Wichita eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1886-1890, 1888-05-06
A MODEST FUNNY MAN.
HOW A HUMORIST CLIMBED TO
AN EMINENT PLACE.

Country Boys Who Have Become Fa.
NOUS in Observation-Disclosures BUSH
ness Men Who First Saw Daylight in
the Rural Districts-A Long List.
| Whoever reads about funny man sus-
poets fun in what he is reading, but no fun
is intended when I say that Nye is modest
He is almost painfully so. He is himself the
last person he ever talks about-the last
minds of most men present on the evening
when he was introduced TO the guild he has
himself distinguished, to regard him as in
teresting because he is an outsider come to
New York. Not only that, because he has
leaped from Wyoming territory over the
heads of SO many of US here and into salary
of 5000 year. That is the broad fact
about his life. The lesser details are known
to few. Born in New England he went west
while young, but, like the typical American,
was not SO much either an eastern or west
ern man, but that he could strongly identify
himself with other sections, as he did WITH
Asheville, N c. He is a lawyer, but discon-
nected newspaper work was his main
reliance until one day be ceased serious
writing, discovered his own humorous
vein, founded paper in Laramie City, Wy,
T., named it The Boomerang, after mule
that he owned, and saw it fail for lack OF
subscribers, while every newspaper Office in
the country priced it and riddled it with
shears Then he had an offer of the position
he now occupies, and his success e1cites re-
mark among his co-laborers because, as they
say, ''he is a country boy who has climbed to
eminence over the shoulders of the New
Workers.
Was there ever such nonsense unpublished?
The very men who have made this remark
to me are countryrnen born and reared In
that room, listening to Nye, there was only
one born New Yorker-himself a curiosity in
the profession on that account. In the little
circle that Nye joined on that night are the
managing editors of six daily newspapers,
and not one of them is a New Yorker. There
were leader writers, critics. city editors and
reporters, and only ono New Yorker. Was
there ever such a thing heard of? New York
is instructed, entertained, advised and in
formed by countrymen manning every one
Of its newspapers.
And pray tell me in what walk Of life in
Gotham would Bill Nye be any moro of an
exception to tie rule than he is in journal
sim! Wall street, ruled by Gould, who came
with headful of hayseed grown UP the
Hudson; or S. Y. White, who is as country
looking today as the obelisk in the park and
who halls from a farm; or Cyrus W. Field,
Of the little hamlet Of Stockbridge, Mass.
Would Bill Nye have broken the rule had he
come here to practice law with Roscoe Conk-
ling, of Utica, who was rank provincial in
dress, habits and manners when he started
anew at middle age in this city few years
ago, with Joseph q. Choate, who was coull-
try boy with Ehhu Root, who halls from the
Adirondack region, or William F. Howe,
the English immigrant, or ninety-nine in O
hundred other lawyerss Would Edgar VIII
son Nye be a rarity if he had come here
clergyman with North Of Ireland JON Hall,
Western DR.. Collyer and all the others,
among whom only two that | know OF are
city men! Here and there you viii find in
the roll of city doctors the born New York
son OF dead and gone New Yorker, Inherit
ing the fathers business, but the leading doc
tors and the mass of doctors are off the farms
of the country. And pray where is it not
the same, from our country born mayor to
the last fguranGe in the last Inns. of girls in
Rice's Burlesque company.
Our best policeman, Alex Williams, is
Nova Scotian; our pet and pride. Chauncey
Mitchell Depew ran barefooted over the rocks
of Westchester as boy; our Harry Hill was
e country pumpkin in England once; our
Morosini, whom the boys nTeverently call
''the macaroni millionaire" was a country
boy in Italy, and Russell Sage would not get
over being country" or swapping horses or
wearing boots if he lived thousand years
Erastus Wiman was born in Toronto, SO that
be is not a countryman, but neither is he a
New Yorker. 1t is the same in the art world
The only New York born artist that know
of is Charles j. Taylor, of Puck. In politics
there are several New Workers, though they
form only drop in the buchetful of country
men who rule this town.
But to turn the subject and view it FROM
the other side, let us see whether any New
Workers occur to the mind as having fame
sufficient to rank them in importance with
the country boys who are forever pouring
into town and shouldering every one before
them and out of their way2 Yes, there is
Theodore Roosevelt and Henry Bergh and
Berry Wall, the ex-monarch of dude
dom; and William Waldorf Astor,
and, / think, Judge Hilton, the heir of A. 7.
Stewart, and James Gordon Bennett, Tony
Pastor, Pierre Lorillard and Edward Harri-
gan. OF those who were born here and are
quite famous in town there are many of the
heirs Of old established business houses,
among which Dir. Bennett and Mr. Lorillard
belong, as do the Appletons and Harpers;
but though their establishments are famous
abroad in the land the individuals are mainly
unknown outside the city. II you include
the knickerbockers and other landed fami-
lies of long established residence here YOU
will add possibly 1900 men, women and chill
dren TO the list, though not all the Knicker
bockers tby which is meant descendants of
the Dutch are city folks. Every one OF the
Vanderbilts of the first, second and third
generations, dating forward from the old
commodore, was born a countryman and
farmers. son.-JuAan Ralphs New York
Letter.