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JOHN A. HOWLAND'S MEMOIR ON RILEY

Part 3  Bookmark for I'D RUTHER WORK WHEN I WANTED TO THAN BE BOSSED ROUND BY OTHERS
Bookmark for 'TEL NOW, IT'S FAME 'AT WRITES YOUR NAME

Riley had chosen the part of wisdom in making the first dash for freedom. The second victim remained to sustain the burden of the punishment.

There was little in Riley's boyhood to make it different from the lives of his chums—little if anything. What there was to mark him as unlike the others was not thought to be to his advantage. He quit school altogether at the age of fif­teen.

One of his first teachers, Lee 0. Har­ris, himself a writer of verses, •has declared that the poet's old text books will show that not all of his time in school was given to study. Their margins and fly leaves were covered with the figures drawn to illustrate the visions which filled his head. His teachers have ad­mitted their inability to guide the boy peacefully in mathematics and grammar. It was his voracious reading in after life that equipped Riley with essentials he failed to grasp in his schooling.

-A        e

koh 1;

All of this is 'the commonplace boy2N:.,;);;I) hood of the ordinary boy in the ordinary."=;\Ni4r. small town. However, genius is not rec­ognized in swaddling clothes and poets are not discovered in tow headed boys who have ambitions, go swimming, and raid melon beds. What there is of value in Riley's boyhood is that he was absorb­ing the atmosphere in these days which gave the world his poems later. That was the difference between his and his playments. Riley found instinctively . the true beauty of fields and forest.

This sense of the beautiful and the artistic must have made his boyhood happier even than the happy lot of the average boy who is free to discard his shoes and ease his feet in the grass of a country field. Riley's sense of this beauty never deserted him. It became the key­note of his future work.

"Ho I'm going back to where

" We were youngsters. Meet me there, " Dear old chum, and we

" Will be as we used to be."

I'D RUTHER WORK WHEN I WANTED TO THAN BE BOSSED ROUND BY OTHERS

  AS Riley grew to manhood it would have puzzled his friends to name his probable occupation later in life. He had realized one of his am­bitions. He could beat the drum and play the banjo. He was well started towards the realization of another. He could paint signs. He had been writing verses, as will be told later, but it is doubtful if even he saw a livlihood in that art just at that time.

From association with John Keefer, a painter in Greenfield, Riley had learned to paint advertising signs. The young man might have continued in this occupation and might have made himself comfortable in life through his labor with the brush.

     His apprenticeship in the business was at the begiining of the rea which covered every barn and every farm fence with legends concerning the virtues of patent medicines --the ^.era which has resulted in the decoration of  country from one coast to the other with daubs against which lovers of natural beauty and civic lonliness have cried in vain.

There is every reason to believe that if Riley had not been a poet he would have been a sign painter. Greenfield today is full of his handiwork. Signs which bear the name "Riley" are proudly cherished by their owners. Many of them are in use now.

The sign painting period is not one which the poet is particularly anxious to be remembered. Especially is not that period which includes his experiences as the " blind sign painter."

Riley's mother had been an invalid and Riley had decided that his own health depended on his not engaging in confin­ing labor. That is the reason he gave at the time to explain his undoubted pro­pensity for tramp life. He had left Green­field on one occasion riding at the tail end of a patent medicine wagon and beating the drum just as he had hoped he might do.

Hamlin's Wizard Oil troupe of min­strels and musicians had passed through Greenfield and Riley went with them when they left. It has been said that he ran away with a circus but this statement has been based on his experience with the Wizard Oil entertainers.

Riley himself says that he " slid out of the office" ^.to leave with the minstrels. Whether this is to be construed into a

"How pleasant the journey down the old dusty
lane."

runaway is left to the reader. At the time he was in the midst of the conflict between his own desire not to read law and his father's desire that he should. He left an open Blackstone when he deserted the law office for the drum at the tail end of the minstrel wagon.

It is undoubtedly true that Riley en­joyed the life with these traveling musi­cians. He was with them one season. As he says he staid with the band " until all the county fairs were over. Then he found himself in a strange state among strangers and he thought it would be fine to pay a flying visit home. But he couldn't fly."

He managed to accomplish the return home and soon afterwards another op­portunity for a roving life was presented, this being connected with the sign paint­ing industry. Of his own ability in this art Riley has said, referring to himself in the third person.

"He could paint a sign—or a house—or a tin roof—if some one else would fur‑

Sign painted by Riley now in use in a Greenfield bank.

nish him with the paint—and one of Riley's hand-painted fences was a rapture to the most exacting eye."

In this budding industry James McClannahan was one of the brightest stars. We have Riley's word for this and the young man acquired his admiration in two seasons of tramping with the ad­vertising genius.

The " blind sign painter " episode is explained in the following manner, al­though Riley in submitting to interviews on the subject of his life's exploits has re­ferred to the matter but seldom.

McClannahan decided that if some novelty could be introduced in the sign painting line business would soon be rush­ing towards the inventors of it. He hit on the expedient of having the painting done by a blind man and Riley was to furnish the blindness.

With a couple of alders, their paint pots and brushes and other apparatus the two set forth in a wagon for a tour of In‑

idiana, Michigan and other nearby states. When a small town was reached McClan­nahan descended to dicker with the mer­chants, explaining the value of having a sign neatly done at the front of their stores by a painter who could not see. By the time the arrangements had been made the word had spread abroad that the quiet young man sitting on the ladders in the wagon could not see but could paint signs without sight.

An agreement having been reached, the ladders would be placed for the painter and Riley, practicing every mani­festation of blindness that he knew, would carefully ascend, and with elabor­ate manipulation, mark off the spaces he intended his letters to occupy. A crowd of several hundred would be collected by this time to watch the progress of the blind sign painter.

In the due course of time the work would be done, to the admiration of the assemblage. Riley preserved the sem­blance of blindness until all the business

Main Street, Greenfield.

afforded by the town had been done an the company had left its borders.

This ruse to gain business was aban­doned finally. McClannahan's ability to argue a dealer into the mood of having a sign painted was sufficient without the aid of the fictitious novelty.

As actual labor the business was hard work—too hard work for one of Riley's build, as he has said himself.

" I can still remember," he has said, " standing on a ladder on the sunny side of one of the big barns and working in the heat until the perspiration ran down my face like rain and my arms seemed ready to break from weariness. You can have no idea of the physical labor of sign painting. Fences were not so bad as barns. On the latter we used to rig a temporary scaffolding, often using a farm wagon for the foundation and building the super­structure in the flimsiest manner possible."

McClannahan was a wonderful solic­itor, according to Riley. When the ad­vertising wagon came to a new town he would get one of the local papers and find the biggest advertisers. Then he would go to the business man and say:

" You evidently are the most wide-awake man in this town. Now we have been painting advertisements on barns, fences and rocks for patent medicine firms and we know what we are saying when we tell you that such advertising is the most remunerative in the world, espe­cially because once paid for it lasts for years. Now there are eight roads lead-g of this town and we will put your ad. in artistic style on every one of the

^Ins and fence f              hree miles out of

or us                                 pey."

ss man. generally protested vigorously a the price dam     Mcrz141-

A masterpiece by Riley.

nahan but he in turn would draw out the county paper and prove by its own adver­tising rates that the form of advertising he offered was cheaper and better.

He always succeeded in the end, the most effective argument being the one that there would not be an inch of space left on any fence or barn near town for any of the business man's rivals to use for like purpose. Then the two had the task of securing the privileges from the farm­ers but there again McClannahan's tact stood them in good stead. He had a way of admiring the cows and horses and of presenting the housewife with a dress pattern and consent was obtained easily.

Business grew rapidly and soon the two were employing a number of assist­ants. Riley also found time in each town to do window work for the merchants, being able to work rapidly and artistic­ally and at lower cost to the dealer than it would have been possible for them to obtain the work from local painters.

If Riley ever had a trade it was this sign painting. If in the end he had been unsuccessful with his poems it is probable that he would have drifted back to it as he has confessed that he never was a

newspaper man in any sense. Although afterwards connected with various papers always was in the capacity of verse writer.

He might have attached himself to some sort or other of theatrical company as he had decided ability. This after­wards was displayed in his platform career as a reader of his own works. On such occasions the real value of his poetry-gained an additional worth in the man­ner of its presentation to the audience.

From sign painting Riley went to newspaper work, the writing of verses, advertisements and paragraphs for Green­field and Anderson papers. All his work in this connection will be the subject of separate discussion in these pages. He did not win immediate honor— did not win recognition even after his poems had secured publication.

It is said in Greenfield that Riley was known as an erratic employe. It is as­serted, with probably unintentional exag­geration, that he never continued in that work more than three weeks until he found his real work in life.

A reflection of his boyish circus days, when the three quarts of pins were accu‑

OLD MASONIC HALL,
Scene of Riley's early theatrical efforts.

R_,y_‘ 4.4

mutated, is found in his young manhood.`‘\(t,i Recollections of his performances in the old Masonic hall in Greenfield are still preserved. He is remembered as " Old Man Probst " in the " Golden Farmer " and as " Troubled Tom " in the " Child of Waterloo."

The assertion is generally made in his native town that " Jim" Riley would have made another Mansfield if he had not taken to writing poetry so there is another probability entered in the inter­esting, if unprofitable, discussion of what the poet might have been if he had not been a poet.

During unemployed days in Green­field Riley encountered acts of kindness on the part of his friends which he never forgot and which he well repaid in his days of prosperity. It is related that on one occasion his life was saved by Daniel Conwell. This is probably an exaggera­tion of the service rendered him, but it was such as to claim Riley's gratitude, and in later days Riley remembered it.

There is many a man in Greenfield who has had occasion to be thankful to fate for granting him the opportunity of befriending the young poet.

One incident of his life in early young manhood there which is still vividly re­membered by him. He and a chum were on the street late one evening when the father of the other young man found them and proceeded summarily to lock them up in a hotel room. During the night the citizens of Hancock county formed in a mob to lynch a negro. Riley and his chum made a rope of sheets and slid down from the window to see the hanging. The spectacle left a deep im­pression on the poet's mind and one which still retains force.

'TEL NOW, IT'S FAME 'AT WRITES YOUR NAME

ILEY began writing during his childhood. His earliest rec­ollection cf an attempt at versification goes back to a disappointment of childhood. One Valentine day came and found the little boy unprovided with pennies to buy the cards which all children exchanged.

His brothers and sisters were spending their pennies for gaudy paste boards with doggerel verses and Riley determined he would send some if he had to make them. He drew pictures of the people to whom his valentines were to be sent and colored them. Then he wrote his own verses underneath the pictures.

If one of the recipients had been en­dowed with prophetic power he would

have saved the missive which the mails brought him and would be the possessor of Riley's first verses.

One of the first poems for which he received money was that entitled " Des­tiny," published by Donald G. Mitchell, editor of " Hearth and Home." Riley has said that he was in the clouds when he recived a check from Mitchell—" Ike Marvell "—whom he knew by reputa­tion, and a note praising the verses which had been accepted. The effect on him was to start him immediately mailing every scrap of poetry he had to the " Hearth and Home."

His first success did not presage a sec­ond. The entire bundle was returned, the disappointment being sweetened by a letter from Mitchell telling the young poet that the work pleased, but could not be used, for the reason that the magazine was to be abandoned.

" A most excellent reason," as Riley said.

At this time he was working on the Greenfield News, a weekly taper which

The Morris Pierson homestead where Riley wrote
some of his early verse.

had been^. bought in 1874 by William R. Hartpence, about the time Riley was busily engaged in sign painting. It was after the receipts from this industry dimin­ished that Riley abandoned it and turned to newspaper labor. Even in this latter occupation he clung to the advertising phase.

He had been doing desultory work on. the News for some time when the man­ager decided to put him in charge of the local field, which, being interpreted, means that he went out after small items and solicited advertisements. In the latter undertaking he was not the greatest suc­cess imaginable. A rival paper of older standing took the greater share of the small town's advertising away from him.

Riley then fell back on his " poetic genius" and did the advertisements in verse, with better results, commercially, although the literary skeletons left in his closet in consequence of that business career are frightful.

One skeleton arises now and shakes its bones to the following accompaniment: "Of all the stores the cheapest one

"Is the grocery store of Carr & Son." Another advertisement began with: "Hootsy-toosy, I declare I

"See the putties everywhere."

Riley went up and down Main street and up and down other streets with these jingles for meat men, shoe men, grocery men and others. It was a sad fate for a young man who was perfectly convinced by this time that he could write poetry, but who was unable to convince other people.

Some of his contributions in the non­commercial line of poetry appeared occa­sionally in the " poet's corner" of the

" Where the cows slept on the cold, dewy grass."

News and of papers in neighboring towns. The general opinion in Green­field, based largely on the advertising verses, was that Riley's poetry was " awful rot." The young poet's friends were not backward in telling him that such was the case.

"Your verses certainly are awful, Jim," said the editor of the rival paper to him one day.

Riley afterwards numbered that man among his friends, but not at that par­ticular moment.

" If your poetry is so good," they-would say to him," why don't the maga­zines take it? " This was before " Des­tiny " had been published, and Riley had no way of answering his critics except by falling back on the • defense which has been used for time immemorial " that the publishers didn't know good poetry."

" I can write as good poems as good poets have written," Riley declared to his friends. He not only believed it, but he.

devised a unique plan to prove it. He decided to test his belief in himself by Writing a poem in imitation of some famous poet and to palm this counter­feit off as a long-lost and newly discov­ered jem.

At the time this decision was reached Riley had left the Greenfield News and was working on an Anderson, Ind., paper. He chose Edgar Allen Poe, a choice which probably was made instinctively but none the less happily. In the poems of Riley and Poe there are resemblances which have been studied seriously by critics.

Plans were laid carefully. Riley wrote to J. 0. Henderson, proprietor of the Ko­komo, Ind., Dispatch, explaining his pur­poses in the matter. Henderson entered heartily into the stratagem.

On the fly leaf of a well worn copy of "Ainsworth's Latin Dictionary" Riley wrote `• Leonainie."

"Leonainie—Angels named her ;

" And they took the light

"Of laughing stars and framed her

" In a smile of white."

The Dispatch published the poem as a "find." It was alleged that the manu­script of a lost Poe poem had been found and the poem was given in evidence. The editor anticipated the uprising of sceptics and took precaution against this by announcing that the original could be seen if there were any doubt as to its authenticity.

In writing the poem Riley had studied oe's methods and had become convinced that he had a theo_jy, about the use of "M " s and_.." N')sand mellifluous vow- els then of-wW dh.'----made his poetry music. The ,success ofhik_!mitation was startling. Rile 's prediction^-that he could

proved

create a literary sensation was true. The poem was copied broadcast. It was studied by American and English reviewers and pronounced genuine.

It never was Riley's intention to reveal his connection with the hoax, and he has regarded it as a mistake to have begun his real work with the swindle.

Of course, the editor having said that the manuscript might be seen, there was immediate call for it. Poe's biographer sent for it.

"What shall we do ?" asked Mr. Henderson.

" We made the poem • we must make the manuscript," said Riley.

A fac simile of Poe's handwriting was obtained from a magazine and the manu­script was produced. Even it passed mus­ter and helped confirm the authenticity of the poem, but finally the exposure came. At the same time Riley lost his position on the Anderson " Democrat,"

"Way back in the airly days."

devised a unique plan to prove it. He decided to test his belief in himself by writing a poem in imitation of some famous poet and to palm this counter­feit off as a long-lost and newly discov­ered jem.

At the time this decision was reached Riley had left the Greenfield News and was working on an Anderson, Ind., paper. He chose Edgar Allen Poe, a choice which probably was made instinctively but none the less happily. In the poems of Riley and Poe there are resemblances which have been studied seriously by critics.

Plans were laid carefully. Riley wrote to J. 0. Henderson, proprietor of the Ko­komo, Ind., Dispatch, explaining his pur­poses in the matter. Henderson entered heartily into the stratagem.

On the fly leaf of a well worn copy of "Ainsworth's Latin Dictionary" Riley wrote " Leonainie."

"Leonainie—Angels named her ;

" And they took the light

"Of laughing stars and framed her

" In a smile of white."

The Dispatch published the poem as a "find." It was alleged that the manu­script of a lost Poe poem had been found and the poem was given in evidence. The editor anticipated the uprising of sceptics and took precaution against this by announcing that the original could be seen if there were any doubt as to its authenticity.

In writing the poem Riley had studied
oe's methods and had become convinced
-that he had a theo5:y about the use of
"Vir s and!! 11^I's_/and mellifluous vow‑
tht₎ use of which -Made his poetry
music... Thi:success of hiimitation was
startling. Rile 's predictiorithat he coTild

CONTINUE TO PART 4