Forest City press. (Forest City, Potter County, D.T. [S.D.]) 1883-19??, 1911-05-11
ADE AND M'CuTCHEON
AS BALLROOM BOYS
cartoonist's Recollections of
the Time They Worked and
Roomed Together.
From the New York Sun.

From the New York IN.
John Il. McCutcheOn. the cartoonist,
wright, attended Purdue university at
bout the same time and Joined the
same college fraternity. Recently at a
INNER given in a western city by n
II the chapters OF the fraternity in
ono ST AIDE. who is now the national
lead u. the fraternity, McCutcheon
narrated some "reminiscences of the
Jays when he and AIDE roomed together
and worked on Chicago newspapers. In
he course of his ak he said:
AS an amateur Boswell to Mr.. AIDE
' feel that history should be set right
Upon the point that we were not twins.
II we had been twins 1t would a been
much more convenient for me. As 1T
VAS l a to take a reef in the sleeves
IF his shirt every time l wore IT. The
discrepancy in our sizes did not extend
20 our collars, for he could wear mine
and l did wear his. All our collars had
our firrl name OIL them. so that after a
week or two the title to all our prop
srty became very much clouded.
TO get the chronology of this period
IT our IGNORED guests career firmly
txed in your minds, perhaps 1t might
De we'll to GO back a little further and
pick UP his career in the ante ballroom
lays. After graduating from Purdue in
1887 he accepted a splendid journalistic
position in Lafayette. 1t paid Sc a week
Ut the start, but later became more ir-
-egular until the paper ceased publica-
Ion and he resigned to accept a lucra-
1--we position writing testimonials to adj
I%ertise a tobacco habit cure.
1T was not a fake remedy and was
guaranteed to cure the most persistent
a 8 If the tobacco user followed direc-
ions. The first direction was to dis
continue the use OF the tobacco and
hen take the tablets. This position paid
sl5 a week. but even this princely sti-
bend Jagged behind his living expenses.
t George had continued to work in La
tayette. even with the cost of living as
Ow as 1t was in those days, he would be
:oday one OF the most prominent bank
'upts In the state. BY dint of great at
sention to detail he managed to accu-
nulate quite q tidy deficit and was de-
rottng his leisure moments to thoughts
of moving elsewhere."
MI. McCutcheon said that he was
graduated at about this time, and being
Unable to get as good a job in Lafay-
ute as AIDE he went to Chicago and in
1890 managed to lure AIDE on there, too.
being In need of some new collars He
continued:
This was the beginning of our hall
bedroom days, When both of us worked
sn the old morning News, he writing
ana i draWfng-days when we weren't
quite poor enough to have beautiful Ia
lies bring us Christmas baskets and
not quite rich enough to buy the Christi
mas baske ourselves. We had no ex-
penslve habits and 80 were able to live.
Uuf only excess was to buy a chrysan-
lnehnum at 80 cen each autumn when
Purdue came up to play football with
Chicago. That was back in the glad
days when a Purdue man could 20 to
see his team play and wear flowers both
going and coming.
hall room we inhabited was
not q mere figure Of speech. There
was no vulgar display OF wealth in it's
modest appointments, nothing to dis
tract our minds from the calm contem-
Patton of our literary and artistic as
pirations. 1t was called a comfortable
furnished room for refined gentlemen
but this was fulsome fattery and most
misleading.
1T was not comfortably furnished.
The room. third floor back, extended in
sweeping perspective 12 feet in one
direction and 10 in the other. One
window, opening to the west, admitted
q flood Of sunlight In the afternoon
while we were at the Office. There was
one bed. which fortunately was a
which we gave house parties to visit
Ing brothers. Tn sofa was q great in
stftution and had a great ridge run
ming down the center, SO that our
guests never made long visits.
: There was n plush covered chair
OF somewhat august proportions: there
was another chair for guests, also one
oureau, one washstand and two paint
ings Of the late Victorian period. Meth
er was a Corot, although there was no
signature from which a ~connoisseur
might Judge.
"One painting represented a forest of
asparagus IN the foreground, with a
| lake in the middle distance and n
range Of the Himalayas shooting vio-
Ilently upward from the edge OF the
little lake. A few cows or sheep. we
never determined which. grazed on a
precipftous slope. while q distant sail
boat gave the n touch Of realism to
the picture. The other picture depicted
q lot of fruit with q large pink water
melon in the background.
Among these artistic surroundings
we spent our nights. A few news
papers scattered upon the carpet inn
parted a literary aspect to the room,
while clouds of tobacco smoke lent q
delightfully."- Bohemian aspect t this
u~nstudied scene Of city splendor.
w often thought of the ones at
our gay life in the city amid surround
ings OF luxury and magTtficence, the
pinnacle Of which was the Palmer House
barber shop. Whenever we purchased
any conspicuously new articles Of wear
ing apparel we would go down to La
fayette to show the home folks how
well we were getting on in Chicago. We
thought ourselves as men about town,
and In fact we were. We were about
| town much more than we were about
our little radiator.
when George first went on the
Morning News he was assigned the
weather. He received SO every week,