The Birmingham age-herald., 1923-12-18
Shoor't<;';kk, o /; 'ReQs < Y. WestbEook
 PeaIer EYE, \
1oqYpiG1T to75 LY0AnED HEwS

The bum business is on the bum
 or course, the Hops on the bowery are still thoroughly peopled with down and cutters of all ages from } to 1O0 but there is a great differ enee between them and the deter mined bum of few years ago
 The bum had very much the same habits as the bear and, like the bear his species is becoming extinct. If it were not SO, by this time Diamond Dan O'Rourke's place at Park Row and Pearl street, the old headduar- ters of the beggars' bund, would be crowded with buns. Diamond Dan's is not crowded. It is almost deserted and Louie, the bartender, drowsinE over his race chart has nothing to do.
 |. When Diamond Dan's place gave off its liveliest glints the bum was the crocus and the shumac to New York city because, in city all steel and stone and concrete, he was the infallible sign of the changing of the seasons.
 When the ice went out in spring he yawnod, shook himself out of his blankets and gently worked the win ter crieks out of his frame by mean dering as far as the Battery tn sun ! himself the lazy afternoon through in balmy April, In the fall he came drifting back to town from his oe- casonal job holding in far parts of the country and na ture gave no Surer warning of winters imminence than the buns furtive plucking at the job holders coat sleeve in City Hall park.
 old Diamond Dan himself, holding up the front of the building with his G75 pounds the other afternoon grew melancholy as he called the old roll of the master buns and none of them answered.
 There was Footsy," he said, "tffst used to wear bushei of bandage on one foot and bum his s10 a day in 2nN weather: and there was the Dude and poppa Johnnie and the Under takcr, and I guess there was 300 I could remember if I was to sit down with my missus and put myself to it.
 "The Undertaken was great grafter He used to get up sub scripton list to bury one of the boys and take it around to all the. store keepers and get $50 or $40 atl then i him and the guy that was supposed l to be dead would get stiff together ] down in my place.
 My Missus says most of thems probably dead down under the new i bridge from drinking that bad i hootch. Anyway, they're all gone now. There ain't any real buns any more."
 Park Row, when it was the news paper row Of New York, where Will i Irwin and Richard Harding Davis and other famous reporters wrote l their great stories for the old Sun. was infested with the newspaper l bum, the mos romantic and pic- l turesque bum of all. There were some engaging buns on the bowery, few blocks away but they became Grab when compared to the old news paper bum of Park Row Davis ia nous "Dereliet" was typical of nu- merous tribe of men, ragged wretehes in whom ambition had eAown cold, who cadged quarters and cigarettes and the drinks from those who held jobs on the papers.
 Some will think 1t is a good thing for journalism in particular and the country in general that the news paper bum has become extinct. In certain respects that is not debatabie. but men who have recollections of old newspaper row will feel certain regret for the passing of some fas- cinating characters.
 Warmed by a few jolts of this or that in Perry's little bar in tlie i World building, the newspaper bum l of old became lively and the cold volcano of his intellect spouted wit, philosophy and romantic reminfs- cence. It was said of many soiled and dreary souse in those days: 'He can write one whale of a story when he's sober but he hasn't been sober | in my time"