Not bad stuff. Robert E. Park as a literary hero

As is widely known, Robert Ezra Park, the "head" of the Chicago School of Sociology, began his career as a reporter and editor, took a crack at being a writer, and used novels as sources in his sociological work. It is less known that he came to be a protagonist as well. In "Organized Crimes" (1984), a novel by Nicholas von Hoffman, Robert Park plays a leading part as a professor of sociology. This article inquires upon the question where the author obtained his detailed knowledge, even regarding Park's fondness of suits made of black and green plaid ("... attributed around the department to an allegedly gamey youth spent as a newspaper reporter.") The story line of the novel and the biography of the author give the crucial clues. Saul Alinsky, a radical community organizer in Chicago and mentor of Nicholas von Hoffman, studied at the Chicago sociology department in the late 1920s. "Organized Crimes" can thus be read as a source for the history of the department in the golden age of the Chicago School.