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take note of these names. For instance, Fields felt that his young sisters were annoyingly consecrated to marathon eating; in The Bank Dick he conceived the name "Elsie Mae Adele Brunch Souse," for the character of his small daughter. It was a coincidence, he said, that in the course of the story he tried to brain her with a concrete urn. Toward the end of his life Fields began to sign dispatches to his most intimate friends, such as Gene Fowler, the writer, and Gregory La Cava, the director, with "Whitey Dukinfield."
In one of these, some notes that he wrote out for Fowler, Fields reminisced about the Philadelphia of his childhood : "The trolleycar parties or trolley rides took the place of the old hayrides in the summertime. A party would get together, engage an open trolley car, and adorn it with bunting. Noise ran rampant; the occupants would blow horns and make noises with rattles, and the smart alecks would make smart cracks at the ghillies who stood on the corners or passed with their girls. Some would even make bad noises with their mouths.
"Philadelphians were fond of riding on cars or trains and singing— not that they ever produced any outstanding singer that I can remember. They would arrange parties, leave Philadelphia about 5:30 p.m. on either the Pennsylvania or Reading Railroad for dinner ( 'supper' they called it, the midday repast was referred to as 'dinner'). They would proceed on a private car to New York, see a show — probably Maurice Barrymore — and return to Philadelphia, everything included for a round sum. One of the swankiest things to do was dine at the Reading Railway Terminal or the Pennsylvania Station dining room in New York, same as people in Los Angeles a few years ago would drive to San Bernardino, a distance of seventy-five miles, to get a full-sized smidgeon of corned-beef hash."
In another reminiscence, also for Fowler, Fields touched on the
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