Wheeling majority. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1907-192?, 1912-12-05
Our Prison Sweatshops
(sy Julian Leavitt.)

, 80 cents or dollar retailed inside /
prison for Is cents "jolt" tberoh,N
netting the syndicate from SIS IL s9n
bottle. The dope" routes waro
tematically organized and "evar, ra sys-
10 nookeo upon as the property Of
some one precisely as the route Nv
ed" ~ uehYer-
The leader in this traffic was .
vfct named Dinsmore, who was serr rSl
ne sentence for Poisoning his yv5fa
elihough he was neither 1icana lle
druggist nor physician the fact tbat ~
was q polsoner seemed to the nrison
autnorltles to qualify him for the ni le,o
OF hospital stewar dand prison pbs&
maclst. In fact he was YIrtuall1 pI H.
prison physician. The fear a. b TO
among the prisoners was SO great ~ ~
tney were known to reject arnos -
MS compromising even though in ~ -
last stages OF their sickness He
ltrol OF the young boys In the nris5n
Twas so utterly evil that the factS Vii
Inot bear publication. : 80
from q paper read by Judge Frost
- 60, 11lncoin lNeo.1 Social Ser.
vice Club, March 10, 1912: The %.
pecial feature that was SO appalI3ng
was the ruin OF so many BOYS %
want to read a little from a state.
ment given me by bright appearing
young man scarcely over age.
Speaking OF Dinsmore, he saws. ~
der the promise OF clothes, done e.
he y. will take and ravish 7mera havs
running them for life. He viii oot
them under the influence Of dona
cause them to form habit and after
rnat he has them at his mercy. Soma
OF. the guards know OF this. practice
and will say "Dinsmore has a nov kid
on the string. - have y, . ~ ~.
similar statements. About a YEAR 100.
Ia lad of sixteen. was sent to the NJ,
Draska Penitentiary. He was scarcely
normal mentally, He has become lust
as common property for immoral BUR-
poses as IS the woman of the Diojhel.
This boy is probably ruined for
life and the State Of Nebraska is a
Iparty to that ruin"
in the course Of certain investiga-
i tons made in 1910 by DR.. Luther
Widen, a student of sociology at the
University of Nebraska, he INQUIRED
specifically Of all the boys DO Won
think there Is a great cal of sexual
vice in the prison?". Sixty per cent
answered in the affirmative.
This situation, declares Julian Lea.
witt, endured substantially without
change for over two decades. 1t
might have continued indefinitely If
the prison had not contained desDer
ate and determined convict BY The
name of Shorty" Gray whose hatred
OF the warden was so intense that he
led a sensational movement to rouse
the Governor and the authorities into
action. Gray succeeded In smuggling
nitroglycerin and revolvers into the
prison.
Aiming himself and two compan.
ions as desperate as he was-John
Dowd and Charles Morley-the three
made break from their cells, shot
down the warden, his deputy and two
other men, blew Their. way out of the
prison with the nitroglycerin caps, and
fled into the blizzard, which, as it hap
peneds was raging that day.
y Four days after their escape these
men, exhausted and broken, drew up
at the place OF Roy Blunt a young
farmer near Springfield, Neb, and de-
manded food And the farmers young
wife made terrific blunder. Pre-.
tending to go into the yard for eggs,
she ran, instead, to their nearest neigh
Dor, q mile distant, and phoned to the
posse which was still securing the
country side. By this act she wrote
her husbands death warrant, for her
failure to return. warned Gray that
they had been tricked. He Immediately
ordered Blunt to hitch up the farm
team and, with the boy as hostage,
began the last mad drive 1t landed
/ them squarely in the hands Of their
pursuers: and the first to fall was
young Blunt, shot by member of the
posse. Gray fell next Dowd, fore
seeing the end, committed suicide
Morl alone, surrendered, Today he
is back in his old CELL
Altogether it cost eight lives to teach
the people of Nebraska THAT it does not
pay to sell their prisoners to- private
contractors, nor to bully and beat and
cheat and dope them. But this lesson,
il we'll learned, is probably. worth the
price. The sad fact remains, however,
that the lessop was in the nature Of an
accident Had it not been for the
madness and despair Of Thomas Gray,
Nebraska might not have known even
to this day. that its prison was merely
an experiment station for crime and
vice.
For the rest OF lis the lesson is OBJ
vious In practically one-half the pris-
ons of the country today the same
forces Of Profits and Politics, that
played havoc in Nebraska are in full
flood, and must, inevitably, drive on
| to similar disaster