News Items from The Kansas City Journal ~ Old News That's New to You from Vintage Kansas City.com

December 29, 1909

P. O. NEW YEAR'S SCHEDULE.

Carriers Will Make Morning De-

livery; Department Hours.

An extra force of clerks and carriers will be maintained at the postoffice the balance of this week to take care of the lag end of Christmas deliveries. For New Year's day the schedule will be as follows:

All carriers will make one complete delivery, leaving postoffice and carrier stations at 8:15 a. m.

Three collections of mail will be made in the business districts beginning at 7 a. m., 2 p. m. and 6 p. m.

Two collections of mail will be made in the residence districts beginning at 8:15 a. m. and 5 p. m.

General delivery, open all day.

Inquiry department, open from 8 a. m. to 11:30 a. m.

Registry division, open from 8 a. m. to 11:30 a. m.

Stamp division, open all day.

Money order division, closed.

Labels: holidays, New Years, post office

September 22, 1909

FEW BOOKS ARE STOLEN

FROM PUBLIC LIBRARY.

Cynics Might Learn Lesson in

Optimism There -- Uncle Sam

Helps Find Delinquents.

The cynic who believes that the world is going to the bow-wows because of increasing dishonesty could take a lesson in optimism at the public library from the infrequency with which books are stolen by the general public.

"The number of books lost through theft in the course of a year is surprisingly small when it is taken into consideration that the library, to meet its greatest usefulness, is forced to allow the books to be taken out in a rather indiscriminate way," said Mrs. Carrie W. Whitney, the librarian. "And beside that, it doesn't seem any more of a crime to a book lover to steal a book than it does to a man with a plug hat to steal an umbrella on a rainy day."

In spite of the air of trust that surrounds the obtaining of books at the library, close supervision over thousands who receive books from there is maintained. The most potent agency used by the library in finding thoughtless persons who take public library books with them when they remove to some other portion of the city than the residence they gave in getting the library card, is the postoffice department. Persons who leave Kansas City are located through the same agency.

When almost every effort to locate the thoughtless borrower had bee made, the librarians drop a registered note in the mails. Uncle Sam takes charge of it. There are few persons who do not leave a new address at the postoffice. They may ignore polite notes to return the book, leaving the librarian to believe they never received the letter.

But when a registered letter arrives, their signatures must be placed on the return slip, which is sent back promptly to the library. This course rarely fails to locate the borrower and the book.

Labels: books, libraries, post office

August 1, 1909

DIDN'T WANT TO BE KNOWN.

"It's Nobody's Business," Said Gun-

ard Edholm, and Died.

Five days ago a well dressed Swede, about 40 years of age, applied to former Mayor James A. Reed for employment as yardman and chauffeur, and was engaged. He said little about himself at the time, no more than that he had been a baker, but wanted an outdoor job, and set about learning how to run Mr. Reed's car with a good deal of intelligence.

Three days ago the new man said he felt ill and the net day went to the hospital. Yesterday Mr. Reed was at the postoffice trying to find some mail for the man, who had died.

"I mean to give him a decent burial," said Mr. Reed, "and want to find out whom the poor fellow was. He evidently was a man of education. One of the maids at the house asked him, when he said he thought he ought to go to the hospital, to give the address of his people.

" 'It is nobody's business,' he said. 'I don't want anybody to know where I am.' "

The former mayor's mysterious stranger had given the name of Gunard Edholm.

Labels: death, immigrants, James A. Reed, post office

June 27, 1909

PRISON PRESENT FOR PRIEST.

Engraving of "Last Supper" on the

Handle of Knife from Greece.

A package sent here from Greece to a Greek church priest who recently came to Kansas City was stopped by the postal authorities yesterday and turned over to the custom official for inspection. If the contents prove to be subject to impost a duty will be levied.

A Greek messenger had called for the priest's mail but the custom officers demanded the presence of the man to whom the package was addressed. The priest, in his rimless stovepipe hat, long black silk robes and thick bushy whiskers, went to the customs ho use in person and claimed the package. In the presence of the treasury department he opened it and discovered a knife. It was wrapped in a letter which said the knife was sent from a prisoner to his old priest as a memento.

As a knife it did not amount to much, the blade, a thick ugly thing, evidently being part of an iron strap from a barrel and the spring made from an old key. On each side of the handle was engraved a representation of the Last Supper. The wood looked like box elder. The carving was excellent though the figures were not over half an inch in height and the distance from the first to the thirteenth only two and one-half inches. The treasury decided the knife had no commercial value and so declared it undutiable.

Edge tools are barred from all United States penitentiaries but the present to the Greek priest which arrived yesterday shows that in Athens they not only allow prisoners to have knives but teach them how to use them.

The address on the wrapper was in Greek characters. An interpreter who took the priest to the customs house accommodated the treasury men by writing the name in English. His English was more puzzling than the Greek, so the customs house does not know yet who got the knife so far as any record goes.

Labels: immigrants, ministers, penitentiary, post office

May 24, 1909

HE CHANGES HIS UNIFORMS.

Letter Carrier Who Believes in

Cleanliness and Neatness.

Should all of the men in the civil service of the United States follow the example of a well known mail carrier in Kansas City the work of tailors would treble and the men would gain fame for their general appearance. The man who sets the pace in neatness is found in the city directory in the following short history: "Harry Feaman, Carrier, P. O. 3217 East Eleventh Street."

This firm believer in the old proverb of "Cleanliness is next to Godliness" works for Uncle Sam for eight hours every day. He carries a mail route in the North End and the city hall. The mail bags are heavy but become burdensome when stuffed with letters and papers. A carrier is constantly waling and is compelled to climb many pairs of stairs in the course of a day.

There is considerable dust flying in the air in the neighborhood of city hall and when Carrier Feaman's work is finished he feels dirty and grimy. He changes his uniform from three to five times a day and tops each change with a cold water bath. In consequence of these many changes this mail carrier always appears neat and tidy, in fact one would believe that he had just stepped out of a band box.

When Feaman gets up in the morning he refreshes himself with a dip in a tub of cold water, dresses and goes to work. Returning home for lunch he again indulges in a plunge and dons clean clothes and a freshly pressed uniform. The work of distributing his mail in the afternoon musses up his garments and so it is bath and change of clothes No. 3 for Mr. Feaman.

Labels: city hall, civil service, clothing, Eleventh street, North end, post office

April 26, 1909

JUDGE M. A. PURSLEY DEAD.

End Came at Hot Springs, Where

He Went for Health.

Judge Marshall A. Pursley of Kansas City died in Hot Springs, Ark., Saturday night where he went in search of health ten days ago. The remains will be brought here for burial. Judge Pursley was born in Farmland, Ind., and was 45 years of age. He is a son-in-law of E. Stine and survived by a widow and two daughters, Helen and Emma, also two brothers and a sister. Judge Pursley came to Kansas City twenty-three years ago, and was prominent in politics. He was elected justice of the peace and for the past eight years was auditor of the Kansas City postoffice. He was a member of the board of directors of the Brotherhood of American Yeomen; judge advocate general of the Missouri Brigade Uniform Rank of Knights of Pythias, a member of No. 3, Uniform Rank Sicilian Lodge No. 39, Knights of Pythias; Albert Pyke Lodge, A. F. and A. M. Modern Woodmen, and Royal Neighbors. Arrangements for the funeral will be announced later.

Labels: death, Judges, lodges, politics, post office

April 4, 1909

OKLAHOMA COUPLE CAUGHT.

Nellie Wylie, 13, of Woodward, Ran

Away With Man of 30 -- Both

Arrested Here.

Three weeks ago Nellie May Wylie, 13 years old, disappeared from her country home near Woodward, Ok. At the same time George Lovett, 30 years old, who had been known to pay the girl some friendly attention, also disappeared.

No trace whatever could be found of the missing girl until recently, when a sister at Woodward got a letter from her postmarked at Broken Bow, Neb. To that she had signed the name of Mrs. Abraham Whistler." The girl's father, L. A. Wylie, placed the matter in the hands of the sheriff at home, and a wire sent to Broken Bow brought the information that the pair had left there and had directed that their mail be sent to Kansas City.

About 4 o'clock yesterday afternoon Patrolman J. R. Robeson of No. 6 station arrested the couple near the postoffice, Ninth street and Grand avenue. To her uncle, E. L. Wylie, who came on from Woodward, his niece is said to have confessed that she and Lovett had not married. She will be taken home this morning by the uncle. Lovett is locked up at police headquarters for investigation.

Labels: children, Grand avenue, Ninth street, No 6 police station, oklahoma, post office

February 26, 1909

A "WASH" UNDER DIFFICULTIES.

Raw Recruit Tried to Bathe in Fed-

eral Building Sink.

"I don't know, I s'pose that feller meant what he said, but how can I get a good wash here unless I get right into it, and how am I going to get in even if he does want me to," ruminated C. L. Johnson, a raw recruit for the navy, in the public wash room in the federal building yesterday.

W. J. Vickery, chief clerk in the postoffice inspector's department, heard Johnson's soliloquy and called in Quartermaster Freese of the recruiting station. When Freese arrived on the scene Johnson was just removing the last articles of his apparel preparatory to the bath he was about to take.

"Now, how do you ever expect a feller to get into that?" exclaimed the recruit, while pointing at the porcelain sink used by the janitors of the building. "I simply can't do it, an' if you want me to take a good wash, I guess I'll have to do it a little at a time. If I did get into it, I could never get out."

By this time an interested group of spectators had gathered, and Johnson concluded to postpone his bath, and hurriedly donned his clothing. Quartermaster Freese explained the situation.

"I told him to go out and take a good wash, so that I could get a record of his finger prints, which we keep on file in our office for reference. I didn't mean for him to take a bath. He'll get all of that that's coming to him when he gets to Mare Island."

Johnson is 18 years old, and said he had parents, but did not know where they were. His physical examination showed far better than the majority of applicants. He was sent to San Francisco, where he will enter the apprentice schools at Mare Island. He said he lived at Anderson, Mo.

Labels: federal building, military, post office

February 21, 1909

EASY DAY FOR UNCLE SAM.

Only Few Departments of Postoffice

Open Tomorrow -- One Delivery.

Tomorrow is Washington's birthday and the schedule at the postoffice will be changed accordingly. All carriers will make one full delivery, leaving the postoffice and substations at 8:15. Three collections will be made in the business districts, at 7 a. m., 2 p. m. and 6 p. m.

The money order division will be closed all day, but Uncle Sam's nieces and nephews can buy all the stamps they want any time in the day. The general delivery window will be opened all day, but the inquiry department and registry division will only do business from 8 to 11 o'clock in the morning.

Labels: holidays, post office

February 9, 1909

LINCOLN STAMPS ARRIVE.

Local Postoffice Receives 10,000 of Souvenir Issue.

A consignment of 10,000 2-cent stamps especially issued in honor of the 100th birthday of Abraham Lincoln was received at the postoffice yesterday. The stamps are red and contain a handsome engraving of Lincoln's face, bowed, and the usual inscription with the dates 1809 - February 12 - 1909. The office has asked for 4,000,000, but will probably not receive that many. Eight millions are the usual number of stamps sold by the office in a year. The memorial stamp is a pretty one and the officials expect the supply to be soon exhausted.

Labels: Abraham Lincoln, post office

January 23, 1909

LINCOLN POSTAGE STAMPS.

Issue Commemorative of 100th Birth-

day of Martyred President.

An issue of 2-cent postage stamps, commemorative of the 100th anniversary of the birth of Abraham Lincoln, will be issued by the postoffice department. The first installment of this issue will be ready for distribution among presidential postoffices the first of the month. Kansas City's postoffice is included among those that will get a supply.

Labels: post office

January 18, 1909

NEW ISSUE OF STAMPS HERE.

Postmaster Harris Has $200,000

Worth of Them on Hand.

A new issue of stamps is about to blossom forth in all its splendor but its splendor is not up to that of the current issue. In fact, severe simplicity is the characteristic of the coming stamp and, except for the 1-cent denomination which is adorned with the bust of Franklin, all of the others bear the bust of Washington in profile, and the designs are almost exactly alike. Something like $200,000 worth of the new issue is already in the Kansas City postoffice, but they are not yet in regular sale at the windows.

The 1-cent is green, the 2-cent, red; the 3-cent, purple; the 4-cent, light brown, the 5-cent, blue, and the 10-cent, a light yellow or lemon.

Labels: post office

January 12, 1909

CAN'T BREAK INTO THE NAVY.

William Grim's Efforts to Get Be-

hind the Gun Unsuccessful.

William Grim, who thought he might win his way into the navy through the police department by giving himself up as a deserter last Saturday, appeared at the naval recruiting station in the postoffice building yesterday afternoon and wanted to enlist in the regular way.

Lieutenant J. F. Landis, in charge of the station, asked the applicant his age. The man said he was 18.

"Haven't we seen you before?" asked Lieutenant Landis.

"Yes; I am the deserter the police arrested," replied Grim. "I should have been billed straight through to my ship, the Baltimore, but it seems there was some hitch."

Grim was given a short examination at the station and refused admission to the society of Jackies.

"You're blackballed in this organization from having betrayed the sacred trust of your country," laughed a quartermaster as the counterfeit deserter left.

"Oh, that's all right. I'll enlist in the marines at the army recruiting station," said Grim.

Labels: military, post office

December 13, 1908

MUST BE MAILED TODAY.

Christmas Presents Intended for the

British Isles.

This is the last day for posting presents for the British Isles and the eastern part of the European continent, if they are to be delivered before Christmas day. Packages should be in the general postoffice not later than 5 o'clock this afternoon, and marked, "per Lusitania," if they are to get across the Atlantic in proper time. The Lusitania will sail at 6:30 Wednesday morning from Ne York, and will land her mails on the other side about Sunday night or Monday morning following. This gives about four days for the land journey.

Labels: boats, holidays, post office

November 4, 1908

STAYED UP NEARLY ALL

NIGHT TO READ RETURNS

Great Crowds in Front of Newspaper

Offices -- Returns at the

Clubs.

Republicans and Democrats alike, not to mention members of the lesser parties, stood cheek by jowl for hours last night -- not in beatific political harmony -- but in a common desire to rubber over the other fellow's shoulder and catch the flashes of election news that were thrown on canvass screens by the stereopticon in many parts of the city. Everybody jostled and laughed and gently roasted each other, and when the returns suited them yelled approval, but never was an ugly bit of temper put on unpleasant display.

Kansas City stayed up late enough to learn the approximate fate of its favorite candidate, and then went to bed with a fair assurance that it would awaken in the land of the free whether Taft, Bryan, or somebody else were elected. For once in the year at least, Papa Casey had a healthy excuse to present to Mamma Casey for staying out so late, but for the fact that in many cases that she was out with him and all the little Caseys.

HOW IT WAS DONE.

Most of the crowd didn't see the men behind the stereopticon, seated at tables and busily transcribing telegrams to the little glass slides in black drawing ink. They had to write minutely so as to get all of a telegram on one of the three by four panes of glass, but the phonographs and cartoons kept the people standing until another fresh slide was ready to put in.

The adding machine was in much demand and whole batteries of them did nocturnal duty in the various newspaper offices, with experts from the banks who knew how to punch the keys properly. Though serpentine in name, the adders produced some straight figures that won't miss the official returns very far, for the benefit of the multitude.

AT THE CLUBS.

In the lodge room of the Elk's Club the furniture was swathed in roughing-it covering and the members held forth for the night, as was true at the Commercial Club, where the attaches of the club and transportation bureau were enlisted in the work of handling the returns.

At the Y. M. C. A. a wire was cut in and between telegrams the waiters were entertained by a stereopticon lecture on California by Aldred Foster of New Zealand.

Members of the Railroad Club heard the returns at the club rooms in Walnut street and after the theaters closed Thespians came up to join them.

Federal officers and employes for the most part heard the returns in the federal court room on the third floor of the postoffice building, and in Convention hall and at the corners of Eighth and McGee, Tenth and McGee and Eleventh and Grand great crowds stood far into the night to get the returns as they came in.

Labels: California, Convention Hall, Eighth street, Eleventh street, Grand avenue, McGee street, organizations, politics, post office, stereopticons, telegram, Tenth street, Walnut Street, YMCA

July 1, 1908

GAVE SIGNAL OF DISTRESS.

Insane Man, Believing Life to Be in

Danger, Calls on Brothers.

The Rev. Reuben Pritchett, and escaped patient from the state hospital for the insane at Austin, Tex., caused much excitement at police headquarters yesterday afternoon by giving the sign of distress of a secret order, meant to be used only by a member of that order who believes his life to be in danger. Several members of the order, not knowing of the man's mental condition, sprang toward him, but stopped when they saw that he was merely being searched by the police.

For several days Detectives J. B. Koshlear and J. J. McGraw have been searching for the Rev. Pritchett, who, they had been informed, was in Kansas City. Detective Keshlear found the man near the postoffice yesterday and had a hard time getting him to the station. The minister fought furiously and it took three policemen to get him in the patrol wagon.

The insane man will be sent to Galveston.

Labels: detectives, mental health, ministers, police, post office

June 18, 1908

CITY IN MOVING PICTURES.

Films Will Be Exposed in the Retail

Section Today.

If your wife's new directoire is finished, dress her up and parade her in the downtown district this afternoon.

That is a duty a good citizen owes Kansas City today, of all days in the year, for today the town goes on the motion picture films to be exhibited all over the world.

A special street car carrying the phenomenal machine which puts you and your smile on the films will start at 1:30 o'clock from Thirteenth street and Grand avenue. If you chance to be strolling from the postoffice about this time the face you turn toward the machine will be exhibited in Hale's Tours in amusement places in many countries.

Here is the route of the car: From the start at Thirteenth street and Grand avenue the first run will be on Grand avenue to Fifth street, west on Fifth street to Walnut street. The car will start south on Walnut street at 1:45, 2 o'clock it will run north on Main street to the city hall and at 2:30 o'clock it will run from Wyandotte and Eighth streets east to Oak street. This will end the first day's film making.

Of course this is going to be done only provided the weather is clear. Next week, probably Saturday or Sunday, the machine will be placed on an automobile and pictures made of the boulevards. When the flood waters recede pictures will be made of the manufacturing district in the West Bottoms and later interior views of the banks and other large institutions will be made.

The films are made in sections. As the Kansas City film will appear it will show Kansas City from an inbound Wabash passenger train, giving a glimpse of the intercity viaduct.

The pictures will be made and exhibited by the International Publicity Company.

Labels: arts, automobiles, Fifth street, Grand avenue, intercity viaduct, Main street, moving pictures, Oak street, post office, streetcar, Thirteenth street, Walnut Street, Wyandotte street

June 5, 1908

CUTTING OUT NAUGHTY CARDS.

Postoffice Authorities Refuse to Han-

dle and Deliver Drivel.

Renewed instructions have come from Washington to stop the custom of sending objectionable postal cards through the mail. Last week Postmaster J. H. Harris refused to forward a big batch of advertising cards which had on them the picture of a little girl only partly dressed. A protest was made that the picture was of a very young child and that it could not be regarded in any way be regarded as suggestive. Yesterday the postmaster was upheld by Washington.

"The department is simply protecting those who cannot otherwise get protection," said Postmaster Harris. "In this instance it was a genuine mistake of judgment, but nine times out of ten some cheap individual will blow himself to the tune of a nickel to send a smart card to a businessman in hopes that the girls in his office will see it. He is not brave enough to send the card to her direct. We are appealed to time and again to stop it. So this office is stopping it. Our sorters do not see all the picture cards that go in, but they nail every one that has a smart Alec look about it. The postoffice never was created for drivel, and frivolous postal cards are drivel."

Labels: post office

June 5, 1908

LOWER POSTAGE TO ENGLAND.

Two-Cent Rate on Letters Goes Into

Effect October 1.

Announcements made yesterday in Washington and London that after October 1 there will be a 2-cent postage between this country and the British isles did not cause much interest here. The British mails here are light. According to Postmaster J. H. Harris they will not run over 250 letters and about five sacks of other matter daily.

"We handle more business correspondence between Great Britain and this city than we do between Germany and this city, but there are more personal letters in the German trade than in the British. The English do not write letters. The Germans write regularly."

It is expected that when the official bulletin arrives, it will add that the domestic post card rates will apply to the British trade. This post card business is one of the wonders of the department. For 4 cents one may buy a foreign "return card," the United States getting and keeping the 4 cents. On being delivered at the other side the recipient there detaches the return portion of the card, bearing the United States coat of arms, writes the reply and deposits it in the foreign mail box. The foreign postoffice department forwards the card without ever getting pay for it, "and it never will," said postmaster Harris. "We keep all we get in this game of postoffice. The presumption is that one letter brings out a reply and, in this return card business it is reckoned there will be as many bought on one side of the ocean as on the other. I never saw a foreign return clear through my postoffice, though."

Labels: England, post office

May 24, 1908

FROM LONDON IN ONE WEEK.

Letters Posted There on May 16 Re-

ceived Here Last Night.

All previous mail records between the British Isles, the Continent and Kansas City have been broken. Letters bearing the London postmark of Saturday, May 16, were received in the postoffice here last night at 10:30 o'clock. In the same consignment were letters bearing the stamp of Lucerne, Switzerland, of May 14; of Glasgow, Scotland, May 15, and other points in England, Ireland and Scotland of May 16, last Saturday, or just one week from the time they were posted.

This quick time is due to the swift run of the great steamer Lusitania, which made the port of New York Friday morning after a run of four days and twenty hours from the last point of land in the British Isles. The letters received here last night came over on her. There was no doubt at all about that, because many of them were stamped: "Via S. S. Lusitania." One week from London to Kansas City, and Foreman B. F. Kingery, in the distributing department of the postoffice, said last night the letters would have reached here a few hours earlier if they had not been "worked over," that is, sorted out and remailed, in New York.

Labels: boats, England, New York, post office

May 23, 1908

MAIL FROM BRITISH

ISLES IN ONE WEEK.

LUSITANIA'S FAST TIME MAKES

THIS RECORD POSSIBLE.

Pouches Which Left London Last

Saturday Are Due Here

at 6 o'clock Today --

A New Record.

Considerable interest is manifested in the postoffice over the chances of getting the Lusitania's mails in at 5:30 tonight. If this is done, it will be the first time one Saturday's British post has got this far West by the following Saturday.

"I think it will be managed," said Postmaster J. H. Harris yesterday, after consulting his schedules. "The Lusitania made the port of New York at 3 o'clock this morning, giving her five hours to transfer her mails. Those mails left for the West at 8 o'clock this morning. They are due in this postoffice at 5:50 Saturday afternoon. It will be a record for trans-Atlantic pouches."

American mails from England, Scotland, and Wales have an exciting time of it. They may not start from the big centers, such as London, Newcastle, Sheffield, Birmingham, Nottingham, where the curtains are made; Edinburgh or Glasgow till the very hour that the steamers are sailing from Liverpool, yet they catch the boat. While the ship is making her way down the Irish channel leisurely, so as to get off Cork harbor, for the Queenstown passengers, in daylight, as those passengers go out to the liner on board a small tender, the mails are rushed to Liverpool by fast trains, hurried directly over the comparatively narrow channel to Dublin, and then sent South as fast as trains can rush them.

In this manner they get to Queenstown before the tender shoves off to steam out to the big liner. On arriving at this side fast tugs meet the liner about ten miles down the bay from New York. The mails are thrown overboard to the tugs and these little vessels, able to make short cuts over shallow places and dodge in and about shipping, have the mails either in the general postoffice at New York or on the Western bound trains long before the liner is docked. In that way it is expected that mails which left London last Saturday at 6 o'clock in the evening may reach here tonight at about the same hour.

Labels: boats, England, New York, post office, railroad

May 11, 1908

SILENT WOMAN MYSTIFIES.

Marie Moore Hasn't Spoken Since Be-

ing Locked in a Cell.

Marie Moore, the sphinx of the federal court, retired early last evening to her cot in the county jail, and when she was asked where she lived and who her father was, she pulled the covers over her head, but never said a word.

Marie was taken before United States Commissioner John M. Nuckols Thursday after her arrest in the postoffice to answer to a charge of sending an improper letter through the mails to another girl. She refused to plead guilty or not guilty and would not answer the commissioner's questions. Saturday she was indicted by the federal grand jury on the same charge, and when arraigned before Judge John C. Pollock again refused to talk. She finally stammered, "I am innocent," but declined to state whether she had an attorney or not or to tell her address or the names of friends.

Since her incarceration in the county jail Thursday no one has called to see her an d she has not spoken one word to the jailers.

"She'll talk in a few days," Night Jailer Sam McGee remarked. "They all do in time. She isn't insane, because she eats her meals and acts like any other woman. She's just got her dander up, that's all.

"I judge from looking at her that she is a city bred girl and known too much to try and pay street car fare with postage stamps."

Labels: federal court, jail, Judge Pollock, post office

April 29, 1908

CLERK STOLE MONEY

FOR SICK BROTHER.

IN CONSEQUENCE JUDGE POL-

LOCK IS LENIENT.

Editor of Art Book Fined Nominal

Sum and Escapes Payment.

Other Federal Offend-

ers Sentenced.

It was sentencing day in the United States district court yesterday. Judge Pollock of Kansas was on the bench. Alfred Friend, formerly a clerk in the New England National bank had stolen out-of-town remittances by means of juggling accounts in the bank. The government prosecuted him for getting only $5, but he was supposed to have got about $2,000. After everything in the case was told Judge Pollock undertook to examine the prisoner on his own account.

"What made you do it?" he inquired.

"This made me do it, sir," Friend replied, displaying a small packet of letters and holding them out towards the bench. "Would your honor read them, please?"

FOR HIS SICK BROTHER.

Judge Pollock scanned some of them, interrupting his perusal to ask:

"And did you send the money to this sick brother of yours?"

"I have the money order receipt for it," Friend then said, at the same time producing another paper and handing it to Judge Pollock.

After reflecting a minute the court announced that as Friend had been confined to jail for six months, had lost his employment and had not profited by his thievery, he would be let off with a fine of $500, which means only thirty days in jail. The United States government never holds a prisoner longer than thirty days in liquidation of a fine, no matter how bit it may be.

JULIUS WAS SURPRISED.

Julius Planca, a Frenchman, who was surprised to know that it is contrary to the laws of this country to sell liquor without a license, was fined $10 and costs for bootlegging in a railroad camp east of the city. Arthur Anderson, a 14-year-old boy from the southeast part of the county, was given the same punishment for stealing stamps and coppers from rural free delivery boxes.

A week ago William Soper robbed the little postoffice at Mount Washington, just outside Kansas City's eastern limits, and got $2.50. Yesterday he got a year and a half in the government prison at Fort Leavenworth. He pleaded guilty, saying to Judge Pollock that he would not have broken into the store where the postoffice was had he known it was a postoffice.

"You would rather have broken the state than the federal laws, would you?" the court remarked, adding, dryly, "Either is wrong."

THAT'S WHEN HE GETS IT.

James A. Pope, editor of the Art Book, who was arrested a month ago on a complaint of a rival in business in St. Louis, got off handsomely. Pope had sent out printed post cards saying that he still owned the copyright to his journal, and that the issues being turned out by his rivals were false. He classified somebody as a "hunchback," and for that got into trouble. He would have gone to jail for the intervening nine weeks, having no bondsmen here, only for friends his tough-luck story made for him. As it turned out, District Attorney Van Valkenburgh took his personal recognizance and let him go. Yesterday the art editor, who is about 20 years of age, turned up "to take my medicine, as I said I would," he said. Judge Pollock heard his story and at the conclusion said:

"Have you $1 and the costs of this case?"

"I have not, sir," replied the editor, showing how dull business in the art journal business is just at present.

"Then if I fine you $1 you will have to go to jail, will you?" the court asked next.

"Yes, sir," the editor-prisoner replied.

"Then it will not do to try to collect it. The punishment will be a fine of $1 and costs, collectible upon execution," and slam went the judge's docket and another case was taken up. Pope did not know what was up, so he took his seat near one of the deputy marshals, supposing it was jail again in view of the fact that he had not the dollar and costs. While in the middle of the next case Judge Pollock caught sight of the little art editor's long curly hair and had to order him to freedom.

"You can get out, Pope," the court said. "That fine against you is collectible upon execution."

It took two lawyers and a deputy to explain this to Pope, who could scarcely believe all his good luck was real.

Labels: alcohol, banking, courtroom, crime, federal court, immigrants, Judge Pollock, Judges, Leavenworth, Mt. Washington, post office, United States District Court

April 24, 1908

CAUGHT POSTOFFICE ROBBER.

Mount Washington Men Chased Him

With Guns Through the Fields.

After discovering a burglar in the postoffice at Mount Washington at 1 o'clock this morning, Orin Shaw, who runs a poolhall next door, armed himself with a Winchester rifle, and with W. H. Chitwood, a grocer, scared the man from the building and chased him across fields for nearly half a mile, finally making a capture just as the fugitive ran into a barb wire fence.

"I saw some one in the postoffice striking a match," Shaw told Sergeant James of the Sheffield station, who later took charge of the marauder. "I armed myself, and then went to Chitwood's house to get assistance. Together we went to the postoffice, but the man evidently heard us coming, for just as we got to the front door he broke from the house and ran past us. We called upon him several times to stop, but he ran on north across the fields.

"After we had chased him for about half a mile I fired at him, but missed. We had been gaining steadily, and just at that time he became tangled in a barb wire fence and we got him."

At the Sheffield station the man gave the name of William Soper. He said he was traveling from Oklahoma to his home in Illinois. A search showed that he had $2.75 in silver, and 45 cents in pennies. This money he confessed having taken from the postoffice.

Labels: billiards, crime, guns, Mt. Washington, post office, sheffield

January 31, 1908

HE ASSOCIATED WITH NEGROES.

Harry Hopkins Makes Out a Poor

Case Against His Comrades.

The negroes charged with throwing Harry Hopkins, 18 years old, over a twenty-foot embankment after assaulting and cutting him, at 919 Oak street, Nov. 16, were discharged yesterday by Justice Shoemaker. They were Dave Foster and Cleve Penn.

Hopkins worked under his father at the postoffice in the special delivery department. Foster, the negro, had also been employed at that work, and there was evidence that they had been very intimate, even spending nights together in the basement of the Keith and Perry Building, where special delivery boys gathered to gamble and drink.

The two boys, the afternoon of Nov 16, were locked in a room at 919 Oak street with two negro women where there was drinking and card playing. The evidence upon which the judge ordered a discharge was coroborated by five witnesses. It was that Cleve Penn, regular attendant of one of the girls, came from work in the barber shop in the Long Building, rapped, told who he was and Hopkins, evidently under the influence of liquor and fright, jumped through a window, ran around two houses and at full sped plunged into Oak street, twenty feet below. Here he was found by strangers, both wrists cut, his left ankle, right leg and right arm broken. He was treated at the Emergency hospital and taken to the German Hospital, where his life was several times despaired of.

Hopkin's testimony was that he had gone to the place to collect $2 from "Cyclone Dave" Foster, who, he asserted, ruled over a number of the special delivery boys, caling himself the "Invincible King." "Bull of the Mill," a professional pugilist, making them at times pay him money. "Cyclone Dave," however, had a witness to prove that Hopkins that morning got $2 of his money on a note sent to a tailor on Twelfth street. This, he said, was spent for candy and liquor for the girls.

Labels: alcohol, emergency hospital, gambling, German hospital, Judge Shoemaker, Oak street, post office, race, Twelfth street

January 25, 1908

MUCH MONEY GOING ABROAD.

Foreigners Are Emigrating Back to

Native Countries.

Postmaster J. H. Harris's reports show that more money orders are being bought to transmit money abroad than ever before in the history of Kansas City, the presumption being that the business is part of a general move of the immigrants back to their native lands during the current period when there is little work going on in the way of railroad construction. The local labor fields do not show the loss of any men, but that is accounted for by the labor agents who say that while their countrymen are going home steadily their places here are being filled by immgrants working their way from the West to the seaboard.

Labels: immigrants, post office

January 2, 1908

SENT AS PACKAGE

TO TEST AIR TUBE.

QUEER EXPERIENCE, YEARS AGO,

OF EDWARD WINSTANLEY.

At First Public Demonstration of

England's Pneumatic Carriers

for Mail, He Was the

Freight.

One of the first, if not the very first, pieces of parcels post over to go through a pneumatic tube is living in Kansas City. This is Edward E. Winstanley.

"I was a boy in those days," said Mr. Winstanley yesterday, "and it was in the early '60s. In order to handle American and Irish mails expeditiously, the government constructed a pneumatic tube between Euston station, where the trains delivered the mails, and the general post office. The distance is about five miles by tube, I should say. On the day the system was to be inaugurated, for the first time anywhere in the world, there was a great crowd and greater ceremony. The Lord mayor with his wig and gown and the other dignitaries were massed . An uncle of mine, there by virtue of his being a member of the Apothecaries' Guild, took me along to the Euston end of the line.

Although I say myself, I was a handsome kid. There is no denying that. I was considered handsome, though spiteful relatives said it wasn't that I was handsome, it was that they could get me into the box. I was picked up, landed in a thing that looked like an oak coffin, the lid shut down and opened again. It was shut down at Euston station and opened at the general post office. The journey had been made so quickly and so imperceptably that I did not know that I had started. Of course, they had to get me back to my uncle, so I was shoved into the box again and with 100 pounds pressure to the square inch I got back to the inaugural party in less time than it takes to tell about it. Since then the mail of vast fleets of trans-Atlantic and Irish sea steamers has gone through the tube. Other tubes soon followed."

Then United States postal department is waiting till the union depot question is settled to construct a pneumatic tube here for handling the mails between the train sheds and the post office. At present it takes an electric tram twenty minutes to transfer the mails from the office to the station, and then only at stated intervals. By means of a pneumatic tube there would be less than a couple of minutes lost in making the transfer, and the work would go on continuously, thus avoiding temporary congestion.

Labels: immigrants, post office

December 30, 1907

STENOGRAPHERS ARE

HARD TO FIND

GOVERNMENT STANDS IN PRESSING

NEED OF THEM.

Special Examination Will Be Held

Here in January 27 -- There Are

Many Other Vacancies

Under Civil Service.

Difficulty is being encountered by the United States civil service in securing eompetent stenographers and typewriters, according to a bulletin issued by the government, through the district secretary in St. Louis. Competent persons are urgently requested to file their applications for positions with the civil service commission at Washington, D. C., immediately. A special examination will be held in many cities, including Kansas City, on January 27.

Examinations for applicants to thirty or forty other positions, chiefly in the Indian service, will also be held this month in Kansas City. Twenty grade teachers are wanted for positions in South Dakota, Nebraska, New Mexico and Arizona at salaries ranging from $50 a month upward. These will be held on January 22. On January 15 there will be an examination to secure men eligible to serve as physicians in the Indian service. The number wanted is not stated.

If more candidates pass the examinations than there are positions immediately vacant, the names will be kept for later vacancies in the same line of work. Full information may be obtained at the Kansas City post office.

Labels: civil service, employment, Native Americans, post office, St Louis

April 22, 1907

UNITE FOR PARDON.

BUSINESS MEN ACTIVE ON BEHALF

OF C. W. ANDERSON.

PETITIONS QUICKLY SIGNED.

MASS MEETING WILL BE HELD TONIGHT ON TWELFTH.

Persons Who Did Not Know Ander-

son Are Interested in the Move-

ment to Secure His Release--

Only the President Can

Free Kansas Cityan.

Today a thousand men, representing every walk of life in Kansas City, will begin working to secure a pardon for Charles W. Anderson, who escaped from the penitentiary at Leavenworth nine years ago with but eight months of five years sentence before him for robbing a post office in Oklahoma, and was arrested here Saturday and taken back to the prison.

A mass meeting of business men who knew Anderson will be held tonight at 702 East Twelfth street with a view of securing a pardon. Petitions were circulated yesterday and one of them had forty signers within an hour after it had been drawn. Last night seventy-five names were on the list.

This petition was drawn in behalf of Anderson to be presented in connection with a petition which will be sent to President Roosevelt. Other similar petitions, to be attached to an original paper which will be presented at the meeting tonight, have been scattered about the city and the signers ask no questions. Many of them know Anderson personally and describe him as a hale fellow well met, honest and trustworthy.

THREE PETITIONS OUT.

Congressman E. C. Ellis has been invited to attend the meeting tonight and it is expected that he will be there. When asked last night what he would do for the prisoner, he said:

I have not investigated the matter as much as I should like to, but will do so tomorrow and if he is as worthy as he is said to be I will present the petition for his pardon to President Roosevelt. If the reports of him are true I will be very glad to take the matter up."

The petitions started yesterday will be given active circulation today. One of them was placed in Brooks' restaurant, 210 East Twelfth street, another at Clifford's cigar store at Twelfth street and Grand avenue, and a third, which received more signatures than the rest, in Lorber's cigar store, 317 East Twelfth street.

Lorber, who has known him in a business way for several years, says that Anderson has been prompt in his payments and that he did not hesitate at any time to trust "Charlie" for $75 or $100. In fact, when Anderson wanted to buy his partner's interest in February, a year ago, Lorber advanced the necessary money to him on Anderson's mere statement he did not have enough money to make the purchase.

"Did he pay it back?" exclaimed Lorber, almost in astonishment that the question should be asked, "Well, I should say he did. And quickly, too. And more than that, all of his payments on bills of goods were made promptly. No one questioned the honestly of Anderson."

BUSINESS RECORD HERE.

All of his friends know him as Anderson. "Charlie," they call him, and in the familiarity of the name itself they express sentiment of men who, when they know a man, know him well.

Anderson first went into business for himself at 720 East Twelfth street, April 4, 1905, in partnership with a man named Lowry, purchasing the latter's interest in the restaurant over a year ago. After running the business alone for a year and two days, he sold out, and started to look for a better location. He was always cheerful, it is said, and everyone who refers to his home life speaks of his affection for his little girl, 3 years old, and his wife.

"Is it justice to take a man who is working industriously and trying hard to succeed, back to prison for a crime committed twelve years ago?" asked a friend of his last night on a street corner where the arrest of Anderson for a forgotten robbery was the chief subject of discussion.

A number of citizens called on Charles Riehl, assistant prosecuting attorney, last night to have him draw up the petition which will be presented to President Roosevelt. It is doubtful if Kansas City ever took as much interest in the release of a prisoner as has been shown in seeking the liberation of Anderson. Not only those who knew him but men who never heard his name before are actively working for his release.

Labels: business, Charles Anderson, cigars, Congressman Ellis, Grand avenue, Leavenworth, oklahoma, penitentiary, post office, President Roosevelt, Twelfth street