'May I Borrow Your Watch?': William Thompson, America's Original Confidence Man

Criminalia

Shondaland Audio and iHeartPodcasts

True Crime, Society & Culture

4.4 • 1.2K Ratings

🗓️ 31 January 2023

⏱️ 36 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

William Thompson certainly was not the first person involved in the con game. We can assume people have been tricking and cheating each other likely since there were people to trick and cheat. We really don’t know a whole lot about William’s life. He just sort of pops up in the historical record when he starts getting noticed around the streets of New York City -- which, as you might imagine, is not good for the con business. He may have been small time, but he was the guy responsible for helping coin the term, confidence man -- or con man.

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0:00.0	Hi guys, Katie Lowe's here. You might know me as Quinn Perkins on Scandal.
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1:03.9	My listeners want more so we are digging in,
1:06.8	comedian Amy Schumer. As far as cancel culture goes, I think that the people who are the most
1:11.8	afraid and complaining about cancel culture are the ones who are in danger of being canceled
1:16.3	and they need to take a look at themselves. I agree with you. You know, I'm not worried about it
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1:45.6	There's specific crimes may vary but con artists have this one thing in common,
	...

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