Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 12, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 January 1918 — ALL MOMENCE FETES ITS SON [ARTICLE]

ALL MOMENCE FETES ITS SON

MOMENCE ON BENDED KNEE AS MOST FAMOUS SON STEPS FROM TRAIN. Momence, dll., Jan. 22.—Scalpers could have reaped a harvest here tonight when Momence feted its hero son, Lieut. Pat O’Brien of his majesty’s flying corps. As high as S2O was offered for seats at the banquet in the hastily improvised auditorium in a local garage, but there are no one dollar patriots in Momence, which boasts 103 stars in its service flag. Not a- ticket changed hands for a momentary consideration.

Four hundred and fifty were seated at the banquet and 3,000 wished to attend to hear Mayor L. J. Tiffany greet the idol of all Kankacee county and to drink in the congratulation extended by Henry R. Rathbone, former president of the Hamilton club of Chicago, and the iev. Father Bergan of St. Viator’s college. Judge Landis and Lieut. Gov. Oglesby were unable to be present. Should some local historian ever attempt to set down the history of this little town on the banks of the Kankakee its alpha and omega will have chiefly to do with the amazing peregrinations of Happy Go Lucky Pat O’Brien. To call its very own a fighting, man whose spectacular escape from a speeding train and whose subsequent flight through Germany thrilled two continents comes to most towns never, and this little city of llinois is making the most of the occasion.

Momence never really expected it of Pat; little Pat who carried water for Contractor Clark when he built the brick building on Front street; mischievous Pat who was a lovable trial to his grade school teachers; Pat who didn’t have time to bother much with high school books; Pat who at 15 contracted the wanderust. Momence always knew that Pat would amount to something some day, for isn’t he a broth of an Irish ad' with a way with colleen and a manner respected of gentlemen? And doesn’t'he come of the Fighting O’Briens and didn’t he have a father and a grandfather and a greatgrandfather who fought side by side throughout the civil war in the famous One Hundred and Thirteenth Illinois? With that ancestry and his own cool daring Momence, has always counted on Pat. Blit that a son of this little island town in the marshlands of the Kankakee should, startle a sensation sated world, should be entertained jy the ruler of a mighty empire and be lionized in London, New York,and Chicago—well, that is almost *too much for Momence to fully comprelend.

But the town rose nobly to the occasion. All Momence was at the train. Schools were closed and many of the stores. Banners and flags of the allies lined the streets from the depot to the O’Brien home. Pat—he ■( refuses to be called by any other name—stepped from the train to face a brass band and a throng of people who had gathered from twenty miles around and to be clasped in a mother’s arms. “Hello, Mom,” was his cheery greeting, but hers was only a sob as she reached up and softly touched the scars where a German bullet had harmed this six foot .giant who was still her boy. “O, I’m all right now, mother,” was his hasty reassurances as he turned with a shout to greet his brother. “Hello, Mulligan.” Mulligan’s real name is Ivan and Brothers “Buck” and “Bud” are Merwin and Clarence in the family Bible. Then there are Brother Perry arid sisters, Mrs. Clara Clegg and Mrs. Lila Worley, and Uncle Jeff of* the G. A. R., the proudest man in town; all the envy of Momence. i <' The girls! It’s really too bad there aren’t 300 Pats with cocky aviation hats that he might go around. Feminine Momence might then be satisfied. As it is, it’s just “Hello, Pat” The call of the river where O’Brien spent many hours as a boy was too strong for the returned soldier to resist, and in the afternoon Pat doffed his uniform and put on a suit of his brother’s clothes. Thus disguised, he slipped away from the crowds and for two hours had the time of his life skating on the old Kankakee.

/ The homecoming of the daring American is now an event of. the past, but it will be many days before Momence regains its normal complacency. It will be long before the kids of the town cease to follow him when he appears in his magic uniform, and to point out the initials, Pat painted on the barn in red when he was a kiddie, too. In the meantime Pat will settle down to complete.his book, already begun, whitin he will call “Outwitting the Hun.” He will write it in the little home where hangs the likeness of a king, whom Pat in boyhood never expected to see, but who finally entertained him as an honored guest, and the pictures of his fighting who fought together in the famous One Hundred and Thirteenth Illinois—his father, Daniel O’Brien; grandfather, Perry Hathaway, and great-grandfather, Uriah Drake.