Their savings went for doctor’s bills and clothing for the little one. Then Blair had difficulty, he says, in finding steady employment at his trade, painting. When they were reduced almost to poverty they decided to come to Los Angeles. They have been here six weeks. In that time, Blair says, he was unable to earn enough to provide properly for his sick wife and impoverished baby.
The last dollar the couple had went a few days ago for rent. Weary of tramping the streets in quest of work, weak from lack of nourishment, and worried because he couldn’t buy food, clothing and medicine, Blair says he conceived the idea of turning highwayman.
“Even then my nemesis followed me,” he said, choking. “I got a few dollars from the conductor and was hurrying home to give it to my wife for food and things when I was stopped by a police officer. I escaped from him and was climbing a fence when the bullet caught me in the leg.”
Blair will be confined in the criminal ward at the County Hospital until he is physically able to be arraigned. He will be charged with highway robbery, the police say.
With whistle screeching and hundreds of passengers yelling for help out of the windows, a northbound Third avenue elevated train was held in panic late last night by a crowd of roughs, who terrorized the passengers and assaulted a conductor.
More than a dozen women, returning from the theatre, fainted, and Mrs. Sadie Arthur, of No. 991 East One Hundred and Seventy-eighth street, was thrown into violent hysterics and taken to the Lebanon Hospital.
The riot started at One Hundred and Thirty-eighth street and continued all the way to One Hundred and Sixty-sixth street. There policemen shoved through a great crowd, which had been attracted by the whistling, and arrested Adolph J. Weiss, eighteen years old, of No. 444 East One Hundred and Sixty-fifth street. His companions in the excitement managed to escape.
Weiss, who is somewhat of a fighter, was the ringleader of the disturbers. They began their horseplay by throwing hats about the car, smashing hats and jostling the passengers. Dresses were torn and women insulted; yet no one took a hand to suppress the outrage.
“Shame on you men,” cried some of the women. “Haven’t any of you enough spirit to protect us?”