Editorial

The Way it Was

Thursday, October 19, 2006

100 years ago

Federal escort for Mrs. Jefferson Davis

NEW YORK -- As a noble victor might pay tribute to a worthy adversary, the United States government yesterday accorded a signal honor to the memory of Mrs. Jefferson Davis, widow of the president of the Confederacy, by sending an escort of Federal troops to her funeral, and side by side they marched with the veterans of the lost cause of her own South.

According to army officers in Washington, it was the first time in the history of the Republic that the obsequies of any women, however eminent, were to dignified.

50 years ago

Robbed of $204 during 'prayer session' here

Police were unable to find two women, who reportedly were driving a late model Buick automobile, one of whom robbed R.C. Hallam, Nevada, of $204 yesterday afternoon on the pretense of "wanting to pray" with Mr. Hallam.

The women, who was reported as about 50, poorly dressed and wearing dark horn-rimmed glasses, had walked to the Hallam house from a Buick car parked on Colorado Street, where another woman was waiting. The woman asked Mr. Hallam, who lives alone, if she could come in and pray with him. He let her in and while she was there she must have taken his wallet, took out the money and returned the wallet to his pocket. After she had left, his daughter, Mrs. Tom Mitchell, who lives nearby came over and the loss was discovered.