Evening Star Newspaper, June 7, 1925, Page 69

ILLUSTRATED FE ATURES MAGAZINE SECTION he Sunday Stae Part 5—8 Pages WASHINGTON, D: “C.; SUNDAY MORNING; JUNE FICTION AND HUMOR 7, 1925. | Contrabrand Articles in Queer Disguises Caught by P. O. Net BY C. HERE is a Government employes on the third floor of the Post Office Building, down at Unlon Sta- tion Plaza, whose moments are never dull. They are Uncle Sam's handwriting experts and mail whose jobs range from finding clues leading to the owners of dead letters and packages to detecting contraband goods passing through the mails. Some of these employes have been| in the service upward of 30 vea They can tell by the “look” or the “feel” of a package that it is not all| that it seems. cotics, obscene lit erature, and other prohibited articles are discovered in the most innocent looking packages. The easiest im- oper packages to spot are those iled from foreign countries by per sons known to be trafficking in ob. scene pictures and literature. There came the office. an oblong pincushion mailed from | Switzerland. T appearances it | was a pi but the sender had | taken su o make that fact abviot 2 needles into it which protruded through the wrapper that the postal inspeciors became sus picio of the cushion re in its center MORAN. i to vecently, | Dissect 1 flask of whisky 25,000 dead letrers containing such things stamps, petti merchandise represent day's receipts at this of-| he quantity obscene lit ire, dope and other contraband seized | in the m provides continuous fuel for the big furnace in the basement of the building The flea episode was in connection with a bundle of unclaimed clothing received from Cuba. When the bundle was opened a swarm fleas flew the office. seeking new homes and the pockets and el the employes. The em ploves were so badly flea-bitten that a general fumigation of the entire out it became necessary. The current campaign suppress indecent newsstand literature is part of a general drive against narcotics, whisky, pornographic pictures and the like which are transported through the mails. Tons.of such materials are found annually, but the quantity i small as compared with that which is successfully carried. The entire postal force has been instructed to be on the | alert for bootleg packages and to for-| ward them immediately to the officials in charge of the work. nd pack- teas, ts and money nera of in cases ANS of opium “happy dus cocaine and other re found in inno- cently appearing packages of candy or cakes. The covers of hymn \wnnk; may very likely contain pages of vile | material. A common deception is to | cut holes in the center of directories | or other thick volumes to conceal ob scene pictur Similarly. the core of a roll of newspapers may contain a sizable supply of narcotics. B. G. Cowles, who is handling the | contraband work at the Washington oflice, has been in the service some A package labeled ‘“cand: s delivered to him during the urse of the interview for this article. 1e package proved to contain candy, hut the contents of the sweets were filled with imported liquors. Another candy box contained half a pound of opium. Bottles labeled “‘medicine” in fact contained concentrates with which to make gallons of whisky. A package containing a fruit cake was recently turned over to Mr. Cowles by Washington Barracks for want of a better address. In seeking clue to the owner, the package was opened and there was revealed through a crack across the top of the cake a pint bottle of whisky \\'hlch‘ had been cooked in the center of the delicacy | The handwriting experts at have acquired. through perience, a remarkable faculty for deciphering the most illegible pt. Of the 28000 dead letters received dafly it is estimated that approxi- | mately 25 per cent are ultimately sent | to their. owners. Considerable quan- tities of dead-letter mail and packages are received written in foreign lan- guages which require the services of foreignlanguage experts at the office. The Division of Dead Letters, which | is also handling the contraband work, was established in 182 in response to an urgent demand to develop some method of identifying the owners of the vast volume of undelivered mail O1d records of the division show that in 1830 some 380,000 letters went to the dead letter office. By 1859 the annual volume of such correspondence reached 2,500,000 pieces of mail vears the of- long ex of Washington those days ndled the dead-letter mail for the entire country, was in- creased from 9 in 1860 to 79 in 1875. By 1900 some 7,500,000 letters were annually reaching the dead letter of- fice. and by 1910 the total had reached over 12,000,000 pieces vear. The volume of dead mail became so large that in 1917 the work had to be split up regional districts, with al Washington, Chicage and San Fran cisco, v empioyes in the TTHE number which in division at [ and handled by headquarters New Yo ington handles the dead letters for 15 Eastern States and dead pack- ages for Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia, North Carolina and the Dis- trict of Columbia. Receipts of dead mail are heaviest from January to | March, handling unclaimed Christmas mail, and from July to October, when the fourist traffic is on. The receipts during these months have run as high as 5,000 pieces of mail a day The dead mail delivered to the office day is opened by machinery and ed up into hundles of 100. hese | bundles are then distributed among the handwriting experts who care- fully examine each letter. Correspond ence which cannot be delivered and which contains valuables such as cash honds, stamps and the like is carefully recorded, and after a time the v ables are turned in to the United States Treasury. Other undeliverable correspondence is destroved. Pack- ages of merchandise are accumulated | and sold at auction I The largest sum of money eve found in an unclaimed letter at Wash ington headquarters was closed in a note reading ke this | and keep vour mouth shut,” Postal | inspectors found the addressee to be a woman who had died two weeks previously. The sender was never located and the money went to the Treasury Another dead letter disclosed a check for $2,000,000 which had been misdirected by the United States Steel Corporation in payment to a Southern rail line. One letter without identity vielded five $10,000 bonds which proved to be part of the loot of a mail robbery. The thief was traced through the letter and subsequently was prosecuted. The New ago returned an to a Milwaukee which was given the return ad dress, The store disclaimed knowl- edge of the parcel. and the package sent to the dead letter office in Chicage, where it was found to con- | 1u- | | York office some months | undeliverable parcel department store | staff of some fifty sleuths, | { Anna Schreiber at S | the articles and directing delivel |that given as the return address on | | able Products an Important Detail for Postal Employes. Damage Post Of currency, and scarf pin. The papers furnished an address of hwenkville, Pa., who, when communicated with, gave the address of Herman Schreiber in Germany. A letter was subsequently received from Schreiber identifying v to his partner in New York. The queer features of the case were that the atore in which the purse had been lost was an entirely different one from some papers a gold the parcel, and that the money origi- nally lost had been in German marks instead of the American currency which was found. * ok ok ok "THE postal authorities declare that | last year the dead letter office re- ceived $120,000 from the sale of orphaned packages which could neither be-forwarded to the addresses nor returned to the senders, because of inadequate addresses. There was also returned into the United States Treasury $55,523.96 in cash, removed from misdirected letters or found loose | in" the mails. Postage stamps taken from letters or found loose in the mails last vear had a value of $12,165.67. which i= almost double the entire revenue of | the postal service in 1783, Three-cent fees collected for the return of letters Careful Packing. be located, amounted to $3,546,54 5 All money ciears through Miss A. F. Peterson of the Washington office, who has been in the service some 38 years. Miss Peterson’s records show $7,549.55 has been realized thus far this year from the auetion sales of BY ARNO DOSRH-FLEUROT. HE ocean glider, neither boat nor hydroplane ‘but somethini between the two, is about to come into existenca. It is be- ing built in France to cross the Atlantic Ocean on its maiden voy- age: In a shipyard at Lyons, the wings are being attached to the ‘“boats,” to use the slang of the: aviators, and its “paws,” to use the phrase of the inventor, are being jointed on. The French government is sufficiently in- terested to risk a 120-horsepower Hispano-Suiza engine to make it move, and as soon as the whole contrivance is launched, if launching be the word for it, the name of it is going to be the Sea Flea. . . 1t hops. Hence the name. The in- which could not be delivered - totaled $92,007.54. Checks, drafts and money ventor, George Gasenko, proposes to ! hep in it right across the Atlantic. 181 0ede PUIrSSe Withe$200ein. .Americansorders,tha-awners,of. which could not . There have beenia.loj of crazy ideas | that | vear | d packages being re-wrapped ai Washinglon Cit o ce.Tuis costs Uncle Sam thousands of doflaisa year. A 5 ixtthou.sa'n,d, pack g cs a month Dead Letter Office in Washington One of Four Central Points Which Handle All Sorts of Undeliverable Letters and Packages—Receipts Heaviest in Months Following Christmas, While Tourist Season Also Adds to Volume of Business. Story of a $2,000,000 Check Which Went Astray—Bonds Worth $50,000 Led to Tracing of Mail Robbers—Scale of Perish- o 1nio e Capitals dead letter office ve -inforded mail sack, re cently developed to protect: parcels from - bfea.ka.ge parcels alone. The total money turned in by the Washington Dead Letter Office last was $53.471.65. Included in the receipts for perishable products, which are sold immediatel an item by the Washington office about variations on aeroplaning, but this one has at least been taken seri- ously by the department of aeronau- tics of the French Army. Gasenko, an experienced aviator who first went into the air with Orville Wright in Berlin, in 1908, talks about it as the coming world method of water navi- gation. “My first craft will be little, half a ton,” he told his interviewer. “It will have to be carefully guided to hop over combers and only touch on the surfacé of the waves, but even- tually there” will be ‘sea-fleas’ of thousands of tons, long enough to skim right over the sea in the worst of storms. “My idea cames from those little water insects which skim across the | surface of still waters halanced on| their long legs ending in feet that hold t packade which might contain . hundreds of doflars wortlh of warcotics. Tesult of bad of 25 cents for a duck. Other items includé opossum hides, eggs, day-old chicks, rabbits, oysters and sausages. The Post* ce Department put on a nation-wide better-mailing campaign during the week of June 1 to 7, in an effort to reduce the tremendous volume to displace water. With their wings, not big enough to fiy with, they hop over rough water and keep right on, They travel neither in nor over the water, but on its surface. We have boats that ply the sea and hydroplanes that fly over it. The ships are hin- dered because they'are in the sea and at its mercy. The hydroplanes are equally at the mercy of the sea be- cause they dare not light-upon it when it is rough: The fastest motor boats are but smoot-water boats. The ocean glider, ocean skimmer, ocean skipper or hopper, call it. what you like, is in between. It can be made to have the stability of a boat be- cause its ‘paws’' are outspread and it cannot capsize. Tt.can Jift off the sea or skim along, just touching the water at 80 or 90’ miles an hour. It can lift off the sea and fiy Jike an airplane. Gasenko, who is half ‘Balt and-half njan And -a. _gradugle packing and poorly wrapped packages of .misdirected :letters and packages, by -inducing senders to -wrap.edch parcel in stout.paper, tie it with strong cord, write addrésses plainly, and put a return address on “each letter - er package. More than 30 :per cent of the Ocean Trip With Half-Ton Sea Flea Charlottenburg Polytechnic: of Berlin, has ‘so far only “bullt his *‘boat” . in wood. But he’proposes in a few weeks to hop down the Rhone with it and the mouth of the river in'the Mediter- ranean, skipping over to Corsica and back. The arrangements with the French mllitary authorities are made. mate his dog. Lubher Feind, and start right out. FHe even has:had. his itif. erary approved by the French govern- ment. He is"to skip over to Oran, in Algiers, skim around through the Straits of Casablanca, -down the Afri- ean_coast 'to Mogador, to Dakar and then-—just” across the way ts Seuth America and, a_skim ‘down -the coast. Tt Is an odd-looking affair, the Sea Flea—something the shape of a canoe that has.grown wings, and has three bt ekt Bttt make his preliminary maneuvers off | Then he is going to ship with him as|. 800,000 packages ®that go to the ‘Dead Letter Office reach their unhappy end as a result of insufficient or im- \)proper wrapping. cribed to the remaining 70 per cent are incorrect and incomplete addresses, supplemented by the failure of send- lers” to respond to notices that the parcels are undeliverable and held for return postage. The bane of the postal authorities is the so-called “Nixie” which is neither fish, flesh nor fowl, but which costs Uncle Sam some $2,000,000 a year. “Nixie” is a word coined by the Post Office Department to mean a iplece of mail so carelessly addressed and poorly wrapped that it can neither be . delivered nor returned without special “hospital” treatment. Nixie is an imp. An animated simp. Ho has no nome. own at no_addrese: Thoush in every State found, e knows not where he's bound. s a -Darreled, Cussed Postal Pest ' -Some 200,000,000 pieces of mail are given “hospital” service every vear, \which means that employes must take time from the regular handling and provide correct addresses. llof this service In New York City iialone is §500 a day. A staff of 400 at Chicago does nothing but handle “nixies. Prchased malling lists for advertis- *ing._ purpose o_malls_are | The causes as- dispatching of mail in an endeavor to| The cost ! of lists current furnist especially prolific owners of such to keep them Post Office will vise lists at a nomir cents an hour Adver fail to specify street addres: advertisements. with the the postal clerks must giy respondence special d A NOTHER s, letter wr address on the the practice of followed, th have to go out of existe |as very seldom does a | return address reach t | than 99 per cent The attempt nixies seldom s in the: result that of troul s do not put envelopes hould doing universally Office would smuch with a More > dead letters elopes as return the sende ; There 1100,000 is also the Washin 200 10 3 ceives from day. One c is that many letter before chie writi Office declares {360,000 employ {000 pieces of | possibly perfect akes are bound to oceur, but investigation of | claims and aints divulges that |in the vast majority of cases it ie the | ma ather than the postal clerk “Wh-r ma the err We are going try 1o do better. We are striving that goal of on, and we d like every to operate | with v d help the appal dead-letter revenue the department’s time may 000,000 lly could is adv money some mean to you Put you per left-h: eturn address nd corner “Use strong cord When in doubt office e up- aind stout paper 1e man at t Emotions in Animals. SCIENTISTS question assure us that the hy of what is meant consciousness in animal difficulty Most without much reflec is one of ex of us, prob n e wil treme { ably ling infer consciou thin ness when we exhibiting be. ourselves would be see any living s havior that sociated w in as h consciousness | Some ago an investigator ¢lled animals in a drop They when the in surface with red hot needle. One of the ani- lculae was killed and scon a clear space was formed An imaginative commentator this a case of nekrophobia, suggesting that these minute creatures feared death! Later workers showed that a dead plece of protoplasm exuded into the water some substance different from the natural reaction of living protoplasm. Most animals shrink or struggle when they come in contact with con- ditions that are unfavorable, behav- ing precisely human beings do when they feel discomfort or pain. In many cases, before physical pain or discomfort can actually be felt, the higher animals show the symptoms that in our case we associate with fear. But do they feel pain, do they remember pain and consequently ex | perience fear? | ur ov the capa to . to remember and to dread pain iated with the activity of the hemispheres of the brain, and be drugged we are uncon A frog whose cerebral hem | ispheres “ave destroyed, if placed in hot water, will make a sudden and violent effort to escape. We our- selves, under a light anaesthesia that prevents consciousness, will struggle violently to avoid pain. It certainly seems more probable that conscious- ness is somethin, s be added to the behavior not pres ent at all in the lowest forms, and coming in slowly and gradually as the scale of life is ascended The supposed fear of death is one of the most salient instances of the fashion in which we are inclined to attribute our own sensations in ani- mals. At the zoos animals that are Kept together often die, and there is | no_instance on record in which (ex- cept among carnivorous animals, which sometimes devour a dead com- panion) an animal has shown the slightest interest or apparent disturb ance at the presence of its dead com panion. According to their sition and habits wals react only to the immediate stimuli that reach them and pain would have to be se vere, repeated many times and asso clated in the most direct way with a simple sense impression hefore the sense impression by itself would arouse in them shrinking or the sign of fear. | placed sing | he microscope. actively ouched the |a cerebr: if these | scious. individual dispo- A Bird Wanderer. R to sea in latitudes of the Indian Ocean lies an uninhabited island. Ships passing on their way from the United States to Melbourne, Australia, will sail quite near this lonely land and some- !Hmes anchor in Christmas Harbor, at | the northern end, for fresh supplies of water. fere, if travelers visit it at any time between October and Jan juary, they will see vast numbers of ithe wandering albatross des ribing ceful curves in the air or sweeping down on the land where their curious ! nests are placed. The albatross, after all, loves home and apparently has an excellent mem- ory, for after five months’ voyaging over untold leagues of ccean’s waste it always returns at the end of that time and occupies the same abode year after y z The nest made by this remarkable bird is in the shape of a half-cone, two feet high, made of earth, and at the top is a shallow cavity, in which the mother aldatross iays oae white egg. More than two months fs required to hatch out the young, which at first appears to be a ball of white silky down. Its parents take turns in golms to sea to capture squids and jelly fish to feed the young squab, and when partly grown it is left to care for {tself while the parent birds start out on a long tour of wandering, but never, ex- cept by accident, visiting the Atlantic | or northern Pacific Oceans where oth- er species of this genus are found. ! When the old birds return from their voyaging the baby bird has somehow managed to thrive and when these old mariner: guin set sail, the | child of the previous year accompanies and Is, in turn, taught the mysteries of the sea. out the southern