Took a Mean Advantage

1901

A supernumerary in Richard Mansfield's company who had been, to use a Scotch phrase, continuously and continually "heckled" by the manager at rehearsals and between the acts for alleged displays of stupidity on the stage, was informed that a near relative of his had departed this life and had left him a competence, so he decided to leave the dramatic profession and, to quote him, become respectable. Before leaving he determined to take his revenge on Mansfield for the attacks on his amour propre that gentleman had made.

The play was "Richard III," and the super was one of the soldiers who led away the Duke of Buckingham when the king orders his demise.

In due time Richard remarked, "Off with his head!" and this was the super's opportunity. Advancing, he touched his helmet in the style of a footman and replied loudly and genially:

"That'll be attended to, old chap. We'll take care of old Buck. It'll be all right!" and retired gracefully. When the infuriated Mansfield came off to commit murder, he found the super had fled. — Chicago Chronicle.

Army Jokes With a Moral

1901

"During the civil war," said an ex-army officer, "the authorities for some reason were anxious to move troops up the Tombigbee river. Word was sent to the engineer in that district asking what it would cost to run up the Tombigbee. That official got gay and reported that the Tombigbee ran down and not up, a joke that promptly landed his head in the basket, as the matter was serious.

"At the bombardment of Charleston it was extremely desirable to bring to bear on the city an extra heavy gun called by the men the Swamp Angel. The gun took its name from the swamp in which it stood, and to move it through that boggy morass was an engineering feat of extreme difficulty. However, the commanding officers were determined to have the gun brought within range of Charleston and issued orders to that effect. At the same time they sent word to the engineer having the matter in charge of requisition without regard to trouble or expense for anything necessary to accomplish the desired object. His first requisition called for men 26 feet 6 inches in height. Another officer promptly took the matter in charge, from which it can readily be deduced that it is not a paying investment to make jokes in the army at the expense of your superiors." — New York Tribune.

Girl's Letter Is Joke on Bachelors, but It Overwhelms Her With Mail

1920

GREAT FALLS, Mont. — Miss Ethel Day, a pretty New York girl, has caused work for a few extra mail clerks and carriers in this city as the result of a little joke that she and two other girl friends played upon several thousand young bachelors scattered over the habitable globe a few months ago. Miss Day is now thoroly convinced of the potency of publicity, and so, incidentally, are the letter shooters and mail sorters in the Great Falls postoffice.

Last summer, while enjoying a vacation in the mountains with her two girl friends from New York, who helped her put over the joke, the trio decided to write the following epistle to a motion picture magazine:

"Editor: I am a girl 19 years old. With three other girls I herd cattle for a wealthy stockman. We get awfully lonely and would like to correspond with some Eastern men."

In one day's mail she received answering letters from Germany, France, Hawaii, the Philippines, Zanzibar, Africa; London, Texas. Maine, New Hampshire, Boston, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, St. Louis, Cleveland, Norfolk. Va.; Brunswick, Ont., Can.; New York, Montreal, Key West. Fla.; Jersey City, the U. S. steamship Savannah, India, and numerous other points about the world.

A young lad from New York who evidently has the impression that Montana is still in "the wild and woolly West" asked Miss Day to put a good word for him with her boss so that he could come West and learn to punch cattle. Others spoke of wolves howling around the door.

A little Virginia lass has asked the following questions: "Do you dance? What style of dancing do they have in the West? (Imagine answering that one!) How are the folks out there, hospitable, friendly, sociable? How are the girls, the fellows? What are the chief entertainments? How do you spend your time?"

Now Miss Day for a little while thought it just lovely to receive hundreds of nice letters, but it is rapidly ceasing to be a joke. Each day her list of unanswered letters increases and all she needs is a permit to start a postoffice all her own. The problem could be easily solved by either ignoring the letters or sending them back unclaimed were it not for the fact that all her correspondents were so anxious for a reply that they carefully enclosed stamped, addressed envelopes.

However, Miss Day cheerfully says she will see the thing thru and answer every letter if she has to hire a couple of stenographers and a dictaphone and take a vacation for three months.

—The Saturday Blade, Chicago, Jan. 3, 1920, p. 5.

A Lawyer's Jokes

1899

Many lawyers are accustomed to relieve the practice of their profession with merry jests. There was one famous lawyer of Philadelphia, Judge Peters, who began his career with a joke, and is said to have ended it in the same way, although most of his jests were of a mild and gentle sort, and not at all uproarious — and they were often at his own expense.

A Philadelphia paper relates that immediately after his admission to the bar, and while still very young, Mr. Peters "hung out his shingle" in the shape of a sign in which these words were inscribed:

RICHARD PETERS, ATTORNEY-AT-LAW.
BUSINESS DONE HERE AT HALF PRICE.
(N. B. — HALF DONE.)

He averred that his sign drew him so much business at the very start that he was soon able to charge full rates and guarantee thorough attention to business. His friends, however, declare that he never did anything otherwise than thoroughly. In his last years, Judge Peters, being much interested in real estate, attempted to develop a suburban tract which he owned, and to encourage it he put up on the ground a plan of the locality, covering it, on a post, with a carefully constructed glass case. He was asked why he did that.

"Oh," he said, "if I leave it exposed every hunter who comes along will riddle it with shot — and then everybody will see through my plan!"

The scheme did not succeed, and some one advised him to have the property officially laid out, which had never been done.

"All right," said the judge, "it's time to lay it out. It's been dead long enough!" — Youth's Companion.

Bones of a Dog Found in "Bomb"

1920

Senders Now Plead They Are Only Two Boy Jokers

OAKLAND, Cal., Feb. 26. — A supposed bomb sent as a joke by two small boys to L. J. Lamb caused the recipient considerable uneasiness until the package was opened and found to contain the bones of a dog.

When Lamb received the package he noted a suspicious piece of rope hanging out. He summoned Police Inspectors Wallman and Flynn, who gingerly opened the parcel and found the bones of a dog with the following note:

"Dear Sir: We hate to inform you that the bones of your ancestors have to be taken from the grave where they have been buried for the last 400 years. The dues that are to be paid every hundred years are forty years overdue. Seeing that there has been no payment on the space for forty years, we are sending them to you, knowing that we could not get in connection with any other member of your family. You may expect them soon. — Manager Brooke, Lender Glen cemetery, London, England."

The inspectors traced the package to two 13-year-old boys, Lester Burpes and Neal Daniel, who declared they sent the parcel as a joke.

Practical Joke Lands Pair in County Jail

1920

Dance Promoters Get Free Dinner, but "Never Again!"

ST. JOSEPH, Mo., Feb. 26. — A little practical joke landed Frank Mahaney and his bosom friend, Toble Resnik, in the county jail, where they were kept for several hours before they could convince the officers that they were only joking. Now, when they are asked about practical jokes, they raise their hands and exclaim: "We're off that stuff!"

It all came about this way. Mahaney, who is a dancing master, was to give a grand ball in the opera house at Savannah. At 2 o'clock in the afternoon he and Resnik drove into Savannah and went to look over the hall and arrange the preliminaries for the evening's fun. But the fun came a long time before that.

When they came down half an hour later they found a great crowd congregated around their car examining a bottle of distilled water. When a fellow asked if it was their alcohol Mahaney answered in the affirmative, and added that "it's good stuff at that."

Then it was all over but the shouting, for the next act opened with Mahaney and Resnik in the county jail. Their only compensation was that they had a free dinner at the expense of the jailer. They were released from the bastile in time to "go on with the dance."


It Merely Saved Time

A rich old fellow refused a friend the loan of $50. "I did not expect that of you," said the friend bitterly, "and I will never forgive you for your refusal." "Of course, you won't, my dear fellow," said the other; "but if I lent you the $50 you wouldn't have repaid me, and we should have quarreled about that — so it's as well to get the row over at once. Good morning!"

Scenes During the Potomac Flood – Great Trees, Debris, Pumpkins

1878

Scenes During the Potomac Flood

The Washington Star has this account of the recent rise in the Potomac at the National Capital:

From the Virginia side to look up the Potomac was like looking up the rapids at Niagara Falls, except that here the water was almost solid with mud, and was loaded with timber hewn and rough, and pumpkins and other farm products. Wrecks of bridges and houses were rapidly driven on the boiling flood.

As the angry waters struck the piers of the bridge they were forced up almost to the quivering timbers, and then started again on their rapid race for the sea. Looking down the river the water was dashed and tossed into the shape of ocean breakers. Behind the piers it boiled and bubbled like the contents of some infernal cauldron, with a roar equal to that of a tornado. Great trees and hewn timbers coming down stream would sometimes strike the piers and be whirled into the air against the bridge. In one case a tree trunk about sixty feet long and almost two feet in diameter was swept crosswise against the pier, and in an instant was broken into three parts and swept away in the mighty current.

Among the debris were hundreds of yellow pumpkins sweet from off the cornfields on the bottom lands many miles above, and the scramble for them was lively, some of the skiffs coming in loaded with them. Men, women and boys could be seen going home a large pumpkin under each arm, and rows of them lined the bridge and shore.

The damage to crops on the river farms must have been considerable, judging from the vast quantities of hay, corn and fodder that were afloat. During the night several canal boats came down, it is thought, from Georgetown, and went to pieces against the Long Bridge. A small dwelling house came down about two o'clock, and striking near the north draw shattered and went to pieces. Another large one with a roof newly shingled came down the south channe1, and striking a pier went to pieces and floated away in fragments below.


That Colorado Stone Man

A Denver assayer gives this account of the origin of the Colorado stone man with a tail:

In August, 1875, five of us were prospecting in the vicinity of Pueblo. In coming upon a sandstone quarry, one of the party observed a sort of likeness of a man drawn upon the rock. The incident occasioned a deal of talk about ancient creations, and the idea of getting up a second Cardiff giant was then favorably discussed.

The party agreed to undertake the task and a stonecutter named Saunders, who had been working in the vicinity and known to be a clever hand at modeling, was at once sought out and an agreement made for the figure. While the plan was in progress one of the party in a joking way, said the thing ought to have a tail, as in ancient times men had tails six or seven inches long. It was decided amongst the party that the figure should be known as a petrified Aztec Indian, and they would resurrect him after six months and impose him on the public as such.

The stonecutter, not seeing the joke, set to work, and made the figure, with tail appended. The price paid the artisan was $135, and after he had completed the figure it was buried. The "Muldoon" was made out of sandstone and dried by the cabin fire, which partly accounts for the little moles on the surface. After the burial — two feet from the surface of the ground — the party went on their way to await the resurrection.

A few of the prospectors had got wind of the proceedings and were keeping an eye on the party, and so they dispersed in different directions. Finally they became scattered, some in New York and the remainder in different portions of the country. I had forgotten nearly about the matter when the discovery was chronicled in the papers.

Joke Hold-Up Real Club Room Robbery

1920

Masked Gunmen Strip Members of $1,000 in Valuables

DOYLESTOWN, Pa. — Thinking it was a joke, twenty members of the Bristol Republican club responded to the wishes of three masked gunmen, who entered the club's headquarters late at night and robbed them of jewelry and cash amounting to approximately $1,000. They escaped before the police arrived.

Chief of Police Sackville of Bristol police station holds to his belief that the robbers were New York gunmen.

A member of the club, explaining the holdup, said: "The club members thought someone was playing a joke on them when a masked man entered the room. But when he insisted that they respond to 'hands up' and when he summoned two assistants, the club members became suspicious, but some of them still insist that it was a joke, although their valuables have not been returned."


Toting Gun His Big Mistake

So Says Youthful Slayer Given Life Term in Prison

BOSTON, Mass. — "All my trouble came from carrying a gun. I had no business having it," said Joseph Sammarco, 22-year-old slayer of Patrolman William G. Clancy, as he left for Charlestown prison to start serving a life sentence as penalty for the crime.

"There is nothing to this gun business. No one ever gained anything from carrying one. I can see how terribly wrong it was, now that it is too late."

Sammarco was sentenced by Judge John F. Brown of the Superior Court. He accepted the sentence passively.

Lover Fell From Tree, Washing Machine Company President

Cincinnati, 1903

LOVER FELL FROM TREE

Andrew Smith Driven to Sore Straits by Teasing.

CINCINNATI, March 2 — The ambulance of F. & W. Siefke was sent to Groesbeck, Ohio, at an early hour this morning for the purpose of removing an injured man to the City Hospital. The request for the ambulance came from the postmaster of that village.

According to meager information received by Mr. Siefke the injured man is Andrew J. Smith, who is the President of the "Latest Invention Triple Action Washing Machine Company," at 812 Elm street. Mr. Smith was violently in love with a young woman, and that as a result of his courtship he was subjected to the jibes of his associates. This affected Mr. Smith greatly. Last evening, in his wanderings, he climbed a tree, lost his balance and fell, sustaining internal injuries. Now the jokers are sorry.

—The Daily Republican-News, Hamilton, Ohio, March 2, 1903, page 1.

Comment: It'd be terrible to wake up and see this about yourself in the paper. Plus, the report could be a bit mangled up, since there doesn't seem to be any obvious connection between the jibes and his climbing the tree and falling out. That the jokers are sorry is probably an unwarranted conclusion of the reporter, since it all happened at an early hour just this morning.

Note: I made a change. The name of the company in the original article had the word "Sriple" that probably should be "Triple," going with Action a lot more. And isn't that a great old-fashioned name from those days of inventions and progress, "Latest Invention Triple Action Washing Machine Company." Thinking about it, it doesn't sound right yet, but, we must let it go...