University of Illinois at Springfield
Norris L Brookens Library
Archives/Special Collections
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir
B884G. Bunn, George W. Jr. #1 (1890-1973)
Interview and memoir
3 tapes, 222 mins., 57 pp.
George Bunn, Springfield businessman, discusses his family's history in
Springfield: his grandfather's 1840's businesses, formation of the Marine Bank,
and the Springfield Watch Company. He recalls his education at Lawrenceville
School in New Jersey and Princeton University, work in New York as a reporter
and editorial assistant, WWI service, and Springfield during the Depression. He
also discusses his involvement with the Abraham Lincoln Association, his tenure
as trustee and president of the Public Library Board, War Fund Council 19411945, the Springfield Art Association, and the Hobby Horse press.
Interview by Sally Schanbacher, 1972
OPEN
See collateral file: Interviewer's notes, a copy of The First Ten Years of the
Hobby Horse Press 1934-1944, and article on the Princeton Triangle Club.
Archives/Special Collections LIB 144
University of Illinois at Springfield
One University Plaza, MS BRK 140
Springfield IL 62703-5407
© 1972, University of Illinois Board of Trustees
George W. B u m , Jr. Memoir
Comections and C o m n t s by Paul M. Angle
December 1973
P. 15, 3rd l i n e from bottom. Durstine, Osborne, w o n .
o r infamous, Bruce Barton.
P. 17, l i n e 3.
P.
Our M r . Wrenn, not Rand.
19, line 7. Neuilly-sur-Seine,
not Nevilly.
P. 20, 4th l i n e f r o m bottom. Saint Nazaire.
Nazaire", which i s good French.
P. 24, l i n e 2.
P. 25, l i n e 10.
That was the famous,
I ' m sure Gib pronounced it "San
Fables in Slang.
Izaak Walton.
And I ' m doubtful about the Itchen but I can't
find it.
P. 28, l i n e 2.
Terrain Hotel? o r Tremnt?
P. 30, l i n e 7.
By this tim, the Ridgely Famners Bank.
P. 32, l i n e s 17-18.
P. 33, l i n e 6.
Lyman Bryson.
Originally called the Lincoln Centennial Association.
Bottom of page. Paul Angle graduated from M i d University, not Wabash,
and at the time he was s e l l i n g books f o r the American Book Co., not
Ginn & Co. The two f i r m s were b i t t e r r i v a l s .
P. 37, 2nd l i n e from bottom.
P. 44, l i n e 3.
P. 48, l i n e
Lindstrom, the name was.
Mrs. Leigh Call.
9. Journal of the I l l i n o i s State Historical Society.
P. 50, l i n e 6.
Graustauk.
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
PREFACE
This m u s c r i p t i s the r e s u l t of a s e r i e s of tape-recorded
intendews conducted by Mrs. Sally Schanbacher f o r the Oral History
Office with her father, M r . George W. B m , Jr., daring 1972.
Mr. BwLn reviewed the transcript with Mrs. Schanbacher and helped
e d i t it f o r final typing.
M r . Bunn was born in Springfield, I l l i n o i s I n 1890 and has
lived there a l l h i s l i f e , except f o r absences t o attend preparatory
school and college, t o work i n New York City as a newspaperman, and
t o serve in the m
d
forces during World W a r I. His active c a e e r has
included wholesale grocering, banking, writing, printing and publishing,
leadership of the Abraham Lincoln Association, philanthropy and a
variety of civic a c t i v i t i e s .
Readers of this o r a l history memoir should bear i n mind t h a t it
i s a transcript of the spoken word, and that the interviewer, narrator
and editor sought t o preserve the informal, conversational s t y l e t h a t
i s inherent l
n such h i s t o r i c a l sources.
Sangamon S t a t e University i s
not responsible f o r the factual accuracy of the memoir, nor f o r views
expressed therein; these a r e f o r the reader t o judge.
The m u s c r i p t m y be read, quoted and c i t e d fYleely.
It m y not
be reproduced i n whole o r i n p a r t by any means, electronic o r mchanical,
without permission in w i t i n g f r o m the Oral History Office, Sangamon
State University, Springfield, I l l i n o i s , 62708.
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
G. W. Bunn, Jr., October
4, 1972, Springfield,
Illinois.
Sally Bunn Schanbacher, Interviewer.
!This i s an Oral History interview with Mr. George W. Wznn, Jr., who was
born in the year 1890, corducted in his library at 1636 West Laurel.
The interviewer i s his daughter.
Q.
Dad, pick a year and pick an incident and l e t ' s just start.
A.
I've been asked t o give impressions of Springfield in the middle
or l a t e 1890's and the tm of the century.
I can push my memory back
t o 1893 t o the World's Fair i n Chicago and the ferris wheel and a lagoon
with gondolas, but that i s rather isolated a r d extremely dim.
Wnt in
1896 ad thereafter, I can remember pretty clearly and pretty consecut i v e l y what happened.
One of the principal events of 1896 was m c h i n g i n a political parade
with my father and brother, my brother and I were in soldier suits. My
father was George W. Wmn, S r . , and
brother was Willard Bwm. We were
marching in the parade for McKinley ard his nmrhg-xmte,' mnnbg f o r
b e s i d e n t against W i l l i a m Jennings Bryan ard Ad1a.i Stevenson.
ber McKinley1s rwnning-n-ate
I remem-
because I either carried a s i g n bearing M s
nam o r marched right behind sorebody who was.
It was Garret A. Hobart,
who c e r t a i n l y i s a forgotten man today.
Of course, Presidential campaigns came only every four years, but in
between, in the sunmrtkne, there were plenty of circus pmades.
When
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
G.
W. Bunn, Jr.
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the circus came t o town, it brought with it much excitement f o r the boys
of Springfield. The circus grounds were in the area called the Comet
grounds, which was a f l e l d bounded on the east by Fifth Street, on the
north by South G r a n d , on the west by the C and A railroad tracks and on
the south by open country.
W
e used t o get up at three or four otclock in
the morning ard go out t o see the circus unload on the switch, just off the
C and A tracks.
The more intrepid of us would get a job c a r r y i n g water f o r
the animals1 breakfasts and even having a place in the parade which always
came ?tn the morming of the afternoon and eve*
The Comet growlds
perfomnances,
were the site of a couple of baseball f i e l d s
ard a good
many people in t h a t p a r t of town tethered t h e i r cows there overnight,
We
had a b a l l team of youngsters of eight, ten, twelve years old, called
the L i t t l e Potatoes Hard To Peel.
Some of the members of the team were
my brother W i l l a r d , Art Baird, Goin Lanphier, Noah Dfxon, Djxon Grout,
Clyde Horton, Adair Stadden, and one or two others,
win'&,
dawn
I am the only s w f v o r .
Of those t h a t Xvye
Whenever we would win, ~ n eof us would go
t o the newspaper office and put the scores i n the paper, an3 f o r
brevity's sake, would leave off the ' H a d To Peel' part of our baseball
title,
There were,
X recall, four newspapers a t t h a t time; the Journal,
whfch was a mmivlg, the Register, an afternoon paper, the News
-9
an
afternoon paper, and the Springfield Modtor, which did not suxvi~ethrough
a very long period,
Q. In the early years t h a t you're talking about now , p~obablyabout
1897, do you recall what the town of Sprhgfield was like?
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
G. W. Bunn,
3
Jr.
A. Well, Springfield of course w a s a small city of between twenty and
t h i r t y thousand i n these days of the l a t e 1890 s.
The s t r e e t s ran
parallel north and south, parallel t o each other east and west, divided
into rectangular blocks with an alley down the middle.
The alleys were
pretty essential because a great m n y people kept cows and horses.
The
other means of transpoyStation were the street cms.
The street cam covered pretty w e l l the whole territory of the city,
although it was rather d i f f i c u l t f o r a young man i n the north end of
town t o c a l l on h i s young lady i n the south pa& of town.
I n the first
place, he had t o change cars, i n the second place, he had t o break off
his c a l l before the owl car, which was generally midnight.
I remember
particularly the south of the Fifth Street c w line, which ran f m m what
i s now Lincoln Park t o South Grand Avenue, where the conductor reversed
the trolley and reversed the t r i p back t o Lincoln Pmk.
One means of
entertainment i n those days were open air trolley rides in the s m e r ,
where a trolley was chartered and f i l l e d with the guests who merrily rode
over one of the routes and were deposited dmtown where they had ice cream
sodas a t Stuarts on North Fifth Street.
Other exciting mthods of enter-
taining one's s e l f were t a f Q pulls, which don't sound very exciting today,
but i n the days of r e a l sport were quite popular.
Q. Do you recall what Springfield was l i k e downtown?
A. Well, of cowse downtown was the center of activity, particularly
the area mud the s q w .
I r e c a l l seven banks [around the square], the
lxrgest of which was probably five million dollars i n t o t a l assets as
compared with the largest banlc today which i s almst two hundred f i f t y m i l lion.
O f the merchants who did business m u n d the square and everybody
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
4
G. W. Bum, Jr.
I can remember, four o r five are s t i l l in business, the Myers Brothers,
John Eressmer and Company, Maldanerls, h e r ' s Shoe Store, possibly two
or tWee others which I can't remember.
Saturday morning was a very busy nmrnbg, because that was the day the
country folks jnvariably came t o town.
The men would gather around the
Farmer's National Bank, on the southwest corner of Sixth and Adams Streets
and t h e l r wives and daughters were easily distinguishable a s country folks
f'rom their dress, s o n ~ t h l n gwhich of course doesn't happen today, because
the country people, fewer i n number, are just a s c i t i f i e d a s the regular
citizens are.
Q. Would there have been any movie theatres in these early years of
Sprbgfield?
A.
I think the movie theatres c a m a t the very end of the 18901s. I can
remember a number of them, M r . Loper had a theatre next t o his restaurant
on South F i f t h Street.
%re was a movie theatre across from the Leland
on South Sixth Street, a movie theatre on the west side of the square,
and one on the north side of the square.
Another method of recreation i n
those days were the frequent bowling alleys which were generally rather
small ones of two or three alleys each, about four or f i v e of them located
within a block or so of the square.
One of the interesting features of that period, I think, was the nurnbey
of young men f3m-nSpringfield who went East t o college.
Princeton was f a r
and aww the most popular college f o r those who went east, Yale was a p r e t t y
good second, Haward a very poor third.
O f the boarding schools, Lawrence-
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
5
G . W. Bmn, Jr.
v i l l e was far ahead of any other.
The collegian who came back on vacation
or after finishing college brought with him some of the r e s u l t s of the
l i f e on the Eastern seaboard--the mst notable being the g a m of golf.
The first golf course which was founded by young collegians who had seen
the game ard learned samething about it awing their college years, was
a four-hole affair located on the inside of the race track at the Fairpowads.
A t l e a s t it whetted the appetite for golf so that
in the very l a s t of the
1890's a club was formed, the Springfield Golf Club, ard the course i s
s t i l l in existence; i t ' s now Pasfield Park.
Q.
When did you actually become interested i n the game of golf?
A.
Well, I think it was when I was about eight or nine years old.
was a r e a l golf fever in Springfield.
I remember that we had a very small
course in our yard of two o r three holes.
Sin the ground, and
There
The hole w a s a tomato can sunk
it sewed as a sort of practice course.
I think that
I took up golf at about the age of eight or nine and continued it f o r
years and years l a t e r .
Q. You mentioned
It was one of the g e a t e s t pleasures I ever had.
sinking the t o m t o cans in the back y x d .
Where was the
back yard, where was your horn at that time?
A.
Home a t that time was at 1001 South Sixth Street, which was occupied
u n t i l n-y motherTs death 3n 1945, and i s now occupied by Mr. and Mrs. John
Sankey
.
Q. What about the neighborhood around your home then arid now. Has it
retained the same atmosphere?
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
6
G. W. Bunn, Jr.
A. Well of course there's a change, but I think it has changed *om a
s t r i c t l y residential d i s t r i c t t o one into which businesses have infiltrated extremely well.
The non-residential buildings which have been
erected on South Sixth Street are, of course, the Cathedral, Franklin
L i f e , the
E N Build-.
&tween t k m a r e old houses which have retained
a great deal of their old atmosphere and have been well kept and taken
care of, such a s the Sankey ho~llewhich I have mentioned, the old Kfmber
house across the s t r e e t , the Wilson home, which i s now the f i l i n and
Egan Funeral Home.
Q.
You mentioned the Ember home.
being
A.
Don't I remember B i l l Kimber as
an early f'riend? Is this where he lived?
Yes, he lived on the corner of Sixth and Clay.
One of my best
Diends was Noah Dixon, who lived in the home on the powads now occupied
by the Cathedral.
The Lmphiers were just around the corner f'romthe
Wilson home on Seventh and Cass, so there was a g o u p of us i n very close
proximity.
Most of us went t o the Stuart School.
The Stuart School now
of course has been transferred h t o a series of doctors' offices arad a
couple of restaurants.
Most of us graduated from Stuart School somewhat
a f t e r the tumz of the century.
I remembe~that we walked down t o the
high school which is not the central high school [springfield High School]
now, but the high school which was converted in a Federal Build-.
It was quite a long walk but we made it four times a day.
I particularly remember was walking home *om
high school.
[IRS].
One thing that
Some of us
stopped in the Arsenal where the Republican State Convention was being
held f o r the purpose of mmbathg the Governor.
The cha:'lmoan who wielded
the gavel was the famous old c h z a c t e r , Unde Joe Cannon, and he presided
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
G. W. F u n , Jr.
7
over this convention which was deadlocked between Governor Yates and
M r . Frank 0. Lowden.
The deadlock lasted f o r I don't know how many days,
but neither would yield until f i n a l l y the deadlock was brok-en by the
nomination of M r . Charles Deneen from Chicago.
The executive mansion was,
of course, the focal point of Springfield society in 1896. The daughter
sf m e y English, a prominent real e s t a t e man i n Sprhgfield, m i e d
J
0,l-p~R.
Tanner, who became Governox? in 1896. She was a most a t t r a c t i v e
*
I
woman ard a charming hostess at the Governor's mansion.
Also, she had a
nwnber of nephews ard a nlece, Tiumey, CaCo, and Cricket Buck who were h
<
our group. Durhg the fowl years, quite a number of parties were given
for the y o w r people, t h e i r fkiends.
Q. What did you do on S m d a y s , as a boy?
A.
Well, Sunday was not too exciting a d a ~ . It did b e g b with a break-
fast that was sorrlewhat later and a bit m e leisurely than on weekdays.
We hvariable went t o Sunday School.
Our family attended the First
Presbyterian C I P I ~ I C ~and
,
I remember a succession of Sunday Schoolteachers
there, Mrs. Stuart Brown, Miss Clementhe Stevay, Miss Lavinia ZmLth, and
peobably the most exciting one of all, an old g e n t l a m named Rollo Diller,
He was a mat fYiend of Lincoln's ard was the proprietor of the Cormeau
ard Diller Drmg Store two doors south of the Marine Bank. W
e soon learned
that when Sunday School class came, we could divert l
k
.Diller from Shad-
rack, Meshad Abednego and the f i e r y f'urnace by t e l l i n g him t o t e l l us something about Mr. Lincoln, which he was only too willing t o do, or how he
cured himself of strong drink by wrestling with the devil which he was
onJy too glad t o do.
He was a f i n e old man, with just enough beard so he
didn't have t a wear a necktie.
W
e noticed always that before he'd got too
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
8
G. W. Bum, Jr.
far, his voice took on so& of a liquid tone.
Shortly after t h a t , two
small t r i c H e s of brown saliva would appear at the comers of his mouth,
and he would have a g o d deal of d i f f i c u l t y with the l i t t l e quid which
he had taken with him up into the church where our Sunday school m e t .
On Sunday afternoons there was a quiet period when Mrs. Dixon read t o
a p o u p of e i g h t or ten boys, the two Dixon boys, Noah and Norman, W i l l a r d
&
myself, the two Joy boys, E k b g and Chwles, Goin Panphier, Euzz
Chatterton and probably one or two others. She would read either an
Alger or an Oliver Optic book
a f t e r an hour o r so of reading, there
was an intemlssion in which i c e cream was served.
This certainly gave
Sunday afternoon a flavor and did m c h t o relieve the tedium.
W a y
night suppers w e r e very ingenious informal a f f a i m , because, at our house,
at a y rate, the Suwaday supper was generally prepared on the chafing
dish, which has smwhat gone out of fashion.
Q. Before we go on too much farther, what do you remember about the
area out near w h a t is now the present Art Association?
A.
Well, I remember t&t
quite vividly because the old Fwguson Home
which was adjacent t o the Edwards Home, which l a t e r becam the Art,
Association, was the residence of my great uncle, Ekqjamin Ferguson.
W
e used t o go out occasionally f o r Swnday supper and I r m b e r one
occasion particularly.
When I was seven years old, 1 walked out *om my
aunt's house on South S M h Street t o the Ferguson house wtth my p a r d father, Nr. Jacob Bwu?. There we had Sunday night supper an3 af'terwards,
walking back t o my aunt's home, rry grandfather became ill; we sat down
and rested f o r fifteen or twenty minutes on the steps of the old Ide
Foundry on Fif'th and MadPson and then resumed the way t o my aunt's home.
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
G. W.
9
Bunn, Jr.
Two o r three days l a t e r , s t i l l feeling a b i t u d e r the weather, he went
into a l i t t l e room adjoining his office, where there was a couch, and
lay down f o r a short nap.
He never woke up.
Q. W i l l you mention who the Fergusons were, particularly IW.Ferguson?
A.
Well, Pk. Ferguson was the brother of Mrs. Jacob Bunn. Pks. Ferguson
was Alice mwards, the daughter of old Mrs. Benjamin Edwards, who occupied
the Edwards home, l a t e r the A r t Association.
Nr. F e r ~ s o nwas, f o r many
years, the President of the Springfield Marine Bank and was the owner of
the building t h a t i s still hown as the Ferguson Building on the southwest
comer of SZxth and Momoe Streets.
He was an extremely pleasant man
with a white moustache, a f i n e record in the Civil W a r , the first
President of the Spr-ield
the t o m .
He
Park Board, a fine, all-around citizen of
my grandfather, Nr. Jacob
Bunn, were, of course,
particularly good fiiends.
My grardfather, I remember well, was a small energetic man who walked
very rapidly, almost a t r o t .
everyday of the week.
He wore a red wig and a high s i l k hat
A r d I remember when he was in good s t r i d e it was
pretty hard, even f o r a small boy, t o keep up with him.
The old Ferguson
house was a typical example of the mid-Victorian era with over-stuffed
furniture, easels displaying pictures and open books, A wide stahway
led up t o the second floor, but before I t got that far, it s p l i t and
went through t o tk l e f t and straight ahead, over the porte cochere,
where
a hut-in organ accupkd the room U t h e a d d l e , Iwer the porte
cockre].
I don't know of m y other house that had qufte as unique a
room as that one.
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
G. W. Wmn, Jr.
Q.
10
Before we go too much farther, t e l l me mre about Jacob h,
yaw
pandf ather.
A.
He came t o Springfield M m New Jersey near Pennhgton, where he
lived on a farm near the Delaware River.
He was one of a large family.
He came out west as so many Easterners did, t o seek t h e i r fortune i n the
new, growing land.
He decided t o s e t t l e first i n one of the r i v e r towns,
because they were the prosperous towns--apparently the towns of the
f'uture.
This was really before the da.y of the railroads, when the r i v e r
t m f f i c was the main method of long distance transportation.
He settled,
I'm sure, in Meredosia and while there, in the year 1837, learned that
the capital of I l l i n o i s , due t o the maneuvering of Abraham Lincoln and
eight others who constLtukd the "long nine1' was t o be moved t o Springfield,
Illinois.
He decided t h a t was the place f o r him. So he came t o Spring-
f i e l d , and i n 1840, established a grocery business on the southwest
corner of the public square, both retail a d wholesale, althorn the
wholesale elerrb?nt gradually became much the larger part of the business.
He succeeded extremely well in that, and by virtue of the f a c t that he
owned one
of the few safes in S p r w i e l d , &re be safeguarrded and kept
money i f any of his friends wanted him t o do so.
He branched out h t o
the private banking business, e s t a b l i s h h g the bar& of J. Bum. HIS
younger brother, John Bum, came out t o Springfield and i n a short time
assumed n w x g m n t of the grocery store, so that Mr. Jacob Bunn devoted
all of his time t o the bank.
The bank was successful.
He was one of
the founders of the M i n e Bank and discovered t h a t there was an incon-
sistency and sometimes a clash of interests t o be a p~ivatebanker and a
director of a State bank.
So he resigned *om
the Marine Bank and devoted
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
G.
W. Bunn, Jr.
11
all of his time and barkirg interests t o his own banking house.
In
the panic of the l a t e 187ots, his bank failed, and while he was resolved
t o pay a l l of the depositors off Ln fill, he could not do so.
I think it
i s within the limits of this l i t t l e discourse t o s t a t e that filfty years
l a t e r his children paZd a l l the surviving members of those who had been
depositors of his bank, either those who had themselves been depositors,
or t h e i r children, with five-percent interest f o r f i f t y years, which
mant that they paid two hundred f i f t y cents on the dollar t o the old
depositors.
A small g o u p of his f'riends purchased the old, almost
defunct, Springfield Watch Company.
They reorganized it as the I l l i n o i s
Watch Company, and made Jacob Wuvl president.
'12ae I l l i n o i s Watch Company
specialized in the manufacture of railroad watches arxl was successfbl.
And on the death of Me. Jacob Bunnts son, Jacob Wuul, Jr., it was sold
in the year 1928, I think, t o the Hamilton Watch Company.
One of the
vivid recollections I have of my grandfather and his younger brother John,
was the Sunday dinners that I sometimes used t o attend.
An occasional
guest a t the Sunday dinner meethgs a t my aunt" house that I remember
we11 was M r . Shelby Cullom, who was a particularly good friend of my
Uncle John. He was a man of great influence i n t h e United States Senate
and was prominently mentioned a number of times f o r the Republican can-
didate for the President of the United States of Amerfca, a l t h o w he
never achieved that distinction.
Q. Wouldn't you l i k e t o , for a a l e , t a l k about school-school
after
high school in Springfield?
A.
I went for two years t o the Springfkld High School, and t k n
pqr
father and mother tookmy brother and myself on t o Lawrenceville School
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
G. W. B m , Jr.
in New Jersey, which nly father had attended
i n 1876. There were only
one o r two buildings s t i l l standing on the school grounds.
l'Q father
had a great time roaming around and discovering the t r e e under which
he smoked h i s first cigar.
mrn that tree home
He intended t o take a small piece of bark
with him, but it was one of those trees [f'mm which]
you couldn't take a small piece.
off.
You grabbed it and a big piece cam
Nevertheless, he did take it home, somwhat t o the chagrin of rry
mther, and put it on the mantelpiece of the bedroom where
h remined
for a nLwlber of yeam, until it suddenly disappeared.
BgT the way, my father was the first t o go t o Iawrenceville.
fall, our farfLly sent the fifteenth boy t o Lawrenceville.
This l a s t
That repre-
sents the l w g e s t group a t Lawrenceville f'rorn any one family in its long
existence.
Iawenceville was considered, by a p a t many people, t o be
a preparatory school For Princeton, which it was not, although a majority
of the class-something
t o Princeton.
between fifty percent and sixty percent-did
go
That p~oportion,however, has been adjusted so that really
too few boys go f k o m Lamnceville t o Princeton today.
Lawrenceville,
however, was a good school with a good staf'f', a good English depmxnent.
I had discovered that I did have an interest i n writing and in newspaper
work and was lucm enough t o become editor of the school newspaper and
of the annual publication.
Q.
Did you have favorite subjects and favorite instructors when you
were away?
A. Well, I think at Lawenceville, unquestionably, rry favorite subject
was English and probably plane geometry. A t Princeton, I m j o ~ e di n
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
13
G. W. Wmn, Jr.
English, and was fortunate enough t o have the same preceptor for three
and one half years, Dr. Charles Osgood.
He encouraged my interest i n
writhg.
Q. Dcuse me, Dad, but before we go on t o Princeton, I want t o know a
l i t t l e b i t more about your l i f e a t Lawrenceville.
A. Well, I was fortunate enough at I,a,wenceville t o play on the golf
team.
A s a matter of fact, second year, I was captain of the team.
My
brother, W i l l a z d , was a fine baseball player, and he was elected captain
of the Lawrenceville team a t the conclusion of his second year, but,
unfortunately, he did not retwn f o r the third year.
been a good captain as he was a very good player.
He would have
A t Princeton, I
continued playing golf and I was fortunate enough to make the Princeton
team.
I was also editor of two of the publications, Tiger, an allegedly
hurmrous magazine, and the Bric-a-Brac,
which, in the senior year, was
the annual. llcompendiumll
of the class of 1912.
Q.
Okay, now, see if you can think of some of the instances that happened
while you were at Princeton that would be of interest.
A.
Well, I had four good years a t Princeth.
In those days, you had t o
have both Greek and L a t i n t o get an A.B. degree, so the degree that I
got was L i t t . B . , although the course I took was called the History:
Politics and Economics.
The most inspjsing teacher that I had was
D r . Charles G. Osgood, who taught English and was an authority on Spenser
and D r . Samuel Johnson. I didn't care much f o r Spenser, but I thought
that Johnson was an extremely interesting arid complex character.
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
G. W.
14
Bwm, Jr.
A number of events happened during my course at Princeton.
Before I
graduated i n 1912, Woodrow Wilson was nominated and elected Governor of
New Jersey Jn 1910. He continued giving one or, two courses and I took
a lecture course from him in senior year i n International Law.
began t o be spoken of a s the Democratic candidate for President.
He
One
of the original Wilson men was a New York lawyer named W i l l i a m McComb,
who often came t o Princeton and, quite often, stayed at the undergraduate
club t o which I belonged, the Tiger Inn.
There he would t a l k t o a group
of us on some of the problems arfl d i f f i c u l t i e s in bringing a relatively
unknown man into the prominence required of Presidential candidates.
O f course the other man who was very influential in promoting, Woodrow
Wilson was George Harvey, editor of Harperst Weekly.
I re~~l~rnber
one day
during the EYesidential campaign of 1912, my senior year, Theodore
Roosevelt came t o Princeton and spoke t o a big crowd from the balcony of
the Nassau Inn.
After his speech, the group moved on t o Wilson's home,
a few blocks away.
They called for him t o come out.
He was very reluc-
tant t o do so because this was Roosevelt's day in Princeton, an3 he
probably didn't want t o infringe upon it. But at last he did, and he
made a very short speech in marked contrast t o Roosevelt.
Roosevelt was
flamboyant ard Wilson was very quiet and logical.
A s I say, D r . Osgood was a very inspiring teacher.
He held his precep-
t o r i a l s i n his l i b r a r y in his house on Stockton Street and they are
among the most vivid memories I have of my four years at Princeton.
I was able t o follow
interest in writing.
I was editor of the Tiger,
which was not as lumorous as it might have been, f o r a kaunarous magazine.
Wnt we introduced short stories t o the columns and that gave it a rather
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
G. W.
Bunn, Jr.
15
different character and trend.
I also wrote two of the Triangle shows,
one of them in collaboration with Cy McComnick and the second one on my
own.
That was called "Main Street," and received rather f B t t e r i n g reviews
from Donald Clive Stuart, the English professor who devoted a good deal of
his time t o the dramatic organization a t Princeton.
I w i l l have somethkig
t o say about "Main Street" l a t e r , when i n New York, I carnra t o work with
Sinclair Lewis.
Occasionally f r o m Princeton, we would go up t o New York, but our v i s i t s
were rather more d i f f i c u l t then than they a r e now because you got off the
t r a i n a t Jersey City, took a ferny across the mdson River, ard reached
New York by land and by sea.
Mostly, the weekends we spent in golfing
weather, playing golf; otherwise just loaf*.
I think that Princeton
probably i n those days, despite the rigors of the cwriculum, was rather
easier than it is today.
There was plenty of time f o r doing nothing
we enjoyed those hours as well as the more studious ones.
Q. I believe you said you paduated i n 1912. After t h a t , what?
A.
We11 a f t e r paduation, I c a m horn f a r a very short stay of a couple
of weeks and then returned t o New York a s a reporter on the [New York]
Morning Sun.
I received this position largely through the e f f o r t s of
Roy IXlrstine, who had been an old T r i a g l e Club m, and then worked on
the Sun and in 1912, had formed an advertising agency. There were so
m n y names i n the t i t l e that I don't venture t o give it, I think it was
Dursthe, Osborne, Borton and sombody else.
. . I give up on that.
Of
course the Sun
-was a morning paper and was a good paper t o work on because
they would accept and r a t k r look f o r human Interest stories, which gave
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16
G. W. Bunn, Jr.
an opportunity t o write sornethbg more than the factual accounts of
various happenings, some of which were most uninterest-.
3
I was given the job of night police editor,
After a few months on the -Sun
o r reporter, at police headquarters.
Q second night there, an event of
p e a t Importance in New York l i f e occurred, when the gambler Rosenthal was
killed as he stood outside the k t r o p o l e Hotel.
It l a t e r developed that
the Chief of the Detective Bureau, o r one of the important men in the
Detective Wnreau, CharZes E. Becker, had arranged his n u d e r t o keep hjm
f r o m talking about Becker, who later by the way, was imprisoned ard executed
for protecting gamblers.
Zelig, Gyp the Blood
Those w e r e the days of Lefty Louie and B i g Jack
tkir crowd.
O f course I didn't write the impor-
tant and leading stories on this case, but I .@hered
a g o d deal of the
information f o r those that did write it. The two leading reporters on the
Sun were
-
a man namd Frank W d OtMalley and W i l l Lrwin, who were very
helpf"u1 t o young reporters when the occasion arose.
Q. I'm interested in what k h d of a salary you rrade at t h a t time, i f you
were able t o live on it.
A.
Well, it was a pretty tight squeeze.
A s I recall, it was twenty dollars
a week and i f it hadn't been for occasional generous checks from home, I
certainly wouldn't have been able t o belong t o the Princeton Club and take
some of my mals there.
After somewhat more than a year on the -3Sun I had
the opportunity of workbg i n the Fditorial Department of a new venture,
which was t o furmish book review pages f o r such newspapers arowld the
country as the Indianapolis 9News
-
the St. Louis Post Dispatch, ~ e a p o l i s
JownaL, Clevelard P l a i n Dealer and so forth.
The editor was a young man
named S l m l a i r L e w i s .ad I was his assistant.
In order t o give the irrrpres-
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
17
G. W. Wuul, Jr.
sion of a rather f l o u r i s h h g e d i t o r i a l staff, we each wrote under a number
of pseudonyms.
kwis, at t h a t tim, had written one boy's book and was
working on a novel called Our M r . Rand, which he published during the year
and a half that we were together on the newspwer publisherst syndicate.
I took along t o New York the printed book of Main Street with the idea
that, possibly, it might be rewritten and find New York production.
Lewis
read it amd encouraged me t o attempt t o place it someplace, but it just
wasn't good enough t o make the pade on Doadway. In passing, a l l of the
m s i c f o r the choruses was mitten by Paul Nevln, who was the son of the
famous Ethelbert Nevin, who wrote the ltRosaryll and other extremely popular
songs.
Q. Before we go too m c h farther, would you describe Sinclair L e w i s , as
you remember him?
A. Sinclair kwis was a tall, lariky, red-haired, rather homely m, with
a severe case of acne which covered his face with red blotches.
him immensely.
I liked
He was very congenial and kind t o me. k t a l l of the
traits which l a t e r on, I'm sorry t o say, made him unpopular were p ~ s e n t
t o a degree which made them a m s i n g rather than imitating.
For instance,
he was a great mimic and loved t o ape people, but there was no cruelty in
his mimicry.
He also was convivially inclined arid imbibed possibly a l i t t l e
more than he should.
He dominated the conversation wherein he found himself.
W s e traits l a t e r on, [along] with his ref'usal of the Pulitzer Prize and
some of the mmrks he made when he received the Nobel Prize f o r Literature,
made him rather unpopular t o those who mew him. 1 remember on one occasion,
after havhg written Elmer G a n t q , he made a talk at a church in--I think,
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
18
G. W. Eamn, Jr.
Kansas City-In
which he defied God and dared Him t o strike him down.
Sinclair Lewis wrote five or six fine books and thereafter, the books
deteriorated in quality u n t i l a t the end of his l i f e , with the thkcteenth
or fourteenth novel, they were far, far below the quality of Main Street
aud Babbitt ard others.
Lewis, I know f'rom remarks that he made, got the
t i t l e of Main Street from the l i t t l e play that I wrote, which was my one
knock on the door of fame In the l i t e r a r y world.
With the beginning of the w a r in 1914, so much news carne from the front
that papers began t o cancel t h e i r book review page which Lewis and I had
written; Lewis doing the main reviews, and I doing the lesser ones.
Lewis
got a job with the George H. bran Publishing Corrrpany and two or three
weeks a f t e r he attained it, got a job there f o r me as reader and writer
of the material that appeared on the jackets of the book.
George H. Doran
was an Ehglishman arad soon combined with Doubleday i n the firm of Doubleday,
Doran and Company.
In the meantime, I was attempt*
my hand at a novel and although I
staggered throu@;hfive o r six of them, none of them seemed t o me t o be
worth presenting t o any publisher.
in chunks--but
They were f a i r l y good, some of them-
they just didn't hold together.
I just must have lacked the narrative g i f t .
hQ great fault was that
I could see no future a t a l l
at Doubleday-bran, and a f t e r a few months of doing nothing but attempting
t o write a novel, I decided t h a t the best thing f o r me t o do was t o go
horn and get into something that was solid axd worth following--and tht
I did.
I am eternally grateful t o my father and m t h e r for giving me the
opportunity t o work, and certainly not waste, but employ two yeam of my
time do-
wkt I rather desperately hoped would be my future vocation-
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
G.
W. SEhuul, Jr.
19
that of a writer.
Q.
Well this i s about 1914, you're a t home and, at this point, w h a t do
you r e c a l l happens next?
A.
Well, I spent two y e w s in the Wholesale Grocery House--almost two
years-and
then one of my classmates and a f r i e d of his who was of the
class of 1915 at Princeton, decided t o go abroad and join the Amrican
Ambulance.
Tbis we did towards the l a t t e r part of 1916.
W
e were quartered
at the American Hospital in Nevilly, just outside the gates of P a r i s ,
and u n t i l the squadron, you might c a l l it was being assembled, we met
trains and took the wounded from the f'ront t o the hospitals in Par-ls.
This was a l l done at night, both because of the traffic, and t o keep the
pedestrians from seeing trainload a f t e r trainload of wounded men.
t h a t se-d
Those
t o be hurt most were the ones that had been burned by liquid
fire. At the slightest j o l t , they would c a l l "doucement ! doucemnt! I'
Although they were swathed in bandages fYom head t o foot, you could t e l l
by expressions ard the look i n their eyes that they were suffering horribly.
After a month o r so, a group of six o r eight ambulances l e f t P a r i s ard
w e r e quartered in a town called Han, pronounced "on."
This was in t e r r i -
tory which just recently had been evacuated by the G e m s , who f e l l back
t o what was called the Hindenberg Line.
A l l of the wells, o r a e a t many
of them, anyway, were poisoned an3 great care had t o be taken f o r
bombs that might have been l e f t unexploded.
From Ham.= could look across
and see St. @entin M c h was occupied by t h e Germans::
.Here we would meet
the ambulances t h a t brought the mwded back & take them t o the newest
railroad station.
The F,nglish and French armies joined
at this particular
place.
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
G. W. Wuu?, Jr.
20
In March, I t h b k it was, of 1917, the United States
entered the war and
the three of us who had come over together decided that as soon a s may be,
we would return t o the States and join the Army there.
After we had sent
in our resignations and were waiting f o r our discharge and passage home,
a very interesting event happened.
Tlne first American contingent had
arrived i n France and sent a battalion of Mantry up t o Paris t o m c h
through the s t r e e t s and show the Frenchmen that a t l a s t we were there.
C
#
The CLdamps Elysees was l i t e r a l l y packed with French people who were in
a very high emotional state.
waving.
Some of them were crying, a l l of them were
In the distance you could see the troops approachin$, a battalion
of infantry with the band playing the Stars and Stripes Forwer.
would break through the line and nul out and put flowers
GFrls
the muzzles
of t h e i r r i f l e s .
The a i r was fUl of excitement, so much so that the three of us decided,
I think very unfaFrly t o our families, that we would enlist there instead
of going back home ard coming back as soon as we possibly could.
We went
down t o the cantonment near one of the gates of P a r i s where the battalion
of Americans were quartered f o r the time they were there.
in charge said they had no way of enlisting us.
k t the officer
TIE thing t o do, i f we
wanted t o enlist, was t o go down t o San Nazaire, where the troops were
disembarking.
This we did.
We l e f t our clothes arid belongings with the
American Express and took a night train, s i t t h g up the entire time, of
course, down t o San Nazafre. After a breakfast, we found out where the
Adjutant General's office was, went over there, and told hlm w h a t we
wanted. He said that they could e n l i s t us as we desired, but that he was
particularly busy at that mment, so we stood in that room an3 waited
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
G. W. Wuzn, Jr.
While waiting, a tall, good looking colonel of Cavalry 2n the regular
Amy c a m into the
charge.
room ar&l stood wait*
also t o see the officer h
He noticed us, as we had our uniforms on which m e l i k e the
uniform of the R-Jglish officer,
he looked at us rather curiously ad
I noticed t h a t he was looking particularly at me.
He cam over aml said,
"Is your name, by any chance, Bunn?" I said yes.
He said, "From Spring-
field, Illinois?"
I said yes.
Now, it happened t h a t this man was the
nephew of George Gusth, who worked f o r my father.
Af'ter having received
orders t o j o h the F i r s t Expeditionary Force, he stopped off i n Springfield
f?om the camp where he had been stationed t o see his uncle.
My father had
them both down t o the Sangam Club f o r lunch and during the course of lunch,
Gustin said that one of.@!I
Bunnls sons was over in France with the American
Ambulance attached t o t h e Wench Army.
hav-
Well, this man, Colonel Gustin,
come f'rom P a r i s , cam over, as I say, with the F i r s t Contingent,
and got up that morning and had came over t o the Adjutant General's office
at practically the same
that we had come.
He asked us what we were
them f o r and we told him, "To e n l i s t . '' And he said that was fine, but
"why don't you go back home and join the officer's t r a i n h g camp?"
Well, we'd never heard of it. He said, "We've got a frightf'ul job ahead
of us, t o r a i s e a large Army in a very short time
can get all the privates we want.
."
He also said, "We
Our great problem i s going t o be t o
train the younger officers, the second lieutenants axd f i r s t lieutenants
and captains, t o command the men. " Well, we hadn't heard anything about
the training camps.
He then said, "They're building them just as rapidly
as they can, a l l over the country.
They're s t a r t i n g t o trab them a t
Plattsburg and a few other places.
And i n a very few months, they'll be
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
G. W.
Bunn, Jr.
ready t o receive a l l of the candidates."
So we decided that the best
thing t o do would be t o go back and join one of these camps.
Another tremndous coincidence happened.
We'd hardly got out of the
Adjutant General's office when we pan into A l f Lanphier, who had gone
t o Annapolis.
He was six or seven years out of Annapolis, and was com-
manding one of the anti-submarine guns on one of the troop transports.
Well, our t r a i n didn't leave Paris u n t i l that night, so we had lunch and
dinner with him and r e t u n e d t o P a r i s .
I n not too long a time we returned t o the States where we separated and
applied for entrance into the nearest Offfcerls Training Camp.
Mine was
the one that was just out of Chicago, near the Great Lakes Naval Station-Fort Sheridan.
The course was tWee months a d a f t e r completing it, I
received a c o d s s i o n a s f i r s t lieutenant and was sent t o the 333rd Machine
Gun Battalion a t
C ~ a m pGrant,
in Rockford, I l l i n o i s . The machine gun batta-
lions were then equipped with rather large, Fhglish guns, which were transported by d e s .
The captaln and f i r s t lieutenant were mounted on horses.
I'd never ridden a horse, I don't tW, in my l i f e .
It was a r e a l expe-
rience t o learn t o ride adequately in the short time we had.
I went down
t o the stables, the stable sergeant was an old regulm Army man, and I
told him my plight.
Fortunately, he was a very humane individual.
ljwne-
diately, he gave me a horse and showed me how t o saddle it and so forth,
ard I went out and took a ride.
If the horse hadn' t got hungry and didn't
know the way back t o tk stable, I think I'd have ended up sanewhere in
Wisconsh.
Wnt the horse did know, a d I did get back, and every oppor-
tunity t h a t I had, I'd go out and ride anf f i m l l y , t o my p e a t r e l i e f , did
learn.
You couldn't post, that is, you had t o ride with the horse and that
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
G. W.
m, Jr.
made it a t r i f l e more d i f f ic u l t at first , but a f t e r you got your seat,
it was easy and I enjoyed it very mch.
Before I had really becom a respectable rider, the officers of the
battalion were ordered out on a f i e l d exercise, where the British machine
gwz officer gave a lecture on selecting machine gun sights.
Everything
was f i n e as we went along the road, but when we started t o go across
country, I began t o get a l i t t l e timid.
We gilloped along.
Ahead of us,
a t the end of a f a i r l y steep slope, was a small creek-hardly
more than a
ditch.
But we speeded up a l i t t l e bit and my horse speeded up considerably.
I sabbed the mane and the p o m l of the saddle and prayed that I would
stay on through our f i r s t jwrrp-and
I barely did.
My horse took the b i t
in i t s teeth ard passed Company after Company, u n t i l I was almost leading
The Comnander of our battalion was a polo player on t k
the procession.
American Polo Team, and a great horseman, and he gave me a pretty vigorous
calling down.
I seem t o r e c a l l his saying, "Bunn, are you riding that
horse o r i s he riding you?"
END OF TAPE
Q. Wetre back in t h e year 1917.
A. We spent
almost a year training at Camp Grant.
we l e f t , the Bro-
machine gun was in production.
lighter than the w i s h gun that we had been us-,
Fortunately, before
It was considerably
and could easLly be
c a r r i e d by one man, so we abandoned the mules and the horses, t o everybody's
delight*
We received orders t o go abroad and left Camp G r a n t in, I think, early
September of 1918, having been there [Camp G r a n t ] f o r a year.
The captain
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
of o w company, George Davis, a fine man and perfectly splendid soldier,
was the nephew of George Ade, the author of Fables and Story, America's
great hmorist.
He was given a special a s s i p n m t leaving me i n c o d
of the company. W
e l e f t Camp Grmt arid went t o New York.
After a few
days there we embarked on the old passenger ship Olympfc, one of the
largest ships in the f l e e t , holding five thousa,nd men.
Men were stuffed
i n every available space, and were assiped quarters according t o the rank
of the commanding officer.
The highest rank of any machine gun o u t f i t was
major, md we were superseded by a m s t every other Department of the
Army aboard.
W
e were assigned miserable quarters in the hold of the ship
next t o the furnace rooms, with s t e e l walls so hot that you could barely
touch them.
The Olynpic became known
as the "Death Ship."
It made the t r i p t o
Southampton i n something l i k e five days, but before it arrived quite a
number of men had died f'mm the f l u epidemic which was so severe in the
fall of 1918. Fortunately, most of the rnen sumrived u n t i l we reached
Southampton, but a t o t a l of over 500 m n who were on the transport died
f'rom the f l u , which in mst cases very quickly turned into pneumonia.
At
Southampton we waited wder a t r a i n shed near the dock, and then masched
t o a camp some four o r five miles away.
toppled over.
On the m c h out there, men
We would put them on the sidewalk and leave one man t o look
a f t e r them, but this happened so f'requently that we abandoned the Ldea of
leaving a m behjuld.
Therefore we l e f t them [ ~ a n i n g
the sick] on the
sidewalk, knowing t h a t they would be picked up as soon as possible.
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
G. W.
m, Jr.
25
The sidewalks of Southampton, of course, were j m d with curious
delighted t o see the American troops w i v i n g .
~ l i s ~ who
n were
,
After
reaching the camp near the l i t t l e town of Whchester, I myself caught the
f l u and was sent t o a hospital near Winchester, which was operated by a
group of physicians from Indianapolis.
I confess that f o r two o r three
days or a week I can't Tarember what happened, i n a week or so I was
strong enough t o get out and w a l k around the growlds, and ride one of the
transports that went back anl f o r t h between the hospital and Winchester.
My only r e a l glinrpse of &gland
ard interest-
was here in Winchester, an extremely lovely
place with the Itchen River where Isaac Walton fished,
flowing through it, with the old castle where the Knights of the Rourad
Table were supposed t o have met, with a beautiful cathedral, Jane Austenrs
house, the old hotel, wMch I think w a s the oldest one i n Ehglaml and the
G o d Begot House on the k o a d Street, and the famous boy's school, Winchester
School.
I f e l t well enough by this time, instead of going t o a recuperation
center--many of which were stationed in old w i s h houses throughout that
part of the country--to go back and attempt t o find my company over i n
Wance
.
Well, I went t o Southarrrpton, got clearance papers t o go t o France t o join
the company and was put in charge of a group of privates who had been
similarly sick and were ready t o rejoin t h e i r company.
We a l l went t o
Le Mans, where there was an exchange depot used by American troaps who were
wait*,
aB
we were, f o r additional assignment.
I got orders t o join my
company in the 333rd Machine Gun Battalion, 86th Division.
Because troops
were corrling over so f a s t , ard there was so mch ced tape and office work
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G. W. Bum, Jr.
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needed t o keep track of everybody, there was a good deal of confusion,
and I had great difficulty i n finding the 86th Division.
I went t o
P a r i s f o r a few days, and got orders there; was sent by mistake t o join
the 35th Division which was, I think, a Missouri o u t f i t .
Then I came
back t o P a r i s , got more orders, and f i n a l l y caught up with the 86th
Division near Bordeaux.
them.
There we wafted f o r orders and finally received
Sometime before this, it was decided that our division, the 86th
Division, w a s t o be broken up and used as replacements f o r outfits which
had already been i n the war and needed t o be filled up and refurbished.
From Bordeaux a &iend of mine and myself were ordered t o return t o
Le Mans. My fYiend, B i l l Bickle, was f"rom Chicago. We received orders
t o return t o Le Mans and await instructions there.
Our two companions
i n the ambulance during the t r i p t o Le Mans were Frank Halsey, who was
a nephew of Admiral Halsey, and a young m named White. Eioth received
c o ~ s s i o n s . Halsey was a balloon observw of a r t i l l e r y , and M i t e was
a first lieutenant i n the infantry.
A t Le Mans there were rumors of an m s t i c e , which was premture and
not officially announced u n t i l November 11. I think t h i s was probably
a leak of the fact that there was t o be a true armistice.
We w e r e i n Le Mans when President Wilson made h i s first t r i p abroad
a f t e r the w a r .
I don't believe there was ever a mn i n history, certainly
i n modem history, who received the adulation and the ovations, and. upon
whom such great hopes were placed, as i n the case of Woodrow Wilson.
He
was the man who was going t o lead the world into peace, and who had been
the leader i n the war t o end a l l wars. This [enthusiasm] was p&iculmly
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true of the more volatile and emotional Frenchmen, but Wilson received
a m s t as great a reception when he went t o London.
It has occurred t o me a great m n y times that i f we could only engender
the enthusiasm and patriotism which w a r seems t o bring out i n people,
if we could do that for peaceful purposes, it would be an entirely
different world, and a much better world than we now have.
I f i n a l l y received o ~ d e r st o report t o the 26th Division, Company C ,
102nd Machine G u n Battalion, which I did.
They were stationed f i r s t
a t Neuilly sur Seine and l a t e r were moved t o a l i t t l e French town.
The
captain of the company which I joined had been given a different assignrnent and was no longer there, so I was i n c o m d of Company C .
This
was rather embarrassing because the 26th Division, the New -land
Division, was one of the f i r s t t o go abroad, and I was vevy eharrassed
a t being placed i n cornnand of a company of those, most of whom had
served throughout the war.
They were a fine group, and accepted me
graciously and i n a most friendly fashion.
When we finally returned t o America, we were mustered out at F'ramingham
i n Boston.
Cape Cod.
One of the companies, by the way, was composed of men from
In my battalion, they were mostly from the neigkborhood of
Boston and surrounding suburbs.
I went t o the connrander of the battalion
and told him that i n a s much a s I had sewed f o r such a short time with
the company, I would appreciate it very much i f I could be excused early,
and perhaps one of the veteran officers could lead the company i n the
pmade, which they were preparing t o take place in Boston.
He agreed,
and I l e f t the day before the welcoming services.
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Getting home a f t e r one night i n Boston, I remember the joy it was t o
spend the night at the Terrain Hotel, and t o go t o a musical comedy
at the 'I"remont Street Theatre; and then get on the t r a i n the next day
f o r Chicago and then Springfield.
Q. What did you do when you returned t o Springfield at t h i s particulavl
time?
A. Well, returning t o Springfield, I was employed again by the Bunn
and Company Wholesale Grocery.
One of my a c t i v i t i e s was the b u l l d i ~
of a candy factory on the pound of the grocery company.
This was
where I spent a good deal of my time.
In the f a l l of 1920, two years a f t e r I ~ t w n e d ,a very happy and momentous event occurred when I was mid t o Melinda Jones, a lovely young
w o r n who i s s t i l l with me.
A s a consequence of the m i a g e , a t the
proper intervals a p p e m d a daughter, Sally; a son, George, and a
daughter, Linda.
In 1928 I l e f t the candy factory and became enployed by the Springfield
Marine Bank as assistant trust officer.
That was i n the period before
the d i f f i c u l t i e s of the l93Ots, when everything looked very rosy and
M r . Hoover had put two cars i n every w a g e .
however that didn't l a s t very long.
Life was extremely pleasant;
The stock m k e t crash cam i n 1929,
and things began t o get bad and steadily worse.
1 was made executive vice president of the bank i n 1933, and remined
In that post u n t i l my f a t h e r t s death i n 1938, when I becam president.
To go back f o r a moment, i n 1931 I was elected president of the Pmk
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Board.
A t that t h ~however,
,
it was called the Springfield Pleasure
Driveway and Park District, and i n addition t o Washington Park, Lincoln
Pwk, B u m Park, I l e s Park and possibly one o r two other small parks,
it consisted of Williams Boulevard; South Grand Avenue; part of Sixth
Street, south on the way t o Bunn Park; West Grand Avenue, the name of
which was soon changed t o MacArthur Boulevwd, and North G m d Avenue.
Due t o the depression which was now well upon us, tax collections were
very poor, and as a result it was very d i f f i c u l t t o operate within the
money that we received.
A s a matter of fact, we couldn't have done so
if it hadn't been for the formtion of a corporation called Taxes, Incor-
porated, which bought up the delinquent taxes.
There was also another
action which we took a t that time which cur5tailed o w operations and
expenses.
That was t o pass a resolution whereby we abandoned juris-
diction of the streets, and changed the name of the Pleasure Driveway
and Park District t o the Springfield Park b a r d .
The city had nothing else t o do but take the s t r e e t s which really
belonged t o them, and not t o the park board, for t h e i r use as a place
on which t o drive horses and whatnot.
The two m t o r policemen whom
we had always had t o look a f t e r and police the streets, we got r i d o f .
One of them got a job on the State Police as chauffeur f o r the Governor
and the other one w i t h the help of som of the board members got a job
as private nightwatchman for different families i n the southeast part
of t a m .
So by cutting those expenses and others too we did manage t o
get through the year on the money we received flmm the taxes and fYom
Taxes, Incorporated.
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To return again t o the bank; those were hectic days.
There had never
been a depression quite a s bad a s the one we were t o face i n 1933, 1934,
1935, 1936 and even 1937. What made matters worse and somewhat more
dramatic was that one of the four Springfield banks was i n bad s b p e ,
had t o close down, and could not pay i t s depositors.
a m on a l l of the Springfield banks.
That p ~ e c i p i t a t e d
W
e had anticipated t h i s action
a week before the closing of the Farmers1 Bank, and had sold a l l of our
anticipatory tax w a ~ ~ a n and
t s teacher's orders t o a srrall group of
depositors; with the proceeds had ordered cash of $250,000 fYom one of
the Chicago banks.
The day the m started, a rainy day, the money had
not yet arrived, and the Chicago bank transferred a credit t o one of
the St. Louis banks, our correspondent, who i n turn sent up t o Springf i e l d a B r i n k ' s Trust truck w i t h $250,000 i n pennies, dims, nickels,
five dollar b i l l s , twenty dollar b i l l s , etcetera, t o pay the depositors
who were coming into the bank t o get their money.
The run on the bank did not last very long.
It looked worse than the
crowd t h a t thronged the lobby mde it appear, because i n om savings
account we had a school savings department with thousands and thousands
of school children as customers.
They had deposited their savings with
t h e i r teachers, who brought it t o the bank for deposit.
In order t o
withdraw it they [the children] had t o have one parent with them, so
the^
were a p e a t mny youngsters with t h e i r pwents who c a m t o the
bank, but the money they drew out was fractional and unimportant.
I remerrber one incident i n which Father Tarrant, a very popular monsignor
of the d i s t r i c t whose s i s t e r was, by the way, a t e l l e r i n the Mwine Park,
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came into the bank t o deposit money.
He told the people that instead
of taking money out of the Marine Bank, he was putting money i n it.
That was done on purpose i n a loud voice so people i n the bank could
hear him. There were other people who did the same thing.
always grateful for the actions of a good friend-especially
You are
when you
need one.
The run did not l a s t long, but was followed, of course, by the bank
holiday which the President called.
A t the time of calling, he gave
his famous Fireside Chat i n which he said that we had nothing t o fear
but fear i t s e l f .
I think the speech had a good effect upon the people
who were af'raid because banks had been closing throughout the country.
I think Springfield's banks cane through in good shape, and were t o
be congratulated.
A s soon as the holiday was ended, two of the banks, our own and the
I l l i n o i s National Bank, opened imediately.
not long a f t e r .
The third bank followed
The work in the bank, pay.ticularly the job that we did
i n closing the loopholes we hadn't closed, involved strengthening the
bank i n any way that we possibly could.
and I enjoyed i t .
The work was most interesting,
I enjoyed the satisfaction as we went serenely on
our way, with our deposits vowing and growing and growing.
The depression which came i n
1938 was a slight one,
trepidation nor any serious obstacle.
and
caused no
For at least a dozen y e a s , pos-
sibly a few more, there were three banks in Springfield who conducted
all of the banking needs of the c o d t y .
They were joined, I don't
remember the year, by the Capitol Bank; and since then everybody knows
banks have been opening here and there m t i l there are presently nine.
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But I l i k e t o think of the three musketeers who, i n the beginning,
shouldered the burdens of the banking cormunity.
Q. Would you elaborate upon some of your other a c t i v i t i e s during this
time?
A.
Life i n the bank went &her
smoothly.
The things that I r e a l l y
remember were a c t i v i t i e s outside the work i n the bank.
Most important
of these, I think, was the work on the Public Library Board, of which
I was president f o r a term, and trustee for twenty odd years.
This
started about 1934 and continued u n t i l around 1960.
The most interesting experience i n the Library was the i n s t a l l a t i o n
of an Adult Education Frogam.
There was a good deal of discussion
between the Board and the librarian as t o whether o r not it was a
proper project f o r the library t o take up at, of course, a f a l r l y considerable cost.
I renaember that D r . Masters and I went t o Chicago and
talked t o the library department at the University of Chicago.
They
thought it was eminently fitting f o r a library t o engage i n t h a t work.
Also, when I was i n New York, I went out t o see a m named Brison a t
Columbia University i n their library school, Lymn Brison, and he was
enthusiastically f o r a library engaging i n that sort of work.
Nevertheless, our l i b r m i a n was not enthused, and it f i n a l l y resulted
in her resignation; but we continued on.
The work as head of the
Adult Education School was managed by a man m
d Leslie Bmwn.
The
classes were held in the Springfield High School and the teachers were
engaged locally, some f'rom the University of I l l i n o i s , sore f'rom I l l i n o i s
College i n Jacksonville, and some fYom MacMwray College, a l l a t very
reasonable prices.
They were very anxious t o see Adult Education getstaxted.
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Af'ter it did get a start, the Board of Education took up p a r t of the
work and the Springfield Junior College took a great, great share of
it; so the library retired from the job.
But we had s t m e d i t , and
we f e l t quite proud.
Another interesting experience was that of the Abraham Lincoln Association.
It was originally the Abraham Lincoln Centennial Association, and
was f o m d t o father a banquet on Lincoln's birthday i n 1909, a t which
four very notable speakers, James Bryce, Ambassador t o the United States
ern England, Senator Dolliver of Iowa, Ambassador
France, and William Jennings Bryan attended.
J, J. Josserand f'rom
The Centennial Association
sponsored dinners every Lincoln's birSthday thereafter and continued
e n g a g a speakers t o come t o the banquet with, however, a continuing
falling off i n the quality of those who spoke,
Gradually the Centennial
Association declined, having served i t s purpose.
W. Logan Hay, whom most a l l people remember as one of the leading lawyers
i n Springfield, and a cousin, by the way, of John Hay, former Secretary of
State, of the United States,
1
had the idea of t r a n s f o ~ gthe Lincoln
Centennial Association into an historical society, with the thought of
gather-
up whatever Lincoln material s t i l l existed i n the way of l e t t e r s ,
documents, and the reminiscences of a few citizens who could s t i l l a t t h i s
l a t e date look back and remnber something about Lincoln. To a s s i s t i n
this,
&. Hhy
engaged a young historian who had graduated from Wabash
College In Indiana and studied a t the University of Illinois-Paul
Angle.
Paul was then selling school books for Ginn and Company, and he welcomd
the chance t o come and do some original historical work.
l ~ o h nHay was also a private s e c ~ e t a r yt o Abraham Lincoln.
[Editor. 1
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Angle received invaluable support f'rom M r . Hay.
I have often thought
of the old saying that the ideal university would be f o r the young
student t o s i t on one end of a log facing Mark Hopkins who sat on the
other, Hopkins being one of the early educators, a fine one, president
of either Williams
o r Arrhwst, I have forgotten which.
In t h e i r
places, i n my hmglnation, I would put M r . Hay on one end of the log
and Paul Angle on the other, each one making a Xncoln authority out
of the other.
The Lincoln Association really got underway i n about 1926. Nr. Hay,
with the help of sore others, assiduously acquired m e r s , who paid
ten dollars a year t o join the Association.
A t i t s peak there were
just under a thousand members.
On Lincoln's birthday there would be a meeting i n the afternoon at the
old State House, a t which time some local
topic:
rclan
would speak on some local
Hayry Converse on the old Court House, Ben Thorns on the monwnent,
and so foulth.
Then at night there would be a scholar who would give
an address on Uncoln.
or what not.
No emphasis was put on reputation or politics
The errphasis was put altogether on the speaker; such men
as Allan Nevins, C a r l Sandburg, and men of that type.
A s material came i n bulletins were issued, and a publication called
the Abraham Lincoln Association Papers was published every year, which
contained the addresses of the local speakers and the visitors.
There
were f i f t e e n of these i n all, through, of cowse, a period of f i f t e e n
years.
Also, photostatic copies were being obtained fkom some of the
@eat collections of Lincoln papers i n prepmation f o r issuing a multi-
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G. W. Bunn, Jr.
volwne edition of L;incolnls writings.
Mr. Hay also raised a sum of
money totaling about some t h i r t y thousand odd dollars, the interest
flmm which was used t o help support the association.
have said, were ten dollars.
The dues, as I
Interest fk.orn this flmd amounted t o about
fifteen hundred dollars, and out of this the salaries of Paul Angle and
the secretary were paid.
Paul Angle l a t e r l e f t the Association t o become State Historian, which
meant that he was head of the State Historical Library and secretary
of the I l l i n o i s Historical Society.
Paul's successors were Benjamin
'I!homs, ELwry PY'att and Roy Basler.
All of them wrote and contPibuted
books which were given t o mrnbers of the Association.
Paul's most
celebrated book was Here I Have Mved, which was a history of LLncohls
Springfield.
Ben Thomas wrote a book called Portrait for Posterity,
which was an account of the various biographers of Lincoln.
William
Barringer, who was for a short time secretary of the Association, wrote
A House Dividing, which was a story of the old days i n the State House
just b e f o ~the Civil WD, and also a history of Vandalia, the capital
of I l l i n o i s before Springf'ield w a s made such i n 1837.
The bulletins and panphlets which were issued gave place t o a quarterly.
Every year members of the Association received a book and four copies
of the q w t e r l y .
Due t o financial pressures it was n e c e s s w t o dis-
continue the dinner, and i n i t s stead the meetings were held i n the afternoon at the State I-listorical Library offices i n the Centennial B u i l d i n g .
'This was
a l i t t l e less f o m l , but a very pleasant m e r of meeting
and celebrating Lincoln's birthday.
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Ivlr. Hay died i n 1942, and I had the honor of succeeding him as president.
During the years in which I served, we gathered a11 the m t e r i a l we had
received additional m t e r i a l from the Library of Congress with the
opening of the Robert T. Lincoln papers, and published the Collected
Works of Abraham Lincoln i n eight volmes under the editorship of our
last executive secretary, Roy P. Basler, and an index, published by the
Rutgers University bess.
Previously, we mde the arrangements whereby
the press published our annual books and possessed distribution rimts.
We had had no help f r o m any publishing house heretofore t o make the books
moye readily available t o libraries and what not.
There was scarcely
an a r t i c l e on Lincoln, certainly never a book on Ldncoln, that didn't
cont&in
footnote references t o the Abraham Lincoln Association as having
rwnished the m t e r i a l i n that particulau, page and parapaph.
Ten years a f t e r 1942, w i t h the publication of the eight v o l m s accornplished, with the increasing difficulty of getting rraterial for the
quarterlies as they came out, it was finally decided that the Abraham
Lincoln Association should cease i t s work and go out of existence.
This was done with great deliberation, but i n the m a n t h - ~ ,under such
E n as Paul Angle, Jay M o m , H h r r y Pratt and others, the State
Historical Soclety had developed an excellent Lincoln depwtment, ,and
we figured it could easily carry on the work of the Association.
In seekfng P a u l Angle's opinion as t o whether or not the Association
should go out of business, Paul said, "Thank God, here i s one organization
that knows when t o quit."
Well, quit we did u n t i l ten years l a t e r .
A t the request of Governor Kemer, we came alive again.
During this
ten year period we f i l e d an annual statement, paid a very smll annual
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G. W. Bunn, Jr.
dues, and had kept the rights t o the name of Abraham Lincoln Association.
We did this because we didn't want just any organization t o come i n and
use that name again.
The reason the Abraham Lincoln Association w a s revived a t the request
of Governor Kerner was because it was decided t o raise mney and remodel
or rebuild the old Court House as it had been when it was the State
Capitol.
The Abraham Lincoln Association acted a s a money-raising
organization, and helped i n any way it could t o accomplish t h i s job.
A s everybody knows the job was done.
The Abraham Lincoln Association
raised close t o $300,000 a l l of which was used t o fwnish the restored
building. The State of I l l i n o i s supplied the reminder, some s i x or
seven million dollars.
The offices of the State Historical L i b r a r y
and Abraham Lincoln Association wevle moved f h m t h e i r quarters i n the
Centennial Build-
t o the basement of the old Capitol Building.
The work there has been very ably c m i e d on by James Hickey, who i s
the Lincoln departmental head of the Association.
A s I say, Jim
Hickey, Lowell Anderson and the architect, Wally Henderson, did a
magnificent job i n planning the whole project.
I think it i s interesting t o note that when the board of directors of
the Association met a f t e r a long absence of ten years, i n order t o
revive themselves, it was necessary t o have a legal f o m of four members.
There were some members a t distant points who were unable t o come,
and the task of getting four members was a d i f f i c u l t one.
was available, and of course, I was.
To get two m r e we had t o have
a rn named Linstrom of Los Angeles come in.
Chicago.
Paul Angle
He came by plane t o
Governor Kerner m e t the plane, and had his own plane i n
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Chicago t o bring M r . Linstrom and Paul Angle down.
The fourth member
was D r . Charles Patton of Springfield, who had been a director of the
Association since i t s inception.
D r . Patton was in bed, sick fYom an incwable disease.
met a t his bedside.
We, however,
H i s brain was perfectly clear; he was excited and
delighted t o be one of the group which met.
W
e had a very shorZ;, but
pleasant meeting, at which I adjourned the meeting until the following
morning i n the office of Clyde Walton, the State Historian.
Charlie Patton, a fine surgeon and a delightfilman, was extremely
interested i n this meeting.
meeting, D r . Patton died.
Exactly one week from the day of t h i s
I think that the last week of h i s l i f e was
brightened by the thoughts of this @thering.
I think so.
I hope so.
Q. Before moving on t o another topic, don't you w a n t t o mention
the
p a n t fkom the Rockefeller Foundation?
A.
Yes, I should have mentioned this.
While we were wondering just
exactly where the funds would come fYom t o prepme the mlzuscript
[Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln] f o r publication, and by the way,
the cost of editing and collecting the m d s c a m t o over $90,000, we
were irrmeaswably helped by the Rockefeller Foundation.
M r . Stevens called on me one afternoon at the bank.
A man named
He had previously
seen Allan Nevins at Colwnbia University and Paul Angle at Chicago.
He came into the bank and wondered i f the Association, i n i t s job of
preparing the material for publication, could use $50,000.
I kept mY
seat with difficulty, and said as gracefully as I could that we surely
could use i t . They furmished $40,000, which was the m u n t that was
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G. W. B u m , Jr.
needed t o get the manuscript prepared t o travel t o such places as
Brown University whe~ethe John Hay collection was housed, and t o make
a f i n a l t r i p t o the Huntington L i b r a r y i n Pasadena, California, gathering
the material, most of which was photostatic.
When we did disband, we
presented a l l of this material t o the I l l i n o i s State Historical Library,
which has, I think, a perfectly m f i c e n t collection of miterial
pertaining t o Lincoln.
Q. Is there anything else that you can think of i n regard t o the work
of the Abraham Lincoln Association that you should mention before we
close this topic?
A. I think I have been lax i n giving credit for the help t h a t was
given Governor Kerner by Clyde Walton, who i s the State Historian.
worked indefatigably and i n the backpound.
He
His work was most valuable
in helping with the Installation of the offices of the State Historian
and I l l i n o i s State Historical Society i n the court house.
Wally Henderson,
the architect of the project, also deserves credit.
Q. Dad, another activity which I know you were very much involved in,
and which I have never understood well, i s that of the W a r Fund Council.
Woudl you explain exactly what it was and what it did?
A. The W a r Fund Council acted during the war years, 1941 t o 1945. It
performed the same job that the local community f'und organization had
performed, except it undertook t o raise a l l the money for the community
fund, for the Red Cross,and the various foreign organizations which looked
t o the United States f o r help, such as Bundles f o r Britain, China Relief,
Friends of Friends, and so forth.
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Bunn, Jr.
This was a big undertaking.
One dilemna i n which we found ourselves
was that the foreign or&zations
cam over long before the time for
the local drive, and attempted t o organize themselves and, of course,
raise as much money as they could.
A national or@zation
was formed,
and looked into the character of these various foreign organizations,
examined their budget, or how the money was t o be spent, and gave t h e i r
okay or not, as they saw f i t .
Thereupon they started out nationwide t o organize various poups which
would raise money f o r them.
It soon became evident that such organiza-
tions a s Bundles for Bylitain, China Relief, and miends of Friends, would
do well.
It seemed that they would raise so much money that it m i g h t
be impossible t o raise the budgets of the Red Cross, the ordinary comd t y f'und groups, and such g o u p s a s the Boy Scouts, G i r l Scouts,
Family Welfare and so forth.
So some method of 1Imitin.g the amount of
money they could take out -om
different communities seemed essential.
Nobody seemed t o have thought of i t .
A cormittee was formed.
I think I have mntioned the fact that I was
president of the W a r Fund Council, and I appointed Fred Schrader,
of
Fred Schuster, and 0. L. Parr as a comnlttee t o devise some me%h~rl
restpaining the eager and worthwhile foreign organizations that had
begun t o come in.
t o come in.
A s a m t t e r of fact, the China Relief was the first
They picked a very prorrAnent Springfield m, who was glad
t o serve, and started t o o r m i z e h i s group when we asked them t o pause
f o r a while.
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G. W. B m , Jr.
The leader of the work which followed; that is, finding some way of
limiting the amount that these f o r e i g organizations could take, was
Fred Schrader, who I think did a perfectly magnificent job.
were:
The questions
What w a s the f a i r amount f o r Sangmon County t o give? Wt pm-
portion of the national budget should we undertake t o raise? Obviously,
it couldn't be based on the population, because the percentage of popu-
lation, or the quality of population, of Sangamn County was much
@eater than most of the poor southern counties; so some other method
had t o be found t o supplement the population yardstick.
Fred Schrader and other members of the corrnnittee commicated with
the United States Chamber of Commerce, the Dep&mnt
of Comrce, the
Treasury DepaYstmnt, and so forth, t o discover w h a t Sangamon County's
share of income tax returns was.
The g o v e m n t would not give the
dollar figure, but they did give the nwnber of incorn tax returns which
w e r e made i n Sangamon County as compared w i t h the income tax returns of the
whole United States.
Also, the Chamber of Comrce and Cormnerce Depart-
ment f'urnished the spending power of Sangamon Comty as compared with
the spending power of the United States,and the per capita income of
Sangamon County as compared w i t h the income of the whole United States.
It developed that one-tenth of one percent represented the m u n t of
money that; %ngamon County should pay.
That is, i f Bundles f o r Britain
had a budget of $50,000,000, which had been approved by the National
Committee in New York, Sangamon County's fair amount would be onetenth of one percent of that m m t .
That sounds l i k e a small proportion, but it was not.
The t o t a l arnount
which we gmmnteed t o ralse was far i n excess of anything that had been
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
raised before.
I r e c a l l that the four men who headed the drives of the
Sagamon County W a r Fund Council were first ikon Fisher, Cwl Carter,
Kurt Bretcher and Lamy Wollan, a l l of whom d i d a perfectly outstanding
job of organizing and money raising.
I should s t a t e here that the method devised by our Sangmon County
Warr Fund Council, was adopted by the National Cormittee as a method
suggested t o every state i n the Union t o follow.
We had l i t t l e or no
difficulty i n persuading the various groups that t h i s nethod was fair.
From the point of view of the continuation of the Boy Scouts, the G i r l
Scouts, and the other organizations, it was absolutely necessary.
We
had only one organization that refused t o abide by the decision that
we had made, and t h a t was the March of Dimes; which was rather political
and refised t o abide.
The action taken by the W w Fund Council was t o go t o each chairman
elected, t e l l them the whole story of what we were trying t o do, and
what this particular organization refbsed t o do.
had the weatest difficulty i n getting f o m d .
This organization
Finally it did so on
a more or l e s s political basis, and had a very, very difficult time
i n getting the money they thought they needed.
Q. Let's, before we go on much f m h e r , say a l i t t l e something about
the AL't Association and IMwarrd1s Place.
A. Well, I remember the Art Association as the old Edward's home,
which, while I don't suppose was a gloomy place, was very dark inside
with lace curtains, hardly any room for the pictures that the Associa-
tion gradually accwnulated.
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G.
W. B m , Jr.
43
When I went on the board of the AY% Club, they had j u s t burned the
mortgage which they had put on the house a f t e r they got it f o r some
refurbishing and so forth.
I remember the president of the Board then
was Mr. R. Allen Stephens, who was i n M r . Hay's law office.
There wasn't much activity as I remember the old A r t Club.
They did
get pictures, but had very l i t t l e wall space t o hang them.
It was
decided that they would build an annex joining the E d w d l s Place in
the form of an ax% gallery.
They had some plans made, and the cost was
estimated as I r e c a l l at $35,000, which f o r the Art Club then was a
pretty s t i f f price; u n t i l my Aunt Alice B u m said that she would pay
for half or it if they would raise the r e s t .
I got Mr. Fred Schrader t o take the chaimnanship of a smll w u p that
went out and raised the remaining arnount with very l i t t l e difficulty.
My recollections of the e m l y A r t Club are pretty dim.
They had
classes f o r school children, and a few adults used the A r t Club for
sketches and so forth.
They had a lithogaphic press and Frank Simnons
was the only one who ever used it, but he did make use of i t , and got
a good deal of enjoyment and good out of doing so.
I think a man named Johnson was probably the f i r s t director of the
a c t i v i t i e s of the f i Club.
He was a portrait painter who had come
here t o paint a portrait of Vachel Lindsay, posthumously, of course,
and also painted pictures, as I remember, of Mr. E-
Scott and Mr. George
B. Stadden, who were ewly presidents of the Franklin Life Insurance
corfrpany.
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44
W. Bunn, Jr.
The l i f e of the A r t Club really didn't start until Lillian Scalzo
became the director.
Increased.
Then the classes f o r the school children were
And a great many older people, women like Mrs. Lee Call
and Mrs. P. C. Yokum, and others who had a talent for painting,
painted and encowaed friends of theirs t o come out.
I think that
one reason men dldnlt paint was that they were rather ashamed of it,
but when some went, that drew those who had been reluctant t o come.
Some of them did excellent work.
A few of them painted bowls of
apples, which took some scrutinizing t o distingUish that they were
bowls of apples.
But nevertheless, it did flourish, and now has become
through other building additions, one of the r e a l cultural centers of
Springfield, a busy place and a fine meeting pound.
I never did any work there but I found one occupation that was somewhat
allied t o the A r t Club, and gave me tremendous amount of pleasure.
When
I was a small boy, I had a l i t t l e printing press, and did various jobs
with it.
I think a drop of printer's inlc must have gotten in my blood,
because just after the bank holiday of the 19301s, my wife and I went
t o New York for a much needed change of scene, and there I took some
lessons fYom Warren Chappel, one of the leading book designers i n the
country, who designs so many books for Alfred A. Knopf.
I took lessons fYom him i n wood engraving and wood cut.
Wood cut was
a picture that was cut on a block of either pine or apple or cherry wood
with the p a i n of the wood.
You had t o have a very sharp h i f e , and
be very caref'ul not t o make any false strokes or s p l i t s i n it.
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G. W. Bunn, Jr.
A wood engraving, on the other hand, was a boxwood,
the best was the
'llrkish box tree cut in swll squares, laminated and very highly
polished, and any way your engaverlx tool went, it went against the
gain.
You could do much finer and more delicate work on the box
than you could on the plank.
Befo~ethat, this drop of blood which I said I had of printer's ink
had stirred, I suppose, and I used t o go out Sunday morning t o the
printing shop of Don Ebe.
Don was one of the l a s t of the old wandering
country newspaper printers who went &om one place t o another.
He
operated old Washington hand presses upon which the country newspapers
were s t i l l printed.
I would go out Sunday mornings t o Don's shop and watch him get ready
for the next week's work and so forth, and out of those meetings, he
ordered me an old Washhgton hand press.
There weren1t very m m y left
because they had been out of use f o r a long, long time, but he f i n a l l y
found one at a place called Chandler and Price i n Cleveland.
We
ordered it and it cam, weighing about two tons.
Don, his assistant and I got It down into the basement, and Don s e t it
up.
There we had an old hand press mch like the one that Emjamin
Franklin had used, except that it was iron instead of wood, and. instead
of a wooden screw t o get the hpression of the type on the paper, it
had an iron toggle joint, which brought the type and the wood cuts
against the paper.
I secured gradually fiom t h e t o time quite a vwiety of type; so that
I did have twenty-one cases of types, with most of them Garam~nttypes
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46
G. W. Bum, Jr.
of different sizes.
The f i r s t thing I printed was a l i t t l e magazine
for the children of the neighborhood called the Hobby Horse.
wrote f o r it and I made
They
...
END OF TAPE
Q. I remember the Hobby Horse press well because 1 think I was one
of the e a r l y contributors.
Would you mention the year and mntion as
many of those people that wrote f o r it that you can remember and what
they wrote?
A. Well, I think the year i n which it started was very, very l a t e
i n 1933 or m r e likely, emly of 1934. The c h i l e e n who cont~ibuted
t o it were my own Sally and George and Linda, Milly Bunn, Bobby Prather,
Pete e a t h e r , one o r two of the Miller chil&ren and almost every
youngster i n the inmediate neighborhood.
I can remmber a poem which
Linda wrote with a l i t t l e i l l u s t ~ a t i o nwith a l i t t l e girl with a hoe
working in the gayden; the poem went, "The Doyle1s garden next t o ours/
i s bright with many lovely flowers/ but every time I plant a seed/ up
pops a jimson weed."
Hobby Horse press.
That was the type of poetry that f i l l e d the
I remember a story that George wrote about a
Rght between our l i t t l e dog Bozo and a big rat i n the basement i n
which I think George used his imagination a g o d deal because the
fight was a fight t o the finish in which Bozo had some trouble winning.
I think there were seven issues of the Hobby Horse printed and then
the i n t e ~ s of
t the children must have waned and disappemed, but my
interest i n printing never lef't me.
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G. W. Bum, Jr.
So a f t e r the -Hobby Horse press issued i t ' s last issue number, I s t i l l
continued t o print l i t t l e books.
I would try t o have one ready every
Christms f o r each of the three children t o give away as Christmas
presents.
The books were generally retell-
of stories f'rorn Grirrnn
and Andersen and P e r r a u l t or mde up with the children as the principle
cmacters.
One that 1 remember was "The L i t t l e Green Apple," which
gave the adventures of George, Sally and Linda.
Printing was a slow process because I remember no matter how I t r i e d
t o speed it up I could r a m l y produce more than one impression a minute.
You have t o r o l l the platen, ink the platen f i r s t using a very thick,
dry ink, r o l l it under the press, pull the tympan down, r o l l it back
out and take the paper off, hang i t up t o dry, and put a new sheet on.
The one book, a l i t t l e book which was printed, [was] written by one of
the Miller boys--I think Daniel Miller, a very bloody story about
pirates entitled, "The Deck Runs Red."
I rernm&er when Sally was away at Shipley School, she asked permission
of the F,nglish teacher f o r the g i r l s in her Finglish class each t o participate i n a short story contest and I agreed that I would i l l u s t r a t e
and p r i n t an edition of f i f t y copies of the prize w i n n i n g story and
send it on t o the girl who had won t o @ve
away for Christmas presents.
The girl's name who won it was, I think, Lucy Galpin.
It was a s t o w
about a pony that had had a part i n one of the operas i n which a horse
could properly appear [named Fa-nny Finds the Opera].
I also printed some books which I had written; one of them was called
Goodbye t o G r i m , wuch was the account of the interest a father had
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48
G. W. Bunn, Jr.
i n reading t o h i s own children books which had been read t o him as a
boy, and how much of the humor, f o r instance, of G r i m and Andersen he
had missed the first time, but had caught the second.
This book was
honored by having been used with the permission which I was very glad
t o give by a publishing house called the Holiday Press which did almost
exclusively children's books, reproduced and d i s t ~ i b u t e dt o the annual
convention of the retail book sellers.
Another book was a History of
the Old Chatterton Opera House, which Paul Angle had used as the leading
a r t i c l e i n an issue of the I l l i n o i s State H s t o r i c a l Review.
Another
book was one which I distributed t o a f i f t y odd members of my class in
college, a book of four essays entitled, The Benches on Nassau Street.
The interest i n the Hobby Horse press started i n about 1933 and lasted
until about 1946. What t o do with a l l the equipment that I had accwnu-
lated was a cause of some concern and worry u n t i l I finally decided or
finally discovered that the Sangxion State University would be delighted
t o have the press and som of the equipment and I was delighted t o have
the old press find that type of a home.
It was quite a job t o bring
it out of the basement, around the comer, up the stairs t o the truck
that was waiting f o r it, but they finally did, and now it i s , as I say,
housed a t Sangamon State i n the art depaYltmnt and i s used largely for
the printing of pictures, wood cuts and linoleum cuts.
The type i s
there and someday I imagine thak somebody w i l l find use for it.
Q. Before we leave the Hobby Horse, I want t o ask you, did you ever
have a drawing lesson i n your l i f e ? Or why this talent, and it cej%ainly
i s a talent-you
could wield the pencil like no one I ever hew.
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W. B m , Jr.
A. I always liked t o d r a w l i t t l e sketches when 1 was a boy and had
sow small shill at it which I developed sonewhat a t Lamenceville and
p z t i c u l a r l y at Princeton in drawing sketches f o the
~ T i g e ~and the
Bric-A-Elrac, and so forth.
The sketches were necessarily rather simple
because the job of transfeming them t o the wood blocks was rendered
mch easier thereby.
back over the topics that we have disQ. In reflecting and tm%
cussed on this tape, Ts there anything i n p&icular
that you think
you might have omitted?
A.
Well, I 1 m sure that there m e things that I rilght have omitted,
although I have included much more than I ever expected.
These tapes
starbed out t o be the recollection of a rn t h a t ' s 82, of h i s boyhood
i n Springffeld back i n the 189o1s, the early 1890ts at the turn of
the century.
Due t o the energy of the questionner, who i s rw daughter,
and the proclivity of old men who, when they reminisce, hardly know
when t o stop, we l e f t the Springfield of the 1890% f a r behind and
even went so far as two world wars and a world depression and advanced
beyond that.
I do want t o mention a few of the things that I have omitted and probably
remedy one or two mistakes.
I think there were four businesses, r e t a i l
businesses, s t i l l extant which were very much i n evidence when I was
a boy i n the l a t e nineties and overlooked some very obvious ones:
Herndons was one, Coe Brothers Book Store, Days Paint Store.
The paint
store, a s a matter of fact, was first Willard and Z S n m e m - - h .
was my great-grandfather.
Willard
Coets was situated on the northwest comer
of Fifth and Momoe Street, where the Bootery now is, for years and
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
G. W. Bunn, Jr.
50
years before moving to i t s present location on the southwest comer of
of Sixth and Monroe.
Books that boys read when I was young were m s t l y by Horatio Alger,
the Ragged Dick and Tattered Tom books, Oliver Optic, Edward Stratemeyer
wrote The Blue and Gray series [about the] Civil War. The f i r s t adult
book t h a t I remrnber reading was G~avstark[ L i t t l e Kingdom] and soon
a f t e r that cam a series by a man who was fm and away the most popular
f i c t i o n writer of h i s tim m
d Winston Churchill.
He was no relation
t o the l a t e Churchill of l3glish f a m , but he wrote sorne fine books
such as Richard Camel, The Crossing, The Crisis, for which he spent
some t u e i n Springfield getting material.
The Crisis was the C i v i l
War and the events leading up t o it, and. I how t h a t he interviewed
Uncle John f o r a good many hours on Lincoln--Lincoln,
before the C i v i l W a r .
of course,
Then Churchill switched t o New E-gland and
worte M r . Carewsl Career and Coniston and a book about a minister
called The Inside of the Cup. He i s almost fopgotten now, but certainly
during a long period he was fa^ and away the mst popular Arnerican
novelist.
Q. Thb subject t h a t i n t e r e s t s rne i n particular t h a t I don't know
many specifics about are sorne of
relatives.
W i l l you mention som
with a brief thumbnail sketch?
A. Well, one of the f i r s t t o come t o mind i s Uncle Benjamin Ferguson.
He was the husband of my aunt Alice Ferguson, who was really a great-
aunt and who was aunt by ViYstue of being married t o my uncle, M r . Ferguson, who i s my uncle by v i r t u e of being brother of the s i s t e r of the
wife of Jacob Bunn.
That seems rather involved and probably was.
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Bunn, Jr.
I t h w I'll put i n a very small vignette of old Mrs. Edwards who
lived i n the house next t o the Fergusons' house.
bmther and I would go over and see her.
Occasionally q y
Sne was a.lovely old lady
and looked, i n my memory, much as Whistler's mother looked with a cap
and a simple dress and seated i n the chair i n a simply rwnished so&
of room.
Uncle Ben Ferguson was a captain I n the Civil W a r and a f t e r he was
mustered out he entered the Marine Eank as a clerk, and before long
became cashier and then president.
During h i s long yews of presidency,
he acquired a quite numerous collection of s-s,
shareholder of the Marine Bank.
and was the biggest
He was also, by the way, first president
of the Springfield Park Board, and a very active and good citizen of
the town.
He owned the Ferguson Building which, as I have mentioned,
Coels now occupy.
I said a good deal about
grandfather, Mr. Jacob Bunn, his younger
bmthep-younger by 17 o r 18 years--was John Bunn, who was born and
raised on the farm in New Jersey which t h e i r father, Henry Bunn, owned.
John B m came t o Springfield a s a young man in the early 1940's and
was employed i n the J. Bunn Grocery Store. One thing that I rmmber
was his rurmhg f o r office, the only office i n his l i f e that he ever
ran for, which was Treasurer of the city of Springfield.
His opponent
was M r . Charles Ridgely with a very l u g e family and M r . B m wasn't
thought t o have much of a chance.
coln.
On the s t r e e t one day he m e t Mr. Ijn-
Mr. Lincoln said, "John, how i s your presidency coming?"
Uncle
John said, "I think it ' s coming along alright. " He said, " A r e you sure?"
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
He said, "You haven't asked me t o vote f o r you."
Uncle John said,
"Well, I kind of counted on you because yout r e a Republican. " "Well,"
l
k
.Lincoln said, lldonlt count on anybody without asking.
Ask as many
people as you can t o vote f o r you. Don't be afraid t o do that."
Uncle John was a bachelor and roomed i n what was known as the Vincent
Apartments back of the public l i b r a r y .
A s he got rather old and feeble,
he asked me t o spend the nights over a t h i s ap&mnt,
about a year.
which I did f o r
Then he was taken sick and i n 1920, he died.
a l l of h i s rneals with my aunt Alice.
He took
She was the only sumiving female
e e r of the family and as such was the aunt of all
generation.
A s time goes on, I want t o speak about her because she was a very fine,
jovial, public-spirited woman.
The oldest uncle was Uncle W i l l , who decided there weu?e plenty of B m s
i n Springfield and he would leave and get out on his own.
He was in
government service a l l his life a s customs agent or head of different
customs bureaus--Plattsbwg,
Buffalo, San Francisco-all
over the country.
He would quite often cone back f o r h e r d s of old fkiends.
I remember
very distinctly that I would always s i t by him because he would want t o
know, i n a rather louder whisper than people who are slightly deaf imagined,
"Who i s that ovey there?"
"m heavens,
I would
sw
it was so and so.
He would say,
I thought he had been dead f o r years ! I 1
Uncle Will was stocky, with a close-clipped mustache and I think was
the handsomst of a l l the brothers.
was long and an&=
Next t o him was Uncle Harry, who
and. a great horseman--he
loved horses.
He was,
I remrher, first lieutenant i n Conpamy C or D which embarked from
Springfield for the Spanish-American War.
He was f o r years cashier of
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53
G. W. Bum, Jr.
the Marine Bank, and then purchased a smll fm in Virginia where he
had some horses and raised a few crops, but spent mst of his time i n
New York.
He lived at Nwnber One Fifth Avenue where
wife and I
once o r twice stayed when we made periodic visits t o New Yo&
was i n Vbglnia.
while he
Ny father was next i n age.
Q. You might just briefly mention what Uncle Harry looked l i k e and
what he wore.
A. Well, a s I say, Uncle Harry was quite angular, a great horseman.
He w a s rather thin, he
WOE
very white, very high starched collms, took
very long strides, and wore a derby hat.
Uncle Hamy returned home as
all of the brothers and s i s t e r s except Uncle W i l l did for h i s last
illness.
The how was b u i l t i n the early 185oTs, and was on South Sixth Street,
just north of the [new] Marine Bank f a c i l i t y .
After Aunt Alice's death,
it was t o m down [in 19531 because she did not want, nor did anybody
want the house t o go through the general disintegration that most
houses i n the downtown period do.
as we grew up.
lady.
It was really the center of the family
Aunt Alice was a very good hostess and a very generous
I have told about her association with the Art Club.
I doubt i f
I mentioned the fact that she gave half of the mney for the gallery.
She was forever suppo&ing this, that, and the other thing, and very
often i f the sum were large would give half with the idea that others
ought t o give t h e i r s h m , too.
People used t o be quite ~ l u c t m as
t
long as they found that somebody else would glve money i f they did not.
She didn't believe i n that--quite
rightly.
I think
i f i t had not been
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
for her, for Mrs. Jacob B m , Mrs. Robert Imphier, there would be no
Memorial Hospital because each made extremely generous contributions
and the hospital was, f o r a m t t e r of fact, the last building t o
receive a permit before World W m 11. The only hospitals b u i l t then
were g o v e m n t hospitals.
I think the mst assiduous money r a i s e r f o r
the Memorial Hospital and the mast assiduous planner f o r the hospital
was Herbert Bartholf.
Of my mother and father I cannot begin t o say too much.
They were, I
think, the ideal parents, forebearing, s t r i c t when strictness was
necessary, very jovial.
My father was particularly a congenital joker.
Along about 1908, 1909, 1910, they bought a cottage on Buzzards Bay,
just across the Ray from Cape Cod, where we a l l went t o spend our s m r s .
A s a matter of fact, it was f h m Salters Point, the name of the cormunity
which they joined, that we knew the Cape and knew Chatham. My wife and
I i n 1950 moved t o Chatham for the summer at a very comfortable, homely,
old inn where we stayed u n t i l 1960, when we bought a cottage that we
enjoyed f o r twelve or thirteen years, the cottage overlooldng the ocean
on one side and Nantucket Sound on the other.
The youngest brother of
w aunt
and uncles w a s Uncle Jake, who succeeded
his father as president of the I l l i n o i s Watch Company.
I very well
remember that when I was in college, I would occasionally get a l i n e
or a wire f'mm Uncle Jake saying that he would be i n New York at a
certain day and wondered i f I wouldn't come up and have dinner with him.
Naturally, I did.
He always stayed a t the old Waldorf, which was, I
think, the finest hotel that I ever hew about.
It stood where the
m i r e State Building stands now and was f m u s f o r its fwd.
The
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
55
G. W. Bunn, Jr.
proprietor of the Waldorf, a man named Oscar, Oscm of the Waldorf, would
always come i n t o the d i n i n g room and he got i n t o the habit of asking old
patrons of the hotel how they were and i f they were enjoying t h e i r food.
On some of these t r i p s with Uncle Jake was Bob Lanphier, who was asso-
ciated with hlm i n the founding of the Sangam0 Electric Company. Uncle
Jake had a s o d deal of difficulty i n keeping Bob fYom talking shop.
I remember him saying, "Now, Bob, the Sangam Electric Company w i l l be
there when you get back, but i n the meantime, forget it and we w i l l have
a good dinner and a good time."
Uncle Jake and Aunt Alice were the two youngest children.
My aunt never
rrarried and Uncle Jake was a bachelor f o r a great many years.
were very, very close together.
They
Aunt Alice was p a t t o entertain.
house wax the scene of a good m n y p a r t i e s .
Her
She was very charitable,
and generous.
The house was b u i l t along i n the middle 185o1s, I think.
children were born there excepting Uncle W i l l .
A l l of the
The house had gone
through sore remodeling--a veranda porch, which was used a great deal i n
swwtler,
was added t o the south side.
It was a square house, b u i l t just
before the gingerbread era; therefore, it was square and solid and bland
i n m k contrast t o some of the neighboring houses, notably the Chatterton
house on the south which was Hudson River Gothic and the Gmendike house
across the street which was of the mansard roof type.
The house was t o m
down when my aunt died i n 1953, but the brick stable which was quite
c o m d i o u s with a room on the second floor, a bedroom and bath f o r the
coachman, plenty of c m i a g e space and stalls f o r a team of horses, and
a bay horse which was A u n t Alice's, which she dmve herself, remained
until a few years before the f a c i l i t y [Marine BanZc f a c i l i t y ] was b u i l t .
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
G.
56
W. B m , Jr.
I can ~mernberthe night that the stable was inaugurated with a p&y
and Mrs. House, who was a cousin of ours and lived with qy aunt, was
a famous punch mixer.
and pleasant occasion.
She was kept pretty busy and it was a very
ga3r
The sort of toastmster was o w Uncle Frank
Jones, who w a s an uncle by marriage t o Missy Sally Bum, who died i n 1902.
He always kept his association with her fmlly and came down often f r o m
Chicago where he lived.
He was Assistant Postmster General under
Gmver Cleveland, and Postmaster of Chicago. He mid Nellie Grant
S z - t o ~ i s ,who was the daughter of General G r a n t , whom he had m e t i n
Washington.
They lived on South Sixth Street in the house t h a t
Q
II
father
and mothey lived i n which was i n i t s e l f subject t o a p a t deal of additions and s t i l l stands being the horn of the Sankey family, long tine
friends of ours.
Q.
Now, I have one more question.
In looking back, who do you think
some of your f a v o ~ i t eauthors would be?
A.
Well, i t ' s rather d i f f i c u l t t o say.
novel that I have read i s W a r and Peace.
before
I ? .
Certainly I think the greatest
The l a s t novel that I read
eyes grew so bad I could read no more, was Thackeryls Vanity
I think some of the poems that I have enjoyed most m d l y are
f?om rdnor poets and I ' m going t o close these &ling
reminiscences of
an octogenarian with a poem which I have memorized by James Stevens.
"And now dear heart the night i s closing i n
The lamps are not yet ready and the gloom i s the sad winter evening
and the din the wind rmkes i n the s t r e e t f i l l s a l l the moms-you have listened t o
stories.
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS
G. W. Bunn, Jr.
Seamus Beg has told you the adventures of his youth
and has no mre hopes t o flnd the buried kegs stuffed t o the l i d
with silver, he, alas, g r e w up
but he has found the path t o true mmance and with you may easily
seek wonders.
i s new.
W
e are bound out t o the storm of things where all.
Give ne your harid, so keeping close t o me,
shut t i g h t your eyes and step forward.
END
OF
Where are we?"
TAPE
George W. Bunn, Jr. Memoir #1 - Archives/Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS