Topeka, Kansas, December, 1893 –Wicked boys of the Wasburn, Kan., College play tricks on the pretty female students.

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The young ladies at Washburn College, in Topeka, Kan., have a class in gymnastics and are required to dress in Turkish costume, using a long skirt to conceal their costumes while going to and from the gymnasium.

Last week while they were going through their exercises one of the boys at the college removed their skirts from the dressing room, and they could only get out of the gymnasium by running a gauntlet of the male students. The facts were reported to the faculty, and upon investigation a student named Charles Paddock was found to be responsible for the caper. It was decided to expel him, but his associates have rebelled and declare they will leave the school of such a penalty is imposed on Paddock. The faculty is giving it further consideration.

Reprinted from The National Police Gazette, December 2, 1893

Illustrated Police News, July 6, 1895.

Note: Origin of the word "Buncombe"

Celebrations of the annual festival in which comfort and fun replace fashion and ceremony, and those who enjoy to-day leave to-morrow to take care of itself.

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Christmas in Bohemia.

The Revels of Genius in its Gay World Within a World.

There are a good many ways of celebrating Christmas and the world makes use of all of them. But from first to last there is no jollier way than the one which Bohemia enjoys Christianity’s great holiday.

There are grander ways, to be sure. The stately pageant with which royalty commemorates it, for instance, with thunder of guns and blare of trumpets; with the flash of jewels, the shimmer of imperial purple and discussion of a banquets under the shadows of flapping banners to the music of a court band. The church, too, has its special celebration, perfumed with the incense of sacrifice, and society does the occasion honor after its on stately and ceremonious fashion. But these are the hollowest of mockeries after all; ghost of that real, healthful enjoyment of a holiday which all the wealth of the world can not buy without the spirit of content to back it.

That enjoyment is found in Bohemia if it is found anywhere. There the revel runs most merrily, the tongue grows lighter and the airy nonsense of the social board sparkles in gems of wit that outshine the diamonds of the most splendid drawing-rooms. What reck they if the fest to-day is followed by fast to-morrow? Is not to-morrow a new day and did they not wonder yesterday where to-day’s feast was to come from? No shadow of the future darkens the Bohemian holiday. If such ever does rise in some graver brain it is resolutely bounced. The wind wails without and misery is buffeted by the storm, but we are warm and gay within and with good store of inner comfort for the present. Time enough to face the tempest when we are forced to; time enough to regret the past when we have no longer a future.

Thus, in studio and green-room, over the beer table and at the garret feast, the men and women who amuse the world sit down to wassail, casting their gay defiance into the face of a staid society which may frown on them for spurning its hollow creeds but can not darken the enjoyment of their holiday. Does society’s frown lighten at the sight of that haggard figure under the lighted window? Doubtless, for in that figure and many like it it sees its vengeance embodied, it sees Bohemia’s wrecks drifting upon the dark sea to which the present revelers close their eyes.

Reprinted from The National Police Gazette, December 31, 1881.

In the Jaw of the Man-Eaters.

James E. Hamilton of Lake Worth, Florida, is Devoured by Sharks. [more]

Terrific But Vain Fight of a Mail Carrier With Man-Eaters.

A special form Jacksonville, Fla. Oct 20, says: The dread of the mail carriers on the Florida southeast coast are the Hillsboro and New River inlets, which have to be crossed by small boats. Here the dark waters of the Everglades empty into the Atlantic with tremendous force at this season, and if the ocean is rough the meeting of the cross currents produces heavy and dangerous seas. Sharks of the fiercest kind fill the inlets.

James E. Hamilton, the mail carrier from Miami to Lake Worth, was an athletic young man and carried the light mail on his shoulders, waking the entire distance. Seventy-five miles, on the beach. He left Lake Worth on Tuesday, in the morning, and should have reached the Refuge Station, twenty-five miles distant, that afternoon.

Late at night a fisherman named Waring came to the station and told the story of Hamilton’s horrible death. Waring was about one-half mile from Hillsboro Inlet when he saw Hamilton get into his boat to cross. He noted that the sharks were about in unusual numbers, and just as Hamilton reached the center of the crossing a huge one drove at the boat and bit a piece off the gunwale.

Hamilton struck at the sharks, but nothing could drive them off. Soon both oars were bitten in two, and then the fierce tigers of the sea seemed perfectly ravenous. The tore at the boat, snapped at one another, and the water for yards around was dyed with their blood. The boat began to fill, and the sharks scenting their prey, redoubled their dashes.

Hamilton stood on the middle seat as if stupefied glaring at them. Looking up and seeing Waring, he cried out to him, but in vain. Even as he shouted a huge monster dashed up and hit the partially filled boat a tremendous blow, throwing Hamilton out into the midst of the monsters.

A cry of agony was heard as he went down, and the devourers had him piecemeal before the horror-stricken spectator could take in the full measure of the tragedy. As soon as Waring recovered his senses he went to the station and told of the affair. A searching party went out at once but nothing was found save the remnants of the boat cast on the shore.

Reprinted from National Police Gazette, November 19,1887.