The
Illiterate Digest

BY

WILL ROGERS

ALBERT & CHARLES BONI

NEW YORK 1924

Copyright, 1924, by Albert & Charles Boni

Copyright, 1923, 1924, by McNaught Syndicate, Inc.
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

TWO LETTERS AND A DEDICATION

Most Books have to have an Excuse by some one for the Author, but this is the only Book ever written that has to have an Alibi for the Title, too. About 4 years ago, out in California, I was writing sayings for the Screen and I called it the Illiterate Digest. Well one day up bobs the following letter from this N. Y. Lawyer. It and the answer are absolutely just as they were exchanged at that time.

WILLIAM BEVERLY WINSLOW LAWYER

55 Liberty Street,
New York, N. Y.

Nov. 5th, 1920.

Will Rogers, Esq.,
c/o Goldwyn Studios,
Culver City, Calif.

Dear Sir:—

My client, the Funk & Wagnalls Company, publishers of the “Literary Digest” have requested me to write to you in regard to your use of the phrase, “The Illiterate Digest,” as a title to a moving picture subject gotten up by you, the consequence of which may have escaped your consideration.

For more than two years past it (my client) has placed upon the moving picture screen a short reel subject carrying the title “Topics of the Day” selected from the Press of the World by “The Literary Digest.” This subject has achieved a wide popularity both because of the character and renown of “The Literary Digest” and through the expenditure of much time, effort and money by its owners in presenting the subject to the public. “The Literary Digest” is a publication nearly thirty years old, and from a small beginning has become probably the most influential weekly publication in the world. Its name and the phrase “Topics of the Day” are fully covered by usage as trademarks as well as by registration as such in the United States Patent Office.

During several months past your “title,” “The Illiterate Digest” has been repeatedly called to our attention and we are told that the prestige of “The Literary Digest” is being lowered by the subject matter of your film as well as by the title of your film because the public naturally confuse the two subjects. We are also told that exhibitors are being misled by the similarity of titles and that some of them install your subject in the expectation that they are securing “The Literary Digest Topics of the Day.”

It seems to me self-evident that your title would scarcely have been thought of or adopted had it not been for our magazine and for our film. If this were not the case the title which you use would be without significance to the general public.

I have advised the publishers that they may proceed against you through the Federal Trade Commission in Washington calling upon you to there defend yourself against the charge of “unfair competition,” because of your simulation of their title, or that they can proceed against you, the producers of your film, its distributors and exhibitors in court for an injunction restraining you from use of the title, “The Illiterate Digest.”

Before, however, instituting any proceedings in either direction they have suggested that I write directly to you to see if your sense of fairness will not cause you to voluntarily withdraw the use of the objectionable title.

Unless I hear favorably from you on or before the first of December, I shall conclude that you are not willing to accede to this suggestion and will take such steps as I may deem advisable.

Yours truly,

WBW/als

(signed) William Beverly Winslow.

Los Angeles, Cal.,
Nov. 15, 1920.

Mr Wm Beverly Winslow,
Dear Sir,

Your letter in regard to my competition with the Literary Digest received and I never felt as swelled up in my life, And am glad you wrote directly to me instead of communicating with my Lawyers, As I have not yet reached that stage of prominence where I was commiting unlawful acts and requireing a Lawyer, Now if the Literary Digest feels that the competition is to keen for them—to show you my good sportsmanship I will withdraw, In fact I had already quit as the gentlemen who put it out were behind in their payments and my humor kinder waned, in fact after a few weeks of no payments I couldent think of a single joke. And now I want to inform you truly that this is the first that I knew my Title of the Illiterate Digest was an infringement on yours as they mean the direct opposite, If a magazine was published called Yes and another Bird put one out called No I suppose he would be infringeing. But you are a Lawyer and its your business to change the meaning of words, so I lose before I start,

Now I have not written for these people in months and they havent put any gags out unless it is some of the old ones still playing. If they are using gags that I wrote on topical things 6 months ago then I must admit that they would be in competition with the ones the Literary Digest Screen uses now. I will gladly furnish you with their address, in case you want to enter suit, And as I have no Lawyer you can take my case too and whatever we get out of them we will split at the usual Lawyer rates of 80-20, the client of course getting the 20,

Now you inform your Editors at once that their most dangerous rival has withdrawn, and that they can go ahead and resume publication, But you inform Your clients that if they ever take up Rope Throwing or chewing gum that I will consider it a direct infringement of my rights and will protect it with one of the best Kosher Lawyers in Oklahoma,

Your letter to me telling me I was in competition with the Digest would be just like Harding writing to Cox and telling him he took some of his votes,

So long Beverly if you ever come to California, come out to Beverly where I live and see me

Illiterately yours
Will Rogers.

When I sent him my answer I read it to some of the Movie Company I was working with at the time and they kept asking me afterwards if I had received an answer. I did not, and I just thought, oh well, there I go and waste a letter on some High Brow Lawyer with no sense of humor. I was sore at myself for writing it. About 6 months later I came back to join the Follies and who should come to call on me but the nicest old Gentleman I had ever met, especially in the law profession. He was the one I had written the letter to, and he had had Photographic Copies made of my letter and had given them around to all his Lawyer friends.

So it is to him and his sense of humor, that I dedicate this Volume of deep thought. I might also state that the Literary Digest was broad-minded enough to realize that there was room for both, and I want to thank them for allowing me to announce my Illiteracy publicly.

CONTENTS

FOOTNOTES:

[A] With apologies to Arthur Brisbane.

ILLUSTRATIONS

INTRODUCTION

This book should have been long before now on the Bookshelves of every reader of worth while Literature in the English speaking World, in addition to being well worn in our best reference Libraries, and should have been already translated into every known and unknown tongue. What you will immediately ask delayed such an important event? Well the principal reason is it had not been written, and the next is We had no introduction for it. You let a Book go out without an Alibi by some other writer, and it is practically a commercial suicide. When the Publishers were all clamoring for a Book from me, and were practically annihilating (Boy there is a word I never used before in my life and I hope it fits in, I read it in some War Novel) each other for the Publishing rights and assured profits, they of course felt that through my wide Literary acquaintance, gained during years of association at the Democratic National Convention, and the late World Series with some of the best contemporary Writers of modern times, I should through my Literary standing and personal friendship, allow some of them to have the honor of penning the introduction to this Time Table of National Catastrophes.

William Emporia Allen White was my first thought, on account of his having a middle name, which always sounds Literary, even if its owner is not. Then I had heard he himself had written a Book once, and by now should know what Introductions should not be. Then he went home and announced himself as a Candidate for Governor. So that eliminated him from my thoughts. To have a big broad-minded book have any narrow Political endorsement would mean certain calamity among people who think. To run for Governor is bad enough, But to run for Governor of Kansas and then write an Introduction of my worthy efforts, would simply make the book a laughing stock.

Then my thoughts turned to Arthur Brisbane, I don’t know what I could have been eating that my thoughts should have done such a mental somersault. But I guess it was because I had known Arthur for years,—I knew him before William Randolph Hearst started working for him. I approached him on it, and he said, Sorry Will but what I write must point a moral, there must be a lesson in every paragraph; mine must not only be news but it must be instructive news. For instance, I read China will not go to war on rainy days. What does that bit of news mean to the individual that dont think? Nothing! What does it mean to me? It means that a Chinaman would rather get shot than wet. It points a moral to peace: Have all so-called civilized Nations stop wars on rainy days. Then hold all wars in Portland, Oregon where it rains every day, and you will eliminate Wars and have universal Peace.

So he could see no particular Moral in writing an Introduction to my book, unless it was that Books should not depend entirely on their introductions as they do now. So I next thought of my friend Irvin Cobb. I had set next to him at so many Speakers Tables, at banquets, and had always given him any little extras that I might not want. Ice Cream and Sweets and things like that he just loves and ruins them at a Banquet. Well he was going Duck shooting down in Louisiana and said he wouldn’t miss one Duck for the pleasure of writing the Introduction to the Encyclopedia Brittanica. So you just let the old fat thing try to get my Ice Cream at another Banquet.

Of course Ring Lardner was one of my very first thoughts, because I knew he could add the little touch of comedy that the book really needed. I went to him and told him that I only wanted something light and airy, maybe just one good joke would do the trick and take away from the serious nature of the Book. He is not only a Humorist but has got plenty money to show that he is. He said before he shook hands with me, What is there in it? I said well this is just a kind of an honorary thing, a kind of courtesy from one Author to another. He then asked me why should he give me a joke for nothing? He could put the joke into his Sunday Newspaper Article; then he could put the joke into his weekly Newspaper Cartoon; then he could sell it to a Musical Comedy and they would tell it so bad it would sound new. Then the Movies would buy it and make a drama out of it; then he would still hold the Phonograph, and broadcasting rights, and after it got well enough known write a Song around it. So he said I would be a fine egg to give you a joke for nothing.

I wish that Spaniard Ibanez, that wrote the 4 Horsemen was over here, I know him well, I had read 5 or 6 of his Books and I was to a big reception given to him in Los Angeles, and during our conversations through an Interpreter he learned I had read so many of his Books. No one else he met there even among the Literary ones had ever read any but the 4 Horsemen, So when he went home he sent me an Autographed Copy which read “To an American Cowboy, the only person in America I found who had read all my Books.” The funny thing about it is that he is the only Author I ever read. Now if he was here he would write me an Introduction, But of course it would be in Spanish and nobody could read it, so I would be just as bad off as I am now.

I also know Elinor Glyn, I met her when she was out in California looking around for some one to cast as Paul in “Three Weeks.” She sent for me but I had just started on another new Picture. She could have cooked me up a hot Introduction. She would have draped the first few paragraphs with Tiger skins, and described me in such a way that I would have really looked like something. So I just says to myself, why monkey with these writers, why not write my own Introduction? So here goes.

I have known Mr. Rogers for years and have long been familiar with his Literary masterpieces, both in Novels, and in Books of technical knowledge. I think there are few writers of Poetry or prose today who equal him, and I am certain he is surpassed by none.

I say this because I have lived and known the life he has pictured so well in this Book; I spent my late youth in these shaded oak lands where so many of his scenes are so pictorially laid, and he has made me live over again the scenes of my freshman manhood. No writer since the days of Remington can give you such a word picture of the west. That’s because he is a westerner himself, and has only an eye for the beautiful things as he and nature alone can describe them. He alone of all our modern writers knows the people of which they write. When he describes a Corset you can feel it pinch. If it’s a Sunrise he describes, you reach for an Umbrella. His jugglery of correct words and perfect English sentences is magical, and his spelling is almost uncanny.

The words, Illiterate Digest, which appear upon the title page of this book, has been generally compared to Don Quixote and to the Pickwick Papers, while E. M. Vogue places its author somewhere between Cervantes and LeSage. However, considerable the influence of Cervantes and Dickens may have been, the first in the matter of structure, the other in background, humor, and detail of characterization, the predominating and distinguishing quality of this Author’s work is undeniably foreign to both and quite peculiar to itself. Something that for want of a better term might be called the quality of American Soul, any reader familiar as I know you all to be with the works of Dostoieffsky, Turgenev, or even Tolstoi, will grasp the deeper meaning of a work like this. Some consider the Author a realist, who has drawn with meticulous detail a picture of contemporary life, others more observing see in him a great symbolist.

He always remembers that it is dangerous to jest with laughter. This man in writing this has done a service to all thinking mankind. It is a revelation, as an omen of a freer future. Belinsky, the great Russian Critic to whom Mr. Rogers had read the manuscript, said “it looked like another Ben Hur to him.”

So now Mr. Cobb, and Mr. Lardner, and all you introduction writers, what do I want with you? There is not a one of you could have said the things of me that I have said, because you Guys dont know what books to look in to get all that big league stuff out of,

Yours for Arts sake,
William Penn Adair Rogers

(boy that is my real name, let some Literary Guy
top that)

P. S. I got enough Introduction left over to write another Introduction if I had anything to write another book about.

BREAKING INTO THE WRITING GAME

YOU ARE GOING TO GET THE LOW-DOWN ON SOME OF THOSE BIRDS WHO ARE SENDING HOME THE RADISH-SEED.

BREAKING INTO THE WRITING GAME

Everybody is writing something nowadays. It used to be just the Literary or Newspaper men who were supposed to know what they were writing about that did all the writing. But nowadays all a man goes into office for is so he can try to find out something and then write it when he comes out.

Now being in Ziegfeld Follies for almost a solid year in New York has given me an inside track on some of our biggest men in this country who I meet nightly at the stage door.

So I am breaking out in a rash here. I will cite an example to prove to you what you are going to get. Not long ago there was a mess of Governors here from various Provinces. And a good friend of mine brought back to the stage and dressing room Governor Allen of Kansas. Well, I stood him in the wings and he was supposed to be looking at my act, but he wasn’t. He was watching what really is the Backbone of our Show. He anyway heard some of my Gags about our Government and all who are elected to help missrun it.

So at the finish of my act I dragged him out on the stage and introduced him to the audience. He made a mighty pretty little speech and said he enjoyed Will’s Impertinences, and got a big laugh on that. Said I was the only man in America who was able to tell the truth about our Men and Affairs.

When he finished I explained to the audience why I was able to tell the truth. It is because I have never mixed up in Politics. So you all are going from time to time to get the real Low Down on some of those Birds who are sending home the Radish Seed.

You know the more you read and observe about this Politics thing, you got to admit that each party is worse than the other. The one that’s out always looks the best. My only solution would be to keep ’em both out one term and hire my good friend Henry Ford to run the whole thing and give him a commission on what he saves us. Put his factory in with the government and instead of Seeds every spring mail out those Things of his.

Mail Newberry one every morning Special Delivery.

Speaking of Henry Ford, I see where Uncle Henry has a new Rule in force out in his Factory where they paste those Knick Knacks together. Every man working there has to have his breath smelled every morning. That, of course, seems like a pretty strict Rule to put in force in a So called Free Country, and it has come in for a lot of criticism in the papers, but the way I look at it, it is absolutely necessary. Should a man go to work in there who had had a few strong shots of some of our National Drinks of today, he would blow his breath on one of those FOB’S, and blow all the bolts right out of it.

Now Mr. Ford is a very smart man and in passing these rigid rules I bet you he knows where to stop. I bet you that he won’t instruct his Salesmen to be so strict with a Purchaser. In fact his salesmen smell of your breath when you come in to buy one and if it shows no signs of drink they don’t try to sell you. He is smart enough to know a sober man would never buy one. Mind you, all this smelling of breath is done, not on the Company’s time, but on the time of the Workers. Some men have to get up at 4 o’clock in the Morning to get their breath examined so they can get to work at 8. Imagine a line of 50 thousand all waiting to blow at a single individual TESTER! Think what he must be with all those Italian workmen passing by him. He is just 180 pounds of Garlic by night.

The University of Michigan is putting in a Chair in their Faculty devoted to the Art of Breath Detecting. But there is always a way to defeat any reform. Drinkers will learn to hold their breath like a Diver.

I tell you Folks, all Politics is Apple Sauce.

The President gave a Luncheon for the visiting Governors, where they discussed but didn’t TRY Prohibition.

It was the consensus of opinion of all their speeches that there was a lot of drinking going on and that if it wasn’t stopped by January that they would hold another meeting and try and get rid of some of the stuff.

Senator Curtis proposed a bill this week to stop Bootlegging in the Senate, making it unlawful for any member to be caught selling to another member while on Government property. While the bill was being read a Government employe fell just outside the Senate door and broke a Bottle of Pre-War Stuff (made just before last week’s Turkish War). Now they are carpeting all the halls with a heavy material so in case of a fall there will be no serious loss.

THEY ARE CARPETING ALL THE HALLS OF THE SENATE SO IN CASE OF A FALL THERE WILL BE NO SERIOUS LOSS.

Well, New Years is coming and I suppose we will have to hear and read all those big men’s New Year greetings, such men as Schwab and Gary and Rockefeller and all of them. Saying the same old Apple Sauce. That they are Optimistic of the coming year and everybody must put their shoulder to the wheel, and produce more and they predict a great year. Say, if we had those Birds’ Dough we could all be just as optimistic as they are. But it’s a good Joke and it’s got in the papers every year and I suppose always will.

Now the Ku Klux is coming into New York and kinder got it in for the Jewish People. Now they are wrong; I am against that. If the Jewish People here in New York City hadn’t jumped in and made themselves good fellows and helped us celebrate our Christmas, the thing would have fell flat. They sold us every Present.

The Ku Klux couldn’t get much of a footing here in New York. If there was some man they wanted to take out and Tar and Feather they wouldn’t know where he lived. People move so often here their own folks don’t know where they live.

And even if they found out the Elevator man in the Apartment wouldn’t let ’em up.

See where there is bills up in Congress now to change the Constitution all around, elect the President in a different way and have Congress meet at a different time. It seems the men who drew up this thing years ago didn’t know much and we are just now getting a bunch of real fellows who can take that old Parchment and fix it up like it should have been all these years. It seems it’s just been luck that’s got us by so far. Now when they get the Constitution all fixed up they are going to start in on the 10 Commandments, just as soon as they find somebody in Washington who has read them.

See where they are talking about another Conference over here. The Social Season in Washington must be lagging.

Well, I think they ought to have it. These Conferences don’t really do any harm and they give certain Delegates pleasure. Of course nothing they ever pass on is ever carried out. (Except in Greece, where they are all carried out.) But each Nation gets a certain amount of Publicity out of it, and us masses that read of it get a certain amount of amusement out of it.

Borah himself admits he don’t know what it’s for or what they should do. But it looks like a good Conference season and there is no reason why we shouldn’t get in on one.

BESIDES, DID YOU EVER REALIZE THIS COUNTRY IS 4 CONFERENCES BEHIND NOW?

I want to apologize and set my many readers straight as to why I am blossoming out as an infliction on you all.

It seems a prominent newspaper syndicate had Lloyd George signed up for a pack of his Memoirs. Well, after the late election Lloyd couldn’t seem to remember anything, so they sent for me to fill in the space where he would have had his junk.

You see, they wanted me in the first place, but George came along and offered to work cheaper, and also to give his to charity. That benevolence on his part was of course before England gave him his two weeks’ notice.

Now I am also not to be outdone by an ex-Prime Minister donating my receipts from my Prolific Tongue to a needy charity. The total share of this goes to the civilization of three young heathens, Rogers by name, and part Cherokee Indians by breeding.

Now, by wasting seven minutes, if you are a good reader—and ten to twelve if you read slow—on me, you are really doing a charitable act yourself by preventing these three miniature bandits from growing up in ignorance. So please help a man with not only one little Megan, but three little Megans.

A great many people may think that this is the first venture of such a conservative paper as the Illiterate Digest in using something of a semi-humorous nature, but that is by no means the case. I am following the Kaiser, who rewrote his life after it was too late. I realize what a tough job I have, succeeding a man who to be funny only had to relate the facts.

Please don’t consider these as my memoirs. I am not passing out of the picture, as men generally are who write those things.

SETTLING THE CORSET PROBLEM OF THIS COUNTRY

(An After Dinner speech made at a Banquet of the Corset Manufacturers of America at the Waldorf-Astoria, New York.)

SETTLING THE CORSET PROBLEM OF THIS COUNTRY

Since I last wrote you all there has been an awful lot of fashion Shows and all their By Products held here in New York. All the out of Town buyers from all over have been here. So, on behalf of New York City, I had to help welcome them at their various Banquets. There was the retail Milliners’ big fashion show at the Astor Ball Room where they showed 500 Hats and me. Some of the hats were just as funny looking as I was.

Well, I settled the Hat and Dress business to the satisfaction of everybody but the Milliners. So the next night at the Commodore Hotel I mingled with those Princes of Brigands, the Leather and Shoe men, and later I want to tell all you people just how they operate. For we never paid more for our Shoes and were nearer barefooted than we are today, so don’t think that I am bought off this week by those Pasteboard Highbinders: it’s only that I want to talk to the Ladies today.

During this reign of Indigestion I was called on to speak at a big Banquet at the Waldorf to the Corset Manufacturers. Now that only shows you what a degrading thing this after Dinner speaking is. I want to get out of it in a few weeks and back to the Movies.

This speaking calls on a fellow to learn something about articles that a self-respecting man has no business knowing about. So that’s why I am going to get away. If a Man is called on to tell in a Public Banquet room what he knows about Corsets, there is no telling what other Ladies’ wearing apparel he might be called on to discuss. So me back to the Morals of Hollywood before it’s too late.

I was, at that, mighty glad to appear at a dinner given by an essential Industry. Just imagine, if you can, if the flesh of this Country were allowed to wander around promiscuously! Why, there ain’t no telling where it would wind up. There has got to be a gathering or a get-together place for everything in this world, so, when our human Bodies get beyond our control, why we have to call on some mechanical force to help assemble them and bring back what might be called the semblance of a human frame.

These Corset Builders, while they might not do a whole lot to help civilization, are a tremendous aid to the Eyesight. They have got what you would call a Herculean task as they really have to improve on nature. The same problem confronts them that does the people that run the Subways in New York City. They both have to get so many pounds of human flesh into a given radius. The subway does it by having strong men to push and shove until they can just close the door with only the last man’s foot out. But the Corset Carpenters arrive at the same thing by a series of strings.

They have what is known as the Back Lace. This is known as a One Man Corset.

Now the Front Lace can be operated without a confederate. By judiciously holding your breath and with a conservative intake on the Diaphragm you arrange yourself inside this. Then you tie the strings to the door knob and slowly back away. When your speedometer says you have arrived at exactly 36, why, haul in your lines and tie off.

We have also the Side Lace that is made in case you are very fleshy, and need two accomplices to help you congregate yourself. You stand in the middle and they pull from both sides. This acts something in the nature of a vise. This style has been known to operate so successful that the victims’ buttons have popped off their shoes.

Of course, the fear of every fleshy Lady is the broken Corset String. I sat next to a catastrophe of this nature once. We didn’t know it at first, the deluge seemed so gradual, till finally the Gentleman on the opposite side of her and myself were gradually pushed off our Chairs. To show you what a wonderful thing this Corseting is, that Lady had come to the Dinner before the broken string episode in a small Roadster. She was delivered home in a Bus.

They have also worked out a second line of control, or a place to park an extra string on the back. You can change a string now while you wait, and they have demountable strings.

Now, of course, not as many women wear Corsets as used to but what they have lost in women they have made up with men. When corsets were a dollar a pair they used to be as alike as two Fords. A clerk just looked you over, decided on your circumference and wheel base and handed you out one. They come in long Boxes and you were in doubt at first if it was a Corset or a Casket.

Nowadays with the Wraparound and the Diaphragm-Control, and all those things a Corset Manufacturer uses more rubber than a Tire Co.

Imagine me being asked to talk at a Corset Dinner, anyway; Me, who has been six years with Ziegfeld Follies and not a Corset in the Show.

Men have gone down in History for shaping the destinies of Nations, but I tell you this set of Corset Architects shape the Destinies of Women and that is a lot more important than some of the shaping that has been done on a lot of Nations that I can name off hand. Another thing makes me so strong for them, if it wasn’t for the Corset Ads in Magazines men would never look at a Magazine.

HOW TO TELL A BUTLER, AND OTHER ETIQUETTE

AS I OPENED THE DOOR TO LET HER IN 2 OF OUR DOGS AND 4 CATS CAME IN

HOW TO TELL A BUTLER, AND OTHER ETIQUETTE

Somebody must have seen me out in Public; I think it was Emily Post, for she sent me a book on ETIQUETTE that she had written herself.

It has 700 pages in it. You wouldn’t think there was that much Etiquette, would you! Well, I hadn’t read far when I found that I was wrong on most every line of the whole Book.

Now, you wouldn’t think a Person could live under fairly civilized conditions (as I imagined I was doing) and be so dumb as to not have at least one of these forms of Etiquette right. Well, when I got through reading it, I felt like I had been a heathen all my life. But after I got to noticing other people I met I didn’t feel so bad. Some of them didn’t know much more about it than I did.

So I predict that her Book and all the other things you read now on Etiquette are going to fall on fertile soil. Now take, for instance, being introduced, or introducing someone; that is the first thing in the Book. I didn’t know up to then that inflection of the voice was such a big factor in introductions.

She says that the prominence of the party being introduced determines the sound of the voice, as she says for instance, “Are you there?” and then on finding out you are there she says, “Is it raining?”

Now the inflection that you use on asking any one if they are there, is the same inflection that you are to use on introducing Mr. Gothis, if he is the more prominent of the two. Then for the other person, who Mr. Gothis probably got his from, why, you use the “Is it raining?” inflection.

You see, a fellow has to know a whole lot more than you think he does before he can properly introduce people to each other. First he has to be up on his Dunn and Bradstreet to tell which of the two is the more prominent. Second, he has to be an Elocutionist so he will know just where to bestow the inflection.

Well, I studied on that introduction Chapter till I thought I had it down pat. So I finally got a chance to try it out. My wife had invited a few friends for Dinner, and as she hadn’t finished cooking it before they come, I had to meet them and introduce them to each other.

Well, I studied for half an hour before they come, trying to figure out which one was the most prominent so I could give her the “Are you there?” inflection. It was hard to figure out because any one of them couldn’t be very prominent and be coming to our House for Dinner. So I thought, well, I will just give them both the “Is it raining?” inflection.

Then I happened to remember that the Husband of one of them had just bought a Drug Store, so I figured that I better give her the benefit of the “Are you there?” inflection, for if Prohibition stays in effect it’s only a matter of days till her Husband will be prominent.

So, when they arrived I was remembering my opening Chapter of my Etiquette on Introductions. When the first one come I was all right; I didn’t have to introduce her to anyone. I just opened our front door in answer to the Bell which didn’t work. But I was peeping through the Curtains, and as I opened the door to let her in 2 of our Dogs and 4 Cats come in.

Well, while I was shooing them out, apologizing, and trying to make her believe it was unusual for them to do such a thing, now there I was! This Emily Post wrote 700 pages on Etiquette, but not a line on what to do in an emergency to remove Dogs and Cats and still be Nonchalant.

The second Lady arrived just as this Dog and Cat Pound of ours was emptying. She was the new Prescription Store Owner’s Wife and was to get the “Are you there?” inflection. Her name was (I will call her Smith, but that was not her name). She don’t want it to get out that she knows us.

Well, I had studied that Book thoroughly but those animals entering our Parlor had kinder upset me. So I said, “Mrs. Smith, Are you there? I want you to meet Mrs. Jones. Is it raining?”

Well, these Women looked at me like I was crazy. It was a silly thing to say. Mrs. Smith was there of course, or I couldn’t have introduced her, and asking Mrs. Jones if it was raining was most uncalled for, because I had just looked out myself and, besides, any one that ever lived in California knows it won’t rain again till next year.

But that didn’t discourage me. I kept right on learning and from now on I am just mangy with Etiquette.

Why, just the other day, I heard what I had always considered up to then a well behaved Woman, introduce one Gentleman friend to another and she said, “Allow me to present.”

Now anybody that’s ever read the first 5 lines in the book knows that the word Present is never used only on formal occasions. You should always say “May I introduce” on all informal occasions. There was a Woman who, to look at her, you would never have thought she could possibly be so rude and uncultured as to have made a mistake like that.

It just spoiled her for me. I don’t care how many nice things she may do in the future, she just don’t belong.

Rule 2, Chapter 5—: “No Gentleman under any circumstances chews Gum in Public.” Now that kinder knocked me for a Goal, for I had been Chewing Gum before some of the best families in this Country. But from now on it is out. I am going to live according to the Book.

Chapter 6—: “Gentleman should not walk along the Street with their Cane or Stick striking the picket fence. Such habits should be curbed in the nursery.”

Now that rule didn’t hit me so hard for I am not lame and I don’t carry a Cane yet, and furthermore, there is no Picket fences in California. If they had enough pickets to make a fence they would take them and build another Bungalow and rent it.

Outside of eating with a sharp knife, there is no rule in the Book that lays you liable to as much criticism as the following: “Whether in a private Car, a Taxi, or a carriage, a lady must never sit on a Gentleman’s left, because according to European Etiquette a Lady ‘on the left’ is no lady.”

I thought at first when I read that it was a misprint, and meant a Lady should never sit on a Gentleman’s Lap, instead of Left. But now I find that it really was Left. So I guess you can go ahead and sit on the lap. It don’t say not to. But don’t sit on his Left, or you can never hope to enter smart society.

Then it says “the Owner of the car should always occupy the right hand side of the rear seat.” No matter how many payments he has to make on it, that is considered his seat.

Chapter 7 is given over entirely to The Opera. What to wear, when to applaud—it tells everything but how to enjoy the thing. The fellow that figures out how to enjoy the Opera in a foreign tongue, without kidding himself or fourflushing, has a fortune in store for him.

BIRDS THAT NEVER CAN TELL THE SERVANTS FROM THE GUESTS.

Chapter 12 tells how the Butler should dress. You don’t know what a relief it was to me to find that news. I never had one, but if I do I will know what to costume him in.

The Book says: “At six o’clock the Butler puts on his dress Suit. The Butler’s suit differs from that of a Gentleman by having no braid on his trousers.”

Now all you Birds that never could tell the Servants from the Guests, except somebody called one of them a Butler and the other a Gentleman, you can’t tell them that way. More than likely the Butler is the Gentleman of the two.

But I can tell the Butler. He has no braid on his trousers.

Now, all I got to do is find out how to tell the Gentleman.

If you see people walking around looking down at your trousers, in the future, you will know they are looking to see if the braid is left off.

DEFENDING MY SOUP PLATE POSITION

I WOULD INVENT A TRIANGLE SHAPE SLIDE THAT COULD BE PUSHED UNDER THE PLATE

DEFENDING MY SOUP PLATE POSITION

A couple of weeks ago in my weekly Hamburger, I had the following, “If Mrs. J. W. Davis ever gets into the White House we will have a mistress to preside whom no titled European visitor can embarrass by doing the right thing first. She will never tip her Soup plate even if she can’t get it all.”

Now comes along an old friend of mine, Percy Hammond, a Theatrical Critic on a New York Paper (Pardon me, Percy, for having to tell them whom you are, but my readers are mostly provincial). He takes up a couple of columns, part of which follows:

“For years I have been tipping my Soup plate, but never until Mr. Rogers instructed me, did I know that I was performing a Social error. Consultation with the polished and urbane head waiters of the Middle West, where I spent my boyhood, taught me, I believed, to eat Soup. One wonders if Mr. Rogers has given as much thought to soup as he has to the Lariat. Perhaps he does not know, being recently from Oklahoma, that in many prominent eastern Dining rooms one may tip one’s Soup plate, without losing his social standing. I regard Mr. Rogers’ interference as prairie, impudent and unofficial. The Stewards of the Dutch Treat Club assure me that it is proper to tip one’s plate, provided (and here is the subtlety that escapes Mr. Rogers), provided that one tips one’s Soup plate from and not toward.

“Mr. Rogers might well observe the modesty in such matters that adorns Mr. Tom Mix his fellow ex-cowman. Mr. Mix, telling of a dinner given in his honor at the Hotel Astor, said, ‘I et for two hours and didn’t recognize a thing I et except an olive.’”

Them are Percy’s very words. Now Percy (you notice I call you Percy, because if I kept saying, “Mr. Hammond, Mr. Hammond,” all through my Article it might possibly appear too formal), Percy, I thought you were a Theatrical Critic. Now I find you are only a Soup Critic. Instead of going, as is customary, from soup to nuts, you have gone from Nuts to soup. Now, Percy, I have just read your Article on “my ignorance of Etiquette” (I don’t know if that Etiquette thing is spelled right, or not; if it is not it will give you a chance for another Article on my bad spelling). Now you do not have to write Articles on my lack of Etiquette, my ignorance, my bad English, or a thousand and one other defects. All the people that I ever met or any one who ever read one of my articles know that. That would be just like saying W. J. Bryan was in Politics just for Chatauqua Purposes. It’s too well known to even comment on. Besides, I admit it.

Percy, I am just an old country boy in a big town trying to get along. I have been eating Pretty regular, and the reason I have been is because I have stayed an old country boy. Now I wrote that Article, and technically I admit I may have been wrong, but the Newspapers paid me a lot of money for it, and I never had a complaint. And by the way, I will get the same this week for writing about you that I did about Soup. Now both Articles may be wrong, But if you can show me how I can get any more money by writing them right, why I will split with you.

Now you took my soup article apart to see what made it float. I will see if we can’t find some SMALL technicalities in your Literary Masterpiece. You say I came recently from Oklahoma, while You come from the Middle West and “by consultation with the Head Waiters have learned the proper way to eat soup.” I thought Oklahoma was in the Middle West. Your knowledge of Geography is worse than my Etiquette. You say you learned to eat Soup from a Head Waiter in the Middle West. Well, I admit my ignorance again; I never saw a head waiter eat Soup. Down in Oklahoma (probably near Siberia) where I come from, we wouldn’t let a head waiter eat at our Table, even if we had a head waiter, which we haven’t. If I remember right I think it was my Mother taught me what little she knew of how I should eat, because if we had had to wait until we sent and got a head waiter to show us, we would have all starved to death. If a head waiter taught you to eat soup, Percy, I suppose you were sent to Bordens to learn how to drink Milk.

Then you state, “The Stewards of the Dutch Treat Club assure me that it is proper to tip one’s plate.” Now if you had learned properly from the great social Head Waiters of the urbane Middle West, why did you have to consult the Stewards of the Dutch Treat Club? Could it be that after arriving in N. Y. you couldn’t rely on the information of the polished Head waiters of your phantom Middle West? Now I was in the Dutch Treat Club once, but just as a Guest of Honor at a Luncheon, and of course had no chance to get into any intimate conversations with the Stewards. At that time, the place did not impress me as being where one might learn the last word in Etiquette.

And as for your saying that “anything of subtlety would escape me,” that I also admit. I attribute it to my Dumbness. But as for me being too Dumb to get the idea of “the Soup plate being tipped away and not toward one,” that’s not Etiquette; that’s just Self Protection. As bad as you plate tippers want all you can get, you don’t want it in your lap. Custom makes manners, and while I know that it is permissible to tip plates, I still say that it is not a universal custom. Manners are nothing more than common sense, and a person has no more right to try and get every drop of soup out of his plate than he has to take a piece of bread and try and harvest all the Gravy in his plate. If you are that hungry, they ought to feed you out of a Nose Bag. So, “prairie impudence” or no “prairie impudence,” I claim there are lots of them that don’t do it, even if it is permissible (Head Waiters and Dutch Stewards to the contrary). It’s permissible to get drunk but we still have a few that don’t.

Now, Percy, suppose they all did as is permitted. Picture a big dinner with everybody with their soup plates all balanced up on edge, with one hand holding them up and the other hand with the spoon rounding up what little soup was left. They would resemble a lot of plate jugglers instead of Dinner Guests. Why if that was the universal custom, I would invent a triangle shape slide that could be pushed under the plate, so it would permit you to have one hand free, in case you were sitting next to your own wife, or if by chance you might want to use your napkin. According to your hungry plan, every Guest practically handcuffs himself during the latter end of the soup course. He is absolutely helpless. So don’t ask head waiters and stewards what to do, Percy, look around yourself. You will find hundreds of them that are satisfied with just what Soup they can get on the level. Why I bet you are a fellow Percy, if you took Castor Oil, you would want to lick the spoon.

You know, Percy, I might know more about Etiquette than you think I do. I wrote a review on Emily Post’s Book on Etiquette, and it was recopied in the Literary Digest (and by the way it did not mention the Digest’s name, and it is unusual for them to re-copy anything unless they are mentioned in the article). Now have you or any of your Mid-Western head waiters, or retinue of Stewards, ever been asked to write a criticism on such an authoritative work as that? So you see I am somewhat of a Critic myself. I am the Hammond of the etiquette Book business.

Another thing, Percy, I spoke of a particular case; I mentioned Mrs. Davis. Well, I happened to see the Lady in question eat soup, and she did not try and corral the whole output. She perhaps knew it was permissible, still, she did not seem eager to take advantage of it.

Now, you speak of my friend, Tom Mix, where he says, “he et two hours and did not recognize anything he et but an olive.” Now, that is bad Grammar, even I will admit, but it’s mighty good eating. Don’t you kinder envy him, that he has lived his life physically so that now he can eat for two hours. I bet you that you would trade your knowledge of the English language now for his constitution. Tipping that soup plate at all your meals for years is what put that front on you, Perc. Leave some, that’s why I am trying to prove to you it’s permissible to tip the plate, but it’s bad physically. The fact that Tom has done something to be given a dinner for, should make him immune from attacks from the Press Table.

Vice Dawes, the profanity end of Coolidge’s Campaign, just went through New York last week cussing everything, and everybody, a Hell’n Maria’ing all over the place. But he has other qualities to offset his cussing, so personally I don’t think this word, “et” on Mix’s part will seriously affect the drawing power of his pictures. You see, Percy, Tom said, “et,” but you know better than him what to say. Still, if a Western Picture was to be made to amuse the entire World, I would trust Tom’s judgment to yours. You know, Percy, everybody is ignorant, only on different subjects.

So, Perc, you string with the High Brows, but I am going to stick to the Low Brows, because I know I am at home with them. For remember, if it was not for us Low Brows, you high brows would have no one to discuss. But God love you, Percy, and if you ever want to leave them and come back to us where you started, we will all be glad to welcome you, even if you do feel like you are slumming. You must remember, Perc, that the question of the World today is, not how to eat soup, but how to get soup to eat.

HELPING THE GIRLS WITH THEIR INCOME TAXES

HELPING THE GIRLS WITH THEIR INCOME TAXES

Well, I haven’t had much time lately to dope out many new jokes. I have been helping the Girls in the Follies make out their Income Tax. A vital question come up, do Presents come under the heading of Salary? You know that’s a mighty big item with us. When I say Us, I don’t mean Me, as no one has given me anything yet, but I stick around in case a few crumbs drop.

I have been looking for a bribe from some of our prominent men to keep their name out of my act, but the only ones who even speak to me are the ones I mention. So I guess about the only way you can get a Man sore nowadays is to ignore him.

One Girl wanted to charge off Taxi Cab fares to and from the Theatre. I told her she couldn’t do that. She said, “Well, how am I to get there?” I said, “Well, as far as the Government is concerned, you can come on the Subway.” She said, “Oh! What is the Subway?”

Another Girl who has been with the various Follies for ten years wanted to know what She could charge off for Depreciation. And she was absolutely right because if, after being with them for that long, and you haven’t married at least one Millionaire, you certainly have a legitimate claim for Depreciation.

I reminded one of the Girls that she had neglected to include two of her Alimony allowances. She said, “Do I have to put them all in?” I said, “Why, certainly you do.” The Girl said, “Well, how did the Government keep track of them? I couldn’t.”

One Girl charged off a non-providing Husband under the heading of Bad Debts. We charged off all Cigarettes smoked in Public under the heading, Advertising.

One Sweetheart who paid for a Girl’s Dinner every night, went thoroughly broke in Wall Street by trying to corner Canned Tomatoes in the late Piggledy-Wiggledy uprising. We figured up what the dinners would be for the rest of the year and charged him off as a Total Loss.

And right here I want to say what an honest bunch these Girls are. They don’t want to beat the Government out of a thing. One Girl who had been away for a few weeks last winter to Palm Beach left a Husband in the good hands of her Girl Chum. When she returned the Girl Chum gave her a Two Thousand Dollar Bracelet. Now she wanted to include this Item in her Tax and we couldn’t figure out where to put it. Finally we decided it was Rents, so we put it in, “For Rent, of One Husband, two Thousand Dollars.”

Of course while the girls had these tremendous salaries I was able to help on account of my technical knowledge of them (as I dress with their Chauffeurs), and on account of my equal knowledge of making out an Income Tax, with any man in the World. As none of us know a thing about it.

Look what I saved them on Bathing Suits! I had them all claim they bought various Suits. And I defy even a Congressional Investigating Committee (and you certainly can’t pick any more useless Body of men than they are), I defy them to say that a Bathing Suit on a Beautiful Girl don’t come under the heading of Legitimate Advertising.

Now, as I say, these Girls all wanted to do what was right as they could afford to but this Income Tax has not acted that way with the Men. The Income Tax has made more Liars out of the American people than Golf has.

Even when you make one out on the level, you don’t know when it’s through if you are a Crook or a Martyr.

Of course, people are getting smarter nowadays; they are letting Lawyers, instead of their conscience, be their Guide.

There is some talk of lowering it, and they will have to. People are not making enough to pay it.

And, by the way, the only way they will ever stop Bootlegging, too, is to make them pay an Income Tax. (At present it is a Tax exempt Industry.) Income Tax has stopped every other Industry, so there is no reason why it won’t stop Bootlegging.

Of course, some of our more thrifty Girls have followed the example of their Male Tax Dodging friends and Incorporated (as the rate is lower on Corporations). Wall Street attended to that little matter when they were drawing the Tax Bill up in Washington.

These Girls had to do that, the same as men, to protect their Salaries. Of course, the big Gamble in buying into these Individual Corporations is the Lucky chance that she might make one or more wealthy marriages during the year. When of course, her being Incorporated, all she gets comes under the heading of Income, and you, as a Stockholder, get your Pro Rata Share. If she lands a big one you have struck Oil. Then, on the other hand, she may marry for love. In that case you have brought in a Duster.

For example, down on the Exchange you will find the Anastasia Reed, incorporated, along with General Motors and Blue Jay Corn Plasters. At the end of the year, the Stockholders, after adding up the Salary along with the accumulated Alimony, can either declare a dividend, or vote a Dinner and put the Undivided profits back into the growing Concern.

Now, I can’t tell you the name but I was lucky enough to land 5 shares just before a Blonde Corporation married a Multi-Millionaire who was over 70 years of age. Us Stockholders have figured out at our last meeting that if he dies when we think he will (and we have no reason to believe otherwise, unless the Poison acts as a Monkey Gland) why, just those 5 shares will make me independent for life.

I don’t want to use this space as an ad, but I have been able for a small monetary fee to tip off my friends just what stock to buy. You see I am in a position to judge as I watch who is in the front row every night and I can just tell when Mendelssohn’s Spring Song will start percolating for some particular Corporation. Now, at the present time, there is every night in the front row a Millionaire Oklahoma Oil Magnate and a Bootlegger, both angling for the same Corporation. If this Bootlegging person lands her, why her Stockholders are made for life, but if the Oil Magnate comes through (for sometimes these female Corporations are swayed by sentiment), why the stock won’t be worth within a thousand Percent of what it will be if the Bootheel Party lands.

Now, take me personally; this Income Tax thing don’t bother me at all. You are allowed 200 dollars for each Child, and my Children and my Income are just coming out even now.

THE GREATEST DOCUMENT IN AMERICAN LITERATURE

SONG WRITERS SHOULD BE SEGREGATED AND MADE TO SING THEIR SONGS TO EACH OTHER.

THE GREATEST DOCUMENT IN AMERICAN LITERATURE

The subject for this brainy Editorial is resolved that, “Is the Song Yes We Have no Bananas the greatest or the worst Song that America ever had?”

I have read quite a lot in the papers about the degeneration of America by falling for a thing like it. Some lay it to the effects of Prohibition, some say it is the after-effects of War, that it is liable to follow every big war. I see where some have written editorials on the Song claiming that things are always in an unsettled state the year before a Presidential Election. I claim it’s due to none of these causes at all; neither is it due to the French occupation of the Ruhr. I claim that it is the greatest document that has been penned in the entire History of American Literature.

And there is only one way to account for its popularity, and that is how you account for anything’s popularity, and that is because it has Merit. Real down to earth merit, more than anything written in the last decade. The World was just hungry for something good and when this Genius come along and got right down and wrote on a subject that every Human being is familiar with, and that was Vegetables, Bologna, Eggs and Bananas, why he simply hit us where we live. You know a War Song will only appeal to people that are interested in war, a Love Song to those who are in love, A Mammy Song to nobody at all, but when you get down and write of Cabbages, Potatoes, and Tomatoes, you just about hit on a Universal subject.

You see, we had been eating these things all our lives but no one had ever thought of paying homage to them in Words and Harmony. It opens up a new field for Song Writers. I look for an epidemic of Corned Beef, Liver and Bacon, Soup and Hash Songs to flood the Market. So more power to an originator. Did you ever stop to realize that that Song has attracted more attention than anything that has taken place in this Country since Valentino gave up the screen for a mud Face preparation?

Magnus Johnson of Wisconsin or Minnesota (they ought to put those States together; nobody can ever remember which one anything ever happens in, generally the same thing happens in both of them); well as I say, Magnus was unfortunate enough to be elected to the United States Senate at a time when Bananas was at its height. Ten thousand people can sing the song that dont know that Magnus can milk a Cow with one hand and broadcast a Political speech with the other. Millions can hum the Song that cant tell you what Lloyd George is sore at England about.

Hiram Johnson arrived from Europe a Presidential possibility, and spoke to 2 thousand people. The creator of Bananas to Music, penned one Gem of constructive thought, and spoke not to two thousand but to one hundred and ten million.

Then some Editorial Newspaper writer has the nerve to sneer at this marvelous Song, when perhaps his writings never cross the County line. Why, Italy has already made arrangements on account of his honoring their National Diet to place his name alongside of Michael Angelo, Garibaldi, and Louis Firpo. It is already bringing on International complications. England is sore because he didn’t say something about Tea and Cake.

If we had had a Man like that to write our National Anthem somebody could learn it. It wouldn’t take three wars to learn the words.

Mother has been done to death in Songs and not enough consideration shown her in real life. We thought when we sang about her we had paid her all the respect there was. I tell you, conditions were Just Ripe for a good fruit Song.

Geo. M. Cohan wore out more Flags than a war waving them to music. He transferred the Flag from Cloth to Paper, he made it a two verse and Chorus affair. Now George was original. He saw an idea; he knew that a big percentage of the American people had seen the flag, so that would give him a subject to write on that people knew about. But look what a Universal subject this Bird hit on. There are thousands of Foreigners landing here daily that know Spin-ISH and HON-ions, that dont know an American Flag from a Navajo Blanket.

Did you ever just dissect the Words to some of our so-called Popular Songs? One has the words “Its not raining Rain, its raining Violets.” Now can you imagine any more of a Cuckoo idea than that? You cant hardly raise the things, much less Rain em. Now which do we owe the most to, the Violet or the Banana? Even such a Genius as Geo. M. Cohan himself has a Song, “You remind me of my Mother when Mother was A Girl like you.” How can any man remember his Mother when she was a girl? Its a Physical impossibility. You would have had to be born almost simultaneously with your Mother.

Now on the other hand take the Banana Classic. “We just killed a Pony so try our Bologna, It’s flavored with Oats and Hay.” Now that’s not only good Poetry but his honesty should be rewarded. He is on the level, he is telling you just what you get. Then those History-making lines, “Our Hen Fruit have you tried em, real live Chickens inside em.” Now I think in the rhyming line that is a positive Gem, and will live when Gungha Din has lost his Hot Water Bottle. That shows originality. He is not just simply going along rhyming Girl and Pearl, Beauty and Cutey, Bees and Knees.

This Boy has got the stuff. Get this one and then read all through Shakespeare and see if he ever scrambled up a mess of words like these, “Try our Walnuts and Co- CO- Nuts, there aint many nuts like They.” Now just off-hand you would think that it is purely a commercial Song with no tinge of Sentiment, but dont you believe it. Read this: “And you can take home for the WIM-mens, nice juicy per-Sim-mons.” Now that shows thoughtfulness for the fair sex and also excellent judgment in the choice of a Delicacy. Then there is rhythm and harmony that would do credit to a Walt Whitman, so I defy you to show me a single song with so much downright merit to it as this has.

You know, it dont take much to rank a man away up if he is just lucky in coining the right words. Now take for instance Horace Greeley, I think it was, or was it W. G. McAdoo, who said “go West, young man.” Now that took no original thought at the time it was uttered. There was no other place for a man to go, still it has lived. Now you mean to tell me that a commonplace remark like that has the real backbone of this one: “Our Grapefruit I’ll bet you, Is not going to wet you, we drain them out every day.” Now which do you think it would take you the longest to think of, that or “Go West, Young Man.”

Some other fellow made himself by saying “War is Hell.” Now what was original about that? Anyone who had been in one could have told you that, and today he has one of the biggest Statues in New York. According to that, what should this Banana man get? He should be voted the Poet Lariet of America.

Now mind you, I am not upholding this man because I hold any briefs for the Songwriters. I think they are in a class with the After Dinner speakers. They should be like Vice used to be in some towns. They should be segregated off to themselves and not allowed to associate with people at all, and should be made to sing these songs to each other. That is the only way you will ever do away with the Song writing business.

Another thing that has made it bad is these People that used to send Scenarios to Moving Picture Studios, after getting them back have turned them into Songs. Its been a Godsend to the Picture business but a blow to the Music business. And those Mammy Songs—those writers should have all been banished to Siberia, and as they went through on their way to Siberia dont let them stop in Russia to see their Mammy. But when one does come along and display real talent as this one has proven, I think he should be encouraged. Some man said years ago that he “cared not who fought their Countries’ Wars as long as he could write their Songs.” But of the two our Songs have been the most devastating.

I understand this Boy was a Drummer in a Jazz Band before this World renown hit him. Now I personally have always considered the Drummer the best part of the Jazz Band. I think if all the members of a Jazz band played the Drums it would make better music. I would rather have been the Author of that Banana Masterpiece than the Author of the Constitution of the United States. No one has offered any amendments to it. Its the only thing ever written in America that we haven’t changed, most of them for the worst.

PROSPECTUS FOR “THE REMODELED CHEWING GUM CORPORATION”

WHY CAN’T I DO SOMETHING WITH SECOND-HAND GUM?

PROSPECTUS FOR “THE REMODELED CHEWING GUM CORPORATION”

Last week I made, on account of my Movie work, a trip to Catalina Island and along with the Glass bottom Boat I had pointed out to me the home of Mr. William Wrigley on the top of the highest mountain. He also owns the Island. We were not allowed to go nearer than the gate as the Guide said some other Tourist had carried away a Grand Piano, and he had gotten discouraged at having them around. Another tourist was caught right on the Lawn Chewing an opposition Brand of Gum. That is really the thing that gummed up the Tourist Parade.

Then I remembered having seen his wonderful building in Chicago, all, mind you, accumulated on Chewing Gum at a Cent a Chew. Now I felt rather hurt at not being allowed to at least walk through maybe the Kitchen, or the Cellar, because I know that I have contributed more to the Building of that Home than any one living. I have not only made Chewing Gum a pastime but I have made it an Art. I have brought it right out in Public and Chewed before some of the oldest Political Families of Massachusetts.

I have had Senator Lodge (who can take the poorest arguments in the World and dress them up in perfect English and sell them) after hearing my Act on the Stage, say: “William” (that’s English for Will), “William, I could not comprehend a Word of the Language you speak, but you do Masticate uncompromisingly excellent.”

This reception which I received at the Wrigley Home was so in contrast to the one which I received at Mr. Adolphus Busch’s in St. Louis. When he heard that one of his best Customers was at the outer Gate, Mr. Busch not only welcomed me, but sent me a fine German Police Dog to California, the stock of which had come direct from the Kaiser’s Kennels in Pottsdam. The Dog did wonderful until some one here by mistake gave him a drink of Half of One Percent Beer. He would have been six years old next May.

After looking on Mr. Wrigley’s home with much admiration and no little envy, the thought struck me: A man to succeed nowadays must have an Idea. Here I am, struggling along and wasting my time on trying to find something nice to say of our Public Men, when I should be doing Something with Dividends connected with it. So then the thought struck me: WHAT BECOMES OF ALL THE CHEWING GUM THAT IS USED IN THIS COUNTRY?

I just thought to myself, if Bill Wrigley can amass this colossal fortune, and pay the Manufacturing charges, why can’t I do something with Second-Hand Gum. I will have no expense, only the accumulation of the Gum after it is thoroughly masticated. Who would be the most beneficial to mankind, the man who invented Chewing Gum, or me who can find a use for it? Why, say, if I can take a wad of old Gum and graft it onto some other substance, I will be the modern Burbank. (With the ideas I have got for used Gum I may be honored by my Native State of Oklahoma by being made Governor, with the impeachment clause scratched out of the Contract.)

All Wrigley had was an Idea. He was the first man to discover that the American Jaws must wag. So why not give them something to wag against? That is, put in a kind of Shock Absorber.

If it wasn’t for Chewing Gum, Americans would wear their teeth off just hitting them against each other. Every Scientist has been figuring out who the different races descend from. I don’t know about the other Tribes, but I do know that the American Race descended from the Cow. And Wrigley was smart enough to furnish the Cud. He has made the whole World chew for Democracy.

That’s why this subject touches me so deeply. I have chewed more Gum than any living Man. My Act on the Stage depended on the grade of Gum I chewed. Lots of my readers have seen me and perhaps noted the poor quality of my jokes on that particular night. Now I was not personally responsible for that. I just happened to hit on a poor piece of Gum. One can’t always go by the brand. There just may be a poor stick of Gum in what otherwise may be a perfect package. It may look like the others on the outside but after you get warmed up on it, why, you will find that it has a flaw in it. And hence my act would suffer. I have always maintained that big Manufacturers of America’s greatest necessity should have a Taster—a man who personally tries every Piece of Gum put out.

Now lots of People don’t figure the lasting quality of Gum. Why, I have had Gum that wouldn’t last you over half a day, while there are others which are like Wine—they improve with Age.

I hit on a certain piece of Gum once, which I used to park on the Mirror of my dressing room after each show. Why, you don’t know what a pleasure it was to chew that Gum. It had a kick, or spring to it, that you don’t find once in a thousand Packages. I have always thought it must have been made for Wrigley himself.

And say, what jokes I thought of while chewing that Gum! Ziegfeld himself couldn’t understand what had put such life and Humor into my Work.

Then one night it was stolen, and another piece was substituted in its place, but the minute I started in to work on this other Piece I knew that someone had made a switch. I knew this was a Fake. I hadn’t been out on the Stage 3 minutes until half of the audience were asleep and the other half were hissing me. So I just want to say you can’t exercise too much care and judgment in the selection of your Gum, because if it acts that way with me in my work, it must do the same with others, only they have not made the study of it that I have.

Now you take Bryan. I lay his downfall to Gum. You put that man on good Gum and he will be parking it right under the White House Dinner Table.

Now, some Gum won’t stick easy. It’s hard to transfer from your hand to the Chair. Other kinds are heavy and pull hard. It’s almost impossible to remove them from Wood or Varnish without losing a certain amount of the Body of the Gum.

There is lots to be said for Gum. This pet Piece of mine I afterwards learned had been stolen by a Follies Show Girl, who two weeks later married an Oil Millionaire.

Gum is the only ingredient of our National Life of which no one knows how or of what it is made. We know that Sawdust makes our Breakfast food. We know that Tomato Cans constitute Ford Bodies. We know that old Second-hand Newspapers make our 15 dollar Shoes. We know that Cotton makes our All-Wool Suits. But no one knows yet what constitutes a mouthful of Chewing Gum.

But I claim if you can make it out of old Rubber Boots and Tires and every form of old junk, why can’t I, after reassembling it, put it back into these same Commodities? No one has found a substitute for Concrete. Why not Gum? Harden the surface so the Pedestrians would not vacate with your street. What could be better for a Dam for a River than old Chewing Gum? Put one Female College on the banks of the Grand Canyon, and they will Dam it up in 2 years, provided they use discretion in their parking.

Now, as for my plans of accumulation, put a Man at every Gum selling place. The minute a Customer buys, he follows him. He don’t have to watch where he throws it when through; all he has to do is to follow. He will step on it sooner or later no matter where they throw it.

When he feels it, he immediately cuts off the part of the shoe where it is stuck on, so he can save the entire piece. Then he goes back and awaits another buyer.

I have gone into the matter so thoroughly that I made a week’s test at a friend of mine’s Theatre. At one of Mr. Sid Grauman’s Movie Theatres here, I gathered gum for one week and kept account of the intake every day. My statistics have proven that every Seat in every Movie Theatre will yield a half Pint of Gum every 2 days, some only just slightly used.

Now that gives us an average of a Pint and a Half every six days, not counting Sunday where the Pro Rata really increases. Now figure the seating capacity of the Theatre and you arrive at just what our Proposition will yield in a good solid commodity.

Of course, this thing is too big for me to handle personally. I can, myself, disrobe, after every Show, one Theatre and perhaps a Church on Sunday. But to make it National I have to form it into a Trust. We will call it the “Remodeled Chewing Gum Corporation.”

Don’t call it Second Hand; there is no Dignity in that name. If we say “remodeled” why every Bird in America falls for that.

Of course, it is my idea ultimately after we have assembled more than we can use for Concrete and Tires and Rubber Boots to get a Press of some kind and mash it up in different and odd shapes.

(You know there is nothing that takes at a Dinner like some Popular Juice Flavor to our Remodeled and overhauled Product. I would suggest Wood Alcohol. That would combine two Industries into one.)

I want to put flavors in there where we can take some of this colossal trade away from these Plutocratic Top Booted Gentlemen. If we can get just enough of this Wood Alcohol into our reassembled Gum to make them feel it and still not totally destroy our Customer we will have improved on the Modern Bootlegger as he can only sell to the same man once.

Now, Gentlemen and Ladies, you have my proposition. Get in early on, “Old Gum made as good as New.” Think of the different brands that would be popular, “Peruna Flavor Gum,” “Jamaica Ginger Gum,” “Glover’s Mange Gum,” “Lysol Gum.”

It looks like a great proposition to me. It will be the only Industry in the World where all we have to do is to just pick it up, already made, and flavor it.

I am going to put this thing up to my friend, Henry Ford. Think, with no overhead, how he could keep the Cost down. It’s a better proposition than being President.

INSIDE STUFF ON THE TOTAL ECLIPSE

THE MORE GLASSES YOU USED THE MORE ECLIPSE YOU COULD SEE.

INSIDE STUFF ON THE TOTAL ECLIPSE

Well, I have just this minute returned from Tia Juana, Mexico, where I along with some thousands of other Scientists went to observe the Total Eclipse. That is that was their excuse for going. You know it don’t take much excuse to get a man, or Woman either, to go to Mexico nowadays. So when the Scientists said that Los Angeles was only to get a 99 percent Eclipse, (That is about the only thing I ever knew Los Angeles to fall down on. They are generally 100 percent) it kinder hurt their pride. It was the first time that Nature had ever handed them a mere 99.

I don’t really think they would have ever gotten over it but San Francisco only received some 85 or 90 percent so that kinder salved things over.

But the Chamber of Commerce has held a meeting and voted Resolutions to apply for the next Eclipse in its entirety. They claim that it was due to the Club not giving the matter more thought that they lost the One Percent on this one.

Well, the Scientist Road Map showed that Catilina Island and San Diego and Tia Juana, were right in the path of total blackness. Everybody that could get out of a Cafeteria line in time to make the trip started for one of these places. Catilina Island offered wonderful possibilities. You could get two rounds of Seasickness, see the Eclipse and get your Chewing Gum at cost—all in one day’s pleasure.

San Diego is a Town built in the most South Westerly part of the United States where Americans who are coming out of Mexico sober up, before being able to go to their various homes, and it is really remarkable what a thriving Town it is. You would be surprised at the business they do.

There are nice Hotels there with Ice Water in every room, and even Banks where you can draw Drafts on your Home Bank after a Day in Mexico at the Tables (as they say in Monte Carlo books). San Diego catches very few going down into Mexico, (only the Punctures) as most People are in a great hurry to get there, once you begin to reach this Oasis.

So you see it didn’t take much decision on my part to decide that if I, along with the other Scientists who were to write on this Traffic accident in the Skies, wanted to pick out an observatory there was no particular reason why we should select a Dry one.

Well, my friend Mr. Henry Ford may or may not ever be President, but I want to publicly say this to him, that the people he sells his Cars to are of a very high type of intelligence. I never saw so many owners of one make of car so interested in Astronomy in my life. There were not only Autos of every make but people of every make, jammed two rows deep for 150 miles struggling to reach Tia Juana, Mexico FOR THE ECLIPSE.

You would see people going to Mexico to see this eclipse, who, if you looked at them, you wouldn’t think they knew when Sunday passed between Monday and Saturday, much less when the Moon passed between the Sun and Earth.

Now, as I say, we passed through some 70 miles of United States Territory that was to be blotted out totally, but there wasn’t an observatory in the entire region. Being my first year as a Journalist and this being my first assignment to cover a total Eclipse for the various papers who crave my Scientific knowledge, I am really ashamed to admit it, but, outside of not even knowing what an Eclipse was or when one was to happen, I had never even entered one of their Observatories where they watch these Eclipses; so it was with the greatest anxiety and enthusiasm that I dashed up to the Mexico line.

The Country to the south of us we have lately recognized. (The receipt for any other Nation that wants us to recognize them, is to strike Oil, or some other commodity that our Capitalists want.) But this editorial is not on our Foreign Relations. That I will take up in due time as we have some Foreign Relations. This is to be on the Planets, their various Routes, mode and speed of travel.

A great many Scientists, I had read in the papers, were bringing Cameras to Photograph this remarkable phenomenon. But most of the Scientists that I saw had Jugs and Flasks. Well, not being up on Science, I didn’t know what to bring. You know these Scientists are such a queer lot I wouldn’t be surprised at anything they do.

Well, I asked the Custom Inspector where the Observatory was. He said, “Which one?” I said, “Lick.” (That was the only one I had ever heard of.) He said, “Right over there is one, if it ain’t all Licked up.”

You never saw such an accommodating Country in the World. Just think the preparations they had gone through for the visiting Scientists’ Pleasure. They had built these Observatories all over the place right up to the line where you would lose no time. You could start observing the minute you got into the Country.

Now, there is apt to be among my readers some who are as ignorant as I was about the inside of an Observatory, so for their benefit I will explain just what it is like. On the left, as you enter, is a long Table affair, that runs the length of the room. It’s really higher than a Table, and back of it is a long Mirror where you get the reflections of any local Eclipses that might happen. Then on the bottom, outside this high counter, is a little low railing that Singers’ Midgets could look over if they wanted to see an Eclipse.

Now, up here in Los Angeles, they talked about smoked Glasses, but down there they just filled them and looked through them, and the more Glasses you used, and the more different kinds of glasses, why, the more Eclipse you could see. Some men would have to get the man to let them try a dozen different Glasses before they could get the right Focus.

Then, on the other side of the room, if you didn’t want to look through glasses upside down, why they had various other instruments of knowledge. One was a Table with little Cubes cut square (or apparently square) with Dots on them and the Scientist would shake them in his hand and lay down some Money, and then let them empty out his hand. Then another Scientist, even more of a Scientist, would pick up the money in one hand and the little squares in the other and hand the squares to another Scientist and put the money in his Pocket. Then the same operation would be gone through, till each Scientist, except the good one, would be Gone Through.

I asked a visiting Astronomy Professor what the idea was. He said, “You can see if you are right.” I says, “What has that got to do with the eclipse?” He says, “Why you bet on the passing.” So I bet him I would pass but I didn’t, so now I want the Scientist to figure out in what year I am going to pass.

By that time it was 12.50 P. M. so I come out of the Observatory as that was the time it was supposed to be Total, but there wasn’t a Soul on the Streets or outside any place. Everybody was on the inside looking at the Eclipse. It was pretty dark on the Street and a Mexican who lived in the edge of the Town started milking his Cow, and raising the mischief with his wife because she didn’t have his supper ready.

One fellow staggered out of an Observatory and I asked him if he had seen the Eclipse and he said, “Which one?” But it certainly was a success from a Scientific point of view, for away along in the evening after it had gotten light, I saw Astronomers piled up in every Observatory just overcome by what the Scientists call the Corona, or after effects of an Eclipse.

Oh yes, the Mexicans also put on for the visiting Astrologers a Bull Fight. It was held at the lower end of the Town. You had to pass every Observatory in town before you reached the Bull Ring.

Well, I went down and there was lots of Natives but very few Americans. As I say, it was held at the wrong end of the Town for them to reach it. I guess it was the only Fight ever held during an Eclipse.

Can you imagine getting in a Pen with a Bull in the dark. I wouldn’t even get in with one in the light. Well, the Bulls turned out to be Steers. I guess on account of the Eclipse and the Condition the Americans would be in, the Mexicans figured they wouldn’t know the difference. They didn’t kill the Bulls, and the Bulls wasn’t lucky enough to do any damage themselves. As a strict Humane man I could see nothing to kick about, only from an audience’s standpoint.

So I left Tia Juana and come back to this side where everybody had looked at the Eclipse from out of doors, and they all seemed to be kinder disappointed. It didn’t do anything. You see from the amount of Press stuff written about it most people kinder thought it would do some tricks, maybe juggle or shimmy or something like that. It just passed—that’s all. I, personally, along with all the others couldn’t see anything so wonderful about it’s doing that. If the two planets hadn’t passed but had hit, that would have been something to see.

Of course, I will admit in this day of congested Traffic, for any two given objects to meet and pass without hitting is considered wonderful.

Everybody I talked with seemed to be unanimous that they would rather have seen the Dempsey and Firpo fight. So I guess that is why they only have Eclipses every 100 years so they won’t have to draw from the same crowd twice.

But no one who saw it from Mexico had any fault to find with it at all. If there is any great thing happening and you are not right sure you will enjoy it, why, go to Mexico and see it.

I tell you a thing looks different from a foreign country. I wish I could have seen the Democratic and Republican Conventions from Tia Juana.

The Eclipse was kinder overrated but I tell you Mexico ain’t.

IT’S TIME SOMEBODY SAID A WORD FOR CALIFORNIA

(A speech delivered impromptu at a Dinner to the Old Settlers of California. Mr. Rogers had another speech prepared but when he found everybody boosting California he changed his speech.)

I JUST HAPPENED TO REMEMBER THAT NO ONE HAD SAID A WORD FOR CALIFORNIA.

IT’S TIME SOMEBODY SAID A WORD FOR CALIFORNIA

I attended a dinner the other morning given for the Old Settlers of California. No one was allowed to attend unless he had been in the State 2 and one-half years.

I was the last speaker on the Menu. They put me last, figuring everybody would either be asleep or gone by the time I began.

Well sir, do you know, by the time it got to me there was nothing left to talk on! But I just happened to notice that in all the other speeches no one had mentioned California, so as that was all I had left I just had to go ahead and do the best I could with California.

Now, it ain’t much of a speech but it is at least a novelty, because in all my time out here I had never heard the subject used before at any Dinners or Luncheons.

Mr. Toastmaster, Ladies and Gentlemen, and Members of the Old California Settlers Association: Your previous speakers have taken up so much time boosting and praising other States and their People that it is now most daylight, and I am at a loss to pick a subject, but at the last minute I just happened to remember that no one had said a word for California. So I will take up this very remote subject and see if I can’t do something to drag it out of the obscurity in which it has been placed here tonight.

Being one of your old Timers (I have been a resident of this State now for nearly 4 years; there is only one other older member in the organization) I want to say right here that you often hear it said, “What is the matter with California?” Well, I will tell you what is the matter—it’s MODESTY, that’s what it is, too much MODESTY.

If we got out and blew our own Horns and Advertised and boosted our State like Delaware, and Rhode Island have, we wouldn’t be so little heard of. So, whether you like it or not fellow Statesmen, I for one am going to throw Modesty to the winds and just tell the World off-hand a few of the things that we have got out here.

Now, just picking subjects at random, what do you suppose we could do if we wanted to say something about CLIMATE? Why, that item alone would draw people here. But what do we do? We just set here and say nothing. We go out of the State and we are so darn generous that all we do is brag on the place where we are. We never think of handing our own State a little free advertising.

But you take, as I say, a fellow from Delaware, and he is preaching Delaware and all its advantages from the time you meet him till you leave him, and by golly, it pays to do that. Look at Delaware today! So never mind this old good fellow spirit of giving the other fellow the best of it. I believe in throwing in a little boost for the old Native Heath.

Now I know you other members don’t agree with me and think that we should think of our proud traditions and not stoop so low as to have to advertise but I tell you that this day and time is a commercial Age, and we have got to throw our Pride away and let the World know just what we have here.

There is no reason why other People from neighboring States shouldn’t know of our Climate. Why keep it hid? It’s here. We got it. They can’t take it away with them.

Of course, I will admit that we have done a little good in a small way with Picture Post Cards. Five years ago Iowa was a prosperous and satisfied State. They had no idea of leaving. They had shoveled snow for 5 months every year and figured they would always shovel snow 5 months every year. But finally one day a Twenty Dollar Bill come into the State and a Farmer wanted to get change for it, so he started out trying to get it changed and wound up in Long Beach, California.

A fellow selling Roses in January changed it for him, and when the Farmer pulled off his Mittens to count the change he found that it was warm and he didn’t have to put the mittens back on again. That made quite a hit with him and he decided to stay awhile. So he sent a Picture Post Card back with the Picture of a Man Picking Oranges off the trees in January, and told them how fine it was and everybody that read the Post Card, including the Postmaster come on out.

So when they came they sent back Picture Post Cards to all their Friends who liked Oranges, and in time they came too, and so on, each newcomer bringing out just as many more as he could afford Post Cards. Now in the short space of 5 years look what has happened. The whole of the State of Iowa is here. The only ones left back there are the ones who can’t read the Post Cards, or People who don’t care for Oranges, and now I see where they have put in Schools to teach those others to read so that means we will eventually have them all, with the exception of the ones who don’t like Oranges.