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| Los Angeles Daily Times, June 13, 1908 |
POLICE PLAN TO LIST
ALL SHOOTING IRONS
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A sweeping crusade against the promiscuous sale of firearms in Los Angeles will be made by acting Chief of Police Paul Flammer.
Every revolver, rifle or shotgun sold by sporting-goods houses, pawn shops and jewelry stores will be registered, and the description of the weapon will be filed with the Police Department, if Flammer’s plans are followed.
The City Council will probably be asked to pass an emergency ordinance governing the case.
The shooting of a small boy by a youthful companion, various holdups and the fact that many revolvers stolen from rooming houses cannot be identified by their owners . . . furnish the motive for the registration act.
The proposed marketing of the new noiseless gun, invented by Hiram Maxwell, makes the action by Capt. Flammer all the more necessary.
With this terrible weapon on the market, the police would be almost helpless to handle holdup and murder cases.
“My attention was called to this noiseless Maxim gun by an article in the Times this morning,” said Flammer. . . . “A weapon like that is a terrible thing to turn loose on the public. . . . If that gun is put up for sale, every crook in the country will buy one. . . .
“In nine-tenths of the murder cases, the attention of neighbors is attracted to the tragedy by the sound of a gun. Imagine how easy it would be for a man with murder in his heart to steal into another man’s home and shoot him in bed without even the members of the family knowing of the tragedy.
“The gun would be an incentive to the highwayman to kill. The slightest move on the part of the victim might cause the holdup criminal to slay, though a policeman might be fifty yards away . . . .
“Every pawn shop in Los Angeles has a large stock of cheap revolvers and rifles. The revolvers are sold promiscuously to tramps
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and yeggmen and to bad boys who have been reading sensationalistic novels. Many tragedies result.
“We managed to secure the complete identification of the bullet with which Patrolman Lyons was killed because a clerk in the hardware store had sold Meskill a cartridge of old army pattern. He happened to remember the sale of that particular box of bullets. . . .”
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| The famous ‘Dr. Shush’ logo for Maxim Silencers. |
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| Diagram of a Maxim silencer; graphic from Gunwriters on the Web |
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Los Angeles Daily Times, June 16, 1908
WINGS SPROUTING
May Sail Air Here Within Two Months
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A flying contest to be held in Los Angeles within the next two months is a probability, according to the Aero Club of California, which met last evening in the library of the Times Building.
Several local aeronauts are completing machines, one of which — a heavier-than-air model — will be tried in two weeks.
Should it be successful, a flight with a dirigible balloon will be attempted and the speed of the relative machines tested.
Should the aeroplane fail, the plans . . . are for a race between dirigible balloons. . . .
An air pilots’ license has been the cause of considerable discussion. . . . to be able to navigate a balloon.
Under the ruling of the Aero Club of America, a member of a club must have made 10 ascensions, one of this number at night, one alone and two conducted under the supervision of a licensed pilot. . . .
No provision has been made for the aëronef type of ship.
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| The remodeled 1905 Wright machine, altered to allow the operator to assume a sitting position and to provide a seat for a passenger, on the launching track at Kill Devil Hills, N.C. This was apparently the only photograph of this machine taken by the Wright brothers in 1908 (May 11). Graphic from the Aviation History Web site. |
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Furthermore, it requires a balloonist who knows little or nothing of an aëroplane type to certify to qualifications.
All of these things were embodied in a report which will be sent to the national club. . . . The local society will, however, issue its own license to the man who, after inventing a [heavier-than-air] machine, proves by actual flight that he can control it in the air.
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[The] Wright Brothers and their machine formed a topic of conversation and debate last night. The various phases of the recent flight were compared with the former flights of other aëronauts in aëronef types.
The general opinion, expressed both by inventors and scientific engineers, seemed to be against the present plan as feasible for perfect atmospheric navigation, since it is against many scientific and natural phenomena of the air. . . .
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| Los Angeles Sunday Times, June 14, 1908 |
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Brown ‘Blue’
JAPS PLAY IN LOSING GAME
No Profits in Berry Raising This Year
Low prices have played sad havoc with the hopes of many berry growers this season.
The Japanese, who rent ground from white owners and usually make big profits, are very “blue.”
At Burbank they are leaving thousands of berries to rot on the ground and, in some cases for lack of cash [they] are defaulting on their rents.
One subject of the Mikado, known as Henry and a tenant of E.C. Colton, at Burbank, is said to [be] missing, leaving debts to the amount of $500. Mr. Colton has attached his building and is gathering the remainder of the berries.
. . . The Los Angeles Inter-Urban Company, which runs berry cars over the Tropico-Glendale line daily, reports a decline in shipments as compared with last year. . . .
The Japanese are very industrious workers and take great care with their crops.
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They have planted palm-leaf hedges around some of their gardens near Strawberry Park to keep off dust from the roads, and they have even had pieces of highways nearby oiled at their own expense.
They are progressive in the matter of irrigation systems, and many of them are working pumping plants with electric or gasoline engine power. . . .
The ill luck that has attended the Oriental berry growers this year appears to have been worse in the San Fernando Valley . . . .
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The Japanese sell their goods through dealers in the market around Third Street and Central Avenue generally
The Chinese [on the other hand] sometimes sell direct to consumers from wagons, going door to door. There is quite a colony of these sons of Confucius in the vicinity of Modjeska Park, just east of Watts. They raise . . . all kind of produce.
Despite the depression, the Pacific Electric and the inter-urban are running 15 berry and produce cars a day.
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| A portion of the Los Angeles produce market. |
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| These folks were picking celery, not berries, but you get the idea |
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