Northern Wisconsin advertiser. [volume] (Wabeno, Wis.) 1898-1925, 1902-09-11


are generally credited with being a
newspaper reading nation, am often
tempted to believe that there must be
many millions of intelligent persons
in the United States who never so
much as glance at the headlines of a
newspaper remarked an official of
the postoffice department. ''At any
rate, if these millions to whom refer
ever actually do read the newspaper.
their gullibility must be so profound
as to be unfathonlable. The postoffice
department is constantly issuing fraud
orders against individuals and alleged
firms engaged in getting rich in the
operation of schemes that it would
seem any shrewd child of 10 aught to
be able to see through without the
least bother.
The other day, for example, the de-
partment got after a chap out in Gin
cinnati who for some months had been
conducting what he called a turf
bureau He alleged in his really adj
mirably written circulars that he had
private and absolutely certain meth
DDS of obtaining information as to the
horses that were slated to win races
on tracks all over the United States,
and he guaranteed returns of tremen-
dous proportions. Well, when we
looked this fellow up he promptly
skipped and his incoming mail was
seized. 1t seems Incredible, but every
days mail brought in thousands of
dollars, in amounts ranging from S.
actually up to $500, and the letters
enclosing cash and checks were near
ly all OF them apparently written by
persons of education. The book in
which the man kept his simple ac-
count of cash received showed that
since he put his scheme into operation
he had taken in no less a sum than
S465,O00, almost out of the question.
as 1t may appear. He has got away.
but even if he is captured, I very
much doubt if any very heavy punish
ment can be visited upon him. These
slippery chaps who work their lodges
by means of the mails have the money
to employ first-rate lawyers, and these
lawyers can generally successfully
construe their clients circulars as not
having really promised anything to
the gulls, after ALL
The endless chain schemes that
the department runs down year after
year are all OF them money makers
for thei operators. 1t would actually
seem as if all a busted individual had
to do to get rich is to get a lot of
circulars printed and send them out.
borrowing the money for postage. and
there will always be enough gulls to
start him on his way. The cherry
tree scheme worked by gang of
southern men, one of them q CLERGY
man, was colossal success for its
promoters, and yet not y man in the
crowd had coin to bless himself
with when they started the endless
chain scheme in nlctio7 The more
recent fountain zen fraud, worked bv
a couple of Pennsylvanians, yielded re-
turns that wect into the thousands
every day, and I haven't a DOUBT in
life that any number of similar end
less schain schemes arc being worked
this very day that we shall have to 20
after later or.
THE people who bite on these end
less chain schemes all obviously want
whole lot for nothing. or little or
nothing, and this. combined with Their
strange simplicity, is at the bottom
of the success of the fellows who AZ.
tempt to make their fortunes through
the use of the mails.
'.You would naturally suppose that
persons sufficiently intelligent to pos
sess an interest in stock speculation
would be able to steer clear of invest.
ment agents whom they only know of
through circulars, would you not?
And yet the department is constantly
in receipt of tales of woe from indivi-
duals who have invested stable sums
Of money with New York and Chicago
swindlers claiming to conduct specu-
lative business, who operate entirely
through the mails. These outfits are
broken up by the United States post
Office authorities as soon as their
fraudulent character is clearly estab-
lished but it seems impossible to
drive these fellows who run the
alleged investment agencies wholly
out of business.
The games too easy for them, and
they are fully aware of the great diff,
iculty found in convicting them. AS
soon as one brokerage firm that car
ries on its business entirely by mail
is smashed the men who have been
successfully conducting it simply move
down to another block and open UP
another brokerage Office under
firm name. The shift only in
wolves their getting ont another batch
of literature. The thousands and
thousands of dollars which these
sharpers take in year in and year out
from people whose way of expressing
themselves on paper makes it patent
that they are educated men and
women is perpetual source of aston
ishment to me-
The smaller fry of the mail swim
dlers are the fellows who advertise
that they will send solid gold watch
es' and all that sort of thing upon the