Faculty and Proctors
enough fell victim to a straw hat crusade. In downtown
New York and in other parts of the city, custom im–
memorial has decreed that straw hats should not be
worn after the middle of September-a custom foolish,
of course, and which has embarrassed and annoyed
many persons who don't see why anybody has a right
to tell them what they shall wear, or when.
"STRAW HAT!"
It was after the fifteenth-considerably past it, in fact
-when Jones entered the·room wearing headgear that
was now on the Index Expurgatorius of local custom. At
one of the tables
sat · ~
group of which "Pete" J. Rogers
was one. Another was John R. Burton. The straw hat
immediately attracted the table's attention.
''I'll tell you what," said one of the group to Burton,
"if you go over and take that fellow's hat off and smash
it, I'll give one hundred dollars to the Red Cross."
Burton got up, went over to the man 'with the straw
hat, whom he knew.
"M J
" h
.d " h '
.
. h "
r. ones, e sa1 , t at s qmte a mce at.
"Do you like it?" Mr. Jones refurned, smiling.
"Yes," said the othet, grabbing it. Then he rammed
his fist through it.
Jones, who was a buyer for one of the railroads, im–
mediately got ready to clean out the whole place. It
looked as if there would be a real fight. The men left the
table and gathered around the pair, and offered to give
Jones twenty-five dollars out of the money won for the
Red Cross, in order to calm him down. However, Jones
would not be appeased. He tried to have the manage-
[ 93]