Jimmy Hoffa

Born in 1913 Indiana, after Jimmy Hoffa’s coal miner father passed away when Hoffa was still a young boy, his mother moved her four children to Detroit in search of employment opportunities, leading young Hoffa to drop out of school early to work a grocery store loading dock, where he organized his first labor strike to land he and his co-workers a better contract.

Rising Trajectory

Joining the International Brotherhood of Teamsters in the 1930s, his ambition and tenacity soon made him president of the Teamsters’ Detroit chapter. After rising to the office of vice president of the entire union in 1952, Hoffa was elected president in 1957, where his back room deals and visible ties to organized crime made him the subject of multiple federal and state investigations into his activities. Managing to evade prosecution, in 1964, Hoffa scored a decisive victory when he brought nearly every trucker in North America under one unified Teamsters contract.

Enemy of the People

Hoffa made numerous enemies during his rise and ascension to Teamsters president, including both the FBI and U.S. Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, the later indicting Hoffa multiple times before the Justice Department finally landed a successful conviction against Hoffa in March of 1964, when he was found guilty of bribery, jury tampering, and a later charge of misusing funds from the Teamsters’ pension plan. He was sentenced in 1967 to 13 years in prison, however, President Richard M. Nixon commuted Hoffa’s sentence in 1971, at the same time, banning the labor leader from holding office within the Teamsters until 1980.

Ongoing Mystery

But perhaps Hoffa’s greatest legacy occurred in the summer of 1975, when Hoffa left his Detroit home for a reconciliation meeting at a Bloomfield Township restaurant, between Hoffa, a mob-connected union boss from New Jersey and a local crime figure from the greater Detroit area. According to communications with family members, Hoffa was the only one to show up for the meeting, making a final phone call with his son at 2:30 in the afternoon of July 30th, before disappearing without a trace.

Speculations Abound

While his car was found in the restaurant’s parking lot, his disappearance has sparked years of speculation regarding who killed Jimmy Hoffa, as well as decades of false leads regarding his final resting place. He was officially declared deceased in 1982, making the life and disappearance of James Riddle Hoffa, a shady glimpse into dark world of organized crime and unionized corruption.