Little Falls herald. [volume] (Little Falls, Morrison County, Minn.) 1889-1950, 1907-08-16
The College Hero.
(Original.1


[Original.1
Whether Tom Trotter was a success
or not in college depends upon what
success is. Tom was the poorest STU
dent and the best fellow at the uni
versity. He would have teen popular
anyway, but the fact that he carried
his college to victory on numerous &C.
casions on the gridiron excited an en-
thusiasm which. had he lived among
the ancient Greeks or Romans, would
have insured his worship az god.
Tom stood six feet two in his stock
ings, was Of gigantic frame ana iron
muscle. Possibly he might have learn
ed something from his books had he
spent any time over them, but how
was he to spend time over bis books
when he was obliged to be head and
front of every athletic club at the uni-
versity? And how was he to be drop
ped at failure to pass his examinations
when he was needed to run the college
athletics and was constantly advertls-
ing the college by the famous victories
he won for it? The truth Is that the
faculty, realizing the Importance Of
keeping him afoat on the university
curriculum, did more worrying about
how to pull him through his exams
than he did about pulling through them
himself. A failure to win an important
game would fill him with dependency.
A failure at examination never trou-
bled him at all.
"Howsoever these things be-" as the
poet says, by hook or by crook Tom
was dragged along till he came to his
graduation examinations. The words
by hook or by crook" may be taken
literally, for he made no pretense to
walking straight and narrow path at
his examinations, and he once actually
used q wire hook on which he had
strung lot Of special problems. These
he could pull up into his sleeve by q
string at moments notice. But now
Toms finals" stared him in the face.
not only him. but the faculty and ev-
cry man in college.
AS the examinations were coming on,
there came also a champion game Of
baseball with tho University Of 7. Ev-
| erybody knew that Tom must bear the
whole weight Of the game himself.
One accident after another had hap
pened to deprive the team Of good
men, to be replaced by inferior ones.
When the game came of. Tom was
| there in all his glory. Stimulated by
the work before him, he surpassed any
thing be had ever done on any field
he would send the ball far up into the
sky, then keep on running as long as
there were runs to make. When the
game was finished, with 4 crushing de-
feat to the enemy, Tom was carried
In triumph on the shoulders Of the
team to his room. where be held re-
eepdon for the rest Of the day.
The next morning Linden saw an
other sight" Tom was sitting In an
examination room. He had been struck
by a ball the day before on the fore
head and In making sliding run had
rubbed the skin of his leg. No record
was made Of these mishaps at tho
time, and few students ORATORS to
college glory limited that they had
| never occurred: Be this as it may,
Toms head was bound up with cloth,
and a pair Of clutches reposed in the
seat next to him. Behind table on a
raised dais sat professor. Every &C.
cupation has Its disagreeable features,
and the man who was wrapped in the
subject he endeayored to engraft into