The Legend of Whitey:Â W. C. Fields'
Philadelphia Roots (Part 3)
© by Howard Tyson. Used by permission. Comments
  Friends called young Claude Dukenfield "Whitey" because of his light blonde hair. He probably attended
WilliamAdamsonPublic School on 4th St. below Lehigh Ave. at first, then transferred to the new FairhillPrimary School at
Somerset & Marshall Sts. circa 1888.Â
   W. C. Fields was a self-educated man, who avidly read Charles Dickens, Jonathan Swift, Mark Twain, William
Shakespeare, and others. While on the road, he always carried a trunk-full of classics with him.  Although intelligent and
well-read, he did not advance beyond the 4th grade in school. From the age of 10 he helped out with his father's produce
business, occasionally shouting out "rutabagas!" "artichokes!" or "pomegranates!" even though his father had none. James
Dukenfield seems to have had both a stand, and a wagon pulled by a horse named "White Swan."Â At one time he also owned
a thoroughbred, which he never raced.  According to Leroy Dukenfield, The Valley Green Inn at that time offered a bottle of
Madeira wine to the first horse-drawn sled to arrive at the inn after a snowfall. James dearly wished to win this prize, but never
managed it.
  The produce business did not intrigue Whitey, so when the boy turned 13 Grandmother Ann Felton steered him to a job as
counter boy in a cigar store. The shop sold only 3 cent cigars, but the boss instructed him to accept nickels from patrons
desiring a 5 cent cigar on the grounds that "the customer is always right."Â After falling asleep at the counter one night, knocking
over a kerosene lamp, and nearly catching himself and the store on fire, Claude ended his career as a tobacconist in 1893 and
applied to Strawbridge & Clothier's department store as a "cash boy" for a weekly salary of $2. Strawbridge's required
him to replenish cash registers with change. He had to fight a nagging temptation to sprint out the door with the till. Whitey
soon became bored with the routine, and tried to get fired by intentionally falling through a skylight. Worried about a lawsuit, the
Quaker management not only retained Dukenfield, but gave him a raise.
  Claude quit Strawbridge's after three months. His antics may have induced the company to install a pneumatic tube
system for transferring cash throughout the store. He ended up back at James Dukenfield's produce stand, where he often
seemed more of a liability than a help. Ever since seeing the Byrne Brothers (dressed as clowns) juggle in a circus
performance, he practiced tossing and catching apples, oranges, and sickle pears. "By the time I could keep two oranges
going, I'd ruined $40. worth of fruit." (Robert Lewis Taylor, p. 16.) He ate most of his mistakes. James Dukenfield frequently
reprimanded and sometimes smacked his son for these shenanigans. One day in the spring of 1894 he caught "Whitey"
juggling and stepped on a rake the boy had left in the aisle, knocking himself upside the head before he could launch into a
tirade. Claude failed to stifle a smirk and got chased down the street by his furious, rake-wielding father. "My father,
unfortunately, lost his poise and angrily pursued me. Finding that he could not catch me, he shouted through the balmy air that
I was never to return." (Smart, p. 7.)
 The runaway story comprises an integral part of the "Whitey Myth." It contains both fact and fiction. Over the years the
comedian told different versions to various people. The one related to Alva Johnston in 1935 has it that James stepped on a
shovel, barked his shin, then struck 14 year old Claude on the shoulder blade with the shovel. A short time later the resentful
boy climbed onto the storeroom loft, dropped a lug box onto his fatherÂ’s head, exited from a second story window, and ran off to
join a traveling carnival, where he took care of elephants and learned to juggle. Fields' sister Adele Dukenfield Smith
dismissed both the assault on her father and the carnival tale as apocryphal, adding: "father was very strict. W.C. and Walter
used to needle him mercilessly to get his goat, but it was all for fun. We all respected and loved our parents." (R. Fields p. 12)
 Â
  Claude did run away from home for several weeks, perhaps months, but never strayed far from his own neighborhood. As
a young fugitive he first slept in a "dug-out" that is, a hole in a field covered by boards. His friends brought him food pilfered
from their mothers' pantries. He made up the difference by shoplifting and soliciting hand-outs from Kate during his father's
absences. The fort's roof leaked and his friends' care packages soon ceased. During inclement weather Claude slept at
Grandmother Ann Felton's house (921 Sterner St.), Uncle William Felton's house (1153 Venango St.), the cellar of a neighbor
(with a broken window he could crawl through,) the backroom of a saloon, "Pothead" Edwards' basement, on a billiard table in a
pool hall, and "The Orlando Social Club","a vacant second floor space above a blacksmith's forge at 11th & Ontario, which he
and his buddies used as a hideout.  Claude often returned home during the day to visit his mother, get a bite to eat, and
perhaps bum a few cents for the road. Once he strolled in the house, almost bumped into his father, quickly swiped a packed
lunch from the parlor table, and ran out the door.Â
  It seems that W.C. often embellished stories in his later years, especially when in his cups. Over cocktails in a Hollywood
restaurant Fields confessed the robbery of a Chinese laundry to Alva Johnston of The New Yorker. This store had a bell on the
door to alert its proprietor when a customer entered. "Whitey" devised a plan to foil this alarm. He had an accomplice stand
in the middle of the trolley tracks outside the shop. When the streetcar driver loudly rang his bells at the boy, “Whitey”
dashed in, grabbed cash from the drawer, and fled. A similar strategy was employed to steal lemon meringue pies from a
bakery. Young Dukenfield could not have avoided Eastern Penitentiary if he actually perpetrated all the thefts later described to
Hollywood cronies. Â
  In 1935 Fields told Alva Johnston that his life as a tramp taught him that the lower orders of humanity enjoyed kicking those
down on their luck. He got into more of his share of fights simply because of his lowly status as a "street-person." Though 14
year old Dukenfield could hold his own in fights, a nineteen year old sailor on leave from the Navy once beat him severely. The
combination of sleeping outside in cold weather and frequently getting punched in the face gave Fields nasal problems, which
aggravated the alcohol-induced nose-swelling of later years.
 At this time Claude became a habitué of bars which offered free buffet lunches. He'd buy a nickel glass of ginger ale, then
eat pickled herring, hardboiled eggs, bread, salad, cheese, pretzels, sausages, and anything else he could snatch. This
practice rapidly wore out his welcome in the pubs along Germantown Ave. One day a bartender aware of his freeloading
banged a mug of ginger ale on the bar so hard it frothed over. With an offended look Whitey admonished: "Be careful, my
friend, or you'll lose my patronage."Â (Johnston, Feb. 2, 1935 New Yorker Profile.)
  How long this homeless period lasted must remain a subject for speculation. It seems that he spent between six weeks
and four months on the lam during the spring and summer of 1894, but never left Philadelphia. When the prodigal son
returned to the Dukenfield household, all agreed that his days as a huckster's apprentice were over. Wanting to earn good
money, he got a job in the galley of a Chestnut St. oyster bar, and sold newspapers on the side. As a newsboy he would yell
the headline:Â "Five men swindled!"Â After a customer bought a paper, he'd cry:Â "Six men swindled!" (Smart, p. 10.)Â
     After a few months of washing dishes and lugging fetid ashcans full of oyster shells around (c. 1895,) Whitey left the
mollusk emporium and secured more congenial employment in a billiard hall, where he supplemented his income by
hustling. Here he expanded his repetoire to include trick pool shots, and balancing stunts with cue sticks and cigars. In his
40's and 50's Fields retained the hustler mentality when he played handball, tennis, and golf for money with Hollywood friends.Â
 Competitors such as Sam Hardy and Gene Fowler remembered "Bill" intentionally missing a few tennis shots, upping the
bet, then coming from behind to beat them.Â