100 years ago in Spokane: Police stop scammer faking war injury; murder suspects arraigned

Harry Forbes, 20, went door-to-door in the Rockwood district, telling housewives, “Can you help a poor soldier who lost an arm in the war?”

One woman became suspicious and called police. Two officers followed him for nearly an hour and confronted him.

Turns out, he had two perfectly serviceable arms.

“He had a hole in his left sleeve near the shoulder and another in the side of this coat,” the Spokane Daily Chronicle said. “This allowed him to conceal his arm back of his body and let his sleeve hang empty.”

Officers found $3.50 in his pockets.

From the murder beat: The four McDonald siblings were set to be arraigned in Superior Court, on charges of murdering W.H. McNutt.

The trial was planned for sometime after the first of the year, the Chronicle reported.

Jewell Marie McDonald, Fay McDonald Wilkinson and Ted McDonald were all being held in Spokane County Jail. Will McDonald was still at large.

From the labor beat: The Deer Park Lumber Co. fired three “radicals” who were trying to organize the 200-person work force.

About half of the men at the plant were already members of Lumber Workers Union No. 34, but the “three men discharged were so radical that their union brothers were glad to get rid of them,” an officer of the company said.