Boswell Van Dusen
Boswell Van Dusen was the owner and editor of the Morning Chief.
He was a very nice fellow.
He always spoke well of everybody.
His wife’s name was Myrtle. That is all we have to say about Mrs. Van Dusen.
Boswell Van Dusen’s motto for the Morning Chief was, If you can’t boost, don’t knock.
He was a great believer in sweetness and light. He had shaved off his mustache and he didn’t have much hair on his head. He claimed there was some good in everybody. He always wrote nice things about everybody in the Morning Chief, He never had a bad word for anyone.
Boswell Van Dusen had a tough time making ends meet with the Morning Chief.
The business men in our town advertised in it when they felt like it. Generally, they didn’t feel like it. They knew Boswell Van Dusen wouldn’t bother them in the Morning Chief.
Nobody paid much attention to him or his paper, because everybody understood that Boswell Van Dusen was a kind man and very harmless, and would give anybody who got married a nice notice, and anybody who died a lovely obituary, and would keep anything out of the paper that anybody wanted kept out.
Then one day Boswell Van Dusen got to thinking things over. He realized that the Morning Chief was dying the death of a rag baby, and that he himself was in danger of starving.
He said to himself. To hell with sweetness and light, it ain’t no good. He began knocking the brains out of everybody.
He called the politicians liars, and thieves, and cutthroats.
He said half the people in Our Town ought to be in jail.
Everybody felt that this statement was a slight exaggeration on Boswell Van Dusen’s part.
Everybody said the number was only one-third, at most.
There was some talk of killing Boswell Van Dusen. He said he didn’t care, he would just as soon be killed as starve to death.
He wouldn’t keep anything out of the paper any more. He began printing news about the leading men in Our Town.
This was very embarrassing to them. They began putting ads in the Morning Chief.
The politicians commenced thinking of Boswell Van Dusen when they were cutting anything up.
In six months the Morning Chief was the most prosperous paper in the State.
Boswell Van Dusen put in a new press, and bought Walter Winchell’s column.
Everybody in Our Town is very proud of the Morning Chief.
Everybody says Boswell Van Dusen is a great editor, even if he doesn’t ever have a kind word for anyone.