No. 499
Crime, Eccentricity, and the Sporting Life in 19th Century America.
January 19, 2021

The Girls Biffed Each Other

January 19, 2021
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Tag: 1870s

A Man in a Black Mask.

Disguised as the Devil.

7/1/2025

The New City of Leadville.

A gambling saloon on one of the main streets of Leadville.

6/24/2025

Pick-pockets "Working the Crowd.''

Getting into the Cars at 4th Avenue and 27th Street, New York.

2/4/2025

A Pair of Colorado Dianas.

The Sensation They Made in Leadville Streets.

11/4/2024

Bucking the Tiger

In a Cheyenne gambling Saloon.

10/7/2024

The Scandal Which Agitates St. Louis.

Astounding Revelations of a Low Cunning and Vile Curiosity in One of the Proprietors of the Grand Opera House.

7/23/2024

A Pullman Parlor Car.

Interior of a Pulman Parlor Car on the Pennsylvania Railroad.

7/16/2024

Knocked Dead by a Meteor.

A Remarkable Casualty which Overtook a Hoosier While Asleep in His Bed.

7/1/2024

Wrestling Match on a Canadian Steamer.

On the St. Lawrence River.

4/16/2024

Rival Monarchs.

3/21/2023

Expensive Blowing in Congress.

Uncle Sam: Come, ye gas-bags, both blue and gray, - Start yourselves on you homeward way.

2/21/2023

Female Wrestling Match in Nevada.

Two female athletes at Virginia city Nevada, indulge in a wrestling match for the championship.

11/8/2022

Interior of a Pullman Parlour Car.

The Smoking Saloon.

9/20/2022

A Female Gambling House in Boston.

They call it the "retreat" because of its charming privacy and apparent obscurity.

5/31/2022

Pandemonium in a Tumult.

Raid on the Broadway concert saloons, New York.

4/26/2022

Her Striped Stockings.

Bound to be in style - The expedient of a carriage painter's daughter at Vallejo, Cal., to obtain striped stockings.

11/30/2021

Forex news live

Two female athletes at Virginia City, Nevada, indulge in a wrestling match for the championship.

11/9/2021

Disguised as the Devil.

A Man in a Black Mask, Disguised as the Devil.

10/19/2021

A Man's Head Blown to Atoms.

A man's head blown to atoms by the explosion of a beer barrel on Long Island.

8/30/2021

A Charming Female Vaccinator.

Young gentlemen of Boston submitting their arms to a charming female vaccinator.

8/30/2021

Desperate Duel.

Desperate Duel between Ladies of Rank, at Santa Cruz.

6/22/2021

The Summer Exodus.

Commencement of the Heated Term—Swells and Belles at the Mountains and on the Sea Shore.

6/15/2021

The Deathly Opium-Drug.

The Demon Work of the Chinese Poppy Poison.

4/27/2021

Vaccination from a Beauty.

Idiotic freak of some young men at Los Angeles.

3/9/2021

Homeward Bound.

Vacationers leaving Lake George, New York, 1879.

5/7/2019

Up the Hudson.

9/18/2018

The Cure for Broken Hearts.

8/27/2018

Why She Pummeled Him.

A Cincinnati woman gets up a lively street sensation by vigorously thrashing a man on the sidewalk, and explains to the crowd that he was her runaway husband, whom she had industriously sought for that sole purpose.

4/17/2017

Take a Chance?

Many a one, who otherwise would not contribute a dime, will take a chance in a lottery.

9/9/2014

Mother Mandelbaum's Secrets.

4/23/2013

The Pawn-Ticket Game.

Pawn tickets make bad collateral.

3/5/2013

Vive Le Sport!

1/15/2013

The Grand Saloon.

Of The Palace Steamer Drew.

11/27/2012

Comstockery.

Anthony Comstock was on a personal mission to protect America from vice.

5/1/2012

Allan Pinkerton.

The Eye that Never Sleeps.

3/27/2012

New York Society Classified.

11/27/2011

Belles of the Bowling Alley.

The athletic diversions of an association of dashing damsels in their club rooms in Chicago. 

6/6/2011

The Cardiff Giant

Cardiff, New York, October 16, 1869.

4/10/2011

Bank Heist

The Audacity of a Professional Thief.

4/3/2011
A journal dedicated to stamp-collecting seems like an unlikely place to find a prime slice of The Weird, but that just goes to show that life is full of surprises.  In 1928, “The Stamp Lover” carried an article by one C.H.R. Andrews titled “The Red Dragon Stamps” that is, frankly, not quite like anything I’ve ever heard of.  I’m a bit surprised that Andrews’ story seemed to languish in
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Strange Company - 9/15/2025
Stop by this week as we explore what happened the week before the murders, Emma and Lizzie’s getaway to Fairhaven and New Bedford, and new imagery which will help to tell the story. The pears are almost ripe, August 4th is coming fast, and thoughts begin to turn to that house on Second Street once again. Follow us at https://www.facebook.com/lizziebordenwarpsandwefts/ !
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Lizzie Borden: Warps and Wefts - 7/26/2025
Deep roots anchor P.J. Clarke’s, the restaurant and bar occupying a Civil War–era brick building with its top two floors sheered off at Third Avenue and 55th Street. Converted into a tavern in 1884 when Irish laborers held a large presence in the developing neighborhood, the building was bought by Irish immigrant Patrick “Paddy” J. […]
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Ephemeral New York - 9/15/2025
Youth With Executioner by Nuremberg native Albrecht Dürer … although it’s dated to 1493, which was during a period of several years when Dürer worked abroad. November 13 [1617]. Burnt alive here a miller of Manberna, who however was lately … Continue reading
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Executed Today - 11/13/2020
Around 1:30 a.m. on February 5, 1881, police were summoned to 109 Poplar Street in St. Louis to investigate gunshots. Inside, they found a scene of bloody carnage. At the top of a staircase, a woman lay on her back, the blood from three gunshot wounds slowly dripping down the steps. Sprawled across the bottom steps in a pool of blood lay the corpse of a man with a single wound to the head. It was
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Murder By Gaslight - 9/13/2025
Soapy Smith STAR NotebookPage 22 - Original copy 1884Courtesy of Geri Murphy(Click image to enlarge) ADDENDUM: Published September 12, 2025(At bottom of page) oapy Smith's "STAR" notebook, 1883-84, St. Louis, San Francisco, Soapy arrested: Pages #22-23      This post is on page 22 and 23 of the "STAR" notebook. I am combining these two pages as they only account for a total of
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Soapy Smith's Soap Box - 8/27/2025
  [Editor’s note: Guest writer, Peter Dickson, lives in West Sussex, England and has been working with microfilm copies of The Duncan Campbell Papers from the State Library of NSW, Sydney, Australia. The following are some of his analyses of what he has discovered from reading these papers. Dickson has contributed many transcriptions to the Jamaica […]
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Early American Crime - 2/7/2019
Hazing at the Stock Board | The Merry Wives of Boston.

The Girls Biffed Each Other

Girls Biffed Each Other

Mabel Herbett and Mamie Brown fight for George Woodward in Pleasantville, N.J.

Two lovely daughters of two prominent Pleasantville, N.J., fami­lies have created a sensation in that town. Mabel Herbett and Mamie Brown nearly scratched each other's eyes out one day re­cently. It is true that they didn't bark and bite, but they came as near as they could without actually doing the dawgie act. From what we can learn, Mamie and Mabel were enamored of George Wood­ward and determined to settle their difficulties according to pugilistic rules.

The two girls consulted with their nearest friends, and decided that nothing but a personal en­counter could settle the question. A prize fight was arranged, the win­ner to have George.

The other girls went into it with a vim; that is, the lively girls did; and Pleasantville has a full quota of lively girls. They arranged to have the affair come off in an old barn on the edge of the village, and after studying up on the subject settled on a 16-foot ring. Three o’clock one Sunday morning recently was the hour set. Of course, only girls were admitted, and they had to sneak out of their bedrooms to attend in regular elopement style.

The bevy of beauties repaired to the barn and there had it out in grand style. The two combatants, when they got through with each other, had neither one won the prize, but both were considerably damaged.


Reprinted from The National Police Gazette - September 27, 1890