The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1909-04-21
AWFUL SINK OF CRIME
The Wild West 0utdOne in the
State Of New York.
wICKEDEST SPOT IN AMERICA

Stacking Conditions of Lawlessness
in Ulster County, Within Less
Than Eighty Miles of New York
Civ, A Heavy Crop of Variegated
crimes Is Produced Daily. Dance
Halls and Gambling Hells For
Negroes.
NEW WORTHWHILE less than
On miles of this city the wickedest
,no+ in North America fiourishes and
daily produces heavy crop of varie-
Gated crime. 1t is in Ulster county,
nat far from High Falls, where an
army of men is at work building the
sbafts and tunnels of the Rondout
sinhon. under the Rondout river,
which is part of the great ten-year
task of preparing for New Yorks
future water supply. Conditions eX-
ist there which are worse than have
over been alleged about Panama.
Not even Dodge City, nor Tombstone,
in their palmiest days exceeded in
wickedness the collection of shacks
that nestle in the Rondout valley.
Negroes Chiefly Employed.
The great aqueous artery which is
being built toward New York from
the huge reservoirs in the CatskiIl
will cross the Rondout valley, and
as it is deemed more economical to
20 under the river than over it what
4 is known as a siphOn is being con-
structed at point about mile from
the village of High Falls, pretty
Mace of about 600 inhabitants The
water will dive hundreds of feet
down one great shaft, flow through
tunnel under the river and emerge
4 through another vertical shaft on
the other side, on a lower level, to
continue on it's way. To facilitate
the construction of this siphon six
other shafts besides those at the ends
are being sunk to the tunnel. They
are used for the removal of the
rocks and earth excavated in driving
forward the subterranean waterway.
There is no harder and more danger
GUS work than this, and there are
few white men that will undertake
it for the wages paid. But negroes
especially those from the coal
mines of Alabama and other parts of
\ the south-are tempted by what
seem to them high wages, and hun
a dreds of them are employed in this
underground work. Three fourths of
\ the workers are negroes, the rest be-
h ing Slavs, Huns and Lithuanians, all
of low intelligence and primitive pas
y Sons.
Dance Halls and Gambling HeIls.
To cater to the baser appetites of
q this army dozens of the vilest dance
halls, saloons and gambling houses
n have blossomed forth-as vicious a
collection of evil resorts as ever eX-
listed anywhere. These are built near
the right of way, on private property
leased from farmers. The struggling
rows of Shacks in which the labOrers
eat and sleep jostle the saloons. Be
cause of the large number of ne
groes practically all the saloons are
run by the blacks. Every saloon is
VI a gambling house, and most of the
saloons have discOrdant pianos and
space reserved for those who wish
to dance. Every Saturday the trains
bring from New York a horde of wO-
men from the wickedest resorts of
the black TenderlOin-''pay day
ladies', the police call them. With
q them comes the carriOn army Of
plckpOcketS, crooked gamblers,
thieves of the meanest and lowest
description. Between shutdown Sat
urday and sunrise Monday the la
Oorers spend more than $4,000 in
N gambling, liquor and RIGHTEOUSNESS.
81 Roulette, klondike and craps are
the principal gambling games. Ev-
cry roulette wheel in the camp is
said to be crooked. AS soon as the
labOrers are paid off on Saturday
business" starts with a whoOp in
every saloon and dance hall. The
pianos rattle all night long, all day
sunday and far into the night be-
lore the next week work begins.
through the thin walls and open
Coors of the shacks the sounds of
SlHeklng and quarreling and shut
IIhg teet mingle in a continuous hid
eous roar that rises above the law
Tess little town and fills the quiet
LIsnt OF the countryside with clamOr.
NOW and then there is the sharp
crack of a pistol. Then out of the
darkness come hurrying two or three
h.hak-clad police-the, clean, lean
Lmoed, resolute picked men that
Oapt Mckay, the West Pointer, has
under him to keep order on the aque
uuct property. These police never
50 INTO any of these negro saloons
pIone. One man, no matter how
oFaye, would stand little show
against rOomful of blacks crazed