WATERMELON STORY

from Fancyclopedia 2

Get Burbee to tell it to you sometime. "It was a story I began telling in 1942 even before I got into fandom", says Burb. "When I got into the Army in '45 I got famous for it and had to tell it several times a day, often by request of the Brass: '...Is there a fellow named -- Burbee -- in this group?' 'Yes, here I am.' 'Fine. I understand you have a story about a watermelon. Would you tell it before we begin our lecture on double-action booby-traps?' I was sort of obsessed by it and told it hundreds of times. I've told it on fannish tape a coupla times, too. And before that, on wire." Don't confuse this with Martin Alger's Watermelon Joke which concerns a fellow he knew in the Army who preferred watermelons to gals.