Twice-a-week plain dealer. (Cresco, Howard County, Iowa) 1895-1913, 1899-10-13
OBSERVATION-DISCLOSURES
q On
3 A DETECTIVE e,
3 -, WHO u, C1,
D nErECTen o.
3 OEIEClED QN,
q. By Philip G. Hubert, Jr. 81 ~
@zH ), sSs %, fIss;, .sss q. RSAA
BY Philip G. Hubert. Jr.

Ha% ~ by JJoR = Iippn cote Co. RNEAn
1t sometimes seems to me as If Ma
ture had keen sense of humor, and
loved now and again to play little jokes
upon her victims. We are apt to think
of Nature as stern, majestic, unrelent-
ing, pitiless. But is she really so?
Animals have no sense of humor, SO it
is said, although have seen dog play
tricks upon cat that set whole room
full of people in roar of laughter.
These, however, were clowns farces,
while Nature plays serious jokes. For
instance, is it not an exquisite joke to
implant in the bosom or the brain of
man born to play the melancholy
Dane the notion that he is really fitted
to do the comic policeman and convulse
the audience by sitting down in his
wife's pumpkin pies? That used to be
the height of the comic mans comic
achievements when was boy. Ihave
seen even Warren do 1t at the Boston
Museum I don't want to say how many
years ago. Nature gives man the
physical and mental outfit for an I'M
dertaker, and at the same time drop
of poison which impels him to play the
clown. This is her little joke. 1t is q
despicable trick both upon the man
and upon the community called upon
to witness his misfortunes. speak
somewhat feelingly because am only
too sure that Nature played little joke
upon me when she filled me with the
idea that was born to be detective,
whereas, as matter of fact-but that
is my story.
l was still very young man, as are
most men when the detective fever
seizes them, at the time entered the
employ of the Morning Gazette as re-
porter. / had no advertised and ac-
knowledged speciality. felt myself a
journalist, and everything pertaining
to journalism was my field. Neverthe-
less, if there was one thing hoped and
perhaps prayed for, it was that some
tremendous crime might come to light
through my exertions. When the police
| of New York, or perhaps of the coun-
try, or even of the continent, or of two
or three continents, acknowledged
themselves beaten and baffled, should
proceed to delve and think until the
criminal was landed in Jail solely
through my delving and thinking.
Such. things had happened.
There was a reporter named Bangs
on Philadelphia paper who had
achieved fame and fortune by tracking
| supposed murderer for three months,
| night and day; that he nearly succeed
ed in getting the wrong man hanged
was his-the misfortune,
and not his fault. His newspaper ac-
knowledged his enterprise and reward
ed 1t. He got it into his head that a
certain man, who happened to be per-
fectly innocent, was criminal, and
having formulated brilliant theory
he worked 1t out so well, he piled has
damning evidence SO high and found so
many facts to fit his theory: and if they
didn't fit made them fit, that, as say,
he came near hanging his Victim, and
thereby VOL the admiration of the
whole newspaper profession Of his
town. This splendid achievement led,
OF course, to emulation. For long
time all the Philadelphia reporters
went about with the idea that every
stranger they met was deep-dyed vii
lain, and worked upon the theory that
all men We're guilty until they had been
proved innocent.
Another noted case occurs to me:
that of a reporter-this time from Bos-
ton-who stood one day at the ticket
window of railway station buying
ticket for the suburb where he lived,
when another person asked for ticket
for Quebec in so peculiar voice that
| the reporters detective instinct began
| to work. The mans hand shook so as
he held it out to receive the ticket that
the big diamond on his little finger
| CLEANED all the more. Between his feet
he Rugged fat valise. Everything
pointed to the defalcation of at least
q million-nervous man, ticket for Can
ada, big diamond, fat valise. The train
was to start in six minutes. The re-
porter wrote hurried note to his chief
telling him that if q big bank defalca-
ton came to light that evening he had
the man and was going to track him to
| his lair.
He managed to get berth near his
victim, who snored for eight hours
probably ruse-while the reporter re-
NAMED on the alert. When they reached
Quebec the man turned out to be the
clerk of big jewelry firm; he had been
to Boston to buy diamonds, and was
perhaps nervous about thieves. That
reporter went home feeling that he had
done his duty; for if there had been q
| defalcation that man must have been
| the defaulter. 1t is of such stuff that
detectives-especially newspaper de-
tectives-are made; men who stop at
everything and can make something
out of less than nothing.
To return to my own adventures in
this exciting field, was highly delight.
ed when one day the managing editor
| OF the Gazette called me into his room
| and closed the door.
"Mr. Seymour" he said, "you may
not happento know it, but the Gazette
has recently been imposed upon in q
most shameful manner. Did you read
the story in last Sundays supplement
called .Daisy's Quest'?"
"Of course" l returned. / made II
a point never to omit line of the Ga.
zette. II thought it was first-rate
story-the best we have had, to my