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ROUND THE TOWN(By THE MAN ON THE STREET)“What won't people do to make a living?”It is a common expression and. heard often. It is used when one sees some man or woman needlessly risking life and limb in some hazardous vocation. The Man On the Street has talked to many professional performers who do stunts where a false step, or the hundredth part of a second in missing a catch hold may prove fatal.The result of such interviews shows that it It is not altogether the money which their acts earn for them that brings the urge to risk their necks, but rather the recognition that they have performed some feat more daring than anybody else. This gives them the thrill and the plaudits of the people furnish the satisfaction. The money the act brings while usually big is the after consideration.Tom Baldwin was of this class. He was always wanting to do something that nobody else could, but he was not satisfied unless it entailed a certain element of risk and danger. Not that he was as foolhardy as people thought he was when he first began to jump out of balloons with the parachute he Invented. No, Indeed. Before he ever made his first jump he tried out his parachute with sandbag* of hi* own weight to see if the parachute would open, nnd he likewise measured the distance it would fall before it opened. It was a matter of the inort careful calculation. But even so. there was always a chance of being killed, as really did happen to many not so careful or well-informed.A few years ago a performer who went under the profeseional name of “DiavnJo” did i» loop-the-loop act on a bicycle. IB* appeared here at a street fair. “Dlavolo f-ald he first experimented with a marble when the idea occurred to him. He made n tin loop and dropped the marble from an Incline and it went round. Then he built a larger loop and tried it with an iron hoop, and it worked. Finally, when he had calculated distances.- weight, incline and the* size of the loop, all based on his experiments. he tried it out and it worked. I^ter, another man more daring, did the trick wi*h an automobile.These “Human Flies.“ like the one in Quincy the past few days, take serious risks. There is no question about ih But. as a rule they know pretty well what they are about. Babe White, v ho climbed the court house, made a. careful examination r,f the cornices and ledges leflt;u*o he walked up the side. However, a cramp may develop lt;»r some physical weakness silt;~-ze the climber, as it did one. in New York, who f* 11 fourteen stories to the pavement.Harry (Laughlim Yokes, in his younger days when he and “Hap * Ward were in vaudeville, did a turn on a barrel. He would make a run. jump on the barrel and turn himself completely over coming up on his feet again. It was a nifty trick and always made a hit. One nigh? the barrel collapsed and he suffered several fractured ribs and nearly broke his neck.It would le possible to go on and give ;lt; long list of those well known who are engaged in hazardous occupations and performances, but it would be the same story. Most of this class are fatalists They believe when their tine* comes they will ••go. whether they are in the air or on terra firm*.Take the rase of Bobby Beach, the man who fifteen years ago went over Niagara Falls in a steel lvarr*! nnd tame out safe. He ha/1 been doing hazardous stunts right along. About two we*ks ago whih- walking along a Firw-t h«- stepped on a banana peel, slipped, and cracked his skull, from the effects of which he died. The other day the newspapers told the -lory of a soldier who had earned all kinds of medals of honor for his bravery in the World war. He seemed to court death, but was seem lhgly immune. Au automobile caught him In a country town, end he Is no more.So there you are. No matter what your or cuptlon. whether it be doomed safe or dangerous. life appear* to be Just a* uncertain. At least, till* stem* to be the philosophy of thosewko take Ion* chances.
Newspaper Details
Quincy Morning Whig Journal
Quincy, Illinois, US
Mon, May 10, 1926
Page 9
Full Page
Clipped by
Anonymous
DE 05 May 2024
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