Art Petacque
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Art Petacque (July 20, 1924 – June 6, 2001) was a Chicago newspaper reporter for the
Chicago Sun-Times The ''Chicago Sun-Times'' is a daily nonprofit newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Since 2022, it is the flagship paper of Chicago Public Media, and has long held the second largest circulation among Chicago newspaper ...
who won the
Pulitzer Prize The Pulitzer Prizes () are 23 annual awards given by Columbia University in New York City for achievements in the United States in "journalism, arts and letters". They were established in 1917 by the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had made his fo ...
in 1974. Petacque, who specialized in writing about crime and in particular about the
Chicago Outfit The Chicago Outfit, also known as the Outfit, the Chicago Mafia, the Chicago Mob, the Chicago crime family, the South Side Gang or the Organization, is an Italian Americans, Italian American American Mafia, Mafia crime family based in Chicago, I ...
shared the 1974 Pulitzer Prize for Local General or Spot News Reporting with his Chicago Sun-Times colleague, Hugh Hough. During the later part of his career, Petacque also worked concurrently as a commentator for
WLS-TV WLS-TV (channel 7) is a television station in Chicago, Illinois, United States, serving as the market's ABC network outlet. It has been owned and operated by the network's ABC Owned Television Stations division since the station's inception. ...
in Chicago.


Early life and education

Raised on the Northwest Side of Chicago, Petacque was the son of a well-known Chicago police captain. He graduated from Chicago's Austin High School in 1942.


Career

Petacque began working as a copy boy in 1942 for the Chicago Sun, which was one of the predecessor newspapers to the Chicago Sun-Times. He was with the Sun-Times from its inception in 1948 until retiring in 1991. From early in his career, Petacque covered the crime beat. He became an investigative reporter in 1957 and a columnist with Hough in 1974. In 1974, Petacque and Hough won the Pulitzer Prize for their work in uncovering new information about the murder of Valerie Percy, the daughter of U.S. Sen.
Charles H. Percy Charles Harting Percy (September 27, 1919 – September 17, 2011), also known as Chuck Percy, was an American businessman and politician. He was president of the Bell & Howell Corporation from 1949 to 1964, and served as a Republican U.S. sen ...
. She had been murdered in their family home in
Kenilworth, Illinois Kenilworth is a village in Cook County, Illinois, United States, north of downtown Chicago. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census it had a population of 2,514. It is the newest of the nine suburban North Shore (Chicago), North Shore c ...
, in 1966 during his senatorial campaign. Although the murder was never solved, Petacque and Hough's work prompted police to reopen a probe into the death. Petacque often wrote about the mobsters of his day, including
Joseph Ferriola Joseph Ferriola (March 16, 1927 – March 11, 1989), also known as, "Joe Nagall," "Mr. Clean" and "Oscar," was an American mobster who was Crime boss, boss of the Chicago Outfit, from 1985 to 1988, after Joseph Aiuppa and Jackie Cerone, John ...
, Sam Carlisi, Joey Aiuppa,
Joseph Andriacchi Joseph Andriacchi (October 20, 1932 – August 10, 2024) was an American convicted criminal who was resident in the Chicago area, considered by that city's Chicago Crime Commission, Crime Commission to be a high-ranking member of the Chicago Out ...
, Jackie Cerone and
Tony Accardo Anthony Joseph Accardo (; born Antonino Leonardo Accardo, ; April 28, 1906 – May 22, 1992), also known as "Joe Batters" and "Big Tuna", was an American longtime mobster. In a criminal career that spanned eight decades, he rose from small-time ...
. Petacque also worked for Chicago's WLS-TV as a commentator on the station's afternoon newscasts, and won a local Emmy in 1984. After Petacque's death, Sun-Times reporter
Neil Steinberg Neil Steinberg (born June 10, 1960) is an American news columnist for the ''Chicago Sun-Times'' and an author. He joined the paper's staff in 1987. Steinberg has written for a wide variety of publications, including ''Esquire'', ''The Washington ...
remembered him as "a colorful presence from a vanished age, with wild, unkempt eyebrows and a soggy cigar, drawing scraps of paper and matchbooks out of his pockets, reading notes on the doings of mobsters and madams...Art Petacque was a police captain when he needed to be a police captain, and a doctor when he needed to be a doctor. He could be a burglar, too, if necessary, slipping into a basement window to snatch a photo for a story." Petacque retired from the Sun-Times in September 1991. The paper's editor at the time, Dennis Britton, told the
Chicago Reader The ''Chicago Reader'', or ''Reader'' (stylized as ЯEADER), is an American alternative newspaper in Chicago, Illinois, noted for its literary style of journalism and coverage of the arts, particularly film and theater. The ''Reader'' has been ...
after Petacque's death that "I had problems with some of the ways Art pursued his job."


Death

Petacque died on June 6, 2001, after suffering a heart attack.


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Petacque, Art 1924 births 2001 deaths Chicago Sun-Times people Journalists from Chicago American male journalists 20th-century American journalists Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News Reporting winners Austin Community Academy High School alumni