March 11, 1958
Los Angeles
As rackets go, it was a pretty good one. There was a lot of quick, easy
money to be made from suckers. And because the victims were breaking the law, they couldn’t complain that they had been scammed. Not bad.
It worked like this:
Step 1) Distribute ads offering dirty pictures to be sent through the
mail, and of course, in 1958, sending smut through the post office was
against the law.
Step 2) Don’t send out anything that is actually illicit–keep it tame.
Sept 3) Haul in $400,000 ($2,915,080.89 USD 2007) a year.
Step 4) Ignore complaints because what are they going to do? Go to the
cops? The postal inspectors? They’re breaking the law by receiving
illicit material.
Repeat as needed.
Of course, some men complained to authorities anyway.
And so we have the case of Edward E. Paramore III, 30, 8801 Encino
Ave., Jacob Heiderich, 32, 12437 Ventura Blvd., and Kathleen Walker,
19, 13554 Rye St. Police confiscated two truckloads of photos and movies, The Times said.
Unfortunately, The Times never followed up on this story. In fact, it
received far more coverage in the Mirror, including a photo of Walker,
who insisted she was only a secretary at the Ventura Boulevard company.
A little research shows that Paramore was an interesting character and
not just because of his name. (Bonus fact: The Times says his father, Ted, helped found the "Screenwriters Guild"). Here’s Dick Adler’s interview with him from 1968.
ladailymirror.com 