In late February 1910 several newspapers carried accounts of a scheme in which an individual used false identities in correspondence and social introductions to secure money and favors from multiple victims. While details vary between reports, the core pattern—fabricated personae maintained through letters and intermediaries—parallels later forms of romance and impersonation fraud. Background At the turn of the 20th century, long-distance courtship and business dealings often depended on letters, personal references, and newspaper notices. Communication delays and reliance on third parties made it relatively easy for a determined deceiver to present a false persona without immediate exposure. Newspapers regularly printed personal advertisements, matrimonial notices, and human-interest items that could be used by impostors to create credibility. The scheme Contemporary press coverage describes an individual who adopted one or more alternate names and communicated with victims through letters and through people acting as go-betweens. Targets included people who had answered advertisements or who were introduced by mutual acquaintances. The impostor cultivated trust by exchanging personal stories and by arranging meetings or proxies to reinforce the illusion. When victims were persuaded, they provided money, gifts, or access to accounts; when discrepancies emerged, the impersonator changed identity or disappeared. Public reaction and legal response Newspaper readers were both fascinated and alarmed. Reports emphasized the vulnerability created by anonymous correspondence and by placing trust in written testimonials. Law enforcement and courts sometimes struggled to prosecute such cases because of jurisdictional limits, the ephemeral paper trail, and variations in testimony. Press coverage urged greater caution in responding to personal ads and in transferring funds without independent verification. Historical significance This 1910 scandal is notable for illustrating how pre-digital societies confronted deception that resembles today’s “catfishing.” The tools differed—letters, telegrams, and newspapers rather than social media—but the social dynamics were similar: trust exploited across distance, reliance on intermediaries, and the difficulty of proving identity. Historians treat such episodes as part of a longer history of fraud and social vulnerability rather than as isolated curiosities. Limitations and sources Accounts of the incident vary in specifics (names, amounts, and the number of victims) across contemporary newspapers, and some later retellings compress or conflate separate episodes. Because surviving reports are journalistic rather than judicial records in many instances, precise legal outcomes and the full list of actors are sometimes uncertain. The summary above synthesizes multiple newspaper narratives from February 1910 and situates them in broader scholarship on early-20th-century fraud and communication practices.