Fremont Older and the Gimlet
And You Thought It was a Drink
In the last episode, we saw how Older engineered the election of James Phelan as Mayor, but then was bitterly disappointed when Eugene Schmitz succeeded him. He thought that Schmitz and his powerful backer, Abraham Ruef, were corrupt and set out to prove it.
Older campaigned ceaselessly against Schmitz and Ruef in the pages of The Bulletin. He was certain they were taking bribes, extorting small businesses, and engaging in other corruption, and he set out to bring them down. This went on for years.
One incident (“the French restaurant affair”) becomes very important later on, so it’s worth quoting it here:
I plunged immediately into a most malignant campaign against Schmitz. The Bulletin was filled with cartoons showing Schmitz and Ruef in stripes. Our editorials declared that these men should be in the penitentiary and would be put there eventually. I spared no effort in running down and printing news stories to their discredit.
At this time I used to dine frequently at Marchand's, a famous restaurant here, controlled by Pierre. One evening when I entered Pierre met me with a face of despair and said : "Mr. Older, I'm a ruined man. They're going to put me out on the sidewalk after all these years building up this business."
"Why, Pierre, what is the trouble ?"
He told me that the French restaurants were threatened with loss of their licenses. I said, laughingly : "Why don't you see Ruef ?"
But he was utterly hopeless. He said that nothing could save him.
A few days later a friend telephoned my office and told me that the French restaurants had paid $10,000 for protection, and that they would not lose their licenses. I rushed over to Marchand's.
Pierre was seated at a side table, his spectacles on his nose, contentedly reading his Chronicle and sipping black coffee, apparently at peace with the world. I said to him, "You look happy, Pierre!"
He replied : "Yes, Mr. Older. My troubles are over. You know, when you are seeck, send for the doctor. Well, and I send for the doctor—Dr. Ruef—and everything is all right."
This confirmed the information I had received over the telephone, and that afternoon the Bulletin printed the story with a flaring headline across the front page. My recollection is that all the other papers permitted me to have this scoop without protest, and made no effort to follow up the story in their own columns.
The Players Assemble
We’re going to show the great game of the Graft Trials, so here are the players. Older and Ruef, we already know.
Older tried to get a criminal indictment for the “French restaurant affair,” but failed, initially. But was this a man who was obsessed? You decide:
Heney and Burns
I recalled a speech Francis J. Heney had made one night during the election, in the Mechanics Pavilion. He had said : "If the people of San Francisco ever want me to come back here and put Abe Ruef in the penitentiary, I'll come."
My mind dwelt on that. I thought, "If I could only get Heney—" He was at that time a conspicuous prosecutor of land frauds in Oregon, and had acquired considerable national reputation in this work. If only I could get him There was the French restaurant case. Something could surely be done with that.
In my mad desire to get Schmitz and Ruef I conceived the idea of going to Washington and asking Heney to come to San Francisco to start a case in the courts. I knew, of course, that he was working for President Roosevelt at that time in the Oregon land fraud cases, but my own obsession was so great that I believed I could convince Roosevelt that the graft in San Francisco was far more important than the land fraud cases in Oregon.
At any rate, I told Mrs. Older and Crothers that I was going. They both said, of course, that it was a crazy thing for me to do, but I was much disturbed and excited, and the trip would perhaps be good for me. They both believed that my plan was an idle dream, that nothing could come from it. But I would rest and become calm, maybe, and the journey could do no harm.
So without letting anyone know, other than Crothers and Mrs. Older and Eustace Cullinan, who at that time was editorial writer on the Bulletin, I departed for Washington.
By appointment I met Heney at luncheon at the Willard Hotel, and told him my mission. I also told him that I thought I had one definite case that he could make good on in the courts, the French restaurant case. Heney said that he would be glad to come, but that he would want William J. Burns, who was working with him as a detective in the land fraud cases. They were both employed by the government.
He asked me to meet Burns in his rooms that afternoon. I did so, and we had a long talk. Burns was eager to come and so was Heney, but Heney said : "We'll need some money."
I said : "How much?'
He thought about a hundred thousand dollars would be as little as we could afford to begin work with. In my desperate frame of mind I said : "Well, I'll take care of that. I'll arrange it." The following morning I saw President Roosevelt, who said that he was in sympathy with what I was trying to do and would do all in his power to help, but that he could not see his way clear to release Heney and Burns. Perhaps, he said, something could be done later.
Let’s recap this amazing initiative by a newspaper editor:
He remembers an important prosecutor, Francis Heney, who’d said he’d love to come back to San Francisco and put the bad guys in jail. He thinks, “That’s the guy we need!”
But Heney is in Washington doing nationally important work. So he decides to go there (remember: you didn’t hop on a plane back then; you took the train, for a four or five-day journey).
Heney and his best detective, Burns, say they’ll need $100,000 (ChatGPT says that is $3,251,848 in 2024 dollars). Older says he’ll get the money.
Older sees President Teddy Roosevelt (it was so easy to just get in to see the President!), who’s sympathetic but can’t let go of Heney and Burns right now.
Spreckels
The name “Spreckels” is a famous one in San Francisco. Claus Spreckels built an enormous fortune in sugar, and the Spreckels Mansion in Pacific Heights
is a historic site, later bought by the novelist Danielle Steele. Claus’ son Rudolph was Older’s choice for contributing that $100,000.
Patrick Calhoun
When I first read his book, he kept referring to “Calhoun” as the really big fish that he wanted to put in prison, and I thought, “Damn, I forgot who that is. Too many names!” So here is where Calhoun is introduced:
The Sutter street line was an old, ramshackle cable system, owned by the United Railroads. It not only ran out Sutter street, passing some of Rudolph Spreckels' property there, but it turned up Polk and rounded on to Pacific avenue, where it passed his residence. The line was so dilapidated that the United Railroads was considering changing it into an overhead trolley system.
To this, naturally, Rudolph Spreckels was opposed. He thought that if a change was to be made, the new system should be the most modern that any city had. He had in mind the underground conduit system which was used in Washington, D. C., and in New York City, a system which conserves the beauty of the streets and increases rather than diminishes the property values near by. Nothing short of that admirable system would satisfy Rudolph Spreckels.
In order to force the installation of this system, he formed an organization of property owners and made a very intelligent campaign in favor of the underground conduits. But Patrick Calhoun, president of the United Railroads, considered the improvement too expensive. He said that it was impossible because of the grades. Spreckels met all his objections intelligently, offering himself to pay for any work required on the grades in order to make the system practical. But Calhoun refused to listen, or to have anything to do with the conduit system. He insisted on the overhead trolley, which cost less.
Then Spreckels conceived the idea of organizing a separate streetcar company, obtaining franchises on certain streets without car lines, and building up a system with the underground conduit in use, which would compete with the United Railroads and by superior service and quality force the United Railroads to abandon the hideous cheaper system and install the underground conduit.
This attempt gave Rudolph Spreckels his first practical experience of politics. He organized the company, with his father and, I think, James D. Phelan. Rudolph and his father called on Mayor Schmitz in regard to the proposed franchises. Of course, Schmitz would not listen to any such proposition. He was definitely tied up with the Calhoun interests and the United Railroads, although at this time Calhoun had not yet bribed him to grant the overhead trolley franchise.
Rudolph Spreckels retired from this attempt with a considerably increased knowledge of underground conditions in San Francisco.
I knew this, and I felt that his public spirit had been awakened to such an extent that he would, perhaps, go further and back a big fight against graft in San Francisco. I did not have Calhoun in mind, because at that time I did not know that he had done anything unlawful. However, I felt that Spreckels was a man upon whom I could call for help.
I first visited Phelan and told him what I had done. I informed him that I had seen Heney and Burns and Roosevelt, and I felt that if I could raise a hundred thousand dollars Heney and Burns could be gotten out here to investigate the graft and punish those guilty of it. Phelan was very much in favor of the attempt, and said he would help to raise the money. Then I called qn Rudolph Spreckels and told him how matters stood. He was most enthusiastic. He rose from his chair, walked over to me and said: "Older, I'll go into this ! I'll put my money in this and back it to the limit. But I want one understanding that our investigation must lead to Herrin. Herrin is the man who has corrupted our state. He is the man who has broken down the morals of thousands of our young men, who has corrupted our legislatures and our courts, who has corrupted supervisors of counties, and coroners and sheriffs and judges. He is the worst influence in California. If we go into this fight, we've got to stay in it till we get him."
Later, when the fight was on, it was charged that Spreckels' motive for going into it was his antagonism to the United Railroads, because he had organized a rival company. This was wholly untrue. He had organized a railway company for the reasons I have stated, but it had nothing to do with his going into the graft prosecution, because at that time none of us knew anything that Calhoun had done unlawfully. As a matter of fact, at that time—December, 1905— Calhoun had not yet bribed the supervisors. That occurred later.
Let the Games Begin
Fremont Older put this whole show together: the lawyers, the detective, and the money, but remember, his only official job was editing the newspaper.
The great 1906 earthquake happened, and oddly enough, Older doesn’t even mention that. The fire that followed it, though, definitely is covered. Most of the City was destroyed.
Jack London, more famous for his novels like The Call of the Wild, The Sea Wolf, and White Fang, was paid $0.25 per word for an article on the fire, by Collier’s Magazine. The article was 2500 words, for a total which ChatGPT estimates to be $20,449.02 in 2024 dollars. Writing used to pay better.
The detective from Washington, Burns, was now on the case, and Ruef and Schmitz were indicted for extortion in the French restaurant case. Older suspected that there were other shoes to drop, though.
Gimlet to the Rescue
I mentioned earlier that Calhoun had “paid Ruef $200,000 to bribe the Supervisors for the overhead trolley system.” This is ultimately what sent Ruef to prison, and also nearly cost Older his life. Older didn’t want to catch some minor players; he desperately wanted to get the big guys: Schmitz, Ruef, and Calhoun.
The way this happened is one of my favorite parts of this book. First, we’ll set the stage:
Golden Roy and the skating rink
A man named Golden Roy was a partner in a skating rink, Dreamland Rink, with a Frank Maestritti. Both of them were involved in the graft. Maestritti was also the San Francisco President of Works. Maestritti had been fired, which led both Roy and Maestritti to be unhappy. Older and the detective, Burns, met with them both:
Burns had many meetings with Maestretti, and he soon discovered that Roy was the man who knew it all, and that unless we could get Roy we could get nowhere. "Work on Roy," he said. In my eagerness to get information from Roy my mind went back to the days before the fire. At that time Roy owned a jewelry store on Kearny street near the Bulletin office. A friend of his called on me and said that Schmitz had offered Roy a position as police commissioner. Having a wife and family whom he dearly loved, Roy did not want to take the place if I were going to attack him.
I said : "Well, tell him to come up and see me."
Older had the power of the press, and Roy was terribly afraid of having his reputation ruined. Older played on that fear:
I learned that this criticism worried him tremendously, and this gave me an idea. I had a very violent personal attack written on Roy. It was a page article, embellished with pictures. I raked up everything in Roy's activities that could place him in a discreditable light before the community. Then I had a proof page of this article printed secretly in the Bulletin office, and when it was ready I laid it face down on my desk and sent for Roy. Burns was waiting in an adjoining room.
Roy came into my office. He said : "Well, what can I do for you, Mr. Older ?" in what I thought was a patronizing tone. I was very much excited.
"You can't do anything for me," I said, "but I'm going to put you in the penitentiary." I picked up the page and handed it to him to read.
He began to read it, turned pale, and reeled on his feet. "Read it all," I said.
"I'm reading it all."
He finished, laid it down and said : "What do you want me to do ?"
Now Older’s got a collaborator on the inside. Moreover, Ruef knows it, and unwittingly sets up a trap for himself:
Meantime it became known to Ruef that Roy had come over to our side, and in order to frighten him into silence Ruef had introduced into the Board of Supervisors an ordinance making it illegal for any girl under eighteen years of age to visit a skating rink without her mother. If this became a law, Roy and Maestretti's business, Dreamland Rink, was doomed.
Roy, far from being intimidated, responded to this threat with a brilliant idea. He suggested to us that by means of this proposed ordinance we could trap the supervisors. His plan was to bribe them to kill the ordinance, have them caught taking the money, and terrorize them into confessing the overhead trolley briberies.
We rehearsed for the plan in Roy's office at Pavilion Rink. There was another room next to his office, in which we planned to hide and watch the bribery. Burns borrowed a gimlet from a nearby grocery store, and we bored three holes through the door, so that three people could look into Roy's office. When this was done, Burns and I stood on the other side of the door and looked through the holes, while Roy rehearsed the coming scene.
If you’re as ignorant as I was, you probably thought a “gimlet” was a drink with vodka. The original meaning, though, was a hand drill
.
Remember: “audio surveillance” in those days didn’t mean installing a microphone; it meant listening in.
Incredibly enough, it worked. Roy brought in the supervisors, one by one, and offered to bribe them to keep his skating rink open. Burns would be listening through the hole in the door. Roy had rehearsed the whole thing so he made sure he’d be audible through the hole (in bold).
Two days later Supervisor Tom Lonergan came into the office, while Burns and two other witnesses stood behind the door. He took the chair that had been placed in position, listened to Roy's talk pitched in a key that the witnesses could overhear, took the money and pocketed it. After him came two others, one at a time, I have forgotten which two they were. We were elated and were arranging to trap the others speedily, when the Chronicle got a tip that something was happening, and ran a story which scared them all.
So we worked on the three, and finding that we had the goods on them, they confessed to everything, including the overhead trolley deal. And their confessions involved the others, and the others got scared and got in line. The whole eighteen made their confessions as quickly as they possibly could, one after the other hurrying into safety, with the promise given them by Heney and Burns and Langdon that they would not be prosecuted if they testified.
We had in our hands all the evidence that I had been combing the town for, during many years. Burns later got the whole credit for obtaining these confessions, but the trap which caught them was entirely Roy's idea, planned by Roy and carried through by Roy.
The DA could have thrown those Supervisors in prison, but they were small fry and he and Older really wanted the big guys. So he gave them immunity, and once that process started, the others all knew that they’d be heading for prison based on the testimony of those immunized Supervisors. He soon had all eighteen Supervisors admitting to being bribed. They all got immunity, too. So who was left?
Schmitz and Ruel, of course, and they both got indicted. Calhoun was, too. But the one thing that Older should have realized was that really big and nasty players have lots of unconventional defense tactics: public opinion, for one. Hired goons, for another.
The Car Men’s Strike
Calhoun knew that he had paid Ruef $200,000, indirectly, to bribe the Supervisors for the overhead trolley system. He feared that he’d be going to prison. Patrick Calhoun was not a man to go quietly.
Who would even think of first, causing a strike that paralyzes the City and second, breaking that strike, thereby earning the thanks of the citizenry? You almost have to admire the effrontery of Patrick Calhoun, who did exactly that with the Car Men’s Union. He got away with it, too. The City’s businesses were desperate to rebuild after the fire, so when Calhoun brought in strikebreakers who attacked and beat the strikers, they applauded. No one blamed him for inciting the strike in the first place.
Bribery and Threats
Calhoun first tried the “silver” option (“silver or lead”): give Older some money to just go away.
While these cases were pending, and San Francisco people in general were absorbed with their own personal affairs, the city became filled with armed detectives, employed either by Burns or by Calhoun. To one who knew the inside facts, the very air of the streets became tense. Every few feet one met a man who was working for one side or the other, and many men of prominence were constantly shadowed by both sides, and even the men who were following them were also followed and watched.
Shortly after Calhoun's indictment he sent a mutual friend to see me to ask me to name my price to quit the fight. I replied, "Tell Mr. Calhoun that I have no price, that nothing will stop me until he has been convicted and sent to the penitentiary."
It was covert warfare on the streets. I could imagine making a great movie out of this: Chinatown but in San Francisco.
Public opinion had definitely turned against Older. He’d been a popular member of the Bohemian Club but now, since no one would speak to him anymore, he resigned.
Mrs. Older and I had known and liked quite a few members of what is known as "society" in San Francisco, and they, of course, dropped us. One of the women called on Mrs. Older and told her that many of her friends liked her very much and would like to continue their friendship, but that they could not stand for the attitude of her husband.
Mrs. Older replied that she did not care for their friendship in that case; that she was perfectly willing to be ostracised with me; that she believed me to be right, and that was the only thing to be considered.
Calhoun had crushed the strike (supposedly), so he was a hero. Mayor Schmitz was a friend of labor, so the unions didn’t care to see him being prosecuted.
Keep Away from the Beach
Older was in it for keeps now. Not only had he lost a lot of friends, he was in danger of losing his life.
In the stress and strain of those days Mrs. Older and I tried to escape from it all every evening by going to the beach, where we had a tiny car-house attached to a restaurant managed by Mrs. Gunn.
It was our one pleasure, just about sunset, to go for a swim in the ocean, return to our car-house and then dine with Mrs. Gunn.
One evening, as I came from the office and crossed the sidewalk to the machine where Mrs. Older was waiting, a very good friend of mine, who had deep connections in the underworld, passed by me, and said warningly : "Keep away from the beach."
He did not stop to be questioned, but went quickly past me, as though he had not spoken to me.
This warning, "Keep away from the beach," I knew to be important. The man who had given it to me was my friend, and a man who was not given to false alarms.
But I was very angry at the thought of giving up my one pleasure, that daily swim in the surf with Mrs. Older and our quiet little dinner later in Mrs. Gunn's small restaurant. I determined that I would continue to have it.
So I secured two plain clothes men from the police department and went to the beach as usual, leaving the two officers sitting in the machine on the beach, watching. Nothing happened. Still I knew that the warning was not without significance, and so each day I took the plain clothes men with me, and never while we were at the beach allowed them to get out of sight.
Trials
There is much more in the book, which makes riveting reading, but this article is already long enough. Briefly: Mayor Schmitz was convicted and removed from office, and Older played a key role in finding a new Mayor and clearing him with all his friends, including Spreckels, and they settled on E.R. Taylor.
Calhoun sent a “double agent” (or a “dangle,” in spy parlance). It was a man who claimed to be disaffected with Calhoun and the Pinkerton Agency, and offered to give Older some secret documents from a safe, which detailed how the Pinkertons had a spy in the dockworkers’ unions. Fortunately, Older suspected a trap, and the veteran detective Burns told him that he’d narrowly escaped going to prison for burglary by declining the invitation.
The Kidnapping
Fremont had been amazingly clever, or lucky, at avoiding Calhoun’s traps so far. But maybe he was getting complacent, because he walked right into this one. Let’s let him tell the story:
A few days later I was waiting for Rudolph Spreckels in Heney's office. I was talking with Charley Cobb, Heney's partner, when the telephone rang. I lifted the receiver. A voice said : "Is Mr. Older there ?"
"I am Mr. Older."
"I am Mr. Stapleton, Mr. Older. If you'll come to the Savoy Hotel on Van Ness avenue I will give you some very important information."
I asked him if he could not come to Heney's office. He said it was impossible. He was being watched, and it would not be safe.
I said : "Very well. I'll come to the Savoy Hotel." The voice insisted that I come immediately, and I agreed.
Before leaving the office I turned to Charley Cobb and said : "This may be a trap. If I am not back in half an hour, you may be sure that it is. Tell this to Spreckels."
Then I went out and started toward Van Ness avenue.
I walked direct down to Van Ness avenue from Franklin, and turned down Van Ness.
As I turned I noticed an automobile with four men in it that looked to me like pretty tough characters. They were all looking at me, and the machine seemed to be hovering along close to the sidewalk as I walked. Suddenly it stopped and two men jumped out.
One of them stepped up to me. He was very' pale and nervous; his hands trembled as he pulled out of his pocket a paper which he said was a warrant for my arrest on a charge of criminal libel. He said the warrant was issued in Los Angeles. He then showed me a constable's star and told me to get into the machine and go with him.
I told him that I wanted to see my lawyer and arrange bail.
He said : "We will go to Judge Cook's chambers. Judge Cook has vised this warrant, and you can get out an order for bail through him."
I said : "Very well, I'll go." But I was very apprehensive. As I stepped into the machine one of the men that was on the sidewalk rubbed his hands over my hips, obviously to see whether I was carrying firearms. This made me still more suspicious.
I sat in the machine on the right hand side of the tonneau. Next to me was a young man who had not got out of the car when it stopped. Next to him on the left sat one of the men who had got out. The constable sat in the front seat with the chauffeur. The car started down Van Ness at great speed.
This was after the fire, when the various departments of the Superior Court were scattered, and I had no accurate knowledge of the location of Judge Cook's court. But when the car swung out Golden Gate avenue I noticed Luther Brown, Calhoun's chief detective, and Porter Ashe, one of Calhoun's lawyers, in a car, leading the way. They were looking back.
I became greatly excited. When we got to Fillmore street I said : "Where are Judge Cook's chambers?" The man in the front seat turned and said : "We are not going to his chambers. We are going to his residence."
Then I knew that it was a trap. The car was speeding faster and faster out Golden Gate avenue toward the park. I started to rise, looking sharply up and down the street to catch the eye of someone I knew or to attract the attention of a policeman.
As I arose the man next to me pressed against my side a pistol that he had in his right hand coat pocket. He said : "If you make any attempt to escape I'll shoot you."
Uh-oh. Now he’s wedged in the car, they’re not going to let him out, and he’s probably going to get killed.
There’s a long section in the book about this, and I’d really urge you at this point to read it. It’s free. I don’t want to copy lots of pages here.
They drive him down to Redwood City and put him on a southbound train, in a private car that had already been prepared. He tries a moral appeal to the kidnappers
"This is a job put up by the United Railroads. I don't blame them for fighting me. It is quite natural that they should. I have been fighting them pretty hard. But this kind of a deal isn't fair. It isn't sportsmanlike. They are dealing the cards from under the table."
I noticed a slight expression in the corner of the dart man's eye that gave me a little hope. He looked like a sport, I thought perhaps my appeal had struck home.
He and two kidnappers are riding down to LA. He eats dinner with them, and tries to exploit what he thought was an opening with “the dark man.”
"I don't care a damn about myself. I am quite well along in years and have lived a pretty full life. But I am concerned about Mrs. Older. She will be in a terrible state of mind over my disappearance. She undoubtedly is in that condition now, because this is just about the time that we were to be together at a little dinner party at the Francisco cafe on Van Ness avenue. By this time the news of my disappearance has spread and no doubt the police department is looking for me. She will think I have been murdered. I don't ask any mercy from the United Railroads for myself, but I don't think it is quite fair to make her suffer, too."
The dark man said : "By God, you write a telegram to her or to any one you like, and I'll file it at San Jose. I won't stand for this thing unless you are allowed to communicate with your friends !"
Calhoun had hired a hitman with a conscience. Rookie mistake! Anyhow, the telegram was never sent. The train continued south.
In Santa Barbara, some constables entered the car and demanded that they take him to a judge’s chambers to investigate this “bail” matter. United Railroads had a lawyer at the hearing, but the judge released him on bail anyway.
After being released I joined the dark man and walked out of the courtroom with him, and he said : "You remember the remark you made in the automobile, that it wasn't sportsmanlike?'
I said : "Yes."
"Well, that kind of got me, and so when it came to the point of testifying to a lie, to have you held, I refused to do it."
I thanked him very cordially for what he had done.
“Thank you for not killing me!” I love it.
I learned later that the only reason why I am now alive to tell my story is due to the lack of nerve of the man who sat next to me with the gun. He was told, so he has since informed the chauffeur of the car, that he would be paid $10,000 if he killed me on the trip. The plan was that I should be taken from the train at San Luis Obispo, taken through the mountains in an automobile, and killed there.
They were relying on the evidence of the constables and the gun man and the chauffeur that I tried to escape while under arrest, and was killed in an attempt to prevent my succeeding. Luther Brown was from Los Angeles, and he had got a friendly justice of the peace to issue a secret warrant for me, so that they would have acted under a color of law. But the gunman said that he lost his nerve.
There’s a lot more in the book about this affair and its aftermath. It was a news story all over the world. A Member of Parliament from England happened to meet Older, later, and told him he’d read this amazing story about a journalist who’d been kidnapped. Older told him he was that journalist.
To Be Continued
Since this is already too long to be sent over email, I’ll stop here. Next week will be the story of the trials, how Ruef actually went to prison but no one else did, and how Older moved down to the place in my neighborhood. And much more.