The Bulletin

“ How much more allowable is a daily bulletin now than a weekly one was then; and though the sick are few in comparison with the numbers who have an interest in them, they are numerous enough, particularly if we include the aged and infirm, to deserve consideration for themselves. ”

“ The editor of the Evening Bulletin, who confesses to the writing of his editorials up in the fourth story—in a dingy apartment, insufferably close, recently closed a long editorial upon summer-houses, walks in shady lanes, and roses, with the cry “a-lass—a-lass!” Considering that the man is married, he ought to be ashamed of himself. ”

“ After recording these transactions, my Journal thus continues:—
“It is impossible to notice all the proceedings of the week, nor is it necessary. The accounts of meetings to protest against the measure, and the gross falsehoods which have been promulgated in order to get up a case, will be found in the Morning Herald; . . . the real facts appearing in my published minute, and in the statements of Ministers on receiving the deputation of Wednesday.” ”

“ THE MISTRESS. I doubt if a daily newspaper is a necessity, in the higher sense of the word.
THE PARSON. Nobody supposes it is to women,—that is, if they can see each other.
THE MISTRESS. Don't interrupt, unless you have something to say; though I should like to know how much gossip there is afloat that the minister does not know. The newspaper may be needed in society, but how quickly it drops out of mind when one goes beyond the bounds of what is called civilization. ”

“ If The Herald wants the mere expansion which many journals possess, we shall try to make it up in industry, good taste, brevity, variety, point, piquancy, and cheapness. It is equally intended for the great masses of the community—the merchant, mechanic, working people—the private family as well as the public hotel—the journeyman and his employer—the clerk and his principal. ”

“ Of course we print the afternoon Associated Press report on the first page, under formal heads and with some pretence of dignity, but that first page is the parlour of the paper, as it is of most of its contemporaries, and in the other pages they and we go around in our shirt sleeves, calling people by their first names; teasing the boys and girls good-naturedly; tickling the pompous members of the village family with straws from time to time, and letting out the family secrets of the community without much regard for the feelings of the supercilious. ”

“ People learned most of the news of the day from distant places, whether it pertained to politics, society, or gossip, through faithful correspondents.
Imagine a busy merchant in one of our great cities writing a business letter, but giving most of the space to the results of the last election, or the doings of the state legislature. ”

“ The present week has been one of such general excitement, that we do not recollect its parallel for many years and, though we have more space to devote to news than any other weekly paper in the town, it would be impossible to give more than a sketch of the proceedings at the different public meetings, on the subject of the ministerial proposition. ”

“ The Herald alone knows how to dish up the foreign news, or indeed domestic events, in a readable style. Every reader, numbering between thirty and forty thousand daily, acknowledges this merit in the management of our paper. We do not, as the Wall street lazy editors do, come down to our office about ten or twelve o'clock, pull out a Spanish cigar, take up a pair of scissors, puff and cut, cut and puff for a couple of hours, and then adjourn to Del- monico's to eat, drink, gormandize, and blow up our contemporaries. ”

“ The Look-Up Club Bulletins, pamphlets and little books containing news of critical importance and timeliness to all members—news not generally known or not available in the same concentrated form in the daily press, will be sent to all members for their own use and for distribution to others at critical times and places and with strategic persons—labor unions and employers and public men. ”

“ I never took much stock in regular stereotyped editorials, but when I turned my eye from the editorial to the basket, I realized than an editorial in a religious newspaper, was liable to contain much truth, for the basket was filled with as fine a lunch as a man ever saw. ”

“ In the magazine the patchwork of daily journalism is assembled into more meaningful designs. Local news is sifted of its provincialism to become matter of national concern. Topics which you rapidly skimmed in the afternoon newspaper three or four weeks ago are re-discussed in the weekly or monthly magazines in a way which often makes you feel that here, for the first time, they become of personal import. ”

“ In magazine sections of Saturday and Sunday issues such articles are supplied in greater numbers. These feature stories are frequently illustrated. They seldom fill less than a column; more often they are several columns in length.
“Human Interest” Stories. Material for the “human interest” type of feature story is to be found anywhere and everywhere in the reporter’s daily round of news gathering. The many police court cases furnish an abundance of humorous and pathetic incidents. ”

“ Round the news-shops—whence poured a very flood of papers and pamphlets—in the cafés and public places, crowds of men formed and dispersed and formed again, who all at once flashed into lightning-like action at the cry "To arms, to arms!" ”

“ These are the men—and there are more, too, I might name—who came forward with their touch upon the pulse of the nation when the day of the daily newspaper as a leader of enlightened public opinion had waned. ”

“ A little later The Boston Herald, in an editorial on the "dignity of the penny press," said, among other things :" The time has come when the respectable portion of the community no longer looks to the big sixpenny, lying oracles of politics for just notions on government, exalted piety, or pure and chaste morality. ”

“ In both the Times and the Herald was an inconspicuous personal in the modest retirement of the advertising section, of obscure wording and small type:
Now is the time for all good men and true to get a cautious move on the trail sit tight coming up. ”

“ A newspaper is a living organism, threaded through with the nerves of men and women, inspired by their spirit, animated by their ideals and thought, the living vehicle of their own adventure of life. So The Tribune seemed to us then, in that last [Pg 108] hour, when we looked back on our labor and comradeship, our laughter, our good times together on “the rag,” as we had called it. ”

“ Type of story. Although most local events have been included in the various classes of stories discussed in preceding chapters, there remain several forms of city news that require separate consideration. Much interesting, timely information is to be found in schools, public libraries, museums, parks, and various departments of city government. As activities supported by public money, these institutions should be of interest to every citizen. Real estate, building, manufacturing, and business matters also furnish news of considerable interest and importance. ”

“ The Tribune, as its name imports, will labor to advance the interests of the people, and to promote their moral, social and political wellbeing. The immoral and degrading police reports, ad- vertisements and other matter which have been allowed to disgrace the columns of our leading penny papers will be carefully excluded from this, and no exertion spared to render it worthy of the hearty approval of the virtuous and refined, and a welcome visitant at the family fire- side. ”

“ What Society News Is.—The society editor's work concerns itself with the social and personal news of the city and county in which the paper is published or from which it draws its patronage. It is almost entirely local, news of the state or of other cities being of value only in so far as it affects women and men of one's own town through former exchanges of courtesy or hospitality, or for similar causes. ”

“ There are too many reform newspapers in circulation. And though the columns of all our great dailies are shut to their truths, still there are channels through which they flow to the people—aye, even to those who delve in the coal mines of Pennsylvania, seldom seeing the joyous sunshine. ”

“ We shall endeavor to make the Chronicle a reliable newspaper, advocating the interest of the farmer, stock raiser, and business man, and to aid in developing the resources of this magnificent country. We shall pay special attention to gathering local, territorial and general news, and make the Chronicle interesting as a home paper. Printing our own outside we shall have room for numerous correspondents. ”

“ The fatigues of this new life are very great. I 'm up before it is well day, writing and revising newspaper articles, answering letters, and replying to 'queries.' I have my whole mornings taken up in audiences of my constituents, swallowing pledges, and recording promises; and later on I go to dinner, 'with what appetite I may,' to some one of my faithful supporters,—some corn-chandler who spouts 'foreign politics,' or a grocer who ought to be Colonial Secretary! ”

“ As he wends his way homeward, he meets a citizen who has for once for some reason arisen at what seems to him an unholy hour of the morning.
“Good morning,” says the citizen, “what in the world are you doing up so early?”
“Oh,” says the night editor, “we newspaper men have to rise real early in order to get the paper out by breakfast time.”
“To be sure, to be sure,” says the citizen. “I never thought of that!”
(Houston Daily Post, Sunday morning, March 29, 1896.) ”

“ Conducting a Local Column.—When conducting a column giving the news of a particular locality or neighborhood, the one thing not to write is that there is little news in the community this week or to-day. The readers of a column should not be allowed to suspect that one has little information to present. All about one are unnumbered sources of news if the correspondent can only find them—humorous incidents, reminiscences of old pioneers, stories of previous extremely wet, dry, hot, or cold seasons, recollections of Civil, Spanish American, and European War battles, etc. ”

“ The panic has paralyzed the journals, with the fewest exceptions, so that one cannot open a newspaper without being disgusted by new records of shame. I cannot read longer even the local good news. When I look down the columns at the titles of paragraphs, “Education in Massachusetts,” “Board of Trade,” “Art Union,” “Revival of Religion,” what bitter mockeries! The very convenience of property, the house and land we occupy, have lost their best value, and a man looks gloomily at his children, and thinks, “What have I done that you should begin life [182] in dishonor?” ”

“ In the treatment of the editorial columns, we insist on versatility. We discuss community problems, uplift movements, politics, the progress of the war, and a wide range of other topics. In this also our purpose is to supply the wants of our readers so that they will not want to look elsewhere for daily newspaper needs. ”

“ I am not asking your newspapers to support the Administration, but I am asking your help in the tremendous task of informing and alerting the American people. For I have complete confidence in the response and dedication of our citizens whenever they are fully informed. ”

“ The early habits and constant practice of our fathers and ourselves have led us, on every great emergency, and on the pressure of political calamities, to resort to town meetings, wherein the general sense of the people might be collected. ”

“ A couple of days later, on a Sunday, before the closed door to the editorial offices I encountered a poorly clad man with hands as black as a chimney sweep's, and with him a slip of a girl carrying a box of old books. ”

“ The sources of knowledge have been multiplied almost indefinitely. In 1835 the daily newspaper was not often seen in country towns, and the circulation of the weekly paper was limited to a very small portion of the families. ”

“ It is also rumored that the Court Journal and the Morning Post, finding themselves quite outdone by the Daily News, and their occupation gone, will shortly cease to appear.
I must not omit to mention that I have been told on authority, which I incline to consider good, that in the said gorgeous sanctum is conspicuous a table of commandments, wrought in letters of fine gold, which commandments are these:
I. Thou shalt never be in earnest about anything, and shalt abhor enthusiasm. ”

“ From the American Newspaper Publishers' Association, bringing together nearly 1000 of our leading newspapers to meetings of the weeklies of a county, a region in a state, a whole state, sections like New England or the Southern States of particular classes of periodicals, these various organizations are rapidly instituting a machinery, and breathing a spirit whose work is a valid factor in the education of the newspaper man. ”

“ The public sentiment being now on the creen, and many heavy circumstances about to fall into the republican scale, we are sensible that this summer is the season for systematic energies and sacrifices. The engine is the press. Every man must lay his purse and his pen under contribution. ”

“ These articles were, I fancy, lumbering in style, and not lively or striking enough to be, at any time, acceptable to newspaper readers; but had they been far more attractive, still, at that particular moment, when great political changes were impending, and engrossing all minds, these discussions were ill-timed, and missed fire altogether. ”

“ In the news columns there is room for only concise announcements of such events as a scientific discovery, an important invention, the destruction of a landmark, the death of an old actor, a new design for coins or postage stamps, an auction of rare books or paintings, a new theory of the origin of life, the results of an investigation of child labor conditions, a report on decreasing soil fertility, or the adoption by a state of a plan for government life insurance. ”