The San Francisco call., 1896-04-03

III Is commonly accepted tnat IOI d
man connected with railroad politics are
impossible. I went to the convention OF
1883 with my State delegation solid for
me for the Presidential nomination. 1t was
the first time the delegation from New
York united for any candidate. l was to
break the spell-to deny and controvert
this story about railroad men. The rail-
road men were to help me do it. They
were to remind the newspapers and petit
TONERS of something which they per-
sistentlv overlook-that there are million
railroad men in this country. These are
intelligent and influential men in the COM
munity. The station master, for instance,
of town is usually one of the best men in
it. He knows and is in touch with every
body else in town. And yet, because he
is in the employ of the railroad, he could
not be elected poundmaster. Well, they
feel and resent this thing.
"As / say, was to break this spell.
went to the convention with the solid dele
CATION, but we had no sooner arrived on
the ground than we began to suffer from
this general anti-railroad sentiment.
There was careful reckoning of the votes
of the States necessary for success in the
general election. The delegates from Iowa,
Nebraska and Kansas came to us and said
that with railroad man at the head of the
ticket their States would surely be lost to
the Republican party. The question re-
solved itself into this. that we must bear
the onus of this loss and defeat at the
polls, if defeat followed our success in the
convention, or We must go back home
having renounced our own cause.-the
cause of railroad men.
GAS showing how high the feeling ran
along these lines little Incident that hap
pened there will illustrate The hotel my
headquarters. was crowded with politicians
A prominent local railroad man came
through the hurly-burly and drew me aside
and said, 'Chauncey. my little girl is lying
dead at my home. My wife and l were
grieving together over our great loss, when
she said to me, "George, we are in great
trouble; we feel the power of sympathy.
Mr.. Depew is down at the hotel also in
great trouble. You may do some good by
simply going down and telling him that
we think of him at this moment"
''The man threw his arms around my
neck and kissed me and returned to his
dead
Mr.. Depew told this story quite simply
and with no sign in the telling of the bit
terness that the story itself might indi-
cate.
Then he went on to tell something of his
experience with reporters-for it is well
known that Mr.. Depew is a newspaper
mans man-said to be the most fire.
quently interviewed of all men. The story
of why Cornelius Vanderbilt refuses to be
interviewed led up to it.
''William Fl. Vanderbilt, father of Cor
aIi cto ho51- oil oil
met among newspaper men. l encour-
aged him to be so. Everywhere he went
the doors were always open to them. He
talked freely and was not afraid to express
opinions. Sometim es he was misquoted,
again misrepresented. Sometimes he
found in the papers - there was
always that prejudice against a
very rich man. He would swear some
times that he would never see another re-
porter, and that / must do the talking for
him. Still, he went on, however. One |
day his car ran into Chicago. Mr. Wander |
bilt happened to be feeling pretty
ing was invited in, glass
of wine placed before him and |
a cigar and shortly after the reporter went
away and sent over the country that re-
mark that has become fixture in litera
tuIe, remark that Mr.. Vanderbilt
because there was nothing in the
occasion TO provoke it, and second,
because Mr. Vanderbilt was not fool
that saying, 'the public be damned
THAT remark was taken up as we all |
know by the press the world over, and has
been harped on ever since. Mr.. Wander
bilt could not get away from it. 1t
bounded him till his death, and still sur
wives to darken his memory No amount
of contradiction could efface it.
"But it changed Mr.. Vanderbilt's front
to the reporter. He would never see an
other, except he knew him well and he
wrote for a paper that he knew would not
finally down to one reporter and two news
him. That is why Cornelius Wander bilt |
will not talk to reporters, and why [ ad
wise him not to.
AS for myself l may say have never
been willfully misrepresented in an inter-
view. But | have been made to talk like a
clown by inexperienced men who wrote
without notes. Only short time ago 1 |
was interviewed on the silver question by
a man who made no notes and who after |
ward confessed that he was wholly
ignorant OF the subject. When I read that
interview l asked my friends to please
have an inquiry instituted as to my
sanity"
Mr.. Depew is travelling, he says, as the
guest of Mr.. Vanderbilt, as are also John
Howe and George Fearing, bankers of New
York, who are of the party.
Ladies' Southern ties, 81 As. all shades, every