Category: Kim Cooper

Trolley vs Ruminant

March 22, 1907
Pasadena 

A special correspondent follows up on the distressing report of a cow gravely injured when struck by an electric car near Lamanda Park. Bossy was found happily chewing her cud with no sign of injury. As near as can be figured, the trolley ran over the cow’s tether, pulling it taut and forcing the reluctant acrobat to turn a dramatic aerial flip. She seems to have landed safely and forgotten all about her wild adventure, until the cries of do-gooders to the Humane Society roused an interest in her case.

Virtue Stolen, Innocence Lost

March 20, 1907
Los Angeles 

Revealed today, with the arrest of M.M. Martinez, proprietor of the Esmeralda Club at Amelia and Ducommon Streets, is a terrible tale of innocence stolen. Several young girls are willing to testify that their virtue was taken from them by Martinez and club regulars following the introduction of drugged champagne into their tender mouths.

Inside the walls of this vile palace of sin unfolded the debauchery of Miss Nellie McCarthy, 668 Date Street, and Miss Julia Wood, 812 South Wall Street. Both girls are just 17 years old, and are telling their stories to Proscecuting Attorney Adcock, and are willing to repeat these horrors for a jury. The girls are being "sent to Whittier" because their parents do not know what to do with them.

Martinez’ arrest came about at the insistence of the mothers of the broken blossoms, who declared their children were pure and lovely in character before they began attending social events at the noisome venue.  

 

Editrix’ note: "sent to Whittier" is a euphemism that was apparently familiar enough to the readers of the 1907 newspapers to require no further elaboration. By reading numerous c. 1900 stories that included the phrase, most dealing with delinquent and sexually promiscuous youths, I discovered that Whittier was the location of the State Reformatory (above), opened in 1891; it operated as the Fred C. Nelles School through 2004, and is currently being redeveloped as a residential/commercial project. Henceforth I will threaten Nathan that he will be "sent to Whittier" should he misbehave.

No More Tamales

March 19, 1907
Los Angeles 

For the past two years, Mrs. C.M. Gray, elderly owner of the Hotel Gray at Third and Main Streets, has received a $15 monthly rental from a tamale vendor who sold his wares on her front walk. This illegal commerce has been stopped, and Mrs. Gray convicted and fined $50. Just the cost of doing business…

Wounded Man Blows Up Like Balloon, Terrible Injury Causes Weird Effect

March 18, 1907
Los Angeles 

Carlos Perez, an unarmed man shot by an Olvera Street nightwatchman as he walked towards his home on Macy Street last evening, lies tonight in County Hospital, gravely wounded with a bullet puncuring his lung. A gruesome side effect of his injury is that air is seeping beneath his skin, inflating his body like a fleshy balloon. Doctors can press gently on the man’s hands, eyelids and ribcage, causing him to briefly deflate, though he quickly swells up again. 

Dr. Barber, the hospital superintendent, says that he has seen victims who suffer minor inflation around their injuries, but never someone whose entire body becomes so like a balloon. Doctors hesitate to puncture Perez’ skin for fear of introducing an infection, and so the poor man suffers the strange sensation of constant pressure from within. His outlook is uncertain.

Richard D. Birch, nightwatchman for the Merchant’s Fire Dispatch, has given conflicting statements regarding the shooting, and will surely face manslaughter charges should his victim perish.

Below, Olvera Street circa 1890 

 

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Evidence of Ancient Beasts Beneath Mission Road

March 16, 1907
Los Angeles 

Sometimes, exhausted after a day pulling clay out of the earth to make into bricks, the workers of the Los Angeles Brick Company would stop by Slovenian laborer George Laubro’s room at 735 Buena Vista Street and say, "Hey George, can we see that thing you found?" And George would open his trunk, unwrap the long, heavy object, and pass it around to his friends. "Have you ever seen the like?" Teeth as big as apples! Fused together in a row!

Word of the workman’s two-year-old discovery recently reached the ears of Jerome Craite, a mining man with an interest in obsolete fauna, who requested that Laubro exhibit his find. Astonished at the fine quality of the specimen, Craite inquired further and learned that the Brick Company pit, on Mission Road just south of the County Hospital, had often offered up the remnants of strange beasts, including a tusk that the son of A.A. Hubbard, former head of the brick concern, has taken home.

Professor A.B. Ulrey, head of the biology department of the University of Southern California, examined the teeth and determined that they were the right lower molars of some large herbivore, possible a mammoth or mastadon.

Laubro was mildly amused at all the interest in his oddity, but remarked that he would much rather have a full larder than some old creature’s teeth in his trunk. 

Grave Embarrassment in the Alexandria Hotel

March 14, 1907

Los Angeles

 
Tongues were wagging on every floor of the Alexandria Hotel this morning, following the delicious faux pas of conservative businessman Walter Dinmore, a resident of San Francisco and Los Angeles. Roused by his "Jap" valet to take an important long distance telephone call from Santa Barbara in the lobby, the tousled Dinmore hurried from his room, only to encounter barely supressed merriment at every turn.

First a crew of Catholic girls fresh from their worships chortled, then an elderly lady he waved into the elevator seemed about to perish from the giggles. A bell hop dropped a pitcher of water, so great was his glee upon seeing Mr. Dinmore.

Finally, the gentleman was alone in the telephone booth, where he had a moment to reflect upon the curious afflictions of his fellow guests… and gaze down his own legs, to see vast billows of pink silk pajama material covering his shoes. Mortified, he dashed for the elevators, but found them engaged. In rising horror, he grabbed a porter and demanded aid. The porter led the humiliated Dinmore into a secret nook below stairs where he could divest himself of his shameful sartorial sin, then slink upward, his errand quite forgotten.

Below, a place where pink pajamas are not welcome.

 

Sad Discovery on Fifth Street: Daughter Finds Estranged Father Only In Death

March 14, 1907

Los Angeles

Pity Miss Jane Beamer of Long Beach, who for most of her 20 years has yearned to meet her father, from whom her mother separated when she was tiny, back in Beamerville, IL.

She has discovered to her great grief that the fruit and confectionary vendor killed Tuesday night near his shop at 708 East Fifth Street was this same Frank O. Beamer, who has been living in this community for a number of years. Many times had Jane Beamer, her mother and her step-father R.E. Blair passed Beamer’s stand, and even gazed into his face, without recognize the ladies’ kinsman, who was also Blair’s schoolyard chum.

Today, Miss Beamer grieves at the Bresee Brothers’ mortuary on South Figueroa Street, lending comfort to Beamer’s widow, who did not know until today of her husband’s previous marriage or child.

The accident occured when Beamer stepped off an East-bound Brooklyn Avenue streetcar at the intersection of Fifth and Ruth Avenue. As he alit, his path was crossed by an automobile driven by W.P. Young, carrying three ladies and R.H. Ingram, general superintendent of the Southern Pacific Railroad, en route to catch the San Francisco Owl train at the Arcade Depot.

Beamer, who was very nearsighted, was apparently startled to see the machine so near him, and moved first one way, then another, before dashing headlong into the path of the oncoming auto. Although Young killed his engine and attempted to swerve, Beamer was struck and killed where he stood.

The inquest found Young without fault after Beamer died in the Emergency Hospital without regaining consciousness.

Illustration below from the 1909 city map compiled by Worthington Gates, Western Litho Co, showing Bresee Bros in the heart of Mortuary Row, on Figueroa just south of Eight Street.

 

Police Grill Pin Boy in Winters Whack

March 13, 1947
Los Angeles

Detectives questioned James Joseph Tiernan Jr., 30, tonight about his movements Monday night, both before and after the time he claimed that Evelyn Winters, 42, left his hotel room at 912 W. Sixth Street. Winters turned up dead just after midnight Tuesday in the railyard at Ducommun Street, her clothes in disarray, with a blood alcohol level of .28, a nearly fatal proportion. According to Dr. Frederick Newbarr of the Coroner’s Office, cause of death was blows to the head, exacerbated by the extent of her drunkenness. Tiernan was arrested the next day at the bowling alley at 924 S. Olive Street where he was formerly employed.

Captain Jack Donahoe is following up on Tiernan’s story. Tiernan admits to knowing Winters–a former movie industry legal secretary fallen on hard times–for about two years. He says he met her on Sunday at the public library, then took her to his hotel room. They both liked reading, and alcohol. On Monday night, they were drinking together in the Sixth Street room. Winters left alone between 7:30 and 8 pm. Tiernan stayed in, and that was the last time he saw his friend Evelyn.

Confidential to 1947project readers: 1947 has been an incredible year, and we hope to see you over at our new digs real soon, where the subject is 1907.