The Ghost of H.L. Mencken

🎵 The program has been funded by the Maryland Committee for the Humanities Incorporated, under a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, and by the Southern Educational

Communications Association. Congratulations! As a member of the City Council and as chairperson of our Menkin Day Committee, it is my pleasure and privilege to proclaim today as Menkin Centennial Day in the City of Baltimore.

Henry Lewis Menkin was one of the great citizens of the city. He was described by the New York Times as the most powerful private citizen in America and the century's greatest literary and social critic. Yes, I knew Henry pretty well. Actually on a personal basis he was a cuttiest, even courtly kind of fellow. But of course, much of the world knew him as a crumogen. And he was a good conservative gentleman, a man who revered the free enterprise system that has made this country great. And Henry Lewis Menkin hated hypocrisy. He changed America by insisting upon courage and honesty he was in his own way. He was well-mannered and polite, but if you're asking me but I think of some of the things

he wrote, well I tried to be a Christian woman and I better not tell you what I think of that side of Mr. Menkin. Well I was just a young reporter and Henry Menkin was getting on in years, but when I worked with him I realized that he was a master craftsman, both as a writer and editor, and everybody in the business respected him, but he was a man who would attack, even ridicule, to industrial ideas and institutions which cause you to wonder if he really believed in anything. Yeah Ben, I know it's Friday and tomorrow's the deadline, look I've been researching this

story all week, I've been every meeting there is, I've read all the Menkin books, I've read over 100 newspaper out of it because I just, yeah, you'll have something soon, I just need to get a handle on them, you know Menkin was a very complicated guy, I bet if he has 50 people about him you get 50 different opinions, I just, yeah, don't worry, I'll have something for you, just give me a little more time to sit through all this material, I really beat right now, all right, you all right, just trust me huh, okay Ben, yeah, I'll check in with you later, right, editors,

first Mmm, mm, mm, mm. Mm, mm. Jesus Christ, not quite. Henry Lewis Lincoln, come on. Who the hell are you? How'd you get in here? Maybe I'll just call the police. Are they straighten this out? The

palpable fact is I am the ghost of H.O. Lincoln. Okay. Okay. The guys in the office put you up to this denday. Probably Sherwood wasn't it? Well Mr. Ghost, I have a lot of work to do so. Look at your book, Thompson. Not the front, the back. Okay. So you look like him. But men can die in 1956, sir. The conception of death is the last and the worst of all the practical jokes played upon poor mortals by the God. Knowing that I have no ambition to be praised, they have rinshed me from my grave to observe this idiotic outpouring of brahmajum sentiment on the occasion of the centennial of my introduction to the universe. An obscene show. It sounds like him too. Simply. I am a Tom Lincoln. Oh sure. Sure you are. Well don't feel guilty about your skepticism. I

myself do not believe in the immortality of the soul nor in the soul. But I do believe that no sane man denies the universe presents phenomena quite beyond human understanding. So it's fair assumption that these phenomena are directed by some understanding that is superhuman. That's as far as sane thought can go. That's far enough. As guys in the office and they're weird jokes. How can I persuade you that I really exist? To me my existence here seems to be self-evident. Oh yeah? Well this is also self-evident. The cigars you're smoking, the real H.L. Menken smoked custom-made Uncle Willie's Londros. And they haven't been sold since his death. I only smoked those at home. They were too strong for

life's society. When visiting I smoked only Havana. However, would you care for an Uncle Willie's Londros, my boy? No thanks. you you

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