Evening Republican, Volume 15, Number 291, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 December 1911 — EDITOR BANQUETED WITH THE HOOSIER LITERATI. [ARTICLE]

EDITOR BANQUETED WITH THE HOOSIER LITERATI.

Participated With Some Six Hundred at Chicago Society Affair and Had a Fine Time. Thanks to William B. Austin for an invitation and to Harry Parker for the loan o£ his dress suit, the writer was able to attend the seventh annual banquet of» the Indian?. Society of Chicago given at the'Congress hotel Saturday night. Besides myself there were some six hundred others there, and all went after the eleven-course banquet like a lot of harvest hands. Thanks to the fact that the dress suit was plenty roomy and that the etiquette of

the day does,not require that you keep the coat buttoned, I was able to return it Without a rip although I disposed of everything of which the banquet consisted in the eating line and took a drink of apolanaris water evdrytlme some one at my table suggested a bumper of “extra dry.” In one respect I was the equal of any man present, I could eat as much. But I didn’t have it over any one else within sight, for there wasn’t a morsel left on any plate nor a dropin a bottle in my section of the great banquet hall. My table did hot run behind in its average any because I skipped the champaigne, there were several fellows' willing to drink my share. Seated at my table was Edward Hines, president of the lumber company bearing his name—the same Hines who was accused of having ;given corrupt aid to the election of Senator Lorimer. He is not a Hoosier either natively or by adoption and broke into the banquet as the guest of L. L. Barth, vice-president of the lumber company and a member of the society. Mr. Hines was both jovial and convivial and willing to talk politics.- He is a republican but is against Taft and the Chicago Tribune because he is against any prosecution of the trusts. He has a record and wants to Hye up to it. Others at the table were Oarrol C. Kent, of Kentland; A. J. Rumley, of Elkhart, and several other Chicago gentlemen, guests of Mr. Barth. There were nine at each of the sixty odd tables, while at the speakers* tabla were about twenty-five. George Ade, president of the Indiana Society, occupied the center of the big table. On his right was Governor Marshall and Rev. John Cavanaugh, president of Notre Dame University; and on his left was Dr. Harvey W. Wiley, chief government chemist; and Chase 9. Osborne, governor of Michigan, and a native Hoosier and a graduate of Purdue University. Other prominent men at the speakers’ table were Hon. William Dudley Folk. Merideth Mcholson, Dr. William E. Stone, president of Purdue University; Dr. H. B. Brown, president of Valparaiso university; Judge C. C. Kohlsaat; Judge Kenesaw M. Landis; Judge Quincey A. Myers; J. M. Studebaker and John T. McCutcheon. In the balcony was an orchestra and the Purdue glee club. Indiana music was sung and the six hundred banqueters Joined in and added to the Volume of the song even if it did not improve the musical elegance. The feasting was occasionally halted by a bugle call for silence and a stentorian voiced gentleman from the balcony, read regrets from the prominent invited absent. None of them would have been missed if they had not sent their regrets. y _ George Ade had some difficulty in gavellng the feasters to sufficient order to make himself heard and then he reviewed the important occurrences of the year with which Hoosiers bad to do. His voice was drowned in laughter occasionally. He introduced Governor Chase 8. Osborne, of Michigan, who gave a splendid short talk filled with humor and eloquence. Father John Cavanaugh was the next speaker and told one good story after another, creating tumultous applause. Dr. Harvey W. Wiley did not mention food, not even to compliment the epicurean excellencies of which he had Just partaken. He evolved a new science to prove that all the genius of Indiana was centered in the southern part of the state, emlnating from the Ohio river and tapering off before the center of the state was reached to a condition which he termed mental mediocrity. The tapering off toward the north according to his scientific map and the northern part of the state he had labeled “also ran" and he | explained that this Included Brook and other places that had made claims to prominence. His address was very novel and so cleverly presented that the great hall resounded with laughter when he had finished. Then came Governor Marshall, who did not prove a very interesting after dinner speaker because be did not have any new funny stories and was (r*i - e , wn—r,- a vonunuta on ngo Four.)