No. 426
Crime, Eccentricity, and the Sporting Life in 19th Century America.
May 28, 2018

A Wine-Inspired Wager.

A Female Who Was Not Allowed to Exhibit Her Terpsichorean Abilities.
May 28, 2018
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 Welcome to this week's Link Dump!However, I'm not sure I like what the Strange Company HQ staffers are planning for today's menu.What the hell was the Dover Demon?An archaeological mystery near Yellowstone.A fatal obsession with an actress.The "f word" goes a long way back.In 1900, these were women's favorite weapons.A look at the latest book about Poe.  It sounds a bit pretentious,
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Strange Company - 10/2/2026
  [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
"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
William H. Devlin(Illustrated Police News, December 22, 1877)Shortly after noon on Monday, December 10, 1877, a man entered the Lowell, Massachusetts, Police Station in a highly excited state. He told Deputy Marshal Favor that he had heard a terrible fight between a husband and wife Saturday night in a tenement on Common Street. Since then, he had heard nothing from the house, and he feared the
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Murder By Gaslight - 10/3/2026
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
June. | Too Fond of Kissing.

A Wine-Inspired Wager.

Wine Inspired Wager

A Female Who Was Not Allowed to Exhibit Her Terpsichorean Abilities.

A lively scene was acted in a private box of one of the leading variety theatres of this society one night during the past week. A convivial party—made so by too much tippling—were present to witness the performance. It was a little too tame to suit them, so the males wager that his female companion dare not execute the “Highland Fling” across the stage to the box opposite. She accepted and stood up to give her companions a specimen of her style. Attention of the audience was attracted. So was that of a policeman, and he nipped the proposed feat by bouncing the lot from the place. 


Reprinted from National Police Gazette, October 2, 1880.