Seven for Jack | movie | 2022 | Official Clip - video Dailymotion

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From the 1926 memoir "You Can't Win", Seven For Jack explores an episode in the life of BC born burglar Jack Black, his  | dG1fR2U4Vnp3V19UcHc

Transcript

00:00 [no audio]

00:28 [music]

00:39 At Victoria, I put in a few very pleasant months.

00:43 I joined the colony of Chinese and opium smugglers

00:46 who ran their freight across the line in fast, small boats at night

00:50 into Port Townsend, Anacortes, or Seattle, Washington.

00:56 The manufacture of smoking opium was then a legalized industry in Canada,

01:00 and the smugglers were welcomed and harbored

01:02 because they brought much American gold to the Canadian side.

01:07 Being in the company of these characters, I was accepted by police as one of them

01:11 and went my way unmolested.

01:15 One fatal evening, as I stood watching a Faro game,

01:18 making mental bets and winning every one,

01:20 a devilish hunch came to me that I was lucky and I ought to make a play.

01:27 I made a bet, lost it, got stuck,

01:31 and feverishly played it in my last dollar.

01:35 [music]

01:53 This gambling habit is the curse of a thief's life.

01:56 He loses his last dime and is forced to go out in haste for money.

02:01 To make a mechanic out of a job, he takes the first one in sight.

02:05 He has no time to pick and choose or calculate carefully what he's about.

02:09 He must eat, and the minute he goes broke, he gets hungry.

02:15 I had strolled through the residence district

02:18 and noted several homes that looked prosperous and easy of approach.

02:21 House Burgly was almost unknown there then.

02:26 There was almost no police protection. None was needed.

02:32 Householders left windows open and doors unlocked.

02:37 [music]

02:46 One o'clock found me in one of the most pretentious places on my list.

02:52 But instead of picking up trifles right and left as I had expected,

02:55 I found but one room occupied.

02:59 I took nothing but money, and not much of that.

03:02 Less than $50 in silver and bills,

03:04 leaving his watch and some small articles of jewelry,

03:07 is not worth the chances I must take in trying to dispose of them in a strange town.

03:12 [music]

03:27 I went straight downtown to the only all-night bar and lunch counter to eat before going to bed.

03:33 Before I had my meal finished, two officers and two civilians came in,

03:37 and they all came over to where I sat eating.

03:41 One of the civilians looked at me closely and said to the other,

03:44 "Looks very much like the man."

03:47 I was in a bad hole.

03:49 If I objected to search, it would look bad, and they would do it anyway.

03:54 "Go ahead and search me," I said, making the best of a bad position.

03:59 "Lock him up," ordered the man.

04:01 "He has the exact amount of money I lost.

04:03 The paper corresponds, and so does the silver.

04:07 You're arrested in the name of the Crown, and anything you say will be used against you."

04:12 [music]

04:19 I was taken to the city prison,

04:21 where I gave the booking officer a very brief and misleading biographical sketch.

04:26 The jail I had fled from, with a China boy loomed before me.

04:30 I put in the balance of the night going over my case.

04:33 It looked hopeless.

04:36 By ten o'clock, I was taken into the magistrate's court.

04:39 The attachés and loungers crowded the house and stared at me curiously.

04:46 The photographer waiting at the jail took a number of pictures of me,

04:49 and I was locked up again.

04:52 The jailer, a sad-eyed, solemn-faced Scotchman,

04:55 gazed at me a long time through the barred door and smacked his lips.

05:01 "You're dead. You escaped from the provincial jail at Revelstoke."

05:11 I already knew I was lost,

05:13 but this conveyed to me the full force and effect of my predicament.

05:17 It made me feel like one buried alive.

05:26 [music]

05:30 In due time, the judge arrived in town.

05:33 My irons were struck off, and I went into court.

05:36 I got a brief, dignified, orderly trial.

05:40 Having no lawyer, the judge asked me if I wanted to go over the points in the case

05:44 and said I could not presume to instruct his lordship on points of law.

05:50 He gave his verdict, then. Guilty, both charges.

05:55 Two years in the provincial penitentiary for burglary,

05:58 six months for jailbreaking, sentences concurrent, and 30 lashes.

06:13 The train carried me to the prison in New Westminster.

06:16 My Scotch jailer loaded me with irons and handcuffed me to a seat

06:20 to make sure he delivered me safely.

06:26 In the town of New Westminster, I looked above me with interest.

06:29 It was my birthplace.

06:35 My parents were married in the United States,

06:37 but spent the first year of their married life in British Columbia,

06:41 where my father had some small business interests.

06:49 He was a British subject and never took the trouble to become an American.

06:56 That left me a subject of Great Britain, which I still am.

07:01 [Music]

07:16 [Music]

07:26 [Music]

07:36 [Music]

07:46 [Music]

07:56 [Music]

08:06 [BLANK_AUDIO]

Seven for Jack | movie | 2022 | Official Clip

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