Interviewing Sinners & Saints

INTERVIEWING SINNERS SAINTS By DAVID W. HAZEN, Staff Writer, The Oregonian. Foreword by Palmer Hoyt, Publisher of The Oregonian. Published by Binfords Mort, Portland, Oregon, U. S. A, Early to bed and early to rise, and you will meet very few prominent people George Adt COPYRIGHT 194 2 BY DAVID W. HAZEN FIRST EDITION Printed and Bound in the United States of America TO MY FRIEND OF CUBHOOD DAYS WILLARD L. MARKS BLACKSTONE SPOILED AN EXCELLENT REPORTER ALSO BY DAVID W. HAZEN OKK WATKUS Burn AMERICAN HISTORY SHKL GIANTS AND YIIOSTS OK CKNTUAL Mil. LINCOLN A Foreword D AVE HAZEN is urtique. He is an interviewer by vocation, a newspaperman by avocation and thus reverses the normal procedure. In his 0 odd years of newspapering he has prob ably talked to more celebrities, near celebrities, geniuses and just plain nuts than any living man. And, so, just as David W. Hazen is unique his latest book, Interviewing Sinners and Saints, is unusual. It isn 9 t a steak dinner. Rather its a salty, zestfuL bouillabaisse put together with a typewriter as talented as the hands of the French chef who originated that famous concoction. Probably Dave Hazen has talked to and written up some 10,000 great and near great. His list mcludes many of the biggest names of the modern world. This has been possible be cause Mr. Hazen does nothing else for The Oregonian and hasnt for 13 years. Before that his services with the old and now deceased Portland Telegram included more than a year as active war correspondent m World War I, and since his last affiliation with The Oregonian yearly . trips to eastern popur lation centers and foreign capitals have kept his contacts gli Dave Hazen collects interviews with the samerelentless aban don that the Maori head hunter gathers the skulls of rival tribesmen or that a Mandan Sioux of the Custer era sought the hair of the whiteman. You may rest assured that if you have built a better mouse trap, written a better book or set a record in climbing snow-capped mountains, and if you come within his ken, this dauntless interviewer will track you down and add yowr intellectual pelt to his growing collection. Before I say something about the book I want to pay my warm tribute to a fellow newspaperman who has done much to keep the pages of The Oregonian warm and bright during my years of active connection with that newspaper. I know of none more tireless m the pursuit of a story nor anyone who will meet a later train to talk to someone who is news. Now about the book here is a parade of not only big names but vital, interesting people who live again m the attractive pages of Mr. Haxens work. In the pages that follow you win find another side to James Branch Cabell, S. S. Van Dine, Vincent Sheean, Fawnie Hurst, Gene Twrmey, Frank Knox, Ed Howe and almost any celebrity you can lay tongue to m a long days thinking. Gods speed to you D ve Haxen, and Bon Voyage to yowr book. PALMER HOYT, Publisher, The Oregonian. A Word to the Wise IN THE pleasant grind of newspaper work, I have been assigned to interview a great number of men and women. The total reaches thousands of persons prominent enough to have the city editor assign me to see them. Thinking a tiny part of this aggregate might be of perma nent interest, I have worked out this book. In it are recorded bits sometimes a line, sometimes several hundred words, in a few instances a thousand or more words from interviews Ihave gathered over the years. All the quotations are from the printed newspaper articles or from notes taken at the time of the inter views. I have not trusted to memory. I used the group pattern in assembling these quoted words of wisdom, save in one chapter. As the year 1932 marks the end of an American era, I decided to select a number of notable interviews gleaned that year to use in a separate chapter. It is titled Dark Days. And speaking of the build-up of this book, I want to thank Palmer Hoyt and Fred M...