Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1906-01-04

cited they could hardly - to ind a
slot machine, and finally they sc,ght
nearly ali my cough i~ozeagsrs, and
went out into the night, aaa pa and /
went along, cause pa said he xaass~
stood all the slot machines wsrs
owned by Rockefeller. and he made
more money on them than he did ON
Standard oil, and the money that he
gave away to schools and churches
was from his rake-off IN his slot ma
chimes. Pa said it would be a good
thing if someone conld break up the
re~prehensible practice by beating the
blasted machines to a finish.
/ So pa he got a bag to bring back the
nickels in, and a bunch of us went to
a store where one whole side of the
place was filled with slot machines,
and the way the people were playing
the game was scanda:aus. Pa watched
a machine until the players had fed it
so 1t seemed as though it would die I'M
less it got air, and ne stepped UP and
put in a lozenger and turned the wheel,
and held the bag under the spout for
the coin, but it didn't come. Some
more fellows put in nickels, and the
machine gave little hacking coughs and
coughed up three or four nickels, but
nothing that seemed at all in the
nature of a financial hemmorague,
when pa took another lozenger and
put it in, and ly ginger the machine
hoOon tn hoauo IN pial-oJc 1;lyo ~ WIZ,
in the trough of -he sea.
Pa was so excited he forgot to hold
the bag, and niekels went all over the
floor, and everybody made a grab for
them, and pa was showed aside, and he
swore he would have the place pulled,
and just then a law officer took pa in
charge because he had put a cough loz-
enger in the slot machine, and he
searched pa and found a lot more
bronchial trochees. and pa was in for
it on a charge of malpractice, for CIV
ing cough medicine for the stomach
trouble of the slot machine, instead of
pepsin tablets.
They took pa in a back. room and
searched him some more, and found
his roll, and then a man who said he
was a lawyer offered to help pa. and
keep him out of the penitentiary. He
told pa the law of Kentucky made the
crime of trif1ing with a slot machine
the same as breach Of promise, or ar
son, and that he would be lucky if he
got off with ten years in the pen, with
80 days solitary confinement in a
Turkish bath cell, with niggers for
companions.
Pa turned blue and asked the laweI
if there was no way out of it, and the
lawyer told him that for $120 in spot
cash he would let him go, and fight
the case after the show had got out
of the state. A hundred and twenty.
five dollars was the amount they found
on pa, and he told them that inasmucl
as they already had it, they better
keep the money and let him go, ant
he would be always a living example
of the terrors of gambling.
So they let pa go. and all the wa.
to the train he told us he hoped thi'
experience would be a lesson to us no
to covet the money Of the rich, and al
far as he was concerned. John u
Rockefeller could go plum to thunde
with his money after this.
Then we got to the car, and fount
, about a dozen of the circus men who
!. had been out to beat the slot machines
. broke fiat, and / had to divide my sho
bag of nickels with them, that hat
, won before I let them into the game
: before they would let me go to bed.
, Dad says this circus life is makin'
me pretty tough.