HUMAN TIDE ON BROADWAY

Manawatu Times, Volume XLIX, Issue 3288, 6 March 1926, Page 10

HUMAN TIDE ON BROADWAY

Melbourne Man Sees Amazing Sights

COLOURED DANDIES AND MASKED LADIES

(By F. P. BROWN in the Melbourne “Herald.”)

■The Great White Way,” “Hard

Boiled Alley,” “The Street of Mys-

tery." These are some of the names given to Broadway in New York, and they are all earned. Th Great White Way is thick with theatres and picture houses. One sees many shops speculating with Uieaitre tickets. A Russian ballet school is perched on the top of a twelve-storey building. A former world’s champion heavy-weight boxer conducts a great gymnasium. He asks 1000 dollars a year from rich pupils and gets it. A little lower down the street another old boxer has his stand—rthe great Australian lightweight Griffo. It is claimed by many that he was the greatest boxer that ever lived. Griffo has nothing. Ho is even dependent on former sport patrons for his bread and butter. Tot he seems consent. He sits on some stone s teps and watches Broadway through half-closed eyes. He has sat in the same spot for many years watching the spenders and the earners, the spiders and the flies. One may see many colcbrites on Broadway, and not a few human oddities. Word goes round that Rudolph Valentino is dining at such and such a cafe, and, whisper it—a noted movie beauty with him! Soon there is not a seat to be obtained where Rudy dines. Lionel Atwell, noted stage lover. Is at another place. The papers have been full of his proposed divorce suit against his aife, formerly Elsie M’Kay, of Australia, and so on. But if the great gain most of the attention, the near great and even the obscure strive hard for their share. One dancer of ordinary merit wears a liver-coloured bowler hat and white gloves. He struts In a style that brings stares Ito the eyes of the visitors. "Who ia he?" they ask. The hard-boiled regulars grin with tight mouths and pass on. It takes more than a liver-coloured bowler to excite them. This Is the street of human oddities, where one may sec many bizarre effects. Further on a dark-skinned Swaml stalks with dignity through the crowd He has been making a sensation with a new cult. He may be sincere, but he certainly knows [the value of ’publicity. One wonders if he learned it in India or New York. The next sight Is a man on sitllta stalking amongst the traffic. A policeman’s whistle shrills, the traffic halts and the man on stltlts casually seats himself on top of a taxi cab until [the traffic moves forward again. Next we pass a newspaper stand where papers from all over the world can be bought. Leaning on one corner is a plainly-dressed Inconspicuous man. 1 am told he is a detective who keeps check on out-of-town criminals. At some time or other they al Icall for a local paper. That is a simple way to catch them; just wait till they make a call at this news stand! Win attention in Broadway and you can win attention anywhere. Many try. They itry all sorts of ways. Ladies parading with foxes, tiger cubs, tame leopards and bears have created a stir for a brief hour, but the law frowns on such pets and they are quickly stopped and then forgotten. There is no harm in carrying a marmoset in one’s muff, however, nor is there anything dangerous in a pot chamelion perched on my lady’s shoulder and kept captive by a thin piatinura chain. Those things are allowed to pass. Three ladies are attracting attention in the Broadway restaurants alt the moment. One carries a high black stick and wears a monocle. Her escort is a turbaned Indian. Another affects a black court plaster butterfly on her smooth red cheek. Still another appears in a mask. . . . mystery ladies indeed. One cannot gauge, (heir obpect, unless it is to draw tho limelight. And so a never-ending crowd sweeps along Broadway until the small hours. But the grey of morning has tinged the sky before the last cup is drunk and the last restaurant empties. Harlem, the coloured quarter of New York, is said to have the largest population of negroes of any town in the world. There are close on 200,000 of mixed Ethiopian blood there. It Is mixed in all kinds of ways. Nerw York calls on them to supply “bell-hops," janitors, elevator boys, and handy men. They are used as house helps, cooks, and what bbt. They supply quite a lot of fighting blood to local boxing rings. They contribute to tho vaudeville stage, and at least one is a famous dramatic actor. A sprinkling work In offices as stenographers and clerks. They live their own life out of work hours and do not mix with the white population. They have their own “black and tan" cafes and night clubs, some good, others rough. They have their own gun and razor gangs as does any civilised community. The Harlemites set their own fashions, and tho coloured Beau Brummel is something to wonder at. A close eye is kept on the most extravagant fashions on Broadway, and then multiplied by three. Behold, you have a Karlem dandy.