Pczq Two
the.fjool-killer
September, 1$12
The E?ofc
A Pungent Periodica oi . Thrilling
E&SUei
Thought,
PUBLISHED MONTHLY
J. L. PEARSON, -
EDITOH
Cae year io your heart, 25 Cents.
In Clubs of Five or More,v 15 Cents.
Entered as -, second class matter
March 30,' 1910, at the postoffice at
Moravian Falls," N. C, under the act
f March 3, 1879.
TAKE NOTICE!
Do. not send postage stamps pn sub
icription. Remittances should be made by
registered letter, express or postoffice
nney order.'
Be careful to write your own name
And address plainly, and direct, all
Utters and make all orders payable
to:
THE FOOL-KILLER,
Car&Tian Falls, - - - North CareUna.
Lei Us Talk It
Over
t
Well, dear sinner friends, this is
The Fool-Killer.
How does it set on your stomach?
If you like it, you can get more at
headquarters.
The Fool-Killer is not even a forty
seventh cousin to any other paper on
earth.
It stands in a - class by itself, and
its field is is broad as the English
language.
a iub paper wears no oeii, muzzie,
collar nor halter.
. You can put that down to start with.
I am the fellow who works at the
mim'n-'hn'nrllo rtn tViia nnncront norin.
leal of thrilling thought. I print only
what I write; I write only what I
think; and I think what I doggon
please.
I own this entire establishment,
and Rockefeller isn't rich enough to
buy one share of it.
- Does that sound strange?
Well; "bless your soul, I am a great
deal richer than old John.
I never travelled any to speak of,
but I have read a great deal, and have
thunk some.
I have also writ a few books which
I know are great, because they don't
ell worth a cent.
Great books never ' do.
, And then I started The Fool-Killer,
Just to quiet my nerves and keep the
Id press from getting rusty.
From the seclusion of these wooded
hills there will go forth each month
a bundle of literary dynamite that
4 will shake the rotten foundations oft
society and cause the Church of Mam
. mon to at least turn over in its sleep.
The Fool-Killer will be a monthly
Bustard-plaster for the blood-boils of
Society, Church and State. '
It will be salted with wit, peppered
-with humor and seasoned with sar
casm. ., , -
i Every line will cut like a whip, and
very' word will raise a blister. '
If job art a fool you had better not
s!&erib for The Pool-Killer. If
yd are lrlsa yea will; And so that
IDIOTORIALS.
The Suffragettes are now re
ceiving candy ana flowers from
allparties.
' Mary had a little lamb, and
now that the price has dropped
a little, she can have a little more.
When Tom Piatt made Roose
velt vice-president he certainly
had no conception of what lie
was starting.
Let the other papers do the
boosting. The Fool-Killer's busi
ness is to knock, and its .hammer
is never idle.
Truth is like rubber if you
stretch the blamed thing too far
it is liable to fly back and hurt
you. y - , :t -
. All roads lead to Rome; also all
lead away from it. It depends on
which way you think you are go
ing. 'm mim
There are lots of funny things
to be seen in this world, and a
mong them is a fat woman sitting
on. a little piano stool.
If Bill Taft had been born a
Filipino aud Teddy Roosevelt a
Spaniard, don't you reckon some
things would have been different?
Many women prefer a poodle
dog above all things; others want
a man, but some of them want
him as near a poodle as possible,
dog-gone it! x.
, The man who , works himself
to death to get more money than
he needs reminds me of the garter
snake that died in the attempt to
swallow a dead mule.
Te, he, he! I bet the reason a
rabbit ain't got no tail is because
t takes so much to make his ears
that there ain't no material left
for his tail.
Some wise sort of a fool down
in South Carolina is building a
plant to extract nitrogen from
the air just like a female dentist
pulling a feller's artificial tooth,
and he is going to manufacture
the air into stable manure with
out having a hoss in forty miles
of it, "
A cathedral costing millions of
dollars was built in New York to
worship a Savior in who had no
place he could call home,' from the
inebme mostly from tenement
houses where the death rate from
tuberculosis is so " high they are
ashamed to talk about it. Salvation
is free, but in some places, if you
haven't got the money to get up to
the bargain counter, hell is your
home. What a pity it is to be poor
like Jesus was! -r:-; u
WHY I DON'T PRINT 'EM.!-
v." " . , , ' - '4.-" V ; ' '
. ' . iv
Almost every mail brings me
one or more articles for ,publica
tion "in The Fool:Killer. Most of
these articles are on live subjects,
well written and full of good sound
sense, and in everyway worthy of
publication. But the one great
trouble about them is thisthey
are not: written in "Fool-Killer
style.'' Some of them contain more
sense and reason tb an anything I
can writer but they lack the droll,
sassy, flat-footed manner of of ex
pression which has made The Fool
Killer so popular. The" world is
full and running over with good .
smooth, sensible reading .matter.
So many thousand writers are
sending out that kind of stuff that
it simply cannot attract any atten
tion. If a little one-hoss editor like
me expects to be noticed among
all the big guns, he's just got to
kick up his heels and act the fool a
little as he goes along. I learned
years ago that people would rather
be tickled than taught, and I had
that fact in mind when I started
The Fool-Killer. My plan was to
make a man laugh right big, and
then cram the truth down him
while his mouth was open. It has
worked like a charm so far, and J
guess it will continue to work. I'll
risk it, anyhow.
Boys, I would be the gladdest in
the world to print all your letters
and articles which you have been
so kind as to send me, but for the
reasons stated above I simply
can't do it. Fifteen thousand peo
ple have subscribed to The Fool
Killer for the purpose of reading
my own sassy, fool talk and I
must try to give them what they
paid for.
Once in awhile I can print a
short, breezy personal letter from
a subscriber, but I positively can't
give space to long, dry, argument
ative articles, no matter how well
written.
In almost every political con
vention I read about I see it stat
ed that ' 'Bedlam Broke Loose. ' '
Wonder why in the mischief they
don't tie Bedlam so he can't get
loose? -
, Say, mister, if you don't like
this paper you can , just pacify
your sweet self with the thought
that it wasn't made for you, no
how There are plenty of others
who do like it '
; When I pass by a man's house
and see the front yard covered
with dog tracks and old dried-up
chaws of -terbacker, I could sit
down on the next stump I come
to and write the whole history of
that family.
j . f -' ' '-, ,
Tote your Fool-Killer in yourpock
et and stow it to every body you eee.
m
lb
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J. L. PEARSON.
HOWDY! THIS IS ME!
Well, boys, I just thought you
might like to take a ,peep at the
bread-and-butter side of my hat
rack, and so here it is. The artist
said he could have made a better
picture if he had had something
better to work from.
This being my birth-month, I
thought it would not be out of
place to stick up my ugliness and
let you-all take a peep at it.
Like nearly all other great men,
I selected a log cabin to be born
in. The cabin was located on Ber
ry's, Mountain, about four miles
from Moravian Falls, and I be
came an occupant of that cabin
on Septemeer 13th, 1879 just 33
years ago by the watch.
I never went to school more
than twelve months in my life,
and have no education except
what I just "picked up" here and
yander. Worked on the farm un
til I was 21, then drifted into the
printing office. My career as a
printer has been full of ups and
downs mostly downs.
- Three years ago I had nothing,
and was in debt for that. With
no money, and no way of making
any, I was strictly -'up against
it" if ever a man was. In a fit of
desperation I started The Fool
Killer, not knowing whether it
would lead to success or starva
tion. For some unaccountable rea
son the drotted thing seemed to
have the guts of life in it right
from the start. The very audacity
of the thing seemed to etfect the
public sorter like hitting a man
in the belly with a baseball, and
they thought, by jinkity, they
had bettersubscribe and see what
in the devil I was up to.
And so it came to pass that
The Fool-Killer was a howling
success right from the jump-go.
The income from it has afforded
me and my widow a fairly decent
living, besides enabling me to
buy several hundred dollars worth
of printing machinery and fit up
an office for making Fool-Killers
right. :- ; , :vr K. i ':'