Category: Kim Cooper

Smashed! Blocked!

June 25, 1947
Hollywood

If you thought the blockades were over, think again. Tonight, 250 of the city’s finest converged on Hollywood in a night-long rampage to break the back of vice. The results: 23 night clubs raided, six intersections gummed up by roadblocks, forty persons taken into custody, including 14 arrests for robbery, two for burglary, a possible bookie, a forger, a man who hit a policeman with a pop bottle, three drunk drivers, six gamblers, six walking drunks, two traffic violators, and a two year old babe in a bar with its parents.

Funny how the Times didn’t run the names and addresses of the nightclubs and their owners like they did when they busted up the Central Avenue clubs...

Produce Man Shot to Death on Wedding Eve


June 24, 1947
Los Angeles

M. Cohen- Samuel Miller.. Sol Rosenblatt- Willie Spector- Samuel Tureck- Max Turetsky- Solomon Turk- Sol Turbin- Sol Turkein- Sam Weiss- Sam Wise.

Consider Sol Turkin, 39, produce merchant and groom-to-be, slain two nights ago in his apartment at 638 S. Cloverdale, after dancing all night with his fiancé, schoolteacher Sylvia Schermer of 837 N. Martel. Like Cinderella, the lady needed to be home before midnight-it was bad luck for them to see each other on their wedding day before the appointed time. Turkin dropped her off around 12:20am (oh- that’s bad) and was home in minutes. Around 12:45, a neighbor heard the sounds of a struggle, then four shots-one of which came through the wall.

Police found Turkin dead of a bullet to the groin, his face bloodied, signs of a struggle in the apartment and the dead man’s watch face smashed. On his person, $630, including five c-notes. Must have been an acquaintance, or Turkin would have called out. Maybe lurking in the dark, surprise attack. Anyway, no wedding for Miss Schermer.

Or for Turkin, some of whose aliases scroll above. The bride knew nothing of his police record dating back to 1924, including convictions for grand larceny and fraud, the three years in Leavenworth for impersonating an officer, the bad check that landed him in a New Jersey prison. Det. Capt. Bert Jones of Wilshire Division says it was “the man’s past catching up with him.”

Or his present. Cops picked up Russell Waterman, 36, Montebello grocer who was holding three guns as security on a $300 loan to Turkin, and two of the three guns. Waterman said he sold the third.

And on Martel, a lady weeps.

Ignition

June 23, 1947
Hawthorne, CA

Bernie Shaw of 1224 W. 123rd Street was first on the scene today when a burning car ran off the road while traveling south on Budlong below 123rd, starting a grass fire in a field. Nearby was Dennis Yates, 64, of 602 West 79th Street, his clothes ablaze. Shaw extinguished the man and pulled off his charred clothing, but Yates later died at Harbor General Hospital, Torrance.

Police speculate that sparks from Yates’ pipe may have ignited a fire in his automobile and caused his death.

Tragic Cygnet


June 22, 1947
Glendale

Swans mate for life, and no amount of publicity-seeking, Trans-American hanky panky can change that simple and profound truism.

You’ll perhaps remember the events of April 17, when Gus the Swan, resident of The Pond, Forest Lawn Memorial Park, and recently left bereft by the death of his beloved Elvira, was flown (via American, actually) to Egypt, Mass. to select a new bride from among the purebred flock at Charles P. Chase’s swan ranch. The droopy bird, nicknamed Gloomy Gus for the obvious suffering in his gait, was put into a cage with four lady swans, a quadrifoil reminder that Elvira was no more. Perhaps to put an end to the obscene display, after six days he made a selection. Henrietta was her name, and the two titular lovebirds flew, or rather were flown, back to the boneyard to honeymoon.

Despite news stories trumpeting (sorry) Gus’ new joy, inside it seems he still grieved. Early this morning his body was found deep among the reeds of his pond. Henrietta is inconsolable. And the men whose business it is to bury the dead in a timely and moderately tasteful fashion seem a tad unsure of what to do next. Hold private rites, and then bury Gus next to Elvira, they reckon.

The Times perhaps cynically suggests that they may not remember where they laid the lady.

Scared Steer Traps Scared Woman in Short Alleyway

June 21, 1947
Lincoln Heights

Mrs. Ruth Twist wasn’t planning on a wild animal encounter when she entered the alley behind her home at 2219 Johnson Street, facing 2226 Griffin Street. But there she discovered an 1800 pound steer, anxious, exhausted and far from its unhappy recent home in a packing house near 700 N. Alameda.

That’s where the animal was first spotted, skidding on the pavement. Police tracked the beast from Alameda and Main, but lost it crossing Griffin, where it knocked Officer Herbert Hansford down.

Then the animal entered the alley, there pinning Mrs. Twist against a fence. The brave lady forced the steer to the alley’s mouth, where officers commenced firing, felling the beast and sending Officer L.P. Walters to Georgia Street Receiving Hospital with a ricocheted bullet to the arm. Mrs. Ruth Twist refused medical attention. And Chief Horrall had steak for dinner.

Bottle of Mayonnaise Costs Life of Child

June 20, 1947
Bellflower

Mayonnaise is rotten stuff, as the parents of little Steven Barrett, 4, discovered after their son was killed today when a car driven by Victor Martinez, 22, of 4321 Elm St., Long Beach, jumped the curb and crushed the tyke as he played on the lawn in front of his home at 5833 Penswood Ave. Martinez reported that he had lost control when a jar of mayo rolled off his bench seat, and he lunged for it. This was apparently considered a reasonable explanation for infanticide, and Martinez was not held.

Steven was #386 in L.A. County’s grim toll of traffic fatalities for the year. Another traffic death recorded today was that of Ellis W. Keim, 73, of 2264 Cedar Ave., Long Beach. Keim was struck in a driveway at 1366 Atlantic Ave. on May 23, and died at his home.

Jack Scher, Won’t You Please Come Home?

June 19, 1947
Pasadena

Frustrated by her husband’s refusal to return to their home, Mrs. Jack Scher had an inspired brainstorm-she’d print up some handbills pleading her case, and hire a couple of strapping lads to distribute them in front of Scher’s fruit stand at 170 S. Marengo.

Were you among Scher’s customers or passersby today, you might have been handed a paper which read: “Mrs. Jack Scher would like her husband, Mr. Jack Scher, of the fruit and vegetable department of the Wonder Shipping Center, to come home to his wife and child.”

The scheme backfired when Scher became incensed, and shot at one of the youths with his .22, nicking the clothing of John Brangard, 127 N. Mentor Ave. His roommate Elrod Swanson was then swatted on his shoulder with Scher’s rifle stock. Pasadena police arrived and booked Scher, 43, for investigation of assault with a deadly weapon, but a sympathetic judge freed the man. Officers hope to get a complaint.

Mrs. Scher reports that it’s now ten days since she and their ten-year-old son were abandoned at their home, 3453 Milton St., East Pasadena.

Son Says His Father sired Wife’s Children

June 18, 1947
El Monte

After ten years, Lester Jean Burnett is tired of the lies. In 1937, aged 18, he acted as a beard for his father Lester Senior, then 36, and Angelina Pizzuto, then 17, whose parents objected to their February-July romance.

Angelina and Lester Junior were wed, but it was Lester Senior who set up house with the girl. Angelina’s children Lester Bryan, 8, and Rose, 6, are supported by and informally acknowledged as the children of the older man. However, on their birth certificates, Lester Junior is named father.

In December 1942, all parties convened in Reno, where Angelina and Lester Junior divorced; Angelina and Lester Senior were married the same day.

Lester Junior entered Superior Court today seeking an official ruling that the two children are not his.

Lester Senior, a refrigeration engineer, resides at 2135 Iola Ave., El Monte, with Angelina and the kids.

Girl, 7, Found Asleep in Car with Her Dog

June 17, 1947
Los Angeles

Joe (or more like Jane) Citizen of the 700 block of S. New Hampshire Ave. just couldn’t stand the sight of the little blonde girl and her dog asleep in the back seat of that car one more night, so on the third incidence she phoned police. Sure enough, radio officers Clyde Giroux and D.R. Lynch discovered 7-year-old Linda Henderson and her dog Butch snoozing in the back of a car parked in front of number 747.

Asked where she lived, the yawning gamine explained “when the sun comes up my mamma comes and takes me to a café, but I can’t tell you where I live for we’re looking for a place.” But mamma was nowhere to be seen this evening, so officers left a note on the car. Then Butch and Linda were processed at Wilshire Police Station and the child sent along to Juvenile Hall.

A friend told Linda’s mamma what had happened, and Mrs. Louise M. Carringer (nee Henderson, 36, divorced) appeared, explaining that during her search for housing she only occasionally left Linda alone. Dep. City Attorney Perry Thomas responded by sending mamma, charged with child neglect, over to spend the night in the Lincoln Heights Jail.

Of Butch, who apparently made no move to stop the strange men from removing his charge from the vehicle, we know no more.

Officers Kill Man As Prowler

June 15, 1947
China City

Pity Wanzy Patterson of 1312 W. 37th Street. The night watchman, 29, somehow came to the conclusion that his job demanded he shimmy over the transom of the bar at 777 Quang Yn Court and relieve the establishment of some of that pesky joy juice. This had been going on for some time, so officers C.A. Stromwell and M. Herman secreted themselves within the establishment, guns aready for when the liquor bandit made a repeat appearance.

Soon enough ol’ Wanzy dropped in, and laid his paws upon several handy bottles. The cops revealed themselves and Wanzy moved as if to retrieve a gun. Bang! 11 shots pierced the hapless Wanzy, and more’n likely the bottles he so loved.