Taft Baffles the Secret Service Men

1910

President Taft has thrown a bombshell into the ranks of that portion of the secret service which is assigned to the duty of protecting the chief executive of the nation from assassination. It is a soft job for the secret service men and often leads to something better, several of those who formerly guarded presidents now holding government positions that pay well and make the holder a man of some consequence in his home territory.

It is feared among Chief Wilkie's men that some of them will have to be looking for other jobs if the president continues to go out for long walks through the busiest streets of Washington unprotected. The president has "had the laugh" on several of the sleuths recently when, without making any announcement of his intentions, he left the White House and started out for a walk. Generally he has been accompanied by some cabinet official, but none of Wilkie's men was along.

On his last walk the president was accompanied by his brother, Charles P. Taft, the millionaire Cincinnatian. They walked up to the capitol and strolled through its wide halls.

So far as runs the memory of Alonzo Stewart, deputy sergeant at arms of the senate, and that is a full generation, it was the first time that a president has visited the capitol on the Sabbath day.

On another occasion the president walked through Pennsylvania avenue, Washington's most prominent business street. He was wearing a sack coat and a gray sweater.

"That looks like President Taft," remarked one man as President Taft passed the five-cent theaters on the avenue. Brig. Gen. Clarence Edwards, who was with the president, giggled and the president smiled. Mr. Taft did not look much like himself in his sack coat with sweater underneath.

The walk began when the president and the general eluded the secret service men at the White House. They walked briskly down to the Potomac flats, along the Southern railroad right of way and back through South Washington, around the capitol building and library. The return trip was down Pennsylvania avenue at dusk.

A president who walks the streets of Washington is too much for Washington. Mr. Taft's predecessors rode in carriages or took their "constitutionals" across country.

Orville Wright Is Aeroplane King

Printed Aug. 1909

Dayton Aviator Sets New Record for Endurance

Washington. — Flying 50 miles, which is more than double the distance across the English channel, Orville Wright, the American "king of the air," Tuesday at Fort Myer, broke the aeroplane endurance record, with Lieut. Frank P. Lahm, as a passenger. The machine was in the air one hour, 12 minutes and 40 seconds.

The former record was made last year by his brother Wilbur, joint inventor with him of the machine in which both achievements were performed, at Le Mans, France, with Prof. Painleve of the French institute as passenger. That flight was one hour, nine minutes and 31 seconds.

The cheering which heralded the setting of a new mark in the conquest of the air was led by President Taft in person, who was an intensely interested spectator throughout the flight, and who insisted at its conclusion upon personally congratulating the brothers upon their success. This success was all-important to the Wrights in that it completed the first of two crucial tests of their machine imposed upon them by the United States government — the so-called "endurance test," which required them to remain one hour continuously in the air with one passenger.


Attempt to Fly Across English Channel Fails

Dover, England. — Hubert Latham's second attempt to fly across the English channel ended disastrously Tuesday. Almost in the moment of victory his monoplane fluttered down into the sea two miles beyond the Admiralty pier, like a bird with a broken wing. Thousands of persons crowding the water front saw the fall and feared Latham was dead.

A flock of large and small craft raced to the scene of the disaster, and a pinnace from the British battleship Russell picked up the unlucky flyer and put him aboard the French torpedo boat destroyer Escopette. After a surgeon had attended to his injuries the destroyer brought Latham ashore and he was taken to the Lord Warden hotel. His face was bandaged and bleeding and his nose was broken. The machine, badly wrecked, was hoisted from the boat to the dock.

Tag On White House Roof

Charlie Taft and His Chums Frolic About the Chimneys.

If there is any place in or about the White House unexplored by Charlie Taft it probably is the top of the flagpole, and this yet may be discovered by the strenuous young son of the president, who is lending to the new administration all the strenuousness that marked the last.

He recently chose the roof of the White House for a playground, to which "tag" figured. Accompanied by some fifteen of his classmates in the public school, he took possession of the broad lawn immediately behind the White House and organized a scrub game of baseball. When the youngsters tired of that they disappeared. In the state, war and navy building, just across Executive avenue those who had been observing the game were astonished to see the boys appear on the roof of the White House, Charlie Taft's tousled head coming through the scuttle first.

For a half hour they slid down the steep slopes of the roof and dodged and hid behind chimneys. The danger of falling to the ground was lessened by the presence of a marble balustrade that runs around the eaves of the house. Both the president and Mrs. Taft were absent from the White House during the afternoon.

--Warren Evening Mirror, Warren, Pennsylvania, May 10, 1909, page 6.

Confidence Man Arrested

Detectives Saw Him April 15 but Were Unable to Leave the President.

New York, May 8. — Frederick J. Remington, who says he is a broker, was arrested last night as he was leaving his apartment in Central Park West and locked up at police headquarters awaiting information from Chicago, where it is alleged he obtained $7,000 by a wire-tapping scheme. Detectives Gray and Savage, who made the arrest, saw Remington on April 15 while acting as President Taft's bodyguard here. They were unable to leave the president at the time but began a search resulting in Remington's detention last night.

Chicago, May 8.—Frederick J. Remington, arrested in New York, was indicted in June, 1907, under the confidence game law. The evidence concerned a St. Louis merchant, who said he lost $7,000 on an "advance tip" on a race horse.

The police say Remington is a gambler, working in poker games on railroad trains and in steamships. A detective will leave for New York to get Remington.

--Warren Evening Mirror, Warren, Pennsylvania, May 8, 1909, page 6.