Lush Worker (1914); No Democratic or Republican way to clean streets

[bapopik at AOL.COM]

NO REPUBLICAN OR DEMOCRATIC WAY TO CLEAN STREETS
...
I saw this in the lead editorial in the New York Post yesterday. I re-checked with different search terms, but still couldn't beat 1934.
...
...
(FACTIVA)
COUNCILMANIC ANTICS
New York Post, 4 April 2005, 655 words, (English)
Politicians and academic types love to say there's no "Republican" or "Democratic" way to pick up the garbage, but New York City Council members seem to have their own idea: Don't pick it up at all.
...
...
(PROQUEST HISTORICAL NEWSPAPERS)
MAYOR LISTS TRAPS FOR MERIT SYSTEM; Exemptions, 'Fixed' Tests and Court Attacks Are Pitfalls, He Warns in Michigan PRAISED BY GOV. MURPHY La Guardia Exemplifies 'Futility of Boss Rule,' Civil Service Meeting Is Told
Special to THE NEW YORK TIMES.. New York Times (1857-Current file). New York, N.Y.: Feb 27, 1938. p. 4 (1 page):
"There's no Republican or Democratic way of cleaning the street."
...
POLITICS AND BRIDGES
New York Times (1857-Current file). New York, N.Y.: Oct 5, 1938. p. 22 (1 page)
Mayor La Guardia reminded the conference of public works officials in his speech last Monday that "there is no Democratic or Republican way to dig a foundation or build a bridge."
...
MAYOR ANNOUNCES 3D TERM CAMPAIGN ON EFFICIENCY ISSUE; Contest Seen Between 'Honest' City Government and One 'Machine-Controlled' GETS BACKING OF FUSION He Will Accept Republican Designation, He Says -- To Retain Defense Post MAYOR ANNOUNCES 3D TERM CAMPAIGN
New York Times (1857-Current file). New York, N.Y.: Jul 22, 1941. p. 1 (2 pages)
Pg. 11:
"That government must be wholly aloof from national partisan politics," the meggage said. "There is no Republican way and no Democratic way of administering its business."

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
LUSH WORKER
...
Gothamist mentions "lush worker" today in a subway story. It seems like it's much older, but several citations start in 1914 and all are about New York. I guess I'll add it.
...
...
(OED)("lush")
    2. Comb.: lush-crib, -ken, = lushing-ken (see LUSHING vbl. n.); lush-head, -hound, a drunkard; lush-roller, -worker, one who steals from drunks.

  1790 POTTER Dict. Cant. (1795), Lush ken, an alehouse. 1812 J. H. VAUX Flash Dict., Lush-crib or Lush-ken, a public-house, or gin-shop. 1823 Blackw. Mag. XIII. 457 On leaving the lush-crib, we can figure them giving fippence to the drawer. 1925 H. LEVERAGE in Flynn's IV. 869/2 Lush-roller, one who robs drunken men. 1930 Lush-worker [see GLOM v.]. 1935 G. INGRAM ‘Stir’ Train ii. 31 He's a ‘lush-hound’ and I knew he must be a coward. 1945 L. SHELLY Jive Talk Dict. 29/1 Lush head, chronic drinker. 1946 MEZZROW & WOLFE Really Blues (1957) Dedication, To all the junkies and lushheads in two-bit scratchpads. 1948 MENCKEN Amer. Lang. Suppl. II. 682 A creep-joint or panel-house is one in which patrons are robbed, a roller or mush-worker is a girl who robs them, and a lush-worker is one who specializes in drunks. 1957 Amer. Speech XXXII. 278 Zoot suit meaning flashy clothes, and lushhead or lush for drunkard are no longer considered good jazz lingo, though they are or were in common nonjazz usage.
...
...
(OED) ("glom")
    trans. To steal; to grab, snatch. Also intr., usu. const. on to. Hence glomming vbl. n.

  1907 J. LONDON Road (1914) 182 We..discovered that our hands were gloved. ‘Where'd ye glahm 'em?’ I asked. ‘Out of an engine-cab,’ he answered. 1914 JACKSON & HELLYER Vocab. Criminal Slang 38 Glom, to grab; to snatch; to take; implying violence. Example: ‘Glom this short and drop off two blocks below.’ 1925 G. H. MULLIN Adv. Scholar Tramp xii. 180, I learnt that stealing clothes from a clothes-line is expressed in Hoboland by the hilarious phrase, ‘Glomming the grape-vine’. 1926 Flynn's 16 Jan. 638/1 'Course, th' rule is, glom while th' glomin's good. 1930 Ibid. 25 Jan. 524/1 In his hip-pocket, where even the lowest kind of lush-worker would have no difficulty in glomming it. 1960 J. PHILIPS Whisper Town (1965) II. v. 105 You think we ought to go out to the school and glom on to that gun? 1962  Dead Ending (1963) I. i. 7 In the process of glomming onto that property in Venezuela some people got killed. 1969 C. ARMSTRONG Seven Seats to Moon xiii. 126 Trust Lily Eden, though, to glom on to a customer.
...
...
...
(PROQUEST HISTORICAL NEWSPAPERS)
Sixty Per Cent of Deadly Criminals The New York City Police Line Up Are Found to Be Victims of Drugs
Special to The Washington Post.. The Washington Post (1877-1954). Washington, D.C.: Jun 14, 1914. p. 14 (1 page):
"Those of us who have been here for years see fellows who were known to us once as 'lush workers' (pickpockets), 'pocketbook droppers,' and 'handkerchief switchers' (swindlers of returning ot newly arrived immigrants), and coalbin and washline and copper wire and lead pipe thieves, coming in here with all the human intelligence gone from their faces."
...
...
OLD TIME SLEUTH GIVES WAY TO EFFICIENCY DETECTIVE
New York Times (1857-Current file). New York, N.Y.: Jul 5, 1914. p. SM9 (1 page) :
They have gone out on their own hook and brought in a number of pickpockets, and "lush workers," criminals who rob men under the influence of liquor, and in practically every case a conviction has been obtained.
...
...
The New "Social Gangsters" Who Prey Upon Silly Women with Whom they Dance; Astonishing Revelations of the Merciless System of Thievery and Blackmail Practiced Upon Idle Matrons and Foolish Girls by Well-Dressed, Well-Mannered Parasites Who Frequent Fashionable Dancing Places.
BY VAL O'FARRELL.. The Washington Post. Aug 15, 1915. p. SM2 (1 page) :
Here in New York the public dance has proved a greater social leveler than any upheaval I recall in history. except the French revolution. It makes for democracy--and promiscuity. And it has brought to the surface a class of lynx-eyed, alert parasites who were originally "lemon-squeezers," "pool sharks," "petermen," "lush workers" of the well-dressed type, "coin flippers," "wire boosters" and touts.
...
...
...
(FACTIVA)
NEWS
SUBWAY TESTS NEW WAY TO FOIL THIEVES
PETE DONOHUE DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER
431 words
3 April 2005
New York Daily News
SPORTS FINAL
2
English
Copyright (c) 2005 Bell & Howell Information and Learning Company. All rights reserved.

TRANSIT OFFICIALS conducted a secret test last week to see if early-morning trains could be made safer by effectively cutting the subways in half, the Daily News has learned.
The hush-hush experiment by the Transit Authority involved running trains with 10 cars along the Lexington Ave. line - but locking the doors of the last five cars to force passengers to enter the front of the trains.
The test was requested by the Police Department to help protect straphangers against "lush workers" - pickpockets who prey on sleeping, sometimes drunken subway riders overnight, police told The News.
...
...
...
(FACTIVA)
Section B; Metropolitan Desk
Transit Patrols On 7 Line Cut Night Crimes
By KIT R. ROANE
1,206 words
1 September 1997
03:39 am
The New York Times
Late Edition - Final
Page 1, Column 5
English
c. 1997 New York Times Company

For nearly four months, police officers on overnight patrols on the No. 7 subway line in Queens have focused on deterring two types of crimes: token booth robberies and thefts by pickpockets who prey silently on riders as they sleep.
The results have been so striking -- a 71 percent drop in grand larcenies and not a single robbed token booth between May 12 and Aug. 11 -- that police and transit officials say they will soon expand the operation to the No. 6 line and possibly the entire system.
''These types of crimes aren't random, they're planned,'' said Inspector Thomas Lawless, who oversees all the police officers assigned to patrol the subways in Queens. ''So we figured we could stop them if we did some planning ourselves. The 7 train seemed a good place to start.''
The program, Operation Awake, concentrates on reducing crime from 10 P.M. to 6 A.M. during the week and from 10 P.M. to 8 A.M. on Saturdays and Sundays. During these periods, shifts for token booth workers have been staggered so an officer is present whenever a clerk retrieves money from the subway's turnstiles. And trains have been shortened to 6 cars, from the usual 11, so that they are easier to patrol.
Officers also run sting operations to catch what they call ''lush workers'' -- stealthy thieves who often seek victims who are in an alcoholic stupor. The officers keep dossiers on repeat offenders and pass out leaflets in English and Spanish warning riders not to nod off.