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| Nov. 8, 1909: The yearly season of petty crimes opens in Los Angeles, according to The Times, with a burglar who ate half a loaf of bread, some peach preserves and helped himself to $3 in a savings bank. [Update: they were pear preserves, as a reader noted]. It’s hard to match “Blows Out His Brains” as a one-column headline. |
| Successful businessmen use the Dictaphone. Great lettering, no? |
| Nov. 5, 1919: The City Council gives police officers and firefighters a raise and the attempts to unionize the Police Department collapse. |
| Some aspects of being a parent haven’t changed! |
| Nov. 4, 1919: An attempt is made to organize the Los Angeles Police Department under one of the railway workers’ unions. Over the years, there were several attempts to unionize the LAPD (the Los Angeles Police Protective League, which now represents officers, was originally established in 1922 in cooperation with firefighters to protect a new retirement system). As late as March 8, 1946, Mayor Fletcher Bowron strongly opposed efforts to unionize the department. |
| Beginning in October 1919, The Times added “Gasoline Alley” to its daily comics, which included “The Gumps,” “Mutt and Jeff” and “When a Feller Needs a Friend” – or whatever Clare Briggs titled his strip that day. |
| Nov. 3, 1919: Lulu Pipe abandons Orange for the lights of the big city. Her mother says they may have been a little too strict with Lulu. |
| A cheese elephant from “The Terrors of the Tiny Tads” by Gustave Verbeck/Verbeek. A five-passenger Cadillac is stolen – police say it’s a prank. |
| Oct. 31, 1909: Three motorcyclists are charged with going almost 30 mph, in violation of the city ordinance … The proprietor of the Optic Theater is charged with letting people stand in the aisles … Four deputy district attorneys move out of crowded offices at the Central Police Station … And a husband is sentenced to 50 days’ for having “encouraged his wife to lead a dishonorable life for the pecuniary gains it would bring for him.” |
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Oct. 28, 1919: The Times editorializes about the shabby condition of the City Jail, which reporter Alma Whitaker documented in 1916. |
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| Oct. 27, 1909: Master Trimble goes hunting Indians on South Main, armed with his new sword. |
L.A. Justice All Steve Medved wants is to be left alone by the LAPD. He hopes that now, after a third trial, he has it made.Medved, 38, is a big (6'2, 230), easy going fellow of Yugoslav descent. But he can be tough and stubborn when aroused. He was in the Marine Corps during the Second World War. His trouble began last Feb. 5 when two officers stopped him at 6th and Bixel and accused him of being drunk. He said he wasn't but admitted he'd had several beers. The words became hotter and the nightmare began. Medved claims he was struck repeatedly on the head with blackjacks until unconscious. Later, at the emergency hospital, he says he was beaten again while his hands were cuffed behind him. He woke up in General Hospital strapped to a bed and in leg irons, charged with being drunk. Stitches were taken to close his wounds. MEDVED BELIEVES IN FIGHTING for his rights. He hired an attorney, a former FBI agent, pleaded not guilty and asked for a jury trial. The trial, held in March, resulted in a hung jury. He was arrested again in April at 6th and Alvarado, this time for being drunk and resisting arrest. The officers said he looked like a robbery suspect they were hunting. Medved pleaded not guilty and asked for a jury trial. This time he was acquitted. He was arrested again for intoxication Sept. 14 as he walked out of a bar at the same corner. Again he pleaded not guilty and asked for a court trial. It was held a few days ago. The officers testified that he was staggering. Witnesses who saw him being arrested testified that he was not. The arresting officers admitted they knew of Medved's prior involvements with police. The judge found him not guilty. Three arrests. No convictions. :: A MAN IN A Hill St. bat cave became spirited the other day, so spirited in fact that his bitterness against society was showing. An alarmed friend, momentarily turning evangelist, suggested soothingly that it was about time for him to change his ways and repent. "Maybe I will some day," said the bitter one, "but when I do I want to travel first class. It'll have to be in some repenthouse like at the Beverly Hilton." :: WHILE ON litterbug patrol the other morning, teacher Karl Kusche picked up a paper airplane on the lawn at Audubon Junior High. A student doubtless had tossed it out of a classroom window the day before. He has picked up many such planes but this one had this message scribbled on it: "Help me! I am being held prisoner in here!" :: B(efore) C(redit) Once we paid with ready cash, Sales were finished in a flash; Now that money is passe We sign and wait till Judgment Day. --G.L. ERTZ :: AT RANDOM -- Autonetics, the missile outfit, received an inquiry from the federal prison in Seagoville, Tex., asking permission to show its film there next week. Title: "Destinations of Tomorrow" -- about outer space. Request granted . . . Frank Barron tells of a quiz show so rigged they even threw a party after the program. |
| Oct. 21, 1909: Johanna Engleman of Santa Monica still hopes to be a juror, but no attorney wants her on a case because the decision might be reversed. After all, she may not be qualified to serve as a juror! Oct. 24, 1909: The police chief says he doesn’t want women jurors in police court because they are too weak to endure the foul language used in legal proceedings. Police Chief Edward F. Dishman says: “Just picture a sensitive woman, with a sense of decency, sitting through some of the cases it is necessary to deal with. It is bad enough to force them to appear as witnesses in some instances. While I am chief of police I will not permit one of my officers to summon any venire or any part of a venire of women.” Below: A Syrians banned from citizenship because they are Mongols? |
| The legal system is grappling with the question of who can be an American citizen. The issue of whether Johnanna Engleman, a woman, can be seated as a juror focuses on whether she meets the requirements, including citizenship. One previous story said that under the laws in force in 1909, a woman didn’t become a citizen until she was married. The other story involves a Syrian named George Shushine/Shushime/Shishim, and whether he is a “free, white person” or a Mongol who would be barred from citizenship. The deputy U.S. attorney argued against admitting him. The Times said: "Debating the proposition that the Syrians stood in the same light as the Jews, the speaker contended that the Jews were scattered all over the earth wherever white men lived, but that Syrians had only begun to come to this country within the last thirty years." The attorney said: “America is for Americans, and those who come here asking for the rights of citizens must accept the terms we give them. It is all very well to talk about this being the asylum for the oppressed of all nations, but the question is, are those who desire to enter within the terms of the naturalization act of Congress?” And yes, he was admitted. Nov. 5, 1909: |
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| Dr. G.W. Finch is arrested on charges of illegally prescribing morphine to drug addicts. |
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