GREAT BRITAIN: King’s Runt

The death of beloved George V filled the Kingdom’s illustrated papers for weeks with every conceivable picture of His late Majesty. Instinctively, out of all the thousands, Englishmen picked one snapshot as their favorite (see cut). Last week began a movement to cast in enduring bronze kindly, paternal King George and the grinning little paint-pot boy who proffered a small, grimy paw to His Majesty in a British shipyard in 1917. “Find that boy!” ordered London editors last week. Soon John Michael Cassidy was found. He turned out to have been in 1917 not the child he looks in the picture but a 16-year-old runt. Now 4 ft. 6 in. tall, nearly toothless, prematurely aged and jobless for most of the past 14 years. John Michael Cassidy muttered that on Britain’s dole a man does not get enough to marry and have children. “I love kids,” added the King’s Runt wistfully. “So did King George!”