2. Joe Bushey
F. E. Burke, according to Doc Powers in
Memories of Clarkson
, started the
Integrator
in
1921, often writing the entire issue singlehanded. One of his creations was Joe Bushey of
French-Canada.
In the
Integrator
of December 1922, the Joe Bushey tradition began when a prospective
student from Trois Rivers, Quebec, Canada, named Alf Bushey visited his cousin at Clarkson
on November 11, 1922, to witness the CCT-SLU game. After his return home, he wrote to his
cousin Joe to explain his reasons for not coming to Clarkson. They were based on:
... that fella who teaches kemistricks tried to tell me that a mollycuil is composed of two
attums or more. Thet kinda stuf dont git you no where, and when they say that 2 pie are around a
round hole or sirckle i cant see why. These is sum of the cheef raisins i didnt stay. also im glad i
saw Tek get those Larries that Saturday. Sum of them looked lik nise fellers and there red
swetters was pretty - to bad to get them al mud - but I'm glad you fellers beet them so bad. I wud
hev walked a tousand miles to seen that sport. got to wash my feet now before winter cums.
hope you are the saim,
your cousin,
alf bushey
A later issue of the
Integrator
, February 1923, reintroduced this cousin Joe who became
a phantom figure on the Clarkson campus; he has been around as a student ever since.
According to the
Integrator
, he, a freshman, was writing his own book,
Freshmen Sfiziks
. Here
are some extracts supposedly from that work in progress:
Density of a substance is equal to the volume at a constance pressure.
Constance
who
? Factor of safety is the amount OVER the load to be carried that the carrier will
carry.
Mail carrier, probably
! Density equals depth!
We always thought these deep
Thinkers were dense
.
In the March 1923
Integrator
, Joe's brother, Willie, wrote to their father:
dere paw,
I tak mi pen and ink botel in hand to tiperite yu a few words. Please excuoose the led
pencil as i hav loss my fountain pen. i want u shood no sum things consarnin mi stay in potsdam whar u
sent me to go to skul at mister Clarksens immoral instoot of theology. first off i want for to say i don go
to his skul no more, the raisin fer which is mad plane in the insooin paragrafs.
you no paw, when jo bushey cum home on his vakashun, how he tol about awl the good
times which he said he had playin stud poker at his fraternity house which was called th Eta
Pesa Pie house frat. well paw when he made them remarks he wuz ether crazy or drunk which
tehe latter was mos probly the cas as this praktis is no uncommon okurence here. about haf the
yung men which attendz mister clarksens institoot is in the boot-leg game and the other haf is
workin there way thru college by playin duses wild at mister arlingtons hotel.
but i wander, i mus tell yu somethin of this houce of lernin. when i cum here in
setember i was took in hand by the ucc [Note: Upper Class Committee] which means ugly
