The book, Girl Waits With Gun, by Amy Stewart, can, melodramatically be said to be ripped from the headlines of a century ago, when their horse drawn buggy was plowed into by a car recklessly driven by a wealthy, and it turns out, a particularly nasty piece of work, Henry Kaufman, an offspring of a famous Paterson, New Jersey silk factory owner, who refuses to pay for the damages.
The oldest, biggest, and sturdiest of the sisters, Constance Kopp attempts to collect money for the damages, but only really gets a life made into a living hell by the actions of the surly Henry and his circle of like-minded, anti-social thugs. Harassment in the form of so-called "Black-Hand" letters, kidnapping threats, fired shots, messages delivered by bricks through glass windows in the dead of night, all contribute to unsettling the Kopp sisters, Constance, Norma, and the teenager Fleurette.
The sisters find an ally in the Bergen County Sheriff Robert Heath, who takes the harassment seriously and helps gather evidence against Mr. Kaufman. One of the more interesting things about the story is that the case winds up in Federal Court because Mr. Kaufman is accused of using the United States mail to spread threats. This is a Federal offense, and the Sheriff works with Postal Inspectors.
Postal Inspectors predate the FBI as Federal law enforcement agents, and were a unit of law enforcement we worked with in my prior employ in a Fraud Division for a major heath insurer in New York. Because the receipt of stolen money through the mails is a Federal offense, the cases fall under United States Penal Code statues, and therefore are pursued in the jurisdiction of Federal courts.
The setting of the story intrigued me--Paterson, New Jersey. Home of silk factories in the early and mid-1900s. I distinctly remember a fairly, colorful, large corner store on 14th Street opposite Union Square Park that was called Paterson Silks. I never had any reason to go into the store, and no one in my family bought silk or made clothes from scratch. But certainly a great deal of women of that era did create clothing from scratch, so supplying the basic material was big business.
In the Historical and Source Notes, Acknowledgements section at the end of the book, the author explains "historical fiction" and discloses what parts were added by her imagination. The added parts and events do not change the story really, and I guess could be likened to adding a little narrative length.
Various New Jersey, and sometimes New York newspapers and other publications are cited as sources for the story. The ordeal of the Kopp sisters became local news fodder, and eventually made its way to the New York Times when they reported on the eventual Federal trial being held in Newark.
Ms. Stewart cites the Times story as the source of a courtroom quote when describing testimony given by Constance. The unbylined account of the trial and the background of the case spills past one column, and heads into the top of another. The great thing about being a full-fledged Times home delivery subscriber I found is that I get full digital access to whatever they have in their database. It was easy to find and print the news story that Ms. Stewart built her story from.
Thus, you can be lead to page 5 of a June 3, 1915 edition of the New York Times where it seems crime and court cases find their way into the paper. "Saw Daddy Make A Fire" turns out to be an arson-murder case where the father burns the mother and wife to death in her bed. "Court Scores Divorce Evil/Judge Calls Swapping Spouses Common as Horse Trading." "Says Doctor Won His Wife." "Conley Released; Shows No Remorse."
With an eight column paper, there's more, and certainly ads. Even ads for silk from Arnold Constable & Co., a carriage trade emporium that when it went out of business saw its building give way to housing the Mid-Manhattan Library on Fifth Avenue.
The account of a day's proceedings of the trial is very well written with a killer lede that rivals anything you read today. The entire story provides a great many details. We are told the Kopp sisters live in a "handsome home on the outskirts of Wyckoff..." The allegations against Mr. Kaufman mesh with Ms. Stewart's narrative.
As nice as the home of the Kopps might have been thought to be, there apparently was no indoor plumbing yet. The news account tells us that as part of Miss Constance Kopp's testimony she relates an incident of being fired on "while on the way from the house to an outhouse."
Acting lady-like to the core, she apparently doesn't mention that this might have scared the shit out of her.
The Lifetime movie version might change that.
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