The Washington times., 1937-01-19

PCAOC W Sck AAkU TIC kduCEy VI
the old Palace or the Victoria
Palace. Ten years later in the
Victoria Palace 1 had the sat
isfactiOn Of putting on the COM
plete show with my South Sea
films and rs years later played
the Palace with "Simba."
Returning to New York again
on cattle boat, I picked up an
old issue Of Ladies' Home Com
panion, wherein appeared an ar
ticle by Jack London outlining
his itinerary for proposed trip
around the world on his 45-foot
boat, the Shark. Taking a long
chance, I wrote Jack and was
knocked for a loop when I got
a wire from him asking: Can
you cook? Can you take trick at
wheel? Salary $25 month"
didn't know how to fry an egg
and nothing about any kind of
wheel. but I wired back, Sure"
and the job was mine. Arriving
at Jack London's home in Oak
land Cal, in the midst of a Cali
fornia rainStorm, I was met by
Mrs. Jack and found London play
ing poker with George Sterling,
the famous poet, Jimmy Hooper,
then an unknown writer, and
Dick Partington, the artist. Two
years and three months we spent
on the Snark-and I made good
as a cook and engineer.
l was in Honolulu with Jack
London when Alice Roosevelt
shocked society by smoking a
cigarette at reception given by
Queen LiliuOkalani, last ruler of
Hawaii. At Solomon Islands we
discovered the movies had ar
rived-three Pathe cameramen
were down with fever. I became
interested in their camera, as
my dad was the first Kodak
dealer IL the West. So induced
them to let me use their camera
and made my firSt-and the
first motion pictures taken in
the South Seas. Later, with one
of the OtiOn-picture cameras
in Australia, shot the Johnson
Burns fight at Sydney.
In Paris I kicked things up a
bit with Count Castellane, who
later married Anna Gould. Eject
ing party Of high-hats trying to
crash the gate, forcibly making
one Of them behave-I discovered
later he was Baron RothSchild,
Europe's richest man at the time.
had a grand chuckle over this
incident with his son, the present
Baron Rothschild, at Tanganyika,
Africa, two years ago. Then
came back and married Osa. The
world was mine and I aimed to
become a second Marcus Loew,
operating five theaters in south
ern Kansas. The world wasn't
mine-we went broke.
There followed then a wildcat
ting period with the Jack John
son pictures-and my trouping
days with Osa started. We
started on the Orpheum circuit at
the Majestic in Chicago-where
Chic Sales was on the same bill,
making his tinid debut. We got
a route from Martin Beck and
Charley Bray that took one year
and five months-with hout a
break.
We came back to Broadway
where I was booked into the
Criterion Theater to show the
first motion picture the house.
had ever Observation-Disclosures
of the South Seas" Thoroughly
imbued with the exploration bug,
/ went to the South Sea Islands
to make "Cannibals of the South
Seas" returned later to film "On
the BOrderland of Civilization"
I became a pal of the Sultan of
Sulu, who had never heard of
George Ade, who wrote the muSi.
cal comedy "The Sultan of
Sulu."
Now we were in Africa-our
first Safari where the Duke of Or.
leans, pretender to the French
throne, was our host. Getting
back to America with Trailing
African Wild Animals I met for
the first time the late Marcus
Loew and Carl Laemmle. Later
I met Carl and Della Akeley and
one of the saddest fragments of
my memories is the occasion when
I decorated my old friends grave
on the slopes of Mount Mikeno in
the gorilla country of the Belgian
Congo.
One Of the big thrills of my life,
I think, was when I returned to
Africa on an expedition sponsored
by the American Museum Of Natu-
raj History. Here started lasting
friendship with the late George
Eastman, Clifford Pinchot, Trubee
Dawson. Daniel Pomeroy, Prof.
Henry Fairfield Osborne. It took
us four years to make "Simba" at
Lake Paradise at the AbysSinia
border and here we entertained
George Eastman for five months,
Daniel Pomeroy for nine months,
the Duke and Duchess of York.
For a time we entertained the
Charlie Brays of our good old