No. 547
Crime, Eccentricity, and the Sporting Life in 19th Century America.
January 18, 2022

Take a Chance?

Many a one, who otherwise would not contribute a dime, will take a chance in a lottery.
January 18, 2022
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 This week's Link Dump is keeping it all in the family.A recently-discovered dolmen complex in Spain.A once-famed, now forgotten 17th century artist.A brief history of being "antsy."In other news, 31/Atlas just keeps getting weirder.  And bigger.How the refrigerator changed food.The history of vanilla.The mystery of an abandoned village.Life on a late 19th century Royal Navy
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Strange Company - 10/3/2025
Soapy Smith STAR NotebookPage 24 - Original copy1884Courtesy of Geri Murphy(Click image to enlarge) oapy Smith's "STAR" notebook page 24, 1882 and 1884, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Portland. Steamer Ancon. This post is on page 24, the last of the "STAR" notebook pages I have been deciphering and publishing for the last two years, since July 24, 2023. The page is two separate notes dated 1882
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Soapy Smith's Soap Box - 9/17/2025
Before Riverside Park, before Riverside Drive, before the sparsely populated Manhattan district known since the 18th century as Bloomingdale was urbanized into the Upper West Side, there was a lone modest house. Perched on the edge of the Hudson River in the West 80s, the two-story, pitched-roof dwelling appears to have no neighbors. A back […]
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Ephemeral New York - 9/29/2025
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
Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper, March 28, 1868.Robert Sprague, a normally peaceful man, was spending a quiet evening with his family in their home in Jasper, Iowa, on February 17, 1868. He was reading the Bible with his mother, wife, and children when his 70-year-old mother asked him a question in relation to a religious meeting the night before. At the previous night’s meeting,
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Murder By Gaslight - 9/27/2025
New to Warps & Wefts? We’ve been online since 2007 with hundreds of articles, posts, over a thousand images, animations, colorizations, newspaper coverage and clippings of the murders and trial day by day, cartoons, AI and imagined imaging, videos, profiles of important people in the case, on the road field trip vlogs and much more. We post every day on Facebook, usually 6-10 posts on various topics so everyone can find something to enjoy reading- why? Because we want a bit of the Borden case every day! We sign off every night around 10 p.m. and upload every morning around 9 a.m. Visit our Facebook and Youtube channel links below. Please do like and follow our Facebook page  Send us your questions! No Patreons or monetization ever. No detail too small to be considered. Stop by to see us- we learn something new every day!  https://www.facebook.com/lizziebordenwarpsandwefts/ https://www.youtube.com/@LizzieBordenWarpsandWefts See less Comments Author Lizzie Borden Warps &
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Lizzie Borden: Warps and Wefts - 9/26/2025
  [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
Western Train Robbers' Ways in New York State. | Comedian Punches Drummer.

Take a Chance?

Take a chance?

Take a Chance? 


Whatever may be said in general terms, against the morality of lotteries, this easy method of raising money has become a part of the regular machinery of charitable fairs, and every objection is met with the undeniable statement that it is both popular and successful. Many a one, who otherwise would not contribute a dime, will take a chance in a lottery, especially when assailed, liked the nice young man in the accompanying sketch, with the pleasant cajoleries of charming young ladies. It is a singular and not very creditable fact that mere misery is less potent than many other influences to unlock a cash-box.


Reprinted from "Take a Chance?" Harper's Weekly. 19 Nov 1870