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especially ones about the early Erie Canal days in upper New York State. This was his milieu.

Another thing that I thought that we might want to discuss popped up in 1943. This is the first indication that I have that you began to get on radio and become more of a public figure.

Well, I had already, as I told you, started “Trade- winds” in The Saturday Review and the Cerfboard column in This Week magazine and my book, Try and Stop Me, had sold over a million copies in one form or another.

The next book that I did was Shake Well before Using, which sold about 80,000 copies in hardback alone. That's when I broke with Simon and Schuster, who had published the first one, because by this time, when the second one came out, I was no longer new to them. Try and Stop Me they did a glorious job for, but by the time they brought out Shake Well before Using they had become enamored of Billy Rose and they were spending their time on his book. I felt that I was being neglected. I was a typical author and I raised holy hell, as a result of which they had to take several full-page ads. I knew how to pressure them. In the end, my book out-sold Billy Rose's about four to one; but I never forgave them. I went to Doubleday after that.

Try and Stop Me...there were some little squibs. I mean