The Virginia enterprise. [volume] (Virginia, St. Louis County, Minn.) 1893-19??, 1903-04-10
COPYRIGHT, 1908.

" always IC SduC.
Woke u TIL tnry b y going after When We pick up our favorte
pidor. newspaper the first thing we read
is the article about the current
murder mystery. We want to get all the particulars and all the
facts. Was he killed by a stroke of lightning or was he talked to
death by an amateur book agent? Did the suspenders that he wore
at the time he met death cost IS cents or a quarter? Did he 90 to
his throat about four inches north OF the wind pipe. or was he hit
with a biscuit while walking from the kitchen into the dining room?
Have the police been able to explain why he had a fried egg in his
vest pocket when found. Who was the man in the celluloid collar
ana a plug nat who was seen riding past the house in a street car
the day before the crime? Have they found the hold-back strap to his
vest that was yanked off in the scufAe? ~
And so we wresle the great mystery up one column and down.
another In the name of civilization and the onward march of higher
culture, we want to know whether the left bureau drawer was open or
shut on the night of the crime, and whether the man with long wfis-
k ks VINO a een a a livery stable the next day., trying to trade a
gold watch and chain for a chew of tobacco could have been implicated
1t is all SO horrible. We can hardly wait till the paper comes
SO that W "a settle down in a n easy chair with a comfortable pillow
at the back of Our neck and read about it. Society demands that
this thing be tcrreted out to the very bottom and that the world be
told to an exact certainty whether he wore a bone collar button " the
kind the laundry sends home with your shirt. We, as a people, strue-
Cling ever onward and upward for the best that is in civilization de-
i1and IN uncompromsing terms that we be correctly informed who
was the mysterious man in a two-do1ar hat who was seen WALKING
nurr1edly up one side OF the street and down the other on the after
noon preceding the tragedy: ""~"
1.-The authorities to-day secured a new c1ew," report the papers
that has never been used before, and which may prove = valuable
factor in solving the great mystery of this revolving but intensely in
terest1ng case. 1t is learned that on the morning following the crime
a stranger wearing a false nnustache and carrying a leather valise that
was tul OF bullet holes, was seen by an old man, standing On a corner
and counting a large sum of money. Suddenly his vaise came omen
and deposited on the sidewalk a set of false whskers, blue: 2 set Of
alse Whlskers, red; a set OF false WhlskerS, green a pair of false burn-
sides; a false nose, a set of false teeth, a %bald-headed wig, a dark-1an-
tern, a stick OF dynamite, a pair of boxing gloves, a Winchester rife
a mask, a skeleton. key, a monkey wrench, a bicycle punp and :
double-barrel shot gun. The police agree that a man with a cargo,
OF this description, could hardly have been returning from an ice
cream festival = prayer meeting, and they believe the discovery has
an important: bearing on the case" =. :"
1.-The hearing Of expert testimony was again taken ID this after.
noon when Professor R. Waldo Perkins, a. hollow chested scientist
who uses peppermint lozenges and a B-aat ear trumpet, was assisted
to the stand. The states attorney asked: ~
professor, what is indicated by the fact that the woodshed door
was found open on the morning following the crime? 49,
hey? quer1ed the professor, stabbing himself in the ear with
us trumpet and aiming the other end OF it at various persons in a
1eversh effort to get a focus On the man who had spoken r. hin
IF IL square yards of sod in the back yard were found to be
torn up by the roots, and trampled over, and covered with susoender
buckles and warts and coat sleeves and vest buttons wor1d II indicate
that there had been a struggled?
"'Hypotheticany so,' answered the professor, A DISTRICT r,,o-
Der of horrors ran through the court room.
"Now, continued the states attorney, If a row of footprints all
OF the same size were found running across the front yard about IT
feet apart, would it indicate that the person who had made them was
in any particular haste? e.
81 object yelled the defendants counsel. ~,
"Hcy? queried the professor, again waving the trumpet throuob
the air in an effort to fnd the new voice.
"1f you should pass a house at night, and, LOOKING in shou1d
see a man raise a cane-bottom chair about eight feet in the air and
bring it down across the features of another man, at which the second
man would pick up a piano stool and plant it on the ueck, of the frs+
man, would you say that their relations were friendly or unfriendlv?
Herei a letter written with a stub-pen. Judging by the hand writing.
was the writer a blonde or a brunette? How old was he at the time s
All of these questions we're answered in a shrir. scientific +one ~
voice that made a profound impression upon all ~
Every effort was made to confuse the witness and make i an
pear that he was the man who had been seen the day following the
crime, trying to trade off a burglars jimmy and a pair of knuckies Is
an old lady for something to eat. The day as a whole was u;thaut
sensational incidents, although the counsel for the defense woke>un
the members o" the jury two or three times by going after the states
attorney with a cuspidore.' .
And, so it goes. Why will newspapers print SO much about these
things, we often ask Mother in eager, trembling tones. Why win
a man read everything hs#paper has about the case and then q. ii.
oyer the neighborhood to see if he can find a paper that has any..
thing more. about s.?