Connecticut western news., 1913-08-21
THOSE FUNNY DE RUES

Minstrels Resent Criticism by Roasting
 the Editor.
 DeRue Brothers miustrels, in Town Hall, Wednesday night, drew a good house, and the performance was an i'm provement on the one they gave here last year, though the same well-known. dear old familiar almanac jokes" shat have split the sides of the outskirters. year after year, were still in commission in the opening part. The improvement in the show was, in large part, due to the sagacity of the management, ia bringing the editor into it. 1t was not exactly an original idea, for other enter prises have been improved by the same wise policy. Bobby DeRue's eloquent 2o-minute negative eulogy of The News and it's editor was the chief new feature but it was nevertheless a new feature, and we frankly give MT. DeRGs .aredit for it.
 But this story is getting ahead of itseIf. To go back and make proper beginning "Wednesday morning Billy DeRue, the big brother, came storming into The News office with blood in his eye, to tell the editor what he thought of him for publishing the fact that the DeRue show. given here last year. was not up to the DeRue standard, and that some of it was of punk" quality. He made a strong point of the fact that The News got s2 for advertising the show, while other papers, he said, gave the same space for $l or $l.50, and indicated his conviction that this lavish expenditure should purchase not only the advertis- ing space, but the news columns, the ed- itorial columns, the editorial endorse ment and the editor, and declared thatif the editor found the show was punk" he should have kept that opinion to him self, in view of that $2. He paid his compliments to Canaan as a one. horse, the show stopped here only because it had to stop somewhere between its two favorite stopping-plaoes on this leg of it's circuit-West Norfolk and VanDeusen- vile, we believe, or perhaps some other metropolitan localities which we do not recall. He made the modest statement that the DeRue Brothers wouldn't "eo broke" because of The News's criticism, as they had "sev eral hundred thousand dollars laid away. "But," he oonolud- ed, in final broadside that was calou- lated to impress the offending scribe with the utter uselessness of living any longer. "the consequence of this affair will be, that we shall cut out this town. from this time forth, and hereafter the DeRue Brothers minstrels will steer clear of Ca- naan and tonight shall say SO. from the stage, and tell the reason why" Then he strode majestically forth with out waiting for the editor to come to.
 By some mysterious method of press- agentIng the announcement soon became generally circulated about town that, as a special feature of the evenings per- the editor would be put on the pan and roasted, toasted, broiled, fricas- seed, devilled, scrambled, and cooked ta a frizzle, and served up to the audiences we'll done on both sides. The announce ment helped, too, in getting n crowd out. It was to be something bran new. ana that was what the DeRue show had long needed. An up-to-date feature on it's program was such an unheard-of thing that the promised roasting of the editor
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