The Birmingham age-herald., 1903-04-05


 take him over a large section Of southern territory. "The colored con man werKs his own race exclusively and some ol his schemes for foong the ignorant ne- groes out of their hard-earned money are mighty ingenious.
 Tn Mississippi town, the other day l had chance to watch the operations of mottled colored man who was max ing money hand over fist. 1 say mottled because he had pure white or pink spots all over his face and hands and, l was told, over all the rest of his body. A tew years ago, while up north, he had some sort of disease which caused these white spots to appear upon him.
 His affliction puzzled the medical men, and a great deal was written about his case at the time in the medical press as well as in the daily papers. 1t was thought that he was going to die in the hospital to which he was taken, but he recovered from his illness. the white spots stopped appearing, and when he found himself on his feet he was about half black and half white. The white spots on his face were as rosy, and the texture of his skin where they had ap- peared as silky as those of a young white girl
 Well, this colored con man was selling 'make-you- whlte' medicine to the colored folk in the Mississippi towns-price, S2J for six bottles, to be used at the rate ot q bottle a month. and guaranteed to rem der 'em just like white folks at the end of six months, when they had finished | saf. lrfff
 The darlley working this game was dressed to the hines, wore diamonds, ana had money in every pocket. He didn sell his make -you- white medicine pub licly or advertise il in any way. but dis posed of it by tie visiting method. He had list of the black people who were known to have little piles of savings tucked away. and he called upon these and stated to them the marvellous na- ture of his medicine.
 The stuff. as physician down there told me, was nothing but water coored with harmless dye and 1iaVored with d lew drops of some essential oil. But the man had only to exhibit himself to prove the efficacy of his treatment He told them that he had only been taking the medicine three months himself and that the white spots on him were spreading every day. He would partially disrobe
 
 his marvellous 'make-you- white dope the fine pink spots on his torso.
 Of course he got the currency Of the black believers In punches and bundles. Few of them could doubt the evidence of their own eyes when they felt of the con mans white spots and found 1t i'm. possible to rub them off He didn't make any bones about the sort of business he was engaged in, and the white authori- ties, far from molesting him, appeared to be rather amused over the cleverness of his graft.
 T had talk with him about hls dope, and with a very broad grin and a screw ed-up wink, he declared to me that his medicine would do for the blacks just what he professed it would do-make them white. Then his grin became still broader as he added:
 It won't make 'em no biackern what dey is, nohow'
 He has been circulating in the black belt for q couple of years now, l under- stand, and I was told that he had bought some valuable real estate in Memphis out of the proceeds of his graft. His scheme, is first of all, to sell all of the twenty-dollar outfits of his medicine that he can, and after that to rake over the town he l.. working for persons of his race who have only $15. $10 or $5 to invest he takes no lower than 8.
 He swears the people who get the cut rate to secrecy as to the amounts they have paid for the make you white dope telling them that he has only made the reduction as special and 'perticular favor. He doesn't make any return trips to the towns he works, for obvious rea- sons. He tells the victims who buy the colored water from him that they can expect action on the stuff after they've been taking 1t for a week. so he isn't talk ing any chances on return trips.
 In the last few years I have been meeting all through the south smooth darkey grafters. whose game is to peddle fake liquids and salves guaranteed to make the hair of their purchasers as l straight as that of white people, Tine l liquids were plain bay rum or some cheap ! sort of toilet water. and the savcs or i dinary Vaseline, but these grafters get as high as Sl0 for their outfits of wool straightening stuff.
 Tt is neatly packed in small paste. board boxes covered with high-fautln posters setting forth the merits of the treatment. They viriously call their l stuff kinkene straightene' 'Inake-it- 1 straight, and so on, and they sell the truck without half trying. They, too. are careful to visit town only once for in selling the hair straighteners they ] guarantee quick results and are not look 1 HIS ltA idHOI lIOuDle.
 l "A year or so ago a crafty. middle. aged black man. who posed before his people as an itinerant preacher of the Gospel corraled scores of them through out Florida and Georgia by selling them l charms which he declared would rem der the wearers invisible whenever they desired not to be seen. The charms were ordinary pebbles neatly sewed in little pieces of chamos skin. The grafter who got rid of them at from S10 to S25 each from credulous members of his race told his victims that the charms were straight from the hands of the mother of the Voodoos in Africa. To einch his areu- | ment he always pronounced certain chanted incantations over the charms Tn the regions in which this man oper- ated white poultry raisers and fruit growers were soon amazed to observe black men helping themselves to all the chickens and fruit in sight often in broad daylight with no apparent fear of the consequences. The negroes taking these chances positively believed that they were invisible, while wearing their charms, to the owners of the farms 1t took a lot of buckshot judlclously placed to convince them that they had been deceived and that their charms from the hands of the mother of the Voodoos' had only a theoretical value. The authorities of Florida got after this black man, but I believe that he wasn't punished.
 Notwithstanding the vituperation and scorn with which the 'blue-gummed nig- ger Is mentioned in some of the current coon songs of the day, the so-called blue gummed negro of the more remote color ed settlements of the far south Is a very much-feared individual by his naiqh-