I was not raised for vaudeville. Father and mother were veteran legits; They loved the Bard and the "Lady of Lyons." I was born on a show boat on the Cumberland; I was carried on as a child When the farm girl revealed her shame On the night of the snowstorm. The old folks died with grease paint on their faces. I did a little of everything Even to staking out a pitch in a street fair. Hiram Grafter taught me to ballyhoo And to make openings. I stole the business of Billy Sunday And imitated William Jennings Bryan. I became famous in the small towns. One day Poli heard me-- He's the head of the New England variety circuit.-- "Cul," he said, "you are a born monologist. Where you got that stuff I don't know, But you would be a riot in the two-a-day. Quit this hanky-panky And I'll make you a headliner." Well, I fell for his line of talk Like the sod busters had fallen for mine. Aaron Hoffman wrote me a topical monologue; Max Marx made me a suit of clothes; And Lew Dockstader wised me up On how to jockey my laughs. I opened in Hartford; Believe me, I was some scream. I gave them gravy, and hokum, And when they ate it up I came through With the old jasbo, Than which there is nothing so efficacious In vaudeville, polite or otherwise. The first thing I did I hollered for more dough, And Poli says: "That's what I get for feeding you meat, But you are a riot all right, all right, So I guess you are on for more kale." I kept getting better. I got so's I could follow any act at all And get my laughs. And he who getteth his laughs Is greater than he who taketh a city. At last the Palace Theatre sent for me And I signed up for a week. They kept me two. I am a headliner; I stand at the corner of Forty-seventh Street And Little Old Broadway; Throw out my chest, Call the agents and vaudeville magnates By their first names. I am a HEADLINER with a home in Freeport.
From midnight till the following noon I stand in shadow, Just a splotch of white, Unnoted by the cleaning crew Who've spent their hours of toil That I might live again. Yet they hold no reverence for my charms, And if they pause amid their work They do not glance at me; All their admiration, all their awe, Is for the gold and scarlet trappings of the home That's built to house my wonders; Or for the gorgeous murals all around, Which really, after all, Were put in place as most lame substitutes, Striving to soothe the patron's ire For those few moments when my face is dark. Yes, men have built a palace sheltering me, And as the endless ocean washes on its stretch of beach The tides of people flow to me.