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it's the cook's fault.

He says, "that woman thou gavest me really ought to know cooking at least." He brings home a pay envelope that strikes terror to the heart of the "sweet woman," and causes her to grab at least three breakfasts per week from the oat bin-can you blame her? There he sits, like a storm cloud on Lookout Mountain, and demands to know why she don't feed him roundsteak at least once't in a while. It's the cook's fault!

Even the children are quick to notice the "culinary failures" of the family foodstuff worker.

Of course I am not trying to advance a child as a person capable of passing on the merits, or demerits, of a cook-nor do I attempt to convey the idea that a child has any exceptional ability "to come to an understanding" of the underlying causes that "offset" the cook in rather a compromising position. No, I merely desire to emphasize the old saying "Like father, like son"childish.

The cook at all times is doing the best she can. (If there is no good food on the table it is because she could not procure it, for some reason or other.)

The hotel cook is generally a man. Ninety-nine in hundred, of such men, are regular "he-men," and many are the battles they have put up, for the "eaters," against

have they fought the encroachments of an organized system of stomach-robberywhich all goes to show how "yellow" the public is.

Ordinarily a cook has all he can do to look after his own welfare; his own wages; his own conditions of servitude. But it is true the cooks have repeatedly sacrificed their own interest, their jobs and their "standing in the industry," trying to better the food for a shiftless, easy-going public. Someone has said, "to hell with the public"; and I do verily believe, he guessed it.

The public is rapidly reaching a stage of mental, moral and physical putrefaction, which might be termed a condition of hell. The cooks have been unable to save the

people from the profit system, although

the people were willing to let them do it.

Not only in swell hotels, but in commissary-camps, are the inmates patiently waiting for the cooks to win "their battle" with the capitalist system. I think they'll wait a long, long time.

It is now up to the cooks to save themselves. This idea of fighting someone else's frowned upon in well-organized circles. Let battles is getting to be old style and is the cooks organize in a union of their industry, and let them fight for wages, shorter days and better conditions for themselves. That's the best thing they can do for the Public.

T-Bone Slim.

F

LOPPIN' is done by the best people. It is an institution highly developed by the human race and is frequently indulged in by tired business men, cow-eyed stenographers and loggers with stag pants. It is the one thing that every man, woman and child enjoys more of than anything else that they get.

Where does a stiff find any more high-class sensations than comes to him just after rollin' in to a fine well-thrown together bunk, piled high with fluffy blankets, clean sheets, one of those doubleribbed, triple-plated, pressure - packed twentylayers-rolled-into-one sort of mattresses,—all landed together on top of a fast feedin' set of springs in a bugless paradise?

Echo answers-"Where?"

Herb Hoover has come out strong for standardization. Me and him are unanimous on this proposition. Of course, Herb has devoted a lot of attention to fields that never interested me. His idea for instance to make only seventeen kinds of bricks bloom where a hundred and ninety cluttered up the roadside before, never aroused any undue enthusiasm in my hyphenated Scotch-Irish-ScandinavianAmerican heart. Somehow I always felt safer with a little heavy confetti laying round handy.

But the principle is sound. Reduce the varieties. And right here is where Herbie finds Tightline Johnson ready to do a Horatius at the Bridge with him any old time.

There is too many varieties of beds, bunks and flops. My idea is this: let's start right in and reduce the species down to about ten kinds, but all of these ten kinds to be built according to the best and most scientific plans and specifications.

I would allow skid-way to take care of any sappy notions as to outward appearance and the like. If anybody is goin' to die happier because they have a bunk all faked up like a Louie Quince, help 'em along, says 1.

And this pet idea of mine has sound practical points to it that would interest any profound capitalist in the market for elbow grease, providin' these said employers had not been in the lumber business so long that the knot on top of their spinal columns had degenerated into punky butt stock.

I speak from practical experience. How is a good and willing slave goin' to give his master his undivided attention when a lumpy flop and last year's crop of fill-or-busters join hands to divert him from his proper rest?

I am with Herbie right down to the ground of his Native Oregon. I don't believe in anything extreme. Far be it from me to hint that a gold decorated bedstead, equipped with the finest auxiliary box spring mattress, supplemented with Belfast linen sheets, brocaded Astrachan blankets and a hand worked and embroidered Irish lace coverlet, should

be installed for every logger that ever threw a spiked hoof on top of a bit of round stuff.

No Sir! I ain't one of these Kerenskies that want nothing less than a Czar's bed to sleep in. Not that I am sayin' anything against 'em, mind. I remember one time when I had the flop of a life time in just such a bunk.

It was down in the heart of the steel country during the early days of the renaissance of the Ku-Klux Klan. Normalcy and the American Defense Society had the country by the throat. To be a foreigner was as popular them days as the corner bootlegger is during a general strike of the I. W. W.

When lots of these ignorant Europeans were asked the original question-"If you don't like this country why don't you go back where you came from?" it was surprising to find so few who could dig up a real convincing answer. The more they thought it over the more determined they got to follow the Goulds and the Astors over to Europe. So they were pullin' out by the thousands every day.

Me I came rollin' into this vacation ground from Cleveland in the dead of winter. I was hooked up inside of a coal gondola on the Panhandle. Me and a couple of chunks of cast iron had been makin' impressions on each other and on the shack all after

noon.

This shack was one of these temperamental cusses. Must have had an unhappy home life, he was that restless and nervous. He chased me off of that string about ten times into the snow rollin' down from the chill breezes of Lake Erie.

The further south we got the colder the wind became. The exercise kept my blood flowin' freely but my ideas of the human race was becoming more and more pessimistic. I thought to myself that Schopenhauer could have written a real masterpiece if he had taken that trip.

After dark it became easier for me and harder for the shack and he got real nervous. When we pulled up to a water tank at Ambridge, about fifteen miles out of the Pitt itself, he went and brought up reinforcements. Two gunmen of the American Bridge Company rallied to save the system and they run me out of that car and up along the bank of the Ohio River like Three Finger Jack on the trail of a lost soul with a ten dollar bill.

I was always inclined to lean towards the idea that efficiency among the lower classes was enhanced by periods of unemployment, and the way these two gun men extended themselves sure cinched the argument. Here was two specimens of a class as low down as can be found and they were sure overworkin' themselves for no other reason at all so far as I could see.

After headin' upstream for a ways I decides to

INDUSTRIAL PIONEER

sprint off to my left up the side hill. The leg that I busted in the log jam at the Mary's, out in Idaho, was in no shape for a marathon and I realized that I had to look for cover pretty pronto.

I must of run about a mile up that hill when I came to a brush hedge, stretched out along a road. I gallops along when I hear a flivver poppin' in my rear. I hears a hail and glancing back I spies the lizzie pickin' up my gladhanders. So havin' a firm idea that I was unable to compete with modern machinery by hand I finds me a nice crotch in the hedge and highclimbed it and boosted myself over. I gave the once over to about four big back yards, each surrounded by a prickly hedge which I was just gettin' the proper hang of the way to bounce over, when they played out on me and I could see nothin' but a road on the other side of the last one. Alexander and me felt just alike regardin' new worlds to conquer.

There was only one thing to do and that was to look for a flop real handy.

*

In my mind back yards is always connected with some kind of houses, barns and the like. I soon located the back building in this shebang. It was a brick garage and had a door on it like the Union Trust Company's safe.

The house was one of these big nifty summer dumps where the hand-outs are pretty certain if a guy can get by the gardener or the lawn-mower pusher. I thinks to myself that nothing can look more lonesome that a summer cottage in the winter time and pinches my ear to see if I was bit. Sure enough, I found it frosted even after my hurdle race. Here was a hell of a fix.

There flashed into my mind the picture of a man I had seen when I was a little kid. He had both legs off at the hip and was out advertisin' artificial limbs. Both his had been froze off.

I decided that I would have a hard time seein' America first if I lost my legs all on account of two Steel Trust sluggers. I looks over this dump loomin' up alongside in the snow light.

There was a big balustraded porch on one whole side of it constructed in a pleasin' architectural style. French windows looked out on to the upper porch. Now it stuck in my mind, from seein' a few movies, that French Windows are duck soup to the heroic burglar that is out to swipe back the jewels which rightfully belong to the daughter of the old man. So I qualifies for a degree in porch climbin' and ten years in the big house and tries my luck. Sure enough, by just nickin' a piece of glass out of one corner of those panels I could reach thru and open the thing up. I stepped in, after pushing open the shutters. I lighted a match and the first thing that I seen was a big cut-glass fruit dish sittin' on the sideboard. I grabbed this like Damon receivin' Pythias and dashed out to the porch and filled it up with snow. I took it in and closed up the shutters and lit up one of the candle sticks.

At one side of the room was a bed the like of which would set an Oregon balloonist to pinchin' himself. But I paid scant attention to it then.

I flipped off my clothes and shoes and rubbed that snow into my skin for fair. A bath before retiring is wonderful for the complexion I was once told and I have been run out for repeatin' it in every loggin' camp from the Hammond outfit up to Ocean Falls. A snow bath and a rub down on a great towel that felt like a spring cushion sure set me up in business. I climbed into a pair of pink pajamas, took a couple of wraps about myself with a plutocratic bath-robe and, armed with the candle stick set out to explore the house.

Me bein' the son of an old-time prospector and havin' done a little mushin' and pannin' myself, the ideas of hospitality in vogue amongst us sourdoughs has always struck me as bein' fair and square. Many is the time some snowshoe pushin' traveler has moved into my cabin when I was out and helped himself to the grub, livin' strictly up to the code by whittlin' shavin's and washin' the dishes before mushin' on next mornin'. And the same had been done by myself.

So here, thinks I, is an opportunity to introduce some fine healthy customs into an effete society. I finds a pantry stocked with can openers, tinned asparagus tips, oysters, corn, tomatoes, crackers and a big hunk of imported French cheese with little blue sections scattered thru it. It sure all tasted good to me.

I carried the cans down cellar and cleaned up the pantry-then I took my candle and went back to my bedroom.

"Call me early, James!" says I to myself as I blew out the candle and jumped into bed.

Boys, I am here to tell you that that was some bunk. It was so comfortable that I went to sleep quicker than Old Shuteye the Burns stool pigeon, who was supposed to be the miners' checkweighman down at the Indiana Number 3.

And I had one of the finest dreams that was ever produced by a Welch rabbit.

*

I was floatin' up thru a pinkish sort of sky with a feelin' of easy gracefulness like that displayed by the choir leader of United Presbyterian Church.

I flitted hither and thither and I thinks to myself "This system of ramblin' around sure is keen. Wonder why I never thought of it before."

By and by I came to a landin'. It looked just like a chunk out of the West Kootenais-anywheres away up in the hills above timber line. A lot of rocky bluffs and a little level piece with thick mountain grass springin' up.

I strolled along but my hat blew off and I had to chase it and push it down solidly. I wondered if it would leave a red crease across my forehead.

Suddenly I was in a field of mountain blossoms and ahead of me was a big gate like they have in Garfield Park in Chicago-all built up out of flowers

and trailing vines and hedges.

I started to walk thru when a funny old guy, with a beard like a Jewish rabbi, bounced out and wiggled his beard at me.

"Who are you?" he asked sadly, like an employment clerk during hard times.

"Tightline Johnson," said I.

"Look him up in the book," he sang over his shoulder to a couple of skinny looking angels who were sittin' on tall stools and were draped over a slant topped desk.

I stood and gawped about me. It was a funny lookin' dump. Little paths run every which way between small grass plots. They were made out of black sand just like I had shoveled up on the Stikine in British Columbia when I was muckin' the stuff into placer cradles for the Guggenheims.

A little cupid came bouncin' over with a card from an index file in his hand. Old Whiskers looked at it and shook his head.

“Mr. Tightline Johnson," he said, “you have a very bad record. It doesn't seem possible that we can let you into the Kingdom of Heaven. Very black. Very black. You have done so many things that you should not have done. You have neglected so many things that should have been done."

"Break it gently," says I. "When did they cut the wages? s?"

"In Heaven," he said, "there are no wages. But your case is very doubtful. I can not let you in on my own authority. You must come before the judgment throne."

"That's all right," says I. squeeze. I never liked to anyway."

"Lead me up to the talk to straw bosses

The fat cupid bounced out with another card in his hand and gave it to me. I looks at it and says to the old fellow who was leadin' me along:

"Say, old timer, was you ever in Butte?" "That sinful place! Never!"

"Well, don't get peeved. I was just wonderin' where you picked up this rustlin' card idea. I thought that system had been knocked in the head everywhere's except around the copper kings' sweat boxes. Even Gary himself is strong for the idea that each man has a sacred right to work and look for a place if he wants to. Come alive! Your outfit must be way behind the times."

"Hush!" says he, "we approach the presence!" The old fellow took me before a grandstand bigger than the Stadium of the University of Washington that I once busted fog on. There was thousands of dim white figures sittin' in this grandstand lookin' on. Out in front on a nifty little stage was a big fellow with whiskers and wings and a long flowin' robe.

My conductor left me standin' on one side and went up and whispered in the big fellow's ear. About half a hundred court room hangers-on was sittin' and standin' around and they all give me

JULY, 1923

the once-over with the same kind of expressions that I saw on the faces of a gang of reformers who came thru the Kansas City Can when I was being kept in cold storage there so as not to interfere with the benificent work of the High-jacks. It sure was a wet lookin' outfit. I punches the nearest one in the ribs and asks, "Who is the main push up there anyway?"

"You are now in the presence of the most high God!" says he.

So I looked again.

"Tightline Johnson!" God booms out. "You are here! Advance to the foot of my throne. I would speak with thee." So I mopes up.

"Johnson," he said, in his deep full tones that reminded me of Harry Feinberg singin' love songs in the Tacoma County jail,-"Johnson, I gave to you many gifts. They have been abused. I granted you many instincts. They have been perverted, twisted, crushed, or are still dormant in your breast.

"To you 1 granted the great instinct of sex.— The record of your life shows much of loose living, of neglect of those love-hungry women who may have longed for consolation and affection. You have produced no children. That instinct which I gave to you, which would have uplifted you into the glory of life and love, you have allowed to drag you into the mire, to torture your nights and to pollute your days.

"I gave you gregariousness so that you might live together with your fellows, leaning upon them and lending them aid in time of social need. I gave you gregariousness so that mankind could live in harmony and peace together, the common needs of this instinct binding the whole world in chains of interdependence and human love. You have separated yourself from the run of human beings. Along the highways and by-ways of the world you have chosen to live. Far from your kind I have seen you in the hills and mountains,-away from all the average humanity I have seen you with a few of your outcast tribe building camp fires along the sides of city dumps and railroad tracks. I have seen you rambling carelessly with defiant head erect from logging camp to logging camp refusing to settle down in company with your fellows, refusing to hearken to the promptings of sexual and gregarious urges.

"You were sent forth with a soul stored with a measure of self pride in order that you might never demean yourself before your fellow creatures, in order that in every task, in every trial you would always stand forth at the peak of your accomplishment in the height of your ability and shining glory. Yet I have seen you walk thru the filthy places of the cities clad in rags. I have seen you turn your back on offered positions which would elevate you to posts where you would in a full measure be able to gratify the urges of my great gifts. Rather

INDUSTRIAL PIONEER

than ride upon soft cushions you have hung at the peril of your very life upon the rods and the blinds of passenger trains or violated the laws of your fellow men by riding in cars constructed to carry freight.

"Acquisitiveness was given you in order that those things which were deemed worthy might appeal to you and cause you to exert yourself in order to acquire them. This great blessing of mine would have caused you to save the product of your toil, to have labored mightily and with all the cunning of hand and brain in order to gain from the storehouse of nature the wealth that lies there for your kind. What have you cared to acquire? Nothing but hard hands and calloused feet. The joys of accumulation which are known even to the tiny ant and the happy skipping squirrel are passed by untasted by you. You have scorned my gifts!

"That great instinct of workmanship which distinguishes man from most of the beasts has been restrained by you with a throttling hand. You have cast slurs at the joy of creative effort, the pleasant upsurge of pure feeling at a task well done. You have scorned the speedy workman, have abjured the creative instincts and have defied the very well springs of my life-giving and precious offerings! Think you that there is room for you here, Tightline Johnson? No! A thousand times NO!!"

A great silence fell on the assembly. Thinks I to myself, "Kangarooed again, by God!" There was a commotion at the entrance to the judgment hall. A tall slender figure clad all in white with hair the soft color of gold and eyes that looked like those of a married man with a family who has just got the sack because he had the guts to carry a red card.

Said he: "Father! Would you cast this fellow worker out, without giving him a chance to speak? Let us ask him why he has done these things. The ways of humans seem strange to us from here, yet I who have been amongst them, am full of compassion for those that err. Pray-let he whose hands and feet are calloused speak, that we may know what is in his heart."

"Johnson!" said God to me. "Have you anything to say for yourself?"

"I've got a mouthful," says I.

"When I was just a kid about three times the size of that cherub over there I went to work in a lead smelter. Over in the Coeur d'Alenes. They set me on the feed floor dumpin' charge cars into the furnace. An old Swede was workin' alongside who had been leaded twice. One of his hands was fixed so he could only use the fingers for a hook, from the other one he had the use of three. His feet were lumpy. His knees knocked. The lead had him right. Every move was a squeak. He was done.

"The only thing that Swede ever thought about was gettin' a few dollars to get out of that lead poisonin'. And he worked-like a fool.

"At every pay day the company men would coax him into the bar and have one drink before he left. 'Come on, you old Scandahoovian grave cheater!— Have one on me', they would say. 'Hell, there is many a wallop in the old boy yet-Hey?'

"For Andy Anderson was a man that knew charges. The smell of the smoke told him more than a chemist would ever find out and the company wanted to keep him, even tho it was killin' him by inches. Other men would not stay with the job, so if they could just keep Andy broke—just get him drunk-the trick was turned.

"Two pay days passed me on the job-interested in the work, tryin' to learn, just achin' to find out the why and how of things. But none of my money went over the bar. I did not spend it with the tinhorns or the chippies that the company brought in to keep us flat. No! I wanted to save my money in that hell hole-so that I could get out and learn something about what makes the wheels go around. I was crazy about machinery. I wanted to study and to have the know. And I was just a kid then, fellow worker.

"Do you think the Idaho Smelters gave a damn about that? What were they thinkin' about me anyway? They seemed to have track of Andy? How about the Kid-Johnson? They had their eye on me all right.

"This outfit run the company store. They sold the tobacco, the clothes, and shoes and operated the saloon. They handed over the booze, they operated the pool tables and over the hill they had the string of crib houses where the girls were brought in about pay day.

"They run the boardin' house-they run everything.

"They had their eyes on me all right. I wasn't spendin' all the money I made. Towards that money I was tighter than alum. You see I had instincts all right and I was tryin'-By God—I was tryin'.

"And what did those psalm readin' directors and flunkies of directors do? When they found that I had some money ahead of the game they laid me off for two weeks. Yes, fellow worker-gave me the sack for fourteen days so that I would have to spend my money either in camp with the company or on the road lookin' for another job, and jobs was hard them days.

"Was you ever turned loose in a smelter camp with nothin' to do for fourteen days but wait till your lay off was over? Did you ever get up in a smelly dirty bunkhouse out of a tier of bunks three high, along a wall where twenty-one men sleptseven men lengthwise and three deep? Did you ever listen thru a long night to men with the lead eatin' into their lungs and hear 'em spit out on the floor-a chunk of lung each crack? Would it drive you to drink or wouldn't it, now-I ask you straight? Well, it didn't drive me! I was young and I was determined that I would save money and get out to where I could learn something else than to mix a

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