The Arizona copper camp., 1916-01-21
SUBTERFUCES OF
THIRSTY ONES ARE
MANY AND STRANGE

PHOENIX, Ariz. Jan. 2O.-A Phoe-
nix business man drove his automo-
bile over to Los Angeles and shipped
it back. He sent two garagemen down
to the freight depot with the, bill of
lading, cautioning them carefully to
tow the machine to his residence. But
they didn't see any reason for towing
! perfectly good car, apparently in
running order, SO they tried to start
the engine. Not cough! They found
! the carbureter full of a liquid that
| looked, but did not smell, like gasoline.
/, from the tank into pan and tasted
it, Two glorious gin jags were the
result and the aforementioned busi-
ness man had all kinds of trouble keep
ing from being indicted for introduc-
ing liquor into dry territory.
This is only one or hundreds of
clever subterfuges that have been re-
sorted to in order to evade Arizona's 8
strict prohibition law. Every day the
officers ''get wise" TO some new
scheme of the booze importers.
A barrel labeled "Asphalt'' came
from Los Angeles for a local contract
or. While it was being hauled to the
contractors warehouse it rolled out of
the back end of the wagon and was
smashed on the pavement. When sew
eral gallons of asphalt had oozed away
a large keg, still intact, was observed
by a policeman to be IN the middle of
the wreckage. He investigated and
found that it contained whisky of high
quality.
A sixty gallon iron barrel, of the
type commonly used by John D. to
ship lubricating oil, was received at
Del Rio, a little station near Pres
colt. 1t was billed from Ell Paso to
one M. F. Loomis, who, by the way, has
never been located. 1t was set out on
the station platform and in the course
OF the night someone struggled through
snowdrift to drill a hole in it's side.
The next morning a strong distillery
odor fingered about the platform In
vestigation showed that the barrel was
divided into two compartments. One,
at the head, contained five gallons of
distillate. The other compartment had
been filled with 55 gallons of whisky,
five of which had been extracted by
the midnight prowler.
Now at Del Rio is located one of the
dairy farms Of the Fred Harvey Santa
Fe eating house system. The employees
of the dairy learned of the barrel, and
the second night they siphoned out
something like half the whisky re-
naming therein. No cows were milked
the next morning. All of the mixers
were deathly sick. A Prescott doctor
was summoned and he analyzed the
liquor. 1t was then found that there
was a leak between the distillate and
whisky compartments.
Officers at Miami became suspicious
that a piano case received there and
billed to Mrs. Rosa Disney did not con-
tain a piano. They were right 1t
contained $436 worth of bottled LIQUOR.
Bottles are inferred in the middle of
cans Of lard or honey shipped to Ari-
zona. Scores of suitcases are left un-
called for at the railroad stations be-
cause the owners suspect that they are
suspected-and often they are right.
Dozens of arrests have been made be-
cause one bottle in a trunk or suitcase
was broken in transit.
OF late number of shipments have
been made in the bladders of animals,
which never break, no matter how
roughly the baggage is handled. 1t is
said that there is an unprecedented
demand for bladders at the slaughter
houses of Ell Paso and Los Angeles.
In Tucson a dealer in household
utensils casually remarked to con-
stable that his stock of can openers
had been exhausted that morning. He
could not understand why so many full
grown men should need can openers.
The constable ran down this clue and
arrested an enterprising young fellow
who had imported and sold whisky in
tomato cans with gaudy labels.
Automobiles have been used exten-
sively for the introduction of liquor.
At Clifton young man with big car
which he frequently drove to Lords
burg, New Mexico, fell under suspic-
Tho {, H,n, 411,an DLn4o Anl-n,,.