In Hagerstown

Citizens of Hagerstown, Md., (population 30,000) will group themselves around a poster tacked to a butternut tree. The poster will announce that Paderewski, World's Greatest Pianist, will play in Hagerstown.

Although local boosters quite naturally take this news to mean that Hagerstown is at last coming to long-merited recognition as a centre of culture and the arts, there is still another reason behind the great pianist's visit. Hagerstown is near Washington, D.C.; and people who want to hear Paderewski can easily get over by bus or motor. In fact, if they expect to hear him this winter, this is just what they will have to do, for Paderewski will not play in Washington.

Has he any grudge against the city? His Manhattan managers say not. Nevertheless, all efforts to book him there have long been given up as useless. "He will not appear as a public entertainer before diplomats who knew him as a Premier of Poland," said some. "He hates the Administration because it opposed the League of Nations," conjectured others. Whatever the reason, managers went out to find a hall for him as near Washington as possible; tried Hyattsville, Berwyn, Laurel, Rockville; chose Hagerstown.