The Waterbury Democrat., 1944-06-30
Walter WimcIleIl COaSt-tO-CO1St
THINGS I DIDN'T KNOW ABOUT
 WOODROW WILSON

THINGS I DIDN'T KNOW ABOUT
 WOODROW WILSON
 He took tap dancing lessons when he vas Governor of New Jersey and he frequently practiced when h, occupied the White Houge. He fancied himself as Q singer and when guests were present he would frequently give his daughter, Mar garet the nod and she would im- mediately start to play the plano His favorite songs were the favorite songs of the day. one of his inti- mate friends said, T am sure that fl he had Q choice he would give up the Presidency to be Eddie Leon- ard"
 His neckties drove everyone nuts He would frequently wear a four-in- hand black tie with a dinner jacket He invariably wore a Frank Sin- atra bow-tie of white linen when engaging in sports activities, such as golf, which was his favorite game. He loved playing golf in the rain.
 He hardly ever missed a perform nrce at the National Theater ii, Washington, and when he was .. Governor of New Jersey-nearly every Monday he could be found n at the Palace theater in New York
 This was his pet limerick which he often recited:
 "At beauty, I'm far from a
 There are others more handsome
 by far
 But my face, I don't mind 1t
 For I am behind 1t
 It's the people out front get the
 jar"
 The only time he ever lost his temper publicly and berated the press was when certain reporters sniped at his romance with Mrs. Gait. At that time he threatened to beat up a certain reporter. On the subject of newspaper criticism he said: Tn my position I must expect criticism. I hope that criti- cisn will be constructive, but whether or not 1t Is constructive, would sooner have 1t malicious than have no criticism at all"
 Many people have forgotten that while leading Republican Senators such as Lodge, Borah and Johnson violently opposed the League of Na- tions and everything that Wilson stood for, two other great Republi- cans supported him; namely, Charles Evans Hughes and William Howard Taft An important Democrat from his own party prac- tically led the opposition--Senator Reed of Mlssouri-who also bucked another liberal Democratic Presi- dent.
 wilson was credited with the largest vocabulary of any man who lived. His extemporaneous speech es (when taken down in shorthand over . period of eight years in the White House) revealed that his im- promptu vocabulary was twice the size of Shakespeare's works. He was one of the few public figures who did not employ ghoSt-writer He did the typing himself lon his own typewriter of every message he wrote. The Declaration of War was typed and re-typed by Wilson himself.
 He once called Clemenceau a thief, and Ciemenceau called him worse in q head-on clash at the Hotel Crillon, Paris.
 Ds:ying negotiations in Paris, Wil- son oaid: There are many sinister influences working here, but none more sinister than those desiring social prestige. Among other famous quotations, he said: "Only I have failed-the cause has not. Tt is not right to do wrong, even to make peace"
 The gossip-mongers of the day anticipated that Mrs. Woodrow Will son (the second wife) would man. age somehow to drift away from the President after he had been stricken. But his needs in his dark est hours multiplied her devotion to him.
 Woodrow Wilson believed in the people. He believed that right was might. He believed in the righteous ness of right. He died as a war casualty on the battlefield of peace. The wilson orchid" has been a standard in exclusive flower shops for 25 years. It is not only trade name: 1t is actually the name of a horticultural variety.
 When he was a freshman in the University of Virginia he had cards printed Senator Thomas Woodrow Wilson" and passed them out freely to his classmates. Shortly after he dropped the Thomas from his name completely. The exact reasons for dropping the Thomas are unknown but many thought it was because he desired to reduce his name to thirteen letters.
 There are more boulevards, streets and squares named for him in Eu- rope than for all other Americans