Forest City press. (Forest City, Potter County, D.T. [S.D.]) 1883-19??, 1912-05-02
ARNOLD BENNETT
THOUGHT IT WAS
BROADWAY. IT WAS
English Writer Discovers Var
ious Other Things and
Tells About Them.

New York.-The first of Arnold Ben
nets articles on America has just APP
pe;sred in Harper's magazine. under
| the title. Your United States" Ben
| nett's first impressions are here dls-
| closed, together With some Very direct
and feeling remarks about ntervicwers
Excitement will indeed take strange
forms. For myself. although / was on
the threshold of the greatest adventure
of my life. ! was unawar of being
eNciled=I had not even "smelled' land,
to say nothing of having seen it-until
when it was quite dark, l described II
Gueerly arranged group of different
colored lights i'm the distance-yellow,
red. green and what not. My thought
ran Instantly to Coney Island. ! knew
that ConeN was an island. and that ii
| WAS q place where people had to be at
tracted and distracted somehow and L
decided that these i~liuminations were Il
device OF the pleasure monger of
Coney. And when the ship began To
| salute these Nominations with answer-
| ing tlares. l thought the captain was a
rather good na;ured man to consent
thus 10 amusc the populacc. But when
we slowed. our propellcrs covering the
calm sea with acres of foam. ana the
whole entire Examinations began to
approach u.s in "A body, l perceived that
my Cuney Island was merely another
craft. out u Very important and official
craft. An extremely small boat soon
detached itself. .
The United States had stretched out
n tcmtacle.
Now for the Interviewer.
TN no time at ALL. as it seemed. am
other and more formidable tcntacle
| had folded round mc--in the shape of
two interviewers. (How these men had
- .-.1 lAu. ,,yv ANvtr NNt
| tirular friend had got on BOARD knew
not. for we We're yet far from uu%ayside.)
/ had been hearing all my life about
| the sublime American institution of the
interview. 1 had been warned by AM
| orleans of its piquamt dangers. And
here was Suddenly up against 1T!
Beneath d casual and jaunty exterior.
trcmhlo,:. I wanted 10 sit. but dared
not. They Stood; l stood. These two
men. however, were adopts. They had
the better qualities of American den
| fists. Obviously they spent their lives
in meeting notorieties on inbound
steamers. and made naught of it. They
were middle aged. disillusicned. tepidly
| polite. conscientious and rapid. They
knew precisely they wanted and
how to get it. Having got it, they
raised their hats and went.
Their printed stories We're brief. quite
u-npretentious and inoffensivc-though
one of them did let out that the most
salient part of me WAS my teeth. and
the other did assert that I behaved like
n school boy. doubtless the result of
tilnidity trying to be dignifled-this all
legged schoolboyishness.) j liked these
men. But they gave me an incomplete
idea of the race of intervieWerS in the
United States.
Many varieties won my regard inn
nlediately and kept it: but ! am con-
scious that my sympathy with one par
ticular brand (perhaps not numerous)
was at times imperfect. TIL brand in
question as to which l was amiably
cautioned before ever leaving the
steamer, is usually very young, and as
often a girl as Il youth. He or she
cheerfully introduces himself or her
| self with Il hint that. of course. it is an
awful bore to be interviewed. but he
| or she has a job to do and he or she
must be allowed to do it. Just so!
America Suggests Efficiency.
But the point which, in my audacity,
1 have occasionally permitted to oc-
cur to me, is this: Is this sort of inter-
viewer capable of doing the job allotted
to linn. i do not mind slips of report
ing. I do not mind a certain agreeable
| malice (indeed. / reckon to do a bit i'm
that line myself). l do not even mind
hasty misrepresentation (for. after all.
we are human, and the millennium is
inefiiciency - especially in America.
where sundry kinds of efficiency have
been carried farther than any ef1i-
| cheney was ever carried before.
Immediately after my first bout with
interviewers | was seated at u table in
the dining saloon of the ship with my
| particular friend aud three or four
friendly. quiet. rather diffidcnt human
beings, whom | afterward discovered
to be among the best and most ex-
perienced newspaper men in New York
hot interviewers.
Said one of them:
Il was "a reporter for IL years. but !
was cured of personalities at an early
stage--and by Il Niger. too! / had been
interviewing a Niger prize fighter and
I'd made some remarks about the facial
characteristics of niggers in general.
Some other niger wrote me n long
letter of protest, and it ended like this:
I've never seen YOU But I've seen
tell you that you're no Lillian Russell.'"
Some mornings l. too, might have sat
down n written from visual observa-
ton, Let me respectfully tell YOU that
| you're no Lillian Russell"
Said my companion:
mo Importance whatever is attached
to a certain kind OF interview in the
United States
"Supposing i refused to talk to that
sort of Interviewer" I asked, at the
| saloon table.
The interview will appear all the
same" was the reply.
~ Was There!"
The romantic sense, which had been
m~omentarily driven back by the dis
cussion Of general ideas, swept over me
again. In fact. through the saloon
windows could be seen all the battery
end Of New York. and the fret vague