A Wife Beater Punished

New York, 1895

John A. Welden, residing on the Springfield road at Queens, went home Saturday evening intoxicated. He had a quarrel with his wife, then beat her and threw her out into the street. Complaint was made to Justice Kissam. Welden was arrested and locked up in the Town Hall by Deputy Sheriff Thornton. Monday he was arraigned before Justice Hendrickson at Jamaica, on a charge of assault in the third degree, and fined $25. He paid the fine.

—The Long Island Farmer, Jamaica, N.Y., Jan. 11, 1895, p. 1.

Murdered for a Cent

1910

A quarrel over a single penny led to a murder in Hoboken the other day. A man from Nebraska, who stopped at a hotel in Hoboken while awaiting the sailing of the steamer for Europe, put a penny in the slot of an automatic music box in the dining-room of the hotel, but the box refused to pour forth the expected ragtime tune. The Nebraskan became indignant and upbraided the German porter. The latter explained to him that it required a nickel and not a penny to set the mechanism of the music-box in motion, but that explanation did not satisfy the man from Nebraska. He became abusive and when the porter threatened to put him out, he pulled a revolver from his pocket and shot the porter dead.

Wise Words — "Whatever Love Undertakes"

1896

Whatever love undertakes to do, it does well.

A sunbeam in the heart is bound to light the face.

Some people might as well be crazy; they have no sense.

Labor is drudgery only when we do not put heart in our work.

A pessimist is not blind, yet he can not see even a bright prospect.

It is to live twice when we enjoy the recollections of our former life.

Some people prepare their excuses before they make their failures.

Everyone believes in friends until he has had occasions to try them.

Nothing succeeds like success. It can convert a traitor into a patriot in five seconds.

When we come close to a giant, he often turns out to be only a common man on stilts.

A little lovers' quarrel or two is a good thing by which to take each other's measure.

It is a question with many bright young men whether they will practice law, medicine or deception.

Never lie in bed thinking that the cat that is howling in the back yard will grow weary and go away.

A single man has nobody but himself to blame if things go wrong. A married man can blame it all to his wife.

It is not in the power of a good man to refuse making another happy, where he has both ability and opportunity. — The South-West.

Eccentricities of Maiden Ladies Amused Eastern Town

1896

A Pair of Twins

The curious streak of obstinacy which crops out in many New England families, especially in small places, where the range of ideas and occupations is small, has been brought into prominence through the tales of a gifted group of story writers, notably by Miss Mary E. Wilkins. People living in other parts of the country often think her stories must be exaggerations, but dwellers in New England towns can parallel most of them from their own knowledge.

In one Massachusetts village there dwelt not many years ago two maiden ladies, called, though they were over forty years of age, "the Hatfield girls." Beside this youthful appellation, they retained a youthful taste for gay colors. As they were twins, very tall, very lean, always wearing skirts conspicuously short to avoid dust, and hat brims unusually wide to avoid injuring their eyes, they would have been rather remarkable figures even if they had not chosen to dress, school girl fashion, in clothes exactly alike to the slightest detail.

They were always together, and it was one of the characteristic sights of the village to see the Hatfield girls plodding through the snow to the postoffice in their green-and-red plaid gowns, black-braided coats and big, brown, fuzzy felt hats with great pea-green bows. Their muffs, mittens, tippets, wristers, barege veils, even their rubber boots, were duplicates of each other. In fact the sisters were as absolutely alike as the twin paper dolls which little girls cut from a piece of paper folded double.

In summer it was the same. They floated by to church in duplicate blue muslins, or watered their flower beds in the early morning in indistinguishable hideous purple wrappers.

Suddenly, the village was stirred by an exciting event: the Hatfield girls had quarreled! They quarreled because Mary Abby, who overheard a small boy making jokes at their expense, suggested to Ann Eliza that perhaps it would be as well if henceforth they dressed just a little differently. Ann Eliza received the suggestion as the cruelest of insults; but she said hotly that, after that, she wouldn't for a kingdom wear a dress off the same piece as Mary Abby's.

Sure enough, the sisters ceased to dress alike. Furthermore, they did not dress harmoniously. They were together as much as ever — but if Mary Abby wore pink, Ann Eliza had on scarlet; if she wore green. Ann Eliza wore blue; if it were yellow, she decked herself in magenta; if it were brown or gray, she tried to get a shade of the same color that would make her sister's appear dingy and faded.

It was a war of colors waged furiously for a week, bitterly for a month, spitefully for a year; then perseveringly, resolutely, obstinately, for one — two — three — four — five years; from five to ten; ten to twelve; twelve to thirteen.

Neither sister would give in, for after a brief exhibition of colors Mary Abby had tried to fight her offended twin with her own weapons, and to array herself in hues too violent to be overwhelmed. They were as gay as parakeets, the two poor bitter old twins, and the interested village had quite given up expectation of a change, when at length a change came.

One morning the "Hatfield girls," side by side, and dressed in new and glossy black, entered the postoffice amid a crowd of staring villagers, and called for their mail. They were in mourning evidently — but nobody could think who had died. At length the postmistress ventured, to inquire.

"Yes," said Ann Eliza, soberly, smoothing down her new cape, "we are in mourning. It wa'n't strictly necessary, I presume, but we thought it best. It's Cousin John's wife out in Montana. We've never seen her but we hear she was a very worthy woman, and a credit to the family."

And whether or not the Hatfield girls mourned deeply for the unknown wife of Cousin John, it is certain that for the remaining years of their lives their clothes were black, and were cut alike, and the village guessed that they had found a way to end their warfare, without acknowledging surrender, or proclaiming peace.

Husband's Bad Table Manners Cause Suicide

1928

CHICAGO, May 25. — (AP) — Her husband's table manners were blamed for the suicide of Mrs. Gladys Drew, who took poison yesterday.

Edwin Drew, the husband, said his wife became angry over the manner in which he handled his spoon as they were eating at a restaurant. A quarrel followed and she went home where he found her shortly afterwards dying.

—The Fresno Bee, Fresno, CA, May 28, 1928, page 1.