W. C. Fields : his follies and fortunes (1949)

Record Details:

Title:
W. C. Fields : his follies and fortunes
Date:
1949
Publisher:
Garden City, NY : Doubleday & Company, Inc.
Volume:
W. C. Fields : his follies and fortunes
Leaf #:
00049
Language:
English
Subjects:
Motion Pictures, Motion pictures--Biography
Collection:
Books
Format:
Books
Contributor:
Niles Essanay Silent Film Museum
Sponsor:
Media History Digital Library
Coordinator:
Media History Digital Library
Description:
Date Added:
March 28, 2024
Something wrong or inaccurate about this page? Let us Know!

Thanks for helping us continually improve the quality of the Lantern search engine for all of our users! We have millions of scanned pages, so user reports are incredibly helpful for us to identify places where we can improve and update the metadata.

Please describe the issue below, and click "Submit" to send your comments to our team! If you'd prefer, you can also send us an email to mhdl@commarts.wisc.edu with your comments.




We use Optical Character Recognition (OCR) during our scanning and processing workflow to make the content of each page searchable. You can view the automatically generated text below as well as copy and paste individual pieces of text to quote in your own work.

Text recognition is never 100% accurate. Many parts of the scanned page may not be reflected in the OCR text output, including: images, page layout, certain fonts or handwriting.

CHAPTER FIVE F JLlEI ields enjoyed telling about his first juggling engagement. He said the episode prevented him from becoming a Methodist. He said further that it illustrated what could be bought in Philadelphia for fifteen cents in 1 89 1 . He and a boy he'd hired as stooge, Fields said, attended the annual outdoor strawberry festival of the First Methodist Church, which had promised to pay him thirty cents if he would do some juggling tricks. Approaching the neighborhood, Fields, with an air of professional elegance, was carrying a cane and the stooge was carrying the paraphernalia — three hats, five tennis balls, and three cigar boxes. A brisk rain started in as they sighted the church, and at the door the elder deacon told him that the festival would be held inside. Fields generously agreed to these arrangements and started in, followed by his porter. "I'm sorry," said the deacon, "but you'll have to leave the cigar boxes behind." "Why is that, my good fellow?" Fields asked. "Because smoking is a sin," said the deacon. "The boxes are empty," said Fields, opening the lids and showing him. "That makes no difference to the Lord," replied the deacon. 35