AN EPITOME OF THE CAREER OF OWEN KILDARE.
That a man should, with the aid of a good woman, raise himself from the depths of brutish degradation to an honest manhood and regard for things pure and holy is a fine thing.
That a man should reach the age of thirty without being able to read and write, and then, within a few years, with the aid of this woman and through his own indomitable will and energy, gain such mastery over the art of writing as to be able to tell such a story as is here presented, is so strange, so unprecedented as to warrant unbelief.
Owen Kildare is a real man and that is his real name. He is widely known on the Bowery, where he lives. The writer of this knew him when he was a bartender in Steve Brodie's saloon and when he was a "bouncer" in the frightful dive to which he refers.
His article is printed as it was written, with no more editing than the "copy" of the average trained writer would receive, and it has a power that is rare in these days. Glance at this epitome of his life, and wonder.
1864—Born in Catharine street. Orphaned in his infancy and adopted by a childless couple.
1870—Became a newsboy in the gang of which Timothy D. Sullivan was the leader, and fended for himself.
1880—A "beer slinger" in a tough Bowery dive and a pugilist. His fighting capacity and brutishness made him a bouncer in one of the most infamous resorts New York has ever known.
1894—Met the little school teacher through protecting her from insult, who taught him to read and write and who made a man of him. Gave up working in dives, where he made sixty dollars a week, more or less dishonestly, to work for eight dollars a week.
1900—Death of the little school teacher one month before they were to be married.