The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1899-03-22
THE CAPTAINS
"REMINISCENCES
4 H, THE good old days have gone"
By George AIDE

4 II, THE good old days have gone"
n said the former captain of the
shell crew. "No matter how far out
into the country you get everybody
knows about the gold brick and the
green goods, and as for three-card
monte and the little ball, why the farm
hands go out in the barn and practice
those tricks. So what chance have we
got? The only thing that we can do
now is to stay in town and speculate in
grain.
I'll always maintain that the gold
brick game was the best one ever in
vented. 1 can't explain why, but the
boys used to get men with the brick
that you couldn't have touched with
any kind of a gambling proposition.
You'd think pawnbroker would be
pretty hard to fool, wouldn't you?
Well, the first gold brick ever handled
in Chicago was sold to pawnbroker.
Two of the wisest guys that ever got to-
gether came into Chicago with the brick
and the scheme. They'd got it out west
somewhere. The first thing they did
was to let a Chicago man into the game,
and they picked out good one, too.
Well call him Johnny, but that wasn't
his name. He had saloon and plenty
of money and pull, and after they'd
swelled around with him a week or two
they had great standing. Then
Johnny introduced them to the pawi-
broker and they sprung the gold brick
on him. He knew they had just come
from the west and figured that they had
come by this gold crooked and couldn't
dispose of it themselves, but for pawn
broker who melts up old jewelry and
SO on it was a cinch to get rid of any
amount in the lump that way. He eX
amined the brick and figured on the
weight, and finally, I think, he offered
them $4,000 for it. Of course they
passed him phoney brick. He must
have been suspicious and nervous, for
he got wise before they had time to
duck.
1.-THE two of them and Johnny were in
the back room there at Johnny's saloon
splittin' up the coin, and just as they
walked out to go up to the bar and take
drink to celebrate the good haul in the
front door comes the pawnbroker. His
hat was off and he was the craziest man
you ever saw in your life. He came
down along the bar like an express
train, but before he could grab either
of these fellows Johnny caught him
around the waist and held him fast and
began to yell: What's the matter?
What's the matter?' Well, this fellow
tried to answer, but he was so mad all
he could do was splutter and choke and
try to break away. The two smooth
boys knew their business. They were
out the back door and up an alley like
the wind.
''There was the pawnbroker trying to
get to the back door and follow them
and Johnny hanging on to him and
shaking him like rat and hollerin':
WHAT the matter? What's the mat
ter" Then when the pawnbroker tried
to tell him he would slam him around
and beg him to keep quiet and tell what
was the matter. At last the pawn
broker managed to say that these fell
lows had robbed him. Then Johnny
was good and surprised. why didn't
you tell me that before? 2 he says. Come
on, and we'll see where they've gone to-
BY that time these fellows were two
miles away. Of course Johnny was
sore. He kept sayin': why didn't you
tell me what was the matter when you
first came imp Then all the pawn
broker could do was weep. And the fun
niest part of it was that he never got on
to Johnny"
Then the ex-captain told of the palmy
days of open gambling and taking" at
the county fairs.
For two or three years / handled a
whole crowd of workers." he said. 81
would pay a certain lump sum for the
grating privileges alta fair, and then
I'd divide up my men to work all kinds
of schemes We used to run a wheel and
play the shells and sell jewelry and
money in little boxes, and buy back gold
watches and buggy whips for twice
what we sold them for, and SO on, oh,
every thing that was ever invented to
separate sucker from his money.
The funniest experience / ever had
when / was in that line was out in Iowa.
We had to jump all the way from Penn