Yes, the Pinkertons are still a thing. There was an interesting post about them here: [1] Some choice quotes from that thread: They became famous when Lincol

Yes, the Pinkertons are still a thing. There was an interesting post about them here: [1] Some choice quotes from that thread: They became famous when Lincoln used them as spies during the Civil War. They became infamous when American industrialists started employing them as union/labor strikebreakers & private police forces who weren’t held accountable by the US government. For some of their most egregious examples of strike-breaking, check out their part in Carnegie’s Homestead Mill Strike & how they turned a peaceful assembly of strikers into Chicago’s Haymarket Riot. From the US Library of Congress What began as a detective agency in Chicago grew into a national private police force. *The Pinkertons stood against organized labor at nearly every turn* from Haymarket to Homestead and famously took down the Molly Maguires, while instilling fear in the hearts of fugitives across the country. ... Ironically, the Pinkerton Detective Agency was a remarkably progressive organization under Allan Pinkerton. Pinkerton himself only escaped dying with John Brown at Harper's Ferry due to coming down with Pneumonia just before leaving Chicago (a significant number of Brown's 19 men were Pinkerton Agents); and was a staunch, radical abolitionist and supporter of the Union throughout the Civil War. Allan Pinkerton was a fantastic detective and analyst - he was one of the the primary inspirations for both Sherlock and Mycroft Holmes - Doyle didn't think one person with all those skillsets was believable (ironically, the other primary inspiration - Eugene Vidocq in France - had similar dual skillset). Under Lincoln, the Pinkertons became the prototype of the CIA, FBI, and modern Secret Service - and were fantastically good at all of them, as Pinkerton held little to traditional ideas about the capability of minorities and women, employing both enthusiastically and creating a large pool of talent as a result. However, after the Civil War, the power of the Pinkertons in the Federal Government was a big issue for former Southern States. One of the first "Reconciliation" points was extracting the Pinkertons from their functions in the federal government. Those agents interested in investigation (including Pinkerton himself) ended up in the Justice Department and would eventually become the FBI, those in intelligence wound up under the Military as MI (later OSS and then CIA), those interested in protection joined the actual Secret Service. . . . And those primarily interested in busting heads, became the private entity known as Pinkerton. Alan Pinkerton had mostly retired by then, and they became a sort of private army for strike-breaking and strong-arming citizens out of the way of the railroads. That's the "Pinkertons" most know, they of Western storybook bad guys and the villains of labour movements. Allan Pinkerton himself wasn't a big fan of labor unions, but only because most unions of the time were segregated, which he could not stand - but otherwise the later actions of the "Pinkertons" had little to do with his influence. [1] - https://www.reddit.com/r/OutOfTheLoop/comments/136zayf/whats_up_with_the_pinkertons_why_does_everyone/ https://www.reddit.com/r/OutOfTheLoop/comments/136zayf/whats...