The aegis & intelligencer. [volume] (Bel Air, Md.) 1864-1923, 1892-11-25
miscellaneous.
An IM4GINATIVER REPORTER.

Crowley was redheaded, freckled
faced lrishman. He had the greatest
Imagination that l ever knew of, and
could express himself fluently and
gracefully. He turned the quiet city
of Rochester upside down more than
once by his imaginary stories. He
worked along about 1880, perhaps a
little before. When he came to work he
wasput on the regular apprentice lines,
but soon showed that he was too good
a man to be kept clubbing after NOR
tuary notices and other truck of that
kind. He had genius for writing
imaginary stories and locating them
somewhere, with the invariable effect
of causing people to flock to the place
where his fairy tale was alleged to
have happened.
One night, when news was dull, the
city editor told Crowley to write a
story of some kind about a column in
down at his desk and ground out a
tale about'a thrilling experience that
he had in the northern part of the
city, which ran like this: He was
walking down in that part of the CITY
when he heard the bell in one of the
steeples near by clang. 1t was late at
night, and he wondered at it and
straightway proceeded to investigate
He found the door of the church
standing wide open ana went in.
Just as he entered the bell rang
again, and he heard u noise up in the
steeple. He started to climb up, and
when he neared the top an enormous
rock came crashing down through the
stairway and nearly struck him. He
climbed farther, and another rock
came down. AT last he reached the
top, where he found an escaped
maniac, and after Il desperate strug-
gle overpOwered him. Absurd as that
story was, thousands of people went
down to that church on the next morn
ing prompted by that insane curiosity
that makes people flock to the scene
of any crime or casualty.
The success of this story gave Crow
ley /, cue, and it wasn't long until the
community was shocked beyond meas
ure by the details of Il horrible muir
der committed on a canal boat tied up
at Fairport, which is a little village
ten miles from Rochester and on the
Erie canal. The crime was described
with a minuteness and the names of
the boat and the man murdered and
everything given with such apparent
candor that the police officers of
Rochester were amazed next morning
to think that they had not heard OF
it before, and a detail of men was sent
to the spot to investigate. When they
got there there was nothing to inveS
tigate, and Crowley got out OF the
scrape in some way or other best
known to himself.
His most famous story was the next
one that is to say, the next big one,
for he was continually writing special
articles. Forepaugh 5 circus came to
Rochester one summer, and on the
night of the show brilliant idea
struck Crowley. He went to work,
and in couple of hours evolved u
story about the escape of the rhino-
ceros from the circus. He told graphi-
cally how it broke out of its cage,
gored a couple of keepers and started
for Lake Ontario. He located this
story on the Brinker farm, which was
then IL comparatively little settled
portion OF the city down in the north
ern part. He told of the chase that
the circus men and residents of that
section made after the animal, and
described its actions. He wrote
paragraph or two on the damage that
the immense beast had done to prop
erty and eloquently portrayed the
sufferings of a number of horses tuat
it ripped up.
The whole story was over two col
ums long and made great sensation.
People flocked down to the Brinker
farm to see the ground on which the
brute did its bloody work, and while
they founu nothing, Crowley squared
himself by printing another story the
next day telling of its capture, and as
the circus was miles away nobody
knew whether it was true or not.
| This story was copied into every
| paper in the country, and it gave old
| Adam Forepaugh tremendous
amount of free advertising. The old
man was immensely tickled with it
| and determined to make use of Crow
ley. :,
One night the redheaded youth sail
ed into the Office after his evening as
sjgnment and was told to do some
| thing or other by the city editor. He
started down stairs to the street and
was met by a messenger boy, who
| handed him a telegram. 1t read,
Come to Philadelphia at once to go
ahead of my show around the world, F"
and was signed by Adam Forepa gh.
| Crowley started Immediately for Phil
adelphia, without even waiting to go
back into the Office and resign. He
went around the world ahead of the
show, was gone three years or more,
and one afternoon walked into the
city room and said to the city editor,
eff you don't mind, I'll go out and
finish that assignment now"
Bright as he was, Crowley was dissi-
pated and died within a comparative
ly short time after his return from his
trip around the world. AS writer of
purely imaginary stories that read
like Gospel truth and as the inventor