Evening star., 1940-01-07
THIS WEEK MAGAZINE

W rescued treasure
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by Thomas NJ. Johnson
0row;es BY kodGodw"
VHERE in New York who can unlock any lock on
earth. Charles Courtney has opened 100000 locks that
others couldn't budge loosng $5O0O0000 in variegated
wealth. jewels from Romanov casket. bonds from safe
crushed by earthquake in Tokyo pounds sterling from
the bottom Of the North Sea- And in Brooklyn
amid showerng sparks from waterfront fire. he unlocked
the door of shed filled with dynamite.
President of the International Locksmths Association at
Courtney the of all keymen His hands
insured for 100000 His 50 keen that he can look
into keyoe and the teeth of the lock to the fraction
of inch needed to make key Recently company adver
ted good lock pickproo The Federal Trade Commits
sion summoned Courtney Washington He picked eight
minutes and forty-one seconds
Couneys conscience sensitive as his fingers He has
Travelled the country to build the ethics of his craft
organizing national body of 1900 ocksmths with member
ship and Standards jury to study locks and to make
recommendations to manufacturers
Ethics didn't bother Courtney youngster. His father
French his mother German but the five little Courneys
grew farm Marion Virginia Here Charles Court
ney the locksmth his start when he filed down key out
Of soupbone and opened the clumsy lock his mothers
Jam closet Later in the nearby town he unlocked all the
stores while merchants ball game 1t in fun of
course. Locks simply fascinated him.
After working in railroad machine shop Courtney spent
three years his mothers native Germany locksmths
apprentice By 1909 when he enlisted in the Marines he
expert Locked bread and water for too much shore
liberty he would pick the lock of the hoosegow at night and
raid the galley for sausage.
In the Marines Courtney learned deepsea diving In 1919
he opened modest lock shop Harlem but his reputation
grew because he could work miracles with locks underwater
Granddaughter of Jules Verne the work natural to him.
To the bottom Of New York Harbor he went seeking the
Revolutionary treasure ship Husar to the liner Egypt sunk
off France salvage safes containing S3OOOOO to the Lus
ana intact the first time he went down. later only wTeckage
In 1892 Sir Basil Zaharof chose Courtney try for the
$1OOOOOOO in gold that said reposed in the British
cruiser Hampshire. sunk by the Germans in 1916 On the
ocean bottom the cruiser he and three divers picked their
way past skeletons still at the guns and into sealed compa
Two British officers from table and oated past
them they had been dead sixteen years. In darkness um
mated only by the divers lights they found eleven strong
boxes sothered in slime Courtney cept but the lock
rusted and he had to force it.
From that chest the four brought up $4,000.
Down again they Under tremendous pressure Courtney
kept at the locks the second songbox Just the door
plate seemed to give the steel door of the compartment
slammed closing their telephone and light wires the
cruiser rolled by powerful underseas current Courtney.
hurled against the WALL felt blood warming his side In pain
that grew he lay almost hour steadily weakening,
although the oxygen was not cut off.
Then suddenly the line erked The steel door had been
swung aar again by the ships notion and Courtney made
out diver failing signals to him. Painfully, the ocksmth
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