The Wilmington morning star. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1909-1990, 1946-01-08
Fair Enough
By wEsTBROOK PEGLER

| NEW YORK, Jan. T. - just can't under
| stand why it is and maybe it is something
about the moon and the stars Of my chemis-
try, but the last few years it seems that every
tim Ell 60 to Chicago it is winter and try as
I may to lead dignified life, fall into bad
company and drift into sin. 1t seems that
when l 90 there, Joe E. Lewis is always
playing that chez paree over on the north
side and I go to listen to his rude rmarks
and stay for the midnight show and then we
60 out on what you might call our milk-route
which is an itinerary of low resorts, and ap-
p1aud the other comedians and the dancer.
and give money to the man who plays the
accordian and don't feel pretty good in the
morning.
One night, although it was really along about
two in the morning, we got into spell-down
with a welldigger in a place on Clark street
and the well-digger spelled both us bow-legged
with one hand tied behind him, and nice
looking rather stout bar-maid named Agnes
refereed. This girl said she was high school
graduate and I guess she was, all right. but
the well digger said he had barely tagged
grammar-school and just spelled by ear. You
meet some very unusual and interesting people
in such places at such times.
Then one time We walked across the street
to big bank and Lewis had his hand jabbed
IN his overcoat pocket and rammed 1t against
policeman and said, "get in there and grab
us hundred grand and be quick about it, J"
and though, ''well, she warned me not to
go out with that Lewis and / wouldn't listen
and now. this is it." But the policeman mere
~ said, You are so comical' and nothing
happened.
It takes nerve enough for Lewis to 60 out
at all in Chicago, considering what happened
to him that time, but to 60 out with me and
pick disputes with well-diggers about the SPELL
ing OF "erysipelas' and" embarrass" is mad
ness becaue am suppoed to be hot cargo,
although that just rumor because Jimmy
Petrillo, for example, is one of my best
friends and old Dan Tobin, Of the teamsters
always sends me turkey for Christmas.
What happened to Joe that time was that
he had just closed a season at a big noisy
joint on the north side and signed contract
with place called the Rendezvous and was
about to open when a CANISTER named Jack
McGurn called on him and told him to ditch
the Rendezvous and 60 on back to the other
place. Joes answer is expressed by telegraph
operators as 9Th. and McGurn said he never
would open at the Rendezvous but he did and
had played week to big business while bust
ness at the old trap went off, Then, about 10
o'clock one morning, there was knock on
his door at his hotel and he opened it and
three Of them walked in.
"One of them pulled out As and belted
me over the head and went down trying to
fight because I was desperate and knew I
was gone," Lewis has told me. II came to in
about 10 nainuted and jiggled the phone be-
cause couldn't talk"
# you have ever seen him you will under
stand why he couldn't talk. They not only
hacked his face with razor, possibly desiring
to send him to his trave with the traditional
laughing mouth Of the underworld, but cut
his thread and left him for dead. He knew
one Of them fairly well, young boy who
really had nothing against Lewis, personally,
but was just doing routine job in his line
Of work. The other two were strangers.
Joe made no formal police complaint be-
cause in those days in Chicago such matters
were regarded as private affairs and in a
couple of years, sure enough, all three were
dead but not by any of Joe's doing or pro-
curement but just as routine casualties from
occupational hazards. He was friend Of Al
Capone. though, which r1ay mean much or
nothing al attl although, feeling secure and
even brash in that friendship, he chased one
punk out of his dressing room at the State
Lake theatre who tried to shake him down, |
as was customary in those days, and warned
him that he was going to turn him in to Ca
pone for using his name in vain. He says
Capone once offered $4,000 to anyone who
would bring in an operator who was running |
a kind of shake and using his name.
He was in the hospital nearly four months
and didn't really regain his speech for about
TWO years ana the IlrSC place ne played Wnen
he was able was the Rendezvous, again.
It is a strange thing to me that, although
Joe made his reputation with the low-downest,
dirtiest hunor you ever heard, his best au-
diences were really nice and respectable men
and women and don't mean just mink trade
but people who live right and 60 to church
and don't even think along the lines of that
hunor, much less talk that way. It seemed
that he hit them with a blackjack and stunned
them and they lost their inhibitions and went
along with Joe.
But in the last year or 50 have noticed
that he has done less Of that and has become
a real good political satirist which I believe
is a new line in night club comedy. Just to
show, one nigh trecently at the Copa here in
New York, facing an audience that was pretty
well along and hard to hold, anyway. he went
on for more than an hour entirely in satire
about President Truman, starting with Mr.
Humans piano playing and not even
snudge Of dirt, and left them hollering for
more because he wanted to come over to our
table and tell her about the time he and
rented push-cart HE BIG BLABMOUTH.
Now I see that this year he is gong to
Miami Beach for the winter season which
seems to mean that can 60 to Chicago with
out any danger that anybody will seize me
from behind, pinion my arms and pour flefy
draughts down my throat to drug my wonder
FIJI ~