The Midnight Drill at the Railway Office
An audacious burglary attempt at the Northern Pacific depot in South Aberdeen ends in silence and failure.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
The employees in the Northern Pacific railroad office at South Aberdeen were considerably surprised Sunday morning on entering the office to find evidences that an attempt had been made during the night to blow open the safe. The first to enter was baggagemaster Drake, whose difficulty in turning his key in the door lock led him to believe that the lock had been tampered with. He finally succeeded, however, in opening the door, when he was fully convinced by the dirt upon the floor and the papers scattered about the room that the office had been visited by others during the previous night. Mr. Drake summoned agent A. Clark, who resides with his family in the building, and together they instituted a search to ascertain what, if anything, was missing. They discovered a large drill hole in the safe, evidently made with the intention of blowing it open, but nothing of value was taken. Mr. Clark says he heard no sounds whatever, and the only reason he can give for them not completing their job is that they were probably frightened away by the footsteps of Mrs. Clark, who arose during the night to attend to their children.
“The only reason he can give for them not completing their job is that they were probably frightened away by the footsteps of Mrs. Clark.”
Railroad depots were once the central nodes of power in towns like Aberdeen. The shift from physical safes in local stations to digital, decentralized commerce has changed how we think about urban safety and 'crimes of opportunity.'
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