Wendall Fletcher Dirst 1893-1950

Wendall Fletcher Dirst, the son of Charles Fletcher Dirst (1865-1926); the grandson of Fletcher Dirst (1835-1907); the great-grandson of John Dirst (1808-1888) who himself was the great-grandson of John Paul Derst (1713-1775), took his life tragically...

Note Explains Cashier's Act

Morris, Ill., (AP) ---- A smalltown bank cashier who killed himself 10 days ago and whose accounts later were discovered to be short $186,000 preferred death to a prison sentence.

The choice by the bank cashier, Wendell Dirst, 57, and the disclosure that he "lost most of the money at the tracks," were revealed in a note read at an inquest into his death Friday.

Dirst, cashier of the Farmers First National bank of nearby Minooka, killed himself with a shotgun on July 27 while alone in the bank. Four days later the Federal Deposit Insurance corporation in Washington said it had been advised of a shortage of approximately $186,000 at the bank.

The note left by Dirst to his wife, Jane, was read to a coroner's jury by Coroner W. Clark Davis. Dirst said he believed his family "would just as soon see me in the cemetery as the prison. It must be one or the other."

Dirst, who was one of the leading citizens of Minooka, a community of about 500 in Northeastern Illinois, disclosed in his note of placing horse rack bets with Chicago handbook operators.

"They were going to make a lot of money for me," the note said, "and I lost $25,000 there in the last three weeks, or rather they took it away from me.

"I have always gambled and for a long time made money, but this is the way it is ending."

The jury ruled "financial worries" led Dirst to kill himself.

Saturday, 5 AUG 1950 - Union Bulletin, Walla Walla, Washington