100 years in Spokane: Adoption fight erupts into police station fisticuffs

From our archive, 100 years ago

Was the great “Alexander,” the well-known clairvoyant and magician appearing at the Auditorium Theater, also a kidnapper?

That was the sensational charge leveled by C.E. Parkes, assistant Spokane County probation officer. Alexander, said Parkes, had just kidnapped Parkes’ own adopted son, Wilfred.

However, the story gets even more complicated. It turned out that “Alexander” was the boy’s birth father and Alexander claimed that the child had actually been “stolen” from him a year ago in California.

The fight over the boy evolved into an actual tussle at Spokane police headquarters, with punches thrown. “You’re the biggest crook that ever came from California and you know it!” screamed Parkes at Alexander, between punches. The fight was broken up by police chief Weir, and Alexander was booked on kidnapping charges.

Police were still trying to sort out the details, but the story seemed to go as follows. Claude Alexander Conklin, aka Alexander, married Ethel Lyman, 15, in California. They had a boy, Wilfred, but Alexander deserted her and they divorced, and Ethel was granted custody. Yet Ethel became ill and her dying wish was that her uncle, C.E. Parkes of Spokane, raise the boy. Parkes then legally adopted the little boy and was bringing him up in Spokane.

Alexander told a different story. He said he had been granted custody and that, a year ago, he was “assaulted by three men” outside a store in Los Angeles, who “stole the child.”

When he arrived for his theatrical engagement in Spokane, he received news that his boy was in Spokane. He talked a Spokane police detective into going to Parkes’ house, where they found Wilfred hiding under a bed. They all went to police headquarters — where Parkes showed up and the fight ensued. Then Parkes grabbed Wilfred from the juvenile detention rooms and took him home.

Alexander claimed that he would regain his son “if it took every cent I possess.”