling house.
==Crime boss of Ybor City==
The young Charlie spent much of his formative years, frequenting the gambling dens of Tampa and, at some point, he took over the city's criminal and political underworld.<ref name=":0" />
Wall ran Tampa from the Ybor City neighborhood and employed Italians, Cubans and Irish into his organization.<ref name=":0" /> His closest associate was Evaristo "Tito" Rubio, a Cuban mobster and co-owner of the El Dorado Club. Additionally, Wall was prominently involved in organized corruption of judges, politicians and other government officials, facing little opposition from the law or other criminals.<ref name=":0" />
==Turf wars and death==
During the late 1920s, a turf war began between Wall and Ignacio Antinori. They fought each other, as well as the Trafficantes, for control of the numbers rackets in the Tampa area.<ref name=":0" />
By the 1930s, Ignacio Antinori and Charlie Wall were in a bloody war for ten years, which would later be known as "Era of Blood".<ref name=":0" /> Eddie Virella, Rubio's former partner at the Lincoln Club, was gunned down on 31 January 1937, and Rubio himself was killed by a gunman while on the porch of his home on March 8, 1938. <ref name=":0" />
The feud between Wall and Antinori came to a head between factions of Antinori Gang, dissatisfied members of Chicago and St. Louis criminal outfits to whom Antinori was supplying narcotics, and Wall's organization. On the morning of October 23, 1940, Antinori was shot dead by two gunmen while sipping his morning coffee at a local restaurant. Wall himself had seen an attempt on his life go awry earlier that spring, possibly by some members of Antinori's outfit or even by some in Antinori's ties to St. Louis mobster Thomas Buffa and/or Kansas City mobsters Nicolo Impostato, James DeSimone and Joseph Deluca.<ref name=":0" />
Charlie Wall supposedly retired from the rackets in the late 1940 but was nevertheless brutally murdered in his home on April 18, 1955. Though the case was never solved, the murder may have been ordered by Santo Trafficante Jr. after his father died (of natural causes) in 1954, removing Wall's promise of protection.<ref name=":0" /><ref>https://www.tampabay.com/life-culture/history/2021/12/08/why-was-charlie-wall-dean-of-tampas-early-underworld-murdered/</ref>
==In popular culture==
The account and rise and fall of Wall was depicted in the 2008 documentary film ''The Ghosts of Ybor: Charlie Wall'' which starred actors John A. Schakel as Wall, Gene Siudut as Joe Bedami, Chris Pardal as Johnny "Scarface" Rivera, and Rod Grant as the lead detective in the Wall murder investigation.
==References== {{reflist}}
==External links== *[https://web.archive.org/web/20110726233934/http://www.cigarcitymagazine.com/people/item/who-killed-charlie-wall Who Killed Charlie Wall? article written by Gary Mormino, ''Cigar City Magazine'', posted 1/11/2011.] *[http://cltampa.com/tampa/the-mob/Content?oid=2011972 The Mob - A Drive-by History of Tampa's Most Notorious Wiseguys, by Scott Deitche for cltampa.com (Creative Loafing), 4/26/2001.]
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Wall, Charlie}} Category:1880 births Category:1955 deaths Category:Businesspeople from Tampa, Florida Category:Murdered American gangsters Category:Deaths by beating in the United States Category:Deaths by stabbing in Florida Category:People murdered in Florida Category:American crime bosses Category:American gangsters of the interwar period Category:Florida local politicians Category:Florida Democrats Category:People murdered in 1955