Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1903-08-20
As NEWS WAS SCARCE
Pasquale Bellini" Kindly Gave
Out Hot Interview.
linn x inntivc Hotel Reporter Moved the
Holy See into Switzerland, Creat-
ing n Sensation Over the
whole World.

newspapers with regard to the failing
health of the venerable Pontiff," said a
correspondent to the Washington Post,
II am reminded of the whopperino fake
which perpetrated in Chicago
newspaper about dozen years ago. with
Leo XII as the central figure of the
story, by Charley Dillingham;, then "A
hig imaginative newspaper man, but
now one of the best known and most
prosperous of New York theatrical man
ayers.
Charley was at that time the hotel re-
porter OF one Of the leading Chicago
newspapers. He was rafting good
gatherer of interviews with distinguished
and notable guests at the hotels. but once
in n while the notabiities didn't turn up,
and then Charley had to frame up stuff
to keep his corner of the paper from un-
dergoing slump which might have oc-
| casioned the suspicion in the mind of
his city editor that Dillingham; was sol
dering on his job. SO, some Of the ex-
traordinary interviews that Dillingham;
published with eminent personages who
never existed on earth or in the water
beneath the earth, while they made good
reading enough. were weird. just weird.
"One sizzling july day charley secured
around all of the Chicago hotels on his
regular beat. from the Grand Pacific to
the Auditorium, without springing n
single, solitary talk ont Of anybody.
There simply were no prominent people
at tIl' H'l'lSs ana lldl WIS all lllflt
about it. Charley was all hct up and
tired and dsgusted; but he had to make
good in the copy line.
Well, here goes said he to himself.
with set teeth when he reached the Hotel
Richelieu, on the lake front, then man
aged by the late Cardinal Bems. Then
Charley picked up a pen and registered on
the hotel register. while the cardinal
looked on amused, the name of 'Signor
Pasquale Bellini, Roma, Italia That
made 1t good in case anybody should take
the pains to stop by the Richclieu to
If any such individual really had his
name on the roster of the hosiery.
Then Charley sat down in the hotel
waiting room and wrote hard he
knew how for about an hour and a half
He wrote an interview with the non
existent 'SgnOr Pasquale Bellini' OF
Rome. whose name he had inscribed on
the hotel register. He set forth the fact
that Signor Pasquale Bcllini was one Of
the leading members of the Italian house
of deputies, who he added, to get the
eminent person out Of town, was in
Chicago ut the Rcheieu yesterday. on
his way to New York. for which place
he started after brief stay in Chicago,
on tour os tho world.
Then Dillingham; put some strange
words into the mouth of his fictitious
Roman statesman of cminence. He made
: that statesman state That it was being
seriously contemplated at the Vatican
to remove the site Of the Holy See from
. - ~ ~, " ' ~ W
~ L;i a % 'i' II %
-, 80. - w an ,""'.' l'Scl' III SuVH
of Italy. and 50 on. The interview made
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