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saw on Broadway...this hick from the grapevine yards of Fresno! And he did. You know, he wrote The Time of Your Life, which was a great success. He did. He actually did. He tossed off a play which was a big hit.

He was an amazing man. I made up a lot of stories about Bill. He was such a cinch to publicize because he lent himself to bizarre stories, and Bill has now made them all part of his autobiography. He believes that these things happened. He's forgotten that I made them up. For instance, a story that when we sent him his six author's copies, he took them on a ferryboat from Oakland to San Francisco and went up to perfect strangers and.said, “Look. This is my book. I wrote it,” and sold the six copies on the ferryboat. I made this story up, and he now tells it as part of his autobiography. Also, that when he came to see me at the Palace Hotel in San Francisco, the phone operator called up chuckling and said, “Mr. Cerf, the greatest author in the world is here to see you” and I said, “Send Mr. Saroyan up.” That story I made up too and Bill tells it as part of his autobiography. It's funny how people will accept stories if they show them in an amusing or friendly light.

Well, yes, exactly.

Just to go back a little bit...did Whit Burnett or Mrs. Burnett...did she call you up and say, “I've got a person that I think you ought to meet” or how did you actually...?