Legal Burglar
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by VERNON WILKINSON
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George Courtney laughs at locksmiths.
Regardless of how cleverly constructed,
no lock or safe is invulnerable. With time
and tools a master lockman could pick them
all.
This is George Courtney's opinion. And
if you think differently, pause before you
start to argue with him, because he has
been called upon to perform a thousand
legal burglaries. His lock-picking has
ranged from rescuing a woman whose loung-
ing pajamas wouldn't come unzipped to
assisting in the salvage operations aboard
the H.M.S. Hampshire, on which Lord
Kitchener was lost during World War
number one.
After he found the right combination, the
pajama job was a cinch, but the Hampshire
proposition .entailed a little more work. The
British Government wanted to recover about
10 million dollars in gold, aboard the vessel.
They called in Courtney, who, in addition
to being an expert locksmith, is also a deep
sea diver. Yes, they got the gold.
Right at the moment you will probably
find Courtney dodging sharks at the bottom
of the China Sea. He's over there assisting
in the salvage operations of the French
submarine, Phenix, that went down off the
China coast.
When we saw him he was safely en-
sconced in a San Francisco hotel room, and
looking forward to talking to his fellow
craftsmen, and seeing the World's Fair
where part of his collection of rare keys
and locks are exhibited.
We were rather awed by Courtney's busi-
ness, figuring that picking locks and open-
ing bank vaults was a pretty serious
business.
But no! It was, we found, a romantic
occupation.
Remember actress Simone Simon's fam-
ous gold key? Well, Courtney is the gentle-
man who made it. He has also opened jewel
cases for former King Alfonso of Spain, for
which the keys had been lost. And when
earthquakes jammed the safes of Japan,
he was summoned to help the sons of Nip-
pon recover their yen.
The start of his career was legal, if not
exactly ethical. It began at the age of nine
when he forced the lock on the cookie
closet. Later, in 1910, he began his diving
operations as a member of the United States
marines. His ship was anchored off the
Central American coast for a number of
weeks, during which an ornery cook had
tossed overboard from the galley, a collec-
tion of empty cans, fouling the propellers.
Mr. Courtney was one of three volunteers
who. dived below to free the ship of debris.
In his hotel room he displayed a few
locks from his rare collection of thousands.
There was an ingenious Egyptian lock made
of wooden tumblers. He also had a heavy
black key and lock with which Ivan the
Terrible locked his women in the Kremlin
while he went to war. From the looks of
the lock that Russian certainly did not trust
his women. The girls didn't have a chance.
Locks have been in use for over 4,000
years, according to Courtney. At the F air he
has an ancient wooden lock from Mesopo-
tamia, the cradle of civilization, on display.
Romans were the first people to manufac-
ture iron locks, and some of the earliest
keys were mounted on rings.
In case you are interested, the key ring
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"Are you the gentleman who advertised far a mate?"
precedes the linger ring. When keys became
too heavy to be worn on the finger, they
were constructed to be carried on a throng.
But Roman vanity was injured by the ab-
sence of key rings. The nobles just couldn't
get used to looking at bare lingers, and
rings for decorative purposes only, were
introduced.
Courtney has quite a collection of keys
and locks on exhibition in the Homes and
Gardens Building at the San Francisco Fair.
There are keys used by Hetty Green, the
Wall Street financieress; General Jackson's
key, and keys used by Jacob Astor.
Most interesting are the keys of the
famous international banker, Nathan Roths-
child. This canny gentleman kept th e coins
of each nation in separate chests, with a
different key for each chest.
Then there is also the lock to the jewel
box of Queen Isabella, whose treasures were
sold to finance Columbus' journey to the
New World.
Further evidence that the lock business
is a romantic one is presented by the pad-
lock for a royal hope chest. Believe it or
not, this padlock has a heart shaped key.
Before we met Courtney we had an idea
that he would look like a character from
Alias Jimmy Valentine. Instead we found a
quiet man in a dark business sui t and a
conservative ti e. His lingers were long and
blunt and he handled locks with the air of
a master. He had a frank, open smile that
was emphasized by a distinguished mus-
tache. The many dangerous jobs he has
undertaken do not seem to have affected
him at all.
Possibly the reason for his cheerful mien
is the fact that never in all his adventurous
career has he found a door that is closed
to- him.
♦
67
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