No. 630
Crime, Eccentricity, and the Sporting Life in 19th Century America.
May 10, 2022
alias: OLD IKE
CONFIDENCE
Via Newspapers.comTenants have been evicted by their landlords for many reasons, but I’m guessing “Your dead relative is lowering my property values” doesn’t crop up very often. The “Detroit Free Press,” December 29, 1929:Berlin, Dec. 28.(U. P.)--There is a landlord in Berlin who absolutely refuses to let tenants bring ghosts with them into his apartments. He has gone to court to ask for
More...
Strange Company - 4/8/2026
"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
More...
Soapy Smith's Soap Box - 10/13/2025
I wonder what the proprietor of the Speedway Livery & Boarding Stables would have thought about his handsome brick building transforming from a home for pricey horses to a pricey home for people? This four-story, Romanesque-style stable at 457 West 150th Street was no ordinary boarding place for teams of working drays. The name of […]
More...
Ephemeral New York - 4/6/2026
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
New York Journal, March 18, 1898.
When the
news of London’s 1888 Whitechapel Murders, attributed to “Jack the Ripper,”
crossed the Atlantic, Americans were instantly fascinated. The vision of a dark,
elusive killer, mutilating women without motive, was morbidly titillating, and the
name Jack the Ripper fired the popular imagination. In the nascent age of
yellow journalism, no one was more
More...
Murder By Gaslight - 4/4/2026
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
More...
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 […]
More...
Early American Crime - 2/7/2019
At the breakfast table at Haman's Hotel, Greensburg, Ind., C. C. Edwards, a dry goods merchant, occupied the seat or honor next to a fascinating and beautiful widow boarder. Dr. H Lee Millican, who is in love with the widow, wanted Mr. Edwards to exchange seats. This Mr. Edwards refused to do. Some hot words followed as to each gentleman's respective rights to a seat next to the lady, and It ended by the doctor flooring the merchant by a blow between the eyes. The case was then appealed to a justice's court, where it was settled to the satisfaction of all concerned.The Bloody Century 2
Takes the reader back to 19th-century America in all its gory glory.
