Raffles Bank Robbery.
One of the most annoying of small grafts is the raffle, as conducted for gain. It is bad enough to be held up for 25 cents or 50 cents for a ticket which entitles you to a chance on a rug or a clock when you reasonably are sure that the proceeds will go to charity, but no man likes to be fooled out of his small change by a cheap grafter, even if the grafter happens to need the money.
A story is told of two printers who lived for a month on a cheap silver watch which they raffled off almost daily until they had "worked" nearly all the printing offices of any size in town. These typographical grafters are unworthy of the noble craft to which they belong. They pretended to be jobless on account of last year's strike, and unable to live with their families on the money furnished by the union.
How Skin Raffle is Worked.
During the noon hour, or about closing or opening time, one of the men would saunter into a composing room and put up a hard luck story. He had an old silverine watch that he wanted to raffle off, if he could sell twenty tickets at 25 cents each. He usually managed to sell the tickets.
About the time the drawing was to take place the confederate entered and cheerfully took a chance and won the watch without any difficulty. Thus, they had the watch and the $5 also. They would split the money, and on the first convenient occasion the raffle would be repeated at another place, and by some trick known to themselves the drawing was manipulated so that the confederate always won the watch.
A South Side woman recently had 500 raffle tickets printed, to be sold at 10 cents each, the drawing to be on Thanksgiving day, for a "grand parlor clock," the proceeds to be for the benefit of a "poor widow." As the woman herself happens to be a grass widow, and as the place of the drawing could not be learned, neither could there be obtained a sight of the clock, it is not difficult to guess the final destination of $50 for which the tickets were sold.
Popular Game in Saloons.
At many saloons and cigar stores there is a continuous raffle in progress for a "fine gold watch." It is well for those who buy chances to inspect the time piece with a critical eye. One of these watches was submitted to a jeweler by the man who won it. "It's what we call an auction watch," said the expert. "It is worth about 87 cents wholesale. The case is gilded, and the works are of less value than the movement of a 69-cent alarm clock. It was keep time until the brass begins to show through the plate, and it may not."