Hattiesburg daily progress. (Hattiesburg, Miss.) 18??-1909, 1902-11-05
A Member of a Well-known Piano
and Organ Firm
HE rs MENTALLY UNBALANCED
Having Been at Three Different
Times Confined in an Asylum.

Boston, Nov An connection
with the fifteen murderous assault
cases which have occurred in Cam
bridge, Brooklyn and Somerville in
the last few months, two Of which re-
suited fatally, the state police today
arrested Alan c. Mason of Boston, q
-elI known and wealthy business man,
member of the piano manufacturing
IN of Mason e. Hamlin, a prominent
lub member and a Harvard graduate.
The police suspect from evidence
1 their hands that Mason has been
involved in nearly all the cases refer
red to, as the circumstances have
cen very similar. Mason is a mid
tim of mental trouble, for which he
was treated at the Mclean Asylum at
WaVerly. About q year ago he was
permitted to leave the institution.
Since that time, it is said, he has
been permitted to go and come at will,
and the fact that he has been fire.
1ently seen about the localities in
1ich the assaults occurred led to sus-
icion against him
The peculiar assault cases which
have terrorized Cambridge and vi
cinity, as well as other suburban sec
tions, began last June. During the
summer there were half q dozen vic
inns of an unknown assault, each of
whom was struck down and beaten
with blunt instrument. Early in
October Miss Agnes Mcpherson was
assaulted in Somerville, and died
frem her injuries. An iron wrench
was found and fixed upon as the
weapon used. During the same
month eight other cases followed, the
last of which occurred last Saturday
night, when Clara Morton, laun-
dress at the Mclean Asylum, was ac-
costed on the grounds of that institu-
tion and beaten with blunt instru-
ment. Miss Morton died Sunday.
Mason was taken into custody at his
mothers home on Newbury street
He made no objection, and on the way
to police headquarters, it is said,
Mason admitted to the officers that he
was in Somerville on the night on
which Miss Mcpherson was fatally
s injured.
The prisoner is about 80 years of
age and is the son of the founder of
the firm of Mason & Hamlin, organ
and piano manufacturers. He was
graduate from Harvard in 1886 and
entered the firm of which his father
was the head. Mental troubles de-
veIoped within few years of his
graduation and he went to the Mclean
Asylum for treatment After a time
he showed improvement and left the
institution A second time it became
necessary for him to return, but he
soon improved, and he was refused a
third time.
In 1901, however, symptoms more
serious than any previous ones devel-
oped and his mother and brother found
it unsafe to be with him at their New
bury street home. He had threatened
] both, and petition was filed to have
him sent away on the ground of insan-
ity, and Mason was sent to Waverly
for the third time. The man himself
protested against what he termed an
injustice, and said that he was per-
fectly sane and would conduct him
self as we'll as possible while he was
there. He remained six months.
Since then he has been free. and has
been stock-taker at the Mason 8
Hamlin organ factory at Cambridge
Mason has a mother and thres
brothers, Edward Palmer Mason
Henry Lowell Mason and Daniel Greg
orv Mason. He is cousin of Johl
Mason, the we'll known actor.
While in college Mason displayed
pronounced musical talent and wa
president of the Glee Club. He wa
also an athlet Of some note.