No. 632
Crime, Eccentricity, and the Sporting Life in 19th Century America.
May 17, 2022

Snares for the Unwary.

The "Sawed-Door Game" on a Gudgeon.
May 17, 2022
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Fractional house numbers can be found across New York’s older brownstone and townhouse neighborhoods. Usually the half refers to an adjacent carriage house or backhouse, or sometimes even a basement apartment. But as far as I can tell, this is the only 3/4 fractional on a Gotham doorway or entryway. It’s at 184 3/4 West […]
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Ephemeral New York - 4/20/2026
"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
 It's time for this week's Link Dump!Let's dance!That time when an English village was terrorized by a giant rabbit.How the Declaration of Independence made the news.The socialite and the "Titanic orphans."The last victim of the Berlin Wall.Remembering the American Soapbox.Life on one of Lord Nelson's 32-pounders.The hidden communication of animals.British fairies, meet Indian changelings.3I
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Strange Company - 4/17/2026
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, May 31, 1896.)On the morning of Memorial Day, May 30, 1896, Mrs. Annie Cunningham had to go to work, while her 13-year-old daughter, Mary (known as Mamie), was home from school for the holiday. Mrs. Cunningham asked Mamie if she planned to go to the parade. Mamie said no, she wasn’t interested, and she planned to do housework and study. At 8:30, she said goodbye to her daughter
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Murder By Gaslight - 4/18/2026
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
A Square Meal. | Chang and Eng, The Siamese Twins.

Snares for the Unwary.

Saratoga's Naughty Girl

Minnie Hull, a dashing young lady from the watering place, is unjustly or otherwise accused of crookedness.

Miss Minnie Hull, a dashing young lady who for the past four seasons has been one of the belles of Saratoga, was arrested recently at the Murray Hill Hotel, New York, by Deputy Sherriff Allen of Saratoga, charged with passing a worthless check for $125 on F. H. Olmstead. Miss Hull was taken to Saratoga where she was released on her own recognizance to appear before the Grand Jury in January. Miss Hill has in the past few years squandered a fortune left to her by a relative. She was divorced about three years ago from Joseph Kuickebacker of Troy, N. Y.


Reprinted from National Police Gazette, November 2, 1889.

sawed-door

A more scared looking lot of prisoners than those gathered in from ten alleged disorderly cafes in the Eleventh Precinct in New York the other night has seldom been seen in Essex Market Police Court.

The policeman had been just three days obtaining the necessary evidence. The places raided were ten in number, and fifty-nine inmates were captured. Capt. Cortright instigated the raids.

"These cafes," said a New York detective, "do much more harm than any full-fledged disorderly house could do, for this reason: Men are on their guard not to be trapped in full-fledged houses of ill-fame, and in the old days, the best houses run by the leading madames were safer for a man's money and for chance of blackmail than any hotel in New York. The cheap cafes and coffee houses are now simply sitting places for 'skin' Mollies and fishing grounds for adventuresses and women who ply their persons to trap men for the purposes of robbery.

The panel house is an old form of crooked joint. The 'sawed door' joint is quite common now as the resort of the coffee house dames when they have trapped a countryman or a gudgeon. A heeler who has one of these sawed door joints will have half a dozen different women running their prey to his joint. He does the 'unexpected return' act and, carrying a revolver in his hand, he and the women shake down the victim and shanghai him into the street. There are very few kicks.''

If the badger workers concerned in these jobs are caught it is seldom that the money is ever recovered. And it there is no money to be regained, the victim says to himself: "What sense is there in exposing my own folly and sending good money after bad?"


Illustrated Police News, May 4, 1895.