Forest City press. (Forest City, Potter County, D.T. [S.D.]) 1883-19??, 1911-04-27
.zigzag Steps In Career Of One
of the Nest Popular Writ
ers Of the Day.
From the New York Sun.

From the New York Sun.
A small boy named Chick Hyatt,
AN hatless n excited late one night
N the spring of 1868 through the three
strcets that make up the entire town Of
ieneseo. N. Y, Main. State and Seven
sy-ninth streets, and as Chick" rang
each doorbell he hollered the tidings:
Samuel c.. Blythe. the writer, has
lust been born!"
The exact date was May 10. 1868.
Why has the precise date been rcmem-
oered? o ask. The next morning
Clint Holfacke. the Geneseo blacksmith,
invented the first successful model of
1 typewriter, the machine which Mr..
out his literary stuff on the who's
Who-and Why" page of the Saturday
Evening Post. and which he also uses
when he eases Off a snappy letter to a
friend. Mr.. Blythe himself invented
The secret code to the typewriter. print
I'd copies of which he encloses with all
ais manuscripts and letters.
Nevertheless and Notwithstanding
many, oh, full many, a clever wheeze
has v come to light because of that
typewriter. The recipient OF the letter
can't figure out what the tangle of
busted typewriter characters mean.
md nobody is indicate enough to ask
Mr.. Blythe what it was he wrote. He'd
only write back another the same
: unsuccessful model machine. BY the
lime h man who gets the letter run
INTO h writer and asks Old Doctor
Blythe what it was he was trying tn
write the latter just hens and haws
uncertainty over the page and suggests
I new cure for sore throat or a sprained
ankle. He has plumb forgot, n he
SAINT read his own typewriting.
That habit of his of SUGGESTING cl1rQS
sor anything from locomotOr ataXia to
aousemaid's limb is the cas- he is
Snown as Old Doctor Blythe. He glories
in the last two-thirds of h title. Most
" he prefers to u across friends with
sprained ankles. He has eight different
cures for this aflment. Whether they're
my good or not will be known.
Mr.. Blythe just sits around till the an
lie naturally heals up and then greets
he patient proudly.
That's I'm" he gloats. 1.-THE
present speaker. Sam G. Blythe. I
guess I'm a bad little physician n sur
yeon.''
This is the reason that When MI.
Blythe comes over to New York on the
irst Of each Month to gather a new
bunch OF anecdotes to stick in between
the end OF his WHO'S Who-And Why
article n the beginning Of his "Hall of
fame" department at the bottom OF the
1871 COluLilIA IN always OACGIS wv 4
der cover of darkness. He boasts that
the county medical detectives here are
shadOwing him.
The only dtsquietfng thing about this
whole matter is that as u result of his
fear Of arrest for prescribing without
\ medical diploma he a n great
lecret sorrow. For years 1t has been
aassn't, he says, because he must ook
rs little like a physician as possible in
brder to avoid arrest by the county
medical societies of whatever county
he nay appear to be in. And so dur
Ing all these days of his young man
hood Old Doctor Blythe has had TO go
through life clean shaven.
Next to kidding the rest of the world
on his page opposite the editorial page,
and mari you he does 1t anonymously,
Mr.. Blythe's best times are the hours
ne puts in playing on the slip horn.
When he Joined the Geneseo Gold and
Silver Cornet band a great many years
ago he was asked by Tulib Skerrett.
the band leader, which instrument he
wanted to play. His first choice was
the bass drum, and he had been taking
lessons on this instrument throughout
the winter when he had a change OF
thought. So he went to Tulib and said
he was going to shift to another in
strument.
1.-THE present speaker. Sam
BY, s. :, he e said ad to p. Taiib; probably
later life. l think I'switch to some
instrument that raj be taken apart
and totcd around easily with my
satchel n typewriter. How about the
slip horn, professor"
In a short time MI. Blythe learned to
break u slip horn at the breech and
then put it together again, although
hA noUoV had mo6o hofnNo thi. n~,v
study of machinery. Porters at the
Hotel Wolcott. where he stays when
he runs over to New York to lay in a
new stock of anecdotes for the spring
and fall trade. always know he's in
town the minute the transwer man
backs up with the baggage. His trunks
and even his suit case are especially
built on long. narrow, graceful lines,
not as many suppose because he him
self is built along the same lines, but
so that he car carry his beloved slip
horn around with him. All his bag
gage also has a cunning little over
hang device to permit the slowing of
the bell of the slip horn.
Once when he was playing angels
Eyer Bright and Fair on the slip horn
at a musical given by the Misses
Martha and Clarice Umpleby, Of Cen
eseo. during the winter OF 1879-but
let's start right in and bring him right
up from a youth to his present estate.
Mr.. Blythe started in life playing
the slip horn. and later became a re-
porter on a Geneseo paper called either
the Democratic or Republican. It
doesn't matter. He was on the o
so short a time that ne doesn't re-
member the name of 1T himself. Upon
being fired. the subject OF this sketch
went home. and while playing on the
slip horn that evening out on the
front StOnn he got an idea