Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1892-08-25
JUST OVER THE WAY.
William Booth Kept a Speak Easy
Under the Police Nose and
DEFIED ALLEGHENY OFFICIALS.
Supt. Muth Stood Rifle Shot Through
His Cfice Window,
BUT HIS PATIENCE AT LAST FAILED

William Booth, the proprietor of Booths
Hotel, on the northwest corner Of West
Diamond and Ohio streets, Allegheny, was
arrested last evening on two charges of SELL
ing liquor without license and selling
liquor on Sunday. The informations were
made by Police Superintendent Muth, and
the warrant was served by Detective Frank
Aiken. Booth was taken to the police sta
tion about7 o'clock, and was locked up
until he could get bail to the amount of
81, 900. This he did not obtain last night,
and he spent the night in an iron cell, while
his wife and children cried for him not 200
yards away.
Booth is an Englishman. large, blonde
and easy-going. He has had a lease on the
old hotel on the corner for a little less than
two years. The house belongs to Mrs
Nettie Mckee Graham, and is part of the
property selected for the site of the new
Allegheny postofice. The entrance to the
hotel, an old three-story frame structure,
Is on West Diamond street. This doorway
and the windows of the dining room on the
second floor face the one large window of
the private Office of Superintendent Muth,
In City Hall. 1t is in that dining room
that the superintendent says the big En-
glishman has been running a speak-easy,
right under the official nose. The nerve
displayed by Booth was CALLING to the Off
cial dignity, and tor several weeks detec-
tives have been at work to secure proof
positive against the bad man from England
A Shot Through Muth's Window.
Booth is a marksman, and his house is
numbered with rifles, Floberts, revolvers
and odd old shooting irons that may once
have been of some value. During the
spring and early summer Mr.. Booth amused
himself by shooting from his windows at the
pigeons that flew about the old barns and
shanties near his inn, and at the sparrows
that twittered in the pine trees in the
municipal yard just across the narrow
street. One calm morning, while the Super
intendent of Police was at his desk, writing
and thinking and enjoying a period of un-
disturbed solitude, there was crack in the
window glass just above his head and a
small bullet struck the wall and fell on
the carpet on the opposite side of
the room. A ball from one of Booths f1o-
berts, perhaps aimed at a vagrant sparrow
on an exposed pine branch, had cut a round
hole in the large pane of the upper sash.
This, the superintendent contended, was
drawing the bead little too fine. A po-
Gceman was sent after Booth. He was
taken before the superintendent and large
section of the riot act was then and there
recited. There has been no more sparrow
shooting and no more bullets have gone
through the police windows. But on quiet
days big Englishman sat at window on one
side of the street, and short, sturdy Ger
man sat at q window on the other side, and
they gazed at one another-not in love.
Shooting Range for the Polio..
About two months ago Booth sprang q
new source of annoyance. He called in
several reporters one dav and gave them a
talk on the miserable weapon equipment
and poor craftsmanship of the ordinary
Allegheny policeman. Every man carried
his own choice of gun, he said, and as the
police had no practice with their revolvers,
one of them, in firing at flying thief, was
next beat. He proposed to establish
shooting gallery in his basement, where
the policemen might have q chance for
target practice with their assorted guns.
This was heaping molten Stag on the
official head, and Booth from that day was
marked for the soup bowl.
About four weeks ago, being convinced
that j ohm Barleycorn was q regular boarder
at Booths Hotel, the superintendent sent
for the Englishman and talked to him in
plain and pointed manner. Booth confessed
that he had been selling without color of
law. He had been in hard luck, he said,
and had to get up before daybreak and
hustle hard to support hungry wife and
five hungry children.
Twice Refused License.
He had twice appealed. in dulcet tones
to the judges of the License Court, but
twice had he been refused. However, he
promised thereafter to be good and strictly
to obey the Brooks law. He would deal in
whisky, he averred, only over some other
fellows bar. With that he was sent home
and the Superintendent felt easier. 4
Watch was not relaxed, though, for the5
superintendent from his own window couldy
in his leisure moments, look through-the
scant shrubbery and see dilapidated
citizens going in and coming out through
the low doorway across the Diamond. He
could even see shadowy forms passing lack
and forth in the dining rooms, for the Iace
curtains which hung at the windows we're
very thin. He set his detectives aga IN at
work, and by pumping well-known citizens
of bibulous inclinations, the superinte endent
became convinced that the Allegheny rep1
resentative of the celebrated Booth family
was still selling liquor out of the old ice
box. Patience at last grew tired. and the
were made.
Superintendent Muth says that he has
will all be compelled to tell what they
Sc h.. &c ! Al,