THE DECEIVERS by Tom Rizzo

Time proved the best ally of con men who roamed the wide open spaces of the Old West ready to spin their creative schemes on all gullible segments of society.

The families who headed for the frontier usually made the rough journey of four to six months with all their possessions plus an average of about $1,000 in cash—considered a sizable amount of the time since wage earners usually brought home only a few dollars a week.

Hucksters and swindlers awaited the unsuspecting like hungry vultures poised to swoop in for the kill. No one was immune: farmers, soldiers, merchants—anyone who had a buck or two or more for the taking. 

Warnings or alerts about these tricksters traveled at a snail’s pace and usually never reached the frontier until pioneers and others fell victim to con men again and again. Con men were as prevalent as bars of soap throughout the American West.

Soap, incidentally, served as the core of one successful swindle. Although it’s impossible to identify all the con men who traveled the Old West, here are three who made a successful living fooling the unsuspecting. 

SOAPY SMITH

A crowd gathered on a busy street corner in Denver stood spellbound as the man in the dark suit and flat-brimmed hat balanced his valise on a tripod stand and opened it to reveal stacks of ordinary soap cakes wrapped in plain paper. 

Jefferson Randolph Smith II took out his wallet and removed paper bills in denominations of one dollar to $100, wrapped them around several of the money-wrapped soap bars, and mixed them with the others. At that point, he offered to sell the soap for $1 to $5 a bar. A few individuals in the crowd—accomplices of Smith, known as the Soap Gang—quickly bought the soap packets.

After ripping away the wrapping, they excitedly displayed the $100 bills, bragging aloud voices they had pulled a fast one on the soap man and beaten him at his own game. Enticed by the success of these shills, others in the crowd anted up the cash to buy their packets—all which contained only soap, valued at about a nickel.

The scam gave birth to the con man’s nickname—Soapy Smith, who continued the hoax over a twenty-year period.

The “Prize Package Soap Sell Swindle,” as a Denver newspaper dubbed it, proved child’s play compared to the overall criminal pursuits of this American con man. Between 1879 and 1898, Smith played a significant role in the operation of organized crime in Denver, and in Creede, Colorado.

Smith’s last con, bilking a Klondike miner out of a sack of gold, cost him his life on July 8, 1898, in what’s known as the Shootout of Juneau Wharf. 

JIM MINER

The crowd gathered around the man in the derby hat, and stylish clothes reacted with surprise when he flashed a big smile and snapped open his umbrella, even though he was indoors. 

“Gather 'round, folks, for a chance to double your money,” announced Jim Miner, also called as Umbrella Jim, one of the slickest of Mississippi shell game artists, a master of the short-con. Miner operated under a simple strategy: Get in. And get out.

Not only did he start his infamous shell-and-pea game by opening his umbrella—rain or shine, indoors or out—he immediately segued into a ballad for his eager onlookers and then launched the con.

Miner smiled and placed a small round ball, the size of a pea, under one of three walnut shells and quickly shuffled them around the tabletop. “Who can guess where the little pea is hiding? Double your money,” he announced, reeling out just enough inducement to convince the daring to wager on the location of the pea.

In reality, the only big winner would be Jim Miner. The game had nothing to do with chance. While those who placed bets stood wide-eyed and focused on the back of Miner's hands, they couldn't spot the slight-of-hand wizardry he used to remove the pea between his thumb and second finger.

On occasion, he allowed someone to win, purely to squeeze higher bets out of the mark. And every crowd included someone who believed he was smarter than the game. No one playing had the ability to pick the right shell unless Miner—or another operator—wanted someone else to win.

CANADA BILL JONES

"Suckers have no business with money, anyhow," said Canada Bill Jones, one of the most capable card sharps in history. 

Born in Yorkshire, England, in the early 1800s, Jones immigrated to Canada when he was about twenty and mastered three-card monte, which is not a game but a scam or swindle.

After several years of fleecing suckers in Canada, he crossed the border into the United States and took his game to the pre-war south where he conned passengers on Mississippi riverboats out of enormous sums of money. 

Jones attributed much of his success to playing the rube. 

He spoke in a squeaky voice, draped baggy clothes over his 130-pound frame, and came across as a bumbling greenhorn, a klutz that few people took seriously. But, that's where they made their mistake. Jones was anything but klutzy. He was a master of the con, and a renowned poker cheat.

After the Civil War, he and his card-sharp partner, George Devol, decided to ply their trade on the railroad, targeting passengers who were heading West at the beginning of the country's ambitious expansion. 

The pair enjoyed so much success that Canada Bill wrote the general superintendent of the Union Pacific Railroad offering to pay between $10,000 and $25,000 a year for the exclusive right to operate a three-card monte on the trains. Bill promised to fleece only “the wealthy, and Methodist ministers.” Not surprisingly, the railroad declined to accept the offer. 

Among his most ardent admirers were other gamblers. When Canada Bill died in 1880 in Reading, Pennsylvania, he was penniless. Dozens of his peers showed up at his funeral and raised money to repay the city for the cost of burying Bill, and to erect a gravestone in his honor.

One card sharp at the funeral wagered $100 that “Bill is not in that box.” 

_______

Tom Rizzo invites you to “Discover the Historical West” and read about characters and events that shaped the American frontier. Join the StoryTeller Posse and receive occasional dispatches from the High Plains and beyond and receive a FREE copy of "WHEN THE SMOKE CLEARS: GUNSLINGERS AND GUNFIGHTS OF THE OLD WEST. "

_______

SWINDLERS & SCOUNDRELS by Tom Rizzo

Time proved the best ally of con men who roamed the wide open spaces of the Old West ready to spin their creative schemes on all gullible segments of society.

The families who headed for the frontier usually made the rough journey of four to six months with all their possessions plus an average of about $1,000 in cash—considered a sizable amount of the time since wage earners usually brought home only a few dollars a week.

Hucksters and swindlers awaited the unsuspecting like hungry vultures poised to swoop in for the kill. No one was immune: farmers, soldiers, merchants—anyone who had a buck or two or more for the taking. 

Warnings or alerts about these tricksters traveled at a snail’s pace and usually never reached the frontier until pioneers and others fell victim to con men again and again. Con men were as prevalent as bars of soap throughout the American West.

Soap, incidentally, served as the core of one successful swindle. Although it’s impossible to identify all the con men who traveled the Old West, here are three who made a successful living fooling the unsuspecting. 

SOAPY SMITH

A crowd gathered on a busy street corner in Denver stood spellbound as the man in the dark suit and flat-brimmed hat balanced his valise on a tripod stand and opened it to reveal stacks of ordinary soap cakes wrapped in plain paper. 

Jefferson Randolph Smith II took out his wallet and removed paper bills in denominations of one dollar to $100, wrapped them around several of the money-wrapped soap bars, and mixed them with the others. At that point, he offered to sell the soap for $1 to $5 a bar. A few individuals in the crowd—accomplices of Smith, known as the Soap Gang—quickly bought the soap packets.

After ripping away the wrapping, they excitedly displayed the $100 bills, bragging aloud voices they had pulled a fast one on the soap man and beaten him at his own game. Enticed by the success of these shills, others in the crowd anted up the cash to buy their packets—all which contained only soap, valued at about a nickel.

The scam gave birth to the con man’s nickname—Soapy Smith, who continued the hoax over a twenty-year period.

The “Prize Package Soap Sell Swindle,” as a Denver newspaper dubbed it, proved child’s play compared to the overall criminal pursuits of this American con man. Between 1879 and 1898, Smith played a significant role in the operation of organized crime in Denver, and in Creede, Colorado.

Smith’s last con, bilking a Klondike miner out of a sack of gold, cost him his life on July 8, 1898, in what’s known as the Shootout of Juneau Wharf. 

JIM MINER

The crowd gathered around the man in the derby hat, and stylish clothes reacted with surprise when he flashed a big smile and snapped open his umbrella, even though he was indoors. 

“Gather 'round, folks, for a chance to double your money,” announced Jim Miner, also called as Umbrella Jim, one of the slickest of Mississippi shell game artists, a master of the short-con. Miner operated under a simple strategy: Get in. And get out.

Not only did he start his infamous shell-and-pea game by opening his umbrella—rain or shine, indoors or out—he immediately segued into a ballad for his eager onlookers and then launched the con.

Miner smiled and placed a small round ball, the size of a pea, under one of three walnut shells and quickly shuffled them around the tabletop. “Who can guess where the little pea is hiding? Double your money,” he announced, reeling out just enough inducement to convince the daring to wager on the location of the pea.

In reality, the only big winner would be Jim Miner. The game had nothing to do with chance. While those who placed bets stood wide-eyed and focused on the back of Miner's hands, they couldn't spot the slight-of-hand wizardry he used to remove the pea between his thumb and second finger.

On occasion, he allowed someone to win, purely to squeeze higher bets out of the mark. And every crowd included someone who believed he was smarter than the game. No one playing had the ability to pick the right shell unless Miner—or another operator—wanted someone else to win.

CANADA BILL JONES

"Suckers have no business with money, anyhow," said Canada Bill Jones, one of the most capable card sharps in history. 

Born in Yorkshire, England, in the early 1800s, Jones immigrated to Canada when he was about twenty and mastered three-card monte, which is not a game but a scam or swindle.

After several years of fleecing suckers in Canada, he crossed the border into the United States and took his game to the pre-war south where he conned passengers on Mississippi riverboats out of enormous sums of money. 

Jones attributed much of his success to playing the rube. 

He spoke in a squeaky voice, draped baggy clothes over his 130-pound frame, and came across as a bumbling greenhorn, a klutz that few people took seriously. But, that's where they made their mistake. Jones was anything but klutzy. He was a master of the con, and a renowned poker cheat.

After the Civil War, he and his card-sharp partner, George Devol, decided to ply their trade on the railroad, targeting passengers who were heading West at the beginning of the country's ambitious expansion. 

The pair enjoyed so much success that Canada Bill wrote the general superintendent of the Union Pacific Railroad offering to pay between $10,000 and $25,000 a year for the exclusive right to operate a three-card monte on the trains. Bill promised to fleece only “the wealthy, and Methodist ministers.” Not surprisingly, the railroad declined to accept the offer. 

Among his most ardent admirers were other gamblers. When Canada Bill died in 1880 in Reading, Pennsylvania, he was penniless. Dozens of his peers showed up at his funeral and raised money to repay the city for the cost of burying Bill, and to erect a gravestone in his honor.

One card sharp at the funeral wagered $100 that “Bill is not in that box.” 

_______

Tom Rizzo invites you to “Discover the Historical West” and read about characters and events that shaped the American frontier. Join the StoryTeller Posse and receive occasional dispatches from the High Plains and beyond and receive a FREE copy of "WHEN THE SMOKE CLEARS: GUNSLINGERS AND GUNFIGHTS OF THE OLD WEST. "

_______

Pioneer Paper of the Plains by Tom Rizzo

On the night of November 19, 1868, an angry and drunken mob of railroad workers tore through the town of Bear River City, Wyoming, leave a trail of destruction in its wake.

The mob burned down the jail to free a comrade, leaving a dead citizen behind. It then headed for the newspaper office of The Frontier Index, which used a box car as its printing office. 

Fueled by publisher and editor Legh Freeman's violent, anti-Mormon viewpoint, the rioters sacked the office, and destroyed the printing press and other equipment. 

When it marched en masse toward a general store, about thirty armed citizens took the offensive, and fired into the crowd, killing several and wounding others. 

The Frontier Index, published by Freeman, and his brother Frederick, provoked passionate reaction wherever they published, and proved a unique venture in the history of Great Plains journalism. 

Started at Fort Kearny, Nebraska, December 1865, the publication was dubbed "the press on wheels" because it followed successive terminus towns of the Union Pacific railroad, along the tracks westward to Julesburg, Cheyenne, Fort Sanders, Green River City, and Ogden, moving into a railhead before they fully developed into towns. 

At the outset, the newspaper was published on an old time hand roller press which was abandoned by General Joseph E. Johnston who, prior to 1861, commanded US troops in the far West. 

The equipment was easy to transport. The Freemans operated out of box cars and tents most of the time, ultimately serving mostly civilian subscribers in about twenty different locations, including a few near military installations. 

Because of easy access to the telegraph, the newspaper was able to print national news as soon as it was available from the East. 

The Frontier Index also borrowed a page from the Associated Press by establishing an exchange program with other newspapers. While on site, Freeman served as a local printer for private projects. And, he also sold advertising space in the newspaper.

Under its masthead motto - Independence in All Things, Neutrality in Nothing - the paper delivered a no-holds-barred, straight-from-the-shoulder digest of sometimes witty opinion. Although it seemed to mirror the sometimes rebellious, independent attitude embraced settlers making a new start in the growing American frontier, Freeman's views and opinions helped alienate a number of people.

He walked a tight but narrow rope between witty and sarcastic. Everyone was fair game, it seemed. 

Freeman often crossed the line with endless, vitriolic, and bigoted attacks against what he labeled the Useless Slaughter and Horse Useless Grant administration, the Credit Mobilier scandal that involved the Union Pacific, Mormonism, Black Republicans, Indians, and Chinese. 

The Frontier Index  became the target of severe criticism from various Rocky Mountain publications. 

The Reveille, Oct 2, 1868: "The filthy rebel sheet, The Frontier Index, is alway filled with ribaldry and gross abuse of the government or some of its agents. It seems to gloat and grow fat with the lowest billingsgate it can command in ministering to its vulgar appetite by pouring out abuse about anything or or any person who stood by out country in the time of her trial. From the tone of the Index, we should judge the editor would make a good member of the Ku Klux Klan…"

The Salt Lake Daily Reporter , Sept. 12, 1868: "The Frontier Index  says it is the mouthpiece of Wyoming Democracy. We wee mistaken, badly mistaken, as everyone it likely to be occasionally. We had come to the conclusion that the Index was the entire butt end of the Democracy of Wyoming."

Editor Freeman liked being on the move and, by 1875, Freeman moved back to Utah to open the Ogden Freeman. He also published others in Utah and Montana. 

The April 16, 1884 edition of the Salt Lake Evening Chronicle's April 16, 1884 edition,  carried this item: 

"That irrepressible rustler, Legh R. Freeman, has consolidated the Chronicle, Herald, Ogden Freeman, Inter-Mountain, Daily Labor Union, Atlantic and Union Freeman into one huge ten page journal called the Frontier Index, and finally stopped his 'press on wheels' at Thompson's Falls, a 'magic city' in the pine woods on the Northern Pacific railway near Coeur d'Alene mines."

Freeman married three times and had four children. He spent the last few years of his life in Washington writing and publishing the Washington Farmland,  becoming involved in the Populist movement. Freeman ran for the Senate twice as the "Red Horse Candidate." He also made an unsuccessful attempt to run for mayor, but finished last in the 1914 race.

He died February 7, 1915, in North Yakima, Washington.

# # #