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| With all of the concern on security of places both public and private sectors where people might be present, we thought that we would include this story written by one of or editors. It is a true story written last year and edited for this page of a noteworthy delivery he made in 1970. I don't know if it has any great relevance to any of today's concerns, but perhaps it will lend a little perspective. -- CSP |
On a Friday morning in the autumn of 1970 I received a call to take a delivery of lost airline baggage from the airport to the State Capitol building. It was not unusual to deliver lost airline baggage in those days. We did it for several airlines. What distinguished this delivery from others was that consisted of one item of an unusual shape. The shape was obviously a rifle case. On top of that, it looked and felt like it had the contents one would expect to be in a rifle case. The recipient of the delivery was to be Lieutenant Governor James Goetz. I was not familiar with all of the details of the interior layout of the Capitol. So when I got to the building I parked the cab on the Park Street side of the building and took my delivery inside looking for the lieutenant governor's office. I moved counterclockwise around the first floor. Had I know what I was doing, I would have gone the other way and the found the lieutenant governor's office a few feet away. As it was, I got to see all of the ground floor of the Capitol building. All during this circumnavigation of the first floor, I expected to be approached by somebody from the security staff inquiring about either whether they could help me or asking what I was doing carrying a rifle through the seat of government. I was not approached. As far as I could tell, nobody was even taking any special notice of me. At the end of this impromptu tour I located the proper office and delivered the rifle, the receptionist nonchalantly signing the ticket to acknowledge receipt. I then returned to the cab. If it had not been for something I heard in my car on the way home from work that afternoon, I would likely have let the run slip from my mind. That afternoon on my trip home from Yellow Cab to my residence on Sherburne Avenue, I heard that two men had been arrested late the night before or really early that morning for plotting to kidnap the Governor of Minnesota, Harold Levander, and Rosalie Butler, who was a Saint Paul City Councilmember who happened to live at 1034 Summit Avenue, next door to the Governor's Mansion at 1006. Neither man was ever brought to trial for this kidnaping plot. From the media of the time, I gather that the men were already wanted for federal charges [a bank robbery in Omaha if I remember right] which would keep them in custody for many years and local authorities saw no point in adding what likely would be concurrent sentences to their time. The delivery became noteworthy because of its timing and what was on the news. There is a usual tendency for any bureaucracy to lock barn doors after the horses are gone and government is no different. That I took what was obviously a piece of fire arms through the Capitol building just hours after these guys' alleged plot was revealed and met no additional security seemed unusual then and still seems so today. Ray Sammons |
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