No. 242
Crime, Eccentricity, and the Sporting Life in 19th Century America.
February 23, 2015

A Monkey and Dog Time.

The novel bating match in Van Wert, Ohio, between a Marion gorilla and a Fort Wayne, Indiana Canine.
February 23, 2015
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Tag: New York

Another Steamboat Disaster.

The Steamboat "Riverdale" Blown Up in the Hudson.

11/14/2023

A Great Game of Football.

Fair college students engage in a rough-and-tumble chase after the pigskin.

11/7/2023

Caught a Cowboy.

A Manheim, N.Y., Maiden insert an advertisement in a matrimonial paper and is astonished at the result.

7/19/2022

A Man's Head Blown to Atoms.

A man's head blown to atoms by the explosion of a beer barrel on Long Island.

8/30/2021

Homeward Bound.

Vacationers leaving Lake George, New York, 1879.

5/7/2019

The Age of Advertising.

The next thing in order - The Hudson River Palisades Art Galery.

12/3/2018

Pedal Advertising.

How two Dizzy Girls Advertised Their Charms and Political Faith.

11/5/2018

Up the Hudson.

9/18/2018

Great Base Ball Match.

Great baseball match between the Atlantic and Boxford Clubs of Brooklyn.

4/23/2018

Thrilling Railroad Accident.

Startling accident at the draw bridge of the Rensselaer and Saratoga Railroad, Federal Street, Troy, N. Y., Saturday, Sept 23.

11/6/2017

Disguising Nature.

Society’s male darlings “making up” their faces for the purpose of “looking pretty” to their addlepated female counterparts; Saratoga, N. Y.

5/29/2017

Pugilists in Petticoats.

Alleged bout between Annie Russell and Elizabeth Sullivan, two pretty clerks in a Buffalo, N. Y.

4/10/2017

Crazed by Politics.

Lendall Pratt, and aged Long Islander, kills himself while in a political frenzy.

11/7/2016

Done Up by Dizzy Blondes.

A special from Canajoharie, Sept 26, says: Duncan Clark, manager of Clark’s Female Minstrels, will probably not visit the Mohawk valley again very soon.

6/20/2016

Saratoga’s Naughty Girl.

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

3/7/2016

Heroism of a Society Belle.

The Bravery of charming Miss Jaffray, the daughter of a New York millionaire, saves many lives at Irvington, N. Y.

12/28/2015

Fighting Marines.

Some of Uncle Sam’s land and water police have a genial shindy among themselves at the Navy Yard, Brooklyn, N. Y.

11/5/2015

Another Amorous Parson.

Westchester County is all agog over the case of the Rev. Mr. White, accused of violently assaulting the sister-in-law of a brother clergyman. We illustrate the scene.

10/6/2015

Said She Would and Did.

Mrs. Cary cures her husband of flirting by ascending in a balloon at Buffalo, N. Y.

4/27/2015

The White Porpoise.

We give in our present number a correct sketch of one of the largest specimens of the Porpoise that has ever been seen.

3/16/2015

Killed and Eaten by Hogs.

9/15/2014

They Got Hilariously Full.

Alleged cancan dance indulged in by young male and female swells at Jamestown, New York.

8/12/2014

Thimble Rig A La Mode.

3/18/2014

A New Shoplifting Dodge.

A female thief who carries a baby in her arms and made its flowing skirts a cover for stolen goods

12/3/2013

The Last Dip of the Season.

Water witches who frolic with Neptune, no matter how cold his embrace.

9/3/2013

First Automobile in Manhattan.

8/5/2013

Dropping Their Disguise.

How a loving bridal couple were suddenly transformed into a brace of absconding counterfeiters.

6/18/2013

Undercover Lunatic.

5/26/2013

Shooting at the Elevated.

After-dinner pistol practice at the trains that rush by windows

5/7/2013

Mother Mandelbaum's Secrets.

4/23/2013

The Pawn-Ticket Game.

Pawn tickets make bad collateral.

3/5/2013

Insane Criminal Escapes.

1/27/2013

An Underground Stale-Beer Dive.

12/18/2012

Rogues & Brawlers.

11/13/2012

A Fiendish Husband’s Desperate Deed.

10/16/2012

Serpent and Dove.

10/2/2012

The Advent of Spiritualism.

A simple schoolgirl prank spawned a new belief with millions of followers.

9/4/2012

Copper.

8/20/2012

A Slippery and Subtle Knave – The Bank Sneak.

7/31/2012

Ararat: City of Refuge.

7/3/2012

Street Arabs and Gutter-Snipes.

Waifs and strays of a great city - A group of homeless New York Newsboys.

6/11/2012

A Ghastly Table.

6/5/2012

Comstockery.

Anthony Comstock was on a personal mission to protect America from vice.

5/1/2012

Being Initiated.

3/13/2012

Inspector Thomas F. Byrnes.

3/4/2012

Another Voice for Cleveland.

12/13/2011

New York Society Classified.

11/27/2011

Trixie Got the Best of It.

Two Little Gem Theatre, Buffalo, N. Y., Soubrettes have a scrap on account of a man.

10/8/2011

Caroline Burned!

9/19/2011

The Astor Place Riot

8/15/2011

Recruiting For Sin's Army

7/5/2011

Sparking in Tompkins Square

Cupid in Tompkins Square

6/28/2011

The Bunco Game

The term “bunco” has come to mean to any type of swindle, but in the 19th century it usually referred to a confidence game involving crooked gambling.

5/17/2011

Hazing at the Stock Board

How the battering-ram process is applied by the bulls and bears to while away the idle hours of the dull season.

5/8/2011

The Cardiff Giant

Cardiff, New York, October 16, 1869.

4/10/2011

Bank Heist

The Audacity of a Professional Thief.

4/3/2011

Chorus Girls in a Panic.

An unruly horse causes great excitement in the Metropolitan Opera House, this city.

3/14/2011

“Daredevil” Steve Brodie

2/17/2011
"Tulsa World," September 9, 1976, via Newspapers.comIn the 1970s, Kenneth D. Bacon was the presiding judge of the Oklahoma State Court of Appeals.  He was also a skilled amateur pilot.  In short, he was an intelligent, competent, and extremely level-headed sort, one of the last people you would expect to provide Strange Company material.  However, Bacon claimed that on a
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Strange Company - 5/4/2026
"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
The upside to a constantly changing city is the sudden resurfacing of a faded store sign. Case in point: the outline of the “Cards-U-Like” Hallmark store on First Avenue between 75th and 76th Streets. I’m placing it in the late 1970s because of the cute cursive letters, and the earliest newspaper ads I could find […]
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Ephemeral New York - 5/4/2026
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 Evening Journal, March 18, 1898)Around 1 a.m. on September 2, 1896, Samuel Meyers ran out of the tenement at 202 East 29th Street, screaming, “Murder! Murder! Police! Police!” Patrolman Tyler heard his cries and ran to the spot. “My wife is murdered!” said Meyers, “Somebody has killed my wife. She’s dead.” Tyler and another officer followed Meyers to a second-floor apartment.
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Murder By Gaslight - 5/2/2026
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
Was Her Story a Fake? | A Woman’s Flat-Irony.

A Monkey and Dog Time.

Monkey and Dog

The novel bating match in Van Wert, Ohio, between a Marion gorilla and a Fort Wayne, Indiana Canine. [more]

A fight between the thoroughbred English bulldog Jack and an African gorilla occurred recently at Van Wert, Ohio. The dog was owned by W. H. Steward, of Fort Wayne, Ind., and weighed about forty pounds. The ape belonged in Marion, Ind., and was nearly twice as heavy. The stakes were a $1000 purse. As soon as the animals faced each other the dog fastened his teeth in the ape’s neck, but seemed unable to penetrate the thick hide of the latter. Quick as a flash the gorilla had the dog in his long arms and broke his back by main strength. He sunk his long tusks repeatedly into the neck and spine of the bulldog until the blood flowed in streams. The dog was utterly helpless, and his owner threw up the sponge to save him from being killed just as the dog fell over dead.


Reprinted from National Police Gazette, January 4, 1890