George Lister, the “Million Dollar Kid”
By Brian K. Crawford
English-born George Lister, 33 and married, worked for the American Railway Express Company, one of the largest companies in the country, handling most package deliveries by railroad. Lister’s office was in the Northwestern Pacific Ferry Building in Sausalito. Every day shipments arrived by train to be delivered to San Francisco on the railroad ferries, or the reverse, and George was the Messenger in charge.
Every Monday morning, Miss Janice Burtchaell of San Rafael, who was employed by the Wells Fargo Bank and Union Trust Company of San Francisco, shipped the company’s payroll as usual from the Bank of Italy (now Bank of America) office in San Francisco to the Bank of Sausalito at Bridgeway and Excelsior. The money was shipped in a small combination safe. When the safe was unloaded from the ferry, Lister’s job was to open the safe, confirm the amount of currency, and walk it across the street to the bank, where it was deposited in the bank’s vault.
On Monday, March 10, 1924, the shipment consisted of $14,000 in twenties, tens, and five dollar bills. For some reason, when Lister opened the safe and counted the cash that morning, he changed his usual routine. First he changed the combination of the empty safe and locked it again. He put the cash in a large black bag, along with some of his clothing. Then he walked across the tracks to the ferry and caught the 8:30 boat to San Francisco.
E. W. Smith, the agent in charge of the express office, had been outside the building watching the trains at the time of the theft. When he went back inside, he saw that Lister was gone and assumed he’d gone to deliver the cash to the bank. About 9 o’clock the bank called him to ask why the money had not arrived. Smith checked the safe and found it locked. He presumed the cash was still inside it had had no idea what had happened to his employee.
He called in a safe expert and had the safe opened. It was empty. Smith called his superiors in the express company. Soon Captain Cornelius Caine, special agent for the express company, arrived to investigate. It was clear to him that Lister had absconded with the money. Caine notified Captain of Detectives Duncan Matheson. The police obtained a search warrant for Lister’s house. When they got there, his wife was away and they waited all day for her return. When they finally got in, they searched the place but found nothing relevant to the crime or his whereabouts. They learned that he had a fondness for liquor and had friends in the bootlegging business. Lister had been drinking and gambling and spending a great deal of his spare time in the local poolrooms for the past two weeks. The Sheriff sent telegrams to all the police departments in the area to be on the lookout for him.
Someone reported seeing him on the San Francisco waterfront, going aboard the fishing boat Viz IV, apparently as crew. The boat then departed the bay. Telegrams went to all the California port cities to report if the vessel came in. A week later the boat returned from a fishing trip to Monterey, but the crew said they knew nothing about Lister.
On March 19th, Marin County Sheriff John J. Keating received a telegram from Gus Panos, foreman of the Union Pacific railway at Egbert, Wyoming, saying that a man answering the description of George Lister had passed through Egbert on a freight train the day before at 3 p. m., east bound. Sheriff Keating telegraphed to Nebraska towns to be on the lookout for Lister. But no one else saw him.
Then on April 12th the New York Police Department contacted Sheriff Keating. They had spotted a man on the street near the police station who looked like the face on the wanted posters. They detained and questioned him. He readily admitted that he was George Lister and said he was on his way to the police station to turn himself in. They asked him about the money and he said that he had spent every dollar. In fact, he’d had to borrow a nickel for the streetcar fare to get to the police station. They were stunned that a man could have spent $14,000 (about $240,000 today) in less than a month.
Lister said that after the robbery he went straight to a hotel in San Francisco, where he remained for several hours. When the newspaper extras came out announcing the robbery, he bought one and went back to the hotel and read it. He took a southbound stage to Pasadena, then caught a Santa Fe train for the East.
When he got to New York he starting drinking and gambling and living the high life with show girls from the cabarets on Broadway. He handed out $100 bills to the girls, waiters in the restaurants, and doormen at the hotels, “just to make them happy.” He was spending a thousand dollars a day and suddenly found himself surrounded by newfound friends.
When the money finally ran out and he couldn’t get any more bootleg whiskey, he became despondent. Lister locked himself in the kitchen of a chorus girl friend, turned on the gas, and lapsed into unconsciousness. He was found and taken to a hospital, where artificial respiration saved his life. With nothing left to live for, he decided to turn himself in.
Sheriff Keating took the train to New York to bring him back. He kept a very close watch on him during the whole trip home to make sure he didn’t try to kill himself again. Lister proudly showed the Sheriff New York newspaper clippings that called him “Thousand-a-Day” George Lister, “the Million Dollar Kid,” and the ‘Pauper Prince.” Lister told Keating he had voted for him for Sheriff and had always wanted to meet him. He commented that at least “San Quentin will be near home.”
Lister was lodged in the county jail in the basement of the Marin County Courthouse on Fourth Street in San Rafael. Over the door of his cell he posted a piece of cardboard bearing the words “The Million Dollar Kid.” In talking to a reporter, he boasted of having stopped the entertainment at a well-known New York cabaret by having champagne served to the entertainers and sending cases of champagne to the waiters and dishwashers. When asked if he had a good time, he replied that most of the time he didn’t know what was going on, as he was under the influence of liquor.
His preliminary hearing was held on May 1st, and he was arraigned to stand trial on May 5th. He did not hire an attorney and pleaded guilty. On May 16th, he was sentenced to a term in San Quentin prison of from one to fourteen years. He was delivered there as soon as the sentence was passed:
The procedure when a prisoner received an indeterminate sentence, as Lister did, was that he would be evaluated after serving one year and then a fixed term would be set. On June 13, 1925, the State Board of Prison Directors set his sentence to five years. With time off for good behavior, he would be eligible for parole in three years and seven months. He applied for early parole in June 1926, but was denied. He was eventually discharged on March 1st, 1927, having served two years, nine and a half months. What he did with the rest of his life is not recorded.
