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LOOK HOMEWARD BABY

OLLIE HARRINGTON

BACK IN THE late 1940's Small's Paradise may have been somewhat less than heavenly. It did however, boast of a bartender who sent spirits soaring and the proud sanctuaries of those spirits tumbling from their barstools, or draped across the juke-box and along the walls, convulsed and twitching like so much Jello. In fact he almost became the "first Black man" to giggle his way to a place among the angels. When the brother reared back and did his thing the gin-induced calm was shattered by a mad fugue euphorically reminiscent of bagpipes, flutes and several neighing horses. It was rumored that if the wind was right you heard the hollerin' and shriekin' way the hell up on Sugar Hill where, if you were feeling down-and the rents had most folks feeling down-you could grab a cab and make the scene before the next lie got told.

Madison Avenue must have heard it too because one day a bespectacled smoothie from CBS showed up with a contract, dangling an impressive amount of bread in return for complete broadcasting rights to the monumental giggle. A studio test was arranged; only as a precautionary step to prepare the sound engineers for the supernatural. But alas, when the brother found himself eyeball to eyeball with an unblinking mike he froze. When he got himself together to trigger the giggle, what leaked out was a mousey whimper. The second and third tests were perhaps better, but only if you consider a groaning rabbit an improvement over a moaning mouse. CBS didn't. Our man lost absolutely no stature in the community for having struck out his first time at bat; after all most brothers never even got into the line-up. So he settled right back behind his bar and giggled like crazy each time he retold his tale to the world's most appreciative audience.

One night my friend Ted Yates, a local gossip columnist whose violently unsympathetic readers forced him to give it up and study embalming, introduced me to the "Giggler." "Meet my buddy Ollie,"
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Ollie Harrington recently made his first visit back to the U.S. in 21 years. His "Bootsie" cartoons appear regularly in the Black Press and his political cartoons in the Daily World.

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