20                           L. S. Alexander Gumby

examinations of the year. I went to Philadelphia, taking with me
the paperhanger's scrapbook, which my sister had reluctantly let
me have when I left for college. It was packed in an old round-top
trunk, along with several unmounted newspaper clippings,
pictures of my student friends, mementos of my few college days,
several badly spelled class compositions, essays with high-sound¬
ing titles, and poems, too, that had been greatly applauded when
read in the classroom or at some literary club but which invariably
rated no better than zero with my professor.

After remaining in Philadelphia about three years, I moved to
New York City. At once I became a New Yorker in spirit and
principle, for I found here more freedom of action than I had
ever known before. I became familiar with all of the best shows
and most famous actors on Broadway, and I formed the habit early
of enthusiastically collecting all the playbills, pictures, and clip¬
pings I could find about my favorites. Somehow in my journeyings
my old round-top trunk had been lost—and with it the wallpaper
scrapbook. Only my suitcase had come through, but it contained
more clippings and pictures than clothes, for the scrapbook-
making urge was never far from my mind.

During those early years in New York it seemed that a willing¬
ness to change jobs was a mark of a youth's ambition. Through a
friend I heard of an opening at Columbia University, waiting on
table at lunch hours. I appUed for the job and got it. The table
assigned to me was frequently chosen by Dr. Koo, who usually
came in late. He was very popular with the students, and I soon
became his great admirer. When, later, he became headline news
I clipped everything I could find about him. I also gathered a good
deal of material about Dr. Butler, but I never got around to collect¬
ing Columbia University items as such in those days.

It was not until 1910 that I seriously began to do something
about my overflowing collection of clippings. I decided to gather
them into scrapbooks. Without experience in the arranging of such
a vast amount of miscellaneous material, I naturally made a botch
of it in my first efforts. When I finally admitted to myself that it