Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1920-07-08
by @. @. LYON

ernor James M. Cox's cronies is Ed
Antrim, Of Hamilton, Ohio, recently
retired as state law librarian. The
two were boyhood friends in Butler
county 35 years ago. -
"My earliest recollection Of Jim
mie Cox" said Antrim, reminisenc-
ing, was seeing him drive into Jake
Morner's feed stable, near the old
High and Main streets suspension
bridge, in Hamilton, back in 1885,
81 was working in Singers hard
ware store, across the street, and Jim
would often come into our store to
buy nails or binder Irvine or other
things needed on his fathers farm.
1.-THE family would send Jim into
town from Jacksonburg, where they
lived, about once every two weeks to
bay. mare, hitched to a light buggy
without top.
Jake Moore, who ran the feed sta
BILE, was an old character, full OF
good stories and he and Jimmie be-
came great friends. I've oSaen look
ed out of the hardware store window
across the street. and have seen Jim
m1e, sitting on q soap box, laughing
his head off at one of Jake's yarns.
When dinner time came, Jimmie
WOulu OII6n come ACROSS TO the store
and say: Come on, Ed. let's go down
to the Butler House and get some
thing to eat and I'd generally go
along with him, If I happened to
have the price. They served regular
meals for 20 cents.
were having a tanning bee,' and he
said to me: Ed, do you think there's
any. place in Ohio today that serves
such good meals as we used to get
at the Old Butler House for 20 cents
when we were kids?'
after Jimmie got all his trading
done, he always went down to the
meat market Of Joe and Johnnie
Fromn and bought big hunk of
bologna to eat on the 10-mile drive
back to Jacksonburg. 1 used to say
to him: Jimmie, you'll kill yourself
eating all that stuff
II was out with him a year or so
ago and we passed meat market
that was displaying some very fine
bologna in it's window. The governor
ordered his car stopped and he said
to me: . Say sa Ed, 60 IN and get a
well now as I did when I was a kid
Likes to Walk in Storms
George F. Burba, a Columbus
newspaper man, probably knows Cox
better, personally. than any other
man. For nearly 20 years Burba
writer on his Dayton newspaper and
then as private secretary during the
governors first term.
zone Of CoX's most interesting
pleasures" says Burba, sis to walk in
the teeth of storms. He loves to
the highways when it's raining tor
rents, or in a snow or sleet storm.
Many a time he has called at my
house in Dayton during storm and
asked me to go tramping with him.
Sometimes we'd walk for four or five
hours and cover as much as 10 miles
of territory.
Ills wonderful vitality is due, in a
measure, to the fact that he can
sleep a few minutes any time he
wants to. I've been hunting with
him and, after eating lunch, he would
say: Call me in Is minutes and he'd
be asleep almost instantly.
On his hunting trips to the wilds
of Michigan he always sleeps one
night out Of doors, in the dense
woods, with only blankets over him.
porous he used to dream of owning
a certain tract of land in the Miami
Valley, four miles below Dayton, and
building home there. The tract is
the present site of Trails End his
valley and is the end of an old In
dian trail. He loves the wild woods
so much that he won't allow the for
ests surrounding his home to be
Held Job as Sexton
he was twelve years old. The United
Butler county, Ohio, hired him at
thirty-fve cents a week to be SEX
ton; and afew weeks later. he went
on the payroll Of the local school
or6 Of 40, ifoy
Of the district school,
THE church was in a cemetery
and in those days the kids all be-
lieved in ghosts" the governor tells.
Il used to be scared half to death
as I would approach the church on
dark Sunday nights to unlock it and
light the lamps.
And then I'd have to sit in the
church alone until the first communi-
cant arrived. 1t was always an old
Mrs. Keister.'
By the time he was fifteen, Cox
could get in his immediate neighbor-
hood. At the same time he had be-
come tired of the farm work. His
father, however, had a farmers ca
reer mapped ont for him.
!, s. So the Cox boy ran off" to Mid
as "devil'' in the office Of the Mid
dletown Signal, running the press
and sweeping out the office, after,
school hours. A week or so later
his father located him, but didn't
take him back to the farm. go
ahead and be a printer if you want
to-" he said.
At sixteen, young Cox secured a
teachers license and began teaching
in the village of Heno at $40 a
month. At the same time he taught
night school in Middletown. It
was while teaching in the night
school that he met Paul Sorg, mil
lionaire tobacco man, who was pres
ident Of the school board.
After teaching several years, Cox
got job as reporter on a Cincin-
natl newspaper. He was fired" how
pleased a railroad official. and then