Omaha daily bee., 1898-10-20
SUICIDE AT THE LIBRARY
Unknown Man Takes His Life on the
Main Stairway,
EVIDENTLY A RUSSIAN OF GOOD BREEDING
Jnnitor, startled by n shot, Later
Finds the Body-Theories of the
Police and the Library Board
Concerning the Case.

An unknown man committed suicide yes
teerday morning by shooting himeelf in the
head at the library building. Death was
almost instantaneous.
The shot was fired at o'clock, Just be-
fore the entrance OF Janitor Charles ]. Sam
uelson into the building. Samuelson. who
was in the basement at the time, heard the
shot, but thought 1t was in the street and
paid no attention to 1t and went about his
work He started the fires in the furnace
and cleaned the lower floors and was pre-
pairing to dust the stairway on the second
floor leading to the art gallery, when he
discovered the dead body Of very large
man lying in a pool of blood and the
Jagged hole in his right temple showed
where the bullet had entered his brain. In
his right hand was clutched cheap 32-
, caliber revolver. Coroner Swanson and the
police were notified and the body was re-
moved to the morgue.
The dead mans name is supposed to be
John Schmidt, as that name was found writ
ten on the margin of small map of Europe
found in one of his pockets. The map was
evidently torn from a Russian geography, as
the lettering on il is in Russian. Among the
other unintelligible inscriptions found on
the margin Of the map are these words:
"Poccor Tepnaney, Russland" The word
"Poccor' is found written in several places.
On one of the mans under garments was
found this name, badly blurred: Rein cart,
49," pair of sun glasses, the case of
which bore Riga, Russia" was also found
On the corner OF a pocket handkerchief in
red silk were embroidered the letters. -.
X. r."
The dead man was evidently Russian
and from the cut of his clothing, he had not
hoe ;,,t t1,f ,lr,,1 .i,.
feet in height and weighed about 195 pounds
He was a very light blond and was smooth
shaven. From the quality of his clothing
and his general appearance, he was above
the ordinary station In life.
The man had been in the building all
night. 1t is believed that he entered just be-
fore closing time Tuesday night and secreted
himself until the janitor had locked the
building and left. An hour or SO after the
place had been locked up, Night Watchman
Larson says that one of the burglar alarm
bells rung violently. He made an investiga-
tion but could not find anybody and concluded
that the alarm system was out of order.
This alarm must have sounded from the
Byron Reed room on the second floor, as
the doors of that room this morning bore
evidences of having been tampered with.
To account for the all night presence of the
the burglar heard the night watchman NOV
ing about and secreted himself to await
until he had retired and that he fell asleep
, and remained in that state until awakened
by the noisy entrance OF the janitor this
morning. Nothing of value was found miss
ing from any Of the rooms this morning.
Members of the Executive board of the IL
library do not hold the burglar
theory. Victor Rosewater, who investigated
the case, and some of his confreres believe
that the suicide was some poor unfortunate
foreigner who, sick and disheartened, chose
the library as a place to die
After the publication in The Bee Of the
story of the suicide great many people
called at Swansons morgue to look at the
body. The majority Of the callers were for
eigners, Russians predominating The re-
mains are still unidentified. Coroner Swan
son has not set date for an inquest over
the body as yet. 1t Is his opinion that the
dead man has no relatives or friends in
Omaha. He thinks he is a recent arrival in
the city.