Radio mirror (Nov 1936-Apr 1937)

The story so far: Ever since he was a child in Washington, D. C, Floyd Gibbons has wanted to be where the excitement was. His first job, when he was eleven, was selling newspapers in Washington, and he took it not because he had to earn money but because the Spanish-American war was on and it was thrilling to be out on the streets, bringing the news to the waiting public. Later, the family moved to other cities, and was in Minneapoiis when Floyd grew old enough to decide he'd had enough formal education and wanted to begin earning his own living. He had only one ambition — to satisfy his insatiable curiosity by being a newspaper reporter. In spite of the opposition of his father, Edward Gibbons, who wanted him to follow some more settled line of work, Floyd got a job on the Minneapolis News. After a few weeks he was fired — he never knew why until years later, when he learned that his father had had him discharged on purpose, hoping to disgust him with a reporter's life. Instead, he went to Milwaukee and got another newspaper job. Part Two MILWAUKEE was kind to the boy from Minneapolis — or perhaps it was just that Floyd was a good reporter. After his first signed story, which he clipped and By NORTON RUSSELL sent proudly home to his mother, there were many more. He was no longer a cub, but a full-fledged reporter— and not yet in his twenties. He stayed in Milwaukee only six months, however. His father came to see him one day and asked him to come home, back to Minneapolis. "You can get a job on a newspaper there, if you want to," he said. "You know how I feel about that, but I guess you know what you want to do. Come home, anyway. Your mother misses you — she thinks you're too young to be out on your own." The truth was, as Floyd realized later, that his mother sympathized perfectly with him, "but his father couldn't bear the thought of his eldest son being in another city. He wanted to have him where he could keep an eye on him, control him. He hadn't learned that controlling Floyd Gibbons was a little like controlling a boiler-full of live steam without a safety valve. Floyd returned, but with a stipulation: he was to be completely on his own. He would neither accept money from his father nor live in the Gibbons home. And, of course, he was to be allowed to work for a newspaper. He got a job with the Minneapolis Tribune, and in the next year or so he had his first (Continued on page 84) Opposite page, Floyd Gibbons in the midst of one of his rapidfire stories on the Nash Speed show. Below, there's a story behind this picture taken during Pancho Villa's revolution. Floyd and another man had just given first aid to the old Mexican soldier at the right, who had been wounded. When Floyd and his companion attempted to continue on their way, the Mexican, unable to speak English, warned them not to go any farther by holding his hat up on the point of his rifle. A bullet zoomed through the hat and Floyd stayed right where he was. Below, Pancho Villa's men and their families beside one of the trains which Villa used as his traveling headquarters. Floyd had a private car to himself. At bottom, Floyd (second from the right) in front of a dugout during the Mexican Revolution. Note the beard — life in Mexico didn't offer the time nor the facilities for very frequent shaving. Photos loaned to Radio Mirror by Floyd Gibbons from his personal scrapbook 41