No. 600
Crime, Eccentricity, and the Sporting Life in 19th Century America.
March 30, 2023

Trying to Scare an Old Maid with a Wooden Dutchman.

A wooden Dutchman, rather than no man at all, was what a sensible spinster argued when some practica
July 11, 2016
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Tag: 1880s

Skating in Central Park.

1/10/2023

A Transparent Rigg.

Benjamin, of that name, vainly attempts to break a bank in female disguise at Palmerston, Ontario.

8/2/2022

The First of the Season.

The Earliest Bath of the Year, at Atlantic City

7/5/2022

Threatening an Umpire.

President Byrne saves the bones of umpire Jimmy Clinton from a severe and undeserved pounding at Brooklyn, N. Y.

5/31/2022

Wanted to Sit by the Widow.

A ruffianly brawl at Haman's Hotel, Greensburg, Ind.

5/10/2022

A Woman Gambler in Nevada.

She Bucks the Tiger and Quits $200 Ahead.

3/29/2022

Photography's Abuse by Blackmailers.

The Scheme of a Conscienceless Adventurer in New York - "Chippies" his Accomplices in Trapping Old Sinners into Hush-Money Situations.

9/28/2021

Customs Inspections on the Canadian Frontier.

"Madam, is there anything dutiable in this bag?"

9/13/2021

The Modern Builder.

7/6/2021

His Mouth Full of Ivory.

A billiard ball stuck in a man's mouth - the mishap of an idiot at the Adams House in Boston.

5/4/2021

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3/19/2019

Dr. Scott's Electric Toothbrush.

2/4/2019

The Age of Advertising.

The next thing in order - The Hudson River Palisades Art Galery.

12/3/2018

Luxurious Bathing.

A bright, healthful skin and complexion ensured by using Pears' Soap.

11/26/2018

The Day We Are Waiting For -

- When the "Irish," "Germans," and All the Other "National Votes" shall Get Together and Call Themselves Americans.

11/19/2018

Pedal Advertising.

How two Dizzy Girls Advertised Their Charms and Political Faith.

11/5/2018

A Way Out of the Sunday Difficulty.

Baffled Policeman, - Bedad, I can't arrest a machine!

10/22/2018

A Newly Acquired Tintype.

I'm hoping one of these guys is Billy the Kid.

8/13/2018

Run on Max Greger's Hungarian Wines.

No. 232 Fifth Avenue, corner Twenty-Seventh Street, New York.

7/16/2018

Broadway Omnibus Racing Season.

Opening of the Broadway Omnibus Racing Season of 1884.

6/25/2018

A Wine-Inspired Wager.

A Female Who Was Not Allowed to Exhibit Her Terpsichorean Abilities.

5/28/2018

Too Fond of Kissing.

A Steamship Steward Who Has Been Kissing Fourteen Years and Hasn’t Got Sick of It.

5/22/2018

Renewed Activity of "The Finest."

The Police Succeed in Breaking Up Another Gambling Establishment.

5/14/2018

Principles of Finance.

Blowupp & Burst Bankers and Breakers. Pass In Your "Soap" and See it Grow.

2/6/2018

That Settled It.

A Chicago man wants a divorce because his wife sings Salvation hymns, gains his suit by having her give an exhibition of her vocal powers in court.

1/22/2018

The New Rule at the Post-Office.

Persons collecting money-orders must be fully and completely identified.

1/15/2018

What Kind of Bald Heads May be Sure of a Growth of Hair.

Benton's Hair Grower.

12/25/2017

Packed Away in a Trunk.

James Lavender of Irwinton, Georgia, tries to elude his bondsmen but is found and dragged out.

11/13/2017

A Duel on Horseback.

Two rivals for the affections for an Arkansas belle fight a desperate battle with knives and are horribly mangled, near Bear Creek.

10/30/2017

Kidnapped in Broad Daylight.

Miss Alice Jackson, of St. Louis, seized by three men who hurry her into a coach and drive away.

10/16/2017

Anti-Everything.

Pictures of a few different parties.

9/25/2017

Her Trick Spirit Trick Exposed.

Mrs. Bested seized by two men while giving a séance at Hartford, Conn.

9/18/2017

The Enlargement of Woman's Sphere.

A few possibilities of the day when all masculine employments are open to women.

9/11/2017

The Latest Invention.

Puck's Patent Combination Office Chair and Bore-Destroyer.

8/28/2017

A Skeleton King with a Silver Crown.

The strange relic of departed greatness found in a Livingston (Ala.) cave by a youthful explorer.

7/24/2017

Midsummer Madness.

Every Dog Has His Day.

7/17/2017

Their Sex's Worst Foes.

How the gilded vice of the metropolis fishes for its victims in the public streets, and innocent confidence is trapped by the fine feathers which disguise foul birds.

6/26/2017

Retribution.

No, this man has not been sunstruck. He has just inquired of the other man going up the street: "Is it hot enough for you?"

6/19/2017

Disguising Nature.

Society’s male darlings “making up” their faces for the purpose of “looking pretty” to their addlepated female counterparts; Saratoga, N. Y.

5/29/2017

What a New York Girl Did.

A vain girl makes a fireman wait until she fixes her hair preferring to risk her life rather than appear in public not “made up’; New York.

5/22/2017

Booze Through a Key-Hole.

5/15/2017

A Duel on Horseback.

Two rivals for the affections of an Arkansas belle fight a desperate battle with knives and are horribly mangled near Bear Creek.

5/2/2017

An Easy Winner.

Architect John M. Merrick of New York triumphantly finishes his thirtieth canvas-back duck on the thirtieth consecutive day

5/1/2017

Chicago’s Latest Craze.

Every Garden City belle wants to have her hair cut like a little man’s.

4/24/2017

Pugilists in Petticoats.

Alleged bout between Annie Russell and Elizabeth Sullivan, two pretty clerks in a Buffalo, N. Y.

4/10/2017

He Liked Little Boys.

How a Georgia alligator attempted to make a meal of Captain Johnson’s son.

3/20/2017

Robbing a Corpse.

Mrs. Day is accused of stealing a ring from the finger of dead Sophie Ahrens as she lay in her coffin.

2/27/2017

He Was Coffined Alive.

A Sandusky citizen, the father of Capt. Jacob Garrett of Springfield, O., has a novel experience which he will not soon forget.

2/20/2017

Thrown from a Balcony.

An Old Man in San Francisco Becomes Enraged at a Young Lady who Teased Him and Flings Her from a Fourth story Balcony.

1/23/2017

The Pastor Kissed Her.

That is the allegation made against Dominie Hall of the Methodist Church at Livermore, Ky., by Miss May.

11/28/2016

The Women Screamed.

A gang of pickpockets go through an excursion train near Wabash, Ind.

11/15/2016

Crazed by Politics.

Lendall Pratt, and aged Long Islander, kills himself while in a political frenzy.

11/7/2016

Eloped with a Convict.

The wife of deputy sheriff Sands of Little Falls, Minn., releases a convict, scoots to Dakota and is arrested.

10/31/2016

A Triangular Fight.

9/19/2016

Athletics.

Athletics

8/23/2016

An Irishman and a Yankee Settle a Dispute.

An Irishman and a Yankee Settle a Dispute Across the Breakfast Table at their Boarding House in New York.

7/18/2016

She Stole Her Lover’s Clothes.

A Cincinnati girl parades the streets in male attire and is yanked in for her temerity and immodesty.

7/4/2016

A Wild Girl in a Connecticut Swamp.

She resides in a swamp near Branford, Conn, and fills the rustics with terror.

6/28/2016

Done Up by Dizzy Blondes.

A special from Canajoharie, Sept 26, says: Duncan Clark, manager of Clark’s Female Minstrels, will probably not visit the Mohawk valley again very soon.

6/20/2016

Ought to be Ashamed of Herself.

Miss Venus De Medici, of Italy, outranges the ideas of Norwalk, Conn., Citizens and is Garbed.

5/30/2016

Demi-Monde Excursion.

Members of the New Orleans Demi-Monde Enjoying an Excursion to the Suburbs of the Southern Metropolis.

5/16/2016

Frail Minnie Gitto.

How a pretty Oyster Bay, Long Island, lassie sinned with a choir-singer and set all the island gossiping.

5/9/2016

The Kissing Quadrille.

A New Attraction to the Ball Room Invented by a New York Genius for the Benefit of Bashful Men and Ugly Women.

4/26/2016

Killed by a Baseball.

John Walters, of Richmond, Indiana becomes a victim of his love for the national game.

4/5/2016

A Sleep-Walker’s Act.

Miss Belle Collis, of Newark, N. J., surprises the neighbors by her want of thought.

3/26/2016

A Square Meal.

A wolf in search of a square meal helps himself to a baby; Clintonville, PA.

3/21/2016

Saratoga’s Naughty Girl.

Minnie Hull, a dashing young lady from the watering place, is unjustly or otherwise accused of crookedness.

3/7/2016

Shocking Youthful Depravity.

The discovery that public school children frequent immoral places creates a startling sensation in Columbus, O.

2/22/2016

She Swallowed Her Teeth.

Mrs. Dunsford, of Reading, Pa., meets with a mishap in a theatre.

2/15/2016

Cowboys Lassoing the Ballet.

The manager of a dizzy blonde troupe is lassoed by an indignant cowboy at Dodge City, Kansas.

1/18/2016

Pugilistic Females.

Two Lebanon, Pa., girls live the same young man and biff each other on the street.

1/4/2016

Heroism of a Society Belle.

The Bravery of charming Miss Jaffray, the daughter of a New York millionaire, saves many lives at Irvington, N. Y.

12/28/2015

A New Wrinkle.

How the fashionable women of “sawciety” get their complexions whit the assistance of a hypodermic injection.

12/14/2015

Her Last Quadrille.

The bursting of an artery due to tight lacing causes the death of Miss Mary Crawford of Detroit, Mich.

12/1/2015

Fierce Football.

The great game recently played between teams representing the colleges of Princeton and Yale, on the former's grounds, Thanksgiving Day.

11/23/2015

The Latest Agony.

A Chicago railroad man and a Chicago porter both say that it is becoming fashionable for young men of that city to kiss each other vigorously when they part for any length of time and when they meet again.

11/2/2015

A Hidden Skeleton.

Barton Russel and his wife discover the skeleton of missing Charlie Young near Moorsburg, Hawkins Co., Tennessee.

10/26/2015

The Cruelties of Fashion.

“Who is killing all the beautiful blue breasts, and green breasts, and purple breasts, and gold breasts. Add the gorgeously-feathered songsters of groves in every clime?”

10/12/2015

The Bicycle Tournament at Springfield, Mass.

Perhaps the most successful bicycle tournament ever held in this country was that which opened at Springfield, Mass., on Tuesday, September 18th, 1883, and continued for three days.

9/29/2015

Raiding the Joints.

Superintendent Walling makes a raid on a Sixth Avenue opium den and gathers in a motley crowd of smokers.

9/15/2015

She Liked Her Lager Beer.

A Murray Hill belle, with a fondness for the Teutonic beverage, sets up a keg in her boudoir.

8/24/2015

New Jersey’s Great Wash Day.

Farmers with their wives and buxom daughters enjoy their annual bath in old ocean, at Spring Lake Beach, N. J.

8/18/2015

Hard Knocks and Horsewhips.

Miss Mamie Gannon, of Jersey City, attacks reporter Lenhart with a horsewhip for traducing her character in his newspaper.

8/10/2015

They Are a Bad Lot.

The frightful picture of crime and debauchery which has given notoriety to Mary Jane Cawley’s backwoods dive at Cookstown, N. J.

7/27/2015

A Duel with Whips.

A Duel with Whips. Two hot-blooded Georgians fight till they are raw and their weapons give out and then call it a draw.

7/14/2015

Eaten by Sharks.

In the Jaw of the Man-Eaters. James E. Hamilton of Lake Worth, Florida, is Devoured by Sharks.

7/6/2015

Oscar Wilde Gets a Reception.

Too, too, utterly utter! Remarkable effect of the appearance of Oscar Wilde, the apostle of Aestheticism, on the streets of New York City.

6/24/2015

What it Has Come To.

A scene from feal life in a sixth avenue smoking car—giddy girls who believe in taking a “whiff of the weed” in public as well as in priv

6/22/2015

Amateur Photography.

The only way to prove that you have been clubbed by a policeman - photograph him in the act.

4/6/2015

"Ten Minutes for Refreshments and Divorce!"

Our suggestion.-- A divorce court in every railroad depot in Chicago! Time saved, and everybody happy!

3/23/2015

A Woman’s Flat-Irony.

Miss Sallie Utterback, of Shoals, Near Vincennes, Indiana, knocks out a man with a waggin' tongue.

2/17/2015

Skating in Central Park.

Winter sports in the metropolis—a skating scene in Central Park.

2/9/2015

Song of the Great Blizzard.

Song of the Great Blizzard, Thirteen Were Saved

1/27/2015

Cheating the Liquor Laws.

The ingenious patent which has been got up for use in prohibition states.

1/6/2015

New Years in the Wings.

12/29/2014

“For Members Only.”

11/10/2014

Bulldozing a Voter.

There is a strong minded woman “way deown in Maine,” who has been protesting for years against her sex being debarred the right of suffrage.

11/4/2014

"It Costs Money to Fix Things."

As it is plain that Most of Our Congressmen Are for Sale, They Might as Well Display Their Prices Prominently.

10/20/2014

The Green-Eyed Monster.

10/14/2014

Set Fire to the Bed.

9/22/2014

The Drama of Life,

9/1/2014

Picnic on Marblehead Neck.

8/5/2014

Beautiful Forever.

7/29/2014

A Minister’s Scrape.

7/21/2014

Tennis.

7/14/2014

A Terrible Scare.

7/8/2014

Two Giddy Girls.

5/27/2014

Decoration Day and its Memories.

5/19/2014

Sights and Sounds of Spring.

4/15/2014

Dr. Scott's Electric Corset.

4/8/2014

Abducted by a Woman.

3/31/2014

What it is Coming to in Chicago.

3/24/2014

Mixed Drinks for Six.

Harry Johnson's Style of Straining Mixed Drinks to a Party of Six.

3/4/2014

The Southern Pacific Railway Disaster.

2/11/2014

Society Unveiled.

2/3/2014

Robbed of Her Tresses.

1/14/2014

Puck's Dude Champions.

12/17/2013

Collegians at Football.

12/10/2013

A New Shoplifting Dodge.

A female thief who carries a baby in her arms and made its flowing skirts a cover for stolen goods

12/3/2013

Hallow Eve Sports.

The cool reception that some frolicsome young Doylestown girls gave to a verdant beau who was not posted as to the manners and customs of the Pennsylvania Dutch

10/27/2013

Hungry Joe.

The conmen of New York City were noted for their colorful nicknames: "Paper Collar Joe", "Grand Central Pete" Jimmy "the Kid" and the greatest of all "Hungry Joe".

10/20/2013

Puck's Family Temperance Primer.

10/15/2013

Lessons in Opium-Smoking.

10/8/2013

The “Prisoners’ March.”

Pennsylvania - Scene in the Schuylkill County Prison at Pottsville - The "Prisoners' March" for exercise in the corridor.

9/17/2013

The Last Dip of the Season.

Water witches who frolic with Neptune, no matter how cold his embrace.

9/3/2013

A Bride’s Toggery.

8/27/2013

She Had a High Old Time.

8/13/2013

Cuban Beauty Emporium.

7/30/2013

It Was a "She."

7/9/2013

She Skipped.

7/2/2013

The Tyranny of Fashion.

6/25/2013

Dropping Their Disguise.

How a loving bridal couple were suddenly transformed into a brace of absconding counterfeiters.

6/18/2013

Undercover Lunatic.

5/26/2013

What Led to a Divorce.

5/20/2013

Baseball Animals.

Cigarette cards, 1880s, 1890s

5/14/2013

Shooting at the Elevated.

5/7/2013

Philanthropist or “Moral Leper?”

4/30/2013

Blood on the Moon.

4/16/2013

Nothing But Wind!

4/2/2013

The St. Patrick's Day Parade.

3/5/2013

Burglary Tools.

2/11/2013

Taking a Criminal's Measure.

12/11/2012

The Diamond King.

J. I. Lighthall, better known as the Diamond King, was a charismatic showman and a master of marketing, but he was also a dedicated healer.

12/4/2012

Breaking Up a Bagnio.

11/18/2012

John L. Sullivan Saved by a Neck.

11/6/2012

Serpent and Dove.

10/2/2012

Serpent and Dove.

How They Meet Behind the Scenes - Temptations and Trials of the High Kickers.

10/2/2012

The Advent of Spiritualism.

A simple schoolgirl prank spawned a new belief with millions of followers.

9/4/2012

A Terrible Punishment.

8/28/2012

A Terrible Punishment.

A father revenges an outrage on his daughter by pulling the wretch asunder; near Junction City, Kansas.

8/28/2012

Steam Powered Reformation.

8/14/2012

Steam Powered Reformation.

8/14/2012

The Two Paths in Life.

"A noble life, to Truth and Virtue given, <br />Makes earth a Paradise scarce less than Heaven. <br />While one to Vice devoted and her ways, <br />Of earth makes hell and blackens all its days"

8/7/2012

A Slippery and Subtle Knave – The Bank Sneak.

7/31/2012

A Slippery and Subtle Knave – The Bank Sneak.

Of the many forms of bank robbery, the bank sneak had the safest, easiest and most lucrative method of all.

7/31/2012

Beauty as a Shield.

Beauty Conquers avarice and outlawry "We won't rob this house to-night."

7/24/2012

Female Tobacco Chewers.

7/10/2012

Torturing a Lover.

6/26/2012

A Ghastly Table.

6/5/2012

She Was Bug Crazy.

5/22/2012

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4/10/2012

Allan Pinkerton.

The Eye that Never Sleeps.

3/27/2012

Hospital Horrors.

3/20/2012

Being Initiated.

3/13/2012

Inspector Thomas F. Byrnes.

3/4/2012

It Was Another Kind of Cat.

2/21/2012

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2/14/2012

A New Gag.

2/7/2012

A Characteristic Present

1/17/2012

The Sawdust Game

The "sawdust game," was a confidence scam that only swindled those who deserved to be swindled.

1/10/2012

Pretty Female Billiardists

1/3/2012

Cursing In Church

Westfield, Ohio, October 23, 1887 - The Sudden Insanity of Rev J. R. Young. He uses profane language in a Sunday school at Westfield, Ohio.

12/20/2011

Cursing In Church

12/20/2011

Another Voice for Cleveland.

12/13/2011

She Played Kissy Kissy

12/6/2011

He Hit the Pipe

A Minneapolis millionaire, visits an opium joint and is carried out feet first.

11/20/2011

Driven by Delusion

Henry Goodwin entered the office of his partner, Albert Swan, pulled out a revolver and shot him.

11/14/2011

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9/5/2011

Recruiting For Sin's Army

7/5/2011

Sparking in Tompkins Square

Cupid in Tompkins Square

6/28/2011

Terrible Struggle with Flame and Flood

The burning of the steamer John H. Hanna near Plaquemine, Louisiana, by which thirty lives were lost

6/20/2011

The Bunco Game

The term “bunco” has come to mean to any type of swindle, but in the 19th century it usually referred to a confidence game involving crooked gambling.

5/17/2011

Hazing at the Stock Board

How the battering-ram process is applied by the bulls and bears to while away the idle hours of the dull season.

5/8/2011

“Daredevil” Steve Brodie

2/17/2011
Via Newspapers.comThis week, we visit a haunted house that has a bit of Mystery Blood thrown in.  The "Glen Elder Sentinel," August 20, 1903:A remarkable ghost sensation is disturbing the serenity of St. Peter Port, Guernsey, where a local photographer has just vacated his residence on the ground that he and members of his family have been terrified by supernatural visitations. The photographer
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Strange Company - 3/29/2023
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When Patrick  H. Doherty joined the Fall River Police Department in 1885, he might have been astounded to learn that he would be involved one day in two notorious murder cases- both involving hatchets and axes.  Patrick Doherty was born in Peoria, Illinois on August 10, 1859 to John and Mary Walsh Doherty.  Later the family moved east to Fall River, and we find Patrick Doherty living at 104 Columbia St. (off South Main) and working as a laborer for a time employed by Fall River Iron Works and the Fall River Line steamboat company.  He married Honora (Nora) E. Coughlin on April 25, 1887 at the age of 28, when he was employed at the Fall River Police Department as a patrolman.  The couple would have seven children:  Charles T., Frank., Grace, Robert, Helene, Margaret (called Marguerite), and John. Doherty, (as were several other patrolmen), was promoted to the rank of captain after their work in the case of the century, the Borden Murders of 1892.  Doherty had arrived at #92 after George Allen on the morning of the murders, and was very quickly in the thick of the action, questioning Lizzie upstairs, looking at the bodies with Dr. Dolan, running down to Smith’s pharmacy with Officer Harrington  to question Eli Bence, prowling the cellar for weapons with Medley, Fleet and Dr. Bowen, and making note of Lizzie’s dress.  Doherty stayed on the job on watch at the Borden house until he was relieved at 9 p.m.  When it came time for the inquest, it was Doherty who slipped down to 95 Division St. to collect Bridget, who had been staying with her cousin, Patrick Harrington after the murders.  He would testify at the Preliminary and the 1893 trial in New Bedford. In the midst of the excitement in New Bedford as Lizzie’s trial was about to get underway, yet another hatchet killing took over the front page, the murder of Bertha Manchester on May 30th.  It was a brutal attack to rival the Borden’s with the weapon being most likely a short-handled axe or possibly a hatchet. Doherty went out to the Manchester place with Marshal Hilliard, Captains Desmond, and Connors and Inspector Perron  on June 6th with the  suspect, Jose Correa de Mello, who revealed his hiding place for the stolen  watch taken from the victim and her purse at that time.  De Mello served time and then was sent back to the Azores, banned from stepping upon U.S. soil again. The Dohertys moved to 1007 Rock St. in 1897 and Patrick was pleased to walk his daughter Margaret (Marguerite) down the aisle in 1913. Patrick Doherty retired from the force in 1915 and succumbed to interstitial nephritis on June 28, 1915.. He, and some of his children are buried in St. Patrick’s Cemetery in Fall River. Resources: Ancestry.com, Parallel Lives,: A Social History of Lizzie A. Borden and her Fall River, Find-a-Grave.com. and Yesterday in Old Fall River: A Lizzie Borden Companion Fall River Globe June 28, 1915
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Lizzie Borden: Warps and Wefts - 3/3/2023
Bernard Gussow was born in Russia in 1881. But by 1900 he’d made it to the Lower East Side, where he was described as an “East Side artist” in a New York Times article about paintings he displayed at an art show at the Educational Alliance settlement house on East Broadway. [“Subway Steps”] Gussow would […]
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Ephemeral New York - 3/27/2023
An article I recently wrote for the British online magazine, New Politic, is now available online. The article, “The Criminal Origins of the United States of America,” is about British convict transportation to America, which took place between the years 1718 and 1775, and is the subject of my book, Bound with an Iron Chain: […]
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Early American Crime - 12/17/2021
 17-year-old James E. Nowlin murdered George Codman in a Massachusetts stable in January 1887. Then he took an axe and chopped Codman’s body into pieces. As he traveled home in a sleigh, he threw the pieces into the snow along the road.Read the full story here: Massachusetts Butchery.
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Murder By Gaslight - 3/25/2023
Roped-inOmaha Daily BeeJune 25, 1884(Click image to enlarge)  OSSIBLE VICTIM OF THE JEFFERSON R. SMITH GANG.  Omaha Daily Bee June 25, 1884 COLORADO. Col. Fletcher, a tourist from Boston, was roped-in by the bunko men of Denver and relieved of $1,000. NOTES: $1,000.00 in 1884 is the equivalent of $33,472.95 in 2023. According to the Rocky Mountain News there were at least two,
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Soapy Smith's Soap Box - 3/12/2023
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 engaged as a carrier of wine, because he and his brother, with the help of […]
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Executed Today - 11/13/2020
An Irishman and a Yankee Settle a Dispute. | She Stole Her Lover’s Clothes.

Trying to Scare an Old Maid with a Wooden Dutchman.

Wooden Dutchman

A wooden Dutchman, rather than no man at all,
Was what a sensible spinster argued when some practical jokers under took to scare her in Oakland, Cal. [more]


Probably the most pathetic incident since the war occurred in Oakland the other day, and it is still agitating the higher circles of that locality to their inner depths. It appears that on Jackson street resides an old maid—a very old maid—who puts in all the time she can spare from the supervision of other people’s affairs to searching for burglars. In fact, the latter occupation may be said to be her hobby.

For the last twenty-five years Miss Goobey has never retired without first  industriously “shooing” under each and every bed for the purpose of expelling any burglariosly inclined person who might be thus secreted.

The other day a bold, bad man, who happened to be temporarily staying at the Goobey residence, concocted a dreadful practical joke. By the assistance of some of his dissolute companions, he stole a life-sized wooden Dutchman form the front of a cigar store, and placed it under the chaste couch of the mature Diana in question.

The conspirators waited on the landing when Miss Goobey locked the door that night expecting a domestic earthquake to be started as soon as the bogus burglar was sighted.  They waited unsuccessfully for an hour. Was it possible Miss G. had neglected her invariable custom of looking under the bed? No, the idea was preposterous. They still lingered for the volcano to begin, throwing up screams, convulsions, melted lava and hair pins.

Silence.

Another hour passed by.

At last the well-known sound of Miss Goobey’s high soprano snore sounded faintly through the door, and impelled by ungovernable suspense and curiosity, the watchers climbed up and peeped though the transom.

There were two figures in the bed.The wooden man had been carefully lifted into the couch and covered up with its head on Miss G’s off pillow. While one thin arm over his manly red-wood chest, and with one saffron cheek pressed against the irresponsive shoulder, Miss Goobey slept in contented sleep of one who had reached bedrock at last.

She was making believe, poor thing!

 


Reprinted from National Police Gazette, December 17, 1881.