Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1921-11-15
ENTER THE SHOPLIFT ER-By Frederic j. Haskin

TEW YORK CITY, Nov. 11.-At this sea-
" son of the year, New York depart
ment stores increase the size of their
detective forces in order to combat the ever
growing number of thoughtful persons who
begin their shoplifting early From now un-
til after Christmas, shoplifting will proceed
at bold and furious pace. The women's
| court will be kept busy hearing the cases
| of 1ght-fingered ladies, caught at inoppor-
| tune moments, while the large Fifth avenue
stores will lose thousands of dollars worth
of goods to others, who will successfully get
| away with it.
! This is always the case. The annual depre-
dations Of shoplifters are regarded as an
| inevitable calamity which no mercantile es-
| tablishment, however resourceful, can hope
| to escape. And this year the stores antici-
pate greater difficulties from this source
| than ever before because of the new styles
| in sleeves.
You may have observed that the new fem
mime sleeve is a voluminous, dropping, bell
| shaped affair, possessing tremendous pos
| Slbllitles for ladies who are clever with their
| fingers. 1t is going to be extremely easy to
| hide stuff in the recesses of a sleeves which
trails oblgingly all over the counter when
| the wearer puts her hand down. We saw
| it done only the other day. plump, agile
hand, accompanied by one of these dangling
| sleeves, glided quickly along a counter COW
cred with feminine lingerie, then paused for
| the texture of the silk. When the hand
moved again it was in swift, upward flight,
presumably to adjust a slight discrepancy in
| the owners lace collar.
! There, you see how easy it is" said the
| salesgirl who had given the demonstration,
| as she removed a pink silk undergarment
| from her sleeve. ''You didn't see me do
| that, even though you were watching, and
| think how much simpler it would be to stuff
my sleeve in the confusion of Christmas
crowd. That's why we've got to be so par
ticular and insist upon customers keeping
| their arms off the counters"
! Store Detective
The interesting information was corrobo-
| rated by one of the store detectives, tall,
| sleek-faced individual who so we'll looked
| his part that one did not see how any shop
litter could fail to notice and avoid him.
There's no doubt but that the new styles
are all in favor of the shoplifter,'' he said.
| But of course, we're gonna watch 'em.
And then we've got our own system. They
! don't get away with as much as they used
| to-
We pressed for details. "By what astute
methods shoplifters prevented from run
ming off with the store?" we inquired.
| ooh, we get to know lot of the profess
| SIGNALS by their looks" the detective replied.
| "And there's usually somethin' about them
to excite suspicion. One thing and another"
"But your system?" we persisted.
"Well, there's the store aisles, for instance.
Notice how wide the isles in this store?
That amt for beauty and it amt for COM
fort. It's because the light-fingered Lizzies
! don't like them. They prefer the narrow,
crowded aisles where they amt so likely to
be SEEM
This was all the information we could drag
forth. The SYSTEM" it seemed, was secret
formula which had to be carefully guarded
If the ghoplifters once got wise to it, it would
be useless. To make up for his inability to
crafty our curiosity ir this respect, however
our friend showed an eager willingness to
discuss other important matters. He gave
u.s. in elaborate detail, his private views on
the disarmament conference; dwelt upon the
carelessness with which the mails we're han
died and explained the most dramatic plays
in the late world series. Finally when he
had talked himself into a good humor and
we were nearly in state of coma, he allowed
himself to be steered gingerly back to the
subject Of his own activities.
LET me see,' he said cautiously, stroking
his long jaw, ''the case of Gabrielle Lemaire
was in the newspapers, so there can't be no
harm in tellin' that Mind, I don't say it
happened in this store, but it shows the kind
of schemes every store is constantly havin'
put over on it,
Not l0ng ago, it seems, a certain store be-
came aware that it was losing a good deal
of valuable merchandise to extremely
clever young woman. She was attractive and
fashionably dressed, and always made a ia
vorable impression upon the sales force. Rep
charge account, the number of which she
gave, she would order goods sent to her sup