Imperial Valley press., 1923-06-20
"Ye Press Gang" Enjoys Desert
Party in a 6O-Mile Gale-and
Thereby Hangs an Exciting Tale!

1ta wv SNtA oahNks VI u W
dance to the music of a vest -pock-
ct size graphophone, in a shanty
built along the lines of a Geor-
gette waist, with a 60 miles gale
blowing between the lines, each
gust ladened with several cubic
feet of desert sand, on a floor that
v8s first cousin to a lemon crater,
and all this after you had gored
yourself on mixture of weinies,
pickles, watermelon and ice cream7
If you have you can get faint
idea of what the Press gang went
through last night on their desert
party, and if the sporting news is
mixed up with the obituaries in to-
days issue, our readers must under
stand that it is not exactly our
fault, as the weinies, ,pickles-wa
melon-ice cream combination is still
on the job, and getting out a paper
is more arduous today than usual.
The scene of the pow-wow was
at the old shack about a mile west
of Coyote Wells, where all the
wind spirits of the world seemed TO
have gathered last night to cele-
brate Old Home Week.
The advance guard, under the
command of Charlie Hamilton
brought out part of the commissary
and had stove erected and a good
fire going by the time the remand
er of the crew registered at the
tumble down shack.
A cup of coffee after the long
cold ride out from Ell Centre tasted
like ambrosia last night, and what
mattered it if there was fine
coating of sand and charred wood
in the coffee' Everything went.
The dogs ran rather short, due
TO theprevailing winds, which blew
them off the roasting sticks, and
before one could stop them, on past
Dixieland.
''Dick'' and Fat, Eat Pie
The "newsies' were along too,
and much as the statement may be
doubted, "Dick' Hockett and
"Fat" Cohen actually put on a
pie eating contest and succeeded in
wrapping themselves around
whole pie in two seconds less than
nothing flat. After that "Dick
wrestled with another youngster,
thereby proving himself an "iron
man" and great things are predict
ed for him if he don t eat himself
to death before he grows up.
Following the pie-eating esca-
pade, "Kid' Drye and Battling
Brookfield put on boxing bout
which ended suddenly when the
Battler stopped straight jab with
the business part of his nose and
was rendered hors de combat
Charlie Hamilton then put on a
one-armed scrap with champion -
Drye and was going along fine
when the pickles slammed him
across his bay-window and he re-
tired, leaving Drye monarch of all
he surveyed.
Then the Dance Began
Then the dancing began. To at
tempt a description of the inside
of that Georgette waist, lighted
by the headlights of several auto
mobiles, with the best efforts of
the vest pocket music box drowned
out by the wind whistling through
the cracks and the noise of Jim
N.Y. Arnold's Number Twelves, as
he steered them over the sand and
gravel, requires at least an Irwin
s. Cobb. One might add the com
bined noise of eight or ten husky
kids, equipped with! firecrackers,
and all past masters at the art of
raising Cain, and the swish of
pieces of watermelon as they came
hurting through space, added zest
to the program.
However, neither the wind, sand,
cold, nor those devilish kids could
stop the Press gang from having
a perfectly good time, and despite
the nerve-wracking experience,
some of them are today talking
over plans for another brawl.
Those who were initiated into the
"Grand Press Order of Desert
Rats" last night were:
Mr.. and Mrs. Charles Hamilton
and Lee Hamilton, Mr.. and Mrs.
Don Hamilton, Prue Latta, Mr.. and
Mrs. Manuel Llama, George Ben
nitt, Jimmy Greene, Mr. and Mrs.
Samuel Eastman, Samuel Eastman,
Jr., Mae Johnson, Clifton Conley,
Wolford Drye, Maye Purdy, Don
Primley, Gertrude Schneider, Ray
mond Brookfield, James S. Arnold,
Laura SWEET, Bernard Barton,
Richard Cohen, Jr., Dick Hockett.
Reed Cunningham, William Waite,
Ray Wynn, Jack Hodge and as
guests the Misses Dorothy and
Eleanor Layman Of Chicago.