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"The Fairfield Tribune"
Thursday, February 2, 1922
Page SIX

NO. 45 (sic - should be 47)

CHARLES EDWARD ANDERSON

"Ah," we hear you saying, "a son of Charles Edward Anderson, our genial shoeman." Which error is quite natural, for this drawing of Charles Edward was made from a photograph taken about the time he was considering matrimony seriously. And the fact that he has had none taken later will prove to some people that Charles Edward isn't what you might call a vain person, though there are some ill-natured enough to remark that Charley thinks there is no photographer good enough to do him justice.

However that may be, it is certain that Charles Edward is a much handsomer chap than he is here shown to be. Over at Washington, where he was born, the girls used to--but we'll let that pass, for Charley is married now.

As stated, Charles Edward was born over in Washington. But people here in Fairfield have been nice to him despite that misfortune, and Charley has succeeded pretty well living it down.

You who have attended Community club dinners, or similar events, where the meal was served by members of the organization giving it may have marveled that Charles Edward was always among the waiters. Likewise you may have been impressed with the grace and ease with which he served you your coffee, roast beef and mashed potatoes. That comes of long experience, as only such skill can come. For Charley got a lot of experience along that line in a railroad lunch counter at Washington. Even yet, that early training persists and you may have noticed that when waiting on you in his shoe store he quite often forgets himself and brings a pair of shoes to you as though it were a tray of food he was carrying. But of course that doesn't make any difference to you as long as he delivers the goods---and that's something he has a way of doing.

Charles Edward Anderson came primarily to Fairfiled (sic) for two purposes; one was to escape Washington, the other to sell shoes. But right from the first there were a lot of people who thought his sole purpose in coming to this fair city was merely to boost and work for the aforesaid fair city. Laboring under this impression they began to find things for him to do. Little things, of course, like putting up the Fourth of July decorations in the park, serving as chairman of a committee of one to raise four or five thousand dollars for a celebration, or going out and getting a couple of hundred new members for some organization and collecting their dues from them. These chores have kept Charles Edward reasonably busy in the years he has been in the city.

A farmer is always assured of a cordial welcome at Charles Edward's shoe store, and will always find in the proprietor a sympathetic listener to all his woes. For you see, Charley knows that the farmer's lot is a mighty hard one because he has worked on a farm, spent one of his vacations during his school days working on a farm down around Crawfordsville.

"'Twasn't an unusually long vacation that year--it just seemed longer," says Charley.

His sympathy and likng for the farmer is so great that he refuses to get mad when one of them points out to him that a pair of shoes costs as much as the farmer gets for a dozen cow hides, and yet one hide would make a dozen pairs of shoes. He's been patiently explaining that discrepancy ever since the kaiser messed up business in this country. It's got so that he can not laugh about it himself but he can actually make the farmer smile. Which is to say that Charles Edward Anderson is a pretty even tempered, patient sort of a chap who has a way of getting your confidence.

However, Charles Edward has shown himself to be a bit short-sighted and careless in some matters. Along early last spring he heard a most insistent pounding at his back door one evening. Charley was busily engaged in writing a speech on "How Merchants Can Find More Time to Give to Public Enterprises," or something of the kind, which he was to deliver at the next Community club meeting, so he didn't take the trouble to go to the door. When the pounding was continued with still greater insistence he threw a paper weight at the door and shouted, "beat it, I'm busy."

He was a bit disconcerted to find next morning that the caller had been Opportunity and that she had left a card at the door informing him that she had called to offer him the job of councilman from his ward, but that because of his indifference she had passed on. Had Charles Edward but heeded the knock of Opportunity he might now have been enabled to give all of his time to the public and would not need to be bothered about running a shoe store.

From this it may be gathered that Charles Edward Anderson is somewhat of a booster for the city's welfare. Not the kind, if you please, who pats the other fellow on the back and says, "You're doing fine, that's the stuff, go to it, I'm for you." Like Ray Maxwell, Fred Jericho, and some of the others, he swears every now and then he's going to quit and give the other fellows a chance to do some of the work, but--well, you'll usually find him plugging away when there's anything to be done. "And," says Charles Edward, "thee's something to be done pretty much all of the time."