Indiana daily times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1914-1922, 1920-07-02

about him. He is famous.
He was nothing but an east side gun
man turned loose in a wilderness where
he had room to expand and to develop
his marvellous talent for homicide.
In New York personalities run about
one to the 100000 of population, and
those few are mostly importations.
AS you go upward In what is com
monty called the higher social scale
you think you are finding real people,
but you soon find that you are mis-
taken.
PERSONALITIES
ARE SCARCE.
You find a millionaire with a house
on Fifth avenue, place on Long Island,
and a yacht.
You say, here is man who had his
way Of the city.
But he is only one Of hundreds or
thousands that have exactly the same
things and uses them in the same ways.
He shows no more individuality or
Imagination in the way he spends his
million than an east-sider does in the
way be blows in dollar at Coney Island
on Saturday night.
Each of them is only one Of a class,
operated according to strict rules and
regulations.
The number of classes or types is
enormous, but the number Of individual
tiles incredibly small.
One east side Jewess Is so like another
that you can hardly tell them apart
So of all the other types.
After a little experience you can spot
them all on sight.
This disease Of uniformity infects
deeply even the arts where individuality
is supposed to be Of the essence Of the
thing.
One musical comedy on Broadway Is
similar to another, and the plays are
almost all of a uniform and similar bad
ness.
The movies grind out endless films
which are endless repetitions Of the same
ideas with minor variations.
/ The song writer's write songs which
are nearly all echoes of each other
The artists paint pretty girls who diff
fer In the color Of their hair and eyes,
but not in the Incredible vacuity Of their
expressions.
The magazines manufactured here are
Of several classes, but those Of the same
class contain always In effect the same
stories
The same hero and the same heroine
eternally caper and osculate through
their pages.
They are as like as the couples that
spoon on the beaches along Riverside
drive
II is the city Of inevitable similarity
II you don't az into a ready made class,
there is no place for you here, and II
you do, your movements are as easy and
inevitable as those OF a tenpin ball com
ing back 20 balkline.
There are q few who resist this iuces-
SAINT friction tending TO reduce them all
70 the same shape and size as pebbles are
ground and Founded IN a stream.
There are a few real writers, few
real artists. and few real PERSONAL
ties IN all lines.
But most OF them got their growth be-
.orc they arrived here. and most Of them
periodically depart for other regions
where there Is more room, more OF the
: oxygen OF human individuality.
THE PROTEST
OF THE FEW.
Quite a number there IS too. OF those
who madly react against this demand for
u meaningless uniformity,
Here, for example. is man who re-
fuses to wear 3 hat or a coat
poor way to assert his personality.
but n way none the less
Every one makes fun Of him.
The newspapers sneer at him.
I The human pack turns on him as
wolves turn on a bob-tailed wolf.
/ But he deaes them and walks bare
/ headed and coatless down Broadway.
/ And there are other men who wear
their hair long, and some who effect
strange garbs
( There are nll sorts Of freaks.
They represent desperate, almost In
+ sane. reheiuons against the grinding Of
the mighty machine that seeks TO turn
+ out all men according to one pattern.
! You can diagnose the whole disease cit
/ ting IN the subway.
4 These folk. you say are all different.
/ Each of them has his own hopes and
fears and purposes.
But. as matter Of fact, each has
only the hopes and fears and purposes
il ~t.-.- 80 his -lass
Here Is a man contemplating murder.
bL. lie Is one Of large class Of Grim
inals and not at all lonely or unique.
He has his friends who are fellow
criminals
Look at these faces in repose.
There are two types.
There are perfectly blank. vacant faces
the faces Of men and women who move
apa thetically IN their little grooves.
And there are faces stamped with fear,
worry. avarice, and some With placid
good nature and animal content
But rare indeed is the face marked by
conscious intelligence, rare the observ-
ing, considering eye Of the man who con
templates and understands life as we'll
as lives 1t.
And what docile herd animals these
people are.
They are jammed and crowded and
pushed about
They tread on each others heels and
toes and knock each others hats askew,
But they neither laugh nor curse.
They have nothing but resignation.
They are domestic animals being
driven to work.
And man, mark you. Is by his birth
right a fierce and proud animal.
He is the only animal that has killed
and tanned every other mammal on earth.
He Is a fighting. carnivorous creature.
Nothing that walks the earth can mas
ter him.
s;ul his own civilization has mastered
him.
/ 1t has made him a docile, as easily
driven or led as sheep or n COW.
In his pride of victory over nature
he created a giant the city.
And the giant laughed at him and
picked him up and swallowed him down
its subway.
Look at him AS he goes sltherino
helplessly down that long meaningless
gullct, and you see him in his ultimate
degradation.
IS AT FRISCO
Il l. Il + Il