Tricking somebody into doing something for your benefit is a tricky proposition. It may be a way to get what you want, but it comes at the expense of integrity and, in some cases, legal jeopardy. This all gets even worse when such underhandedness occurs between a married couple. Chicagoan Mathias Blau found that out the hard way almost a century ago when he had to answer to a judge and pay the price for bamboozling his wife. In 1928, Blau’s wife Helen was having some problems with her teeth, so he convinced her that the best course of action would be to have them all pulled. The suffering woman went to the dentist and had all her teeth pulled. She then began a period of convalescence, waiting for her gums to heal before having dentures made. During that time, she could eat nothing but soup. Her husband came to enjoy the savings he noticed in their food bill, so he tried to make it a permanent arrangement by refusing to pay for his wife to get a set of dentures. Unhappy at the prospect of having no teeth for the rest of her life, Helen took the only reasonable course of action available to her — she took her husband to court. Instead of congratulating Blau on his frugality, the presiding magistrate, Judge Jonas, was outraged over the cruel way the poor woman was being treated. Telling the cheap husband that his trick was "the meanest I've ever heard of,” he found in favor of Helen with extreme prejudice. Not only was Helen awarded two sets of dentures, it was also deemed that the devious husband had to give her at least one steak a week for dinner to make sure she had something good to chew on once her teeth were in place. It’s unknown if the couple remained together after the horrible trick and the adjudication of their case. However, if they did stay together it appears that Helen did so with a new set of teeth and a regular steak dinner.
