Bismarck daily tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1881-1916, 1914-11-20
Fargo Journalists Up.
On Contempt Charges
BOB BURDEIIE
PASSES AWAY
Well Known Humorist Dies
After Lingering Illness Of
Two Years.

Pasadena, CAL, NOV. I5'-D'' W."
ert j. Burdette, preacher, altthor anu
humorist, died at his home this AFTER
noon, from am illness which lastec
t the greater part of two years. Nol
weeks he had been in state OF coma.
Robert J. Burdette began cuitfvat-
ing good humor obscurely in PEORIA
III. 40 years ago, when he spent part
Of his DAYS at 5asdesk on the Peoria
Transcript, trying to think, as ne
himself once related. "of pleasant
things to tell the folks when Went
home at night" His audience on
"folks" then was Carrie Garrett, the
Peoria girl he had married short
time before, while she lay supposedly
on her deathbed, but who lived, and,
though an invalid for life, became inn
mortalized by her husband as Tier
Little Serene Happiness II was she
who encouraged him to SOW ms nu-
NOR in wider fields. At her bedside
Burdette became prolific with fun
making contributions to the .Burllng-
ton, Ia, Hawkeye, and through these
he became famous the country over
as "The Burlington Hawkeye Man"
The little invalid wife encouraged
him, too, to try the lecture field.
Kept Him At II.
",She kept me at it, said Burdette.
"and in due time we had a lecture on
our hands-The Rise and Fall Of the
Moustache. Burdette Insisted on
trying the lecture first in Keokuk-
"for Keoluk hated Burlington" and
If he succeeded there he would know
that it was good. Even Keokuk ap.
plauded. The whole United States
later did the same. He became a sort
Of itinerant preacher.
& At 60, ten years ago, Mr. Burdette
was called to the permanent pastor
ate Of the e"Temple Baptist church or
Los Angeles, Cal.
Although Burdette's original home
was in Greensboro, Pa, where he
was born in 1874, the later part OF his
life was spent in California. At Cliff
ton-on-th -the-Sea, Pasadena, he had a
spacious house with broad yerandas.
His first wife died after Is years OF
encouragement to him, during whicn
she had travelled all over the country
with him. In 1899 he married Mrs.
Clara B. Baker of Pasadena.
"A fugitive instance OF 1Burdette;s
rollicking humor was a letter home to
his flock in Los Angeles during his
first trip to Europe. He dated the
letter from "some distance out in
the DAMP and said, in part:
Two Kinds Of Days.
"The scenery along this route, al
though somewhat nlonotonous, is
splendidly irrigated. But it seems too
early for the growing crops. Nothing
has come up yet, except on shipbOard,
and that has gone overheard The
route is not nearly so populous as the
Santa Fe trail over the desert. We
have just two Kinds. of days-the days
we see a ship and the days we don't
The veteran hllmorist found fun in
everything. Willie he was forced to
abandon it in the pulpit largely, be
cause Of the reputation he had made
for flln,making, he agreed with. Hem
ry Ward Beecher that a joke in the
pulpit was not at all out Of place: 1t
was, as Beecer said: 'WThen you are
fighting the devil, shoot him with any.
thing"
Burdette died with the conviction
that there was not only just as much
fun in the world today as ever, but
"a great deal more, because as he
said, "there are more people in il,
and people are the funniest things on
this side Of the grave"