The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1915-11-02
HERMAN BIDDER
 F AMOUS EDITOR. DIES SUDDENLY
Editor of New York Staats-
 Zeitung Victim of Kid eney Trouble.

sU
 sNew York, Nov. 2-Herman Rid der, president and principal owner ot
 the Staats-Zeitung and a leader of the sGerman propaganda in the United States. died at his home, II West
 Eighty first street, shortly after 4
 o'clock yesterday afternoon after suf-
 fering for almost a year from Bright's
 disease.
 stDuring the last two weeks Mir. Rid
 der's condition had been such that his
 death was expected at any time As
 long ago as the gubernatorial cam.
 padgni of last year, when the editor
 and pub1icist went to Elrnira to speak
 in advocacy of the retention in office
 of the then Governor Glynn, his ad-
 vancing weakness was apparent The months ago his physicians realized
 that fthete was next to no hope of his recovery
 Mrs. Ridder, who was Miss Mary
 Amend, a sister of the late Justice Amend of the Supreme Court. was with her husband when he died. At the bedside also were Mir Ridder's Three sons. Victor F. Bernard H. and
 Joseph E. Ridder and MT. Ridder's ;Prothers Henry. A brother-fn-1aw, William U. Amend, and Mrs Ridder's sister, Miss Dena Amend, also we're ptsesent, together with the Rev Father Thomas F.. Myhan and the Rev. Dr. A. B. Stuart Chambers, both of the Catholic Church of the Blessed Sacrament.
 1t was announced last night that the funeral of MT. Ridder will be held Thursday morning at 10 o'clock
 A requiem mass will be sung at the Church Of the Bessed Sacrament
 Broadway and Sevefity-hrst street, by 9l1e pastor, the Rev. Father Thomas F Myhan. Interment will be in Calvary. cemetery.
 Made His Own Way in World.
 The entire span oHHernan. Riders life, measuring almost 65 years and all Of it spent in this city of his birth, was typical of what the ambitious foreign ancestry, even the foreign horn boy himself, may accomplish. with nothing to start on except the Opportunities offered most freely un- der the Stars and Stripes
 Ills parents who had emigrated to New York from Germany, we're too poor to pay for schooling for the boy, but near by their home at 400 Green wich street in the old Ninth ward, here he was born on March 5. 1851, were the free schools of Manhattan.
 ATd so in the public schools for a wjhiIe-the boy had to- leave school and go to work when he was only T years o1d-he learned the ground work of. the three R's by means of which in later years he was enabled 10 become an editor and publicist and protagonfst of the German propa- ganda whose word meant much to e4a1nt1ess Germa n-zA i17erican adn1irerss here and throughout the country.
 With the first gun of the present sgorad war MT. Ridder gave his voice aHd7 pen to acclaiming the righteous-s ness of the German cause. Previous tos tnee war whatever antagonisrn he had met with was merely the opposi- ton in politics from time to time which all men active in political affairs must meet.
 5 But since the war began, or during a time when he was more in the pub lie mind than at any other period of his career, he had daily faced written and snokens opposition of a. more bitter kind, from vast number of citizens who believed his advocacy of the Ger man cause smacked of un-American-l ism.
 ss Here you see three generations of sRidder he answered this charge when a newspaper reporter called to interview him a few months ago at bis home and.sfound him surrounded by his family. All Of us, myself. my wife, my brother, my sons and my grandson. were born in America T venture to suggest" he continued, that you never have been in a more Intensely Arnerican home, nor in one that need be less ashamed of it's. The United States comes first m opposed to war. If we must ave- # at any time. with any nation Whatever, America comes first with me. s
 Died in the Harness.
 Right up to the last, however, for despite his long illness he virtually died in the harness so far as his jour naIistic espousaI Of the German cause was eoncerned, the Staats- -Zeitung on it's editorial page and especially by means of an English column published Gaify lover his signature hammered at the Admin istra ton whenever Mr. Rid | der thought it showed signs of British or French symp pathies. And when the bis sAfrerIcaen loan to the Allies was launched he printed in his paper each day, without comment, but enclosed in 1 a heavy mourning border, the names ] of banking and other firms subscribing to the. loan, the names being purely German. From an errand boy in a hat shop agtlen he wass11 years old Mr. Riders career up to5the time he began, year ago last summer, to devote almost all 1 his time to the German spropaganda. i, Included not only Journalism and a | great deal of charitable and reIigious activities but also many years of ac- tive political life. At various times his name was mentioned seriously | among Candidates for the offices of | Mayor of New York, Governor and | Lieutenant-Governor of the State and for Cabinet and high diplomatic posts.
 When in 1908 Mir Bryan made his | third trial for the PresiG ency MT Rid Ger became treasurer of the National | Remocratie Committee following MT. BEyan's insistence upon the resigna- | ton of Gov. Charles N. Haskell as Treasurer. Thereupon it was freely [ Relieved during the campaign that in | Case Mir Bryan were elected MT R1dder had only to say whether he q wanted to enter the Cabinet or become | nlhassador to Germany MT Bryan | was not elected and MT. Ridder never held any appointive or elective office |