No. 8 County Courthouse

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The photographer surprised us with this attractive picture of the Lancaster county courthouse, a testimonial to his art or to our lack of perception. Our initial impression of the courthouse was gained from the third story of The Journal building in the days when it still wore a conventional round dome, on top of which was perched a sad castiron statue of Abraham Lincoln. Once a painter clambered up and gave the statue a coat of bright red paint. Protests poured in. It developed that the red was only preliminary to a more suitable bronze. But eventually dome and statue disappeared, with pleasing results.

In its 55 years the courthouse has seen drama. The most sensational trials held within its walls were during the tumultuous 90’s—the John Sheedy, Irvine-Montgomery, George Washington Davis and Lillie cases. Sheedy was Lincoln’s kingpin gambler of the 90’s, a large handsome person who was found at his office with skull crushed. His beautiful young wife and a Negro, Monday MacFarland, were tried and acquitted. W. H. Irvine was tried for the fatal shooting of C. E. Montgomery, a Lincoln banker, and exonerated. Mrs. Lillie, found guilty of killing her husband at David City and later pardoned by Governor Mickey, here forced the Woodman company to pay her insurance for the death of the husband whom a jury had convicted her of killing.

George Washington Davis, a Negro, loosened part of the Rock Island track southeast of the penitentiary with the idea of notifying the company and securing a job as a reward. He notified them too late. There was a train wreck and 12 were killed. Davis was convicted.

A later incident was the trial of iron-faced Frank Sharp, found guilty of the brutal hammer murder of his wife.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           

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