trade was new in America and I foresaw a future in the industry,
for all kinds of food were now being put up in tin, whereas when
I was a child a tin can was rarely seen. I decided that two
trades were better than one, and I would learn the tin plate
trade. I went to Elwood, Indiana, and found a place there in a
tin mill. My knowledge of puddling, heating and rolling,
occasionally working in a sheet mill similar to a tin mill,
prepared me for this new work. In tin making a piece of wrought
iron is rolled thin and then covered with a thinner coating of
pure tin. After this is done the plate remains soiled and
discolored, and the next process is to remove the stain and
polish the tin until it shines like silver.

To have a job and eat pie again made me happy. Our union
contained several hundred members, so I had a lot of prospective
friends to get acquainted with. I was then nearly twenty-one and
a pretty good mixer; I liked men and enjoyed mingling with them
and learning all I could from what they told me. When they
drifted into a saloon I went along for the company. I did not
care to drink, so I would join some impromptu quartet and we
would sing popular songs while the other fellows cheered us with
the best will in the world. A drink of beer or two heightens a
man's appreciation of music, and the way the boys applauded my
singing makes me rather regret the Volstead Act. It queered my
act. Since beer disappeared nobody has asked me to sing.
Prohibition may be good for the health but it is sure death to
art.

Those were happy days. But just when all my troubles seemed
ended and the rainbow of promise in the sky, a new cloud