Strange Times 184: A Good Fight

Today we have punching and murder and fireworks and punching and punching and punching. Get thumped in the jaw on:

July 3, 1921

The world buzzes with news of the Dempsey fight, which the heavyweight champion won handily, knocking out the challenger Carpentier in the fourth round. (You can watch some pretty good footage of it here.) The Times goes all out in its coverage, providing over ten full pages of reporting and analysis and devoting nearly six columns of its front page to the story. (President Harding’s signing of the treaty that formally ended World War 1, meanwhile, received only one.) Some highlights:

• President Harding, taking a break from ending the Great War, “showed little interest” in the bout, asking “Was it a good fight?” before returning to his duties.

• “It was a good fight,” says Dempsey, “and I think the public was satisfied.…You’ve got to hand it to Carpentier; he was surely game.”

• “I staked my all to win in the second round,” says Carpentier. “America should be proud of Dempsey. He is a great champion.”

• As he left the ring, Dempsey’s first action was to telegram his mother in Salt Lake City: “Dear Mother: Won in the fourth round. Received your wire. Will be home as soon as possible. Love and kisses. —Jack.”

• Accounts and photos of the fight were sent around the world by airplane, by cable, and by a new process which transmits photos by converting them into a “series of code numbers which represented varying depths of impressions on a plate prepared at the other end of the wire.”

• An attorney for the International Reform Bureau demands Dempsey’s arrest on charges of assault and battery in the ring, but local police refuse to comply without a signed arrest warrant.

• The Weather: Generally fair and warmer today; Monday, cloudy, probably thunder showers; southwesterly winds.

Meanwhile, in Berlin, a mother and daughter learn that murder is harder than it looks. 

BERLIN, July 2.—Berliners are experiencing a non-reparation thrill in reading about a janitress, Frau Otilie Flehmer, and her 20-year-old daughter Gertrude, whom a local scribe styles as “human hyenas,” who are being tried for one of the worst murders in the memory of Berlin. The victim was an invalid widow, Emilie Tiller, 70 years old, a neighbor of the Flehmers. The latter are accused of rendering friendly services to the aged invalid under the guise of Good Samaritans and at the same time forging her name and withdrawing her funds from the savings bank.

According to the women’s confession, fearing exposure of the fraud, they decided to kill the invalid. They dissolved five tablets of mercury sublimate in cold water and each morning poured some of it into the invalid’s coffee.

The poison made Frau Tiller ill, but acted too slowly for the impatient mother and daughter, who one morning choked the dying woman to death by pressing a pillow over her face. Then they carried the body into the laundry, where the mother with a hatchet chopped off the head, arms and legs while the daughter held the torso. They tried to burn the parts in a stove, but as the torso would not burn they chopped it into pieces, which they packed in a sack and threw into a canal.

I’ve been saying it for years—or at least since I acquired a wife, children and dog who are all scared of explosions—fireworks are the worst.

NORWALK, Conn., July 2.—William Rumm of this city died at the local hospital late this afternoon from lockjaw as a result of an explosion of a blank cartridge. Mike Eannuzzi and Walter Wisinesky are on the dangerous list and Mike Santello is suffering from less serious injuries at the same institution, caused by the premature explosion of torpedoes. All four were celebrating the Fourth of July ahead of time.

Mayor Donovan has ordered the arrest of all dealers who have sold blank cartridge pistols or other fireworks of a forbidden nature.