No. 871
Crime, Eccentricity, and the Sporting Life in 19th Century America.
June 23, 2026

Thrown from a Balcony.

An Old Man in San Francisco Becomes Enraged at a Young Lady who Teased Him and Flings Her from a Fou
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June 23, 2026
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Tag: New Orleans

She Whipped the Dude.

Young man who guyed performers in a New Orleans theatre was severely corrected.

10/29/2023

Pretty Stars for the Southern Dives.

Fifteen charming chippies make Rome howl while voyaging to New Orleans, Louisiana.

12/19/2016

Demi-Monde Excursion.

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

5/16/2016

Torturing a Lover.

6/26/2012

Voodoo Queen Marie

For over forty years, beginning around 1830, Marie Laveau was the most powerful and most feared woman in New Orleans.

3/21/2011
JOHN HOPE
alias: WATSON
MANHATTAN BANK BURGLAR

What you’d be wearing to Rockaway Beach or Coney Island if you were a woman in the 1860s

Bare arms, visible ankles, a more relaxed waistline—the most fashionable “bathing dresses” of 1868 allowed a woman to strip off her day-to-day corsets, feather hats, and petticoats and luxuriate in the freedom of the seaside. This ad for what were also called “bathing costumes” came from Godey’s Lady’s Book, an influential periodical that helped shape […]
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Ephemeral New York - 7/6/2026

Artifact #93: Soapy's son, hires attorney to stop the slurring of his father's name.

"As his son I am proud of hisefforts to succeed in life"Jefferson Randolph Smith IIIArtifact #93-2Jeff Smith collection(Click image to enlarge) oapy's son hires a legal firm to stop the defamation of his father's name. At age 30, Jefferson Randolph Smith III, Soapy and Mary's oldest son, was protecting his father's legacy and his mother's reputation from "libel" and scandal. He was also
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Soapy Smith's Soap Box - 10/13/2025
Amen.

Weekend Link Dump

 Welcome to this week's Link Dump, where we wish our fellow Americans a happy 250th birthday!The unveiling of the Victoria Cross.A handy reminder that Robin Hood was no hero.One really freaking long tennis match.The motivations of Richard, Duke of York."Somebody's father" at the battle of Gettysburg.Why we call it a "honeymoon."The dog who loved trains.Now that all other problems on Earth
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Strange Company - 7/3/2026

1617: A miller of Manberna, the hangman’s last

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

Jennie Cramer's Tragic Ballad.

(New Haven Independent) Taylor Ward sings "Found Drifting with the Tide" (excerpt), the tragic ballad of Jennie Cramer's murder.“Found Drifting with the Tide” was a song written by A. C. Willis, "Dedicated to the memory of Jennie Cramer," who was murdered in 1881.When the body of beautiful young Jennie Cramer was found on a sandbar
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Murder By Gaslight - 7/4/2026
On the Russians.

June 14, 1893 Big Day In Court

Be sure to stop by our Facebook page tomorrow for a Prosecution Marathon of witnesses. Here are the witnesses for Wednesday, June 14th, Day 9 Rufus Hilliard, City Marshal, Mayor John Coughlin, Mrs. Hannah Gifford (seamstress and dressmaker), Anna Borden ( wealthy socialite who was on Lizzie’s grand tour of Europe, distantly related to Lizzie), Lucy Collett (watching the office of Dr. Chagnon day of the murder), Thomas Bowles ( handyman who once rented a room from Addie Churchill and was wa
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Lizzie Borden: Warps and Wefts - 6/13/2026

Convicts to Maryland, 1773 by Peter Dickson

  [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
Can Crack a Chandelier Globe Every Time. | Pandemonium in a Tumult.

Thrown from a Balcony.

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. 

It is well known that young ladies and misses have an inordinate propensity to tease persons, especially those of the other sex. Sometimes they are made to pay dearly for so doing, as was the case of a young miss in San Francisco. She was enjoying rare sport in teasing an old man, who suddenly became enraged, rushed from his room to the balcony where he was standing and seizing her, flung her over the railing to the ground in spite of her struggles. She was badly injured and the pugnacious old man is under arrest.

Weekly Varieties, February 27, 1887.

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