The following is my newest list of enemies and despised foes. A twice-annual tradition since 1918, the list serves to inform my nemeses of my low regard for them, and alerts the ordinary reader to clear a wide berth should he encounter one of them on the street. And if you are one of these fiends, take care, for I intend to destroy you, to crush you like a soft, fat caterpillar under the iron wheels of my wheel-chair. Consider this publicly known register a sporting chance for you to get your affairs in order before your inevitable demise. Cry foul if you wish, or believe you are an innocent victim of untoward enmity, but I will soon have my sweet revenge.
This year’s list of enemies, in alphabetical order, is as follows:
Aagard, Timothy C., former business partner. Balfour, Posonby H., former homo-sexual lover. Black Scarlet, rogue highway-man and blood-thirsty adventurer. Devlin, Curtis R., delinquent Onion subscriber. Flemish, all. Gummidge, P. Oliver, editor of The Brickton Atlas-Trumpet. Harbaugh, Stella M., woman. Hearst, William Randolph, rival publisher and cavorter with diseased chorus-girls. Leman, Violet P., one-time Onion copy editor. Li Ming, a Chinee-man and my rival for title of world’s oldest human. Nurse, my former care-giver who ran off with the villainous Black Scarlet. The person who wrote “Yes! We Have No Bananas.” Porter, Ryan, immodest gad-about. Puppetry of all kinds. Spaniards, all. Taft, William H., U.S. President. Tin, Mr., my former mechanical ro-bot nurse. Vallee, Rudy, vulgar crooner of the wax-cylinders. Uncle Sam, boastful symbol of the Republic. Whig Party, The. Zweibel, D. Manfred, illegitimate off-spring of my unfaithful late wife and the coal-hauler.
T. Herman Zweibel, the great grandson of Onion founder Friedrich Siegfried Zweibel, was born in 1868, became editor of The Onion at age 20, and persisted in various editorial posts until his launching into space in 2001. Zweibel’s name became synonymous with American business success in the 20th century. Many consider him the “Father Of American Journalism,” also the title of his well-known 1943 biography, written by Norman Rombauer.
