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Bennett CerfBennett Cerf
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Session:         Page of 1029

until the war ended just as I was getting my commission. I got out and came back a hero, having won the battle of Camp Lee, Virginia. I went back to college, had credit for all these courses that I never could have passed....

Q:

Did you keep up your column when you came back?

Cerf:

Yes. Then also when I came back, Morrie Ryskind, who was the editor of the Jester, was kicked out of college for the simple reason that he called Columbia's prexy, Nicholas Murray Butler, a blithering idiot, and I was made editor of the Jester. In my sophomore year I was made editor-in-chief of the Jester! That was heady stuff!

Q:

Do you remember your experiences at the Jester at all?

Cerf:

Yes. The first issue of the Jester that I edited gave me a chance to meet Nicholas Murray Butler.

Q:

What was that like?

Cerf:

There were only two ways you met Nicholas Murray Butler. One was to give a million dollars to the University, and the other was to print a joke in the Jester that he didn't like. I chose the latter method.

Q:

Do you remember the joke?





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