Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1913-06-23
IFLlRTS WITH DEATH FOR $500 A
YEAR.
Experiences of Owen Eagan With
kIotz' Internal Machines.

l How would you IKE the SOD OF open,
ing a bomb a day at So per With ne
| insurance company willing to insur,
your life no pension if you are killed
no doctors bill paid if part of you is
! blown to atoms, and your wife and ba-
| bes waiting at home 500 days a year
! for the ring of the telephone bell an
nouncing that you are coming home
in the dead wagon?
| This. and a lot more, is precisely the
] job of owen Eagan. Inspector of Com
iffst!bles Is what they call him official
~, New Jerk city's professional
bomb ol,catr IS what he really is
f + H. Years he's been opening infer
ri machines, prying apart electrically
exploded packages Of guncotton nitro
glycerin. poking his hands and his
nose into inventions of the master
minds of criminal chemists, Designed
especially to blow to shreds the hands
! and noses and bodies of all who so
much as touch them, and pitting his
skill and craft against the craft and
skill of those most terrible of all Grim
/ mai ffends-the bombmakers of New
/ York.
In those 10 years he has met lis
match but once That was in Klotz-
klotz the inventor, the eonsummate
mechanic, the expert in high explosives.
klotz whose bombs showed the ingen-
uity OF IL genius and the planning OF
scientist. And lcagan has always main
tanned that was not fair test.
4 could have opened that bomb II 1t
had not been tempered with first
Eagan maintains stoutly. I have new
er seen the one | could not open--yet.
grant that Klotz was the most dan
gerous of all. He was clever and
shrewd, and even though l did lose II
him that once I've beaten him a good
many times. I've opened safely nail IL
dozen of his bombs more ingenious
than the one that got my hand.
L is in this strain of friendly COM
petition of Ingenuity that quiet-faced
owen Eagan, "0wnie. as they can
him foi.dly up at the bureau, talks OF
his tits with the shrewdest pomo-
makers in the world-tilts that to the
bombmaker means simply to be outwlt-5
ted
Snort, stocky, with gray, curly mar
and level blue-gray eye. Ihae IS
Eaean Fifteen hundred year. ne
says, isn't enough for his JOB. ne
thinks he ought to get anyway s-oao'
That for the professional pomb Opener
of the greatest bomb center III ehe
world. Five to eight hundred inierht, ]
machines q year. And in between jug
Cling with death and dynamite ciefleai
work in the office of. the bureau, ana
inspection of buildings. and routine Oh
the department. not every oas, eee
every day and every night.
DO +. mind it, asked the curry.
haired inspector Not me- It's luii Oh
interest and zest. There always rs the
element of the Unexpected which Ieilus
thrill to any game. There's variety
tno- No bombs are exactly alike
never know whether the quits are go
ing to be black powder, mtro-siyeerih,
a ehlorate mixture, or dynamite, OF
whether the killing material inside IS
hent wire nails. or staples. or scrap
ron or lust common lead slugs. Inc
only way to tell is to open up the diihs
and find out
How does he open them? That's the
eeeret of his craft To reveal mat
would mean that the criminals VINO
have for years been trying to cohstfuet
:, eonh tina. owen Eagan could not
omen might invent way OF gettihs
him Even Mrs Eagan does not Know
how E.aean does his work. he Viii
toll Won that he does not open lnieIllai
machines under water-water causes
Some chemical explosives to go OIL. Mo-
does he use any knives or tools TO open
them. He does it all with ms hahas'
and what is more, he does IL Ill 4.
square. reinforced, bomb-prool fooill
1--WE feet by five feet, by seven Ieet' anu
W. ascane save narrow door WHICH
is bolted. ste,v
T,,;s bomb chamber lis a mystery
whore ii is situated only Eagan' toiii
nissioner Johnson and pr. Ncniii
ynow 1T is in the thickly popuia.eu
section. under a row of tenements, Tue
occupants of which do not Know oi 10
oxistence. It is constructed OF steer
md concrete and sand bags. AL .'iiies
no oan has a dozen infernol machihes
IN it at one time ~
He makes light of his WORK. Se. ''o
insurance companies smile when nc
tries 10 take out life policy. me rea-
con for the secrecy as to the where
.,houts of the chamber is the fear liiae
the makers of bombs, VINO long nave
sought to blow up Eagan, would soiile
.lay drou one of their machines outslde
+be door of the room when the inspect
ar was at work within. If inc poH'u
failed to do the work 1t is propapie ina,
the conclusion would set off any othef
which Eagan happened to be WORKING
with.
~ would have wagered." Eagan SAID
crimly, that had Koltz lived ana peer
permitted to continue bomb ihVeh,ioh'
that 7 could have opened anything ne
constructed without accident. YET he
was the greatest of them all. l never We.
touched one of his bombs unless lei'
perfectly fit. My mind had TO De ac'
tive and alert to every possible deVlce
before I trusted myself to work on one
; of his inventions.
"They were marvels for the unex-
pected. For instance, there was on'
that | still have in the bomb chamber
| 1t is harmless looking wooden boz
with very handsome, japanese inlay
| of pearl in the design of pair o.
clasped hands and two crossed SWORDS
! Woven through these so as to be al
most lmperceptible, is the outline OF
skull and crossbones.
1 "1 ne eyes of the skull were matches
n.