Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 225, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 September 1915 — WHEN THE AMATEUR “FIRED” [ARTICLE]

WHEN THE AMATEUR “FIRED”

Was Looking for Experience and Got. Enough of It to Be Glad ' of Assistance. t __ - The engineer and the Old Timer of a fireman and I were eating our lunch at the. depot lunch counter in Burlington. Our engine was being given a chance to rest -up along with us, and the train that had come out of Chicago, headed by a new engine and a new crew, was already beating it west across the lowa prairies. I was so “all in” that I could hardly keep my eyes open while I sipped my coffee And gnawed my ham sandwich, but I missed no chance to pose while still garbed in my grimy overalls and jumper and while the mixture of oil and coal dust was still on my face. In fact, I confided to a fellow railroad man sitting beyond me that we had "just come in on No. 1 out of ‘Chi.’” "But on the square now,” asked the engineer in ordinary voice, it being no longer necessary for him to bellow, "ain’t you kind o’ glad that the Old Timer happened to be along with us to help shovel in a little of that coal? Ain’t you kind o’ glad that you got

over the sulks you had up there in Chicago about not getting a chance to make the trip with me alone? He come in sort o’ handy, didn’t he, bo?” “Yeah,” I drawled, indifferently. “He wasn’t in my way to speak of, and I guess it was just as well we let him come along.”—Exchange.