Newspaper Page Text
8 (174) TBI ]
[ Our Boys
UIL.L.Y KUliJH, A iUGKO,
Gary, the city of steel, showed its more human
side the other day when it was announced
from a hospital that "cheerful Billy'.'
Rugh, a crippled newsboy, was dead. Mayor
Thomas E. Knotts issued a proclamation expressing
public sentiment on behalf of the citizens
and appointing a committee to raise funds
for the funeral. One of the leading ministers
of Gary preached the funeral sermon, a Masonic
lodge furnished a band, scores of per
sons took or sent costly floral tributes, and the
church was filled to overflowing. The whole
country had read of "Billy's" permitting the
amputation of his "game" leg, in order that
the skin might be grafted on the burned body
of Ethel Smith, an eighteen-year-old girl whom
he hardly knew; and it was not surprising that
scores of persons, far and near, should offer to
help pay the funeral expenses and Gary people
should start a fund for a permanent memorial.
The story of Rugh and his sacrifice is here told
in fragments taken from dispatches in four
newspapers. This is from the Chicago Evening
Post:
Weeks ago, when "Billy" was told of the
dangers of the operation, he said, "What of
it? The leg's of no use to me. Maybe it'll
help her. I'd like to be of some use to some
one."
He entered the hospital. A few days later
he was wheeled into the operating-room; from
another door a cot bearing a frail girl, hei* life
hanging in the balance from the terrible burns
she had suffered, was brought in. The two patients
looked at each other curiously, the girl
smiled toward "Billy," and there was a wealth
of exnressiou in tho crlj?n<?? "'Rillv" oUn*
eyes.
Two hours later the two patients recovered
from the anaesthetic. Every inch of the skin on
the hoy's leg down to the foot had been grafted
on the burned portions of the girl's body. The
newsboy's leg had been amputated.
The boy rallied for several days from the
operation and then pneumonia set in. "Billy"
only grinned cheerfully and joked with the
nhvaipiono or?rl nnrooo n Kah 4- if ?" -1
r..(, u.v.uuu uuvt nut ovo a>'uut ii. * * ncn L1IC girl
and her friends filled his room with flowers,
"Billy" grew happier. He always asked about
her.
That, even when he realized he had only a
few more minutes to live, Hugh thought only of
the girl's welfare, is shown in a dispatch to
the New York Press:
"I'm glad I done it, Doc," the newsboy
whispered to the physician in attendance at his
bedside a few minutes before the end came.
"Tell her for me I hope she gets well quick,
will you?"
Then, as he turned his fact to the wall, there
came in almost unintelligible tones the words:
"I guess I'm some good, after all."
The Chicago Tribune tells about the incidents
following Rugh's death:
All day there was a knot of people at Sixth
Avenue and Broadway where Billy used ^ to
"hustle." There was a wreath of mourning
flhnnt Ilia nnnnr.of trVtioK woa
mwmv M.rna |?n j-v/i nillVil *? ao guai UCU UJ
downhearted "Jim," the deaf-mute who was
Billy's partner. It was a busy day for "Jim,"
but he was too dejected to take an interest.
Three small boys sold his papers for him.
The people missed Billy's cheerful cry:
"Want a paper, palt Yassir, here you are.
Fine day. Hello there, pard. I know what
.
> B E S B Y T E ft I A If OF TBI SO
m
and Girls
you want. How's the kid at hornet"
That's the way Billy talked. He always had
a cheerful word and ay smile for every one.
..... i.?:JJI it- i
v>nei--i ?as ma miuuie-naine. xie never Knew
what it was to be grouchy. If he had any
troubles nobody knew of them. And he did
have them. For nearly twenty years Billy had
been trying to accumulate enough money to
go into some small business. It was his one
aim in life. And just when the gifts of kindhearted
persons were to make that thing possible,
he was attacked with pneumonia.
In the drug store window at the corner was
a poster bearing Billy's likeness and the inscrmtion
?
"Billy Rugh is dead. This hero sacrificed his
life to save another. Subscriptions to a memorial
fund received inside."
Mayor Knotts' proclamation expresses the
sentiment of the city where in two years Billy
worked himself into the hearts of the people.
It follows:
The name of William Rugh should be remembered
in Gary as long as the city shall
last. The hearts of all are torn today when
we realize that his act of noble heroism, his un?:n:
' -
ociiioa wuiuiguess xo suner mat another might
enjoy health and life, has culminated in the supreme
sacrifice.
"Greater love hath no man than this."
Lest we forget, and that succeeding generations
may remember and honor his name, I
call upon all the appreciative citizens of this
city, because of our common humanity, to subscribe
to a fund for the erection of a permanent
memorial. I appoint the following citizens as
a committee to take charge of the collection of
such memorial fund and the disposition of the
same: W. A. Wirt, A. B. Keller, and W. P. Gleason.
To this committee will be turned over about
$900 which sympathetic persons had sent for
Billy'8 use when he recovered. This money
and an additional sum to be subscribed will be
expended for some appropriate memorial. A
statue in Jefferson Park, a bronze tablet on the
building at the corner where Billy sold papers,
and an endowed room in the Gary General
Hospital where Billy died are three suggesti
nr?o C'i- ?* * '*
?uua. iiai oieariiB, rtiuy s Drotner, likes the
idea of a memorial room for charity patients.
"The money will do some one good then,"
was his endorsement. "That is the way Billy
would want it."
Stearns lives in Orion, 111. He changed his
name when his mother died and he went, tn 15v??
with his aunt. He is ten years younger than
Billy.
Billy received $35 in cheeks from unknown
friends while he was in the hospital. A check
for $25 from a crippled woman in Baltimore
arrived.
The Chicago Daily News quotes Mayor
Knotts' story of how he started Hugh in business,
and also tells of an offer of the newsboys
of Jackson, Mich., to pa.y the funeral expenses:
"I remember the first time I ever saw Billy,"
said tho mflrnp "Tt u- ?
nno inc \xay nc imilie IU
Gary. He came right up to this office."
" 'Are you Mayor Knotts?' he ftaid.
" 'I am,' I answered.
" 'I've just come to the city,' he said. 'I'm
a newsboy. Lend me a dollar to buy my first
bunch of papers.'
" 'You want it for papers, do you?' I asked.
'Not for drink?'
U T H [February 26, 1913
" 'Oh, no, no, no!' he cried, with that friendly
smile of hiB.
" 'Then here is your dollar,' said I.
"The next day he was standing out there
selling papers and after that there wasn't a fel
low in town that didn't know Billy Rugh."
To the mayor's office today there came a telegram
from the Newsboys' Association of Jackson,
Mich.
"Jackson Newsboys' Association desires
Billy Rugh be given good Christian burial,"
it read. ."Send bill of expenses to W. W.
Todd, secretary."
"I wired them we wouldn't need their money
for expenses," said the Mayor. "Their hearts
arc in the right place though."?Literary Digest.
JUST IN TIME.
CECIL. TROUT BLAKE.
Now, Elizabeth, don't forget that you don't
like soup. You needn't say so, of course. Just
don't take any, and if you really want it you
can get some in the kitchen while we're clearing
away the first course. Bertie, don't you
say anything about the size of vour Dlate and
Jean'8. Of course you have to have small
plates because you're the youngest."
The children laughed merrily, in spite of
their older sister's solemn manner. It really
was a very serious occasion. The minister was
coming to dinner and there were not enough
dishes to go round! It meant two extra, for
Aunt Maria would be there, too, and when
there were just enough dinner plates for six,
and only five cups and saucers, two extra
maonf tk.t 1 1 * - V. - J
uivauv mat ouiucinillg lltlU IU UC UU11C. 1 Uitt
was why Elizabeth didn't like soup; why Jean
was too young to drink tea; and why the two
youngest had to have small plates.
"If the china had only come!" said Eleanor.
"After having saved all the money, and sent
for it and everything, I do think it's mean! Of
course Aunt Maria didn't know!"
Eleanor sighed. She was only eighteen. For
two years she had had entire charge of five
sisters and brothers and their tiny home, and
sometimes the burden seemed almost too heavy
for her young shoulders. Now the minister
was coming to dinner, and the new set of china,
which they had all saved their pennies to buy,
and had ordered from a near-by factory, had
not come!
Rumor said that Aunt Maria was going to
marrv the minister. As Klosnnr stmiorhtpnerl
up the house on the day of the great event, she
wondered whether it was so. If he was going
to be one of the family?but, no, it was awful
anyway! There wasn't a piece of the old blue
china that wasn't either chipped or cracked in
some way.
Eleanor finished her dusting and went downstairs.
Margaret was jnaking salad dressing
and Elizabeth was beating eggs. Even little
Jean was laboriously filling saltcellars. AH
were busy in preparation. Suddenly a shout
came from the porch:
"Hooray, hooray! It's come'"
Yes. it really had come. The two hovs. smil
ing and happy, had brought it up in their express
wagon.
Eleanor's heart bounded with joy and then
sank as quickly. It. was only an hour before
dinner time and there was already plenty to
do. And all that china must be washed!
The eager children had dragged the box into
the kitchen?the two boys were already busy
with hammer and hatchet, loosening the
boards.
"I'm afraid"?Eleanor began, but tb?
hadn't the heart to finish the sentence.
"I'll wash them all, honey," Margaret velnnteered,
reading the expression of her sitter's
?
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