Hotel Lobby Gleanings [excerpt]

     Thomas V. Maxedon, a Crawfordsville manufacturer, who was at the Denison Hotel last night, has written a book called “The Crime of the Age,” the idea for the story being suggested by the assassination of William McKinley. The author is now reading the last batch of proofs and expects to have the story out about the 1st of May. Mr. Maxedon was in Cleveland at the time of the assassination and was so impressed with the horror of the crime that he decided to put his views on paper.
     “The idea suggested itself to me,” said Mr. Maxedon last night, “of taking the truths as they pertained to anarchism and socialism and putting them to the severest test of discussion and criticism. In that view of the case I laid the scene of the story on Fleet street [sic], in Cleveland, where the demon Czolgocz formery [sic] lived. I took up a good, sensible housewife and her Anarchist husband and put them through four evenings of debate. In these debates they discuss anarchism, socialism, the labor question, foreign alliance, the Philippines and many other kindred subjects. The book naturally divides itself into three parts. The first part is anarchism, the second part is common socialism and the third part is erudite socialism. The book will contain about thirty-five chapters. The names of the people in the book are ‘Sallie’ and ‘Pete.’ ‘Sallie’ is a common-sense woman and is well informed on all these subjects, having read a great deal. She contends that anarchism is wrong and that socialism is also founded on fallacies. She meets all of her husband’s arguments on this ground.”