Of course, the headline is of great interest: "Amherst Has Booze Ring, Says Rum Runner." It seems that a bootlegger named Dave Brennin of Amherst "squealed" on George Bailey (another Amherst man) and fingered him as being the supplier of his liquor. Surprisingly (to me at least), Bailey was immediately arrested simply on Brennin's information.
It's kind of funny that George Bailey is the name of James Stewart's character in It's A Wonderful Life.
Illegal booze (it was Prohibition times, after all) also figured prominently in the article directly below the Amherst story.
Also of interest to me is the story about the "Hazard On Lake Road To Go." It notes, "Elimination of the grade crossing on Lake Road, between Lorain and Vermilion, of both the Lake Shore Electric and Nickel Plate Railroads, is included in the 1926 program of the state highway department for Lorain County, it was announced in Columbus today.
I wrote about this dangerous crossing (with photos) back here (in 2010) and here (in 2020).
Alas, the bridge over the railroad tracks would not be completed until September 1938.
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| August 31, 1938 |
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| Sept. 17, 1938 |
2 comments:
I felt bad for Mrs. Josiah Kirby, who was down to only one servant and without a yacht and fleet of motor cars after her husband was indicted for fraud. Kirby had a habit of such things, per the Encyclopedia of Cleveland History:
"Following several trials during the mid-1920s in which he was acquitted or released by failure of juries to agree, Kirby was sentenced to prison, convicted of using the mails to defraud and of jury tampering. Kirby was released in 1932, returned to Cleveland, but by 1940 was living in New York, indicted by a federal grand jury on 14 counts, including conspiracy, mail fraud, and market rigging. He was permanently enjoined from selling securities in 1949, served 10 months in prison, and returned to Cleveland upon his release. In 1962, the Securities & Exchange Commission charged Kirby had been selling and buying stocks since 1954, and he was placed on 5 years' probation."
Amherst was a beehive of boozing during Prohibition. Then, again, the Lorain County Courts were so overwhelmed by so many cases of illegal
consumption / public intoxication / sales of alcohol they ended up getting a rubber stamp for "Violation of liquor laws" to save them writing it out at the top of each criminal docket entry. It was the only type of crime to have its own rubber stamp!
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