The morning times., 1895-12-08
-- Q -
STORIES OF GENE FIELD.
Playful Jokes the Poet Used to Pra
tice on His COMPANIONS.

Playful Jokes the Poet Used to Prac-
tice on His Companions.
Gene Field, the dead huinorst and poet,
was a joker at all times. The most OF his
humor was never printed, for 1t was Con-
tiuuous in its happening and went forward
every day, truthfully conments one who
evidently knew the poet in the Portland
Evening Press. When he was editor of the
Kansas City Times he found great amAse-
ment In annoying one Of the staid and re-
spectacle characters employed on tue paper.
This was back in tue very early sos.
The gentleman who was the target for
Fields fun was a party called Ferguson.
He was one OF the "make-ups" on tue
paper, aud staid and dignlfied gentle
man. He was intensely respectable, and in
Wyandotte, where he resided, just over the
line from Kansas City, he was the leader
of local temperance society. For over a
year Field, on coming down to the paper
to go to work, would write personal coI-
cerning Ferguson. Sometimes its phrasinG
varied, but generally il ran like this:
Mr.. John Ferguson, the well-known
makeup of the Times composing room,
appeared for work yesterday evening In his
usual beastly state OF iutoXication."
This entertaining bit Field would send
dow in some bundle OF copy, and the others
OF the composing room, who were in q
fashion of tacit league with Field, would set
Ii up and say nothing. Poor Ferguson
knew that this awful personal was in their
midst, and every night would go carefully
over every galley for the purpose OF locat-
ing and killing 1t. 1t gave him vast trouble
Every now and then Field would not write
his personal about Ferguson, and then the
be-deyiled Ferguson was worse off than
ever. As long as he couldn'tfiud It 1t might
still be there. II almost drove the poor ma n
off the paper. Now ard then it escaped his
o,rIa o,,A ,arsr, n,,
cRsious Ferguson's burdens were beyond
the power OF even Christian spirit to bear.
They tell story Of Field in Kansas
City which shows the quickness of his in
veDtioD and the earnest kindness OF his
heart. He was going 10 his room about
one morning, just after the per was
up" on the other side OF the street his
attention was called by row. sturdy
policeman had captured two heavily y-loaded
printers, and despite their maudlin ex-
postuations was dragging them to the
bastile. Fields kind heart bled for the
poor printers. They were on his paper,
too.
An idea seized him. His room was near
at hand, and he hurriedly climbed the stairs
to the third story, which he Inhabited,
and standing near the open window, he
shrieked:
Murder! Murder! Help Help,'' and
all in a shrill falsetto voice.
The policeman IN charge of the un-
happy printers stopped irresolute. Very
evidently a woman was being murdered
Should he go to her rescue or should he
hang on to his drunken printers. 1t took
only a moment to decide. He cast the
two followers OF Ben Franklin from him
and flew swiftly to the rescue. By the
time he had climbed the stairs to Fields
floor that bumorist was in bed and ap-
pareDtly asleep. The policeman poked
about for fifteen minutes before he con-
vinced himself that no blood had been
shed, pending which the printers had made
an intelligent escape. The policeman
afterward told the story to his mates and
declared that the cries came from the
banshee of his family, who 1t would seem
was wont to howl just before the death
of some member of the noble household
it patronized. The policeman, however,
Is yet alive.