April 10, 1909

FIVE ESCAPE JAIL AT CHARLESTOWN NAVY YARD: Police in Boston and elsewhere are hunting down five U.S. Navy prisoners who escaped the prison at the Navy yard in Charlestown sometime between 6:30 and 7 p.m. yesterday. What police do know is that the prisoners left by way of "the old smelter route." They "scaled the navy yard wall near Chelsea bridge by climbing over the roof of an old furnace building and jumping the wall at the incline near the bridge," according to a story on the front page of today's Globe.
Officials say the escape "was in many details ONE OF THE MOST DARING PLANS executed at any prison in this vicinity in years" [emphasis added]. The prisoners cut through the one-inch soft-iron bars. They bent the bars, tied a 12-foot rope to the bars and squeezed through the opening, and slid down the rope.
The escapees were wearing the white duck working uniforms of the Navy, allowing them to blend into the surrounding area. They were seen running through the yard at a "dog trot," but suspicions were not raised because of their uniforms.
One of the prisoners, George Ross, is reported to have been charged with desertion SIX TIMES from various branches of the U.S., service


A POSSE HAS BEEN FORMED ... IN MAINE: A young woman was shot to death in Bingham, Maine, yesterday and about 40 citizens and sheriffs are looking for her husband, Herbert Nottage. They are serious. According to today's Globe, they are "armed with revolvers, rifles, axes and other weapons." No trace of the fugitive had turned up as of late last night.

TOWN TREASURER PLAYS A LITTLE JOKE ON FIRE FIGHTERS ON THEIR ANNUAL PAYDAY: The 40 firefighters in the 40-man Fire King engine company in East Douglas were paid their annual salaries recently.The pay came in the form of 32,000 copper one-cent pieces from Town Treasurer Walter Schuster. That covers the pay of each, who are paid $8 A YEAR for their work. Each man received 800 pennies in a bag -- weighing about 5.5 pounds. Some enjoyed the joke. Others, however, "did not take kindly" to it, according to today's Globe. The ones who really made out the best, evidently, were the children because the pay was tailor made for the penny-candy trade in the town -- a trade which, the Globe says, took "a decidedly 'bullish' turn.

April 9, 1909 (Friday)

GLOBE TEMPTS READERS WITH ART, MUSIC and FASHION: Today's Globe has a self-promotion that indicates that the paper was, indeed, flush but needed to scramble to promote itself. The ad above tries to inspire readers to "order the Easter Sunday Globe from [their] newsdealer at once." The pitch tells customers that the Easter issue will include a "Beautiful Art Print" of a work by Raphael (called "Madonna of the Chair") dating from 1510. It also includes an Easter song ("Hosanna"), a description of cotton mills of Japan and a piercing looks at women's fashion trends.
The ad notes that the Globe is the biggest Sunday newspaper published in New England.
It still is in 2009, but, as is well known, the circumstances are worlds (or globes) apart. Today, the Globe is, sadly, spinning toward trouble.
NOTE: A reader directed me to the painting, which can be found here.


WINDS WHIP THROUGH BOSTON: Today's Globe told readers what they already knew -- that a huge wind roared through Eastern Massachusetts on Wednesday night and during the day Thursday. What the readers might not have known was that the gusts reached 92 MPH on Blue Hill, the second highest reading in the 25-year history of the observatory. (It hit 100 in 1893.) The front page included this illustration, showing a woman struggling to keep her clothes from being whipped off her body. She says, "Oh! Dear! And I don't approve of Salome dances." The reference is to the provocative work by Strauss, based on a German translation of Oscar Wilde's story.

CHURCH GIVES MAN OR WOMAN A CHANCE TO CHANGE THEIR WAYS -- AND BE LESS GENEROUS: Globe readers likely got a kick out of a notice in today's paper with a Washington, Pa., dateline. The Rescoe [sic; likely meant Roscoe] Methodist Episcopal Church bought an advertisement that appeared in today's paper to let the community know that someone had dropped a $1000 BILL in the COLLECTION PLATE. The church wasn't bragging. Rather, church officials worried that someone had done this BY MISTAKE. After all that amount of money (about $20,000 in 2009 dollars) was about the same as an average year's worth of collections. The church offers to return the money if the owner wants it back and "can prove that he inadvertently dropped it on the plate."

April 8, 1909 (Thursday)

CARTOONIST TAKES HAT OBSESSIONS TO A NEW LEVEL: If you're wondering how important big hats are to women in 1909, this cartoon from today's front page reveals something. Their big enough to provide ammunition for a cartoonist who wants to show just how this naval arms race between Germany and Great Britain is getting out of hand. The "dreadnought race" will propel Europe and the world in an ugly direction.

April 7, 1909 (Wednesday)

THEY COULDN'T UNDERSTAND WHAT THE WOMAN WAS SCREAMING ABOUT AS SHE POINTED INSIDE HER BURNING HOUSE; SO TWO DORCHESTER BOYS HEROICALLY RAN INSIDE....: About 11 a.m. yesterday, Mrs. Karalikas was working in the kitchen of her house on Melbourne Street in Dorchester. She noticed a fire. The flames became so aggressive that she barely managed to get out of the kitchen. When she got out on the street, "she made loud outcries," according to today's Globe. Two boys -- Edwin Farley of Mallet Street and Paul Benson of Roseland Street -- heard her screams. All they could tell was that somebody or something had been left behind in the dining room of the burning house. Understandably, they thought a child was in danger. They "rushed into the flame- and smoke-filled building," according to the paper. A few minutes later, they emerged -- with the only thing of value they could find in the dining room -- a pricey CANARY.