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Orris Oliver Hewitt
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Director
of Niles Public Safety.
Orris Oliver Hewitt, born January 16, 1879 in Newton
Township, was the son of Levi and Anne Kistler.
He married Blanche M. Everitt on September 28, 1904.
For a time, Hewitt worked at a plant in Mineral Ridge, where he
had moved from Newton Township. He and his wife eventually moved
to Niles after he found a job with the Niles Forge & Manufacturing
Company. He and his family lived at 913 South and later at 135
Hartzell Avenue.
Hired first as a bookkeeper, he was elected a
member of the Board of Directors and secretary of the company
in 1905. The other members of the Board were: Frank C. Robbins,
President; George B. Robbins; William Herbert,
vice-president; H.J. Robbins, general manager and treasurer.
Active in civic affairs, Hewitt was selected
by the Democrat party in 1909 as their mayoral candidate. His
Republican counterpart, Charles Naylor, however won the
mayoral election. He was treasurer for the city of Niles for one
term in 1918 and served two terms as safety director under Mayor
Harvey C. Kistler. He also served in the county treasurer’s
office under William O. Williams for eight years. (Read
about the Mayors of Niles: nileshistoricalsociety.org/mayors.htm)
An active member of the First Presbyterian church,
he served as an elder and trustee for 40 years, was formerly superintendent
of the Sunday school and was elected ruling elder for life.
Mr. Hewitt was a member of Mahoning Lodge, F
&AM., No. 394 and attended Lordstown schools and Warren Business
College, he taught school at Lordstown for 10 years. He had been
employed at the Niles Forge Company for 25 years.
O O, as he was called, passed July 19, 1955. |
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Orris Oliver Hewitt, born January 16,
1879 in Newton Township, was the son of Levi and Anne
Kistler. |

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He married Blanche M. Everitt on September
28, 1904. The couple first lived at 624 Robbins Avenue in Niles,
Ohio. |
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Hewitt was selected by the Democrat party in
1909 as their mayoral candidate. |

1909 city voting ballot for the Democrat, Republican
and Socialist candidates and their respective offices.
A male voter could cast a ballot for individuals
or a straight party ticket.
Right: Advertisement for Hewitt campaign for
City Treasurer. |
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Photograph of the Niles Police Dept.- about 1915.
Seated left to right - Officer Williams, Officer Link Rounds,
Mayor F.E. Bryan (1914-1916), unknown, Officer Fitzpatrick. Standing
left to right: Officer Richard Neiss, Officer Charles Mullens,
unknown, Officer Lally. Officer Charles Berline, unknown, unknown
and Officer Charles Nicholas. |
Waging
War on the Niles Underworld
As with the mayor before him, Charles Crow, bootlegging
and the rackets became one of the primary concerns of the newly
elected (1924) Niles Mayor, Harvey Kistler. He had selected
the right man to help him in his endeavor against crime. That
person was his cousin, Director of Public Safety O.O. Hewitt,
a no-nonsense individual who proved to be a courageous public
servant against the racketeers. Hewitt was of average build, but
his square jaw gave him the physical appearance of being a determined
and decisive individual. The soft-spoken Safety Director, who
was in his forties when he served in Kistler’s administration,
had been a farmer and teacher in Newton Township during his younger
years.
As Safety Director, Hewitt not only focused his
attention on crime in the streets, but ineptitude and corruption
within the police department as well. On two occasions soon after
taking office, the Kistler Administration proved that it meant
business. In late March, 1924, Officer William H. Mullens
was suspended from the force for sleeping at his post. He was
also charged with conduct unbecoming an officer and intoxication
while on duty. Two months later, Officer Joseph Mears
was fired by Police Chief Leonard Round for allegedly
reporting to duty in an intoxicated state. |
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Niles City Building on State Street,
erected in 1928, was partly funded by fines against bootleggers
levied by Mayor Harvey Kistler.
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While Mears never
appealed the Chief’s decision, Mullens retained lawyers
P.N. Fusco and R.H Patchin. The hearing was
held March 27, 1924 and the Civil Service Commission sided with
Mullens. Eighteen months later, Mullens lost his job when he again
was found to be intoxicated while on the job and this time the
Kistler administration documented their evidence and brought in
witnesses.
The vice raids against gambling and bootlegging
produced a steady source of income for the Mayor’s Court;
in July 1925 nearly $4,000 in fines and license fees was brought
into the city treasury. By 1928, enough money had been accumulated
to build the new City Building on West State Street which is the
current (2021) location of the Niles City Building. |
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Hewitt,
Kistler and Service Director J.H. Morall strengthened
their resolve to combat vice operations in the city. For their
efforts in trying to control these illegal and immoral activities,
however, these crime fighters paid a heavy price. In March 1924,
Chief Round’s home was bombed as a warning to back off the
raids.
Hewitt often conducted liquor and
gambling raids, not revealing his plans until the police officers
who accompanied him were enroute to their objective. On many of
these raids, Hewitt wielded an axe, which he used with devastating
effect on the speakeasy doors.
To the left is a scan of the letter
sent to O.O. Hewitt detailing corruption in the police department
ranks.
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Bombing of Hewitt family residence.
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On August 18, 1926, Hewitt and
his family nearly paid with their lives when a blast reverberated
through the night and left their home in shambles. The Safety
Director, his wife and two children, Lee and Ruth,
were asleep when the explosion occurred. Because the bomb had
been placed next to a brick pier which supported the porch,
the force of the blast was deflected outward, away from the
home. Thus no one was seriously injured.
The safety director’s unprecedented
policy of personally leading raids against city vice operations
may have been the reason for the destruction of his home. Other
bomb investigators believed the bombing had stemmed directly
from a large raid Hewitt had recently launched against a local
underworld figure in which an entire truckload of beer had been
confiscated and five men arrested. Whatever line of thought
existed, authorities interpreted the bombing of Hewitt’s
house as a warning that the vice raids must stop.
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Click on the links:
Harvey
Kistler oral history by Steve Papalas
O.O.
Hewitt oral history by Steve Papalas
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After the bombing,
the administration virtually declared war on the underworld; they
formulated a joint strategy for an all-out assault on the criminal
element in Niles enlisting Federal Prohibition agents, Immigration
Inspectors and any state agents needed to close down vice operations
and deport habitual offenders who did not have U.S. citizenship.
Although the Hewitts had escaped serious injury,
Hewitt’s wife had been so terrified by the bombing that
she found it uncomfortable to stay in the house at night and became
increasingly opposed to her husband’s continued participation
in the Kistler Administration. Eventually the Hewitt family moved
out of the neighborhood and the courageous safety director was
later destined to resign from city politics before the expiration
of his cousin’s term in office.
Those responsible for the bombing of the Hewitt
home soon realized that their warning for the service director
to stop further raids had backfired. Several residents held a
town meeting to demand a clean-up of the city’s criminal
element and set a reward fund for the arrest and prosecution of
the bombers and the Niles City Council hired a secret undercover
agent whose duty was to gather evidence against major underworld
elements.
Excerpts of Steve Papalas Oral History Project;
Harvey Kistler
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1925 lawsuit by police officer
Joseph Gerard against City of Niles and Safety Director, O.O.
Hewitt.

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