Telephone Office Moved - Grand Masked Ball - A Deserving Case - Valuable Presents - Secured Considerable Plunder
29 DEC 1883. Austin Daily Statesman.
CITY MATTERS IN BRIEF.
The general telephone office has been moved to the Hancock building, up stairs. It was formerly in the Brueggerhoff building.
The preparations are now complete for the grand masked ball of the Austin Athletic Association, and if the weather is favorable, the event will be one of the most successful, from a social standpoint, of anything held in this city for a long time past.
Mr. Andrew V. Gustafson, of 605 East Bois d’Arc street, has been very unfortunate, and deserves help at the hands of our citizens. He has been paralyzed in the lower part of his body from the hips down, and is rendered helpless to make a living, and is without any means of support. We are satisfied his case is a most deserving one.
Mr. P.W. Barton and Miss Mary A. Young, colored, of this city, were married Thursday night, December 27, at 8 o’clock p.m., at the residence of the bride, Elder Swan officiating. Many valuable presents were received by the newly married couple. Among these were several from Mr. John Bremond, in whose store Barton has been employed as porter for sixteen years. The gifts presented by Mr. Bremond were one fine clock, one lamp and one chamber set. These, with the others presented by many friends, are estimated to be worth between $125 and $150.
Robbery.
Last night, or in the early hours of this morning burglars entered the saloon of Mr. John B. Neff and secured considerable plunder. The manner in which the burglary was committed was as follows: There is a flight of stairs leading into an upper room just at the side of the saloon, and at the foot of these stairs is a door cut through the partition into the saloon. The thief secreted himself in the stairway while the saloon and outside door to the stairway were being closed, and then, cutting the tin which was used instead of glass in the windows of the door leading to the saloon, he reached through the opening thus made, and slipping back the bolt that fastened the door, he opened the latter and walked in. He first went to the cigar stand in front of the saloon and took out several boxes of cigars. There is a door behind the bar, shutting out the forward part of the space behind the bar from the main part in the rear. The thief closed this door, and then went to the rear of the bar, where the money drawer is, opened it and took the contents. Next he turned his attention to an iron box which was riveted to a plank near the money drawer and in which the receipts which are taken in at night after the safe in locked, are kept. This, by means of a hatchet, he succeeded in tearing from the plank and carried it off with him. The total amount of his plunder amounted to eighty-eight dollars and drink checks amounting to about twelve more. During the entire time taken in consummating the robbery the lights were brightly burning, the thief being secured from view by the closed door behind the bar. As the police have been repeatedly notified that whenever this door was closed something must be wrong. The question arises, where was the patrolman? This is the second time the Iron Front has been burglarized in the same manner in a year. The new detective agency should be welcomed with delight in view of the large number of burglaries which have been perpetrated and not been detected of late.
