Thanks to Monique Beliveau for bringing to light The Confessions of a Bank Swindler written by Lucius A. Parmelee and published in 1968 by Bodero Editions Inc, Montreal, Canada.

Lucius Parmalee was arrested for the last time at the train station in Vars, Ontario. While serving his sentence he wrote about his life, beginning in Waterloo, Québec in 1889.

It’s an interesting point of view on life in Québec in the late 19th century, of the economic system of the early 20th century and of the penal institutions of the United States and Canada. It really doesn’t have anything to say about Cumberland Township. It’s just that his final arrest took place there. We have included an excerpt from the Lethbridge Herald recording his arrest. You can read his version of the arrest if you can find a copy of this out-of-print publication.

From a moral point of view I had no scruples whatever. They paid their employees atrocious wages. They offered very little in the way of a life career. They obtained subsidy from the general public, due to the fact that their employees must have help from their parents for a few years, and in the case of the institution in which I served they had no pension plan. All in all I considered them bigger, and more cowardly robbers than myself.