Rock Island daily Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1886-1893, 1892-12-12
HOW THEY STRING WIRES WHERE
PEOPLE DON'T WANT THEM.

His Being Aware of 1t.
On the roof of lofty building in the
business district two brawny linemen were
| toiling among the network of wires fas-
tened to a high series of cross arms. One
bent his ear close to a tiny telegraph in
s.rument connected with a wire, while the
other, under his direction, busily twisted
two wires together.
Hold on" cried the man listening at
the instrument. "They want to measure
resistance. Well have to wait awhile"
The two descended, and behind huge
! chimney lit their pipes. Asked young
man, who had been watching them with
, interest:
Suppose you wanted to string a wire
| from this TO that building opposite, how
would you do itS''
| That's against the law, young man, !"
| responded the taller of the two linemen
Telegraph companies never break the
| law"
But suppose you wanted to-"
Young man, if wanted to carry wire
across the street from here I'd let YOU go
down on the sidewalk and watch, and
while you were watching I'd get the wire
over and you'd never know it. How Well
| that's a business secret, but don't mind
| telling you that I've known men TO per
| form the feat several ways. IL | wanted
TO do it l might take that pilot wire, for
| instance, that is composed of two or three
| strands. I might twist bunch of wires to
| &C across the street till they exactly re-
semblrd the pilot wire to an observer on
| the sidewalk. might cut the pilot wire,
| hitching CT. my bunch, and keeping iC taut
| by main strength my man opposite would
| slowly haul it over.
'sYou wouldn't know it was moving.
| When he had wire enough ia shake out
| the -rires / wanted from the bunch and
leave the rest to make good the gap in the
| pilot. If couldn't find pilot wire on the
particular roof I'd take the biggest gauge
| single wire there and hitch two small wires
twisted together to it, make fine joint.
and my assistant would haul them over.
One would serve to make up the break in
the big wire, the other would be mine. If
were driven to it and had to get a rope
across the street I'd work either early in
the evening or early in the morning, when
l have heard there are only a few police
men around, and those either asleep or
chumps that wouldn't know what was
doing
Il knew a man on Dear born street who
another. An enemy sNore he shouldn't,
and hired a man and a policeman TO watch
the corners Of two buildings on opposite
sides Of the street and the sky to see that
no wire was strung. While they were
looking the wire went over. 1t was little,
two strand cable, just the size of the single
wire. and after it was fastened to the lat
ter and the joint nicely soldered it took an
hour to pull it slowly over"
If You We're to undertake such a lob
wouldn't you he liable to mistake tha wire
get the wrong ONE There are a GOOD
many on the roof tops"
Yes, there are thousands of them-tel-
egraph telephone, electric light. signal.
fire alarm, public and private dead and
secret-huJ there are scores of lincmen
that know every one. | can put my hands
ON a dozen men, any one Of whom you can
take bindfolded on any roof and he'll tell
you the name, number, ownership, use.
destination, origin and age of every wire
in the biggest rack you can find. It's
kind Of 4 natural knowledge You either
know it or you don't. know a man who
can't read or write, but he can break open
thirty-twO strand cable and pick out the
wire he wants.
1T Is always a fellow who knows the
wire geography of the roofs" he con
tinued, that makes the taps. Are there
many taps? You don't hear of a fraction
OF them. 1t is natural that sometimes
people would try to catch the secrets
worth thousands of dollars that 90 over
telegraph wires, amt it?'
y was after a tap the other day and
found it in our own office tower. II re-
minded me of another in the DAYS of the
hottest war against the bucket shops. A
certain shop was getting quotations We
made a dozen tests and tours and found
nothing. Finally, by accident. l discov-
cred the operator in certain hotel had his
instrument near a telephone, and shouted
quotations out too loudly. looked at that
telephone and found that it was kent in
circuit by little wooden peg under the
lever, which was apparently with the ear
piece hanging in it. That was a good
dodge, but the tappers made it a beautiful
one by taking that telephone wire all over
town and actually breaking open a tele-
phone cable, running it through that a
piece, then into another cable and finally
taking 1t through 4 central tower, all to
dlsarm suspicion. We located its other
end IN an office in a high building on Clark
street, and there sat telegraph operator.
the phone to his ear, catching the shouted
quotations of the other operator and tele-
graphing them over secret wire to the
bucket shop.
I'm another case they left blind lead
for US in the shape of a wire half concealed
running into hole in a brick wall, while
they broke open the linen covered line wire.
fastened their tiny copper threads to it and
ran them down holes bored in the insulator
into chimney. In another case they
tapped every wire of a certain companv
and rugged up battery of their own. Tins
making themselves independent, and bade
defiance to that company for four weeks.
till it dropped on the taps in its own Office
In another case they went on a certain roof
the owner of which swore he would shoot
any man found there stringing more iras
and kept guard to do it, aud while the
guard was on hand they tapped the wire
they wanted. OF course we didn't tbinl- of
looking there, and didn't 90 I'D there till
we had to, fearing we'd be thrown off Oh
there are tricks in all trades-but ours ~
Chicago Tribune
a.