One hundred twenty-five years ago in 1898, taken directly from the pages of The Youngstown Vindicator:

A woeful loss. The spoliation of Sheriff C.F. Callahan last night. Umbrella purloined. The article was taken while the sheriff was enjoying humor and absorbing melody.

Sheriff C.F. Callahan went to the opera house last evening to enjoy H. Henry’s minstrels.

The evening was moist, humid, wet. The sheriff, being prudent and desiring to be fully prepared for a pour, took along with him an expensive silken umbrella. In the opera house he placed the protector from the element in a corner near his chair, and drinking in the minstrel melody and enjoying the humor of the comedians, paid no attention to the parachute — not until the curtain had fallen on the finale.

Then the sheriff made a dive for his umbrella. And lo and behold! It was not. It was as if it had folded up its tent and departed into the deep and pluvial night.

The sheriff did not become publicly vehement, but he probably thought things unutterable and may be thinking them yet, for at last accounts, he had no more umbrella than a rabbit.

This morning, Mr. Callahan called up some of his friends who sat near him in the opera house, but not one had seen the case of misappropriation, mistaken identity or petty larceny.

It is a scurvy trick to steal any umbrella from any man, but think of the deep depravity and temerity of the individual so abandoned and sandy as to purloin the article when it is the cherished property of the sheriff!

The theft was annoying and yet, such is the perversity of human nature, that many of the friends of the sheriff seem today to be enjoying the news of his spoliation.

During the day, the sheriff obtained a clue and as the umbrella was probably taken by mistake, he asserts that unless it is returned, the number of prisoners taking their meals in the pail will be increased by one.

• Compiled from the Youngstown Vindicator by Chelsea Hess, Mahoning Valley Historical Society archives assistant.