The Carbon advocate. [volume] (Lehighton, Pa.) 1872-1924, 1891-01-31
1ho Original 6ioThatIoR IalRs.

Col. Joe Mulhatton, Of Kentucky,
the biggest liar in the United States,
if not in the universe, has been a
drummer for a long time. He has
been liar for twenty years or more,
according to the story he told a re-
porter of the Times yesterday:
81 am not liar by nature" said
Col. Mulhatton; l make a business
of it for amusement. | told my first
big lie for a Louisville newspaper
twenty years ago. l told of a score
of mummies that were discovered in
a wonderful cave in Pike county, KY.
Each mummy was eighteen feet long
and had red hair all over his body.
The cave was three miles long and a
mile wide, with a very small and
almost impossible entrance. One
chamber was lined with the richest
gold and quartz, and in another
diamonds and rubies sparkled like the
stars in the armament People
hocked to PiSesville by the hundreds,
and town lots were selling out near
White Post, in the northern end Of the
county, at S100 foot. Every show
man in the country had agents in
Pike county, and old BaCnum himself
was down there trying to buy the cave.
Where I got real fame, however"
said the genial liar, strutting proudly
before the crowd that had gathered
about him and the newspaper man,
was in that meteor story. was
talking to Bill Eads, a Louisville
newspaper man, one time, and he
asked me to write him story. told
him l was out of ideas and couldn't
do it. Just that minute little meteor
shot across the blue dome of heaven
and it brought me an idea.
'Pll write you a story about
meteors, Bill 1 said, and 1 turned
right around and got to work. Well.
while Bill was talking to me of the
newspaper business and the last scooY
he missed, l wrote the story. The
meteor covered an acre of ground and
sunk about 100 feet. The people all
over Texas thought the end of crea-
tion had come. I located the thing
in Brown county, at Williams ranch,
near Brownwood, and worked in lot
of stuff about the fleeing populace anC
a sulphurous smell that prevaded the
atmosphere for miles. said that
that meteor sized and sizzled in the
damp ground and withered plantations
for acres and acres around, parching
the ground into friedrich for many
miles.
"Well, the story appeared in good
season and the Associated Press sent
the item out. In a week there were
more scientists and newspaper ulen or
their way to Texas than the boarding.
houses OF the State could accommo-
date. Some Of them got lost In the
mesquite brush and fed on the beans
for weeks, and some of them got dis
couraged looking for the meteor an6
bought a hundred acres of fve-cent
land and are living there yet, raising
mosquitoes, tarantulas, and chi ldren.
7 think it was the best thing for them
that ever happened. The London
Times, Paris Temps, Paris Gaulcis
Paris Petit Journal, Hong-Konc
Chow Chow, and the Volksblatt,
Perrin, all had men securing Texas for
that meteor. These poor fellows
were afraid to go back home without
the facts and some photographs, and
they just stayed here. The London
Times man is now running a saloon
at Cheyenne, the Temps man is a bar
her down on Delaware street, and the
Chow-Chow correspondent has a lam-
dry on Franklin avenue, St. Louis.
Pve lost track of the others."-Kansas
City Times.