25 / 252
Hall of Fame
trict Attorneyship of New York City an office of nation–
wide importance. Larry Jerome's niece, Jennie Jerome,
had married Lord Randolph Churchill and had become
a great favorite in London society. Her son, Winston,
has been in the British public eye as continuously as
any other statesman during the last twenty-five years:
The elder Jerome's
bon mots
were as much quoted by
New Yorkers in the Eighties and Nineties as Irvin Cobb's
stories, "Odd" Mcintyre's and Walter Winchell's wise–
cracks, and the gossip in the
New Yorker
are retold to–
day. Sometimes those sayings of Jerome's were not es–
sentially humorous, for his reputation as a wag was
helped by a stutter that tended to make anything he
said sound funny. One story, often credited elsewhere,
originated with him.
_He was riding up Fifth Avenue in a crowded bus,
which kept bounding from cobblestone to cobblestone
in the fashion Fifth Avenue buses frequently affected, in
the wake of trotting horses.
In
order to make room for
another passenger, he made his little son sit upon his lap.
When the bus stopped at the next corner, in came a
beautiful young woman.
"G-g-get up, m-m-my s-s-son, .and g-g-g-gi-ve the
y-y-young I-I-lady your s-s-seat," said the elder Jerome.
*
*
*
*
In
the days before he was made Chairman of the
Board of the newly formed United States Steel Corpo–
ration, and thus elevated to what was long perhaps the
most commanding position in the indus trial world, Judge
Elbert H. Gary was often seen in the Bar. Later on, the
prominence of his job and its dignity may have had effect