Eagle River review. [volume] (Eagle River, Wis.) 1890-1927, 1925-01-01
Labels Stick to
a Man
%. Doubleday. Page & COD
BY M. and R. M. TERRELL

fellow citizens as much as by race
tiOuS fate Hard luck had consistent
ly logged his trail ever since he had
left his cradle. He was only thirty,
but he had lived sixty years Of ups
and downs, mostly downs. Now he
was Stony Points best utility. When
in doubt blame it on "that gOod-for-
nothing" Bingo Dickerson, had become
a town maxim. Such is the drift of
human nature. Label some innocent
duffer and underdog, and soon he
wouldn't be known by any other name
Then one day he disappeared. The
earth had opened up and apparently
swallowed him. He became nine-day
mystery in Stony Point until Seth Gar
rison, who owned the Elite restaurant
received marked copy of the Sierre
Blanca Longhorn News, from cousin
in far-away Texas. The newspaper
carried the information that a Mr.. b
lingo Dickerson, resident OF Stony
Point, had arrived in Sierra Blanca
to take over the 5,OO0-acre ranch OF his
late uncle, old Buck Dickerson, up In
the Guadalupe mountain country near
the Salt lakes.
Five thousand acres The news
spread all over Stony Point in an hour.
OF all people-Bingo DickersOn, who
now called himself B. lingo. One or
the greatest ranches in Texas. Wow
Three months passed. Then one day
Bingo Dickerson got Off the train at
Stony Point. He was the same old
Bingo; If anything little more the
same. He wasn't dressed like mil
liOnaire, and he. certainly didn't act
like one. He just resumed his old
place In the towns daily life-Or rath-
er, tried to- His fellow citizens hadn't
been born the day before; you couldn't
hOOdwink them that easily! Bingo
had a mint behind him and those Boil
shevikian days 1t paid rich men to keep
that fact camoufaged. B. lingo couldn't
fool them No street When ne
would confess that he had left half Of
the money in Texas they would be his
boon companions.
Whereupon B. lingo Dickerson auto
matically resigned his position as town
underdog. That action, too, was
wished upon him, for old Bing0 went
about his business in his same old mat
ter-of-fact way. He never had been
a bad sort, and now that fact became
apparent even to Ike Timmons, the
One-eyed barber Back on Bells Half
Acre he farmed away contentedly and
without disclosing any of his future
plans. To all inquiries, adroit or 9th
erwise, about his 5,OO0-acre ranch, he
remained. as mute as he was good
naturally patient.
Label q man as good citizen, and
he soon becomes one, or apparently ap-
pears to have become one. Frequently
the change is only in the labelling. b.
lingo Dickerson thrived under his new
role. His fellow citizens made 1t their
pleasure to go out Of their way, to do
favOrs for him. Not that he asked
them. Principally, they spoke well OF
him and acted, when they met him, as
though he was a fellow human being.
Old Bingo smiled and plugged away at
his farm work. The place, once
reputed to be the worst patch In the
county, began to take on look of pros
perity. Bart Kestler, the banker, In
sisted upon extending the mortgage.
and good old B. lingo did nothing to
dissuade him. In six months he had
begun to pay some of it off.
In year B. lingo Dickerson was part
and parcel Of the towns pride. In one
short year he had revolutionized that
miserable little half-acre farm that
once caught your cynical eyes as you
drove into town. Now 1t was place
to be proud of: the little house had
been rebuilt and with the new fence,
painted. Neighbors, who would be IN
right on the finish of this crazy-quilt
comedy, had helped much In this trans
figuration.
The farm wasn't all that had
changed. B. lingo was a different
man. True, his easy-going, happy-go-
lucky manner hadn't changed, but MS
appearance had. Not so much his
clothes, which don't count as much as
they're popularity supposed to In fne
making of man, but his face! DE
looked ten years younger and twenty
years happier, and that is infectious.
Some of his friends began to look ike
him. An epidemic Of sunniness and
cordiality swept the town. People
went out of their way to see that no
crouch remained In Stony Point. CLOUDS
with silver Innings were the only ones
permissible.
Two years passed. B. lingo prosper
ing. still remained mute about his enor-
nous Texas interests. His fellow Cit
liens had almost forgotten their reso-
buttons to be in on the unwilling or the
Dickerson fortune when Seth Garrison
who not only ran the Elite restaurant
but had the worst curiosity in Stony
Point. having written his far-aWay
cousin out in Sierra Blanca, received
the following delayed answer:
Sierra Blanca, Texas,
Feb. ID, Fri. P. M
Got yore letter last month Q. K.
Been busy building pig pens. FIGS
cant wait. About yore old friend, T.
lingo Dickerson, he's still got his
uncle's old salt lake ranch, yes. They
was a Mexican Kid born up there last
spring. that's all that's been raised on
old Bucks ranch IN thirty years. NO,
T. lingo haint sold out. He cant. Rele
estate market plumb shot to HI. Ola
Bucks ranch is worth every cent OF
fifty cents acre but NOBODY wants 70
gamble.