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HOW I CAUGHT LAND BY W.IBURHT J J Wfc- THE MOST FAMOW \W M AMERICAN \ ,W DETECTIVE A' \ A> Z MfZZ .$! X JMP S\\ 7 / azzJtf dr WBF 1 / / w < XiH / vs? ■ / w 1 J /.Jjjp / s' Skl w I ■ - ?t-. x ? ■ 'Mw Representative Gordon States His Land Swindle Case to De tective Burns.—Burns on Left. -S I W*wl& WiP Bwm ii ? ; >. y '.■ ■ ■■. '• ■-'. • WSott ft ■ ; si aS sSfe Jf'^.. | L«- -ww *dftf «> Ueiective Burns Prepares a Dictagraph for Senator Archer’s and His Confedeates’ Undoing. *'i*® £ ; -t ■ f: > TwM *' * w Mr i ■ " • lial > 4 & - ■ X ?C*'* ... :■ Fq/ «h W-’-®-V«» Wlk - - '• WWHWkffW aEgT _/3Mi The Dictagaph Reveals the Conspirators’ Plans to Burns’ Men in Gordon’s Presence. FOR the first time in the history of moving pictures, a world fa- The Grafting Senator Leaves mous detective has His Telltale Thumb-Print written and acted for on Congressman Gor- ’he films the story don’s Glove. °f one °f *^ e B reat ’ est achievements in bringing criminals to justice. The author- —and chief actcr is William Jt Burns, who broke up the Government land fraud ring, convicted the Los Angeles dynamiters and has added to the mechanics of the modern science of criminal investigations that wonderful device called the dictagraph —which matches the " long arm" with the ‘ long ear. ' In the action of Detective Burns's story telling, "How I Caught the Land Swindlers," which occupies more than an hour and has By William J. Burns. r-pHE whole country was flooded with the enticing literature of the Nelson Land Company. Up in ■*• Vermont the frugal, saving, hard-working Ed wards family—father, mother and grown daughter, Kitty—were unable to resist appeals like this: “Come to the South and live like a king! We have the richest soil on earth. Ten acres will make you in dependent. Some make JSOO a year on each acre." So this simple, trusting Vermont family signed the Nelson Land Company’s ironclad contract, paid the first instalment on the purchasing price, sold out the comfortable home where the Edwardses had lived for generations, and journeyed hopefully to their new home —the new home they had bought, but had never seen. In Washington, D. C„ at about this time Represent ative Gordon, a young Congressman of serious and ex alted ideals, escorted his sweetheart, the pretty daugh ter of United States Senator Archer, to a lecture de livered by Detective William J. Burns. The lecture ap pealed powerfully to Gordon, who toon notes, of the following statement especially: “Every criminal leaves a track through which he may be traced. There are no mysteries, and a failure to obtain results Indicates that the matter has not been properly nor thoroughly investigated." On his vacation, automobiling through the South, Gordon nearly ran down Kitty Edwards. The machine did, in fact, dash out of her hand the pail of water she was carrying from a spring beside the road. In con sternation over the girl’s narrow escape the young Con gressman refilled her pail and accompanied her to the miserable shack on a ten-acre tract of sandy, worn-out soil where Mr. and Mrs. Edwards are bemoaning the ruin that has overwhelmed them. They show him their one-sided contract with the land company. Gordon's imlicnation was great. "I am a member of Congress.” he told them. “I will have this matter thoroughly investigated and the swin dlers punished.” Back in Washington, Gordon got the matter before a ioint committee of the Senate and House, of which Senator Archer was chairman. The committee report ed that there was no evidence of fraud. Gordon’s in dignation over this result was increased by a letter from Kitty Edwards telling how her father, calling on Nelson of the Land Company to protest against further payments on his contract, had been assaulted and near ly burned to death when Nelson fired the building and dIS Tlwrimpon Gordon lost no time In laying the case before Detective Burns, submitting to him the Edwards agreement with the Nelson Land Company. Bums ex amined the paper and said: “Our work is in Washington. I will go with you at ° nC Nelson had fled to Washington to claim the protec tion of his chief confederate in Congress—Senator Archer One day when Gorden called at the Senator’s house to see his sweetheart. Mary Archer, Nelson had lust been shown the door, after having, in his agita tion upset an inkstand, spilling its contents over the Senator’s hand. Thus, when Mary Archer summoned her father to sav good-by to her departing lover, the Senator’s handclasp left’a perfect thumb print on Gor den's light suede glove. Gordon, going directly to Detective Burns’s office, found him examining, with a strong glass.athumb print nn the Edwards agreement with the Nelson Land Com- PRn "What’s that on your glove?" asked the detective, as they shook hands. “Why. it’s an ink spot, said Gordon. I wonder where I got it?” "Have you shaken hands with any one recently? asked the detective, adding: “With your glove on.” “Yes,” answered Gordon. “With Senator Archer, as 1 was leaving his house not half an hour ago.” The detective examined the ink spot through his glass showing it also to Gordon. “Why, it’s a perfect imprint of a thumb!” exclaimed The World’s Greatest Detective Tells for the First Time in Moving Pictures Just How Criminal Investigations Are Conducted thirty scenes, the Kalcm Company has introduced some very startling and realistic effects. For one of the scenes the hall of the House of Representatives, with that body in session, was faith fully reproduced in detail. In another an automobile is wrecked by an express train. The criminal, escaping with his life, boards the tram and is seen to stop the pursuing motor car by sending a bullet through one of its tires. The installation of a dictagraph instrument and its acua! use in securing the conversation of suspected swindlers is shown. An inky thumb print on a glove, made in shaking hands, is demonstrated to match one left on an incriminating document. For another scene the actors and camera men were sent far down South, to the lo cale of the swindle. On the deck of an Atlantic liner in mid ocean a guilty, fleeing senator receives lhe wireless dispatch which causes him to commit suicide. On this page Detective Bums tells the story in condensed form, and it is illustrated with scenes from the films. America’s Most Famous Detective. the young Congressman; “of Senator Archer’s thumb, as we shook hands.” The detective smiled, and showed through his glass the thumb print' on the Edwards agreement. Their identity was unmistakable. Gordon was aghast. Hero was absolute proof that the father of the ghl ha loved was Nelson’s confederate in the land swindles! Burns immediately placed "shadows” on Senator Archer and on Nelson. Learning s he meeting place of Archer and his Congressional confederates, he had his assistants install the famous dictagraph on a wall of the roam, stretching the communicating wire across a corridor to the receiving instrument in another room, A large calendar on the wall concealed the little trans mitter from view of the confederates when they met. Senator Archer sat directly beneath the instrument thus concealed. Every word he uttered was taken down in the other room by Burns’s stenographer. Discussing a date for another meeting, Archer, see ing the calendar, pulled it down, revealing the dicta graph. Realizing its meaning, the confederates poured out into the corridor, traced the wire under the hall carpet to a room opposite, and burst in the door, where they were confronted by Gordon, champion of the land swindle victims, standing at the stenographer-detect ive’s elbow! w Senator Archer w’ent directly to his home, packed a bag with important papers and left the house in such a state of agitation that his daughter’s suspicions were aroused. Mary lost no time in reporting the matter to her lover. Gordon. As he refused to discuss the matter with her, she went later to the office of Detective Burns. Finding Gordon there, she denounced her lover for hounding her father. "You are obsessed with the illusion that my father is in some way connected with the land swindles,” she said. “All is over between us!” Burns seized the opportunity to break it gently to Mary that there was proof of her father's complicity, and she went homo broken-hearted. Senator Archer reached New York in time to catch an outgoing Atlantic liner. Two days later, in mid ocean, while sitting on deck, he received a wireless message. He opened it with trembling fingers, and read: "Gordon addressing House. We are ruined." Senator Archer went directly to his stateroom, took a small phial from his pocket, drank the contents, and lay down in his berth. In the meantime Nelson, the land swindler, had caught Burns’s assistant shadowing him. Suddenly he cranked up the motor of an automobile standing by the curb, jumped aboard and raced away for the open country. The detective followed in another car, which the swindler saw gradually overhauling him. He drove his machine over a railway crossing too late to escape the locomotive of an express train. His machine was wrecked. Escaping personal injury in the wreck, the fugitive was taken aboard the train. Realizing this, the detective raced the train until the swindler, from the rear platform, punctures one of his tires with a re volver shot. Then, beset by trainmen, he leaped from the platform, nearly killing himself, and was captured. While Representative Gordon was addressing the House on his motion to impeach the Senators and Congressmen proved guilty in connection with the land swindles, Mary Archer received a wireless dispatch announcing her father's suicide. She carried it im mediately to the Capitol and had It delivered to Gordon, who was then finishing his address on the floor of the House. “Suicide is confession." Gordon’s motion is carried—he is the hero of the hour. Retiring from the floor of the House. Gordon found Mary, who had witnessed his triumph, and escorted her from the Capitol. He soothed her anguished mind by reminding Ler: “I am left to you, Mary. I love you more than ever. We will labor together for the cause of the Right!” (rtiotcgrapbs on ibis n«e» fron> tb» «Un b, the ao ffitiln £ , 'W&k: < iSri ’ -JSa ■RiF' il *«s3l » 'V* ** y Z zfrjaEa < .$■ ■ x >VV> * < ■ • i liter ~ - Senator Archer and His Confederates Discover the Dirt, graph—but Too Late. ■4f wO'lk $ «s. - I - -I. ;S> g|pr •' <\ 1 w 4 ?** i— The Fugitive Swindler’s Auto Wrecked by an Express Train, .4? :> o ~ ■ - ->iroffsßgfr 1 Z’ Nelson, the Swindler, Escapes from the Wreck Uninjured, . B'Zf fyc<%3W *. '*L s 3®J” Jf «hs” '•'* ' f x°l ■"■*«»waJ|A MraHVnKSMHr^BB^' ; ESSMBfe ‘W. x t /-’''r* y,*. ■*■? • '»_• ■ -1 ’-*• .£»> „.£-<:> ":^-- r ,: >®?: • uJ|Et *W The Fugitive Leaps from the Moving Train and Is Captured. KWMIIFi liWOUIRUIfiOI £ m »Ufr|HyMPt •* i| W ♦tggr ntnm yjhlMOT ■jBPOSI On the Floor of the House Honest Representative Go impeaches the Grafting Members.