7. 15 Diamonds Were Lost on the First Day of the Subway Opening
28th Street Subway Station. Photo from Library of Congress.
The third man to buy a ticket, Henry Barrett who lived on West 46th Street, took the first train at 7:02 at 28th Street. At 7:03 he says he looked for his diamond horseshoe pin with 15 diamonds (or 15 carats according to another report), but it was missing. With a value of $500, it would have been worth almost $13,000 in 2014 dollars. This very first crime in the New York City subway was reported with seriousness by the Times: “The thieves will be looked for and the pawnshops watched.”
