the disappearance of Adam Foltz's barber pole. One of these gentlemen is the head of an El Paso Ford agency, slightly related to the complainant, and another has a very high position in the centennial organization. Both of these boys had been so far above suspicion in the case they were not called as witnesses. But after the "trial" the barber pole was removed from its hiding place in the weeds along the Illinois Central tracks and tossed into an empty coal car passing south, lest it be found as the needed evidence. The case still throws such fear into certain men of El Paso that no one can be found who will admit tossing that pole into the coal car, but they do state positively that that was the end of the Adam Foltz barber pole, if not the law case.
Illinois banks had a Bankers' Protective Association with certain citizens deputized to help capture bank bandits. Dr. A. C. King was one of the El Paso bank guard force when a call came from Secor the afternoon of January 3, 1927, saying a bandit had held up the First National Bank there and was headed east. The dentist left a patient in his chair, grabbed his sawed-off shotgun and drove to the four corners. A speeding car soon appeared from the west and Dr. King brandished his gun in the middle of the road, then stepped behind a pillar of the corner service station. Another car containing Albert Jacobs and Ralph Burster, cashier who had just faced the bandit's gun, was following the speeding car and about to overtake it. A shot was heard and the bandit car turned over in the ditch before it reached the crossing. Closing in, King, Burster and Jacobs found the man dead in the car, killed by a shot from his own pistol. The money was returned to Secor, and King looked at his gun to find it was locked and wouldn't have fired. The bandit proved to be from a good family in Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin. They did not claim the body and he was buried in Evergreen Cemetery.
Edward Perry Bennett, fifteen, one of the finest football backs El Paso High School ever had, died January 28, 1947 in an altercation between two groups of boys near the intersection of Routes 24 and 51. Dewey Cook, seventeen, of Farina, Illinois, finally pled guilty to manslaughter by stabbing and was sentenced to fourteen years in the penitentiary. Edward and Frederick Hollingsworth were charged with manslaughter, but were acquitted.
John Seggerman died November 3, 1949 from gunshot wounds which his wife said she inflicted following a quarrel. She was charged with murder, but was acquitted on her plea of self-defense.
CITY OFFICIALS. Clyde L. Tegard is the only one of El Paso's mayors who was born in El Paso. Horace H. Baker was the youngest man ever elected to the office, having just turned twenty-six. Fred Eastman is believed the youngest alderman to be elected. Joseph G. Baker and Horace H. Baker are the only father and son to both hold the office of mayor. John B. Michels served the longest period as
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