The Birmingham age-herald., 1923-03-18

w malaria and assorted hooch, held 8
 position with the Government. was buck private in Uncles army, and while not engaged in mopping up officers quarters, was employed as mopper-up of Gu-gus in Mindanao.
 After serving my sentence in the army, I fell into the electrical game by way of the heavy end, stringng wire, digging post holes and the like. In the course of dozen or more years, because I hadn't the ambi- tion to seek easier work, became foreman.
 It was thus met Artie. One of my men jumped the job in Oakland, and by strange coincidence, the next ferryboat from Frisco brought filler. It was Artie.
 Not until we pulled out of Oakland and were drifting across the desert at the little end of freight did we make" Artie's hobby. Most transient wire stringers de- vote their ability as shooters to the shooting of craps in or out of season. Artie didn't shoot craps, he shot pistol. Being back at the tail end of the train that way, the shack" was not liable to hear the shooting and enforce the road rule against shooting. So Artie shot from the door and burned box after box of ammunition. Likewise he burned everything he shot at Up to that time I had considered pistol something dangerous to the guy that held it, or nearly everything else within a radius of ten feet, but not a weapon for potting jackrabb.ts, hawks and other things from a running train. Artie did that and more.
 In our business we didn't know one week where we would be the next. We might be putting in a set of yard signals up near the big lakes when we got orders to beat it for Arizona and renew wiring in a depot dam aged by fire. At least third of our time was spent in transit. When found out how much Artie knew about the invisible im- pulse,' as some scientific sharp calls the 'juice," I wondered why he didn't settle down somewhere and ge ta good job. But he seemed to like the life. In rare out burst of confidence he told me that he had worked at the same game on half cozen big lines, "just because he liked to travel" And so we pounded around, up and down the country for a year before l got line on what was really eating ArtieI OConnor.
 For long time one of Artie's pecuiiarities had been soaking into me gradually. When we were sitting in our bunk car at night, the other boys might be making lot of noise but Artie was sitting by the door listening-eternaly listening for something. Dozens of times he had stopped the racket, or jumped to the ground and away from the car. It finally occurred to me that this was only when there were other men around the neighborhood and still later that the sound of mans voice raised in more or less tuneful melody seemed to get his atten- ton. Every time our car was set out near switch shanty or car-whackers' dump he seemed to take a special interest in their home life. He would drop in on them and sometimes spend hours in their company. Knowing him, couldn't understand it. asked him one time why he mingled with such inferior persons, and he said the type intereted him, and he liked to study them at close range And in particular he says, "I am interested in their quaint songs. l love music, railroad music"
 That got my goat. Anybody knows a railroader-at least a railroader of the oper- ating or maintenance department-has no music in his soul or elsewhere about him. l began to take interest in Artie as strange specimen. He didn't look nutty or act like any cuckoo 1 had ever seen, anc knew he wasn't a hop head. l can spot doper as far as can see him. Aside from his ever lasting pistol practice and his eternal listen ing for quaint railroad songs, I couldn't find particle of fault with him.