No. 397
Crime, Eccentricity, and the Sporting Life in 19th Century America.
November 27, 2017

The Wedding Postponed.

November 27, 2017
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Tag: Mourning

Decoration Day and its Memories.

5/19/2014
"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
"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
More...
Soapy Smith's Soap Box - 10/13/2025
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
 Ida Quinlan and Sophia Grant.Mrs. Ida Quinlan went out to buy a pair of stockings at around 9:00 on the night of February 1, 1896, leaving her baby in the care of her sister, Mrs. Sophia Grant. She took a streetcar to the store several miles away and returned to the house at around 11:00. Entering the sitting room, she was surprised to find the drawers of the chiffoniers pulled out and
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Murder By Gaslight - 8/15/2026
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
More...
Executed Today - 11/13/2020
  [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
Via Newspapers.comOn this blog, I’ve covered what many Fortean experts like to call “Anomalous Falls From the Sky,” but this is a new one for me.  Lousy actors and criminals in the stocks used to get pelted with tomatoes, but it’s a bit unusual for modern-day suburbanites to get such treatment.  The following is from a syndicated 1998 Dave Barry column which summarizes the incident.&
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Strange Company - 8/19/2026
Via Newspapers.comOn this blog, I’ve covered what many Fortean experts like to call “Anomalous Falls From the Sky,” but this is a new one for me.  Lousy actors and criminals in the stocks used to get pelted with tomatoes, but it’s a bit unusual for modern-day suburbanites to get such treatment.  The following is from a syndicated 1998 Dave Barry column which summarizes the incident.&
More...
Strange Company - 8/19/2026
  [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 […]
More...
Early American Crime - 2/7/2019
Won on the Midway. | Turkey Shooting.

The Wedding Postponed.

Wedding PostponedMichael O’Toole of Edgewood, Maryland, goes for his bride but gets bullets and hot water instead.[more]

Michael O’Toole, a section hand on the Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore Railroad, was brought to the Baltimore City Hospital recently, suffering from several pistol wounds. O’Toole had been shot in the left shoulder and in the hip, and was suffering intensely from his wounds. He stated that he lived at Edgewood, about thirteen miles from Baltimore, and was engaged to be married to Kate Callahan, who lived a short distance from his home. He visited the girl and made arrangements to be married at Abington but Rev. Father Sartoria. Charles Callahan, a brother of his betrothed, warned him off the place, and when O’Toole called for the girl, Charles again appeared. Bitter words passed, both produced revolvers and began blazing away. Callahan slipped behind a tree, and from this point of vantage hit O’Toole twice. Callahan is said to have escaped unhurt. To add to O’Toole’s ill luck Mrs. Callahan dashed a pail of water over him and his face is scalded.


Reprinted from National Police Gazette, January 4, 1890.