File:George Fanner - Riverside Cemetery (45247685212).jpg

Grave of George Fanner in section 3 at Riverside Cemetery in Cleveland, Ohio, in the United States.

In 1874, William W. Sly founded W. W. Sly Manufacturing, a foundry that made a wide variety of iron parts. The firm was incorporated in 1903. He died in May 1911. In 1897, George J. Fanner founded Fanner Manufacturing, a firm that made parts for foundries.

George's son, George K. Fanner, was born in Cleveland in 1886. He joined Sly Mfg. as a machinist, but was quickly promoted through the ranks to become plant superintendent. He was appointed vice-president of the company in 1909.

On Friday, December 31, 1920, 58-year-old Wilfred C. Sly, president of Sly Mfg. (and son of William), and Fanner left a downton Cleveland bank at about 11:30 AM to return to the Sly Manufacturing Plant (located at about W. 37th Street and Brookside Park, now the main parking lot of the Cleveland Zoo).

At the time, few banks allowed working-class people to have bank accounts. Industrial workers were paid in cash every week or every two weeks. Sly and Fanner were obtaining the company payroll of $4,200 (about $100,000 in 2017 dollars) to pay the workers before the weekend.

Cleveland was in the grip of a massive crime wave. A wide range of loosely- and partially-organized criminal gangs had arisen in the city between 1900 and 1914, including the Mayfield Road Mob -- predecessor of the Cleveland Mafia. At the end of World War I, large numbers of discharged veterans returned to the city. Many suffered from psychological problems, and had physical disabilities. Few found work, as the city's iron, steel, and manufacturing industries were in recession after the end of the war. Prohibition in Ohio began on May 27, 1919, and almost immediately gangs formed to begin brewing and importing illegal liquor.

The crime wave was big news in Cleveland. Almost every day, a daring daylight robbery of a bank or jewlery store occurred in the city. Several gangs engaged exclusively in payroll heists, lured by the large amounts of money moving about the city to the giant iron, steel, and manufacturing plants scattered around the urban area. Payroll robberies occured two or three times a week.

Most companies varied the route every single time they moved payroll.

Fanner and Sly never did.

At about noon, Fanner and Sly were traveling south on W. 47th Street to reach their plant. As they crossed the bridge over the Nickel Plate trailroad tracks, a car passed them and then slid to a halt in front of them -- blocking their way. Three men got out. A second car pulled up behind them, also blocking their vehicle. Three more men got out.

The 19-year-old driver of the first car claimed that Sly had hit his vehicle. Sly got out from behind the wheel and pulled out his handgun, sure this was a holdup. When the teenager calmed him down, he put his gun away and took out some notepaper to write down his contact information. As he did so, Fanner exited the car.

One of the men from the second car reached in and pulled out the satchel containing the payroll. Fanner tried to retrieve the satchel, and all six gunmen began firing. Purpera shot Sly in the abdomen and then, after he fell to the ground, fired two more bullets into his head. Fanner, shot in the face below his right eye, screamed "Oh my God!" and then died.

Five of the gangsters piled into the rear car, while the teenager ran off on foot.

The Sly-Fanner murders were a sensation in Cleveland for two years. The murders were the work of local mafioso: Angelo Amato, Dominic Benigno, Louis Komer, Dominic Lonardo, Frank Motto, and Ignatius "Sam" Purpera. Komer and Motto had formed the gang on an impromptu basis on December 20, and planned the heist to raise money for Motto's appeal on car-theft charges.

It's widely believed that the immature, hot-headed Purpera started the shooting. Begnigno, Motto, and Purpera all got the chair. Komer got a life sentence after pleading guilty. Lonardo fled to Los Angeles, and soon his older brothers had convinced eyewitnesses to withdraw their statements. Amato fled to Italy, where he got a 30-year sentence at hard labor.