The New Bloomfield, Pa. times. (New Bloomfield, Pa.) 1877-188?, 1880-03-02
Secrets Of a Dissecting Room.

Legislature In lcOb III was also enacted
that the bodies of all friendless paupers,
criminals and unknown persons that
remained unclaimed and for whose In
terment no one provided should be dis
tributed among the different medical col
leges Of the city in the interests Of
dlssecting purposes. This enactment
had the double effect of putting an end
to the city's expense for carriage and
burial of the remains, and to remove, to
certain extent, the temptation of
body snatchlng" and the hideous
traffic in "stifis," as the subjects are
designated by the medical profession
The increased supply by this means,
while II afforded larger and better va
riety of bodies has also reduced the
prices from as high as $40 and $25 per
subject, at which these were held In
former years, to about So, and for this
sum no one would assume the risk and
labor that attended the robbing of
graves.
We used to pull up sixty stiffs
every spring and fall," said a retired
member of that ghoulish fraternity, and
who now keeps concert saloon In a
certain part of this city, "and I've 'ad
as Ugh as $50 for some. Twenty and
twenty-five dollars was fair price, and
i never touched job for less than fif-
teen. j remember one time was Of
fered $1O0 to fetch chap that died kind
er sudden and queer like, and whose
people was rich. We tried to get i'm
twice but 1t was too risky and we 'ad to
let it drop"
"Where did you operate principally p
asked the News man.
"Well, the old Lebanon cemetery, on
the Passyunk road used to be our cheese.
We 'ad the sexton of the place all right
and got enough "stifis from that place
to supply the doctors but they were
all darkies, and when white one or
something extra nice was wanted we'd
take hack at some other grave yard
but the Lebanon was our standby. There
are some spots In that old cemetery that
are almost depopulated, and no one Is
never 'eard of anything being missed
yet
"But how did you know whether you
struck the grave of body that would
bear handling ?"
"Well, I'll tell YER" replied the man,
giving the reporter tremendous wink
from behind the flash of a match, while
he lit his dirty little pipe. "We lad
sexton all right and we never risked
making mistake. But when something
extra nice was wanted we'd watch the
funeral and saw where they planted the
body and when the track was clear we'd
fetch 1t up"
'' Can you remember the names of
some who you resurrected in those
days?"
"Ah, but to print them in the paper
would be giving me away. l remember
only one can never forget it. 1t was
an old man died very sudden and whom
the doctors wanted very bad and there is
a man in this city now-if I'D tell you
his name you'd know him-he got
some of the old mans money, and that's
what started him In the business he has
to-day. Well, we watched where the
old man was laid, and a few days after
ward, when everything was safe we dug
for him. You know how that's done,
don't you Well, we dig down on the
end where the head lies, and when we
strike the box we saw 1t across, about l3
inches from the top then this part of
the lid is pried open, a rope slipped
around the neck, and little steady care.
full pulling fetches the body out. Then
we shove 1t into a rubber bag, and If we
amt disturbed we fill the hole and
smooth everything over as we found 1t.
Well, in the case that L was going to
tell you about, we got the lid off and
put the rope around the neck, but when
we pulled only the head and part of the
shoulders came, and on closer investiga-
ton we found that the rest of the body
had been consumed by quicklime. What
did we do then Why we just drop
ped the whole thing, covered up our
tracks and skipped"
"Why do you suppose quicklime, was
put on that body ?"
81 don't know perhaps he was pois-
oned, and the lime would destroy all the
proof"
About 300 bodies are annually f1rnish-
ed by the city to the colleges, bat that
number is not equal to the demand,
which is constantly growing with the
increased number of students. In addi-