ecords and
repeat the actual words used by police officers, irate neighbors, or
discouraged parents, when the boys were brought before the judge. (1)
Building fires along the railroad tracks; (2) flagging trains; (3)
throwing stones at moving train windows; (4) shooting at the actors in
the Olympic Theatre with sling shots; (5) breaking signal lights on
the railroad; (6) stealing linseed oil barrels from the railroad to
make a fire; (7) taking waste from an axle box and burning it upon
the railroad tracks; (8) turning a switch and running a street car off
the track; (9) staying away from home to sleep in barns; (10) setting
fire to a barn in order to see the fire engines come up the street;
(11) knocking down signs; (12) cutting Western Union cable.

Another dozen charges also taken from actual court records might be
added as illustrating the spirit of adventure, for although stealing
is involved in all of them, the deeds were doubtless inspired much
more by the adventurous impulse than by a desire for the loot itself:

(1) Stealing thirteen pigeons from a barn; (2) stealing a bathing
suit; (3) stealing a tent; (4) stealing ten dollars from mother with
which to buy a revolver; (5) stealing a horse blanket to use at night
when it was cold sleeping on the wharf; (6) breaking a seal on a
freight car to steal "grain for chickens"; (7) stealing apples from a
freight car; (8) stealing a candy peddler's wagon "to be full up just
for once"; (9) stealing a hand car; (10) stealing a bicycle to take a
ride; (11) stealing a horse and buggy and driving twenty-five miles
into the country; (12) stealing a stray horse on the prairie and
trying to sell it for twenty dollars.

Of another dozen it might be claimed that they were also due to this
same adventurous spirit, although the first six were classed as
disorderly conduct: (1) Calling a neighbor a "scab"; (2) breaking down
a fence; (3) flipping cars; (4) picking up coal from railroad tracks;
(5) carrying a concealed "dagger," and stabbing a playmate with it;
(6) throwing stones at a railroad employee. The next three were called
vagrancy: (1) Loafing on the docks; (2) "sleeping out" nights; (3)
getting "wandering spells." One, designated petty larceny, was cutting
telephone wires under the sidewalk and selling them; another, called
burglary, was taking locks off from basement doors; and the last one
bore the dignified title of "resisting an officer" because the boy,
who was riding