No. 796
Crime, Eccentricity, and the Sporting Life in 19th Century America.
February 11, 2025

This Soubrette Played Faro.

To win a bet she played in the "combination" at Butte Mont.
February 11, 2025
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Tag: Railroad

Sketches on the Rail.

Characters Found on a Passenger Train.

3/24/2026

Wantons' Wiles.

The Bad Girls of Gotham and Their New Schemes for Man-Catching.

9/10/2024

A Pullman Parlor Car.

Interior of a Pulman Parlor Car on the Pennsylvania Railroad.

7/16/2024

Interior of a Pullman Parlour Car.

The Smoking Saloon.

9/20/2022

Customs Inspections on the Canadian Frontier.

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

9/13/2021

Thrilling Railroad Accident.

Startling accident at the draw bridge of the Rensselaer and Saratoga Railroad, Federal Street, Troy, N. Y., Saturday, Sept 23.

11/6/2017

A Train of Cars Rushing Through Fire.

Traveling through fire—Fearful peril of a railway train, at Cedar Swamp, on the Eastern Railroad, Maine, Sunday, Sept. 17

10/23/2017

The Women Screamed.

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

11/15/2016

"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

The Southern Pacific Railway Disaster.

2/11/2014

"Four Aces."

9/25/2012

Love in a Railroad Car.

9/16/2012

Steam Powered Reformation.

8/14/2012

Another Voice for Cleveland.

12/13/2011

Crush Collision!

Crush, Texas, September 15, 1896

2/24/2011
Via Newspapers.comBring on the Mystery Fires!  The (Napoleon, Ohio) “Democratic Northwest,” January 6, 1890:In regard to the mysterious fires that have visited the home of W. F. Miller, and which have been noted in the Advertiser, a Bairdstown friend sends us the following, which we are sure our readers will peruse with interest:The first of the series of unaccountable fires that have
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Strange Company - 10/7/2026
  [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
"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
William H. Devlin(Illustrated Police News, December 22, 1877)Shortly after noon on Monday, December 10, 1877, a man entered the Lowell, Massachusetts, Police Station in a highly excited state. He told Deputy Marshal Favor that he had heard a terrible fight between a husband and wife Saturday night in a tenement on Common Street. Since then, he had heard nothing from the house, and he feared the
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Murder By Gaslight - 10/3/2026
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
Concert Saloons Changed to Skating Rinks. | Pick-pockets "Working the Crowd.''

This Soubrette Played Faro.

Soubriette

The three-night date which a snap extravaganza company played in Butte, Montana, a short time ago, will be remembered for a long time by some of the leading citizens of that very enterprising town. In the first place the bunch of girls who came with the show, and who, in fact, were the show, were the jolliest lot that ever smoked cigarettes or knocked the heads off champagne bottles.

They had seen something of the world, they had, and so when a swell sport of the town invaded the rooms behind the scenes and said there was a cold hundred in it for any girl who would go around to the Combination house and play out a deal of faro in tights, half a dozen of them jumped at him so quick that he almost lost his balance. He didn't want them all so he picked out the one that pleased him most, Nadage De Witt. He engaged a carriage for her after the show and after she had wrapped up well to keep those precious legs of hers warm, she was bundled in. She made the hit of her life when she stepped into, the brilliantly lighted faro room, and the created the biggest sensation Butte has known for some time. She took a seat at the layout and was staked to a $50 stack of chips. She played out three boxes, when she got up from the chair with $160 to the good, which with the $100 she earned by her appearance, made $260 clean. She tells the story herself now and is very anxious to get with any theatrical companies intending to play Butte. Do you blame her?


National Police Gazette, January 25, 1896.