Muncie Post-Democrat, Muncie, Delaware County, 26 August 1927 — Page 1
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POST-DEMOCRAT
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VOLUME VII-—NUMBER 32
MUNCIE, I|
L\A, FRIDAY, AUGUST 2(>, 1927.
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Price 5 Cents—^.$2.00 a Year
HOFFMAN GETS BRAVEL CONTRACT
TO ARMS YE KLUCKERS! THE POPE IS COMING
Cotton Tom Heflin The Alabama Wonder To Save The Day In New York Bay
iECHO OF HI KLSJX i FIGHT BEAM) IN JAY CO. COURT
Hell’s a. poppin’ on the Potomac, blowing all of onr little red school 'p elTl p 0rar y {Receivership of K„!
suh! “Cotton Tom’’ Heflin, Alabama’s double jointed, brass mounted, leather lunged, blown-in-the-bottle Klux United States senator, has been proposed Py the Alabama legislature as a navy commander to defend New York harbor against papal invasion. A resolution to that effect, presented to Representative Lee Edmonson, of Jefferson county, is now in the hands of the rules committee of the Alabama state leg-
islature.
The resolution, put on the wires of the Associated Press at Montgomery, Ala., reads as follows: “Whereas, the United States of America is in grave danger of an attack by the pope of Roime; • “Whereas, except for valor, bravery and foresight of that great |
A. P. Denied By
Judge Wheat.
houses into kingdom come. This must be stopped and we!
have patriots right here in our
midst to prevent the awful earn-1
ige. ; Portland, Ind., Aug. 26.—Run-;
Before the city budget is finallyIning true to form, that the organi-i
passed an appropriation should bejzation breeds nothing but trouble,! made for naval defense, even if!the Ku Klux Klan was here again; we have to forego that other greatjthis week in the Jay circuit court,! river project,, the three million dol-jfor an airing of the most common j
scandal attached to its operations:
lar sewer.
We propose the immediate construction of seventeen gunboats (Continued to Lage Two) o !—--
ARMY KEPT SELF SOBER, YETS SAY; NOT SHUMAKER
—a dispute over money, which is i the only god a real klansman wor-;
| ships.
' The case in the court here, was; jone venued from Muncie, the hot-j | bed of the hooded nightwalkers, j {pasture skulkers and imported; thugs. The trouble dates back toj the time when Delaware Klan No. j |1 v-as in its lieydey and reaping ai i golden harvest from the boobs and | {suckers who fell over themselves!
j to part with their money.
I The case was one entitled Chas. | j W. Cecil et al. Trustee, versus i Samuel H. Bemenderfer et al, and I was an amended complaint in two I paragraphs in replevin and for the i {appointment of a temporary re-1
i eeiver.
■ Bemenderfer, Orion Norcross. i arm yjClarence Benadum and others, alU equally well known in Muncie as!
and eminent leader and statesman,
the Hon. J. Thomas Heflin, senior i “—
uaim of Dry
less against such an attack; Head. “Whereas, the Hon. J. Thomas, _______
Heflin should be placed in a posi-i
tion where he can defend this (Chicago Tribune) country in person against the im-j “Who kept" the American pending attack of the pope; ! from being drunkards?”
“Now, therefore, be it resolved Counsel for E, S. Shumaker, su ■, . . . ... by the house of representatives | perintendent of the Anti-Saloon! 1 ^^ ^ fflliated with Klan No. 1, lhat the president of the United | League of Indiana, said he had ! eb ® Ile(1 at the methods used by States be requested to appoint theldone just that, but yesterday there! ( Stephenson, die law at Hon. J. Thomas Heflin an admiral 1 were those who didn’t agree. Gen-j °* )e ^ ime 111 Indiana. Di. Hiram in the navy, and to place him in jerais, colonels, and even privates j bjVrans a,ld other leaders, and a command of the battleship, “West! were incensed at that statement; 1111 ^ 3 hitmber ot members of DelaVirginia', the pride of the navy, land hotly denied they had been in-[Y are Klan No. 1 withdrew. These with orders to anchor at New York jfluenced to sobriety by Shumaker , lormed another organization called harbor; .or any of his like. ' jthe Independent Klan of America.
“Kesblved furtner, that the new! be instructed upon .the !!^ ai '
n t ’r ur^ea Ixm, buDimg'dhrinp; the «mcnj in fancy, within 12 miles of thei so Anterica wouW « ot have an army,the few remaining deserted broth-!
ceadly verbosity at the command
of rive new admiral;
“Resolved further, that a copy of
Statue of Liberty to fire unceas-| oomposea 01 aramcaras," Attorney! prs wanted—particularly the moningiy for a period of If hours with Tames Bingham said in frying to ey. Various legal expedients were 16-inch shells loaded with the most! have Shumaker’s jail sentence set]resorted to in an effort to obtain
aside. i the .lack, part ot the evidence beWhere Was Shumaker j in » heard in the Ja y circuit court Where was Shumaker during the| abont ] a lf r a f°- Needless to say
Cos resolution be forwarded to the! war?” Gen. MiRon J. Foreman i th ® old Kla n did not get it. Mesident of the senate of the Unit- asked. ; However they did do one thing, ed States, the secretary of the; “His statement is just about the! They t°^ ced tbc Independent Klan navy and to our most valiant and ! sort of remark that could be ex- 0 abandon tbe use I be W0ld
courageous protector and states-j pected from that source,” the fightman, the Honorable J. Thomas jing general continued. “There is
I more malice than ignorance in that statement. I didn’t know the AntiSaloon league had anything to do
with the army.
Heflin.”
An Amendment From Muncie To arms, all Yc Ku Kluckers!
Vvhat about White river? Suppose Cation Tom’s sixteen pound wind
shooter fails to stop the ■men where will we be at?
klan. Bemenderfer, Norcross et al,; then adopted the title of the Knights of American Protestantism. and began preparations to make the world safe for Protestants—that is all those who had the
pope,
Bill Run This Town.
There were two million soldiers| reau I red t en I )U( 'ks.
in France and a soberer and clean-j But, alas, they were not be let er lot of men was never assembled.; a I° ne i n the good work. The evil
If the pope gets past Tom noth- I didn’t know the Anti-Saloon 'rail of the old money serpent foling will prevent him from sailing league was there and I don’t think 1° wed them to their quarters, and up White River in a canal boat and I Erance did, either.” {dissension broke out. Cecil and | i others, the Knights claim, encour1 ^ ——— = jageJ and financied by members of mill ii in iniMm j Klan No. 1, made an effort to get
possession of the contents of the j treasury. Hence the present suit. Cecil and his co-conspirators,! quoting the Knights, are seeking to | replevin a sum of money amounting to something like $6,000 and property of the value of $3,000. Cecil et al, also were asking for a temporary receiver for the Knights, their armor, chewing tobacco and drinking liquor—a mortal blow, should the court decide in favor
of Cecil et al.
Judge R. D. Wheat denied the motion for a temporary receiver, the action following an all day hearing of the case. The trial of | the replevin suit has been set for
September 12.
A prominent member of the Elkhart police department, who attended the Elks’ convention here, states that Bill Cahill, the man who put the klan on the map in Muncie, is still a fugitive from justice. After Bill left here with a bank roll that would choke an ox, taken from gullible Delaware county suckers, he went to Toledo. He dbuble crossed his hundred percent dupes there and sought’ fresher fields. Landing in Elkhart, he organized a “Caribou” lodge, which promptly went bump when the jiners ceased to produce. He then took a job managing a dance resort and went south one dark night with two
days’ receipts.
He took with him a $600 diamond that he had forgotten to pay for, and left debts behind him aggre-
gating $1,500.
Cahill was sent here in 1922 by D. C. Stephenson, with a roving commission to skin the people of Muncie and when he left they were properly “skun.” For two years Cahill was absolutely in control here, numbering among his subjects Judge Clarence Dearth, former Prosecutor Van Ogle, former Sheriff Harry Hoffman, and the entire police department. Hoffman made Cahill a deputy sheriff and he swaggered over Muncie with two large revolvers in armpit holsters, thus earning the title of “Two Gun Bill.” It was Cahill who organized the plan to destroy the editor of the Post-Democrat, but he and his dupes never came within a mile of reaching the goal of their
ambition.
The vacant chair at Michigan City, which D. C. Stephenson spoke about, is simply yawning for Bill.
Navy Continues Hunt for Fliers
| San Francisco, Cal., Aug. 26.—; j Under a second extension of tim j- j i the United States Navy continued! ! its search last night for six men | and one woman missing in the 35,-{ I 000 Dole air race to Hawaii. Search was to have been concluded last night but under a new! plan devised for covering a section of the Pacific from a point 600i | miles off the California coast to the, {islands, the light cruiser Omaha; | and six destroyers were proceeding I from Puget Sound, Wash., to spend; jthe next four or''five days looking | for the lost fliers. Hope was still alive yesterday {that Miss Mildred Doran of Flint, Mich.; John Auggy Pedlar, Lieut. Vilas R. Knope, Jack Frost and Gordon Scott, the Dole air racers, might be alive after being lost nine days. The extended seach was also to cross the spot where Capt. William Erwin and A. H. Eichwaldt were believed to have fallen into th esea after telling by radio last Friday night of going into a dreaded tail spin. Etwin and Eichwaldt {went out in search of the other fliers. [
How About Helvie?
ufr
Apparenifyjthe county commissioners are not interested in ty disgraceful performance of County Road Superintendent Owen E. Helvie, who was caught at Elwobd with a bottle of booze in an automobile belonging to the county, after he had tried unsuccessfully to rani the radiator of the car through a solid cement traffic post which stands at the intersection of two of the Principal streets in the business section of Elwood. if Just what kind of hocus pocus was used to get Helvie off with |n eleven dollar fine for “reckless driving.” when lie should have been prosecuted for transporting and possessing Honor, and driving an automobile while intoxicated, does not appear on the surface, but ii is mitre than likely that his political friends here-got busy,;as the friends of another republican, State Policem ' jailed in Alex of liquor, and v as still kept on the job as state police-
man.
The auto n bile Helvie smashed up belonged to
Deiav laxpg
drunken companion, Dr. Kilgore, county coroner, He was drunk himself. Instead of one traffic post, he saw a whole flock of them. He missed them all but one. The police got him dead to rights, but the next day the Elwood city judge and the deputy prosecutor listened to distress signals and he escaped. Here was a case of two prominent republican officials of Delaware county receiving official protection which is denied poor devils caught with a half pint on their hip and no republican machine to help them out of the hole. Matt McGuigan, who has a young wife and three small children, was sent to the penitentiary from Judge Dearth’s court for transporting liquor, and he wasn’t even caught with the liquor in his car. But Matt is a democrat and he has no political pull. If Matt had been a republican, and held a county office he wouldn’t have gone to the penitentiary. The Helvies have been active in jury service in Dearth’s court. Helvie himself was a member of Dearth’s first grand jury. He helped indict the editor of the Post-Democrat on a liquor charge that was absolutely groundless. It was so flimsy that even former Prosecutor Van Ogle caused it to be dismissed. Helvie was given a job as road superintendent for helping to frame the crooked indictment against the Post-Democrat. He still holds his job but will be kicked out the first of the year when the republican machine loses control of the board of county commissioners. The party of Lincoln, Roosevelt, Hayes, McKinley and Bill Floyd has come to a pretty pass in Delaware county when it is forced to step out in the open to protect its booze fighting office holders. Citizens generally will welcome the day when democrats are entrusted with the administration of county affairs.
Truitt and McCreery Taking a Final Shot At the l axpayers—Kimbroughs Also Get Orphans’ Home Job With High Bid—Republican Machine Takes Care of Its Favorites. The prediction of the Post-Democrat last week that the county commissioners would contract with Harry Hoffman to dip ten thousand yards of gravel, “more or less,” on the Fuson farm, near Cammack, came true. The commissioners met last Saturday and behind locked doors awarded the contract. Herb Fuson, owner of the farm from which the gravel is to be dipped, is a Billy Williams republican county central committeeman. While they were locked in, the commissioners also awarded a contract for the repair of the heaping system of the orphans’ home to the Kimbrough company, notwithstanding the fact that a bid' of $305 less was presented by Paul Stauf.
The Big Dipper People living in Mt. Pleasant
| township, are extremely indignant
The commissioners had adver/.s-1 aV er this latest gravel deal. There ed for bids for dipping gravel in ; s plenty of gravel in the vicinity of District 14.” Nobody knew whatjeammack that, can be secured by Section 14 meant, but everybody | the department, as It is needed, at knew that the Fuson farm had been! a much less price than 70 cents a
selected and that Harry Hoffman (yard.
would he the “Big Dipper.' ; There was absolutelv no necesTwo bids were opened. Ope bore 3 ity for making such a contract and the signature of M. C. Bradway, the whole thing was framed up for
Hoffman and Kimbrough.
c to A aim that it was the lav ana on m i n a s 0 f the voters of Perry
the custom for county commission- township that that
ers to go into executive session
who agreed to do the dipping for I4Y2 cents a yard. Hoffman & Hines bid 70 cents. Bradway is said to be a Richmond friend of
Hoffman.
the benefit of Hoffman and a pret cinct committeeman who was in line for some kind of a reward.
They Get The Dougn
„ . . T , x. To those who do not understand : Commissioner Joseph Mann, he how ^ comitv pays the benefit democratic member, fought the. jiar{es of these gravel dipping con gravel project, but was two-timed ; tracts . it might be stated that the !by McCreery. who is somewhat m-j el is aid f 0X immediately after fferested m gravel himself, and j t ig di d and Ued ; rnu t whose discovery some timei H ile ., of graveI dot the landago that gravel had to be cured be-! e in DeL . vare county. Manv of !iore it could be used contributed!,^ have stood i: ,, re for years.. [Somewha.t to his reputation tor ex- t ree gravel road 'fund has been exi eme oiigmality. hausted to pay for these useless T l(>i e letting the contract to p{j es 0 j- g rave j and money has not • man, the commissioners tare- been ava ii a fii e to keep the roads in fully locked the <oor. The republi- a proper stat8 o£ repair . i an mem bet s did the locking. local gravel trust has branchAlann. the democratic member ed out and ^ operating in Madison was locked in with them. He might i; H aashman, a relative of i as ' vaiave been locked out, tin .Commissioner McCreery, has had
I everything was cut and dried tor
the gravel oncession there for two ,years. Harshman is the man who
|when contracts were let. Naturally a star chamber session seemed safest for them, for tht | public has had pretty nearly i. {stomach full of Harry Hoffman. While he was sheriff of the conn Ify Hoffman acquired considerable wealth by feloniously selling gravel {to the county and participating in ! county road contracts. It was Hoffman’s hoggishness land the many raw gravel deals that ; were pulled off that caused the dejfeat at the polls, last fall, of Com-! ;missioners Truitt and Andy Jack-:
! son.
Wnsl|p, nor-
mally ten fo one republican, gave Acker and Mann, democratic candidates for county commiss^ner, ast fall, majorities of two huna\d jver Truitt and Jackson. Although defeated for re-election Commissioner Truitt, w r ho believes gravel should be piled up and cursd, will not retire from office until 'he first of next January. He will then be succeeded by Commissioner Bob Acker, a democrat. After January 1, the board
will be democratic.
Will Welcome a Change The taxpayers ot Delaware
; Notwithstanding this the gravel colinty wil1 welcome the day, four {combine is going right ahead just| mollths hence, when honest and in- | the same as if nothing had happen- corruptible officials gain control. ‘ ed to the well oiled republican ma- °n January 1, the grip of the gravel j chine. (Continued to Page Two)
They Might Try Looking Around. Some humorist on the staff of the Muncie Evening Press pulled a good one Tuesday on Chief of Police Arthur Jones. According to the Press the Chief explained that men arrested for intoxication invariably refused to tell who sold them the liquor, therefore it is impossible for the police department to locate bootleggers. If the chief knows any other good ones like that the people here would like to hear from him so they can lawf again. We would say, offhand, that there are at least five hundred bootleggers in good standing in Muncie, working every day at their trade. One of these lives next to a church and he has a man working with him who has standing orders from the police department not to be seen on the street after midnight so his boss keeps him on the day shift exclusively. Another is an ex-policenjan, in good with the republican machine. One lives at a hotel and the man whose wife he stole has tried unsuccessfully to have him arrested. Bootleggers’ automobiles are so thick on the streets that traffic officers are hard put to it to keep them from bumping into each other. The business is so crowded and competition is so keep that it is proposed that they wear uniforms and badges, like policemen, so they won’t make the mistake of trying to sell to each other. About everybody in Muncie, with the exception of the police, know who these bootleggers are. Policemen are not supposed to know. How can they possibly know, in fact, if nobody tells them ? Of course a policeman would have to be dumb, blind and deaf not to know who the bootleggers are, who hauls in the liquor and who buys it, but far be it from a humble newspaper reporter to accuse the police of being anything else, since the chief himself admits it.