Excerpt from Smith's Barn: "A Child's History" Of the West Side, Worcester, 1880-1923

Since going to press, the crime of removing Smith's barn has finally been fixed on one Ewell. It is almost unnecessary to add that he is a Yale man. Some one once asked a Yale grad uate why, of two boys, the crude material was sent to Yale and the other to Harvard. He replied - I have a harder question. Why, when they have graduated, does the crude at Yale become refined and the other at Harvard hopeless? Ewell is said to be a doctor, whether of philosophy, science, medicine or a veterinarian, it has been impossible - down ber%to deter mine. His tracks have been well covered. Why the son-in-law of a church deacon removed this sacred structure will forever remain an enigma. For stables stand high in the scriptures.

This does not pretend to be a history in its usual interpreta tion. Some are deliberately passed by who would belong in a history of the United States. With one exception, the house of Washburn is eliminated, for unavoidable reasons, except in its early close entwinement with the house of Smith. Inciden tally, thus is eliminated a Suspicion of bias, and assured an at mosphere of modesty unlike the G. A. R. Veteran, who, reciting his service in the 60's at a family gathering, provoked this question from one of the children z - Gramper, couldn't youget any one to help yer? The portrait on the cover is of the author by Collier and endorsed and used by the first Republican paper in Massachusetts. Perhaps it is too easily identified. There is but one other illustration because there is nothing extant fit to qualify with it, except possibly a portrait of the child Thayer in his peculiar pants, beyond the reach of the connoisseur. There IS no chapter 13, out of respect to the un reasonably timid.

This is a child's history so that they who run may read. Some who read may run. Again, this is unavoidable. Unhappi ly in its praise it is almost a slobber-fest. In this way it is personally disappointing but a psychological experiment. Because of its sweetness it might have been published anony mously without a suspicion of the author. Intimately, its saccharine safety has been developed under the influence of a partner from the South, where women talk softly and musically and use their noses for purposes other than for conversation. Those who love and expect to see the great raked will find few oases and a liability for libel strangely reduced to a minimum. They will expect to be refunded the purchase price. They will forget that it might have been greater. Some with the grit which brought Peary to the Pole may push on to the end. Then perhaps is it justified.

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