The fact that there is no variance whatever between accounts given by several witnesses, especially when their testimony concerns an occurrence involving violence, is as certain an indication of collusive fraud as is the fact that two signatures, ostensibly penned by the same individual, show not the slightest difference in form, shading, or pen pressure at any point. Unless one or both such signatures are forgeries, absolute identity is a practical impossibility. The question of whether or not the Kingfish could have wrested political control of the United States from Franklin Roosevelt became academic when a bullet found its mark in his body. But a glance at the highlights of his career offers some of the clues to what happened to him on September 8, 1935. 2 ---- PROFILE OF A KINGFISH “_The iniquity of oblivion blindly scattereth her poppy, and deals with the memory of men without distinction to merit of perpetuity._” ----SIR THOMAS BROWNE One day some of the VIP’s of the Long political hierarchy were gathered in the office of Governor Oscar Allen when a matter of legislative procedure was under discussion. It is worth noting for the record that the Governor’s chair was occupied by Senator Huey Long. Governor Allen sat at one side of his desk. The names of the others do not matter. Among them were highway commissioners, a state purchasing agent, floor leaders from House and Senate, the head of an upstate levee board, and the like. Huey was issuing orders and lost his temper over the apparent inattention of some conferees, who were conducting a low-voiced conversation in a corner of the room. “Shut up, damn it!” he shouted suddenly. “Shut up and listen to me. This is the Kingfish of the Lodge talking!” From that day on he was “Kingfish.” Even Franklin Roosevelt, telephoning him from New York during the hectic maneuvering which preceded that summer’s Democratic national convention, greeted him with the words: “Hello, Kingfish!” The self-proclaimed Kingfish was named Huey Pierce Long at his birth on August 30, 1893, the third of four sons born to Huey Pierce Long, Sr., and Caledonia Tyson Long. The family farm was near Winnfield, and by the standards of that place and time the Longs were well off; not wealthy, to be sure, but never in want. Winnfield, seat of Winn parish, is a small wholly rural community not far from the center of the state. “Just _near_ the center of the state?” Westbrook Pegler once asked Senator Long incredulously after watching him put his legislative trained seals through their paces. “Just _near_ the center of the state? I’m surprised you haven’t had the legislature declare it to _be_ the center of the state.”