DUKE LEE QUITS THE FORCE.
Big Cop Returns to Old Love -- the
Wild West Show.
DUKE LEE.
Duke Lee, after two years of faithful service as a Kansas City policeman, turned in his resignation to Secretary James Vincil of the board of police commissioners yesterday. Last night was Lee's final performance in the role of a bluecoat. Within a few days he will be at Ponca City, Ok., where he will join his old love -- a Wild West show.
Lee has crowded an interesting and somewhat extraordinary career into a life of 32 years. He was a good horseman, a good shot and a good cowpuncher when he was 16 years old. He rode the plains of Wyoming and might have been there yet had it not been for a war with the sheep herders. This caused him to migrate to Texas, where he joined the Buffalo Bill Wild West show. When the Spanish war was declared in 1898 Lee joined Troop C of the Sixth cavalry, was sent to the Philippines and later went to China and participated in the siege of Peking.
Returning to America after the Boxer trouble, Lee rejoined the Buffalo Bill show and stuck to the sawdust for four years, but upon the suggestion of friends came here and landed a job on the force. Lee thought that he was to be given a place in the mounted squad, but he rode a horse only the first month. He has been walking a beat ever since.
While in Kansas City Lee got married and got fat. His wife was Miss Pansy Clark, whose dower amounted to several thousand dollars.
In the capacity of showman, Lee will soon be in Kansas City. He hopes to take off about twenty-five pounds of flesh before his return.
