Editing Anton Cermak (section)

==Death==
[[File:GiuseppeZangara.png|thumb|250px|Zangara after his arrest in custody of Dade County Sheriff Dan Hardie (left) and Miami Police Officer Lestron G. "Red" Crews (right) holding the pistol used by Zangara]]

[[File:Chicago, Bohemian National Cemetery, Anton Cermak.jpg|thumb|right|Anton Cermak's tomb at [[Bohemian National Cemetery (Chicago, Illinois)|Bohemian National Cemetery]] in [[Chicago]].]]
On February 15, 1933, while shaking hands with President-elect [[Franklin D. Roosevelt]] at [[Bayfront Park]] in [[Miami, Florida]], Cermak was shot in the lung and mortally wounded by [[Giuseppe Zangara]], who was attempting to [[assassinate]] Roosevelt. At the critical moment, Lillian Cross, a woman standing near Zangara, hit Zangara's arm with her purse, and spoiled his aim.<ref name="autogenerated1">Smith, pg. 297.</ref> In addition to Cermak, Zangara hit four other people: Margaret Kruis, 21, of [[Newark, New Jersey|Newark]], NJ, shot through the hand; Russell Caldwell, 22, of Miami, hit squarely in the forehead by a spent bullet, which embedded itself under the skin; Mabel Gill of Miami, shot in the abdomen; and William Sinnott, a New York police detective, who received a glancing blow to the forehead and scalp.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://miami-history.com/attempted-assassination-of-fdr-in-bayfront-park/|title = Attempted Assassination of FDR in Bayfront Park in 1933|date = March 5, 2012}}</ref> All four of those injuries were minor.

Once at the hospital, Cermak reportedly uttered the line that was engraved on his tomb, saying to Roosevelt, "I'm glad it was me, not you." The ''[[Chicago Tribune]]'' reported the quote without attributing it to a witness, and most scholars doubt that it was ever said.<ref>{{cite news|last=Benzkofer|first=Stephen|date=February 10, 2013|title= 'Tell Chicago I'll pull through': In 1933, a bullet meant for FDR hit Chicago Mayor Anton Cermak instead|url=https://www.chicagotribune.com/2013/02/10/tell-chicago-ill-pull-through/|newspaper=[[Chicago Tribune]]|access-date=December 22, 2016}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Pearce |first=Michael J. |date=2023 |title=Kitsch, Propaganda, and the American Avant-Garde |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=U6S6EAAAQBAJ&pg=PA127 |location=Newcastle upon Tyne, UK |publisher=Cambridge Scholars Publishing |page=127 |isbn=978-1-5275-9411-1 |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref>

Zangara told the police that he hated rich and powerful people, but not Roosevelt personally.<ref>Smith, pp. 297–98.</ref> Later, rumors circulated that Cermak, not Roosevelt, had been the intended target, as his promise to clean up Chicago's rampant lawlessness posed a threat to [[Al Capone]] and the Chicago [[organized crime]] syndicate.<ref name="FIA">{{cite web
|url=http://ibisweb.miami.edu/search/gJ+1.14%2F2%3AFDRx+/gj++++1.+++14%2F++++2+%3Afdrx/1,1,1,E/l856~b2854384&FF=gj++++1.+++14%2F++++2+%3Afdrx&1,1,,2,0/startreferer//search/gJ+1.14%2F2%3AFDRx+/gj++++1.+++14%2F++++2+%3Afdrx/1,1,1,E/frameset&FF=gj++++1.+++14%2F++++2+%3Afdrx&1,1,/endreferer/
|title=Freedom of Information Act: Franklin D. Roosevelt (assassination attempt)
|access-date=August 4, 2008}} {{Dead link|date=September 2010|bot=H3llBot}}</ref><ref>Gumbel, Andrew: ''Steal This Vote''. Nation Books, 2005; {{ISBN|1560256761}}, p. 157.</ref> One of the first people to suggest the organized crime theory was reporter [[Walter Winchell]], who happened to be in Miami the evening of the shooting.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Chicago to Springfield: Crime and Politics in the 1920s|last=Ridings|first=J.|year=2010|publisher=Arcadia|isbn=978-0738583730|page=19|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mgiHpdviPJQC&pg=PA19|access-date=May 18, 2013}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|title=The Defining Moment: FDR's Hundred Days and the Triumph of Hope|last=Alter|first=Jonathan|year=2007|publisher=Simon and Schuster|isbn=9780743246019|page=367|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ASmlaOHQNawC&pg=PA367|access-date=May 18, 2013}}</ref>  According to Roosevelt biographer [[Jean Edward Smith]], there is no proof for this theory.<ref>Smith, Jean Edward, ''FDR'' (2007), [[Random House]]; {{ISBN|978-1400061211}}, p. 715n.</ref>

Long-time Chicago newsman Len O’Connor offers a different view of the events surrounding the mayor's assassination. He has written that aldermen [[Paddy Bauler]] and Charlie Weber informed him that relations between Cermak and Roosevelt were strained, because Cermak fought Roosevelt's nomination at the [[1932 Democratic National Convention|Democratic convention in Chicago]].<ref>O'Connor, Len: ''Clout: Mayor Daley and His City'' McGraw-Hill/Contemporary, 1984; {{ISBN|0809254247}}{{page needed|date=December 2022}}</ref>

Author Ronald Humble provides yet another perspective as to why Cermak was killed. In his book ''Frank Nitti: The True Story of Chicago’s Notorious Enforcer'', Humble contends that Cermak was as corrupt as Thompson, and that the [[Chicago Outfit]] hired Zangara to kill Cermak in retaliation for Cermak's attempt to murder [[Frank Nitti]].{{citation needed|date=April 2018}}
[[File:Anton-Cermak-monument-1.jpg|thumb|upright|Monument to Anton Cermak in the town in which he was born.]]
Cermak died at [[Jackson Memorial Hospital]] in Miami<ref>{{cite web|url=http://politicalgraveyard.com/families/12640.html|title=Kerner-Cermak family of Illinois|publisher=The Political Graveyard|access-date=May 22, 2013}}</ref> on March 6, partly due to his wounds. On March 30, however, his personal physician, Dr. Karl A. Meyer, revealed that the primary cause of Cermak's death was [[ulcerative colitis]], commenting, "The mayor would have recovered from the bullet wound had it not been for the complication of colitis. The autopsy disclosed the wound had healed ... the other complications were not directly due to the bullet wound."<ref>[https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=ds4MAAAAIBAJ&sjid=yWkDAAAAIBAJ&pg=3008,834759&dq=cermak+colitis&hl=en Reveals Colitis Fatal to Cermak"], ''Pittsburgh Post-Gazette'', March 31, 1933, pg. 1</ref> Doubts were raised at the time and later concerning whether the bullet wound directly contributed to his death. A theory raised decades later contended that the bullet had actually caused damage to his colon which led to perforation which was undiagnosed by his doctors. It alleged that "but for [the] physicians' blunders" Cermak might have survived.<ref name="picchi">{{Cite book |last=Picchi |first=Blaise |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/38468505 |title=The Five Weeks of Giuseppe Zangara : The Man Who Would Assassinate FDR |date=1998 |publisher=Academy Chicago Publishers |isbn=978-0897334433 |location=Chicago |oclc=38468505 |pages=134–136, 147}}</ref> This theory was refuted by a later medical analysis of the event.<ref name="pappas surg">{{cite journal |last1=Pappas |first1=Theodore N. |title=The Assassination of Anton Cermak, Mayor of Chicago: A Review of His Postinjury Medical Care |journal=The Surgery Journal |date=April 2020 |volume=06 |issue=2 |pages=e105–e111 |doi=10.1055/s-0040-1709459 |pmid=32566747 |pmc=7297642 }}</ref>

Zangara was convicted of murder after Cermak's death under the law of [[transferred intent]], and was [[Capital punishment|executed]] in Florida's [[electric chair]] on March 20, 1933.<ref>Dwyer, Jim, ed. (1989). "An Assassin's Bullets for FDR". ''Strange Stories, Amazing Facts of America's Past''. Pleasantville, New York/Montreal: The Reader's Digest Association. p. 14. {{ISBN|978-0895773074}}.</ref>

Cermak was interred in a mausoleum at the [[Bohemian National Cemetery (Chicago, Illinois)|Bohemian National Cemetery]] in Chicago. The mayor's death was followed by a struggle for succession both to his party chairmanship, and for the mayor's office.<ref>[http://galleries.apps.chicagotribune.com/chi-130129-assassination-chicago-mayor-anton-cermak-pictures/ Chicago Tribune - Assassination of Chicago Mayor Anton Cermak - March 1933], galleries.apps.chicagotribune.com; accessed April 17, 2018.</ref>

A plaque honoring Cermak still lies at the site of the assassination in Miami's [[Bayfront Park]]. It is inscribed with Cermak's alleged words to Roosevelt after he was shot, "I'm glad it was me instead of you." Following Cermak's death, 22nd Street—a major east–west artery that traversed Chicago's West Side, and the close-in suburbs of [[Cicero, Illinois|Cicero]] and [[Berwyn, Illinois|Berwyn]], areas with significant Czech populations—was renamed [[Cermak Road]]. In 1943, a [[Liberty ship]], the [[SS A. J. Cermak|SS ''A. J. Cermak'']] was named in Cermak's honor. It was scrapped in 1964.{{citation needed|date=April 2018}}