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The Detroit River By Ex-Boatswain Walter 8. Casey ' Last spring 1 was ordered to re port to Commander Martin V, Ras- mussen at Buffalo, and by him was masigned to take over the 236, one of the standard 75-foot patrol boats. When 1 went. aboard the crew in- formed me that the Coast Guard was mot fussy about stopping rummies, and later an officer told me the same dhing. "All you have to do,' he said, "is burn up gas and then stand by each month for your pay." The 236 was the first Coast Guard patrol boat to operate in the Detroit River, The customs patrol men were supposed to look after it, but they were almost all green men, and where handicapped by a hard fast rule that dhey were not to use their guns un- Jess fired upon. The 236 bad been in these waters Just one hour when five "luggers" large skiffs powered with outboard motors--were sighted putting out from the Canadian shore. Through the binoculars we could see burlap packs full of liquor, But before this flotilla reached the boundary line in snid-channel the 236 appeared, and ley put back to shore to await dark- ness. When it was dark two of my nen, Goebel and "Red" Pickering, went over the side in the pulling boat with "Wrders to stand watch at Slab Island, #n American waters, and if firearms were necessary, to shoot into the beach. They shoved off and it was mot long before I heard three shots, The puttering of an outboard motor suddenly stopped, but we heard the yoar of a speedboal's engine. A few fminutes later Goebel and "Red" show- ed up with a skiff loaded with 185 eases of beer and a prisoner, a lad of 19 years. "The kid was easy," sald Goebel *He was trying to get away from the speedboat. When we got him the speedboat circled close, and the wash rlmost swamped the skiff, Then they came like bell right for the skiff. "Red' yelled to them, and when they held for the skiff he let go with his 45. The speedboat then veered off. "We nabbed the kid and the beer. HA wanted to know whether we were Bijackers or agents, and was damn glad to learn that the Coast Guard bad got him and not the hijackers in tbe black speedboat." The second night on the river Goe- bel and "Red" made another catch, 'A "Monkey" named Walker, who was whipping a skiff-load of 150 cases of beer across, had to be tapped on the Bead befcre he submitted to arrest. {The lad of the previous night was ¥mall potatoes compared to Mr, Wal- her. He had a notebook ehowing the amounts be had received from ihe head man or "gorilla" of the out- fit. The acoounts also showed that Mr. Walker, as a sideline, supplied a welect Detroit clientele with better grades of liquor than those run by the gang. T We were soon assigned to ihe sec- Alon of the river between Ecorse and Wyandotte. That riverfront is not & pleasant place. For several blocks, bouses built eave-to-eave.back up on the water. From the street side fbey appear to be dwellings and stores. In the rear of each house, bowever, there is a boat-well in which the speedboats and skiffs of the rum fleet are docked. By lowering the door of the boat-well a rummy 1s pro- tected by a legal barrier which defies anything but a search warrant, Ecorse is the domain of the Purple Gang, a gubsidiary of the Chicago out- fit. Its "gorilla" is George Cordell. [There are other gangs which operate elong here, and the river as a whole perves as a channel mot only for tremendous liquor smuggling opera- tions but also for en extensive traffic in dope and aliens, The smuggling pf women to supply rescrts in the guining and Jumber camps of the porthwest is particularly lucrative. Canadian smugglers make a good Khing out of the alien racket. Some of the allens are not even landed In the United States. A fee Is collectd from them on the Canadian beach often as much as $500 for a China- man), and then they are taken over fo Greese Ile. Here the smugglers direct them to the bridge which leads $0 the American mainland, and them- pelves depart for Canada. When the aliens reach the bridge they are pick. #d up by the Immigration Service and Berorica. The 236 was continuing to capture pummies with a good deal of regul | @rity when I received orders to re port to Rasmussen at the Base at Buffalo. He seemed to be not at all ! pleased by the way things were go- ! #ng, but 1 was alldwed to return to the . Detroit River. Immediately upon our 2 Jeter we sighted a big gray lugger ; we had run in a few days before. | hey refused to stop at our whistle, . nd we let go a couple of blank cart in the one-pounder. That night newspapers gave us a frontpage ing for firing directly at the shore- where hundreds of innocent peo ere. This seemed a trifie rough ue, Inasmuch as we had used i Furthermore, there were no t, people living In that section we continued to make captures tions with the rummies be op curions. One morning when 6 was tled up at the foot of Goebel gave him as good as he sent. He told Richards thet I had remark- ed that if any of the Ecorse gang got fresh I'd put a line on their boats and boat-wells and tow "the whole damn- ed business up the river." Two hours after that, when I was alone in the pilot house, a stranger called to me from the dock. He sald he was "Jimmy Schuppe of Chicago." He didn't beat about the bush, "Well, asey," he said, 'I want you to do a job for us. It'll only take two days, and you'll get 15 grand. Another gang's hijacked us out of a brewery up north, and we're gonna take it back again; see?" It was obvious no such job could be worth $15,000. "What have 1 got to do with it?" 1 said. "Just take that machine gun and come along. That will scare the other guys out; see?" "While this flattering offer was be- Ing made I kept my eyes on Mr. Schuppe's automobile, parked in the shadows, In which sat three men. 1 was careful to remain inside the pilot house with the radio cabinet between myself and the car. I had no inten- tion of being "put on the spot." Mr. Schuppe finally left, followed by my advise to get out of the Detroit River before he became a nuisance, Several days followed in which we were kept busy boarding boats. The newspapers were full of our activities, and liquor prices In Detroit had. gone up. It was at this time that the rum- mies tried to make a "connection." It began when Cordell started send- ing b0-cent cigars wrapped In foil aboard the 236 for the crew. A small boy would come to the dock with them and say, "Mr. Cordell sent them." 1 always opened the packages in the presence of the crew to show that there were no bills inside. One evening Cordell circled the 236 In a powerboat until he was hailed and boarded. That was what be want. ed. . "You're trying to make a record, aren't you?" he asked me. "Sure," I replied. "Ill be willing to help youn," the gorilla declared generously. "How?" "Well, I'll give you two seizures évery night" Cordell said. "You get the boats, but you don't get the men. See? You take the beer, and I'll take the whisky." Cordell made other attempts at "connections." Once he offered me a Packard roadster. Another time a $75 dress, mysteriously paid for, was delivered to my wife from a store, It went back. Perhaps Cordell got it. The days passed and the 236 got low on supplies Because of Gov- ernment "red tape" we dad to rum more than 100 miles to our base for new supplies Not wishing to leave the area uncovered I arranged for a picket boat to patrol the upper end of the area ,while I patroled the shore in my automobile. A few minutes before midnight I oame upon three men near a creek where a lugger had just put in. They stopped in their tracks. Then, see- ing the white top on my cap, two of them broke into a run. The third stood his ground until I was within ten feet of him and then ran. I call-| ed him to stop or I would shoot. He turned abruptly and fired. The bul- let ripped through the flesh of my left arm. I shot at him and he stum- bled and then ran again. I saw him rejoin his comrades. Returning to the Custome base, 1 learned that my pickét boat had knocked off a load of liquor off Point Hennepin just about the time I was having my party. : It was just after this affalr that Commander Rasmussen summoned me before tim. During an abusive re- primand he accused me of being off my patrol area, and said the area bad been left uncovered while the 236 was on its trip for supplies, Pointing out to him that I had been shot in my own area during the time he alleged it had been uncovered, and that the picket boat had seized a rum- my on the same night, falled to im- press him. 1 went to Buffalo very much dis heartened. While packing my gear on board the boat Gecrge Cordell came down to see me. He sald, "You are the squarest guy the gov- ernment ever put in this river. But you raised so much hell we had to get rid of you. It cost us five grand to get you out, but you're gone.'-- Plain Talk. een in order to get anything lke an exact figure, The amount, however, is prob- 'ably higher than the average motorist suspects, One person who has a small six- cylinder coach type of car has | figured out a cost of 11.73 cents a mile. Of this amount he has estimated 2.4 cents for depreciation, He is a man who takes rather good of his car and consequently his depreciation is doubtless lower than most. Some car Nl DIET WEY owners are certainly experiencing a depreciation of their machines of from 3 to 5 per cent, V There are certain items in operatin an automobile which one cannot well eliminate. "For instance, it is neces- sary to b certain amount of gaso- | line to certain number of 'miles of way, and gasoline costs about so mueh wherever you buy it. Even here a person can cut down the gasoline expense by seeing to it that the engine is working so as to get the most number of miles out of every gal- lon of gasoline. Good Care Is Repaid In the item of depreciation, the auto- mobile owner has the greatest oppor- tunity for eliminating useless gxpense in his automobile experience, By tak- Wi Mmmre%.> ing unusually good care of his car he can get many additional years of ser- The Pearl Standard A story condensed from "The World Traveler" by J. George Frederick to show what the Japanese have done, You have beard of the panic which would occur if alchemists should dis- cover how to make gold. +The "gold standard" would totter" Some- thing of this situation occurred with regard to the "pearl standard," after the Japanese learned how to make "cultured" pearls which nohe but ex- perts gould distinguish. ~But French courts have decided that cultured pearls are entitled to the name pearl, and so the "pear! standard" is evem now in process of adjustment. It is dificult indeed to find some- body with any real pearl to sell! Few have a bank roll big enough to buy even one or two, to say nothing of a "rope" of them. The true, natural pearl comes from the Indian Ocean, the Persian Gulf, Central America, West Indies, Australia, and the Jap- anese Islands. Of these the Austra lian pearl fisheries are the important source. In' fact, pearl divers from the Indian Ocean are coming to Aus- tralia, and nearly all'the Japanese in Australia are In the pearl business. To-day the Japanese are more or less the decisive factors in the pearl industry, both real and. "cultured." They are the most daring, persistent, and scientific divers and the most ag- gressive merchandisers. The little yellow men, reruited from the sea faring stock of the Japanese shores, have a fatalism mixed up in with their science, which makes an ideal pearl fishing combination, At depths mo other divers have attempted they are serene and efficient. They go 80 fathoms deep and more; they call 7 to 20 fathoms "shallow water." Woman claims equal 'rights with man in Japan as a pearl diver. Be- fore the Jap girl is 15 she knows all about diving, and the pearly merchant often hires her as an expert before she enters her teens! From Febru- ary to December she, with the Jap- anese men, dives 25 to 35 times a day, coming up with as many oysters as she can grab before her breath gives out. She remains at a depth of 30 fathoms for two minutes with out ill effects, She brings up about 50 oysters per dive, and there is good- natured competition. A girl' of 12 from Shima holds the record with 72 oysters--and they had almost turned away for being too young. The diver has no easy task, for the shell lying on the bottom is generally hard to see, as its back Is often covered with varioys kinds of marine growth and may be in marine grass two or three feet bigh, The pearl fishers consist of a fleet of "luggers," with a two- masted schooner as a mother ship, The oysters are dumped on the decks, and opened by white men specially appointed for the task. What 1s a pearl anyway? The healthy parent oyster lays thousands of eggs a year, but they float on the surface of the sea until they hatch. The tiny bivalve, using a greénish fiber-root sticking out of it, clings to anything it can, and feeds on the microscopic vegetable and animal forms in the water. Shifting about with the tides, it finally clings to the seabed with ts byssus root uniil it grows and anchors itself for life---or until a fierce-looking diver gras it. Oysters have other enemlos, however; turtles crack open their shells, fish at- tack them and worst of all, borers which gradually, like an auger. go through the shell and kii--or it they can't kill, perhaps bring into being a pearl. The parasite borer, or often a worm spewed out by a small fish in the neighborhood of the shell, pene- trates to the oyster, irritates the very delicate but hardy oyster sub- stance, and a pearl rasmits! It takes years, of course--years of building layer upon layer of "nacre." Strange- ly enough, these large oysters from the deep sea are not like the delicate bivalve we order in a restaurant-- they are coarse in flavor. The gath- ering of shells under five inches in diameter is {llegal. On deck they are opened with a large-handled knife and thrown away when no pearl is found. In 8000 or 4000 shells only one may be found, and then it may not be very valuable. Before the Christian era the Chinese tried to propogate pearls, and artifi- clal pearls were first made, though not very successfully, in 1680. The Chinese had hit upon 'the intimate secret of the pearl--that it was the result of an irritant. They Introduc- ed bits of wood or mud Into the oys- ter shell, put the oysters in vats for three 'or four years, and actually achieved pearla. For centurles they carried this on; but the catch to this easy road to high fortune is that the resulting pearls are dull, flat white, the real pear! being lustrous with a very rare luster. Sclence In modern days has penetrated deeper Into.this precious secret. The little borer is partly responsible; be bores through the shell; is met by a secretion as a defense, dies, is oxidized, and the pearl remains as a defense, A French writer put it cleverly, "A pear] which milady loves next her delicate skin is the brilliant sarcophagus of a worm." Here is where the Japs come in with their "cultured" or "nurtured" pearls. They doped it out that a tiny bit of chemically treated mother-of- pearl (the same substance as Is on the lining of the shell) introduced in- vice and consequently greatly reduce the depreciation item. . In a new automobile engine the in- side of the cylinder is a perfect circle, but after a few years of service the cylinder most likely will need to be reground. When the automobile en- gine is built the piston cannot be fitted to form an air-tight joint, since the temperature of the engine varies in accordance with the amount of heat generated In the engine, these tem- perature variations in turn causing the piston and the cylinder to expand and contract, although not to the same de- gree. In this way a piston which at a certain temperature fitted the cylin- der perfectly would. expand enough to stick fast in the cylinder at another temperature. It is possible that at yet another degree it would fit the cylin der loosely, causing a great deal of noise and loss of gas through leakage past the pistqn 'during the compres- sion period. How Contact Is Retained To secure a gas-tight contact with the cylinder wall the piston has sev- eral flexible rings which expand out- ward, forming a perfect contact with the cylinder wall, They have sufficient elasticity to keep this contact, as the cylinder expands and contracts be- cause of the changes in temperature.- The power for operating the engine is produced through the. pressure of the expanding gas which forces the piston straight out of the cylinder. Through the resistance of the crank- shaft, which is connected to the pis- ton by means of the connecting rod, the piston is forced with considerable pressure against the side of the cylin- der, because during the power stroke the crankpin is traveling through an aro at one side of the center of the piston, instead of directly under it. It in this side thrust on the piston which tends to wear away one side of the cylinder wall. How quickly this wear takes place depends upon several fac- tors, probably the most important be- ing the perfection-of_the lubrication of the parts. As this wear takes place the cylin der loses its original circular shape, becoming oval, and the piston rings not being flexible enough to fill in the worn space naturally allow leakage of the compressed gas. Due to this leaking, several kinds of trouble fol- low. The gas which is being com- pressed passes by the piston, in this way reducing the power generated by the engine, and as the gas condenses in the crankcase the oil is diluted and its lubricating quality somewhat im- paired. On the suction stroke too much oil may be drawn past the pis- ton into the b hamber, where it burns, causing smoke and to the oyster shell would form the corréct nucleus for. growing a real pearl, ' The experiment produced pearls which did have a"very fine lus- ter, and the Japs sold them as na- tural Oriental pearls throughout the world for a considerable time. When the English pearl expert, H. C. Hop- kins, together with a staff succeeded In devising a machifie which now ab- solutely determines the difference be- tween true Oriental 'pearls and the cul- tured ones. The basis of this pow- er of detection is the fact that the concentric layers of nacre forming the true pearl have a power of reflect- ing and transmitting light, which Is the true distinguishing mark of the gem. The beautiful pearl appearance is due to an optical phenomenon--the interference of rays of light reflected from microscopic corrugations on the surface of the pearl. Mr. Hopkins says: "The Japanese pearls have the appearance of yel- lowish lumps of lard, the true pearls remaining perfectly white. I explain this coloring by the presence of the chemical with which the mother-of- pearl nucleus is treated In order to increase the secretion by the oyster. A very simple test 1s made with a needle provided with a tiny mirror. This being introduced into the hole bored through the pearl the nucleus will at once be apparent if it is a Japanese cultivated pearl. "Women often ask if it is possible to distinguish ypon the wearer's neck, at a distance of two yards, between a collar of Japanese pearls and one of natural pearls. It is impossible thus to tell false pearls from the genuine, Just as dt 1s impossible at a glance to tell an original work of art from a copy." Thus sclence becomes the only true arbiter of the preclousness of stones! . ' The popularity of pearls has enor mously increased in the last ten years, as the Imitation or nurtured or arti ficial pearls have been put upon the market. The long-suppressed desire of women to own pearls was glven.an opportunity, and to-day strings of "pearls" are sold in great quantity for a couple of dollars--good enough at least to serve ms a tribute to the great esteem in which true pearls are held. -------- et 3 "I suppose the boss was annoyed when you told him I was leaving next week?" "Yes, he thought it was this week." ---- eine "Undoubtedly there is a lot of luck in every successful career."--Bruce Barton. ef es ee. Objects impertectly Yiscerned take forms from the hope or fear of the beholder.--Dr. Johnson. . The Modiste--"It's all down on my d Modisle--its all dus / and figures don't ol - aT rl ne . Booksmith--The things you've =~ For Ovet a Yeo: this Evidence of Fog He ny wite's figure have made i oe... JUST A FEW YARDS GUT OF HER COURSE RE ving." , Zia) 88. Celtie, agrondd oft Gneenstows, retard! y a RE CBR en 1 SULTED IN 3 J pF antied, 'and punding to pleces on rocks, ing of the engine. This carbon gets under the valves, resulting in loss of compression - and short-circuits the spark plugs, which makes the engine miss fire. Restoring the cylinder to its origin al form of a perfect circle and fitting new pistons and rings to it will relieve these troubles, the best way to ac complish this being by having the cylinder reground. This is done by the use of emery or carborundum | wheels on a machine designed par- || Hioularly. for this work, a delicate operation requiring the skilled service '| of a high-grade mechanic in this line. s advantag forming carbon, which causes knock- [> the mathematicians hay at work, and the chances of this thrill coming to any one player are declared to be 635,000,000,000 to one--odds that must really be too much for the great. "est optimist among gamblers, The most outstanding instance of this amazing luck occurred in a Lob- don club, when each of the hour play. ers was dealt thirteen cards of one suit, In Honolulu luck indulged her cap. rices with largesse, supplying two pers fect hands to the same group of play. | ers in a single evening, not to mene tion two other hands with twelve cards each of one suit. % Night of Thrills Chicago had one remarkable inci dent to report among its varied ex- citements, Two players held perfect 'hands in one evening, and another in the same party held one of the varle- ties of perfect no-trump hands--the ace, king, queen of each of the four suits, and the jack of spades, Brooklyn produced a veritable mir- acle when four girls at a table dis-| covered that they all had , perfect) hands; but the borough's reputation | for conservatism was maintained when one of the players fainted from the excitement of the bidding. In Providence, R.I, a man got all thirteen diamonds, and had the added good fortune to have his opponents double his bid of seven. He restrained himself from redoubling for fear that his opponents might take the chance of bidding seven spades, of which they held eleven between them. Such a series of occurrences was bound to get the "chance" experts _ busy, and there has now just been.is- sued, the result of the "research" by Theodore Gibson, Instructor of Mathe- matics at Long Island University. What the Experts Say He has worked it out that the chance of one perfect hand being ac- cidentally dealt to a table is one out of 40,000,000,000, The chance of any set of players getting the perfect hand is computed to be only one out of 159,000,000,000. And the chance that a particular suit, say spades, will be dealt entirely to a certain player is only one of 635,000,- 000,000. It all goes back to two phenomena of algebra known as permutation and combination, Permutation is the word that mathematicians use to describe _ one of the various possible arrange- ments of a group of objects. For example, in a group of two, such as the numbers 1-and 2, there are two possible permutations, 12 and 21; in the group 123 there are six, as 123, 218, 281, and so on; and they mount so rapidly that the group 1234 has twenty-four, and g@ group with five numbers has 129, Luck of the Deal Bince a deck consists of -fifty-two cards, the number of possible permuta- tions becomes astronomical--that is, if some patient soul sets out to spread the fifty-two on a table in all the pos- sible different arrangements, it would , take him millions of years. For purposes. of dealing, dbf course, the work would be lightened sliglitly by the fact that he would be putting the cards into what is called combina- tions; that is, into hands of thirteen, each of which would have to be charfged every time, Still, the chances would be that he would deal one of the perfect hands once in every 40,000, 000,000 times. In haphazard dealing, of course, there is no assurance that one of the perfect hands would turn up once in each 40,000,000,000 deals, or tHat sev- eral of them will not come oftener, any more than that a penny, when tossed up, will come down alternately, heads and tails. near -------- v heavy Solder of ight called a bloated blond may be oH ISAS