THE OREGON- SUNDAY JOURNAL, PORTLAND. SUNDAY MORNING, SEPTEMBER ' 19, 4 1920. '
i .'.
Mike Gilhooley Enjoying the . Fine
Clothes Which Replaced His Rags,
With a Liveried Servant to Help
Him on With Them.
ALL. the heroes of the BtoQloooks
those, surprising youths who rise
to fame and fortune with such- in
credible quickness before the last chapter
la reached have been outdone in real
life by Mike Gilhooley, the freckle-faced, .
red-headed sixteen-year-old son of an Irish
father and a Belgian mother, who stole his
way. across the Atlantic In the hold of a
troopship, and promptly landed in a soft
lap of luxury from which nothing seems
able to shake him. The way this boy's
lucky star has shone on him, enabling him
to triumph over all sorts of adversities and
giving him every assurance of a happy,
prosperous future In this land of the free,'
makes the imaginary achievements of the
"do aJd dare," "luck and pluck" boys aboat
Whom Horatio Alger and Oliver Optic
wrote seem, quite tame and commonplace.
If there had been any doubt of this after
Mike Gilhooley was suddenly snatched
from Ellis Tsland's crowded deportation
pen asd Installed In a luxurious suite at
one of New York's most fashionable hotels,
It would be dispelled by the latest amazing
turn which the whirligig of fortune has
taken for this young hero of real life.
Mrs. Marion Gilhooley Curry was the
fairy godmother who brought about the re
, markable transformation that turned Mike
Gilhooley, penniless waif, into Mr. Michael
Gilhooley, prosperous young gentleman. By
touching the ragged, grimy, half-starved
stowaway with her magio wand of good
American dollars she not only secured his
admission to this country but also assured
him all the advantages of a millionaire's
son. Was ever anything In this world of
tern reality so Infinitely stranger than fic
tion?" Even Alger and Optla might well
bare hesitated to build one of their famous
stories around such a chain of events for
fear of straining their readers' credulity.
But the luck which was working these
wonders for Mike Gilhooley proved unable
to hold good for his fairy godmother. Be
fore she-was fairly started on the task of
giving her protege a good education and
polishing off the rough edges left by his
years of vagabondage, a series of unfortu
nate investments made serious lnroadsion
her wealth. Soon some of her creditors
began to press her, and at last she was
forced to declare herself a bankrupt, with
only a few handredlollars of assets ta
' offset liabilities of more than .$100,000.
There seemed nothing to, do hut give up
an her ambitious plans for Mike's future
and either send him back to Belgium or
put him to earning his living here in some
humble, fashion. '
"Just , what we've expected all along,"
said the confirmed pessimists, who thought
the luck; which had attended-Mike Gilhoo
ley since he first set foot on Ellis Island
altogether, too good to be true. But the
pessimists were wrong this time, as they
often are. Not even the bankruptcy of his"
fairy godmother was able to dim the rays
of the lucky star which for nearly a year
now has been shining on this Irish-Belgian
waif. ...
While Mrs. Carry was still bemoaning
her sudden fall from affluence and. Mike
was gloomily contemplating the prospect
of having to rive up his school and his
nice clothes and his pleasant companions,
there entered the room where they sat a
brand new character In these real life ad
venturesMr. Harold Bolster, prosperous
New York hanker.
Mr. Bolster was a friend of Mrs. Curry's.
, He knew. Mike through having entertained
, . the boy for a few days at his jountry
home. He liked the freckle-faced . young
ster, thought he had the right stuff In him
and would make a successful man If given
half a chance. Now, having heard ft Mrs.
Curry's financial misfortune, he cameto
offer to. become the boy's cnardiaa and to
give him all the advantages which she was
to longer able to. .
Whoh'i
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row timet h trio hi mta M fMlUi wur
M Om Atlantic M Hamiwy.
In a few minutes everything was Joy.
fully arranged. Mr. Bolster assumed the
bond which Mrs. Curry had given the
immigration authorities when she arranged
for Mike's admission to the United States,
and all the other responsibilities which
the boy's upbringing will entail. Once
more Mike iGilhooley's lucky star had
saved him. His fairy godmother had
"gone broke," hut even that could not
spoil his chances of -happiness and suc
cess. All it did was to give him a fairy
godfather who will bestow on him as
many advantages as the generous Mrs.
Curry would have done had she (been
possessed of a better head for finance.
In the words of Mike himself, "Can you
beat that ton luck?" And before any one
has a chance to reply the boy makes
answer himself, with a thoughtful shake
of his head: "IH tell the world you can't."
The real Interest in Mike Gllhooley's
life begins after the death of his father,
shortly before the outbreak of the great
war. There was "little money and Mike
and his mother had hard work making
both ends meet When the war came,
conditions were even worse, and then one
day Mrs. Gilhooley was killed by a Ger
man bomb and Utile Mike was left to face
the world, alone.
He made his way to Brussels and eked
out a miserable existence, sleeping where
ever hetiould find a place along the docks
and living oh food begged from kind
hearted soldiers and saflora. When Amer
' lea entered the war Mike fell In wlthsome
.American soldiers. There seemed some
wonderful kinship between him and them
he was fascinated bj the" etorlea they
told of the boundless opportunities In the
land from which they had come far across
' the sea. At the first opportunity he smug
gled himself across the border Into France
tand took up his abode behind the lines of
steel which General Pershing was throw-'
lng out to oppose , the Germans. He had
no end of .exciting adventures, narrowly
escaping death on several occasions in his
effort to repay the kindness shown him
by the American dough-boys.
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Long before Ar
mistice Day Mike
had become deeply
attached to every
thing American,
and when his Yan
kee friends began
to sail for home he
burned with a de
Sire to follow them
across the Atlantic
and see for himself
the great land of
opportunity about
which he had heard
so much. Even..
If he had had a pocket full of money, get
ting across the Atlantic would have been
no easy task dn those days, when every
Inch of ship room was needed for return
ing soldiers and Mike was penniless. AH
he possessed ln the world were the rags
on his bade
But his ambition was too great to'be
e'asily discouraged. He patiently watched
for his opportunity and at last managed
to hide himself In the hold of an outgoing
transport Long before the coast of Amer
ica was ln sight he was dragged out of his
hiding place and made a prisoner. The
Immigration authorities at New York
promptly sent him back to Belgium. Four
times he tried this, each time with the
same discouraging result He was fast
making a surprising record of transatlan
tic trips for a boy of his age.
On his fifth attempt he managed to hide
himself so Ingeniously Inside a coil
of rope that the watchful ship's officers
did not catch sight of his towseled red
head until the transport was feeling Its
way Into New York harbor. Once more
came the familiar ceremony of dragging
the stowaway out and turning him over to
the immigration authorities.
XO) 1920. International remtar Senrtee. Id
His Lucky Star Continues to Shine on
the Former Penniless Waif and
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SV -X. "N 1 V.--V-.'TI mm m W Wf-.-eWr r I & . f If. -
thenewspapersnow L TTM VjV (f i
r " 31 became interested f 2t)7 1 1 T l I
"2fi,w ln the sturdy. lad ".Jli III I IT I II
4fc who was so intent jHiAiLI II
r on becoming an ' z3&H
American that he f
i . iizsn.au km sons oi i i
"vw hardships In these I tZyy '
reneated attemnts WT! A-JI?oew
Into this country.
lng stories of his adventures and a picture
6howing what a sturdy, bright-eyed little
chap he was. Mrs. Curry, reading her
paper one morning In her luxurious suite at
the Hotel Vanderbilt saw one of these ac-
counts of Mike's adventures. Her heart
was filled with a sudden desire to lend; &
helping band to the luckless stowaway who
bore' the same name, that had been hers
before marriage. She put on her hat and
started at once for Ellis Island to have a
talk with the Commissioner of Immigration.
The Commissioner introduced Mike to
her. From the moment when he clicked
his heels together and saluted as bis douga
boy friends had taught him, be quite won
Mrs. Curry's heart She was convinced
that he was a diamond In the rough, and
she could imagine nothing more fascinating
than the task of polishing this forlorn wait
into a good American citizen.
A few wares of Mrs. Curry's magic wand
disentangled Mike from the Government
red-tape which held him for early deporta
tion. - She filed i bond to assure the Gov
ernment of ber responsibility for him and a
few days later Mike went with his fairy
godmother to live-at the Hotel Vanderbilt
area Britain airfcts aerrxL
Not Even Mrs. Curry's Bankruptcy
Can Shake Him from the Lap of
Luxury Where He Landed After
Adventures More
Mrs. Marlon
Gilhooley Curry,
the FaSrA
Godmother Tno
Started; Mike on
the Road
to Happiness
and Success,
a strange contrast, indeed, to the Belgian
docks, French army camps and stifling
ahlpholds which, for years, had been his
only home.
As Mrs. Curry learned when she hear'd
Mike's story from his own nngrammatical
lips, it was only by the merest chance that
sue naa oeen aDie to come to nis rescue.
ne naa been
scheduled for deportation
some time before, but an the night before
n was to sail the bor elnded the vlrilaru.i
of the Ellis Island guards, plu'nged into the
COld waters Of New York Harbor and swam
two miles though the dark to The ManhaT-
tan shore. To his dismay, a pollcemau
seired him as he tlambered un the Battery
sea wall, and the next afternoon he was
sent back to Elli, Island. But the ship on
which he was to have been denoried was
by this time well on her way to sea, and
thus Mrs. Curry got the chance to become
bis fairy godmother.
At the Hotel Vanderbilt where he lived
among surroundings that continually made
to steal hi. way . '"4 WJfc
They printed Interest-
Amazing Than
Any in the
Story Books
The Former Stowaway Taking Things Easy at tHi
Fashionable Hotel Vanderbilt and. Below, a
Few Pages from the Story of This Boy
Hero's Extraordinary Adventures.
an niD his eyes with amaze
jent, and at the exclusive private
school to which be was later sent,
Mike made rapid progress toward
becoming the young gentleman
his fairy godmother intended hint
to te. He fought manfully against
his fondness ' for crap-shooting, '
learned to be mannerly , with his
knife and fork, and soon' enlarged
his vocabulary to include some
thing more polished than the
doughboys' slang. ' 7) '
Mike's ambition'' is to becomi
a great engineer, and the fairy ;
godfather "who has so oppor
tunely taken bankrupt Mrs., Curry's placa
says he shall He aspires to build "
a railroad -tunnel through the Andes
Mountains of South' Amerlca-a tunnel '
which he ' declares shall be bigger,
better, more wonderful ln every way
than, the famous St Gothard hole through
child when his parents took him on a trio
to Italy. . .,-..-.- .,Vi . , .
"a..
" some one was conrntnlatlnr bim Z I
tnalnlJ . il Tx. TiA0!!11? n.lm
... me uwr cay, wnea
re-
,cSyV bankrupt l"7rUiifr em to
have been born under, a !Sck sV , And
those wh v. ...3L A"
'adventures w 11 certalnlr irrae wm him
' Why shouU l L ffiS&5? ft
headed boy grow up to be the engineering-
twuvwao wiu mnnei the Andes? .Thai
achievement would hardly be more remark
able than tome of the things .which havo
befallen him during these last crowded
months of his life.
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