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George is all the more remarkable be cause, to the naked eye, he is a clown. He is fat, he rolls his eyes, he shakes like jelly, he roars with laughter. He can keep friends in stitches for hours with his stories. The butt of all of them is George himself and that makes good fun, too.
A favorite is his account of the Georgia Tech-Cumberland U. football game in 1916. Cumberland's fullback and captain, George Allen himself, made the best run of the game for his hard pressed side: "I only lost six yards." He would have made one beautiful punt if his own center had not blocked it with the back of his neck. George recalls: "I once dropped the ball and yelled at another fellow: 'Pick it up.' He yelled back at me, 'Pick it up yourself, you dropped it.'" The score: Tech, 220; Cumberland, 0.
George's first law case was against a railroad on behalf of a woman who tripped over an umbrella and broke her leg. George filed suit for $40,000. The railroad settled for $10—$5 for the woman, $5 for George. "I was in no mood to dicker," is George's gag line.
Once when he was District Commissioner he started out to settle a local carpenters' strike. "And in no time at all," he says, "it was national."
George's comedy is always pretty much the same routine, but his tireless friends are convulsed. He never seems to run out of funny things to say—scrupulously never tells anything off-color.
Handy Man. His career as a national figure began with the Washington job, to which Franklin Roosevelt appointed him. George made the most of it. One way or another he kept his name on the front page: ALLEN DEMANDS MORE MONEY FOR DISTRICT RELIEF . . . COMMISSIONER ALLEN VIEWS COMING YEAR WITH OPTIMISM. In 1934 he set forth across the country dressed as a hobo to study conditions. It made a fine story.
Fun-loving George, who knew everyone worth knowing in Washington, became vice president of the Home Insurance Company. The way it happened was that the company had found itself involved with Boss Pendergast in Missouri's fire insurance scandal. It needed someone like George to fan out the smoke and put Home Insurance back in good odor with Congress. George's job was Good Relations.
So handy was George that other big companies put him on their boards. Among them: Victor Emanuel's Aviation Corp. and Consolidated Vultee Aircraft Corp., Tom Girdler's Republic Steel, General Aniline and Film Corp. George knew the men who ran the country. George was a fixer and a puller of wires. That was what George got paid for. Keeping a gruelling schedule, he seldom got home to his Wardman Park apartment and his pretty, pert wife.
"Don't Mess with Mr. In-Between." In 1943 George was made secretary of the Democratic National Party. Roosevelt trusted him even if he did not react to George's humor. "I am exactly 100% certain of his loyalty," wrote F.D.R. At the 1944 Democratic convention, when most smart politicians realized they might be nominating two Presidents, George latched on to Harry Truman and helped smooth his way to the No. 2 nomination. Then he helped draft the first speech for the vice-presidential candidate.