SAFE-MAKER V. SAFE-BREAKER.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 10418, 23 March 1912, Page 1

SAFE-MAKER V. SAFE-BREAKER.

THE LONG, DRAMATIC DUEL BETWEEN SCIENCE AND THE CRIMINAL BRAIN. (By GEORGE JEAN NATHAN, in " Harper's Weekly.")

i The international rivalry between ! iirmo.ii- plate and the big guns, in • which each of the great world Powers is hopefully seeking to evolve a species of the former that will beat a species of tho latter, and vice versa, has its analogy in the world of business, where there 'is being foutfit, and for a century lias been fought, the bactle between the makers of safes and the breakers of safes. The sates are the armour plate, representing protection, •{ho safe-breakers the guns, representin cr assault. And the story of this latter conflict, that has been going on since tho first receptacle for valuables was designed about one hundred years "Co, shows forth as brilliant a picture { of a tilt botween two classes of society i as time's records have ever shown. " There is nothing made by the hand ; of man that cannot be unmade by the ' hand of man." It is this familiar : quotation that the makers of sates, since tho first safe was made and openied have sought to prove tal acious; ' and it is this same quotation that the : safe-breakers, since one of their number broke open the first safe, have sought to prove correct. And although to-cfav the defensive powers appear to have "the decisive upper hand, that upper hand has been gained only after a struggle of wits extending over the ' entire period of modern business. How long, moreover, the hand will correctly . bear its present adjective remains for ! tho newspaper of to-morrow or the day : after to-morrow to chronicle—maybe, | indeed, for to-night's special edition. I THE FIRST SAFE,

as wo Know safes, was invented about a century ago by a man named Fitzgerald, and opened by a man named lieim. Or, to bo more exact, a duplicate of the initial safe, serving its purpose in a financial establishment, succumbed to the cunning of the initial safe-breaker. Ihis first safe in the records of the safe-maker v. safe-breaker battle was, judged from modern standards, a clumsy affair indeed, and yet it marked the first step in tho increasingly intricate campaign of the concealing of valuables. The Fitzgerald safe was made of iron, and was built square. It was a formidable thing to look at, and appeared invulnerable as far us the powers of tho dark were concerned. It attracted world-wide attention, and was proclaimed to be the undoubted herald of a new day in the protection of property. Imagine, then, the subsequent consternation when it was discovered one morning that the Criminal Brain , had opened the safe (and hauled away its contents) by tho simple method of drilling a hole in the side and opening the lock from within. Hero was something the safe-maker had not taken into consideration. Ho had worked on the lock that could not be opened from the outside, but had not thought about the possibility of opening h from the inside. As a result there came about the second stage in the tilt. "We must make the walls of the safe of some metal that cannot bo drilled," decided tho makers. Steel was employed, and temporarily the breakers were nonplussed. But one night there came along a Crimina.l Brain with a new kind of drill, and safe number two fell before the cunning. Science, however, came to tho aid of the safe-maker, steel of another kind was made which would withstand tho drills, and again the safe-breaker was baffled.

After fighting ineffectually with their tools against the walls of these newer safes, the safe-breakers—about sixtyfive years ago—figured it out.that the makers, in their effort to perfect the walls of the safe, had failed to keep pace in the matter of improving the door of the safe. And the Criminal Brain at once began a scheme against the. door, which the safe-maker had seemingly forgotton iu his haste- to make the sides unassailable. Then came the era of the wedge. At this stage of the tiji,, the tiny cracks above and beneath the safe door were hit upon as the lines of least resistance, and, by the use of muffled hammers, drills, and wedges, the safe-breakers managed either to break open the door or, by widening the crack above or below it, to insert saws and separate it from the bolts. No sooner had the Criminal Brain hit upon this method, however, than its foe, the Inventive Brain, designed an interlocking door, seconded by a series of protecting flanges that eliminated the dangerous cracks. "With the body, of the safe proper thus protected against his skill, the safe-breaker was again baffled, until one of his number figured out that, while the body of the receptacle itself had been safeguarded in every way by fhe makers, the central object of the invention—the lock—still remained vulnerable. And, as n result.

THE ERA OF LOCK-ATTACK came about. In those clays the lock was built out and was a thing apart from the body of the safe. It afforded a comparatively easy attack for the Criminal Brain, which decided that it was not to be. opened in the manner in which a " lock is usually opened, but . that it _ was not to lie attacked as an object separate from the body of the safe. Drills were brought into play, the lock spindles were"broken, and the safe was opened. Then the locks were made part of the body of the safe and, for approximately ten years, the safemakers had ' tho safe-breakers outwitted. This brings us to about fifty years ago. and to tho melodramatic beginning of the. more modern phase of tho eoniiiet, to the introduction into the battle of explosives on the part of the, criminals. In the period of ten years during Which the Criminal Brain iouiuf itself beaten by the Scientific Brain, it did not slop working, planning, experimenting, and scheming; and the result of ail its scheming took the form of nitre-glycerine. Here, again was an element " the safe-maker of those days had failed to take into consideration, and for many a year subsequently the battle between the two sides became fiercer and more complex than ever. Finding that tools alone would «vail them nothing against tho sturclv sti-iictnres of steel that the safe-makers had invented, the safebienkers enlisted, by way of what a nrominout safe .expert calls "secondary assault," the explosive. With the aid of drills, while they could no longer make cracks in tho safe. THE EXPLOSIVE WAS GIVEN A HOLD. and I lie door of the safe subsequently forced out. Y.'heie drills proved inrlfcet.ive agains; metal the Criminal ! .h-ain discovered that all that was necessary to circumvent the safe-maker was to scrape olf a line of the paint on the- safe and, along the scraped channel thus made, to "soup" tho •. \-p]o:.:ivo~-that is, to work the nitroglycerine, into and down the surface crack by means of a hold manufactured from some such substance as damp clay, putty, or the like. A third way was to pour the explosive in a crack, however tiny, near tho top of the safe

door, and, by means of a suction pump, to draw it down into the safe. If the safe-breakers believed that they had outwitted tho safo-makers in turn fur any length of time, however, they were doomed to disappointment, for here again, as before, the Scientific Brain oiitgoneralled them. Paint was eliminated entirely from the surfaces of the safes and, in addition, tho walto were made, not of one species of steel, but of two. Soft and hard steel, in alternate layers, that have now come to tho five-ply point and will break the strongest drill, were tested and put into effective use. Tims the drill was beaten. Then the door was further protected by making it, when closed, a part of the solid, even -safe surface. 'Kvevy possible suspicion of crack was thus covered. The air-tight safe, against which the use of nitro-glycer-ine is practically impossible, sounded the final death-knell of the Criminal Brain in this on© particular direction. Further protective measures in safe construction were tho gradual thickening of tho walls; tho inventions of a safo constructed of one continuous plate with round corners and concealed lock, resembling, in its entirety, a big boiler; the general use of chrome steel; an increasingly complex system of interior arrangement that provides a double, sometimes triple, protection, even if tho outer door of the safe has been opened; a locking device and -handle covered by n plate with a key lock, so that the combination lock is hidden, the lock, in addition, having a slip dial which may he removed and kept separate ; spindles built with offsets, so that they can neither be driven in nor pulled out; and, finally, absolutely perfect

INTERLOCKING DOOR-JAMBS THAT DEFY EXPLOSIVES. Appreciating that effective obstacles had been thrown in its way- and that it was well-nigh impossible to get into the inside of a safe from the outside, the Criminal Brain began to lay its plans toward getting into the inside from the inside. And here still another phase of the constant romance presented itself. , A number of years ago two prospective safe-breakers succeeded in obtaining employment in two different safe factories, worked over a period of years in the various_ departments, gained all the information that they desired, and, subsequently working together, managed to baffle the safe-makers by their skill in opening complicated safes in different parts of the country. The police were at a loss to understand how the .safes had been opened, and only upon the apprehension of the two men several years later was it learned that the jobs had not been "inside" ones, as was ongiVially suspected, but had really been the work of two men who had been initiated into the mysteries of safecraft, and had put their knowledge to criminal use. .This put the safe-makers on their guard, and an exceedingly- complicated system was immediately put into force, whereby not only was the pedigree of every workman looked into closely, but the work among the employees wa.s so separated that no one man or two men could gather enough information about a safe to put it to dangerous use afterward. Furthermore, when an employee is discharged, or when he voluntarily leaves his position, his actions are watched, and, although the safe companies refuse to discuss this (particular point, it is a matter of record that any former employee of a safe company, who is possessed of intimate inforrhation regarding the secrets of that company's safes, is KEPT UNDER CONSTANT SURVEILLANCE.

As an illustration of the thoroughness with which this is done, there may be cited the case of a former superintendent of one of tho principal safe companies, who was discharged eight years ago for intoxication, who subsequently sought and obtained a position as superintendent of an iron foundry in tho Middle West, who has now held that position for the last seven years, who has done his work well, and who is yet kept under tho eye of a detective in the safe company's pay. There is not tho slightest reason to doubt the man's integrity, but as has been suggested by tho man's employer, who knows his superintendent is being watched, the safe company seems unwilling to taKo tho slightest chance.