Arizona republican., 1921-09-26
Step-k7other Arbuck|e "Forgot"
 Tells of Fatty's Boyhood Days
By Jack Junomever

cut pack, Tn film parlance, from the tragic Virginia Rappe episode in Roscoe Arbuckle's life-reel to closeup of his .boyhood as pictured by the aged step mother who has long felt herself renounced by him.
 The location is an humble home on the outskirts of this California town where Mrs. Mollie Arbuclzle, 63, and lifelong bread winner over the washtubs, pauses with folded hands to recite her story of "Fatty's' lugu- brious amble toward fame.
 When as widow with five chiI- dren she married Roscoes father, with four, Mrs. Arbuckle mothered the boy through adolescence. She speaks with tender pity cf his serio- comic youth when the poundage that was to make him celebrated served but as target for the village jibes She tells of his chronic laziness; of his unhappy days at school; of her unavailing efforts to stir his ambi- ton, pride of person and industry.
 Was Lazy Boy
 And then she directs the spotlight out along the road to fortune taken by this puzzling lad who trudged it with a loaf and a laugh; tells of his failure to write, his forgetfulness of the mixed family with whom he grew up, and his indifference to her in creased burdens when the husband deserted the double brood.
 "But it is no more than expected of Roscoe" she states internationally, with neither bitterness nor reproach.
 "He was aggravatingly lazy as a boy. Neither his fathers cuttings nor my pleadings could cure it. lie didn't do any work around the house, and didn't contribute toward the family support, though his two full brothers did their full share.
 Jeered At School
 Roscoe was big, fat boy who weighted 16 pounds at birth He didn't seem to fit in anywhere very we'll He quit school in the fifth grade, before I married his father. I urged him to go back, but MT. Ar buckle was indifferent. And when he did start his father compelled him to wear his old overalls and sha bby shoes so that the school children jeered him. That hurt Roscoe and he stayed away for longer and longer periods. spending his time near the quitting altogether. I was sorry for him.
 His father used to beat him-and I will say he often deserved it. ''One of his brothers secured him a job and paid two weeks board and room at hotel for him. His untidi- ness made him an object of reproach there.
 "Then he started hanging around saloons, finally getting work as bar boy. cleaning the floors. He would jig-step half an hour for a mug of beer. and at such times, oddly enough, he seemed to have plenty of energy.
 When he left Santa Clara he owed a number of people small amounts. One was a working girl from whom | he borrowed S2.50 the night he went away, and she is still hopeful of it's repayment. I suppose he has forgot ten-as he forgot us
 Foroets His Family
 'sHe has never written to me or any of the family. Often he has driven through the town in his fine automobile. but he never seems to find time to stop and say hello or to recognize his folks. The only way we learn what he is doing is through the papers.
 "No, I have never gone to see him | in the movies. I am not without my pride, and if he wants none of us, so let it be-"
 Mrs. Arbuckle recounted how he | had gone on the stage in song and dance at the old Unique theater in San Jose. then with the Ferris Hart man stock company as comedian, la 1 ter to the Orient, and then back to California with Mack Sennett as an extra man in motion pictures
 T pity the boy" she resumed, speaking quietly. T hope he is not guilty of that dreadful thing. but if he is, would see him punished"
 T have been told that Roscoe now intends sending me some money. But I will not touch it. I feel it would not come to me unprompted, and I should return it''
 Deep affection, it seems, never