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When Tarzan Went to Harvard
The Hyde Park Historical Society is a unique local institution in Chicago staffed by volunteers. The mission of the organization is to collect and exhibit historical information about this very interesting neighborhood called Hyde Park. Not only is it home of the University of Chicago, The Museum of Science and Industry, The Oriental Institute, The Smart Gallery, and Frank Lloyd Wright’s Robie House, it is also the home of presidential candidate Barak Obama. The Society publishes a quarterly newsletter full of interesting articles and information about historical Hyde Park. The following is an excerpt from one of the newsletter articles. From the Hyde Park Historical Society Newsletter, Spring, 2001
When Tarzan went to Harvard by
William Rice Burroughs Because I attended Harvard School sometime between the Pliocene and Pleistocene eras, Miss Schobinger has suggested that I write a little article for the School Annual and call it Before the Birth of Tarzan.... It was in 1888 that I entered the old Harvard School at 21st Street and Indiana Avenue, where my brother, Coleman, had been a student for a year. I was never a student-I just went to school there. I lived over on the West Side where everybody made his money in those days and then moved to the South Side to show off. I kept my pony in a livery stable on Madison Street west of Robey Street... and in good weather I rode to school. In inclement weather, I took the Madison Street horse-cars to Wabash, a cable-car to 18th Street, and another horse-car to school. Sometimes, returning from school, I used to run down Madison Street from State Street to Lincoln Street, a matter of some three miles, to see how many horse-cars I could
beat in that direction. It tires me all out even to think of it now. I must have been long on energy, if a trifle short on brains. I cannot recall much about my classmates. Mancel Clark, Bennie Marshall, and I came over to Harvard together from Miss Coolie's Maplehurst School forGirls on the West Side-and were we glad to escape that blot on our escutcheons! There had been a diphtheria epidemic in the public schools the previous year, and our fond parents had prevailed upon Miss Coolie to take us in...Bennie Marshall and I used to sneak down to the breakwater and smoke cubeb cigarettes and feel real devilish. I imagine we even chewed gum too. Hebecame a very famous Chicago architect (with Charles Eli Fox, he designed the Drake Hotel-Ed.) I can see him now sitting at his desk drawing pictures and chewing his tongue when he should have been studying.
At Harvard School I studied Greek and Latin because someone believed that they should be taught before English grammar was taken up; then I went to Andover and studied Greek and Latin all over again. So, having never studied English, I conceived the brilliant idea of taking up writing as my profession. Perhaps, had I studied English grammar, I would have known better, but then there would have been no Tarzan... There should be a moral to this. Perhaps it is that one should not smoke Cubeb cigarettes. The Hyde Park Historical Society Newletter is available on the web site newsletter in pdf. Form. There are countless interesting articles about the community and its history and about important historical figures who have either lived in the neighborhood or have visited it. See my articles Mary Todd Lincoln, Summer 1865
Death of the Lady Elgin
My Grandfather’s Clock by Henry Clay Work
Ferris Wheel at the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition |
http://www.julierichman.com
| http://www.zazzle.com/julier*
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