Carolina watchman. [volume] (Salisbury, N.C.) 1871-1937, 1932-07-22
FOURTH INSTALLMENT

A<0SP
er" Jorgan, known to the Greenpoint
section as the "Polack Wonder" The
boys were to weigh in at one hundred
and thirty-ehree, ringside, and go ten
rounds in n of the preliminary bouts
before the famous Samson Sporting
Club. 1t was the most ambitious bout
yet secured by Manager Bernfeld, and
the purse, SO Sol stated, was to be
twenty-five dollars, to the winner. If
John won he would split with John,
taking ten dollars for his share, and
John Breen, glancing curiously at the
typewriter letter from the trainer of
the Samson Sporting Club, wondered
at the queer kind Of printing, for he
had never seen a typewriter letter
before and he was ashamed to admit
that he could not read a word, a def
cheney Manager Sol Bernfeld was
thoroughly aware of.
FIFTH AVENUE
Let us go back, in an orderly way,
and sketch the story of the Van Horns
as generally understood; the myths of
the new city are its "old families, -
running back two or three or even
four generations.
Guysbert Van Horn, g~reat-grand-
father of Gilbert, was a man of hard
common sense and the son of no less
a man than Peter Van Horn, who
came over from Holland as a young
man, preferring an English colony,
with Dutch traditions, t. life at home.
Guysbert was a man of frugal hab-
its and of strong religious convictions,
when drunk or sober, in fact a man
we'll calculated to prosper in the new
New York. His son, Van Winckle Van
Horn, proved a true son of New York.
Born in 1900, he married a Lambert
and determined to found the Van
Horn fortune on the future of the
city. He believed New York would
eventually grow northward, in spite
of its width from river to river. In
the face of much contrary advice he
bought cheap land far to the north in
the tract of Greenwich Village, and
he held on.
The only sol of Van Wickle-the
Van Horns ran to only sons-was Bre-
WORT Van Horn, father of Gilbert.
So this family tree had its simple roots
back in the rocky soil of Manhattan.
So at the time we make the &C
quaintance of the last of the Van
Horns, as he was generally called, Gil
bert Van Horn was forty years of
age; his hair was iron gray and he
might easily have passed for a we'll
preserved man of fifty.
Gilbert Van Horn was never mar
ried or divorced. He never worked,
never worried so far as the world
knew, and seldom did anything to dis
turb the social balance of the outer
world. Having been born into a pre-
pared position, he agreed with life,
and to a large extent life agreed with
him. Gilbert Van Horn was consid-
cred a typical Van Bibber, a creature
utterly unknown to fact, but beloved
of fiction.
Gilbert was genial. Women were at
tracted to him; so general was this
that the effect became negligible. He
had good breeding and common sense
and a certain lack Of perception. The
combination saved him from becom-
ing an utter loss. Had he wished he
might have married money but the
thought never occurred to him. The
daughters of a half dozen or SO of the
country's richest and hardest-working
plutocrats might have accepted him,
one at a time, of course.
These Woodworking men might ev-
en- have respected him. Gilbert Van
Horn stripped like a heavyweight and
had a wide reputation as an amateur
pugilist.
But we must go a bit further with
the story of this bachelor, prize fight
fan and general all round favorite of
fortune.
He was certain of a beneficent prov
idence that looks out for gentlemen.
To be a gentleman, as he understood
it, was the highest idea of, we'll, of a
gentleman. He never got beyond that;
it was like many of the great funda-
mental things, it was simply so, and
no gentleman could question it, and
still remain a gentleman. His code, for
in those days it was the fashion to
have one, included frank understand
ing in advance. Whatever hopes he
raised were always doomed to disap-
pointment.
Gilbert had no desire to make mon
ey, for the frugal habits of his father
had left the family fortune fairly well