Jack Black

Jack Black (1871–1932) was a Canadian-born American hobo and professional burglar. Black is best known for his autobiography You Can't Win (Macmillan, 1926), describing his days on the road and life as an outlaw. Black's book was written as an anti-crime book urging criminals to go straight, but it is also his statement of belief in the futility of prisons and the criminal justice system, hence the title of the book. Jack Black was writing from experience, having spent thirty years (fifteen of which were spent in various prisons in Canada and the United States) as a traveling criminal, and offers tales of being a cross-country stick-up man, home burglar, petty thief, and opium fiend. He gained fame as a prison reformer, writer and playwright. He disappeared in 1932 in a likely suicide.