No. 876
Crime, Eccentricity, and the Sporting Life in 19th Century America.
July 21, 2026

A Somnambulistic Feat.

Pretty Louise Liebendorfer, of Pittsburg, Pa., crosses a steep trestle while asleep.
July 21, 2026
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Tag: Ohio

A New Child Abandonment Trick.

How a woman slipped out and left a kid on a photographer's hands.

11/4/2024

So Far from Home

Her struggle was useless, the life-blood was pouring from a gaping wound in her throat.

12/21/2021

Burning of Steamers at Cincinnati.

Burning of Steamers on the Ohio River at Cincinnati May 17, 1869.

9/17/2018

Afloat on a Cake of Ice.

Perilous Situation of a Skating Party on the Ohio River Near Zanesville, Ohio.

1/1/2018

Whipped for Alleged Slander.

Actress Dorothy Morton cowhided in Heucks’ Theatre, Cincinnati, by irate chorus girls.

9/4/2017

He Was Coffined Alive.

A Sandusky citizen, the father of Capt. Jacob Garrett of Springfield, O., has a novel experience which he will not soon forget.

2/20/2017

A Scene not on the Bills.

Actor Ricardo’s bluff jump from the stage to the audience at the Grand Opera House, Columbus, Ohio.

10/17/2016

A Triangular Fight.

9/19/2016

Pretty Mary Nelson’s Downfall.

Wine suppers, fine dresses and rolls of greenbacks cause a young and fascinating Cincinnati girl to cast aside the mantle of virtue.

8/29/2016

His Peep Ends Disastrously.

William Peters, a Cincinnati dude, tries to mash Maggie Bolton but gets mashed instead.

8/15/2016

She Stole Her Lover’s Clothes.

A Cincinnati girl parades the streets in male attire and is yanked in for her temerity and immodesty.

7/4/2016

Comedian Punches Drummer.

Pete Baker thrashes H. J. Jenkins for trying to flirt with the actor’s daughter in Dayton, O.

3/10/2015

Aboriginal Footprints.

11/17/2014

A Human Vampire.

4/28/2014

She Skipped.

7/2/2013

Cursing In Church

Westfield, Ohio, October 23, 1887 - The Sudden Insanity of Rev J. R. Young. He uses profane language in a Sunday school at Westfield, Ohio.

12/20/2011

Did the Naughty Midway Dance

Pretty Ida Lawrence gets arrested while entertaining some hackmen in Cincinnati, O.

3/28/2011
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  [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
(Illustrated Police News, April 3, 1886.)Agnes Anastasia Long moved out of her parents’ home in East Attleboro, Massachusetts, in April 1882. With her many male suiters, she was considered the black sheep of the family. Her father had enough of her bad behavior and, according to the Boston Herald, “refused to permit her to darken the threshold of his humble home.”She took a job at Streeter
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Murder By Gaslight - 8/22/2026
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
Squabbling Socialists. | A Jilted Woman’s Revenge.

A Somnambulistic Feat.

Sleepwalker

Police Officer David Smith, of Pittsburgh, Pa., was startled a few mornings ago by what at first appeared to be an apparition from the other world. A nearer approach showed that the figure was Miss Louise Liebendorfer, clad only in a nightgown and slippers. She had left her home while in a somnambulatistic state, and going to the top of the Knoxville incline, had walked along the steep trestle work to the bottom of the track and then along Carson Street, where Officer Smith met and awakened her. She was taken to the police station, where clothing as supplied with which to go home.


National Police Gazette, January 17, 1891.