The Holly chieftain., 1920-01-15
WORKED IN GARDEN CITY
PRINT SHOP TWO DAYS
Was Easy for Alexander to Get
Work at Newspaper Offices as
He framped Through Country
Out of Tune With q. s.

same Alexander tarried in the vi
cinity of Holly in his earlier career
in America. According to q recent
story in the st. Louis POst-Dis-
patch Berkman was employed for
two days-this was as long as his
views and eccentricities could be
tolerated by his employer-On a lit
tie Russian paper published at
Garden City. Doubtless Alexander
in his journey from Garden City
to Pueblo must have passed
through Holly, though there is no
specific data at hand to indicate
that he really set type in The
Chieftain office.
Following is the story from the
PostDispatch:
Garden City is on the Arkansas
river, SO miles northwest OF Dodge
City, in southwestern Kansas. All
around are stock farms. acres OF
beets, pumping stations. irrigation
canals, lightning rods, cyclone GEL
lars and Kansas farmers. Garden
City being the seat of Finney coun-
ty, has its newspapers, movies,
general stores, an attractive combl.
nation Jail and court house and
lots of lawyers.
There was quite colony OF
Russian refugee farmers growing
beets for the sugar industry Just
outside of Garden City in 1859.
There was good money in growing
beets even in those days, and the
colonists could well afford to. sup.
port the little newspaper printed
in Russian and issued once week
from it's own printing shop IN
Garden City.
alexander Berkman, tramp
printer. slid from moving freight
lust outside the Garden City yards
one summer morning in 1889. He
came from st. Louis, where he had
STAYED one week setting type on
small German weekly. He was
short and slender, short-sighted and
hard up, and he preferred pipe to
cigarettes
"As this was the man whom, in
later years, it was to cost Henry
Clay Frick $4,000 per annum to
keep an eye on, the little tramp
printer may be accorded fuller
description. He had a strong face,
with high, broad forehead, thin
aquiline nose, q jutting under. lip,
heavy chin, small gray eyes, hard
and sharp like needle points, and
a most ingratiating way of asking
the boss of any printing shop for a
few days work.
"At the time he struck Garden
City Berkman could set type in
several languages. He was born in
Petrograd and educated at the
University of Odessa. After leav
ing school he tried Journalism, but
the things wrote were unprintable
except in secretly printed bulletins
and circulars preaching nihilism
and anarchy. Berkman wrote him
self out of Russia very quickly. He
fled to the United States. and be
fore the end of three years knew
every printing shop, every freight
conductor, every switch and water
tank and the geographical confOr-
nation of most of Colorado, Kansas
and Missouri.
"Berkman, in those happy-go
lucky days, rarely held a job more
than a week. COmpOsing-rOom
foreman, as rule patient, long
SUFFERING anu SiOW w oISCl, 6lCW
tired of him because they said he
talked too much during working
hours. Moreover. they said he talk
ed too much like an anarchist. So
they all fired him, one after the
other.
when Berkman reached Garden
City the same old ingratiating
smile got him job on the Russian
weekly, and the same old gospel of
anarchy caused him to lose it two
days later. The editor, who also
was everything from the business
manager to press feeder, elected
him forcibly. Berkman arose with
a stone in his hand and fired it
through the office window. That
was his first known violent act in
this country
"a few weeks later he was arrest.
ed at Pueblo. Colo, for stabbing
printer. When he got out of prison
for that he went straight to New
York City. The late Johann Most
was editing Die Freiheit' in small
printing shop on William street at
that time Radicals with SYM
pathetic leanings toward anarchy
admired Herr Most and his editor
ials in Die Freiheit.' Berkman call
ed on Herr Most and landed a job
after the usual suave preliminar.
Briefly summed up, Alexander