No. 819
Crime, Eccentricity, and the Sporting Life in 19th Century America.
July 08, 2025

A Poker-playing Prima Donna.

High Jinks on a Lorg Island Sound Steamer
July 8, 2025
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Tag: Theft

A Man in a Black Mask.

Disguised as the Devil.

7/1/2025

Caught Helping Themselves.

Boston detectives arrest two stylishly-dressed women while in the act of the shoplifting game.

1/9/2017

The Women Screamed.

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

11/15/2016

A Man under Her Bed.

Had Miss Baker looked under the bed before making her toilet she would have postponed it.

9/26/2016

She Had a High Old Time.

8/13/2013

A Slippery and Subtle Knave – The Bank Sneak.

7/31/2012
In the not-so-good old days, it was not rare for animals to be put on trial for crimes, usually witchcraft or murder, and summarily executed.  As dreadful as these events were, one at least has the comfort of knowing that in modern times, we have rejected such barbarism.That assumption, unfortunately, is not entirely correct.  In 1930s America, newspapers eagerly covered the grim story
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Strange Company - 4/27/2026
"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
There’s a curious pair of limestone row houses on the lower end of peaceful, park-facing Riverside Drive. Each looks similar from afar. They share the same color of stone, and both facades have bow fronts. But on closer look, you’ll notice that each sports different ornamental bells and whistles. One has a conical roof and […]
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Ephemeral New York - 4/27/2026
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
(New York Journal, August 5, 1896)Annie Bock and her husband, Jacob, were spending the summer at Rockaway Beach. On Sunday, August 1, 1896, Annie went back to their flat at 207 E. 21st Street in New York City’s Tenderloin district to pay their monthly rent. She had $300 in the Dry Dock Savings Bank, and on Monday morning, she withdrew $50 and paid $20 rent. The plan was to return to Rockaway that
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Murder By Gaslight - 4/25/2026
Whatever you believe about the guilt or innocence of Lizzie Borden, I have always believed film makers do a great injustice to the story by not beginning at the beginning- the death on March 26, 1863 of the first Mrs. Borden. In the dying moments of Sarah Morse, Emma takes on the weight of the care of her little sister, not yet three years old. Emma herself was just 12 on March 1st. Emma has seen her mother suffer for a long time, seen her pain and loss of little Alice Esther. Emma is old enough
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Lizzie Borden: Warps and Wefts - 3/26/2026
  [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
Yachting. | A Man in a Black Mask.

A Poker-playing Prima Donna.

High-Jinks Pugilists, Variety Actors and Opera Bouff People on a Grand Hurrah.

The Long Island Sound steamboat, "City of New York," had a strange conglomeration of characters on board on her trip from New York to New London, Conn., the other night. It was Sunday night, and the Aimee opera troupe, Harrigan & Hart's variety troupe, Johnny Dwyer, who recently fought and whipped Elliott; Dooney Harris, Dwyer's backer, and several gamblers, roughs and sporting men were on board. Aimee played poker with three male members of her troupe all the way up. Dwyer and Dooney entered into friendly gin-hiding competition, and the variety people shocked the Sunday sanctity with variations upon the ballad “Such an education has my Mary Ann." During the voyage Dwyer and Harris discussed theological questions with more energy than discretion, especially Mr. Harris, who, feeling himself aggrieved at being called a Roman pup, gave one of his gang an unanswerable argument in the shape of a knockdown blow. The two troupes numbered one hundred and fifty people, and there were fifty or sixty other passengers. By the time the boat reached New London the bibulous element in the party had succumbed to the insidious character of their beverages, and were quiet as lambs, but Aimee obligingly sang now and then for the benefit of those who had ears to hear. It was a red-hot time all round, and there were some sore and swelled heads in the party of amusement artists which landed in Boston on Monday morning.


Illustrated Police News, June 21, 1879.