Whorls DNA Fingerprints and Bernice Pepperling.
Are all fingerprints unique? Well…if you've been following here long, you probably know the answer. Not really. We'll get to that later.
Fingerprint and Identification Magazine. Fingerprint Magazine ran for some 50 years, and guess what? The Genealogy Today website is indexing all the issues into their database as fast as they can find them!
The magazine was sold to 16,000 police chiefs who in turn shared it with ten patrolmen. (yes, sold…it was a subscription item your local chief had to pay for.) See the stats on the cover? 16,000 sold, 160,000 readers. In the publishing business that is known as the pass-along rate. "Mac…stop screwing around. Go study the Fingerprint magazine."
It ran profiles and the whorls of wanted desperadoes, including gunsel (and cover girl) Bernice Pepperling (AKA Marie Riley) here who tried to slip a weapon into jail to her lover. She is presumed innocent until rounded up. If you are doing some genealogical research on your great aunt Bernice, you are in for a surprise.
They also has curious little news items, like the one here about fingerprints being used to control quarantined Detroit citizens…You'll see they fingerprinted the resident of every rooming house to prevent the spread of smallpox. Sorry privacy advocates. Public Health wins out every time, just like it did back in 1924. Read the piece and you'll see some guys were sending in ringers to give prints for them so they could keep on spreading germs.
I looked for the newest issue of Fingerprints at Barnes and Noble, but it must have slipped back behind one of the Brides magazines or something.
Anyway, back to the initial question. Is every fingerprint one of a kind? Turns out it is kinda like every snowflake being different. Wilson Bentley found identical snowflakes, and he only had to look at 5,000. We had that many nearly every DAY last winter on my PORCH. Then Mr. Bentley died of pneumonia. (True)
That is, the uniqueness of a fingerprint is "a working hypothesis" which is why in court they used to pay someone to come in and say it's a science. I guess in the trade the problem is known as "false positives" which is an oxymoron, but it works.
I quote. "Five examiners made false positive errors for an overall false positive rate of 0.1%. Eighty-five percent of examiners made at least one false negative error for an overall false negative rate of 7.5%." For you sticklers, the citation is "Accuracy and reliability of forensic latent fingerprint decisions" by Bradford T. Ulery" National Academy of Sciences. Even better is THIS ONE.
Fingerprints are increasingly being replaced by DNA. DNA never lies, but the problem is often getting juries to believe in science. Some jurors zone out around 10:30 and miss the explanation…and they zone out again after those two hour lunch breaks. I do know there has been a marked decrease in the number of perps trying to file or burn their fingerprints off…something which happened in movies during the depression and in Dick Tracy comics. By the way, did you know John Dillinger tried to burn his fingerprints off with acid? Yep…not long after this magazine appeared.
Fingerprint and Identification Magazine September 1924 Collection Jim Linderman
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I am not into genealogy, though the doctor did take a DNA test today...scientists are learning how genetics influences disease. I have always been more interested in moving ahead than looking back, but those who do the family history are to be much admired, and if it weren't for my uncle I would not know I was related to Buffalo Bill. (True) When I was young, that was really cool, but now that I know he was a "showman" and big-time hunter, I have had second thoughts.
The document here lasted one hundred years. Not a long time when tracing your roots or relatives. And yet to me it seems ancient. The entries begin in 1826, and the last entry is dated 1927. One hundred years before the family lost interest and stopped keeping track. The latest death recorded was 1880 and it is still sad. The country was young when this record was started, but in the span of life on earth, this entire familial package doesn't even qualify as a freakin' blip.
I am sorry the entire document doesn't fit on the scanner, but we should be glad it remains at all. It has been in a flood or two and has been repaired, but at some point it was passed over or weeded out, and I found it abandoned in an antique mall.
The document itself was printed by Kellogg and Comstock, lithographers who churned them out and underpaid women to add the color by hand. They were second only to Currier and Ives in sales.
As the world shrinks, we will actually have to rely on science even more for our records. Travel and the growing population have put one tribe in touch with another to the extent that culture, language and heritage are even harder to trace and record. When one married the "girl next door" it was easy to know where she came from (of "good stock" probably) but now who knows?
I have been doing this blog a few years. It is surprising how many relatives of those I have mentioned or profiled have gotten in touch. I'm not too polite or delicate, but in all that time not one family member has written to criticize. Every single mail I have received from a surviving member, be their ancestors scoundrel or saint, has been to thank me. I am including the folks I put on old time religion and vintage sleaze as well...not one critical letter from a family member. I think we have lost so much of our roots, we are grateful for whatever we find. I have had former strippers, children of musicians, great grandchildren of artists, family members of postcard makers and more write to say "Thanks..."I didn't know that!"
(I try to generate heat, but the only complaints I have received came from a post where I made fun of Glenn Beck (which I ignored) and from a post where I roasted the "science" of chiropractic. I ignored them as well for the most part, but did refer a few to the Wiki article. I also got one or two angry notes from folks who didn't like my profile of scam artist Charles Jessup...so let's bring it up again HERE. Facts is facts.)
The important categories are Family, Born, Married and Died. Not died HOW, but died when and where. Although the family here came all the way from England, it looks like most of them never got out of Michigan after that. Having gotten out and returned, I know one could do both better and worse.
I won't be making any deathbed confessions (or having a deathbed conversion.) I am an open book for the most part, and now even my Deoxyribonucleic acid will be in digital form I guess. Medical confidentiality is sacred, but how many of you read the forms you sign? Eh...if whoever replaced J. Edgar wants my DNA, let him have it. At least I don't have to worry about some crime from decades ago coming up when they sort through my strands of genetic material. When I was ten, I was fingerprinted during a boy scout tour through a police station. That has never haunted me either! Kellogg and Comstock Lithograph, embellished by hand circa 1825. Collection Jim LindermanDull Tool Dim Bulb Books HERE
