Flesh From Body Saves Eye.
The sight of Doctor E. Lerendinger, a professor of Hood College, Frederick, Md., has been restored as the result of an unusual surgical operation. Flesh was removed from the professor’s abdomen and placed in a cavity above one of his eyes, which had been caused by an accident. The operation was performed several weeks ago, but was not made public until success was assured.
Tallest Couple are Wedded.
The tallest couple in Pennsylvania were united in marriage a few days ago in Lewistown. The bridegroom, George Schaffer, who stands six feet seven inches in his stockings, achieved quite a reputation when he was a member of the Allentown police as the tallest cop. The bride is Mrs. Angie Kern, six feet two inches tall. Both parties are about forty years of age.
Mrs. Schaffer is a prospective heiress if she can break the will of the late Charles Losch, who left about $150,000 to be divided among relatives. She produced a letter purporting to have been signed by Losch, saying that if she would take care of him in his declining years he would leave her his homestead in Allentown, valued at $12,000. Schaffer says he often heard Losch say he would leave Mrs. Kern the homestead.
The newlyweds have purchased a farm, and whatever the outcome of the will contest, it will not affect their happiness. The bride says she fell in love with her new husband because she detested walking around with a man shorter than herself.
This Modest Inventor Would Stop World War.
“I can make the United States the strongest nation in the world. I can end the European struggle in a short time. I can make the smallest nation most powerful.[Pg 62]”
This is the assertion of John Vogelzangs, of Menominee, Mich., an inventor, who claims to have a method of extracting electricity from the air so that air craft might be manned with powerful guns and not be forced to land until they want to.
“I can sweep the seas clear of vessels. I can kill armies and level cities,” claimed the inventor, who in the same breath asserted he favored universal peace, but that the world was not ready for it.
He says Secretary Daniels’ plan for an advisory board is good.
He refused to give out much information about his new device. He said he lacked money to carry on the work, and displayed a letter from Mr. Daniels, written before the war broke out, saying this nation was not ready to take up his ideas.
Vogelzangs has a reputation for being an inventor of ability. He made a street cleaner, which he refused to sell for $10,000. He also claims he will revolutionize the berry business with a new picker.
Walks on 113th Birthday.
Mrs. Edna G. Goldman, of Glamorgan, Va., celebrated her 113th birthday by walking ten miles to the home of her son, Henry Goldman, at Pound, Va.
Mrs. Goldman was born in Appomattox County, Va., in 1802. Despite her age, she cultivates a small patch of land in corn and beans each year. This year she is “farming” about two acres.
Flivver is Not Amphibious.
Edward Kirby, of Newton, N. J., erred in believing a flivver amphibious. It is alleged that he stole the automobile at the Grand Hotel, Golden Springs, and, when closely pursued by other automobiles, he ran the flivver into the Delaware River, seeking to reach Pike County shore.
The flivver floated several minutes and made quite a little progress in the current, but when the body filled, she went down at the bow and soon plunged to the bottom.
Kirby swam out and made his way across the river. He disappeared into the woods there, and a posse under Sheriff Applegate is seeking him.
Song Tells of Old Man Who Had a Wooden Leg.
John Strain, of Greenwich, Conn., who lost his leg three years ago and his temper recently, has announced that he intends to obtain a rubber artificial limb. His statement was made to-day through a window of the county jail, from which he will watch the dying sun precede each of the next thirty twilights.
The reason Mr. Strain intends to obtain the new artificial limb described it that his wife, a muscular woman, who has been getting plenty of exercise since John ceased to work eight years ago, has been and is in the habit of bounding his artificial limb off his forehead when a domestic storm brews. The present limb is of wood, and, for various reasons, is unsatisfactory to Mr. Strain and his brow.
Over the condition of the weather a quarrel started in the Strain home. Mr. Strain declared he felt that a gale was coming from the northeast, inasmuch as his left leg—not the wooden one—pained slightly. Mrs. Strain, with that rare spirit of raillery which characterizes[Pg 63] a woman who supports four children, told John the weather could scarcely affect a man who sat in the house smoking all the time. It was then that John, according to the testimony of his wife in police court, threw eight volumes of Dumas, apparently bound in zinc. His aim was true.
Mrs. Strain then took John’s artificial limb and hung it just west of where he parts his hair. Her judgment of distance was perfect—it generally is. She then cried for help.
When help arrived, John had hopped on one foot over the State border, into New York. A sheriff with a rich baritone voice explained to him that hopping about New York State with no hat and only an undershirt over his shoulders would mean but little in his life. John thought deeply, hopped over into Connecticut again, and was sentenced to thirty days in jail by Judge James R. Meade.
Machine That Remembers.
A machine which will remember the date and hour of an appointment made several weeks previous is one of the latest efficiency devices to be placed on the market. A roll of paper strip passes over a flat surface where the appointment is indicated, and a punch mark made in the margin. When that time occurs, a gong is sounded and a reference to the strip will give the information as to what appointment is to be kept.
Fifty Dollars Gone, Flivver May Survive.
Probably the maddest man in and about Montgomery County, New York State, just at present is Reuben Hyney, who keeps a shoe store on the main street of Fonda, and who, as a side line, rents his automobile to any one who can fit in it. Mr. Hyney has no more temper than any other normal man who lives in Montgomery County, but the shoe business has run over at the heel a bit recently, and the other afternoon something happened which increased Mr. Hyney’s height four inches.
Hyney was adjusting a spring-heeled shoe to a broad foot at about a moment after two o’clock, when the telephone rang sharply. He dropped his client’s foot onto his own and limped to the booth. A man with an educated voice, as Mr. Hyney describes it, was asking if he might hire an automobile for the afternoon. He said he was a school inspector and was as busy as a one-eyed mouse in a cheese factory. He would come running if the buzz wagon was not busy. It was not.
Hardly had the satisfied customer walked from the store when a bearded stranger, wearing a slouch hat, stopped at the door, looked up and down the street craftily, and entered.
“Wait there,” said the shoe merchant, pointing to the central design on a piece of linoleum. “I will oil the machine and call my daughter.”
The stranger, laughing up his sleeve, through his vest and along his hatband, reached into the cash register and took fifty dollars. Then he sat down and waited until Miss Hyney came to watch the store. By this time it was hardly worth it.
An hour later the mysterious stranger told the owner of the machine to stop in front of a building in Fort Plain. He went upstairs.
Three hours later Hyney decided the stranger had given him the metropolitan fare-thee-well. He entered the build[Pg 64]ing and found nothing but the janitor and a flock of rent signs.
Two hours later he was back in Fonda, telling his daughter about the “cuss” who tore the soul out of a dandy four-hundred-dollar touring car and didn’t pay for it. Then his daughter asked him if he had taken fifty dollars from the cash register.
Mr. Hyney is in bed. But what’s the use?—he can’t sleep.
Capture Odd Pair of Mice.
A most remarkable freak of nature is a white mouse and a black one captured in a bureau drawer by John Elias, who lives in Atchison, Kan. The white mouse hasn’t a black spot on it and has black eyes. The black mouse has fur as black as the ace of spades, and its eyes are brown.
Local zoölogists are unable to account for the strange markings of the mice. They are very vicious and never miss a chance to attempt to bite members of the Elias family while being fed.
Billy Goat is Boss of Town.
A billy goat tied up traffic in Kokomo, Ind., as effectively as the street-car strike did in Chicago. The goat broke away from a colored man who was leading it at the transfer corner.
The conductors of two cars standing there were on the sidewalk at the time. They started for their cars and the goat started for them. The men “beat it” for a candy store and won.
The goat then turned his attention to several pedestrians and soon made a scatterment. About this time Patrolmen Elkins and Webb came along.
Webb lived on a farm and knew the habits of the goat. He kept in the rear. Elkins bravely went forward to capture the goat. He managed to seize the animal by the head and tried to go with him to the station. Every time he pulled, the goat started to butt him. He held on for several minutes, afraid to let go, until the owner of the goat relieved him.
Aged Couple Joined at Last.
George W. Hayden, a retired farmer of Big Laurel, Va., and Larestia Fulton, of Lipps, were married at the home of the bride’s son, Henry Fulton, a few days ago. The bridegroom was some few days past ninety years of age when the knot was tied and the bride was lacking a few days of being eighty-seven.
About seventy years ago Hayden and Miss Helt—the bride’s maiden name—were engaged, but quarreled, and both married other parties and reared large families. Hayden’s wife died eighteen years ago and Mrs. Fulton was left a widow three years ago.
“Well Broken to Hard Work.”
Although many bones in his body have been broken as a result of various accidents during his life, W. M. Morgan, who lives near Lancaster, Kan., finds little cause for complaint for the treatment he has had at the hands of “cruel fate.”
At various times he has had both shoulders fractured, a number of ribs cracked, a thumb broken, both legs broken, and his right foot has almost every bone in it[Pg 65] broken. Despite all these handicaps, he works every day at hard labor and has little use for the fellow who thinks hard luck has given him a jolt.
Snake Swallows China Egg.
Blacksnakes down Gales Ferry way cannot tell china nest eggs for hen’s eggs, according to a story related by Mr. and Mrs. R. B. de Bussy, of Mount Vernon, N. Y. The De Bussys were recent guests of Miss Caroline Freeman at the Bouwerie, Gales Ferry. Miss Freeman’s guests at that time included Professor Heuser, instructor in German at Columbia University, and his family.
Professor Heuser’s daughter, six years old, returning from the poultry house at Bouwerie, reported no eggs, but said a big snake was in a hen’s nest. A manservant, using an ax, killed the five-foot snake.
Miss Freeman then discovered that the china nest egg was missing from the nest. The search led to the interior of the snake, where the missing china nest egg was recovered.
Lightning’s Queer Freak.
Lightning apparently photographed a perfect likeness of a tree, branches, twigs, and leaves, in minutest detail, on the breast of Edwin Liesman, who was instantly killed in the Magnolia clubhouse on Mount Penn, near Reading, Pa., in a violent electrical storm.
Liesman’s mother, Mrs. Bernard Liesman, and a friend, Harry Opperman, were badly shocked, but will recover.
Liesman was sitting at a window next to a telephone. The bolt followed the telephone wire. The tree outside the window was almost exactly reproduced on Liesman’s body. The tragedy occurred during four brilliant flashes in swift succession, putting out all the lights in the cottage. Medical men and photographers were puzzled by the strange features wrought on the dead man.
Sounds Like a Fish Story.
A flock of geese were swimming in White River, near Augusta, Ark., and a splash attracted the attention of several men and boys who were near by. A large blue channel catfish came up and grabbed a goose, taking the fowl under with him.
People watched for some time, but the goose never came up. This may sound like a fish story, but nevertheless it is true.
Ghostly Figure That is an Awful Shrieker.
A ghost, or some other creature with a voice like an armload of siren whistles, has frightened the residents of Somerville, N. J., to the point where it is no longer a joke, and they want to get to sleep. The disorder, frightful beyond words, ghastly, ghostly, and hair elevating, has been going on for a week, and the whole town is determined that something is to be done about it.
Thomas Hagen, night roundhouse watchman, was the first one to hear the shrieks. He was going round and round the roundhouse when the most frightful bellow imaginable rent the air. Mr. Hagen, who comes of a warm-blooded race, was so startled that his blood ran cold. It could barely run, even.
Right across the railroad tracks from the roundhouse is the cemetery, and Mr. Hagen, after recalling this, took a little jaunt up the road that restored his circulation[Pg 66] to normal. He notified the police force, who were sitting up late, reading, and he became indignant when the department took a cigar out of its mouth and laughed at him.
Every night since then the terrible noise has been repeated, and persons who have passed the roundhouse have seen a strange figure flitting about among the bushes and trees which border the railroad tracks at that point. Some of them even describe the flitter, which is going some, considering the speed with which they invariably leave the neighborhood.
For the last two nights every one in the village has been shuddering in unison, and the vibration can be felt as far as Philadelphia. Every now and then the shriek ceases and is replaced by a wail—and the wail is a whale of a wail. It is a relief when the shriek starts again.
Mr. Hagen, who originally heard the alleged ghost and who has become more bored with the noise than any of the comparative beginners, yesterday resigned his position as watchman in the roundhouse. He declared that if everything was on the square he would work forever and willingly walk around and around and around all night, but that under present conditions no self-respecting roundhouse watchman could stand around watching.
Chief of Police Bellis will watch with seven railroad detectives. They will stay right at the roundhouse until the ghost appears. Beyond that they have made no arrangements.
Hoodoo Pursues Two Miners.
Two mining partners, Gus Erickson and Bert Pinney, of Hailey, Idaho, are certainly pursued by some hoodoo. While working on a stage ten feet below the surface, the stage broke away from its fastenings, dropping Pinney down the shaft twenty feet, where, after he had turned head down, his buckskin shoe laces caught on a nail and held him until help arrived. Three hundred feet of water would have received him had his laces broke.
The next afternoon Erickson came to town on his motor cycle to get the mail. Returning, the motor cycle skidded in a rut, throwing its rider over the handlebars into the road, the machine piling on top of him. With his skull fractured in three places, he lay in the road an hour before he was found. Both men will recover.
Former Water Boy’s Story.
A prominent business man of Castleton, Ill., told the following story the other night to three or four citizens assembled in A. A. Webber’s real-estate office:
“When I was a boy,” he said, “I used to carry water for the men to drink when they were working in the field some distance from the house. One real warm day I carried water to my father, who was running a mower and cutting timothy for hay. As I was about to return home, I noticed a prairie chicken fly up from the freshly mown swath. Thinking there might be a nest of eggs—which, by the way, are fine eating—I investigated, and what do you think I found? A prairie chicken with its head cut off, the mowing bar being just the right height to perform the operation. I also found the feet and legs that belonged to the one that flew away. It probably stood up ready to fly as the mowing bar came along, while the other remained sitting and lost its head. Needless to say, we had prairie chicken for dinner.[Pg 68][Pg 67]”
The Nick Carter Stories
ISSUED EVERY SATURDAY BEAUTIFUL COLORED COVERS
When it comes to detective stories worth while, the Nick Carter Stories contain the only ones that should be considered. They are not overdrawn tales of bloodshed. They rather show the working of one of the finest minds ever conceived by a writer. The name of Nick Carter is familiar all over the world, for the stories of his adventures may be read in twenty languages. No other stories have withstood the severe test of time so well as those contained in the Nick Carter Stories. It proves conclusively that they are the best. We give herewith a list of some of the back numbers in print. You can have your news dealer order them, or they will be sent direct by the publishers to any address upon receipt of the price in money or postage stamps.[Pg 69]
730—The Torn Card.
731—Under Desperation’s Spur.
732—The Connecting Link.
733—The Abduction Syndicate.
738—A Plot Within a Plot.
739—The Dead Accomplice.
746—The Secret Entrance.
747—The Cavern Mystery.
748—The Disappearing Fortune.
749—A Voice from the Past.
752—The Spider’s Web.
753—The Man With a Crutch.
754—The Rajah’s Regalia.
755—Saved from Death.
756—The Man Inside.
757—Out for Vengeance.
758—The Poisons of Exili.
759—The Antique Vial.
760—The House of Slumber.
761—A Double Identity.
762—“The Mocker’s” Stratagem.
763—The Man that Came Back.
764—The Tracks in the Snow.
765—The Babbington Case.
766—The Masters of Millions.
767—The Blue Stain.
768—The Lost Clew.
770—The Turn of a Card.
771—A Message in the Dust.
772—A Royal Flush.
774—The Great Buddha Beryl.
775—The Vanishing Heiress.
776—The Unfinished Letter.
777—A Difficult Trail.
782—A Woman’s Stratagem.
783—The Cliff Castle Affair.
784—A Prisoner of the Tomb.
785—A Resourceful Foe.
789—The Great Hotel Tragedies.
795—Zanoni, the Transfigured.
796—The Lure of Gold.
797—The Man With a Chest.
798—A Shadowed Life.
799—The Secret Agent.
800—A Plot for a Crown.
801—The Red Button.
802—Up Against It.
803—The Gold Certificate.
804—Jack Wise’s Hurry Call.
805—Nick Carter’s Ocean Chase.
807—Nick Carter’s Advertisement.
808—The Kregoff Necklace.
811—Nick Carter and the Nihilists.
812—Nick Carter and the Convict Gang.
813—Nick Carter and the Guilty Governor.
814—The Triangled Coin.
815—Ninety-nine—and One.
816—Coin Number 77.
NEW SERIES
NICK CARTER STORIES
1—The Man from Nowhere.
2—The Face at the Window.
3—A Fight for a Million.
4—Nick Carter’s Land Office.
5—Nick Carter and the Professor.
6—Nick Carter as a Mill Hand.
7—A Single Clew.
8—The Emerald Snake.
9—The Currie Outfit.
10—Nick Carter and the Kidnapped Heiress.
11—Nick Carter Strikes Oil.
12—Nick Carter’s Hunt for a Treasure.
13—A Mystery of the Highway.
[Pg 70]14—The Silent Passenger.
15—Jack Dreen’s Secret.
16—Nick Carter’s Pipe Line Case.
17—Nick Carter and the Gold Thieves.
18—Nick Carter’s Auto Chase.
19—The Corrigan Inheritance.
20—The Keen Eye of Denton.
21—The Spider’s Parlor.
22—Nick Carter’s Quick Guess.
23—Nick Carter and the Murderess.
24—Nick Carter and the Pay Car.
25—The Stolen Antique.
26—The Crook League.
27—An English Cracksman.
28—Nick Carter’s Still Hunt.
29—Nick Carter’s Electric Shock.
30—Nick Carter and the Stolen Duchess.
31—The Purple Spot.
32—The Stolen Groom.
33—The Inverted Cross.
34—Nick Carter and Keno McCall.
35—Nick Carter’s Death Trap.
36—Nick Carter’s Siamese Puzzle.
37—The Man Outside.
38—The Death Chamber.
39—The Wind and the Wire.
40—Nick Carter’s Three Cornered Chase.
41—Dazaar, the Arch-Fiend.
42—The Queen of the Seven.
43—Crossed Wires.
44—A Crimson Clew.
45—The Third Man.
46—The Sign of the Dagger.
47—The Devil Worshipers.
48—The Cross of Daggers.
49—At Risk of Life.
50—The Deeper Game.
51—The Code Message.
52—The Last of the Seven.
53—Ten-Ichi, the Wonderful.
54—The Secret Order of Associated Crooks.
55—The Golden Hair Clew.
56—Back From the Dead.
57—Through Dark Ways.
58—When Aces Were Trumps.
59—The Gambler’s Last Hand.
60—The Murder at Linden Fells.
61—A Game for Millions.
62—Under Cover.
63—The Last Call.
64—Mercedes Danton’s Double.
65—The Millionaire’s Nemesis.
66—A Princess of the Underworld.
67—The Crook’s Blind.
68—The Fatal Hour.
69—Blood Money.
70—A Queen of Her Kind.
71—Isabel Benton’s Trump Card.
72—A Princess of Hades.
73—A Prince of Plotters.
74—The Crook’s Double.
75—For Life and Honor.
76—A Compact With Dazaar.
77—In the Shadow of Dazaar.
78—The Crime of a Money King.
79—Birds of Prey.
80—The Unknown Dead.
81—The Severed Hand.
82—The Terrible Game of Millions.
83—A Dead Man’s Power.
84—The Secrets of an Old House.
85—The Wolf Within.
86—The Yellow Coupon.
87—In the Toils.
88—The Stolen Radium.
89—A Crime in Paradise.
[Pg 71]90—Behind Prison Bars.
91—The Blind Man’s Daughter.
92—On the Brink of Ruin.
93—Letter of Fire.
94—The $100,000 Kiss.
95—Outlaws of the Militia.
96—The Opium-Runners.
97—In Record Time.
98—The Wag-Nuk Clew.
99—The Middle Link.
100—The Crystal Maze.
101—A New Serpent in Eden.
102—The Auburn Sensation.
103—A Dying Chance.
104—The Gargoni Girdle.
105—Twice in Jeopardy.
196—The Ghost Launch.
107—Up in the Air.
108—The Girl Prisoner.
109—The Red Plague.
110—The Arson Trust.
111—The King of the Firebugs.
112—“Lifter’s” of the Lofts.
113—French Jimmie and His Forty
Thieves.
114—The Death Plot.
115—The Evil Formula.
116—The Blue Button.
117—The Deadly Parallel.
118—The Vivisectionists.
119—The Stolen Brain.
120—An Uncanny Revenge.
121—The Call of Death.
122—The Suicide.
123—Half a Million Ransom.
124—The Girl Kidnapper.
125—The Pirate Yacht.
126—The Crime of the White Hand.
127—Found in the Jungle.
128—Six Men in a Loop.
129—The Jewels of Wat Chang.
130—The Crime in the Tower.
131—The Fatal Message.
132—Broken Bars.
133—Won by Magic.
134—The Secret of Shangore.
135—Straight to the Goal.
136—The Man They Held Back.
137—The Seal of Gijon.
138—The Traitors of the Tropics.
139—The Pressing Peril.
140—The Melting-Pot.
141—The Duplicate Night.
142—The Edge of a Crime.
143—The Sultan’s Pearls.
144—The Clew of the White Collar.
145—An Unsolved Mystery.
146—Paying the Price.
147—On Death’s Trail.
148—The Mark of Cain.
Dated July 17th, 1915.
149—A Network of Crime.
Dated July 24th, 1915.
150—The House of Fear.
Dated July 31st, 1915.
151—The Mystery of the Crossed Needles.
Dated August 7th, 1915.
152—The Forced Crime.
Dated August 14th, 1915.
153—The Doom of Sang Tu.
Dated August 21st, 1915.
154—The Mask of Death.
Dated August 28th, 1915.
155—The Gordon Elopement.
Dated Sept. 4th, 1915.
156—Blood Will Tell.
[Pg 72]
PRICE, FIVE CENTS PER COPY. If you want any back numbers of our weeklies and cannot procure them from your news dealer, they can be obtained direct from this office. Postage stamps taken the same as money.
STREET & SMITH, Publishers, 79-89 Seventh Ave., NEW YORK CITY