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Course. After an applicant is accepted, he goes to school for three months in Washington. There he is taught by Bureau oldsters the involved routine of "fishing," the Bureau's word for building a case. He is given courses in ballistics, fingerprinting, criminal psychology. He is taken to the "murder room," where a dummy named Oscar is sprawled amid a welter of clues, there tested for alertness of observation. Finally he goes down in the basement to the Bureau's rifle range, the last word in safety, convenience and noise-proofing, where he must qualify with rifle, revolver, tear-gas gun, shot gun, Thompson ("Tommy") sub-machinegun. If the candidate is satisfactory he is given a small gilt badge and a card signed by Director Hoover which will admit him to any place from a brothel to a debutante ball, and for $2,900 a year (which he may raise to $9,000) he goes out to face the hazards of his country's criminal enemies. Why? "I'm damned if I know,'' says J. Edgar Hoover. "Maybe it has something to do with the spirit of adventure."
That is just the beginning. If the man lacks efficiency or courage, his resignation is quickly requested. Fifteen have been dropped since Jan. 1. If he sticks, he must requalify with all weapons once a month, attend a monthly field office conference, go back to Washington once a year for a month's re-education.
Prints & Pet Names. When Director Hoover took over in 1924, Alphonse Bertillon and Sir Edward R. Henry might almost have never lived insofar as their systems of criminal identification were being put to national use in the U. S. Local police and prisons had photographs and fingerprints on file, but were slow to exchange them. The small Federal fingerprint file had just been transferred from Leavenworth to Washington. Under Director Hoover, more than 7,000 law-enforcement agencies now voluntarily augment the Bureau's 5,000,000-print file at Washington by some 3,000 prints and photographs a day.* In the U. S. the sender is notified within 48 hours if the printee has a previous criminal record with the Bureau. One out of four has.
There is also an immense file of personal appearance records of criminals. And on the theory that a crook may change his name ten times while the underworld still addresses him by one nickname, the Bureau has a huge collection of criminal sobriquets. The men attract such titles as "Ape," "High-pockets" or "Newark Kid." The women's pet names are usually unprintable.
Tires & Typewriters. In 1932 Director Hoover founded the Bureau's busy, spotless laboratories. Crimes are "signed" in many a way besides by fingerprints and handwriting.
To back up the men in the field the Bureau's laboratories supplement the identification department, keep on file a large collection of tire tread blueprints, typewriting specimens, bullets. The Bureau's scientists are on call 24 hours a day, free of charge, to any local police service in the land which needs expert advice or testimony on anything from a footprint to an inkstain.