Show GE RGE ABE TELLS S WHO MCUTCHEONIS Chicago Record In the course of a vent harsh attack on the newspaper correspondents who protested against the strictness of the censorshIp at Manila the ChIcago TimesHerald under date of July 19 prInts the following JOHN T ICUTCHEOX Chicago Record Who Is he An exceedingly clever cartoonist who won recognition during the campaign of 186 lot some humorous humor-ous cartoons in which figured a lop cared DUD Mr lcCtcheon happened to be on a trip round the world on the revenue cuter lcuIo when the war brke out He secured permission to accompany pan i with Deweys teet to Mania The writer of the editorial submits the foregoing as a biographical sketch and lets It go at that He admits that McCutcheon is a cartoonist He sneers at the doga most kindly animal He says that McCutcheon happened to be on a trip around the world Possibly he should have been at home playing golf He secured smermission to aCcompany aC-company Deweys fleet to Manila doubtless on account of his standing asa as-a cartoonist It is hardly worth while to enter Into a discussion as to the merit of Me Cutcheons work in the Philippines He has been sending cablegrams and let tars at close interais ever since May iSIS and readers of the Record know by this time whether or not ire has been seeing things and reporting them truth fuiit The man who wrote the editorial be iittiing McCutcheon and slandering th dog had to make some kind of an effort in the generai direction of Indorsing the administration at Wahington H couldnt write any other kind of editorj ial He had to blame somebody He couldnt blame General Otisas yet so he blamed the correspondents ahd selected McCutcheon as a sinning mark because MeCutcheon had drawn a pie ture of a dog In 1196 As a matter of fact McCutcheon started around the world so as to getaway get-away from that dog But he didnt succeed He writes home that occa sionaiiy he meets an American soldier out in the jungle and when they have sat down in the shade of a palm tree to escape the killing heat the soldier says So your names McCutcheon Is + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + 1 iiiiitii 4 5 + + + 4 r + + w + + S + + + + + 4 + + > j + I t trz 4 4 f + + + 4 JOHN T McCUTCHEON + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + 4 + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + it Are you the man who drew the flexThea Thea McCutcheon books for another treeMcCutcheon McCutcheon does not disown the dog but he is trying to lire it down by men Itonious conduct in the field Its a mean thing to bring up on a man when he is so far away Asknowledging the dog therefore It must be urged in all fairness that it does not stand for a complete biography of McCutcheon The TimesHerald asks the question John T McCutii eonwho is he and then fails to answer an-swer the question It is true that McCutcheon vas known as a cartoonist and not known as a writer up to the time that he happened to be on a trip around the world and made arrangements to seethe see-the battle of Manila He had been a writer all the time but ire hadnt been working at it Some people thought that a miracle had happened in eastern waters seeing that a cartoonist had been transformed into a good war con respondent Those of us who had known McCuteheon for years were not greatly shaken In fact McCutcheon was sending send-ing frqm the Orient brilliant letters of travel to the Record A somewhat cx tended answer to the TimesHerald question Who is he will explain why MdCutcheon was enabled to see things in and about Manila and make an interestIng and veracious report of them John T McCutcheon was born near Romney Ind in lSt His father Cap tam John B McCutcheon known throughout Tbppecanoe county as Barr McCutcheon had fought on the Union side throughout the cIvIl war and was severely marked with wounds He was the most popular man in or around Lafayette for he was the only Democrat Demo-crat who could overcome a Republican majority of 1500 and be alected sheriff two terms in succession At the time of his death about twelve years ago ne was city treasurer of Lafayette Without trying to establish tile fact that McCutcheon ire or was a hero the hero market being glutted at present it may be worth whIle to tell of something that happened to him when he was 14 years of age His father was sheriff at the time Young McCutcheon was assisting as-sisting the turnkey at tire jail anti was directing the transfer of about twenty prisoners front the dining room to another an-other part of the building A prisoner who was under penitentiary sentence stood behind the solid door heading into the dining rooni and as the boy came in he upset him bounded through then the-n doorway and reached the street eCutcheon locked the door grabbed a revolver and went in iiursuit The prisoner made for the Wabash river and the boy was after him firing as he ran One bullet came close to the prisoner and he dodged into a lumberyard lumber-yard into which the boy followed tak log two more shots finally cornering his man and marching him back to the jail McCutcheon took his degree at Pur due university in ISS9 His feputrttion in college was earned by writing ai though he had attempted some pen and ink drawing He wrotq most of the stuff and drew nearly all the pictures for the first annual ever issued at the university and he was the author of a very clever burlesque performed at the class day exercises of his class When he finished college It was his in tentioa to try for a writing job on a newspaper but after he ka looked around and observed the supply and demand in newspaper offices he decid ad that the larger opportunity and the more becoming salary awaited the ii bustrator so he camne to Chicago ir October Oc-tober lISP and succeeded in getting a trial with the Record He became a newspaper artist and It time developed into a cartoonist against his will but he never promised any one that ho wouldnt be a firstclass war comes pendent If he found the right opportu ally It is true that he happened to be on 1is way around the wend which prey ad that he had the enterprise of a tray eler or as previously suggested was trying to escape the distinction of being the nran who drew the dog His amntvat at Mirs bay in the nick of time was not in the nature of an accident Neither wan his presence on the firing line dur log the continued weeks of fighting This last surely cannot be classed as an accident It is too prolonged McCutcheon entered Mabolos with Funston He entered San Fernando with Major Bell Probably when the United States soldiers capture some more Filipino capitals he will eater them with the advance guard also Ia drawing pictures or telling stories McCutcheors has a natural preference for exact truth He cant help it For manly when he drew men and women for the stories in this column he made real men and women such as you see in State street Now that he Is in the Philippines he has beers picturing what is there The TinuesHemaid would have him represent the Filipinos as strewing flowers in the pathway of General Otis But the Filipinos have not been strewing strew-ing any flowers and so of course Mc Cutcheon couldnt make a picture of it You cant make a picture of something that doesnt happenthat Is if you are truthful Tire otily thing that you can make out of something that doesnt happen Is an official bulletin The man up itt the TimesHerald of free says that McCutcheon appears to have been the prime mover in an attempt at-tempt Ot override the judgment of the commanding ofilcer in the Philtppines There are eleven correspondents repre renting the pross associations and in fiuentiai newspapers not including the TimesHerald which has no correspondent corres-pondent at Manila These correspondents correspond-ents are rivals and competitorrtstrlv Ing to outdo one another in securing and forwarding important news Anyone Any-one who can induce eleven independent and selfreliant newspaper correspondents correspond-ents to agree to any proposition against their separate wills Is more than mm prime mover He is a Napoleon Yet this is what the TimesHerald thInks McCutcheon has done Either that or the entire eleven fully believed what was written on the paper which they signed and were not under the malign influence of the clever cartoonist cartoon-ist Or again it may be that they signed It as a favor to McCutcheon because be-cause he as the man who drew the dog Anyway they shouldnt have signed it because It has made a lot of trouble trou-ble It has put the TimesHerald into a cold perspIrationGEORGE GEORGE ADF |