Grayson County TXGenWeb

The Sunday Gazetteer
Sunday, June 22, 1890
pg. 4

EMBRACED ETERNITY
Ben Hassberg Makes His Quietus WIth a Dose of Morphine

The sensational ending of the life of Ben Hassberg has been the all absorbing topic for the past three days. The question "why did he do it? has been asked and reiterated ten thousand times, and has elicited in every instance the same resply "no one knows."
Hassberg locked up his store at No. 324 Main street about 9:30 o'clock Wednesday night and in company with several friends started for home. He seemed in his usual spirits, but laboring under a suppressed excitement, and on the way up the street remarked that if he should die he supposed the world would move on pretty much the same as ever, and that "when he died he wanted the band to march at the head of his funeral procession." This off hand way of talking was however characteristic of the man and nothing was thought of it. On arriving at his home, corner of Sears street and Austin avenue he kissed his two children, bade them good-by, told his wife that she would not be bothered with him long and went to bed.
It seems to have been Mrs. Hassberg's impression that her husband had been drinking for she paid no attention to his condition until about 12 o'clock when in an effort to get himself a drink he fell on the floor, arousing her. The alarm was at once given and Dr. DeBow sent for. He was joined later by Drs. Booth, Field and Bailey who entered with him upon the work of resuscitation but without effect. The desperate man had taken the surest plan of self-destruction by narcotic means - that of taking the drug in small quantities. He had started early in the evening with small doses of morphine and long before he lay down for the night enough of the drug had passed into the circulation to render death sure. Despite all the antidotes given and all the mechanical expedients resorted to, he continued to sleep heavily and long ere he passed away. It was known that he could not live. About a half hour before he died he was aroused to consciousness by whiskey hypodermically administed and on being questioned by Dr. DeBow if he knew him, said "yes" and spoke his name. In answer to similar questions he named Mr. L. Eppstein and Alex Rennie, but further attempts to have him talk were unsuccessful and he relapsed into his former stupor from which after a few minutes death relieved him.
The report published in one of the evening papers that he left an antemortem written statement with Mr. L. Eppstein was not correct. He left no explanation writte or verbal and exactly what led him to prefer death by his own hand to existence, will probably always be a mystery. He was the possessor of a business that must have been fairly profitable, a comfortable and even luxurous home, the husband of a wife who gave him her undivide regard, the father of two unusually handsome and interesting children, surely here was much to live for and yet he chose to die, and with will as firm and methods as precise as ever marked his conduct in the most common place business transaction he set about, accomplished his end.
Ben Hassberg had been a resident of Denison for nearly 13 years, during which time he was constantly identified with the business interests of the city. He was in the early days a merchant on his own account, as a member of the dry goods firm Hassberg & Goldsoll, but it was as manager of Jacob's Bazar - a position he held for many years - that he was best known. Last spring he opened a gents furnishing and custom clothing store in the Albany block, and being popular with a numerous class of the trading public, he is believed to have been doing well. He is known, however, to have been a pretty hard drinker, and it is said gambled heavily, and not unlikely these practices had their effect in bringing about his unhappy end. He had his vices and his faults, but he had many qualities that commended him to the liking of his fellow-men. He was courteous and affable in his dealing with everybody, frank and unassuming in manner, outspoken in speech, and liberal to a fault in profession and deed. He spent with a royal recklessness what he had to-day, and with implicit confidence in the future, trusted in the chapter of accidents to bring him more. An intimate acquaintance said of him Thursday that $10,000 a year would have been none too much to keep him and the desire for a high pressure existence which he constantly displayed would indicate this statement to be but little of an exaggeration.
Hassberg was a member of the Masonic fraternity and of the Knights of Pythias, and it will be under the auspices of these societies that the funeral will take place to-day (Sunday) at 9 a.m. The interement will be at the Hebrew cemetery in this city. It is known that the deceased had his life insured though for what amount has not been learned, the policies being in the safe which has not yet been opened.