Little Falls transcript. [volume] (Little Falls, Morrison County, Minn.) 1876-1894, 1883-08-10
Pro sI b Gus PEN DRI YERs,
CONCERNING Noted stsmo1,gers Who sTsskle
the Taste Of. the Curious BY Furnish
ing the Gossip Of Gotham.
The Comfortable Incomes Earned by the Poet
=2 B. B. Of the sierras and the omnis.ent
&# 38s sH and Reminiscent Gath. IA
Also a Glimpse Of Genial Joe Howard. The Old
II s..5 but Neyer.Aging Nestor OF :
,* S#z55i $ Journalists

NEW York, peoial Correspondence, July 81.
| IL have already told you somsof the things I
know about Gotham and its newspapers, and
il You found those statements Interesting
perhaps yon would like to 80 into the question
q little further, and hear something Of the
and in some respeors curious body Of
men who furnish New York espondenoe to
newspapers printed in various parts Of the
country. There are good many men--and
women too-Who make a moro or
less snmptuous living in, this way, and there
are good many more who by means Of
metropolitan correspondence ada largely to in
comes gained in other directions Joaquin
MillerI George Alfred Townsend, Joe Howard,
old New York rockingham, Jennie June Croly,
Annie Wakeman Janet Glider, and a raft Of
others, make it their business to tell the count
less thousands out Of Gotham what is going on
here--and 8 good deal that isn't Some of
! these folks are worth writing about Some of
them are not Take the case Of man
like Miller-often1 an interesting writer
of prose, always an attractive talker
about the wild life Of the extreme West, Ger
tainly q poet by nature, and generally as full
Of eccentricity as d locomotive with wheel
of, Miller cats a striking figure wherever he
goes. His present occupation is the furnish
ing Of ton rural journals with q weekly letter
written In manifold. In addition to this he
turns up random poem now and then
and he makes in all about $1,000
a year. His letters bring him $40
apiece, so that for actually writing column
and half OF matter with manifold pencil,
| he receives the handsome sum of 800 week
which is.better pay IN comparison with the
actual work done than any other writer in
America receives believe the sierrau poet
has also had a hand recently in a new comedy
for Annie Pixley-a piece Of work in which he
went s'cahoots'' with Archie Gordon
who is one Of the cleverest and brightest
writer's in New York. Long ago Miller
ceased to receive royalties from the Danites
His contract called for nightly SUM until the
total Of $4,000 should be reached. He re-
ceived the final $500 two years ago, and has
never turned out another cohesive dramatic
work, though believe he is all the time doing
something in the dramatic line. Miner's long
hair Of former days has yielded to the persua-
sive shears Of the barber. and he is getting
to be slightly bald. But he wears his blonde
beard just the same, and has never fortaken
his slouched felt hat Miller has fine large
head and a game leg. He got his latter adorn-
m emf, ne says through the agency Of some
|
| fat in New York, his only attendant being a
colored boy who vainly tried to keep the place
in order, while Miller did the cooking, slept on
the floor rolled up in buffalo robe, broke the
necks from his bottles in preference to using a
corkscrew, and otherwise conducted his daily
life in a way vaguely reminiscent of his former
times on the border. The greatest mistake
Miller ever made was in not staying in London
the first time he went over. He was lion on
that side Of the water, where the
quaint freshness Of his poems struck
| forctbly upon tbs minds Of read
ers unaccustomed to his method. He came
back here, was considerably guyed, and
| for some years lived in more or less poverty
But there proved TO be more stuff III him than
he WAS given credit for, and he finally came
down to solid, hard work, after giving up the
silly notion that he had been intended by high
heaven to represent the great American nation
as minister to the court Of st. James. Miller
is pretty we'll fixed at present. and hardly
think he is likely to lose his head again He
| ia one Of those rarely found men who have
| lived down the aninlos1ties Of early life, and
whose excentrieities, il pronounced, are a. lesst
| innocent
GATH. 49,, 49,;
| Another sort of bird Is George Alfred
Townsend You know him, of course. He
! writes over the name of Cath, and he sings
personalities around him with free hand. In
consequence, he has made q great many enc
mics. What is more, Gath doesn't always mind
| what he says. OF course, he doesn't tell down.
| right whoppers you know, butsome Of bis truths
have an India rubber attachment, for tho sake of
convenience, that is exceptionally aggravating
at tinnes. Not long ago Cath went after
Joe Howard with some statements about
the latter's private relations, which were not
strictly governed by the facts Of the case. In
response to this, friend Of Towards inter-
viewed Gath according to tho rules Of the Bos-
ton prize ring In other words, Gath was
knocked out in one round. A sarcastic
journalist said to me that night, ''Townsend
won't fight He belongs to the ambulance
corps Of journalisn--goes around with a
Geneva cross On bis arm, picking up the
| wounded" Nevertheless, Townsend is an at
| tractive cuss. He writes more matter than
any other one man in America, and more Of it
is probably called untrue. But his work
has the merit Of undagging interest at all times,
and it helps the circulation of paper he
| writes for. I suppose no individual journalist
| in America is so much copied IS Townsend,
and few il any men get such good prices for
| their work. At the time Of the Chicago con-
| vention, for instance, he wrote page after page
| for the Cincinnati Enquirer and sold the same
| material to the Chicago Tribune. Each paper
paid him, $40 column, and he used to run as
| high IS nine or ten columns day. OF
| course, he did not do all the actual
writing himself. He Ind three or four
stenographers, and he has learned the difficult
task Of debating with rapidity and at the same
accomplished Few newspaper men who
dictate give their productions the same air Of
indi yiduality which ia possessed by the stuff
they turn out from the points Of their per-
sona1 pens. It is only when 9 man is better
.alker than writer that he is able to carry his
| individuality into dietssion. Townsend, how
ever, has got it down fine. One other
thing d about him Isl is his memory,
which, Is OF most extraordinary description in
| regard 10 its tenacity. He il acquainted with
pretty much everybody in the United States,
and never knew him TO forget either a face or
| the name Of a man at all prominent in politics
| or other branches of life, il he had once come
Id contact with him. In Chicago, Townsend
used TO drift around the hotel Hobbies and
| the outside edges of the conyen-
ton, stopping for a monent and chat
| ting with everybody be met who Was
| familiar to him, or exchanging . word here
and there with people he knew only BY reputa-
| ton. He never took note that saw during
the entire time, but he would sit down every
j now and then with his shcrth and men and load
/ them up one after the other with the material
/ gathered during the day He wrote but Little
! with his own hand. but the matter he turned
out was certainly Of q spicy and Interesting
character. ss "a n So Is: Ss=