The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1902-12-14
N. STRONG. an Alabama sol

NJ STRONG, an Alabama sol
81 der of fortune Is In town.
7H Now that peace reigns in the
Transyaal. he has returned to Uncle
Sans domain to look for something else
to turn up.
Strong is one of the picturesque char
aotera of the country. He came. 10 Biz
mingham. twelve years ago, and during
the winter of 90 and 81, worked In the
yards of the Louisville & Nashville rail-
road. as foreman of a switch engine. He
is a "box-ear" artist parexeellence. but
he does It as easily as a gentleman ever
did anything worth doing at all.
I Strong goes where he WILL He has no
where to lay his head yet he is up with
the sun, refreshed. He has nothing, not
even troubles. He is a second Don Quix-
ate with no tagging Sancho. and with
two much sense to fight wind-mills. For
over a quarter of a century he has been
what an eastern editor once called him,
a tramp" from choice. He has a variety
Of professions, In any one of which he
could mako an easy living II he would
| but settle down. lie is a newspaper
writer. photographer. engraver, and
| when he can find no short Job in either OF
| these vocations and the last dime has
been dug up he hustles n job railroad
ing, to get a stake" and then Is away
again.
In the last twenty-five years he has
| been In every civilized country on the
| globe but one. Norway. He has sailed
every navigable bit of water from lake
| to ocean, and Is a veteran of many wars.
/ He fought with the French in Madagas-
car. Went up the Nile in the hhartoum
expedition under Lord Wolseley, In search
of "Chlnese" Gordon; was on newspa-
| per boat off Santiago In SO, and has late
| ~ been In the English army in Africa
He was, In the American civil war
| young as he is-he Is nearly 54-and mas
been wounded many times, yet today, ne
is a clear-eyed. deep-voieed, quiet we'll
knit American with slight Yankee ac-
cent and skin bronzed by exposure by
his months of service in Africa
| It might be a mistake to call strong
tramp As we'll, might Isaac Newton be
called a loiterer or the good Pere Mar
| quette a vagrant with no permanent
place of abide. To be sure, Strong has
| thumped out thousands of miles In a
box car, yet he often travels first-class,
| and he neither looks, acts or talks like a
tramp He travels usually to see the
world Tramps beat their way for the
sheer sake of beating. Strong does 1t
because 1t enables him to travel when
otherwise he would, perforce, remain at
home and deny himself that educative
polish that only comes of much brush
ing about the world To call Strong
tramp would be to forget that there are
travellers and travellers.
Mr. Strong has written for the Age
Herald the story of his last trip abroad.
1t was fruitless Grand for he went
only to get a lot of Photographic plates
he was obliged to leave on his previous
| 1,a mr.
to land.
Here is the story of this soldier Of for
tune.
''I went first to Africa in the late fall
of '99. Why, l din't know, unless 1t was
to see the country, photograph 1t ana sell
the product. However, l went over on
horse transport; found 1 couldn't land
unless l enlisted took on In a hospital
| corps and served my six months and at
every spare moment worked the camera
for illustration of the story l was get
ting the information for. The story Is
written and lies in a Chicago publishing
house, but the plates are still in Africa,
/ unless they have been sent to Chicago
| very lately.
1.-THE way l came to leave them was
this. When I came to Durpan, from the
front, having but little money, thoughe
1 was going to have trouble getting back
| home but found out late IMat the gov
| eminent was sending Americans back
| free. l had to wait over a month for a
transport, and while waiting. l worked
for the Natal Government railway. One
morning l got a note from the leading
military lanolng officer Lieutenant VIM
gate, to call at his office. l supposed 1t
was only to notify me when to report
for my transportation home so 1 hur-
ried oh Gown to the docks over two miles
from the main part of town.
MY negatives and cameras mad
stored with local photographer named
| Middlebrook when I first came to Dur
ban, and he wanted to make some copies,
and said he would care for all of them
when I got to the office I was inform
ed / had just 80 minutes to go an addi-
tional mile to the landing jetty to catch
the last boat to the transport. 1t was
a hard problem. All my clothes were at
my boarding house up town; my photo
outfit and photos there too, and the
money l had earned with the railroad