The Atlantic

Sympathy for the Con Man

Confidence tricks have enjoyed a special place in American culture since the 1840s. But three TV shows suggest the image of the likable crook may be evolving.
Source: ABC

In New York City in 1849, a man named William Thompson stole a gold watch just by asking for it. Strolling down a busy Broadway, Thompson approached a stranger with a strange question: “Have you confidence in me to trust me with your watch until tomorrow?” Eager to prove his good faith, the stranger handed his watch over. Tomorrow came; Thompson did not. As far as street crimes go, it was a funny and largely forgettable one. Thompson himself has been largely forgotten, but he nonetheless retains the unique distinction of being the first so-called confidence man—named for “using the word confidence in his swindle,” as the scholar Johannes Dietrich Bergmann wrote in his landmark 1969 article on the origins of the phrase.

There’s a little of Thompson in every con man, whether real or fiction. Swindlers, grifters, and tricksters are everywhere in American literature and folklore, from Davy Crockett to the likes of Jay Gatsby and Augie March. Thompson himself was a probable inspiration for the inscrutable scammer in Herman Melville’s novel . Now, another cast of cons appears in , , and , all

You’re reading a preview, subscribe to read more.

More from The Atlantic

The Atlantic4 min read
Hayao Miyazaki’s Anti-war Fantasia
Once, in a windowless conference room, I got into an argument with a minor Japanese-government official about Hayao Miyazaki. This was in 2017, three years after the director had announced his latest retirement from filmmaking. His final project was
The Atlantic3 min readDiscrimination & Race Relations
The Legacy of Charles V. Hamilton and Black Power
This is an edition of Time-Travel Thursdays, a journey through The Atlantic’s archives to contextualize the present and surface delightful treasures. Sign up here. This week, The New York Times published news of the death of Charles V. Hamilton, the
The Atlantic6 min read
The Happy Way to Drop Your Grievances
Want to stay current with Arthur’s writing? Sign up to get an email every time a new column comes out. In 15th-century Germany, there was an expression for a chronic complainer: Greiner, Zanner, which can be translated as “whiner-grumbler.” It was no

Related Books & Audiobooks