Tulsa daily world. [volume] (Tulsa, Indian Territory [Okla.]) 1905-1919, 1918-06-16
SAMMIES GET FIRST
LONDON IMPRESSION
Visit Foreign Quarter of Worlds
Metropolis; Not Impressed
With American Homes.
THINK DAY WELL SPENT
Architecture Of Ancient Quarters Is
Interesting; Try samples OF
All Strange Foods.
CBy THOMAS BURKE1

The other morming l picked up
two of your boys who were at a
loose end for one precious day and
who wanted to see London. Of
fered to show them the artistic
London homes OF famous Americans,
each marked with an enamel plaque
a charming custom created by our
London county council for perpe-
tudting the history of old houses.
There are houses so marked as the
London residence OF Benjamin
Franklin, Washington Irving, Ma
thaniel Hawthorne, Ralph waldo
Emerson and others. But they were
not specially interested. They wanted
the London proposition only; our
east end. our Russian quarter. our
Ghetto, Chinese quarter, Italian
quarter and the crowded acres
where our obscure millions live and
love and die.
SO | dug out another American
your Alvin Langdon Coburn, who is
universally acknowledged as the
greatest artist Cor demon) OF the
camera, and who has made marvel
Gus pictures OF our slums and docks
and foreign reservations. He has
lived long in the Chinatowns OF New
York and Frisco. and now knows
Londons' Chinatown and its people
far better than | do. With him we
made our foursOme. | was afraid
the soldier boys might grin when
they saw our little patch OF Orient,
for II consists only of two narrow
streets of restaurants, stores and
laundries. 1t is not so obviously ar
ranged" as the quarters on your side
1t Is not a show place, and strang
ers are decidedly not wanted. there
Is no chance for party of sight
seers. But once the boys have re-
oeived you. you Will certainly find
something in the unstudied atmos-
phere that will reward you. To
begin with 1t is well set. 1t turks
on the edge OF the great West India
docks Its doorways are narrow and
furtive. Day and night river-mist
cloaks 1t with nameless touches of
the macabre. From unseen win
dows comes the wall of Chinese
fiddle or the raspDof a gramaphone
delivering records Of interminable
Chinese plays.
1t being midday Coburn and the
rest OF us called at the new, loudly
decorated restaurant in West India
dock road. and paid attention to an
eight-course meal OF tea, noodle.
awabi, picked vintage" eggs, guar
anteed thirty years old, sweet onions.
a little sharks fin, rice and vinegar
and chow-chow. l think what most
impressed our guests was the pain
full respectability OF the place-eX-
ternal responsibility | should add
No disorder, no assaults. no drunk
enness: all as suave and seemly as
Rumpelmayer's, the great society
tea house in st. James. They were
sappointed until / reported some
of the affairs ! had witnessed in
this wide, gray, cul-de-sac that ends
at the dock gates. In this very res
taurant / once saw what is, / think,
the most appalling of all scenes; a
fight between two white girls. 1t
finished with one girl seized from
behind by the manager and pitched
down the marble stairs to the door
way; whereupOn her opponent dis
solved in Mysteries.
Our guests were DSich impressed
by the architecturalSb beauty OF our
east end slums, whereat l was glad.
for l, too, find pleasure in these
crumbling eighteenth century gables
and in these struggling streets with
no two cottages alike. without
Ouubt the hideous six-story tene-
ments which our cold-hearted phil.