Evening Republican, Volume 59, Number 73, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 April 1917 — STAR CITY BANK ROBBED OF $5,000 [ARTICLE]

STAR CITY BANK ROBBED OF $5,000

Automobile Robbers Make Good Haul In Pulaski County and Make Good Their Escape. ... ... « Sheriff B. D. McCoLly was warned to be on the lookout for an automobile load of strangers this morning. • The sheriff was informed by Star City authorities that a bank at that place had been robbed at about 3 o’clock this morning and the safe relieved of $5,000" in cash. The robbers blew open the safe and escaped in an automobile. No one knew of the visit of the robbers until this morning, when the bank was opened for the day’s business. Star City is a small town in Pulaski county,"" satnfatedohthe P. F. C. and St. L. railroad, and the authorities are confident that the robbers left the place in an automobile as there were no trains passing through the town at that hour by which the thieves could have left. Automobile thieves worked in this section of the state all last summer and several towns in close proximity to Rensselaer were the victims of the gang, and a concerted effort should be made bv the police of the towns of this part of the state to round up the bunch.

W. L. Bott, who was cashier of the Star City bank for a good many years, talked to the bank officials over the phone this morning. The robbers had evidently worked nitroglycerine in the crack around the door, then muffled the explosion with blankets and blew the doot open. Mr. Bott says the robbers could have gone to Winamac and taken an early morning arriving in Chicago at 6 o’clock, where all trace could probably be destroyed. The bank always carried insurance and will probably not lose anything, except a great deal of inconvenience and delay in getting the safe repaired. The safe is a large one and was supposed to be almost proof against robbers, but these.men were evidently “old-timers” at thie business.