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photo circa 1911 By T. Herman Zweibel Publisher Emeritus

Rejoice, O readers! Let there be songs of praise sung throughout the press-rooms! Bedeck the rooms of my estate with the merry-buntings, and polish my court-yard statue! Truly this is a day for hosannas, for an 8-year-old girl has perished beneath the wheels of a bull-dozer!

Perhaps I should back up a bit for my more ignorant readers. Since the early days of the McKinley Administration, I have been without a liver. The stress of being the publisher of the world's greatest news-paper, in addition to my advanced years, has taken its toll on my sweet-meats, and my liver in particular is susceptible to the corrosive humors of my time-blasted carcass. Even for a man of my stature, a liver is not easy to procure, especially now that my scullery-maids have been emancipated.

But this morning, Doc McGillicuddy greeted me with the happy news that a young slip of a girl had apparently pursued a gaily painted inflated pig's bladder into a field where earthworks were being constructed. She chased her toy beneath the steel carriage of a great bull-dozer, which quickly made an example of her by propelling itself over her brain-pan. My joy only increased when I was told she shared my rather rare Prusso-Bavarian blood-type, and that her still-pulsating liver could be placed into my thorax!

Huzzah! Once more I shall be able to eat the oats-meal, drink the delicious formaldehyde which gives such a sheen to my prosthetic silver ears, and void urine of a pure golden hue! No more shall I rely on bile-transfusions from my sons G. Talmadge and R. Buckminster to maintain my energy! I am informed that the girl's liver has been torn from her ribcage by my own chirurgeons and placed in an ice-chest, and is at this very moment on its way to my bed-chamber. Open the dove-cotes and release the ceremonial flock!

Such joy is upon me, I find myself considering the installation of bull-dozers wherever little children congregate. It would cost thousands of dollars, I am sure, but if it assures me of a constant supply of fresh young liver-flesh, it is well worth it!

Affix the Zweibel family empennage to the highest mountain-tops! Ignite the fatted-calf! Drape the servants in their most splendorous chains! Engage the calliope-bellows! It will be a merry two or three weeks before I shit this new liver into my golden bedpan, choked and corrupted with my body's vile excrescences, and I mean to enjoy them!

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|  | 14 June 2000 | Ad Info | Copyright

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