She-Devils and How They Weave Their Webs

The Candy-Store Traps for School-Girls—The Fiendish Traffic in Children's Souls

These tenement blocks are little worlds in themselves, and so it is with the residents on our most popular streets. An old citizen, one would suppose, might easily familiarize himself with the calling and habits of his neighbors, but not even the most experienced have any suspicion of the crimes that are nightly committed within a stone's throw of their parlors, of the villainous snares set to entrap the pure yet thoughtless young girls, of the hellish traffic that is covertly carried on—all looking to the corruption of the young females, and the enrichment of the heartless hags who woo their victims to their nests.

Illustrated Police News, January 31, 1880.

They are infatuated with two minstrel men, but their mothers interfere, Winchester, Ind. [more]

A scene was enacted at Winchester, Ind., by the reckless escapade indulged in by two young ladies of Greenville, O., who became infatuated with two members of Cleveland’s Minstrel Company and followed them from Greenville to that place. Friends of the girls suspected their intentions, and had in turn followed them. The girls registered at a hotel, and were just on the point of retiring, having engaged separate rooms, when they were surprised, not to say paralyzed, by the sudden and alarming appearance of their mothers. The old ladies “had blood in their eyes,” and a dramatic scene was only averted by the quick surrender of the girls and their departure for home. The entertainment hadn’t closed when the ladies left, and the two disappointed showmen afforded spectators considerable amusement by their efforts to locate their friends before they learned of the old ladies’ visit and the announced change of programme. The showmen are married men.

Reprinted from the National Police Gazette, December 8, 1894