Wall Street is really a small district. Most of its business is done within the space of a city block. Messengers on their trips sometimes went only to another floor in the same building, or to an office across the street. Yet in those short trips they would dis¬ appear with all their securities, seldom to be heard of again.
Up to the summer of 1918 the absconding mes¬ senger boy was a rarity. The type was regarded with good-humored indulgence on the Street. They were generally happy-go-lucky youngsters, and the steadier heads among them graduated into clerks in the com¬ mission houses. # THE HIGH AND LOW OF JEWISH MONEY POWER 51 The labor shortage struck Wall Street, along with other sections of the country, and messenger boys were difficult to find. During this period there was also a great expansion in business. Nearly everyone in the country possessed bonds of some kind, and these changed hands in unparalelled quantities. On the floor of the Stock Exchange, daily transactions in bonds up to $20,000,000, and in stocks up to one or two mil¬ lion shares, were common. Following the sales, the stocks and bonds were transferred from seller to buyer by messenger boy. It was not unusual for irre¬ sponsible lads to be running from office to office in Wall Street with $250,000 each under the arms.
Then, with the shortage of boys, another type of messenger began to appear, and with this type the trouble began. Disappearances and losses became more frequent and costly. The indemnities paid by the insurance companies reached such staggering figures that the custom of issuing blanket insurance was withdrawn. Various expedients were adopted to solve the mystery; boys were required to travel in pairs, guards were posted throughout Wall Street, the best detectives in the land were assigned to the matter, but without avail.