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- min-width: 0; - max-width: 100%; - } - - .figleft.noclear {clear: both;} - - .ilb, .ilb2 {display: block; max-width: 17em; text-align: center; - margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;} - .ilb .figleft, .ilb2 .figleft {max-width: 100%; margin: 1em auto 1em auto;} - - p.drop-cap {text-indent: 1.75em; margin-bottom: .24em;} - p.drop-cap:first-letter { - float: none; - font-size: 100%; - margin-left: 0; - margin-right: 0; - text-indent: 1.75em; - } - - p.drop-cap .smcap1 {margin-left: 0;} - p .smcap1 {font-size: 100%;} - - hr { - margin-top: .1em; - margin-bottom: .1em; - visibility: hidden; - color: white; - width: .01em; - display: none; - } - - ul {margin-left: 1em; padding-left: 0;} - li {list-style-type: none; padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1.5em;} - - .blockquot {margin: 1.5em 3% 1.5em 3%;} - .poetry-container {text-align: center;} - .poetry {display: block; text-align: left; margin-left: 1.5em;} - .poetry .stanza {page-break-inside: avoid;} - - .transnote { - page-break-inside: avoid; - margin-left: 2%; - margin-right: 2%; - margin-top: 1em; - margin-bottom: 1em; - padding: .5em; - } - - .index {margin-left: 0;} -} - - </style> - </head> - -<body> - -<div style='text-align:center; font-size:1.2em; font-weight:bold'>The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Story of the Sun. New York, 1833-1918, by Frank M. O'Brien</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online -at <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you -are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the -country where you are located before using this eBook. -</div> - -<p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: The Story of the Sun. New York, 1833-1918</p> - -<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Frank M. O'Brien</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: July 18, 2021 [eBook #65868]</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Character set encoding: UTF-8</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Produced by: deaurider, Charlie Howard, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced from images made available by the HathiTrust Digital Library.)</div> - -<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE STORY OF THE SUN. NEW YORK, 1833-1918 ***</div> - -<div class="transnote"> -<p class="center larger">Transcriber's Note</p> - -<p>Larger versions of most illustrations may be seen by right-clicking them -and selecting an option to view them separately, or by double-tapping and/or -stretching them.</p> -</div> - -<div id="cover" class="newpage figcenter" style="max-width: 30em;"> - <img src="images/cover.jpg" width="1622" height="2162" alt="cover" /> -</div> - -<div class="newpage"> -<hr class="wide" /> -<h1>The Story of<br /> -<span class="large">The</span> - <img src="images/i_001.png" width="288" height="93" style="max-width: 5em; padding: 0; vertical-align: -15%;" alt="logo" /> -<span class="large">Sun</span></h1> - -<hr class="wide" /> -<div id="if_i_001l" class="newpage figcenter" style="max-width: 50em;"> - <img src="images/i_001l.jpg" width="3034" height="710" alt="" /> - <div class="caption">THE FIRST HEAD-LINE OF THE NEW YORK SUN</div></div> -</div> - -<hr class="wide" /> - -<div id="if_i_001r" class="newpage figcenter" style="max-width: 50em;"> - <img src="images/i_001r.jpg" width="3059" height="793" alt="" /> - <div class="caption">THE SECOND HEAD-LINE OF THE NEW YORK SUN</div></div> - -<hr class="wide" /> - -<div id="i_frontis" class="newpage figcenter" style="max-width: 30em;"> - <img src="images/i_002.jpg" width="1607" height="2248" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - -BENJAMIN H. DAY, FOUNDER OF “THE SUN”</div></div> - -<div class="newpage p6 center wspace larger"><div class="bbox"> -<p class="xlarge"> -THE STORY OF<br /> - -<span class="large">The</span> <img src="images/i_003.png" width="766" height="251" style="max-width: 5em; padding: 0; vertical-align: -10%;" alt="logo" /> <span class="large">Sun.</span></p> - -<div class="p1"> -<p class="rule2"> </p> -<p class="rule2"> </p> -<p class="rule3">NEW YORK, 1833–1918</p> -<p class="rule2"> </p> -<p class="rule2"> </p> -</div> - -<p class="p1 vspace"><span class="smaller">BY</span><br /> - -<span class="larger">FRANK M. O’BRIEN</span></p> - -<p class="p1 small">WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY EDWARD<br /> -<span class="gesperrt1">PAGE MITCHELL, EDITOR OF “THE</span><br /> -SUN”—ILLUSTRATIONS AND FACSIMILES</p> - -<p class="p8 rule1">NEW YORK: GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY</p> -</div> - -<hr /> - -<div class="smaller"> -<p class="newpage p4 vspace"> -<i>Copyright, 1918,<br /> -By George H. Doran Company</i></p> - -<p class="p4"><i>Copyright, 1917, 1918, The Frank A. Munsey Company</i></p> -<hr class="narrow" /> - -<p><i>Copyright, 1918, The Sun Printing and Publishing Association</i></p> -<hr class="narrow" /> - -<p><i>Printed in the United States of America</i> -</p> -</div> -</div> - -<hr /> - -<p class="newpage p4 center vspace wspace"> -TO<br /> - -<span class="larger">FRANK A. MUNSEY</span></p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 class="nobreak" id="AN_INTRODUCTION">AN INTRODUCTION<br /> - -<span class="subhead">BY THE EDITOR OF THE SUN</span></h2> -</div> - -<p>It is truer, perhaps, of a newspaper than of most -other complex things in the world that the whole -may be greater than the sum of all its parts. In any -daily paper worth a moment’s consideration the least -fancifully inclined observer will discern an individuality -apart from and in a degree independent of the -dozens or hundreds or thousands of personal values -entering at a given time into the composite of its grey -pages.</p> - -<p>This entity of the institution, as distinguished from -the human beings actually engaged in carrying it on, -this fact of the newspaper’s possession of a separate -countenance, a spirit or soul differentiating it from all -others of its kind, is recognised either consciously or -unconsciously by both the more or less unimportant -workers who help to make it and by their silent partners -who support it by buying and reading it. Its -loyal friends and intelligent critics outside the establishment, -the Old Subscriber and the Constant Reader, -form the habit of attributing to the newspaper, as to -an individual, qualities and powers beneficent or -maleficent or merely foolish, according to their mood or -digestion. They credit it with traits of character quite -as distinct as belong to any man or woman of their -acquaintance. They personify it, moreover, without -much knowledge, if any, of the people directing and producing -it; and, often and naturally, without any particular<span class="pagenum" id="Page_viii">viii</span> -concern about who and what these people may be.</p> - -<p>On their own side, the makers of the paper are accustomed -to individualise it as vividly as a crew does -the ship. They know better than anybody else not -only how far each personal factor, each element of the -composite, is modified and influenced in its workings -by the other personal factors associated in the production, -but also the extent to which all the personal units -are influenced and modified by something not listed in -the office directory or visible upon the payroll; something -that was there before they came and will be there -after they go.</p> - -<p>Of course, that which has given persistent idiosyncrasy -to a newspaper like the <i>Sun</i>, for example, is accumulated -tradition. That which has made the whole -count for more than the sum total of its parts, in the -<i>Sun’s</i> case as in the case of its esteemed contemporaries, -is the heritage of method and expedient, the increment -of standardised skill and localised imagination contributed -through many years to the fund of the paper -by the forgotten worker as well as by the remembered.</p> - -<p>The manner of growth of the great newspaper’s well-defined -and continuous character, distinguishing it from -all the rest of the offspring of the printing press, a development -sometimes not radically affected by changes -of personnel, of ownership, of exterior conditions and -fashions set by the popular taste, is a subject over -which journalistic metaphysics might easily exert itself -to the verge of boredom. Fortunately there has -been found a much better way to deal with the attractive -theme.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> is eighty-five years old as this book goes to -press. In telling its intimate story, from the September -Tuesday which saw the beginning of Mr. Day’s -intrepid and epochal experiment, throughout the days<span class="pagenum" id="Page_ix">ix</span> -of the Beaches, of Dana, of Laffan, and of Reick to the -time of Mr. Munsey’s purchase of the property in the -summer of 1916, Mr. O’Brien has done what has never -been undertaken before, so far as is known to the -writer of this introduction, for any newspaper with a -career of considerable span.</p> - -<p>There have been general histories of Journalism, presenting -casually the main facts of evolution and progress -in the special instance. There have been satisfactory -narratives of journalistic episodes, reasonably accurate -accounts of certain aspects or dynastic periods -of newspaper experience, excellent portrait biographies -or autobiographies of journalists of genius and high -achievement, with the eminent man usually in strong -light in the foreground and his newspaper seldom -nearer than the middle distance. But here, probably -for the first time in literature of this sort, we have a -real biography of a newspaper itself, covering the whole -range of its existence, exhibiting every function of its -organism, illustrating every quality that has been conspicuous -in the successive stages of its growth. The -<i>Sun</i> is the hero of Mr. O’Brien’s “Story of the <i>Sun</i>.” -The human participants figure in their incidental relation -to the main thread of its life and activities. -They do their parts, big or little, as they pass in interesting -procession. When they have done their parts -they disappear, as in real life, and the story goes on, -just as the <i>Sun</i> has gone on, without them except as -they may have left their personal impress on the newspaper’s -structure or its superficial decoration.</p> - -<p>During no small part of its four score and five -years of intelligent interest in the world’s thoughts and -doings it has been the <i>Sun’s</i> fortune to be regarded as -in a somewhat exceptional sense the newspaper man’s -newspaper. If in truth it has merited in any degree<span class="pagenum" id="Page_x">x</span> -this peculiar distinction in the eyes of its professional -brethren it must have been by reason of originality of -initiative and soundness of method; perhaps by a -chronic indifference to those ancient conventions of -news importance or of editorial phraseology which, -when systematically observed, are apt to result in a -pale, dull, or even stupid uniformity of product. Mr. -Dana wrote more than half a century ago to one of his -associates, “Your articles have stirred up the animals, -which you as well as I recognise as one of the great -ends of life.” Sometimes he borrowed Titania’s wand; -sometimes he used a red hot poker. Not only in that -great editor’s time but also in the time of his predecessors -and successors the <i>Sun</i> has held it to be a duty and -a joy to assist to the best of its ability in the discouragement -of anything like lethargy in the menagerie. Perhaps, -again, that was one of the things that helped to -make it the newspaper man’s newspaper.</p> - -<p>However this may be, it seems certain that to the -students of the theory and practice of journalism, now -happily so numerous in the land, the chronicler of one -highly individual newspaper’s deeds and ways is affording -an object lesson of practical value, a textbook -of technical usefulness, as well as a store of authoritative -history, entertaining anecdote, and suggestive professional -information. And a much wider audience -than is made up of newspaper workers present or to -come will find that the story of a newspaper which Mr. -O’Brien has told with wit and knowledge in the pages -that follow becomes naturally and inevitably a swift and -charming picture of the town in which that newspaper -is published throughout the period of its service to that -town—the most interesting period in the existence of -the most interesting city of the world.</p> - -<p>It is a fine thing for the <i>Sun</i>, by all who have worked<span class="pagenum" id="Page_xi">xi</span> -for it in its own spirit beloved, I believe, like a creature -of flesh and blood and living intelligence and human -virtues and failings, that through Mr. Munsey’s wish -it should have found in a son of its own schooling a -biographer and interpreter so sympathetically responsive -to its best traditions.</p> - -<p class="sigright"> -<span class="smcap">Edward P. Mitchell.</span> -</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CONTENTS">CONTENTS</h2> -</div> - -<table id="toc" summary="Contents"> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chap" colspan="2">CHAPTER I</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chapsub" colspan="2">SUNRISE AT 222 WILLIAM STREET</td> -</tr> -<tr class="small"> - <td> </td> - <td class="tdr">PAGE</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>Benjamin H. Day, with No Capital Except Youth and Courage, Establishes the First Permanent Penny Newspaper.—The Curious First Number Entirely His Own Work</i></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#toclink_21">21</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chap" colspan="2">CHAPTER II</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chapsub" colspan="2">THE FIELD OF THE LITTLE “SUN”</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>A Very Small Metropolis Which Day and His Partner, Wisner, Awoke by Printing Small Human Pieces About Small Human Beings and Having Boys Cry the Paper</i></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#toclink_31">31</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chap" colspan="2">CHAPTER III</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chapsub" colspan="2">RICHARD ADAMS LOCKE’S MOON HOAX</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>A Magnificent Fake Which Deceived Two Continents, Brought to “The Sun” the Largest Circulation in the World and, in Poe’s Opinion, Established Penny Papers</i></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#toclink_64">64</a><span class="pagenum" id="Page_xiv">xiv</span></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chap" colspan="2">CHAPTER IV</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chapsub" colspan="2">DAY FINDS A RIVAL IN BENNETT</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>The Success of “The Sun” Leads to the Founding of The “Herald.”—Enterprises and Quarrels of a Furious Young Journalism.—The Picturesque Webb.—Maria Monk</i></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#toclink_103">103</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chap" colspan="2">CHAPTER V</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chapsub" colspan="2">NEW YORK LIFE IN THE THIRTIES</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>A Sprightly City Which Daily Bought Thirty Thousand copies of “The Sun.”—The Rush to Start Penny Papers.—Day Sells “The Sun” for Forty Thousand Dollars</i></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#toclink_121">121</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chap" colspan="2">CHAPTER VI</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chapsub" colspan="2">MOSES Y. BEACH’S ERA OF HUSTLE</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>“The Sun” Uses Albany Steamboats, Horse Expresses, Trotting Teams, Pigeons, and the Telegraph to Get News.—Poe’s Famous Balloon Hoax and the Case of Mary Rodgers</i></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#toclink_139">139</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chap" colspan="2">CHAPTER VII</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chapsub" colspan="2">“THE SUN” IN THE MEXICAN WAR</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>Moses Y. Beach as an Emissary of President Polk.—The Associated Press Founded in the Office of “The Sun.”—Ben Day’s Brother-in-Law Retires with a Small Fortune</i></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#toclink_164">164</a><span class="pagenum" id="Page_xv">xv</span></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chap" colspan="2">CHAPTER VIII</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chapsub" colspan="2">“THE SUN” DURING THE CIVIL WAR</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>One of the Few Entirely Loyal Newspapers of New York.—Its Brief Ownership by a Religious Coterie.—It Returns to the Possession of M. S. Beach, Who Sells It to Dana</i></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#toclink_172">172</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chap" colspan="2">CHAPTER IX</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chapsub" colspan="2">THE EARLIER CAREER OF DANA</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>His Life at Brook Farm and His Tribune Experience.—His Break with Greeley, His Civil War Services and His Chicago Disappointment.—His Purchase of “The Sun”</i></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#toclink_202">202</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chap" colspan="2">CHAPTER X</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chapsub" colspan="2">DANA: HIS “SUN” AND ITS CITY</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>The Period of the Great Personal Journalists.—Dana’s Avoidance of Rules and Musty Newspaper Conventions.—His Choice of Men and His Broad Definition of News</i></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#toclink_233">233</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chap" colspan="2">CHAPTER XI</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chapsub" colspan="2">DANA, AS MITCHELL SAW HIM</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>A Picture of the Room Where One Man Ruled for Thirty Years.—The Democratic Ways of a Newspaper Autocrat.—W. O. Bartlett, Pike, and His Other Early Associates</i></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#toclink_247">247</a><span class="pagenum" id="Page_xvi">xvi</span></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chap" colspan="2">CHAPTER XII</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chapsub" colspan="2">DANA’S FIRST BIG NEWS MEN</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>Amos J. Cummings, Dr. Wood, and John B. Bogart.—The Lively Days of Tweedism.—Elihu Root as a Dramatic Critic.—The Birth and Popularity of “The Sun’s” Cat</i></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#toclink_262">262</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chap" colspan="2">CHAPTER XIII</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chapsub" colspan="2">DANA’S FAMOUS RIVALS PASS</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>The Deaths of Raymond, Bennett, and Greeley Leave Him the Dominant Figure of the American Newspaper Field.—Dana’s Dream of a Paper Without Advertisements</i></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#toclink_293">293</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chap" colspan="2">CHAPTER XIV</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chapsub" colspan="2">“THE SUN” AND THE GRANT SCANDALS</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>Dana’s Relentless Fight Against the Whisky Ring, the Crédit Mobilier, “Addition, Division, and Silence,” the Safe Burglary Conspiracy and the Boss Shepherd Scandal</i></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#toclink_304">304</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chap" colspan="2">CHAPTER XV</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chapsub" colspan="2">“THE SUN” AND “HUMAN INTEREST”</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>Something About Everything, for Everybody.—A Wonderful Four-Page Paper.—A Comparison of the Styles of “Sun” Reporters in Three Periods Twenty Years Apart</i></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#toclink_313">313</a><span class="pagenum" id="Page_xvii">xvii</span></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chap" colspan="2">CHAPTER XVI</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chapsub" colspan="2">“SUN” REPORTERS AND THEIR WORK</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>Cummings, Ralph, W. J. Chamberlin, Brisbane, Riggs, Dieuaide, Spears, O. K. Davis, Irwin, Adams, Denison, Wood, O’Malley, Hill, Cronyn.—Spanish War Work</i></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#toclink_328">328</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chap" colspan="2">CHAPTER XVII</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chapsub" colspan="2">SOME GENIUS IN AN OLD ROOM</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>Lord, Managing Editor for Thirty-Two Years.—Clarke, Magician of the Copy Desk.—Ethics, Fair Play and Democracy.—“The Evening Sun” and Those Who Make It</i></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#toclink_369">369</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chap" colspan="2">CHAPTER XVIII</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chapsub" colspan="2">THE FINEST SIDE OF “THE SUN”</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>Literary Associations of an Editorial Department That Has Encouraged and Attracted Men of Imagination and Talent.—Mitchell, Hazeltine, Church, and Their Colleagues</i></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#toclink_402">402</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chap" colspan="2">CHAPTER XIX</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc chapsub" colspan="2">“THE SUN” AND YELLOW JOURNALISM</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>The Coming and Going of a Newspaper Disease.—Dana’s Attitude Toward President Cleveland.—Dana’s Death.—Ownerships of Paul Dana, Laffan, Reick, and Munsey</i></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#toclink_413">413</a></td> -</tr> -<tr class="tpad"> - <td class="tdl"><i>Bibliography</i></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#toclink_435">435</a></td> -</tr> -<tr class="tpad"> - <td class="tdl"><i>Chronology</i></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#toclink_437">437</a></td> -</tr> -<tr class="tpad"> - <td class="tdl"><i>Index</i></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#toclink_439">439</a></td> -</tr> -</table> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 class="nobreak" id="ILLUSTRATIONS">ILLUSTRATIONS</h2> -</div> - -<table id="loi" summary="Illustrations"> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">BENJAMIN H. DAY, FOUNDER OF “THE SUN”</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#i_frontis"><i>Frontispiece</i></a></td> -</tr> -<tr class="small"> - <td class="tdl"> </td> - <td class="tdr">PAGE</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">BENJAMIN H. DAY, A BUST</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_22">22</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">THE FIRST ISSUE OF “THE SUN”</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_28">28</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">THE FIRST HOME OF “THE SUN”</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_34a">34</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">THE SECOND HOME OF “THE SUN”</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_34b">34</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">BARNEY WILLIAMS, THE FIRST NEWSBOY</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_50">50</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">RICHARD ADAMS LOCKE, AUTHOR OF THE MOON HOAX</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_68">68</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">THE FIRST INSTALMENT OF THE MOON HOAX</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_96a">96</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">A MOON SCENE, FROM LOCKE’S GREAT DECEPTION</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_96b">96</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">MOSES YALE BEACH, SECOND OWNER OF “THE SUN”</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_124">124</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">AN EXTRA OF “THE SUN”</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_136a">136</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">THE THIRD HOME OF “THE SUN”</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_136b">136</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">MOSES SPERRY BEACH</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_166">166</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">ALFRED ELY BEACH</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_170">170</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">CHARLES A. DANA AT THIRTY-EIGHT</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_204">204</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">MR. DANA AT FIFTY</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_224">224</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">THE FIRST NUMBER OF “THE SUN” UNDER DANA</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_236a">236</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">THE HOME OF “THE SUN” FROM 1868 TO 1915</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_236b">236</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">MR. DANA IN HIS OFFICE</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_248">248</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">JOSEPH PULITZER</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_258a">258</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">ELIHU ROOT</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_258b">258</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">JUDGE WILLARD BARTLETT</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_258c">258</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">MR. DANA AT SEVENTY</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_270">270</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">AMOS JAY CUMMINGS</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_280">280</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">DANIEL F. KELLOGG</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_290a">290</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">AMOS B. STILLMAN</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_290b">290</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">JOHN B. BOGART</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_290c">290</a><span class="pagenum" id="Page_xx">xx</span></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">JAMES GORDON BENNETT, SR.</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_300a">300</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">HORACE GREELEY</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_300b">300</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">HENRY J. RAYMOND</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_300c">300</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">JULIAN RALPH</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_316">316</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">ARTHUR BRISBANE</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_330">330</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">EDWARD G. RIGGS</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_350">350</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">CHESTER SANDERS LORD</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_370">370</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">SELAH MERRILL CLARKE</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_380">380</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">SAMUEL A. WOOD</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_390a">390</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">OSCAR KING DAVIS</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_390b">390</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">THOMAS M. DIEUAIDE</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_390c">390</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">SAMUEL HOPKINS ADAMS</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_390d">390</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">WILL IRWIN</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_398a">398</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">FRANK WARD O’MALLEY</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_398b">398</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">EDWIN C. HILL</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_398c">398</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">PAUL DANA</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_404">404</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">WILLIAM M. LAFFAN</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_410">410</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">WILLIAM C. REICK</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_416">416</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">FRANK A. MUNSEY</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_422">422</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">EDWARD PAGE MITCHELL</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_430">430</a></td> -</tr> -</table> - -<hr /> - -<div id="toclink_21" class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_21">21</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="THE_STORY_OF_THE_SUN"><span class="larger">THE STORY OF “THE SUN”</span></h2> -</div> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_I">CHAPTER I<br /> - -<span class="subhead">SUNRISE AT 222 WILLIAM STREET</span></h2> -</div> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p><i>Benjamin H. Day, with No Capital Except Youth and Courage, -Establishes the First Permanent Penny Newspaper.—The -Curious First Number Entirely His Own Work.</i></p> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">In</span> the early thirties of last century the only newspapers -in the city of New York were six-cent journals -whose reading-matter was adapted to the politics -of men, and whose only appeal to women was their size, -perfectly suited to deep pantry-shelves.</p> - -<p>Dave Ramsey, a compositor on one of these sixpennies, -the <i>Journal of Commerce</i>, had an obsession. It was -that a penny paper, to be called the <i>Sun</i>, would be a -success in a city full of persons whose interest was in -humanity in general, rather than in politics, and whose -pantry-shelves were of negligible width. Why his mind -fastened on the <i>Sun</i> as the name of this child of his -vision is not known; perhaps it was because there was -a daily in London bearing that title. It was a short -name, easily written, easily spoken, easily remembered.</p> - -<p>Benjamin H. Day, another printer, worked beside -Dave Ramsey in 1830. Ramsey reiterated his idea to -his neighbour so often that Day came to believe in it, -although it is doubtful whether he had the great faith -that possessed Ramsey. Now that due credit has been -given to Ramsey for the idea of the penny <i>Sun</i>, he<span class="pagenum" id="Page_22">22</span> -passes out of the record, for he never attempted to put -his project into execution.</p> - -<p>Nor was Day’s enthusiasm for a penny <i>Sun</i> so big -that he plunged into it at once. He was a business -man rather than a visionary. With the savings from -his wages as a compositor he went into the job-printing -business in a small way. He still met his old chums -and still talked of the <i>Sun</i>, but it is likely that he never -would have come to start it if it had not been for the -cholera.</p> - -<p>There was an epidemic of this plague in New York -in 1832. It killed more than thirty-five hundred people -in that year, and added to the depression of business -already caused by financial disturbances and a wretched -banking system. The job-printing trade suffered with -other industries, and Day decided that he needed a -newspaper—not to reform, not to uplift, not to arouse, -but to push the printing business of Benjamin H. Day. -Incidentally he might add lustre to the fame of the -President, Andrew Jackson, or uphold the hands of the -mayor of New York, Gideon Lee; but his prime purpose -was to get the work of printing handbills for John -Smith, the grocer, or letter-heads for Richard Robinson, -the dealer in hay. Incidentally he might become rich -and powerful, but for the time being he needed work at -his trade.</p> - -<p>Ben Day was only twenty-three years old. He was -the son of Henry Day, a hatter of West Springfield, -Massachusetts, and Mary Ely Day; and sixth in descent -from his first American ancestor, Robert Day. Shortly -after the establishment of the Springfield <i>Republican</i> -by Samuel Bowles, in 1824, young Day went into the -office of that paper, then a weekly, to learn the printer’s -trade. That was two years before the birth of the -second and greater Samuel Bowles, who was later to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_23">23</span> -make the <i>Republican</i>, as a daily, one of the greatest of -American newspapers.</p> - -<div id="ip_22" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 19em;"> - <img src="images/i_022a.jpg" width="912" height="1819" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - -<p>BENJAMIN H. DAY</p> - -<p class="subhead">A Bust in the Possession of Mrs. Florence A. Snyder, Summit, N. J.</p> -</div></div> - -<p>Day learned well his trade from Sam Bowles. When -he was twenty, and a first-class compositor, he went to -New York, and worked at the case in the offices of the -<i>Evening Post</i> and the <i>Commercial Advertiser</i>. He married, -when he was twenty-one, Miss Eveline Shepard. -At the time of the <i>Sun’s</i> founding Mr. Day lived, with -his wife and their infant son, Henry, at 75 Duane Street, -only a few blocks from the newspaper offices.</p> - -<p>Day was a good-looking young man with a round, -calm, resolute face. He possessed health, industry, and -character. Also he had courage, for a man with a -family was taking no small risk in launching, without -capital, a paper to be sold at one cent.</p> - -<p>The idea of a penny paper was not new. In Philadelphia, -the <i>Cent</i> had had a brief, inglorious existence. -In Boston, the <i>Bostonian</i> had failed to attract the cultured -readers of the modern Athens. Eight months before -Day’s hour arrived the <i>Morning Post</i> had braved it -in New York, selling first at two cents and later at one -cent, but even with Horace Greeley as one of the -founders it lasted only three weeks.</p> - -<p>When Ben Day sounded his friends, particularly the -printers, as to their opinion of his project, they cited -the doleful fate of the other penny journals. He drew, -or had designed, a head-line for the <i>Sun</i> that was to be, -and took it about to his cronies. A. S. Abell, a printer -on the <i>Mercantile Advertiser</i>, poked the most fun at -him. A penny paper, indeed! But this same Abell -lived to stop scoffing, to found another <i>Sun</i>—this one -in Baltimore—and to buy a half-million-dollar estate -out of the profits of it. He was the second beneficiary -of the penny <i>Sun</i> idea.</p> - -<p>William M. Swain, another journeyman printer, also<span class="pagenum" id="Page_24">24</span> -made light of Day’s ambition. He lived to be Day’s -foreman, and later to own the Philadelphia <i>Public -Ledger</i>. He told Day that the penny <i>Sun</i> would ruin -him. As Day had not much enthusiasm at the outset, -surely his friends did not add to it, unless by kindling -his stubbornness.</p> - -<p>As for capital, he had none at all, in the money sense. -He did have a printing-press, hardly improved from the -machine of Benjamin Franklin’s day, some job-paper, -and plenty of type. The press would throw off two -hundred impressions an hour at full speed, man power. -He hired a room, twelve by sixteen feet, in the building -at 222 William Street. That building was still there, -in the shadow of the Brooklyn Bridge approach, when -the <i>Sun</i> celebrated its fiftieth anniversary in 1883; but -a modern six-story envelope factory is on the site to-day.</p> - -<p>There is no question as to the general authorship of -the first paper. Day was proprietor, publisher, editor, -chief pressman, and mailing-clerk. He was not a lazy -man. He stayed up all the night before that fateful -Tuesday, September 3, 1833, setting with his own hands -some advertisements that were regularly appearing in -the six-cent papers, for he wanted to make a show of -prosperity.</p> - -<p>He also wrote, or clipped from some out-of-town newspaper, -a poem that would fill nearly a column. He rewrote -news items from the West and South—some of -them not more than a month old. As for the snappy -local news of the day, he bought, in the small hours of -that Tuesday morning, a copy of the <i>Courier and Enquirer</i>, -the livest of the six-cent papers, took it to the -single room in William Street, clipped out or rewrote -the police-court items, and set them up himself. A -boy, whose name is unknown to fame, assisted him at -devil’s work. A journeyman printer, Parmlee, helped<span class="pagenum" id="Page_25">25</span> -with the press when the last quoin had been made tight -in the fourth and last of the little pages.</p> - -<p>The sun was well up in the sky before its namesake -of New York came slowly, hesitatingly, almost sadly, -up over the horizon of journalism—never to set! In -the years to follow, the <i>Sun</i> was to have changes in -ownership, in policy, in size, and in style, but no week-day -was to come when it could not shine. Of all the -morning newspapers printed in New York on that 3rd -of September, 1833, there is only one other—the <i>Journal -of Commerce</i>—left.</p> - -<p>But young Mr. Day, wiping the ink from his hands -at noon, and waiting in doubt to see whether the public -would buy the thousand <i>Suns</i> he had printed, could not -foresee this. Neither could he know that, by this humble -effort to exalt his printing business, he had driven -a knife into the sclerotic heart of ancient journalism. -The sixpenny papers were to laugh at this tiny intruder—to -laugh and laugh, and to die.</p> - -<p>The size of the first <i>Sun</i> was eleven and one-quarter -by eight inches, not a great deal bigger than a sheet of -commercial letter paper, and considerably less than one-quarter -the size of a page of the <i>Sun</i> of to-day. Compared -with the first <i>Sun</i>, the present newspaper is about -sixteen times larger. The type was a good, plain face -of agate, with some verse on the last page in nonpareil.</p> - -<p>An almost perfect reprint of the first <i>Sun</i> was issued -as a supplement to the paper on its twentieth birthday, -in 1853, and again—to the number of about one hundred -and sixty thousand copies—on its fiftieth birthday, in -1883. Many of the persons who treasure the replicas -of 1883 believe them to be original first numbers, as -they were not labelled “Presented gratuitously to the -subscribers of the <i>Sun</i>,” as was the issue of 1853. -Hardly a month passes by but the <i>Sun</i> receives one of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_26">26</span> -them from some proud owner. It is easy, however, to tell -the reprint from the original, for Mr. Day in his haste -committed an error at the masthead of the editorial or -second page of the first number. The date-line there -reads “September 3, 1832,” while in the reprints it is -“September 3, 1833,” as it should have been, but wasn’t, -in the original. And there are minor typographical -differences, invisible to the layman.</p> - -<p>Of the thousand, or fewer, copies of the first <i>Sun</i>, only -five are known to exist—one in the bound file of the -<i>Sun’s</i> first year, held jealously in the <i>Sun’s</i> safe; one -in the private library of the editor of the <i>Sun</i>, Edward -Page Mitchell; one in the Public Library at Fifth -Avenue and Forty-second Street, New York; and two in -the library of the American Type Founders Company, -Jersey City.</p> - -<p>There were three columns on each of the four pages. -At the top of the first column on the front page was a -modest announcement of the <i>Sun’s</i> ambitions:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The object of this paper is to lay before the public, -at a price within the means of every one, <span class="allsmcap">ALL THE NEWS -OF THE DAY</span>, and at the same time afford an advantageous -medium for advertising.</p> -</div> - -<p>It was added that the subscription in advance was -three dollars a year, and that yearly advertisers were to -be accommodated with ten lines every day for thirty -dollars per annum—ten cents a day, or one cent a line. -That was the old fashion of advertising. The friendly -merchant bought thirty dollars’ worth of space, say in -December, and inserted an advertisement of his fur -coats or snow-shovels. The same advertisement might -be in the paper the following July, for the newspapers -made no effort to coordinate the needs of the seller<span class="pagenum" id="Page_27">27</span> -and the buyer. So long as the merchant kept his name -regularly in print, he felt that was enough.</p> - -<p>The leading article on the first page was a semi-humorous -story about an Irish captain and his duels. -It was flanked by a piece of reprint concerning microscopic -carved toys. There was a paragraph about a Vermont -boy so addicted to whistling that he fell ill of it. -Mr. Day’s apprentice may have needed this warning.</p> - -<p>The front-page advertising, culled from other newspapers -and printed for effect, consisted of the notices -of steamship sailings. In one of these Commodore -Vanderbilt offered to carry passengers from New York -to Hartford, by daylight, for one dollar, on his splendid -low-pressure steamboat Water Witch. Cornelius Vanderbilt -was then thirty-nine years old, and had made the -boat line between New York and New Brunswick, New -Jersey, pay him forty thousand dollars a year. When -the <i>Sun</i> started, the commodore was at the height of his -activity, and he stuck to the water for thirty years afterward, -until he had accumulated something like forty -million dollars.</p> - -<p>E. K. Collins had not yet established his famous Dramatic -line of clipper-ships between New York and Liverpool, -but he advertised the “very fast sailing coppered -ship Nashville for New Orleans.” He was only thirty -then.</p> - -<p>Cooks were advertised for by private families living -in Broadway, near Canal Street—pretty far up-town -to live at that day—and in Temple Street, near Liberty, -pretty far down-town now.</p> - -<p>On the second page was a bit of real news, the melancholy -suicide of a young Bostonian of “engaging manners -and amiable disposition,” in Webb’s Congress Hall, -a hotel. There were also two local anecdotes; a paragraph -to the effect that “the city is nearly full of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_28">28</span> -strangers from all parts of this country and Europe”; -nine police-court items, nearly all concerning trivial -assaults; news of murders committed in Florida, at -Easton, Pennsylvania, and at Columbus, Ohio; a report -of an earthquake at Charlottesville, Virginia, and a few -lines of stray news from Mexico.</p> - -<p>The third page had the arrivals and clearances at -the port of New York, a joke about the cholera in New -Orleans, a line to say that the same disease had appeared -in the City of Mexico, an item about an insurrection in -the Ohio penitentiary, a marriage announcement, a death -notice, some ship and auction advertisements, and the -offer of a reward of one thousand dollars for the recovery -of thirteen thousand six hundred dollars stolen -from the mail stage between Boston and Lynn and the -arrest of the thieves.</p> - -<p>The last page carried a poem, “A Noon Scene,” but -the atmosphere was of the Elysian Fields over in Hoboken -rather than of midday in the city. When Day -scissored it, probably he did so with the idea that it -would fill a column. Another good filler was the bank-note -table, copied from a six-cent contemporary. The -quotations indicated that not much of the bank currency -of the day was accepted at par.</p> - -<p>The rest of the page was filled with borrowed advertising. -The Globe Insurance Company, of which -John Jacob Astor was a director, announced that it had -a capital of a million dollars. The North River Insurance -Company, whose directorate included William B. -Astor, declared its willingness to insure against fire and -against “loss or damage by inland navigation.” At -that time the boilers of river steamboats had an unpleasant -trick of blowing up; hence Commodore Vanderbilt’s -mention of the low pressure of the Water Witch. -John A. Dix, then Secretary of State of the State of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_29">29</span> -New York, and later to be the hero of the “shoot him -on the spot” order, advertised an election. Castleton -House Academy, on Staten Island, offered to teach and -board young gentlemen at twenty-five dollars a quarter.</p> - -<div id="ip_28" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 38em;"> - <img src="images/i_028a.jpg" width="1818" height="2405" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl">THE FIRST ISSUE OF “THE SUN”</div></div> - -<p>Such was the first <i>Sun</i>. Part of it was stale news, -rewritten. Part was borrowed advertising. It is doubtful -whether even the police-court items were original, although -they were the most human things in the issue, -the most likely to appeal to the readers whom Day -hoped to reach—people to whom the purchase of a paper -at six cents was impossible, and to whom windy, monotonous -political discussions were a bore.</p> - -<p>In those early thirties, daily journalism had not advanced -very far. Men were willing, but means and -methods were weak. The first English daily was the -<i>Courrant</i>, issued in 1702. The <i>Orange Postman</i>, put out -the following year, was the first penny paper. The -London <i>Times</i> was not started until 1785. It was the -first English paper to use a steam press, as the <i>Sun</i> -was the first American paper.</p> - -<p>The first American daily was the <i>Pennsylvania -Packet</i>, called later the <i>General Advertiser</i>, begun in -Philadelphia in 1784. It died in 1837. Of the existing -New York papers only the <i>Globe</i> dates back to the -eighteenth century, having been founded in 1797 as the -<i>Commercial Advertiser</i>. Next to it in age is the <i>Evening -Post</i>, started in 1801.</p> - -<p>The weakness of the early dailies was largely due to -the fact that their publishers looked almost entirely to -advertising for the support of the papers. On the other -hand, the editors were politicians or highbrows who -thought more of a speech by Lord Piccadilly on empire -than of a good street tragedy; more of an essay by Lady -Geraldine Glue than of a first-class report of a kidnapping.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_30">30</span></p> - -<p>Another great obstacle to success—one for which -neither editor nor publisher was responsible—was the -lack of facilities for the transmission of news. Fulton -launched the Clermont twenty-six years before Day -launched the <i>Sun</i>, but even in Day’s time steamships -were nothing to brag of, and the first of them was yet -to cross the Atlantic. When the <i>Sun</i> was born, the most -important railroad in America was thirty-four miles -long, from Bordentown to South Amboy, New Jersey. -There was no telegraph, and the mails were of pre-historic -slowness.</p> - -<p>It was hard to get out a successful daily newspaper -without daily news. A weekly would have sufficed for -the information that came in, by sailing ship and stage, -from Europe and Washington and Boston. Ben Day -was the first man to reconcile himself to an almost impossible -situation. He did so by the simple method of -using what news was nearest at hand—the incidental -happenings of New York life. In this way he solved his -own problem and the people’s, for they found that the -local items in the <i>Sun</i> were just what they wanted, -while the price of the paper suited them well.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div id="toclink_31" class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_31">31</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_II">CHAPTER II<br /> - -<span class="subhead">THE FIELD OF THE LITTLE “SUN”</span></h2> -</div> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p><i>A Very Small Metropolis Which Day and His Partner, -Wisner, Awoke by Printing Small Human Pieces About -Small Human Beings and Having Boys Cry the Paper.</i></p> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">How</span> far could the little <i>Sun</i> hope to cast its beam -in a stodgy if not naughty world? The circulation -of all the dailies in New York at the time was less than -thirty thousand. The seven morning and four evening -papers, all sold at six cents a copy, shared the field thus:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p class="center">MORNING PAPERS</p> - -<table id="t31a" class="tnarrow25" summary="morning papers circulation"> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>Morning Courier and New York Enquirer</i></td> - <td class="tdr">4,500</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>Democratic Chronicle</i></td> - <td class="tdr">4,000</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">New York <i>Standard</i></td> - <td class="tdr">2,400</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">New York <i>Journal of Commerce</i></td> - <td class="tdr">2,300</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">New York <i>Gazette and General Advertiser</i></td> - <td class="tdr">1,500</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">New York <i>Daily Advertiser</i></td> - <td class="tdr">1,400</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>Mercantile Advertiser and New York Advocate</i></td> - <td class="tdr">1,200</td> -</tr> -</table> - -<p class="p1 center">EVENING PAPERS</p> - -<table id="t31b" class="tnarrow25" summary="evening papers circulation"> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>Evening Post</i></td> - <td class="tdr">3,000</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><i>Evening Star</i></td> - <td class="tdr">2,500</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">New York <i>Commercial Advertiser</i></td> - <td class="tdr">2,100</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">New York <i>American</i></td> - <td class="tdr">1,600</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><span class="in2">Total</span></td> - <td class="tdr"><span class="bt">26,500</span></td> -</tr> -</table> -</div> - -<p>New York was the American metropolis, but it was -of about the present size of Indianapolis or Seattle. Of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_32">32</span> -its quarter of a million population, only eight or ten -thousand lived above Twenty-third Street. Washington -Square, now the residence district farthest down-town, -had just been adopted as a park; before that it -had been the Potter’s Field. In 1833 rich New Yorkers -were putting up some fine residences there—of which a -good many still stand. Sixth Street had had its name -changed to Waverley Place in honor of Walter Scott, -recently dead, the literary king of the day.</p> - -<p>Wall Street was already the financial centre, with its -Merchants’ Exchange, banks, brokers, and insurance -companies. Canal Street was pretty well filled with -retail stores. Third Avenue had been macadamized -from the Bowery to Harlem. The down-town streets -were paved, and some were lighted with gas at seven -dollars a thousand cubic feet.</p> - -<p>Columbia College, in the square bounded by Murray, -Barclay, Church, and Chapel Streets, had a hundred -students; now it has more than a hundred hundred. -James Kent was professor of law in the Columbia of -that day, and Charles Anthon was professor of Greek -and Latin. A rival seat of learning, the University of -the City of New York, chartered two years earlier, was -temporarily housed at 12 Chambers Street, with a certain -Samuel F. B. Morse as professor of sculpture and -painting. There were twelve schools, harbouring six -thousand pupils, whose welfare was guarded by the -Public School Society of New York, Lindley Murray -secretary. The National Academy of Design, incorporated -five years before, guided the budding artist in -Clinton Hall, and Mr. Morse was its president, while -it had for its professor of mythology one William Cullen -Bryant.</p> - -<p>Albert Gallatin was president of the National Bank, -at 13 Wall Street. Often at the end of his day’s work<span class="pagenum" id="Page_33">33</span> -he would walk around to the small shop in William -Street where his young friend Delmonico, the confectioner, -was trying to interest the gourmets of the city -in his French cooking. Gideon Lee, besides being -mayor, was president of the Leather Manufacturers’ -Bank at 334 Pearl Street. He was the last mayor of -New York to be appointed by the common council, for -Dix’s advertisement in the first <i>Sun</i> called an election -by which the people of the city gained the right to elect -a mayor by popular vote.</p> - -<p>A list of the solid citizens of the New York of that -year would include Peter Schermerhorn, Nicholas Fish, -Robert Lenox, Sheppard Knapp, Samuel Swartwout, -Henry Beekman, Henry Delafield, John Mason, William -Paulding, David S. Kennedy, Jacob Lorillard, David -Lydig, Seth Grosvenor, Elisha Riggs, John Delafield, -Peter A. Jay, C. V. S. Roosevelt, Robert Ray, Preserved -Fish, Morris Ketchum, Rufus Prime, Philip Hone, William -Vail, Gilbert Coutant, and Mortimer Livingston.</p> - -<p>These men and their fellows ran the banks and the -big business of that day. They read the six-cent papers, -mostly those which warned the public that Andrew -Jackson was driving the country to the devil. It would -be years before the <i>Sun</i> would bring the light of common, -everyday things into their dignified lives—if it -ever did so. Day, the printer, did not look to them to -read his paper, although he hoped for some small part -of their advertising. It is likely that one of the Gouverneurs—Samuel -L.—read the early <i>Sun</i>, but he was -postmaster, and it was his duty to examine new and -therefore suspicionable publications.</p> - -<p>Incidentally, Postmaster Gouverneur had one clerk -to sort all the mail that came into the city from the rest -of the world. It was a small New York upon which the -timid <i>Sun</i> cast its still smaller beams. The mass of the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_34">34</span> -people had not been interested in newspapers, because -the newspapers brought nothing into their lives but the -drone of American and foreign politics. A majority of -them were in sympathy with Tammany Hall, particularly -since 1821, when the property qualification was -removed from the franchise through Democratic effort.</p> - -<p>New York had literary publications other than the -six-cent papers. The <i>Knickerbocker Magazine</i> was -founded in January of 1833, with Charles Hoffman, -assistant editor of the <i>American Magazine</i>, as editor. -Among the contributors engaged were William Cullen -Bryant and James K. Paulding. The subscription-list, -it was proudly announced, had no fewer than eight -hundred names on it. The <i>Mechanics’ Magazine</i>, the -<i>Sporting Magazine</i>, the <i>American Ploughboy</i>, the <i>Journal -of Public Morals</i>, and the <i>Youth’s Temperance Lecturer</i> -were among the periodicals that contended for -public favour.</p> - -<p>Bryant was a busy man, for he was the chief editor -of the <i>Evening Post</i> as well as a magazine contributor -and a teacher. Fame had come to him early, for -“Thanatopsis” was published when he was twenty-three, -and “To a Water-fowl” appeared a year later, -in 1818. Now, in his thirties, he was no longer the -delicate youth, the dreamy poet. One April day in -1831 Bryant and William L. Stone, one of the editors -of the <i>Commercial Advertiser</i>, had a rare fight in front -of the City Hall, the poet beginning it with a cowskin -whip swung at Stone’s head, and the spectators ending -it after Stone had seized the whip. These two were -editors of sixpenny “respectables.”</p> - -<div id="ip_34a" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 38em;"> - <img src="images/i_034a.jpg" width="1813" height="1073" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - -<p>THE FIRST HOME OF “THE SUN,” 222 WILLIAM STREET</p> - -<p class="subhead">(<em>Under the Arrow</em>)</p> -</div></div> - -<div id="ip_34b" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 38em;"> - <img src="images/i_034ab.jpg" width="1816" height="1264" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - -<p>THE SECOND HOME OF “THE SUN”</p> - -<p class="subhead">Nassau Street, from Frankfort to Spruce, in the Early Forties. “The Sun’s” -Second Home Is Shown at the Right End of the Block. The Tammany Hall -Building Became “The Sun’s” Fourth Home in 1868.</p> -</div></div> - -<p>Irving and Cooper, Bryant and Halleck, Nathaniel -P. Willis and George P. Morris were the largest figures -of intellectual New York. In 1833 Irving returned from -Europe after a visit that had lasted seventeen years.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_35">35</span> -He was then fifty, and had written his best books. -Cooper, half a dozen years younger, had long since -basked in the glory that came to him with the publication -of “The Spy,” “The Pilot,” and “The Last of the -Mohicans.” He and Irving were guests at every cultured -function.</p> - -<p>Prescott was finishing his first work, “The History -of Ferdinand and Isabella.” Bancroft was beginning -his “History of the United States.” George Ticknor -had written his “Life of Lafayette.” Hawthorne had -published only “Fanshawe” and some of the “Twice -Told Tales.” Poe was struggling along in Baltimore. -Holmes, a medical student, had written a few poems. -Dr. John William Draper, later to write his great -“History of the Intellectual Development of Europe,” -arrived from Liverpool that year to make New York -his home.</p> - -<p>Longfellow was professor of modern languages at -Bowdoin, and unknown to fame as a poet. Whittier had -written “Legends of New England” and “Moll -Pitcher.” Emerson was in England. Richard Henry -Dana and Motley were at Harvard. Thoreau was helping -his father to make lead-pencils. Parkman, Lowell, -and Herman Melville were schoolboys.</p> - -<p>Away off in Buffalo was a boy of fourteen who clerked -in his uncle’s general store by day, selling steel traps to -Seneca braves, and by night read Latin, Greek, poetry, -history, and the speeches of Andrew Jackson. His name -was Charles Anderson Dana.</p> - -<p>The leading newspaperman of the day in New York -was James Watson Webb, a son of the General Webb -who held the Bible upon which Washington took the -oath of office as first President. J. Watson Webb had -been in the army and, as a journalist, was never for -peace at any price. He united the <i>Morning Courier</i><span class="pagenum" id="Page_36">36</span> -and the <i>Enquirer</i>, and established a daily horse express -between New York and Washington, which is said to -have cost seventy-five hundred dollars a month, in order -to get news from Congress and the White House twenty-four -hours before his rivals.</p> - -<p>Webb was famed as a fighter. He had a row with -Duff Green in Washington in 1830. In January, 1836, -he thrashed James Gordon Bennett in Wall Street. He -incited a mob to drive Wood, a singer, from the stage -of the Park Theater. In 1838 he sent a challenge to -Representative Cilley, of Maine, a classmate of Longfellow -and Hawthorne at Bowdoin. Cilley refused to -fight, on the ground that he had made no personal reflections -on Webb’s character; whereupon Representative -Graves, of Kentucky, who carried the card for -Webb, challenged Cilley for himself, as was the custom. -They fought with rifles on the Annapolis Road, and -Cilley was killed at the third shot.</p> - -<p>In 1842 Webb fought a duel with Representative -Marshall, of Kentucky, and not only was wounded, but -on his return to New York was sentenced to two years -in prison “for leaving the State with the intention of -giving or receiving a challenge.” At the end of two -weeks, however, he was pardoned.</p> - -<p>Having deserted Jackson and become a Whig, Webb -continued to own and edit the <i>Courier and Enquirer</i> -until 1861, when it was merged with the <i>World</i>. His -quarrels, all of political origin, brought prestige to his -paper. Ben Day had no duelling-pistols. His only -chance to advertise the <i>Sun</i> was by its own light and -its popular price.</p> - -<p>Beyond Webb, Day had no lively journalist with -whom to contend at the outset, and Webb probably did -not dream that the <i>Sun</i> would be worthy of a joust. -Perhaps fortunately for Day, Horace Greeley had just<span class="pagenum" id="Page_37">37</span> -failed in his attempt to run a one-cent paper. This was -the <i>Morning Post</i>, which Greeley started in January, -1833, with Francis V. Story, a fellow printer, as his -partner, and with a capital of one hundred and fifty -dollars. It ran for three weeks only.</p> - -<p>Greeley and Story still had some type, bought on -credit, and they issued a tri-weekly, the <i>Constitutionalist</i>, -which, in spite of its dignified title, was the avowed -organ of the lotteries. Its columns contained the following -card:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Greeley & Story, No. 54 Liberty Street, New York, -respectfully solicit the patronage of the public to their -business of letterpress printing, particularly lottery-printing, -such as schemes, periodicals, and so forth, -which will be executed on favorable terms.</p> -</div> - -<p>It must be remembered that at that time lotteries -were not under a cloud. There were in New York -forty-five lottery offices, licensed at two hundred and -fifty dollars apiece annually, and the proceeds were -divided between the public schools and a home for deaf-mutes. -That was the last year of legalized lotteries. -After they disappeared Greeley started the <i>New Yorker</i>, -the best literary weekly of its time. It was not until -April, 1841, that he founded the <i>Tribune</i>.</p> - -<p>Doubtless there were many young New Yorkers of -that period who would have made bang-up reporters, -but apparently, until Day’s time, with few exceptions -they did not work on morning newspapers. One exception -was James Gordon Bennett, whose work for Webb -on the <i>Courier and Enquirer</i> helped to make it the leading -American paper.</p> - -<p>Nathaniel P. Willis and George P. Morris would probably -have been good reporters, for they knew New York -and had excellent styles, but they insisted on being<span class="pagenum" id="Page_38">38</span> -poets. With Morris it was not a hollow vocation, for -the author of “Woodman, Spare That Tree,” could always -get fifty dollars for a song. He and Willis ran -the <i>Mirror</i> and later the <i>New Mirror</i>, and wrote verse -and other fanciful stuff by the bushel. Philip Hone -would have been the best reporter in New York, as his -diary reveals, but he was of the aristocracy, and he -seems to have scorned newspapermen, particularly -Webb and Bennett.</p> - -<p>But somehow, by that chance which seemed to smile -on the <i>Sun</i>, Ben Day got clever reporters. He wanted -one to do the police-court work, for he saw, from -the first day of the paper, that that was the kind of -stuff that his readers devoured. To them the details of -a beating administered by James Hawkins to his wife -were of more import than Jackson’s assaults on the -United States Bank.</p> - -<p>When George W. Wisner, a young printer who was -out of work, applied to the <i>Sun</i> for a job, Day told -him that he would give him four dollars a week if he -would get up early every day and attend the police-court, -which held its sessions from 4 <span class="allsmcap">A.M.</span> on. The people -of the city were quite as human then as they are -to-day. Unregenerate mortals got drunk and fought -in the streets. Others stole shoes. The worst of all -beat their wives. Wisner was to be the Balzac of the -daybreak court in a year when Balzac himself was writing -his “Droll Stories.”</p> - -<p>The second issue of the <i>Sun</i> continued the typographical -error of the day before. The year in the date-line of -the second page was “1832.” The big news in this -paper was under date of Plymouth, England, August 1, -and it told of the capture of Lisbon by Admiral Napier -on the 25th of July. Day—or perhaps it was Wisner—wrote -an editorial article about it:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_39">39</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>To us as Americans there can be little of interest in -the triumph of one member of a royal family of Europe -over another; and although we can but rejoice at the -downfall of the modern Nero who so lately filled the -Portuguese throne, yet if rumor speak the truth the -victorious Pedro is no better than he should be.</p> -</div> - -<p>The editor lamented the general lack of news:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>With the exception of the interesting news from -Portugal there appears to be very little worthy of note. -Nullification has blown over; the President’s tour has -terminated; Black Hawk has gone home; the new race -for President is not yet commenced, and everything -seems settled down into a calm. Dull times, these, for -us newspaper-makers. We wish the President or Major -Downing or some other distinguished individual would -happen along again and afford us material for a daily -article. Or even if the sea-serpent would be so kind as -to pay us a visit, we should be extremely obliged to him -and would honor his snakeship with a most tremendous -puff.</p> -</div> - -<p>Theatrical advertising appeared in this number, the -Park Theater announcing the comedy of “Rip Van -Winkle,” as redramatized by Mr. Hackett, who played -<em>Rip</em>. Mr. Gale was playing “Mazeppa” at the Bowery. -Perhaps these advertisements were borrowed from a -six-cent paper, but there was one “help wanted” advertisement -that was not borrowed. It was the upshot -of Day’s own idea, destined to bring another revolution -in newspaper methods:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>TO THE UNEMPLOYED—A number of steady men -can find employment by vending this paper. A liberal -discount is allowed to those who buy to sell again.</p> -</div> - -<p>Before that day there had been no newsboys; no -papers were sold in the streets. The big, blanket political<span class="pagenum" id="Page_40">40</span> -organs that masqueraded as newspapers were -either sold over the counter or delivered by carriers to -the homes of the subscribers. Most of the publishers -considered it undignified even to angle for new subscribers, -and one of them boasted that his great circulation -of perhaps two thousand had come unsolicited.</p> - -<p>The first unemployed person to apply for a job selling -<i>Suns</i> in the streets was a ten-year-old-boy, Bernard -Flaherty, born in Cork. Years afterward two continents -knew him as Barney Williams, Irish comedian, -hero of “The Emerald Ring,” and “The Connie Soogah,” -and at one time manager of Wallack’s old Broadway -Theatre.</p> - -<p>When Day got some regular subscribers, he sent -carriers on routes. He charged them sixty-seven cents -a hundred, cash, or seventy-five cents on credit. The -first of these carriers was Sam Messenger, who delivered -the <i>Sun</i> in the Fulton Market district, and -who later became a rich livery-stable keeper. Live lads -like these, carrying out Day’s idea, wrought the greatest -change in journalism that ever had been made, for -they brought the paper to the people, something that -could not be accomplished by the six-cent sheets with -their lofty notions and comparatively high prices.</p> - -<p>On the third day of the <i>Sun’s</i> life, with Wisner at the -pen and Barney Flaherty “hollering” in the startled -streets, the editor again expressed, this time more positively, -his yearning that something would happen:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>We newspaper people thrive best on the calamities -of others. Give us one of your real Moscow fires, or -your Waterloo battle-fields; let a Napoleon be dashing -with his legions through the world, overturning the -thrones of a thousand years and deluging the world -with blood and tears; and then we of the types are in -our glory.</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_41">41</span></p> - -<p>The yearner had to wait thirty years for another -Waterloo, but he got his “real Moscow fire” in about -two years, and so close that it singed his eyebrows.</p> - -<p>Lacking a Napoleon to exalt or denounce, Mr. Day -used a bit of that same page for the publication of homelier -news for the people:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The following are the drawn numbers of the New -York consolidated lotteries of yesterday afternoon:</p> - -<p class="center b1"> -62 6 59 46 61 34 65 37 8 42 -</p> -</div> - -<p>So Horace Greeley and his partner, with their tri-weekly -paper, could not have been keeping all of the -lottery patronage away from the <i>Sun</i>.</p> - -<p>Over in the police column Mr. Wisner was supplying -gems like the following:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>A complaint was made by several persons who -“thought it no sin to step to the notes of a sweet violin” -and gathered under a window in Chatham Street, where -a little girl was playing on a violin, when they were -showered from a window above with the contents of -a dye-pot or something of like nature. They were directed -to ascertain their showerer.</p> -</div> - -<p>The big story on the first page of the fourth issue of -the <i>Sun</i> was a conversation between <em>Envy</em> and <em>Candor</em> -in regard to the beauties of a Miss H., perhaps a fictitious -person. But on the second page, at the head of -the editorial column, was a real editorial article approving -the course of the British government in freeing the -slaves in the West Indies:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>We supposed that the eyes of men were but half -open to this case. We imagined that the slave would -have to toil on for years and <em>purchase</em> what in justice -was already <em>his own</em>. We did not once dream that light -had so far progressed as to prepare the British nation<span class="pagenum" id="Page_42">42</span> -for the colossal stride in justice and humanity and benevolence -which they are about to make. The abolition -of West Indian slavery will form a brilliant era in the -annals of the world. It will circle with a halo of imperishable -glory the brows of the transcendent spirits -who wield the present destinies of the British Empire.</p> - -<p>Would to Heaven that the honor of leading the way -in this godlike enterprise had been reserved to our own -country! But as the opportunity for this is passed, we -trust we shall at least avoid the everlasting disgrace of -long refusing to imitate so bright and glorious an example.</p> -</div> - -<p>Thus the <i>Sun</i> came out for the freedom of the slave -twenty-eight years before that freedom was to be accomplished -in the United States through war. The <i>Sun</i> -was the <i>Sun</i> of Day, but the hand was the hand of -Wisner. That young man was an Abolitionist before -the word was coined.</p> - -<p>“Wisner was a pretty smart young fellow,” said Mr. -Day nearly fifty years afterward, “but he and I never -agreed. I was rather Democratic in my notions. Wisner, -whenever he got a chance, was always sticking in -his damned little Abolitionist articles.”</p> - -<p>There is little doubt that Wisner wrote the article -facing the <i>Sun</i> against slavery while he was waiting for -something to turn up in the police-court. Then he went -to the office, set up the article, as well as his piece -about the arrest of Eliza Barry, of Bayard Street, for -stealing a wash-tub, and put the type in the form. -Considering that Wisner got four dollars a week for his -break-o’-day work, he made a very good morning of that; -and it is worthy of record that the next day’s <i>Sun</i> did -not repudiate his assault on human servitude, although -on September 10 Mr. Day printed an editorial grieving -over the existence of slavery, but hitting at the methods -of the Abolitionists.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_43">43</span></p> - -<p>These early issues were full of lively little “sunny” -pieces, for instance:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Passing by the Beekman Street church early this -morning, we discovered a milkman replenishing his -lacteous cargo with Adam’s ale. We took the liberty -to ask him, “Friend, why do ye do thus?” He replied, -“None of your business”; and we passed on, determined -to report him to the Grahamites.</p> -</div> - -<p>A poem on Burns, by Halleck—perhaps reprinted -from one of the author’s published volumes of verse—added -literary tone to that morning’s <i>Sun</i>.</p> - -<p>In the next issue was some verse by Willis, beginning:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="verse indent0">Look not upon the wine when it</div> - <div class="verse indent0">Is red within the cup!</div> - </div> -</div> -</div> - -<p>Then, and for some years afterward, the <i>Sun</i> exhibited -a special aversion to alcohol in text and head-lines. -“Cursed Effects of Rum!” was one of its favourite -head-lines.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> was a week old before it contained dramatic -criticism, its first subject in that field being the appearance -of Mr. and Mrs. Wood at the Park Theatre in -“Cinderella,” a comic opera. The paper’s first animal -story was printed on September 12, recording the fact -that on the previous Sunday about sixty wild pigeons -stayed in a tree at the Battery nearly half an hour.</p> - -<p>On September 14 the <i>Sun</i> printed its first illustration—a -two-column cut of “Herschel’s Forty-Feet Telescope.” -This was Sir W. Herschel, then dead some ten -years, and the telescope was on his grounds at Slough, -near Windsor, England. Another knighted Herschel -with another telescope in a far land was to play a big -part in the fortunes of the <i>Sun</i>, but that comes later. -In the issue with the cut of the telescope was a paragraph<span class="pagenum" id="Page_44">44</span> -about a rumour that Fanny Kemble, who had just -captivated American theatregoers, had been married to -Pierce Butler, of Philadelphia—as, indeed, she had.</p> - -<p>Broadway seems to have had its lure as early as -1833, for in the <i>Sun</i> of September 17, on the first page, -is a plaint by “Citizen”:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>They talk of the pleasures of the country, but would -to God I had never been persuaded to leave the labor -of the city for such woful pleasures. Oh, Broadway, -Broadway! In an evil hour did I forsake thee for verdant -walks and flowery landscapes and that there tiresome -piece of made water. What walk is so agreeable -as a walk through the streets of New York? What -landscape more flowery than those of the print-shops? -And what water was made by man equal to the Hudson?</p> -</div> - -<p>This was followed by uplifting little essays on “Suicide” -and “Robespierre.” The chief news of the day—that -John Quincy Adams had accepted a nomination -from the Anti-Masons—was on an inside page. What -was possibly of more interest to the readers, it was -announced that thereafter a ton of coal would be two -thousand pounds instead of twenty-two hundred and -forty—Lackawanna, broken and sifted, six dollars and -fifty cents a ton.</p> - -<p>On Saturday, September 21, when it was only eighteen -days old, the <i>Sun</i> adopted a new head-line. The -letters remained the same, but the eagle device of the -first issue was supplanted by the solar orb rising over -hills and sea. This design was used only until December -2, when its place was taken by a third emblem—a -printing-press shedding symbolical effulgence upon -the earth.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun’s</i> first book-notice appeared on September -23, when it acknowledged the sixtieth volume of the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_45">45</span> -“Family Library” (Harpers), this being a biography -of Charlemagne by G. P. R. James. “It treats of a -most important period in the history of France.” The -<i>Sun</i> had little space then for book-reviews or politics. -Of its attitude toward the great financial fight then -being waged, this lone paragraph gives a good view:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The <i>Globe</i> of Monday contains in six columns the -reasons which prompted the President to remove the -public deposits from the United States Bank, which -were read to his assembled cabinet on the 18th instant.</p> -</div> - -<p>Nicholas Biddle and his friends could fill other papers -with arguments, but the <i>Sun</i> kept its space for -police items, stories of authenticated ghosts, and yarns -about the late Emperor Napoleon. The removal of -William J. Duane as Secretary of the Treasury got two -lines on a page where a big shark caught off Barnstable -got three lines, and the feeding of the anaconda at the -American Museum a quarter of a column. Miss Susan -Allen, who bought a cigar on Broadway and was -arrested when she smoked it while she danced in the -street, was featured more prominently than the expected -visit to New York of Mr. Henry Clay, after -whom millions of cigars were to be named. For the -satisfaction of universal curiosity it must be reported -that Miss Allen was discharged.</p> - -<p>On October 1 of that same year—1833—the <i>Sun</i> came -out for better fire-fighting apparatus, urging that the -engines should be drawn by horses, as in London. In -the same issue it assailed the gambling-house in Park -Row, and scorned the allegation of Colonel Hamilton, -a British traveller, that the tooth-brush was unknown in -America. Slowly the paper was getting better, printing -more local news; and it could afford to, for the penny<span class="pagenum" id="Page_46">46</span> -<i>Sun</i> idea had taken hold of New York, and the sales -were larger every week.</p> - -<p>Wisner was stretching the police-court pieces out to -nearly two columns. Now and then, perhaps when Mr. -Day was away fishing, the reporter would slip in an -Abolition paragraph or a gloomy poem on the horrors -of slavery. But he was so valuable that, while his -chief did not raise his salary of four dollars a week, he -offered him half the paper, the same to be paid for out -of the profits. And so, in January of 1834, Wisner -became a half-owner of the <i>Sun</i>. Benton, another <i>Sun</i> -printer, also wanted an interest, and left when he could -not get it.</p> - -<p>Before it was two months old the <i>Sun</i> had begun to -take an interest in aeronautics. It printed a full column, -October 16, 1833, on the subject of Durant’s balloon -ascensions, and quoted Napoleon as saying that -the only insurmountable difficulty of the balloon in -war was the impossibility of guiding its course. “This -difficulty Dr. Durant is now endeavoring to obviate.” -And the <i>Sun</i> added:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>May we not therefore look to the time, in perspective, -when our atmosphere will be traversed with as much -facility as our waters?</p> -</div> - -<p>In the issue of October 17 a skit, possibly by Mr. Day -himself, gave a picture of the trials of an editor of the -period:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>SCENE—An editor’s closet—editor solus.</p> - -<p>“Well, a pretty day’s work of it I shall make. News, -I have nothing—politics, stale, flat, and unprofitable—miscellany, -enough of it—miscellany bills payable, and -a miscellaneous list of subscribers with tastes as miscellaneous -as the tongues of Babel. Ha! Footsteps!<span class="pagenum" id="Page_47">47</span> -Drop the first person singular and don the plural. WE -must now play the editor.”</p> - -<p>(Enter Devil)—“Copy, sir!”</p> - -<p>(Enter A.)—“I missed my paper this morning, sir, -I don’t want to take <span class="locked">it—”</span></p> - -<p>(Enter B.)—“There is a letter ‘o’ turned upside -down in my advertisement this morning, sir! <span class="locked">I—I—”</span></p> - -<p>(Enter C.)—“You didn’t notice my new work, my -treatise on a flea, this morning, sir! You have no literary -taste! <span class="locked">Sir—”</span></p> - -<p>(Enter D.)—“Sir, your boy don’t leave my paper, -sir—I live in a blind alley; you turn out of —— Street -to the right—then take a left-hand turn—then to the -right again—then go under an arch—then over a kennel—then -jump a ten-foot fence—then enter a door—then -climb five pair of stairs—turn fourteen corners—and -you can’t miss my door. I want your boy to leave -my paper first—it’s only a mile out of his way—if he -don’t, I’ll <span class="locked">stop—”</span></p> - -<p>(Enter E.)—“Sir, you have abused my friend; the -article against Mr. —— as a candidate is intolerable—it -is scandalous—I’ll stop my paper—I’ll cane <span class="locked">you—I’ll—”</span></p> - -<p>(Enter F.)—“Mr. Editor, you are mealy-mouthed, -you lack independence, your remarks upon Mr. ——, -the candidate for Congress, are too tame. If you don’t -put it on harder I’ll stop <span class="locked">my—”</span></p> - -<p>(Enter G.)—“Your remarks upon profane swearing -are personal, d——n you, sir, you mean me—before I’ll -patronize you longer I’ll see you in <span class="locked">——”</span></p> - -<p>(Enter H.)—“Mr. ——, we are very sorry you do -not say more against the growing sin of profanity. Unless -you put your veto on it more decidedly, no man of -correct moral principles will give you his patronage—I, -for <span class="locked">one—”</span></p> - -<p>(Enter I.)—“Bad luck to the dirty sowl of him, -where does he keep himself? By the powers, I’ll strike -him if I can get at his carcass, and I’ll kick him anyhow! -Why do you fill your paper with dirty lies about -Irishmen at all?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_48">48</span></p> - -<p>(Enter J.)—“Why don’t you give us more anecdotes -and sich, Irish stories and them things—I don’t like the -long <span class="locked">speeches—I—”</span></p> - -<p>(Devil)—“Copy, sir!”</p> -</div> - -<p>The day after this evidence of unrest appeared the -<i>Sun</i> printed, perhaps with a view to making all manner -of citizens gnash their teeth, a few extracts from the -narrative of Colonel Hamilton, “the British traveler in -America”:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>In America there are no bells and no chambermaids.</p> - -<p>I have heard, since my arrival in America, the toast -of “a bloody war in Europe” drank with enthusiasm.</p> - -<p>The whole population of the Southern and Western -States are uniformly armed with daggers.</p> - -<p>At present an American might study every book -within the limits of the Union and still be regarded in -many parts of Europe, especially in Germany, as a man -comparatively ignorant.</p> -</div> - -<p>The editorial suggested that the colonel “had better -look wild for the lake that burns with fire and brimstone.”</p> - -<p>The union printers were lively even in the first days -of the <i>Sun</i>, which announced, on October 21, 1833, that -the <i>Journal of Commerce</i> paid its journeymen only ten -dollars a week, and added:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The proprietors of other morning papers cheerfully -pay twelve dollars. Therefore, the office of the <i>Journal -of Commerce</i> is what printers term a rat office—and -the term “rat,” with the followers of the same profession -with Faust, Franklin, and Stanhope, is a most -odious term.</p> -</div> - -<p>The “pork-barrel” was foreshadowed in an item -printed when the <i>Sun</i> was just a month old:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_49">49</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>At the close of the present year the Treasury of the -nation will contain twelve million dollars. This rich -and increasing revenue will probably be a bone of contention -at the next session of Congress.</p> -</div> - -<p>At the end of its first month the <i>Sun</i> was getting more -and more advertising. Its news was lively enough, considering -the times. Rum, the cholera in Mexico, assassinations -in the South, the police-court, the tour of Henry -Clay, and poems by Walter Scott were its long suit. -The circulation of the little paper was now about twelve -hundred copies, and the future seemed promising, even -if Mr. Day did print, at suspiciously frequent intervals, -articles inveighing against the debtor’s-prison law.</p> - -<p>The Astor House—now half a ruin—was at first to be -called the Park Hotel, for the <i>Sun</i> of October 29, 1833, -announced editorially:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>THE PARK HOTEL—Mr. W. B. Astor gives notice -that he will receive proposals for building the long-contemplated -hotel in Broadway, between Barclay and -Vesey Streets.</p> -</div> - -<p>An advertisement which the <i>Sun</i> saw fit to notice -editorially was inserted by a young man in search of -a wife—“a young woman who understands the use of -the needle, and who is willing to be industrious.” The -editorial comment was:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The advertisement was handed to us by a respectable-looking -young man, and of course we could not refuse -to publish it—though if we were in want of a wife we -think we should take a different course to obtain one.</p> -</div> - -<p>Sometimes the police items, flecked with poetry, and -presumably written by Wisner, were tantalizingly -reticent, as:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_50">50</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Maria Jones was accused of stealing clothing, and -committed. Certain affairs were developed of rather a -singular and comical nature in relation to her.</p> -</div> - -<p>Nothing more than that. Perhaps Wisner rather -enjoyed being questioned by admiring friends when he -went to dinner at the American House that day.</p> - -<p>Bright as the police reporter was, the ship-news man -of that day lacked snap. The arrival from Europe of -James Fenimore Cooper, who could have told the <i>Sun</i> -more foreign news than it had ever printed, was disposed -of in twelve words. But it must be remembered -that the interview was then unknown. The only way -to get anything out of a citizen was to enrage him, -whereupon he would write a letter. But the <i>Sun</i> did -say, a couple of days later, that Cooper’s newest novel, -“The Headsman,” was being sold in London at seven -dollars and fifty cents a copy—no doubt in the old-fashioned -English form, three volumes at half a guinea -each.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> blew its own horn for the first time on November -9, 1833:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Its success is now beyond question, and it has exceeded -the most sanguine anticipations of its publishers -in its circulation and advertising patronage. Scarcely -two months has it existed in the typographical firmament, -and it has a daily circulation of upward of two -thousand copies, besides a steadily increasing advertising -patronage. Although of a character (we hope) -deserving the encouragement of all classes of society, -it is more especially valuable to those who cannot well -afford to incur the expense of subscribing to a “blanket -sheet” and paying ten dollars per annum.</p> - -<p>In conclusion we may be permitted to remark that the -penny press, by diffusing useful knowledge among the -operative classes of society, is effecting the march of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_51">51</span> -intelligence to a greater degree than any other mode of -instruction.</p> -</div> - -<p>The same article called attention to the fact that the -“penny” papers of England were really two-cent papers. -The <i>Sun’s</i> price had been announced as “one -penny” on the earliest numbers, but on October 8, -when it was a little more than a month old, the legend -was changed to read “Price one cent.”</p> - -<div id="ip_50" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 28em;"> - <img src="images/i_050a.jpg" width="1336" height="2164" alt="" /> - <div class="captionr"><i>From the Collection of Charles Burnham</i></div> - <div class="captionl p1"> -<p class="subhead">BARNEY WILLIAMS, THE COMEDIAN, WHO WAS THE -FIRST NEWSBOY OF “THE SUN”</p> -</div></div> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> ran its first serial in the third month of its -existence. This was “The Life of Davy Crockett,” dictated -or authorized by the frontiersman himself. It -must have been a relief to the readers to get away from -the usual dull reprint from foreign papers that had -been filling the <i>Sun’s</i> first page. In those days the first -pages were always the dullest, but Crockett’s lively -stories about bear-hunts enlivened the <i>Sun</i>.</p> - -<p>Other celebrities were often mentioned. Aaron Burr, -now old and feeble, was writing his memoirs. Martin -Van Buren had taken lodgings at the City Hotel. The -Siamese Twins were arrested in the South for beating -a man. “Mr. Clay arrived in town last evening and -attended the new opera.” This was “Fra Diavolo,” in -which Mr. and Mrs. Wood sang at the Park Theatre. -“It is said that Dom Pedro has dared his brother -Miguel to single combat, which has been refused.” -A week later the <i>Sun</i> gloated over the fact that Pedro—Pedro -I of Brazil, who was invading Portugal on behalf -of his daughter, Maria da Gloria—had routed the usurper -Miguel’s army.</p> - -<p>On December 5, 1833, the <i>Sun</i> printed the longest -news piece it had ever put in type—the message of -President Jackson to the Congress. This took up three -of the four pages, and crowded out nearly all the advertising.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_52">52</span></p> - -<p>On December 17, in the fourth month of its life, the -<i>Sun</i> announced that it had procured “a machine press, -on which one thousand impressions can be taken in an -hour. The daily circulation is now nearly FOUR -THOUSAND.” It was a happy Christmas for Day and -Wisner. The <i>Sun</i> surely was shining!</p> - -<p>The paper retained its original size and shape during -the whole of 1834, and rarely printed more than four -pages. As it grew older, it printed more and more -local items and developed greater interest in local affairs. -The first page was taken up with advertising and reprint. -A State election might have taken place the day -before, but on page 1 the <i>Sun</i> worshippers looked for a -bit of fiction or history. What were the fortunes of -William L. Marcy as compared to a two-column thriller, -“The Idiot’s Revenge,” or “Captain Chicken and Gentle -Sophia”?</p> - -<p>The head-lines were all small, and most of them -italics. Here are samples:</p> - -<p class="p1 b1 center larger wspace"> -<i>INGRATITUDE OF A CAT.</i><br /> - -<i>PERSONALITY OF NAPOLEON.</i><br /> - -<i>WONDERFUL ANTICS OF FLEAS.</i><br /> - -<i>BROUGHT TO IT BY RUM.</i> -</p> - -<p>The news paragraphs were sometimes models of condensation:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>PICKPOCKETS—On Friday night a Gentleman lost -$100 at the Opera and then $25 at Tammany Hall.</p> - -<p>The Hon. Daniel Webster will leave town this morning -for Washington.</p> - -<p>John Baker, the person whom we reported a short -time since as being brought before the police for stealing -a ham, died suddenly in his cell in Bellevue in the -greatest agony—an awful warning to drunkards.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_53">53</span></p> - -<p>James G. Bennett has become sole proprietor and -editor of the Philadelphia <i>Courier</i>.</p> - -<p>Colonel Crockett, it is expected, will visit the Bowery -Theater this evening.</p> - -<p>RUMOR—It was rumored in Washington on the 6th -that a duel would take place the next day between two -members of the House.</p> - -<p>SUDDEN DEATH—Ann McDonough, of Washington -Street, attempted to drink a pint of rum on a wager, -on Wednesday afternoon last. Before it was half -swallowed Ann was a corpse. Served her right!</p> - -<p>Bayington, the murderer, we learn by a contemporary, -was formerly employed in this city on the <i>Journal -of Commerce</i>. No wonder he came to an untimely fate.</p> - -<p>DUEL—We understand that a duel was fought at -Hoboken on Friday morning last between a gentleman -of Canada and a French gentleman of this city, in which -the latter was wounded. The parties should be arrested.</p> - -<p>LAMENTABLE DEATH—The camelopard shipped -at Calcutta for New York died the day after it was -embarked. “We could have better spared a better” -<em>crittur</em>, as Shakespeare doesn’t say.</p> -</div> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i>, although read largely by Jacksonians, did -not take the side of any political party. It favoured -national and State economy and city cleanliness. It -dismissed the New York Legislature of 1834 thus:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The Legislature of this State closed its arduous -duties yesterday. It has increased the number of our -banks and fixed a heavy load of debt upon posterity.</p> -</div> - -<p>Nothing more. If the readers wanted more they -could fly to the ample bosoms of the sixpennies; but<span class="pagenum" id="Page_54">54</span> -apparently they were satisfied, for in April of 1834 the -<i>Sun’s</i> circulation reached eight thousand, and Colonel -Webb, of the <i>Courier and Enquirer</i>, was bemoaning the -success of “penny trash.” The <i>Sun</i> replied to him by -saying that the public had been “imposed upon by ten-dollar -trash long enough.” The <i>Journal of Commerce</i> -also slanged the <i>Sun</i>, which promptly announced that -the <i>Journal</i> was conducted by “a company of rich, -aristocratical men,” and that it would take sides with -any party to gain a subscriber.</p> - -<p>The influence of Partner Wisner, the Abolitionist, -was evident in many pages of the <i>Sun</i>. On June 23, -1834, it printed a piece about Martin Palmer, who was -“pelted down with stones in Wall Street on suspicion -of being a runaway slave,” and paid its respects to -Boudinot, a Southerner in New York who was reputed -to be a tracker of runaways. It was he who had set -the crowd after the black:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The man who will do this will do anything; he would -dance on his mother’s grave; he would invade the sacred -precincts of the tomb and rob a corpse of its winding-sheet; -he has no SOUL. It is said that this useless -fellow is about to commence a suit against us for a -libel. Try it, Mr. Boudinot!</p> -</div> - -<p>During the anti-abolition riots of that year the <i>Sun</i> -took a firm stand against the disturbers, although there -is little doubt that many of them were its own readers.</p> - -<p>The paper made a vigorous little crusade against -the evils of the Bridewell in City Hall Park, where -dozens of wretches suffered in the filth of the debtors’ -prison. The <i>Sun</i> was a live wire when the cholera re-appeared, -and it put to rout the sixpenny papers which -tried to make out that the disease was not cholera, but -“summer complaint.” Incidentally, the advertising<span class="pagenum" id="Page_55">55</span> -columns of that day, in nearly all the papers were filled -with patent “cholera cures.”</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> had an eye for urban refinement, too, and -begged the aldermen to see to it that pigs were prevented -from roaming in City Hall Park. In the matter -of silver forks, then a novelty, it was more conservative, -as the following paragraph, printed in November, 1834, -would indicate:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>EXTREME NICETY—The author of the “Book of -Etiquette,” recently printed in London, says: “Silver -forks are now common at every respectable table, and -for my part I cannot see how it is possible to eat a -dinner comfortably without them.” The booby ought -to be compelled to cut his beefsteak with a piece of old -barrel-hoop on a wooden trencher.</p> -</div> - -<p>Not even abolition or etiquette, however, could sidetrack -the <i>Sun’s</i> interest in animals. In one issue it dismissed -the adjournment of Congress in three words and, -just below, ran this item:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>THE ANACONDA—Most of those who have seen the -beautiful serpent at Peale’s Museum will recollect that -in the snug quarters allotted to him there are two -blankets, on one of which he lies, and the other is covered -over him in cold weather. Strange to say that on -Monday night, after Mr. Peale had fed the serpent with -a chicken, according to custom, the serpent took it into -his head to swallow one of the blankets, which is a seven-quarter -one, and this blanket he has now in his stomach. -The proprietor feels much anxiety.</p> -</div> - -<p>Almost every newspaper editor in that era had a theatre -feud at one day or another. The <i>Sun’s</i> quarrel was -with Farren, the manager of the Bowery, where Forrest -was playing. So the <i>Sun</i> said:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_56">56</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>DAMN THE YANKEES—We are informed by a correspondent -(though we have not seen the announcement -ourselves) that Farren, the chap who damned the Yankees -so lustily the other day, and who is now under -bonds for a gross outrage on a respectable butcher near -the Bowery Theater, is intending to make his appearance -on the Bowery stage THIS EVENING!</p> -</div> - -<p>Five hundred citizens gathered at the theatre that -night, waited until nine o’clock, and then charged -through the doors, breaking up the performance of -“Metamora.” The <i>Sun</i> described it:</p> - -<p>The supernumeraries scud from behind the scenes like -quails—the stock actors’ teeth chattered—<i>Oceana</i> -looked imploringly at the good-for-nothing Yankees—<i>Nahmeeoke</i> -trembled—<i>Guy of Godalwin</i> turned on his -heel, and <i>Metamora</i> coolly shouldered his tomahawk and -walked off the stage.</p> - -<p>The management announced that Farren was discharged. -The mayor of New York and Edwin Forrest -made conciliatory speeches, and the crowd went away.</p> - -<p>The attacks of Colonel Stone, editor of the six-cent -<i>Commercial</i>, aroused the <i>Sun</i> to retaliate in kind. A -column about the colonel ended thus:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>He was then again cowskinned by Mr. Bryant of the -<i>Post</i>, and was most unpoetically flogged near the American -Hotel. He has always been the slave of avarice, -cowardice, and meanness.... The next time he sees -fit to attack the penny press we hope he will confine himself -to facts.</p> -</div> - -<p>A month later the <i>Sun</i> went after Colonel Stone -again:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The colonel ... for the sake of an additional glass -of wine and a couple of real Spanish cigars, did actually<span class="pagenum" id="Page_57">57</span> -perpetrate a most excellent and true article, the first -we have seen of his for a long time past. Now we have -serious thoughts that the colonel will yet become quite -a decent fellow, and may ultimately ascend, after a -long course of training, to a level with the penny dailies -which have soared so far above him in the heavens of -veracity.</p> -</div> - -<p>It must be said of Colonel Stone that he was a man -of literary and political attainments. He was editor -of the <i>Commercial Advertiser</i> for more than twenty -years.</p> - -<p>The colonel did not reform to the <i>Sun’s</i> liking at once, -but the feud lessened, and presently it was the <i>Transcript</i>—a -penny paper which sprang up when the <i>Sun’s</i> -success was assured—to which the <i>Sun</i> took its biggest -cudgels. One of the <i>Transcript’s</i> editors, it said, had -passed a bogus three-dollar bill on the Bank of Troy. -Another walked “on both sides of the street, like a -twopenny postman,” while a third “spent his money -at a theatre with females,” while his family was in -want. But, added the <i>Sun</i>, “we never let personalities -creep in.”</p> - -<p>The New York <i>Times</i>—not the present <i>Times</i>—had -also started up, and it dared to boast of a circulation -“greater than any in the city except the <i>Courier</i>.” Said -the <i>Sun</i>:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>If the daily circulation of the <i>Sun</i> be not larger than -that of the <i>Times</i> and <i>Courier</i> both, then may we be -hung up by the ears and flogged to death with a rattle-snake’s -skin.</p> -</div> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> took no risk in this. By November of 1834 -its circulation was above ten thousand. On December -3 it published the President’s message in full and circulated -fifteen thousand copies. At the beginning of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_58">58</span> -1835 it announced a new press—a Napier, built by -R. Hoe & Co.—new type, and a bigger paper, circulating -twenty thousand. The print paper was to cost four-fifths -of a cent a copy, but the <i>Sun</i> was getting lots of -advertising. With the increase in size, that New Year’s -Day, the <i>Sun</i> adopted the motto, “It Shines for All.” -which it is still using to-day. This motto doubtless -was suggested by the sign of the famous Rising Sun -Tavern, or Howard’s Inn, which then stood at the junction -of Bedford and Jamaica turnpikes, in East New -York. The sign, which was in front of the tavern as -early as 1776, was supported on posts near the road and -bore a rude picture of a rising sun and the motto which -Day adopted.</p> - -<p>In the same month—January, 1835—the bigger and -better <i>Sun</i> printed its first real sports story. The sporting -editor, who very likely was also the police reporter -and perhaps Partner Wisner as well, heard that there -was to be a fight in the fields near Hoboken between -Williamson, of Philadelphia, and Phelan, of New York. -He crossed the ferry, hired a saddle-horse in Hoboken, -and galloped to the ringside. It was bare knuckles, -London rules, and only thirty seconds’ interval between -rounds:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>At the end of three minutes Williamson fell. (Cheers -and cries of “Fair Play!”) After breathing half a -minute, they went at it again, and Phelan was knocked -down. (Cheers and cries of “Give it to him!”) In -three minutes more Williamson fell, and the adjoining -woods echoed back the shouts of the spectators.</p> -</div> - -<p>The match lasted seventy-two minutes and ended in -the defeat of Williamson. The <i>Sun’s</i> report contained -no sporting slang, and the reporter did not seem to like -pugilism:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_59">59</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>And this is what is called “sports of the ring!” We -can cheerfully encourage foot-races or any other humane -and reasonable amusement, but the Lord deliver us from -the “ring.”</p> -</div> - -<p>The following day the <i>Sun</i> denounced prize-fighting -as “a European practice, better fitted for the morally -and physically oppressed classes of London than the -enlightened republican citizens of New York.”</p> - -<p>As prosperity came, the news columns improved. The -sensational was not the only pabulum fed to the reader. -Beside the story of a duel between two midshipmen he -would find a review of the Burr autobiography, just out. -Gossip about Fanny Kemble’s quarrel with her father—the -<i>Sun</i> was vexed with the actress because she said -that New York audiences were made up of butchers—would -appear next to a staid report of the doings of -Congress. The attacks on Rum continued, and the -<i>Sun</i> was quick to oppose the proposed “licensing of -houses of prostitution and billiard-rooms.”</p> - -<p>The success of Mr. Day’s paper was so great that -every printer and newspaperman in New York longed -to run a penny journal. On June 22, 1835, the -paper’s name appeared at the head of the editorial -column on Page 2 as <i>The True Sun</i>, although on the first -page the bold head-line <i>THE SUN</i>, remained as usual. -An editorial note said:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>We have changed our inside head to <i>True Sun</i> for -reasons which will hereafter be made known.</p> -</div> - -<p>On the following day the <i>True Sun</i> title was entirely -missing, and its absence was explained in an editorial -article as follows:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Having understood on Wednesday (June 21) that a -daily paper was about being issued in this city as nearly<span class="pagenum" id="Page_60">60</span> -like our own as it could be got up, under the title of -<i>The True Sun</i>, for the avowed purpose of benefitting the -proprietors at our expense, we yesterday changed our -inside title, being determined to place an injunction -upon any such piratical proceedings. Yesterday morning -the anticipated <i>Sun</i> made its appearance, and at -first sight we immediately abandoned our intention of -defending ourselves legally, being convinced that it is -a mere catchpenny second-hand concern which (had it -our whole list and patronage) would in one month be -among the “Things that were.” It is published by -William F. Short and edited by Stephen B. Butler, who -announces that his “politics are Whig.”... Mr. -Short, with the ingenuity of a London pickpocket, -though without the honesty, has made up his paper as -nearly like ours as was possible and given it the name -of <i>The (true) Sun</i> for the purpose of imposing on the -public.... We hereby publish William F. Short and -Stephen B. Butler to our editorial brethren and to -the printing profession in general as <em>Literary Scoundrels</em>.</p> -</div> - -<p>A day later (June 24, 1835) the <i>Sun</i> declared that -in establishing the <i>True Sun</i> “Short, who is one of the -printers of the <i>Messenger</i>, actually purloined the composition -of his reading matter”; and it printed a letter -from William Burnett, publisher of the <i>Weekly Messenger</i>, -to support its charge of larceny.</p> - -<p>On June 28, six days after the <i>True Sun’s</i> first appearance, -the <i>Sun</i> announced the failure of the pretender. -The <i>True Sun’s</i> proprietors, it said, “have concluded -to abandon their piratical course.”</p> - -<p>Another <i>True Sun</i> was issued by Benjamin H. Day -in 1840, two years after he sold the <i>Sun</i> to Moses Y. -Beach. A third <i>True Sun</i>, established by former employees -of the <i>Sun</i> on March 20, 1843, ran for more than -a year. A daily called the <i>Citizen and True Sun</i>, started -in 1845, had a short life.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_61">61</span></p> - -<p>When a contemporary did not fail the <i>Sun</i> poked -fun at it:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>MAJOR NOAH’S SINGULARITY—The <i>Evening -Star</i> of yesterday comes out in favor of the French, -lottery, gambling, and phrenology for ladies. Is the -man crazy?</p> -</div> - -<p>The editor whose sanity was questioned was the -famous Mordecai Manuel Noah, one of the most versatile -men of his time. He was a newspaper correspondent -at fifteen. When he was twenty-eight, President -Madison appointed him to be consul-general at Tunis, -where he distinguished himself by his rescue of several -Americans who were held as slaves in the Barbary -States. On his return to New York, in 1816, he again -entered journalism, and was successively connected with -the <i>National Advocate</i>, the <i>Enquirer</i>, the <i>Commercial -Advertiser</i>, the <i>Times and Messenger</i>, and the <i>Evening -Star</i>. In 1825 he attempted to establish a great Jewish -colony on Grand Island, in the Niagara River, but he -found neither sympathy nor aid among his coreligionists, -and the scheme was a failure.</p> - -<p>Noah wrote a dozen dramas, all of which have been -forgotten, although he was the most popular playwright -in America at that day. His <i>Evening Star</i> was a good -paper, and the <i>Sun’s</i> quarrels with it were not serious.</p> - -<p>For their attacks on Attree, the editor of the <i>Transcript</i>, -Messrs. Day and Wisner got themselves indicted -for criminal libel. They took it calmly:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Bigger men than we have passed through that ordeal. -There is Major Noah, the Grand Mogul of the editorial -tribe, who has not only been indicted, but, we believe, -placed at the bar. Then there’s Colonel Webb; no -longer ago than last autumn he was indicted by the -grand jury of Delaware County. The colonel, it is said,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_62">62</span> -didn’t consider this a fair business transaction, and, -brushing up the mahogany pistol, he took his coach and -hounds, drove up to good old Delaware, and bid defiance -to the whole posse comitatus of the county. The greatest -men in the country have some time in the course of -their lives been indicted.</p> -</div> - -<p>A few weeks later, when Attree, who had left the -<i>Transcript</i> to write “horribles” for the <i>Courier</i>, was -terribly beaten in the street, the <i>Sun</i> denounced the -assault and tried to expose the assailants.</p> - -<p>In February, 1835, a few days after the indictment of -the partners, Mr. Wisner was challenged to a duel by a -quack dentist whose medicines the <i>Sun</i> had exposed. -The <i>Sun</i> announced editorially that Wisner accepted -the challenge, and that, having the choice of weapons, -he chose syringes charged with the dentist’s own medicine, -the distance five paces. No duel!</p> - -<p>It would seem that the <i>Sun</i> owners sought a challenge -from the fiery James Watson Webb of the mahogany -pistol, for they made many a dig at his sixpenny -paper. Here is a sample:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>OUTRAGEOUS—The <i>Courier and Enquirer</i> of Saturday -morning is just twice as large as its usual size. -The sheet is now large enough for a blanket and two -pairs of pillow-cases, and it contains, in printers’ language, -698,300 ems—equal to eight volumes of the ordinary-sized -novels of the present day. If the reading -matter were printed in pica type and put in one unbroken -line, it would reach from Nova Zembla to Terra -del Fuego. Such a paper is an insult to a civilized community.</p> -</div> - -<p>A little later, when Colonel Webb’s paper boasted of -“the largest circulation,” the <i>Sun</i> offered to bet the -colonel a thousand dollars—the money to go to the -Washington Monument Association—that the <i>Sun</i> had<span class="pagenum" id="Page_63">63</span> -a circulation twice as great as that of the big sixpenny -daily.</p> - -<p>It must not be thought, however, that the <i>Sun</i> did not -attempt to treat the serious matters of the day. It -handled them very well, considering the lack of facilities. -The war crisis with France, happily dispelled; the -amazing project of the Erie Railroad to build a line as -far west as Chautauqua County, New York; the anti-abolitionist -riots and the little religious rows; the ambitions -of Daniel Webster and the approach of Halley’s -comet—all these had their half-column or so.</p> - -<p>When Matthias the Prophet, the Dowie of that day, -was brought to trial in White Plains, Westchester -County, on a charge of having poisoned a Mr. Elijah -Pierson, the <i>Sun</i> sent a reporter to that then distant -court. It is possible that this reporter was Benjamin -H. Day himself. At any rate, Day attended the trial, -and there made the acquaintance of a man who that -very summer made the <i>Sun</i> the talk of the world and -brought to the young paper the largest circulation of -any daily.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div id="toclink_64" class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_64">64</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_III">CHAPTER III<br /> - -<span class="subhead">RICHARD ADAMS LOCKE’S MOON HOAX</span></h2> -</div> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p><i>A Magnificent Fake Which Deceived Two Continents, -Brought to “The Sun” the Largest Circulation in the -World and, in Poe’s Opinion, Established Penny Papers.</i></p> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">The</span> man whom Day met at the murder trial in -White Plains was Richard Adams Locke, a reporter -who was destined to kick up more dust than -perhaps any other man of his profession. As he comes -on the stage, we must let his predecessor, George W. -Wisner, pass into the wings.</p> - -<p>Wisner was a good man, as a reporter, as a writer -of editorial articles, and as part owner of the paper. -His campaign for Abolition irritated Mr. Day at first, -but the young man’s motives were so pure and his articles -so logical that Day recognized the justice of the -cause, even as he realized the foolish methods employed -by some of the Abolitionists. Wisner set the face of -the <i>Sun</i> against slavery, and Day kept it so, but there -were minor matters of policy upon which the partners -never agreed, never could agree.</p> - -<p>When Wisner’s health became poor, in the summer -of 1835, he expressed a desire to get away from New -York. Mr. Day paid him five thousand dollars for his -interest in the paper—a large sum in those days, considering -the fact that Wisner had won his share with -no capital except his pen. Wisner went West and settled -at Pontiac, Michigan. There his health improved,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_65">65</span> -his fortune increased, and he was at one time a member -of the Michigan Legislature.</p> - -<p>When Day found that Locke was the best reporter -attending the trial of Matthias the Prophet, he hired -him to write a series of articles on the religious fakir. -These, the first “feature stories” that ever appeared -in the <i>Sun</i>, were printed on the front page.</p> - -<p>A few weeks later, while the Matthias articles were -still being sold on the streets in pamphlet form, Locke -went to Day and told him that his boss, Colonel Webb -of the <i>Courier and Enquirer</i>, had discharged him for -working for the <i>Sun</i> “on the side.” Wisner was about -to leave the paper, and Day was glad to hire Locke, for -he needed an editorial writer. Twelve dollars a week -was the alluring wage, and Locke accepted it.</p> - -<p>Locke was then thirty-five—ten years senior to his -employer. Let his contemporary, Edgar Allan Poe, describe -him:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>He is about five feet seven inches in height, symmetrically -formed; there is an air of distinction about his -whole person—the <i xml:lang="fr" lang="fr">air noble</i> of genius. His face is -strongly pitted by the smallpox, and, perhaps from the -same cause, there is a marked obliquity in the eyes; a -certain calm, clear <em>luminousness</em>, however, about these -latter amply compensates for the defect, and the forehead -is truly beautiful in its intellectuality. I am acquainted -with no person possessing so fine a forehead -as Mr. Locke.</p> -</div> - -<p>Locke was nine years older than Poe, who at this -time had most of his fame ahead of him. Poe was quick -to recognize the quality of Locke’s writings; indeed, -the poet saw, perhaps more clearly than others of that -period, that America was full of good writers—a fact of -which the general public was neglectful. This was Poe’s -tribute to Locke’s literary gift:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_66">66</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>His prose style is noticeable for its concision, luminosity, -completeness—each quality in its proper place. -He has that <em>method</em> so generally characteristic of genius -proper. Everything he writes is a model in its peculiar -way, serving just the purposes intended and nothing to -spare.</p> -</div> - -<p>The <i>Sun’s</i> new writer was a collateral descendant of -John Locke, the English philosopher of the seventeenth -century. He was born in 1800, but his birthplace was -not New York, as his contemporary biographers wrote. -It was East Brent, Somersetshire, England. His early -American friends concealed this fact when writing of -Locke, for they feared that his English birth (all the -wounds of war had not healed) would keep him out -of some of the literary clubs. He was educated by his -mother and by private tutors until he was nineteen, -when he entered Cambridge. While still a student he -contributed to the <i>Bee</i>, the <i>Imperial Magazine</i>, and -other English publications. When he left Cambridge -he had the hardihood to start the London <i>Republican</i>, -the title of which describes its purpose. This was a -failure, for London declined to warm to the theories of -American democracy, no matter how scholarly their -expression.</p> - -<p>Abandoning the <i>Republican</i>, young Locke devoted -himself to literature and science. He ran a periodical -called the <i>Cornucopia</i> for about six months, but it was -not a financial success, and in 1832, with his wife and -infant daughter, he went to New York. Colonel Webb -put him at work on his paper.</p> - -<p>Locke could write almost anything. In Cambridge -and in Fleet Street he had picked up a wonderful store -of general information. He could turn out prose or -poetry, politics or pathos, anecdotes or astronomy.</p> - -<p>While he lived in London, Locke was a regular reader<span class="pagenum" id="Page_67">67</span> -of the Edinburgh <i>New Philosophical Journal</i>, and he -brought some copies of it to America. One of these, -an issue of 1826, contained an article by Dr. Thomas -Dick, of Dundee, a pious man, but inclined to speculate -on the possibilities of the universe. In this article Dr. -Dick suggested the feasibility of communicating with -the moon by means of great stone symbols on the face -of the earth. The people of the moon—if there were any—would -fathom the diagrams and reply in a similar -way. Dr. Dick explained afterward that he wrote this -piece with the idea of satirizing a certain coterie of -eccentric German astronomers.</p> - -<p>Now it happened that Sir John Frederick William -Herschel, the greatest astronomer of his time, and the -son of the celebrated astronomer Sir William Herschel, -went to South Africa in January, 1834, and established -an observatory at Feldhausen, near Cape Town, with -the intention of completing his survey of the sidereal -heavens by examining the southern skies as he had -swept the northern, thus to make the first telescopic -survey of the whole surface of the visible heavens.</p> - -<p>Locke knew about Sir John and his mission. The -Matthias case had blown over, the big fire in Fulton -Street was almost forgotten, and things were a bit dull -on the island of Manhattan. The newspapers were in -a state of armed truce. As Locke and his fellow journalists -gathered at the American Hotel bar for their -after-dinner brandy, it is probable that there was nothing, -not even the great sloth recently arrived at the -American Museum, to excite a good argument.</p> - -<p>Locke needed money, for his salary of twelve dollars -a week could ill support the fine gentleman that he was; -so he laid a plan before Mr. Day. It was a plot as well -as a plan, and the first angle of the plot appeared on -the second page of the <i>Sun</i> on August 21, 1835:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_68">68</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>CELESTIAL DISCOVERIES—The Edinburgh -<i>Courant</i> says—“We have just learnt from an eminent -publisher in this city that Sir John Herschel, at the -Cape of Good Hope, has made some astronomical discoveries -of the most wonderful description, by means of -an immense telescope of an entirely new principle.”</p> -</div> - -<p>Nothing further appeared until Tuesday, August 25, -when three columns of the <i>Sun’s</i> first page took the -newspaper and scientific worlds by the ears. Those -were not the days of big type. The <i>Sun’s</i> heading read:</p> - -<p class="p1 b0 center wspace vspace bold large"> -GREAT ASTRONOMICAL DISCOVERIES.</p> -<hr class="narrow" /> -<p class="center bold vspace wspace">LATELY MADE<br /> -BY SIR JOHN HERSCHEL, LL.D., F.R.S., &c.</p> -<hr class="narrow" /> -<p class="center bold smaller wspace">At the Cape of Good Hope.</p> -<hr class="narrow" /> -<p class="center b1">[<cite>From Supplement to the Edinburgh Journal of Science.</cite>] -</p> - -<p>It may as well be said here that although there had -been an Edinburgh <i>Journal of Science</i>, it ceased to -exist several years before 1835. The periodical to which -Dr. Dick, of Dundee, contributed his moon theories was, -in a way, the successor to the <i>Journal of Science</i>, but -it was called the <i>New Philosophical Journal</i>. The -likeness of names was not great, but enough to cause -some confusion. It is also noteworthy that the sly -Locke credited to a supplement, rather than to the -<i>Journal of Science</i> itself, the revelations which he that -day began to pour before the eyes of <i>Sun</i> readers. Thus -he started:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>In this unusual addition to our <i>Journal</i> we have the -happiness of making known to the British public, and -thence to the whole civilized world, recent discoveries -in astronomy which will build an imperishable monument -to the age in which we live, and confer upon the -present generation of the human race proud distinction -through all future time. It has been poetically said -that the stars of heaven are the hereditary regalia of -man as the intellectual sovereign of the animal creation. -He may now fold the zodiac around him with a loftier -consciousness of his mental supremacy.</p> -</div> - -<div id="ip_68" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 34em;"> - <img src="images/i_068a.jpg" width="1607" height="2103" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - -<p>RICHARD ADAMS LOCKE, AUTHOR OF THE MOON HOAX</p> - -<p class="subhead">From an Engraving in the Possession of His Granddaughter, Mrs. F. Winthrop -White of New Brighton, S. I.</p> -</div></div> - -<p>After solemnly dwelling on the awe which mortal -man must feel upon peering into the secrets of the sky, -the article declared that Sir John “paused several -hours before he commenced his observations, that he -might prepare his own mind for discoveries which he -knew would fill the minds of myriads of his fellow men -with astonishment.” It continued:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>And well might he pause! From the hour the first -human pair opened their eyes to the glories of the blue -firmament above them, there has been no accession to -human knowledge at all comparable in sublime interest -to that which he has been the honored agent in supplying. -Well might he pause! He was about to become -the sole depository of wondrous secrets which had been -hid from the eyes of all men that had lived since the -birth of time.</p> -</div> - -<p>At the end of a half-column of glorification, the writer -got down to brass tacks:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>To render our enthusiasm intelligible, we will state -at once that by means of a telescope, of vast dimensions -and an entirely new principle, the younger Herschel, at -his observatory in the southern hemisphere, has already -made the most extraordinary discoveries in every planet -of our solar system; has discovered planets in other -solar systems; has obtained a distinct view of objects in -the moon, fully equal to that which the unaided eye -commands of terrestrial objects at the distance of one -hundred yards; has affirmatively settled the question -whether this satellite be inhabited, and by what orders -of beings; has firmly established a new theory of cometary<span class="pagenum" id="Page_70">70</span> -phenomena; and has solved or corrected nearly -every leading problem of mathematical astronomy.</p> -</div> - -<p>And where was the <i>Journal of Science</i> getting this -mine of astronomical revelation for its supplement? -The mystery is explained at once:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>We are indebted to the devoted friendship of Dr. -Andrew Grant, the pupil of the elder, and for several -years past the inseparable coadjutor of the younger Herschel. -The amanuensis of the latter at the Cape of Good -Hope, and the indefatigable superintendent of his telescope -during the whole period of its construction and -operations, Dr. Grant has been able to supply us with -intelligence equal in general interest at least to that -which Dr. Herschel himself has transmitted to the Royal -Society. For permission to indulge his friendship in -communicating this invaluable information to us, Dr. -Grant and ourselves are indebted to the magnanimity of -Dr. Herschel, who, far above all mercenary considerations, -has thus signally honored and rewarded his fellow -laborer in the field of science.</p> -</div> - -<p>Regarding the illustrations which, according to the -implications of the text, accompanied the supplement, -the writer was specific. Most of them, he stated, were -copies of “drawings taken in the observatory by Herbert -Home, Esq., who accompanied the last powerful -series of reflectors from London to the Cape. The -engraving of the belts of Jupiter is a reduced copy of -an imperial folio drawing by Dr. Herschel himself. The -segment of the inner ring of Saturn is from a large -drawing by Dr. Grant.”</p> - -<p>A history of Sir William Herschel’s work and a description -of his telescopes took up a column of the -<i>Sun</i>, and on top of this came the details—as the <i>Journal</i> -printed them—of Sir John’s plans to outdo his -father by revolutionary methods and a greater telescope.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_71">71</span> -Sir John, it appeared, was in conference with Sir David -Brewster:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>After a few minutes’ silent thought, Sir John diffidently -inquired whether it would not be possible to -effect a <em>transfusion of artificial light through the focal -object of vision!</em> Sir David, somewhat startled at the -originality of the idea, paused a while, and then hesitatingly -referred to the refrangibility of rays and the -angle of incidence. Sir John, grown more confident, -adduced the example of the Newtonian reflector, in -which the refrangibility was corrected by the second -speculum and the angle of incidence restored by the -third.</p> - -<p>“And,” continued he, “why cannot the illuminated -microscope, say the hydro-oxygen, be applied to render -distinct and, if necessary, even to magnify, the focal -object?”</p> - -<p>Sir David sprang from his chair in an ecstasy of conviction, -and, leaping half-way to the ceiling, exclaimed:</p> - -<p>“Thou art the man!”</p> -</div> - -<p>Details of the casting of a great lens came next. It -was twenty-four feet in diameter, and weighed nearly -fifteen thousand pounds after it was polished; its estimated -magnifying-power was forty-two thousand times. -As he saw it safely started on its way to Africa, Sir -John “expressed confidence in his ultimate ability to -study even the entomology of the moon, in case she contained -insects upon her surface.”</p> - -<p>Thus ended the first instalment of the story. Where -had the <i>Sun</i> got the <i>Journal of Science</i> supplement? -An editorial article answered that “it was very politely -furnished us by a medical gentleman immediately from -Scotland, in consequence of a paragraph which appeared -on Friday last from the Edinburgh <i>Courant</i>.” The article -added:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_72">72</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The portion which we publish to-day is introductory -to celestial discoveries of higher and more universal interest -than any, in any science yet known to the human -race. Now indeed it may be said that we live in an age -of discovery.</p> -</div> - -<p>It cannot be said that the whole town buzzed with -excitement that day. Perhaps this first instalment was -a bit over the heads of most readers; it was so technical, -so foreign. But in Nassau and Ann Streets, wherever -two newspapermen were gathered together, there was -buzzing enough. What was coming next? Why hadn’t -they thought to subscribe to the Edinburgh <i>Journal of -Science</i>, with its wonderful supplement?</p> - -<p>Nearly four columns of the revelations appeared on -the following day—August 26, 1835. This time the -reading public came trooping into camp, for the <i>Sun’s</i> -reprint of the <i>Journal of Science</i> supplement got beyond -the stage of preliminaries and predictions, and began -to tell of what was to be seen on the moon. Scientists -and newspapermen appreciated the detailed description -of the mammoth telescope and the work of placing it, -but the public, like a child, wanted the moon—and got -it. Let us plunge in at about the point where the public -plunged:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The specimen of lunar vegetation, however, which -they had already seen, had decided a question of too -exciting an interest to induce them to retard its exit. -It had demonstrated that the moon has an atmosphere -constituted similarly to our own, and capable of sustaining -organized and, therefore, most probably, animal -life.</p> - -<p>“The trees,” says Dr. Grant, “for a period of ten -minutes were of one unvaried kind, and unlike any I -have seen except the largest class of yews in the English -churchyards, which they in some respects resemble. -These were followed by a level green plain which, as<span class="pagenum" id="Page_73">73</span> -measured by the painted circle on our canvas of forty-nine -feet, must have been more than half a mile in -breadth.”</p> -</div> - -<p>The article had explained that, by means of a great -reflector, the lunar views were thrown upon a big canvas -screen behind the telescope.</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Then appeared as fine a forest of firs, unequivocal -firs, as I have ever seen cherished in the bosom of my -native mountains. Wearied with the long continuance -of these, we greatly reduced the magnifying power of the -microscope without eclipsing either of the reflectors, -and immediately perceived that we had been insensibly -descending, as it were, a mountainous district of highly -diversified and romantic character, and that we were -on the verge of a lake, or inland sea; but of what relative -locality or extent, we were yet too greatly magnified -to determine.</p> - -<p>On introducing the feeblest achromatic lens we possessed, -we found that the water, whose boundary we had -just discovered, answered in general outline to the Mare -Nubicum of Riccoli. Fairer shores never angel coasted -on a tour of pleasure. A beach of brilliant white sand, -girt with wild, castellated rocks, apparently of green -marble, varied at chasms, occurring every two or three -hundred feet, with grotesque blocks of chalk or gypsum, -and feathered and festooned at the summits with the -clustering foliage of unknown trees, moved along the -bright wall of our apartment until we were speechless -with admiration.</p> -</div> - -<p>A column farther on, in a wonderful valley of this -wonderful moon, life at last burst upon the seers:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>In the shade of the woods on the southeastern side -we beheld continuous herds of brown quadrupeds, having -all the external characteristics of the bison, but more -diminutive than any species of the <i xml:lang="la" lang="la">bos</i> genus in our -natural history. Its tail was like that of our <i xml:lang="la" lang="la">bos grunniens</i>; -but in its semicircular horns, the hump on its -shoulders, the depth of its dewlap, and the length of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_74">74</span> -its shaggy hair, it closely resembled the species to which -I have compared it.</p> - -<p>It had, however, one widely distinctive feature, which -we afterward found common to nearly every lunar -quadruped we have discovered; namely, a remarkable -fleshy appendage over the eyes, crossing the whole -breadth of the forehead and united to the ears. We -could most distinctly perceive this hairy veil, which -was shaped like the upper front outline of the cap known -to the ladies as Mary Queen of Scots cap, lifted and lowered -by means of the ears. It immediately occurred to -the acute mind of Dr. Herschel that this was a providential -contrivance to protect the eyes of the animal -from the great extremes of light and darkness to which -all the inhabitants of our side of the moon are periodically -subjected.</p> - -<p>The next animal perceived would be classed on earth -as a monster. It was of a bluish lead color, about the -size of a goat, with a head and beard like him, and a -<em>single horn</em>, slightly inclined forward from the perpendicular. -The female was destitute of the horn and -beard, but had a much longer tail. It was gregarious, -and chiefly abounded on the acclivitous glades of the -woods. In elegance of symmetry it rivaled the antelope, -and like him it seemed an agile, sprightly creature, running -with great speed and springing from the green turf -with all the unaccountable antics of the young lamb or -kitten.</p> - -<p>This beautiful creature afforded us the most exquisite -amusement. The mimicry of its movements upon our -white-painted canvas was as faithful and luminous as -that of animals within a few yards of a camera obscura -when seen pictured upon its tympan. Frequently, when -attempting to put our fingers upon its beard, it would -suddenly bound away into oblivion, as if conscious of -our earthly impertinence; but then others would appear, -whom we could not prevent nibbling the herbage, say or -do what we would to them.</p> -</div> - -<p>So, at last, the people of earth knew something concrete -about the live things of the moon. Goats with<span class="pagenum" id="Page_75">75</span> -beards were there, and every New Yorker knew goats, -for they fed upon the rocky hills of Harlem. And the -moon had birds, too:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>On examining the center of this delightful valley we -found a large, branching river, abounding with lovely -islands and water-birds of numerous kinds. A species -of gray pelican was the most numerous, but black and -white cranes, with unreasonably long legs and bill, were -also quite common. We watched their piscivorous experiments -a long time in hopes of catching sight of a -lunar fish; but, although we were not gratified in this -respect, we could easily guess the purpose with which -they plunged their long necks so deeply beneath the -water. Near the upper extremity of one of these islands -we obtained a glimpse of a strange amphibious creature -of a spherical form, which rolled with great velocity -across the pebbly beach, and was lost sight of in the -strong current which set off from this angle of the -island.</p> -</div> - -<p>At this point clouds intervened, and the Herschel -party had to call it a day. But it had been a big day, -and nobody who read the <i>Sun</i> wondered that the astronomers -tossed off “congratulatory bumpers of the best -‘East India particular,’ and named this place of wonders -the Valley of the Unicorn.” So ended the <i>Sun</i> -story of August 26, but an editorial paragraph assured -the patrons of the paper that on the morrow there would -be a treat even richer.</p> - -<p>What did the other papers say? In the language of -a later and less elegant period, most of them ate it up—some -eagerly, some grudgingly, some a bit dubiously, but -they ate it, either in crumbs or in hunks. The <i>Daily -Advertiser</i> declared:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>No article has appeared for years that will command -so general a perusal and publication. Sir John has<span class="pagenum" id="Page_76">76</span> -added a stock of knowledge to the present age that will -immortalize his name and place it high on the page of -science.</p> -</div> - -<p>The <i>Mercantile Advertiser</i>, knowing that its lofty -readers were unlikely to see the moon revelations in -the lowly <i>Sun</i>, hastened to begin reprinting the articles -in full, with the remark that the document appeared to -have intrinsic evidence of authenticity.</p> - -<p>The <i>Times</i>, a daily then only a year old, and destined -to live only eighteen months more—later, of course, the -title was used by a successful daily—said that everything -in the <i>Sun</i> story was probable and plausible, and -had an “air of intense verisimilitude.”</p> - -<p>The New York <i>Sunday News</i> advised the incredulous -to be patient:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Our doubts and incredulity may be a wrong to the -learned astronomer, and the circumstances of this wonderful -discovery may be correct.</p> -</div> - -<p>The <i>Courier and Enquirer</i> said nothing at all. Like -the <i>Journal of Commerce</i>, it hated the <i>Sun</i> for a lucky -upstart. Both of these sixpenny respectables stood -silent, with their axes behind their backs. Their own -readers, the Livingstons and the Stuyvesants, got not a -line about the moon from the blanket sheets, but they -sent down into the kitchen and borrowed the <i>Sun</i> from -the domestics, on the shallow pretext of wishing to -discover whether their employees were reading a moral -newspaper—as indeed they were.</p> - -<p>The <i>Herald</i>, then about four months old, said not a -word about the moon story. In fact, that was a period -in which it said nothing at all about any subject, for -the fire of that summer had unfortunately wiped out -its plant. On the very days when the moon stories appeared, -Mr. Bennett stood cracking his knuckles in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_77">77</span> -front of his new establishment, the basement of 202 -Broadway, trying to hurry the men who were installing -a double-cylinder press. Being a wise person, he advertised -his progress in the <i>Sun</i>. It may have vexed -him to see the circulation of the <i>Sun</i>—which he had -imitated in character and price—bound higher and -higher as he stood helpless.</p> - -<p>The third instalment of the literary treasure so -obligingly imported by the “medical gentleman immediately -from Scotland” introduced to <i>Sun</i> readers new -and important regions of the moon—the Vagabond -Mountains, the Lake of Death, craters of extinct volcanoes -twenty-eight hundred feet high, and twelve luxuriant -forests divided by open plains “in which waved -an ocean of verdure, and which were probably prairies -like those of North America.” The details were satisfying:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Dr. Herschel has classified not less than thirty-eight -species of forest trees and nearly twice this number of -plants, found in this tract alone, which are widely different -to those found in more equatorial latitudes. Of -animals he classified nine species of mammalia and five -of oviparia. Among the former is a small kind of reindeer, -the elk, the moose, the horned bear, and the biped -beaver.</p> - -<p>The last resembles the beaver of the earth in every -other respect than its destitution of a tail and its invariable -habit of walking upon only two feet. It carries -its young in its arms, like a human being, and walks -with an easy, gliding motion. Its huts are constructed -better and higher than those of many tribes of human -savages, and from the appearance of smoke in nearly -all of them there is no doubt of its being acquainted -with the use of fire.</p> -</div> - -<p>The largest lake described was two hundred and -sixty-six miles long and one hundred and ninety-three<span class="pagenum" id="Page_78">78</span> -wide, shaped like the Bay of Bengal, and studded with -volcanic islands. One island in a large bay was pinnacled -with quartz crystals as brilliant as fire. Near -by roamed zebras three feet high. Golden and blue -pheasants strutted about. The beach was covered with -shell-fish. Dr. Grant did not say whether the fire-making -beavers ever held a clambake there.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> of Friday, August 28, 1835, was a notable -issue. Not yet two years old, Mr. Day’s newspaper had -the satisfaction of announcing that it had achieved the -largest circulation of any daily in the world. It had, it -said, 15,440 regular subscribers in New York and 700 -in Brooklyn, and it sold 2,000 in the streets and 1,220 -out of town—a grand total of 19,360 copies, as against -the 17,000 circulation of the London <i>Times</i>. The double-cylinder -Napier press in the building at Nassau and -Spruce Streets—the corner where the <i>Tribune</i> is to-day, -and to which the <i>Sun</i> had moved on August 3—had to -run ten hours a day to satisfy the public demand. People -waited with more or less patience until three o’clock -in the afternoon to read about the moon.</p> - -<p>That very issue contained the most sensational instalment -of all the moon series, for through that mystic -chain which included Dr. Grant, the supplement of the -Edinburgh <i>Journal of Science</i>, the “medical gentleman -immediately from Scotland,” and the <i>Sun</i>, public curiosity -as to the presence of human creatures on the orb -of night was satisfied at last. The astronomers were -looking upon the cliffs and crags of a new part of the -moon:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>But whilst gazing upon them in a perspective of -about half a mile we were thrilled with astonishment -to perceive four successive flocks of large winged creatures, -wholly unlike any kind of birds, descend with a -slow, even motion from the cliffs on the western side<span class="pagenum" id="Page_79">79</span> -and alight upon the plain. They were first noticed by -Dr. Herschel, who exclaimed:</p> - -<p>“Now gentlemen, my theories against your proofs, -which you have often found a pretty even bet, we have -here something worth looking at. I was confident that -if ever we found beings in human shape it would be in -this longitude, and that they would be provided by their -Creator with some extraordinary powers of locomotion. -First, exchange for my Number D.”</p> - -<p>This lens, being soon introduced, gave us a fine half-mile -distance; and we counted three parties of these -creatures, of twelve, nine, and fifteen in each, walking -erect toward a small wood near the base of the eastern -precipices. Certainly they were like human beings, for -their wings had now disappeared, and their attitude in -walking was both erect and dignified.</p> - -<p>Having observed them at this distance for some minutes, -we introduced lens H.<em>z</em>., which brought them to the -apparent proximity of eighty yards—the highest clear -magnitude we possessed until the latter end of March, -when we effected an improvement in the gas burners.</p> - -<p>About half of the first party had passed beyond our -canvas; but of all the others we had a perfectly distinct -and deliberate view. They averaged four feet in height, -were covered, except on the face, with short and glossy -copper-colored hair, and had wings composed of a thin -membrane, without hair, lying snugly upon their backs, -from the top of the shoulders to the calves of the legs.</p> - -<p>The face, which was of a yellowish flesh-color, was a -slight improvement upon that of the large orang-utan, -being more open and intelligent in its expression, and -having a much greater expanse of forehead. The mouth, -however, was very prominent, though somewhat relieved -by a thick beard upon the lower jaw, and by lips -far more human than those of any species of the <i xml:lang="la" lang="la">Simia</i> -genus.</p> - -<p>In general symmetry of body and limbs they were infinitely -superior to the orang-utan; so much so that, but -for their long wings, Lieutenant Drummond said they -would look as well on a parade-ground as some of the -old cockney militia. The hair on the head was a darker<span class="pagenum" id="Page_80">80</span> -color than that of the body, closely curled, but apparently -not woolly, and arranged in two curious semi-circles -over the temples of the forehead. Their feet -could only be seen as they were alternately lifted in -walking; but from what we could see of them in so transient -a view, they appeared thin and very protuberant -at the heel.</p> - -<p>Whilst passing across the canvas, and whenever we -afterward saw them, these creatures were evidently -engaged in conversation; their gesticulation, more particularly -the varied action of the hands and arms, appeared -impassioned and emphatic. We hence inferred -that they were rational beings, and, although not perhaps -of so high an order as others which we discovered -the next month on the shores of the Bay of Rainbows, -that they were capable of producing works of art and -contrivance.</p> - -<p>The next view we obtained of them was still more favorable. -It was on the borders of a little lake, or expanded -stream, which we then for the first time perceived -running down the valley to the large lake, and -having on its eastern margin a small wood. Some of -these creatures had crossed this water and were lying -like spread eagles on the skirts of the wood.</p> - -<p>We could then perceive that their wings possessed -great expansion, and were similar in structure to those -of the bat, being a semi-transparent membrane expanded -in curvilineal divisions by means of straight -radii, united at the back by the dorsal integuments. -But what astonished us very much was the circumstance -of this membrane being continued from the shoulders to -the legs, united all the way down, though gradually decreasing -in width. The wings seemed completely under -the command of volition, for those of the creatures -whom we saw bathing in the water spread them instantly -to their full width, waved them as ducks do -theirs to shake off the water, and then as instantly -closed them again in a compact form.</p> - -<p>Our further observation of the habits of these creatures, -who were of both sexes, led to results so very remarkable -that I prefer they should be first laid before<span class="pagenum" id="Page_81">81</span> -the public in Dr. Herschel’s own work, where I have -reason to know that they are fully and faithfully stated, -however incredulously they may be received....</p> - -<p>The three families then almost simultaneously spread -their wings, and were lost in the dark confines of the -canvas before we had time to breathe from our paralyzing -astonishment. We scientifically denominated them -the <i xml:lang="la" lang="la">vespertilio-homo</i>, or man-bat; and they are doubtless -innocent and happy creatures, notwithstanding -some of their amusements would but ill comport with -our terrestrial notions of decorum.</p> -</div> - -<p>So ended the account, in Dr. Grant’s words, of that -fateful day. The editor of the supplement, perhaps a -cousin of the “medical gentleman immediately arrived -from Scotland,” added that although he had of course -faithfully obeyed Dr. Grant’s injunction to omit “these -highly curious passages,” he did not “clearly perceive -the force of the reasons assigned for it,” and he added:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>From these, however, and other prohibited passages, -which will be published by Dr. Herschel with the certificates -of the civil and military authorities of the -colony, and of several Episcopal, Wesleyan, and other -ministers who, in the month of March last, were permitted -under the stipulation of temporary secrecy to -visit the observatory and become eye-witnesses of the -wonders which they were requested to attest, we are confident -his forthcoming volumes will be at once the most -sublime in science and the most intense in general interest -that ever issued from the press.</p> -</div> - -<p>New York now stopped its discussion of human -slavery, the high cost of living—apples cost as much as -four cents apiece in Wall Street—and other familiar -topics, and devoted its talking hours to the man-bats of -the moon. The <i>Sun</i> was stormed by people who wanted -back numbers of the stories, and flooded with demands<span class="pagenum" id="Page_82">82</span> -by mail. As the text of the <i>Journal of Science</i> article -indicated that the original narrative had been illustrated, -there was a cry for pictures.</p> - -<p>Mr. Day was busy with the paper and its overworked -press, but he gave Mr. Locke a free hand, and that -scholar took to Norris & Baker, lithographers, in the -Union Building, Wall Street, the drawings which had -been intrusted to his care by the “medical gentleman -immediately from Scotland.” Mr. Baker, described by -the <i>Sun</i> as quite the most talented lithographic artist -of the city, worked day and night on his delightful task, -that the illustrations might be ready when the <i>Sun’s</i> -press should have turned out, in the hours when it was -not printing <i>Suns</i>, a pamphlet containing the astronomical -discoveries.</p> - -<p>“Dr. Herschel’s great work,” said the <i>Sun</i>, “is preparing -for publication at ten guineas sterling, or fifty -dollars; and we shall give all the popular substance of -it for twelve or thirteen cents.” The pamphlets were to -be sold two for a quarter; the lithographs at twenty-five -cents for the set.</p> - -<p>Most newspapers that mentioned the discovery of -human creatures on the moon were credulous. The -<i>Evening Post</i>, edited by William Cullen Bryant and -Fitz-Greene Halleck—“the chanting cherubs of the -<i>Post</i>,” as Colonel Webb was wont to call them—only -skirted the edge of doubt:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>That there should be winged people in the moon does -not strike us as more wonderful than the existence of -such a race of beings on earth; and that there does or -did exist such a race rests on the evidence of that most -veracious of voyagers, <em>Peter Wilkins</em>, whose celebrated -work not only gives an account of the general appearance -and habits of a most interesting tribe of flying Indians, -but also of those more delicate and engaging<span class="pagenum" id="Page_83">83</span> -traits which the author was enabled to discover by reason -of the conjugal relations he entered into with one of -the females of the winged tribe.</p> -</div> - -<p><em>Peter Wilkins</em> was the hero of Robert Paltock’s imaginative -book, “The Life and Adventures of Peter Wilkins, -a Cornish Man,” published in London in 1750. -Paltock’s winged people, said Southey, were “the most -beautiful creatures of imagination that were ever devised.”</p> - -<p>The instalment of the discoveries printed on August -29 revealed to the reader the great Temple of the Moon, -built of polished sapphire, with a roof of some yellow -metal, supported by columns seventy feet high and six -feet in diameter:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>It was open on all sides, and seemed to contain -neither seats, altars, nor offerings, but it was a light -and airy structure, nearly a hundred feet high from -its white, glistening floor to the glowing roof, and it -stood upon a round, green eminence on the eastern side -of the valley. We afterward, however, discovered two -others which were in every respect facsimiles of this -one; but in neither did we perceive any visitants except -flocks of wild doves, which alighted on its lustrous -pinnacles.</p> - -<p>Had the devotees of these temples gone the way of all -living, or were the latter merely historical monuments? -What did the ingenious builders mean by the globe surrounded -with flames? Did they, by this, record any -past calamity of <em>their</em> world, or predict any future one -of <em>ours</em>? I by no means despair of ultimately solving -not only these, but a thousand other questions which -present themselves respecting the object in this planet; -for not the millionth part of her surface has yet been -explored, and we have been more desirous of collecting -the greatest possible number of new facts than of indulging -in speculative theories, however seductive to the -imagination.</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_84">84</span></p> - -<p>The conclusion of this astounding narrative, which -totalled eleven thousand words, was printed on August -31. In the valley of the temple a new set of man-bats -was found:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>We had no opportunity of seeing them actually engaged -in any work of industry or art; and, so far as we -could judge, they spent their happy hours in collecting -various fruits in the woods, in eating, flying, bathing, -and loitering about upon the summits of precipices.</p> -</div> - -<p>One night, when the astronomers finished work, they -neglectfully left the telescope facing the eastern horizon. -The risen sun burned a hole fifteen feet in circumference -through the reflecting chamber, and ruined -part of the observatory. When the damage was repaired, -the moon was invisible, and so Dr. Herschel -turned his attention to Saturn. Most of the discoveries -here were technical, as the <i>Sun</i> assured its readers, and -the narrative came to an end. An editorial note added:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>This concludes the supplement with the exception of -forty pages of illustrative and mathematical notes, -which would greatly enhance the size and price of this -work without commensurably adding to its general interest. -In order that our readers may judge for themselves -whether we have withheld from them any matter -of general comprehension and interest, we insert one -of the notes from those pages of the supplement which -we thought it useless to reprint; and it may be considered -a fair sample of the remainder. For ourselves, -we know nothing of mathematics beyond counting dollars -and cents, but to geometricians the following new -method of measuring the height of the lunar mountains, -adopted by Sir John Herschel, may be quite interesting.</p> -</div> - -<p>Perhaps the pretended method of measuring lunar -mountains was not interesting to laymen, but it may -have been the cause of an intellectual tumult at Yale.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_85">85</span> -At all events, a deputation from that college hurried -to the steamboat and came to New York to see the -wonderful supplement. The collegians saw Mr. Day, -and voiced their desire.</p> - -<p>“Surely,” he replied, “you do not doubt that we -have the supplement in our possession? I suppose the -magazine is somewhere up-stairs, but I consider it almost -an insult that you should ask to see it.”</p> - -<p>On their way out the Yale men heard, perhaps from -the “devil,” that one Locke was interested in the matter -of the moon, that he had handled the supplement, and -that he was to be seen at the foot of the stairs, smoking -his cigar and gazing across City Hall Park. They advanced -upon him, and he, less brusque than Mr. Day, -told the scientific pilgrims that the supplement was in -the hands of a printer in William Street—giving the -name and address.</p> - -<p>As the Yale men disappeared in the direction of the -printery, Locke started for the same goal, and more -rapidly. When the Yalensians arrived, the printer, -primed by Locke, told them that the precious pamphlet -had just been sent to another shop, where certain proof-reading -was to be done. And so they went from post -to pillar until the hour came for their return to New -Haven. It would not do to linger in New York, for -Professors Denison Olmsted and Elias Loomis were -that very day getting their first peep at Halley’s comet, -about to make the regular appearance with which it -favours the earth every seventy-six years.</p> - -<p>But Yale was not the only part of intellectual New -England to be deeply interested in the moon and its -bat-men. The <i>Gazette</i> of Hampshire, Massachusetts, -insisted that Edward Everett, who was then running -for Governor, had these astronomical discoveries in -mind when he declared that “we know not how soon<span class="pagenum" id="Page_86">86</span> -the mind, in its researches into the labyrinth of nature, -would grasp some clue which would lead to a new universe -and change the aspect of the world.”</p> - -<p>Harriet Martineau, who was touring America at the -time, wrote in her “Sketches of Western Travel” that -the ladies of Springfield, Massachusetts, subscribed to -a fund to send missionaries to the benighted luminary. -When the <i>Sun</i> articles reached Paris, they were at once -translated into illustrated pamphlets, and the caricaturists -of the Paris newspapers drew pictures of the -man-bats going through the streets singing “<i xml:lang="fr" lang="fr">Au Clair -de la Lune</i>.” London, Edinburgh, and Glasgow made -haste to issue editions of the work.</p> - -<p>Meanwhile, of course, Sir John Herschel was busy -with his telescope at the Cape, all unaware of his expanded -fame in the north. Caleb Weeks, of Jamaica, -Long Island, the Adam Forepaugh of his day, was setting -out for South Africa to get a supply of giraffes for -his menagerie, and he had the honour of laying in the -great astronomer’s hand a clean copy of the pamphlet. -To say that Sir John was amazed at the <i>Sun’s</i> enterprise -would be putting it mildly. When he had read -the story through, he went to Caleb Weeks and said that -he was overcome; that he never could hope to live up -to the fame that had been heaped upon him.</p> - -<p>In New York, meanwhile, Richard Adams Locke had -spilled the beans. There was a reporter named Finn, -once employed by the <i>Sun</i>, but later a scribe for the -<i>Journal of Commerce</i>. He and Locke were friends. -One afternoon Gerard Hallock, who was David Hale’s -partner in the proprietorship of the <i>Journal of Commerce</i>, -called Finn to his office and told him to get extra -copies of the <i>Sun</i> containing the moon story, as the -<i>Journal</i> had decided, in justice to its readers, that it -must reprint it.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_87">87</span></p> - -<p>Perhaps at the <i>Sun</i> office, perhaps in the tap-room -of the Washington Hotel, Finn met Locke, and they -went socially about to public places. Finn told Locke -of the work on which he was engaged, and said that, -as the moon story was already being put into type at the -<i>Journal</i> office, it was likely that it would be printed on -the morrow.</p> - -<p>“Don’t print it right away,” said Locke. “I wrote -it myself.”</p> - -<p>The next day the <i>Journal</i>, instead of being silently -grateful for the warning, denounced the alleged discoveries -as a hoax. Mr. Bennett, who by this time -had the <i>Herald</i> once more in running order, not only -cried “Hoax!” but named Locke as the author.</p> - -<p>Probably Locke was glad that the suspense was over. -He is said to have told a friend that he had not intended -the story as a hoax, but as satire.</p> - -<p>“It is quite evident,” he said, as he saw the whole -country take the marvellous narrative seriously, “that -it is an abortive satire; and I am the best self-hoaxed -man in the whole community.”</p> - -<p>But while the <i>Sun’s</i> rivals denounced the hoax, the -<i>Sun</i> was not quick to admit that it had gulled not only -its own readers but almost all the scientific world. Barring -the casual conversation between Locke and Finn, -there was no evidence plain enough to convince the layman -that it was a hoax. The <i>Sun</i> fenced lightly and -skilfully with all controverters. On September 16, -more than two weeks after the conclusion of the story, -it printed a long editorial article on the subject of the -authenticity of the discoveries, mentioning the wide-spread -interest that had been displayed in them:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Most of those who incredulously regard the whole -narrative as a hoax are generously enthusiastic in -panegyrizing not only what they are pleased to denominate<span class="pagenum" id="Page_88">88</span> -its ingenuity and talent, but also its useful effect -in diverting the public mind, for a while, from that -bitter apple of discord, the abolition of slavery, which -still unhappily threatens to turn the milk of human -kindness into rancorous gall. That the astronomical -discoveries have had this effect is obvious from our exchange -papers. Who knows, therefore, whether these -discoveries in the moon, with the visions of the blissful -harmony of her inhabitants which they have revealed, -may not have had the effect of reproving the discords of -a country which might be happy as a paradise, which -has valleys not less lovely than those of the Ruby Colosseum, -of the Unicorn, or of the Triads; and which has -not inferior facilities for social intercourse to those possessed -by the <i xml:lang="la" lang="la">vespertiliones-homines</i>, or any other -<i xml:lang="la" lang="la">homines</i> whatever?</p> - -<p>Some persons of little faith but great good nature, -who consider the “moon story,” as it is vulgarly called, -an adroit fiction of our own, are quite of the opinion -that this was the amiable moral which the writer had in -view. Other readers, however, construe the whole as -an elaborate satire upon the monstrous fabrications of -the political press of the country and the various genera -and species of its party editors. In the blue goat with -the single horn, mentioned as it is in connection with -the royal arms of England, many persons fancy they -perceive the characteristics of a notorious foreigner -who is the supervising editor of one of our largest morning -papers.</p> - -<p>We confess that this idea of intended satire somewhat -shook our own faith in the genuineness of the extracts -from the Edinburgh <i>Journal of Science</i> with -which a gentleman connected with our office furnished -us as “from a medical gentleman immediately from -Scotland.”</p> - -<p>Certain correspondents have been urging us to come -out and confess the whole to be a hoax; but this we can -by no means do until we have the testimony of the -English or Scotch papers to corroborate such a declaration. -In the mean time let every reader of the account -examine it and enjoy his own opinion. Many intelligent<span class="pagenum" id="Page_89">89</span> -and scientific persons will believe it true, and will -continue to do so to their lives’ end; whilst the skepticism -of others would not be removed though they were -in Dr. Herschel’s observatory itself.</p> -</div> - -<p>The New York showmen of that day were keen for -novelty, and the moon story helped them to it. Mr. -Hannington, who ran the diorama in the City Saloon—which -was not a barroom, but an amusement house—on -Broadway opposite St. Paul’s Church, put on “The -Lunar Discoveries; a Brilliant Illustration of the Scientific -Observation of the Surface of the Moon, to Which -Will Be Added the Reported Lunar Observations of -Sir John Herschel.” Hannington had been showing -“The Deluge” and “The Burning of Moscow,” but the -wonders of the moon proved to be far more attractive -to his patrons. The <i>Sun</i> approved of this moral -spectacle:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Hannington forever and still years afterward, say we! -His panorama of the lunar discoveries, in connexion -with the beautiful dioramas, are far superior to any -other exhibition in this country.</p> -</div> - -<p>Not less popular than Hannington’s panorama was -an extravaganza put on by Thomas Hamblin at the -Bowery Theatre, and called “Moonshine, or Lunar Discoveries.” -A <i>Sun</i> man went to review it, and had to -stand up; but he was patient enough to stay, and he -wrote this about the show:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>It is quite evident that Hamblin does not believe a -word of the whole story, or he would never have taken -the liberties with it which he has. The wings of the -man-bats and lady-bats, who are of an orange color and -look like angels in the jaundice, are well contrived for -effect; and the dialogue is highly witty and pungent. -Major Jack Downing’s blowing up a whole flock of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_90">90</span> -winged lunarians with a combustible bundle of Abolition -tracts, after vainly endeavoring to catch a long aim -at them with his rifle, is capital; as are also his puns -and jokes upon the splendid scenery of the Ruby Colosseum. -Take it altogether, it is the most amusing thing -that has been on these boards for a long time.</p> -</div> - -<p>Thus the moon eclipsed the regular stars of the New -York stage. Even Mrs. Duff, the most pathetic <i>Isabella</i> -that ever appeared in “The Fatal Marriage,” saw her -audiences thin out at the Franklin Theatre. Sol Smith’s -drolleries in “The Lying Valet,” at the Park Theatre, -could not rouse the laughter that the burlesque man-bats -caused at the Bowery.</p> - -<p>All this time there was a disappointed man in Baltimore; -disappointed because the moon stories had -caused him to abandon one of the most ambitious stories -he had attempted. This was Edgar Allan Poe, and the -story he dropped was “Hans Pfaall.”</p> - -<p>In the spring of 1835 the Harpers issued an edition -of Sir John Herschel’s “Treatise on Astronomy,” and -Poe, who read it, was deeply interested in the chapter -on the possibility of future lunar investigations:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The theme excited my fancy, and I longed to give -free rein to it in depicting my day-dreams about the -scenery of the moon; in short, I longed to write a story -embodying these dreams. The obvious difficulty, of -course, was that of accounting for the narrator’s acquaintance -with the satellite; and the equally obvious -mode of surmounting the difficulty was the supposition -of an extraordinary telescope.</p> -</div> - -<p>Poe spoke of this ambition to John Pendleton Kennedy, -of Baltimore, already the author of “Swallow -Barn,” and later to have the honour of writing, as the -result of a jest by Thackeray, the fourth chapter of -the second volume of “The Virginians.” Kennedy<span class="pagenum" id="Page_91">91</span> -assured Poe that the mechanics of telescope construction -were so fixed that it would be impossible to impart -verisimilitude to a tale based on a superefficient telescope. -So Poe resorted to other means of bringing the -moon close to the reader’s eye:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>I fell back upon a style half plausible, half bantering, -and resolved to give what interest I could to an actual -passage from the earth to the moon, describing the -lunar scenery as if surveyed and personally examined by -the narrator.</p> -</div> - -<p>Poe wrote the first part of “Hans Pfaall,” and published -it in the <i>Southern Literary Messenger</i>, of which -he was then editor, at Richmond, Virginia. Three weeks -afterward the first instalment of Locke’s moon story -appeared in the <i>Sun</i>. At the moment Poe believed that -his idea had been kidnapped:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>No sooner had I seen the paper than I understood the -jest, which not for a moment could I doubt had been -suggested by my own <i xml:lang="fr" lang="fr">jeu d’esprit</i>. Some of the New -York journals—the <i>Transcript</i>, among others—saw the -matter in the same light, and published the moon story -side by side with “Hans Pfaall,” thinking that the -author of the one had been detected in the author of -the other.</p> - -<p>Although the details are, with some exceptions, very -dissimilar, still I maintain that the general features of -the two compositions are nearly identical. Both are -hoaxes—although one is in a tone of mere banter, the -other of down-right earnest; both hoaxes are on one -subject, astronomy; both on the same point of that subject, -the moon; both professed to have derived exclusive -information from a foreign country; and both attempt -to give plausibility by minuteness of scientific detail. -Add to all this, that nothing of a similar nature had -even been attempted before these two hoaxes, the one of -which followed immediately upon the heels of the other.</p> - -<p>Having stated the case, however, in this form, I am<span class="pagenum" id="Page_92">92</span> -bound to do Mr. Locke the justice to say that he denies -having seen my article prior to the publication of his -own; I am bound to add, also, that I believe him.</p> -</div> - -<p>Nor can any unbiassed person who reads, for purpose -of comparison, the “Astronomical Discoveries” and -“Hans Pfaall” suspect that Locke based his hoax on -the story of the Rotterdam debtor who blew his creditors -to bits and sailed to the moon in a balloon. Chalk -and cheese are much more alike than these two products -of genius.</p> - -<p>Poe may have intended to fall back upon “a style -half plausible, half bantering,” as he described it, but -there is not the slightest plausibility about “Hans -Pfaall.” It is as near to humour as the great, dark mind -could get. “Mere banter,” as he later described it, is -better. The very episode of the dripping pitcher of -water, used to wake <i>Hans</i> at an altitude where even -alcohol would freeze, is enough proof, if proof at all -were necessary, to strip the tale of its last shred of -verisimilitude. No child of twelve would believe in -<i>Hans</i>, while Locke’s fictitious “Dr. Grant” deceived -nine-tenths—the estimate is Poe’s—of those who read -the narrative of the great doings at the Cape of Good -Hope.</p> - -<p>Locke had spoiled a promising tale for Poe—who tore -up the second instalment of “Hans Pfaall” when he -“found that he could add very little to the minute and -authentic account of Sir John Herschel”—but the poet -took pleasure, in later years, in picking the <i>Sun’s</i> moon -story to bits.</p> - -<p>“That the public were misled, even for an instant,” -Poe declared in his critical essay on Locke’s writings, -“merely proves the gross ignorance which, ten or twelve -years ago, was so prevalent on astronomical topics.”</p> - -<p>According to Locke’s own description of the telescope,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_93">93</span> -said Poe, it could not have brought the moon nearer -than five miles; yet Sir John—Locke’s Sir John—saw -flowers and described the eyes of birds. Locke had an -ocean on the moon, although it had been established beyond -question that the visible side of the moon is dry. -The most ridiculous thing about the moon story, said -Poe, was that the narrator described the entire bodies -of the man-bats, whereas, if they were seen at all by an -observer on the earth, they would manifestly appear as -if walking heels up and head down, after the fashion of -flies on a ceiling.</p> - -<p>And yet the hoax, Poe admits, “was, upon the whole, -the greatest hit in the way of sensation—of merely -popular sensation—ever made by any similar fiction -either in America or Europe.” Whether Locke intended -it as satire or not—a debatable point—it was a -hoax of the first water. It deceived more persons, and -for a longer time, than any other fake ever written: and, -as the <i>Sun</i> pointed out, it hurt nobody—except, perhaps, -the feelings of Dr. Dick, of Dundee—and it took -the public mind away from less agreeable matters. -Some of the wounded scientists roared, but the public, -particularly the New York public, took the exposure of -Locke’s literary villainy just as Sir John Herschel accepted -it—with a grin.</p> - -<p>As for the inspiration of the moon story, the record -is nebulous. If Poe was really grieved at his first -thought that Locke had taken from him the main imaginative -idea—that the moon was inhabited—then Poe -was oversensitive or uninformed, for that idea was at -least two centuries old.</p> - -<p>Francis Godwin, an English bishop and author, who -was born in 1562, and who died just two centuries before -the <i>Sun</i> was first printed, wrote “The Man in the -Moone, or a Discourse of a Voyage Thither by Domingo<span class="pagenum" id="Page_94">94</span> -Gonsales, the Speedy Messenger.” This was published -in London in 1638, five years after the author’s death.</p> - -<p>In the same year there appeared a book called “The -Discovery of a World in the Moone,” which contained -arguments to prove the moon habitable. It was written -by John Wilkins—no relative of the fictitious <i>Peter</i> of -Paltock’s story, but a young English clergyman who -later became Bishop of Chester, and who was the first -secretary of the Royal Society. Two years later Wilkins -added to his “Discovery of a World” a “Discourse -Concerning the Possibility of a Passage Thither.”</p> - -<p>Cyrano de Bergerac, he of the long nose and the -passion for poetry and duelling, later to be immortalized -by Rostand, read these products of two Englishmen’s -fancy, and about 1650 he turned out his joyful “Histoire -Comique des Etats et Empires de la Lune.” But -Bergerac had also been influenced by Dante and by -Lucian, the latter being the supposed inspiration of the -fanciful narratives of Rabelais and Swift. Perhaps -these writers influenced Godwin and Wilkins also; so -the trail, zigzagged and ramifying, goes back to the -second century. It is hard to indict a man for being -inspired, and in the case of the moon story there is no -evidence of plagiarism. If “Hans Pfaall” were to be -compared with Locke’s story for hoaxing qualities, it -would only suffer by the comparison. It would appear -as the youthful product of a tyro, as against the cunning -work of an artist of almost devilish ingenuity.</p> - -<p>Is there any doubt that the moon hoax was the sole -work of Richard Adams Locke? So far as concerns the -record of the <i>Sun</i>, the comments of Locke’s American -contemporaries, and the belief of Benjamin H. Day, expressed -in 1883 in a talk with Edward P. Mitchell, the -answer must be in the negative. Yet it must be set -down, as a literary curiosity at least, that it has been<span class="pagenum" id="Page_95">95</span> -believed in France and by at least one English antiquary -of repute that the moon hoax was the work of a Frenchman—Jean -Nicolas Nicollet, the astronomer.</p> - -<p>Nicollet was born at Cluses, in Savoy, in 1786. First -a cowherd, he did not learn to read until he was twelve. -Once at school his progress was rapid, and at nineteen -he become preceptor of mathematics at Chambry. He -went to Paris, where in 1817 he was appointed secretary-librarian -of the Observatory, and he studied astronomy -with Laplace, who refers to Nicollet’s assistance -in his works. In 1823 he was appointed to the government -bureau of longitudes, and at the same time was -professor of mathematics in the College of Louis le -Grand.</p> - -<p>He became a master of English, and through this -knowledge and his own mathematical genius he was able -to assemble, for the use of the French life-insurance -companies, all that was known, and much that he himself -discovered, of actuarial methods; this being incorporated -in his letter to M. Outrequin on “Assurances -Having for Their Basis the Probable Duration of -Human Life.” He also wrote “Memoirs upon the -Measure of an Arc of Parallel Midway Between the -Pole and the Equator” (1826), and “Course of Mathematics -for the Use of Mariners” (1830).</p> - -<p>In 1831 Nicollet failed in speculation, losing not only -his own fortune but that of others. He came to the -United States, arriving early in 1832, the very year that -Locke came to America. It is probable that he was in -New York, but there is no evidence as to the length of -his stay. It is known, however, that he was impoverished, -and that he was assisted by Bishop Chanche, -of Natchez, to go on with his chosen work—an exploration -of the Mississippi and its tributaries. He made -astronomical and barometrical observations, determined<span class="pagenum" id="Page_96">96</span> -the geographical position and elevation of many important -points, and studied Indian lore.</p> - -<p>The United States government was so well pleased -with Nicollet’s work that it sent him to the Far West -for further investigations, with Lieutenant John C. Frémont -as assistant. His “Geology of the Upper Mississippi -Region and of the Cretaceous Formation of the -Upper Missouri” was one of the results of his journeys. -After this he tried, through letters, to regain his lost -standing in France by seeking election to the Paris -Academy of Sciences, but he was black-balled, and, -broken-hearted, he died in Washington in 1843.</p> - -<p>The Englishman who believed that Nicollet was the -author of the moon hoax was Augustus De Morgan, -father of the late William De Morgan, the novelist, and -himself a distinguished mathematician and litterateur. -He was professor of mathematics at University College, -London, at the time when the moon pamphlet first appeared -in England. His “Budget of Paradoxes,” an -interesting collection of literary curiosities and puzzles, -which he had written, but not carefully assembled, was -published in 1872, the year after his death.</p> - -<div id="ip_96a" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 38em;"> - <img src="images/i_096a.jpg" width="1813" height="801" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - -<p>THE FIRST INSTALLMENT OF THE MOON HOAX</p> -</div></div> - -<div id="ip_96b" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 38em;"> - <img src="images/i_096ab.jpg" width="1820" height="1655" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - -<p>A MOON SCENE, FROM LOCKE’S GREAT DECEPTION</p> -</div></div> - -<p>Two fragments, printed separately in this volume, -refer to the moon hoax. The first is this:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p class="hang b1">“Some Account of the Great Astronomical Discoveries -Lately Made by Sir John Herschel at the Cape of -Good Hope.”—Second Edition, London, 12mo, 1836.</p> - -<p>This is a curious hoax, evidently written by a person -versed in astronomy and clever at introducing probable -circumstances and undesigned coincidences. It first -appeared in a newspaper. It makes Sir J. Herschel discover -men, animals, <i xml:lang="la" lang="la">et cetera</i>, in the moon, of which -much detail is given. There seems to have been a -French edition, the original, and English editions in -America, whence the work came into Britain; but<span class="pagenum" id="Page_97">97</span> -whether the French was published in America or at -Paris I do not know. There is no doubt that it was -produced in the United States by M. Nicollet, an astronomer, -once of Paris, and a fugitive of some kind.</p> - -<p>About him I have heard two stories. First, that he -fled to America with funds not his own, and that this -book was a mere device to raise the wind. Secondly, -that he was a protégé of Laplace, and of the Polignac -party, and also an outspoken man. That after the Revolution -he was so obnoxious to the republican party that -he judged it prudent to quit France; which he did in -debt, leaving money for his creditors, but not enough, -with M. Bouvard. In America he connected himself -with an assurance office. The moon story was written, -and sent to France, chiefly with the intention of entrapping -M. Arago, Nicollet’s especial foe, into the belief -of it. And those who narrate this version of the -story wind up by saying that M. Arago <em>was</em> entrapped, -and circulated the wonders through Paris until a letter -from Nicollet to M. Bouvard explained the hoax.</p> - -<p>I have no personal knowledge of either story; but as -the poor man had to endure the first, it is but right that -the second should be told with it.</p> -</div> - -<p>The second fragment reads as follows:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p class="hang b1">“The Moon Hoax; or, the Discovery That the Moon Has -a Vast Population of Human Beings.” By Richard -Adams Locke.—New York, 1859.</p> - -<p>This is a reprint of the hoax already mentioned. I -suppose “R. A. Locke” is the name assumed by M. -Nicollet. The publisher informs us that when the hoax -first appeared day by day in a morning newspaper, the -circulation increased fivefold, and the paper obtained -a permanent footing. Besides this, an edition of sixty -thousand was sold off in less than one month.</p> - -<p>This discovery was also published under the name of -A. R. Grant. Sohnke’s “Bibliotheca Mathematica” -confounds this Grant with Professor R. Grant of Glasgow, -the author of the “History of Physical Astronomy,” -who is accordingly made to guarantee the discoveries<span class="pagenum" id="Page_98">98</span> -in the moon. I hope Adams Locke will not -merge in J. C. Adams, the codiscoverer of Neptune. -Sohnke gives the titles of three French translations of -“The Moon Hoax” at Paris, of one at Bordeaux, and of -Italian translations at Parma, Palermo, and Milan.</p> - -<p>A correspondent, who is evidently fully master of -details, which he has given at length, informs me that -“The Moon Hoax” first appeared in the New York <i>Sun</i>, -of which R. A. Locke was editor. It so much resembled -a story then recently published by Edgar A. Poe, in a -Southern paper, “Adventures of Hans Pfaall,” that -some New York journals published the two side by side. -Mr. Locke, when he left the New York <i>Sun</i>, started -another paper, and discovered the manuscript of Mungo -Park; but this did not deceive. The <i>Sun</i>, however, continued -its career, and had a great success in an account -of a balloon voyage from England to America, in -seventy-five hours, by Mr. Monck Mason, Mr. Harrison -Ainsworth, and others.</p> - -<p>I have no doubt that M. Nicollet was the author of -“The Moon Hoax,” written in a way which marks the -practised observatory astronomer beyond all doubt, and -by evidence seen in the most minute details. Nicollet -had an eye to Europe. I suppose that he took Poe’s -story and made it a basis for his own. Mr. Locke, it -would seem, when he attempted a fabrication for himself, -did not succeed.</p> -</div> - -<p>In his remark that “there seems to have been a -French edition, the original,” Augustus De Morgan was -undoubtedly misled, for every authority consultable -agrees that the French pamphlets were merely translations -of the story originally printed in the <i>Sun</i>; and -De Morgan had learned this when he wrote his second -note on the subject.</p> - -<p>The M. Arago whom De Morgan believes Nicollet -sought to entrap was Dominique François Arago, the -celebrated astronomer. In 1830, as a reward for his -many accomplishments, he was made perpetual secretary<span class="pagenum" id="Page_99">99</span> -of the Paris Academy of Sciences, and in the following -year—the year of Nicollet’s fall from grace—he -was elected to the Chamber of Deputies. As to the intimation -that Arago was really misled by the moon -story, it is unlikely. W. N. Griggs, a contemporary of -Locke, insists in a memoir of that journalist that the -narrative was read by Arago to the members of the -Academy, and was received with mingled denunciation -and laughter. But hoaxing Arago in a matter of astronomy -would have been a difficult feat. Surely the discrepancies -pointed out by Poe would have been noticed -immediately.</p> - -<p>It is, however, easy to understand De Morgan’s belief -that Nicollet was the author of the moon story. Much -of the narrative, particularly parts which have here -been omitted, is made up of technicalities which could -have come only from the pen of a man versed in the -intricacies of astronomical science. They were not put -into the story to interest <i>Sun</i> readers, for they are far -over the layman’s head, but for the purpose of adding -verisimilitude to a yarn which, stripped of the technical -trimmings, would have been pretty bald.</p> - -<p>It was plain to De Morgan that Nicollet was one of -the few men alive in 1835 who could have woven the -scientific fabric in which the hoax was disguised. It -was also apparent to him that Nicollet, jealous of the -popularity of Arago, might have had a motive for -launching a satire, if not a hoax. And then there was -Nicollet’s presence in America at the time of the moon -story’s publication, Nicollet’s knowledge of English, and -Nicollet’s poverty. The coincidences are interesting, -if nothing more.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Let us see what the French said about Nicollet and -the story that came to the <i>Sun</i> from “a medical gentleman<span class="pagenum" id="Page_100">100</span> -immediately from Scotland.” In a sketch of Nicollet -printed in the “Biographie Universelle” (Michaud, -Paris, 1884), the following appears:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>There has been attributed to him an article which -appeared in the daily papers of France, and which, in -the form of a letter dated from the United States, spoke -of an improvement in the telescope invented by the -learned astronomer Herschel, who was then at the Cape -of Good Hope. It has been generally and with much -probability attributed to Nicollet.</p> - -<p>With the aid of this admirable improvement Herschel -was supposed to have succeeded in discovering on the -surface of the moon live beings, buildings of various -kinds, and a multitude of other interesting things. The -description of these objects and the ingenious method -employed by the English astronomer to attain his purpose -was so detailed, and covered with a veneer of -science so skilfully applied, that the general public was -startled by the announcement of the discovery, of which -North America hastened to send us the news.</p> - -<p>It has even been said that several astronomers and -physicists of our country were taken in for a moment. -That seems hardly probable to us. It was easy to perceive -that it was a hoax written by a learned and mischievous -person.</p> -</div> - -<p>The “Nouvelle Biographie Générale” (Paris, 1862), -says of Nicollet:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>He is believed to be the author of the anonymous -pamphlet which appeared in 1836 on the discoveries in -the moon made by Herschel at the Cape of Good Hope.</p> -</div> - -<p>Cruel, consistent Locke, never to have written down -the details of the conception and birth of the best invention -that ever spoofed the world! He leaves history -to wonder whether it be possible that, with one -word added, the French biographer was right, and that<span class="pagenum" id="Page_101">101</span> -it was “a hoax written by a learned and <em>a</em> mischievous -person.” Certain it is that Nicollet never wrote all -of the moon story; certain, too, that Locke wrote much, -if not all of it. The calculations of the angles of reflection -might have been Nicollet’s, but the blue unicorn is -the unicorn of Locke.</p> - -<p>No man can say when the germ of the story first took -shape. It might have been designed at any time after -Herschel laid the plans for his voyage to the Cape of -Good Hope, and that was at least two years before it -appeared in the <i>Sun</i>. Was Nicollet in New York then, -and did he and Locke lay their heads together across -a table at the American Hotel and plan the great -deceit?</p> - -<p>There was one head full of figures and the stars; -another crammed with the imagination that brought -forth the fire-making biped beavers and the fascinating, -if indecorous, human bats. If they never met, more is -the pity. Whether they met, none can say. Go to ask -the ghosts of the American Hotel, and you find it gone, -and in its place the Woolworth Building, earth’s spear -levelled at the laughing moon.</p> - -<p>Whatever happened, the credit must rest with Richard -Adams Locke. Even if the technical embellishments -of the moon story were borrowed, still his was the genius -that builded the great temple, made flowers to bloom in -the lunar valleys, and grew the filmy wings on the -<i xml:lang="la" lang="la">vespertilio-homo</i>. His was the art that caused the -bricklayer of Cherry Street to sit late beside his candle, -spelling out the rare story with joyous labour. It must -have been a reward to Locke, even to the last of his -seventy years, to know that he had made people read -newspapers who never had read them before; for that -is what he really accomplished by this huge, complex -lie.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_102">102</span></p> - -<p>“From the epoch of the hoax,” wrote Poe, “the Sun -shone with unmitigated splendor. Its success firmly -established the ‘penny system’ throughout the country, -and (through the <i>Sun</i>) consequently we are indebted -to the genius of Mr. Locke for one of the most important -steps ever yet taken in the pathway of human progress.”</p> - -<hr /> - -<div id="toclink_103" class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_103">103</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_IV">CHAPTER IV<br /> - -<span class="subhead">DAY FINDS A RIVAL IN BENNETT</span></h2> -</div> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p><i>The Success of “The Sun” Leads to the Founding of the -“Herald.”—Enterprises and Quarrels of a Furious -Young Journalism.—The Picturesque Webb.—Maria -Monk.</i></p> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">The</span> usefulness of Richard Adams Locke as a <i>Sun</i> -reporter did not end with the moon hoax. Far -from expressing regret that its employee had gulled -half the earth, the <i>Sun</i> continued to meet exposure with -a calm and almost flippant front, insisting that it would -never admit the non-existence of the man-bats until -official contradiction arrived from Edinburgh or the -Cape of Good Hope. The paper realized the value, in -public interest, of Locke’s name, and was proud to announce, -in November of 1835, that it had commissioned -Locke to write another series of articles, telling the -story of the “Life and Adventures of Manuel Fernandez, -otherwise Richard C. Jackson, convicted of the -murder of John Roberts, and to be executed at the Bellevue -Prison, New York, on Thursday next, the 19th -instant.”</p> - -<p>This was a big beat, for the young men of the <i>Courier -and Enquirer</i>, and perhaps of the <i>Herald</i>, had been trying -to get a yarn from the criminal, a Spaniard who -had served in foreign wars, had been captured by savages -in Africa, and had had many other adventures. -Fernandez was convicted of killing another sailor for -his attention to Fernandez’s mistress, a Mrs. Schultz;<span class="pagenum" id="Page_104">104</span> -and for about three weeks Locke spent several hours a -day in the condemned man’s cell. The “Life and Adventures,” -which was printed on the first page of the -<i>Sun</i>, ran serially from November 14 to November 25, -and was read with avidity.</p> - -<p>It was ironical that the hero of the story, who had -expressed to Locke an eagerness to have his career set -before the public in its true light, was prevented from -reading the later instalments; for the law, taking no -cognizance of the literary side of the matter, went about -its business, and Fernandez was hanged in the Bellevue -yard on the 19th, a morning when the <i>Sun’s</i> narrative -had wrecked the sailor off the coast of Wales. Mr. -Locke reported the execution and drew upon the autopsy -to verify the “Adventures.”</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>It is an interesting fact that the corpse of Fernandez -exhibited marks of all those serious injuries which are -recorded in the course of our narrative of his life, more -particularly that dreadful fracture of his vertebræ which -he suffered in Leghorn.</p> -</div> - -<p>The mere word of a “medical gentleman immediately -from Scotland” was no longer to be relied upon!</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun’s</i> story of the great fire of December, 1835, -sounds like Locke, but it may have been written by one -of the other bright young men who worked for Benjamin -H. Day. Among them were William M. Prall, who -succeeded Wisner as the court reporter, and Lucius -Robinson.</p> - -<p>“Robinson seemed to be a young man of excellent -ideas, but not very highly educated,” Mr. Day remarked -about fifty years later.</p> - -<p>Perhaps the Day standards were very high. Robinson -was twenty six when he worked on the <i>Sun</i>. He had -been educated at an academy in Delhi, New York, and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_105">105</span> -after that had studied law and been admitted to the -bar. He was too poor to practise at once, and went into -newspaper work to make a living. After leaving the -<i>Sun</i> he was elected district attorney of Greene County, -and in 1843 was appointed master of chancery in New -York. He left the Democratic party when the Republican -party was organized, but returned to his old political -allegiance after the Civil War. In 1876 he was -elected Governor of New York—an achievement which -still left him a little less famous than his fellow reporter, -Locke.</p> - -<p>“Give us one of your real Moscow fires,” sighed the -<i>Sun</i> in the first week of its existence.</p> - -<p>The prayer was answered a little more than two -years later, when about twenty blocks south of Wall -Street, between Broad Street and the East River, were -consumed. The fire started late in the evening of -Wednesday, December 16, and all that the <i>Sun</i> printed -about it the next morning was one triple-leaded paragraph:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>POSTSCRIPT—HALF PAST 1 O’CLOCK—A TREMENDOUS -CONFLAGRATION is now raging in the -lower part of the city. The Merchants’ Exchange is in -flames. Nearly all the blocks in the triangle bounded -by William and Wall Streets and the East River are -consumed! Several hundred buildings are already -down, and the firemen have given out. God only knows -when the fire will be arrested.</p> -</div> - -<p>On Friday morning the <i>Sun</i> had two and a half columns -about the fire, and gave an approximately correct -estimate that seven hundred buildings had been burned, -at a loss of twenty million dollars. The calamity provided -an opportunity for the fine writing then indulged -in, and the fire reporter did not overlook it; nor did he -forget Moscow. Here are typical extracts:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_106">106</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Where but thirty hours since was the rich and prosperous -theater of a great and productive commerce, -where enterprise and wealth energized with bold and -commanding efforts, now sits despondency in sackcloth -and a wide and dreary waste of desolation reigns.</p> - -<p>It seemed as if God were running in his anger and -sweeping away with the besom of his wrath the proudest -monuments of man. Destruction traveled and triumphed -on every breeze, and billows of fire rolled over -and buried in their burning bosoms the hopes and fortunes -of thousands. Like the devouring elements when -it fed on Moscow’s palaces and towers, it was literally -a “sea of fire,” and the terrors of that night of wo and -ruin rolling years will not be able to efface.</p> - -<p>The merchants of the First Ward, like Marius in the -ruins of Carthage, sit with melancholy moans, gazing -at the graves of their fortunes, and the mournful mementoes -of the dreadful devastation that reigns.</p> -</div> - -<p>On the afternoon of the following day the <i>Sun</i> got out -an extra edition of thirty thousand copies, its normal -morning issue of twenty-three thousand being too small -to satisfy the popular demand. The presses ran without -stopping for nearly twenty-four hours.</p> - -<p>On Monday, the 21st, the <i>Sun</i> had the enterprise to -print a map of the burned district. Copies of the special -fire editions went all over the world. At least one of -them ran up against poetic justice. When it reached -Canton, China, six months after the fire, the English -newspaper there classed the story of the conflagration -with Locke’s “Astronomical Discoveries,” and begged -its readers not to be alarmed by the new hoax.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> had grown more and more prosperous. In -the latter part of 1835 its four pages, each eleven and -one-half by eighteen inches, were so taken up with advertising -that it was not unusual to find reading-matter -in only five of the twenty columns. Some days the publisher -would apologize for leaving out advertisements,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_107">107</span> -on other days, for having so little room for news. He -promised relief, and it came on January 4, 1836, when -the paper was enlarged. It remained a four-page <i>Sun</i>, -but the pages were increased in size to fourteen by -twenty inches. In announcing the enlargement, the -third in a year, the <i>Sun</i> remarked:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>We are now enabled to print considerably more than -twenty-two thousand copies, on both sides, in less than -eight hours. No establishment in this country has such -facilities, and no daily newspaper in the world enjoys -so extensive a circulation.</p> -</div> - -<p>In the first enlarged edition Mr. Day made the boast -that the <i>Sun</i> now had a circulation more than double -that of all the sixpenny respectables combined. He -had a word, too, about the penny papers that had sprung -up in the <i>Sun’s</i> wake:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>One after another they dropped and fell in quick succession -as they had sprung up; and all, with but one -exception worth regarding, have gone to the “receptacle -of things lost upon earth.” Many of these departed -ephemerals have struggled hard to keep within their -nostrils the breath of life; and it is a singular fact that -with scarcely an exception they have employed, as a -means of bringing a knowledge of their being before the -public, the most unlimited and reckless abuse of ourselves, -the impeachment of our character, public and -private; the implications, moral and political; in short, -calumny in all its forms.</p> - -<p>As to the last survivor of them worth note, which remains, -we have only to say, the little world we opened -has proved large enough for us both.</p> -</div> - -<p>The exception to the general rule of early mortality -was of course the <i>Herald</i>. In spite of this broad attitude -toward his only successful competitor, Day could<span class="pagenum" id="Page_108">108</span> -not keep from swapping verbal shots with Bennett. The -<i>Sun</i> said:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Bennett, whose only chance of dying an upright man -will be that of hanging perpendicularly upon a rope, -falsely charges the proprietor of this paper with being -an infidel, the natural effect of which calumny will be -that every reader will believe him to be a good Christian.</p> -</div> - -<p>Day had a dislike for Colonel Webb, of the <i>Courier -and Enquirer</i>, almost as great as his enmity toward Bennett; -so when Webb assaulted Bennett on January 19, -1836, it was rather a hard story to write. This is the -<i>Sun’s</i> account of the fray:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Low as he had fallen, both in the public estimation -and his own, we were astonished to learn last evening -that Colonel Webb had stooped so far beneath anything -of which we had ever conceived it possible for him to be -guilty, as publicly, and before the eyes of hundreds who -knew him, to descend to a public personal chastisement -of that villainous libel on humanity of all kinds, the -notorious vagabond Bennett. But so it is.</p> - -<p>As the story is told to us by an eye-witness, the -colonel met the brawling coward in Wall Street, took -him by the throat, and with a cowhide striped the -human parody from head to foot. For the space of -nearly twenty minutes, as we are told, did the right -arm of the colonel ply his weapon with unremitted activity, -at which time the bystanders, who evidently enjoyed -the scene mightily, interceded in behalf of the -suffering, supplicating wretch, and Webb suffered him -to run.</p> - -<p>Had it been a dog, or any other decent animal, or had -the colonel himself with a pair of good long tongs removed -a polecat from his office, we know not that we -would have been so much surprised; but that he could, -by any possibility, have so far descended from himself as -to come in public contact with the veriest reptile that<span class="pagenum" id="Page_109">109</span> -ever defiled the paths of decency, we could not have -believed.</p> -</div> - -<p>Webb’s quarrel with Bennett grew out of the <i>Herald’s</i> -financial articles. Bennett was the first newspaperman -to see the news value of Wall Street. When he was -a writer on the <i>Courier and Enquirer</i>, and one of -Webb’s most useful men, he made a study of stocks, -not as a speculator, but as an investigator. He had a -taste for money matters. In 1824, five years after his -arrival in America from the land of his birth, Scotland, -he tried to establish a commercial school in New York -and to lecture on political economy. He could not -make a go of it, and so returned to newspaper work as -reporter, paragrapher, and poet.</p> - -<p>In 1828 he became Washington correspondent of the -<i>Enquirer</i>, and it was at his suggestion that Webb, in -1829, bought that paper and consolidated it with his -own <i>Courier</i>. Bennett was a Tammany Society man, -therefore a Jacksonian. He left Webb because of -Webb’s support of Nicholas Biddle, and started a Jackson -organ, the <i>Pennsylvanian</i>, in Philadelphia. This -was a failure.</p> - -<p>Meanwhile Bennett had seen the <i>Sun</i> rise, and he felt -that there must be room for another penny paper in -New York. With his knowledge of stocks he believed -that he could make Wall Street news a telling feature. -In his second issue of the <i>Herald</i>, May 11, 1835, he -printed the first money-market report, and three days -later he ran a table of sales on the Stock Exchange. -At this time, and for three years afterward, Bennett -visited Wall Street daily and wrote his own reports.</p> - -<p>His flings at the United States Bank, of which Webb’s -friend Biddle was president, and his stories of alleged -stock speculations by the colonel himself, were the cause<span class="pagenum" id="Page_110">110</span> -of Webb’s animosity toward his former associate. Bennett -took Webb’s assault calmly, and even wrote it up -in the <i>Herald</i>, suggesting at the end that Webb’s torn -overcoat had suffered more damage than anything else.</p> - -<p>Day’s quarrel with Bennett, which never reached the -physical stage, was the natural outcome of an intense -rivalry among the most successful penny papers of that -period—the <i>Sun</i>, the <i>Herald</i>, and the <i>Transcript</i>. -Against the sixpenny respectables these three were one -for all and all for one, but against one another they -were as venomous as a young newspaper of that day felt -that it had to be to show that it was alive.</p> - -<p>Day’s antagonism toward Webb was sporadic. Most -of the time the young owner of the <i>Sun</i> treated the fiery -editor of the <i>Courier and Enquirer</i> as flippantly as he -could, knowing that Webb liked to be taken seriously. -Day’s constant <i xml:lang="fr" lang="fr">bête noire</i> was the commercial and foreign -editor of Webb’s paper, Mr. Hoskin, an Englishman.</p> - -<p>On January 21, 1836, the <i>Sun</i> charged that Webb and -Hoskin had rigged a “diabolical plot” against it. The -sixpenny papers had formed a combination for the purpose -of sharing the expense of running horse-expresses -from Philadelphia to New York, bringing the Washington -news more quickly than the penny papers could -get it by mail. The <i>Sun</i> and the <i>Transcript</i> then formed -a combination of their own, and in this way saved themselves -from being beaten on Jackson’s message, sent to -Congress in December, 1835.</p> - -<p>In January, 1836, Jackson sent a special message to -Congress. It was delivered on Monday, the 18th, and -on Wednesday, the 20th, the <i>Sun</i> published a column -summary of it. Webb made the charge that his messenger -from Washington had been lured into Day’s -offices, and that the <i>Sun</i> got its story by opening the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_111">111</span> -package containing the message intended for the -<i>Courier and Enquirer.</i> The <i>Sun</i> replied that it received -the message legitimately, and that the whole -thing was a scheme to discredit Mr. Day and his bookkeeper, -Moses Y. Beach:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The insinuation of Webb that we violated the sanctity -of a seal we hurl back in proud defiance to his own -brow.</p> -</div> - -<p>Webb went to the police and to the grand jury, and -for a few days it looked as if the hostile editors might -reach for something of larger calibre than pens. Thus -the <i>Sun</i> of January 22:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>We were informed yesterday at the police office, and -subsequently by a gentleman from Wall Street, that -Webb, of the <i>Courier and Enquirer</i>, had openly threatened -to make a personal assault upon us. It was lucky -for him that we did not hear this threat; but we can -now only say that if such, or anything similar to it, be -his intention, he will find each of the three editors of -the <i>Sun</i> always provided with a brace of “mahogany -stock” pistols, to accommodate him in any way he likes, -or may not like.</p> -</div> - -<p>The specification of “mahogany stock” referred to -Colonel Webb’s own supposed predilection for pistols -of that description. Mr. Day and his aids may have -carried these handsome weapons, but it is not on record -that they made use of them, or that they had occasion -to do so. Persons gunning for editors seemed to neglect -Mr. Day in favour of Mr. Bennett.</p> - -<p>No sooner was this fierce clash with Webb over than -the <i>Sun</i> found itself bombarded from many sides in the -war over Maria Monk. This woman’s “Awful Disclosures” -had just been published in book form by<span class="pagenum" id="Page_112">112</span> -Howe & Bates, of 68 Chatham Street, New York. They -purported to be “a narrative of her sufferings during a -residence of five years as a novice and two years as a -black nun in the Hôtel Dieu Nunnery at Montreal.” On -January 18, 1836, the <i>Sun</i> began to publish these shocking -stories, in somewhat condensed and expurgated -form. It did not vouch for their truth, but declared that -it printed them from an “imperative sense of duty.” -“We have no better means than are possessed by any -reader,” it cautiously added, “to decide upon their truth -or falsehood.”</p> - -<p>The “Disclosures” ran in the <i>Sun</i> for ten days, during -which time about one-half of the book was printed. -Maria Monk herself was in New York, and so cleverly -had she devised the imposture that she was received in -good society as a martyr. Such was the public interest -that it was estimated by Cardinal Manning, in 1851, -that between two hundred and two hundred and fifty -thousand copies of the volume were sold in America and -England. The Know-Nothing Party used it for political -capital, and anti-Catholic riots in several cities were the -result of its publication.</p> - -<p>Its partial appearance in the <i>Sun</i>, while it may have -helped the circulation of the book, undoubtedly hastened -the exposure of the fraud. The editor of the <i>Commercial -Advertiser</i>, William Leete Stone, liked nothing better -than to show up impostors. He had already written -a life of Matthias the Prophet, and he decided to get at -the truth of Maria Monk’s revolting story.</p> - -<p>Stone was at this time forty-four years old. He had -been editor of the Herkimer <i>American</i>, with Thurlow -Weed as his journeyman; of the <i>Northern Whig</i>, of Hudson, -New York; of the Albany <i>Daily Advertiser</i>, and of -the Hartford <i>Mirror</i>. In 1821 he came to New York -and succeeded Zachariah Lewis as editor of the <i>Commercial<span class="pagenum" id="Page_113">113</span> -Advertiser</i>. As a Mason he had a controversy -with John Quincy Adams, who was prominent in the -anti-Masonic movement.</p> - -<p>Stone was prominent politically. In 1825 he and -Thurlow Weed accompanied Lafayette in his tour of -the United States. In 1841 President William Henry -Harrison appointed him minister to The Hague, but -when Harrison died he was recalled by President Tyler. -He was also the first superintendent of the New York -public schools—an office which he held at the time of -his death, in 1844.</p> - -<p>Stone went to Montreal, visited the Hôtel Dieu, and -minutely compared the details set down by the Monk -woman in regard to the inmates of the nunnery and -the plan of the building. The result of his investigation -was to establish the fact that the “Awful Disclosures” -were fiction, and he exposed the impostor not only in -his newspaper, but in his book, “Maria Monk and the -Nunnery of the Hôtel Dieu.” The adherents of the -woman abused Stone roundly for this, and the general -belief in her fake was not entirely dissipated for years; -not even after her own evil history was told, and after -the Protestant residents of Montreal had held a mass-meeting -to denounce her. Maria Monk died in the city -prison in New York fourteen years after she had created -the most unpleasant scandal of the time.</p> - -<p>News matters of a genuine kind diverted the types -from Maria Monk. There was the celebrated murder of -Helen Jewett, a case in which Mr. Bennett played detective -with some success, and the Alamo massacre. -Crockett, Bowie, and the rest of that band of heroes -met their death on March 6, 1836, but the details did -not reach New York for more than a month; it was -April 12 when the <i>Sun</i> gave a column to them.</p> - -<p>Texas and the Seminole War kept the news columns<span class="pagenum" id="Page_114">114</span> -full until May 10, when Colonel Webb again pounced -upon James Gordon Bennett. Said the <i>Sun</i>:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Upon calculating the number of public floggings -which that miserable scribbler, Bennett, has received, -we have pretty accurately ascertained that there is not -a square inch of his body which has not been lacerated -somewhere about fifteen times. In fact, he has become -a common flogging property; and Webb has announced -his intention to cowskin him every Monday morning until -the Fourth of July, when he will offer him a holiday. -We understand that Webb has offered to remit the flogging -upon the condition that he will allow him to shoot -him; but Bennett says:</p> - -<p>“No; skin for skin, behold, all that a man hath will -he give for his life!”</p> -</div> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> beat the town on a great piece of news that -spring. “Triumphant News from Texas! Santa Anna -Captured!” the head-lines ran.</p> - -<p>This appeared on May 18, four weeks after Sam -Houston had taken the Mexican president; but it was -the first intimation New York had had of the victory at -San Jacinto.</p> - -<p>During the investigation of the murder of Helen -Jewett and the trial of Richard P. Robinson, the suspect, -the <i>Sun</i> attacked Bennett for the manner in which -the <i>Herald</i> handled the case. Bennett saw a good yellow -story in the murder, for the house in which the murdered -girl had lived could not be said to be questionable; -there was no doubt about its character. Bennett’s interviewing -of the victim’s associates did not please the -<i>Sun</i>, which pictured the unfortunate women “mobbed -by several hundred vagabonds of all sizes and ages—amongst -whom the long, lank figure of the notorious -Bennett was most conspicuous.”</p> - -<p>When it was not Bennett, it was Colonel Webb or one<span class="pagenum" id="Page_115">115</span> -of his men. The <i>Sun</i> went savagely after the proprietor -of the <i>Courier and Enquirer</i> because he led the hissing -at the Park Theatre against Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Wood, -the English opera-singers. The offence of the Woods -lay in giving a performance on an evening when a benefit -was announced for Mrs. Conduit, another popular -vocalist. The town was divided upon the row, but as -the Woods and Mrs. Conduit were all English-born, it -was not a racial feud like the Macready-Forrest affair. -The <i>Sun</i> rebuked Colonel Webb particularly because, -after booing at the Woods, he had refused Mr. Wood’s -offer to have it out over pistols and coffee.</p> - -<p>Wood was not a lily-finger. He had been plain Joe -Wood, the pugilist, before he married the former Lady -Lennox and embraced tenor song in a serious way. Society -rather took the part of the Woods, for after the -Park Theatre row a dinner in their compliment was -arranged by Henry Ogden, Robert C. Wetmore, Duncan -C. Pell, John P. Hone, Carroll Livingston, and -other leading New Yorkers.</p> - -<p>The fearlessness of the <i>Sun</i> did not stop with saucing -its contemporaries. When Robinson was acquitted of -the Jewett murder, after a trial which the <i>Sun</i> reported -to the extent of nearly a page a day, the <i>Sun</i> editorially -declared:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Our opinion, calmly and dispassionately formed from -the evidence, is that Richard P. Robinson is guilty of -the wilful and peculiarly atrocious murder of Helen -Jewett.... Any good-looking young man, possessing -or being able to raise among his friends the sum of -fifteen hundred dollars to retain Messrs. Maxwell, -Price, and Hoffman for his counsel, might murder any -person he chose with perfect impunity.</p> -</div> - -<p>Robinson’s acquittal was credited largely to Ogden -Hoffman, whose summing up the <i>Sun</i> described as “the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_116">116</span> -most magnificent production of mind, eloquence, and -rhetorical talent that ever resounded in a hall of justice.” -This was the Ogden Hoffman of whom Decatur -said, when Hoffman left the navy in 1816, that he regretted -that the young man should have exchanged “an -honourable profession for that of a lawyer.” Hoffman -and his partner Maxwell, who shared in this tremendous -fee of fifteen hundred dollars, had been district -attorneys of New York before the time of the Jewett -murder, and the <i>Sun</i> inquired what would have been -Robinson’s fate if Hoffman, and not Phenix, had been -the prosecutor.</p> - -<p>On August 20, 1836, the <i>Sun</i> announced that its circulation -averaged twenty-seven thousand copies daily, -or fifty-six hundred more than the combined sale of the -eleven six-cent papers. Of the penny papers the Sun -credited the <i>Herald</i> with thirty-two hundred and the -<i>Transcript</i> with ten thousand, although both these -rivals claimed at least twice as much. Columns were -filled with the controversy which followed upon the -publication of these figures. The <i>Sun</i> departed from a -scholarly argument with the <i>Transcript</i> over the pronunciation -of “elegiac,” and denounced it as a “nestle-tripe,” -whatever that was.</p> - -<p>There was a little room left for the news. Aaron -Burr’s death got a stick; Marcy’s nomination for Governor -of New York, an inch; Audubon’s arrival in -America, four lines. News that looks big now may not -have seemed so imposing then, as this <i>Sun</i> paragraph of -September 22, 1836, would show:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Two more States are already spoken of for addition -to the Union, under the names of Iowa and Wisconsin.</p> -</div> - -<p>Richard Adams Locke left the <i>Sun</i> in the fall of -1836, and on October 6, in company with Joseph Price,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_117">117</span> -started the <i>New Era</i>, a penny paper for which the <i>Sun</i> -wished success. In less than a month, however, Locke -and his former employer were quarrelling about the price -of meals at the Astor House. That famous hotel was -opened in May, 1836, with all New York marvelling at -the wonders of its walnut furniture, so much nicer than -the conventional mahogany! Before it was built, it -was referred to as the Park Hotel. When it opened it -was called Astor’s Hotel, but in a few months it came -to be known by the name which stuck to it until it was -abandoned in 1913.</p> - -<p>But to return to our meal. Said Mr. Locke’s <cite>New -Era</cite>:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>A paragraph is going the rounds of the papers abusing -the Astor House. Nothing can be more groundless. -Where the arrangements are complete, the charges, of -course, must be corresponding. We suppose the report -has been set afloat by some person who was kicked out -for not paying his bill.</p> -</div> - -<p>To this horrid insinuation Day replied:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The report they speak of was set afloat by ourselves, -after paying $1.25 for a breakfast for a lady and her -infant a year and a half old, served just one hour and -seven minutes after it was ordered, with coffee black -as ink and without milk, and that, too, in a room so -uncleanly as to be rather offensive.</p> -</div> - -<p>Locke wanted to make the <i>New Era</i> another <i>Sun</i>, -but he failed. His second hoax, “The Lost Manuscript -of Mungo Park,” which purported to tell hitherto unrelated -adventures of the Scottish explorer, fell down. -The public knew that the <i>New Era</i> was edited by the -author of the moon story. When the <i>New Era</i> died, -Locke went to the Brooklyn <i>Eagle</i>, just founded, and he -succeeded Henry C. Murphy, the proprietor and first<span class="pagenum" id="Page_118">118</span> -editor, when that famous lawyer and writer was running -for mayor of Brooklyn. Locke afterward was a -custom-house employee. He died on Staten Island in -1871.</p> - -<p>Squabbling with his former friend Locke over hotel -service was no such sport for Day as tilting at the -owner of the <i>Herald</i>. The <i>Sun</i> attacked Bennett in the -fall of 1836 for his attitude toward the Hamblin benefit. -Thomas Sowerby Hamblin was made bankrupt by the -Bowery Theatre fire on September 22, for the great fires -of the previous December had ruined practically all the -fire-insurance companies of New York, and there was -not a policy on the theatre which this English actor-manager, -with James H. Hackett, had made the leading -playhouse of America. Hamblin did not like Bennett’s -articles and the <i>Sun</i> thus noted the result of them:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Alas, poor Bennett! He seems destined to be flogged -into immortal fame, and become the common buffet-block -of all mankind. Mr. Hamblin paid him a complimentary -visit last evening [November 17] in his editorial -closet and lathered him all into lumps and -blotches, although the living lie was surrounded by his -minions and had a brace of loaded pistols lying on his -desk when the outraged visitor first laid hands on him.</p> -</div> - -<p>When the <i>Sun’s</i> advertising business had increased -until its income from that source was more than two -hundred dollars a day, it bought two new presses of the -Napier type from Robert Hoe, at a cost of seven thousand -dollars. These enabled Mr. Day to run off thirty-two -hundred papers an hour on each press. On the 2nd -of January, 1837, the size of the <i>Sun</i> was slightly increased, -about an inch being added to the length and -width of each of its four pages.</p> - -<p>In February, 1837, the price of flour rose from the -normal of about $5.50 a barrel to double that amount.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_119">119</span> -The <i>Sun</i> declared that the increase was not natural, -but rather the result of a combination—a suspicion -which seems to have been shared by a large number of -citizens. The bread riots of February 13 and later -were the result of an agitation for lower prices.</p> - -<p>The <i>Journal of Commerce</i> denounced the <i>Sun</i> as an -inciter of the riots, and suggested that the grand jury -should direct its attention toward Mr. Day. The <i>Sun</i> -not only refused to recede from its stand, but suggested -that the foreman of the grand jury, the famous Philip -Hone, had himself incited a riot—the riot against the -Abolitionists, July 11, 1834—which had a less worthy -purpose than the <i>Sun’s</i> stand on the matter of flour -prices. The <i>Sun</i> was virtuously indignant, even more -than it had been a short time before, when the Transcript -charged the <i>Sun’s</i> circulation man, Mr. Young, -with biting two of the <i>Transcript’s</i> carriers!</p> - -<p>The beginning of regular transatlantic steamship -service did not find in the <i>Sun</i> a completely joyous welcome—thanks, -perhaps, to the temperament of Lieutenant -Hosken, R.N. He was an officer of the Great -Western, a side-wheeler of no less than thirteen hundred -and forty tons, with paddles twenty-eight feet in diameter. -This new ship, built at Bristol, and a marvel of -its time, reached New York, April 23, 1838, after a passage -of only sixteen days! The Sirius, another new -vessel, got in a few hours ahead of the Great Western, -after a voyage of eighteen days. The <i>Sun</i> said of this -double event:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Of the conduct of the officers in command of the -Great Western, we regret that we are compelled by reports -to place it in no very favorable contrast with the -gentlemanly demeanor of the officers of the Sirius. -Every attention has been paid her, citizens have turned -out to welcome her arrival, she was saluted by the battery<span class="pagenum" id="Page_120">120</span> -on Ellis’s Island, <i xml:lang="la" lang="la">et cetera, et cetera</i>, and thousands -of other demonstrations of courtesy were made, which -proved only throwing pearls before swine. A news boat -was ordered to keep off or be run down, and the hails -of that boat and others were answered through a speaking-trumpet -in a manner which would have done toward -the savage of Nootka Sound, but is not exactly the style -in which to meet the courtesies of members of a community -upon which the line of packets depends in a -large part for success. One would have thought that all -the impudence of Europe was put on board a vessel -built of large tonnage expressly for its embarkation. -By the time our corporation officers have run the suspender-buttons -off their breeches in chase of Lieutenant -Hosken, R. N., they will discover that they have been -fools for their pains.</p> - -<p>Reverse this account entirely, and it will apply to the -Sirius—testimony which we are happy to make.</p> -</div> - -<p>So the <i>Sun</i> was not obsequiously grateful for the -arrival of a ship whose speed enabled it to announce -on April 24 that Queen Victoria had issued, on the 6th, -the proclamation of the details of her coronation at -Westminster on June 26, and that O’Connell was taking -steps to remove the civil disabilities from the Jews.</p> - -<p>All this time the <i>Sun</i> was not neglecting the minor -local happenings about which its patrons liked to read. -The police-courts, the theatres, and the little scandals -had their column or two.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div id="toclink_121" class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_121">121</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_V">CHAPTER V<br /> - -<span class="subhead">NEW YORK LIFE IN THE THIRTIES</span></h2> -</div> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p><i>A Sprightly City Which Daily Bought Thirty Thousand -Copies of “The Sun.”—The Rush to Start Penny Papers.—Day -Sells “The Sun” for Forty Thousand Dollars.</i></p> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">No</span> dull city, that New York of Ben Day’s time! -Almost a dozen theatres of the first class were -running. The Bowery, the first playhouse in America -to have a stage lighted with gas, had already been twice -burned and rebuilt. The Park, which saw the American -début of Macready, Edwin Forrest, and James H. -Hackett, was offering such actors as Charles Kean, -Charles and Fanny Kemble, Charles Mathews, Sol -Smith, Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Wood, and Master Joseph -Burke, the Irish Roscius. Forrest, then talked of as a -candidate for Congress, was the favourite of New York. -On his appearance, said a <i>Sun</i> review of his acting in -“King Lear,” the audience uttered “the roar of seven -thunders.”</p> - -<p>There was vaudeville to be enjoyed at Niblo’s Garden, -a circus at Vauxhall Garden. Drama held the -boards at the Olympic and the National. The Franklin -was one of the new theatres. It was in Chatham Street, -between James and Oliver, and it was there that Barney -Williams, the <i>Sun’s</i> pioneer newsboy, made his first -stage appearance, as a jig-dancer, when he was about -fifteen years old.</p> - -<p>Charlotte Cushman, Hackett, Forrest, and Sol Smith<span class="pagenum" id="Page_122">122</span> -were the leading American actors of that day, although -Junius Brutus Booth had achieved some prominence. -Edwin Booth, Joseph Jefferson, William J. Florence, -and Maggie Mitchell were children, all a little older -than the <i>Sun</i>. John T. Raymond was born at Buffalo -in 1836, John E. McCullough in Ireland the next -year, and Lawrence Barrett at Paterson, New Jersey, -in 1838.</p> - -<p>The hotels were temples of plenty. English travellers, -going to the new Astor, the American, Niblo’s, or -the New York House, recoiled in horror at the appetite -of the Yankee. At breakfast they saw the untutored -American break two or three boiled eggs into a tumbler -and eat them therefrom—and then they wrote letters -to the London <i>Times</i> about it. At dinner, served in the -hotels about noon—three o’clock was the fashionable -hour in private houses—the hungry New Yorker, including -Mr. Day and his brother-in-law, Mr. Beach, -would sit down to roast beef, venison, prairie-chicken, -and a half-dozen vegetables. Bottles of brandy stood -in the centre of the table for him who would; surely not -for Mr. Day, who printed daily pieces about the effects -of strong drink!</p> - -<p>There was gambling on Park Row—Chatham Row, -it was called then—games in the Elysian Fields of -Hoboken on Sundays, and duels there on week-days; -picnickings in the woods about where the Ritz-Carlton -stands to-day; horse-racing on the Boulevard, now -upper Broadway, and rowing races on the Harlem. -Those who liked thoroughbred racing went to the Union -Course on Long Island, or to Saratoga.</p> - -<p>Club life was young. Cooper, Halleck, Bryant, and -other literary moguls had started the Bread and Cheese -Club in 1824. The Hone Club, named for Mayor Hone, -sprang up in 1836, and gave dinners for Daniel Webster,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_123">123</span> -William H. Seward, and other great Whigs. In -that same year the Union Club was founded—the oldest -New York club that is still in existence.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> was not as popular in the clubs as it is -to-day. A clubman of 1837 caught reading any newspaper -except the <i>Courier and Enquirer</i>, the <i>Evening -Post</i>, or one of their like, would have been frowned upon -by his colleagues.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> found plenty to print.</p> - -<p>“We write,” it boasted, “more original editorial -matter than any other paper in the city, great or small.”</p> - -<p>It poked with its paragraphs at the shinplaster, that -small form of currency issued by private bankers. It -made fun of phrenology, then one of the fads. It jeered -at animal magnetism, another craze. It had the Papineau -rebellion, the Patriot War, Indian uprisings, and -the belated news from Europe. It printed extracts from -the “Pickwick Papers.” Dickens was all the rage.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun’s</i> comment on “Nicholas Nickleby,” when -Dickens’s fourth book reached New York in 1838, was -that it was as well written as “Oliver Twist,” and “not -so gloomy.” Yet the grimness of the earlier novel had -a fascination for the youth of that day. It was this -book, read by candle-light after the store was closed, -that so weakened the eyes of Charles A. Dana—still -clerking in Buffalo—that he believed he would have to -become a farmer.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> did not mention, in its report of the Patriot -War, that Dana was a member of the Home Guard in -Buffalo, and had ideas of enlisting as a regular soldier. -The <i>Sun</i> did not know of the youth’s existence; nor is -it likely that he read Mr. Day’s paper.</p> - -<p>A piece of “newspaper news” was printed in the -<i>Sun</i> of June 1, 1837—a description of the first so-called -endless paper roll in operation. Day still printed on<span class="pagenum" id="Page_124">124</span> -small, flat sheets, but evidently he was impressed with -the novelty. The touch about the rag-mill, of course, -was fiction:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>We have been shown a sheet of paper about a hundred -feet in length and two feet wide, printed on both sides -by a machine at one operation. This extraordinary invention -enables a person to print off any length of paper -required for any number of copies of a work or a public -journal without a single stop, and without the assistance -of any person except one to put in the rags at the -extremity of the machine.</p> - -<p>This wonderful operation is effected by the placing -of the types on stereotype plates on the surface of two -cylinders, which are connected with the paper-making -machinery. The paper, as it issues from the mill, enters -in a properly moistened state between the rollers, which -are evenly inked by an ingenious apparatus, and -emerges in a printed form. The number of copies can -be measured off by the yard or mile. The work which -we have seen from this press is “Robinson Crusoe,” and -consists of one hundred and sixty duodecimo pages.</p> - -<p>The Bible could be printed off and almost disseminated -among the Indians in one continuous stream of -living truth. The <i>Sun</i> would occupy a roll about seven -feet in diameter, and our issue to Boston, Philadelphia, -and other cities would be not far from a quarter of a -mile long, each. The two cents postage on this would -be but a trifle. The whole length of our paper would be -about seventy-seven thousand feet, a papyrus which it -must be confessed it would take Lord Brougham a -longer time to unroll than the vitrified scrolls of Herculaneum -and Pompeii.</p> - -<p>All that it is necessary for a man to do on going into -a paper-mill is to take off his shirt, hand it to the devil -who officiates at one extremity, and have it come out -“Robinson Crusoe” at the other. We should like to -exchange some of our old shirts in this way, as we cannot -afford the expense, during these hard times, of getting -them washed.</p> - -<p>Mr. Thomas French, the inventor, is from Ithaca,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_125">125</span> -and is now in this city. He has one roll about six inches -in diameter which is six hundred feet long.</p> -</div> - -<div id="ip_124" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 28em;"> - <img src="images/i_124a.jpg" width="1331" height="1706" alt="" /> - <div class="captionm"><p>(<i>From a Picture in the Possession of -Mrs. Jennie Beach Gasper</i>)</p></div> - <div class="captionl"> - -<p>MOSES YALE BEACH, SECOND OWNER OF “THE SUN”</p></div></div> - -<p>No display advertising was printed in the <i>Sun</i> of -those years, but there was a variety of “liners.” These -were adorned with tiny cuts of ships, shoes, horses, -cows, hats, dogs, clocks, and what not. For <span class="locked">example—</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Came to the premises of F. Reville, Gardener, on the -16th inst., a COW, which has since calved. The owner -is requested to call, prove property, and pay expenses. -Bloomingdale, between fifth and sixth mile-stones.</p> -</div> - -<p>That is nearly five miles north of the City Hall, on -the West Side—a region where now little grows except -the rentals of palatial apartment-houses. Here are -two other advertisements characteristic of the time:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>A CARD—TO BUTCHERS—Mr. Stamler, having -retired to private life, would be glad to see his friends, -the Butchers, at his house, No. 5 Rivington Street, this -afternoon, between the hours of 2 and 5 <span class="allsmcap">P.M.</span>, to partake -of a collation.</p> -</div> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>SIX CENTS REWARD!—Run away from the subscriber, -on the 30th of May, Charles Eldridge, an indented -apprentice to the Segar-Making business, about -16 years of age, 4 feet high, broken back. Had on, when -he left, a round jacket and blue pantaloons. The above -reward and no charges will be paid for his delivery to</p> - -<p class="p0 sigright">JOHN DIBBEN, No. 354 Bowery.</p> -</div> - -<p>On June 15, 1837, the name of Benjamin H. Day, -which had appeared at the masthead of the <i>Sun</i> since its -beginning, disappeared. In its place was the legend: -“Published daily by the proprietor.” This gave rise to -a variety of rumours, and about a week later, on June -23, the <i>Sun</i> said editorially:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_126">126</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Several of our contemporaries are in a maze of wonder -because we have taken our beautiful cognomen -from the imprint of the <i>Sun</i>. Some of the loafers among -them have even flattered themselves that our humble -self in person had consequently disappeared. Not so, -gentlemen—for though we may not be ambitious that -our thirty thousand subscribers should daily pronounce -our name while poring over advertisements on the first -page, we nevertheless remain steadily at our post, and -shall thus continue during the pleasure of a generous -public, except, perchance, an absence of a few months -on a trip to Europe, which we purpose to make this -season.</p> - -<p>With regard to a certain report that we had lost -twenty thousand dollars by shaving notes, we have -nothing to say. Our private business transactions cannot -in the least interest the public at large.</p> -</div> - -<p>Day’s name never went back. The reason for its disappearance -was a libel-suit brought by a lawyer named -Andrew S. Garr. On May 3, 1837, the <i>Sun</i> printed a -report of a case in the Court of Chancery, in which it -was incidentally mentioned that Garr had once been -indicted for conspiracy to defraud. The reporter neglected -to add that Garr had been acquitted. At the end -of the article was the quotation:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>When rogues get quarreling, the truth will out.</p> -</div> - -<p>Garr sued Day for ten thousand dollars, and Day not -only took his name from the top of the first column of -the first page, but apparently made a wash sale of the -newspaper.</p> - -<p>The case was tried in February, 1838, and on the -16th of that month Garr got a verdict for three thousand -dollars—“to be extracted,” as the <i>Sun</i> said next -morning, “from the right-hand breeches-pocket of the -defendant, who about a year since ceased replenishing<span class="pagenum" id="Page_127">127</span> -that fountain of the ‘needful’ from the prolific source -of the <i>Sun’s</i> rays by virtue of a total, unconditional, -and unrevisionary sale of the same to its present proprietor.”</p> - -<p>The name of that “present proprietor” was not -given; but on June 28, 1838, the following notice appeared -at the top of the first page:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Communications intended for the <i>Sun</i> must be addressed -to Moses Y. Beach, 156 Nassau Street, corner -of Spruce.</p> -</div> - -<p>Day was really out of the <i>Sun</i> then, after having been -its master for five years lacking sixty-seven days, and -the paper passed into the actual ownership of Beach, -who had married Day’s sister, and who had acted as -the bookkeeper of the <i>Sun</i> almost from its inception. -There were those, including Edgar Allan Poe, who believed -that Beach was the boss of the <i>Sun</i> even in the -days of the moon hoax, but they were mistaken. The -paper, as the <i>Sun</i> itself remarked on December 4, 1835, -was “altogether ruled by Benjamin H. Day.”</p> - -<p>“I owned the whole concern,” said Mr. Day in 1883, -“till I sold it to Beach. And the silliest thing I ever -did in my life was to sell that paper!”</p> - -<p>And why did Day sell, for forty thousand dollars, a -paper which had the largest circulation in the world—about -thirty thousand copies? The answer is that it -was not paying as well as it had paid.</p> - -<p>There were a couple of years when his profits had -been as high as twenty thousand dollars. The net return -for the six months ending October 1, 1836, as announced -by the <i>Sun</i> on April 19, 1837, was $12,981.88; -but at the time when Day sold out, the <i>Sun</i> was about -breaking even. The advertising, due to general dulness -in business—for which the bank failures and the big<span class="pagenum" id="Page_128">128</span> -fire were partly to blame—had fallen off. It was costing -Day three hundred dollars a week more for operating -expenses and materials than he got for the sales of -newspapers, and this loss was barely made up by the -advertising receipts. With what he had saved, and the -forty thousand paid to him by Beach, he would have a -comfortable fortune. He was only twenty-eight years -old, and there might be other worlds to conquer.</p> - -<p>From nothing at all except his own industry and -common sense Day had built up an enterprise which the -<i>Sun</i> itself thus described a few days before the change -of ownership:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Some idea of the business done in the little three-story -building at the corner of Nassau and Spruce -Streets occupied by the <i>Sun</i> for the publication of a -penny paper may be formed from the fact that the -annual outlay for material and wages exceeds ninety-three -thousand dollars—very nearly two thousand a -week, and more than three hundred a day for the six -working days. On this outlay we circulate daily thirty -thousand papers. Allowing the other nine morning -papers an average of three thousand circulation—which -may fall short in two or three cases, while it is a large -estimate for all the rest—it will appear that the circulation -of the <i>Sun</i> newspaper is daily more than of all -the others united.</p> - -<p>That this is not mere gasconade, but susceptible of -proof, we refer the curious to the paper-makers who -furnish the stock for this immense circulation; to the -type-founders who give us a new dress three times a -year, and to the Messrs. Hoe & Co., who built our two -double-cylinder Napier presses, which throw off copies -of the <i>Sun</i> at the rate of four thousand per hour. We -invite newspaper publishers to visit our establishment -when the presses are in operation, and we shall be happy -to show them what would have astonished Dr. Faust, -with all his intimacy with a certain <i xml:lang="la" lang="la">nil admirari</i> -potentate.</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_129">129</span></p> - -<p>As for the influence of the paper among the people, -the <i>Sun</i> dealt in no vain exaggeration when it said of -itself, a year before Day’s departure:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Since the <i>Sun</i> began to shine upon the citizens of -New York there has been a very great and decided -change in the condition of the laboring classes and the -mechanics. Now every individual, from the rich aristocrat -who lolls in his carriage to the humble laborer who -wields a broom in the streets, reads the <i>Sun</i>; nor can -even a boy be found in New York City or the neighboring -country who will not know in the course of the day -what is promulgated in the <i>Sun</i> in the morning.</p> - -<p>Already can we perceive a change in the mass of the -people. They think, talk, and act in concert. They -understand their own interest, and feel that they have -numbers and strength to pursue it with success.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> newspaper has probably done more to benefit -the community by enlightening the minds of the common -people than all the other papers together.</p> -</div> - -<p>Day found New York journalism a pot of cold, stale -water, and left it a boiling caldron; not so much by -what he wrote as by the way in which he made his -success. There were better newspapermen than Day -before and during his time, plenty of them. They had -knowledge and experience, they knew style, but they -did not know the people. In their imagination the -“gentle reader” was a male between the ages of thirty-five -and ninety, with a burning interest in politics, and -a fancy that the universe revolved around either Andrew -Jackson or Daniel Webster. Why write for any one -who did not have fixed notions on the subject of the -United States Bank or Abolition?</p> - -<p>To the mind of the sixpenny editor, the man who -did not have six cents to spend was a negligible quantity. -Nothing was worth printing unless it carried an -appeal to the professional man or the merchant.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_130">130</span></p> - -<p>The <i>Courier and Enquirer</i>, under Colonel Webb, -belched broadsides of old-fashioned Democratic doctrine, -and Webb hired the best men he could find to load -the guns. He had Bennett, Noah, James K. Paulding, -and, later, Charles King and Henry J. Raymond. These -were all good writers, most of them good newspapermen; -but so far as the general public was concerned, -Colonel Webb might as well have put them in a cage.</p> - -<p>The <i>Journal of Commerce</i> was a great sixpenny, but -it was not for the people to read. From 1828 until the -Civil War its editor was Gerard Hallock, an enterprising -journalist who ran expensive horse-expresses to -Washington to get the proceedings of Congress, but -would not admit that the public at large was more interested -in a description of the murdered Helen Jewett’s -gowns than in a new currency bill. The clipper-ships -that lay off Sandy Hook to get the latest foreign news -from the European vessels cost Hallock and Webb, who -combined in this enterprise, twenty thousand dollars a -year—probably more than they spent on all their local -news.</p> - -<p>In the solemn sanctum of the <i>Evening Post</i>, William -Cullen Bryant and William Leggett wrote scholarly -verse and free-trade editorials. They were live men, but -their newspaper steed was slow. Leggett could urge -Bryant to give a beating to Stone, the editor of the <i>Commercial -Advertiser</i>, and he himself fought a duel with -Blake, the treasurer of the Park Theatre; but these -great men had little steam when it came to making a -popular newspaper. The great editors were of a cult. -They revolved around one another, too far aloft for the -common eye.</p> - -<p>Charles King was the most conservative of them all. -He was a son of Rufus King, Senator from New York -and minister to England, and he was editor of the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_131">131</span> -<i>American</i>, an evening sixpenny, from 1827 to 1845. He -lacked nothing in scholarship, but his paper was miserably -dull, and rarely circulated more than a thousand -copies. He remained at his editorial desk for four years -after the <i>American</i> was absorbed by the <i>Courier and -Enquirer</i>, and then he became president of Columbia -College, a place better suited to him.</p> - -<p>Such were the men who ruled the staid, prosy, and -expensive newspapers of New York when Day and his -penny <i>Sun</i> popped up. Most of them are better known -to fame than Day is, but not one of them did anything -comparable to the young printer’s achievement in making -a popular, low-priced daily newspaper—and not only -making it, but making it stick. For Day started something -that went rolling on, increasing in size and -weight until it controlled the thought of the continent. -Day was the Columbus, the <i>Sun</i> was the egg. Anybody -could do the trick—after Day showed how simple it was.</p> - -<p>Bennett and his <i>Herald</i> were the first to profit by -the example of the young Yankee printer. It should -have been easy for Bennett, yet he had already failed -at the same undertaking. He was at work in the newspaper -field of New York as early as 1824, nine years -before Day started the <i>Sun</i>. He failed as proprietor -of the Sunday <i>Courier</i> (1825), and he failed again with -the Philadelphia <i>Pennsylvanian</i>. He had a wealth of -experience as assistant to Webb and as the Washington -correspondent of the <i>Enquirer</i>.</p> - -<p>It was no doubt due to the success of the <i>Sun</i> that -Bennett, after two failures, established the <i>Herald</i>. He -saw the human note that Ben Day had struck, and he -knew, as a comparatively old newspaperman—he was -forty when he started the <i>Herald</i>—what mistakes Day -was making in the neglect of certain news fields, such -as Wall Street. But the value of the penny paper Day<span class="pagenum" id="Page_132">132</span> -had already proved, and Day had established, ahead of -everybody else, the newsboy system, by which the man -in the street could get a paper whenever he liked without -making a yearly investment.</p> - -<p>Bennett may have written the constitution of popular -journalism, but it was Day who wrote its declaration -of independence. If it had not been for the untrained -Day, fifteen years younger than Bennett, it is possible -that there would have been no <i>Herald</i> to span nearly a -century under the ownership of father and son; and the -two James Gordon Bennetts not only owned but absolutely -<em>were</em> the <i>Herald</i> from May 10, 1835, when the -father started the paper, until May 14, 1918, when the -son died.</p> - -<p>It had been said of Bennett that he discovered that -“a paper universally denounced will be read.” Day -learned that much a year before the <i>Herald</i> was started. -Day was sensational, and he seemed to court the written -assaults of the sixpenny editors. Bennett also sought -abuse, and did not care when it brought physical pain -with it. He was still more sensational than Day. If -there was nothing else, his own personal affairs were -made the public’s property. He was about to marry, -so the <i>Herald</i> printed this:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>TO THE READERS OF THE HERALD—Declaration -of Love—Caught at Last—Going to be Married—New -Movement in Civilization.</p> - -<p>My ardent desire has been through life to reach the -highest order of human excellence by the shortest possible -cut. Association, night and day, in sickness and -in health, in war and in peace, with a woman of the -highest order of excellence must produce some curious -results in my heart and feelings, and these results the -future will develop in due time in the columns of the -<i>Herald</i>. Meantime I return my heartfelt thanks for -the enthusiastic patronage of the public, both of Europe<span class="pagenum" id="Page_133">133</span> -and of America. The holy estate of wedlock will only -increase my desire to be still more useful. God Almighty -bless you all—JAMES GORDON BENNETT.</p> -</div> - -<p>James Parton described Bennett as “a man of French -intellect and Scotch habits.” Bennett was not of Scottish -blood, his parents being of French descent, but -his youth in Scotland, where he was born, probably -impregnated him with the thrift of his environment. -He established the no-credit system in the <i>Herald</i> business -office. Probably he had observed that Colonel -Webb had lost a fortune in unpaid subscriptions and -advertisements.</p> - -<p>Bennett was a good business man and an energetic -editor. He used all the ideas that Day had proved -profitable, and many of his own. Perhaps the most -valuable thing he learned from Day was that it was -unwise to be a slave to a political party. But his own -experience with the luckless <i>Pennsylvanian</i>, a Jackson -organ, may have convinced him of the futility of the -strictly partisan papers, which neglected the news for -the sake of the office-holders.</p> - -<p>Day’s success with the <i>Sun</i> was responsible for the -birth, not only of the <i>Herald</i>, but of a host of American -penny papers, which were established at the rate of a -dozen a year. Of the New York imitators the <i>Jeffersonian</i>, -published by Childs & Devoe, and the <i>Man</i>, -owned by George H. Evans, an Englishman who was the -Henry George of his day, were not long for this world. -The <i>Transcript</i>, started in 1834, flashed up for a time -as a dangerous rival of the <i>Sun</i>. Three compositors, -William J. Stanley, Willoughby Lynde, and Billings -Hayward, owned it. Its editor was Asa Greene, erstwhile -physician and bookseller and always humorist. -He wrote “The Adventures of Dr. Dodimus Duckworth,”<span class="pagenum" id="Page_134">134</span> -“The Perils of Pearl Street,” and “The Travels -of Ex-Barber Fribbleton in America”—this last a -travesty on the books of travel turned out by Englishmen -who visited the States.</p> - -<p>William H. Attree, a former compositor, wrote the -<i>Transcript’s</i> lively police-court stories, the <i>Sun’s</i> rival -having learned how popular was crime. The <i>Transcript</i> -lasted five years, the earlier of them so prosperous that -the proprietors thought they were going to be millionaires. -But Reporter Attree went to Texas with the -land-boomers, and Lynde, who wrote the paragraphs, -died. When the paper failed, in 1839, Hayward went -to the <i>Herald</i>, where he worked as a compositor all the -rest of his life.</p> - -<p>The other penny papers that sprang up in New York -to give battle—while the money lasted—to the <i>Sun</i>, the -<i>Transcript</i>, and the <i>Herald</i>, were the <i>True Sun</i>, started -by some of Day’s discharged employees; the <i>Morning -Star</i>, run by Major Noah, of the <i>Evening Star</i>; the <i>New -Era</i>, already mentioned, which Richard Adams Locke -started in 1836 in company with Jared D. Bell and -Joseph Price; the <i>Daily Whig</i>, of which Horace Greeley -was Albany correspondent in 1838; the <i>Bee</i>, the <i>Serpent</i>, -the <i>Light</i>, the <i>Express</i>, the <i>Union</i>, the <i>Rough Hewer</i>, -the <i>News Times</i>, the <i>Examiner</i>, the <i>Morning Chronicle</i>, -the <i>Evening Chronicle</i>, the <i>Daily Conservative</i>, the -<i>Censor</i>, and the <i>Daily News</i>. All these bobbed up, in -one city alone, in the five years during which Ben Day -owned the <i>Sun</i>.</p> - -<p>Most of them were mushrooms in origin and morning-glories -by nature. They could not stand the <i>Sun’s</i> -rays.</p> - -<p>Notable exceptions were two evening papers, the -<i>Express</i> and the <i>Daily News</i>. The <i>Express</i> was established -in June, 1836, under the editorship of James<span class="pagenum" id="Page_135">135</span> -Brooks and his brother Erastus, graduates of the <i>Advertiser</i>, -of Portland, Maine. It was devoted to Whig -politics and the shipping of New York. The <i>Daily News</i> -took no considerable part in journalism until twenty-five -years later, when Benjamin Wood bought it.</p> - -<p>In other parts of the country the one-cent newspaper, -properly conducted, met with the favour which the public -had showered upon Ben Day. William M. Swain, -who has been mentioned as a fellow compositor with -Ben Day, and who tried to dissuade his friend from the -folly of starting the <i>Sun</i>, saw the wisdom of the penny -paper, and saw, also, that the New York field was filled. -He went to Philadelphia and established the <i>Public -Ledger</i>, the first issue appearing on March 25, 1836. -The <i>Ledger</i> was not the first penny sheet to be published -in Philadelphia, the <i>Daily Transcript</i> having preceded -it by a few days. These two newspapers soon -consolidated, however.</p> - -<p>Swain’s <i>Ledger</i> was at once sensational and brave. -It came out for the abolition of slavery, and its office -was twice mobbed. It was mobbed again in 1844, during -the Native American riots. Swain was a big, -hard-working man. George W. Childs, his successor -as proprietor of the <i>Ledger</i>, wrote of him that for -twenty years it was his habit to read every paragraph -that went into the paper. Swain made three million -dollars out of the <i>Ledger</i>; but when, during the -Civil War, the cost of paper compelled nearly all the -newspapers to advance prices, he tried to keep the -<i>Ledger</i> at one cent, and lost a hundred thousand dollars -within a year. Childs, who had been a newsdealer and -book-publisher, bought the paper from Swain in 1864, -and raised its price to two cents.</p> - -<p>When Swain went to Philadelphia he had two partners, -Arunah S. Abell and Azariah H. Simmons, both<span class="pagenum" id="Page_136">136</span> -printers, and, like Swain, former associates of Day. -Simmons remained with Swain on the <i>Ledger</i> until his -death in 1855, but Abell—the man who poked more fun -than anybody else at Day for his penny <i>Sun</i> idea—went -to Baltimore and there established a <i>Sun</i> of his -own, the first copy coming out on May 17, 1837. -It was a success from the start. How well it paid -Abell to follow Ben Day’s scheme may be judged by -the fact that thirty years later Abell bought Guilford, -a splendid estate near Baltimore, and paid $475,000 -for it.</p> - -<p>Both Swain and Abell were friends of S. F. B. Morse, -and they helped him to finance the electric telegraph. -The Baltimore <i>Sun</i> published the famous message—“What -hath God wrought?”—sent over the wire from -Washington to Baltimore on May 24, 1844, when the telegraph -first came into practical use. Abell was the sole -proprietor of the Baltimore <i>Sun</i> from 1837 to 1887. -He died in 1888 at the age of eighty-two.</p> - -<p>Other important newspapers started in the ten years -that followed Day’s founding of the <i>Sun</i> were the Detroit -<i>Free Press</i>, the St. Louis <i>Republic</i>, the New -Orleans <i>Picayune</i>, the Burlington <i>Hawkeye</i>, the Hartford -<i>Times</i>, the New York <i>Tribune</i>, the Brooklyn <i>Eagle</i>, -the Cincinnati <i>Enquirer</i>, and the Cleveland <i>Plain -Dealer</i>.</p> - -<p>In 1830 there were only 852 newspapers in the United -States, which then had a population of 12,866,020, and -these newspapers had a combined yearly circulation of -68,117,000 copies. Ten years later the population was -17,069,453, and there were 1,631 newspapers with a combined -yearly circulation of 196,000,000 copies. In other -words, while the population increased 32 per cent. in -a decade, the total sale of newspapers increased 187 -per cent. The inexpensive paper had found its readers.</p> - -<div id="ip_136a" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 34em;"> - <img src="images/i_136a.jpg" width="1618" height="1200" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - <p>AN EXTRA OF “THE SUN”</p> - -<p class="subhead">These Special Editions Were Issued on the Arrival of Every Mail Ship from England.</p> -</div></div> - -<div id="ip_136b" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 38em;"> - <img src="images/i_136ab.jpg" width="1805" height="1075" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - <p>THE THIRD HOME OF “THE SUN”</p> - -<p class="subhead">Beach and Bennett, Rival Publishers, Had Offices Opposite Each Other at Fulton and -Nassau Streets.</p> -</div></div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_137">137</span></p> - -<p>In his report on newspapers for the Census of 1880, -S. N. D. North says that from 1830 to <span class="locked">1840—</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>By the sheer force of its superior circulation, the -penny press exerted the most powerful newspaper influence -that was felt in the United States, and during -this interval its beneficial influence was the most apparent. -It taught the higher-priced papers that political -connection was properly subordinated to the -other and higher function of the public journal—the -function of gathering and presenting the news as it -is, without reference to its political or other effect upon -friend or foe.</p> - -<p>The advent of the penny press concluded the transition -period in American journalism, and had three -effects which are easily traceable. It increased the circulation, -decreased the price of daily newspapers, and -changed the character of the reading-matter published.</p> -</div> - -<p>As Charles H. Levermore wrote in an article on the -rise of metropolitan journalism in the <i>American Historical -Review</i>:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Independent journalism, as represented first by the -<i>Sun</i> and the <i>Herald</i>, won a complete victory over old-fashioned -partizan journalism. The time had forever -departed when an Albany regency could tune the press -of the State as easily and simply as Queen Elizabeth -used to tune the English pulpits. As James Parton -said, “An editorial is only a man speaking to men; -but the news is Providence speaking to men.”</p> -</div> - -<p>Thus Ben Day’s <i>Sun</i> remade American journalism—more -by accident than design, as he himself remarked -at a dinner to Robert Hoe in 1851.</p> - -<p>It is evident that Day soon regretted the sale of the -<i>Sun</i>, for in 1840 he established a penny paper called the -<i>True Sun</i>. This he presently sold for a fair price, but -his itch for journalism did not disappear. He started<span class="pagenum" id="Page_138">138</span> -the <i>Tatler</i>, but it was not a success. In 1842, in conjunction -with James Wilson, he founded the monthly -magazine, <i>Brother Jonathan</i>, which reprinted English -double-decker novels complete in one issue. This later -became a weekly, and Day brought out illustrated editions -semi-annually.</p> - -<p>This was a new thing, at least in America, and Day -may be called the originator of our illustrated periodicals -as well as of our penny papers. His right-hand -men in the editing of <i>Brother Jonathan</i> were Nathaniel -P. Willis, the poet, and Horatio H. Weld, who was -first a printer, next an editor, and at last a minister.</p> - -<p>Day sold <i>Brother Jonathan</i> for a dollar a year. -When the paper famine hit the publishing business in -1862, he suspended his publication and retired from -business. He was well off, and he spent the remaining -twenty-seven years of his life in ease at his New York -home. He died on December 21, 1889. His son Benjamin -was the inventor of the Ben Day process used in -making engravings.</p> - -<p>Day always watched the fortunes of the <i>Sun</i> with -interest, but he did not believe that his immediate successors -ran it just the right way. When the paper -passed into the hands of Charles A. Dana, in 1868, Day—then -not yet threescore—said:</p> - -<p>“He’ll make a newspaper of it!”</p> - -<p>And it was then he added that the silliest thing he -himself ever did was to sell the <i>Sun</i>.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div id="toclink_139" class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_139">139</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_VI">CHAPTER VI<br /> - -<span class="subhead">MOSES Y. BEACH’S ERA OF HUSTLE</span></h2> -</div> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p><i>“The Sun” Uses Albany Steamboats, Horse Expresses, Trotting -Teams, Pigeons, and the Telegraph to Get News.—Poe’s -Famous Balloon Hoax and the Case of Mary Rogers.</i></p> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">The</span> second owner of the <i>Sun</i>, Moses Yale Beach, -was, like Ben Day, a Yankee. He was born in -the old Connecticut town of Wallingford on January 7, -1800. He had a little education in the common schools, -but showed more interest in mechanics than in books. -When he was fourteen he was bound out to a cabinet-maker -in Hartford. His skill was so fine that he saw -the needlessness of serving the customary seven years, -and his industry so great that he was able, by doing -extra work in odd times, to get together enough money -to buy his freedom from his master. He set up a cabinet-shop -of his own at Northampton, Massachusetts.</p> - -<p>When Beach was twenty, he made the acquaintance -of Miss Nancy Day, of Springfield, the sister of Benjamin -was the inventor of the Ben Day process used in -Day were married in 1821, and as the business at -Northampton was not prospering, they settled down in -Springfield.</p> - -<p>The young man was a good cabinet-maker, but his -mind ran to inventions rather than to chests and high-boys. -Steamboat navigation had not yet attained a -commercial success, but Beach was a close student of -the advance made by Robert Fulton and Henry Bell. -First, however, he devoted his talents as an inventor<span class="pagenum" id="Page_140">140</span> -to a motor in which the power came from explosions of -gunpowder. He tried this on a boat which he intended -to run on the Connecticut River between Springfield -and Hartford. When it failed, he turned back to steam, -and he undoubtedly would have made a success of this -boat line if his money resources had been adequate.</p> - -<p>Beach then invented a rag-cutting machine for use -in paper-mills, and he might have had a fortune out of -it if he had taken a patent in time, for the process is -still used. As it was, the device enabled him to get an -interest in a paper-mill at Saugerties, New York, where -he removed in 1829. This mill was prosperous for some -years, but in 1835 Beach found it more profitable to go -to work for his young brother-in-law, Mr. Day, who had -by this time brought the <i>Sun</i> to the point of assured -success.</p> - -<p>Beach was a great help to Day, not only as the -manager of the <i>Sun’s</i> finances, but as general supervisor -of the mechanical department. In the three years of -his association with Day he picked up a good working -knowledge of the newspaper business. He recognized -the features that had made the <i>Sun</i> successful—chiefly -the presentation of news that interested the ordinary -reader—and saw the neglect of this policy was keeping -the old-fashioned sixpenny papers at a standstill.</p> - -<p>He did not underestimate other news. “Other news,” -in that day, meant the proceedings of Congress and the -New York State Legislature, the condensed news of -Europe, as received from a London correspondent or rewritten -from the English journals, and such important -items as might be clipped from the newspapers of the -South and West. Many of these American papers sent -proof-sheets of news articles to the <i>Sun</i> by mail.</p> - -<p>When Beach bought the paper there was no express -service. There had been, in fact, no express service in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_141">141</span> -America except the one which Charles Davenport and -N. S. Mason operated over the Boston and Taunton -Railway. But in March, 1839, about a year after Beach -got the <i>Sun</i>, William F. Harnden began an express -service—later the Adams Express Company—between -New York and Boston, using the boats from New York -to Providence and the rail from Providence to Boston.</p> - -<p>This was a big help to the New York papers, for with -the aid of the express the English papers brought by -ships landing at Boston were in the New York offices -the next day. To a city which still lacked wire communication -of any kind this was highly important, and -there was hardly an issue of the <i>Sun</i> in the spring of -1839 that did not contain a paragraph laudatory of -Mr. Harnden’s enterprise.</p> - -<p>The steamship, still a novelty, was the big thing in -newspaperdom. While the <i>Sun</i> did not neglect the -police-court reports and the animal stories so dear to -its readers, the latest news from abroad usually had -the place of honour on the second page. The first page -remained the home of the advertisement and the haunt -of the miscellaneous article. It was by ship that <i>Sun</i> -readers learned of Daguerre and his picture-taking device; -of Cobden and the Anti-Corn-Law League; of the -war between Abd-el-Kader and the French; of Don -Carlos and his ups and downs—mostly downs; of the -first British invasion of Afghanistan. There was the -young queen, Victoria, always interesting, and there -were the doings of actors known to America:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>At the queen’s desire, her tutor, Dr. Davys—father to -the Miss Davys whose ears the queen boxed—has been -appointed Bishop of Marlborough.</p> - -<p>Charles Kean’s friends say he has been offered the -sum of sixty pounds a night for sixty nights in New -York.</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_142">142</span></p> - -<p>On June 1, 1839, the <i>Sun</i> got out an extra on the -arrival, at three o’clock that morning, of the Great -Western, after a passage of thirteen days—the fastest -trip up to that time—and fifty-seven thousand copies -of the paper were sold. The <i>Sun’s</i> own sailing vessels -met the incoming steamships down the bay. The <i>Sun</i> -boasted:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>In consequence of our news-boat arrangements we -receive our papers more than an hour earlier than any -other paper in this city. On the arrival of the Liverpool -[July 1, 1839], we proceeded to issue an extra, -which will reach Albany with the news twelve hours -before it will be published in the regular editions of -their evening papers, and twenty-four hours ahead of -the morning papers.</p> -</div> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> had woodcuts made of all the leading ships, -and these, with their curly waves, lit up a page wonderfully, -if not beautifully. When the British Queen arrived -on July 28, 1839, there was a half-page picture -of her. She was the finest ship that had ever been built -in Great Britain, with her total length of two hundred -and seventy-five feet—less than one-third as much as -some of the modern giants—and her paddle-wheels with -a diameter of thirty-one feet. Small wonder that the -<i>Sun</i> favoured New York with a Sunday paper in honour -of the event, and that the Monday sale, with the -same feature, was forty-nine thousand. Quoth the <i>Sun</i>:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Who will wonder, after this, that the lazy, lumbering -<i xml:lang="it" lang="it">lazaroni</i> of Wall Street stick up their noses at us?</p> -</div> - -<p>In January, 1840, when the packet-ships United -States and England arrived together, the <i>Sun</i> gave the -story a front-page display, and actually used full-faced -type for the subheads of the article.</p> - -<p>A tragedy is recalled in one paragraph of the <i>Sun’s</i><span class="pagenum" id="Page_143">143</span> -account of the arrival of the Great Western on April -26, 1841:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Up to the closing of the mail from Liverpool to London -on the 7th, the steamer President had not arrived.</p> -</div> - -<p>The President never arrived, and her fate is one of -the secrets of the sea. She sailed from New York on -March 11, 1841, with thirty-one passengers, including -Tyrone Power, the Irish actor, who had just concluded -his second American tour. It is conjectured that the -President sank during the great gale that sprang up her -second night out.</p> - -<p>In getting news from various parts of the United -States, the <i>Sun</i> took a leaf from the book of Colonel -Webb and other journalists who had used the horse express. -In January, 1841, on the occasion of Governor -William H. Seward’s message to the Legislature, the -<i>Sun</i> beat the town. The Legislature received the message -at 11 <span class="allsmcap">A.M.</span> on January 5:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>An express arriving exclusively for the <i>Sun</i> then -started, it being one o’clock, and at six this morning -reached our office, thus enabling us to repeat the triumph -achieved by us last year over the whole combined -press of New York, large and small. It is but just to -say that our express was brought on by the horses of -the Red Bird Line with unparalleled expedition, in -spite of wind, hail, and rain.</p> -</div> - -<p>Nowadays a Governor’s message is in the newspaper-offices -days before it is sent to the Legislature, and -there, treated in the confidence that is never betrayed -by a decent newspaper, it is prepared for printing, so -that it may be on the street five minutes after it is delivered, -if its importance warrants. In the old days -the message, borne by relays of horse vehicles down -the snow-covered post-road from Albany to New York,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_144">144</span> -was more important to the newspapers than the messages -of this period appear to be. With newspapers, -as with humans, that which is easy to get loses value.</p> - -<p>In October, 1841, the <i>Sun</i> spent money freely to -secure a quick report of the momentous trial of Alexander -McLeod for the murder of Amos Durfee. War -between the United States and Great Britain hinged -on the outcome. During the rebellion in Upper Canada, -in 1837, the American steamer Caroline was used by -the insurgents to carry supplies down the Niagara River -to a party of rebels on Navy Island. A party of loyal -Canadians seized and destroyed the Caroline at Grand -Island, and in the fight Durfee and eleven others were -killed. The Canadian, McLeod, who boasted of being -a participant, was arrested when he ventured across the -American border in 1840.</p> - -<p>The British government made a demand for his release, -insisting that what McLeod had done was an act -of war, performed under the orders of his commanding -officer, Captain Drew. President Van Buren replied -that the American government had several times asked -the British government whether the destruction of the -Caroline was an act of war, and had never received a -reply; and further, that the Federal government had -no power to prevent the State of New York from trying -persons indicted within its jurisdiction.</p> - -<p>The whole country realized the hostile attitude of -the British ministry, and accepted its threat that war -would be declared if McLeod were not released. The -trial took place at Utica, New York, and the <i>Sun</i> printed -from two to five columns a day about it. It ran a -special train from Utica to Schenectady. There a -famous driver, Otis Dimmick, waited with a fine team -of horses to take the story to the Albany boat, the fastest -means of transportation between the State capital<span class="pagenum" id="Page_145">145</span> -and the metropolis. The <i>Sun</i> declared that one day -Dimmick and his horses made the sixteen miles between -Schenectady and Albany in forty-nine minutes.</p> - -<p>And the end of it all was proof that McLeod, who had -boasted of killing “a damned Yankee,” had been asleep -in Chippewa on the night of the Caroline affair, and -was nothing worse than a braggart. So the war-cloud -blew over.</p> - -<p>Beach was a man of great faith in railroads and all -other forms of progress. When the Boston and Albany -road was finished, the <i>Sun</i> related how a barrel of flour -was growing in the field in Canandaigua on a Monday—the -barrel in a tree and the flour in the wheat—and on -Wednesday, transformed and ready for the baker, it -was in Boston.</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Sperm candles manufactured by Mr. Penniman at -Albany on Wednesday morning were burning at Faneuil -Hall and at the Tremont, in Boston, on the evening of -the same day.</p> -</div> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> had faith in Morse and his telegraph from -the outset. The invention was born in Nassau Street, -only a block or two from the <i>Sun’s</i> office. Morse put -the wire into practical use between Baltimore and Washington -on May 24, 1844. That was a Friday. The <i>Sun</i> -said nothing about it the next day, and had no Sunday -paper; but on Monday it said editorially:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>MAGNETIC TELEGRAPH—The new invention is -completed from Baltimore to Washington. The wire, -perfectly secured against the weather by a covering of -rope-yarn and tar, is conducted on the top of posts -about twenty feet high and one hundred yards apart. -The nominations of the convention this day are to be -conveyed to Washington by this telegraph, where they -will arrive in a few seconds. On Saturday morning the -batteries were charged and the regular transmission of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_146">146</span> -intelligence between Washington and Baltimore commenced.... -At half past 11 <span class="allsmcap">A.M.</span>, the question being -asked, what was the news at Washington, the answer -was almost instantaneously returned: “Van Buren -stock is rising.” This is indeed the annihilation of -space.</p> -</div> - -<p>It is hardly necessary to say that the convention referred -to was the Democratic national convention at -Baltimore, that Van Buren’s stock, high early in the -proceedings, fell again, and that James K. Polk was the -nominee.</p> - -<p>But as New York was not fortunate enough to have -the first commercial telegraph-line, the <i>Sun</i> had to rely -on its own efforts for speedy news from the convention. -It ran special trains from Baltimore, “beating the -United States mail train and locomotive an hour or -two.”</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> soon afterward expressed annoyance at a -report that it was itself a part of a monopoly which was -to control the telegraph, and that it had bought a telegraph-line -from New York to Springfield, Massachusetts. -It insisted that there should be no monopoly, -and that the use of the telegraph must be open to all. -There was no suggestion that Morse intended to control -his invention improperly, but the <i>Sun</i> was not quite -satisfied with the government’s lassitude. Morse had -offered his rights to the government for one hundred -thousand dollars, and Congress had sneered.</p> - -<p>It was not until 1846 that the telegraph was extended -to New York, and in the meantime the New York papers -used such other means as they could for the collection -of news. Besides trains, ships, horses, and the -fleet foot of the reporter, there were pigeons. Beach -went in for pigeons extensively. When the <i>Sun</i> moved -from 156 Nassau Street, in the summer of 1842, it took<span class="pagenum" id="Page_147">147</span> -a six-story building at the southwest corner of Nassau -and Fulton Streets, securing about three times as much -room as it had in the two-story building at Spruce -Street. On the top of the new building Beach built a -pigeon-house, which stood for half a century.</p> - -<p>The strange, boxlike cote attracted not only the attention -of Mr. Bennett, whose <i>Herald</i> was quartered -just across the street, but of all the folk who came and -went in that busy region. So many were the queries -from friends and the quips from enemies concerning the -pigeon-house that the <i>Sun</i> (December 14, 1843), vouchsafed -to explain:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Why, we have had a school of carrier-pigeons in the -upper apartments of the <i>Sun</i> office since we have occupied -the building. Did our contemporaries believe that -we ever could be at fault in furnishing the earliest news -to our readers? Or did they indulge the hope that in -newspaper enterprise they could ever catch us napping?</p> - -<p>Carrier-pigeons have long been remarked for their -sagacity and admired for their usefulness. They are, -of all birds, the most invaluable, and as auxiliary to a -newspaper cannot be too highly prized. Part of the -flock in our possession were employed by the London -<i>Morning Chronicle</i> in bringing intelligence from Dublin -to London, and from Paris to London, crossing both -channels; therefore they are not novices in the newspaper -express.</p> - -<p>If there was delay in the arrival of the Boston -steamer, and the weather clear, we despatched our choice -pigeon, Sam Patch, down the Sound, and he invariably -came back with a slip of delicate tissue-paper tied under -his wing, containing the news. We thus are apprised -of the arrival of the steamer some two hours before any -one else hears of her. Our men are at their cases; the -steam is up in our pressroom, and our extras are always -out first.</p> - -<p>We sometimes let one of our carriers fly to the Narrows, -and in twenty minutes or so we know what is<span class="pagenum" id="Page_148">148</span> -coming in, thirty miles from Sandy Hook Light. We -despatch them as far as Albany, on any important mission; -frequently to New Jersey, and in the summer-time -they sometimes look in at Rockaway and let us know -what is going on at the pavilion. We have a small -sliding door in our observatory, on the top of the <i>Sun</i> -office, through which the little aerials pass. By sending -off one every little while, we ascertain the details of -whatever is important or interesting at any given point.</p> - -<p>They often fly at the rate of sixty miles an hour, easy! -For example, a half-dozen will leave Washington at daylight -this morning and arrive here about noon, beating -the mail generally ten hours or so. They can come -through from Albany in about two hours and a half, -solar time. They fly exceedingly high, and keep so until -they make the spires of the city, and then descend. We -have not lost one by any accident, and believe ours is -the only flock of value or importance in the country.</p> - -<p>We give this brief detail of “them pigeons” because -our prying friends and neighbors in the newspaper way -have such a meager, guesswork account of them; and -because we dislike any mystery or artifice in our business -operations.</p> -</div> - -<p>Speed and more speed was the newspaper demand of -the hour, particularly among the penny papers. The -<i>Sun</i> and the <i>Herald</i> had been battling for years, with -competitors springing up about them, usually to die -within the twelvemonth. Now the <i>Tribune</i> had come to -remain in the fray, even if it had not as much money to -spend on news-gathering as the <i>Sun</i> and the <i>Herald</i>.</p> - -<p>Edgar Allan Poe saw the fever that raged among the -rivals. He had just returned to New York from Philadelphia -with his sick wife and his mother. He was a -recognized genius, but his worldly wealth amounted to -four dollars and fifty cents. He had written “The -Narrative of A. Gordon Pym,” “The Murders in the -Rue Morgue,” “The Gold Bug,” and other immortal -stories, but his livelihood had been precarious. He had<span class="pagenum" id="Page_149">149</span> -been in turn connected with the <i>Southern Literary Messenger</i>, -the <i>Gentleman’s Magazine</i>, and <i>Graham’s Magazine</i>, -and had twice issued the prospectuses for new -periodicals of his own, fated never to be born.</p> - -<p>His fortunes were at their lowest when he arrived in -New York on April 6, 1844. He and his family found -rooms in Greenwich Street, near Cedar, now the thick -of the business district. “The house is old and looks -buggy,” he wrote to a friend, but it was the best he -could do with less than five dollars in his pocket.</p> - -<p>He had to have more money. The newspapers seemed -to be the most available place to get it, and the <i>Sun</i> the -livest of them. Speed—that was what they wanted. -They had been having ocean steamers until they were -almost sick. Railroads were unromantic. Horses were -an old story. The telegraph was still regarded as -theory, and it hardly appealed to the imagination.</p> - -<p>Pigeons? Perhaps there was inspiration in the sight -of Sam Patch preening himself on a cornice of the <i>Sun’s</i> -building. A magnified pigeon would be an air-ship. -Poe sat him down, wrote the “balloon hoax,” and sold -it to Mr. Beach. It appeared in the <i>Sun</i> of April 13, -1844.</p> - -<p>Beneath a black-faced heading that was supplemented -by a woodcut of three race-horses flying under the whips -of their jockeys and the subtitle “By Express,” was the -following introduction:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p class="hang2">ASTOUNDING INTELLIGENCE BY PRIVATE EXPRESS -FROM CHARLESTON, VIA NORFOLK!—THE -ATLANTIC OCEAN CROSSED IN THREE -DAYS!!!—ARRIVAL AT SULLIVAN’S ISLAND OF -A STEERING BALLOON INVENTED BY MR. MONCK -MASON.</p> - -<p>We stop the press at a late hour to announce that by -a private express from Charleston, South Carolina, we<span class="pagenum" id="Page_150">150</span> -are just put in possession of full details of the most -extraordinary adventure ever accomplished by man. -<em>The Atlantic Ocean has actually been traversed in a -balloon, and in the incredibly brief period of three days!</em> -Eight persons have crossed in the machine, among -others Sir Everard Bringhurst and Mr. Monck Mason. -We have barely time now to announce this most novel -and unexpected intelligence, but we hope by ten this -morning to have ready an extra with a detailed account -of the voyage.</p> - -<p>P. S.—The extra will be positively ready, and for sale -at our counter, by ten o’clock this morning. It will -embrace all the particulars yet known. We have also -placed in the hands of an excellent artist a representation -of the “Steering Balloon,” which will accompany -the particulars of the voyage.</p> -</div> - -<p>The promised extra bore a head of stud-horse type, -six banks in all, and as many inches deep.</p> - -<p>“Astounding News by Express, <i xml:lang="la" lang="la">via</i> Norfolk!” it announced. -“The Atlantic Crossed in Three Days!—Signal -Triumph of Mr. Monck Mason’s Flying-Machine!!!—Arrival -at Sullivan’s Island, Near Charleston, of -Mr. Mason, Mr. Robert Holland, Mr. Henson, Mr. Harrison -Ainsworth, and Four Others in the Steering Balloon -Victoria, after a Passage of Seventy-Five Hours -from Land to Land—Full Particulars of the Voyage!!!”</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The great problem is at length solved. The air, as well -as the earth and the ocean, has been subdued by science, -and will become a common and convenient highway for -mankind. The Atlantic has been actually crossed in a -balloon! And this, too, without difficulty—without any -great apparent danger—with thorough control of the -machine—and in the inconceivably brief period of -seventy-five hours from shore to shore!</p> - -<p>By the energy of an agent at Charleston, South Carolina, -we are enabled to be the first to furnish the public -with a detailed account of this most extraordinary voyage,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_151">151</span> -which was performed between Saturday, the 6th -instant, at 11 <span class="allsmcap">A.M.</span> and 2 <span class="allsmcap">P.M.</span> on Tuesday, the 9th instant, -by Sir Everard Bringhurst, Mr. Osborne, a -nephew of Lord Bentinck; Mr. Monck Mason, and Mr. -Robert Holland, the well-known aeronauts; Mr. Harrison -Ainsworth, author of “Jack Sheppard,” <i xml:lang="la" lang="la">et cetera</i>, -and Mr. Henson, the projector of the late unsuccessful -flying-machine—with two seamen from Woolwich—in -all, eight persons.</p> - -<p>The particulars furnished below may be relied on as -authentic and accurate in every respect, as with a slight -exception they are copied verbatim from the joint diaries -of Mr. Monck Mason and Mr. Harrison Ainsworth, to -whose politeness our agent is indebted for much verbal -information respecting the balloon itself, its construction, -and other matters of interest. The only alteration -in the MS. received has been made for the purpose of -throwing the hurried account of our agent, Mr. Forsyth, -into a connected and intelligible form.</p> -</div> - -<p>The story that followed was about five thousand -words in length. To summarize it, Monck Mason had -applied the principle of the Archimedean screw to the -propulsion of a dirigible balloon. The gas-bag was an -ellipsoid thirteen feet long, with a car suspended from -it. The screw propeller, which was attached to the car, -was operated by a spring. A rudder shaped like a -battledore kept the air-ship on its course.</p> - -<p>The voyagers, according to the story, started from -Mr. Osborne’s home near Penstruthal, in North Wales, -intending to sail across the English Channel. The -mechanism of the propeller broke, and the balloon, -caught in a strong northeast wind, was carried across -the Atlantic at the speed of sixty or more miles an hour. -Mr. Mason kept a journal, to which, at the end of each -day, Mr. Ainsworth added a postscript. The balloon -landed safely on the coast of South Carolina, near Fort -Moultrie.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_152">152</span></p> - -<p>The names of the supposed voyagers were well chosen -by Poe to give verisimilitude to the hoax. Monck -Mason and Robert Holland, or Hollond, were of the -small party which actually sailed from Vauxhall Gardens, -London, on the afternoon of November 7, 1836, -in the balloon Nassau and landed at Weilburg, in Germany, -five hundred miles away, eighteen hours later. -Harrison Ainsworth, the novelist, was then one of the -shining stars of English literary life. The others named -by Poe were familiar figures of the period.</p> - -<p>Poe adopted the plan, used so successfully by Locke -in the moon hoax, of having real people do the thing -that they would like to do; but there the resemblance -of the two hoaxes ends, except for the technical bits that -Poe was able to inject into his narrative. The moon -hoax lasted for weeks; the balloon hoax for a day. -Even the <i>Sun</i> did not attempt to bolster it, for it said -the second day afterward:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>BALLOON—The mails from the South last Saturday -night not having brought confirmation of the balloon -from England, the particulars of which from our -correspondent we detailed in our extra, we are inclined -to believe that the intelligence is erroneous. The description -of the balloon and the voyage was written with -a minuteness and scientific ability calculated to obtain -credit everywhere, and was read with great pleasure and -satisfaction. We by no means think such a project impossible.</p> -</div> - -<p>About a week later, when the <i>Sun</i> was still being -pounded by its contemporaries, a few of which had been -gulled into rewriting the story, another editorial article -on the hoax appeared:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>BALLOON EXPRESS—We have been somewhat -amused with the comments of the press upon the balloon -express. The more intelligent editors saw its object<span class="pagenum" id="Page_153">153</span> -at once. On the other hand, many of our esteemed -contemporaries—those who are too ignorant to appreciate -the pleasant satire—have ascribed to us the worst -and basest motives. We expected as much.</p> -</div> - -<p>The “pleasant satire” of which the <i>Sun</i> spoke was -evidently meant to hold up to view the craze of the day -for speed in the transmission of news and men. Yet -the <i>Sun</i> itself, as the leader of penny journalism, had -been to a great extent the cause of this craze. It had -taught the people to read the news and to hanker for -more.</p> - -<p>There was another story which Poe and the <i>Sun</i> -shared—one that will outlive even the balloon hoax. -Almost buried on the third page of the <i>Sun</i> of July 28, -1841, was this advertisement in agate type:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Left her home on Sunday morning, July 25, a young -lady; had on a white dress, black shawl, blue scarf, -Leghorn hat, light-colored shoes, and parasol light-colored; -it is supposed some accident has befallen her. -Whoever will give information respecting her at 126 -Nassau shall be rewarded for their trouble.</p> -</div> - -<p>The next day the <i>Sun</i> said in its news columns:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p class="in0"><span class="xlarge bold tpadhand">☞</span> The body of a young lady some eighteen or twenty -years of age was found in the water at Hoboken. From -the description of her dress, fears are entertained that -it is the body of Miss Mary C. Rogers, who is advertised -in yesterday’s paper as having disappeared from her -home, 126 Nassau Street, on Sunday last.</p> -</div> - -<p>The fears were well grounded, for the dead girl was -Mary Cecilia Rogers, the “beautiful cigar-girl” who -had been the magnet at John Anderson’s tobacco-shop -at Broadway and Duane Street; the tragic figure of -Poe’s story, “The Mystery of Marie Roget,” a tale which -served to keep alive the features of that unsolved riddle<span class="pagenum" id="Page_154">154</span> -of the Elysian Fields of Hoboken. To the <i>Sun</i>, which -had then no Poe, no <i>Sherlock Holmes</i>, the murder was -the text for a moral lesson:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>There can be no question that she had fallen a victim -to the most imprudent and reprehensible practise, -which has recently obtained to a considerable extent -in this city, of placing behind the counters and at the -windows of stores for the sale of articles purchased exclusively -by males—especially of cigar-stores and drinking-houses—young -and beautiful females for the purpose -of thus attracting the attention, exciting the interest -(or worse still), and thus inducing the visits and -consequent custom, of the other sex—especially of the -young and thoughtless.</p> - -<p>It was by being placed in such a situation, in one of -the most public spots in the city, that this unfortunate -girl was led into a train of acquaintances and associations -which has eventually proved not only her ruin, -but an untimely and violent death in the prime of youth -and beauty. From being used as an instrument of -cupidity—as a sort of “man-trap” to lure by her -charms the gay and giddy into the path of the spendthrift -and of constant dissipation—she has become the -victim of the very passions and vices which her exposure -to the public gaze for mercenary gain was so well -calculated to engender and encourage.</p> -</div> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> and the other papers might have pursued -the Mary Rogers mystery further than they did had it -not been that in a few weeks a more tangible tragedy -presented itself, when John C. Colt, a teacher of bookkeeping, -and the brother of Samuel Colt, the inventor, -killed Samuel Adams, one of the leading printers of -New York. Adams had gone to Colt’s lodgings at -Broadway and Chambers Street to collect a bill, and -Colt, who had a furious temper, murdered him with a -hammer, packed the body in a box, and hired an innocent -drayman to haul it down to the ship Kalamazoo,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_155">155</span> -for shipment to New Orleans. This affair drove the -Rogers murder out of the types, and left it for Poe to -preserve in fiction with the names of the characters -thinly veiled and the scene transferred to Paris.</p> - -<p>The great social event of the town in 1842 was the -visit of Charles Dickens. He had been expected for -several years. In fact, as far back as October 13, 1838, -the <i>Sun</i> remarked:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Boz is coming to America. We hope he will not make -a fool of himself here, like a majority of his distinguished -countrymen who preceded him.</p> -</div> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> got out an extra on the day when Dickens -landed, but it was not in honour of Boz, but rather because -of the arrival of the Britannia with a budget of -foreign news. Buried in a mass of Continental paragraphs -was this one:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Among the passengers are Mr. Charles Dickens, the -celebrated author, and his lady.</p> -</div> - -<p>The ship-news man never even thought to ask Dickens -how he liked America. But society was waiting for -Boz, and he was tossed about on a lively sea of receptions -and dinners. The <i>Sun</i> presently thought that the -young author was being exploited overmuch:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Mr. Dickens, we have no doubt, is a very respectable -gentleman, and we know that he is a very clever and -agreeable author. He has written several books that -have put the reading world in most excellent good -humor. In this way he has done much to promote the -general happiness of mankind, and honestly deserves -their gratitude.</p> - -<p>Having crossed the water for the purpose of traveling -in America, where his works have been extensively read -and admired, he is, of course, received and treated with<span class="pagenum" id="Page_156">156</span> -marked civility, attention, and respect. We should be -ashamed of our countrymen if it were otherwise. During -his stay at Boston the citizens gave him a public -dinner. At New Haven he received a similar token of -kind regard. In this city a ball has been given him. -All these attentions were right and proper, and as far -as we can learn they have been uniformly conducted in -a gentlemanly and respectable manner, becoming alike -to the characters of those who gave and him who received -them.</p> - -<p>But a few penny-catchers of the press are determined -to make money out of Boz. The shop-windows are -stuffed with lithograph likenesses of him, which resemble -the original just about as much as he resembles -a horse. His own wife would not recognize them in -any other way than by the word “Boz” written under -them.</p> - -<p>Then a corps of sneaking reporters, most of them -fresh from London, are pursuing him like a pack of -hounds at his heels to catch every wink of his eye, every -motion of his hands, and every word that he speaks, to -be dished up with all conceivable embellishments by -pen and pencil, and published in extras, pamphlets, and -handbills. To make all this trash sell well in the market, -the greatest possible hurrah must be made by the papers -interested in the speculations, and therefore the -whole American people are basely caricatured by them, -and represented as one vast mob following Dickens from -place to place, and striving even to touch the hem of -his garment.</p> - -<p>That our readers at a distance may not be induced to -suppose that the good people of New York are befooling -themselves in this way, we beg leave to assure them that -all these absurd reports are ridiculous caricatures, -hatched from the prolific brains of a few reckless reporters -for a few unprincipled papers. They do in truth -make as great fools of themselves as they represent the -public to be generally. But beyond their narrow and -contemptible circle we are happy to know that Mr. -Dickens is treated with that manly and sincere respect -which is so justly his due, and which must convince him<span class="pagenum" id="Page_157">157</span> -that he is amongst a warm-hearted people, who know -both how to respect their guest and themselves.</p> -</div> - -<p>When Dickens sailed for home, in June, the <i>Sun</i> bade -him <i xml:lang="fr" lang="fr">bon voyage</i> with but a paragraph. It was more -than a year afterward that it came to him again; and -meanwhile he had trodden on the toes of America:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The appearance of the current number of “The Life -and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit” will not add -to the happiness of retrospections. Where is that Boston -committee, where the renowned getters-up of the -City Hotel dinner and the ball at the Park Theater, -with its <i xml:lang="fr" lang="fr">tableaux vivants</i>, its splendid decorations, and -tickets at ten dollars each?</p> - -<p>The scene is passing now before our memory—the -crammed theater, full up to its third tier, the dense -crowd opening a passage for Mr. Dickens and the proud -and happy committee while he passes up the center of -the stage amid huzzas and the waving of handkerchiefs, -while the band is playing “God Save the Queen” and -“See, the Conquering Hero Comes.” And <em>our</em> Irving, -<em>our</em> Halleck, <em>our</em> Bryant passed around in the crowd, -unnoticed and almost unknown. Shame! Let our -cheeks crimson, as they ought.</p> -</div> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> itself was doing very nicely. On its tenth -birthday, September 3, 1843, it announced that it employed -eight editors and reporters, twenty compositors, -sixteen pressmen, twelve folders and counters, and one -hundred carriers. The circulation of the daily paper -was thirty-eight thousand, of the <i>Weekly Sun</i> twelve -thousand.</p> - -<p>Mr. Beach owned the <i>Sun’s</i> new home at Fulton and -Nassau Streets and the building at 156 Nassau Street -which he had recently vacated, and which was burned -down in the fire of February 6, 1845. He had a London -correspondent who ran a special horse express to carry<span class="pagenum" id="Page_158">158</span> -the news from London to Bristol. A <i>Sun</i> reporter went -to report Webster’s speech on the great day when the -Bunker Hill Monument was finished. He got down -correctly at least the last sentence: “Thank God, I—I -also—am an American!”</p> - -<p>With a circulation by far the largest in the world, -the <i>Sun</i> was obliged to buy a new dress of type every -three months, for the day of the curved stereotype plate -was still far off. Early in 1846 two new presses, each -capable of six thousand <i>Suns</i> an hour, were put in at a -cost of twelve thousand dollars.</p> - -<p>The size of the paper grew constantly, although Beach -stuck to a four-page sheet because of the limitations of -the presses. Instead of adding pages, he added columns. -From Day’s little three-column <i>Sun</i> the paper -had grown, by April of 1840, to a width of seven columns. -Of the total of twenty-eight columns in an issue -twenty-one and a half were devoted to advertising, -three to mixed news and editorials, two and a half to -the court reports, and one column to reprint.</p> - -<p>With the page seven columns wide, Beach thought -that the two words—“<i>The Sun</i>”—looked lonely, and -to fill out the heading he changed it to read “<i>The New -York Sun</i>.” This continued from April 13 to September -29, 1840, when the proprietor saw how much more -economical it would be to cut out “New York” and -push the first and seventh columns of the first page up -to the top of the paper. Then it was “<i>The Sun</i>” once -more in head-line as well as body.</p> - -<p>The paper is never the <i>New York Sun</i>, Eugene Field’s -poem to the contrary notwithstanding. It is the <i>Sun</i>, -universal in its spirit, and published in New York by -the accident of birth.</p> - -<p>Three years after that the <i>Sun</i> became an eight-column -paper, and there were no more sneers at the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_159">159</span> -blanket sheets, for the <i>Sun</i> itself was getting pretty -wide.</p> - -<p>It was in the reign of Moses Y. Beach as owner of -the <i>Sun</i>, that Horace Greeley came to stay in New York -journalism. He had been fairly successful as editor -of the <i>New Yorker</i>, and his management of the campaign -paper called the <i>Log Cabin</i>, issued in 1840 in the interest -of General Harrison, was masterly. With the prestige -thus obtained, he was able, on April 10, 1841, to -start the <i>Tribune</i>.</p> - -<p>In the first number he announced his intention of -excluding the police reports which had been so valuable -to “our leading penny papers”—meaning the -<i>Sun</i> and the <i>Herald</i>—and of making the <i>Tribune</i> -“worthy of the hearty approval of the virtuous and refined.” -It was a week before the <i>Sun</i> mentioned its -former friend, and then it was only to say:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>A word to Horace Greeley—if he wishes us to write -him or any of his sickly brood of newspapers into notice, -he must first go to school and learn a little decency. He -must further retract the dirty, malignant, and wholesale -falsehood which he procured to be published in the -Albany <i>Evening Journal</i> a year ago last winter, with -the hope of injuring the <i>Sun</i>. He must then deal in -something besides misstatements of facts.... Until -he does all this we shall feel very indifferent to any -thrusts that he can make at us with his dagger of lath.</p> -</div> - -<p>Soon afterward the <i>Sun</i> rubbed it in by quoting the -Albany <i>Evening Journal</i>:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Galvanize a large New England squash, and it would -make as capable an editor as Horace.</p> -</div> - -<p>But Greeley was a lively young man, in spite of his -eccentric ways and his habit of letting one leg of his -trousers hang out of his unpolished boots. Only thirty<span class="pagenum" id="Page_160">160</span> -when he started the <i>Tribune</i>, he had had a lot of experience, -particularly with politicians and with fads. -He still believed in some of the fads, including temperance—which -was then considered a fad—vegetarianism, -and Abolition. He had been, too, a poet; and his verses -lived to haunt his mature years. He had to give away -most of the five thousand copies that were printed of -the first number of the <i>Tribune</i>, but in a month he had -a circulation of six thousand, and in two months he -doubled this.</p> - -<p>Greeley had the instinct for getting good men, but -not always the knack of holding them. One of his early -finds was Henry J. Raymond, who attracted his attention -as a boy orator for the Whig cause. Raymond -worked for Greeley’s <i>New Yorker</i> and later for the -<i>Tribune</i>. He was a good reporter, using a system of -shorthand of his own devising.</p> - -<p>On one occasion, at least, he enabled the <i>Tribune</i> to -beat the other papers. He was sent to Boston to report -a speech, and he took with him three printers and -their cases of type. After the speech Raymond and -his compositors boarded the boat for New York, and -as fast as the reporter transcribed his notes the printers -put the speech into type. On the arrival of the boat -at New York the type was ready to be put into the forms, -and the <i>Tribune</i> was on the street hours ahead of its -rivals.</p> - -<p>Greeley paid Raymond eight dollars a week until -Raymond threatened to leave unless he received twenty -dollars a week. He got it, but Greeley made such a -fuss about the matter that Raymond realized that further -increases would be out of the question. Presently -he went to the <i>Courier and Enquirer</i>, and from 1843 to -1850 he tried to restore some of the glory that once had -crowned Colonel Webb’s paper.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_161">161</span></p> - -<p>In this period Raymond and his former employer, -Greeley, fought their celebrated editorial duel—with -pens, not mahogany-handled pistols—on the subject of -Fourierism, that theory of social reorganization which -Greeley seemed anxious to spread, and which was -zealously preached by another of his young men, Albert -Brisbane, now perhaps better remembered as the father -of Arthur Brisbane. But Colonel Webb’s paper would -not wake wide enough to suit the ambitious Raymond, -who seized the opportunity of becoming the first editor -of the New York <i>Times</i>.</p> - -<p>Other men who worked for Greeley’s <i>Tribune</i> in its -young days were Bayard Taylor, who wrote articles -from Europe; George William Curtis, the essayist; -Count Gurowski, an authority on foreign affairs; and -Charles A. Dana.</p> - -<p>Beach soon recognized Greeley as a considerable -rival in the morning field, and there was a long tussle -between the <i>Sun</i> and the <i>Tribune</i>. It did not content -itself with words, and there were street battles between -the boys who sold the two papers. Stung by one of -Beach’s articles, Greeley called the <i>Sun</i> “the slimy and -venomous instrument of Locofocoism, Jesuitical and -deadly in politics and grovelling in morals.” The term -Locofoco had then lost its original application to the -Equal Rights section of the Democratic party and was -applied—particularly by the Whigs—to any sort of -Democrat.</p> - -<p>Moses Y. Beach had no such young journalists about -him as Dana or Raymond, but he had two sons who -seemed well adapted to take up the ownership of the -<i>Sun</i>. He took them in as partners on October 22, 1845, -under the title of “M. Y. Beach & Sons.” The elder -son, Moses Sperry Beach, was then twenty-three years -old, and had already been well acquainted with the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_162">162</span> -newspaper business, particularly with the mechanical -side of it. Before his father took him as a partner, -young Moses had joined with George Roberts in the -publication of the Boston <i>Daily Times</i>, but he was glad -to drop this and devote himself to the valuable property -at Fulton and Nassau Streets.</p> - -<p>If a genius for invention is inheritable, both the -Beach boys were richly endowed by their father. Moses -S. invented devices for the feeding of rolls of paper, -instead of sheets, to flat presses; for wetting news-print -paper prior to printing; for cutting the sheets after -printing; and for adapting newspaper presses to print -both sides of the sheet at the same time.</p> - -<p>Alfred Ely Beach was only nineteen when he became -partner in the <i>Sun</i>. After leaving the academy at Monson, -Massachusetts, where he had been schooled, he -worked with his father in the <i>Sun</i> office, and learned -every detail of the business. The inventive vein was -even deeper in him than in his brother. When he was -twenty he formed a partnership with his old schoolmate, -Orson D. Munn, of Monson, and they bought the <i>Scientific -American</i> from Rufus Porter and combined its -publishing business with that of soliciting patents.</p> - -<p>Alfred Beach retained his interest in the <i>Sun</i> for -several years, but he is best remembered for his inventions -and for his connection with scientific literature. -In 1853 he devised the first typewriter which printed -raised letters on a strip of paper for the blind. He -invented a pneumatic mail-tube, and a larger tube on -the same principle, by which he hoped passengers could -be carried, the motive power being the exhaustion of -air at the far end by means of a rotating fan.</p> - -<p>He was the first subway-constructor in New York. -In 1869 he built a tunnel nine feet in diameter under -Broadway from Warren Street to Murray Street, and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_163">163</span> -the next year a car was sent to and fro in this by pneumatic -power. A more helpful invention, however, was -the Beach shield for tunnel-digging—a gigantic hogs-head -with the ends removed, the front circular edge -being sharp and the rear end having a thin iron hood. -This cylinder was propelled slowly through the earth by -hydraulic rams, the dislodged material being removed -through the rear.</p> - -<p>Mr. Beach was connected with the <i>Scientific American</i> -until his death in 1896. His son, Frederick Converse -Beach, was one of the editors of that periodical, -and his grandson, Stanley Yale Beach, is still in the -same field of endeavour.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div id="toclink_164" class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_164">164</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_VII">CHAPTER VII<br /> - -<span class="subhead">“THE SUN” IN THE MEXICAN WAR</span></h2> -</div> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p><i>Moses Y. Beach as an Emissary of President Polk.—The Associated -Press Founded in the Office of “The Sun.”—Ben -Day’s Brother-in-Law Retires with a Small Fortune.</i></p> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">The</span> Beaches, father and sons, owned the <i>Sun</i> -throughout the Mexican War, a period notable for -the advance of newspaper enterprise; and Moses Yale -Beach proved more than once that he was the peer of -Bennett in the matter of getting news.</p> - -<p>Shortly before war was declared—April 24, 1846—the -telegraph-line was built from Philadelphia to Fort -Lee, New Jersey, opposite New York. June found a -line opened from New York to Boston; September, a -line from New York to Albany. The ports and the capitals -of the nation were no longer dependent on horse expresses, -or even upon the railroads, for brief news of -importance. Morse had subdued space.</p> - -<p>For a little time after the Mexican War began there -was a gap in the telegraph between Washington and -New York, the line between Baltimore and Philadelphia -not having been completed; but with the aid of special -trains the <i>Sun</i> was able to present the news a few hours -after it left Washington. It was, of course, not exactly -fresh news, for the actual hostilities in Mexico were not -heard of at Washington until May 11, more than two -weeks after their accomplishment.</p> - -<p>The good news from the battle-fields of Palo Alto -and Resaca de la Palma was eighteen days in reaching<span class="pagenum" id="Page_165">165</span> -New York. All Mexican news came by steamer to New -Orleans or Mobile, and was forwarded from those ports, -by the railroad or other means, to the nearest telegraph-station. -Moses Y. Beach was instrumental in whipping -up the service from the South, for he established a -special railroad news service between Mobile and Montgomery, -a district of Alabama where there had been -much delay.</p> - -<p>On September 11, 1846, the <i>Sun</i> uttered halleluiahs -over the spread of the telegraph. The line to Buffalo -had been opened on the previous day. The invention -had been in every-day use only two years, but more than -twelve hundred miles of line had been built, as follows:</p> - -<table id="t165" class="tnarrow30" summary="miles of telegraph lines in 1846"> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">New York to Boston</td> - <td class="tdr">265</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">New York to Albany and Buffalo</td> - <td class="tdr">507</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">New York to Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington</td> - <td class="tdr">240</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Philadelphia to Harrisburg</td> - <td class="tdr">105</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Boston to Lowell</td> - <td class="tdr">26</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Boston toward Portland</td> - <td class="tdr">55</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Ithaca to Auburn</td> - <td class="tdr">40</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Troy to Saratoga</td> - <td class="tdr">31</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl"><span class="in2">Total</span></td> - <td class="tdr"><span class="bt">1,269</span></td> -</tr> -</table> - -<p>England had then only one hundred and seventy-five -miles of telegraph. “This,” gloated the <i>Sun</i>, “is -American enterprise!”</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> did not have a special correspondent in -Mexico, and most of its big stories during the war, including -the account of the storming of Monterey, were -those sent to the New Orleans <i>Picayune</i> by George W. -Kendall, who is supposed to have put in the mouth of -General Taylor the <span class="locked">words—</span></p> - -<p>“A little more grape, Captain Bragg!”</p> - -<p>Moses Yale Beach himself started for Mexico as a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_166">166</span> -special agent of President Polk, with power to talk -peace, but the negotiations between Beach and the -Mexican government were broken off by a false report -of General Taylor’s defeat by Santa Anna, and Mr. -Beach returned to his paper.</p> - -<p>The more facilities for news-getting the papers enjoyed, -the more they printed—and the more it cost them. -Each had been doing its bit on its own hook. The <i>Sun</i> -and the <i>Courier and Enquirer</i> had spent extravagant -sums on their horse expresses from Washington. The -<i>Sun</i> and the <i>Herald</i> may have profited by hiring express-trains -to race from Boston to New York with the latest -news brought by the steamships, but the outflow of -money was immense. The news-boats—clipper-ships, -steam-vessels, and rowboats—which went down to Sandy -Hook to meet incoming steamers cost the <i>Sun</i>, the -<i>Herald</i>, the <i>Courier and Enquirer</i>, and the <i>Journal of -Commerce</i> a pretty penny.</p> - -<p>With the coming of the Mexican War there were special -trains to be run in the South. And now the telegraph, -with its expensive tolls, was magnetizing money -out of every newspaper’s till. Not only that, but there -was only one wire, and the correspondent who got to -it first usually hogged it, paying tolls to have a chapter -from the Bible, or whatever was the reporter’s favourite -book, put on the wire until his story should be ready -to start.</p> - -<p>It was all wrong, and at last, through pain in the -pocket, the newspapers came to realize it. At a conference -held in the office of the <i>Sun</i>, toward the close of -the Mexican War, steps were taken to lessen the waste -of money, men, and time.</p> - -<div id="ip_166" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 34em;"> - <img src="images/i_166a.jpg" width="1637" height="1924" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - -<p>MOSES SPERRY BEACH</p> - -<p class="subhead">A Nephew of Benjamin H. Day and a Son of Moses Yale Beach. He Held -“The Sun” Until Dana’s Time. This Picture is Reproduced from the First -Edition of Mark Twain’s “Innocents Abroad.” Mr. Beach Was One of Clemens’s -Fellow Voyagers.</p> -</div></div> - -<p>At this meeting, presided over by Gerard Hallock, -the veteran editor of the <i>Journal of Commerce</i>, there -were represented the <i>Sun</i>, the <i>Herald</i>, the <i>Tribune</i>—the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_167">167</span> -three most militant morning papers—the <i>Courier -and Enquirer</i>, the <i>Express</i>, and Mr. Hallock’s own -paper. The conference formed the Harbour Association, -by which one fleet of news-boats would do the work -for which half a dozen had been used, and the New -York Associated Press, designed for cooperation in the -gathering of news in centres like Washington, Albany, -Boston, Philadelphia, and New Orleans. Alexander -Jones, of the <i>Journal of Commerce</i>, became the first -agent of the new organization. He had been a reporter -on both sides of the Atlantic, and it was he who invented -the first cipher code for use in the telegraph, saving -time and tolls.</p> - -<p>Thus in the office where some of the bitterest invective -against newspaper rivals had been penned, there -began an era of good feeling. So busy had the world -become, and so full of news, through the new means of -communication afforded by Professor Morse, that the -invention of opprobrious names for Mr. Bennett ceased -to be a great journalistic industry.</p> - -<p>As an example of the change in the personal relations -of the newspaper editors and proprietors, the guests -present at a dinner given by Moses Y. Beach in December, -1848, when he retired from business and turned the -<i>Sun</i> over to his sons Moses and Alfred, were the venerable -Major Noah, then retired from newspaper life; -Gerard Hallock, Horace Greeley, Henry J. Raymond, -of the <i>Courier and Enquirer</i>, and James Brooks, of the -<i>Express</i>. All praised Beach and his fourteen years of -labour on the <i>Sun</i>, but there was never a word about -Benjamin H. Day. Evidently that gentleman’s re-entry -into the newspaper field as the proprietor of the -<i>True Sun</i> had put him out of tune with his brother-in-law. -Richard Adams Locke was there, however—the -only relic of the first régime.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_168">168</span></p> - -<p>What the <i>Sun</i> thought of itself then is indicated in -an editorial printed on December 4, when the Beach -brothers relieved their father, who was in bad health:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>We ask those under whose eyes the <i>Sun</i> does not -shine from day to day—our <i>Sun</i>, we mean; this large -and well-printed one-cent newspaper—to look it over -and say whether it is not one of the wonders of the age. -Does it not contain the elements of all that is valuable -in a diurnal sheet? Where is more effort or enterprise -expended for so small a return?</p> - -<p>Of this effort and enterprise we feel proud; and a -circulation of over fifty thousand copies of our sheet -every day among at least five times that number of -readers, together with the largest cash advertising -patronage on this continent, convinces us that our pride -is widely shared.</p> -</div> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> that Ben Day had turned over to Moses Y. -Beach was no longer recognizable. Fifteen years -had wrought many changes from the time when the -young Yankee printer launched his venture on the tide -of chance. The steamship, the railroad, and the telegraph -had made over American journalism. The police-court -items, the little local scandals, the animal stories—all -the trifles upon which Day had made his way to -prosperity—were now being shoved aside to make room -for the quick, hot news that came in from many quarters. -The <i>Sun</i> still strove for the patronage of the -People, with a capital P, but it had educated them away -from the elementary.</p> - -<p>The elder Beach was enterprising, but never rash. -He made the <i>Sun</i> a better business proposition than -ever it was under Day. Ben Day carried a journalistic -sword at his belt; Beach, a pen over his ear. Perhaps -Day could not have brought the <i>Sun</i> up to a circulation -of fifty thousand and a money value of a quarter of a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_169">169</span> -million dollars; but, on the other hand, it is unlikely -that Beach could ever have started the <i>Sun</i>.</p> - -<p>Once it was started, and once he had seen how it was -run, the task of keeping it going was fairly easy for -him. He was a good publisher. Not content with getting -out the <i>Sun</i> proper, he established the <i>Weekly Sun</i>, -issued on Saturdays, and intended for country circulation, -at one dollar a year. In 1848 he got out the <i>American -Sun</i>, at twelve shillings a year, which was shipped -abroad for the use of Europeans who cared to read of -our rude American doings. Another venture of Beach’s -was the <i>Illustrated Sun and Monthly Literary Journal</i>, -a sixteen-page magazine full of woodcuts.</p> - -<p>Mr. Beach had for sale at the <i>Sun</i> office all the latest -novels in cheap editions. He wrote a little book himself—“The -Wealth of New York: A Table of the -Wealth of the Wealthy Citizens of New York City Who -Are Estimated to Be Worth One Hundred Thousand -Dollars or Over, with Brief Biographical Notices.” It -sold for twenty-five cents.</p> - -<p>Perhaps Beach was the father of the newspaper syndicate. -In December, 1841, when the <i>Sun</i> received -President Tyler’s message to Congress by special messenger, -he had extra editions of one sheet printed for -twenty other newspapers, using the same type for the -body of the issue, and changing only the title-head. In -this way such papers as the <i>Vermont Chronicle</i>, the -Albany <i>Advertiser</i>, the Troy <i>Whig</i>, the Salem <i>Gazette</i>, -and the Boston <i>Times</i> were able to give the whole text -of the message to their readers without the delay and expense -of setting it in type.</p> - -<p>Here is Dana’s own estimate of the second proprietor -of the <i>Sun</i>:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Moses Y. Beach was a business man and a newspaper -manager rather than what we now understand as a journalist—that<span class="pagenum" id="Page_170">170</span> -is to say, one who is both a writer and a -practical conductor and director of a newspaper. Mr. -Beach was a man noted for enterprise in the collection -of news. In the latter days when he owned and managed -the <i>Sun</i> in New York, the telegraph was only -established between Washington and Boston, though -toward the end of his career it was extended, if I am -not mistaken, as far towards the South as Montgomery -in Alabama. The news from Europe was then brought -to Halifax by steamers, just as the news from Mexico -was brought to New Orleans. Mr. Beach’s energy found -a successful field in establishing expresses brought by -messengers on horseback from Halifax to Boston and -from New Orleans to Montgomery, thus bringing the -news of Europe and the news of the Mexican War to -New York much earlier than they could have arrived -by the ordinary public conveyance. With him were -associated, sooner or later, two or three of the other -New York papers; but the energy with which he carried -through the undertaking made him a conspicuous and -distinguished figure in the journalism of the city. The -final result was the organization of the New York Associated -Press, which has now become a world-embracing -establishment for the collection of news of every description, -which it furnishes to its members in this city and -to other newspapers in every part of the country. Under -the stimulus of Mr. Beach’s energetic intellect, aided -by the cheapness of its price, the <i>Sun</i> became in his -hands an important and profitable establishment. Yet -he is scarcely to be classed among the prominent journalists -of his day.</p> -</div> - -<p>Through conservatism, good business sense, and -steady work, Moses Y. Beach amassed from the <i>Sun</i> -what was then a handsome fortune, and when he retired -he was only forty-eight. His last years were spent at -the town of his birth, Wallingford, where he died on -July 19, 1868, six months after the <i>Sun</i> had passed out -of the hands of a Beach and into the hands of a Dana.</p> - -<div id="ip_170" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 27em;"> - <img src="images/i_170a.jpg" width="1285" height="1687" alt="" /> - <div class="captionm"> - -<p>(<i>From Photo in the Possession of -Mrs. Jennie Beach Gasper</i>)</p></div> - <div class="captionl"> - -<p>ALFRED ELY BEACH</p> - -<p class="subhead">A Son of Moses Y. Beach; He Left “The Sun” to Conduct the “Scientific -American.”</p> -</div></div> - -<p>Beach Brothers, as the new ownership of the <i>Sun</i><span class="pagenum" id="Page_171">171</span> -was entitled, made but one important change in the -appearance and character of the paper during the next -few years.</p> - -<p>Up to the coming of the telegraph the <i>Sun</i> had devoted -its first page to advertising, with a spice of reading-matter -that usually was in the form of reprint—miscellany, -as some newspapermen call it, or bogus, as most -printers term it. But when telegraphic news came to -be common but costly, newspapers began to see the importance -of attracting the casual reader by means of -display on the front page. The Beaches presently used -one or two columns of the latest telegraph-matter on -the first page; sometimes the whole page would be so -occupied.</p> - -<p>In 1850, from July to December, they issued an -<i>Evening Sun</i>, which carried no advertising.</p> - -<p>On April 6, 1852, Alfred Ely Beach, more concerned -with scientific matters than with the routine of daily -publication, withdrew from the <i>Sun</i>, which passed into -the sole possession of Moses S. Beach, then only thirty -years old. It was reported that when the partnership -was dissolved the division was based on a total valuation -of two hundred and fifty thousand dollars for the paper -which, less than nineteen years before, Ben Day had -started with an old hand-press and a hatful of type. -Horace Greeley, telling a committee of the British parliament -about American newspapers, named that sum -as the amount for which the <i>Sun</i> was valued in the sale -by brother to brother.</p> - -<p>“It was very cheap,” he added.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div id="toclink_172" class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_172">172</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_VIII">CHAPTER VIII<br /> - -<span class="subhead">“THE SUN” DURING THE CIVIL WAR</span></h2> -</div> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p><i>One of the Few Entirely Loyal Newspapers of New York.—Its -Brief Ownership by a Religious Coterie.—It Returns -to the Possession of M. S. Beach, Who Sells It to Dana.</i></p> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">In</span> 1852, when Moses Sperry Beach came into the sole -ownership of the <i>Sun</i>, it was supposed that the -slavery question had been settled forever, or at least -with as much finality as was possible in determining -such a problem. The Missouri Compromise, devised by -Henry Clay, had acted as a legislative mandragora -which lulled the United States and soothed the spasms -of the extreme Abolitionists. Even Abraham Lincoln, -now passing forty years, was losing that interest in -politics which he had once exhibited, and was devoting -himself almost entirely to his law practice in Springfield, -Illinois.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> had plenty of news to fill its four wide pages, -and its daily circulation was above fifty thousand. The -Erie Railroad had stretched itself from Piermont, on -the Hudson River, to Dunkirk, on the shore of Lake -Erie. The Hudson River Railroad was built from New -York to Albany. The steamship Pacific, of the Collins -Line, had broken the record by crossing the Atlantic -in nine days and nineteen hours. The glorious yacht -America had beaten the British Titania by eight miles -in a race of eighty miles.</p> - -<p>Kossuth, come as the envoy plenipotentiary of a -Hungary ambitious for freedom, was New York’s hero.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_173">173</span> -Lola Montez, the champion heart-breaker of her century, -danced hither and yon. The volunteer firemen of -New York ran with their engines and broke one another’s -heads. The Young Men’s Christian Association, -designed to divert youth to gentler practices, was organized, -and held its first international convention at -Buffalo in 1854. Lieutenant Ulysses S. Grant, of the -United States army, was in California, recently the -scene of the struggle between outlawry and the Vigilantes, -and was not very sure that he liked the life of a -soldier.</p> - -<p>Messrs. Heenan, Morrissey, and Yankee Sullivan furnished, -at frequent intervals, inspiration to American -youth. The cholera attacked New York regularly, and -as regularly did the <i>Sun</i> print its prescription for -cholera medicine, which George W. Busteed, a druggist, -had given to Moses Yale Beach in 1849, and which is -still in use for the subjugation of inward qualms. The -elder Beach, enjoying himself in Europe with his son -Joseph Beach, sent articles on French and German life -to his son Moses Sperry Beach’s paper.</p> - -<p>Literature was still advancing in New England. Persons -of refinement were reading Hawthorne’s “Scarlet -Letter” and “The House of Seven Gables,” Ik Marvel’s -“Reveries of a Bachelor,” Irving’s “Mahomet,” -and Parkman’s “Conspiracy of Pontiac.” Marion Harland -had written “Alone.” Down in Kentucky young -Mary Jane Holmes was at work on her first novel, -“Tempest and Sunshine.” But brows both high and -low were bent over the instalments in the <i>National Era</i> -of the most fascinating story of the period, Harriet -Beecher Stowe’s “Uncle Tom’s Cabin.”</p> - -<p>The writing of news had not gone far ahead in quality. -Most of the reporters still wrote in a groove a century -old. Every chicken-thief who was shot, “clapped<span class="pagenum" id="Page_174">174</span> -his hand to his heart, cried out that he was a dead man, -and presently expired.” But the editorial articles were -well written. On the <i>Sun</i> John Vance, a brilliant Irishman, -was turning out most of the leaders and getting -twenty dollars a week. In the <i>Tribune</i> office Greeley -pounded rum and slavery, while his chief assistant, -Charles A. Dana, did such valuable work on foreign and -domestic political articles that his salary grew to the -huge figure of fifty dollars a week.</p> - -<p>Bennett was working harder than any other newspaper-owner, -and was doing big things for the <i>Herald</i>. -Southern interests and scandal were his long suits. -“We call the <i>Herald</i> a very bad paper,” said Greeley -to a Parliamentary committee which was inquiring -about American newspapers. He meant that it was -naughty; but naughtiness and all, its circulation was -only half as big as the <i>Sun’s</i>.</p> - -<p>Henry J. Raymond was busy with his new venture, -the <i>Times</i>, launched by him and George Jones, the -banker. With Raymond were associated editorially -Alexander C. Wilson and James W. Simonton. William -Cullen Bryant, nearing sixty, still bent “the good grey -head that all men knew” over his editor’s desk in the -office of the <i>Evening Post</i>. With him, as partner and -managing editor, was that other great American, John -Bigelow.</p> - -<p>J. Watson Webb, fiery as ever in spirit, still ran the -<i>Courier and Enquirer</i>, “the Austrian organ in Wall -Street,” as Raymond called it because of Webb’s hostile -attitude toward Kossuth. Webb had been minister to -Austria, a post for which Raymond was afterward to -be nominated but not confirmed. The newspapers and -the people were all pretty well satisfied with themselves. -And then Stephen A. Douglas put his foot in it, and -Kansas began to bleed.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_175">175</span></p> - -<p>Douglas had been one of the <i>Sun’s</i> great men, for the -<i>Sun</i> listed heavily toward the Democratic party nationally; -but it did not disguise its dislike of the Little -Giant’s unhappily successful effort to organize the Territories -of Kansas and Nebraska on the principle of -squatter sovereignty. After the peace and quiet that -had followed the Missouri Compromise, this attempt to -bring slavery across the line of thirty-six degrees and -thirty minutes by means of a local-option scheme looked -to the <i>Sun</i> very much like kicking a sleeping dragon in -the face.</p> - -<p>After Douglas had been successful in putting his bill -through Congress, the <i>Sun</i> still rejected its principles. -Commenting on the announcements of certain Missourians -that they would take their slaves into the new -Territory, the <i>Sun</i> said:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>They may certainly take their slaves with them into -the new Territory, but when they get them there they -will have no law for holding the slaves. Slavery is a -creation of local law, and until a Legislature of Kansas -or Nebraska enacts a law recognizing slavery, all slaves -taken into the Territory will be entitled to their freedom.</p> -</div> - -<p>It was at this time that the germs of Secession began -to show themselves on the culture-plates of the continent. -The <i>Sun</i> was hot at the suggestion of a division -of the Union:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>It can only excite contempt when any irate member -of Congress or fanatical newspaper treats the dissolution -of the Union as an event which may easily be -brought about. There is moral treason in this habit of -continually depreciating the value of the Union.</p> -</div> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> saw that Douglas’s repeal of the Missouri -Compromise was a smashing blow delivered by a Northern<span class="pagenum" id="Page_176">176</span> -Democrat to the Democracy of the North; but the -sectional hatred was not revealed in all its intensity -until 1856, when Representative Preston S. Brooks, of -South Carolina, made his murderous attack on Senator -Charles Sumner, of Massachusetts, in the Senate Chamber. -This and its immediate consequences were well -covered by the <i>Sun</i>, not only through its Associated -Press despatches, but also in special correspondence -from its Washington representative, “Hermit.” It had -a report nearly a column long of Sumner’s speech, -“The Crime Against Kansas,” which caused Brooks to -assault the great opponent of slavery.</p> - -<p>That year was also the year of the first national convention -of the Republican party, conceived by the Abolitionists, -the Free Soilers, and the Know-nothings, and -born in 1854. The <i>Sun</i> had a special reporter at Philadelphia -to tell of the nomination of John C. Frémont, -but the paper supported Buchanan. Its readers were -of a class naturally Democratic, and although the paper -was not a party organ, and had no liking for slavery or -Secession, the new party was too new, perhaps too much -colored with Know-nothingism, to warrant a change of -policy.</p> - -<p>On the subject of the Dred Scott decision, written by -Chief Justice Taney and handed down two days after -Buchanan’s inauguration, the <i>Sun</i> was blunt:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>We believe that the State of New York can confer -citizenship on men of whatever race, and that its citizens -are entitled, by the Constitution, to be treated in -Missouri as citizens of New York State. To treat them -otherwise is to discredit our State sovereignty.</p> -</div> - -<p>John Brown’s raid at Harper’s Ferry was found -worthy of a column in the <i>Sun</i>, but space was cramped -that morning, for four columns had to be given to a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_177">177</span> -report of the New York firemen’s parade. The firemen -read the <i>Sun</i>.</p> - -<p>But Mr. Beach sent a special man to report Brown’s -trial at Charlestown, Virginia. The editorial columns -echoed the sense of the correspondence—that the old -man was not having a fair show. Besides, the <i>Sun</i> believed -that Brown was insane and belonged in a madhouse -rather than on the gallows. It printed a five-thousand-word -sermon by Henry Ward Beecher on -Brown’s raid. Beecher and the Beaches were very -friendly, and there is still in Beecher’s famous Plymouth -Church, Brooklyn, a pulpit made of wood brought from -the Mount of Olives by Moses S. Beach.</p> - -<p>When John Brown was hanged, December 2, 1859, -the <i>Sun</i> remarked:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The chivalry of the Old Dominion will breathe easier -now.... But, while Brown cannot be regarded as a -common murderer, it is only the wild extravagance of -fanatical zeal that will attempt to elevate him to the -rank of a martyr.</p> -</div> - -<p>In the Illinois campaign of 1858 the <i>Sun</i> was slow -to recognize Abraham Lincoln’s prowess as a speaker, -although Lincoln was then recognized as the leading exponent -of Whig doctrine in his State. Referring to the -debates between Lincoln and Douglas in their struggle -for the Senatorship, the <i>Sun</i> said:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>An extraordinary interest is attached by the leading -men of all parties to the campaign which Senator -Douglas is conducting in the State of Illinois. His -rival for the Senatorial nomination, Mr. Lincoln, being -no match for the Little Giant in campaign oratory, -Senator Trumbull has taken the stump on the Republican -side.</p> -</div> - -<p>Two years later, when Lincoln was nominated for<span class="pagenum" id="Page_178">178</span> -President, the <i>Sun</i> saw him in a somewhat different -light:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Mr. Lincoln is an active State politician and a good -stump orator. As to the chances of his election, that is a -matter upon which we need not at present speculate.</p> -</div> - -<p>But the time for the <i>Sun</i> to speculate came only three -days later (May 22, 1860), when it frankly stated:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>It is now admitted that Mr. Lincoln’s nomination is -a strong one.... He is, emphatically, a man of the -people.... That he would, if elected, make a good -President, we do not entertain a doubt. His chances -of election are certainly good. The people are tired of -being ruled by professional politicians.</p> -</div> - -<p>That was written before the Democratic national convention. -The <i>Sun</i> wanted the Democrats to nominate -Sam Houston. It saw that Douglas had estranged the -anti-slavery Democrats of the North. When Douglas -was nominated, the <i>Sun</i> remarked:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Of the six candidates in the field—Lincoln, Bell, -Houston, Douglas, Breckinridge, and Gerrit Smith—Lincoln -has unquestionably the best chance of an election -by the people.</p> -</div> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> had no illusions as to the candidacy of John -C. Breckinridge, the Vice-President under Buchanan, -when he was nominated for President by the Democrats -of the South, who refused to flock to the colours of -Douglas:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The secessionists do not expect that Breckinridge will -be elected. Should Lincoln and Hamlin be elected by -the votes of the free States, then the design of the conspirators -is to come out openly for a disruption of the -Union and the erection of a Southern confederacy.</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_179">179</span></p> - -<p>“The Union cannot be dissolved,” the <i>Sun</i> declared -on August 4, “whosoever shall be elected President!”</p> - -<p>And on the morning of Election Day the <i>Sun</i>, which -had taken little part except to criticise the conduct of -the Democratic campaign, said prophetically: “History -turns a leaf to-day.” Its comment on the morning after -the election was characteristic of its attitude during -the canvass:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Mr. Lincoln appears to have been elected, and yet the -country is safe.</p> -</div> - -<p>In a paragraph of political gossip printed a week later -the <i>Sun</i> said that Horace Greeley could have the collectorship -of the port of New York if he resigned his -claims to a seat in the Cabinet, and <span class="locked">that—</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>For the postmastership Charles A. Dana of the -<i>Tribune</i>, Daniel Ullman, Thomas B. Stillman, and -Armor J. Williamson are named. Either Mr. Dana -or Mr. Williamson would fill the office creditably.</p> -</div> - -<p>That was probably the first time that Charles A. -Dana got his name into the <i>Sun</i>.</p> - -<p>Although unqualifiedly opposed to Secession, the -<i>Sun</i> did not believe that military coercion was the best -way to prevent it. It saw the temper of South Carolina -and other Southern States, but thought that it saw, -too, a diplomatic way of curing the disorder. South -Carolina, it said, had a greater capacity for indignation -than any other political body in the world. Here was -the way to stop its wrath:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Open the door of the Union for a free and inglorious -egress, and you dry up the machine in an instant.</p> -</div> - -<p>This was somewhat on a plane with Horace Greeley’s -advice in the <i>Tribune</i>—“Let the erring sisters go in -peace.” The <i>Sun</i>, however, was more Machiavellian:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_180">180</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Our proposition is that the Constitution be so -amended as to permit any State, within a limited period, -and upon her surrender of her share in the Federal -property, to retire from the confederacy [the Union] in -peace. It is a plan to emasculate Secession by depriving -it of its present stimulating illegality. Does any -one suppose that even South Carolina would withdraw -from the Union if her withdrawal were normal?</p> -</div> - -<p>This was printed on December 8, 1860, some weeks -before the fate of the Crittenden Compromise, beaten -by Southern votes, showed beyond doubt that the South -actually preferred disunion.</p> - -<p>With mingled grief and indignation the <i>Sun</i> watched -the Southern States march out of the Union. It poured -its wrath on the head of the mayor of New York, Fernando -Wood, when that peculiar statesman suggested, -on January 7, 1861, that New York City should also -secede. “Why may not New York disrupt the bonds -which bind her to a venal and corrupt master?” Wood -had inquired.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> had more faith in Lincoln than most of its -Democratic contemporaries exhibited. Of his inaugural -speech it said:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>There is a manly sincerity, geniality, and strength to -be felt in the whole address.</p> -</div> - -<p>The day after the fall of Fort Sumter the <i>Sun</i> found -a moment to turn on the South-loving <i>Herald</i>:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>We state only what the proprietor of the <i>Herald</i> undoubtedly -believes when we say that if the national -ensign had not been hung out yesterday from its windows, -as a concession to the gathering crowd, the issue -of that paper for another day would have been more -than doubtful.</p> -</div> - -<p>Shortly afterward the <i>Sun</i> charged that the <i>Herald</i><span class="pagenum" id="Page_181">181</span> -had had in its office a full set of Confederate colours, -“ready to fling to the breeze of treason which it and the -mayor hoped to raise in this city.” Later in the same -year the <i>Sun</i> accused the <i>Daily News</i> and the <i>Staats-Zeitung</i> -of disloyalty, and intimated that the <i>Journal -of Commerce</i> and the <i>Express</i> were not what they should -be. The owner of the <i>Daily News</i> was Ben Wood, a -brother of Fernando Wood. In its youth the <i>News</i> had -been a newspaper of considerable distinction. It was -an offshoot of the <i>Evening Post</i>, and one of its first -editors was Parke Godwin, son-in-law of William Cullen -Bryant. Another of its early editors was Samuel J. -Tilden.</p> - -<p>Wood, who was a Kentuckian by birth, made the -<i>News</i> a Tammany organ and used it to get himself -elected to Congress, where he served as a Representative -from 1861 to 1865, constantly opposing the continuation -of the war. The <i>Sun’s</i> accusation of disloyalty against -the <i>News</i> was echoed in Washington, and for eighteen -months, early in the war, the <i>News</i> was suppressed. -The <i>Staats-Zeitung</i>, also included in the <i>Sun’s</i> suspicion, -was then owned by Oswald Ottendorfer, who had come -into possession of the great German daily in 1859, by -his marriage to Mrs. Jacob Uhl, widow of the man who -established it as a daily.</p> - -<p>Presence in the ranks of the copperhead journalists -was disastrous to the owner of the <i>Journal of Commerce</i>, -Gerard Hallock, who had been one of the great -figures of American journalism for thirty years. In -the decade before the war Hallock bought and liberated -at least a hundred slaves, and paid for their transportation -to Liberia; yet he was one of the most uncompromising -supporters of a national proslavery policy. -When the American Home Missionary Society withdrew -its support from slave-holding churches in the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_182">182</span> -South, Hallock was one of the founders of the Southern -Aid Society, designed to take its place.</p> - -<p>In August, 1861, the <i>Journal of Commerce</i> was one -of several newspapers presented by the grand jury of -the United States Circuit Court for “encouraging rebels -now in arms against the Federal government, by expressing -sympathy and agreement with them.” Hallock’s -paper was forbidden the use of the mails. He sold -his interest in the <i>Journal of Commerce</i>, retired from -business, never wrote another line for publication, and -died four years later.</p> - -<p>Another contemporary of the <i>Sun</i> which suffered during -the war was the <i>World</i>, then a very young paper. -It had first appeared in June, 1860, as a highly moral -daily sheet. Its express purpose was to give all the -news that it thought the public <em>ought</em> to have. This -meant that it intended to exclude from its staid columns -all thrilling police reports, slander suits, divorce cases, -and details of murders. It refused to print theatrical -advertising.</p> - -<p>The <i>World</i> had a fast printing-press and obtained an -Associated Press franchise. It hired some good men, -including Alexander Cummings, who had made his mark -on the Philadelphia <i>North American</i>, James R. Spalding, -who had been with Raymond on the <i>Courier and -Enquirer</i>, and Manton Marble. But the <i>World</i>, -stripped of lively human news, was a failure. After -two hundred thousand dollars had been sunk in a footless -enterprise, the religious coterie retired, and left the -<i>World</i> to the worldly.</p> - -<p>Its later owners were variously reported to be August -Belmont, Fernando Wood, and Benjamin Wood; but it -finally passed entirely into the hands of Manton Marble, -who made it a free-trade Democratic organ. Marble -had learned the newspaper business on the <i>Journal</i> and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_183">183</span> -the <i>Traveler</i> in Boston, and in 1858 and 1859 he was -on the staff of the <i>Evening Post</i>. In July, 1861, the -<i>World</i> and the <i>Courier and Enquirer</i> were consolidated, -and Colonel J. Watson Webb, who had owned and -edited the latter paper for thirty-four years, retired -from newspaper life.</p> - -<p>During the Civil War the <i>World</i> was strongly opposed -to President Lincoln’s administration. Perhaps -this fact accounts for the punishment which befell it -through the misdeed of an outsider.</p> - -<p>In May, 1864, there was sent to most of the morning-newspaper -offices what purported to be a proclamation -by the President, appointing a day of fasting and -prayer, and calling into military service, by volunteering -and draft, four hundred thousand additional troops. -This was a fake, engineered by Joseph Howard, Jr., a -newspaperman who had been employed on the <i>Tribune</i>, -and who put out the hoax for the purpose of influencing -the stock-market. The <i>Sun</i>, the <i>Tribune</i>, and the <i>Times</i> -did not fall for the hoax, but the <i>Herald</i>, the <i>World</i>, and -the <i>Journal of Commerce</i> printed it, stopping their -presses when they learned the truth.</p> - -<p>General John A. Dix seized the offices of the <i>Herald</i>, -the <i>World</i>, and the <i>Journal of Commerce</i>, put soldiers -to guard them, and suppressed the papers for several -days—all this by order of the President. Howard, the -forger, was arrested, and on his confession was sent to -Fort Lafayette, where he was a prisoner for several -weeks. Manton Marble wrote a bitter letter to Lincoln -in protest against what he considered an outrage on the -<i>World</i>. Marble remained at the head of the paper until -1876.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> took the setback of Bull Run with better -grace than most of the papers—far better than Horace -Greeley, who yelled for a truce. It seemed to see that<span class="pagenum" id="Page_184">184</span> -this was only the beginning of a long conflict, which -must be fought to the end, regardless of disappointments. -On August 15, 1861, it declared:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Let there be but one war. Better it should cost millions -of lives than that we should live in hourly dread of -wars, contiguous to a people who could make foreign -alliances and land armies upon our shores to destroy -our liberties.</p> -</div> - -<p>On the subject of the war’s cost it said:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>No more talk of carrying on the war economically! -The only economy is to make short and swift work of -it, and the people are ready to bear the expense, if it -were five hundred millions of dollars, to-day.</p> -</div> - -<p>This was printed when the war was very young; when -no man dreamed that it would cost the Federal government -six times five hundred millions.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun’s</i> editorial articles were not without criticism -of the conduct of the war. It was one of the many papers -that demanded the resignation of Seward at a time -when the Secretary of State was generally blamed for -what seemed to be the dilly-dallying of the government. -Lincoln himself was still regarded as a politician as -well as a statesman—a view which was reflected in the -<i>Sun’s</i> comment on the preliminary proclamation of -emancipation, September 22, 1862:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>As the greatest and most momentous act of our nation, -from its foundation to the present time, we would -rather have seen this step disconnected from all lesser -considerations and from party influences.</p> -</div> - -<p>The inference in this was that Lincoln had deliberately -made his great stroke on the eve of the Republican -State convention in New York.</p> - -<p>The <i>Tribune</i> declared that the proclamation was “the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_185">185</span> -beginning of the end of the rebellion.” “The wisdom of -the step is unquestionable,” said the <i>Times</i>; “its necessity -indisputable.” The businesslike <i>Herald</i> remarked -that it inaugurated “an overwhelming revolution in -the system of labour.” The <i>World</i> said that it regretted -the proclamation and doubted the President’s power to -free the slaves. “We regard it with profound regret,” -said the <i>Journal of Commerce</i>. “It is usurpation of -power!” shouted the <i>Staats-Zeitung</i>.</p> - -<p>Such was the general tone of the New York morning -newspapers during the war. Only three—the <i>Sun</i>, the -<i>Tribune</i>, and the <i>Times</i>—could be described as out-and-out -loyalists. The <i>Sun</i> was for backing up Lincoln -whenever it believed him right, and that was most of the -time; yet it was free in its criticism of various phases of -the conduct of the war.</p> - -<p>Like most of the Democrats of New York, the <i>Sun</i> -was an admirer of General McClellan, and it believed -that his removal from the command of the army was due -to politics. But when the election of 1864 came around, -the <i>Sun</i> refused to join its party contemporaries in wild -abuse of Lincoln and Johnson. On the morning after -the Republican nominations it said:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>It is no time to quarrel with those men who honestly -wish to crush the rebellion on the ground that they have -nominated a rail-splitter and a tailor. It would be -more consistent with true democracy if these men were -honored for rising from an humble sphere.</p> -</div> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> supported McClellan, praising him for his -repudiation of the plank in the Democratic platform -which declared the war a failure; but in the last days -of the campaign it was frank in its predictions that -Lincoln would be elected. On the morning after election -it had this to say:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_186">186</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The reelection of Abraham Lincoln announces to the -world how firmly we have resolved to be a free and -united people.</p> -</div> - -<p>After the assassination of President Lincoln the <i>Sun</i> -said:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>In the death of Mr. Lincoln the Southern people have -lost one of the best friends they had at the North. He -would have treated them with more gentleness than any -other statesman. From him they would have obtained -concessions it is now almost impossible for our rulers -and people to grant.</p> -</div> - -<p>The <i>Sun’s</i> attitude toward the copperheads and -deluded pacifists of the North is reflected in an editorial -article published on June 5, 1863. The North was then -in its worst panic. Only a month previously Lee had -defeated Hooker at Chancellorsville, and the victorious -Confederates were marching through Maryland into -Pennsylvania. At a mass-meeting in Cooper Union, -George Francis Train and other copperheads denounced -the war, praised Vallandigham, of Ohio, who had been -banished into the South for his unpatriotic conduct, and -declared for “peace and reunion.” It was largely a -Democratic meeting, but the <i>Sun</i> would not stomach the -disloyal outburst:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The fact that over ten thousand people assembled in -and about Cooper Union on Thursday evening to listen -to speeches and adopt an address and resolutions prepared -under that “eye single to the public welfare,” -discloses the ease with which a few political tricksters -may present false issues to the unthinking and, in the -excitement of the moment, induce their hearers to applaud -sentiments that, when calmly considered, are unworthy -of a great and free people. Taking advantage -of the blunders of the present administration, these self-styled -Democrats raise their banners and, under the -guise of proclaiming peace, in reality proclaim a war<span class="pagenum" id="Page_187">187</span> -upon those very principles it is the highest boast of every -true Democrat to acknowledge.</p> - -<p>The Democratic party is essentially the peace party -of the present rebellion; but it will sanction no peace -that is obtained by compromising the vital principles -that give force to our form of government. They will -not ask for peace at the expense of the Union, and desire -no Democratic victories that do not legitimately -belong to them as an expression of the confidence of the -people in their fidelity to the Union and the Constitution.</p> - -<p>The late meeting, then, should not be sanctioned by -any true Democrat. It was in no sense Democratic; -it was in reality an opposition meeting, and only as -such will it be looked upon as having any important -bearing upon the great questions of the hour, and if -rightly interpreted by the administration will exert no -evil influence upon the future destinies of this great -nation.</p> -</div> - -<p>The methods of gathering war news, early in the conflict, -were haphazard. The first reports to reach New -York from Southern fields were usually the government -bulletins, but they were not as trustworthy as the official -bulletins of the European war.</p> - -<p>On the morning after the first battle of Bull Run, the -<i>Sun’s</i> readers were treated to joyous head-lines:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>A GREAT BATTLE—SEVENTY THOUSAND REBELS -IN IT—OUR ARMY VICTORIOUS—GREAT LOSS OF -LIFE—TWELVE HOURS’ FIGHTING—RETREAT OF -THE REBELS—UNITED STATES FORCES PRESSING -FORWARD.</p> -</div> - -<p>But on the following morning the tune changed:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>RETREAT OF OUR TROOPS—OUR ARMY SCATTERED—ONLY -TWENTY-TWO THOUSAND UNION -TROOPS ENGAGED—ENEMY NINETY THOUSAND -STRONG—OUR CANNON LEFT BEHIND.</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_188">188</span></p> - -<p>As a matter of fact, only about eighteen thousand -troops were engaged on each side.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> had no famous correspondents at the front. -It sent three reporters to Virginia in 1861, and these -sent mail stories and some telegraph matter, which was -of value in supplementing the official bulletins, the Associated -Press service, the specials from “Nemo” and -“Hermit,” the <i>Sun</i> correspondents in Washington, and -the matter rewritten from the Philadelphia and Western -newspapers.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> was still a local paper, with a constituency -hungry for news of the men of the New York regiments. -To the <i>Sun</i> readers the doings of General Meagher, of -the Irish Brigade, or Colonel Michael Corcoran, of the -Sixty-Ninth Regiment, were more important than the -strategic details of a large campaign.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i>, like all the Northern papers, was frequently -deceived by false reports of Union victories. -Federal troops were in Fredericksburg—on the front -page—weeks before they were in it in reality; in Richmond, -years too soon. But there was no doubt about -Gettysburg, although the North did not get the news -until the 5th of July. The <i>Sun</i> came out on Monday, -the 6th, with these head-lines:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>VICTORY!—INVASION COMES TO GRIEF—LEE -UTTERLY ROUTED—HIS DISASTROUS RETREAT—ALL -FEDERAL PRISONERS RECAPTURED—EIGHTEEN -THOUSAND PRISONERS CAPTURED—MEANS -OF ESCAPE DESTROYED.</p> -</div> - -<p>On April 10, 1865, the head-lines were sprinkled with -American flags and cuts of Columbia, and the types -carried the welcome news for which the North had -waited for four long years:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_189">189</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>OUR NATION REDEEMED—SURRENDER OF LEE -AND HIS WHOLE ARMY—THE TERMS—OFFICERS -AND MEN PAROLED AND TOLD TO GO HOME—THE -COUNTRY WILD WITH JOY, ETC., ETC., ETC.</p> -</div> - -<p>The “etc., etc., etc.,” suggests that the head-writer -was too wild with joy to go into more details.</p> - -<p>It was not until May, 1862, that the <i>Sun</i> abandoned -the ancient custom of giving a large part of the first -page to advertising. This reform came late, perhaps -because Moses S. Beach was out of the <i>Sun</i> in the early -months of the war.</p> - -<p>On August 6, 1860, the control of the paper had passed -from Mr. Beach to Archibald M. Morrison, a rich young -man of religious fervour, who was prompted by other religious -enthusiasts to get the <i>Sun</i> and use it for evangelical -purposes. Mr. Morrison gave Mr. Beach one hundred -thousand dollars for the good-will of the paper, and -agreed to pay a rental for the material. Mr. Beach retained -the ownership of the building, of the presses, -and, indeed, of every piece of type.</p> - -<p>The new proprietors of the <i>Sun</i> held a prayer-meeting -at noon every day in the editorial rooms. They also -injected a bit of religion into the columns by printing -on the first page reports of prayer-meetings in the -Sailors’ Home and of the doings of missionaries in -Syria and elsewhere. In spite of the new spirit that -pervaded the office, however, it was still possible for -the unregenerate old subscriber to find some little space -devoted to the fistic clashes of Heenan and Morrissey. -Flies are not caught with vinegar.</p> - -<p>The new management made a sort of department paper -of the <i>Sun</i>, the front page being divided with the -headings “Financial,” “Religious,” “Criminal,” -“Calamities,” “Foreign Items,” “Business Items,”<span class="pagenum" id="Page_190">190</span> -and “Miscellaneous.” It was not a bad newspaper, and -it was quite possible that some business men would prefer -it to the Beach kind of sheet; but it is certain that -the advertisers were not attracted and that some readers -were repelled. One of the latter climbed the stairs of -the building at Fulton and Nassau Streets early one -morning and nailed to the door of the editorial rooms a -placard which read: “Be ye not righteous overmuch!”</p> - -<p>During the Morrison régime the <i>Sun</i> refused to accept -advertisements on Sunday. Of course, the printers -worked on Sunday night, getting out Monday’s paper, -but that was something else. The <i>Sun</i> went so far -(July 23, 1861) as to urge that the Union generals -should be forbidden to attack the enemy on Sundays. -“Our troops must have rest, and need the Sabbath,” it -said.</p> - -<p>William C. Church, one of the rising young newspapermen -of New York, was induced to become the -publisher under the <i>Sun’s</i> new management. He was -only twenty-four years old, but he had had a good deal -of newspaper experience in assisting his father, the -Rev. Pharcellus Church, to edit and publish the New -York <i>Chronicle</i>. After a few weeks in the <i>Sun</i> office, -however, Mr. Church saw that the paper, though daily -treated with evangelical serum, was not likely to be a -howling success; and on December 10, 1860, four months -after he took hold as publisher, it was announced that -Mr. Church had “withdrawn from the publication of -the <i>Sun</i> for the purpose of spending some months in -European travel and correspondence for the paper.”</p> - -<p>Mr. Church wrote a few letters from Europe, but -when the Civil War started he hurried home and went -with the joint military and naval expedition headed by -General T. W. Sherman and Admiral S. F. Dupont. -He was present at the capture of Port Royal, and wrote<span class="pagenum" id="Page_191">191</span> -for the <i>Evening Post</i> the first account of it that appeared -in the North. Later he acted as a war-correspondent of -the <i>Times</i>, writing under the pseudonym “Pierrepont.” -In October, 1862, he was appointed a captain of volunteers, -and toward the close of the war he received the -brevets of major and lieutenant-colonel.</p> - -<p>During the war Mr. Church and his brother, Francis -Pharcellus Church, established the <i>Army and Navy -Journal</i>, and in 1866 they founded that brilliant magazine, -the <i>Galaxy</i>—later merged with the <i>Atlantic -Monthly</i>—which printed the early works of Henry -James. Colonel Church owned the <i>Army and Navy -Journal</i>, and was its active editor, until his death, May -23, 1917, at the age of eighty-one. He was the biographer -and literary executor of John Ericsson, the inventor, -and he wrote also a biography of General Grant. -He and his brother Francis were the most distinguished -members of a family which, in its various branches, gave -no less than seventeen persons to literature.</p> - -<p>Francis P. Church’s connection with the <i>Sun</i> was -longer and more pleasant than William’s. His writings -for it ranged over a period of forty years. He was one -of the <i>Sun’s</i> greatest editorial writers, and was the -author of the most popular editorial article ever written—“Is -There a Santa Claus?” But that comes in -a later and far more brilliant period than the one in -which William C. Church served the <i>Sun</i> all too -briefly.</p> - -<p>At the end of 1861, what with the expense of getting -war news, and perhaps with the reluctance of the readers -to absorb piety, the <i>Sun’s</i> cash-drawer began to -warp from lack of weight, and Mr. Beach, who had -never relinquished his rights to all the physical part of -the paper, took it back. This is the way he announced -his resumption of control on New Year’s morning, 1862:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_192">192</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Once more I write myself editor and sole proprietor -of the New York <i>Sun</i>. My day-dream of rural enjoyment -is broken, and I am again prisoner to pen and -types. For months I sought to avoid the surrender, but -only to find resistance without avail.... But I congratulate -myself on my surroundings. Never was prisoner -more royally treated.</p> - -<p>What, then, to the readers of the <i>Sun</i>? Nothing save -the announcement that I am henceforth its publisher -and manager. They require no other prospectus, program, -or platform.</p> - -<p class="p0 sigright"><span class="smcap">Moses S. Beach.</span></p> -</div> - -<p>John Vance, who is said to have worked twelve years -without a vacation, left the <i>Sun</i> about that time because -Mr. Beach refused to name him as editor-in-chief. -Vance was a good writer, but he and Beach -were often at odds over the <i>Sun’s</i> policies. It probably -was Vance’s influence that kept the paper in line -for Douglas in the Presidential campaign of 1860—a -campaign in which the <i>Sun</i> was run for two months by -Beach and for three months by the Morrisonites. -Vance, in spite of his leaning toward Douglas, was an -intimate friend of Elihu Burritt, the Learned Blacksmith, -who was an Abolitionist and an advocate of universal -brotherhood.</p> - -<p>On Beach’s return to the <i>Sun</i> he set out to recover its -lost advertising and to restore some of the livelier news -features that had been suppressed by the Morrison -group. Early in the summer of 1862 he began to shift -advertising from the front page, to make room for the -big war head-lines that had been run on the second -page. He also used maps and woodcuts of cities, ships, -and generals. The <i>Sun’s</i> pictures of the Monitor and -the Merrimac were printed in one column by deftly -standing the gallant iron-clads on their sterns.</p> - -<p>It was in this summer that Beach reduced expenses<span class="pagenum" id="Page_193">193</span> -and speeded up the issue of the paper by adopting the -stereotyping process, one of the greatest advances in -newspaper history:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>About a week ago we commenced printing the <i>Sun</i> by -a new process—that of stereotyping and printing with -two presses. We are much gratified to-day in being -able to say that the process has proved eminently successful. -From this time forth we may expect to present -a clean face to our many readers every day. We have -completed one stereotype within seventeen minutes and -a quarter, and two within nineteen minutes and a half.</p> -</div> - -<p>That was rapid work for 1862, but the stereotypers -of the present day will take a form from the composing-room, -make the papier-mâché impression, pour in the -molten metal, and have the curved plate ready for the -press in twelve minutes.</p> - -<p>The new process saved Beach a lot of money as well -as much precious time. Before its coming, when the -paper was printed directly from the face of the type, -the <i>Sun</i> had to buy a full new set of type six or eight -times a year, at an annual cost of six thousand dollars.</p> - -<p>The war played havoc with newspaper finances. The -price of news-print paper rose to twenty-four cents a -pound. All the morning papers except the <i>Sun</i> raised -their prices to three or four cents in 1862. The <i>Sun</i> -stayed at its old penny.</p> - -<p>On January 1, 1863, in order to meet advancing costs -and still sell the <i>Sun</i> for one cent, Beach found it necessary -to “remove one column from each side of the -page”—a more or less ingenuous way of saying that the -<i>Sun</i> was reduced from seven columns to five. The columns -were shortened, too, and the whole paper was set -in agate type. The <i>Sun</i> then looked much as it had -appeared twenty years before.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_194">194</span></p> - -<p>With these economies Beach was able to keep the -price at one cent until August 1, 1864, when the <i>Sun</i> -slyly said:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>We shall require the one cent for the <i>Sun</i> to be paid -in gold, or we will receive as an equivalent two cents -in currency.</p> - -<p>Apologies or explanations are needless. An inflated -currency has raised the price of white paper nearly -threefold.</p> -</div> - -<p>Of course nobody had one cent in gold, so the <i>Sun</i> -readers grinned and paid two cents in copper.</p> - -<p>From that day on the price of the <i>Sun</i> was two cents -until July 1, 1916, when Frank A. Munsey bought the -<i>Sun</i>, combined his one-cent newspaper, the New -York <i>Press</i>, with it, and reduced the price to one -cent. On January 26, 1918, by reason of heavy expenses -incidental to the war, the <i>Sun</i>, with all the other large -papers of New York, increased its price to two cents -a copy. In its eighty-five years the <i>Sun</i> has been a -penny paper thirty-two years, a two-cent paper fifty-three -years.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> was constantly profitable in the decade before -the Civil War. The average annual profits from -1850 to 1860 were $22,770. The high-water mark in that -period was reached in 1853, when the advertising receipts -were $89,964 and the net profits $42,906. Its circulation -in September, 1860, was fifty-nine thousand -copies daily, of which forty-five thousand were sold on -the island of Manhattan.</p> - -<p>One of the secrets of the <i>Sun’s</i> popularity in the years -when it had no such news guidance as Bennett gave to -the <i>Herald</i>, no such spirited editorials as Greeley put -into the <i>Tribune</i>, no such political prestige as Raymond -brought to the <i>Times</i>, was Moses S. Beach’s belief that<span class="pagenum" id="Page_195">195</span> -his public wanted light fiction. The appetite created by -Scott and increased by Dickens was keen in America. -True, the penny <i>Sun’s</i> literary standards were not of -Himalayan height. Hawthorne was too spiritual for -its readers, Poe too brief. They wanted wads of adventure -and dialogue, dour squires, swooning ladies, hellish -villains, handsome heroes, and comic character folk. -The young mechanic had to have something he could -understand without knitting his brows. For him, -“The Grocer’s Apprentice; a Tale of the Great -Plague,” and “Dick Egan; or, the San Francisco -Bandits,” written for the <i>Sun</i> by H. Warren Trowbridge.</p> - -<p>In the days before the Civil War, wives snatched -the <i>Sun</i> from husbands to read “Maggie Miller; or, -Old Hagar’s Secret,” “written expressly for the <i>Sun</i>” -by Mary J. Holmes, already famous through “Lena -Rivers” and “Dora Deane.” Ephemeral? They are -still reading “Lena Rivers” in North Crossing, -Nebraska.</p> - -<p>Horatio Alger, Jr., wrote several of his best tales -for Mr. Beach, who printed them serially in the <i>Sun</i> -and the <i>Weekly Sun</i>. To the New York youth of 1859, -who dreamed not that in three years he would be clay -on the slope at Fredericksburg, it was the middle of a -perfect day to pick up the <i>Sun</i>, read a thrilling news -story about Blondin cooking an omelet while crossing -the Niagara gorge on a tight rope, and then, turning -to the last page, to plunge into “The Discarded -Son; or, the Cousin’s Plot,” by the author of -“The Secret Drawer,” “The Cooper’s Ward,” “The -Gipsy Nurse,” and “Madeline the Temptress”—for all -these were written expressly for the <i>Sun</i> by young Mr. -Alger. He was only twenty-five then, with the years -ahead when, a Unitarian minister, he should see fiction<span class="pagenum" id="Page_196">196</span> -material in the New York street-boy and write the epics -of <i>Ragged Dick</i> and <i>Tattered Tom</i>.</p> - -<p>What did the women readers of the <i>Sun</i> care about -the discovery of oil in Pennsylvania or the wonderful -trotting campaign of Flora Temple, when they could -devour daily two columns of “Jessie Graham; or, Love -and Pride”? The <i>Sun</i> might condense A. T. Stewart’s -purchase of two city blocks into a paragraph, but there -must be no short measure of “Gerald Vane’s Lost One,” -by Walter Savage North.</p> - -<p>When the religious folk held the reins of the <i>Sun</i> -they tried to compromise by printing “Great Expectations” -as a serial, but the wise Mr. Beach, on getting -the paper back, quickly flung to his hungry readers -“Hunted Down,” by Ann S. Stephens. Later in the -war he catered to the martial spirit with “Running -the Blockade,” by Captain Wheeler, United States -army.</p> - -<p>One column of foreign news, one of city paragraphs, -one of editorial articles, one of jokes and miscellany, one -of fiction, and nineteen of advertising—that was about -the make-up of Beach’s <i>Sun</i> before the Civil War; that -was the prescription which enabled the <i>Sun</i> to sell -nearly sixty thousand copies in a city of eight hundred -thousand people. It was a fairly well condensed paper. -In February, 1857, when it printed one day two and a -half columns about the mysterious murder of Dr. -Harvey Burdell, the rich dentist of Bond Street, it -broke its record for length in a police story.</p> - -<p>It was in Moses S. Beach’s time that the Atlantic -cable, second only to the telegraph proper as an aid to -newspapers, was laid. On August 6, 1858, when Cyrus -W. Field telegraphed to the Associated Press from Newfoundland -that the ends of the cables had reached both -shores of the sea, the <i>Sun</i> said that it was “the greatest<span class="pagenum" id="Page_197">197</span> -triumph of the age.” Eleven days later the <i>Sun</i> contained -this article:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>We received last night and publish to-day what purports -to be the message of Queen Victoria, congratulating -the President of the United States on the successful -completion of the Atlantic telegraph. We are -assured that the message is genuine, and that it came -through the Atlantic cable. It is not surprising, however, -that the President, on receiving it, doubted its -genuineness, as among the hundreds who crowded our -office last evening the doubters largely preponderated.</p> - -<p>The message, accepting it as the queen’s, is, in style -and tone, utterly unworthy of the great event which it -was designed to celebrate.</p> - -<p>The message is so shabbily like royalty that we cannot -believe it to be a fabrication.</p> -</div> - -<p>Perhaps that was written by John Vance, the Irish -exile. And perhaps the editorial article which appeared -the following day was written by Beach himself:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Victoria’s message ... in its complete form, as it -appears in our columns to-day, is friendly and courteous, -though rather commonplace in expression and -style.</p> -</div> - -<p>New York had a great celebration over the laying of -the cable that week. The <i>Sun’s</i> building bore a sign -illuminated by gaslight:</p> - -<p class="p1 b1 center wspace"> -S. F. B. MORSE AND CYRUS W. FIELD,<br /> -WIRE-PULLERS OF THE NINETEENTH<br /> -CENTURY. -</p> - -<p>The first piece of news to come by cable was printed -in the <i>Sun</i> of August 27, 1858, and ran:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>A treaty of peace has been concluded with China, by -which England and France obtain all their demands,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_198">198</span> -including the establishment of embassies at Peking and -indemnification for the expenses of the war.</p> -</div> - -<p>It will be remembered that this first cable was not a -success, and that permanent undersea telegraph service -did not come until 1866; but the results produced in -1858 convinced the world that Field and his associates -were right, and that perseverance and money would -bring perfect results.</p> - -<p>After the war, when paper became cheaper, Beach -preferred to enlarge the <i>Sun</i> rather than reduce its price -to one cent. He never printed more than four pages, -but the lost columns were restored, with interest, so -that there were eight to a page. Even at two cents a -copy it was still the cheapest of the morning papers; -still the beloved of the working classes and the desired -of the politicians. Just after the war ended the <i>Sun</i> -declared that it was read by half a million people.</p> - -<p>On January 25, 1868, when the <i>Sun</i> had been in the -possession of the Beaches for about thirty of its thirty-five -years, a new editor and manager, speaking for a new -ownership of the <i>Sun</i>, made this announcement at the -head of the editorial column:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p class="p1 center wspace larger">THE SUN</p> - -<p class="b1 center wspace"><span class="smcap">The Oldest Cheap Paper in New York.</span></p> - -<p>Notice is hereby given that the <i>Sun</i> newspaper, with -its presses, types, and fixtures, has become the property -of an association represented by the undersigned, -and including among its prominent stockholders Mr. -M. S. Beach, recently the exclusive owner of the whole -property. It will henceforth be published in the -building known for the last half-century as Tammany -Hall, on the corner of Nassau and Frankfort -Streets. Its price will remain as heretofore at two -cents a copy, or six dollars per annum to mail subscribers.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_199">199</span> -It will be printed in handsome style on a folio -sheet, as at present; but it will contain more news and -other reading matter than it has hitherto given.</p> - -<p>In changing its proprietorship, the <i>Sun</i> will not in -any respect change its principles or general line of conduct. -It will continue to be an independent newspaper, -wearing the livery of no party, and discussing public -questions and the acts of public men on their merits -alone. It will be guided, as it has been hitherto, by uncompromising -loyalty to the Union, and will resist every -attempt to weaken the bonds that unite the American -people into one nation.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> will support General Grant as its candidate -for the Presidency. It will advocate retrenchment and -economy in the public expenditures, and the reduction -of the present crushing burdens of taxation. It will -advocate the speedy restoration of the South, as needful -to revive business and secure fair wages for labor.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> will always have all the news, foreign, domestic, -political, social, literary, scientific, and commercial. -It will use enterprise and money freely to make -the best possible newspaper, as well as the cheapest.</p> - -<p>It will study condensation, clearness, point, and will -endeavor to present its daily photograph of the whole -world’s doings in the most luminous and lively manner.</p> - -<p>It will not take as long to read the <i>Sun</i> as to read the -London <i>Times</i> or Webster’s Dictionary, but when you -have read it you will know about all that has happened -in both hemispheres. The <i>Sun</i> will also publish a semiweekly -edition at two dollars a year, containing the -most interesting articles from the daily, and also a condensed -summary of the news prepared expressly for this -edition.</p> - -<p>The <i>Weekly Sun</i> will continue to be issued at one -dollar a year. It will be prepared with great care, and -will also contain all the news in a condensed and readable -form. Both the weekly and semiweekly will have -accurate reports of the general, household, and cattle -markets. They will also have an agricultural department, -and will report the proceedings of the Farmers’ -Club. This department will be edited by Andrew S.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_200">200</span> -Fuller, Esq., whose name will guarantee the quality of -his contributions.</p> - -<p>We shall endeavor to make the <i>Sun</i> worthy the confidence -of the people in every part of the country. Its -circulation is now more than fifty thousand copies -daily. We mean that it shall soon be doubled; and in -this, the aid of all persons who want such a newspaper -as we propose to make will be cordially welcomed.</p> - -<p class="p0 sigright"> -<span class="l2"><span class="smcap">Charles A. Dana</span>,</span><br /> -Editor and Manager.</p> - -<p class="p0">New York, January 25, 1868.</p> -</div> - -<p>Beneath this announcement was a farewell message -from Moses Sperry Beach to the readers whom he had -served for twenty years:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>With unreserved confidence in the ability of those -who are to continue this work of my life, I lay aside an -armor which in these latter years has been too loosely -borne.</p> -</div> - -<p>So Moses S. Beach retired from journalism at forty-five. -With the $175,000 paid to him for the <i>Sun</i>, and -the profits he had made in his many years of ownership, -he was easily rich enough to realize his dream of quiet -rural life—a realization that lasted until his death in -1892.</p> - -<p>But who was this Dana who was taking up at forty-eight -the burden that a younger man was almost wearily -laying down?</p> - -<p>It is very likely that he was not well known to the -readers of the <i>Sun</i>. The newspaper world knew him as -one who had been the backbone of Greeley’s <i>Tribune</i> -in the turbulent period before the Civil War and for a -year after the war was on. The army world knew him -as the man who had been chosen by Lincoln and Stanton -for important and confidential missions. Students<span class="pagenum" id="Page_201">201</span> -knew him as one of the editors of the “New American -Encyclopedia.” By many a fireside his name was -familiar as the compiler of the “Household Book of -Poetry.” Highbrows remembered him as one of the -group of geniuses in the Brook Farm colony.</p> - -<p>In none of these categories were many of the men -who ran with the fire-engines, voted for John Kelly, and -bought the <i>Sun</i>. But the <i>Sun</i> was the <i>Sun</i>; it was their -paper, and they would have none other; and they would -see what this Dana would do with it.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div id="toclink_202" class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_202">202</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_IX">CHAPTER IX<br /> - -<span class="subhead">THE EARLIER CAREER OF DANA</span></h2> -</div> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p><i>His Life at Brook Farm and His Tribune Experience.—His -Break with Greeley, His Civil War Services and His -Chicago Disappointment.—His Purchase of “The Sun.”</i></p> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">Day</span> and Dana each did a great thing for the <i>Sun</i> -and incidentally for journalism and for America. -Day made humanity more intelligent by making newspapers -popular. Dana made newspapers more intelligent -by making them human.</p> - -<p>Day started the <i>Sun</i> at twenty-three and left it at -twenty-eight. Dana took the <i>Sun</i> at forty-eight and -kept it for thirty years. Each, in his time, was absolute -master of the paper.</p> - -<p>“The great idea of Day’s time,” wrote E. P. Mitchell -on the <i>Sun’s</i> fiftieth birthday, fifteen years after Dana -took hold, “was cheapness to the buyer. The great idea -of the <i>Sun</i> as it is, was and is interest to the reader.”</p> - -<p>Of the nine men who have been owners of the <i>Sun</i>, -seven were of down-east Yankee stock, and six of the -seven were born in New England. Of the editors-in-chief -of the <i>Sun</i>—except in that brief period of the -lease by the religious coterie—all have been New Englanders -but one, and he was the son of a New Englander.</p> - -<p>Dana was born in Hinsdale, New Hampshire, on -August 8, 1819. His father was Anderson Dana, sixth -in descent from Richard Dana, the colonial settler; and -his mother, Ann Denison, came of straight Yankee stock.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_203">203</span> -The father failed in business at Hinsdale when Charles -was a child, and the family moved to Gaines, a village -in western New York, where Anderson Dana became a -farmer. Here the mother died, leaving four children—Charles -Anderson, aged nine; Junius, seven; Maria, -three, and David, an infant. The widower went to the -home of Mrs. Dana’s parents near Guildhall, Vermont, -and there the children were divided among relatives. -Charles was sent to live with his uncle, David Denison, -on a farm in the Connecticut River Valley.</p> - -<p>There was a good teacher at the school near by, and -at the age of ten Charles was considered as proficient in -his English studies as many boys of fifteen. When he -was twelve he had added some Latin to the three R’s. -In the judgment of that day he was fit to go to work. -His uncle, William Dana, was part owner of the general -store of Staats & Dana, in Buffalo, New York, whither -the boy was sent by stage-coach. He made himself -handy in the store and lived at his uncle’s -house.</p> - -<p>Buffalo, a distributing place for freight sent West on -the Erie Canal, had a population of only fifteen thousand -in 1831. Many of Staats & Dana’s customers were -Indians, and young Charles added to the store’s efficiency -by learning the Seneca language. At night he -continued his pursuit of Latin, tackled Greek, read what -volumes of Tom Paine he could buy at a book-shop -next door, and followed the career, military and political, -of the strenuous Andrew Jackson. When he had a -day off he went fishing in the Niagara River or visited -the Indian reservation.</p> - -<p>He was a normal, healthy lad, even if he knew more -Latin than he should. When war threatened with Great -Britain over the Caroline affair, Dana joined the City -Guard and had a brief ambition to be a soldier. He<span class="pagenum" id="Page_204">204</span> -was of slender build, but strong. He belonged to the -Coffee Club, a literary organization, and he made a talk -to it on early English poetry.</p> - -<p>“The best days of my life,” he called this period.</p> - -<p>Staats & Dana failed in the panic of 1837, and -Charles, then eighteen, and the possessor of two hundred -dollars saved from his wages, decided to go to -Harvard. He left Buffalo in June, 1839, although his -father did not like the idea of letting him go to Harvard.</p> - -<p>“I know it ranks high as a literary institution, but -the influence it exerts in a religious way is most horrible—even -worse than Universalism.”</p> - -<p>Anderson Dana had a horror of Unitarianism, and -had heard that Charles was attending Unitarian meetings.</p> - -<p>“Ponder well the paths of thy feet,” he wrote in -solemn warning to his perilously venturesome son, “lest -they lead down to the very gates of hell.”</p> - -<p>Dana entered college without difficulty, and devoted -much of his time to philosophy and general literature. -He wrote to his friend, Dr. Austin Flint, whom he had -met in Buffalo, and who had advised him to go to Harvard.</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>I am in the focus of what Professor Felton calls -“supersublimated transcendentalism,” and to tell the -truth, I take to it rather kindly, though I stumble sadly -at some notions.</p> -</div> - -<p>This was not strange, for besides hearing Unitarian -discourse, young Dana was attending Emerson’s lectures -at Harvard and reading Carlyle.</p> - -<div id="ip_204" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 26em;"> - <img src="images/i_204a.jpg" width="1249" height="2418" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - -<p>CHARLES A. DANA AT THIRTY-EIGHT</p> - -<p class="subhead">A Photograph Taken in 1857 When He Was Managing Editor -of the New York “Tribune.”</p> -</div></div> - -<p>In his first term Dana stood seventh in a class of -seventy-four. In the spring of 1840 he left Cambridge, -but pursued the university studies at the home of his<span class="pagenum" id="Page_205">205</span> -uncle in Guildhall, Vermont. Here, at an expense of -about a dollar a week, he put in eight hours a day at -his books, and for diversion went shooting or tinkered -in the farm shop. His sister, then fifteen years old, was -there, and he helped her with her studies.</p> - -<p>Dana returned to Harvard in the autumn, but not -for long. His purse was about empty, and he found no -means of replenishing it at Cambridge. In November -the faculty gave him permission to be absent during the -winter to “keep school.” Dana went to teach at Scituate, -Massachusetts, getting twenty-five dollars a month -and his board.</p> - -<p>His regret at leaving college was keen, for it meant -that he would miss Richard Henry Dana’s lectures on -poetry, and George Ripley’s on foreign literature.</p> - -<p>Young Dana’s mind was full in those days. There -was the eager desire for education, with poverty in the -path. He thought he saw a way around by going to -Germany, where he could live cheaply at a university -and be paid for teaching English. There was also a -religious struggle.</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>I feel now an inclination to orthodoxy, and am trying -to believe the real doctrine of the Trinity. Whether I -shall settle down in Episcopacy, Swedenborgianism, or -Goethean indifference to all religion, I know not. My -only prayer is, “God help me!”</p> -</div> - -<p>But the immediate reality was teaching school in a -little town where most of the pupils were unruly sailors, -and Dana faced it with good-natured philosophy. At -the end of a day’s struggle to train some sixty or seventy -Scituate youths, he went back to the home of Captain -Webb, with whose family he boarded, and read Coleridge -for literary quality, Swedenborg for religion, and -“Oliver Twist” for diversion. Candles and whale-oil<span class="pagenum" id="Page_206">206</span> -lamps were the only illuminants, and Dana’s eyes, never -too strong, began to weaken.</p> - -<p>He returned to college in the spring of 1841, but his -eyes would stand no more. He was about to find work -as an agricultural labourer when Brook Farm attracted -him. Through George Ripley he was admitted to that -association, which sought to combine labour and intellect -in a beautiful communistic scheme. He agreed to -teach Greek and German and to help with the farm -work.</p> - -<p>Dana subscribed for three of the thirty shares—at -five hundred dollars a share—of the stock of the Brook -Farm Institute of Agriculture and Education, as the -company was legally titled. Brook Farm was a fine -place of a hundred and ninety-two acres, in the town of -Roxbury, about nine miles from Boston. It cost $10,500 -and, as most of the shareholders had no money to pay on -their stock, mortgages amounting to eleven thousand -dollars were immediately clapped on the place—a feat -rare in the business world, at once to mortgage a place -for more than its cost. Dana, now twenty-three years -old, was elected recording secretary, one of the three -trustees, and a member of the committees on finance -and education.</p> - -<p>He remained as a Brook Farmer to the end of the -five years that the experiment lasted. There he met -Hawthorne, who lingered long enough to get much of -the material for his “Blithedale Romance”; Thoreau, -who had not yet gone to Walden Pond; William Ellery -Channing, second, the author and journalist; Albert -Brisbane, the most radical of the group of socialists -of his day; and Margaret Fuller, who believed in Brook -Farm, but did not live there.</p> - -<p>Brook Farm was the perfect democracy. The members -did all the work, menial and otherwise, and if there<span class="pagenum" id="Page_207">207</span> -was honour it fell to him whose task was humblest. The -community paid each worker a dollar a day, and -charged him or her about two dollars and fifty cents a -week for board. It sold its surplus produce, and it educated -children at low rates. George Ripley, the Unitarian -minister, was chief of the cow-milking group, -and Dana helped him. Dana, as head waiter, served -food to John Cheever, valet to an English baronet then -staying in Boston.</p> - -<p>“And it was great fun,” Dana said, in a lecture delivered -at the University of Michigan forty years afterward. -“There were seventy people or more, and at -dinner they all came in and we served them. There was -more entertainment in doing the duty than in getting -away from it.”</p> - -<p>It was at Brook Farm that Dana first made the acquaintance -of Horace Greeley, who, himself a student -of Fourier, was interested in the Roxbury experiment, -so much more idealistic than Fourierism itself.</p> - -<p>Dana took Brook Farm seriously, but he was not one -of the poseurs of the colony. No smocks for him, no -long hair! He wore a full, auburn beard, but he wore -a beard all the rest of his life. He was a handsome, -slender youth, and he got mental and physical health -out of every minute at the farm. By day he was busy -teaching, keeping the association’s books, milking, waiting -on table, or caring for the fruit-trees. He was the -most useful man on the farm. At night, when the others -danced, he was at his books or his writings.</p> - -<p>He wrote articles for the <i>Harbinger</i>, and for the <i>Dial</i>, -which succeeded the <i>Harbinger</i> as the official organ of -the Transcendentalists. Dr. Ripley was the editor of -the <i>Harbinger</i>, and he had such brilliant contributors -as James Russell Lowell and George William Curtis; -but Dana was his mainstay. He wrote book-reviews,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_208">208</span> -editorial articles and notes, and not a little verse. His -“Via Sacra” is typical of the thoughtful youth:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="verse indent0">Slowly along the crowded street I go,</div> - <div class="verse indent2">Marking with reverent look each passer’s face,</div> - <div class="verse indent2">Seeking, and not in vain, in each to trace</div> - <div class="verse indent0">That primal soul whereof he is the show.</div> - <div class="verse indent2">For here still move, by many eyes unseen,</div> - <div class="verse indent0">The blessed gods that erst Olympus kept;</div> - <div class="verse indent2">Through every guise these lofty forms serene</div> - <div class="verse indent0">Declare the all-holding life hath never slept;</div> - <div class="verse indent2">But known each thrill that in man’s heart hath been,</div> - <div class="verse indent0">And every tear that his sad eyes have wept.</div> - <div class="verse indent2">Alas for us! The heavenly visitants—</div> - <div class="verse indent0">We greet them still as most unwelcome guests,</div> - <div class="verse indent2">Answering their smile with hateful looks askance,</div> - <div class="verse indent0">Their sacred speech with foolish, bitter jests;</div> - <div class="verse indent2">But oh, what is it to imperial Jove</div> - <div class="verse indent2">That this poor world refuses all his love?</div> - </div> -</div> -</div> - -<p>A Mrs. Macdaniel, a widow, came to Brook Farm -from Maryland with her son and two daughters. One -of the daughters brought with her an ambition for the -stage, but her destiny was to be Mrs. Dana. On March -2, 1846, in New York, Charles A. Dana and Eunice Macdaniel -were married. That day, coincidentally, the fire -insurance on the main building at Brook Farm lapsed, -perhaps through the preoccupation of the recording -secretary; and the next day this building, called the -Phalanstery, was burned.</p> - -<p>That was the beginning of the end of Brook Farm -and of Dana’s secluded life. He went to work on the -Boston <i>Daily Chronotype</i> for five dollars a week. It -was a Congregational paper, owned and edited by -Elizur Wright. When Wright was absent, Dana acted<span class="pagenum" id="Page_209">209</span> -as editor, and on one of these occasions he caused -the <i>Chronotype</i> to come out so “mighty strong -against hell,” that Mr. Wright declared, years afterward, -that he had to write a personal letter to -every Congregational minister in Massachusetts, explaining -that the apparent heresy was due to his having -left the paper in the charge of “a young man without -journalistic experience.”</p> - -<p>In February, 1847, Dana went to New York, and -Horace Greeley made him city editor of the <i>Tribune</i> at -ten dollars a week. Later in that year Dana insisted -on an increase of salary, and Greeley agreed to pay him -fourteen dollars a week—a dollar less than his own -stipend; but in consideration of this huge advance Dana -was obliged to give all his talents to the <i>Tribune</i>.</p> - -<p>Dana still nursed his desire to see Europe, but he had -given up the idea of teaching in a German university. -Newspaper work had captured him. Germany was still -attractive, but now as a place of news, for the rumblings -against the rule of Metternich were being heard in central -Europe. And in France there was a sweep of -socialism, a subject which still held the idealistic Dana, -and the beginning of the revolution in Paris (February -24, 1848).</p> - -<p>Dana told Greeley of his European ambition, but -Greeley threw cold water on it, saying that Dana—not -yet thirty—knew nothing about foreign politics. Dana -asked how much the <i>Tribune</i> would pay for a letter a -week if he went abroad “on his own,” and Greeley -offered ten dollars, which Dana accepted. He made a -similar agreement with the New York <i>Commercial Advertiser</i> -and the Philadelphia <i>North American</i>, and contracted -to send letters to the <i>Harbinger</i> and the <i>Chronotype</i> -for five dollars a week.</p> - -<p>“That gave me forty dollars a week for five letters,”<span class="pagenum" id="Page_210">210</span> -said Dana afterward; “and when the <i>Chronotype</i> went -up, I still had thirty-five dollars. On this I lived in -Europe nearly eight months, saw plenty of revolutions, -supported myself there and my family in New York, -and came home only sixty-three dollars out for the -whole trip.” Not a bad outcome for what was probably -the first correspondence syndicate ever attempted.</p> - -<p>The trip did wonders for Dana. He saw the foreign -“improvers of mankind” in action, more violent than -visionary; saw theory dashed against the rocks of -reality. He came back a wiser and better newspaperman, -with a knowledge of European conditions and men -that served him well all his life. There is seen in some -of his descriptions the fine simplicity of style that was -later to make the <i>Sun</i> the most human newspaper.</p> - -<p>Social experiments still interested Dana after his return -to New York in the spring of 1849, but he was -able to take a clearer view of their practicability than -he had been in the Brook Farm days. He still favoured -association and cooperation, and every sane effort toward -the amelioration of human misery, but he now -knew that there was no direct road to the millennium.</p> - -<p>Once home, however, and settled, not only as managing -editor, but as a holder of five shares of stock in the -<i>Tribune</i>, Dana was kept busy with things other than -socialistic theories. Slavery and the tariff were the -overshadowing issues of the day.</p> - -<p>Greeley was the great man of the <i>Tribune</i> office, but -Dana, in the present-day language of Park Row, was the -live wire almost from the day of his return from Europe. -When Greeley went abroad, Dana took charge. Greeley -now drew fifty dollars a week; Dana got twenty-five, -Bayard Taylor twenty, George Ripley fifteen. Dana’s -five shares of stock netted him about two thousand dollars -a year in addition to his salary.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_211">211</span></p> - -<p>Here is a part of a letter which Dana wrote in 1852 -to James S. Pike, the Washington correspondent of the -<i>Tribune</i>:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p class="in0"><span class="smcap">Keenest of Pikes</span>:</p> - -<p>What a desert void of news you keep at Washington! -For goodness’ sake, kick up a row of some sort. Fight -a duel, defraud the Treasury, set fire to the fueling-mill, -get Black Dan [Webster] drunk, or commit some other -excess that will make a stir.</p> -</div> - -<p>The solemn phrases of transcendentalism had vanished -from the tip of Dana’s pen.</p> - -<p>In the fight over slavery in the fifties, the effort of -Greeley and Dana was against the further spread of -the institution over new American territory, rather than -for its complete overthrow. When Greeley was at the -helm, the <i>Tribune</i> appeared to admit the possibility of -secession, a forerunner of “Let the erring sisters depart -in peace.” But when Dana was left in charge, the editorials -pleaded for the integrity of the Union at any cost. -Greeley was heart and soul for liberty, but his fist was -not in the fight. Of the political situation in 1854, -Henry Wilson wrote, in his “Rise and Fall of the -Slave Power”:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>At the outset Mr. Greeley was hopeless, and seemed -disinclined to enter the contest. He told his associates -that he would not restrain them; but, as for himself, he -had no heart for the strife. They were more hopeful; -and Richard Hildreth, the historian; Charles A. Dana, -the veteran journalist; James S. Pike, and other able -writers, opened and continued a powerful opposition in -its columns, and did very much to rally and assure the -friends of freedom and nerve them for the fight.</p> -</div> - -<p>Dana went farther than Greeley cared to go, particularly -in his attacks on the Democrats; so far, in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_212">212</span> -fact, that Greeley often pleaded with him to stop. -Greeley wrote to James S. Pike:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Charge Dana not to slaughter anybody, but be mild -and meek-souled like me.</p> -</div> - -<p>Greeley wrote to Dana from Washington, where -Dana’s radicalism was making his colleague uncomfortable:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Now I write once more to entreat that I may be -allowed to conduct the <i>Tribune</i> with reference to the -mile wide that stretches either way from Pennsylvania -Avenue. It is but a small space, and you have all the -world besides. I cannot stay here unless this request -is complied with. I would rather cease to live at all.</p> - -<p>If you are not willing to leave me entire control with -reference to this city, I ask you to call the proprietors -together and have me discharged. I have to go to this -and that false creature—Lew Campbell, for instance—yet -in constant terror of seeing him guillotined in the -next <i>Tribune</i> that arrives, and I can’t make him believe -that I didn’t instigate it. So with everything here. If -you want to throw stones at anybody’s crockery, aim at -my head first, and in mercy be sure to aim well.</p> -</div> - -<p>Again Greeley wrote to Dana:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>You are getting everybody to curse me. I am too sick -to be out of bed, too crazy to sleep, and am surrounded -by horrors.... I can bear the responsibilities that -belong to me, but you heap a load on me that will kill -me.</p> -</div> - -<p>With all Dana’s editorial work—and he and Greeley -made the <i>Tribune</i> the most powerful paper of the fifties, -with a million readers—he found time for the purely -literary. He translated and published a volume of -German stories and legends under the title “The Black -Ant.” He edited a book of views of remarkable places<span class="pagenum" id="Page_213">213</span> -and objects in all countries. In 1857 was published his -“Household Book of Poetry,” still a standard work of -reference. He was criticised for omitting Poe from the -first edition, and at the next printing he added “The -Raven,” “The Bells,” and “Annabel Lee.” Poe and -Cooper were among the literary gods whom Dana refused -to worship in his youth, but in later life he -changed his opinion of the poet.</p> - -<p>With George Ripley, his friend in Harvard, at Brook -Farm, and in the <i>Tribune</i> office, Dana prepared the -“New American Encyclopedia,” which was published -between 1858 and 1863. It was a huge undertaking and -a success. Dana and Ripley carefully revised it ten -years afterward. In 1882, with Rossiter Johnson, Dana -edited and published a collection of verse under the title -“Fifty Perfect Poems.”</p> - -<p>Although Dana persisted that the Union must not -fall, Greeley still believed, as late as December, 1860, -that it would “not be found practical to coerce” the -threatening States into subjection. When war actually -came, however, Greeley at last adopted the policy of -“No compromise, no concessions to traitors.”</p> - -<p>The <i>Tribune’s</i> cry, “Forward to Richmond!” sounded -from May, 1861, until Bull Run, was generally attributed -to Dana. Greeley himself made it plain that it was -not his:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>I wish to be distinctly understood as not seeking to -be relieved from any responsibility for urging the advance -of the Union army in Virginia, though the precise -phrase, “Forward to Richmond!” was not mine, and I -would have preferred not to reiterate it. Henceforth I -bar all criticism in these columns on army movements. -Now let the wolves howl on! I do not believe they can -goad me into another personal letter.</p> -</div> - -<p>As a matter of fact, “Forward to Richmond!” was<span class="pagenum" id="Page_214">214</span> -phrased by Fitz-Henry Warren, then head of the -<i>Tribune’s</i> correspondence staff in Washington. He -came from Iowa, where in his youth he was editor of the -Burlington <i>Hawkeye</i>. He resigned from the <i>Tribune</i> -late in 1861 to take command of the First Iowa Cavalry, -which he organized. In 1862 he became a brigadier-general, -and he was later brevetted a major-general. -In 1869 he was the American minister to Guatemala. -From being one of the men around Greeley he became -one of the men with Dana, and in 1875–1876 he did -Washington correspondence for the <i>Sun</i>, and wrote -many editorial articles for it.</p> - -<p>In 1861 Dana was an active advocate of Greeley’s -candidacy for the United States Senate, and almost got -him nominated. If Greeley had gone to the Senate, -Dana might have continued on the <i>Tribune</i>; but it became -evident, before the war was a year old, that one -newspaper was no longer large enough for both men. -The sprightly, aggressive, unhesitating, and practical -Dana, and the ambitious, but eccentric and somewhat -visionary Greeley found their paths diverging. The circumstances -under which they parted were thus described -by Dana in a letter to a friend:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>On Thursday, March 27, I was notified that Mr. -Greeley had given the stockholders notice that I must -leave, or he would, and that they wanted me to leave -accordingly. No cause of dissatisfaction being alleged, -and H. G. having been of late more confidential and -friendly than ever, not once having said anything betokening -disaffection to me, I sent a friend to him to -ascertain if it was true, or if some misunderstanding -was at the bottom of it. My friend came and reported -that it was true, and that H. G. was immovable.</p> - -<p>On Friday, March 28, I resigned, and the trustees at -once accepted it, passing highly complimentary resolutions -and voting me six months’ salary after the date of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_215">215</span> -my resignation. Mr. Ripley opposed the proceedings in -the trustees, and, above all, insisted on delay in order -that the facts might be ascertained; but all in vain.</p> - -<p>On Saturday, March 29, Mr. Greeley came down, -called another meeting of the trustees, said he had never -desired me to leave, that it was a damned lie that he -had presented such an alternative as that he or I must -go, and finally sent me a verbal message desiring me to -remain as a writer of editorials; but has never been near -me since to meet the “damned lie” in person, nor written -one word on the subject. I conclude, accordingly, -that he is glad to have me out, and that he really set on -foot the secret cabal by which it was accomplished. As -soon as I get my pay for my shares—ten thousand dollars -less than I could have got for them a year ago—I -shall be content.</p> -</div> - -<p>That was the undramatic and somewhat disappointing -end of Dana’s fourteen years on the <i>Tribune</i>. He -was forty-three years old and not rich. All he had was -what he got from the sale of his <i>Tribune</i> stock and what -he had saved from the royalties on his books.</p> - -<p>From the literary view-point he was doubtless the -best-equipped newspaperman in America, but there was -no great place open for him then.</p> - -<p>Dana’s work on the <i>Tribune</i> had attracted the attention -of most of the big men of the North, including -Edwin M. Stanton, who in January, 1862, was appointed -Secretary of War in place of Simon Cameron. -Stanton asked Dana to come into the War Department, -and assigned him to service upon a commission to audit -unsettled claims against the quartermaster’s department. -While in Memphis on this work he first met -General Grant, then prosecuting the war in the West.</p> - -<p>In the autumn of 1862, Stanton offered to Dana a -post as second Assistant Secretary of War, and Dana, -having accepted, told a newspaperman of his appointment.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_216">216</span> -When the news was printed, the irascible Stanton -was so much annoyed—although without any -apparent reason—that he withdrew the appointment. -Dana then became a partner with George W. Chadwick, -of New York, and Roscoe Conkling, of Utica, in an -enterprise for buying cotton in that part of the Mississippi -Valley which the Union army occupied.</p> - -<p>Dana and Chadwick went to Memphis in January, -1863, armed with letters from Secretary Stanton to -General Grant and other field commanders. But no -sooner had their cotton operations begun than Dana saw -the evil effect that this traffic was having. It had -aroused a fever of speculation. Army officers were forming -partnerships with cotton operators, and even privates -wanted to buy cotton with their pay. The Confederacy -was being helped rather than hindered.</p> - -<p>Disregarding his own fortunes, Dana called upon -General Grant and advised him to “put an end to an -evil so enormous, so insidious and so full of peril to the -country.” Grant at once issued an order designed to -end the traffic, but the cotton-traders succeeded in having -it nullified by the government.</p> - -<p>Then Dana went to Washington, saw President Lincoln -and Secretary Stanton, and convinced them that -the cotton trade should be handled by the Treasury -Department. As a result of Dana’s visit, Lincoln issued -his proclamation declaring all commercial intercourse -with seceded States to be unlawful. Thus Dana -patriotically worked himself out of a paying business.</p> - -<p>Yet his unselfishness was not without a reward. It -reestablished his friendly relations with Stanton, and -won for him the President’s confidence.</p> - -<p>Just then there was an important errand to be done. -Many complaints had been made against General Grant. -Certain temperance people had told Lincoln that Grant<span class="pagenum" id="Page_217">217</span> -was drinking heavily, and although Lincoln jested—“Can -you tell me where Grant buys his liquor? I -would like to distribute a few barrels of the same brand -among my other major-generals”—he really wished to -have all doubts settled.</p> - -<p>The President and Mr. Stanton chose Dana for the -mission. It was an open secret. If Grant did not know -that Dana was coming to make a report on his conduct, -all the general’s staff knew it. General James -Harrison Wilson, biographer of Dana—and, with Dana, -biographer of Grant—wrote of this situation:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>It was believed by many that if he [Dana] did not -bring plenary authority to actually displace Grant, the -fate of that general would certainly depend upon the -character of the reports which the special commissioner -might send to Washington in regard to him.</p> -</div> - -<p>Wilson was at this time the inspector-general of -Grant’s army. He consulted with John A. Rawlins, -Grant’s austere young adjutant-general and actual chief -of staff, and the two officers agreed that Dana must be -taken into complete confidence. Wilson wrote:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>We sincerely believed that Grant, whatever might -be his faults and weaknesses, was a far safer man to -command the army than any other general in it, or than -any that might be sent to it from another field.</p> -</div> - -<p>Dana and Wilson and Rawlins made the best of a -delicate, difficult situation. Dana was taken into headquarters -“on the footing of an officer of the highest -rank.” His commission was that of a major of volunteers, -but his functions were so important that he was -called “Mr. Dana” rather than “Major Dana.” Dana -himself never used the military title.</p> - -<p>Dana sent his first official despatches to Stanton in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_218">218</span> -March, 1863, from before Vicksburg. Grant’s staff made -clear to him the plan of the turning movement by which -the gunboats and transports were to be run past the -Vicksburg batteries while the army marched across the -country, and Dana made most favourable reports to -Washington on the general’s strategy.</p> - -<p>Dana saw not only real warfare, but a country that -was new to him. After a trip into Louisiana he wrote -to his friend, William Henry Huntington:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>During the eight days that I have been here, I have -got new insight into slavery, which has made me no -more a friend of that institution than I was before.... -It was not till I saw these plantations, with their -apparatus for living and working, that I really felt the -aristocratic nature of it.</p> -</div> - -<p>Under a flag of truce Dana went close to Vicksburg, -where he was met by a Confederate major of artillery:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Our people entertained him with a cigar and a drink -of whisky, of course, or, rather, with two drinks. This -is an awful country for drinking whisky. I calculate -that on an average a friendly man will drink a gallon -in twenty-four hours. I wish you were here to do my -drinking for me, for I suffer in public estimation for -not doing as the Romans do.</p> -</div> - -<p>Dana was with Grant on the memorable night of -April 16, 1863, when the squadron of gunboats, barges, -and transports ran the Vicksburg forts. From that -time on until July he accompanied the great soldier. -It was Dana who received and communicated Stanton’s -despatch giving to Grant “full and absolute authority to -enforce his own commands, and to remove any person -who, by ignorance, inaction, or any cause, interferes -with or delays his operations.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_219">219</span></p> - -<p>Dana was in many marches and battles. Like the -officers of Grant’s staff, he slept in farmhouses, and ate -pork and hardtack or what the land provided. The -move on Vicksburg was a brilliant campaign, and in ten -days Dana saw as much of war as most men of the -Civil War saw in three years. Dana sent despatches to -Washington describing the battles at Champion’s Hill -and the Big Black Bridge, the investment of Vicksburg, -and the establishment of a line of supply from the -North. Through Dana’s eyes the government began to -see Grant as he really was.</p> - -<p>Dana, with either Grant or Wilson, rode over all the -country of the Vicksburg campaign, often under fire. -He was present at Grant’s councils, and rode into Vicksburg -with him after its surrender. Dana’s view of the -great soldier’s personality is given in something he -wrote many years later, long after their friendship was -ended:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Grant was an uncommon fellow—the most modest, -the most disinterested, and the most honest man I ever -knew, with a temper that nothing could disturb, and a -judgment that was judicial in its comprehensiveness and -wisdom. Not a great man, except morally; nor an -original or brilliant man, but sincere, thoughtful, deep, -and gifted with courage that never faltered. When the -time came to risk all, he went in like a simple-hearted, -unaffecting, unpretending hero, whom no ill omens -could deject and no triumph unduly exalt. A social, -friendly man, too; fond of a pleasant joke and also -ready with one; but liking above all a long chat of an -evening, and ready to sit up with you all night talking -in the cool breeze in front of his tent. Not a man of -sentimentality, not demonstrative in friendship; but -always holding to his friends and just even to the -enemies he hated.</p> -</div> - -<p>Here is Dana’s picture of Rawlins, sent to Stanton<span class="pagenum" id="Page_220">220</span> -on July 12, 1863—eight days after the fall of Vicksburg:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>He is a lawyer by profession, a townsman of Grant, -and has great influence over him, especially because he -watches him day and night, and whenever he commits -the folly of tasting liquor, hastens to remind him that -at the beginning of the war he gave him [Rawlins] his -word of honor not to touch a drop as long as it lasted. -Grant thinks Rawlins a first-rate adjutant, but I think -this is a mistake. He is too slow, and can’t write the -English language correctly without a great deal of careful -consideration.</p> -</div> - -<p>In spite of this criticism, Dana admired Rawlins. -Without him, he said, Grant would not have been the -same man.</p> - -<p>After Vicksburg and Gettysburg, Dana returned to -Washington. He was now an Assistant Secretary of -War, and his success as an official reporter on the conduct -of the Army of the Tennessee had been so great -that Stanton sent him to cover, in the same way, the -operations of the Army of the Cumberland, going first -to General Rosecrans at Chattanooga. Dana saw the -hottest of the great fight at Chickamauga, and galloped -twelve miles to send his despatches about it to Stanton. -He made blunt reports to the government on the unfitness -of Rosecrans:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>I consider this army to be very unsafe in his hands, -but I know of no one except Thomas who could now be -safely put in his place.</p> -</div> - -<p>After a conference at Louisville between Stanton and -Grant, Rosecrans was relieved and Thomas became commander -of the Army of the Cumberland. A fine soldier -and a modest man, Thomas was disinclined to supplant -a superior.</p> - -<p>“You have got me this time,” he said to Dana, “but<span class="pagenum" id="Page_221">221</span> -there is nothing for a man to do in such a case but -obey orders.”</p> - -<p>Dana’s despatches had made Stanton realize the importance -of holding Chattanooga, and the Secretary of -War ordered Thomas to defend it at all hazards.</p> - -<p>“I will hold the town till we starve!” replied -Thomas.</p> - -<p>Dana was not only a useful eye for the government, -but he was a valued companion for General Wilson and -other officers who went with him on his missions. He -knew more poetry than any other man in the army except -General Michael Lawler, an Illinois farmer, whose -boast it was that on hearing any line of standard English -verse he could repeat the next line. Dana, the compiler -of the “Household Book of Poetry,” would try to -catch Lawler, but in vain. Dana was not so literal -as the Illinois general, but General Wilson says that -he “seemed never to forget anything he had ever -read.”</p> - -<p>The great advantage of Dana’s despatches to Stanton -was that they gave a picture of the doings in his -field of work that was not biased by military pride or -ambition. He wrote what he saw and knew, without -counting the effect on the generals concerned. For one -illuminating example, there was his story of the final -attack in the battle of Missionary Ridge. To read -Grant or Sherman, one would suppose that the triumphant -assault was planned precisely as it was executed; -but Dana’s account of that fierce day is the one that -must be relied upon:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The storming of the ridge by our troops was one of the -greatest miracles in military history. No man that -climbs the ascent by any of the roads that wind along -its front could believe that eighteen thousand men were -moved up its broken and crumbling face, unless it was<span class="pagenum" id="Page_222">222</span> -his fortune to witness the deed. It seems as awful as -the visible interposition of God. Neither Grant nor -Thomas intended it. Their orders were to carry the -rifle-pits along the base of the ridge and capture their -occupants; but when this was accomplished, the unaccountable -spirit of the troops bore them bodily up -those impracticable steeps, over bristling rifle-pits on -the crest, and thirty cannon enfilading every gully. The -order to storm appears to have been given simultaneously -by Generals Sheridan and Wood, because the -men were not to be held back, dangerous as the attempt -appeared to military prudence. Besides, the generals -had caught the inspiration of the men, and were ready -themselves to undertake impossibilities.</p> -</div> - -<p>No wonder that even when Lincoln was confined to his -chamber by illness, Dana’s despatches were brought -to him; “not merely because they are reliable,” as -Assistant Secretary of War Watson wrote to Dana, -“but for their clearness of narrative and their graphic -pictures of the stirring events they describe.” A conservative -tribute to the best reporter of the Civil War.</p> - -<p>Dana returned to Washington about the beginning of -1864 to take up office tasks, and particularly the reorganization -of the Cavalry Bureau. Dishonest horse-dealers -were plundering the government, and Dana -never rested until he had sent enough of these rogues -to prison to frighten the rest of the band. Dana was a -good office man; he worked, says James Harrison Wilson, -“like a skilful bricklayer.” And as he relieved -Stanton of much of the routine of the War Department, -the Secretary supported him in his assaults on dishonest -contractors, even when the political pressure brought to -bear for their protection was at its highest.</p> - -<p>Lincoln sent Dana to report Grant’s progress in the -Virginia campaign that opened in May, 1864. On the -26th, three weeks after the march began, he was able<span class="pagenum" id="Page_223">223</span> -to notify Washington of an entire change in the morale -of the contending armies:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The rebels have lost all confidence, and are already -morally defeated. This army has learned to believe -that it is sure of victory. Even our officers have ceased -to regard Lee as an invincible military genius.... -Rely upon it, the end is near as well as sure.</p> -</div> - -<p>In the eventful weeks of that early summer Dana -became an observer for Grant as well as for the government. -It was evident to Dana that the great soldier, -and not Washington, must decide what was to be done. -In a despatch from Washington, whither he had returned -at Grant’s request, Dana said to the general:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Until you direct positively and explicitly what is to -be done, everything will go on in the fatal way in which -it has gone on for the past week.</p> -</div> - -<p>Longstreet’s Confederates were coming down the -Shenandoah Valley, and Grant, taking heed of Dana’s -significant message, sent Sheridan to dispose of them. -Then, as Grant himself was stationed in front of Petersburg, -Dana resumed his activities in the office at Washington.</p> - -<p>“It has fallen to the lot of no other American,” says -General Wilson, “to serve as the confidential medium -of communication between the army and the government -and between the government and the general-in-chief, -as it did to Dana during the War of the Rebellion.”</p> - -<p>One pleasant errand which fell to Dana was the delivery -to Sheridan, after his victory over Early at Cedar -Creek, of his promotion to major-general. This entailed -a journey on horseback through the Valley of Virginia, -and the constant danger of capture by Mosby’s guerrillas;<span class="pagenum" id="Page_224">224</span> -but Dana, who greatly admired Sheridan, was -glad to take the chance.</p> - -<p>When the news came to Washington of the fall of -Richmond, in April, 1865, Secretary Stanton sent Dana -to the Confederate capital to gather up its archives. -Many of these historically valuable papers had been -removed and scattered, but Dana collected what he -could and sent them to Washington. He wanted to be -present with Grant at Lee’s surrender, but fate kept -him in Richmond, for Lincoln was there, and needed -him. When at last he got away, Grant had left Appomattox. -Dana joined him <i xml:lang="fr" lang="fr">en route</i>, and together they -reached Washington on the day before the President’s -assassination.</p> - -<p>It was on the day of his arrival that Dana went to -the President to ask him whether it would be well to -order the arrest of Jacob Thompson, a Confederate -commissioner who was trying to go from Canada to -Europe through Maine. Lincoln returned the historic -reply:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>“No, I rather think not. When you have got an -elephant by the hind leg, and he is trying to run away, -it’s best to let him run!”</p> -</div> - -<p>A few hours after the President’s death, however, -Stanton ordered Dana to obtain Thompson’s arrest.</p> - -<p>Dana was active in unearthing the conspiracy that -led to the assassination. A month later, acting under -Stanton’s injunctions, he wrote the order to General -Miles authorizing him to manacle and fetter Jefferson -Davis and Clement C. Clay, Jr., whenever he thought -it advisable, the Secretary of War being in fear that -some of the prisoners of state might escape or kill -themselves.</p> - -<div id="ip_224" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 34em;"> - <img src="images/i_224a.jpg" width="1607" height="2155" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - -<p>MR. DANA AT FIFTY</p> - -<p class="subhead">From a Photograph Taken in 1869, a Year After He Obtained Control of “The Sun.”</p> -</div></div> - -<p>Dana then and afterward resented the suggestion that<span class="pagenum" id="Page_225">225</span> -the president of the fallen Confederacy had met with -cruelty or injustice while he was confined in Fortress -Monroe. In his “Recollections of the Civil War,” he -said:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Medical officers were directed to superintend his -meals and give him everything that would excite his -appetite. As it was complained that his quarters in -the casemate were unhealthy and disagreeable, he was, -after a few weeks, transferred to Carroll Hall, a building -still occupied by officers and soldiers. That Davis’s -health was not ruined by his imprisonment at Fort Monroe -is proved by the fact that he came out of prison in -better condition than when he went in, and that he -lived for twenty years afterward, and died of old age.</p> -</div> - -<p>A new newspaper, the <i>Daily Republican</i>, was started -in Chicago, a few weeks after the close of the Civil War, -by Senator Trumbull and other prominent Illinoisans. -They asked Dana to become its editor. His work in -the War Department was done, and he had hoped to go -into business, for his own estimate of his power as a -journalist was not as flattering as the opinions of those -who knew him. Yet the Chicago proposition was attractive -on paper, for its capital was fixed at the large -sum of five hundred thousand dollars—an amount sufficient, -in those days, to carry on any intelligently managed -journal.</p> - -<p>Dana resigned as Assistant Secretary of War on -July 1, 1865, went to Chicago, and became editor of the -<i>Republican</i>. No man was more intellectually fit for -the editorship of a newspaper in that hour of reconstruction. -He had been a real Republican from the -founding of the party. He cared little for the new -President, Andrew Johnson, and the <i>Republican</i> was -more inclined toward the side of Stanton, who differed -with Johnson as to the methods which should be used<span class="pagenum" id="Page_226">226</span> -in the remaking of the South. Of Johnson, Dana wrote -to General Wilson:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The President is an obstinate, stupid man, governed -by preconceived ideas, by whisky, and by women. He -means one thing to-day and another to-morrow, but the -glorification of Andrew Johnson all the time.</p> -</div> - -<p>The statement that the capital stock of the <i>Republican</i> -was fixed at half a million dollars must now be qualified. -It was fixed on paper, but not in the banks. Little of -the money was actually paid in, and some of the subscribers -were not solvent. Dana worked hard with his -pen, but the <i>Republican</i> had not enough backing to -hold it up. After one year of it Dana resigned and -came East, determined to start a paper in New York.</p> - -<p>He had friends of influence and wealth who were -glad to be associated with him. These included:</p> - -<p class="in0 in4"> -Thomas Hitchcock<br /> -Isaac W. England<br /> -Charles S. Weyman<br /> -John H. Sherwood<br /> -M. O. Roberts<br /> -George Opdyke<br /> -E. D. Smith<br /> -F. A. Palmer<br /> -William H. Webb<br /> -Roscoe Conkling<br /> -A. B. Cornell<br /> -E. D. Morgan<br /> -David Dows<br /> -John C. Hamilton<br /> -Amos R. Eno<br /> -S. B. Chittenden<br /> -Freeman Clarke<br /> -Thomas Murphy<br /> -William M. Evarts<br /> -Cyrus W. Field<br /> -E. C. Cowdin<br /> -Salem H. Wales<br /> -Theron R. Butler<br /> -Marshall B. Blake<br /> -F. A. Conkling<br /> -A. A. Low<br /> -Charles E. Butler<br /> -Dorman B. Eaton -</p> - -<p>The most eminent of this distinguished group was, -of course, William M. Evarts, then the leader of the -American bar. He had been counsel for the State of -New York in the Lemmon slave case, pitted against -Charles O’Connor, counsel for the State of Virginia.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_227">227</span> -He became chief counsel for President Johnson in the -impeachment proceedings of 1868, and later was Johnson’s -Attorney-General. He was chief counsel for the -United States in the Alabama arbitration, senior counsel -for Henry Ward Beecher in the Tilton case, Secretary -of State under Hayes, and a United States Senator -from 1885 to 1891.</p> - -<p>Roscoe Conkling was a United States Senator from -New York at the time when Dana bought the <i>Sun</i>. He -was one of Grant’s strongest supporters, and led the -third-term movement in 1880. His brother, Frederick -Augustus Conkling, was the Republican candidate for -mayor of New York in the first year that Dana controlled -the <i>Sun</i>, although later he changed his politics, -supporting Tilden in 1876, and Hancock in 1880.</p> - -<p>Edwin D. Morgan was Conkling’s colleague in the -Senate, where he served from 1863 to 1869. He was Governor -of New York from 1858 to 1862. He, like most -of Dana’s associates, was a Grant man, and it was Morgan -who managed Grant’s second Presidential campaign.</p> - -<p>Alonzo B. Cornell, then only thirty-six years old, -had risen from being a boy telegrapher to a directorship -in the Western Union. He was already prominent in -the Republican politics of New York State, and was -afterward Governor for three years (1880–1882).</p> - -<p>George Opdyke, a loyal Lincoln man, had been mayor -of New York in the trying years of 1862 and 1863.</p> - -<p>Cyrus W. Field had won world-wide distinction as -the Columbus of modern times, as John Bright called -him. Two years before Dana bought the <i>Sun</i> Field had -succeeded, after many reverses, in making the Atlantic -cable a permanent success.</p> - -<p>Amos R. Eno, merchant and banker, was the man -who had made New York laugh by building the Fifth<span class="pagenum" id="Page_228">228</span> -Avenue Hotel so far north—away up at Twenty-Third -Street—that it was known as Eno’s Folly. This he did -nearly ten years before Dana went to the <i>Sun</i>, and in -1868 the hotel was not only the most fashionable in the -United States, but the most profitable.</p> - -<p>A. A. Low was a merchant and the father of Seth -Low, later mayor of New York. William H. Webb was -a big ship-builder. Thomas Murphy was a Republican -politician whom Grant made collector of the port of -New York, and who gave Grant his place at Long -Branch as a summer home.</p> - -<p>At least three of the men in the list were active in -the <i>Sun</i> office. Thomas Hitchcock was a young man -of wealth and scholarship who had become acquainted -with Dana when both were interested in Swedenborgianism. -He wrote, among other books, a catechism of that -doctrine. For many years he contributed to the <i>Sun</i>, -under the name “Matthew Marshall,” financial articles -which appeared on Mondays, and which were regarded -as the best reviews and criticisms of their kind.</p> - -<p>Charles S. Weyman got out the <i>Weekly Sun</i>, and -edited that delightful column, “Sunbeams.”</p> - -<p>Salem H. Wales was a merchant whose daughter became -Mrs. Elihu Root. Dorman B. Eaton was one of -the pioneers of civil-service reform. Marshall O. Roberts, -F. A. Palmer, David Dows, and E. C. Cowdin were -great names in the business and financial world.</p> - -<p>Why Dana and his friends did not start a new paper -is explained in the following letter, written by Dana to -General Wilson:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Just as we were about commencing our own paper, -the purchase of the <i>Sun</i> was proposed to me and accepted. -It had a circulation of from fifty to sixty thousand -a day, and all among the mechanics and small -merchants of this city. We pay a large sum for it—$175,000—but<span class="pagenum" id="Page_229">229</span> -it gives us at once a large and profitable -business.</p> - -<p>If you have a thousand dollars at leisure, you had -better invest it in the stock of our company, which is -increased to $350,000 in order to pay for the new acquisition. -Of this sum about $220,000 is invested in the -Tammany Hall real estate, which is sure to be productive, -independent of the business of the paper.</p> -</div> - -<p>The “Tammany Hall real estate” was the building -at the corner of Nassau and Frankfort Streets, where -Tammany kept its headquarters from 1811, when it -moved from Martling’s Long Room, at Nassau and -Spruce Streets, to 1867, when Dana and his friends -bought the building with the expectation of starting a -new paper. If Moses S. Beach had attracted Dana’s -attention to the <i>Sun</i> in time, he might have sold him, -as well as the paper, his own building at Nassau and -Fulton Streets. But the Tammany Hall building was -a better-placed home for the <i>Sun</i> than its old quarters. -It faced City Hall Park and was a part of Printing-House -Square. Dana was right about the productiveness -of the real estate, for no spot in New York sees -more pedestrians go by than the Nassau-Frankfort corner. -The <i>Sun</i> lived there for forty-three years, and its -present home, taken when the old hall became too small -and ancient, is only a block away.</p> - -<p>The first number of the <i>Sun</i> issued under Dana—Monday, -January 27, 1868—contained a long sketch of -Tammany Hall and its former home, concluding:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Peace succeeds to strife. No new Halleck can sing:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="verse indent0">There’s a barrel of porter at Tammany Hall,</div> - <div class="verse indent2">And the Bucktails are enjoying it all the night long;</div> - <div class="verse indent0">In the time of my boyhood ’twas pleasant to call</div> - <div class="verse indent2">For a seat and cigar ’mid the jovial throng.</div> - </div> -</div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_230">230</span></p> -<p>So far as the corner of Nassau and Frankfort Streets -is concerned, <i xml:lang="fr" lang="fr">L’Empire est paix</i>. The <i>Sun</i> shines for -all; and on the site of old Tammany’s troubles and tribulations -we turn back the leaves of the past, dispel the -clouds of discord, and shed our beams far and near over -the Regenerated Land.</p> -</div> - -<p>Dana changed the appearance of the <i>Sun</i> overnight. -He kept it as a folio, for he always believed in a four-page -paper, even when he was printing ten pages, but -he reduced the number of columns on a page from eight -to seven, widening each column a little.</p> - -<p>The principal head-lines, which had been irregular in -size and two to the page, were made smaller and more -uniform, and four appeared at the top of the front page. -The editorial articles, which had been printed in minion, -now appeared a size larger, in brevier, and the heads on -them were changed to the simple, dignified full-face -type of the size that is still used.</p> - -<p>Dana changed the title-head of the <i>Sun</i> from Roman, -which it had been from the beginning, to Old English, -as it stands to-day. He also changed the accompanying -emblem. It had been a variation of the seal of the -State of New York, with the sun rising in splendour behind -mountains; on the right, Liberty with her Phrygian -cap held on a staff, gazing at an outbound vessel; -on the left, Justice with scales and sword, so -facing that if not blindfolded she would see a locomotive -and a train of cars crossing a bridge. These -classic figures were kept, but the eagle—the State crest—which -brooded above the sunburst in Beach’s time, -was removed, so that the rays went skyward without -hindrance.</p> - -<p>Dana liked “It Shines for All,” the <i>Sun’s</i> old motto—everybody -liked it, but only one newspaper, the <i>Herald</i>, -ever had the effrontery to pilfer it—but he took it from<span class="pagenum" id="Page_231">231</span> -the scroll in the emblem and replaced there the State -motto, “Excelsior.”</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i>, under its new master, rose auspiciously—master, -not masters, for in spite of the number of his -financial associates, Dana was absolute. The men behind -him realized the folly of dividing authority. The -<i>Sun</i>, whether under Day or one of the Beaches, had always -been a one-man paper. Therefore it succeeded, -just as the <i>Herald</i>, another journal governed by an -autocrat, went ahead; but with the <i>Tribune</i>, where the -stockholders ruled and argued, things were different.</p> - -<p>Dana was the boss. As General Wilson wrote in his -biography:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>From this time forth it may be truthfully said that -Dana was the <i>Sun</i>, and the <i>Sun</i> Dana. He was the sole -arbiter of its policy, and it was his constant practice to -supervise every editorial contribution that came in -while he was on duty. The editorial page was absolutely -his, whether he wrote a line in it or not, and he -gave it the characteristic compactness of form and -directness of statement which were ever afterward its -distinguishing features.</p> -</div> - -<p>Dana was a man whose natural intellectual gifts had -been augmented by his travels, his experience on the -<i>Tribune</i>, his exploits in the war, and his association -with the big men of his time. Add to all this his solid -financial backing and his acquirement of a paper with -a large circulation, and the combination seemed an -assurance of success. Yet, had Dana lacked the peculiarly -human qualities that were his, the indefinable -newspaper instinct that knows when a tom-cat on the -steps of the City Hall is more important than a crisis -in the Balkans, the <i>Sun</i> would have set.</p> - -<p>Only genius could enable a lofty-minded Republican,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_232">232</span> -with a Republican aristocracy behind him, to take over -the <i>Sun</i> and make a hundred thousand mechanics and -tradesmen, nearly all Democrats, like their paper better -than ever before. And that is what Dana did, except -that he added to the <i>Sun’s</i> former readers a new -army of admirers, recruited by the magic of his pen.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div id="toclink_233" class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_233">233</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_X">CHAPTER X<br /> - -<span class="subhead">DANA: HIS “SUN” AND ITS CITY</span></h2> -</div> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p><i>The Period of the Great Personal Journalists.—Dana’s -Avoidance of Rules and Musty Newspaper Conventions.—His -Choice of Men and His Broad Definition of News.</i></p> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">When</span> Dana came into control of the <i>Sun</i>, the city -of New York, which then included only Manhattan -and the Bronx, had less than a million population, -yet it supported, or was asked to support, almost -as many newspapers as it has to-day. That was the -day of the great personal editor. Bennett had his -<i>Herald</i>, with James Gordon Bennett, Jr., as his chief -helper. Horace Greeley was known throughout America -as the editor of the <i>Tribune</i>. Henry J. Raymond was at -the head of the <i>Times</i>. Manton Marble—who died in -England in 1917—was the intellectual chief of the -highly intellectual <i>World</i>.</p> - -<p>The greatest Republican politician of that day, Thurlow -Weed, was the editor of the <i>Commercial Advertiser</i>. -He had just changed his political throne from the Astor -House to the comparatively new Fifth Avenue Hotel. -Weed was seventy-one years old, but not the Nestor of -New York editors, for William Cullen Bryant was three -years his senior and still the active editor of the <i>Evening -Post</i>. The <i>Evening Express</i>, later to be incorporated -with the <i>Mail</i>, was ruled by the brothers Brooks, James -as editor-in-chief and Erastus as manager. David M. -Stone ran the <i>Journal of Commerce</i>. Ben Wood owned<span class="pagenum" id="Page_234">234</span> -the only penny paper in town—the <i>Evening News</i>. -Marcus M. Pomeroy, better known as Brick Pomeroy, -had just started his sensational sheet, the <i>Democrat</i>, -on the strength of the reputation he had won in the -West as editor of the La Crosse <i>Democrat</i>. Later he -changed the title of the <i>Democrat</i> to <i>Pomeroy’s Advance -Thought</i>.</p> - -<p>These were the men who assailed or defended the -methods of the reconstruction of the South; who stood -up for President Johnson, or cried for his impeachment; -who supported the Presidential ambitions of Grant, -then the looming figure in national politics, or decried -the elevation of one whose fame had been exclusively -military; who hammered at the wicked gates of Tammany -Hall, or tried to excuse its methods.</p> - -<p>Tweed had not yet committed his magnificent atrocities -of loot, but he was practically the boss of the city, -at the same time a State Senator and the street commissioner. -John Kelly, then forty-six—two years the -senior of the boss—was sheriff of New York. Richard -Croker, who was to succeed Kelly as Kelly succeeded -Tweed at the head of the wigwam, was then a stocky -youth of twenty-five, engineer of a fire-department -steamer and the leader of the militant youth of Fourth -Avenue. He was already actively concerned in politics, -allied with the Young Democracy that was rising against -Tweed. In the year when Dana took the <i>Sun</i>, Croker -was elected an alderman.</p> - -<p>A slender boy of ten played in those days in Madison -Square Park, hard by his home in East Twentieth -Street, just east of Broadway. His name was Theodore -Roosevelt.</p> - -<p>New York’s richest man was William B. Astor, with -a fortune of perhaps fifty million dollars. He was -then seventy-six years old, but he walked every day<span class="pagenum" id="Page_235">235</span> -from his home in Lafayette Place—from its windows -he could see the Bowery, which had been a real bouwerie -in his boyhood—to the little office in Prince Street -where he worked all day at the tasks that fell upon -the shoulders of the Landlord of New York. He probably -never had heard of John D. Rockefeller, a prosperous -young oil man in the Middle West.</p> - -<p>Cornelius Vanderbilt, only two years younger than -Astor, was president of the New York Central Railroad, -and was linking together the great railway system that -is now known by his name, battling the while against -the strategy of Jay Gould and his sinister associates. -By far the most imposing figure in financial America, -Vanderbilt had everything in the world that he wanted—except -Dexter, and that great trotter was in the -stable of Robert Bonner, who was not only rich enough -to keep Dexter, but could afford to pay Henry Ward -Beecher thirty thousand dollars for a novel, “Norwood,” -to be printed serially in the <i>Ledger</i>.</p> - -<p>Only one other New Yorker of 1868 ranked in wealth -with Astor and Vanderbilt—Alexander T. Stewart, -whose yearly income was perhaps greater than either’s. -He was then worth about thirty million dollars, and he -had astonished the business world by building a retail -shop on Broadway, between Ninth and Tenth Streets—now -half of Wanamaker’s—at a cost of two millions and -three-quarters.</p> - -<p>In Wall Street the big names were August Belmont, -Larry Jerome, Jay Gould, Daniel Drew, and Jim Fisk. -Gould and Fisk were doing what they pleased with -Erie stock. They and the leaders of Tammany Hall, -like Tweed and Peter B. Sweeny and Slippery Dick -Connelly, hatched schemes for fortunes as they sat -either in the Hoffman House, where Fisk sometimes -lived, or at dinner in the house in West Twenty-Third<span class="pagenum" id="Page_236">236</span> -Street, where the only woman at table was Josie Mansfield.</p> - -<p>Of the great hotels of that day not more than one -or two are left. The Fifth Avenue then took rank not -only as the finest hostelry in New York, but perhaps -in the world. The Hoffman House was running as a -European-plan hotel. It had not yet become a Democratic -headquarters, for the Democrats still preferred -the New York, on the American plan. The other big -“everything included” hotels were the St. Nicholas, -where Middle West folk stayed, and the Metropolitan, -where the exploiter of mining-stock held forth. Among -the smaller and European-plan hotels were the St. -James, the St. Denis, the Everett, and the Clarendon, -all more or less fashionable, and the Brevoort and the -Barcelona, patronized largely by foreigners.</p> - -<p>The restaurants were limited in number, for New -York had not acquired the restaurant habit as strongly -as it has it now. When you have mentioned Delmonico’s, -Taylor’s, Curet’s, and the Café de l’Université, you -have almost a complete list of the places to which fashion -drove in its brougham after the theatre.</p> - -<p>The playhouses were plentiful enough, considering -the size of the city. None was north of Twenty-Fourth -Street. Wallack’s, at Broadway and Thirteenth Street, -was considered the best theatre in America. The Grand -Opera House, at Eighth Avenue and Twenty-Third -Street, was called the handsomest. Surely it was costly -enough, for Jim Fisk, who had his own way with Erie -finances, paid eight hundred thousand dollars of the -railroad stockholders’ gold for it, to buy it from the -railroad later with some of its own stock, of problematical -value.</p> - -<div id="ip_236a" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 38em;"> - <img src="images/i_236a.jpg" width="1802" height="644" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - -<p>THE FIRST NUMBER OF “THE SUN” UNDER DANA</p> - -<p class="subhead">The Title Heading Has Remained Unchanged for Fifty Years.</p> -</div></div> - -<div id="ip_236b" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 38em;"> - <img src="images/i_236ab.jpg" width="1799" height="1934" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - -<p>THE HOME OF “THE SUN” FROM 1868 TO 1915</p> - -<p class="subhead">The Famous Old Building at Nassau and Spruce Streets.</p> -</div></div> - -<p>The Academy of Music, at Fourteenth Street and -Irving Place, housed Italian opera. The Théâtre Français,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_237">237</span> -also on Fourteenth Street, but near Sixth Avenue, -was the original home in this country of opera bouffe. -Opera burlesque prevailed at the Fifth Avenue Opera -House, on West Twenty-Fourth Street. The Olympic, -on Broadway near Houston, had been built for Laura -Keene; it was there that Edward A. Sothern first appeared -under his own name. Barney Williams, the -<i>Sun’s</i> first newsboy, was managing the Broadway -Theatre, in Broadway near Broome Street. Edwin -Booth was building a fine theatre of his own at Sixth -Avenue and Twenty-Third Street—destined to score an -artistic but not a financial success.</p> - -<p>Club life was well advanced. In the house of the Century -Club, then in East Fifteenth Street, the member -would come upon Bayard Taylor, George William Curtis, -Parke Godwin, William Allen Butler, Edwin Booth, -Lester Wallack, John Jacob Astor, August Belmont. -The Union League was young, and was just about to -move from a rented home at Broadway and Seventeenth -Street to the Jerome house, at Madison Avenue and -Twenty-Sixth Street, where it remained until 1881, -then to go to its present home in Fifth Avenue at -Thirty-Ninth Street. In the Union League could be -seen John Jay, Horace Greeley, William E. Dodge, and -other enthusiastic Republicans. Upon occasion Mr. -Dana went there, but he was not an ardent clubman.</p> - -<p>All in all, the New York of Dana’s first year as an -absolute editor was an interesting island, with just -about as much of virtue and vice, wisdom and folly, -sunlight and drabness, as may be found on any island -of nine hundred thousand people. He did not set out -to reform it. He did not try to turn the general journalism -of that day out of certain deep grooves into -which it had sunk. He had his own ideas of what news -was, how it should be written, how displayed; but they<span class="pagenum" id="Page_238">238</span> -were ideas, not theories. He was not perturbed because -the <i>Sun</i> had not handled a big story just the way the -<i>Herald</i> or the <i>Tribune</i> dished it up; nor was it of the -slightest consequence to him what Mr. Bennett or Mr. -Greeley thought of the way the <i>Sun</i> used the story.</p> - -<p>Dana made no rules. Other newspapers have printed -commandments for their writers, but the <i>Sun</i> has never -wasted a penny’s worth of paper on rules. If there -ever was a rule in the office, it was “Be interesting,” -and it was not only an unwritten rule, but generally an -unspoken one.</p> - -<p>Dana’s realization that journalism was a profession -which could be neither guided nor governed by set rules -was expressed in a speech made by him before the Wisconsin -Editorial Association at Milwaukee, in 1888:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>There is no system of maxims or professional rules -that I know of that is laid down for the guidance of -the journalist. The physician has his system of ethics -and that sublime oath of Hippocrates which human wisdom -has never transcended. The lawyer also has his -code of ethics and the rules of the courts and the rules -of practice which he is instructed in; but I have never -met with a system of maxims that seemed to me to be -perfectly adapted to the general direction of a newspaperman. -I have written down a few principles which -occurred to me, which, with your permission, gentlemen, -I will read for the benefit of the young newspapermen -here to-night:</p> - -<p>Get the news, get all the news, get nothing but the -news.</p> - -<p>Copy nothing from another publication without perfect -credit.</p> - -<p>Never print an interview without the knowledge and -consent of the party interviewed.</p> - -<p>Never print a paid advertisement as news-matter. -Let every advertisement appear as an advertisement; -no sailing under false colors.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_239">239</span></p> - -<p>Never attack the weak or the defenseless, either by -argument, by invective, or by ridicule, unless there is -some absolute public necessity for so doing.</p> - -<p>Fight for your opinions, but do not believe that they -contain the whole truth or the only truth.</p> - -<p>Support your party, if you have one; but do not think -all the good men are in it and all the bad ones outside -of it.</p> - -<p>Above all, know and believe that humanity is advancing; -that there is progress in human life and human -affairs; and that, as sure as God lives, the future will -be greater and better than the present or the past.</p> -</div> - -<p>In other words, don’t loaf, don’t cheat, don’t dissemble, -don’t bully, don’t be narrow, don’t grouch. -Mr. Dana’s maxims were as applicable to any other -business as to his own. In a lecture delivered at Cornell -University in 1894—three years before his death—Mr. -Dana uttered more maxims “of value to a newspaper-maker”:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Never be in a hurry.</p> - -<p>Hold fast to the Constitution.</p> - -<p>Stand by the Stars and Stripes. Above all, stand for -liberty, whatever happens.</p> - -<p>A word that is not spoken never does any mischief.</p> - -<p>All the goodness of a good egg cannot make up for -the badness of a bad one.</p> - -<p>If you find you have been wrong, don’t fear to say so.</p> -</div> - -<p>All these maxims were quite as useful to the merchant -as to the newspaperman. They related to the broad -conduct of life. They counselled against folly, so far as -the making of newspapers was concerned, but they did -not convey the mysterious prescription with which Dana -revived American journalism from that trance in which -it had forgotten that everybody is human and that the -English language is alive and fluid.</p> - -<p>If there had been rules by which a living newspaper<span class="pagenum" id="Page_240">240</span> -could be made from men and ink and wood-pulp, Dana -would have known them; but there were none, nor are -there now. The present editor of the <i>Sun</i>, E. P. -Mitchell, who knew Dana better than any other man -knew him, said in an address at the Pulitzer School of -Journalism a few years ago:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Mr. Dana used to lecture on journalism sometimes, -when he was invited, but in the bottom of my heart I -don’t believe he had any theories of journalism other -than common sense and free play for individual talent -when discovered and available. And I do remember -distinctly that when he sent Mr. Joseph Pulitzer, then -fresh from St. Louis, on to Washington to report in -semieditorial correspondence the critical stage of the -electoral controversy of 1876, Mr. Dana did not think -it necessary to instruct that correspondent to assimilate -his style to the <i>Sun’s</i> methods and traditions. Never -was a job of momentous journalistic importance better -done in the absence of plain sailing directions; but that, -perhaps, was due partly to the fact that Mr. Pulitzer -was somewhat of an individualist himself.</p> - -<p>For the ancient common law of journalism, as derived -from England, and perhaps before that from away back -in Bœotia, Mr. Dana didn’t care one comic supplement. -If anybody had asked Mr. Dana to compile a set of specific -directions for running a newspaper, his reply, I -am sure, would have been something like this:</p> - -<p>“Heaven bless you, young man, there aren’t any -rules! Go ahead and write when you have something to -say, not when you think you ought to say something. -I’ll edit out the nonsense. And, by the way, unless -there happens to have been born into your noddle a -little bit of the native aptitude, you ought to go and be -a lawyer or a farmer or a banker or a great statesman.”</p> -</div> - -<p>Mr. Dana had no regard for typographical gymnastics. -To him a head-line was something to fill the -mind rather than the eye. He knew the utter impossibility -of trying to startle the reader eight times in as<span class="pagenum" id="Page_241">241</span> -many adjacent columns—a feat which Mr. Bennett and -some of his imitators seemed to consider feasible. Surprise -is not the only emotion upon which a newspaper -can play. The <i>Sun</i> stretched all the human octaves from -horror to amusement, but the keys of horror were only -touched when it was necessary.</p> - -<p>Make rules for news? How is it possible to make a -rule for something the value of which lies in the fact -that it is the narrative of what never had happened, in -exactly the same way, before? John Bogart, a city -editor of the <i>Sun</i> who absorbed the Dana idea of news -and the handling thereof, once said to a young reporter:</p> - -<p>“When a dog bites a man, that is not news, because -it happens so often. But if a man bites a dog, that is -news.”</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> always waited for the man to bite the dog.</p> - -<p>Here is Mr. Dana’s own definition of news:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The first thing which an editor must look for is news. -If the newspaper has not the news it may have everything -else, yet it will be comparatively unsuccessful; -and by news I mean everything that occurs, everything -which is of human interest, and which is of sufficient -interest to arrest and absorb the attention of the public -or of any considerable part of it.</p> - -<p>There is a great disposition in some quarters to say -that the newspapers ought to limit the amount of news -that they print; that certain kinds of news ought not to -be published. I do not know how that is. I am not -prepared to maintain any abstract proposition in that -line; but I have always felt that whatever the divine -Providence permitted to occur I was not too proud to -report.</p> -</div> - -<p>A belief has been accepted in some quarters that the -<i>Sun</i> of Dana’s time preferred college men for its staff. -This was in a way false, but it is true that a great<span class="pagenum" id="Page_242">242</span> -many of the <i>Sun’s</i> young men came from the colleges. -Mr. Dana’s views on the matter of educational equipment -were quite plainly expressed by himself:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>If I could have my way, every young man who is -going to be a newspaperman, and who is not absolutely -rebellious against it, should learn Greek and Latin -after the good old fashion. I had rather take a young -fellow who knows the “Ajax” of Sophocles, and has -read Tacitus, and can scan every ode of Horace—I -would rather take him to report a prize-fight or a spelling-match, -for instance, than to take one who has never -had those advantages.</p> - -<p>At the same time, the cultivated man is not in every -case the best reporter. One of the best I ever knew was -a man who could not spell four words correctly to save -his life, and his verb did not always agree with the subject -in person and number; but he always got the fact -so exactly, and he saw the picturesque, the interesting, -the important aspect of it so vividly, that it was worth -another man’s while, who possessed the knowledge of -grammar and spelling, to go over the report and write -it out.</p> - -<p>Now, that was a man who had genius; he had a -talent the most indubitable, and he got handsomely -paid in spite of his lack of grammar, because after his -work had been done over by a scholar it was really beautiful. -But any man who is sincere and earnest and not -always thinking about himself can be a good reporter. -He can learn to ascertain the truth; he can acquire the -habit of seeing.</p> - -<p>When he looks at a fire, what is the most important -thing about that fire? Here, let us say, are five houses -burning; which is the greatest? Whose store is that -which is burning? And who has met with the greatest -loss? Has any individual perished in the conflagration? -Are there any very interesting circumstances about the -fire? How did it occur? Was it like Chicago, where a -cow kicked over a spirit-lamp and burned up the city?</p> - -<p>All these things the reporter has to judge about. He -is the eye of the paper, and he is there to see which is<span class="pagenum" id="Page_243">243</span> -the vital fact in the story, and to produce it, tell it, -write it out.</p> -</div> - -<p>Dana saw the usefulness to a reporter of certain -qualities which are acquired neither at school nor in -the office:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>In the first place, he must know the truth when he -hears it and sees it. There are a great many men who -are born without that faculty, unfortunately. But there -are some men that a lie cannot deceive; and that is a -very precious gift for a reporter, as well as for anybody -else. The man who has it is sure to live long -and prosper; especially if he is able to tell the truth -which he sees, to state the fact or the discovery that he -has been sent out after, in a clear and vivid and interesting -manner.</p> - -<p>The invariable law of the newspaper is to be interesting. -Suppose you tell all the truths of science in a -way that bores the reader; what is the good? The -truths don’t stay in the mind, and nobody thinks any -the better of you because you have told the truth -tediously. The reporter must give his story in such a -way that you know he feels its qualities and events and -is interested in them.</p> -</div> - -<p>Dana was catholic not only in his taste for news, but -in his idea of the manner of writing it. Nothing gave -him more uneasiness than to find that a <i>Sun</i> man was -drifting into a stereotyped way of handling a news -story or writing an editorial article. Even as he advised -young men to read everything from Shakespeare -and Milton down, he repeatedly warned them against -the imitation, unconscious or otherwise, of another’s -style:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Do not take any model. Every man has his own -natural style, and the thing to do is to develop it into -simplicity and clearness. Do not, for instance, labor<span class="pagenum" id="Page_244">244</span> -after such a style as Matthew Arnold’s—one of the most -beautiful styles that has ever been seen in any literature. -It is no use to try to get another man’s style or to imitate -the wit or the mannerisms of another writer. The -late Mr. Carlyle, for example, did, in my judgment, a -considerable mischief in his day, because he led everybody -to write after the style of his “French Revolution,” -and it became pretty tedious.</p> -</div> - -<p>If a writer could not keep on without aping the literary -fashion of another, then he was not for the <i>Sun</i>. -Dana wanted good English always, but a constant spice -of variety in the treatment of a subject, and in the style -itself; therefore he chose a variety of men.</p> - -<p>If he believed that the best report of a ship-launching -could be written by a longshoreman, he would have -hired the hard-handed toiler and assigned him to the -job. He wanted men who would look at the world with -open eyes and find the new things that were going on. -Dana knew that they were going on. His vision had -not been narrowed by too close application to newspaper -offices where editors and managing editors had handled -the stock stories year in and year out in the same wearisome -way.</p> - -<p>To Dana life was not a mere procession of elections, -legislatures, theatrical performances, murders, and lectures. -Life was everything—a new kind of apple, a crying -child on the curb, a policeman’s epigram, the exact -weight of a candidate for President, the latest style in -whiskers, the origin of a new slang expression, the -idiosyncrasies of the City Hall clock, a strange four-master -in the harbour, the head-dresses of Syrian girls, -a new president or a new football coach at Yale, a vendetta -in Mulberry Bend—everything was fish to the -great net of Dana’s mind.</p> - -<p>Human interest! It is an old phrase now, and one<span class="pagenum" id="Page_245">245</span> -likely to cause lips to curl along Park Row. But the -art of picking out the happenings of every-day life that -would appeal to every reader, if so depicted that the -events lived before the reader’s eye, was an art that did -not exist until Dana came along. Ben Day knew the -importance of the trifles of life and the hold they took -on the people who read his little <i>Sun</i>, but it remained -for Dana to bring out in journalism the literary quality -that made the trifle live. Whether it was an item of -three lines or an article of three columns, it must have -life, or it had no place in the <i>Sun</i>.</p> - -<p>Dana did not teach his men how to do it. If he -taught them anything, it was what not to do. His men -did the work he wanted them to do, not by following -instructions, but by being unhampered by instructions. -He set the writer free and let him go his own way to -glory or failure. There were no conventions except -those of decency, of respect for the English language. -Because newspapermen had been doing a certain thing -in a certain way for a century, Dana could not see why -he and his men should go in the same wagon-track. -With a word or an epigram he destroyed traditions -that had fettered the profession since the days of the -Franklin press.</p> - -<p>One day he held up a string of proofs—a long obituary -of Bismarck, or Blaine, or some celebrity who had -just passed away.</p> - -<p>“Mr. Lord,” he said to his managing editor, “isn’t -that a lot of space to give to a dead man?”</p> - -<p>Yet the next day the same Dana came from his office -to the city editor’s desk to inquire who had written a -certain story two inches long, and, upon learning, went -over to the reporter who was the author.</p> - -<p>“Very good, young man, very good,” he said, pointing -to the item. “I wish I could write like that!”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_246">246</span></p> - -<p>Names of writers meant nothing to Dana. He judged -everything that was printed in the <i>Sun</i>, or offered to it -for publication, on its own merits. He went through -manuscript with uncanny speed, the gaze that seemed -to travel only down the centre of the page really taking -in the whole substance. A dull article from a celebrity -he returned to its envelope with the note “Respectfully -declined,” and without a thought of the author’s surprise, -or possibly rage. But over a poem from an up-State -unknown he might spend half an hour if the verses -contained the germ of an idea new to him.</p> - -<p>One clergyman who had come into literary prominence -offered to write some articles for the <i>Sun</i>. Dana -told him he might try. The clergyman evidently had a -notion that the <i>Sun’s</i> cleverness was a worldly, reckless -devilishness, and he adapted the style of his first article -to what he supposed was the tone of the paper. Dana -read it, smiled, wrote across the first page “This is too -damned wicked,” and mailed it back to the misguided -author.</p> - -<p>He was a patient man. A clerk in the New York -post-office copied by hand Edward Everett Hale’s story, -“The Man Without a Country,” and offered it to the -<i>Sun</i>—as original matter—for a hundred dollars. It -was suggested to Mr. Dana that the poor fool should -be exposed.</p> - -<p>“No,” said Dana, “mark it ‘Respectfully declined,’ -and send it back to him. He has been honest enough to -enclose postage-stamps.”</p> - -<hr /> - -<div id="toclink_247" class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_247">247</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XI">CHAPTER XI<br /> - -<span class="subhead">DANA, AS MITCHELL SAW HIM</span></h2> -</div> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p><i>A Picture of the Room Where One Man Ruled for Thirty -Years.—The Democratic Ways of a Newspaper Autocrat.—W. -O. Bartlett, Pike, and His Other Early Associates.</i></p> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">The</span> English historian, Kinglake, wrote a description -of John T. Delane, the most famous editor of -the London <i>Times</i>, which Mr. Dana’s associate, Mr. -Mitchell, liked to quote as a picture of what Mr. Dana -was <em>not</em>. It is a fine limning of the great editor, as great -editors were supposed to be before Dana showed his disregard -for the journalistic dust of the ages:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>From the moment of his entering the editor’s room -until four or five o’clock in the morning, the strain he -had to put on his faculties must have been always great, -and in stirring times almost prodigious. There were -hours of night when he often had to decide—to decide, -of course, with great swiftness—between two or more -courses of action momentously different; when, besides, -he must judge the appeals brought up to the paramount -arbiter from all kinds of men, from all sorts of earthly -tribunals; when despatches of moment, when telegrams -fraught with grave tidings, when notes hastily scribbled -in the Lords or Commons, were from time to time coming -in to disturb, perhaps even to annul, former reckonings; -and these, besides, were the hours when, on questions -newly obtruding, yet so closely, so importunately, -present that they would have to be met before sunrise, -he somehow must cause to spring up sudden essays, invectives, -and arguments which only strong power of -brain, with even much toil, could supply. For the delicate<span class="pagenum" id="Page_248">248</span> -task any other than he would require to be in a -state of tranquillity, would require to have ample time. -But for him there are no such indulgences; he sees the -hand of the clock growing more and more peremptory, -and the time drawing nearer and nearer when his paper -must, <em>must</em> be made up.</p> -</div> - -<p>That, mark you, was Delane, not Dana. When Mr. -Dana counselled the young men at Cornell never to be -in a hurry, he meant it. Fury was never a part of his -system of life and work. Probably he viewed with -something like contempt the high-pressure editor of his -own and former days. There was no agony in the daily -birth of the <i>Sun</i>. Mr. Mitchell said of his chief:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Mr. Dana has always been the master, and not the -slave, of the immediate task. The external features -of his journalism are simplicity, directness, common -sense, and the entire absence of affectation. He would -no more think of living up to Mr. Kinglake’s ideal of a -great, mysterious, and thought-burdened editor, than -of putting on a conical hat and a black robe spangled -with suns, moons, and stars, when about to receive a -visitor to his editorial office in Nassau Street.</p> -</div> - -<p>That office in Nassau Street, of which every reader -of the <i>Sun</i>, and surely every newspaperman in America, -formed his own mental picture! To some imaginations -it probably was a bare room, with a desk for the editor -and, close by, the famous cat. To other imaginations, -whose owners were familiar with Mr. Dana’s love for -the beautiful, the office may have been a studio unmarred -by the presence of a single unbeautiful object. -Both visions were incorrect.</p> - -<div id="ip_248" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 37em;"> - <img src="images/i_248a.jpg" width="1781" height="2407" alt="" /> - <div class="captionr"> - (<i>Drawn from Life by Corwin Knapp Linson</i>)</div> - <div class="captionl"> - <p>MR. DANA IN HIS OFFICE</p> -</div></div> - -<p>Surroundings were nothing to Dana. To him an -office was a place to work, to convert ideas into readable -form. What would works of art be in such a -place to a man who took more interest in the crowds<span class="pagenum" id="Page_249">249</span> -that went to and fro on Park Row beneath his window? -Let the room itself be described by Mr. Mitchell, who -set down this picture of it after he had spent hours in -it with Mr. Dana almost daily for twenty years:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>In the middle of the small room a desk-table of black -walnut of the Fulton Street style and the period of the -first administration of Grant; a shabby little round -table at the window, where Mr. Dana sits when the day -is dark; one leather-covered chair, which does duty at -either post, and two wooden chairs, both rickety, for -visitors on errands of business or ceremony; on the desk -a revolving case with a few dozen books of reference; -an ink-pot and pen, not much used except in correcting -manuscript and proofs, for Mr. Dana talks off to a -stenographer his editorial articles and his correspondence, -sometimes spending on the revision of the former -twice as much time as was required for the dictation; a -window-seat filled with exchanges, marked here and -there in blue pencil for the editor’s eyes; a big pair of -shears, and two or three extra pairs of spectacles in -cache against an emergency—these few items constitute -what is practically the whole objective equipment -of the editor of the <i>Sun</i>. The shears are probably the -newest article of furniture in the list. They replaced, -three or four years ago, another pair of unknown antiquity, -besought and obtained by Eugene Field, and -now occupying, alongside of Mr. Gladstone’s ax, the -place of honor in that poet’s celebrated collection of -edged instruments.</p> - -<p>For the non-essentials, the little trapezoid-shaped -room contains a third table containing a file of the newspaper -for a few weeks back, and a heap of new books -which have passed review; an iron umbrella-rack; on -the floor a cheap Turkish rug; and a lounge covered -with horsehide, upon which Mr. Dana descends for a five -minutes’ nap perhaps five times a year.</p> - -<p>The adornments of the room are mostly accidental -and insignificant. Ages ago somebody presented to Mr. -Dana, with symbolic intent, a large stuffed owl. The<span class="pagenum" id="Page_250">250</span> -bird of wisdom remains by inertia on top of the revolving -bookcase, just as it would have remained there -if it had been a stuffed cat or a statuette of “Folly.” -Unnoticed and probably long ago forgotten by the proprietor, -the owl solemnly boxes the compass as Mr. -Dana swings the case, reaching in quick succession for -his Bible, his Portuguese dictionary, his compendium -of botanical terms, or his copy of the Democratic national -platform of 1892. On the mantelpiece is an ugly, -feather-haired little totem figure from Alaska, which -likewise keeps its place solely by possession. It stands -between a photograph of Chester A. Arthur, whom Mr. -Dana liked and admired as a man of the world, and the -japanned calendar-case which has shown him the time -of year for the last quarter of a century. A dingy -chromolithograph of Prince von Bismarck stands shoulder -to shoulder with George, the Count Joannes.</p> - -<p>The same mingling of sentiment and pure accident -marks the rest of Mr. Dana’s picture-gallery. There is -a large and excellent photograph of Horace Greeley, -who is held in half-affectionate, half-humorous remembrance -by his old associate in the management of the -<i>Tribune</i>. Another is of the late Justice Blatchford, -of the United States Supreme Court; it is the strong -face of the fearless judge whose decision from the Federal -bench in New York twenty years ago blocked the -attempt to drag Mr. Dana before a servile little court -in Washington to be tried without a jury on the charge -of criminal libel, at the time when the <i>Sun</i> was demolishing -the District Ring.</p> - -<p>Over the mantel is Abraham Lincoln. There are pictures -of the four Harper brothers and of the Appletons. -Andrew Jackson is there twice, once in black and white, -once in vivid colors. An inexpensive Thomas Jefferson -faces the livelier Jackson. A framed diploma certifies -that Mr. Dana was one of several gentlemen who presented -to the State a portrait in oils of Samuel J. Tilden. -On different sides of the room are William T. -Coleman, the organizer of the San Francisco Vigilantes, -and a crude colored print of the Haifa colony at the -foot of Mount Carmel in Syria. Strangest of all in this<span class="pagenum" id="Page_251">251</span> -singular collection is a photograph of a tall, lank, and -superior-looking New England mill-girl, issued as an -advertisement by some Connecticut concern engaged in -the manufacture of spool-cotton.</p> - -<p>For a good many years the most available wall-space -in Mr. Dana’s office was occupied by a huge pasteboard -chart, showing elaborately, in deadly parallel columns, -the differences in the laws of the several States of the -Union respecting divorce. It was put there, and it remained -there, serving no earthly purpose except to -illustrate the editor’s indifference as to his immediate -surroundings, until it disappeared as mysteriously as it -had come.</p> -</div> - -<p>Such were Mr. Dana’s surroundings, with nothing to -indicate, as Mr. Mitchell remarked, that the occupant -“knew Manet from Monet, or old Persian lustre from -Gubbio.”</p> - -<p>It is twenty years since Dana went out of that room -for the last time, and the room and the old building -are no more, but the stuffed owl is still at his post in -the office of the editor of the <i>Sun</i>. He is an older if not -wiser bird, and he is no longer subjected to the revolutions -of the bookcase, for Mr. Mitchell has given him a -firmer perch beside his door. From a nearby wall Mr. -Dana’s pictures of the four Harpers keep vigil, too.</p> - -<p>Dana was interested in everything, read everything, -saw almost everybody. His own office was almost as -free as the great main office of the <i>Sun</i>, where sat everybody -from the managing editor down to the office-boy. -One day Dana, coming into the big room, saw carpenters -building a partition between the room and the head of -the stairs that led to the street. It was explained to -him that the public was inclined to be unnecessarily intrusive -at times.</p> - -<p>“Take the partition down,” he said. “A newspaper -is for the public.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_252">252</span></p> - -<p>That this was not always a desirable plan is illustrated -in a story about Dana, probably apocryphal, but -characteristic. One night the city editor rushed into -his chief’s room.</p> - -<p>“Mr. Dana,” he said, “there’s a man out there with -a cocked revolver. He is very much excited, and he -insists on seeing the editor-in-chief.”</p> - -<p>“Is he very much excited?” inquired Mr. Dana, returning -to the proof that he was reading. “If you -think it is worth while, ask Amos Cummings if he will -see the gentleman and write him up.”</p> - -<p>Persons in search of alms would enter Mr. Dana’s -room without ceremony. If they were Sisters of Charity, -as often was the case, Mr. Dana would walk up and -down, telling them of his visit with the Pope, and would -finish by giving them one of the silver dollars of which -his pocket seemed to have an endless supply. Almost -every day, when he despatched a boy to a nearby restaurant -for his sandwich and bottle of milk, he would -give him a five-dollar bill and instruct him to bring -back the change all in silver. He liked to jingle the -coins in his pocket and to have them ready for alms-giving.</p> - -<p>Dana was never fussy, never overbearing with his -men. He bore patiently with the occasional sinner, and -tried to put the best face on a mistake.</p> - -<p>The Dana patience extended also to outsiders. On -one occasion William M. Laffan, then the dramatic -critic and later the owner of the <i>Sun</i>, wrote a severe -criticism of a performance by Miss Ada Rehan. Augustin -Daly hurried to Mr. Dana’s office the next afternoon.</p> - -<p>“Mr. Dana,” he said, “I have called to try to convince -you that you should discharge your dramatic -editor. He <span class="locked">has—”</span></p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_253">253</span></p> - -<p>“I see,” said Dana, smiling. “Well, Mr. Daly, I will -speak to Mr. Laffan about the matter, and if he thinks -that he really deserves to be discharged, I will most -certainly do it!”</p> - -<p>Thirty or forty years ago the belief was not uncommon, -among those ignorant of editorial methods and the -limitations of human powers, that Mr. Dana wrote every -word that appeared on the editorial page of the <i>Sun</i>. -It is likely that this flattering myth came to his ears -and caused him more than one chuckle. Dana wrote -pieces for the <i>Sun</i>, many of them, but he never essayed -the superhuman task of filling the whole page with his -own self. Nobody knew better than he what a bore a -man becomes who flows opinion constantly, whether by -voice or by pen.</p> - -<p>For Dana, not the eternal verities in allopathic doses, -but the entertaining varieties, carefully administered. -He might be immensely interested in the destruction of -the Whisky Ring, and in writing about that infamy -articles which would scorch the ears of Washington; -but he knew that not every man, woman, and child who -read the <i>Sun</i> was furious about the Whisky Ring or -cared to read columns of opinion about it every day. -They must have pabulum in the form of an article about -the princely earnings of Charles Dickens, or the identification -of Mount Sinai, or the mysterious murder of a -French count.</p> - -<p>So he hired men who could compare Dickens’s lectures -with Thackeray’s, or were familiar with the controversy -over Mount Barghir, or who knew a murder mystery -when they saw it. They wrote, and he read and sometimes -edited, but usually approved, for he knew that -newspaper success lay not so much in a choice of topics -as in a choice of men. He knew that the success of an -editorial page came less from inside opinions than from<span class="pagenum" id="Page_254">254</span> -outside interest. Dana’s remarkable success in the -exaltation of journalism to literary heights was won -not so much through what he wrote, but through what -he left other men free to write.</p> - -<p>His own work as a writer for the <i>Sun</i> took but a fraction -of his busy day. He dictated his articles to Tom -Williams, his stenographer, a Fenian and a bold man.</p> - -<p>“Can you write as fast as I talk?” asked Dana when -Williams applied for the job.</p> - -<p>“I doubt it, Mr. Dana,” said Williams; “but I can -write as fast as any man ought to talk.”</p> - -<p>For twenty years Tom Williams transcribed articles -that absorbed the readers of the <i>Sun</i>, but his own heart -was down the bay, near his Staten Island home, where -he spent most of his spare time in fishing and sailing. -It was always a grief to Williams to enter the office on -an election or similarly important night, and to find -that no one paid any attention to his stories about how -the fish were biting.</p> - -<p>Dana had no doubt—nor had any one, least of all -those who came under his editorial condemnation—of -his own ability as a trenchant writer. The expression -of thought was an art which he had studied from boyhood. -Whatever of the academic appeared in his early -work had been driven out during his service on the -<i>Tribune</i> and in the war, particularly the latter, for as -a reporter for the government he learned to avoid all -but the salients of expression. But as the editor of the -<i>Sun</i> he found less delight in his own product than in -the work of some other man whose literary ability answered -his own standards of terseness, vigour, and -illumination. The new man would help the <i>Sun</i>, and -that was all that Dana asked.</p> - -<p>That another man’s work should be mistaken for -his own, or his own for another man’s, was to Dana<span class="pagenum" id="Page_255">255</span> -nothing at all, except perhaps a source of amusement. -The anonymity of the writers on the <i>Sun</i> was so complete -that the public knew their work only as a whole; -but whenever anything particularly biting or humorous -appeared, the same public instantly decided that Dana -must have written it.</p> - -<p class="p1 b1 center"> -No king, no clown, to rule this town! -</p> - -<p>That line, born in the <i>Sun’s</i> editorial page, will live -as long as Shakespeare. In eight words it embodied -the protest of New York against the arrogance and -stupidity of machine political rule. Ten thousand times, -at least, it has been credited to Dana, but as a matter -of fact it was written by W. O. Bartlett.</p> - -<p>Bartlett was one of those great newspaper writers -whose fate—or choice—it is never to own a newspaper -and never to attract public attention through the writing -of signed articles or books. Writing was not primarily -his profession, and by the older men of New -York who remember him he is recalled as a brilliant -lawyer rather than as a writer. He met Dana through -Secretary Stanton, and he was the <i>Sun’s</i> attorney soon -after Dana and his friends bought the paper. His law-offices -were in the Sun Building, directly below Mr. -Dana’s own offices. There, and also at the Hoffman -House, where he lived when he was not on his estate -at Brookhaven, Long Island, Mr. Bartlett wrote his -articles for the <i>Sun</i>.</p> - -<p>Bartlett was a writer of the school of simplicity. -His style of reducing a proposition to its most elementary -form, so that it was clear to even the Class B intellect, -was the admiration and envy of all who knew -his articles. It was an inspiration, too, to many young -newspapermen of his day.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_256">256</span></p> - -<p>The manner of Mr. Arthur Brisbane of the <i>Evening -Journal</i>, luring the reader into a sociological dissertation -by first inquiring whether he knows “Why a Flea -Jumps So Far,” is the Bartlett manner, with such modifications -as are necessary to reach the attention of a -group intellectually somewhat different from Bartlett’s -readers. Only Bartlett did not spend too much time -on the flea. Of the three men whose articles have most -distinguished the first column of the <i>Sun’s</i> editorial -page, each has had his own weapon when leading to attack. -Dana struck with a sword. Mitchell used—and -uses—the rapier. Bartlett swung the mace. It was -jewelled with the gems of language, but still it was a -mace; and if it crushed the skull of the enemy at the -first blow, so much the better. It was Bartlett, for instance, -who wrote the article in which the Democratic -candidate for President in 1880, General Hancock, was -referred to as “a good man, weighing two hundred and -forty pounds.”</p> - -<p>W. O. Bartlett wrote for the <i>Sun</i> from 1868 until -his death in 1881. He was the foremost figure in the -group of older men around Dana—the men who had -been prominent in political and literary life before the -Civil War. Other notable men of middle age who were -chosen by Mr. Dana to write editorial articles were -James S. Pike, Fitz-Henry Warren, Henry B. Stanton, -and John Swinton.</p> - -<p>James Shepherd Pike’s articles appeared more frequently -in the columns of the <i>Sun</i> than Pike himself -appeared in the office, for most of his work was done -in Washington. He was about eight years older than -Mr. Dana, but they were great friends from the earliest -days of Dana’s <i>Tribune</i> experience. For five years, beginning -in 1855, Pike was a Washington correspondent -and one of the associate editors of the <i>Tribune</i>. During<span class="pagenum" id="Page_257">257</span> -the Civil War he was United States minister to the -Netherlands, a reward for his services in his home State, -Maine, where he was useful in uniting the anti-slavery -forces. He was a brother of Frederick A. Pike, a war-time -Representative from Maine, whose “Tax, fight, -emancipate!” was the Republican watchword from its -utterance in 1861.</p> - -<p>Pike was one of the group that supported Greeley for -the Presidency in 1872. He was one of the really great -publicists of his day. He wrote “The Restoration of -the Currency,” “The Financial Crisis,” “Horace Greeley -in 1872,” “A Prostrate State”—which was a description -of the Reconstruction era in South Carolina—and -“The First Blows of the Civil War,” this last a -volume of reminiscent correspondence, some newspaper, -some personal. The friendship and literary -association of Pike and Dana lasted more than thirty -years, and ended only with Pike’s death in 1882, just -after he had passed threescore and ten.</p> - -<p>Fitz-Henry Warren, who has been already referred -to in this narrative as the author of the <i>Tribune’s</i> -cry, “On to Richmond!” wrote many editorial articles -for Dana, who had conceived a great admiration for -Warren when both were in the service of the <i>Tribune</i>, -Dana as managing editor and Warren as head of the -Washington bureau. Warren emerged from the Civil -War not only a major-general, but a powerful politician, -and it was not until several years later, after he had -served in the Iowa Senate and as minister to Guatemala, -that Dana was able to bring the pen of this transplanted -New Englander to the office of the <i>Sun</i>. Once there, -it did splendid work.</p> - -<p>It is not easy to identify the editorials that appeared -in the <i>Sun</i> under the Dana régime; not so much because -of the lapse of years, but because the spirit of Dana so<span class="pagenum" id="Page_258">258</span> -permeated everything that was printed on his page that -it is difficult to say with certainty, “This Dana wrote, -this Bartlett, this Mitchell, this Warren, and this Pike.” -But, for the purpose of giving some small idea of the -grace and magnificence of Warren’s style, here is a -paragraph from an editorial article known to have been -written by him on the death of Charles Sumner in -March, 1874:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Men spoke softly on the street; their very voices betokened -the impending event, and even their footfalls -are said to have been lighter than common. But in the -neighborhood of the Senator’s house there was a sense -of singular and touching interest. Splendid equipages -rolled to the corner, over pavements conceived in fraud -and laid in corruption, to testify the regard of their -occupants for eminent purity of life. Liveried servants -carried hopeless messages from the door of him who was -simplicity itself, and to whom the pomp and pageantry -of this evil day were but the evidences of guilty degeneracy. -Through all those lingering hours of anguish -the sad procession came and went.</p> - -<p>On the sidewalk stood a numerous and grateful representation -of the race to whom he had given the proudest -efforts and the best energies of his existence. The -black man bowed his head in unaffected grief, and the -black woman sat hushing her babe upon the curbstone, -in mute expectation of the last decisive intelligence from -the chamber above.</p> -</div> - -<p>General Warren continued to write for the <i>Sun</i> until -1876, and he died two years afterward, when he was -only sixty-two years old, in Brimfield, Massachusetts, -the town of his birth.</p> - -<div class="center"><div class="ilb"> -<div id="ip_258a" class="figleft"> - <img src="images/i_258a.jpg" width="844" height="1512" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl">JOSEPH PULITZER</div></div> - -<div id="ip_258b" class="figleft noclear"> - <img src="images/i_258b.jpg" width="844" height="1512" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl">ELIHU ROOT</div></div> - -<div id="ip_258c" class="figleft noclear"> - <img src="images/i_258c.jpg" width="844" height="1512" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl">JUDGE WILLARD BARTLETT</div></div> -</div></div> - -<p>Although Henry Brewster Stanton was a comparatively -old man when he began writing for the <i>Sun</i>, his -activities in that line lasted for nearly twenty years. -In 1826, when he was twenty-one years old, he entered<span class="pagenum" id="Page_259">259</span> -newspaper work on Thurlow Weed’s <i>Monroe Telegraph</i>, -published in Rochester. Soon afterward he became an -advocate of the anti-slavery cause. In 1840 he married -Elizabeth Cady, and with her went abroad, where in -Great Britain and France they worked for the relief -of the slaves in the United States. It was during that -journey that Elizabeth Cady Stanton signed the first -call for a woman’s rights convention.</p> - -<p>On his return to America Stanton studied law with -his father-in-law, Daniel Cady. After his admission to -the bar he practised in Boston, but he returned to New -York and politics in 1847. He left the Democratic -party to become one of the founders of the Republican -party.</p> - -<p>Dana met Stanton when the latter was a writer for -the <i>Tribune</i>, and when Dana came into the control of -the <i>Sun</i> he secured the veteran as a contributor. Stanton -knew politics from A to Z, and his brief articles, -filled with political wisdom and often salted with his -dry humour, were just the class of matter that Dana -wanted for the editorial page. Stanton was also a capable -reviewer of books. He wrote for the <i>Sun</i> from 1868 -until his death in 1887. Henry Ward Beecher said of -him:</p> - -<p>“I think Stanton has all the elements of old John -Adams—able, staunch, patriotic, full of principle, and -always unpopular. He lacks that sense of other people’s -opinions which keeps a man from running against -them.”</p> - -<p>John Swinton was one of the few of Dana’s men who -might be described as a “character.” He lived a double -intellectual life, writing conservative articles in his -newspaper hours and making socialistic speeches when -he was off duty. Yet it was a double life without duplicity, -for there was no concealment in it, no hypocrisy,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_260">260</span> -and no harm. When he had finished his day in the office -of the <i>Sun</i>, perhaps at writing some instructive paragraphs -about the possibilities of American trade in -Nicaragua, he would take off his skull-cap, place a -black soft hat on his gray head, and go forth to dilate -on the advantages of super-Fourierism to some sympathetic -audience of socialists.</p> - -<p>There was a story in the office that one evening Mr. -Swinton, making a speech at a socialistic gathering, referred -hotly to the editor of the <i>Sun</i> as one of the props -of a false form of government, and added that “some -day two old men will come rolling down the steps of the -<i>Sun</i> office,” and that at the bottom of the steps he, -Swinton, would be on top.</p> - -<p>This may be of a piece with the story about Mr. -Dana and the man with the revolver; but the young men -in the reporters’ room liked to tell it to younger men. -It probably had its basis in the fact that on the morning -after a particularly ferocious assault on capital, John -Swinton would poke his head into Mr. Dana’s room to -tell him how he had given him the dickens the night -before—information which tickled Mr. Dana immensely. -And Dana never went to the bottom of the <i>Sun</i> stairs -except on his own sturdy legs.</p> - -<p>Swinton was a Scotsman, born in Haddingtonshire in -1830. He emigrated to Canada as a boy, learned the -printer’s trade, and worked at the case in New York. -After travels all over the country, he lived for a time -in Charleston, South Carolina, and there acquired an -abhorrence for slavery. He went to Kansas and took -part in the Free Soil contest, but returned to New York -in 1857 and began the study of medicine.</p> - -<p>While so engaged he contributed articles to the New -York <i>Times</i>, and Henry J. Raymond, who liked his -work, took him as an editorial writer. He was the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_261">261</span> -managing editor of the <i>Times</i> during the Civil War, and -had sole charge during Raymond’s absences. At the -end of the war Swinton’s health caused him to resign -from the managing editorship, but he continued to -write for the editorial page. He went to work on the -<i>Sun</i> about 1877.</p> - -<p>His specialty was paragraphs. Dana liked men who -could do anything, but he also preferred that every man -should have some specialty. Swinton had the imagination -and the light touch of the skilful weaver of small -items. Also, he was much interested in Central America, -and his knowledge of that region was of frequent -use to the <i>Sun</i>.</p> - -<p>Swinton left the <i>Sun</i> in 1883 to give his whole time -to <i>John Swinton’s Paper</i>, a weekly journal in which he -expounded his labour-reform and other political views. -He was the author of many pamphlets and several books, -including a “Eulogy of Henry J. Raymond” and an -“Oration on John Brown.”</p> - -<p>Such were the editorial writers of what may be called -the iron age of the <i>Sun</i>; the men who helped Dana to -build the first story of a great house. As they passed -on, younger men, some greater men, trained in the Dana -school, took their places and spanned the <i>Sun’s</i> golden -age—such men as E. P. Mitchell, Francis P. Church, -and Mayo W. Hazeltine.</p> - -<p>Meanwhile, on the other side of a partition on the -third floor of the old brick building at the corner of -Frankfort Street, another group of men were doing their -best to advance Dana’s <i>Sun</i> by making it the best newspaper -as well as the best editorial paper in America. -These, too, were giants.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div id="toclink_262" class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_262">262</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XII">CHAPTER XII<br /> - -<span class="subhead">DANA’S FIRST BIG NEWS MEN</span></h2> -</div> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p><i>Amos J. Cummings, Dr. Wood, and John B. Bogart.—The -Lively Days of Tweedism.—Elihu Root as a Dramatic -Critic.—The Birth and Popularity of “The Sun’s” Cat.</i></p> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">Managing</span> editors did not come into favour in -American newspaper offices until the second half -of the last century. As late as 1872 Frederic Hudson, -in his “History of Journalism in the United States,” -grumbled at the intrusion of a new functionary upon -the field:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>If a journal has an editor, and editor-in-chief, it is -fair to assume that he is also its managing editor.</p> -</div> - -<p>That historian (he was a <i>Herald</i> man, and Bennett -would have no managing editor) had not been reconciled -to the fact that between the editor of a newspaper—the -director of its policies and opinions and general -style and tone—and the subeditors to whose various -desks comes the flood of news there must be some one -who will act as a link, lightening the labours of the -editor and shouldering the responsibilities of the desk -men. He may never write an editorial article; may -never turn out a sheet of news copy or put a head on an -item; may never make up a page or arrange an assignment -list—but he must know how to do every one of -these things and a great deal more.</p> - -<p>A managing editor is really the newspaper’s manager -of its employees in the news field. He is an editor to the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_263">263</span> -extent that he edits men. He may appear to spend most -of his time and judgment on the acceptance or rejection -of news matter, the giving of decisions as to the length -or character of an article, its position in the paper, and, -more broadly, the general make-up of the next day’s -product; but a man might be able to perform all these -professional functions wisely and yet be impossible as -a managing editor through his inability to handle newspapermen.</p> - -<p>The <i>Tribune</i> was the first New York paper to have a -managing editor. He was Dana. Serene, tactful, and -a man of the world, he was able by judicious handling -to keep for the <i>Tribune</i> the services of men like Warren -and Pike, who might have been repelled by the sometimes -irritable Greeley. The title came from the London -<i>Times</i>, where it had been used for years, perhaps -borrowed from the <i xml:lang="fr" lang="fr">directeur gérant</i> of the French newspapers.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> had no managing editor until Dana bought -it, Beach having preferred to direct personally all matters -above the ken of the city editor. The <i>Sun’s</i> first -managing editor was Isaac W. England, whom Dana -had known and liked when both were on the <i>Tribune</i>. -England was of Welsh blood and English birth, having -been born in Twerton, a suburb of Bath, in 1832. He -worked at the bookbinding trade until he was seventeen, -and then came to the United States and made his living -at bookbinding and printing. He used to tell his <i>Sun</i> -associates of his triumphal return to England, when -he was twenty, for a short visit, which he spent in the -shop of his apprenticeship, showing his old master how -much better the Yankees were at embossing and -lettering.</p> - -<p>England returned to America in the steerage and saw -the brutal treatment of immigrants. This he described<span class="pagenum" id="Page_264">264</span> -in several articles and sold them to the <i>Tribune</i>. Greeley -gave him a job pulling a hand-press at ten dollars a -week, but later made him a reporter. He was city editor -of the <i>Tribune</i> until after the Civil War, and then he -went with his friend Dana to Chicago for the short and -profitless experience with the Chicago <i>Republican</i>. In -the period between Dana’s retirement from the <i>Republican</i> -and his purchase of the <i>Sun</i>, England was manager -of the Jersey City <i>Times</i>.</p> - -<p>England was managing editor of the <i>Sun</i> only a year, -then becoming its publisher—a position for which he -was well fitted. An example of his business ability was -given in 1877, when Frank Leslie went into bankruptcy. -England was made assignee, and he handled the affairs -of the Leslie concern so well that its debts were paid -off in three years. This was only a side job for England, -who continued all the time to manage the business -matters of the <i>Sun</i>. When he died, in 1885, Dana wrote -that he had “lost the friend of almost a lifetime, a man -of unconquerable integrity, true and faithful in all -things.”</p> - -<p>The second managing editor of the <i>Sun</i> was that great -newspaperman Amos Jay Cummings. He was born to -newspaper work if any man ever was. His father, who -was a Congregational minister—a fact which could not -be surmised by listening to Amos in one of his explosive -moods—was the editor of the <i>Christian Palladium and -Messenger</i>. This staid publication was printed on the -first floor of the Cummings home at Irvington, New -Jersey. Entrance to the composing-room was forbidden -the son, but with tears and tobacco he bribed the printer, -one Sylvester Bailey, who set up the Rev. Mr. Cummings’s -articles, to let him in through a window. Cummings -and Bailey later set type together on the <i>Tribune</i>. -They fought in the same regiment in the Civil War.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_265">265</span> -They worked together on the <i>Evening Sun</i>, and they are -buried in the same cemetery at Irvington.</p> - -<p>The trade once learned, young Amos left home and -wandered from State to State, making a living at the -case. In 1856, when he was only fourteen, he was -attracted by the glamour that surrounded William -Walker, the famous filibuster, and joined the forces of -that daring young adventurer, who then had control -of Nicaragua. The boy was one of a strange horde of -soldiers of fortune, which included British soldiers who -had been at Sebastopol, Italians who had followed Garibaldi, -and Hungarians in whom Kossuth had aroused -the martial flame.</p> - -<p>Like many of the others in Walker’s army, Cummings -believed that the Tennessean was a second Napoleon, -with Central America, perhaps South America, -for his empire. But when this Napoleon came to his -Elba by his surrender to Commander Davis of the -United States navy, in the spring of 1857, Cummings -decided that there was no marshal’s baton in his own -ragged knapsack and went back to be a wandering -printer.</p> - -<p>Cummings was setting type in the <i>Tribune</i> office when -the Civil War began. He hurried out and enlisted as a -private in the Twenty-Sixth New Jersey Volunteer Infantry. -He fought at Antietam, Chancellorsville, and -Fredericksburg. At Marye’s Hill, in the battle of -Fredericksburg, his regiment was supporting a battery -against a Confederate charge. Their lines were broken -and they fell back from the guns. Cummings took the -regimental flag from the hands of the colour-sergeant -and ran alone, under the enemy’s fire, back to the guns. -The Jerseymen rallied, the guns were recovered, and -Cummings got the Medal of Honor from Congress. He -left the service as sergeant-major of the regiment and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_266">266</span> -presently appeared in Greeley’s office, a seedy figure infolded -in an army overcoat.</p> - -<p>“Mr. Greeley,” said Amos, “I’ve just got to have -work.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, indeed!” creaked Horace. “And why have -you got to have work?”</p> - -<p>Cummings said nothing, but turned his back on the -great editor, lifted his coat-tails and showed the sad, if -not shocking, state of his breeches. He got work. In -1863, when the <i>Tribune</i> office was threatened by the -rioters, Amos helped to barricade the composing-room -and save it from the mob.</p> - -<p>Cummings served as editor of the <i>Weekly Tribune</i> -and as a political writer for the daily. This is the way -he came to quit the <i>Tribune</i>:</p> - -<p>John Russell Young, the third managing editor of -the <i>Tribune</i>, got the habit of issuing numbered orders. -Two of these orders reached Cummings’s desk, as -follows:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Order No. 756—There is too much profanity in this -office.</p> - -<p>Order No. 757—Hereafter the political reporter must -have his copy in at 10.30 <span class="allsmcap">P.M.</span></p> -</div> - -<p>Cummings turned to his desk and wrote:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Order No. 1234567—Everybody knows —— well that -I get most of the political news out of the Albany -<i>Journal</i>, and everybody knows —— —— well that the -<i>Journal</i> doesn’t get here until eleven o’clock at night, -and anybody who knows anything knows —— —— well -that asking me to get my stuff up at half past ten is -like asking a man to sit on a window-sill and dance on -the roof at the same time.</p> - -<p class="p0 sigright"><span class="smcap">Cummings.</span></p> -</div> - -<p>The result of this multiplicity of numbered orders was<span class="pagenum" id="Page_267">267</span> -that shortly afterward Cummings presented himself to -the editor of the <i>Sun</i>.</p> - -<p>“Why are you leaving the <i>Tribune</i>?” asked Mr. Dana.</p> - -<p>“They say,” replied Amos, “that I swear too much.”</p> - -<p>“Just the man for me!” replied Dana, according to -the version which Cummings used to tell.</p> - -<p>At any rate, Amos went on the <i>Sun</i> as managing -editor, and he continued to swear. The compositors -now in the <i>Sun</i> office who remember him at all remember -him largely for that.</p> - -<p>The union once set apart a day for contributions to -the printers’-home fund, and each compositor was to -contribute the fruits of a thousand ems of composition. -Cummings, who was proud of being a union printer, -left his managing-editor’s desk and went to the composing-room.</p> - -<p>“Ah, Mr. Cummings,” said Abe Masters, the foreman, -“I’ll give you some of your own copy to set.”</p> - -<p>“To hell with my own copy!” said Cummings, who -knew his handwriting faults. “Give me some reprint.”</p> - -<p>Green reporters got a taste of the Cummings profanity. -One of them put a French phrase in a story. -Cummings asked him what it meant, and the youth told -him.</p> - -<p>“Then why the hell didn’t you write it that way?” -yelled Cummings. “This paper is for people who read -English!”</p> - -<p>In those days murderers were executed in the old -Tombs prison in Centre Street. Cummings, who was -full of enterprise, sought a way to get quickly the fall -of the drop. The telephone had not been perfected, but -there was a shot-tower north of the <i>Sun’s</i> office and east -of the Tombs. Cummings sent one man to the Tombs, -with instructions to wave a flag upon the instant of the -execution. Another man, stationed at the top of the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_268">268</span> -shot-tower, had another flag, with which he was to make -a sign to Cummings on the roof of the Sun Building, -as soon as he saw the flag move at the prison.</p> - -<p>The reporter at the Tombs arranged with a keeper -to notify him just before the execution, but the keeper -was sent on an errand, and presently Cummings, standing -nervously on the roof of the Sun Building, heard the -newsboys crying the extras of a rival sheet. The plan -had fallen through. No blanks could adequately represent -the Cummings temper upon that occasion.</p> - -<p>Cummings was probably the best all-round news man -of his day. He had the executive ability and the knowledge -of men that make a good managing editor. He -knew what Dana knew—that the newspapers had yet -to touch public sympathy and imagination in the news -columns as well as in editorial articles; and he knew -how to do it, how to teach men to do it, how to cram -the moving picture of a living city into the four pages -of the <i>Sun</i>. He advised desk men, complimented or -corrected reporters, edited local articles, and, when a -story appealed to him strongly, he went out and got it -and wrote it himself.</p> - -<p>In such brief biographies of Cummings as have been -printed you will find that he is best remembered in the -outer world as a managing editor, or as the editor of the -<i>Evening Sun</i>, or as a Representative in Congress fighting -for the rights of Civil War veterans, printers’ -unions, and letter-carriers; but among the oldest generation -of newspapermen he is revered as a great reporter. -He was the first real human-interest reporter. -He knew the news value of the steer loose in the streets, -the lost child in the police station, the Italian murder -that was really a case of vendetta. The <i>Sun</i> men of his -time followed his lead, and a few of them, like Julian -Ralph, outdid him, but he was the pioneer; and a thousand<span class="pagenum" id="Page_269">269</span> -<i>Sun</i> men since then have kept, or tried to keep, on -the Cummings trail.</p> - -<p>It was Cummings who sent men to cover the police -stations at night and made it possible for the <i>Sun</i> to -beat the news association on the trivial items which -were the delight of the reader, and which helped, among -other things, to shoot the paper’s daily circulation to -one hundred thousand in the third year of the Dana -ownership.</p> - -<p>The years when Cummings was managing editor of -the <i>Sun</i> were years stuffed with news. Even a newspaperman -without imagination would have found plenty -of happenings at hand. The Franco-Prussian War, the -gold conspiracy that ended in Black Friday (September -24, 1869), the Orange riot (July 12, 1871), the great -Chicago fire, the killing of Fisk by Stokes, Tweedism—what -more could a newspaperman wish in so brief a -period? And, of course, always there were murders. -There were so many mysterious murders in the <i>Sun</i> that -a suspicious person might have harboured the thought -that Cummings went out after his day’s work was done -and committed them for art’s sake.</p> - -<p>When men and women stopped killing, Cummings -would turn to politics. Tweed was the great man then; -under suspicion, even before 1870, but a great man, -particularly among his own. The <i>Sun</i> printed pages -about Tweed and his satellites and the great balls of -the Americus Club, their politico-social organisation. -It described the jewels worn by the leaders of Tammany -Hall, including the two-thousand-dollar club badge—the -head of a tiger with eyes of ruby and three large diamonds -shining above them.</p> - -<p>Everybody who wanted the political news read the -<i>Sun</i>. As Jim Fisk remarked one evening as he stood -proudly with Jay Gould in the lobby of the Grand Opera<span class="pagenum" id="Page_270">270</span> -House—proud of his notoriety in connection with the -Erie Railroad jobbery, proud of the infamy he enjoyed -from the fact that he owned two houses in the same -block in West Twenty-third Street, housing his wife in -one and Josie Mansfield in the other; proud of his guilty -partnership in <span class="locked">Tweedism—</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>“The <i>Sun’s</i> a lively paper. I can never wait for daylight -for a copy. I have my man down there with a -horse every morning, and just as soon as he gets a <i>Sun</i> -hot from the press he jumps on the back of that horse -and puts for me as if all hell was after him.</p> - -<p>“Gould’s the same way; he has to see it before daylight, -too. My man has to bring him up a copy. You -always get the news ahead of everybody else. Why, the -first news I got that Gould and me were blackballed in -the Blossom Club we got from the <i>Sun</i>. I’m damned -if I’d believe it at first, and Gould says, ‘What is this -Blossom Club?’ Just then Sweeny came in. I asked -Sweeny if it was true, and Sweeny said yes, that Tweed -was the man that done it all. There it was in the <i>Sun</i>, -straight’s a die.”</p> -</div> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> reporter who chronicled this—it may have -been Cummings himself—had gone to ask Fisk whether -he and his friends had hired a thug to black-jack the -respectable Mr. Dorman B. Eaton, a foe of the Erie outfit; -but he took down and printed Fisk’s tribute to the -<i>Sun’s</i> enterprise. As there was scarcely a morning in -those days when the <i>Sun</i> did not turn up some new trick -played by the Tweed gang and the Erie group, their -anxiety to get an early copy was natural.</p> - -<p>Tweed and his philanthropic pretences did not deceive -the <i>Sun</i>. On February 24, 1870—a year and a -half before the exposure which sent the boss to prison—the -<i>Sun</i> printed an editorial article announcing that -Tweed was willing to surrender his ownership of the -city upon the following terms:</p> - -<div id="ip_270" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 34em;"> - <img src="images/i_270a.jpg" width="1625" height="2190" alt="" /> - <div class="captionr">(<i>From a Photograph by Paul Dana</i>)</div> - <div class="captionl"> - <p>MR. DANA AT SEVENTY</p> -</div></div> - -<div class="blockquot"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_271">271</span> - -<p>To give up all interest in the court-house swindle.</p> - -<p>To receive no more revenue from the department of -survey and inspection of buildings; and he hopes the -people of New York will remember his generosity in -giving up this place, inasmuch as his share amounts to -over one hundred thousand dollars a year.</p> -</div> - -<p>Tweed was liked by many New Yorkers, particularly -those who knew him only by his lavish charities. One -of these wrote the following letter, which the <i>Sun</i> -printed on December 7, 1870, under the heading “A -Monument to Boss Tweed—the Money Paid In”:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Enclosed please find ten cents as a contribution to -erect a statue to William M. Tweed on Tweed Plaza. I -have no doubt that fifty thousand to seventy-five thousand -of his admirers will contribute. Yours, etc.,</p> - -<p class="p0 sigright"><span class="smcap">Seventeenth Ward Voter.</span> -</p> -</div> - -<p>On December 12 the <i>Sun</i> said editorially:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Has Boss Tweed any friends? If he has, they are a -mean set. It is now more than a week since an appeal -was made to them to come forward and put up the ancillary -qualities to erect a statue of Mr. Tweed in the -centre of Tweed Plaza; but as yet only four citizens -have sent in their subscriptions. These were not large, -but they were paid in cash, and there is reason for the -belief that they were the tokens of sincere admiration -for Mr. Tweed. But the hundreds, or, rather, thousands, -of small-potato politicians whom he has made -rich and powerful stand aloof and do not offer a -picayune.</p> - -<p>We propose that the statue shall be executed by -Captain Albertus de Groot, who made the celebrated -Vanderbilt bronzes, but we have not yet decided -whether it shall represent the favorite son of New -York afoot or ahorseback. In fact, we rather incline -to have a nautical statue, exhibiting Boss Tweed as a -bold mariner, amid the wild fury of a hurricane, splicing<span class="pagenum" id="Page_272">272</span> -the main brace in the foretopgallant futtock shrouds -of his steam-yacht. But that is a matter for future -consideration. The first thing is to get the money; -and if those who claim to be Mr. Tweed’s friends don’t -raise it, we shall begin to believe the rumor that the -Hon. P. Brains Sweeny has turned against him, and -has forbidden every one to give anything toward the -erection of the projected statue.</p> -</div> - -<p>Ten days later the <i>Sun</i> carried on the editorial page -a long news story headed “Our Statue of Boss Tweed—the -Readers of the <i>Sun</i> Going to Work in Dead -Earnest—The <i>Sun’s</i> Advice Followed, Ha! Ha!—Organisation -of the Tweed Testimonial Association of -the City of New York—A Bronze Statue Worth -Twenty-Five Thousand Dollars to Be Erected.”</p> - -<p>Sure enough, the ward politicians had taken the joke -seriously. Police Justice Edward J. Shandley, Tim -Campbell, Coroner Patrick Keenan, Police Commissioner -Smith, and a dozen other faithful Tammany men -were on the list of trustees. They decided upon the -space then known as Tweed Plaza, at the junction of -East Broadway and New Canal and Rutgers Streets as -the site for the monument.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> added to the joke by printing more letters -from contributors. One, from Patrick Maloy, “champion -eel-bobber,” brought ten cents and the suggestion -that the statue should be inscribed with the amount -of money that Tweed had made out of the city. This -sort of thing went on into the new year, the <i>Sun</i> -aggravating the movement with grave editorial advice.</p> - -<p>At last the jest became more than Tweed could bear, -and from his desk in the Senate Chamber at Albany, on -March 13, 1871, he sent the following letter to Judge -Shandley, the chairman of the statue committee:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_273">273</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> -<p class="in0"> -<span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>: -</p> - -<p>I learn that a movement to erect a statue to me in the -city of New York is being seriously pushed by a committee -of citizens of which you are chairman.</p> - -<p>I was aware that a newspaper of our city had brought -forward the proposition, but I considered it one of the -jocose sensations for which that journal is so famous. -Since I left the city to engage in legislation the proposition -appears to have been taken up by my friends, no -doubt in resentment at the supposed unfriendly motive -of the original proposition and the manner in which it -had been urged.</p> - -<p>The only effect of the proposed statue is to present -me to the public as assenting to the parade of a public -and permanent testimonial to vanity and self-glorification -which do not exist. You will thus perceive that -the movement, which originated in a joke, but which -you have made serious, is doing me an injustice and an -injury; and I beg of you to see to it that it is at once -stopped.</p> - -<p>I hardly know which is the more absurd—the original -proposition or the grave comments of others, based upon -the idea that I have given the movement countenance. -I have been about as much abused as any man in public -life; I can stand abuse and bear even more than my -share; but I have never yet been charged with being -deficient in common sense.</p> - -<p class="p0 sigright"> -<span class="l4">Yours very truly,</span><br /> -<span class="smcap">Wm. M. Tweed</span>. -</p> -</div> - -<p>This letter appeared in the <i>Sun</i> the next day under -the facetious heading: “A Great Man’s Modesty—The -Most Remarkable Letter Ever Written by the Noble -Benefactor of the People.” Editorial regret was expressed -at Tweed’s declination; and, still in solemn -mockery, the <i>Sun</i> grieved over the return to the subscribers -of the several thousand dollars that had been -sent to Shandley’s committee. William J. Florence, -the comedian, had put himself down for five hundred -dollars.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_274">274</span></p> - -<p>Was it utterly absurd that the Tweed idolaters should -have taken seriously the <i>Sun’s</i> little joke? No, for so -serious a writer as Gustavus Myers wrote in his “History -of Tammany Hall” (1901) that “one of the signers -of the circular has assured the author that it was a serious -proposal. The attitude of the <i>Sun</i> confirms this.” -And another grave literary man, Dr. Henry Van Dyke, -set this down in his “Essays on Application” (1908):</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>William M. Tweed, of New York, who reigned over -the city for seven years, stole six million dollars or more -for himself and six million dollars or more for his followers; -was indorsed at the heights of his corruption by -six of the richest citizens of the metropolis; had a public -statue offered to him by the New York <i>Sun</i> as a “noble -benefactor of the city,” etc.</p> -</div> - -<p>Of course Mr. Myers and Dr. Van Dyke had never -read the statue articles from beginning to end, else -they would not have stumbled over the brick that even -Tweed, with all his conceit, was able to perceive.</p> - -<p>In July, 1871, when the New York <i>Times</i> was fortunate -enough to have put in its hands the proof of what -everybody already suspected—that Senator Tweed, -Comptroller Connolly, Park Commissioner Sweeny, and -their associates were plundering the city—the <i>Sun</i> was -busy with its own pet news and political articles, the -investigation of the Orange riots and the extravagance -and nepotism of President Grant’s administration.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> did not like the <i>Times</i>, which had been directed, -since the death of Henry J. Raymond, in 1869, -by Raymond’s partner, George Jones, and Raymond’s -chief editorial writer, Louis J. Jennings; but the <i>Sun</i> -liked the Tweed gang still less. It had been pounding -at it for two years, using the head-lines “Boss Tweed’s -Legislature,” or “Mr. Sweeny’s Legislature,” every day<span class="pagenum" id="Page_275">275</span> -of the sessions at the State capital; but neither the <i>Sun</i> -nor any other newspaper had been able to obtain the -figures that proved the robbery until the county bookkeeper, -Matthew J. O’Rourke, dug them out and took -them to the <i>Times</i>.</p> - -<p>The books showed that the city had been gouged out -of five million dollars in one item alone—the price paid -in two years to a Tweed contracting firm, Ingersoll & -Co., for furniture and carpets for the county court-house. -Enough carpets had been bought—or at least -paid for—to cover the eight acres of City Hall Park -three layers deep. And that five million dollars was -only a fraction of the loot.</p> - -<p>In September, 1871, after the mass-meeting of citizens -in Cooper Union, the <i>Sun</i> began printing the revelations -of Tweedism under the standing head, “The Doom of -the Ring.”</p> - -<p>Tweed engaged as counsel, among others, William O. -Bartlett, who was not only counsel for the <i>Sun</i> but, -next to Mr. Dana, the paper’s leading editorial writer -at that time. The boss may have fancied that in retaining -Bartlett he retained the <i>Sun</i>, but it is more -likely that he sought Bartlett’s services because of that -lawyer’s reputation as an aggressive and able counsellor. -If Tweed had any delusions about influencing the <i>Sun</i>, -they were quickly dispelled. On September 18, in an -editorial article probably written by Dana, the <i>Sun</i> -said:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>While Mr. Bartlett, in his able argument before -Judge Barnard on Friday, vindicated Mr. Tweed from -certain allegations set forth in the complaint of Mr. -Foley, he by no means relieved him from all complicity -in the enormous frauds and robberies that have been -committed in the government of this city. With all his -ability, that is something beyond Mr. Bartlett’s power;<span class="pagenum" id="Page_276">276</span> -and it is vain to hope that either of the leaders of the -Tammany Ring can ever regain the confidence of the -public, or for any length of time exercise the authority -of political office. They must all go, Sweeny, Tweed, -and Hall, as well as Connolly.</p> - -<p>Mr. Tweed must not imagine that he can buy his way -out of the present complication with money, as he did -in 1870. The next Legislature will be made up of different -material from the Republicans he purchased, and -the people will exercise a sterner supervision over its -acts.</p> -</div> - -<p>A good picture of Tweed’s popularity, which he still -retained among his own people, was drawn in an editorial -article in the <i>Sun</i> of October 30, 1871, three days -after the boss had been arrested and released in a million -dollars’ bail:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>In the Fourth District William M. Tweed is sure to -be re-elected [to the State Senate]. The Republican -factions, after a great deal of quarreling, have concentrated -on O’Donovan Rossa, a well-known Fenian, but -his chance is nothing. Even if it had been possible by -beginning in season to defeat Tweed, it cannot be done -with only a week’s time.</p> - -<p>Besides, his power there is absolute. The district -comprises the most ignorant and most vicious portion -of the city. It is full of low grog-shops, houses of ill-fame, -low gambling-houses, and sailor boarding-houses, -whose keepers enjoy protection and immunity, for which -they pay by the most efficient electioneering services. -Moreover, the district is full of sinecures paid from the -city treasury. If, instead of having stolen millions, Mr. -Tweed were accused of a dozen murders, or if, instead of -being in human form, he wore the semblance of a bull or -a bear, the voters of the Fourth District would march -to the polls and vote for him just as zealously as they -will do now, and the inspectors of election would furnish -for him by fraudulent counting any majority that might -be thought necessary in addition to the votes really -given.</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_277">277</span></p> - -<p>Tweed was re-elected to the State Senate by twelve -thousand plurality.</p> - -<p>The great robber-boss was a source of news from his -rise in the late sixties to his death in 1878. As early as -March, 1870, the <i>Sun</i> gave its readers an intimate idea -of Tweed’s private extravagances under the heading: -“Bill Tweed’s Big Barn—Democratic Extravagance -Versus That of the White House—Grant’s Billiard -Saloon, Caligula’s Stable, and Leonard Jerome’s Private -Theatre Eclipsed—Martin Van Buren’s Gold Spoons -Nowhere—Belmont’s Four-in-Hand Overshadowed—a -Picture for Rural Democrats.”</p> - -<p>Beneath this head was a column story beginning:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The Hon. William M. Tweed resides at 41 West -Thirty-sixth Street. The Hon. William M. Tweed’s -horses reside in East Fortieth Street, between Madison -and Park Avenues.</p> -</div> - -<p>That was the <i>Sun’s</i> characteristic way of starting a -story.</p> - -<p>Tweed was, in a way, responsible for the appearance -of a <i>Sun</i> more than four pages in size. Up to December, -1875, there was no issue of the <i>Sun</i> on Sundays. In -November of that year it was announced that beginning -on December 5 there would be a Sunday <i>Sun</i>, to be sold -at three cents, one cent more than the week-day price, -but nothing was said, or thought, of an increase In -size.</p> - -<p>On Saturday, December 4, Tweed, with the connivance -of his keepers, escaped from his house in Madison -Avenue. This made a four-column story on which Mr. -Dana had not counted. Also, the advertisers had taken -advantage of the new Sunday issue, and there were more -than two pages of advertisements. There was nothing -for it but to make an eight-page paper, for which Dana,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_278">278</span> -who then believed that all the news could be told in a -folio, apologised as follows:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>We confess ourselves surprised at the extraordinary -pressure of advertisements upon our pages this morning; -and disappointed in being compelled to present the -<i>Sun</i> to our readers in a different form from that to -which they are accustomed. We trust, however, that -they will find it no less interesting than usual; and, -still more, that they will feel that although the appearance -may be somewhat different, it is yet the same -friendly and faithful <i>Sun</i>.</p> -</div> - -<p>But the Sunday issue of the <i>Sun</i> never went back to -four pages, for the eight-page paper had been made so -attractive with special stories, reprint, and short fiction -that both readers and advertisers were pleased. It was -ten years, however, before the week-day <i>Sun</i> increased -its size. Even during the Beecher trial (January, -1875) when the <i>Sun’s</i> reporter, Franklin Fyles, found -himself unable to condense the day’s proceedings within -a page of seven columns, the <i>Sun</i> still gave all the rest -of the day’s news.</p> - -<p>Cummings’s right-hand man in the news department -of the <i>Sun</i> was Dr. John B. Wood, the Great American -Condenser. All the city copy passed through his hands. -He was then nearing fifty, a white-haired man who wore -two pairs of glasses with thick lenses, these crowned -with a green shade. He had been a printer on several -papers and a desk man on the <i>Tribune</i>, whence Dana -brought him to the <i>Sun</i>. Wood’s sense of the value of -words was so acute that he could determine, as rapidly -as his eye passed along the pages of a story, just what -might be stricken out without loss. It might be a word, -a sentence, a page; sometimes it would be ninety-eight -per cent of the article.</p> - -<p>Even when his sight so failed that he was unable to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_279">279</span> -read copy continuously, Dr. Wood performed the remarkable -feat of condensing through a reader. Willis -Holly read copy to him for months, six hours a night. -Holly might read three pages without interruption, -while Wood sat as silent as if he were asleep. <span class="locked">Then——</span></p> - -<p>“Throw out the introduction down to the middle of -the second page, begin with ‘John Elliott killed,’ and -cut it off at ‘arrested him.’”</p> - -<p>Joseph C. Hendrix, who became a member of Congress -and a bank president, was a <i>Sun</i> cub reporter. One -night he was assigned to read copy to Dr. Wood. He -picked up a sheet and began:</p> - -<p>“‘The application of Mrs. Jane Smith for divorce -from her husband, John <span class="locked">Smith—’”</span></p> - -<p>“Cut out ‘her husband,’” said Wood.</p> - -<p>“‘—who alleges cruelty,’” Hendrix continued, “‘in -that he—’” Here the reporter’s writing was blurred, -and Hendrix, who could not decipher it, said “Damn!”</p> - -<p>“Cut out the ‘damn,’” said Dr. Wood.</p> - -<p>In keeping news down to the bone Wood was of -remarkable value to the <i>Sun</i> in those years when Dana -showed that it was possible to tell everything in four -pages. New York was smaller then, and display advertising -had not come to be a science. The <i>Sun</i> got along -nicely on its circulation, for the newsdealers paid one -and one-third cents for each copy. With the circulation -receipts about fourteen hundred dollars a day, the advertising -receipts were clear profit. Amos Cummings -had such a fierce disregard for the feelings of advertisers -that often, when a good piece of news came in late, he -would throw out advertising to make room for it.</p> - -<p>The city editors of the <i>Sun</i> under Cummings were, in -order, John Williams, Lawrence S. Kane, Walter M. -Rosebault, William Young, and John B. Bogart. Williams, -who had been a Methodist preacher, left the <i>Sun</i><span class="pagenum" id="Page_280">280</span> -in 1869 to become religious editor of the <i>Herald</i>. Kane, -a big blond Irishman with mutton-chop whiskers, held -the city desk until the summer of 1870 and then returned -to the reportorial staff. Rosebault, who had -been one of the <i>Sun’s</i> best young reporters, resigned -from the city editorship late in 1870 in order to study -law. He afterward went to San Francisco to be principal -editorial writer of the <i>Chronicle</i>, but soon returned -to New York and for many years, while practising law, -he contributed editorial and special articles to the <i>Sun</i>. -Mr. Rosebault, who is still an active lawyer, told the -present writer, in July, 1918, that of all the reporters -who served on his staff when he was city editor of the -<i>Sun</i> only one, Sidney Rosenfeld, later a dramatist and -the first editor of <i>Puck</i>, was still alive.</p> - -<p>The first telegraph editor of the <i>Sun</i> was an Episcopalian -clergyman, Arthur Beckwith, afterward connected -with the Brooklyn <i>Eagle</i> and the Brooklyn -<i>Citizen</i> as a law reporter. When he left the telegraph -desk of the <i>Sun</i> his place was taken by Colonel Henry -Grenville Shaw, a Civil War veteran. Colonel Shaw -left the <i>Sun</i> to become night editor of the San Francisco -<i>Chronicle</i> and was succeeded by Amos B. Stillman, a -ninety-pound man from Connecticut. He was a newspaperman -in his native state until the Civil War, and -after Appomattox he went back to Connecticut. He -went on the <i>Sun</i> in 1870 as telegraph editor, and stayed -on the same desk for forty-five years.</p> - -<p>In the early days of Dana’s <i>Sun</i> there were no night -editors, for it had not been found necessary to establish -a central desk where all the news of all the departments -could be gathered together for judgment as to relative -value. Each desk man sent his own copy to the composing-room, -and the pages were made up by the managing -editor or the night city editor after midnight. Leisurely<span class="pagenum" id="Page_281">281</span> -nights, those, with no newspaper trains to catch -and no starting of the presses until four o’clock in the -morning!</p> - -<div id="ip_280" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 33em;"> - <img src="images/i_280a.jpg" width="1593" height="1916" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - <p>AMOS JAY CUMMINGS</p> -</div></div> - -<p>One evening in that period the other desk men in -the news department of the <i>Sun</i> observed that Amos -Stillman was extraordinarily busy and more than -usually silent. He scribbled away, revising despatches -and writing subheads, and it was after twelve o’clock -when he got up, stretched, and uttered one sentence:</p> - -<p>“Quite a fire in Chicago!”</p> - -<p>That was the October evening in 1871 when Mrs. -O’Leary’s cow started the blaze that consumed seventeen -thousand buildings. To Deacon Stillman it was -just a busy night.</p> - -<p>Deacon Stillman was born only eighteen months after -the <i>Sun</i>—Ben Day’s <i>Sun</i>; but even as this is being written -he is strolling up and down a corridor in the <i>Sun</i> -office, waiting for another old-timer, some mere lad of -sixty, to come out and have dinner with him.</p> - -<p>Under Cummings was developed a young man who -turned out to be one of the great city editors of New -York—John B. Bogart, of whom Arthur Brisbane wrote -that he was the best teacher of journalism that America -had produced. He was in most respects the opposite -of Cummings. He had all of Cummings’s love for the -business, but not his tremendous rush. Cummings was -an explosion, Bogart a steady flame. Cummings roared, -Bogart was gentle.</p> - -<p>Like Cummings and Stillman, Bogart was a Union -veteran. In 1861, when he was only sixteen years old, -he left the New Haven store where he was a clerk and -enlisted in the Seventh Connecticut Volunteers. After -serving three years in the army, he returned home to -become a bookkeeper in a dry-goods store. He went on -the <i>Sun</i> February 21, 1871, as a general reporter. On<span class="pagenum" id="Page_282">282</span> -March 17, 1873—his twenty-eighth birthday—he was -made city editor, the former city editor, William Young, -having been promoted to the managing editor’s desk to -take the place of Cummings, whose health was poor.</p> - -<p>John Bogart remained at the city desk for seventeen -years of tireless work. He was a master of journalistic -detail, a patient follower-up of the stories which, like -periscopes, appear and reappear on the sea of events.</p> - -<p>“He was a whole school of journalism in himself,” -Brisbane wrote of Bogart years afterward. “He could -tell the young men where to go for their news, what -questions to ask, what was and what was not worth -while. Above all, he could give enthusiasm to his men. -He worked by encouraging, not by harsh criticism.”</p> - -<p>Bogart always asked a young reporter whether he had -read the <i>Sun</i> that morning. If one confessed that he -had read only part of it, Bogart would invite him to -sit down, and would say:</p> - -<p>“Mr. Jones, it is one of the salutary customs of this -paper that every reporter shall read everything in it -before appearing for duty. Don’t even skip the advertisements, -because there are stories concealed in many -of them. The <i>Sun</i> is good breakfast-food.”</p> - -<p>The custom of Bogart’s time is the custom still, but -a reporter has to go harder at his reading than he did -in the days of the four-page <i>Sun</i>.</p> - -<p>If a new reporter had not absorbed the <i>Sun</i> style, -Bogart gently tried to saturate him with it.</p> - -<p>“I notice,” he said to a man who had covered a little -fire the night before, “that you begin your story with -‘at an early hour yesterday morning,’ and that you say -also that ‘smoke was seen issuing from an upper -window.’”</p> - -<p>“Isn’t that good English?” asked the young man.</p> - -<p>“It is excellent English,” Bogart replied calmly,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_283">283</span> -“and it has been indorsed by generations of reporters -and copy-readers. If you look in the other papers you -will find that some of them also discovered smoke issuing -from an upper window at an early hour yesterday -morning. We do not deny that it is good English; but -it is not good <i>Sun</i> English.”</p> - -<p>Never again did smoke issue from an upper window -of that reporter’s copy.</p> - -<p>Under Cummings and Bogart the <i>Sun</i> turned out <i>Sun</i> -men. A young man from Troy, Franklin Fyles, was -one of their first police-station reporters. He did not -know as many policemen as did Joseph Josephs, who -wore a silk hat and a gambler’s mustache, and who -covered the West Side stations, but he wrote well. He -did not know as many desperate characters as were -honoured with the acquaintance of David Davids, the -East Side police reporter, but he knew a <i>Sun</i> story when -he saw it. In 1875, five years after Fyles came on the -<i>Sun</i>, he was the star reporter, and he reported the -Beecher trial. Ten thousand words a day in longhand -was an easy day’s work for the reports of that great scandal. -Fyles became the dramatic critic of the <i>Sun</i> in -1885, and continued as such until 1903. In that period -he wrote several plays, including “The Girl I Left Behind -Me,” in which David Belasco was his collaborator; -“Cumberland ’61,” and “The Governor of Kentucky.” -Fyles died in 1911 at the age of 64.</p> - -<p>Another police-station reporter of the <i>Sun</i> was Edward -Payson Weston, who had been an office-boy in -various newspaper offices until about the beginning of -the Civil War and had then become a reporter. Before -Dana bought the <i>Sun</i> Weston had walked from Portland, -Maine, to Chicago—thirteen hundred and twenty-six -miles—in twenty-six days. Forty years later he -walked it in twenty-five days.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_284">284</span></p> - -<p>Cummings liked Weston. Whatever faults there may -have been in his literary style, his knee action was a -perfect poem. He could bring a story down from the -Bellevue morgue faster than all the horse-cars. He was -the best “leg man” in the history of journalism. In -1910, more than four decades after the <i>Sun</i> first took -him on, Weston, then a man of seventy years, walked -from Los Angeles to New York in seventy-seven days.</p> - -<p>Henry Mann, a Civil War veteran, was the <i>Sun’s</i> principal -court reporter. He covered the Tweed and Stokes -trials and the impeachment of Judge Barnard. Later -he was exchange editor and he is remembered also as -the author of “The History of Ancient and Medieval -Republics.”</p> - -<p>Other <i>Sun</i> reporters were Tom Cook, who came from -California, had the shiniest silk hat on Park Row, and -knew Fisk and the rest of the Erie crowd; Big Jim Connolly, -one of the best news writers of his day; the -McAlpin brothers, Robert and Tod; and Chester S. -Lord, who was to become the managing editor of the -<i>Sun</i> and serve it in that capacity for a third of a -century.</p> - -<p>William Young, who was city editor when Lord went -on the paper, gave him his first assignment—to get a -story about the effect of the Whisky Ring’s work on -the liquor trade. Lord wrote a light and airy piece -which indicated that the ring’s operations would bring -highly moral results by decreasing the supply of intoxicants; -but when the copy-reader got through with the -story this is the way it read:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>A <i>Sun</i> reporter interviewed several leading wholesale -liquor-dealers yesterday concerning the despatch from -Louisville, saying that all the old whisky in the country -had been purchased by a Western firm for a rise. They -said that they had sold their accumulated stock of prime<span class="pagenum" id="Page_285">285</span> -whisky months ago. One firm, the largest in the city, -had sold nearly two thousand barrels, stored since 1858. -One shrewd dealer said it was reported that Grant was -in the ring, and that he wanted to secure a supply to -fall back on in his retirement.</p> -</div> - -<p>Mark Maguire, the celebrated “Toppy,” was the chief -of the sporting writers. He was about the oldest man -in the <i>Sun</i> office, born before Napoleon went to Elba. -He was the first king of the New York newsboys, and -Barney Williams, the boy who first sold Ben Day’s <i>Sun</i>, -once worked for him.</p> - -<p>Maguire had as customers, when they visited New -York, Jackson, Webster, Clay, and Calhoun. When -prosperity came to him he opened road-houses that were -the resorts of horse-owners like Commodore Vanderbilt -and Robert Bonner. His Cayuga House, at McComb’s -Dam, was named after his own fast trotter, Cayuga -Girl. Maguire’s intimacy with Bonner was such that -the hangers-on in the racing game believed that Bonner -owned the <i>Sun</i> and transmitted his views to Dana -through “Toppy.” Maguire worked for the <i>Sun</i> up -to his death in 1889.</p> - -<p>When Amos Cummings had an evening to spare from -his regular news work he would go with Maguire to a -prize-fight and write the story of it. Maguire invented -the chart by which a complete record of the blows struck -in a boxing match is kept—one circle for the head and -one for the body of each contestant, with a pencil-mark -for every blow landed. After an evening in which Jem -Mace was one of the entertainers, Maguire’s chart -looked like a shotgun target, but Cummings, who -watched the fighters while Mark tallied the blows, would -make a live story from it.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> of that day had women reporters; indeed, it -had the first real woman reporter in American journalism,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_286">286</span> -Mrs. Emily Verdery Battey. She worked on -fashion stories, women’s-rights stories, and general-news -stories. She was one of the Georgia Verderys, and she -went on the <i>Sun</i> shortly after Mr. Dana took hold. Her -brother, George Verdery, was also a <i>Sun</i> reporter. Another -<i>Sun</i> woman of that time was Miss Anna Ballard, -who wrote, among other things, the news stories that -bobbed up in the surrogates’ court.</p> - -<p>The dramatic criticisms of the <i>Sun</i>, in the first three -or four years of the seventies, were written by two young -lawyers recently graduated from the law school of New -York University, Willard Bartlett and Elihu Root. -Bartlett was a year the younger, but he ranked Root -as a critic because of his acquaintance—through his -father, W. O. Bartlett—with newspaper ways. If -Lester Wallack was putting on “Ours,” that would be -Mr. Bartlett’s assignment, while Mr. Root went to -report the advance of art at Woods’s Museum, where -was the Lydia Thompson troupe. If it befell that on -the same evening Edwin Booth produced “Hamlet” in -a new setting and George L. Fox appeared in a more -glorious than ever “Humpty Dumpty,” Critic Bartlett -would see Booth; Assistant Critic Root, Fox.</p> - -<p>In time these young journalists passed on to be actors -in that more complex and perhaps equally interesting -drama, the law, which for fourteen years they practised -together. Mr. Bartlett figured as one of Mr. Dana’s -counsel in several of the <i>Sun’s</i> legal cases. After thirty -years on the bench, retiring from the chief judgeship of -the Court of Appeals of the State of New York through -the age statute in 1916, Judge Bartlett is still actively -interested in the <i>Sun</i>, and many of its articles on legal -and literary topics are contributed by him.</p> - -<p>As for Mr. Root, his friendship with the <i>Sun</i> has been -unbroken for almost fifty years, and he has made more<span class="pagenum" id="Page_287">287</span> -news for it than most men. Under such circumstances -even the most jealous newspaper is willing to forgive -the desertion of an assistant dramatic critic.</p> - -<p>It was Willard Bartlett, incidentally, who was the -inventor of the <i>Sun’s</i> celebrated office cat. One night -in the eighties the copy of a message from President -Cleveland to Congress came to the desk of the telegraph -editor. It was a warm evening, and the window near -the telegraph desk was open. The message fluttered -out and was lost in Nassau Street. The <i>Sun</i> had nothing -about it the next morning, and in the afternoon, -when Mr. Bartlett called on Mr. Dana, the matter of -the lost message was under discussion. The editor remarked -that it was a matter difficult to explain to the -readers.</p> - -<p>“Oh, say that the office cat ate it up,” suggested -Bartlett.</p> - -<p>Dana chuckled and dictated a paragraph creating the -cat. Instantly the animal became famous. Newspapers -pictured it as Dana’s inseparable companion, -and the <i>Sun</i> presently had another, and longer, editorial -article about the wonderful beast:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The universal interest which this accomplished animal -has excited throughout the country is a striking -refutation that genius is not honored in its own day -and generation. Perhaps no other living critic has -attained the popularity and vogue now enjoyed by our -cat. For years he worked in silence, unknown, perhaps, -beyond the limits of the office. He is a sort of -Rosicrucian cat, and his motto has been “to know all -and to keep himself unknown.” But he could not -escape the glory his efforts deserved, and a few mornings -ago he woke up, like Byron, to find himself famous.</p> - -<p>We are glad to announce that he hasn’t been puffed -up by the enthusiastic praise which comes to him from -all sources. He is the same industrious, conscientious, -sharp-eyed, and sharp-toothed censor of copy that he has<span class="pagenum" id="Page_288">288</span> -always been, nor should we have known that he is conscious -of the admiration he excites among his esteemed -contemporaries of the press had we not observed him in -the act of dilacerating a copy of the <i>Graphic</i> containing -an alleged portrait of him.</p> - -<p>It was impossible not to sympathize with his evident -indignation. The <i>Graphic’s</i> portrait did foul injustice -to his majestic and intellectual features. Besides, it -represented him as having a bandage over one eye, as -if he had been involved in controversy and had had his -eye mashed. Now, aside from the fact that he needs -both eyes to discharge his literary duties properly, he is -able to whip his weight in office cats, and his fine, large -eyes have never been shrouded in black, and we don’t -believe they ever will be. He is a soldier as well as a -scholar.</p> - -<p>We have received many requests to give a detailed -account of the personal habits and peculiarities of this -feline Aristarchus. Indeed, we have been requested to -prepare a full biographical sketch to appear in the next -edition of “Homes of American Authors.” At some -future day we may satisfy public curiosity with the details -of his literary methods. But genius such as his -defies analysis, and the privacy of a celebrity ought not -to be rudely invaded.</p> - -<p>It is not out of place, however, to indicate a few -traits which illustrate his extraordinary faculty of literary -decomposition, so to speak. His favorite food -is a tariff discussion. When a big speech, full of wind -and statistics, comes within his reach, he pounces upon -it immediately and digests the figures at his leisure. -During the discussion of the Morrison Bill he used to -feed steadily on tariff speeches for eight hours a day, -and yet his appetite remained unimpaired.</p> - -<p>When a piece of stale news or a long-winded, prosy -article comes into the office, his remarkable sense of -smell instantly detects it, and it is impossible to keep -it from him. He always assists with great interest at -the opening of the office mail, and he files several hundred -letters a day in his interior department. The -favorite diversion of the office-boys is to make him<span class="pagenum" id="Page_289">289</span> -jump for twelve-column articles on the restoration of -the American merchant marine.</p> - -<p>He takes a keen delight in hunting for essays on civil-service -reform, and will play with them, if he has time, -for hours. They are so pretty that he hates to kill -them, but duty is duty. Clumsy and awkward English -he springs at with indescribable quickness and ferocity; -but he won’t eat it. He simply tears it up. He can’t -stand everything.</p> - -<p>We don’t pretend he is perfect. We admit that he -has an uncontrollable appetite for the <i>Congressional -Record</i>. We have to keep this peculiar publication out -of his reach. He will sit for hours and watch with -burning eyes the iron safe in which we are obliged to -shut up the <i>Record</i> for safe-keeping. Once in a while -we let him have a number or two. He becomes uneasy -without it. It is his catnip.</p> - -<p>With the exception of this pardonable excess he is a -blameless beast. He mouses out all the stupid stuff and -nonsense that finds its way into the office and goes for -it tooth and claw. He is the biggest copyholder in the -world. And he never gets tired. His health is good, -and we have not deemed it necessary to take out a policy -on any one of his valuable lives.</p> - -<p>Many of our esteemed contemporaries are furnishing -their offices with cats, but they can never hope to have -the equal of the <i>Sun’s</i> venerable polyphage. He is a cat -of genius.</p> -</div> - -<p>The cat may have contracted his hatred of the dull -and prosy from the men who worked in the <i>Sun</i> office -when Amos Cummings smiled and swore and got out -the greatest four-page paper ever seen, singing the while -the song of Walker’s filibusters:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="verse indent0">How would you like a soldier’s life</div> - <div class="verse indent2">On the plains of Nicara-goo?</div> - <div class="verse indent0">Marching away and fighting all day,</div> - <div class="verse indent0">Nothing to eat and as much to pay—</div> - <div class="verse indent0">We do it all for glory, they say,</div><span class="pagenum" id="Page_290">290</span> - <div class="verse indent0">On the plains of Nicara-goo.</div> - <div class="verse indent0">Not a bit of breakfast did I see,</div> - <div class="verse indent0">And dinner was all the same to me;</div> - <div class="verse indent0">Two fried cats and three fried rats</div> - <div class="verse indent2">Was a supper at Nicara-goo.</div> - <div class="verse indent0">Marching away and fighting all day,</div> - <div class="verse indent0">Nothing to eat and as much to pay—</div> - <div class="verse indent0">We do it all for glory, they say,</div> - <div class="verse indent2">On the plains of Nicara-goo!</div> - </div> -</div> -</div> - -<p>Cummings worked so hard that in 1873 he broke down -and the <i>Sun</i> sent him to Florida. There he wandered -about, exploring rivers, studying the natives, and writing -for the <i>Sun</i>, over the signature of “Ziska,” a series -of travel letters as interesting as any that ever appeared -in a newspaper. When he returned to New York in -1876, John Kelly, then endeavouring to raise Tammany -from the mire into which Tweed had dropped it, persuaded -Cummings to become managing editor of the -New York <i>Express</i>. Cummings did not stay long on -the <i>Express</i>, being disgusted with Kelly’s hostility -toward Tilden’s candidacy for the presidential nomination, -and he went back to the <i>Sun</i>.</p> - -<div class="center"><div class="ilb"> -<div id="ip_290a" class="figleft"> - <img src="images/i_290a.jpg" width="842" height="1516" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl">DANIEL F. KELLOGG</div></div> - -<div id="ip_290b" class="figleft noclear"> - <img src="images/i_290b.jpg" width="842" height="1516" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl">AMOS B. STILLMAN</div></div> - -<div id="ip_290c" class="figleft noclear"> - <img src="images/i_290c.jpg" width="842" height="1516" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl">JOHN B. BOGART</div></div> -</div></div> - -<p>For the next ten years his efforts were mostly in the -direction of improving the weekly issue. In 1886 he -was elected to the House of Representatives from a -West Side district, but he maintained his connection -with the <i>Sun</i>, and in 1887 he became editor of the -<i>Evening Sun</i>, then just started. In 1888 Cummings -resigned from the House, saying that he was too poor -to be a Congressman, but on the death of Representative -Samuel Sullivan (“Sunset”) Cox he consented to -take the vacant place and continue Cox’s battles for the -welfare of the letter-carriers. His service in the House -lasted fifteen years. Cummings was a great labour advocate, -not only in behalf of letter-carriers, but of printers,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_291">291</span> -navy-yard employees, and musicians. He had the last-named -in mind when he said in a speech on an alien-labour -bill:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>As the law now stands, when a German student, or -one of those fellows that swill beer along the Rhine, -desires to come here for the summer, all he has to do -is to get a saxophone or some other kind of musical -instrument, call himself an artist, and be allowed to -land here.</p> -</div> - -<p>That was Amos’s convincing, if inelegant, style. -When he introduced a bill to compensate navy-yard men -for labour already performed, but not paid for, Representative -Holman, of Indiana, asked:</p> - -<p>“How much money will it take out of the Treasury?”</p> - -<p>“None of your business!” snapped Cummings. -“The government must pay its just debts.”</p> - -<p>While he was in the House, Cummings wrote a series -of articles on the big men of Washington. He was a -delegate to the Democratic national conventions of 1892 -and 1896. He died in Baltimore May 2, 1902, and a -Republican House of Representatives voted a public -funeral to this militant Democrat.</p> - -<p>Greater news men than Cummings followed him, undoubtedly, -but there was no newspaperman in New -York before his time who knew better what news was -or how to handle it; not even the elder Bennett, for -that great man knew only the news that looked big. -Cummings was the first to know the news that felt big.</p> - -<p>It was Cummings and his work that Henry Watterson -had in mind when he one day remarked to Mr. Dana:</p> - -<p>“The <i>Sun</i> is a damned good paper, but you don’t -make it.”</p> - -<p>That statement undoubtedly pleased the editor of the -<i>Sun</i>, for it was evidence from an expert that he had<span class="pagenum" id="Page_292">292</span> -carried his theory to success. He had set men free to -write what they saw, as they saw it, in their own way. -It was the <i>Sun</i> way, and that was what he wanted. As -Dana himself handed down this heritage of literary freedom -in his editorial page to Mitchell, so he gave to the -men on the news pages, through Amos Cummings and -Chester S. Lord and their successors, the right to watch -with open eyes the world pass by, and to describe that -parade in a different way three hundred and sixty-five -days a year.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div id="toclink_293" class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_293">293</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XIII">CHAPTER XIII<br /> - -<span class="subhead">DANA’S FAMOUS RIVALS PASS</span></h2> -</div> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p><i>The Deaths of Raymond, Bennett, and Greeley Leave Him -the Dominant Figure of the American Newspaper Field.—Dana’s -Dream of a Paper Without Advertisements.</i></p> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">Four</span> years after he became the master of the <i>Sun</i>, -and a quarter of a century before death took him -from it, Dana found himself the Nestor of metropolitan -journalism. Of the three other great New York editors -of Dana’s time—three who had founded their own -papers and lived with those papers until the wing of -Azrael shut out the roar of the presses—Raymond had -been the first, and the youngest, to go; for his end came -when he was only forty-nine, eighteen years after the -establishment of his <i>Times</i>.</p> - -<p>Bennett, the inscrutable monarch of the <i>Herald</i>, died -in 1872, three years after Raymond, but Bennett, who -did not establish the <i>Herald</i> until he was forty, had -owned it, and had given every waking hour to its welfare, -for thirty-seven years. The year of Bennett’s -death saw the passing of the unfortunate Greeley, -broken in body and mind from his fatuous chase of -public office, within three weeks of his defeat for the -presidency. As the sprightly young editor of the Louisville -<i>Courier-Journal</i>, Colonel Henry Watterson, wrote -in his paper in January, 1873:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Mr. Bryant being no longer actively engaged in newspaper -work, Mr. Dana is left alone to tell the tale of -old-time journalism in New York. He, of all his fellow<span class="pagenum" id="Page_294">294</span> -editors of the great metropolis, has passed the period -of middle age; though—years apart—he is as blithe and -nimble as the youngest of them, and has performed, with -the <i>Sun</i>, a feat in modern newspaper practice that entitles -him to the stag-horns laid down at his death by -James Gordon Bennett. Mr. Dana is no less a writer -and scholar than an editor; as witness his sketch of -Mr. Greeley, which for thorough character-drawing is -unsurpassed. In a word, Mr. Dana at fifty-three is as -vigorous, sinewy, and live as a young buck of thirty-five -or forty.</p> - -<p>His professional associates were boys when he was -managing editor of the <i>Tribune</i>. Manton Marble was -at college at Rochester, and Whitelaw Reid was going -to school in Ohio. Young Bennett and Bundy were -wearing short jackets.</p> - -<p>They were rough-and-tumble days, sure enough, even -for New York. There was no Central Park. Madison -Square was “out of town.” Franconi’s Circus, surnamed -a “hippodrome,” sprawled its ugly wooden -towers, minarets, and sideshows over the ground now -occupied by the Fifth Avenue Hotel. <i>Miss Flora -McFlimsy</i> of the opposite square had not come into being; -nay, Madison Square itself existed in a city ordinance -merely, and, like the original of Mr. Praed’s Darnell -Park, was a wretched waste of common, where the -boys skated and played shinny.</p> - -<p>The elder Harpers stood in the shoes now worn by -their sons, who were off at boarding-school. George -Ripley was as larky as John Hay is. Delmonico’s, -down-town, was the only Delmonico’s. The warfare -between the newspapers constituted the most exciting -topic of the time. Bennett was “Jack Ketch,” Raymond -was the “little villain,” and Greeley was by turns -an “incendiary,” a “white-livered poltroon,” and a -“free-lover.” Parke Godwin and Charles A. Dana were -managing editors respectively; both scholars and both, -as writers, superior to all the rest, except Greeley, who, -as a newspaper writer, never had a superior.</p> - -<p>The situation is changed completely. Bennett, Greeley, -and Raymond are dead. Dana and Godwin, both<span class="pagenum" id="Page_295">295</span> -about of an age, stand at the head of New York journalism; -while Reid, Marble, and Jennings, all young -men, wear the purple of a new era.</p> - -<p>Will it be an era of reforms? There are signs that -it will be. Marble is a recruit. Reid is essentially a -man of the world. Jennings is an Englishman. One -would think that these three, led by two ripe scholars -and gentlemen like Godwin and Dana, would alter the -character of the old partisan warfare in one respect at -least, and that if they have need to be personal, they -will be wittily so, and not brutally and dirtily personal; -the which will be an advance.</p> - -<p>There will never be an end to the personality of journalism. -But there is already an end of the efficacy of -filth. In this, as in other things, there are fashions. -What ill thing, for example, can be said personally injurious -of Reid, Marble, Jennings, Bundy, and the rest, -all hard-working, painstaking men, without vices or peculiarities, -who do not invite attack?</p> - -<p>On the whole, the newspaper prospect in New York -is very good. There will be, perhaps, less of what we -call “character” in New York journalism, but more -usefulness, honesty, and culture and as the New York -dailies, like the New York milliners, set the fashion, -these excellent qualities will diffuse themselves over the -country. They may even reach Nashville and Memphis. -It is an age of miracles. Who can tell?</p> -</div> - -<p>“There will never be an end to the personality of -journalism.” It is curious to note in passing that -Henry Watterson, who retired from the active editorship -of the <i>Courier-Journal</i> on August 7, 1918, after -fifty years’ service, was the last of the men who, according -to the measure of forty years ago, were “personal -journalists.” “Dana says,” “Greeley says,” “Raymond -says”—such oral credits are no longer given by the -readers of the really big and reputable newspapers of -New York to the men who write opinions. “Henry -Watterson says” was the last of the phrases of that -style.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_296">296</span></p> - -<p>Dana believed in personal journalism and thought it -would not pass away. A few days after the death of -Horace Greeley, the editor of the <i>Sun</i> printed his views -on the subject:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>A great deal of twaddle is uttered by some country -newspapers just now over what they call personal journalism. -They say that now that Mr. Bennett, Mr. Raymond, -and Mr. Greeley are dead, the day for personal -journalism is gone by, and that impersonal journalism -will take its place. That appears to be a sort of journalism -in which nobody will ask who is the editor of a -paper or the writer of any class of article, and nobody -will care.</p> - -<p>Whenever in the newspaper profession a man rises -up who is original, strong, and bold enough to make his -opinions a matter of consequence to the public, there -will be personal journalism; and whenever newspapers -are conducted only by commonplace individuals whose -views are of no interest to the world and of no consequence -to anybody, there will be nothing but impersonal -journalism.</p> - -<p>And this is the essence of the whole question.</p> -</div> - -<p>For all that, Dana must have felt lonely, for at that -moment, at any rate, the new chiefs of the <i>Sun’s</i> rivals -did not measure up to the heights of their predecessors. -To Dana, the trio that had passed were men worthy of -his steel, and worthy, each in his own way, of admiration. -Toward Greeley, in spite of the circumstances -under which Dana left the <i>Tribune</i>, the editor of the -<i>Sun</i> showed a kindly spirit; not only in his support of -Greeley for the presidency, which may have sprung from -Dana’s aversion to Grantism, but in his general attitude -toward the brilliant if erratic old man. As for Bennett, -Dana frankly believed him to be a great newspaperman, -and never hesitated to say so.</p> - -<p>What Dana thought of the three may be judged by his<span class="pagenum" id="Page_297">297</span> -editorial article in the <i>Sun</i> on the day after Greeley’s -funeral:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>In burying Mr. Greeley we bury the third founder of -a newspaper which has become famous and wealthy in -this city during the last thirty-five years. Mr. Raymond -died three years and Mr. Bennett barely six -months ago.</p> - -<p>These three men were exceedingly unlike each other, -yet each of them possessed extraordinary professional -talents. Mr. Raymond surpassed both Mr. Bennett and -Mr. Greeley in the versatility of his accomplishments, -and in facility and smoothness as a writer. But he was -less a journalist than either of the other two. Nature -had rather intended him for a lawyer, and success as a -legislative debater and presiding officer had directed his -ambition toward that kind of life.</p> - -<p>Mr. Bennett was exclusively a newspaperman. He -was equally great as a writer, a wit, and a purveyor of -news; and he never showed any desire to leave a profession -in which he had made himself rich and formidable.</p> - -<p>Horace Greeley delighted to be a maker of newspapers, -not so much for the thing itself, though to that -he was sincerely attached, as for the sake of promoting -doctrines, ideas, and theories in which he was a believer; -and his personal ambition, which was very profound and -never inoperative, made him wish to be Governor, Legislator, -Senator, Cabinet Minister, President, because -such elevation seemed to afford the clearest possible -evidence that he himself was appreciated and that the -cause he espoused had gained the hearts of the people. -How incomplete, indeed, would be the triumph of any -set of principles if their chief advocate and promoter -were to go unrecognized and unhonored!</p> - -<p>It is a most impressive circumstance that each of -these three great journalists has had to die a tragic -and pitiable death. One perished by apoplexy long -after midnight in the entrance of his own home; another -closed his eyes with no relative near him to perform that -last sad office; and the third, broken down by toils,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_298">298</span> -excitements, and sufferings too strong to be borne, -breathed his last in a private madhouse. What a lesson -to the possessors of power, for these three men were -powerful beyond others! What a commentary upon -human greatness, for they were rich and great, and -were looked upon with envy by thousands who thought -themselves less fortunate than they! And amid such -startling surprises and such a prodigious conflict of -lights and shadows, the curtain falls as the tired actor, -crowned with long applause, passes from that which -seems to that which is.</p> -</div> - -<p>Louis J. Jennings succeeded Raymond as the editor -of the <i>Times</i>, and acted as such until 1876, when he -returned to England, his desk being taken by John -Foord. Jennings went into politics in England, and -was elected a member of Parliament. He also wrote -a life of Gladstone and edited a collection of Lord Randolph -Churchill’s speeches.</p> - -<p>Bennett was followed in the possession of the <i>Herald</i> -by his son and namesake. Whitelaw Reid took Greeley’s -place at the head of the <i>Tribune</i>. Dana did not -like Reid in those days. In a “Survey of Metropolitan -Journalism” which appeared in the editorial columns -of the <i>Sun</i> on September 3, 1875—the <i>Sun’s</i> forty-second -birthday—Dana dismissed his neighbour of the then -“tall tower” <span class="locked">with—</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>We pass the <i>Tribune</i> by. Our opinion of it is well -known. It is Jay Gould’s paper, and a disgrace to -journalism.</p> -</div> - -<p>Dana’s attitude toward the other big newspapers was -more kindly:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The <i>Times</i> is a very respectable paper, and more than -that, a journal of which the Republican party has reason -to be proud. It is not a servile organ, but a loyal partisan.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_299">299</span> -We prefer for our own part to keep aloof from -the party politicians. They are disagreeable fellows to -have hanging about a newspaper office, and their advice -we do not regard as valuable. But we do not decry -party newspapers. They have their field, and must -always exist. The <i>Times</i> is a creditable example of -such a newspaper. It would be better, however, if Mr. -Jennings himself wrote the whole editorial page.</p> - -<p>The mistake of the <i>Times</i> was in lapsing into the dulness -of respectable conservatism after its Ring fight. It -should have kept on and made a crusade against frauds -of all sorts.</p> - -<p>The <i>Herald</i> has improved since young Mr. Bennett’s -return. We are attracted toward this son of his father. -He has a passion for manly sports, and that we like. If -the shabby writers who make jest of his walking-matches -had an income of three or four hundred thousand dollars -a year, perhaps they would drive in carriages instead of -walking and dawdle away their time on beds of ease or -the gorgeous sofas of the Lotos Club. Mr. Bennett does -otherwise. He strides up Broadway with the step of an -athlete, dons his navy blue and commands his yacht, -shoots pigeons, and prefers the open air of Newport to -the confinement of the <i>Herald</i> office.</p> - -<p>The <i>World</i> is a journal which pleases us on many accounts -... but occasionally there is a bit of prurient -wit in its columns that might better be omitted. The -<i>World</i> is also too often written in too fantastic language. -Its young men seem to vie with each other in tormenting -the language. They will do better when they learn -that there is more force in simple Anglo-Saxon than in -all the words they can manufacture. We advise them -to read the Bible and Common Prayer Book. Those -books will do their souls good, anyway, and they may -also learn to write less affectedly.</p> -</div> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> was as frank in discussing its own theories -and ambitions as it was in criticising its contemporaries -for dulness and poor writing. Dana’s dream, never to be -realized, was a newspaper without advertisements. He<span class="pagenum" id="Page_300">300</span> -believed that by getting all the news, condensing it into -the smallest readable space, and adding such literary -matter as the readers’ tastes demanded, a four-page -paper might be produced with a reasonable profit from -the sales, after paper and ink, men and machinery, had -been paid for.</p> - -<p>An editorial article in the <i>Sun</i> on March 13, 1875, -was practically a prospectus of this idea:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Until Robert Bonner sagaciously foresaw a handsome -profit to be realized by excluding advertisements and -crowding a small sheet with such choice literature as -would surely attract a mighty throng of readers, never -did the owner of any serial publication so much as dream -of making both ends meet without a revenue from advertisements. -The <i>Tribune</i>, the <i>Times</i>, and the <i>Herald</i> -at length ceased to expect a profit from their circulation, -and then they came to care for large editions only so -far as they served to attract advertisers.</p> - -<p>It was then that the <i>Sun</i> conceived the idea of a daily -newspaper that should yield more satisfactory dividends -from large circulation than had ever been declared by -the journals that had looked to the organism of political -parties and to enterprising advertisers for the bulk of -their income. It saw in New York a city of sufficient -population to warrant the experiment of a two-cent -newspaper whose cost should equal that of the four-cent -dailies in every respect, the cost of white paper alone -excepted. Accordingly we produced the <i>Sun</i> on a sheet -that leaves a small margin for profit, and by restricting -the space allotted to advertisers and eliminating the verbiage -in which the eight-page dailies hide the news, we -made room in the <i>Sun</i> for not only all the real news of -the day, but for interesting literature and current political -discussion as well.</p> - -<p>It was an enterprise that the public encouraged with -avidity. The edition rapidly rose to one hundred and -twenty thousand copies daily, and it is now rising; while -the small margin of profit on that enormous circulation -makes the <i>Sun</i> able to exist without paying any special<span class="pagenum" id="Page_301">301</span> -attention to advertising—approaching very closely, in -fact, to the condition of a daily newspaper able to support -itself on the profits of its circulation alone.</p> - -<p>Only a single further step remains to be taken. That -step was recently foreshadowed in a leader in which the -<i>Sun</i> intimated that the time was not far distant in which -it would reject more advertising than it would accept. -With a daily circulation of fifty or a hundred thousand -more, there is little doubt that the <i>Sun</i> would find it -necessary to limit the advertisers as the reporters and -other writers for its columns are limited, each to a space -to be determined by the public interest in his subject.</p> - -<p>It will be a long stride in the progress of intellectual -as distinguished from commercial journalism, and the -<i>Sun</i> will probably be the first to make it, thus distancing -the successors of Raymond, Bennett, and Greeley in the -great sweepstakes for recognition as the Journal of the -Future.</p> -</div> - -<div class="center"><div class="ilb"> -<div id="ip_300a" class="figleft"> - <img src="images/i_300a.jpg" width="844" height="1516" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl">JAMES GORDON BENNETT, SR.</div></div> - -<div id="ip_300b" class="figleft noclear"> - <img src="images/i_300b.jpg" width="844" height="1516" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl">HORACE GREELEY</div></div> - -<div id="ip_300c" class="figleft noclear"> - <img src="images/i_300c.jpg" width="844" height="1516" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl">HENRY J. RAYMOND</div></div> -</div></div> - -<p>It must be remembered, in recalling the failure of -Dana’s dream of a paper <i xml:lang="fr" lang="fr">sans</i> advertising, that his mind -was not usually the port of vain dreams. He was a -practical man, with more business sense than any other -editor of his time, Bennett alone excepted. In him -imagination had not swallowed arithmetic, and there is -no possible doubt that he had good reason to believe in -the practicability of the program he so candidly outlined -to his readers. It was part and parcel of his faith -in a four-page newspaper—a faith so strong, so well -grounded on results, that for the first twenty years of -the Dana régime the <i>Sun</i> never appeared in more than -four pages, except in emergencies.</p> - -<p>In the end, of course, the scheme was beaten by the -very excellence of its originator’s qualities. The <i>Sun</i>, by -its popularity, drew more and more advertising. By its -good English, its freedom from literary shackles, and -the spirit of its staff, it attracted more and more writers -of distinction, each unwilling to be denied his place in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_302">302</span> -the <i>Sun</i>. Dana always had unlimited space for a good -story, just as the cat had an insatiable appetite for a -bad one; and thus, through his own genius, he destroyed -his own dream, but not without having almost proved -that it was possible of realisation.</p> - -<p>Dana believed that most of the newspapers of his day—particularly -in the seventies—were tiring out not only -the reader, but the writer. Commenting on a decline -in the newspaper business in the summer of 1875, the -<i>Sun</i> said:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Some of our big contemporaries have been overdoing -the thing. They seem to think that to secure circulation -it is necessary to overload the stomachs of their -readers.</p> - -<p>The American newspaper-reader demands of an editor -that he shall not give him news and discussions in heavy -chunks, but so condensed and clarified that he shall be -relieved of the necessity of wading through a treatise to -get at a fact, or spending time on a dilated essay to get -a bite at an argument.</p> - -<p>Six or seven dreary columns are filled with leading -articles, no matter whether there are subjects to discuss -of public interest, or brains at hand to treat them. Our -big contemporaries exhaust their young men and drive -them too hard. The stock of ideas is not limitless, even -in a New York newspaper office.</p> - -<p>Another thing has been bad. Men with actual capacity -of certain sorts for acceptable writing have been -frightened off from doing natural and vigorous work by -certain newspaper critics and doctrinaires who are in -distress if the literary proprieties are seemingly violated, -and if the temper and blood of the writer actually show -in his work. They measure our journalistic production -by an English standard, which lays it down as its first -and most imperative rule that editorial writing shall be -free from the characteristics of the writer. This is -ruinous to good writing, and damaging to the sincerity -of writers.... If we choose to glow or cry out in indignation,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_303">303</span> -we do so, and we are not a bit frightened at the -sound of our own voice.</p> -</div> - -<p>Dana himself had that peculiar faculty, as indescribable -as instinct, of knowing, when he saw an article in -the paper, just how much work the author of it had put -in—particularly in cases where the labour had been in -leaving out, rather than in writing. As a result of this -intuition he never drove his men. He would accept -three lines or three columns for a day’s work, and his -admiration might go out more heartily to the three lines. -As for the appearance of characteristics in men’s writing, -that was as necessary, in Dana’s opinion, as it was -wicked in the judgment of the ancient editors.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div id="toclink_304" class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_304">304</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XIV">CHAPTER XIV<br /> - -<span class="subhead">“THE SUN” AND THE GRANT SCANDALS</span></h2> -</div> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p><i>Dana’s Relentless Fight Against the Whisky Ring, Crédit -Mobilier, “Addition, Division, and Silence,” the Safe -Burglary Conspiracy and the Boss Shepherd Scandal.</i></p> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">The</span> first ten years of Dana’s service on the <i>Sun</i> were -marked by the uprooting of many public evils. To -use the mild phrasing of the historian John Fiske, “Villains -sometimes succeeded in imposing upon President -Grant, who was an honest, simple-hearted soldier without -much knowledge of the ways of the world.” To say -it more concretely, hardly a department of the national -government but was alive with fraud. The <i>Sun</i>, which -had supported Grant in the election of 1868, turned -against his administration in its first months, and for -years it continued to keep before the public the revelations -of corruption—which were easily made, so bold -were the scoundrels, so coarse their manner of theft.</p> - -<p>Among the scandals which the <i>Sun</i> either brought to -light or was most vigorous in assailing, these were the -principal:</p> - -<p>The Crédit Mobilier Scandal—This involved the -names of many Senators and Representatives who were -accused of accepting stock in the Crédit Mobilier of -America, the fiscal company organised to build the -Union Pacific Railroad, as a reward for using their -influence and votes in favour of the great enterprise.</p> - -<p>The Navy Department Scandal—In this the <i>Sun</i> accused -George M. Robeson, Secretary of the Navy, of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_305">305</span> -having permitted double payment to contractors and of -violating the law in making large purchases without -competitive bidding. Mr. Dana appeared as a witness -in the Congressional investigation of Robeson, who, in -the end, while not convicted of personal corruption, was -censured for the laxity of his official methods.</p> - -<p>The Whisky Ring—This evil combination cheated the -government out of millions of dollars. It was made up -of distillers, wholesale liquor-dealers, and employees of -the internal revenue office, these conspiring together to -avoid the payment of the liquor tax. The first attack -on the corrupt alliance was made in the <i>Sun</i> of February -3, 1872, in an article by “Sappho,” one of the <i>Sun’s</i> -Washington correspondents. Other great newspapers -took up the fight, but the <i>Sun</i> was the chief aggressor. -As a result of the exposure, two hundred and thirty-eight -men were indicted and many of them, including -the chief clerk of the Treasury Department, were sent -to prison.</p> - -<p>“Addition, Division, and Silence”—On March 20, -1867, W. H. Kemble, State Treasurer of Pennsylvania -and one of the Republican bosses, wrote the following -letter to Titian J. Coffey, a lawyer and claim-agent in -Washington:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> -<p class="in0"> -<span class="smcap">My dear Titian</span>: -</p> - -<p>Allow me to introduce to you my particular friend, -Mr. George O. Evans. He has a claim of some magnitude -that he wishes you to help him in. Put him -through as you would me. He understands addition, -division, and silence.</p> - -<p class="p0 sigright"><span class="smcap">W. H. Kemble.</span></p> -</div> - -<p>When this letter fell into the hands of the <i>Sun</i>, which -had already made war on the ring formed for the collection -of war claims, it saw in Kemble’s last four words<span class="pagenum" id="Page_306">306</span> -the sententious platform of wide-spread fraud. It -printed the letter, and kept on printing it, with that -iteration which Dana knew was of value in a crusade. -In a few months the whole country was familiar with -the phrase so suggestive of plunder.</p> - -<p>Kemble was a politician with a thick skin, but he at -last became so enraged at the repetition of “addition, -division, and silence,” whether uttered by street urchins -or printed all over America as the watchword of corruption—“honest -graft,” he would have called it, if that -phrase had then been common—that he sued out a writ -of criminal libel against Mr. Dana and had him arrested -as he was passing through Philadelphia. The -only result of this was to make the phrase more common -than before.</p> - -<p>Kemble was afterward convicted of trying to bribe -Pennsylvania legislators, and was sent to prison for a -year.</p> - -<p>The Post-Trader Scandal—William W. Belknap, -Grant’s Secretary of War, was charged with receiving -from Caleb P. Marsh fifteen hundred dollars in consideration -for the appointment of John S. Evans to maintain -a trading-establishment at Fort Sill, in the Indian -Territory. The scandal came to the surface through the -remark of Mrs. Belknap that Mrs. Evans would have -no place in society, “as she is only a post-trader’s wife,” -and the retort of Mrs. Evans, upon hearing of this, that -“a post-trader’s wife is as good as the wife of an official -who takes money for the appointment of a post-trader.”</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> laid the story of bribery wide open, and the -Senate proceeded to impeach the Secretary of War. He -escaped punishment by resigning his office, twenty-five -Senators voting “not guilty” on the ground that -Belknap’s resignation technically removed him from -the Senate’s jurisdiction. Thirty-five Senators voted<span class="pagenum" id="Page_307">307</span> -“guilty,” but a two-thirds vote was necessary to punish.</p> - -<p>The Salary Grab—This was the act of Congress of -March 3, 1873, which raised the President’s salary from -twenty-five thousand dollars to fifty thousand, and the -salaries of Senators and Representatives from five thousand -to seventy-five hundred. Its evil lay not in the -increases, but in the retroactive clause which provided -that each Congressman should receive five thousand -dollars as extra pay for the two-year term then ending. -The assaults of the <i>Sun</i> and other newspapers so -aroused public indignation that Congress was obliged -to repeal the act in January, 1874, and many Members -returned their share of the spoil to the Treasury.</p> - -<p>The Boss Shepherd Scandal—The <i>Sun</i> printed an -article from Washington accusing Alexander Shepherd, -vice-president of the Board of Public Works of the -District of Columbia, and Henry D. Cooke, governor of -the District, with having a financial interest in the -Metropolitan Paving Company, which had many street -contracts in the national capital. Shepherd and Cooke -laid a complaint of criminal libel against Mr. Dana, and -an assistant district attorney of the District of Columbia -came to New York and procured from United States -Commissioner Davenport a warrant for the editor’s -arrest.</p> - -<p>It was the intent of the prosecution to hale Dana to -a Washington police-court, where he would be tried -without a jury. Dana had gone willingly, even eagerly, -to Washington when summoned in the Robeson case, but -the Shepherd strategy was so manifestly an attempt to -railroad him that an appeal was taken to the Federal -court for the southern district of New York. The historic -decision of the district judge—Samuel Blatchford, -subsequently promoted to the United States Supreme -Court—may be summed up in one of its paragraphs:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_308">308</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The Constitution says that all trials shall be by jury, -and the accused is entitled, not to be first convicted by -a court and then to be convicted by a jury, but to be -convicted or acquitted <em>in the first instance</em> by a jury.</p> -</div> - -<p>As the <i>Sun</i> said of this decision, important to the -freedom of the individual as well as to that of the press:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Those who sought to murder liberty, where they -looked for a second Jeffreys, found a second Mansfield.</p> -</div> - -<p>The Safe Burglary Conspiracy—Columbus Alexander, -a reputable citizen of Washington, was active in -the movement to smash the Washington contractors’ -ring. He sought to bring certain contractors’ books -into court and exposed the false set that was produced. -The ringsters hired a man to go to Mr. Alexander with -a story that he could bring him the genuine books. -Then the gang, which included men in the secret-service -departments of the government, placed some of the genuine -books in the safe of the district attorney’s office and -employed three professional burglars to blow open the -safe.</p> - -<p>The books, taken from the safe, were carried to Alexander’s -home by the man who had approached him. -Close behind came police, who were prepared to arrest -Alexander as soon as he received the “stolen property.” -He was to be accused of hiring the burglars to crack -the district attorney’s safe. But the hour was early in -the morning, Alexander was sleeping the deep sleep of -the just, and the criminal rang his doorbell in vain.</p> - -<p>The ringsters then “arrested” the “thief,” and -caused him to sign a false confession, accusing Alexander; -but the failure of their theatricals had broken -the hireling’s nerve as well as their own, and the conspiracy -collapsed. Two of the hired criminals turned<span class="pagenum" id="Page_309">309</span> -state’s evidence at the trial, but the powerful politicians -of the ring were able to bring about a disagreement of -the jury.</p> - -<p>These were the greatest of the scandals which the <i>Sun</i> -exposed in its news columns and denounced on its editorial -page. It was the cry of the ringsters, and even -of some honest men, that the <i>Sun’s</i> assaults on the evils -that marred Grant’s administration were the result of -Dana’s personal dislike of the President. More specifically -it was declared that Dana was a disappointed -office-seeker, and that the place of collector of customs -at the port of New York was the office he sought.</p> - -<p>We have it on the unimpeachable testimony of General -James Harrison Wilson, the biographer of Dana, -and, with Dana, a biographer of Grant, that General -Rawlins, Grant’s most intimate friend, told Dana’s associates, -and particularly General Wilson, that Dana -was to be appointed collector. There is no evidence -that Dana ever asked Grant, or any other man, for -public office. One place, that of appraiser of merchandise -at the port of New York, was offered him, and -he refused it. The <i>Sun</i> said editorially, replying to an -insinuation made by the <i>Commercial Advertiser</i> that if -Dana had been made collector his paper would not denounce -the administration:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The idea that the editor of the <i>Sun</i>, which shines for -all, could consent to become collector of the port of -New York is extravagant and inadmissible. It would -be stepping down and out with a vengeance.</p> - -<p>And yet we do not mean that the collector of New -York need be other than an upright man. Moses H. -Grinnell was such, and Tom Murphy, though a politician, -a crony of Boss Grant, and one of the donors of -Boss Grant’s cottage, certainly never took a dollar of -money from the Federal Treasury to which he was not<span class="pagenum" id="Page_310">310</span> -entitled. General Arthur, the present collector, is a -gentleman in every sense of the word.</p> - -<p>The office of collector is respectable enough, but it is -not one that the editor of the <i>Sun</i> could desire to take -without deserving to have his conduct investigated by -a proceeding <i xml:lang="la" lang="la">de lunatico</i>.</p> -</div> - -<p>Dana and the <i>Sun</i> lost friends because of the assaults -on Grantism. The warfare was bitter and personal. -In the case of Belknap, for instance, the <i>Sun</i> was attacking -a man whom Dana, having known him as a good -soldier, had recommended for appointment as Secretary -of War. But it must be recalled that at the very -height of his antagonism to Grant, the President, Dana -never receded from his opinion that Grant, the general, -was the Union’s greatest soldier. And the <i>Sun</i> was -quick to applaud him as President when, as in currency -matters, he took a course which Dana considered right.</p> - -<p>The friends of Grant, nevertheless, turned against -Dana and his paper. Some of them, stockholders in the -Sun Printing and Publishing Association, quit the concern -when they found themselves unable to turn Dana -from his purpose. All their pleadings were vain.</p> - -<p>“A few years from now,” Dana would reply, “I shall -be willing to accept whatever judgment the nation passes -on my course of action; but now I must do as I think -right.”</p> - -<p>So far as the material prosperity of the <i>Sun</i> was concerned, -the desertion of Grant’s friends hurt it not a -whit. For every reader lost, four or five were won. -Men may stop reading a paper because it disgusts them; -they rarely quit it because it is wounding them.</p> - -<p>“I don’t read the <i>Sun</i>,” said Henry Ward Beecher -during his trial, “and don’t allow anybody to read it -to me. What’s the good of a man sticking pins into -himself?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_311">311</span></p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> made this reply to Beecher’s assertion:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Everybody reads the <i>Sun</i>—the good, that they may -be stimulated to do better; the bad, in fear and trembling -lest their wickedness shall meet its deserts.</p> -</div> - -<p>In Beecher’s case, as in Grant’s, the <i>Sun</i> believed that -it was doing a public service in laying open wrongful -conditions. In answer to one who criticised its brutal -candour about the Plymouth Church scandal the <i>Sun</i> -said:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The exposure of the moral nastiness in Brooklyn is a -salutary thing. If, when the exposure of the scandal -took place, the people had been indifferent—as indifferent -as Beecher assumed to be—and had received no -shock to their sense of purity and propriety, then the -Jeremiahs might well have bewailed the turpitude of -society and prophesied evil things for the country. -Then, indeed, the poison would have been in the whole -social atmosphere....</p> - -<p>The Plymouth pastor, if a guiltless man, has brought -all this trouble on himself by his cowardly course in -dealing with the accusations against him....</p> - -<p>If he is not a bold man, strong in the truth and in -purity, what business has he to preach the religion of -the Apostles to his fellow men—he who distributed -Sharp’s rifles to the Kansas combatants with slavery, -who denounced sin and bore his head high as a man -of freedom of thought and action? To have kept himself -consistent, he should not have dallied with Tilton -and Moulton in secret, but if entrenched in innocence -he should have dragged out their slanders and torn to -pieces their plans from the pulpit where he had preached -courage under difficulties, divine faith under sorrow, -and bold encounter with sin. This would soon have -expelled the poison lurking in the social atmosphere, -but Beecher did not do it.</p> -</div> - -<p>Perhaps Beecher’s thanks were not due to Dana, but -Grant’s surely were. It is impossible that scandals like<span class="pagenum" id="Page_312">312</span> -those of the Whisky Ring could have lain hidden forever. -If they had not been exposed when they were, -they would have come to the top later, perhaps after -Grant went out of office, and when his cry, “Let no -guilty man escape!” would have been in vain.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun’s</i> fights against the scandals of the Grant -period were no more bitter than its attacks on the -frauds attending the Presidential election of 1876, -although Dana had no cause for personal animosity -toward Hayes. The <i>Sun’s</i> chief Washington correspondent, -A. M. Gibson, who handled many of the -Grant scandals, wrote most of the news stories about -the theft of the Presidency by Mr. Hayes’s managers. -He also published in book form an official history of -the fraud.</p> - -<p>Joseph Pulitzer, then newly come from the West, was -assigned by Dana to cover the proceedings of the Electoral -Commission in semieditorial style. Pulitzer was -later, in 1878, a European correspondent of the <i>Sun</i>.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div id="toclink_313" class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_313">313</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XV">CHAPTER XV<br /> - -<span class="subhead">“THE SUN” AND “HUMAN INTEREST”</span></h2> -</div> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p><i>Something About Everything, for Everybody.—A Wonderful -Four-Page Paper.—A Comparison of the Styles of -“Sun” Reporters in Three Periods Twenty Years Apart.</i></p> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">The</span> political scandals made good reading, but the -<i>Sun</i> was not content to feed its readers on investigations. -It put a little bit of everything on their breakfast-plates—the -Moody and Sankey revivals, Mr. Keely’s -motor, which didn’t work, and young Edison’s multiple -telegraph, which did; the baseball games of the days -when Spalding pitched for Boston and Anson and Reach -were at first and second base, respectively, for the Philadelphia -Athletics; the presentation of a cup to John -Cable Heenan, the prize-fighter, as the handsomest and -best-dressed man at the ball of the Shandley Association; -an interview with Joaquin Miller on Longfellow; -the wiggles of the sea-serpent off Swampscott; a ghost-story -from Long Island, with a beautiful spook lashed -to the rigging of a spectral bark; the arrival of New -York’s first Chinese laundryman; Father Tom Burke’s -lectures on Ireland; the lectures of Tyndall on newly-discovered -phenomena of light; the billiard-matches between -Cyrille Dion and Maurice Daly; a tar-and-feathers -party in Brooklyn—the <i>Sun</i> skimmed the pan of life and -served the cream for two cents.</p> - -<p>The familiar three-story head-line, which was first -used by the <i>Sun</i> on the day of Grant’s inauguration, -and which stayed the same until long after Mr. Dana’s<span class="pagenum" id="Page_314">314</span> -death, attracted readers with the magic of the head-writers’ -art. “The Skull in the Chimney,” “Shaved by -a Lady Barber,” “A Man Hanged by Women,” “Burned -Alive for $5,000,” “The Murder in the Well,” “Death -Leap in a Theatre,” “An Aged Sinner Hanged,” “The -Duel in the Bedroom,” “Horrors of a Madhouse,” “A -Life for a Love-Letter”—none could glance at the compelling -titles of the <i>Sun</i> stories without remaining to -read. They are still fascinating in an age when lady -barbers would attract no attention.</p> - -<p>A typical <i>Sun</i> of 1874 might contain, in its four pages, -six columns about the Beecher-Tilton case; four columns -of editorial articles; a letter from Eli Perkins (Melville -DeLancey Landon) at Saratoga, declaring that the spa -was standing still commercially because of its lack of -good drinking-water; a column, also from Saratoga, describing -the defeat of Preakness by Springbok; the -latest in the strange case of Charley Ross; a column -headed “Life in the Metropolis—Dashes Here and -There by the <i>Sun’s</i> Reporters”; a column of “Sunbeams,” -a column about trout-fishing, two columns of -general news, and five columns of advertisements.</p> - -<p>Instead of Eli Perkins’s letter, there might be a -critique by Leopold Damrosch, from Baireuth, of Wagner’s -“Götterdämmerung,” just presented; or a dissection, -by “Monsieur X,” of E. A. Sothern’s <i>Dundreary</i>. -“Monsieur X” was Napoleon Leon Thiéblin, who was -for years one of the <i>Sun’s</i> most distinguished critics and -essayists. He was that kind of newspaperman who -could—and did—write on Saturday of the political news -of Bismarck and on Sunday of the crowd at Coney -Island.</p> - -<p>Thiéblin, who was of French blood, was born in St. -Petersburg in 1834. He was graduated at the Russian -Imperial Academy of Artillery, and commanded forty<span class="pagenum" id="Page_315">315</span> -pieces of cannon at the siege of Sebastopol. At the -close of the Crimean War he went to London and became -a member of the staff of the <i>Pall Mall Gazette</i>, -reporting for that journal the French side of the war -with Germany in 1870–71, and the atrocities of the -Commune, over the pen-name of “Azamet Batuk.” He -reported the Carlist War in Spain for the New York -<i>Herald</i>, and then came to America to lecture, but Dana -persuaded him to join the <i>Sun</i> staff. He contributed -to the <i>Sun</i> many articles on foreign affairs, including -a series on European journalism; “The Stranger’s Note-Book,” -which was made up of New York sketches; letters -from the Centennial Exposition at Philadelphia; -and the Wall Street letters signed “Rigolo.”</p> - -<p>In the “Sunbeams” column were crowded the vagrant -wit and wisdom of the world. The items concerned -everything from great men in European chancelleries -to organ-grinders in Nassau Street:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The mules are all dying in Arkansas.</p> - -<p>A printer in Texas has named his first-born Brevier -Fullfaced Jones.</p> - -<p>Real estate is looking up at New Orleans.</p> - -<p>Translations from Hawthorne are becoming popular -in France.</p> - -<p>Venison costs six cents a pound in St. Paul.</p> - -<p>Queen Victoria says every third woman in Cork is a -beauty.</p> - -<p>Goldwin Smith is coming to the United States.</p> - -<p>The Pope denounces short dresses.</p> -</div> - -<p>The same terseness is seen in the “Footlight Flashes,” -begun in 1876:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Clara Morris takes her lap-dog out for a daily drive.</p> - -<p>Miss Claxton is meeting with indifferent success in -“Conscience.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_316">316</span></p> - -<p>Not less than $30,000 was spent last evening in the -theatres of New York.</p> - -<p>John T. Raymond drew excellent houses as <i>Colonel -Sellers</i> at the Brooklyn Theatre.</p> - -<p>For the term of their appearance in “King Lear,” -Lawrence Barrett will receive $1,200 a week; E. E. -Sheridan, $1,000; Frederick B. Warde, $500.</p> -</div> - -<p>The interview, invented by the elder Bennett, was -becoming more and more popular. The <i>Sun</i> used it, -not only as the vehicle of acquired information, but -sometimes as the envelope of humour. Take, for -example, this bit, printed in 1875, but as fresh in style -and spirit as if it were of the product of a reporter of -1918:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p class="p1 center larger">INTERVIEWING VANDERBILT</p> - -<p class="p1 b1 center">ANOTHER REPORTER COMES AWAY FREIGHTED WITH -VALUABLE INFORMATION</p> - -<p>Commodore Vanderbilt was eighty-one years old yesterday. -He spent the day in his Fourth Avenue offices, -taking his usual drive in the afternoon. A <i>Sun</i> reporter -visited him in the evening to inquire about a favorable -time for selling a few thousands of New York Central.</p> - -<p>“This,” said the commodore, slowly and solemnly, as -he entered the drawing-room, “is my birthday.”</p> - -<p>“Indeed!” said the reporter. “Do you think the -preferred <span class="locked">stock——”</span></p> - -<p>“To-day,” the commodore interrupted, “I am eighty-one -years old. I am <span class="locked">stronger——”</span></p> - -<p>“Is there any prospect of an immediate rise?”</p> - -<p>“I have never gone into the late-supper business,” the -commodore answered, apparently not catching the drift -of the question; “and I have always been a very temperate -man. But how did you find out that this was -my birthday?”</p> - -<p>“You hinted at the fact yourself,” the reporter replied. -“Will the Erie <span class="locked">troubles——”</span></p> - -<p>“The Erie troubles will not prevent me from beginning<span class="pagenum" id="Page_317">317</span> -my eighty-second year with a young heart and a -clear conscience.”</p> - -<p>“And with the prospect of seeing a good many more -birthday anniversaries?” the reporter asked.</p> - -<p>“That, my dear boy,” said the commodore, “is one of -those things that no fellow can tell about.”</p> - -<p>“Do you think that this is a good time to sell?”</p> - -<p>“No, it’s never a good time to sell after banking-hours.”</p> - -<p>“Good evening!”</p> - -<p>“Good evening! Drop in again.”</p> -</div> - -<div id="ip_316" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 34em;"> - <img src="images/i_316a.jpg" width="1632" height="2027" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - <p>JULIAN RALPH</p> -</div></div> - -<p>How did the <i>Sun</i> reporters of the seventies compare -with those of later years? As no two reporters are alike -in vision and style, no two occasions identical in incident, -no two dramatic moments twin, it is better to make -comparison by choosing arbitrarily scenes far apart in -years, but set on similar stages, and to lay before the -reader the work of the <i>Sun</i> reporter in each case. Let -us take, because of their resemblance in public interest -and the similarity of physical surroundings, the close -of the trials, twenty years apart, of Edward S. Stokes -for the murder of James Fisk, Jr.; of Lizzie Borden for -the killing of her father and step-mother, and of Charles -Becker for the assassination of Herman Rosenthal.</p> - -<p>The following is from the <i>Sun</i> of January 6, 1873:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Stokes took his accustomed place, and his relatives -sat down facing the jurors. The judge entered and took -his place. Then, amid the most solemn silence, the -twelve jurymen filed in and seated themselves. The -awful conclusion at which they had arrived could be -read in their faces. Each juror’s name was called, and -with the usual response.</p> - -<p>The judge turned toward them, and in a low, clear -voice asked:</p> - -<p>“Gentlemen, have you agreed on a verdict?”</p> - -<p>The foreman of the jury arose and said, “We have.”</p> - -<p>Clerk of the Court: “Gentlemen of the jury, rise.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_318">318</span> -Prisoner, stand up. Gentlemen of the jury, look upon -the prisoner. Prisoner, look upon the jury. What say -you, gentlemen of the jury? Do you find the prisoner -at the bar guilty or not guilty?”</p> - -<p>Foreman of the Jury: “Guilty of murder in the first -degree.”</p> - -<p>A passionate wail that made men’s hearts leap rose -from the group that clustered round the prisoner, and -the head of the horror-stricken girl, from whose bosom -the anguished cry was rent, fell upon the shoulder of -her doomed brother.</p> - -<p>The jury was polled by request of the prisoner’s counsel. -No sooner had the last man answered “Yes” to -the question whether all agreed on the verdict than the -prisoner, erect and firm, turned his face full upon Mr. -Beach (of the prosecution), who at one time had been -his counsel in a civil case.</p> - -<p>“Mr. Beach,” the prisoner said, slowly and in a full-toned -voice, “you have done your work well. I hope -you have been well paid for it.”</p> - -<p>Then the prisoner sank slowly into his seat. Mr. -Beach made no reply. Mr. Fellows, assistant district -attorney, explained that he had refused to try the case -unless Mr. Beach and Mr. Fullerton were associated -with him. They had consented to join him at the request -of District Attorney Garvin, and without any fee -from any member of Colonel Fisk’s family.</p> - -<p>The prisoner half-arose and, sweeping the air with his -clenched fist, said:</p> - -<p>“Mr. Fellows, say that they were hired by Jay Gould. -Please say that!”</p> - -<p>The sensation in court was such as is seldom known. -You could hear it as you hear the wind stirring the trees -of the forest. Then the court discharged the jury and -the people began to move.</p> -</div> - -<p>The following was printed in the <i>Sun</i> of June 21, -1893, under date of New Bedford, Massachusetts:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>“Lizzie Andrew Borden,” said the clerk of the court, -“stand up!”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_319">319</span></p> - -<p>She arose unsteadily, with a face as white as -marble.</p> - -<p>“Gentlemen, have you agreed upon a verdict?” said -the clerk to the jury.</p> - -<p>It was so still in court that the flutter of two fans -made a great noise.</p> - -<p>“We have,” said Foreman Richards boldly.</p> - -<p>The prisoner was gripping the rail in front of the -dock as if her standing up depended upon its keeping -its place.</p> - -<p>“Lizzie Andrew Borden,” said the clerk, “hold up -your right hand. Jurors, look upon the prisoner. -Prisoner, look upon the foreman.”</p> - -<p>Every juryman stood at right-about-face, staring at -the woman. There was such a gentle, kindly light beaming -in every eye that no one questioned the verdict that -was to be uttered. But God save every woman from -the feelings that Lizzie Borden showed in the return -look she cast upon that jury! It was what is pictured -as the rolling gaze of a dying person. She seemed not -to have the power to move her eyes directly where she -was told to, and they swung all around in her head. -They looked at the ceiling; they looked at everything, -but they saw nothing. It was a horrible, a pitiful sight, -to see her then.</p> - -<p>“What say you, Mr. Foreman?” said the gentle old -clerk.</p> - -<p>“Not guilty!” shouted Mr. Richards.</p> - -<p>At the words the wretched woman fell quicker than -ever an ox fell in the stockyards of Chicago. Her forehead -crashed against the heavy walnut rail so as to -shake the reporter of the <i>Sun</i> who sat next to her, twelve -feet away, leaning on the rail. It seemed that she must -be stunned, but she was not. Quickly, with an unconscious -movement, she flung up both arms, threw them -over the rail, and pressed them under her face so that it -rested on them. What followed was mere mockery, but -it was the well-governed order of the court and had to -be gone through with.</p> -</div> - -<p>And finally, this is from the <i>Sun</i> of May 23, 1914:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_320">320</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>“Charles Becker to the bar!”</p> - -<p>Once more the door that gives entrance toward the -Tombs as well as to the jury-room was opened. A -deputy sheriff appeared, then Becker, then a second -deputy. One glance was all you needed to see that -Becker had himself under magnificent control. His -iron nerve was not bending. He swung with long -strides around the walls and came to a stand at the -railing. Those who watched him did not see a sign -of agitation. He was breathing slowly—you could see -that from the rise and fall of his powerful chest—and -smiling slightly as he glanced toward his counsel.</p> - -<p>He looked for the first time toward the jurors. There -was confidence and hope shining in his eyes. Coolly, -without haste, he studied the face of every man in the -box. Not one of them met his eye. Foreman Blagden -gazed at the floor. Frederick G. Barrett, Sr., juror No. -12, studied the ceiling. The others gazed into space or -turned their glance toward the justice.</p> - -<p>There was the most perfect silence in the court-room. -The movements of trolley-cars in Centre Street made a -noise like rolling thunder. A pneumatic riveter at work -on a building close by set up a tremendous din.</p> - -<p>And yet such sounds and annoyances were forgotten, -ceased to be of consequence, when Clerk Penny bent -toward the foreman and slowly put the customary question:</p> - -<p>“Gentlemen of the jury, have you agreed upon your -verdict?”</p> - -<p>Mr. Blagden’s reply was barely audible; many in the -room sensed its import, but failed to grasp the actual -words. It was obvious that the foreman, having to -express the will of his associates, was stirred by such -feeling as seldom comes to any man.</p> - -<p>“Guilty as charged in the indictment,” he breathed -more than spoke.</p> - -<p>Becker’s right hand was then gripped to the railing. -He held his straw hat in his left hand, which, as his -arm was bent backward and upward, rested against the -small of his back. It is the plain truth that he took the -blow without a quiver. After a second, it may be, he<span class="pagenum" id="Page_321">321</span> -coughed just a little; a mere clearing of the throat. -But his mouth was firm. His dark face lost no vestige -of color. His black eyes turned toward the jurymen, -who still avoided his glance, who looked everywhere but -at the man they had condemned.</p> -</div> - -<p>If comment were needed, it would be that the <i>Sun</i> -reporter in the court-room at New Bedford had the advantage -of describing a protagonist who, by her sex and -by the very mystery that was left unsolved at her acquittal, -was a far more dramatic figure than Stokes or -the police lieutenant. The climaxes quoted are useful -as an illustration of the advance of reporting from 1873, -when the <i>Sun</i> style was still forming, to 1893 and 1914, -when it was fully formed; not as a comparison between -what may not have been the best work of the reporter of -the Stokes trial, Henry Mann, and the stories by Julian -Ralph, who saw Lizzie Borden fall, and Edwin C. Hill, -who wrote the Becker article.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> omitted the weary introductions that had -been the fashion in newspapers—leading paragraphs -which told over again what was in the head-lines and -were merely a prelude to a third and detailed telling. -The <i>Sun</i> reporter began at the beginning, thus:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The Hon. John Kelly, wearing a small bouquet in the -lapel of his coat, stepped out of his coach in front of -Cardinal McCloskey’s residence in Madison Avenue just -before eight o’clock yesterday morning. A few minutes -later three other coaches arrived, and their occupants -entered the house. Many of the neighbors knew that a -niece of the cardinal was to be married to Mr. Kelly, and -they strained their eyes through plate-glass windows in -the hope that they might see the bride and the groom. -Cardinal McCloskey, having been apprized of the arrival -of the wedding-party, went to the chapel in the other -part of the house, and at about a quarter past eight,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_322">322</span> -the time fixed for the mass <i xml:lang="la" lang="la">pro sponsis</i>, the marriage -ceremony was begun.</p> -</div> - -<p>In the longer and more important stories, the rule -was adhered to as closely as possible. Prolixity, fine -writing, and hysteria were taboo. Mark the calmness -with which the <i>Sun</i> reporter began his story of the most -sensational crime of the late seventies:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Two little mounds of red-colored earth around a small -hole in the ground, and a few feet of downtrodden grass, -were all that marked the last resting-place of Alexander -T. Stewart yesterday morning. In the dead of the night -robbers had dug into the earth above the vault, removed -one of the stones that covered it, and stolen the body of -the dead millionaire.</p> -</div> - -<p>The human lights of life were caught by the <i>Sun</i> men -and transferred to every page of every issue. In 1878 -a <i>Sun</i> reporter was sent to Menlo Park, New Jersey, to -see how a young inventor there, who had just announced -the possibility of an incandescent electric light, worked:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Here Mr. Edison dropped his cigar-stump from his -mouth, and, turning to Griffin, asked for some chewing-tobacco. -The private secretary drew open his drawer -and passed out a yellow cake as large as a dinner-plate. -The professor tore away a chew, saying:</p> - -<p>“I am partly indebted to the <i>Sun</i> for this tobacco. -It printed an article saying that I chewed poor tobacco. -That was so. The Lorillards saw the article and sent -me down a box of the best plug that ever went into a -man’s mouth. All the workmen have used it, and Grif -says there is a marked moral improvement in the men. -It seems, however, to have the opposite effect on Grif. -You see that he has salted away the last cake for his -own use.”</p> -</div> - -<p>Nearly forty years later <i>Sun</i> reporters still went to -see Mr. Edison borrow white magic from nature and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_323">323</span> -chewing-tobacco from his employees, and to describe -both interesting processes.</p> - -<p>With Dana’s knowledge of what people wanted to -read was mixed a curiosity, sometimes frankly expressed -in the <i>Sun</i>, as to just why they wanted to read some -things a great deal more than other things. It must be -remembered that even in the seventies and eighties not -everybody read a newspaper every day; some reserved -their pennies and their eyes for great climaxes. The -<i>Sun</i>, a paper which paid much attention to political -matters, naturally found its circulation sharply affected -by important political happenings. It sold -ninety-four thousand extra copies on the morning after -the Tilden-Hayes election—two hundred and twenty-two -thousand copies, in all, being disposed of before -eight o’clock in the morning. In 1875, when the pugilist, -John Morrissey, who was supported by the <i>Sun</i> -for the State Senate because he was anti-Tammany, -defeated Fox, the <i>Sun</i> sold forty-nine thousand extra -copies on the day after the election.</p> - -<p>The assassination of the Czar Alexander II of Russia -did not sell an extra paper, but the hanging of Foster, -the “car-hook murderer,” sent the sales up seventeen -thousand. The deaths of Cornelius Vanderbilt and -Alexander T. Stewart had no effect on the <i>Sun’s</i> circulation, -the passing of Napoleon III raised it only -one thousand for the day, and the death of Pius IX -caused only four thousand irregular readers to buy the -paper; but the execution of Dolan, a murderer now -practically forgotten, sent the sales up ten thousand. -The beginning of coercive measures in Ireland by the -arrest of Michael Davitt sold no extra papers in a city -full of Irishmen, but the Fenian invasion of Canada -meant the sale of ten thousand copies more than -usual.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_324">324</span></p> - -<p>Tweed’s death caused an increase of five thousand; -the death of President Garfield, of seventy-four thousand. -Only thirteen thousand extras were sold after -the Brooklyn Theatre fire, while the Westfield steamboat -explosion sold thirty-one thousand. Twenty-one -thousand irregular readers bought the <i>Sun</i> to read -about the first blasting of Hell Gate in 1876, while -only eight thousand were interested in the fact that -Tilden had been counted out by the Electoral Commission. -The flare-up of the Beecher scandal, in -August, 1874, sold as many extras—ten thousand—as -the shooting of Fisk.</p> - -<p>The beginning of the Crédit Mobilier exposé added -only a thousand to the normal circulation, but on the -morning after a big walking-match the presses had to -run off forty thousand more than their usual daily -grist. The resignation of Roscoe Conkling and Thomas -C. Platt from the United States Senate hoisted the -circulation only two thousand, but the fight between -John L. Sullivan and Paddy Ryan meant a difference -of eleven thousand. The opening of the Centennial -Exposition in Philadelphia caused extra sales of three -thousand; an international rifle-match at Creedmoor, -ten thousand.</p> - -<p>In 1882 the <i>Sun</i> made the calculation that the average -effect of certain sorts of news in increase of circulation -was about as follows:</p> - -<table id="t324" class="tnarrow30" summary="effect of events on circulation"> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Presidential elections</td> - <td class="tdr">82,000</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">State and city elections</td> - <td class="tdr">42,000</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Last days of walking-matches</td> - <td class="tdr">25,000</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">October State elections in Presidential years</td> - <td class="tdr">21,000</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Great fires</td> - <td class="tdr">10,000</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Notable disasters</td> - <td class="tdr">9,000</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Hangings in or near New York</td> - <td class="tdr">8,000</td> -</tr> -</table> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_325">325</span></p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> expressed a curiosity to <span class="locked">know—</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Who are the eighty or ninety thousand people, not -regular readers of the <i>Sun</i>, that buy the paper after -a Presidential election? Where do they live? Do they -read the papers only after exciting events?</p> -</div> - -<p>On its fiftieth birthday—September 3, 1883—the <i>Sun</i> -printed a table showing the high-tide marks of its circulation:</p> - -<table id="t325" class="tnarrow30" summary="circulation summary"> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">November 8, 1876—Presidential election</td> - <td class="tdr">222,390</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Sept. 20, 1881—Garfield’s death</td> - <td class="tdr">212,525</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Nov. 3, 1880—Presidential election</td> - <td class="tdr">206,974</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">July 13, 1871—Orange riots</td> - <td class="tdr">192,224</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Sept. 21, 1881—Second day after Garfield’s death</td> - <td class="tdr">180,215</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Nov. 3, 1875—State and city election</td> - <td class="tdr">177,588</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">July 3, 1881—Garfield shot</td> - <td class="tdr">176,093</td> -</tr> -</table> - -<p>In the same article, a page review written by Mr. -Mitchell, the reasons for the <i>Sun’s</i> success were succinctly -given:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>No waste of words, no nonsense, plain, outspoken -expressions of honest opinion, the abolishment of the -conventional measures of news importance, the substitution -of the absolute standard of real interest to human -beings, bright and enjoyable writing, wit, philosophical -good humor, intolerance of humbug, hard -hitting from the shoulder on proper occasions—do we -not see all these qualities now in our esteemed contemporaries -on every side of us, and in every part of -the land?</p> -</div> - -<p>By this time Dana had framed a newspaper organisation -more nearly perfect than any other in America. -Grouping about him men suited to the <i>Sun</i>, to himself, -and to one another, he had created a literary world of -his own—a seeing, thinking, writing world of keen objective<span class="pagenum" id="Page_326">326</span> -vision. Men of a hundred various minds, each -with his own style, his own ambition, his own manner -of life, the <i>Sun</i> staff focused their abilities into the -one flood of light that came out every morning. It -was a bohemia of brightness, not of beer; unconventional -in its manner of seeing and writing, but not in -its collars or its way of living. The <i>Sun</i> spirit, unquenchable -then as now, burned in every corner of the -shabby old rooms. It was the spirit of unselfish devotion, -not so much to Dana or his likable lieutenants -as to the invisible god of a machine in which each man -was a pinion, meshing smoothly with his neighbour.</p> - -<p>That these pinions did mesh without friction was -due, in largest part, to Dana’s intuitive faculty of -choosing men who would “fit in” rather than men -who could merely write. It was by his choosing that -the <i>Sun</i> came to have for its editorial page writers -like W. O. Bartlett and E. P. Mitchell, M. W. Hazeltine -and N. L. Thiéblin, Henry B. Stanton and John -Swinton, James S. Pike and Fitz-Henry Warren, Paul -Dana and Thomas Hitchcock, Francis P. Church and -E. M. Kingsbury. It was by his choosing that the Sun -had managing editors like Amos J. Cummings and -Chester S. Lord, city editors like John B. Bogart and -Daniel F. Kellogg, and night city editors like Henry -W. Odion, Ambrose W. Lyman, and S. M. Clarke.</p> - -<p>Managing editors and city editors hired men, hundreds -of them, but always according to the Dana plan—first -find the man, then find the work for him. -Chester S. Lord, who took more men on the <i>Sun</i> than -any other of its executives, was fully familiar with the -Dana method when he began, in 1880, a career as managing -editor that lasted for thirty-two years of brilliant -achievement; and he followed it until he retired. He -had been on the <i>Sun</i> since 1872, shortly after he came<span class="pagenum" id="Page_327">327</span> -out of Hamilton College, and he had served as a reporter, -as editor of suburban news, as assistant night -city editor under Lyman, and as assistant managing -editor in the brief period when Ballard Smith succeeded -Cummings and Young as chief of the <i>Sun’s</i> -news department.</p> - -<p>At the beginning of his service as managing editor -Lord found himself with a staff which included Bogart, -Dr. Wood, Stillman, Odion, E. M. Rewey, Garrett -P. Serviss, and Cyrus C. Adams, all trained desk men -and most of them good reporters as well; and such -first-class reporters and correspondents as Julian -Ralph, S. S. Carvalho, Willis Holly, and E. J. Edwards. -To these, by the time the <i>Sun</i> reached its half-century -mark, had been added the great night city -editor Clarke and reporters like John R. Spears and -Arthur Brisbane. Other great newspapermen were -soon to join the army of Mr. Lord in that long campaign -of which the editor of the <i>Sun</i> said, on the occasion -of Mr. Lord’s retirement:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Every night of his ten thousand nights of service -has been a Trafalgar or a Waterloo. He has fought -ten thousand battles against the world, the flesh, and -the devil; the woman applicant, the refractory citizen, -the liar at the other end of the wire, and the ten thousand -demons which make up the great army of nervous -prostration.</p> -</div> - -<hr /> - -<div id="toclink_328" class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_328">328</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XVI">CHAPTER XVI<br /> - -<span class="subhead">“SUN” REPORTERS AND THEIR WORK</span></h2> -</div> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p><i>Cummings, Ralph, W. J. Chamberlin, Brisbane, Riggs, -Dieuaide, Spears, O. K. Davis, Irwin, Adams, Denison, -Wood, O’Malley, Hill, Cronyn.—Spanish War Work.</i></p> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">There</span> is an unconventional club which has no home -except on the one night each year when it holds -a dinner in a New York hotel. Its members are men -who have been writers on the <i>Sun</i>, and who, though they -have left the paper, love it. They meet for no purpose -except to toast the <i>Sun</i> of their day and this. They -call themselves the Sun Alumni.</p> - -<p>From the ranks of the novelists and magazine editors -and writers come men like Will Irwin, Samuel Hopkins -Adams, Robert Welles Ritchie, Albert W. Atwood, -Henry James Forman, Cameron Mackenzie, Kirk Munroe, -Charles Mason Fairbanks, Robert R. Whiting, -James L. Ford, E. J. Edwards, Arthur F. Aldridge, -George B. Mallon, Gustav Kobbé, and Frederick Kinney -Noyes.</p> - -<p>From the lists of newspaper owners and editors come -Arthur Brisbane, of the Washington <i>Times</i>; Edward -H. Mott, of the Goshen <i>Republican</i>; Frank H. Simonds, -of the New York <i>Tribune</i>; Martin J. Hutchins, of the -Chicago <i>Journal</i>; C. L. Sherman, of the Hartford -<i>Courant</i>.</p> - -<p>From the staffs of other New York newspapers come -Charles Selden, Carr V. Van Anda, and Richard V. -Oulahan, of the <i>Times</i>; William A. Willis, of the -<i>Herald</i>; Rudolph E. Block, of the <i>American</i>; J. Arthur<span class="pagenum" id="Page_329">329</span> -Seavey, of the <i>Tribune</i>; and Lindsay Denison, of the -<i>Evening World</i>.</p> - -<p>From the bench come Judges Willard Bartlett, Warren -W. Foster, and Willard H. Olmsted; from government -work, Stephen T. Mather, Robert Sterling Yard, -and E. W. Townsend; from business, Edward G. Riggs, -Willis Holly, Collin Armstrong, Oscar King Davis, -Robert Grier Cooke, John H. O’Brien, and Roy Mason. -If the racing season is over in Cuba, C. J. Fitzgerald is -present. If business on the San Diego <i>Sun</i> is not too -brisk, its editor, Clarence McGrew, crosses the continent -to be at the feast. Until his death in 1917, Franklin -Matthews, associate professor of journalism at Columbia -University, who was with the <i>Sun</i> from 1890 to 1909 in -many capacities, was one of the leading spirits of the -Alumni. Dr. Talcott Williams, chief of the school of -journalism, is another enthusiastic alumnus.</p> - -<p>These men, the outsider observes, gather and talk in -groups. The men of the eighties recall the wonders of -the four-page <i>Sun</i> and its Bogarts, Ralphs, and Cummingses. -Men of the nineties chat of the feats of “Jersey” -Chamberlin and “Commodore” Spears. The -alumni who matriculated in the present century speak -of Riggs and Irwin, Denison and O’Malley and Hill. -But all talk of the <i>Sun</i>, and of Dana and Mitchell and -Lord and Clarke.</p> - -<p>It is only when they speak of reporters that there is -a grouping of heroes. That is because it is a natural -and pleasant practice, if an illogical one, for newspapermen -of the present and previous decades to look back -to this or that period of a paper and say:</p> - -<p>“That was <em>the</em> day! The names of the men on the -staff prove it.”</p> - -<p>An old <i>Sun</i> man will point, for instance, to the <i>Sun’s</i> -roster of reporters in 1893, when the local staff included:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_330">330</span></p> - -<p class="in0 in4"> -Julian Ralph<br /> -John R. Spears<br /> -Oscar K. Davis<br /> -C. J. Fitzgerald<br /> -Carr V. Van Anda<br /> -David Graham Phillips<br /> -George B. Mallon<br /> -Samuel Hopkins Adams<br /> -Daniel F. Kellogg<br /> -C. M. Fairbanks<br /> -Lawrence Reamer<br /> -W. J. Chamberlin<br /> -Edward G. Riggs<br /> -E. W. Townsend<br /> -Rudolph E. Block<br /> -Samuel A. Wood<br /> -E. D. Beach<br /> -E. O. Chamberlin<br /> -Victor Speer<br /> -Joseph Vila<br /> -W. A. Willis<br /> -Collin Armstrong -</p> - -<p>The weak place in this sort of retrospection is that -after twenty-five years the observer’s focus is twisted. -Julian Ralph was a great reporter in 1893, but W. J. -Chamberlin, whose name is linked with Ralph’s among -great <i>Sun</i> reporters, was only just arriving. John R. -Spears had made his reputation, but Riggs’s fame as -a political writer was not yet established. Townsend -had tickled New York with his “Chimmie Fadden” -stories, but Sam Adams was a cub. Wood, Vila, and -Reamer were not as important to the <i>Sun</i> in 1893 as -they are at this writing.</p> - -<p>The men of 1893 probably agreed that there was no -staff like the staff of 1868, just as the men of 1942 may -gaze with proud regret at the staff list of 1917. Distance, -like pay-day, lends enchantment; and newspaper -history is a little more hazy than most other kinds of -history, because the men who write what happens to -other people have no time to set down what happens -to themselves.</p> - -<p>The anonymity of the <i>Sun</i> reporter has been almost -complete. If Julian Ralph had never gone into the field -of books and magazines, he would have been as little -known to the general public as the <i>Sun’s</i> best reporter -is to-day; but newspapermen would not have undervalued -him. There is better quality in the things he<span class="pagenum" id="Page_331">331</span> -wrote hastily and anonymously for the <i>Sun</i> than in -some of the eight or nine published volumes that bear -his name, and the reason for this is that he was primarily -a newspaperman.</p> - -<div id="ip_330" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 34em;"> - <img src="images/i_330a.jpg" width="1610" height="2134" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - <p>ARTHUR BRISBANE</p> -</div></div> - -<p>He entered the game at fifteen, as an apprentice in -the office of the Red Bank (New Jersey) <i>Standard</i>. At -seventeen he was a city editor and a writer of humour. -At eighteen he had founded the Red Bank <i>Leader</i>—a -failure. At nineteen he was one of the editors of the -Webster (Massachusetts) <i>Times</i>, and at twenty he was -a reporter on the New York <i>Graphic</i>. At twenty-two -he was on the <i>Sun</i>, where he remained from 1875 to -1893.</p> - -<p>Ralph was a news man who lacked none of the large -reportorial qualities. He enjoyed seeing new places -and new people. He liked to hunt news—an instinct -missing in some good writers who fail to be great reporters. -He liked to write—a taste found too seldom -among men who write well, and too frequently among -the graphomaniacs who fancy that everything is worth -writing, and that perfection lies in an infinite number -of words.</p> - -<p>Some one said of Ralph that he “could write five -thousand words about a cobblestone.” If he had done -that, it would have been an interesting cobblestone. He -had a passion for detail, but it was not the lifeless and -wearisome detail of the realistic novelist. When he -wrote half a column about a horse eating a woman’s -hat, the reader became well acquainted with the horse, -the woman, and the crowd that had looked on.</p> - -<p>Ralph was untiring in mind, legs, and fingers. He -liked the big one-man news story, such as an inauguration -or a parade, or the general introduction of a national -convention. His quiet, easy style, his ability to -cover an event of many hours and much territory, were<span class="pagenum" id="Page_332">332</span> -shown to good advantage in his description of the -funeral of General Grant in August, 1885. He wrote -it all—a full front page of small type—in about seven -hours, and with a pencil. It began:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>There have not often been gathered in one place so -many men whose names have been household words, and -whose lives have been inwoven with the history of a -grave crisis in a great nation’s life, as met yesterday -in this city. The scene was before General Grant’s -tomb in Riverside Park; the space was less than goes -to half an ordinary city block, and the names of the -actors were William T. Sherman, Joe Johnston, Phil -Sheridan, Simon B. Buckner, John A. Logan, W. S. -Hancock, Fitz John Porter, Chester A. Arthur, Thomas -A. Hendricks, John Sherman, Fitzhugh Lee, John B. -Gordon, David D. Porter, Thomas F. Bayard, John L. -Worden, and a dozen others naturally linked in the -mind with these greater men. Among them, like children -amid gray-heads, or shadows beside monuments, -were other men more newly famous, and famous only -for deeds of peace in times of quiet and plenty—a President, -an ex-President, Governors, mayors, and millionaires. -And all were paying homage to the greatest -figure of their time, whose mortal remains they pressed -around with bared, bowed heads.</p> -</div> - -<p>That was the beginning of a story of about eleven -thousand words, all written by Ralph in one evening. -It told everything that was worth reading about the -burial—the weather, the crowded line of march, the -people from out of town, the women fainting at the -curbs, the uniforms and peculiarities of the Union and -Confederate heroes who rode in the funeral train; told -everything from eight o’clock in the morning, when the -sightseers began to gather, until the bugler blew taps -and the regiments fired their salute volleys. It was -a story typical of Ralph, who saw everything, remembered<span class="pagenum" id="Page_333">333</span> -everything, wrote everything. In detail it is unlikely -that any reporter of to-day could surpass it. In -dramatic quality it has been excelled by half a dozen -<i>Sun</i> reporters, including Ralph himself.</p> - -<p>For example, there is the story of a similar event—Admiral -Dewey’s funeral—written in January, 1917, by -Thoreau Cronyn, of the <i>Sun</i>, with a dramatic climax -such as Ralph did not reach. This is the end of -Cronyn’s story—the incident of the old bugler whose -art failed him in his grief:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Chattering of spectators in the background hushed -abruptly. A light breeze, which barely rumpled the -river, set a few dry leaves tossing about the tomb of -Farragut, Dewey’s mentor at Mobile. The voice of -Chaplain Frazier could be heard repeating a prayer, -catching, and then going on smoothly.</p> - -<p>A second of silence, then the brisk call of the lieutenant -commanding the firing-squad of Annapolis cadets.</p> - -<p>“Load!”</p> - -<p>Rifles rattling.</p> - -<p>“Aim!”</p> - -<p>Rifles pointed a little upward for safety’s sake, though -the cartridges had no bullets.</p> - -<p>“Fire!”</p> - -<p>Twenty rifles snapped as one. This twice repeated—three -volleys over the tomb into which the twelve sailors -had just carried the admiral’s body.</p> - -<p>And now came the moment for Master-at-Arms -Charles Mitchell, bugler on the Olympia when Dewey -sank the Spanish fleet, to perform his last office for the -admiral. Raising the bugle to his lips and looking -straight ahead at the still open door of the tomb, he -sounded “taps.” The first three climbing notes and -the second three were perfect. Then the break and the -recovery, and the funeral was over.</p> -</div> - -<p>Julian Ralph saw more of the world, and made more -copy out of what he saw, than any other newspaperman.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_334">334</span> -While still on the <i>Sun</i> he was making books out of the -material he picked up on his assignments. In the early -nineties, while still on the <i>Sun</i> staff, he made two tours -for <i>Harper’s Magazine</i> and wrote “On Canada’s Frontier,” -“Our Great West,” and “Chicago and the World’s -Fair,” the last of which was the official book of the -Columbian Exposition. After his experiences in the -Boer War he wrote “Towards Pretoria,” “War’s -Brighter Side” (with Conan Doyle), and “An American -with Lord Roberts.” His other books are “Alone -in China,” “Dixie; or, Southern Scenes and Sketches,” -“People We Pass,” and a novel, “The Millionairess.” -He was the author of the “German Barber” sketches, -which appeared almost weekly in the <i>Sun</i> for a long -time, and which are remembered as among the genuine -examples of real humour in dialect. During the Boer -War, Ralph joined the staff of the London <i>Daily Mail</i>, -and after returning from South Africa he made his -home in London until his death in 1903.</p> - -<p>A tradition about Ralph, indicating the pleasure that -his articles gave to his own colleagues as well as to the -public, concerns one of the great football-games of the -eighties. John Spears discovered the picturesqueness -of the Yale-Princeton games, usually played on Thanksgiving -Day, and the <i>Sun</i> featured them year after year. -Reporters hungered for the job, for it meant not only -money, but the opportunity to write a fine story.</p> - -<p>When Ralph’s turn came he wrote such a good article -that the copy-desk let it run for five columns. Lord -admired it, Clarke was enthusiastic over it, and the -other men in the office took turns in reading the story -in the proofs, so happily was it turned. It was not -until the first edition was off the press that an underling, -who cared more for football than for literature, -suggested that the story ought to contain the score of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_335">335</span> -the game. Ralph had forgotten to state it, and all the -desks, absorbed in the thrill of the article itself, had -overlooked the omission.</p> - -<p>Ralph reported for the <i>Sun</i> the outrages of the Molly -Maguires in the Pennsylvania coal-fields. After the -execution of two of the outlaws for murder, he was -bold enough to follow their bodies back to their village -where they had lived, in order to describe the wake. -He was warned to leave the place before sunset, on -pain of death, and he went, for there was nothing to -be gained by staying.</p> - -<p>On another assignment, a murder mystery, the relatives -of the victim, who were ignorant and superstitious -people, suspected Ralph of being the murderer. When -he came into their house to see the body, they demanded -that he should touch it, their belief being that the body -would turn over, or the wounds reopen, if touched by -the murderer. There was an implied threat of death -for the reporter if he refused, but Ralph walked out -without complying.</p> - -<p>Ralph was a believer in the sixth sense of journalists, -that inexplicable gift by which a man, and particularly -a newspaperman, comes to a clairvoyant knowledge that -something is about to happen—in other words, an exalted -hunch. John B. Bogart, city editor in Ralph’s -<i>Sun</i> days, had this sense, and he called it a “current -of news.” He thus described its workings to Ralph:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>One day I was walking up Broadway when suddenly -a current of news came up from a cellar and enveloped -me. I felt the difference in the temperature of the air. -I tingled with the electricity or magnetism in the current. -It seemed to stop me, to turn me around, and to -force me to descend some stairs which reached up to -the street by my side.</p> - -<p>I ran down the steps, and as I did so a pistol-shot<span class="pagenum" id="Page_336">336</span> -sounded in my ears. One man had shot another, and -I found myself at the scene upon the instant.</p> -</div> - -<p>While acting as the legislative correspondent of the -<i>Sun</i> at Albany, Ralph was in the habit of walking to -one of the local parks to enjoy the view across a valley -southwest of the city. One day, while gazing across -the valley, he was seized with a desire to go to the -mountains in the distance beyond it. The impulse remained -with him for two days, and then, on the third -day, he read of a news happening that had occurred in -the mountains on the very day when the current of news -had thrilled him.</p> - -<p>Ralph reported the Dreyfus court-martial at Rennes, -in France. One morning he could not sleep after five -o’clock. As he was on his way to court he said to -George W. Steevens, of the London <i>Daily Mail</i>, who -was walking with him:</p> - -<p>“Wait a moment while I go into the telegraph office -and wire my paper that I expect exciting news to-day.”</p> - -<p>At that hour there was no apparent reason to expect -any news out of the ordinary, but it was only a few -hours later that Maître Labori, Dreyfus’s counsel, was -shot down on his way to court.</p> - -<p>Young newspapermen who are fortunate enough to -be possessed of—or by—the sixth sense must remember, -however, that it cannot be relied upon to sound the -alarm on every occasion. Mr. Bogart, who felt that -he had a friend in the current of news, kept close track -of the assignment-book. As a city editor he was unsurpassed -for his diligence in following up news stories. -One day he assigned Brainerd G. Smith, afterward professor -of journalism at Cornell, to report the first reception -given by Judge Hilton after the death of the -judge’s partner, A. T. Stewart.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_337">337</span></p> - -<p>“And above all,” Mr. Bogart wound up, “don’t leave -the house without asking Judge Hilton whether they’ve -found Stewart’s body yet.”</p> - -<p>Julian Ralph attributed his success as a journalist -chiefly to three things—a liking for his work, the ability -to get what he was sent for, and good humour. He -omitted mention of something which distinguished him -and Chamberlin and all other great reporters—hard -work. Ralph himself gives a brief but complete picture -of a day’s hard work in his description, in “The Making -of a Journalist,” of the way in which he reported the -inauguration of a President:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>I had myself called at five o’clock in the morning, -and, having a cab at hand, mounted the box with the -negro driver and traveled about the city from end to -end and side to side. I did this to see the people get -up and the trains roll in and the soldiers turn out—to -catch the capital robing like a bride for her wedding.</p> - -<p>After breakfast, eaten calmly, I made another tour -of the town, and then began to approach the subject -more closely, calling at the White House, mingling with -the crowds in the principal hotels, moving between the -Senate and the House of Representatives, to report the -hurly-burly of the closing moments of a dying administration. -I saw the old and the new President, and then -witnessed the inauguration ceremonies and the parade.</p> - -<p>Then, having seen the new family in place in the -White House, I took a hearty luncheon, and sat down -at half past one o’clock to write steadily for twelve -hours, with plenty of pencils and pads and messenger-boys -at hand, and with my notebook supplemented by -clippings from all the afternoon papers, covering details -to which I might or might not wish to refer. Cigars, a -sandwich or two at supper-time, and a stout horn of -brandy late at night were my other equipments.</p> -</div> - -<p>As Ralph remarked, that was hard work, but it was -nothing when compared with the job of reporting a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_338">338</span> -national convention. “One needs only to <em>see</em> an inauguration,” -he said. “In a national convention one -must <em>know</em>.”</p> - -<p>Wilbur J. Chamberlin’s name is not in any book of -American biography. In library indexes his name is -found only as the author of “Ordered to China,” a series -of letters he wrote to his wife while on the assignment -to report the Boxer rebellion—one of the many pieces -of <i>Sun</i> work which he did faithfully and well. He never -found time to write books, although he wished to do so. -He was a <i>Sun</i> man from the day he went on the staff, -in 1890, until the day of his death, August 14, 1901.</p> - -<p>Chamberlin was born in Great Bend, Pennsylvania, -March 12, 1866. While he was still a boy he went to -Jersey City, where he worked in newspaper offices and -became the local correspondent of several newspapers, -including the <i>Sun</i>. He came to be known as “Jersey” -Chamberlin to the <i>Sun</i> men who did not know how -much he detested the nickname. His intimates called -him Wilbur, and the office knew him generally as “W. -J.”—an easy way of distinguishing him from other -Chamberlins and Chamberlains. He lacked Ralph’s -rather distinguished personal appearance, but his strong -personality, his courage, ability, and industry overshadowed -any lack of fashion.</p> - -<p>Like Ralph, he was indefatigable. Like his brother, -E. O. Chamberlin, he let nothing stop him in the pursuit -of news. Like Henry R. Chamberlain, he had the gift -of divining rapidly the necessary details of any intricate -business with which his assignment dealt. If a bank -cashier had gone wrong, “W. J.” was the man to describe -how the sinner had manœuvred the theft; to -wring from usually unwilling sources the story which -appeared in the bank only in figures, but which must -appear in the <i>Sun</i> in terms of human life. The world<span class="pagenum" id="Page_339">339</span> -of finance was more dumb then than it is now, for Wall -Street had not learned the wisdom of uttering its own -pitiless publicity.</p> - -<p>Chamberlin had one idiosyncrasy and one hatred. -The mental peculiarity was a wish to conceal his own -age. Unlike most successful men, he wished to be -thought older than he was; and he looked older. He -was only thirty-five when he died in Carlsbad, on his -way home from China; yet he had packed into that -brief life the work of an industrious man of fifty.</p> - -<p>His single enmity was directed against cable companies, -and he had good reason to dislike them. One -day, during the Spanish-American War he boarded the -<i>Sun</i> boat, the Kanapaha, and ran to Port Antonio, -Jamaica, with an exclusive story. The women clerks -in the telegraph office took his despatch and counted -the words three times before they would start sending -it. They told Chamberlin the cost, about a hundred -dollars, which he promptly paid in cash.</p> - -<p>Three or four days later he went back to Port Antonio -with another important despatch. The cable clerk told -him that on his previous visit their count had been one -word short.</p> - -<p>“That’s all right,” said Chamberlin, and he threw -down a shilling to pay for the one word.</p> - -<p>“Thank you,” said the lady. “<em>Now</em> we can send -the message!”</p> - -<p>The cable hoodoo pursued Chamberlin to China. As -soon as he arrived in Peking he began sending important -news stories by telegraph to Tientsin, where he had left -a deposit of three hundred dollars with the cable company -that was to forward the messages to New York. -After working in Peking for two weeks, he discovered -that all his stories were lying in a pigeonhole at Tientsin; -not one had been relayed.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_340">340</span></p> - -<p>A third time an important despatch was held up overnight -because it had not been written on a regular telegraph-blank. -But Chamberlin’s most bitter grudge -against the cable companies was the result of his adding -to a message sent to the <i>Sun</i> on Christmas Eve, 1900, -the words “Madam Christmas greeting.” This was a -short way of saying, “Please call up Mrs. Chamberlin -and tell her that I wish her a Merry Christmas.” Under -the cable company’s rules nothing could be sent at the -special newspaper rate except what was intended for -publication. Chamberlin got a despatch from the manager -of the cable company as follows:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Your cable <i>Sun</i> New York December 24 words -“Madam Christmas greeting” not intended for publication. -Please explain.</p> -</div> - -<p>There was nothing for Chamberlin to do but assure -the cable manager that if the <i>Sun</i> had wished to print -“Madam Christmas greeting” in its columns it was -welcome to do so.</p> - -<p>In spite of his cable misfortunes Chamberlin got more -news to the <i>Sun</i> about the Boxer troubles than any -other correspondent obtained. He was the first reporter -in China who told the truth about the outrageous treatment -of the Chinese by some of the so-called Christians. -He was particularly frank in describing the brutality -of Count von Waldersee’s German soldiers. In November, -1900, he wrote to his wife:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>As you have probably noticed in my despatches, I -have not much use for the German soldiers anyhow. -They are a big lot of swine, if human beings ever are -swine.</p> -</div> - -<p>Chamberlin had a reputation for possessing the ability -to write any kind of a story, no matter how technical<span class="pagenum" id="Page_341">341</span> -or how delicate. Edward G. Riggs was sitting beside -him in the Populist convention of July, 1896, when the -suspenders of the sergeant-at-arms of the convention, -who was standing on a chair, cheering, surrendered to -cataclasm. Riggs turned to his colleague and said -triumphantly:</p> - -<p>“At last, W. J., there’s one story you can’t write!”</p> - -<p>But Chamberlin wrote it:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>He clutched, but he clutched too late. He dived and -grabbed once, twice, thrice, but down those trousers -slipped. Mary E. Lease was only three feet away. -Miss Mitchell, of Kansas, was less than two feet away. -Helen Gougar was almost on the spot. Mrs. Julia -Ward Pennington was just two seats off, and all around -and about him were gathered the most beautiful and -eloquent women of the convention, and every eye was -upon the unfortunate Deacon McDowell.</p> - -<p>Then he grabbed, and then again, again, and again -they eluded him. Down, down he dived. At last victory -perched on him. He got the trousers, and, with -a yank that threatened to rip them from stem to stern, -he pulled them up. At no time had the applause ceased, -nor had there been any sign of a let-up in the demonstration. -Now it was increased twofold. The women -joined in.</p> - -<p>McDowell, clutching the truant trousers closely about -him, attempted to resume his part in the demonstration, -but it was useless, and after frantic efforts to show enthusiasm -he retired to hunt up tenpenny nails. When -it was over, an indignant Populist introduced this resolution:</p> - -<p>“Resolved, that future sergeants-at-arms shall be required -to wear tights.”</p> - -<p>The chairman did not put the resolution.</p> -</div> - -<p>The number of Chamberlains and Chamberlins in the -history of American journalism is enough to create confusion. -The <i>Sun</i> alone had four at one time. They<span class="pagenum" id="Page_342">342</span> -were Wilbur J. Chamberlin and his almost equally valued -brother, Ernest O. Chamberlin, who later became -managing editor of the <i>Evening World</i>; Henry Richardson -Chamberlain, and Henry B. Chamberlin.</p> - -<p>E. O. Chamberlin went on the <i>Sun’s</i> local staff while -Wilbur was still engaged in small work in Jersey City. -In the late eighties he was a colabourer with reporters -like Daniel F. Kellogg, Edward G. Riggs, William McMurtrie -Speer, Charles W. Tyler, Robert Sterling Yard, -Samuel A. Wood, Paul Drane, and Willis Holly.</p> - -<p>Henry Richardson Chamberlain, who was born in -Peoria, Illinois, became a <i>Sun</i> reporter in May, 1889. -He was then thirty years old, and had had twelve years’ -experience in Boston and New York. In 1888 he had -served as managing editor of the New York <i>Press</i>. He -was particularly valuable to the <i>Sun</i> on the stories most -easily obtained by reporters of wide acquaintance, such -as business disasters. In 1891 he returned to Boston -to become managing editor of the Boston <i>Journal</i>, but -he was soon back on the <i>Sun</i>.</p> - -<p>In 1892 he was sent to London as the <i>Sun’s</i> correspondent -there, and it was at this post that he won his -greatest distinction. He had a news eye that looked -out over political Europe and an imagination that compelled -him to concern himself as much with the future -of the continent as with its past and present. The -Balkans and their feuds interested him strongly, and -he was forever writing of what might come from the -complications between the little states through their -own quarrels and through their tangled relations with -the powers. It was the habit of some newspapermen, -both in London and New York, to stick their tongues in -their cheeks over “H. R. C.’s war-cloud articles.”</p> - -<p>“H. R. is always seeing things,” was a common remark, -even when the logic of what he had written was<span class="pagenum" id="Page_343">343</span> -undeniable. There couldn’t be a general war in Europe, -said his critics, kindly; it was impossible.</p> - -<p>Besides having general supervision over the <i>Sun’s</i> -European news, Chamberlain personally reported the -Macedonian disturbances, the Panama Canal scandal in -France, the Russian crisis of 1906, and the Messina -earthquake. He was the author of many short stories -and of one book, “Six Thousand Tons of Gold.” He -died in London in 1911, while still in the service of the -<i>Sun</i>; still believing in the impossibility of putting off -forever the great war which so often rose in his visions.</p> - -<p>Henry B. Chamberlin’s service on the <i>Sun</i> was briefer -than that of the Chamberlin brothers or H. R. Chamberlain. -He came to New York from Chicago, where he -had been a reporter on the <i>Herald</i>, the <i>Tribune</i>, the -<i>Inter-Ocean</i>, the <i>Times</i>, and the <i>Record</i>. After 1894, -when he left the <i>Sun</i>, he was again with the Chicago -<i>Record</i>, and in that paper’s service he saw the Santiago -sea-fight from his boat—the only newspaper boat with -the American squadron.</p> - -<p>Nor must any of these Chamberlins and Chamberlains -be confused with some of their distinguished contemporaries -not of the <i>Sun</i>—Joseph Edgar Chamberlin, -who was the Cuban correspondent of the New York -<i>Evening Post</i> in 1898, and later an editorial writer on -the New York <i>Evening Mail</i> and the Boston <i>Transcript</i>; -Eugene Tyler Chamberlain, one-time editor of the Albany -<i>Argus</i>; and Samuel Selwyn Chamberlain, son of -the famous Ivory Chamberlain of the New York <i>Herald</i>, -founder of the <i>Matin</i> of Paris, and at various times -editor of the San Francisco <i>Examiner</i> and the New -York <i>American</i>.</p> - -<p>Edward G. Riggs, who left the <i>Sun</i> on February 1, -1913, to become a railroad executive, had been a <i>Sun</i> -reporter and political correspondent for twenty-eight<span class="pagenum" id="Page_344">344</span> -years. He joined the staff in 1885 as a Wall Street -reporter. Though he never lost interest in the world -of finance and its remarkable men, he soon gravitated -toward politics. He became, indeed, the best-known -writer of political news in America. He wrote at every -national convention from 1888—when Ambrose W. -Lyman, then the Washington correspondent of the <i>Sun</i>, -was at the head of a staff that included Julian Ralph -and E. O. Chamberlin—until 1912. In 1892 Ralph was -in charge of the <i>Sun’s</i> national convention work, with -Riggs as his first lieutenant; but Riggs was the <i>Sun’s</i> -top-sawyer at the conventions of 1896, 1900, 1904, 1908, -and 1912.</p> - -<p>Riggs had a closer view of the wheels of the political -machines of New York State than any other political -writer. His intimate acquaintance with Senators Platt -and Hill, Governors Odell and Flower, and the other -powers of the State brought to him one hundred per -cent of the political truths of his time—the ten per cent -that can be printed and the ninety per cent that can’t.</p> - -<p>Riggs never became a regular correspondent at either -Washington or Albany. He preferred to rove, going -where the news was. In Washington he knew and was -welcomed by Presidents Harrison, Cleveland, McKinley, -Roosevelt, and Taft; by Senators like Hanna and Quay; -by Cabinet members like Hay and Knox; by House -leaders like Reed and Bland. He knew J. P. Morgan -and William C. Whitney as well as he knew William J. -Bryan and Peffer, the Kansas Populist.</p> - -<p>Between Presidential elections, when political affairs -were quiet in New York, Riggs acted as a scout for the -<i>Sun</i> with the whole country to scan. Mr. Dana had -an unflagging interest in politics, and he relied on Riggs -to bring reports from every field from Maine to -California.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_345">345</span></p> - -<p>“Riggs,” Dana once remarked to a friend, “is my -Phil Sheridan.”</p> - -<p>It was through Riggs that Thomas C. Platt, then the -Republican master of New York State, sent word to -Dana that he would like to have the <i>Sun’s</i> idea of a -financial plank for the Republican State platform of -1896. The plank was written by Mr. Dana and the -<i>Sun’s</i> publisher—afterward owner—William M. Laffan. -It denounced the movement for the free coinage of silver -and declared in favour of the gold standard. The State -convention, held in March, adopted Dana’s plank, and -the national convention in June accepted the same ideas -in framing the platform upon which Major McKinley -was elected to the Presidency.</p> - -<p>It was Riggs who carried a message from Dana to -Platt, in 1897, asking the New York Senator to withdraw -his opposition to the nomination of Theodore -Roosevelt as Assistant Secretary of the Navy. Platt -complied, and Roosevelt got the position.</p> - -<p>Some years ago, in response to a question as to the -difference between a political reporter and a political -correspondent, Riggs wrote:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>There was a vast difference between the two. The -political reporter is he who begins at the foot of the -ladder when he reports the actual facts at a ward meeting. -The political correspondent is he who has run -the gamut of ward meetings, primaries, Assembly district, -Senate district, and Congress district conventions, -city conventions, county conventions, State conventions, -and national conventions, and who builds his articles -to his newspaper on his information of the situation -in the State or nation, based upon circumstances and -facts arising out of all of the aforesaid conventions.</p> - -<p>A political reporter and a political correspondent occupy -in newspaper life the same relative positions as -the cellar-digger and the architect in the building-trade<span class="pagenum" id="Page_346">346</span> -world. Cellar-digger is just as important in his sphere -as architect. The most superb architects were the most -superb cellar-diggers. No man can be a successful political -correspondent unless he has been a successful -political reporter. Judges are made out of lawyers, -generals and admirals out of cadets. Only the most -ordinary of human virtues are necessary for the equipment -of a successful political reporter and correspondent—cleanliness, -sobriety, honesty, and truthfulness.</p> -</div> - -<p>Writing of Riggs as the dean of American political -correspondents, Samuel G. Blythe said in the <i>Saturday -Evening Post</i>:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>He has made it his business to know men in all parts -of the country, and to know them so they will tell him -as much of the truth as they will tell anybody. He is -tenacious of his opinions and loyal to his friends. He -is jolly, good-natured, companionable, and a fine chap -to have around when he is in repose. Wherever men -spoke the English language he was known as “Riggs—of -the <i>Sun</i>.”</p> - -<p>Reputation and success in newspaper work demand -the highest and most unselfish loyalty to one’s paper. -It must be the paper first and nothing else second. -Loyalty is Riggs’s first attribute, even better than his -courage.</p> - -<p>The influence of a man like Riggs cannot be estimated. -There is no way of computing this, but there -is no person who will deny that he has been a power. -He has not had his head turned by flattery. He has -been “Riggs—of the <i>Sun</i>.”</p> -</div> - -<p>One of Mr. Riggs’s last great pieces of newspaper -work was a twenty-thousand-word history of national -conventions which appeared in the <i>Sun</i> in 1912—the -first history of its kind ever written. Mr. -Riggs was also a frequent contributor to the editorial -page.</p> - -<p>Arthur Brisbane, when he became a <i>Sun</i> reporter in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_347">347</span> -1882, was almost the youngest reporter the <i>Sun</i> had -had; he went to work on his eighteenth birthday. He -had been intensively educated in America and abroad. -In his first three or four months he was a puzzle to his -superiors, his colleagues, and perhaps to himself.</p> - -<p>“He sat around,” said one of his contemporary reporters, -“like a fellow who didn’t understand what it -was all about—and then he came out of his trance like -a shot from a gun and seemed to know everything about -everything.”</p> - -<p>Brisbane was well liked. He was a handsome, athletic -youth, interested in all lines of life and literature, -cheerful, and eager for adventurous assignment. After -two years of reportorial work he went to France to -continue certain studies, and while he was there the -<i>Sun</i> offered to him the post of London correspondent, -which he accepted.</p> - -<p>In March, 1888, when John L. Sullivan and Charley -Mitchell went to Chantilly, in France, for their celebrated -fight, Brisbane went with them and wrote a good -two-column story about it—a story that contained never -a word of pugilistic slang but a great deal of interest. -He saw the human side:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Deeply interested were the handfuls of Frenchmen -who gathered and watched from such a safe and distant -pavilion as we would select to look upon a hyena fight.</p> -</div> - -<p>And, when other reporters were deafened by the battle, -Brisbane heard the plaintive appeal of Baldock, -Mitchell’s tough second:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>“Think of the kids, Charley, the dear little kids, -a calling for you at home and a counting on you for -bread! Think what their feelings will be if you don’t -knock the ear off him, and knock it off him again!”</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_348">348</span></p> - -<p>Not but what the correspondent paid conscientious -attention to the technique of the fray:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>A detailed report of each of the thirty-nine rounds -taken by me shows that out of more than a hundred -wild rushes made by Sullivan, and of which any one -would have been followed by a knockout in Madison -Square, not half a dozen resulted in anything.</p> -</div> - -<p>A couple of years after the establishment of the -<i>Evening Sun</i> Brisbane was made its managing editor—a -big job for a man of twenty-three years. In 1890 he -went to the <i>World</i>, where he became the editor of the -Sunday magazine and the most illustrious exponent of -that startling form of graphic art which demonstrates -to the reader, without calling upon his brain for undue -effort, how much taller than the Washington Monument -would be New York’s daily consumption of dill -pickles, if piled monumentwise.</p> - -<p>Seven years later Mr. Hearst took Brisbane from -Mr. Pulitzer and made him editor of the <i>Evening Journal</i>—a -position eminently suited to his talents, for here -he was able to write as he wished in that clear, simple -style which had endeared him to the <i>Sun</i>.</p> - -<p>Brisbane’s newspaper style goes directly back to the -writing of William O. Bartlett. It has its terse, cutting -qualities, the avoidance of all but the simplest words, -and the direct drive at the object to be attained. Brisbane, -too, adopted the Dana principle that nothing was -more valuable in editorial writing, for the achievement -of a purpose, than iteration and reiteration. This was -the plan that Dana always followed in his political -battles—incessant drum-fire. Brisbane uses it now as -proprietor of the Washington <i>Times</i>, which he bought -from Frank A. Munsey, the present owner of the <i>Sun</i>, -in June, 1917.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_349">349</span></p> - -<p>John R. Spears was one of the big <i>Sun</i> men for fifteen -years. He, like Amos Cummings and Julian -Ralph, was brought up in the atmosphere of a printing-office -as a small boy; but in 1866, when he was sixteen -years old, he entered the Naval Academy at Annapolis -and spent a couple of years as a naval cadet. His -cruise around the world in a training-ship filled him -with a love of the sea that never left him. His marine -knowledge helped him and the <i>Sun</i>, for which he wrote -fine stories of the international yacht-races between the -Mayflower and the Galatea (1886) and the Volunteer -and the Thistle (1887).</p> - -<p>Spears liked wild life on land, too, and the <i>Sun</i> sent -him into the mountains of West Virginia and Kentucky -to tell of the feuds of the Hatfields and the McCoys. -He went into the Ozarks to write up the Bald Knobbers, -and he sent picturesque stories, in the eighties, from -No Man’s Land, that unappropriated strip between -Kansas and Texas which knew no law from 1850, when -it was taken from Mexico, until 1890, when it became -a part of the new State of Oklahoma.</p> - -<p>Spears was a hard worker. They said of him in the -<i>Sun</i> office that he never went out on an assignment -without bringing in the material for a special article -for the Sunday paper. He wrote several books, including -“The Gold Diggings of Cape Horn,” “The Port of -Missing Ships,” “The History of Our Navy,” “The -Story of the American Merchant Marine,” “The Story -of the New England Whalers,” and “The History of -the American Slave Trade.” He now lives in retirement -near Little Falls, New York. His son, Raymond -S. Spears, the fiction-writer, was a <i>Sun</i> reporter from -1896 to 1900.</p> - -<p>Park Row knows Erasmus D. Beach chiefly through -the book-reviews he wrote for the <i>Sun</i> during many<span class="pagenum" id="Page_350">350</span> -years, but he was a first-class reporter, too. The <i>Sun</i> -liked specialists, but no man could expect to stick to -his specialty. When Gustav Kobbé went on the <i>Sun</i> -in March, 1880, it was for the general purpose of assisting -William M. Laffan in dramatic criticism and Francis -C. Bowman in musical criticism; but his first assignment -was to go to Bellevue Hospital and investigate the -reported mistreatment of smallpox patients—a job -which he accepted like the good soldier that every good -<i>Sun</i> man is.</p> - -<p>Mr. Beach was a clever all-round writer and reporter, -with a leaning toward the purely literary side of the -business, and he had no special fondness for sports; -but the <i>Sun</i> sent him, with Christopher J. Fitzgerald -and David Graham Phillips, to report the Yale-Princeton -football-game at Eastern Park, Brooklyn, on Thanksgiving -Day, 1890—that glorious day for Yale when the -score in her favour was thirty-two to nothing. It was -the time of Heffelfinger and Poe, McClung and King. -Beach wrote an introduction which Mr. Dana classed -as Homeric. Here is a bit of it:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Great in the annals of Yale forever must be the name -of McClung. Twice within a few minutes this man has -carried the ball over the Princeton goal-line. He runs -like a deer, has the stability of footing of one of the -pyramids, and is absolutely cool in the most frightfully -exciting circumstances.</p> - -<p>A curious figure is McClung. He has just finished -a run of twenty yards, with all Princeton shoving -against him. He is steaming like a pot of porridge, -and chewing gum. His vigorously working profile is -clearly outlined against the descending sun. How dirty -he is! His paddings seem to have become loosed and -to have accumulated over his knees. He has a shield, -a sort of splint, bound upon his right shin. His long -hair is held in a band, a linen fillet, the dirtiest ever -worn.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_351">351</span></p> - -<p>He pants as a man who has run fifty miles—who has -overthrown a house. He droops slightly for a moment’s -rest, hands on knees, eyes shining with the glare -of battle, the gum catching between his grinders. A -tab on one of his ears signifies a severe injury to that -organ, an injury received in some previous match from -an opposition boot-heel, or from a slide over the rough -earth with half a dozen of the enemy seated upon him. -He has a little, sharp-featured face, squirrel-like, with -a Roman nose and eyes set near together. Brief dental -gleams illuminate his countenance in his moments of -great joyfulness.</p> -</div> - -<div id="ip_350" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 34em;"> - <img src="images/i_350a.jpg" width="1629" height="2441" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - <p>EDWARD G. RIGGS</p> -</div></div> - -<p>Dana liked Beach’s introduction because the reader -need not be a football fan to enjoy it. For the technique -of the game he who wished to follow the plays -could find all that he wanted in the stories of Fitzgerald -and Phillips.</p> - -<p>In connection with Beach’s literary accomplishments, -there is a tradition that another famous <i>Sun</i> reporter -of the eighties, Charles M. Fairbanks, was assigned to -report one of the great games at Princeton, and, although -entirely unacquainted with punts and tackles, -came back with a story complete in technical detail, -having learned the fine points of football in a few hours. -Later, in the early nineties, Fairbanks was night editor -of the paper.</p> - -<p>A <i>Sun</i> man who has been a <i>Sun</i> man from a time -to which the memory of man goeth back only with a -long pull, is Samuel A. Wood, who has been the <i>Sun’s</i> -ship-news man for more than thirty-five years. He is -a good example, too, of the <i>Sun</i> man’s anonymity, for -although he was the originator of the rhymed news story -and his little run-in lyrics have been the admiration -of American newspapermen for more than a generation, -few persons beyond Park Row have known Wood as -the author of them.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_352">352</span></p> - -<p>Although a first-class general reporter, Wood has -stuck closely to his favourite topics, the ships and the -weather. He made weather news bearable with such -bits as this:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The sun has crossed the line, and now the weather -may be vernal; that is, if no more cyclones come, like -yesterday’s, to spurn all the efforts of the spring to -come as per the classic rhymers. (Perhaps there was -a spring in those days of the good old-timers!) But -this spring sprang a fearful leak from clouded dome -supernal, and weather that should be divine might be -declared infernal; entirely too much chilliness, nocturnal -and diurnal, which prompted many citizens to -take, for woes external, the ancient spring reviver of -the old Kentucky colonel.</p> - -<p>The mercury fell down the tube a point below the -freezing, and Spring herself might be excused for shivering -and sneezing. The wind, a brisk northeaster, -howled, the sky was dark and solemn, and chills chased -one another up and down the spinal column.</p> - -<p>Oh hail, diphtherial mildness, hail, and rain, and -snow—and blossom! Perhaps the spring has really -come, and may be playing possum!</p> -</div> - -<p>Wood writes rhymeless sea-stories with the grace of -a Clark Russell. He turns to prose-verse only when -the subject particularly suits it, as for instance in the -story upon which Mr. Clarke, the night city editor, -wrote the classic head—“Snygless the Seas Are—Wiig -Rides the Waves No More—Back Come Banana Men—Skaal -to the Vikings!” This is the text:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>While off the Honduranean coast, not far from Ruatan, -the famous little fruiter Snyg on dirty weather ran. -Her skipper, Wiig, was at the helm, the boatswain hove -the lead; the air was thick; you could not see a half-ship’s -length ahead. The mate said:</p> - -<p>“Reefs of Ruatan, I think, are off our bow.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_353">353</span></p> - -<p>The skipper answered:</p> - -<p>“You are right; they’re inside of us now.”</p> - -<p>The water filled the engine-room and put the fires -out, and quickly o’er the weather rail the seas began -to spout.</p> - -<p>When dawn appeared there also came three blacks -from off the isle. They deftly managed their canoe, -each wearing but a smile; but, clever as they were, their -boat was smashed against the Snyg, and they were -promptly hauled aboard by gallant Captain Wiig.</p> - -<p>“We had thirteen aboard this ship,” the fearful cook -remarked. “I think we stand a chance for life, since -three coons have embarked. Now let our good retriever, -Nig, a life-line take ashore, and all hands of -the steamship Snyg may see New York once more.”</p> - -<p>But Nig refused to leave the ship, and so the fearless -crew the life-boat launched, but breakers stove the stout -craft through and through. Said Captain Wiig:</p> - -<p>“Though foiled by Nig, our jig’s not up, I vow; I’ve -still my gig, and I don’t care a fig—I’ll make the beach -somehow!”</p> - -<p>And Mate Charles Christian of the Snyg (who got -here yesterday) helped launch the stanch gig of the -Snyg so the crew could get away. The gig was anchored -far inshore; with raft and trolley-line all hands on the -Snyg, including Nig, were hauled safe o’er the brine.</p> - -<p>Although the Snyg, of schooner rig, will ply the waves -no more, let us hope that Wiig gets another Snyg for -the sake of the bards ashore.</p> -</div> - -<p>The <i>Sun’s</i> handling of the news of the brief war with -Spain, in 1898, has an interest beyond the mere brilliance -of its men’s work and the fact that this was the -last war in which the newspaper correspondents had -practically a free hand.</p> - -<p>For years “Cuba Libre” had been one of the <i>Sun’s</i> -fights. From the first days of his control of the paper -Mr. Dana had urged the overthrow of Spanish dominion -in the island. His support of the revolutionists went<span class="pagenum" id="Page_354">354</span> -back, as E. P. Mitchell has written, “to the dark remoteness -of the struggles a quarter of a century before -the war—the time of the Cespedes uprising, the Virginius -affair, and the variegated activities of the New -York Junta.” Mr. Mitchell adds:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The affection of the <i>Sun</i> and its editor for everything -Cuban except Spanish domination lasted quite down to -and after the second advent of Maximo Gomez; it was -never livelier than in the middle seventies.</p> - -<p>Mr. Dana was the warm friend of José Marti. He -corresponded personally (with the assistance of his -Fenian stenographer, Williams) with the leading revolutionists -actually fighting in the island. He was the -constant and unwearied intellectual resource of a swarm -of patriots, adventurers, near-filibusters, bondholding -financiers, lawyer-diplomats, and grafters operating exclusively -in Manhattan. A Latin-American accent was -a sure card of admission to the woven-bottomed chair -alongside the little round table in the inner corner room -of the series of four inhabited by the <i>Sun’s</i> entire force -of editors and reporters.</p> - -<p>We were then the foremost if not the only American -organ of Cuban independence. The executive journalistic -headquarters of the cause was just outside Mr. -Dana’s front door. The Cuba Libre editor, as I suppose -he would be styled nowadays, was a gentleman of -Latin-American origin, who bore the aggressive and appropriate -name of Rebello. The Cuba Libre “desk” -was about as depressing a seat of literary endeavor as -the telegraph-blank shelf in a country railroad station, -which it resembled in its narrowness, its dismal ink-wells, -rusty pens, and other details of disreputable -equipment. From this shelf there issued, by Mr. Dana’s -direction, many encouraging editorial remarks to Rebello’s -compatriots in the jungle.</p> -</div> - -<p>Nor was free Cuba ungrateful to the <i>Sun</i>. A few -years after the war, when Mr. Mitchell was walking -about the interior Cuban town of Camaguey, formerly<span class="pagenum" id="Page_355">355</span> -Puerto Principe, he came upon a modest little public -square, the lamp-posts of which were labelled “Plaza -Charles A. Dana.” At the corner of the church of Las -Mercedes was a tablet with the following inscription:</p> - -<p class="p1 b1 center wspace" xml:lang="es" lang="es"> -TRIBUTO DEL PUEBLO A LA MEMORIA DE<br /> -<span class="larger">CHARLES A. DANA</span><br /> -ILLUSTRE PUBLICISTA AMERICANO<br /> -DEFENSOR INFATIGABLE DE LAS<br /> -LIBERTADES CUBANAS<br /> -ABRIL 10 DE 1899 -</p> - -<p>Dana was dead, without having seen the blooming of -the flower he had watered, but Cuba had not wholly -forgotten.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>When the Maine was blown up in February, 1898, -the <i>Sun</i> began preparations to cover a war. The managing -editor, Chester S. Lord, assisted by W. J. Chamberlin, -worked out the preliminary arrangements. John -R. Spears, then thirty-eight years old and a reporter -of wide experience, particularly in matters of the sea—he -had already written “The History of Our Navy”—was -sent to Key West, the headquarters of the fleet -which was to blockade Havana. He was at Key West -some weeks before war was declared.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> chartered the steam yacht Kanapaha and -sent her at once to Key West, under the command of -Captain Packard, to take on Spears and his staff, which -included Harold M. Anderson, Nelson Lloyd, Walstein -Root, Dana H. Carroll, and others. Besides the men -named, who were to go with the Kanapaha on her voyage -with Sampson’s fleet, the <i>Sun</i> sent Oscar King Davis -with Schley’s squadron, and Thomas M. Dieuaide on -board the Texas. Dieuaide got a splendid view of the -great sea-fight of July 3, when Cervera came out of the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_356">356</span> -harbour of Santiago, and he wrote the <i>Sun’s</i> first detailed -account of the destruction of the Spanish fleet.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> men ashore in Cuba were captained by W. J. -Chamberlin, who succeeded Mr. Spears some time before -the battle of Santiago. His force included H. M. -Anderson, Carroll and Root of the <i>Sun</i>, and Henry M. -Armstrong and Acton Davies of the <i>Evening Sun</i>. -Armstrong, who was with Shafter, covered much of the -attack and investment of Santiago and the surrender -of that city. It was Chamberlin who sent to the United -States the first news of the formal surrender of Santiago, -but the message was not delivered to the <i>Sun</i>. The -government censorship gently commandeered it and -gave it out as an official bulletin. Chamberlin wrote -the story of the battle of San Juan Hill on board a -tossing boat that carried him from Siboney to the cable -station at Port Antonio.</p> - -<p>The first American flag hoisted over the Morro at -Santiago was the property of the <i>Sun</i>, but in this case -there was no government peculation. Anderson and -Acton Davies gave the flag, which was a boat ensign -from the Kanapaha, to some sailors of the Texas, and -the sailors fastened it to the Morro staff.</p> - -<p>When Schley’s squadron was united with Sampson’s -fleet, some time before the battle of Santiago, O. K. -Davis was ordered to Manila. He had the luck to sail -on the cruiser Charleston, which, on June 21, 1898, -made the conquest of the island of Guam. That famous -but bloodless victory was described by Davis in a two-page -article which was exclusively the <i>Sun’s</i>, and of -which the <i>Sun</i> said editorially on August 9, 1898:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>No such story ever has been written or ever will be -written of our conquest of the Ladrones as that of the -Sun’s correspondent, published yesterday morning. It -is the picture of a historic scene, in which not a single<span class="pagenum" id="Page_357">357</span> -detail is wanting. This far-away little isle of Guam, -so much out of the world that it had not heard of our -war with Spain, and mistook the Charleston’s shells -for an honorary salute, is now a part of the United -States of America, and destined to share in the greatness -of a progressive country. The queer Spanish governor, -who declined to go upon Captain Glass’s ship -because it would be a breach of Spanish regulations, is -now our prisoner at Manila.</p> -</div> - -<p>Dieuaide, who wrote the <i>Sun’s</i> story of the Santiago -sea-fight, is also distinguished as the author of the first -published description of St. Pierre—or, rather, of the -ashes that covered it—after that city and all but two -persons of its thirty thousand had been buried by the -eruption of Mont Pelée. The introductory paragraph -of Dieuaide’s article gives an idea of his graphic power:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p><span class="smcap">Fort de France, Martinique</span>, May 21—To-day we -saw St. Pierre, the ghastliest ghost of the modern centuries. -But yesterday the fairest of the fair of the -wondrous cities of the storied Antilles, bright, beautiful, -glorious, glistening and shimmering in her prism of -tropical radiance, an opalescent city in a setting of -towering forest and mountain, now a waste of ashen-gray -without life, form, color, shape, a drear monotone, -a dim blur on the landscape—it seems even more than -the contrast between life and death.</p> - -<p>The dead may live. St. Pierre is not alive, and never -will be. Out of shape has come a void. It is the -apotheosis of annihilation. To one who sits amid the -ruins and gazes the long miles upward over the seamed -sides of La Pelée, still thundering her terrible wrath, -may come some conception of the future ruin of the -worlds.</p> - -<p>It has been a day of sharp impressions, one cutting -into another until the memory-pad of the mind is -crossed and crisscrossed like the fissured flanks of La -Pelée herself; but most deeply graven of all, paradoxically, -is the memory of a dimness, a nothingness, an<span class="pagenum" id="Page_358">358</span> -emptiness, a lack of everything—the gray barrenness unrelieved -of what was the rainbow St. Pierre. Mont -Pelée, the most awful evidence of natural force to be -seen in the world to-day—La Pelée, majestic, terrible, -overpowering, has been in evidence from starlight to -starlight, but it is the ashen blank that was once the -city of the Saint of the Rock that stands out most -clearly in the kaleidoscopic maze slipping backward and -forward before our eyes.</p> -</div> - -<p>And thus on, without losing interest, for seven solid -columns.</p> - -<p>Will Irwin’s great page story, printed beside the -straight news of the San Francisco earthquake, is another -<i>Sun</i> classic. Irwin had the fortune to be familiar -with San Francisco, and he was able, without reference -to book or map, to give to New York, through the <i>Sun</i>, -a most vivid picture of “The City That Was.” It is -a literary companion-piece of Thomas M. Dieuaide’s -gray drawing of St. Pierre, but only the introduction -must do here:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The old San Francisco is dead. The gayest, lightest-hearted, -most pleasure-loving city of this continent, and -in many ways the most interesting and romantic, is a -horde of huddled refugees living among ruins. It may -rebuild; it probably will; but those who have known -that peculiar city by the Golden Gate, and have caught -its flavor of the “Arabian Nights” feel that it can never -be the same.</p> - -<p>It is as though a pretty, frivolous woman had passed -through a great tragedy. She survives, but she is sobered -and different. If it rises out of the ashes it must -be a modern city, much like other cities and without -its old flavor.</p> -</div> - -<p>There were less than five columns of the article, but -it told the whole story of San Francisco; not in dry -figures of commerce and paved streets, but of the people<span class="pagenum" id="Page_359">359</span> -and places that every Eastern man had longed to see, -but now never could see.</p> - -<p>Writers like Ralph and Chamberlin, Dieuaide and -Irwin, are spoken of as “star” reporters, yet the saying -that the <i>Sun</i> has no star men is not entirely fictional. -Its best reporters are, and will be, remembered -as stars, but no men were, or are, treated as stars. Big -reporters cover little stories and cubs write big ones—if -they can. A city editor does not send an inexperienced -man on an assignment that requires all the skill -of the trained reporter, yet it is <i>Sun</i> history that many -new men have turned in big stories from assignments -that appeared, at first blush, to be inconsequential. -There are always two or three so-called star men in the -office, but the days when there are two or three star -assignments are comparatively few.</p> - -<p>Let us take, arbitrarily, one day twenty-five years -ago—February 1, 1893—and see what some of the <i>Sun</i> -reporters did:</p> - -<table id="t359" summary="reports from 1893"> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Jefferson Market Court</td> - <td class="tdl">S. H. Adams</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Essex Market Court and Meeting of Irish Federalists</td> - <td class="tdl">Rudolph E. Block</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">With R. Croker at Lakewood</td> - <td class="tdl">George B. Mallon</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Custom-House News</td> - <td class="tdl">E. G. Riggs</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">City Hall News</td> - <td class="tdl">W. H. Olmsted</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Police Headquarters</td> - <td class="tdl">Robert S. Yard</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Ship News</td> - <td class="tdl">S. A. Wood</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Coroners and Post-Office</td> - <td class="tdl">W. A. Willis</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Subway Project and Murder at East Eighty-Eighth Street</td> - <td class="tdl">W. J. Chamberlin</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Magic Shell Swindle</td> - <td class="tdl">E. W. Townsend</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Condition of Police Lodging-Houses</td> - <td class="tdl">D. G. Phillips</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Carlyle Harris Case</td> - <td class="tdl">F. F. Coleman</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Fire at Koster & Bial’s</td> - <td class="tdl">John Kenny</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">Bishop McDonnell’s Trip to Rome</td> - <td class="tdl">Evans</td> -</tr> -</table> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_360">360</span></p> - -<p>To gain an impression of the variety of work which -comes to a <i>Sun</i> reporter, take the assignments given to -David Graham Phillips in the last days of his service -with the <i>Sun</i> in 1893:</p> - -<table id="t360" class="tnarrow30" summary="David Graham Phillips assignments"> -<tr> - <td class="tdc">March</td> - <td class="tdl"> 1—Joseph Jefferson’s Lecture on the Drama</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc">”</td> - <td class="tdl"> 2—Bear Hunt at Glen Cove</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc">”</td> - <td class="tdl"> 3—Special Stories for the Sunday <i>Sun</i></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc">”</td> - <td class="tdl"> 6—Obituary of W. P. Demarest</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc">”</td> - <td class="tdl"> 7—Meeting of Russian-Americans</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc">”</td> - <td class="tdl"> 8—Mystery at New Brunswick, New Jersey</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc">”</td> - <td class="tdl"> 9—Special Stories for Sunday</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc">”</td> - <td class="tdl">10—Accident in Seventy-First St. Tunnel</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc">”</td> - <td class="tdl">11—More Triplets in Cold Spring</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc">”</td> - <td class="tdl">12—Services in Old Scotch Church</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc">”</td> - <td class="tdl">13—Furniture Sale</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc">”</td> - <td class="tdl">14—Opening of Hotel Waldorf</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc">”</td> - <td class="tdl">15—Married Four Days, Then False</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc">”</td> - <td class="tdl">17—Dinner, Friendly Sons of St. Patrick</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc">”</td> - <td class="tdl">18—Parade and Show, Barnum & Bailey</td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc">”</td> - <td class="tdl">19—Church Quarrel, Rutherford, N. J.</td> -</tr> -</table> - -<p>Phillips was then one of the <i>Sun’s</i> best reporters; -not as large a figure in the office as Ralph, or Chamberlin, -or Spears, but one entitled to assignments of the -first class. A list of his assignments soon after he -joined the staff in the summer of 1890 would be monotonous—Jefferson -Market police-court day after day; -the kind of work with which the <i>Sun</i> broke in a new -man. Once on space, with eight dollars a column instead -of fifteen dollars a week, Phillips got what he -wanted—a peep at every corner of city life. In a little -more than two years as a space man he picked up much -of the material that is seen in his novels.</p> - -<p>A <i>Sun</i> man takes what comes to his lot. When W. -J. Chamberlin returned from Cuba, his first assignment -was a small police case. But a really good reporter<span class="pagenum" id="Page_361">361</span> -finds his opportunity and his “big” stories for himself.</p> - -<p>It would take a small book to give a list of the “big” -stories that the <i>Sun</i> has printed, and a five-foot shelf -of tall volumes to reprint them all. Some of them -were written leisurely, like Spears’s stories of the Bad -Lands, some in comparative ease, like Ralph’s stories -of Presidential inaugurations and the Grant funeral, -or W. J. Chamberlin’s eleven-column report of the -Dewey parade in 1899. In these latter the ease is only -comparative, for the writer’s fingers had no time to rest -in the achievement of such gigantic tasks. And the -comparison is with the work done by reporters on occasions -when there was no time to arrange ideas and -choose words; when the facts came in what would be -to the layman hopeless disorder.</p> - -<p>Such an occasion, for instance, was the burning of -the excursion steamer General Slocum, the description -of which—in the end a marvellous tale of horror—was -taken page by page from Lindsay Denison as his typewriter -milled it out. Such an occasion was Edwin C. -Hill’s opportunity to write his notable leads to the -stories of the Republic wreck in 1909 and the Titanic -disaster in 1912. But the <i>Sun</i> and <i>Sun</i> men never have -hysterics. Tragedy seems to tighten them up more -than other newspapers and newspapermen.</p> - -<p>Introductions to big stories tell the pulse of the -paper. Read, for example, the <i>Sun</i> introduction to the -great ocean tragedy of 1898:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p><span class="smcap">Halifax, Nova Scotia</span>, July 6—The steamship La -Bourgogne of the Compagnie Générale Transatlantique, -which left New York on Saturday last bound for Havre, -was sunk at five o’clock on Monday morning after a -collision with the British ship Cromartyshire in a dense -fog about sixty miles south of Sable Island. The ship -had 750 persons aboard. The number of first and second<span class="pagenum" id="Page_362">362</span> -cabin passengers was 220 and of the steerage passengers -297, a total of 517. The number of officers was -11, of the crew 222. Eleven second-cabin and 51 steerage -passengers and 104 of the crew, a total of 166, were -saved. All the officers but four, all the first-cabin passengers, -and all but one of the more than one hundred -women on board, were lost. The number of lost is believed -to be 584.</p> -</div> - -<p>This was more detailed, but not more calm than the -opening of Edwin C. Hill’s story on the loss of the -Titanic:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The greatest marine disaster in the history of ocean -traffic occurred last Sunday night, when the Titanic -of the White Star Line, the greatest steamship that ever -sailed the sea, shattered herself against an iceberg and -sank with, it is feared, fifteen hundred of her passengers -and crew in less than four hours. The monstrous -modern ships may defy wind and weather, but ice and -fog remain unconquered.</p> - -<p>Out of nearly twenty-four hundred people that the -Titanic carried, only eight hundred and sixty-six are -known to have been saved, and most of these were -women and children.</p> -</div> - -<p>Probably the most restrained lead on a <i>Sun</i> account -of a great disaster was the introduction to the article -on the Brooklyn Theatre fire of 1876:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The Brooklyn Theatre was built in September, 1871, -opened for public entertainment October 2, 1871, and -burned to the ground with the sacrifice of three hundred -lives on the night of Tuesday, December 5, 1876.</p> -</div> - -<p>Of a more literary character, yet void of excitement, -was the way Julian Ralph began his narrative of the -blizzard of March, 1888:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_363">363</span></p><div class="blockquot"> - -<p>It was as if New York had been a burning candle -upon which nature had clapped a snuffer, leaving nothing -of the city’s activities but a struggling ember.</p> -</div> - -<p>While on this subject, it is as well to say that the <i>Sun</i>, -in ordinary stories, does without introductions. “Begin -at the beginning” has been one of its unwritten rules; -or, as a veteran copy-reader remarked to a new reporter -who told it all in the first paragraph:</p> - -<p>“For the love of Mike, can’t you leave something for -the head-writer to say?”</p> - -<p>Every young newspaper man hears a good deal about -“human-interest stories.” Some of the professors of -journalism tell their pupils what human-interest stories -are; others advise the best way to know one, or to get -one. It is not evident, however, that any one has devised -an infallible formula for taking a trivial or commonplace -event and, by reason of the humour, pathos, -or liveliness thereof, lifting it to a higher plane.</p> - -<p>Amos Cummings is believed to have been the first -newspaperman to see the news value of the lost child -or the steer loose in the street. Amos himself wrote -a story about the steer. Ralph wrote another one, and -got his first job in New York on the strength of it. -Frank W. O’Malley wrote one recently, and made New -York laugh over it. But your newspaperman needs -something besides a frightened steer and some streets; -he must have “something in his noddle,” as Mr. Dana -used to say.</p> - -<p>Every reporter gets a chance to write a story about -a lost child, but there are perhaps only two lost-child -stories of the last thirty years that are remembered, -and both were <i>Sun</i> stories. David Graham Phillips -found his lost child in the Catskills and wrote an article -over which women wept. The next time a child was -lost, Phillips’s city editor sent him on the assignment, -and he fell down. The child was there, and the woods,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_364">364</span> -and the bloodhounds, but the reporter’s brain would -not turn backward and go again through the processes -that made a great story. Hill’s story, which is remembered -by its head—“A Little Child in the Dark”—will -never be repeated—by Hill.</p> - -<p>The tear-impelling article is the most difficult thing -for a good reporter to write or a bad reporter to avoid -trying to write. It might be added that good reporters -write a “sob story” only when it fastens itself on them -and demands to be written; and then they write the -facts and let the reader do the weeping. O’Malley’s -story of the killing of Policeman Gene Sheehan, which -has been reprinted from the <i>Sun</i> by several text-books -for students of journalism, is good proof of this. Practically -all of it—and it was a column long—was a -straightforward report of the story told by the policeman’s -mother. This is a part:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Mrs. Catherine Sheehan stood in the darkened parlor -of her home at 361 West Fifteenth Street late yesterday -afternoon and told her version of the murder of her son -Gene, the youthful policeman whom a thug named Billy -Morley shot in the forehead down under the Chatham -Square elevated station early yesterday morning. -Gene’s mother was thankful that her boy hadn’t killed -Billy Morley before he died, “because,” she said, “I -can say honestly, even now, that I’d rather have Gene’s -dead body brought home to me, as it will be to-night, -than to have him come to me and say, ‘Mother, I had -to kill a man this morning.’</p> - -<p>“God comfort the poor wretch that killed the boy,” -the mother went on, “because he is more unhappy to-night -than we are here. Maybe he was weak-minded -through drink. He couldn’t have known Gene, or he -wouldn’t have killed him. Did they tell you at the -Oak Street Station that the other policemen called Gene -‘Happy Sheehan’? Anything they told you about him -is true, because no one would lie about him. He was -always happy, and he was a fine-looking young man.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_365">365</span> -He always had to duck his helmet when he walked -under the gas-fixture in the hall as he went out the door.</p> - -<p>“After he went down the street yesterday I found -a little book on a chair—a little list of the streets or -something that Gene had forgot. I knew how particular -they are about such things, and I didn’t want the -boy to get in trouble, so I threw on a shawl and walked -over through Chambers Street toward the river to find -him. He was standing on a corner some place down -there near the bridge, clapping time with his hands for -a little newsy that was dancing; but he stopped clapping—struck, -Gene did, when he saw me. He laughed -when I handed him a little book and told him that was -why I’d searched for him, patting me on the shoulder -when he laughed—patting me on the shoulder.</p> - -<p>“‘It’s a bad place for you here, Gene,’ I said. ‘Then -it must be bad for you, too, mammy,’ said he; and as -he walked to the end of his beat with me—it was dark -then—he said, ‘There are lots of crooks here, mother, -and they know and hate me, and they’re afraid of me’—proud, -he said it—‘but maybe they’ll get me some -night.’</p> - -<p>“He patted me on the back and turned and walked -east toward his death. Wasn’t it strange that Gene -said that?</p> - -<p>“You know how he was killed, of course, and how—now -let me talk about it, children, if I want to. I -promised you, didn’t I, that I wouldn’t cry any more -or carry on? Well, it was five o’clock this morning -when a boy rang the bell here at the house, and I looked -out the window and said:</p> - -<p>“‘Is Gene dead?’</p> - -<p>“‘No, ma’am,’ answered the lad; ‘but they told me -to tell you he was hurt in a fire and is in the hospital.’</p> - -<p>“Jerry, my other boy, had opened the door for the -lad, and was talking to him while I dressed a bit. And -then I walked down-stairs and saw Jerry standing silent -under the gaslight; and I said again, ‘Jerry, is Gene -dead?’ And he said ‘Yes,’ and he went out.</p> - -<p>“After a while I went down to the Oak Street Station -myself, because I couldn’t wait for Jerry to come<span class="pagenum" id="Page_366">366</span> -back. The policemen all stopped talking when I came -in, and then one of them told me it was against the -rules to show me Gene at that time; but I knew the -policeman only thought I’d break down. I promised -him I wouldn’t carry on, and he took me into a room -to let me see Gene. It was Gene.”</p> -</div> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> has been richly fortunate in the humour that -has tinged its news columns since its very beginning. -Even Ben Day, with all the worries of a pioneer journalist, -made the types exact a smile from his readers. -With Dana, amusing the people was second only to instructing -them. Julian Ralph and Wilbur Chamberlin -both had the trick of putting together the bricks of fact -with the mortar of humour. Chamberlin had several -characters, like his <i>Insec’ O’Connor</i>, whose strings he -pulled and made to dance. Hardly a sea-story of Sam -Wood’s—except where there is tragedy—does not contain -something to be laughed over. Samuel Hopkins -Adams was an adept at the comic twist. Lindsay -Denison once wrote a story of a semipublic celebration -of an engagement so delightfully that the bride’s father, -perhaps the only person in New York who did not see -the humour of the affair, threatened to break the pledge -of troth, although the groom was a public character -who had courted publicity all his life.</p> - -<p>Charles Selden, as grave a reporter as ever glowered -at a poor space-bill, had a vein of structural humour -perhaps unsurpassed by any reporter. His account of -a press reception at the home of Miss Lillian Russell -has been approached in delicacy only by O’Malley’s -interview with Miss Laura Jean Libbey. Selden’s story -of the occasion when creditors took away all the furniture -of John L. Sullivan’s café—except the one chair -upon which the champion snoozed—was a model of dry, -unlaboured humour.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_367">367</span></p> - -<p>As an example of the drollness with which O’Malley -has delighted <i>Sun</i> readers for ten years, take this extract -from his report of the East Side Passover parade -of 1917, referring to Counselor Levy, the Duke of Essex -Street, whose title was conferred by the <i>Sun</i> twenty -years ago:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>It was difficult for a time to get the details of the -duke’s Passover garb, owing to the fact that the interior -of his Nile-green limousine has recently been fitted up -with book-shelves, so that the duke can be surrounded -with his law library even when motoring to and from -his office on the East Side. Furthermore, every space -not occupied by the duke and duchess and the law -library yesterday was decorated with floral set pieces -in honor of Easter, a large pillow of tuberoses inscribed -with the words “Our Duke” in purple immortelles, -and presented by the Essex Market Bar Association to -their dean, being the outstanding piece among the interior -floral decorations of the duke’s Rolls-Royce. Beside -Ittchee, the duke’s Jap valet and chauffeur, was -a large rubber-plant, which shut off the view, the rubber-plant -being the Easter gift of Solomon, Solomon, Solomon, -Solomon, Solomon and Solomon, who learned all -their law as students in the offices of the duke.</p> - -<p>Little or nothing remains to be told about the duke’s -Easter scenery. He was dressed in the mode, that’s -all—high hat, morning coat, trousers like Martin Littleton’s, -mauve spats, corn-colored gloves, patent-leather -shoes, Russian-red cravat, set off with a cameo showing -the face of Lord Chief Justice Russell in high relief. -His only distinctive mark was the absence of a gardenia -on his lapel.</p> - -<p>He was off then, waving his snakewood cane jauntily, -while the East Side scrambled after the car to try to -feel the Nile-green varnish. And with a final direction -to Ittchee, “Go around by Chauncey Depew’s house on -the way home, my good man,” the car exploded northward, -and the Passover parade on Delancey Street -officially ended for the day.</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_368">368</span></p> - -<p>There is hardly a man who has lived five years as a -<i>Sun</i> reporter but could write his own story of the <i>Sun</i> -just as he has written stories of life. Here but a few -of these men and their work have been touched. It has -been a long parade from Wisner of 1833 to Hill of 1918. -Many of the great reporters are dead, and of some of -these it may be said that their lives were shortened by -the very fever in which they won their glory. Some -passed on to other fields of endeavour. Others are -waiting to write “the best story ever printed in the -<i>Sun</i>.”</p> - -<p>What was the best story ever printed in the <i>Sun</i>? -It may be that that story has been quoted from in these -articles; and yet, if a thousand years hence some super-scientist -should invent a literary measure that would -answer the question, the crown of that high and now -unbestowable honour of authorship might fall to some -man here unmentioned and elsewhere unsung. Perhaps -it was an article only two hundred words long.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div id="toclink_369" class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_369">369</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XVII">CHAPTER XVII<br /> - -<span class="subhead">SOME GENIUS IN AN OLD ROOM</span></h2> -</div> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p><i>Lord, Managing Editor for Thirty-Turn Years.—Clarke, -Magician of the Copy Desk.—Ethics, Fair Play and Democracy.—“The -Evening Sun” and Those Who Make It.</i></p> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">For</span> forty-seven years the city or news room of the -<i>Sun</i> was on the third floor of the brick building -at the south corner of Nassau and Frankfort Streets, -a five-story house built for Tammany Hall in 1811, when -that organization found its quarters in Martling’s Tavern—a -few doors south, on part of the site of the present -Tribune Building—too small for its robust membership.</p> - -<p>In the days of Grand Sachems William Mooney, -Matthew L. Davis, Lorenzo B. Shepard, Elijah F. -Purdy, Isaac V. Fowler, Nelson J. Waterbury, and -William D. Kennedy, and the big and little bosses, -including Tweed, this third-floor room had been used -as a general meeting-hall. It was here, in 1835, that -the Locofoco—later the Equal Rights—party was born -after a conflict in which the regular Tammany men, -finding themselves in the minority, turned off the gas -and left the reformers to meet by the light of locofoco -matches. It was a room from which many a Democrat -was hurled because he preferred De Witt Clinton to -Tammany’s favourite, Martin Van Buren. Two flights -of long, straight stairs led to the ground floor. They -were hard to go up; they must have been extremely -painful to go down bouncing.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_370">370</span></p> - -<p>It was a long, wide, barnlike room, lighted by five -windows that looked upon Park Row and the City Hall. -The stout old timbers were bare in the ceiling and in -them were embedded various hooks and ring-bolts to -which, once upon a time, was attached gymnasium apparatus -used by a <em>turn verein</em>, which hired the room -when the Tammanyites did not need it.</p> - -<p>It was not a beautiful room. Mr. Dana never did -anything to improve it except in a utilitarian way, and -from the time when he bought the building from the -Tammany Society, in 1867, until it was torn down in -1915, the old place looked very much the same. Of -course, new gas-jets were added, these to be followed -by electric-light wires, until the upper air had a jungle-like -appearance, and there were rude, inexpensive desks -and telephone-booths.</p> - -<p>The floor was efficient, for it was covered with rubber -matting that deadened alike the quick footstep of Dana -and the thundering stride of pugilistic champions who -came in to see the sporting editor. But the city room’s -only ornaments were men and their genius. Here wrote -Ralph and Chamberlin, Spears and Irwin, and all -the rest of the fine reporters of the old building’s -years.</p> - -<p>Near the windows of this shabby room were the desks -of the men who planned news-hunts, chose the hunters, -and mounted their trophies. Six desks handled all the -news-matter in the old city room of the <i>Sun</i>. The -managing editor sat at a roll-top in the northwest corner, -near a door that led to Mr. Dana’s room. A little -distance to the east was the night editor’s desk. At -the large flat-top desk near the managing editor three -men sat—the cable editor, who handled all foreign news; -the “Albany man,” who edited articles from the State -and national capitals and all of New York State; and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_371">371</span> -the telegraph editor, who took care of all other wire -matter.</p> - -<div id="ip_370" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 34em;"> - <img src="images/i_370a.jpg" width="1622" height="2166" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - <p>CHESTER SANDERS LORD</p> -</div></div> - -<p>In the southwest corner of the room was a double -desk at which the city editor sat from 10 <span class="allsmcap">A.M.</span> until -5 <span class="allsmcap">P.M.</span>, when the night city editor came in. Next to -the city editor’s desk was the roll-top of the assistant -city editor, also used by the assistant night city editor. -Beyond that was the desk of the suburban or “Jersey” -editor. Nearest the door, so that the noise of ten-thousand-dollar -challenges to twenty-round combat -would not disturb the whole room, was the desk of the -sporting editor.</p> - -<p>In the fifty years that have passed since Dana bought -the <i>Sun</i>, the changes in the heads of the news departments -have been comparatively few. True, the news -office has not been as fortunate as the editorial rooms, -where only three men, Charles A. Dana, Paul Dana, -and Edward P. Mitchell, have been actual editors-in-chief; -but the list of managing editors and night city -editors is not long. Before the day of Chester S. Lord, -the managing editors were, in order: Isaac W. England, -Amos J. Cummings, William Young, and Ballard Smith. -Since Lord’s retirement the managing editors have been -James Luby, William Harris, and Keats Speed.</p> - -<p>The city editors have been John Williams, Larry -Kane, W. M. Rosebault, William Young, John B. -Bogart (1873–1890), Daniel F. Kellogg (1890–1902), -George B. Mallon (1902–1914), and Kenneth Lord, the -present city editor, a son of Chester S. Lord.</p> - -<p>The night city editors before the long reign of Selah -Merrill Clarke—of whom more will be said presently—were -Henry W. Odion, Elijah M. Rewey, and Ambrose -W. Lyman, all of whom had previously been <i>Sun</i> reporters, -and all of whom remained with the <i>Sun</i>, in -various capacities, for many years. Rewey was the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_372">372</span> -exchange editor from 1887 to 1903, and was variously -employed at other important desk posts until his death -in 1916. Since Mr. Clarke’s retirement, in 1912, the -night city editors have been Joseph W. Bishop, J. W. -Phoebus, Eugene Doane, Marion G. Scheitlin, and M. -A. Rose.</p> - -<p>The night editors of the <i>Sun</i>, whose function it is to -make up the paper and to “sit in” when the managing -editors are absent, have been Dr. John B. Wood, the -“great American condenser”; Garret P. Serviss, now -with the <i>Evening Journal</i>; Charles M. Fairbanks, Carr -V. Van Anda (1893–1904), now managing editor of the -New York <i>Times</i>; George M. Smith (1904–1912), the -present managing editor of the <i>Evening Sun</i>; and -Joseph W. Bishop.</p> - -<p>In the eighties, the nineties, and the first decade of -the present century the front corners of the city room -were occupied, six nights a week, by two men closely -identified with the <i>Sun’s</i> progress in getting and preparing -news. These, Chester S. Lord and S. M. Clarke, -were looked up to by <i>Sun</i> men, and by Park Row generally, -as essential parts of the <i>Sun</i>.</p> - -<p>Lord, through his city editors, reporters, and correspondents, -got the news. If it was metropolitan news—and -until the latter days of July, 1914, New York -was the news-centre of the world, so far as American -papers were concerned—Clarke helped to get it and -then to present it after the unapproachably artistic -manner of the <i>Sun</i>. In the years of Lord and Clarke -more than a billion copies of the <i>Sun</i> went out containing -news stories written by men whom Lord had hired -and whose work had passed beneath the hand of Clarke.</p> - -<p>Chester Sanders Lord, who was managing editor of -the <i>Sun</i> from 1880 to 1913, was born in Romulus, New -York, in 1850, the son of the Rev. Edward Lord, a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_373">373</span> -Presbyterian clergyman who was chaplain of the One -Hundred and Tenth Regiment of New York Volunteer -Infantry in the Civil War. Chester Lord studied at -Hamilton College in 1869 and 1870, and went from -college to be associate editor of the Oswego <i>Advertiser</i>. -In 1872 he came to the <i>Sun</i> as a reporter, and covered -part of Horace Greeley’s campaign for the Presidency -in that year. After nine months as a reporter he was -assigned by the managing editor, Cummings, to the suburban -desk, where he remained for four years.</p> - -<p>In the fall of 1877 he bought the Syracuse <i>Standard</i>, -but in six weeks he returned to the <i>Sun</i> and became -assistant night city editor under Ambrose W. Lyman, -the predecessor of S. M. Clarke. Ballard Smith, who -succeeded William Young as managing editor in 1878, -named Lord as his assistant, and Lord succeeded Ballard -Smith as managing editor on December 3, 1880.</p> - -<p>For thirty-three years Lord inspected applicants for -places in the news departments of the <i>Sun</i>, and decided -whether they would fit into the human structure that -Dana had built. Edward G. Riggs, who knew him as -well as any one, has written thus of him:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Like Dana, he has been a great judge of men. His -discernment has been little short of miraculous. Calm, -dispassionate, without the slightest atom of impulse, -as wise as a serpent and as gentle as a dove, Lord got -about him a staff that has been regarded by newspapermen -as the most brilliant in the country. Independent -of thought, with a placid idea of the dignity of his place, -ever ready to concede the other fellow’s point of view -even though maintaining his own, Lord was never -known in all the years of his managing editorship of -the <i>Sun</i> to utter an unkind word to any man on the -paper, no matter how humble his station.</p> -</div> - -<p>One of Lord’s notable performances as managing<span class="pagenum" id="Page_374">374</span> -editor was the perfecting of the <i>Sun’s</i> system of collecting -election returns. Before 1880 the correspondents -had sent in the election figures in a conscientious but -rather inefficient manner—by towns, or cities. Lord -picked out a reliable correspondent in each county of -New York State and gave to the chosen man the responsibility -of sending to the <i>Sun</i>, at nine o’clock on -election night, an estimate of the result in his particular -county. This was to be followed at eleven o’clock, if -necessary, with the corrected figures.</p> - -<p>“Don’t tell us how your city, or township, or village -went,” he said to the correspondents. “Let us have -your best estimate on the county. Don’t spare the telephone -or the telegraph, either to collect the returns or -to get them into the <i>Sun</i> office.”</p> - -<p>The telephone was just coming into general use for -the transmission of news, and Lord saw its possibilities -on an election night.</p> - -<p>As a result of the new system, improved from year -to year, the <i>Sun</i> became what it is—the election-night -authority on what has happened. So confident was the -<i>Sun</i> of its figures on the night of the Presidential election -of 1884 that it, alone of all the New York papers, -declared the next morning that Mr. Cleveland had defeated -Mr. Blaine, although the <i>Sun</i> had been one of -the most strenuous opponents of the Democratic candidate. -Blaine, who had wired to the <i>Sun</i> for its estimates, -got the first news of his defeat from Lord. Eight -years later, when Mr. Cleveland defeated President -Harrison, the winner’s political chief of staff, Daniel -S. Lamont, received the first tidings of the great and -unexpected victory from Mr. Lord.</p> - -<p>In the late eighties the <i>Sun</i> was supplementing its -Associated Press news service with a valuable corps of -special correspondents scattered all over America and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_375">375</span> -Europe. The news received from these <i>Sun</i> men led -to the establishment, by William M. Laffan, then publisher -of the <i>Sun</i>, of a <i>Sun</i> news agency which was -called the Laffan Bureau. This service, originated for -the purpose of covering special events in the live way -of the <i>Sun</i>, was suddenly called upon to cover the whole -news field of the world in a more comprehensive way.</p> - -<p>Lord’s part in this work, when Dana decided to break -with the Associated Press, has been graphically described -by Mr. Riggs:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>“Chester,” said Mr. Dana one afternoon early in the -nineties, leaning over Lord’s desk, “I have just torn -up my Associated Press franchise. We’ve got to have -the news of the world to-morrow morning, and we’ve -got to get it ourselves.”</p> - -<p>“Don’t let that fret you, Mr. Dana,” replied Lord. -“You’ve got a Dante class on hand to-night. You just -go home and enjoy yourself. I’ll have the news for -you all right.”</p> - -<p>Dana always said that he didn’t enjoy his Dante class -a single bit that night; but he didn’t go near the <i>Sun</i> -office, neither did he communicate with the office. He -banked on Lord, and the next morning and ever afterward -Lord made good on the independent service. He -built up the Laffan Bureau, which more recently has -become the Sun News Service, and the special correspondents -of the paper in all parts of the world see to -it that the <i>Sun</i> gets the news.</p> - -<p>A task like that which Dana thrust on Lord might -have paralyzed the average managing editor of a great -metropolitan newspaper confronted by keen and powerful -competitors. It was unheard of in journalism. It -had never been attempted before. Lord, with calm -courage and confidence, sent off thousands of telegrams -and cable despatches that night. Many were shots in -the air, but the majority were bull’s-eyes, as the next -morning’s issue of the <i>Sun</i> proved.</p> - -<p>Was Dana delighted? If you had seen him hop, -skip, and jump into the office that morning, you’d have<span class="pagenum" id="Page_376">376</span> -received your answer. When Lord turned up at his -desk in the afternoon, Dana rushed out from his chief -editor’s office, grasped him about the shoulders, and -chuckled:</p> - -<p>“Chester, you’re a brick, you’re a trump. You’re the -John L. Sullivan of newspaperdom!”</p> -</div> - -<p>The Laffan Bureau, which assimilated the old United -Press, became a news syndicate the service of which -was sought by dozens of American papers whose editors -admired the <i>Sun’s</i> manner of handling news. The Laffan -Bureau lasted until 1916, when the <i>Sun</i>, through -its purchase by Frank A. Munsey, absorbed Mr. Munsey’s -New York <i>Press</i>, which had the Associated Press -service.</p> - -<p>Among Mr. Lord’s fortunate traits as managing editor -were his ability to choose good correspondents all over -the world and his entire confidence in them after they -were selected. No matter what other correspondents -wrote, the <i>Sun</i> stood by its own men. They were on -the spot; they should know the truth as well as any -one else could.</p> - -<p>Months before Aguinaldo’s insurrection the <i>Sun</i> man -at Manila, P. G. McDonnell, kept insisting that the -Filipino chieftain would revolt. The other New York -newspapers laughed at the <i>Sun</i> for seeing ghosts, but -McDonnell was right.</p> - -<p>Newspaper readers will remember that in 1904 the -fall of Port Arthur was announced three or four times -in about as many months, and each time the <i>Sun</i> appeared -to be beaten on the news until the next day, -when it was discovered that the Russians were still -holding out. All the <i>Sun</i> did about the matter was -to notify its Tokyo correspondent, John T. Swift, that -when Port Arthur really fell it would expect to hear -from him by cable at “double urgent” rates. At midnight<span class="pagenum" id="Page_377">377</span> -of January 1, 1905, four months after these instructions -were given to Swift, the <i>Sun</i> got a “double -urgent” message:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Port Arthur fallen—<span class="smcap">Swift</span>.</p> -</div> - -<p>No other paper in New York had the news. The <i>Sun</i> -rubbed it in editorially on January 3:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Deeply conscious as we are of the deplorable lack of -modern enterprise which has hitherto deprived the <i>Sun</i> -of the distinction of repeatedly announcing the fall of -Port Arthur, we have to content ourselves with the -reflection that when finally the <i>Sun</i> did print the fall -of Port Arthur, it was so.</p> -</div> - -<p>Soon after the election of Woodrow Wilson, in 1912, -the head of the <i>Sun</i> bureau in Washington, the late -Elting A. Fowler, made the prediction that William -Jennings Bryan would be named as Secretary of State. -Nearly every other metropolitan newspaper either ignored -the story, or ridiculed it as absurd and impossible. -The <i>Sun</i> never made inquiry of Fowler as to the source -of his information. He had been a <i>Sun</i> man for ten -years, and that was enough. Fowler repeated and reiterated -that Bryan would be the head of the new -Cabinet, and sure enough, he was.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> correspondent in a city five hundred miles -from New York was covering a great murder mystery. -Every other New York newspaper of importance had -sent from two to five men to handle the story; the <i>Sun</i> -sent none. The correspondent saw that the New York -men were getting sheaves of telegrams from their newspapers, -directing them in detail how to tell the story, -and to what length; so he sent a message to the <i>Sun</i> -advising it of the large numbers of New York reporters -engaged on the mystery, and of the amount of matter<span class="pagenum" id="Page_378">378</span> -they were preparing to send. Had the <i>Sun</i> any instructions -for him? Yes, it had. The reply came -swiftly:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Use your own judgment—<span class="smcap">Chester S. Lord</span>.</p> -</div> - -<p>That was the <i>Sun</i> way, and the <i>Sun</i> printed the correspondent’s -stories, whether they were one column long, -or six. The <i>Sun</i> could not see how an editor in New -York could know more about a distant murder than a -correspondent on the spot.</p> - -<p>It was the <i>Sun’s</i> way, once a man was taken on, to -keep him as long as it could. One day Mr. Lord sent -for Samuel Hopkins Adams, then a reporter, and asked -him whether he would like to go away fishing.</p> - -<p>“A Sunday story?” inquired Adams.</p> - -<p>“No, not exactly,” said Mr. Lord. “A vacation, -rather. You’ve been fired. Go away, but come back, -say, next Tuesday, and go to work, and it’ll be all -right. Don’t worry!”</p> - -<p>Adams learned that a suit for libel had been brought -against the paper by an individual who had been made -an unpleasant figure in a police story which Adams -had written.</p> - -<p>A few days after Adams returned to his duties Mr. -Dana came out of his room and asked the city editor, -Mr. Kellogg, the name of the reporter who had written -an article to which he pointed. Kellogg told Dana that -Adams was the author, and Dana strode across the -room and bestowed upon the reporter one of his brief -and much prized commentaries of approval. Then he -looked at Adams more closely, and, with raised eyebrows, -walked to the managing editor’s desk.</p> - -<p>“Who is that young man?” he asked Mr. Lord, indicating -Adams with a movement of the head.</p> - -<p>Mr. Lord murmured something.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_379">379</span></p> - -<p>“Didn’t I order him discharged a few days ago?” -said Mr. Dana.</p> - -<p>Another but more prolonged murmur from Mr. Lord. -Adams got up from his desk to efface himself, but as -he left the room he caught the voice of Mr. Dana, a -trifle higher and a bit plaintive:</p> - -<p>“Why is it, Mr. Lord, that I never succeed in discharging -any of your bright young men?”</p> - -<p>Adams did not wait for the answer.</p> - -<p>This story, while typical of Lord, is not typical of -Dana. For every word of censure he had a hundred -words of praise. He read the paper—every line of it—for -virtues to be commended rather than for faults to -be condemned.</p> - -<p>“Who wrote the two sticks about the lame girl? A -good touch; that’s the <i>Sun</i> idea!”</p> - -<p>If a new man had written something he liked—even -a ten-line paragraph—the editor of the <i>Sun</i> would cross -the room to shake the man’s hand and say:</p> - -<p>“Good work!”</p> - -<p>The spirit he radiated was contagious. The men, -encouraged by Dana, spread faith to one another. The -“<i>Sun</i>” spirit—the envious of other newspapers were -wont to refer to those who had it as “the <i>Sun’s</i> Mutual -Admiration Society”—did and does much to make the -<i>Sun</i>. The men lived the socialism of art. If a new -reporter received a difficult assignment, ten older men -were ready to tell him, in a kindly and not at all didactic -way, how to find the short cut.</p> - -<p>Perhaps some part of the democracy of the <i>Sun</i> office -has come from the fact that men have rarely been taken -in at the top. It was Dana’s plan to catch young men -with unformed ideas of journalism and make <i>Sun</i> men -of them. They went on the paper as cubs at fifteen -dollars a week—or even as office-boys—and worked their<span class="pagenum" id="Page_380">380</span> -way to be “space men,” if they had it in their noddles.</p> - -<p>All space men were free and equal in the Jeffersonian -sense. Their pay was eight dollars a column. That -one man made one hundred and fifty dollars in a week -when his neighbour made only fifty was usually the -result, not of the system, but of the difference between -the men. Some were harder workers than others, or -better fitted by experience for more important stories; -and some were born money-makers. If a diligent reporter, -through no fault of his own, was making small -“bills,” the city editor would see to it that something -profitable fell to him—perhaps a long and easily written -Sunday article.</p> - -<p>Through changed conditions in newspaper make-up -and policies, the space system in the payment of reporters -is now practically extinct. It had good points -and bad ones. Undoubtedly it developed a large number -of men to whom a salary would not have been -attractive. Some, to whose style and activities the -space system lent itself, remained in the profession -longer than they would otherwise have stayed. On the -other hand, it was not always fair to reporters with -whom a condensed style was natural. The dynamics -of a two-inch article, the very value of which lies in -its brevity, cannot be measured with a space-rule.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun’s</i> ideas of fairness do not end with itself and -its men. It has always had a proper consideration for -the feelings of the innocent bystander. It never harms -the weak, or stoops to get news in a dishonourable or -unbecoming way. It would be hard to devise a set of -rules of newspaper ethics, but a few examples of things -that the <i>Sun</i> doesn’t do may illuminate.</p> - -<div id="ip_380" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 34em;"> - <img src="images/i_380a.jpg" width="1617" height="2138" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - <p>SELAH MERRILL CLARKE</p> -</div></div> - -<p>Soon after one of the <i>Sun’s</i> most brilliant reporters -had come on the paper, he was sent to report the wedding -of a noted sporting man and a famous stage beauty,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_381">381</span> -the marriage ceremony being performed by a picturesque -Tammany alderman. The reporter returned to the -office with a lot of amusing detail, which he recited in -brief to the night city editor.</p> - -<p>“Just the facts of the marriage, please,” said Mr. -Clarke. “The two most important events in the life -of a woman are her marriage and her death. Neither -should be treated flippantly.”</p> - -<p>Another reporter wrote an amusing story about a fat -policeman posted at the Battery, who chased a tramp -through a pool of rain-water. The policeman fell into -the water, and the tramp got away. No report of the -occurrence was made at police headquarters, but a <i>Sun</i> -man saw the incident and wrote it.</p> - -<p>“It’s an amusing story,” said Clarke to the reporter, -“but they read the papers at police headquarters, and -this policeman may be put on trial for not reporting -the escape of the hobo. Suppose we drop this classic -on the floor?”</p> - -<p>A telegraph messenger-boy once wrote a letter to the -police commissioner, telling him how to break up the -cadets (panders) of the East Side. A <i>Sun</i> man found -the lad and got an interesting interview with him.</p> - -<p>“Leave my name out, won’t you?” the messenger -said to the reporter. “If you print it, I may lose my -job.”</p> - -<p>He was told that his name was known in the <i>Sun</i> -office, but that the reporter would present his appeal.</p> - -<p>“Did you find the messenger?” Clarke asked the reporter -on his arrival.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> man replied that he had found him, and -that the interview was interesting and exclusive. Before -he had an opportunity to repeat the boy’s plea for -anonymity, Clarke said:</p> - -<p>“Is it going to hurt the boy if we print his name?<span class="pagenum" id="Page_382">382</span> -If it is, leave it out, and refer to him by a fictitious -number.”</p> - -<p>Two reporters, one from the <i>Sun</i> and one from another -big daily, went one night to interview a famous -man on an important subject. The <i>Sun</i> man returned -and wrote a brief story containing none of the big news -which it had been hoped he might get. The other newspaper -came out with some startling revelations, gleaned -from the same interview. Mr. Lord showed the rival -paper’s article to the <i>Sun</i> reporter, with a mild inquiry -as to the reason for the <i>Sun’s</i> failure to get the news.</p> - -<p>“We both gave our word,” said the reporter, “that -we would keep back that piece of news for three days, -even from our offices.”</p> - -<p>“Son,” said Mr. Lord, “you are a great man!”</p> - -<p>That was the Lord phrase of acquittal.</p> - -<p>One of the big occurrences in the investigation of the -life-insurance companies in 1905 was a report which -was read to the investigating committee in executive -session. Every newspaper yearned for the contents of -the document. After the committee adjourned, a member -of it whispered to a <i>Sun</i> reporter:</p> - -<p>“There is a bundle of those reports just inside the -door of the committee room. I should think that five -dollars given to a scrub-woman would probably get a -copy for you.”</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> man, knowing the value of the report, and -not content to act on his own estimate of <i>Sun</i> ethics, -telephoned the temptation to the city editor, Mr. Mallon.</p> - -<p>“A <i>Sun</i> man who would do that would lose his job,” -was the instant decision.</p> - -<p>A couple of days after Stephen Tyng Mather, recently -First Assistant Secretary of the Interior, went on the -<i>Sun</i> as a reporter, the city editor, Mr. Bogart, called -him to his desk.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_383">383</span></p> - -<p>“Mr. Mather,” said Bogart, “an admirer of the <i>Sun</i> -has sent me a turkey. Of course, I cannot accept it. -Please take it to his house in Harlem and explain why; -but don’t hurt his feelings.”</p> - -<p>Mather had just come from college, where he had -never learned that the ethics of journalism might require -a reporter to become a deliverer of poultry, but -he took the turkey. It does not detract from the moral -of the story to say that Mather and another young reporter, -neither quite understanding the <i>Sun’s</i> stern -code, took the bird to the Fellowcraft Club and had it -roasted—a fact of which Mr. Bogart may have been -unaware until now.</p> - -<p>The best news-handler that journalism has seen, Selah -Merrill Clarke, was night city editor of the <i>Sun</i> for -thirty-one years. He came to the paper in 1881 from -the New York <i>World</i>, where he had been employed as -a reporter, and later as a desk man. In the early seventies -he wrote for the <i>World</i> a story of a suicide, and -one of the newspapers of that day said of it that neither -Dickens nor Wilkie Collins, with all the time they could -ask, could have surpassed it. His story of the milkman’s -ride down the valley of the Mill River, warning -the inhabitants that the dam had broken at the Ashfield -reservoir, near Northampton, Massachusetts (May 16, -1874), was another classic that attracted the attention -of editors, including Dana.</p> - -<p>Clarke never thought well of himself as a reporter, -and often said that in that capacity he was a failure. -As a judge of news values, or news presentation, or as -a giver of the fine literary touch which lent to the <i>Sun’s</i> -articles that indescribable tone not found in other papers, -Clarke stood almost alone.</p> - -<p>The city editor of a New York newspaper sows seeds; -the night city editor re-seeds barren spots, waters wilting<span class="pagenum" id="Page_384">384</span> -items, and cuts and bags the harvest. The city -editor sends men out all day for news; the night city -editor judges what they bring in, and decides what space -it shall have. In the handling of a big story, on which -five or fifteen reporters may be engaged, the night city -editor has to put together as many different writings -in such a way that the reader may go smoothly from -beginning to end. Chance may decree that the poorest -writer has brought in the biggest news, and the -man on the desk must supply quality as well as judgment.</p> - -<p>At such work Clarke was a master. It has been said -of him that by the eliding stroke of his pencil and the -insertion of perhaps a single word he could change the -commonplace to literature. No reporter ever worked -on the <i>Sun</i> but wished, at one time or another, to thank -Clarke for saving him from himself. Clarke had the -faculty of seeing instantly the opportunity for improvement -that the reporter might have seen an hour or a -day later.</p> - -<p>Clarke got about New York very little, but he knew -the city from Arthur Kill to Pelham Bay; knew it just -as a general at headquarters knows the terrain on which -his troops are fighting, but which he himself has never -seen. He had the map of New York in his brain. -When an alarm of fire came in from an obscure corner, -he knew what lumber-yards or oil-refineries were near -the blaze, and whether that was a point where the water -pressure was likely to fail.</p> - -<p>Clarke’s memory was uncanny; it seemed to have -photographed every issue of the <i>Sun</i> for years. It was -a saying that while Clarke stayed the <i>Sun</i> needed -neither an index nor a “morgue”—that biographical -cabinet in which newspapers keep records of men and -affairs.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_385">385</span></p> - -<p>Twenty-five years after the Beecher-Tilton trial a -three-line death-notice came to Clarke’s desk. He read -the dead man’s name and summoned a reporter.</p> - -<p>“This man was a juror in the Beecher case,” said -Clarke. “Look in the file of February 6 or 7, 1875, -and I think you’ll find that this man stood up and made -an interruption. Write a little piece about it.”</p> - -<p>A <i>Sun</i> man who reported the funeral of Russell Sage -at Lawrence, Long Island, in July, 1906, returned to -the office and told Mr. Clarke that an acquaintance of -the Sage family had told him, on the train coming back, -the contents of the old man’s will—a document for -which the reading public eagerly waited. The reporter -laid his informant’s card before the night city editor. -Clarke studied the name on it for a minute, and then -said:</p> - -<p>“We won’t print the story. Dig out the file for June, -1899, and somewhere on the front page—I think it will -be in the third or fourth column—on the 1st or 2nd of -June you’ll find a story telling that this man was sent -to Sing Sing for forgery.”</p> - -<p>Clarke’s memory was right. Although it is anti-climactic -to relate it, the ex-convict’s description of -what the will contained was also correct.</p> - -<p>Will Irwin, while reporting a small war between two -Chinese societies, wrote an article one night about the -arrest of two Hip Sing tong men who were wearing -chain armour under their blouses. Clarke, much interested, -asked Irwin all about the armour.</p> - -<p>“It reminds me of ‘King Solomon’s Mines,’” remarked -Irwin, “and the chain armour that the heroes -had made in Sheffield to wear in Africa.”</p> - -<p>“Yes,” replied Clarke, who had not read the Haggard -novel in fifteen years; “but it wasn’t Sheffield—it was -Birmingham.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_386">386</span></p> - -<p>Clarke had a sense of responsibility that showed itself -in nervousness. On a night when news was breaking, -that nervousness was exhibited in his trips, every ten -minutes, to the ice-water tank; in the constant lighting -and relighting of his pipe; in the quick turn of his -head at the approach of a reporter. Yet his nervousness -was not contagious. So long as Clarke was nervous, -the men under him felt that they need not be. He -did all the worrying, and, unlike most worriers, got -results from it.</p> - -<p>Let him know that something had happened in the -city, and his drag-net system was started. No matter -how remote the happening, how apparently hopeless the -clue, he let neither man nor telephone rest until every -possible corner had been searched for the guilty news -item. Once the situation was in hand he would return -to the adornment of a head-line or the working out of -some abstruse problem in mathematics—perhaps the -angles of a sun-dial, for Clarke’s hobby was gnomonics, -and he knew dials from Ptolemy’s time down. As a -rest from mathematics he might write a limerick in -Greek, and then carefully tear it up.</p> - -<p>Almost every newspaper in New York tried, at one -time or another, to take Clarke from the <i>Sun</i>. One -night an emissary from one of the apostles of the then -new journalism entered the <i>Sun</i> office and sent his card -to Mr. Clarke. When the night city editor appeared, -he whispered:</p> - -<p>“Mr. —— says that if you’ll ascertain the highest -salary the <i>Sun</i> will pay you to stay, he’ll double it.”</p> - -<p>Clarke uttered the strange sound that was his indulgence -when disagreeably disturbed—a cross between -a growl and a grunt—and turned back toward his desk.</p> - -<p>“He’ll triple it!” cried the tempter.</p> - -<p>Although Clarke heard the words, he kept on to his<span class="pagenum" id="Page_387">387</span> -desk, and not only never mentioned the matter, but -probably never thought of it again.</p> - -<p>On another occasion he made a notable trip to the -gate at the entrance to the big room. A drunken visitor -was making the place ring with yells, and the office-boys -could not stop him. Clarke bore the noise for ten -minutes, and then, remarking, “This is unendurable!” -went and threw the man down the stairs.</p> - -<p>Clarke was the hero of a dozen newspaper stories, -which he scorned to read.</p> - -<p>“Do you know, Mr. Clarke,” said a reporter who did -not know how shy “the boss” was, “that Blank has -put you into a short story in <i>Space’s Magazine</i>?”</p> - -<p>“Who is Blank?” said Clarke shortly.</p> - -<p>“Why,” said his informant, “he worked here for -several weeks.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, Lord!” said Clarke. “I can’t be expected, -can I, to remember all the geniuses that come and -go?”</p> - -<p>There was a mild ferocity about him that caused -more than one cub to think that the night boss was unfriendly, -but this attitude had a good effect. No young -reporter ever made the same mistake twice.</p> - -<p>“If you mean ‘child,’ write it so,” he would say. -“Don’t write it ‘tot.’ And please have more variety -in your motor cars. I have seen several that were not -large and red and high-powered.”</p> - -<p>The head-lines of the <i>Sun</i> have been well written since -the first days of Dana, and Clarke, for thirty years, was -the best of the head-line writers. He wrote rhyming -heads for Sam Wood’s prose verse, satirical heads for -satires, humorous heads for the funny men’s articles. -A <i>Sun</i> reader could gauge almost exactly the worth of -an article by the quality of the heading. A <i>Sun</i> reporter -could tell just what Clarke thought of his story<span class="pagenum" id="Page_388">388</span> -by the cleverness of the lines that the night city editor -wrote above it.</p> - -<p>Clarke would put the obvious heading on a long, -matter-of-fact yarn in two minutes, but he might spend -half an hour—if he had it to spare—polishing a head -for a short and sparkling piece of work. Two architects -who did city work pleaded poverty, but admitted -having turned over property to their wives. Clarke -headed the story:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>“We’re Broke,” Says Horgan.—“Sure,” Says Slattery, -“But Our Wives Are Doing Fine.”</p> -</div> - -<p>A brief item about the arrest of some boys for stealing -five copies of “The Simple Life” he headed -“Tempted Beyond Their Strength.” Over a paragraph -telling of the killing of a Park Row newsboy -by a truck he wrote: “A Sparrow Falls.”</p> - -<p>Clarke had a besetting fear that Russell Sage would -die suddenly late at night, and that the <i>Sun</i> would not -learn of it in time. Again and again false “hunches” -caused him to send men to the Sage home on Fifth -Avenue to discover the state of the old millionaire’s -health. When Mr. Sage became seriously ill, reporters -were sent in relays to watch the house. One man who -had such an assignment turned up at the <i>Sun</i> office at -one o’clock in the morning.</p> - -<p>“I left Mr. Sage’s house,” he explained to Clarke, -“because Dr. Blank just came out and I had a little -talk with him. He asked me if S. M. Clarke was still -night city editor of the <i>Sun</i>; and when I told him that -you were, he said:</p> - -<p>“‘Tell Selah for me that I will call him personally -on the ’phone if there is the least change in Mr. Sage’s -condition. Selah and I are old friends; we used to be -room-mates in college.’”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_389">389</span></p> - -<p>“Blank always was a darn liar!” said Mr. Clarke. -“Go back to the house and sit on the door-step.”</p> - -<p>On February 28, 1917, five years after Clarke retired, -the Sun Alumni Association gave a dinner in his honour, -with Mr. Lord presiding. Men came five hundred miles -for the event, and the speeches were entirely about -Clarke and his work. Mr. Clarke himself, who was -only five miles away, sent a kindly letter to say that -he was pleased, but that he could not imagine anything -more absurd than a man’s attending a dinner given in -his own honour.</p> - -<p>Clarke was a factor in that nebulous institution so -frequently referred to as the “<i>Sun</i> school of journalism,” -a college in which the teaching was by example -rather than precept. Clarke occasionally told the -young reporters how not to do it, but his real lessons -were given in the columns of the <i>Sun</i>. There, in cold -type, the man could see that Clarke had thrown his -beautiful introduction on the floor, had lifted a word -or a phrase from the middle of the article and put it -to the fore, or had, by one of the touches which marked -the great copy-reader’s genius, breathed life into the -narrative. Clarke had no rules for improving a story, -but he had a faculty, not uncommon among the finest -copy-readers, of seeing an event more clearly than it -had appeared to the reporter who described it, even -when the desk man’s information came entirely from -the reporter’s screed.</p> - -<p>If a reporter found his story in the paper almost -untouched by Clarke’s pencil and adorned with a typical -Clarkean head, it was a signal to him that he had done -well. He was sure not to get verbal approbation from -Clarke. There is a legend that Clarke once cried -“Fine!” after skimming over a sheet of well-written -copy, but it is only a legend. With a reporter who<span class="pagenum" id="Page_390">390</span> -never wrote introductions and never padded his articles -Clarke would sometimes crack a joke. <i>Sun</i> traditions -have it that once, after a reporter had turned New York -inside out to dig out a particularly difficult piece of -news, the night city editor remarked to his assistant -that that reporter “was a handy man to have around -the office.” Although Clarke has been referred to by -an excellent judge, Will Irwin, as “the greatest -living schoolmaster of newspapermen,” his methods -could never be adapted to the academies of journalism.</p> - -<p>As a schoolmaster of a more positive type, <i>Sun</i> men -remember the late Francis T. Patton, who edited suburban -news for twenty years. Staff men on assignments -in New Jersey, Westchester, Long Island, and -other places just beyond the city turned in their copy -to “Boss” Patton, a cultured man who spent his spare -hours reading old Latin works in the original or working -out chess problems. It was to him that the bewildered -cub turned in his hour of torment, and Patton -would tell him how long his story ought to run, how -he might begin it, how end it.</p> - -<p>“I know it isn’t right to fake, Mr. Patton,” said -a new reporter; “but is exaggeration never permissible?”</p> - -<p>“It is,” said Patton. “You may use exaggeration -whenever it is needed to convey to the reader an adequate -but not exaggerated picture of the event you are -describing. For instance, if you are reporting a storm -at Seabright, and the waves are eight and one-half feet -high by the tape which you surely carry in your hip-pocket -for such emergencies, it will hardly do to inform -the reader that the waves are eight and one-half feet -high; his visualization of the scene would not be perfect. -Yet, if you write that the waves ran mountain-high,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_391">391</span> -I shall change your copy if it comes to me. The -expression would be too stale. Hyperbole is one of -the gifts.”</p> - -<div class="center"><div class="ilb2"> -<div id="ip_390a" class="figleft"> - <img src="images/i_390a.jpg" width="800" height="1244" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl">SAMUEL A. WOOD</div></div> - -<div id="ip_390b" class="figleft noclear"> - <img src="images/i_390b.jpg" width="800" height="1244" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl">OSCAR KING DAVIS</div></div> -</div></div> - -<div class="center"><div class="ilb2"> -<div id="ip_390c" class="figleft"> - <img src="images/i_390c.jpg" width="800" height="1244" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl">THOMAS M. DIEUAIDE</div></div> - -<div id="ip_390d" class="figleft noclear"> - <img src="images/i_390d.jpg" width="800" height="1244" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl">SAMUEL HOPKINS ADAMS</div></div> -</div></div> - -<p>Patton’s droll humour was one of the delights of the -<i>Sun</i> office. One night Charles M. Fairbanks was writing, -for the <i>Herald</i>, a story about “The Men Who Make -the <i>Sun</i> Shine.” He asked Patton for something about -himself.</p> - -<p>“You may say,” replied the boss of the suburban -desk, “that my characteristics are brilliancy, trustworthiness, -accuracy, and poetic fervour.”</p> - -<p>“Boss,” said a young reporter to Mr. Patton, “I -often think you and I could run this paper better than -the men who are running it.”</p> - -<p>“How strange!” said Mr. Patton, looking surprised. -“I know that I could, but it has never occurred to me -that you would not do worse than they do.”</p> - -<p>The sports department has been one of the <i>Sun’s</i> -strongholds since Mr. Dana’s first years. Dana would -let Amos Cummings give half a page to a race at Saratoga -or Monmouth Park, and would encourage Amos -to neglect his executive duties so that the paper might -have a good report of a boxing-match. When William I -lay dead in Berlin, the <i>Sun’s</i> principal European correspondent, -Arthur Brisbane, was concerned, not with -the future of the continent, but with the aftermath of -the Sullivan-Mitchell fight at Chantilly.</p> - -<p>The stories of the international yacht-races have always -been told best in the <i>Sun</i>, whether the reporter -was John R. Spears or William J. Henderson. Mr. -Henderson, who is the ablest musical critic in America, -is probably the best yachting reporter, too. While the -world of music knows him through his distinguished -critiques, particularly of opera, the <i>Sun</i> knows him as -a great reporter—one who would rank high among<span class="pagenum" id="Page_392">392</span> -the best it has ever had. Another <i>Sun</i> man who -wrote yachting well is Duncan Curry, later of the -<i>American</i>.</p> - -<p>In turf matters the <i>Sun</i> has long been looked upon -as an authority. In the heyday of racing the paper -enjoyed the services of Christopher J. Fitzgerald, since -then familiar as a starter on many race-tracks, and -of Joseph Vila, now sporting editor of the <i>Evening -Sun</i>. Fitzgerald, although a specialist in sports, was -also a first-class general reporter. He is the hero -of a story of the proverbial “<i>Sun</i> luck,” which in -this case might better be called <i>Sun</i> persistence and -activity.</p> - -<p>In the latter part of December, 1892, the steamship -Umbria, the fastest transatlantic boat of her day, was -two weeks overdue at New York. Every newspaper -had tugs out to watch for her first appearance. On the -night of December 28 Fitzgerald was assigned to tug -duty. The first tug he took down the moonlit bay -broke her propeller in the ice; with the second tug he -ran twenty miles beyond Sandy Hook. Presently an -inward-bound liner appeared in the dark, and the other -newspaper boats followed her; but this was not the -Umbria, but the Britannic. An hour later a tank -steamer came along, and Fitzgerald hailed her on the -chance that she knew something about the missing -ship.</p> - -<p>“The Umbria,” came back the answer, “is about five -miles astern, coming in slowly.”</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun’s</i> tug raced to sea and soon came alongside -the overdue steamer. On board was Frank Marshall -White, the <i>Sun’s</i> London correspondent, and he had, -all ready written, a story telling how the Umbria broke -her machinery, and how the chief engineer lay on his -back for five days trying to mend the break. Fitzgerald<span class="pagenum" id="Page_393">393</span> -took White’s story and raced to Quarantine, -where there was a telegraph-station, but, at that hour, -no operator. Fitzgerald, himself an expert telegrapher, -pounded the <i>Sun’s</i> call, “SX,” for ten minutes, but the -<i>Sun</i> operator had gone home.</p> - -<p>Fitzgerald returned to the tug and went under full -speed to the Battery, landing at 3.35 <span class="allsmcap">A.M.</span> Running to -Park Row, he found an assistant foreman of the <i>Sun</i> -composing-room enjoying his lemonade in Andy Horn’s -restaurant. This man rounded up four or five printers, -and they began setting up the story at 4 <span class="allsmcap">A.M.</span> The <i>Sun</i> -had a complete and exclusive story, and twenty thousand -copies were sold of Fitzgerald’s extra.</p> - -<p>Vila, like Fitzgerald a man of large physique and -a former athlete, wrote the descriptions of a dozen Suburban -Handicaps and Futurities, of a score of great -college rowing-matches, of a thousand baseball and football -games. Damon Runyon, the poet and sporting -editor, once remarked that “Vila is the only sporting -writer I have ever seen who knows exactly, at the end -of a sporting event, just what he is going to write, -when he is going to write it, and how much he is going -to write.”</p> - -<p>When John W. Gates and John A. Drake came to the -New York race-tracks and made bets of sensational -magnitude, Vila was the only turf reporter able to give -the exact figures of the amounts bet by the Western -plungers. The printing of these in the <i>Sun</i> so aroused -the Jockey Club that a curb was put on big betting.</p> - -<p>The present sports staff includes some of the writers, -like Nat Fleischer, “Daniel,” Frederick G. Lieb, and -George B. Underwood, who were on the big sports staff -of the New York <i>Press</i> when that paper was amalgamated -with the <i>Sun</i>.</p> - -<p>Returning to the big, bare room in the old Sun Building,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_394">394</span> -cast the eye of memory through the thin forest of -chandeliers entwined with lianas of electric wiring, and -across the dull desks. Boss Lord has come in from -dinner and is reading telegraphic bulletins from out-of-town -correspondents or glancing at a growing pile -of proofs. At the Albany desk Deacon Stillman is -editing a batch of Congress news from Walter Clarke -or Richard V. Oulahan in Washington, or of legislative -news from Joseph L. McEntee in Albany, or is trying to -think out an apt head for a double murder in Herkimer -County. At the cable desk Cyrus C. Adams, long secretary -of the American Geographical Society, is looking -in a guide-book to discover whether the name of a street -in Naples has not been distorted by the operators while -in transit between the Rome correspondent and New -York. The telegraph editor is telling the night editor, -Van Anda or Smith, that he has “nothing much but -yellow fever,” and the night editor is replying that -“three-quarters of a column of yellow fever will be -plenty.”</p> - -<p>At the city desk Clarke, who has half finished the -heading on a bit about a green heron seen in Bronx -Park, picks up the telephone to tell an East Side police-station -reporter to investigate the report of an excursion -boat gone aground on Hart’s Island, and then turns -away to tell Ralph, or Chamberlin, or Joseph Fox, or -Irwin, or Hill, or O’Malley, that a column and a half -lead will do for the police investigation, or the great -public dinner, or whatever his task may have been. -As he finishes, a reporter lays on his desk a long story, -and Clarke, reading the substance of the first page of it -in an instant, hands it over to his assistant to edit.</p> - -<p>At the Jersey desk Boss Patton has polished the disquisitions -of a suburban correspondent on the antics -of a shark in Barnegat Bay, and is explaining to a space<span class="pagenum" id="Page_395">395</span> -man, almost with tears, why it was necessary to cut -down his article about the picnic of the Smith family -at Peapack.</p> - -<p>The sporting editor, John Mandigo, has just bade -good night to some distinguished visitor—say Mr. Fitzsimmons—and -is bending over some copy from Fitzgerald -or Vila. Perhaps Henry of Navarre and Domino -are nose-and-nose in the stretch at Gravesend, or Amos -Rusie has struck out seventeen opposing batters, or Kid -Lavigne has lambasted Joe Walcott quite properly at -Maspeth.</p> - -<p>At a side desk a copy-reader on local news is struggling -with a mass of writing from various youthful reporters. -“At seven ten o’clock last evening, as Policeman -McGuffin was patrolling his beat, his attention was attracted -by a cry of fire,” etc. The copy-reader knows -that smoke will presently issue from the upper windows; -knows, too, that he presently will boil the seven -pages down to three lines and gently tell the reporter -why he did it.</p> - -<p>The chess expert is turning a cabalistic cablegram -from St. Petersburg into a detailed story of the contest -between a couple of the masters of the game. The -bowling man is writing a description, which may never -see the light, of a desperate struggle between the Harlem -Pin Kings and the Bensonhurst Alley Scorchers. -H. L. Fitzpatrick is writing a golf story with such -magnificent technique that Mandigo will not dare to -cut a line out of it.</p> - -<p>A dozen reporters, great and small, are at the desks -in the middle of the room, busy with pencils. In a side -room three or four others, converts to the typewriter, -are pounding out copy. In another room Riggs is dictating -to a stenographer the day’s doings in political -life.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_396">396</span></p> - -<p>Four or five “rewrite men,” the “long wait” and -his helpers, the “short waits,” are slipping in and out -of the telephone-booths, taking and writing news articles -from twenty points in the city where the Mulberry -Street reporter, the police-station reporters, the Tenderloin -man—who covers the West Thirtieth Street police-station, -the Broadway hotels, and the theatrical district—and -the Harlem man are still busy gathering news.</p> - -<p>From a room wisely distant comes the rattle of the -telegraph. Half a dozen wires are bringing in the continent’s -news. Half a dozen boys, spurred by their chief, -Dan O’Leary, carry the typed sheets to the proper desks.</p> - -<p>The dramatic critic comes in and sits down at his -desk to write two-thirds of a column about a first performance. -The music critic has sent down a brief -notice of the night’s opera.</p> - -<p>Most of the reporters finish their work and go out. -One or two remain to write special articles for the Sunday -papers. A sporting reporter is spinning a semi-fictional -yarn of life in Chinatown. A police reporter -is composing little classics of life in Dolan’s Park Row -restaurant.</p> - -<p>At one o’clock there is a rumbling of the presses in -the basement, and soon copies of the first edition come -to the desks of the news-masters. Lord suggests to the -night editor a shift of front-page articles. Clarke, his -pencil flashing, marks in additions to the story of a late -accident. A cub waits patiently for a discarded paper, -to see whether his piece has got in. An older reporter, -who wrote the story in the first column of the first page, -does not look at his own work, but turns to the sporting -page to read the racing entries for the next day—his -day off.</p> - -<p>At 1.27 <span class="allsmcap">A.M.</span> Clarke rises and goes home. At two -o’clock Lord closes his desk. Most of the desk men<span class="pagenum" id="Page_397">397</span> -disappear; the work is done. The night editor—Van -Anda or the imperturbable Smith—remains at his desk, -with the “long wait” reporter to bear him company. -At half past three they also go, and the watchman begins -to turn out the lights. Down below, the presses -are tossing forth the product of a night’s work in the -big, bare, old room.</p> - -<p>A story of the <i>Sun</i> would be incomplete without a -sketch of its little sister. The <i>Evening Sun</i> was established -by Mr. Dana nearly twenty years after he bought -the <i>Sun</i>. He saw a place for a one-cent evening newspaper, -for the only journal of that description then -published in New York was the <i>Daily News</i>, which was -largely a class publication. The leading evening newspapers -were the <i>Evening Post</i>, the <i>Commercial Advertiser</i>, -and the <i>Mail and Express</i>, selling for three cents -and catering to a highbrow or a partisan clientele.</p> - -<p>The first <i>Evening Sun</i> was issued on March 17, 1887, -at an hour when the St. Patrick’s Day parade was being -reviewed by Mayor Hewitt. With its four pages of six -columns each, its brief, lively presentation of general -news, and its low price, the paper was an immediate -success—though not the success that it is to-day, with -its sixteen pages, its wealth of special articles, and the -many features that make it one of America’s best evening -newspapers.</p> - -<p>The new paper had no titular editor-in-chief. Mr. -Dana was the editor of the <i>Sun</i> and had the general -guidance of the evening paper. Dana’s associate, the -publisher of the <i>Sun</i>, William M. Laffan, took a deep -interest in the welfare of the new venture, and the -<i>Evening Sun</i> was often referred to as his “baby.”</p> - -<p>The first managing editor of the paper was Amos J. -Cummings, with Allan Kelly as city editor and John -McCormick as sporting editor. When Cummings went<span class="pagenum" id="Page_398">398</span> -to Congress, E. J. Edwards took his place and remained -as managing editor until August, 1889, when Arthur -Brisbane returned from the post of London correspondent -of the <i>Sun</i> to manage the evening paper.</p> - -<p>It was Brisbane who induced Richard Harding Davis, -then a young reporter in Philadelphia, to come to New -York. As Davis was walking up from the ferry one -morning in October, 1889, on his way to take up his -new duties, he was taken in hand, in City Hall Park, -by a bunco-steerer. Davis listened to the man’s wiles, -turned him over to the police of the City Hall station, -and then hurried to the <i>Evening Sun</i> office to write a -story about it for the paper. Davis’s <i>Van Bibber</i> stories, -the first of his fiction to attract wide attention, were -originally printed in the <i>Evening Sun</i>, in 1890. As a -reporter under Brisbane, Davis picked up much of the -information and experiences that coloured his fiction.</p> - -<p>When Brisbane went to the Pulitzer forces, he was -succeeded as managing editor by W. C. McCloy, who -had been city editor, and who remained at the head -of the news department for more than twenty years.</p> - -<p>Jacob A. Riis, who had been the police-headquarters -reporter of the <i>Tribune</i> since 1877, went to the <i>Evening -Sun</i> in 1890, coincident with the publication of his first -popular work, “How the Other Half Lives.” Other -of his works, including “The Children of the Poor” -and “Out of Mulberry Street,” were written while he -was the chief police reporter of the <i>Evening Sun</i>. Riis’s -work was valuable, not only to the paper, but to the -city itself. His writings attracted the attention of -Theodore Roosevelt when the future President was head -of the police board of New York (1895–1897), and the -men became close friends. Together they worked to -improve conditions in the tenement districts, and Roosevelt -called Riis “New York’s most useful citizen.”</p> - -<div class="center"><div class="ilb"> -<div id="ip_398a" class="figleft"> - <img src="images/i_398a.jpg" width="846" height="1502" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl">WILL IRWIN</div></div> - -<div id="ip_398b" class="figleft noclear"> - <img src="images/i_398b.jpg" width="846" height="1502" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl">FRANK WARD O’MALLEY</div></div> - -<div id="ip_398c" class="figleft noclear"> - <img src="images/i_398c.jpg" width="846" height="1502" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl">EDWIN C. HILL</div></div> -</div></div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_399">399</span></p> - -<p>Thomas M. Dieuaide, whose work for the <i>Sun</i> in the -Spanish War has been referred to in this volume, and -who became city editor of the <i>Evening Sun</i>, was one of -Riis’s colleagues. Dieuaide was the author of the -<i>Evening Sun’s</i> broadside against the black vice of the -East Side. Printed in 1901, shortly before the beginning -of a mayoralty campaign, it was a prime -factor in the election of a reforming administration.</p> - -<p>Richard Harding Davis was not the only fiction-writer -to graduate from the <i>Evening Sun’s</i> school. -Irvin S. Cobb got his start in the North as an <i>Evening -Sun</i> reporter. He came to New York from Paducah, -Kentucky, rented a hall room, and sat down and wrote -to the managing editor of the <i>Evening Sun</i> a letter of -application so humorous that he was employed immediately. -His report of the peace conference at Portsmouth, -New Hampshire, following the Russo-Japanese -War, attracted wide attention. Stephen French Whitman -and Algernon Blackwood, the novelists, were also -<i>Evening Sun</i> men.</p> - -<p>The <i>Evening Sun’s</i> list of former dramatic critics -includes Acton Davies and Edward Fales Coward, both -playwrights, and Charles B. Dillingham, the theatrical -manager. Arthur Woods, recently police commissioner -of New York, and Robert Adamson, recently fire commissioner, -were old <i>Evening Sun</i> men. Frederick -Palmer, Associated Press correspondent with the -British forces in the great war, and Arthur Ruhl, a -special correspondent at the front, are <i>Evening Sun</i> -alumni.</p> - -<p>In the early years of the <i>Evening Sun</i> the chief editorial -writer was James T. Watkins, whom Mr. Laffan -had known in California as a man of wide scholarship -and an economic expert. He was so prolific that it<span class="pagenum" id="Page_400">400</span> -was a common saying in the office that, with Watkins -at his desk, the <i>Evening Sun</i> needed no other writers -of editorial articles. Frank H. Simonds, who had been -an editorial writer for the <i>Sun</i> since 1908, became chief -editorial writer for the <i>Evening Sun</i> in 1913. In 1914 -his war articles attracted wide attention. He was -afterward editor of the <i>Tribune</i>.</p> - -<p>Other writers for the editorial page were Edward H. -Mullin, an Irishman from Dublin, and Frederic J. -Gregg. The chief editorial writer is now James Luby, -who is assisted by an <i>Evening Sun</i> veteran, Winfield -S. Moody.</p> - -<p>The managing editors since W. C. McCloy have been -Charles P. Cooper, James Luby, and the present incumbent, -George M. Smith, for many years night editor -of the <i>Sun</i>, and its managing editor in the absence of -Mr. Lord.</p> - -<p>After Allan Kelly, the city editors were W. C. McCloy, -Charles P. Cooper, Ervin Hawkins, Nelson Lloyd, -and T. M. Dieuaide. Mr. Lloyd, who left the paper -to write fiction, had served as city editor from 1897 -to 1904.</p> - -<p>The <i>Evening Sun</i> has always had a particular appeal -to the woman reader. Its first woman reporter, Miss -Helen Watterson, of Cleveland, Ohio, was induced to -come East in Brisbane’s régime to write a column called -“The Woman About Town,” and ever since 1890 the -staff of women writers on the paper has been increasing. -The <i>Evening Sun</i> has a page or two a day of -feature articles written for women, by women, about -women.</p> - -<p>The financial and sports departments of the <i>Evening -Sun</i> make it a man’s paper, too. No home-going broker -would dare to board the subway without a copy of the -Wall Street edition of the <i>Evening Sun</i>. A large staff<span class="pagenum" id="Page_401">401</span> -of sporting writers, captained by Joseph Vila, provides -each day a page or two of authoritative athletic news.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> and the <i>Evening Sun</i> are run as separate -publications, each with a complete staff, but their -presses and purposes are one.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div id="toclink_402" class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_402">402</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XVIII">CHAPTER XVIII<br /> - -<span class="subhead">THE FINEST SIDE OF “THE SUN”</span></h2> -</div> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p><i>Literary Associations of an Editorial Department That Has -Encouraged and Attracted Men of Imagination and Talent.—Mitchell, -Hazeltine, Church, and Their Colleagues.</i></p> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">The</span> <i>Sun’s</i> association with literature, particularly -with fiction, has been more intimate than that of -any other daily American newspaper. Ben Day had -a taste for fiction, else the moon hoax, a bit of good -writing as well as the greatest of fakes, would not have -appeared. In the time of Moses Y. Beach the balloon -hoax and other writings of Poe were in the <i>Sun</i>. Moses -S. Beach, who owned or controlled the paper for twenty -years, brought popularity and profit to it through -stories written exclusively for the <i>Sun</i> by Mary J. -Holmes, Horatio Alger, Jr., and a dozen other authors -whose tales compelled readers to burn the midnight gas.</p> - -<p>Under Dana the <i>Sun’s</i> interest in literature became -broader, more intense. Dana’s knowledge that the most -avid appetite of the public was for the short story and -the novel, led him to encourage his men to adopt, when -feasible, the fiction form in news writing. In his four-page -daily there was not much room for romance proper, -but when the Sunday <i>Sun</i> was under way, its eight -pages afforded space for tales of fancy.</p> - -<p>In the first few years of Dana’s ownership the walks -of American literature were not crowded. As late as -1875 the <i>Sun</i> lamented:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>For younger rising men we look almost in vain. Bret -Harte gives no promise of lasting fecundity. Howells<span class="pagenum" id="Page_403">403</span> -does charming work, and will probably long remain in -position as a dainty but not suggestive or formative -writer. Aldrich is very slight. John Hay easily won -whatever name he has, and it will easily pass away. -Henry James the younger is one of the rising men, the -youth of literature.</p> - -<p>But of all these there is not one who has yet discovered -the stuff out of which the kings and princes, or -even the barons, of literature are made.</p> -</div> - -<p>Harte, having written his most famous short stories, -had come East. Howells, then thirty-eight, had published -three or four novels, but “The Rise of Silas -Lapham” was ten years ahead. John Hay, then on -the <i>Tribune</i> editorial staff, had written his “Pike -County Ballads” and “Castilian Days.” Henry James -had put forth only “Watch and Ward.” To these -budding geniuses the general public was rather inclined -to prefer Augusta Evans’s “St. Elmo,” E. P. Roe’s -“Barriers Burned Away,” and Edward Eggleston’s -“Hoosier Schoolmaster.”</p> - -<p>Notwithstanding the expressed doubt as to Harte’s -fecundity, Dana admired his work and printed his -stories in the <i>Sun</i> for years afterward. Late in the -seventies he bought Harte’s output and syndicated it—probably -the first successful application of the newspaper -syndicate system to fiction. About the same -period Robert Louis Stevenson’s earlier successes, such -as “The Treasure of Franchard” and “The Sire de -Maletroit’s Door,” were having their first American -printing in the <i>Sun</i>, their original appearance having -been in <i>Temple Bar</i> and other English magazines.</p> - -<p>The files of the <i>Sun</i> for 1891 contain writings of -Stevenson that are omitted from most, if not from all -of the collections of his works. These are parts of his -articles on the South Seas, an ambitious series which -he was unable to finish. Some of them were printed<span class="pagenum" id="Page_404">404</span> -in the London <i>Black and White</i>. All of them appeared -in the <i>Sun</i>. Through the <i>Sun’s</i> literary syndicate the -American public gained some of its earliest acquaintance -with Harte and Henry James. Kipling’s “Light -That Failed” had its first American appearance in the -<i>Sun</i> in the autumn of 1890. It may interest Mr. James’s -admirers to know that one of the Middle Western newspapers, -having bought a James novel from the <i>Sun</i>, -played it up with a gingery head-line:</p> - -<div class="p2 b1 center bold"> -<p class="larger wspace"> -GEORGINA’S REASONS!</p> -<hr class="narrow" /> -<p>HENRY JAMES’S LATEST STORY!</p> -<hr class="narrow" /> -<p>A Woman Who Commits Bigamy and Enforces Silence on -Her Husband!</p> -<hr class="narrow" /> -<p>Two Other Lives Made Miserable by Her Heartless Action! -</p> -</div> - -<p>Among the literary men given less to fiction and more -to history, sociology, and philosophy who have yielded -to the <i>Sun’s</i> columns from their treasure, sometimes -anonymously, were Jeremiah Curtin, the translator of -Sienkiewicz and Tolstoy and an authority on folk-lore; -George Ticknor Curtis, jurist and writer on the Constitution; -Goldwin Smith, whose views on the subject -of the destiny of Canada coincided with Dana’s, and -who contributed to the <i>Sun</i> hundreds of articles from -his store of philosophical and political wisdom; Charles -Francis Adams, Jr., who wrote on railway management; -General Adam Badeau, one of Grant’s biographers; -William Elliot Griffis, probably the most authoritative -of all American writers upon Japanese affairs; -and Francis Lynde Stetson, the distinguished authority -on corporation and railway law.</p> - -<div id="ip_404" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 33em;"> - <img src="images/i_404a.jpg" width="1577" height="2157" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - <p>PAUL DANA</p> -</div></div> - -<p>Of the more strictly journalistic writers who, although<span class="pagenum" id="Page_405">405</span> -not attached permanently to the <i>Sun’s</i> staff, -contributed to its news and editorial columns, the names -rise of James S. Pike, of Joseph Pulitzer and his predecessor -as editor of the <i>World</i>, William Henry Hurlbut; -of James F. Shunk and his brother-in-law, Chauncey -F. Black, both of Pennsylvania and both humorists; -of Edward Spencer, a writer of fiction who displayed -splendid imaginative qualities, and of Oliver Dyer, -whose range of ability was so great that while one day -he wrote for Bonner’s <i>Ledger</i> advice to distressed lovers, -the next day would find him penning for the <i>Sun</i> an -exhaustive article on the methods employed in building -a railroad across the Andes!</p> - -<p>Dana encouraged the men who wrote exclusively, or -almost entirely, for the <i>Sun</i>, to write fiction. Edward -P. Mitchell, whom Mr. Dana attracted to the <i>Sun</i> from -the Lewiston (Maine) <i>Journal</i> in 1875, when Mr. -Mitchell was twenty-three years old, wrote for the <i>Sun</i> -at least a score of short stories of between two thousand -and six thousand words. Two of his tales—“The -Ablest Man in the World” and “The Tachypomp,” both -scientific fantasies of remarkably ingenious construction, -were included in the Scribner collection of “Short -Stories by American Authors,” Mr. Mitchell being the -only writer doubly represented in those volumes. “The -Ablest Man in the World” also has its place in Stedman -and Hutchinson’s distinguished “Library of American -Literature.”</p> - -<p>Other short stories of Mr. Mitchell’s, like “The Man -Without a Body” and “The Balloon Tree,” are remembered -by older <i>Sun</i> readers for their ingenious form -and delightful narrative. Mr. Mitchell’s smaller -sketches, numbering perhaps three hundred, included -not only fancy but humour, and particularly little -burlesques delicately picturing the weaknesses of the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_406">406</span> -great or quasi-great men of the day. As a change from -his strictly editorial work he might write a description -of Mark Twain in his observatory, armed with a boat-hook -and preparing to fend off a comet; or, becoming -Mr. Dana’s reporter, he would expose a spiritualistic -séance of the Eddy Brothers somewhere up in Vermont, -or go to Madison Square to record the progress of -George Francis Train toward world dictatorship by -self-evolution on a diet of peanuts; or he would write -a dramatic criticism of the appearance of the <i>Sun’s</i> -droll friend, George, the Count Joannes, as <i>Hamlet</i>.</p> - -<p>These few instances, a dozen out of twenty thousand -articles that Mr. Mitchell wrote for the <i>Sun</i>, are not -mentioned as a key to the general tenor of his work—which -has covered everything from the definition of a -mugwump to the interpretation of a President’s Constitutional -powers—but rather as an indication of the -<i>Sun’s</i> catholicity in subjects. If incidentally they serve -to counteract the impression that the editorship of a -great newspaper is gained through mere erudition, as -opposed to a fine understanding of the very human -reader, so much the better.</p> - -<p>From his first day with the <i>Sun</i> Mr. Mitchell absorbed -his chief’s lifelong belief that the range of public -interest was infinite. As he said in 1916, in an address -to the students of the Pulitzer School of Journalism -on “The Newspaper Value of Non-Essentials”:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Sometimes people are as much interested in queer -names, like Poke Stogis, for example, or in the discussion -of a question such as “What Is the Best Ghost -in Fiction?” or “How Should Engaged Couples Act -at the Circus?” or “What Is a Dodunk?” or “Do the -Angels Play Football?” as some other people are interested -in the conference of the great powers.</p> - -<p>It is well to remember always this psychological factor. -Both the range of the newspaper and the attractive<span class="pagenum" id="Page_407">407</span> -power of the writer for the newspaper in any department -depend upon the breadth of sympathy with human -affairs and the diversity of things in which he, the -writer, takes a genuine personal interest.</p> -</div> - -<p>In that speech the <i>Sun’s</i> judgment of what the people -want, whether it be in news, editorial, or fiction, is restated -exactly as it might have been stated at any time -within the last fifty years. And Dana and Mitchell are -found in agreement not only upon the subject of what -the reader wishes, but upon the necessity for the -preservation in newspapers, as well as in books, of the -ideals of the language. Speaking at a conference held -at Princeton University in 1917, Mr. Mitchell said:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The most serious practical evil that will result from -the elimination of the classics will fall upon the English -language itself. The racial memory begins to decay, -the racial imagination, the begetter of memory, begins -to weaken, the sense of precise meanings begins to lose -its edge, and the English language ceases to be a vital -thing and becomes a mere code of arbitrary signals -wigwagged from mouth to ear. Were I the emergency -autocrat of this language, I should proclaim in drastic -regulations and enforce by severe penalties the American -duty of adherence to the old habits of speech, the -old scrupulous respect for the finer shades of meaning, -the old rigid observance of the morality of word relations; -and this, I believe, can be done only by maintaining -the classical culture at high potency.</p> -</div> - -<p>Mr. Mitchell was born in Maine in 1852, and was -graduated from Bowdoin in 1871. It is curious to note, -scanning the names of the editors and proprietors, how -the <i>Sun</i> has drawn upon New England.</p> - -<p>Benjamin H. Day was born in West Springfield, -Massachusetts, April 10, 1810.</p> - -<p>Moses Yale Beach was born in Wallingford, Connecticut, -January 7, 1800.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_408">408</span></p> - -<p>Moses Sperry Beach was born in Springfield, Massachusetts, -October 5, 1822.</p> - -<p>Charles A. Dana was born in Hinsdale, New Hampshire, -August 8, 1819.</p> - -<p>Edward P. Mitchell was born in Bath, Maine, March -24, 1852.</p> - -<p>Frank A. Munsey was born in Mercer, Maine, August -21, 1854.</p> - -<p>Any grouping of <i>Sun</i> men on the purely literary side -brings the name of Hazeltine to stand with those of -Dana and Mitchell. Mayo Williamson Hazeltine was -a fine example of the scholar in newspaper work; an -example of the way in which Dana, with his intellectual -magnificence, found the best for his papers.</p> - -<p>Educated at Harvard and Oxford and in continental -Europe, Hazeltine came to the <i>Sun</i> in 1878, and was its -literary critic until his death in 1909. During the same -period he was also one of its principal writers of articles -on foreign politics and sociology. His book-reviews, -published in the <i>Sun</i> on Sundays, which made the initials -“M. W. H.” familiar to the whole English-reading -world, were marvels of comprehension. Many a publisher -of a three-volume historical work lamented when -it attracted Hazeltine’s attention, for his review, whether -two columns or seven, usually compressed into that -space all that the average student cared to know about -the book, reducing the high cost of reading from six -or eight dollars to a nickel.</p> - -<p>Hazeltine enjoyed, under both Dana and Mitchell, -practically his own choice of subjects, a free hand with -them, and a generous income; and in return, for more -than thirty years, he poured into the columns of the -<i>Sun</i> a wealth of the erudition which was his by right -of education, travel, an intense interest in all things -intellectual, and a wonderful memory.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_409">409</span></p> - -<p>In the list of writers of editorial articles which includes -Dana, Mitchell, William O. Bartlett, and Hazeltine, -are found also the names of Frank P. Church, -E. M. Kingsbury, Napoleon L. Thiéblin, James Henry -Wilson, John Swinton, Henry B. Stanton, Fitz-Henry -Warren, William T. Washburn, Harold M. Anderson, -Frank H. Simonds, and Henry M. Armstrong. Of these -Church stands alone as the writer in whose case the -<i>Sun</i> broke its rule that the anonymity of editorial -writers is absolute. After Mr. Church’s death on April -11, 1906, it was announced in the <i>Sun</i> that he was the -author of what for more than twenty years has been -regarded as the most popular editorial article ever -written. It appeared on September 21, 1897:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<div class="intact"> -<p class="center b1 wspace">IS THERE A SANTA CLAUS?</p> - -<p>We take pleasure in answering at once and thus -prominently the communication below, expressing at -the same time our great gratification that its faithful -author is numbered among the friends of the <i>Sun</i>:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p class="in0"><span class="smcap">Dear Editor</span>:</p> - -<p>I am eight years old. Some of my little friends -say there is no Santa Claus. Papa says “If you -see it in the <i>Sun</i> it’s so.” Please tell me the truth, -is there a Santa Claus?</p> - -<p class="p0 sigright"> -<span class="smcap">Virginia O’Hanlon.</span> -</p> - -<p class="in0">115 West Ninety-Fifth Street.</p> -</div> -</div> - -<p>Virginia, your little friends are wrong. They have -been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They -do not believe except they see. They think that nothing -can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. -All minds, Virginia, whether they be men’s or children’s, -are little. In this great universe of ours man is a mere -insect, an ant, in his intellect, as compared with the -boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence -capable of grasping the whole of truth and -knowledge.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_410">410</span></p> - -<p>Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as -certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and -you know that they abound and give to your life its -highest beauty and joy. Alas, how dreary would be the -world if there were no Santa Claus! It would be as -dreary as if there were no Virginias. There would be -no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance, to make -tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment -except in sense and sight. The eternal light with which -childhood fills the world would be extinguished.</p> - -<p>Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not -believe in fairies! You might get your papa to hire -men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas Eve to -catch Santa Claus, but even if they did not see Santa -Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody -sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no -Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are -those that neither children nor men can see. Did you -ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, -but that’s no proof that they are not there. Nobody -can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen -and unseeable in the world.</p> - -<p>You tear apart the baby’s rattle and see what makes -the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen -world which not the strongest man, nor even the united -strength of all the strongest men that ever lived, could -tear apart. Only faith, fancy, poetry, love, romance, -can push aside that curtain and view and picture the -supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, -Virginia, in all this world there is nothing else real and -abiding.</p> - -<p>No Santa Claus! Thank God, he lives, and he lives -forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay, ten -times ten thousand years from now, he will continue to -make glad the heart of childhood.</p> -</div> - -<p>Church, as one intimate wrote upon his death, after -more than thirty years with the <i>Sun</i>, had all the literary -gifts, “the tender fancy, the sympathetic understanding -of human nature, the humour, now wistful, now joyous, -the unsurpassed delicacy of touch.”</p> - -<div id="ip_410" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 33em;"> - <img src="images/i_410a.jpg" width="1599" height="2038" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - <p>WILLIAM M. LAFFAN</p> -</div></div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_411">411</span></p> - -<p>In dramatic criticism, where the <i>Sun</i> has required -from its writers somewhat more than the mere ability -to praise or blame, its roster bears such names as Frank -Bowman, Willard Bartlett, Elihu Root, William Stewart -(“Walsingham”), who was the first of the dramatic -critics to adopt an intimate style; Andrew Carpenter -Wheeler, better known to the public under his -pen-name of “Nym Crinkle,” whose reviews were a feature -of the Sunday issue of the <i>Sun</i>; William M. Laffan, -the always brilliant and sometimes caustic; Franklin -Fyles, who wrote plays as well as reviews of plays; -John Corbin, the scholarly analyst; Walter Prichard -Eaton, author of “The American Stage of To-day,” -and Lawrence Reamer, who has been with the <i>Sun</i>, as -reporter or critic, for a quarter of a century.</p> - -<p>In criticism of opera and other musical events the -<i>Sun</i>, through the writings of William J. Henderson, -has pleased the general public as well as the musicians, -and has added many sound and scholarly chapters to -newspaper literature.</p> - -<p>In book-reviewing a hundred pens have served the -<i>Sun</i>. Hazeltine, E. P. Mitchell, Willard Bartlett, Erasmus -D. Beach, George Bendelari, Miss Dana Gatlin, -H. M. Anderson, and Grant M. Overton are but a few -of the men and women who have told <i>Sun</i> readers what’s -worth while.</p> - -<p>For <i>Sun</i> reporters the Sunday paper has been a favourable -field for an excursion into fiction-writing. In -its columns a man with a tale to tell has every chance. -There William Norr gave, in his “Pearl of Chinatown,” -the real atmosphere of a little part of New York that -once held romance. It was for the Sunday <i>Sun</i> that -Edward W. Townsend created his celebrated characters, -<i>Chimmie Fadden</i>, <i>Miss Fanny</i>, <i>Mr. Paul</i>, and the rest -of that happy, if slangy, family. Clarence L. Cullen<span class="pagenum" id="Page_412">412</span> -laid bare the soul of alcoholic adventurers in his “Tales -of the Ex-Tanks.” Ed Mott made famous the bears of -Pike County, Pennsylvania. David A. Curtis related -the gambling ways of <i>Old Man Greenlaw</i> and his associates. -Charles Lynch conferred the title of the Duke -of Essex Street upon an obscure lawyer, and made him -the talk of the East Side. Joseph Goodwin brought to -the notice of an ignorant world the ways of <i>Sarsaparilla -Reilly</i> and other Park Row restaurant heroes. David -Graham Phillips, Samuel Hopkins Adams, and other -men destined to be known through their books, ground -out, for glory and eight dollars a column, the yarns—sometimes -fact turned into fiction, sometimes fiction -masked as fact—that kept the readers of the Sunday -<i>Sun</i> from getting out into the open air.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div id="toclink_413" class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_413">413</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XIX">CHAPTER XIX<br /> - -<span class="subhead">“THE SUN” AND YELLOW JOURNALISM</span></h2> -</div> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p><i>The Coming and Going of a Newspaper Disease.—Dana’s -Attitude Toward President Cleveland.—Dana’s Death.—Ownerships -of Paul Dana, Laffan, Reich, and Munsey.</i></p> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">Of</span> such things as we have mentioned here, putting -into the necessary news, attractively written, a -proper seasoning of regional colour and atmosphere, -humour and pathos, the <i>Sun</i> has been made since Dana -came to it. He created a new journalism, but it was -a decent and distinct kind, appealing to the intellect -rather than to the passions. It gave room for the honest -expression of everybody’s opinion, from Herbert -Spencer to <i>Chimmie Fadden</i>. Because of this, because -he had lifted American newspaper work out of the dust -of tradition, Dana had a holy anger when a newer -journalism tried to throw it into the mud.</p> - -<p>When Henry Watterson was called as an expert witness -in proceedings to appraise the estate of Joseph -Pulitzer, in 1914, the veteran editor of the Louisville -<i>Courier-Journal</i> made an interesting statement on this -subject:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>There is much confusion in the public mind about -what is known as “yellow journalism.” There have been -several periods of it in New York. James Gordon Bennett -was the first yellow journalist, and Charles A. Dana -was the second. Mr. Pulitzer was the third. Finally, -when Mr. Hearst came along, he was the fourth, and -I think he quite filled the field of yellow journalism.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_414">414</span></p> - -<p>As Mr. Bennett became more respectable and Mr. -Dana more fixed in his efforts, they were raised in the -public estimation. So was Mr. Pulitzer. I think the -field of yellow journalism is so filled by the Hearst -newspapers that they no more compete with the <i>World</i> -than with the <i>Herald</i> or the <i>Sun</i>.</p> -</div> - -<p>Mr. Watterson did not define yellow journalism. -Perhaps he considered it broadly as sensational journalism. -The elder Bennett was sensational to the extent -that he printed things which the sixpenny papers -of his time did not print. He made the interview -popular, and he was the first editor to see the value -of paying attention to financial news.</p> - -<p>So far as printing human news is concerned, Benjamin -H. Day worked that field before Bennett started the -<i>Herald</i>. If Mr. Watterson considered Dana a yellow -journalist, what else was Day, with his stories about -the sodden things of the police-courts, or his description -of Miss Susan Allen smoking a cigar and dancing in -Broadway?</p> - -<p>Printing a diagram of the scene of a murder, with -a big black X to mark the spot where the victim was -found, did not make the <i>World</i> a yellow newspaper, -for Amos Cummings began to print murder charts as -soon as he became managing editor of the <i>Sun</i>. Putting -black-faced type over a story on the front page -did not make the <i>World</i> or the <i>Journal</i> yellow, for -Cummings, when he was on the <i>Tribune</i>, was the first -to use big type in head-lines, and the <i>Tribune</i> was never -accused of yellowness.</p> - -<p>If pictures made a paper yellow, Dana was not yellow, -for he used few illustrations in the news pages of the -paper. Again, if head-lines indicate yellowness, Dana -must be acquitted of being a yellow journalist; for the -head-lines of the <i>Sun</i>, from the first year of Dana’s control<span class="pagenum" id="Page_415">415</span> -until after his death, remained practically unchanged, -and were conservative to the last degree.</p> - -<p>Head-lines and pictures, so far as their sensational -attraction was concerned, meant nothing to Dana. He -was not yellow, but white and alive. The distinction -was clearly explained by Mr. Mitchell:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Remember the difference between white and yellow. -The essential difference is not of method or quality of -product, but of purpose and of moral responsibility or -moral debasement. Yellow will tell you that it means -force, originality, and independence in the presentation -of ideas. This is consolatory to yellow, but not accurate. -Yellow will print an interesting exaggeration -or misstatement, knowing it to be such. If in doubt -about the truth of alleged news, but in no doubt whatever -as to its immediate value as a sensation, yellow will -give the benefit of the doubt to the sensation every time, -and print it with head-lines tall enough to reach to -Saturn. White won’t; that is the only real color test. -I hope you are all going to be white, and not only white, -but red, white, and blue.</p> -</div> - -<p>No yellow journalist he, Dana! To paraphrase Webster, -he smote the rock of humanity, and abundant -streams of literature rushed forth. If he startled, he -startled the intellect, not the eye. His appeals were -to the intelligence, the soul, the risibilities of man, and -not to his primitive passions. He believed that all the -information, the philosophy, and the humour of the -world could be conveyed through the type of a daily -newspaper as surely as and much more broadly than they -had been conveyed through the various mediums of the -old newspapers, the encyclopedias, the novels, the pulpit, -and the lecture platform.</p> - -<p>When Dana attacked yellow journalism—the expressive -phrase was fastened in the language by Ervin -Wardman, in the <i>Press</i>—it was in the firm belief that<span class="pagenum" id="Page_416">416</span> -this new journalism, the “journalism that did things,” -was doing the wrong thing; that it was breaking down -the magnificent structure that had been reared by himself -and Greeley and Raymond and Bennett and Hurlbut. -This group had been possessed of all the newspaper -faculties and facilities. If yellow journalism had -been right, they would have raised it to its highest peak. -Dana, who knew better than any editor of his time what -the public wanted, could have produced a perfect yellow -<i>Sun</i>; but he chose to print a golden one. He wrought -more genuine journalistic advance than any other man -in history. As Mr. Mitchell wrote of him in <i>McClure’s -Magazine</i> in October, 1894, three years before Mr. -Dana’s death:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The revolution which his genius and invention have -wrought in the methods of practical journalism in -America during the past twenty-five years can be estimated -only by newspaper-makers. His mind, always -original, and unblunted and unwearied at seventy-five, -has been a prolific source of new ideas in the art of -gathering, presenting, and discussing attractively the -news of the world.</p> - -<p>He is a radical and unterrified innovator, caring not -a copper for tradition or precedent when a change of -method promises a real improvement. Restlessness like -his, without his genius, discrimination, and honesty of -purpose, scatters and loses itself in mere whimsicalities -or pettinesses; or else it deliberately degrades the newspaper -upon which it is exercised.</p> - -<p>To Mr. Dana’s personal invention are due many, if -not most, of the broad changes which within a quarter -of a century have transformed journalism in this country. -From his individual perception of the true philosophy -of human interest, more than from any other -single source, have come the now general repudiation -of the old conventional standards of news importance; -the modern newspaper’s appreciation of the news value -of the sentiment and humor of the daily life around us;<span class="pagenum" id="Page_417">417</span> -the recognition of the principle that a small incident, -interesting in itself and well told, may be worth a -column’s space, when a large, dull fact is hardly worth -a stickful’s; the surprising extension of the daily newspaper’s -province so as to cover every department of -general literature, and to take in the world’s fancies -and imaginings as well as its actual events.</p> - -<p>The word “news” has an entirely different significance -from what it possessed twenty-five or thirty years -ago under the ancient common law of journalism as -derived from England; and in the production of this -immense change, greatly in the interest of mankind -and of the cheerfulness of daily life, it would be difficult -to exaggerate the direct and indirect influence of -Mr. Dana’s alert, scholarly, and widely sympathetic -perceptions.</p> -</div> - -<div id="ip_416" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 34em;"> - <img src="images/i_416a.jpg" width="1624" height="2331" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - <p>WILLIAM C. REICK</p> -</div></div> - -<p>The assaults which Dana made upon yellow journalism -were not actuated by the jealous envy of one -who has himself overlooked an opportunity. Everything -that the <i>Sun</i> attacked in yellow newspapers was -something to which the <i>Sun</i> itself never would have -stooped—the faked or distorted interview, the product -of the thief or the eavesdropper, the collection of back-stairs -gossip, the pilfered photograph, the revelation of -personal affairs beyond the public’s business, the arrogation -of official authority, the maudlin plea for sympathy -in a factitious cause, the gross exaggeration for -sensation’s sake of a trifling occurrence, the appeal -to sensualism, and the demagogic attack upon the -rich.</p> - -<p>Right endures, and where is yellow journalism? -Gone where the woodbine twineth. Its prototype, the -wild ass, stamps o’er its head and cannot break its sleep. -The “journalism that does things” doesn’t do anything -any more except to try and teach its men to write -articles the way the <i>Sun</i> has been printing them since -1868. In a chart of new journalism the largest, blackest<span class="pagenum" id="Page_418">418</span> -X-mark would show where the body of new journalism, -slain by public taste, lies buried forever.</p> - -<p>The New York <i>World</i>, once the most ingenious exponent -of yellow journalism, has become as conservative -as the <i>Sun</i> was in the days when Joseph Pulitzer worked -for Dana. Mr. Hearst’s papers, once the deepest of all -yellows, now hold up their hands in horror when they -see, beside them on the news-stands, the bold, black -head-lines of the <i>Evening Post</i>!</p> - -<p>Yellow journalism said to its readers:</p> - -<p>“This way to the big show! We have a mutilated -corpse, a scandal in high life, divorce details that -weren’t brought out in court, a personal attack on the -mayor, lifelike pictures of dead rats, the memoirs of a -demented dressmaker, some neatly invented prison horrors, -and a general denunciation of everybody who owns -more than five hundred dollars. Don’t miss it!”</p> - -<p>Dana said to his readers:</p> - -<p>“Come, let me show you the clean stream of life; -the newsboy with the trained dog, the new painting at -the Metropolitan Museum, an Arabian restaurant on the -East Side, the new Governor at Albany, the latest theory -of planetary control, one book by Old Sleuth and another -by Henry James, a ghost in a Berkshire tavern -and an authentic recipe for strawberry shortcake, a -clown who reads Molière and a king who plays pinochle, -a digest of ten volumes of history and the shortest complete -poem (“This bliz knocks biz”) ever written, a -dark tragedy in the Jersey pines and a plan for a new -subway, a talk with the Grand Lama and a home-run by -Roger Connor, a panic in Wall Street and a poor little -girl who finds a quarter.”</p> - -<p>In the long run—and it did not have to be very long—the -more attractive offering was permanently chosen -by newspaper-readers.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_419">419</span></p> - -<p>The curious effect on American journalism of the -conflict between <i>Sun</i> methods and the so-called new -journalism was referred to, in an address delivered at -Yale University on January 12, 1903, by Frank A. -Munsey, then owner of the New York <i>Daily News</i> and -now proprietor of the <i>Sun</i>:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The newspaperman of to-day is a composite type, the -product of the <i>Sun</i> and the New York <i>World</i> of fifteen -or eighteen years ago. These two newspapers represented -two distinct and widely different styles of journalism. -The <i>World</i> was alert, daring, aggressive, and -sensational. It was about the liveliest thing that ever -swung into New York from the West.... No man has -ever stamped himself more thoroughly upon his generation -than has Joseph Pulitzer on the journalism of -America. He was the originator and the founder of -our present type of overgrown newspaper, with its illustrations -and its merits and its defects.</p> - -<p>The part the <i>Sun</i> played in this recreating and rejuvenating -of the American press was purely literary. -It was the first newspaper to make fiction out of facts—that -is, to handle facts with the skill and manner of -the novelist, so that they read like fiction and possessed -all its charm and fascination. The <i>Sun</i> at that time -consisted of but four pages, and I am convinced that -it was the best example of newspaper-making ever produced -anywhere. With the exception of one or two of -these fiction-fact stories so charmingly told, it was the -perfection of condensation, accuracy, brilliancy.</p> -</div> - -<p>Mr. Munsey did not say, because it was not germane -to his subject, that for fourteen years before the advent -of Pulitzer, Dana had been demonstrating the news -value of the human-interest story, and that it was -almost entirely upon the human-interest story, twisted -and exaggerated, that yellow journalism was founded. -Mr. Munsey did not say, for he could not know, that -fifteen years after his address at Yale the new journalism<span class="pagenum" id="Page_420">420</span> -would be extinct and the <i>Sun</i> would be still -the <i>Sun</i>. The editors of to-day do not ask a reporter -whether he can climb a porch or photograph an unwilling -person, but whether he can see news and write it.</p> - -<p>An adequate history of the <i>Sun’s</i> political activities -during Dana’s time would fill volumes. Rather than -the editor of an organ of the opposition, Dana was -usually an opposition party in himself; not merely for -the sake of opposition, but because the parties in power -from 1869 to 1897 usually happened to have practices -or principles with which he, as the editor of the <i>Sun</i>, -was in disagreement. His attacks on the Grant administration -for the thievery that spotted it, and on the -Hayes administration because of the circumstances -under which Mr. Hayes came to the Presidential chair, -were bitter and without relent. His opposition to -Grover Cleveland, an intellectual rather than a personal -war, began before Mr. Cleveland was a national figure. -In September, 1882, when the hitherto obscure Buffalonian -was nominated for Governor of New York, the -<i>Sun</i> said:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>It is usually not a wise thing in politics, any more -than in war, to take a private from the ranks and at -one bound to promote him to be commander-in-chief; -yet that is what has been done in the case of Grover -Cleveland.</p> -</div> - -<p>In the Presidential campaign of 1884 the <i>Sun</i> would -not support Cleveland and could not support Blaine, -whose conduct in Congress the <i>Sun</i> had frequently condemned; -so it advocated the hopeless cause of General -Benjamin F. Butler, who had been elected Governor of -Massachusetts in 1882, the year when Cleveland was -chosen Governor of New York. Dana was not an -admirer of Butler’s spectacular army career, or of his -general political leanings, but he admired him for his<span class="pagenum" id="Page_421">421</span> -attitude in the Hayes-Tilden scandal, and he believed -that Butler, if elected President, would shake things up -in Washington. The <i>Sun</i> supported him “as a man to -be immensely preferred to either of the others and as -a protest against such nominations.” Dana personally -announced that sooner than support Blaine he would -quit work and burn his pen.</p> - -<p>In 1885, opposing Cleveland’s free-trade policy, the -<i>Sun</i> vigorously supported Samuel J. Randall, of Pennsylvania, -a protectionist Democrat, for speaker of the -House, as against John G. Carlisle, of Kentucky, a free-trader; -but Randall was beaten.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> ridiculed Cleveland’s theories of civil-service -reform, although it believed that real reforms were -needed. On this point Dana wrote, in a letter:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>I do not believe in the establishment in this country -of the German bureaucratic system, with its permanent -staff of office-holders who are not responsible to the -people, and whose tenure of place knows no variation -and no end except the end of life. In my judgment a -genuine reform of the evils complained of is reached by -the vigorous simplification of the machinery of government, -by the repeal of all superfluous laws, the abolition -of every needless office, and the dismissal of every needless -officer. The true American doctrine on this subject -consists in the diminution of government, not in its -increase.</p> -</div> - -<p>For all of its opposition to Cleveland, whom it dubbed -the “stuffed prophet,” the <i>Sun</i> preferred him to General -Harrison in the campaign of 1888. It feared a return -to power of the influences which it had combated during -the administrations of Grant and Hayes. Four years -afterward, however, the <i>Sun</i> was strongly against the -third nomination of Cleveland.</p> - -<p>In Mr. Cleveland’s second term the <i>Sun</i> supported his -course when Dana believed it to be American. While<span class="pagenum" id="Page_422">422</span> -at first it considered the President too mild and conciliatory -in matters of foreign policy, it praised him and -his Secretary of State, Richard Olney, for their stand -against Great Britain in the Venezuela boundary dispute; -praised them just as heartily as it had condemned -Mr. Cleveland’s earlier action in the Hawaiian matter, -when the President withdrew the treaty of annexation -which his predecessor had sent to the Senate.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun’s</i> most deadly weapon, ridicule, was constantly -in play in the years of the Hawaiian complications. -It found vulnerable spots in Mr. Cleveland’s -re-establishment of the deposed Queen Liliuokalani and -in the President’s sending of a commissioner—“Paramount” -Blount, as the <i>Sun</i> called him—without the -advice and consent of the Senate. As jealous then as -it is to-day of any raid by the Executive upon the Constitution -or the powers of Congress, the <i>Sun</i> had the -satisfaction of a complete victory in the Hawaiian -matter.</p> - -<p>On the other hand, the <i>Sun</i> applauded Mr. Cleveland’s -attitude on the money question and his brave -stand against the mob in the Chicago railway strikes of -1894, when the President used troops to prevent the -obstruction of the mails by Eugene V. Debs and his -followers.</p> - -<p>Dana was seventy-seven years old when William J. -Bryan—whom the <i>Sun</i> had already immortalized as the -Boy Orator of the Platte—was nominated for the Presidency -in 1896, but the veteran editor went at the task -of exposing the free-silver fallacy with the same blithe -vigour that he had shown twenty years before. His -opinion, printed in the <i>Sun</i> of August 6, 1896, is a good -example of Dana’s clear style:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>The Chicago platform invites us to establish a currency -which will enable a man to pay his debts with<span class="pagenum" id="Page_423">423</span> -half as much property as he would have to use in order -to pay them now. This proposition is dishonest. I do -not say that all the advocates of the free coinage of -silver are dishonest. Thousands of them—millions, if -there be so many—are doubtless honest in intention. -But I am unable to reconcile with any ideal of integrity -a change in the law which will permit a man who has -borrowed a hundred dollars to pay his debt with a -hundred dollars each one of which is worth only half -as much as each dollar he received from the lender.</p> -</div> - -<div id="ip_422" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 34em;"> - <img src="images/i_422a.jpg" width="1606" height="2210" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - <p>FRANK A. MUNSEY</p> -</div></div> - -<p>Dana’s opinions on political questions were more -eagerly sought than those of any other editor after -Greeley’s death, and the <i>Sun’s</i> political news was complete; -yet with Dana, and with the <i>Sun</i>, politics was, -after all, only one small part of life. The whole world, -with its facts and fancies, not the political problems of -one continent, was the real field to be covered.</p> - -<p>Dana’s curiosity was all-embracing. After the <i>Sun’s</i> -financial success was assured he went abroad frequently, -and saw not only western Europe, but Russia and the -Levant. Of these he wrote in his “Eastern Journeys.” -He knew a dozen languages. He conversed with the -Pope about Dante and with Russian peasants about -Tolstoy. His knowledge of Spanish, acquired early in -life, made easy his travels in Mexico and Cuba. Everywhere -he went he talked of freedom with its friends, and -encouraged them. He knew Kossuth, Mazzini, Garibaldi, -Clémenceau, Marti, and Parnell.</p> - -<p>At home, Dana’s amusements were chiefly literary -and artistic—the study of languages, history, and -<i xml:lang="fr" lang="fr">belles-lettres</i>, the collection of pottery and pictures. -His Chinese porcelains were perhaps the best, in point -of quality, in the Occident.</p> - -<p>“I am persuaded,” one critic said of them, “that Mr. -Dana must have had a most profound instinct in relation -to the whole subject.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_424">424</span></p> - -<p>After Mr. Dana’s death these porcelains, about four -hundred in number, were sold at auction for nearly -two hundred thousand dollars.</p> - -<p>In winter Dana lived in a large house which he built -in 1880 at the corner of Madison Avenue and Sixtieth -Street, and which held the art treasures that he began -to gather in the first days of his prosperity. Here he -kept his pictures, notably some fine specimens of the -Barbizon school, and his books, which included some -rare volumes, but which in the main were chosen for -their usefulness.</p> - -<p>Dana’s happiest days were spent at his country place, -Dosoris, an island near Glen Cove, on the north shore -of Long Island. There, around a large, old-fashioned, -square frame house, he made roads and flower-beds and -planted trees from many parts of the world. He grew -an oak from an acorn that was brought from the tomb -of Confucius. He knew Gray’s “Botany” almost by -heart, and could give an intimate description of every -flower in the Dosoris gardens. His interest in plants -was so deep that once, while travelling in Cuba with an -eminent painter, he led his companion for hours through -the hot hills of Vuelta Abajo in order to satisfy himself -that a certain variety of pine did <em>not</em> grow in that -region.</p> - -<p>Dana’s was a normal, healthy life. He was a good -horseman and swimmer and a great walker. When he -was seventy-five years old he climbed to the top of -Croyden Mountain, in New Hampshire, with a party -of younger men puffing behind him. He found pleasure -in all of life, whether it was at the office, where he -worked steadily but not feverishly, or with his family -among the rural delights of Dosoris, or surrounded by -congenial literary spirits at the dinner-table.</p> - -<p>He knew no illness until his last summer. Up to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_425">425</span> -June, 1897, the sturdy figure and the kindly face framed -in a white beard were as familiar to the <i>Sun</i> office as -they were in the seventies. With Dana there was no -slow decay of body or mind. He died at Dosoris on -October 17, 1897, in the thirtieth year of his reign over -the <i>Sun</i>.</p> - -<p>A few years before, on observing an obituary paragraph -which Mr. Dana had written about some noted -man, John Swinton asked his chief how much space he -(Swinton) would get when his time came.</p> - -<p>“For you, John, two sticks,” said Mr. Dana. Turning -to Mr. Mitchell, then his chief editorial writer, he -added: “For me, two lines.”</p> - -<p>On the morning after Mr. Dana’s death every newspaper -but one in New York printed columns about the -career of the dean of American journalism. The <i>Sun</i> -printed only ten words, and these were carried at the -head of the first editorial column, without a heading:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p><span class="smcap">Charles Anderson Dana</span>, editor of the <i>Sun</i>, died -yesterday afternoon.</p> -</div> - -<p>Mr. Swinton perhaps believed that Mr. Dana was -joking when he said “two lines,” but Mr. Mitchell knew -that his chief was in earnest. The order was characteristic -of Dana. It was not false modesty. Perhaps it -was a certain fine vanity that told him what was true—that -he and his work were known throughout the -land; that the <i>Sun</i>, in its perfection the product of his -genius and vigour, would continue to rise as regularly -as its celestial namesake; that all he had done would -live on. He had made the paper so great that the withdrawal -from it of one man’s hand was negligible.</p> - -<p>Dana was gone, but his son remained as principal -owner, and his chief writer and most intimate intellectual -associate for twenty years was left to form the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_426">426</span> -<i>Sun’s</i> policies as he had moulded them in Dana’s absences -and as he shapes them to-day. His publisher, -the astute Laffan, was still in charge of the <i>Sun’s</i> financial -affairs. Other men whom he had found and trained, -like Frank P. Church, Mayo W. Hazeltine, and Edward -M. Kingsbury in the editorial department, and Chester -S. Lord and Daniel F. Kellogg in the news department, -continued their work as if Dana still lived.</p> - -<p>With their grief doubt was not mingled. The <i>Sun’s</i> -success resulted from no secret formula that died with -the discoverer. Half of Dana’s victory came by his -attraction to himself of men who saw life and literature -as he saw them; and so, in a magnificent way, he had -made his work dispensable.</p> - -<p>And Dana’s was always the magnificent way. To -him journalism was not a means of making money, but -of interesting, elevating, and making happy every one -who read the <i>Sun</i> or wrote for it. He raised his profession -to new heights. As Hazeltine wrote in the <i>North -American Review</i>:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>One of Mr. Dana’s special titles to the remembrance -of his fellow workers in the newspaper calling is the fact -that, more than any other man on either side of the -Atlantic, he raised their vocation to a level with the -legal and medical professions as regards the scale of -remuneration. He honored his fellow craftsmen of the -pen, and he compelled the world to honor them.</p> -</div> - -<p>Shortly after the death of his father, Paul Dana, who -was then forty-five years old, and who had been on the -<i>Sun</i> editorial staff for seventeen years, was made editor -by vote of the trustees of the Sun Printing and Publishing -Association. In the following year (1898) the -younger Dana bought from Thomas Hitchcock, who was -one of Charles A. Dana’s associates both in a financial<span class="pagenum" id="Page_427">427</span> -and in a literary way, enough shares to give him the -control of the paper.</p> - -<p>Paul Dana continued in control of the property for -several years and held with credit his father’s title of -editor until 1903. William Mackay Laffan, who had -been associated with the elder Dana since 1877, next -obtained the business control. His proprietorship was -announced on February 22, 1902, and it continued until -his death in 1909.<a id="FNanchor_1" href="#Footnote_1" class="fnanchor">A</a></p> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p class="in0"><a id="Footnote_1" href="#FNanchor_1" class="fnanchor">A</a> The following editorial article appeared in the <i>Sun</i> on July 26, 1918:</p> - -<p>“Mr. Paul Dana calls the <i>Sun’s</i> attention to what he claims was an -error in ‘The Story of the <i>Sun</i>’ as it originally appeared in the <i>Munsey -Magazine</i>: the statement that ‘he [Mr. Dana] continued in control -of the property until 1900.’ Mr. Dana states that he did not dispose -of his controlling interest until 1902. The statement in the <i>Munsey -Magazine</i> publication of ‘The Story of the <i>Sun</i>’ was founded upon the -International Encyclopædia’s biography of William M. Laffan and also -upon a statement published in the <i>Sun</i> at the time of Mr. Laffan’s -death in 1909, that Mr. Laffan obtained the control of the <i>Sun</i> in 1900. -When the <i>Munsey Magazine</i> articles were reprinted in the Sunday <i>Sun</i> -the paragraph referred to by Mr. Dana was changed to read as follows:</p> - -<p>“‘Paul Dana continued in control of the property for several years -and held with credit his father’s title of editor until 1903. William -Mackay Laffan, who had been associated with the elder Dana since -1877, obtained the business control. His proprietorship was announced -on February 22, 1902, and it continued until his death in 1909.’</p> - -<p>“We will let Mr. Dana’s version of this matter stand in ‘The Story -of the <i>Sun</i>’ unless some further evidence appears on the disputed -point.”</p> - -</div> - -<p>Among the makers of the <i>Sun</i> who best knew the -paper and the intellectual demands of its readers, -Laffan must be included with Dana and Mitchell. At -the time when he came to be master of the paper, his -career had covered the entire journalistic field, and he -was, moreover, a thorough <i>Sun</i> man, sympathetic with -all the ideals of his old friend Dana.</p> - -<p>Laffan, who was born in Dublin, Ireland, and had a -light and delightful brogue, was educated at Trinity -College and at St. Cecilia’s School of Medicine. When -he was twenty he went to San Francisco, where, beginning -as a reporter, he became city editor of the <i>Chronicle</i> -and managing editor of the <i>Bulletin</i>. In 1870 he went<span class="pagenum" id="Page_428">428</span> -to Baltimore, to be a reporter on the <i>Daily Bulletin</i>, -and of this newspaper he became editor and part owner. -Eventually he became the full owner of both the <i>Daily -Bulletin</i> and the <i>Sunday Bulletin</i>, and in this capacity -he endeared himself to the citizens of Baltimore by his -fight against political rings.</p> - -<p>He left newspaper work for a short time to become -general passenger-agent of the Long Island Railroad; -but in 1877, on Mr. Dana’s invitation, he went on the -<i>Sun</i> as a general writer. Himself an artist who modelled -in clay, painted in oils and water-colours, and -etched, his judgment made him valuable to the paper -as an art critic.</p> - -<p>Like Mr. Dana, he was interested in Chinese porcelains, -and he made a deeper study of them than did -his employer. When a catalogue was needed for the -Chinese porcelains in the Morgan collection in the -Metropolitan Museum of Art, Mr. Laffan, who was an -active trustee of the museum, was called upon to edit -the work. He also edited a book on “Oriental Porcelain.” -He was the author of “American Wood Engravers,” -published in 1883. For these things he is -remembered in the world of art. The men of the stage -remember him as one of the most distinguished dramatic -critics that New York has seen. Even to-day, in the -comparison of the styles of critics old and new, Laffan’s -incisive reviews are recalled as standards.</p> - -<p>In the business world of journalism Laffan is thought -of chiefly as the publisher of the <i>Sun</i> from 1884 on, and -as the live spirit of the <i>Evening Sun</i> for many of its -years. As the actual director of the <i>Sun</i>—although his -editorial powers were almost entirely delegated to Mr. -Mitchell—Mr. Laffan was a picturesque and powerful -figure. Beneath an inscrutable exterior he was distinctly -a likable person.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_429">429</span></p> - -<p>One day Laffan wrote a ten-line item, a bit about an -exhibition of a friend’s painting, and asked the city -editor to print it. He never commanded, even when he -controlled the paper; he asked. The item was lost in -the shuffle that night. The next day he rewrote it and -again asked a place for it. It was printed in the first -edition and left out of the city edition. For the third -time he carried the article to the city editor, and without -a sign of anger.</p> - -<p>“It seems to me,” he said, “that anybody can get anything -printed in this paper—except the owner.”</p> - -<p>A millionaire advertiser asked Laffan to print an -article about his pet charity.</p> - -<p>“Take it to Clarke,” said Laffan. “If he’ll print it -for you, he’ll do more for you than he’ll do for me.”</p> - -<p>A New York newspaper once remarked of Laffan that -“he never drove any man to drink, but he drove many -a man to the dictionary.” That was a commentary on -the unusual words which Laffan, whose vocabulary was -wide, would occasionally use in an editorial article. His -articles were never involved, however. They were not -frequent, they were generally short, never without important -purpose, and they drove home.</p> - -<p>Patient as Laffan was with lost items of his own, he -was a man of fine human temper. One morning, on -arriving at the office, he found that a Wall Street group -of rich scoundrels had sued the <i>Sun</i> for several hundred -thousand dollars for its exposure of their methods. He -called the city editor.</p> - -<p>“Mr. Mallon,” he said, “tell your young man who -wrote the articles to go ahead and give these men better -cause for libel suits!”</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> was making a vigorous war on a great railroad -magnate. One day an attaché of the office informed -Laffan that a man was waiting to see him who<span class="pagenum" id="Page_430">430</span> -bore a contract which would bring to the <i>Sun</i> four hundred -thousand dollars’ worth of advertising from the -magnate’s railroads.</p> - -<p>“Tell him to see the advertising manager,” said -Laffan.</p> - -<p>“He insists on seeing you,” said the clerk.</p> - -<p>“Tell him to go to hell,” said Laffan.</p> - -<p>There was a keen humour in the big Irish head. -Laffan was opposed to the amendment to the New York -State constitution which provided for an expenditure -of more than a hundred millions in improving the Erie -Canal. Under his direction a <i>Sun</i> reporter, John H. -O’Brien, wrote a series of articles intended to shatter -public faith in the huge investment. The amendment, -however, was approved by a great majority.</p> - -<p>“Mr. O’Brien,” said Mr. Laffan to the reporter, a -few days after the election, “I think it would be a very -graceful thing on your part to give a little dinner to -all those gentlemen who voted against the canal project.”</p> - -<p>Upon Mr. Laffan’s death, in November, 1909, the trustees -of the Sun Printing and Publishing Association -asked Mr. Mitchell, who had been made editor of the <i>Sun</i> -on July 20, 1903, to take up the administrative burden -as well as the editorial. This Mr. Mitchell did for a -little more than two years, although his personal inclinations -were toward the literary construction and -supervision of the paper rather than toward the business -detail incident to the presidency of so large a corporation. -The double load was lightened in December, -1911, when control of the <i>Sun</i> was gained through stock -purchase by William C. Reick, who became the president -of the company, Mr. Mitchell being permitted to -return to the editorial functions which have now engrossed -him, either as Mr. Dana’s aid or as editor-in-chief, -for more than forty years.</p> - -<div id="ip_430" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 30em;"> - <img src="images/i_430a.jpg" width="1610" height="2549" alt="" /> - <div class="captionl"> - <p>EDWARD PAGE MITCHELL</p> - <p class="subhead">Editor of “The Sun”</p> -</div></div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_431">431</span></p> - -<p>Mr. Reick, who was born in Philadelphia in 1864, -entered newspaper work in that city when he was nineteen -years old. A few years later he removed to -Newark, New Jersey, where he became the correspondent -of the New York <i>Herald</i>. He attracted the attention -of Mr. Bennett, the owner of the <i>Herald</i>, and -in 1888 he was made editor of the <i>Herald’s</i> London and -Paris editions. A year later he returned to America to -become city editor of the <i>Herald</i>, the highest title then -given on a newspaper which refuses to have a titular -managing editor. In 1903 he was elected president of -the New York Herald Company, and he remained in -that position until 1906, when he left the <i>Herald</i> to -become associated with Adolph Ochs in the publication -of the New York <i>Times</i> and with George W. Ochs in the -publication of the Philadelphia <i>Public Ledger</i>.</p> - -<p>When Mr. Reick assumed the control of the <i>Sun</i> -properties, he devoted much care to the improvement of -the <i>Evening Sun</i>, putting it under the managing editorship -of George M. Smith, who had served for many years -as news editor of the <i>Sun</i> under Chester S. Lord. As -Mr. Munsey said when he acquired the <i>Sun</i> and the -<i>Evening Sun</i> from Mr. Reick:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>Very great credit is due Mr. Reick for the fine development -of the <i>Evening Sun</i> since it came under his control. -I know of no man who has done a better and sounder -piece of newspaper work at any time, in New York or -elsewhere, than Mr. Reick has done on the <i>Evening Sun</i>.</p> -</div> - -<p>Among the events of the Reick régime were the retirement -of Chester S. Lord from the managing editorship -and of George B. Mallon from the city editorship, and -the removal of the newspaper from its old home at -Nassau and Frankfort Streets to the American Tract<span class="pagenum" id="Page_432">432</span> -Society Building, one block farther south, at Nassau -and Spruce Streets.</p> - -<p>It was during Mr. Reick’s control of the <i>Sun</i> that Mr. -Munsey, in the autumn of 1912, bought the New York -<i>Press</i>, a one-cent Republican morning daily holding an -Associated Press membership. The <i>Sun</i> had lacked the -Associated Press service since the fateful night when -Mr. Dana bolted from that organization and started the -Laffan News Bureau.</p> - -<p>Mr. Munsey bought the <i>Sun</i> from Mr. Reick on June -30, 1916, and four days later, on July 3, the <i>Press</i>, with -its Associated Press service, its best men, and some of -its popular features, was absorbed by the <i>Sun</i>. As the -<i>Press</i> had been a penny paper, the price of the <i>Sun</i> was -reduced to one cent, after having stood at two cents -since the Civil War. It remained a penny paper until -January 26, 1918, when the pressure of production-costs -forced the price of all the big New York dailies to two -cents.</p> - -<p>The amalgamation of the <i>Sun</i> and the <i>Press</i> wrought -no change in the editorial department of the <i>Sun</i>, Mr. -Mitchell remaining as its chief. Ervin Wardman, long -the editor of the <i>Press</i>, became the publisher of the Sun -and vice-president of the Sun Printing and Publishing -Association. Mr. Reick remained with the organization -in an advisory capacity. Keats Speed, the managing -editor of the <i>Press</i>, became managing editor of the -<i>Sun</i>, Kenneth Lord remaining as city editor.</p> - -<p>The <i>Sun</i> has had five homes—at 222 William Street, -where Benjamin H. Day struck off the first tiny number; -at 156 Nassau Street, rented by Day in August, 1835, -when the paper began to pay well; at the southwest -corner of Nassau and Fulton Streets, to which Moses Y. -Beach moved the <i>Sun</i> in 1842; at Nassau and Frankfort -Streets, the old Tammany Hall, which Dana and his<span class="pagenum" id="Page_433">433</span> -associates bought; and at 150 Nassau Street, whither -the <i>Sun</i> moved in July, 1915. It is expected that the -<i>Sun</i> will presently move to another and a fine home, for -in September, 1917, Mr. Munsey bought the Stewart -Building, at the northeast corner of Broadway and -Chambers Street, just north of City Hall Park. The -site is generally admitted to be the most desirable building -site downtown, so large is the ground space, so fine -is the outlook over the spacious park, and so close is it -to three subways, three or four elevated-railroad lines, -and the Brooklyn Bridge.</p> - -<p>Should the criticism be made that this book is not all-inclusive, -let it be remembered that there can be no -really complete history of the <i>Sun</i> except itself—the -tons of files in which for eighty-five years <i>Sun</i> men have -drawn their pictures of life’s procession. In a narrative -like this only the outlines of the <i>Sun’s</i> course, margined -with incidents of the men who made it great by making -it as human as themselves, can find room.</p> - -<p>It is easy to begin a story of the <i>Sun</i>, because Ben -Day and that uncertain morning in 1833, the very dawn -of popular journalism, make a very real picture. Try -to end it, and the roar of the presses in the basement is -remindful of the fact that there is no end, except the -arbitrary closing. This <i>Sun</i>, like <span class="locked"><i>Richmond’s</i>—</span></p> - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="verse indent0">By the bright track of his fiery car</div> - <div class="verse indent0">Gives token of a goodly day to-morrow.</div> - </div> -</div> -</div> - -<hr /> - -<div id="toclink_435" class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_435">435</span></p> -<h2 class="nobreak" id="BIBLIOGRAPHY">BIBLIOGRAPHY</h2> -</div> - -<p>The files of the <i>Sun</i>, 1833–1918.</p> - -<p>“The Life of Charles A. Dana,” by James Harrison Wilson, -LL.D., late Major General, U. S. V. Harper & Bros., -1907.</p> - -<p>“Journalism in the United States from 1690 to 1872,” by -Frederic Hudson. Harper & Bros., 1873.</p> - -<p>“The Art of Newspaper Making,” by Charles A. Dana. -D. Appleton & Co., 1895.</p> - -<p>“Henry J. Raymond and the New York Press for Thirty -Years,” by Augustus Maverick. A. S. Hale & Co., Hartford, -Conn., 1870.</p> - -<p>“First Blows of the Civil War,” by James S. Pike. American -News Co., 1879.</p> - -<p>“Ordered to China; Letters of Wilbur J. Chamberlin.” -Frederick A. Stokes Co., 1903.</p> - -<p>“The Making of a Journalist,” by Julian Ralph. Harper -& Bros., 1903.</p> - -<p>“Mr. Dana of the <i>Sun</i>,” by Edward P. Mitchell. -<cite>McClure’s Magazine</cite>, October, 1894.</p> - -<p>“The New York <i>Sun</i>,” by Will Irwin. <cite>American Magazine</cite>, -January, 1909.</p> - -<p>“The Men Who Make the New York <i>Sun</i>,” by E. J. Edwards. -<cite>Munsey’s Magazine</cite>, October, 1893.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div id="toclink_437" class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_437">437</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHRONOLOGY">CHRONOLOGY</h2> -</div> - -<div class="hang"> - -<p>1833.—The <i>Sun</i> is founded by Benjamin H. Day, September 3.</p> - -<p>1835.—Its home is changed from 222 William street to 156 -Nassau street, August 3.</p> - -<p>1835.—The Moon Hoax appears, August 25.</p> - -<p>1838.—Moses Yale Beach becomes proprietor, June 28.</p> - -<p>1842.—The <i>Sun</i> moves to the southwest corner of Fulton and -Nassau streets, July.</p> - -<p>1844.—Poe’s Balloon Hoax appears, April 3.</p> - -<p>1845.—M. Y. Beach takes his sons, Moses S. and Alfred E., -as partners, October 22.</p> - -<p>1848.—Moses Yale Beach retires, December 4.</p> - -<p>1852.—Alfred Ely Beach retires, April 6.</p> - -<p>1860.—Moses S. Beach lets the <i>Sun</i> to a religious group, -August 6.</p> - -<p>1861.—The <i>Sun</i> returns to the management of M. S. Beach, -January 1.</p> - -<p>1864.—The price is raised to two cents, August 1.</p> - -<p>1868.—Charles A. Dana becomes the editor and manager of -the <i>Sun</i>, January 25.</p> - -<p>1868.—The <i>Sun</i> moves to 170 Nassau street, January 25.</p> - -<p>1875.—Edward P. Mitchell joins the editorial staff, October 1.</p> - -<p>1897.—Death of Charles A. Dana, October 17.</p> - -<p>1902.—William M. Laffan’s proprietorship is announced, -February 22.</p> - -<p>1903.—Edward P. Mitchell becomes the editor of the <i>Sun</i>, -July 20.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_438">438</span></p> - -<p>1909.—Death of William M. Laffan, November 19.</p> - -<p>1911.—William C. Reick becomes proprietor, December 17.</p> - -<p>1915.—The <i>Sun</i> moves to 150 Nassau street, July 11.</p> - -<p>1916.—Frank A. Munsey becomes proprietor, June 30.</p> - -<p>1916.—With the <i>Sun</i> is amalgamated the New York <i>Press</i>, -July 3.</p> - -<p>1916.—The price is reduced to one cent, July 3.</p> - -<p>1918.—The price again becomes two cents, January 26.</p> -</div> - -<hr /> - -<div id="toclink_439" class="chapter"><div class="index"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_439">439</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="INDEX">INDEX</h2> - -<ul class="index"> -<li class="ifrst">Abell, Arunah S., associate of Day, <a href="#Page_23">23</a></li> -<li class="isub1">establishes Baltimore <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_136">136</a></li> -<li class="isub1">buys Guilford estate, <a href="#Page_136">136</a></li> -<li class="isub1">helps S. F. B. Morse, <a href="#Page_136">136</a></li> -<li class="isub1">death of, in 1888, <a href="#Page_136">136</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Abolition of slavery, article on, <a href="#Page_54">54</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Wisner’s editorial on, <a href="#Page_42">42</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Actors of the early 30’s, <a href="#Page_121">121</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Adams, Cyrus C., cable editor, <a href="#Page_394">394</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Adamson, Robert, <i>Evening Sun</i> reporter, <a href="#Page_399">399</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Adams, Samuel Hopkins, Dana finds it hard to discharge, <a href="#Page_378">378</a>, <a href="#Page_379">379</a></li> -<li class="isub1">writes Sunday <i>Sun</i> fiction, <a href="#Page_412">412</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Adams, Samuel, murdered by John C. Colt, <a href="#Page_154">154</a></li> - -<li class="indx">“Addition, Division, and Silence,” <a href="#Page_305">305</a>, <a href="#Page_306">306</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Advertising, fashions of, in 1833, <a href="#Page_26">26</a></li> -<li class="isub1">specimens of early “liners,” <a href="#Page_125">125</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Sun</i> takes off the first page in 1862, <a href="#Page_189">189</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Sun</i>, under Morrison, refuses advertisements on Sunday, <a href="#Page_190">190</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Alamo massacre, <a href="#Page_113">113</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Alexander, Columbus, escape of, in the Safe Burglary Conspiracy, <a href="#Page_308">308</a>, <a href="#Page_309">309</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Alger, Horatio, Jr., writes fiction for the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_195">195</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Allen, Miss Susan, smokes a cigar on Broadway, <a href="#Page_45">45</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Alumni, of the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_328">328</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Anderson, Harold M., Spanish war correspondent, <a href="#Page_355">355</a>, <a href="#Page_356">356</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Arago, D. F., alleged deception of, by the Moon Hoax, <a href="#Page_97">97–99</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Armstrong, Henry M., Spanish war correspondent, <a href="#Page_356">356</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Associated Press, Dana’s break with, <a href="#Page_374">374</a></li> -<li class="isub1">formed in <i>Sun</i> office, <a href="#Page_167">167</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Astor House, <a href="#Page_49">49</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Astor, William B., New York’s richest man, <a href="#Page_234">234</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Attree, William H., <a href="#Page_61">61–62</a></li> -<li class="isub1">reporter on the <i>Transcript</i>, <a href="#Page_133">133</a>, <a href="#Page_134">134</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Aviation, prophetic editorial comment on, <a href="#Page_46">46</a></li> - -<li class="indx">“Azamet Batuk.” See <a href="#Thieblin">Thiéblin, N. L.</a></li> - -<li class="ifrst">Badeau, General Adam, a <i>Sun</i> contributor, <a href="#Page_404">404</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Ballard, Anna, reporter, <a href="#Page_286">286</a></li> - -<li class="indx"><a id="Balloon_Hoax"></a>Balloon Hoax, Poe’s, referred to by De Morgan, <a href="#Page_98">98</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Bartlett, Willard, dramatic critic, counsel for Dana, editorial contributor, <a href="#Page_286">286</a></li> -<li class="isub1">invents the <i>Sun</i> Cat, <a href="#Page_287">287</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Bartlett, William O., writes “No king, no clown, to rule this town!”, <a href="#Page_255">255</a></li> -<li class="isub1">style of, compared with Dana’s and Mitchell’s, <a href="#Page_256">256</a></li> -<li class="isub1">reference of, to General Hancock’s weight, <a href="#Page_256">256</a></li> -<li class="isub1">counsel for Tweed, <a href="#Page_275">275</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Battey, Emily Verdery, first real woman reporter, <a href="#Page_285">285</a>, <a href="#Page_286">286</a></li> -<li class="isub1">appears in the <i>Sun</i> on April 13, 1844, <a href="#Page_149">149–153</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Beach, Alfred Ely, becomes partner in the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_161">161</a>, <a href="#Page_162">162</a></li> -<li class="isub1">invents first typewriter for the blind, <a href="#Page_162">162</a></li> -<li class="isub1">builds first New York subway, <a href="#Page_162">162</a>, <a href="#Page_163">163</a></li> -<li class="isub1">withdraws from the <i>Sun</i> April 6, 1852, <a href="#Page_171">171</a></li> -<li class="isub1">dies in 1896, <a href="#Page_163">163</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Beach Brothers, name of ownership, <a href="#Page_170">170</a>, <a href="#Page_171">171</a></li> -<li class="isub1">issue <i>Evening Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_171">171</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Beach, Erasmus D., book reviewer, <a href="#Page_349">349</a></li> -<li class="isub1">writes classic football story, <a href="#Page_350">350</a></li> - -<li class="indx"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_440">440</span>Beach, Frederick Converse, <a href="#Page_163">163</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Beach, Joseph, son of Moses Y. Beach, <a href="#Page_173">173</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Beach, Moses Sperry, becomes a partner in the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_161">161</a>, <a href="#Page_162">162</a></li> -<li class="isub1">part owner Boston <i>Daily Times</i>, <a href="#Page_162">162</a></li> -<li class="isub1">invents printing devices, <a href="#Page_162">162</a></li> -<li class="isub1">becomes sole owner of the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_171">171</a></li> -<li class="isub1">brings wood from the Mount of Olives for Beecher’s pulpit, <a href="#Page_177">177</a></li> -<li class="isub1">absence of, from the <i>Sun</i> in the early months of the Civil War, <a href="#Page_189">189</a></li> -<li class="isub1">takes the <i>Sun</i> back, <a href="#Page_191">191</a></li> -<li class="isub1">sells the <i>Sun</i> to Dana, <a href="#Page_198">198</a>, <a href="#Page_199">199</a></li> -<li class="isub1">bids readers farewell, <a href="#Page_200">200</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Beach, Moses Yale, enters <i>Sun</i> office as bookkeeper, <a href="#Page_111">111</a></li> -<li class="isub1">buys the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_127">127</a></li> -<li class="isub1">youth and marriage of, <a href="#Page_139">139</a></li> -<li class="isub1">inventions of, <a href="#Page_140">140</a></li> -<li class="isub1">joins Benjamin H. Day, <a href="#Page_140">140</a></li> -<li class="isub1">owns two buildings where the <i>Sun</i> had its home, <a href="#Page_157">157</a></li> -<li class="isub1">takes sons as partners, <a href="#Page_161">161</a></li> -<li class="isub1">enterprise of, in Mexican War, <a href="#Page_164">164</a>, <a href="#Page_165">165</a></li> -<li class="isub1">starts for Mexico as President Polk’s special agent, <a href="#Page_166">166</a></li> -<li class="isub1">retires from the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_167">167</a></li> -<li class="isub1">dinner in his honour, <a href="#Page_167">167</a></li> -<li class="isub1">issues various editions of the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_169">169</a></li> -<li class="isub1">publishes “The Wealth of New York,” <a href="#Page_169">169</a></li> -<li class="isub1">father of the newspaper syndicate, <a href="#Page_169">169</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Dana’s estimate of, <a href="#Page_169">169</a>, <a href="#Page_170">170</a></li> -<li class="isub1">amasses a fortune and retires, <a href="#Page_170">170</a></li> -<li class="isub1">writes European articles for the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_173">173</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Beach, Stanley Yale, <a href="#Page_163">163</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Becker, Charles, conviction of, reported by E. C. Hill, <a href="#Page_320">320</a>, <a href="#Page_321">321</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Beckwith, Arthur, telegraph editor, <a href="#Page_280">280</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Beecher, Henry Ward, John Brown speech of, in the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_177">177</a></li> -<li class="isub1">tribute to H. B. Stanton, <a href="#Page_259">259</a></li> -<li class="isub1">trial of, <a href="#Page_278">278</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“I don’t read the <i>Sun</i>,” <a href="#Page_310">310</a></li> -<li class="isub1">denounced by the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_311">311</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Belknap, William W., accused by the <i>Sun</i> in Post-trader scandal and impeached, <a href="#Page_306">306</a>, <a href="#Page_307">307</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Bell, Jared D., part owner, <i>New Era</i>, <a href="#Page_134">134</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Bendelari, George, book-reviewer, <a href="#Page_411">411</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Bennett, James Gordon, thrashed by Col. Webb, <a href="#Page_36">36</a></li> -<li class="isub1">work of, for the <i>Courier and Enquirer</i>, <a href="#Page_37">37</a></li> -<li class="isub1">editor Philadelphia <i>Courier</i>, <a href="#Page_53">53</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Sun</i> replies to charge of, that Day is an infidel, <a href="#Page_108">108</a></li> -<li class="isub1">early career of, <a href="#Page_109">109</a></li> -<li class="isub1">treats Helen Jewett’s murder sensationally, <a href="#Page_114">114</a></li> -<li class="isub1">second assault on, by Webb described, <a href="#Page_114">114</a></li> -<li class="isub1">early failures of, <a href="#Page_131">131</a></li> -<li class="isub1">debt of, to Day’s example, <a href="#Page_132">132</a></li> -<li class="isub1">announcement of coming marriage of, <a href="#Page_132">132</a></li> -<li class="isub1">establishes the no-credit system, <a href="#Page_133">133</a></li> -<li class="isub1">works harder than other proprietors, <a href="#Page_174">174</a></li> -<li class="isub1">dies in 1872, <a href="#Page_293">293</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“the first yellow journalist,” <a href="#Page_413">413</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Bennett, J. G., Jr., takes his father’s place, <a href="#Page_298">298</a></li> -<li class="isub1">death of, <a href="#Page_132">132</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Bigelow, John, associate of Bryant, <a href="#Page_174">174</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Bishop, Joseph W., night city editor, <a href="#Page_372">372</a></li> -<li class="isub1">night editor, <a href="#Page_372">372</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Black, Chauncey F., a <i>Sun</i> contributor, <a href="#Page_405">405</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Blackwood, Algernon, <i>Evening Sun</i> reporter, <a href="#Page_399">399</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Blatchford, Judge Samuel, historic decision of, in the Shepherd case, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>, <a href="#Page_308">308</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Blizzard of March, 1888, <a href="#Page_362">362</a>, <a href="#Page_363">363</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Blythe, Samuel G., describes E. G. Riggs, <a href="#Page_346">346</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Bogart, John B., “If a man bites a dog, that is news,” <a href="#Page_241">241</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“a whole school of journalism,” <a href="#Page_281">281</a></li> -<li class="isub1">possesses “sixth sense,” <a href="#Page_335">335</a>, <a href="#Page_336">336</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_441">441</span>persistence of, <a href="#Page_336">336</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Bonner, Robert, pays $30,000 for “Norwood,” <a href="#Page_235">235</a></li> -<li class="isub1">sagacity of, commented on by Dana, <a href="#Page_300">300</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Book-reviewers, <i>Sun’s</i>, list of, <a href="#Page_411">411</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Borden, Lizzie, acquittal of, reported by Julian Ralph, <a href="#Page_318">318</a>, <a href="#Page_319">319</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Bowery Theatre Fire, ruins Hamblin, <a href="#Page_118">118</a></li> -<li class="isub1">first American playhouse lighted with gas, <a href="#Page_121">121</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Bowles, Samuel, employs B. H. Day, <a href="#Page_22">22–23</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Bowman, Frank, dramatic critic, <a href="#Page_411">411</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Bread riots, the <i>Sun’s</i> part in, <a href="#Page_118">118</a>, <a href="#Page_119">119</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Brewster, Sir David, appears in Moon Hoax, <a href="#Page_71">71</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Brisbane, Albert, association of, with Greeley, <a href="#Page_161">161</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Brisbane, Arthur, son of Albert Brisbane, <a href="#Page_161">161</a></li> -<li class="isub1">style of, like W. O. Bartlett’s, <a href="#Page_256">256</a></li> -<li class="isub1">becomes reporter at 18, <a href="#Page_346">346</a>, <a href="#Page_347">347</a></li> -<li class="isub1">becomes London correspondent, <a href="#Page_347">347</a></li> -<li class="isub1">reports Sullivan-Mitchell fight, <a href="#Page_347">347</a></li> -<li class="isub1">is managing editor <i>Evening Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_348">348</a></li> -<li class="isub1">becomes editor Sunday <i>World</i> magazine, <a href="#Page_348">348</a></li> -<li class="isub1">becomes editor <i>Evening Journal</i>, <a href="#Page_348">348</a></li> -<li class="isub1">becomes proprietor Washington <i>Times</i>, <a href="#Page_348">348</a></li> -<li class="isub1">takes Richard Harding Davis on <i>Evening Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_398">398</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Brook Farm, Dana enters, <a href="#Page_206">206</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Brooklyn Theatre fire, <a href="#Page_362">362</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Brooks brothers, James and Erastus, establish New York <i>Express</i>, <a href="#Page_134">134</a>, <a href="#Page_135">135</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Brown, John, the <i>Sun’s</i> attitude toward, <a href="#Page_177">177</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Bryant, William Cullen, editor and poet in 1833, <a href="#Page_34">34</a></li> -<li class="isub1">conflict of, with W. L. Stone, <a href="#Page_34">34</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Buchanan, James, supported by the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_176">176</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Burdell, Dr. Harvey, murder of, <a href="#Page_196">196</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Burnett, Wm., <a href="#Page_60">60</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Burr, Aaron, <a href="#Page_51">51</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Butler, Stephen B., <a href="#Page_60">60</a></li> - -<li class="ifrst">Cady, Elizabeth, marries Henry B. Stanton, <a href="#Page_259">259</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Caroline case, the <i>Sun’s</i> enterprise in reporting, <a href="#Page_144">144</a>, <a href="#Page_145">145</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Carroll, Dana H., Spanish war correspondent, <a href="#Page_355">355</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Cat, the <i>Sun’s</i>, his invention and reputation, <a href="#Page_287">287–289</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Chadwick, George W., in business with Dana, <a href="#Page_216">216</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Chamberlains and Chamberlins, <a href="#Page_341">341–343</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Chamberlain, Henry Richardson, covers Europe for the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_342">342</a></li> -<li class="isub1">visions by, of a great war, <a href="#Page_342">342</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Chamberlin, Wilbur J., takes charge of the <i>Sun</i> staff in Cuba, <a href="#Page_356">356</a></li> -<li class="isub1">eleven-column report by, <a href="#Page_361">361</a></li> -<li class="isub1">known as “Jersey,” <a href="#Page_338">338</a>;</li> -<li class="isub2">cable hoodoo of, <a href="#Page_339">339</a>, <a href="#Page_340">340</a></li> -<li class="isub1">describes German soldiers’ brutality in China, <a href="#Page_340">340</a></li> -<li class="isub1">describes the Deacon’s broken suspenders, <a href="#Page_341">341</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Chamberlin, E. O., reporter, <a href="#Page_342">342</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Chamberlin, Henry B., reporter, <a href="#Page_343">343</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Childs, George W., tells of W. M. Swain’s industry, <a href="#Page_135">135</a></li> -<li class="isub1">buys <i>Public Ledger</i>, <a href="#Page_135">135</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Cholera, in New York, 1832, <a href="#Page_22">22</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Church, Francis P., a <i>Sun</i> editorial writer for forty years, <a href="#Page_191">191</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“Is There a Santa Claus?,” <a href="#Page_409">409</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Church, William C., publisher of the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_190">190</a></li> -<li class="isub1">war correspondent, <a href="#Page_190">190</a>, <a href="#Page_191">191</a></li> -<li class="isub1">owns <i>Army and Navy Journal</i>, <a href="#Page_191">191</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Circulation in November, 1833, 2,000, <a href="#Page_50">50</a></li> -<li class="isub1">in December, 1833, <a href="#Page_52">52</a></li> -<li class="isub1">April, 1834, <a href="#Page_54">54</a></li> -<li class="isub1">in November, 1834, <a href="#Page_57">57</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Day offers to bet on it, <a href="#Page_62">62–63</a></li> -<li class="isub1">in August, 1835, it becomes the largest in the world, <a href="#Page_78">78</a></li> -<li class="isub1">in August, 1836, 27,000, <a href="#Page_116">116</a></li> -<li class="isub1">in September, 1843, 38,000, <a href="#Page_157">157</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_442">442</span>in December, 1848, 50,000, <a href="#Page_168">168</a></li> -<li class="isub1">in September, 1860, 59,000, <a href="#Page_194">194</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Dana’s estimate of 50,000 to 60,000 in 1868, <a href="#Page_228">228</a></li> -<li class="isub1">in 1871, 100,000, <a href="#Page_269">269</a></li> -<li class="isub1">in March, 1875, 120,000, <a href="#Page_300">300</a></li> -<li class="isub1">day after Tilden-Hayes election, <a href="#Page_220">220</a>, <a href="#Page_390">390</a>, <a href="#Page_323">323</a>, <a href="#Page_325">325</a></li> -<li class="isub1">after other interesting events, <a href="#Page_323">323–325</a></li> -<li class="isub1">high-tide marks, <a href="#Page_325">325</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Civil War, the <i>Sun</i> in the, <a href="#Page_172">172</a> <i>et seq.</i></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Sun</i> declares “the Union cannot be dissolved,” <a href="#Page_179">179</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Sun</i> charges the <i>Herald</i>, the <i>Daily News</i>, and the <i>Staats-Zeitung</i> with disloyalty, <a href="#Page_180">180</a>, <a href="#Page_181">181</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Sun</i>, the <i>Tribune</i>, and the <i>Times</i> entirely loyal, <a href="#Page_185">185</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Sun’s</i> news from Bull Run, <a href="#Page_187">187</a>;</li> -<li class="isub2">from Gettysburg, <a href="#Page_188">188</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Sun</i> protests against Sunday battles, <a href="#Page_190">190</a></li> -<li class="isub1">attitude of Greeley and Dana, <a href="#Page_211">211</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Clarke, Selah Merrill, night city editor, 1881–1912, <a href="#Page_383">383</a></li> -<li class="isub1">story of the Northampton disaster by, <a href="#Page_383">383</a></li> -<li class="isub1">remarkable memory of, <a href="#Page_384">384</a>, <a href="#Page_385">385</a></li> -<li class="isub1">head-lines written by, <a href="#Page_387">387</a>, <a href="#Page_388">388</a></li> -<li class="isub1">gifts of, as copy reader, <a href="#Page_389">389</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Cleveland, Grover, Dana’s opposition to, <a href="#Page_421">421</a>, <a href="#Page_422">422</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Clubs: Bread and Cheese, Hone, Union, <a href="#Page_122">122</a>, <a href="#Page_123">123</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Cobb, Irvin S., reports Portsmouth peace conference for <i>Evening Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_399">399</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Coffey, Titian J., recipient of the “addition, division, and silence” letter, <a href="#Page_305">305</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Collins, E. K., an advertiser in the first <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_27">27</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Colt, John C., murders Samuel Adams, <a href="#Page_154">154</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Conkling, Roscoe, in business with Dana, <a href="#Page_216">216</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Connolly, James, reporter, <a href="#Page_284">284</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Conventions, national, <i>Sun</i> men reporting, <a href="#Page_344">344</a></li> -<li class="isub1">history of, written by E. G. Riggs, <a href="#Page_346">346</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Cook, Tom, reporter, <a href="#Page_284">284</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Cooper, Charles P., city editor, <i>Evening Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_400">400</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Cooper, James Fenimore, <a href="#Page_50">50</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Corbin, John, dramatic critic, <a href="#Page_411">411</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Coward, Edward Fales, <i>Evening Sun</i> dramatic critic, <a href="#Page_399">399</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Crédit Mobilier scandal, <a href="#Page_304">304</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Crockett, David, memoirs of, in the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_51">51</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Cronyn, Thoreau, Dewey’s funeral, report by, <a href="#Page_333">333</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Cuba, Dana’s interest in struggle of, <a href="#Page_353">353–355</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Cullen, Clarence L., writes “Tales of the Ex-Tanks,” <a href="#Page_411">411</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Cummings, Alexander, writes for the <i>World</i>, <a href="#Page_182">182</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Cummings, Amos Jay, secretly learns typesetting, <a href="#Page_264">264</a></li> -<li class="isub1">goes with Filibuster Walker, <a href="#Page_265">265</a></li> -<li class="isub1">wins Medal of Honor at Fredericksburg, <a href="#Page_265">265</a></li> -<li class="isub1">holds <i>Tribune</i> office against rioters, <a href="#Page_266">266</a></li> -<li class="isub1">conflicts with John Russell Young, <a href="#Page_266">266</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“They say I swear too much,” <a href="#Page_267">267</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“To hell with my own copy,” <a href="#Page_267">267</a></li> -<li class="isub1">best news man of his day, <a href="#Page_268">268</a></li> -<li class="isub1">is first human interest reporter, <a href="#Page_268">268</a></li> -<li class="isub1">reports prize fights, <a href="#Page_285">285</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Nicara-goo Song of, <a href="#Page_289">289</a>, <a href="#Page_290">290</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“Ziska” letters of, <a href="#Page_290">290</a></li> -<li class="isub1">is managing editor of the <i>Express</i>, <a href="#Page_290">290</a></li> -<li class="isub1">returns to the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_290">290</a></li> -<li class="isub1">is elected to House of Representatives, <a href="#Page_290">290</a></li> -<li class="isub1">becomes editor <i>Evening Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_290">290</a></li> -<li class="isub1">returns to Congress, <a href="#Page_290">290</a>, <a href="#Page_291">291</a></li> -<li class="isub1">death and funeral of, <a href="#Page_291">291</a></li> -<li class="isub1">prints murder charts, <a href="#Page_414">414</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Curtin, Jeremiah, a <i>Sun</i> contributor, <a href="#Page_404">404</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Curtis, David A., Sunday <i>Sun</i> writer, <a href="#Page_412">412</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Curtis, George Ticknor, a <i>Sun</i> contributor, <a href="#Page_404">404</a></li> - -<li class="indx"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_443">443</span>Curtis, George William, writes for the <i>Tribune</i>, <a href="#Page_161">161</a></li> - -<li class="ifrst">Daly, Augustin, tries to have Dana dismiss Laffan, <a href="#Page_252">252</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Damrosch, Leopold, music critic, <a href="#Page_314">314</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Dana, Charles A., a boy in Buffalo when Day founded the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_35">35</a></li> -<li class="isub1">reading “Oliver Twist” weakens eyes of, <a href="#Page_123">123</a></li> -<li class="isub1">draws $50 a week on <i>Tribune</i>, <a href="#Page_174">174</a></li> -<li class="isub1">named by the <i>Sun</i> as a possible postmaster, <a href="#Page_179">179</a></li> -<li class="isub1">buys the <i>Sun</i> and announces its policy, <a href="#Page_198">198</a>, <a href="#Page_199">199</a></li> -<li class="isub1">absolute master of the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_202">202</a></li> -<li class="isub1">birth and ancestry, <a href="#Page_202">202</a></li> -<li class="isub1">brothers and sisters of, <a href="#Page_203">203</a></li> -<li class="isub1">boyhood and life of, in Buffalo, <a href="#Page_203">203</a>, <a href="#Page_204">204</a></li> -<li class="isub1">goes to Harvard, <a href="#Page_204">204</a></li> -<li class="isub1">teaches school at Scituate, <a href="#Page_205">205</a></li> -<li class="isub1">religious indecision of, <a href="#Page_205">205</a></li> -<li class="isub1">sight of, impaired, <a href="#Page_206">206</a></li> -<li class="isub1">joins Brook Farm, <a href="#Page_206">206</a></li> -<li class="isub1">milks cows and waits on table, <a href="#Page_207">207</a></li> -<li class="isub1">meets Horace Greeley, <a href="#Page_207">207</a></li> -<li class="isub1">writes for the <i>Harbinger</i> and the <i>Dial</i>, <a href="#Page_207">207</a></li> -<li class="isub1">writes poetry, <a href="#Page_208">208</a></li> -<li class="isub1">marries, <a href="#Page_208">208</a></li> -<li class="isub1">goes to Boston <i>Daily Chronotype</i>, <a href="#Page_208">208</a></li> -<li class="isub1">comes out “strong against hell,” <a href="#Page_209">209</a></li> -<li class="isub1">becomes city editor of the New York <i>Tribune</i>, <a href="#Page_209">209</a></li> -<li class="isub1">goes to Europe, <a href="#Page_209">209</a></li> -<li class="isub1">returns to be managing editor of the <i>Tribune</i>, <a href="#Page_210">210</a></li> -<li class="isub1">his pay and income, <a href="#Page_210">210</a></li> -<li class="isub1">literary works of, before Civil War, <a href="#Page_213">213</a></li> -<li class="isub1">leaves the <i>Tribune</i>, <a href="#Page_214">214</a>, <a href="#Page_215">215</a></li> -<li class="isub1">induces Grant to stop the cotton speculation, <a href="#Page_216">216</a></li> -<li class="isub1">convinces Lincoln of needed reforms, <a href="#Page_216">216</a></li> -<li class="isub1">is chosen to report on complaints against Grant, <a href="#Page_216">216</a>, <a href="#Page_217">217</a></li> -<li class="isub1">writes of his “new insight into slavery,” <a href="#Page_218">218</a></li> -<li class="isub1">is with Grant at Vicksburg, <a href="#Page_218">218</a></li> -<li class="isub1">brings Grant full authority, <a href="#Page_218">218</a></li> -<li class="isub1">sees much of war, <a href="#Page_219">219</a></li> -<li class="isub1">estimate of Grant by, <a href="#Page_219">219</a></li> -<li class="isub1">estimate of Rawlins by, <a href="#Page_219">219</a>, <a href="#Page_220">220</a></li> -<li class="isub1">reports on Rosecrans, <a href="#Page_220">220</a></li> -<li class="isub1">poetry contest of, with General Lawler, <a href="#Page_221">221</a></li> -<li class="isub1">describes the storming of Missionary Ridge, <a href="#Page_221">221</a>, <a href="#Page_222">222</a></li> -<li class="isub1">reports Grant’s Virginia campaign, <a href="#Page_222">222</a>, <a href="#Page_223">223</a></li> -<li class="isub1">goes to Richmond to gather Confederate archives, <a href="#Page_224">224</a></li> -<li class="isub1">talks with Lincoln about Jacob Thompson, <a href="#Page_224">224</a></li> -<li class="isub1">authorizes Miles to manacle Jefferson Davis, <a href="#Page_224">224</a></li> -<li class="isub1">quoted on Davis’s imprisonment, <a href="#Page_225">225</a></li> -<li class="isub1">becomes editor of Chicago <i>Republican</i>, <a href="#Page_225">225</a></li> -<li class="isub1">assails President Johnson, <a href="#Page_226">226</a></li> -<li class="isub1">quits Chicago <i>Republican</i>, <a href="#Page_226">226</a></li> -<li class="isub1">determines to have a New York newspaper, <a href="#Page_226">226</a></li> -<li class="isub1">his backers, <a href="#Page_226">226</a></li> -<li class="isub1">decides to buy the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_228">228</a>, <a href="#Page_229">229</a></li> -<li class="isub1">changes its appearance, <a href="#Page_230">230</a></li> -<li class="isub1">moves “It Shines for All,” <a href="#Page_230">230</a>, <a href="#Page_231">231</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“Dana was the <i>Sun</i> and the <i>Sun</i> Dana,” <a href="#Page_231">231</a></li> -<li class="isub1">makes no rules for the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_238">238</a></li> -<li class="isub1">editorial principles of, <a href="#Page_238">238</a>, <a href="#Page_239">239</a></li> -<li class="isub1">lectures at Cornell, <a href="#Page_239">239</a></li> -<li class="isub1">defines news, <a href="#Page_241">241</a></li> -<li class="isub1">on college education, <a href="#Page_242">242</a></li> -<li class="isub1">on reporting, <a href="#Page_242">242</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“The invariable law is to be interesting,” <a href="#Page_243">243</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“Do not take any model,” <a href="#Page_243">243</a>, <a href="#Page_244">244</a></li> -<li class="isub1">not impressed by names of writers, <a href="#Page_246">246</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“This is too damned wicked,” <a href="#Page_246">246</a></li> -<li class="isub1">refuses to expose a silly literary thief, <a href="#Page_246">246</a></li> -<li class="isub1">methods and surroundings of, <a href="#Page_246">246–251</a></li> -<li class="isub1">interest of, in everything and everybody, <a href="#Page_251">251</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“Take the partition down,” <a href="#Page_251">251</a></li> -<li class="isub1">love of, for variety of topics, <a href="#Page_253">253</a></li> -<li class="isub1">delight of, in other men’s work, <a href="#Page_254">254</a></li> -<li class="isub1">tact of, in handling men, <a href="#Page_263">263</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_444">444</span>death of great rivals of, <a href="#Page_293">293</a></li> -<li class="isub1">quoted on “personal journalism,” <a href="#Page_296">296</a></li> -<li class="isub1">quoted on Greeley, Raymond, and Bennett, <a href="#Page_297">297</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“We pass the <i>Tribune</i> by”, <a href="#Page_298">298</a></li> -<li class="isub1">advises <i>World</i> reporters to read the Bible, <a href="#Page_299">299</a></li> -<li class="isub1">kindly feeling of, toward the younger Bennett, <a href="#Page_299">299</a></li> -<li class="isub1">belief of, in a newspaper without advertising, <a href="#Page_299">299–301</a></li> -<li class="isub1">objects to “heavy chunks of news,” <a href="#Page_302">302</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“our contemporaries exhaust their young men,” <a href="#Page_302">302</a></li> -<li class="isub1">is a witness against Secretary Robeson, <a href="#Page_305">305</a></li> -<li class="isub1">defeats Shepherd’s attempt to railroad him, <a href="#Page_307">307</a></li> -<li class="isub1">denies wishing to be collector of the port, <a href="#Page_309">309</a>, <a href="#Page_310">310</a></li> -<li class="isub1">loses friends because of attacks on Grantism, <a href="#Page_310">310</a></li> -<li class="isub1">refuses to be turned, <a href="#Page_310">310</a></li> -<li class="isub1">retains opinion of Grant’s military ability, <a href="#Page_310">310</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“First find the man,” plans of, <a href="#Page_326">326</a></li> -<li class="isub1">frames gold plank for New York convention of 1896, <a href="#Page_345">345</a></li> -<li class="isub1">asks Platt not to oppose Roosevelt, <a href="#Page_345">345</a></li> -<li class="isub1">affection of, for Cuba, <a href="#Page_353">353–354</a></li> -<li class="isub1">memorial to, in Camaguey, <a href="#Page_354">354</a>, <a href="#Page_355">355</a></li> -<li class="isub1">breaks with Associated Press, <a href="#Page_374">374</a></li> -<li class="isub1">encouraged <i>Sun</i> men to write fiction, <a href="#Page_405">405</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“The second yellow journalist,” <a href="#Page_413">413</a></li> -<li class="isub1">not a yellow journalist, <a href="#Page_415">415</a></li> -<li class="isub1">attacks yellow journalism, <a href="#Page_413">413</a>, <a href="#Page_415">415</a>, <a href="#Page_416">416</a>, <a href="#Page_417">417</a></li> -<li class="isub1">revolutionizes journalism, <a href="#Page_416">416</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“An opposition party in himself,” <a href="#Page_420">420</a></li> -<li class="isub1">attacks Hayes, <a href="#Page_420">420</a></li> -<li class="isub1">opposition of, to Cleveland, <a href="#Page_420">420</a></li> -<li class="isub1">supports B. F. Butler, <a href="#Page_420">420</a></li> -<li class="isub1">would burn his pen rather than support Blaine, <a href="#Page_421">421</a></li> -<li class="isub1">opinion of, on civil service reform, <a href="#Page_421">421</a></li> -<li class="isub1">opposes Bryan, <a href="#Page_422">422</a></li> -<li class="isub1">continental travels, <a href="#Page_423">423</a></li> -<li class="isub1">knowledge of languages, <a href="#Page_423">423</a></li> -<li class="isub1">porcelain collection of, <a href="#Page_423">423</a></li> -<li class="isub1">country home of, <a href="#Page_424">424</a></li> -<li class="isub1">death of, <a href="#Page_425">425</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Sun’s</i> announcement of death of, <a href="#Page_425">425</a></li> -<li class="isub1">elevation of journalism by, <a href="#Page_426">426</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Dana, Paul, succeeds his father as editor, <a href="#Page_426">426</a></li> -<li class="isub1">chief owner, <a href="#Page_427">427</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Davids, David, reporter, <a href="#Page_283">283</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Davies, Acton, Spanish war correspondent, <a href="#Page_356">356</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><i>Evening Sun</i> dramatic critic, <a href="#Page_399">399</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Davis, Oscar King, goes with Schley’s squadron, <a href="#Page_355">355</a></li> -<li class="isub1">describes capture of Guam, <a href="#Page_356">356</a>, <a href="#Page_357">357</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Davis, Richard Harding, experiences and work of, on <i>Evening Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_398">398</a></li> -<li class="isub1">writes <i>Van Bibber</i> stories for <i>Evening Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_398">398</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Day, Benjamin H., decides to publish the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_22">22</a></li> -<li class="isub1">birth and ancestry of, <a href="#Page_22">22</a></li> -<li class="isub1">issues the first <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_25">25</a></li> -<li class="isub1">issues a <i>True Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_60">60</a></li> -<li class="isub1">is indicted for attacking Attree, <a href="#Page_61">61</a></li> -<li class="isub1">welcomes an attack by Col. Webb, <a href="#Page_111">111</a></li> -<li class="isub1">quarrels with Bennett, <a href="#Page_110">110</a></li> -<li class="isub1">attacks the service at the Astor House, <a href="#Page_117">117</a></li> -<li class="isub1">name of, taken from the <i>Sun’s</i> masthead, <a href="#Page_125">125</a></li> -<li class="isub1">sells the <i>Sun</i> to Moses Y. Beach, <a href="#Page_127">127</a></li> -<li class="isub1">period of ownership by, of the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_127">127</a></li> -<li class="isub1">profits from the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_127">127</a>, <a href="#Page_128">128</a></li> -<li class="isub1">influence of, upon journalism, <a href="#Page_129">129</a></li> -<li class="isub1">influence of, on Bennett’s success, <a href="#Page_131">131</a>, <a href="#Page_132">132</a></li> -<li class="isub1">success of, responsible for the founding of many one-cent papers, <a href="#Page_133">133</a></li> -<li class="isub1">says the <i>Sun’s</i> success was “more by accident than design,” <a href="#Page_137">137</a></li> -<li class="isub1">establishes <i>True Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_137">137</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_445">445</span>starts the <i>Tatler</i>, <a href="#Page_137">137</a>, <a href="#Page_138">138</a></li> -<li class="isub1">founds <i>Brother Jonathan</i>, <a href="#Page_138">138</a></li> -<li class="isub1">retirement and death of, <a href="#Page_138">138</a></li> -<li class="isub1">remarks on Dana’s purchase of the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_138">138</a></li> -<li class="isub1">son of Benjamin H. Day, <a href="#Page_138">138</a></li> -<li class="isub1">contrasted with Dana, <a href="#Page_202">202</a></li> -<li class="isub1">was he a yellow journalist?, <a href="#Page_414">414</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Delane, John T., pictured by Kinglake, <a href="#Page_247">247</a></li> - -<li class="indx">De Morgan, Augustus, notes of, on the Moon Hoax, <a href="#Page_96">96–99</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Denison, Lindsay, covers Slocum disaster, <a href="#Page_361">361</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Dick, Dr. Thomas, <a href="#Page_66">66</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Dickens, Charles, “Nicholas Nickleby” criticized, <a href="#Page_123">123</a></li> -<li class="isub1">The <i>Sun’s</i> comments on American visit of, <a href="#Page_155">155</a>, <a href="#Page_156">156</a>, <a href="#Page_157">157</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Dieuaide, Thomas M., writes story of the Santiago sea fight, <a href="#Page_355">355</a>, <a href="#Page_356">356</a></li> -<li class="isub1">describes the destruction of St. Pierre, <a href="#Page_357">357</a>, <a href="#Page_358">358</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Dillingham, Charles B., <i>Evening Sun</i> dramatic critic, <a href="#Page_399">399</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Dix, John A., an advertiser in the first <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_28">28</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Dix, John A., Governor, seizes three New York newspapers in 1864, <a href="#Page_183">183</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Douglas, Stephen A., the <i>Sun’s</i> attitude toward, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>, <a href="#Page_177">177</a>, <a href="#Page_178">178</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Draper, Dr. John W., <a href="#Page_35">35</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Dyer, Oliver, versatility of, <a href="#Page_405">405</a></li> - -<li class="ifrst">Eaton, Walter P., dramatic critic, <a href="#Page_411">411</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Edison, Thomas A., thanks the <i>Sun</i> for chewing tobacco, <a href="#Page_322">322</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Editorial writers, list of, <a href="#Page_326">326</a></li> - -<li class="indx">England, Isaac W., first managing editor of the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_263">263</a>, <a href="#Page_264">264</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Dana’s tribute to, <a href="#Page_264">264</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Evans, George O., “He understands addition, division, and silence,” <a href="#Page_305">305</a></li> - -<li class="indx"><i>Evening Sun</i>, first issued by Beach Brothers, <a href="#Page_171">171</a></li> -<li class="isub1">issued by Dana, March 17, 1887, <a href="#Page_397">397</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“Laffan’s baby,” <a href="#Page_397">397</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Cummings first managing editor of, <a href="#Page_397">397</a></li> -<li class="isub1">later managing editors of, <a href="#Page_398">398</a>, <a href="#Page_400">400</a></li> -<li class="isub1">list of editorial writers, managing editors, and city editors of, <a href="#Page_399">399</a>, <a href="#Page_400">400</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Express service, usefulness to the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_140">140</a>, <a href="#Page_141">141</a></li> - -<li class="ifrst">Fairbanks, Charles M., reporter and night editor, <a href="#Page_351">351</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Fernandez, the murderer, <a href="#Page_103">103–104</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Field, Eugene, obtains Dana’s shears, <a href="#Page_249">249</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Fire, New York conflagration of 1835, <a href="#Page_105">105–106</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Fisk, James, Jr., pays $800,000 for a theatre, <a href="#Page_236">236</a></li> -<li class="isub1">tells of <i>Sun</i> enterprise, <a href="#Page_269">269</a>, <a href="#Page_270">270</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Fitzgerald, Christopher J., finds the lost Umbria, <a href="#Page_392">392</a>, <a href="#Page_393">393</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Flaherty, Bernard. See <a href="#Williams_Barney">Williams, Barney</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Flint, Dr. Austin, youthful friend of Dana, <a href="#Page_204">204</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Florence, William J., subscriber to the Tweed statue fund, <a href="#Page_273">273</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Foord, John, editor of the <i>Times</i>, <a href="#Page_298">298</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Football, Ralph’s story without a score, <a href="#Page_334">334</a>, <a href="#Page_335">335</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Beach’s Homeric introduction, <a href="#Page_350">350</a>, <a href="#Page_351">351</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Forks, the <i>Sun’s</i> conservative attitude toward, <a href="#Page_55">55</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Forrest, Edwin, <a href="#Page_55">55–56</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Fowler, Elting A., predicts Bryan’s appointment as Secretary of State, <a href="#Page_377">377</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Fuller, Andrew S., agricultural editor, <a href="#Page_199">199</a>, <a href="#Page_200">200</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Fyles, Franklin, reports Beecher trial, <a href="#Page_278">278</a></li> -<li class="isub1">reporter, dramatic critic, and playwright, <a href="#Page_283">283</a></li> - -<li class="ifrst">Garr, Andrew S., sues Day for libel, <a href="#Page_126">126</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Gibson, A. M., Washington correspondent, <a href="#Page_312">312</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Godwin, Parke, edits <i>Daily News</i>, <a href="#Page_181">181</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Goodwin, Joseph, creates <i>Sarsaparilla Reilly</i>, <a href="#Page_412">412</a></li> - -<li class="indx"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_446">446</span>Gould, Jay, is blackballed in the Blossom Club, <a href="#Page_270">270</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Grant, Ulysses S., the <i>Sun’s</i> support of, in 1868, announced, <a href="#Page_199">199</a></li> -<li class="isub1">imposed upon, <a href="#Page_304">304</a></li> -<li class="isub1">opposed by the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_304">304</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Grant scandals, <a href="#Page_304">304–310</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Greeley, Horace, founds <i>Morning Post</i>, <a href="#Page_23">23</a></li> -<li class="isub1">fails with <i>Morning Post</i>, <a href="#Page_37">37</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Albany correspondent <i>Daily Whig</i>, <a href="#Page_134">134</a></li> -<li class="isub1">starts the <i>Tribune</i>, <a href="#Page_159">159</a></li> -<li class="isub1">is scorned by the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_159">159</a></li> -<li class="isub1">hires Henry J. Raymond, <a href="#Page_160">160</a></li> -<li class="isub1">attacks the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_161">161</a></li> -<li class="isub1">tells British legislators the <i>Sun</i> was cheap at $250,000, <a href="#Page_171">171</a></li> -<li class="isub1">mentioned for the collectorship, <a href="#Page_179">179</a></li> -<li class="isub1">hires Dana, <a href="#Page_209">209</a></li> -<li class="isub1">timidity of, toward slavery, <a href="#Page_211">211</a></li> -<li class="isub1">writes pleas to Dana, <a href="#Page_212">212</a></li> -<li class="isub1">denies writing “Forward to Richmond!”, <a href="#Page_213">213</a></li> -<li class="isub1">hires Cummings on the state of his breeches, <a href="#Page_266">266</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Gregg, Frederic J., editorial writer, <i>Evening Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_400">400</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Griffis, William Elliot, a <i>Sun</i> contributor, <a href="#Page_404">404</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Gurowski, Count, writes for the <i>Tribune</i>, <a href="#Page_161">161</a></li> - -<li class="ifrst">Hackett, James H., <a href="#Page_39">39</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Hallock, Gerard, sympathy of, with slavery forces him to retire from the <i>Journal of Commerce</i>, <a href="#Page_181">181</a>, <a href="#Page_182">182</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Hamblin, Thomas S., ruined by fire of 1836, <a href="#Page_118">118</a></li> -<li class="isub1">beats Bennett, <a href="#Page_118">118</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Hamilton, Captain, aspersions of, relative to tooth brushes, <a href="#Page_45">45</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Harbour Association, formed by six newspapers, <a href="#Page_167">167</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Harnden, William F., starts express service, New York to Boston, <a href="#Page_141">141</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Harte, Bret, stories by, syndicated by the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_403">403</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Hawkins, Ervin, city editor, <i>Evening Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_400">400</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Hayward, Billings, part owner of the <i>Transcript</i>, <a href="#Page_133">133</a>, <a href="#Page_134">134</a></li> - -<li class="indx"><a id="Hazeltine"></a>Hazeltine, Mayo W., writes on Dana’s elevation of journalism, <a href="#Page_426">426</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“M. W. H.,” <a href="#Page_408">408</a></li> -<li class="isub1">literary critic for thirty-one years, <a href="#Page_408">408</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Head-lines, the <i>Sun’s</i> second, <a href="#Page_44">44</a></li> -<li class="isub2">examples of (1833), <a href="#Page_52">52</a></li> -<li class="isub2">example of, in Dana’s time, <a href="#Page_314">314</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Hearst, William R., “the fourth yellow journalist,” <a href="#Page_413">413</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Henderson, William J., musical critic and yachting writer, <a href="#Page_391">391</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Hendrix, Joseph C., “Cut out the damn,” <a href="#Page_279">279</a></li> - -<li class="indx">“Hermit,” writes Washington letters for the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_176">176</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Herschel, Sir John F. W., <a href="#Page_66">66</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Hill, Edwin C., reports Becker trial, <a href="#Page_321">321</a></li> -<li class="isub2">style of, in disaster stories, <a href="#Page_361">361</a>, <a href="#Page_362">362</a></li> - -<li class="indx"><a id="Hitchcock"></a>Hitchcock, Thomas, author of “Matthew Marshall” financial articles, <a href="#Page_228">228</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Hoaxes. See <a href="#Moon_Hoax">Moon Hoax</a>, <a href="#Balloon_Hoax">Balloon Hoax</a>, <a href="#Park_Mungo">Mungo Park</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hoe, Robert, Day’s remark at dinner to, <a href="#Page_137">137</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Holmes, Mary J., writes novels for the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_195">195</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Hone, Philip, as a writer, <a href="#Page_37">37</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Horse expresses: the six-cent papers combine to use, <a href="#Page_110">110</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Hotels, huge noon dinners in the thirties, <a href="#Page_122">122</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Howard, Joseph, Jr., issues a false Presidential proclamation, <a href="#Page_183">183</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Hudson, Frederic, opposes managing editorships, <a href="#Page_262">262</a></li> - -<li class="indx">“Human interest,” <a href="#Page_244">244</a>, <a href="#Page_245">245</a>, <a href="#Page_313">313</a>, <a href="#Page_363">363</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Humour, <a href="#Page_366">366</a>, <a href="#Page_367">367</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Hurlbut, William Henry, a <i>Sun</i> contributor, <a href="#Page_405">405</a></li> - -<li class="ifrst">Illustrations, the <i>Sun’s</i> first, <a href="#Page_43">43</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Interviews, invented by Bennett, <a href="#Page_316">316</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Introductions, the <i>Sun’s</i> objection to, <a href="#Page_363">363</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Irving, Washington, <a href="#Page_34">34–35</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Irwin, Will, “The City That Was,” <a href="#Page_358">358</a></li> - -<li class="indx"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_447">447</span>“It Shines for All,” <a href="#Page_58">58</a></li> - -<li class="ifrst">Jackson, Andrew, message of, printed in full, <a href="#Page_51">51</a></li> - -<li class="indx">James, Henry, flashy head-lines on a novel by, <a href="#Page_404">404</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Jennings, Louis J., chief editorial writer of the <i>Times</i>, <a href="#Page_274">274</a></li> -<li class="isub1">becomes editor of the <i>Times</i>, <a href="#Page_298">298</a></li> -<li class="isub1">returns to England, <a href="#Page_298">298</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Jewett, Helen, murder of, <a href="#Page_113">113</a>, <a href="#Page_114">114</a></li> -<li class="isub1">trial of Robinson for murder of, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>, <a href="#Page_116">116</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Jones, Alexander, becomes first agent of Associated Press, <a href="#Page_167">167</a></li> -<li class="isub1">invents telegraph cipher, <a href="#Page_167">167</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Jones, George, partner of H. J. Raymond, <a href="#Page_274">274</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Journalism, the earliest dailies, <a href="#Page_29">29</a></li> -<li class="isub1">advance of, between 1830 and 1840, <a href="#Page_136">136</a>, <a href="#Page_137">137</a></li> -<li class="isub1">great editors of 1868, <a href="#Page_233">233</a></li> -<li class="isub1">managing editors, <a href="#Page_262">262</a>, <a href="#Page_263">263</a></li> -<li class="isub1">first women reporters, <a href="#Page_285">285</a>, <a href="#Page_286">286</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Watterson’s review in 1873, <a href="#Page_293">293–295</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“Personal journalism,” <a href="#Page_295">295</a>, <a href="#Page_296">296</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Dana’s dream of a paper without advertisements, <a href="#Page_299">299–301</a></li> -<li class="isub1">interviewing, <a href="#Page_316">316</a></li> -<li class="isub1">What do people read?, <a href="#Page_323">323</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“Sixth sense,” <a href="#Page_335">335</a>, <a href="#Page_336">336</a></li> - -<li class="indx"><i>Journal of Commerce</i>, the <i>Sun’s</i> only surviving morning contemporary of 1833, <a href="#Page_25">25</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Josephs, Joseph, reporter, <a href="#Page_283">283</a></li> - -<li class="ifrst">Kane, Lawrence S., city editor, <a href="#Page_279">279</a></li> -<li class="isub1">reporter, <a href="#Page_280">280</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Kellogg, Daniel F., city editor 1890–1902, <a href="#Page_371">371</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Kelly, John, marriage of, reported, <a href="#Page_321">321</a>, <a href="#Page_322">322</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Kemble, Fanny, <a href="#Page_44">44</a>, <a href="#Page_59">59</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Kemble, W. H., author of the “addition, division, and silence” letter, <a href="#Page_305">305</a></li> -<li class="isub1">causes Dana’s arrest, <a href="#Page_306">306</a></li> -<li class="isub1">is sent to prison, <a href="#Page_306">306</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Kendall, George W., despatches of, to the New Orleans <i>Picayune</i> used by the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_165">165</a></li> - -<li class="indx">King, Charles, editor of the <i>American</i>, <a href="#Page_130">130</a>, <a href="#Page_131">131</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Know-Nothing Party, uses Maria Monk’s “Disclosures” as political capital, <a href="#Page_112">112</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Kobbé, Gustav, dramatic and musical critic, <a href="#Page_350">350</a></li> - -<li class="ifrst">Laffan Bureau, established, <a href="#Page_375">375</a></li> -<li class="isub1">growth, <a href="#Page_376">376</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Laffan, William M., becomes proprietor of the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_427">427</a></li> -<li class="isub1">thorough newspaper training of, <a href="#Page_427">427</a></li> -<li class="isub1">art expert, <a href="#Page_427">427</a>, <a href="#Page_428">428</a></li> -<li class="isub1">dramatic critic, <a href="#Page_428">428</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“Anybody can get anything printed, except the owner,” <a href="#Page_428">428</a></li> -<li class="isub1">death of, in 1909, <a href="#Page_430">430</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Landon, M. D. See <a href="#Perkins">Eli Perkins</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Leggett, William, fights duel with Blake, <a href="#Page_130">130</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Levermore, Charles H., describes victory of the <i>Sun</i> and the <i>Herald</i> over old-fashioned journalism, <a href="#Page_137">137</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Lincoln, Abraham, “No match for the Little Giant,” <a href="#Page_177">177</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“A man of the people,” <a href="#Page_178">178</a></li> -<li class="isub1">is elected, “and yet the country is safe,” <a href="#Page_179">179</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><i>Sun</i> comments on re-election of, <a href="#Page_182">182</a>;</li> -<li class="isub2">on death of, <a href="#Page_182">182</a></li> -<li class="isub1">New York newspapers’ comment on emancipation proclamation, <a href="#Page_184">184</a></li> -<li class="isub1">assigns Dana to Virginia campaign, <a href="#Page_222">222</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Literature, in the fifties, <a href="#Page_173">173</a></li> -<li class="isub1">serial novels contracted for by M. S. Beach, <a href="#Page_196">196</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“The finest side of the <i>Sun</i>,” <a href="#Page_402">402</a>, <i>et seq.</i></li> - -<li class="indx">Literary men, list of, in 1833, <a href="#Page_34">34–35</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Lloyd, Nelson, Spanish war correspondent, <a href="#Page_355">355</a></li> -<li class="isub1">city editor, <i>Evening Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_400">400</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Locke, Richard Adams, goes on <i>Sun</i> as a reporter, <a href="#Page_64">64</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Poe’s sketch of, <a href="#Page_65">65</a>, <a href="#Page_66">66</a></li> -<li class="isub1">early life of, <a href="#Page_66">66</a></li> -<li class="isub1">confesses the Moon Hoax, <a href="#Page_86">86–87</a></li> -<li class="isub1">life of the murderer, Fernandez, by, <a href="#Page_103">103–104</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_448">448</span>starts the <i>New Era</i>, <a href="#Page_116">116–117</a></li> -<li class="isub1">writes “The Lost Manuscript of Mungo Park,” <a href="#Page_117">117</a></li> -<li class="isub1">becomes editor of the Brooklyn <i>Eagle</i>, <a href="#Page_117">117</a>, <a href="#Page_118">118</a></li> -<li class="isub1">death of, <a href="#Page_118">118</a></li> -<li class="isub1">attends dinner to Moses Y. Beach, <a href="#Page_167">167</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Lord, Chester S., Whisky Ring story by, <a href="#Page_284">284</a>, <a href="#Page_285">285</a></li> -<li class="isub1">long service of, <a href="#Page_326">326</a>, <a href="#Page_327">327</a></li> -<li class="isub1">first staff of, <a href="#Page_327">327</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“Ten thousand battles of,” <a href="#Page_327">327</a></li> -<li class="isub1">managing editor, 1880–1913, <a href="#Page_372">372</a></li> -<li class="isub1">studies at Hamilton College, <a href="#Page_373">373</a></li> -<li class="isub1">goes on the <i>Sun</i> as a reporter, <a href="#Page_373">373</a></li> -<li class="isub1">buys Syracuse <i>Standard</i>, <a href="#Page_373">373</a></li> -<li class="isub1">returns to the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_373">373</a></li> -<li class="isub1">assistant managing editor, <a href="#Page_373">373</a></li> -<li class="isub1">managing editor, <a href="#Page_373">373</a></li> -<li class="isub1">described by E. G. Riggs, <a href="#Page_373">373</a></li> -<li class="isub1">perfects collection of election returns, <a href="#Page_374">374</a></li> -<li class="isub1">sends Blaine first news of his defeat, <a href="#Page_374">374</a></li> -<li class="isub1">establishes a news service in a night, <a href="#Page_375">375</a></li> -<li class="isub1">selection of correspondents by, <a href="#Page_376">376</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“Use your own judgment,” <a href="#Page_377">377</a>, <a href="#Page_378">378</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“You’ve been fired, but come back,” <a href="#Page_378">378</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Lord, Kenneth, city editor, <a href="#Page_371">371</a>, <a href="#Page_432">432</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Lotteries, list of numbers drawn, in the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_40">40</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Lottery advertising, <a href="#Page_37">37</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Luby, James, chief editorial writer, <i>Evening Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_400">400</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Lyman, Ambrose W., night city editor, <a href="#Page_371">371</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Lynch, Charles, Sunday <i>Sun</i> writer, <a href="#Page_412">412</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Lynde, Willoughby, part owner of the <i>Transcript</i>, <a href="#Page_133">133</a>, <a href="#Page_134">134</a></li> - -<li class="ifrst">Magazines, New York periodicals in 1833, <a href="#Page_34">34</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Maguire, Mark, newsboy and sports writer, <a href="#Page_285">285</a></li> -<li class="isub1">invents boxing chart, <a href="#Page_285">285</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Mallon, George Barry, city editor, 1902–1914, <a href="#Page_371">371</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Mandigo, John, sporting editor, <a href="#Page_395">395</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Mann, Henry, reporter, exchange editor and author, <a href="#Page_284">284</a></li> -<li class="isub1">reports Stokes trial, <a href="#Page_321">321</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Mansfield, Josephine, <a href="#Page_236">236</a>, <a href="#Page_270">270</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Marble, Manton, joins the <i>World</i>, <a href="#Page_182">182</a></li> -<li class="isub1">controls it, <a href="#Page_182">182</a></li> -<li class="isub1">protests to Lincoln when the <i>World</i> is suppressed, <a href="#Page_183">183</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Maria Monk, the <i>Sun</i> prints “Disclosures” of, <a href="#Page_111">111</a>, <a href="#Page_112">112</a></li> -<li class="isub1">exposed by W. L. Stone in the <i>Commercial Advertiser</i>, <a href="#Page_112">112</a>, <a href="#Page_113">113</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Martineau, Harriet, comments of, on the Moon Hoax, <a href="#Page_86">86</a></li> - -<li class="indx">“Matthew Marshall.” See <a href="#Hitchcock">Hitchcock, Thomas</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Matthias the Prophet, trial of, for murder, <a href="#Page_63">63</a></li> - -<li class="indx">McAlpin, Robert, reporter, <a href="#Page_284">284</a></li> - -<li class="indx">McAlpin, Tod, reporter, <a href="#Page_284">284</a></li> - -<li class="indx">McClellan, George B., supported by the <i>Sun</i> in 1864, <a href="#Page_185">185</a></li> - -<li class="indx">McCloy, W. C., city editor and managing editor, <i>Evening Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_398">398</a>, <a href="#Page_400">400</a></li> - -<li class="indx">McDonnell, P. G., predicts Aguinaldo’s revolt, <a href="#Page_376">376</a></li> - -<li class="indx">McEntee, Joseph, Albany correspondent, <a href="#Page_394">394</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Mexican War, <i>Sun’s</i> news of, <a href="#Page_164">164</a>, <a href="#Page_165">165</a></li> -<li class="isub1">costly to newspapers, <a href="#Page_166">166</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Mitchell, Edward P., owns a copy of the first <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_26">26</a></li> -<li class="isub1">is quoted on Dana’s freedom from ancient journalistic rules, <a href="#Page_240">240</a></li> -<li class="isub1">describes Dana’s methods and surroundings, <a href="#Page_247">247–251</a></li> -<li class="isub1">describes Dana’s encouragement of Cuba Libre, <a href="#Page_354">354</a></li> -<li class="isub1">finds “Plaza Charles A. Dana” in Camaguey, <a href="#Page_355">355</a></li> -<li class="isub1">writes short stories of distinction, <a href="#Page_405">405</a></li> -<li class="isub1">breadth of his fancy and humour, <a href="#Page_405">405</a>, <a href="#Page_406">406</a></li> -<li class="isub1">address on “The Newspaper Value of Non-essentials,” <a href="#Page_406">406</a></li> -<li class="isub1">champions the classics, <a href="#Page_407">407</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_449">449</span>defines yellow journalism and white, <a href="#Page_415">415</a></li> -<li class="isub1">describes Dana’s revolution of journalism, <a href="#Page_416">416</a></li> -<li class="isub1">receives Dana’s instructions as to length of death notice, <a href="#Page_425">425</a></li> -<li class="isub1">becomes editor-in-chief, <a href="#Page_430">430</a></li> -<li class="isub1">president of the Sun Printing and Publishing Association, 1909–1911, <a href="#Page_430">430</a></li> -<li class="isub1">remains as editor, <a href="#Page_432">432</a></li> - -<li class="indx">“Monsieur X.” See <a href="#Thieblin">Thiéblin, Napoleon L.</a></li> - -<li class="indx"><a id="Moon_Hoax"></a>Moon Hoax, <a href="#Page_64">64–101</a></li> -<li class="isub1">reacts on the <i>Sun’s</i> big fire story, <a href="#Page_106">106</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Morris, George P., <a href="#Page_37">37</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Morrissey, John, pugilist, is supported for the Senate by the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_323">323</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Morrison, Archibald M., gains control of the <i>Sun</i> to use it for evangelical purposes, <a href="#Page_189">189</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Morse, Samuel F. B., assisted by W. M. Swain and A. S. Abell to finance the telegraph, <a href="#Page_136">136</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Motto, “It Shines for All” appears, origin of, <a href="#Page_58">58</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Mullin, Edward H., editorial writer, <i>Evening Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_400">400</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Munn, Orson D., buys <i>Scientific American</i> with Alfred E. Beach, <a href="#Page_162">162</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Munsey, Frank A., sells Washington <i>Times</i> to Brisbane, <a href="#Page_348">348</a></li> -<li class="isub1">remarks of, at Yale on the influence of the <i>Sun</i> and the <i>World</i>, <a href="#Page_419">419</a></li> -<li class="isub1">buys New York <i>Press</i>, <a href="#Page_431">431</a></li> -<li class="isub1">buys the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_431">431</a></li> -<li class="isub1">consolidates the <i>Sun</i> and the <i>Press</i>, <a href="#Page_431">431</a></li> -<li class="isub1">buys Stewart Building, <a href="#Page_432">432</a></li> - -<li class="indx">“M. W. H.” See <a href="#Hazeltine">Hazeltine, M. W.</a></li> - -<li class="indx">“Mystery of Marie Roget.” See <a href="#Rogers">Rogers, Mary</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst">Navy Department scandals, <a href="#Page_304">304</a>, <a href="#Page_305">305</a></li> - -<li class="indx">“Nemo,” a <i>Sun</i> correspondent in the Civil War, <a href="#Page_188">188</a></li> - -<li class="indx">News boats, <a href="#Page_166">166</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Newsboys, Day originates street sales by, <a href="#Page_39">39–40</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Sam Messenger, <a href="#Page_40">40</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Newspapers, <i>Courrant</i>, the first English daily, <a href="#Page_29">29</a></li> -<li class="isub1">London <i>Times</i> the first English paper to use a steam press, <a href="#Page_29">29</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><i>Pennsylvania Packet</i>, the first American daily, <a href="#Page_29">29</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Globe</i>, oldest New York paper, <a href="#Page_29">29</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Evening Post</i>, second oldest New York paper, <a href="#Page_29">29</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Courier</i> and the <i>Enquirer</i> amalgamated, <a href="#Page_35">35</a></li> -<li class="isub1">New York <i>Tribune</i>, founding of, <a href="#Page_37">37</a></li> -<li class="isub1">New York <i>Times</i> is started, <a href="#Page_57">57</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Transcript</i> is started, <a href="#Page_57">57</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>True Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_59">59–60</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><i>Courier and Enquirer</i>, its huge size, <a href="#Page_62">62</a></li> -<li class="isub1">attitude of the <i>Sun’s</i> contemporaries toward the Moon Hoax, <a href="#Page_75">75</a>, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>, <a href="#Page_82">82</a>, <a href="#Page_87">87</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Sun’s</i> penny imitators, editorial reference to, <a href="#Page_107">107</a></li> -<li class="isub1">New York <i>Herald</i> prints the first report of Stock Exchange sales, <a href="#Page_109">109</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><i>Herald’s</i> circulation in 1836, <a href="#Page_116">116</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Journal of Commerce</i> denounces the <i>Sun</i> as an inciter of riots, <a href="#Page_119">119</a></li> -<li class="isub1">paper rolls, a new invention, described, <a href="#Page_123">123</a>, <a href="#Page_124">124</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><i>Courier and Enquirer’s</i> writers under Webb, <a href="#Page_130">130</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><i>Journal of Commerce</i>, enterprise under Gerard Hallock’s editorship, <a href="#Page_130">130</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Transcript’s</i> early success, <a href="#Page_133">133</a>, <a href="#Page_134">134</a></li> -<li class="isub1">list of penny papers started in New York, 1833–1838, <a href="#Page_134">134</a></li> -<li class="isub1">New York <i>Express</i> established, <a href="#Page_134">134</a>, <a href="#Page_135">135</a></li> -<li class="isub1">New York <i>Daily News</i> established, <a href="#Page_134">134</a>, <a href="#Page_135">135</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Daily Transcript</i>, the first Philadelphia penny paper, <a href="#Page_135">135</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Philadelphia <i>Public Ledger</i>, office mobbed, <a href="#Page_135">135</a></li> -<li class="isub1">list of great dailies founded, 1833–1843, <a href="#Page_136">136</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Herald</i> called “a very bad paper,” by Greeley, <a href="#Page_174">174</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_450">450</span>New York <i>World</i>, appearance of, as a highly moral sheet, <a href="#Page_182">182</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the New York <i>Times</i> and the Tweed exposure, <a href="#Page_274">274</a>, <a href="#Page_275">275</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Orange <i>Postman</i>, the first penny paper, <a href="#Page_29">29</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Newspaper feuds, Day and Webb, <a href="#Page_54">54</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><i>Sun</i> and <i>Journal of Commerce</i>, <a href="#Page_54">54</a></li> - -<li class="indx">New York, size and life of, in 1833, <a href="#Page_32">32–34</a></li> -<li class="isub1">life in the thirties, <a href="#Page_121">121–123</a></li> -<li class="isub1">rich and powerful figures of Dana’s first <i>Sun</i> year, <a href="#Page_234">234</a>, <a href="#Page_235">235</a></li> -<li class="isub1">clubs, hotels, and theatres of the sixties, <a href="#Page_236">236</a>, <a href="#Page_237">237</a></li> - -<li class="indx">New York <i>Press</i>, sports staff of, transferred to the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_393">393</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Nicollet, Jean Nicolas, supposed connection of, with the Moon Hoax, <a href="#Page_94">94–101</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Noah, Mordecai M., <a href="#Page_61">61</a></li> -<li class="isub1">establishes <i>Morning Star</i>, <a href="#Page_134">134</a></li> - -<li class="indx">“No king, no clown, to rule this town,” <a href="#Page_255">255</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Norr, William, writes “The Pearl of Chinatown,” <a href="#Page_411">411</a></li> - -<li class="indx">North, S. N. D., describes the influence of the penny press, <a href="#Page_137">137</a></li> - -<li class="indx">North, Walter Savage, writes fiction for the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_196">196</a></li> -<li class="isub1">circulation of New York dailies in 1833, <a href="#Page_31">31</a></li> - -<li class="indx">“Nym Crinkle.” See <a href="#Wheeler">Andrew C. Wheeler</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst">O’Brien, John H., Laffan’s jest with, <a href="#Page_429">429</a>, <a href="#Page_430">430</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Odion, Henry W., night city editor, <a href="#Page_371">371</a></li> - -<li class="indx">O’Hanlon, Virginia, asks the <i>Sun</i> if there is a Santa Claus, <a href="#Page_409">409</a></li> - -<li class="indx">O’Malley, Frank W., story by, on Policeman Sheehan’s death, <a href="#Page_364">364</a></li> -<li class="isub1">describes Passover parade, <a href="#Page_367">367</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Overton, Grant M., book-reviewer, <a href="#Page_411">411</a></li> - -<li class="ifrst">Palmer, Frederick, <i>Evening Sun</i> reporter, <a href="#Page_399">399</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Paragraphs, quotations from, in 1834, <a href="#Page_52">52–53</a></li> - -<li class="indx"><a id="Park_Mungo"></a>Park, Mungo, Locke writes the “Lost Manuscript” of, <a href="#Page_117">117</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Patton, Francis T., rules for exaggeration by, <a href="#Page_390">390</a>, <a href="#Page_391">391</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Penny newspapers, failure of, before the <i>Sun</i> was established, <a href="#Page_23">23</a></li> - -<li class="indx"><a id="Perkins"></a>Perkins, Eli (Melville De Lancey Landon), <i>Sun</i> correspondent, <a href="#Page_314">314</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Philip Hone, the <i>Sun</i> suggests that he incited a riot, <a href="#Page_119">119</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Phillips, David Graham, last assignments of, <a href="#Page_360">360</a></li> -<li class="isub1">finds material for novels, <a href="#Page_360">360</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Pigs in City Hall Park, the <i>Sun</i> objects to, <a href="#Page_55">55</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Pigeons, the <i>Sun</i> uses, to carry ship news, <a href="#Page_146">146</a>, <a href="#Page_147">147</a></li> -<li class="isub1">editorial explaining presence of, on the <i>Sun’s</i> roof, <a href="#Page_147">147</a>, <a href="#Page_148">148</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Pike, James S., Dana advises, to get “Black Dan drunk,” <a href="#Page_211">211</a></li> -<li class="isub1">career of, as journalist and diplomat, <a href="#Page_256">256</a>, <a href="#Page_257">257</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Poe, Edgar Allan, describes R. A. Locke, <a href="#Page_65">65</a>, <a href="#Page_66">66</a></li> -<li class="isub1">his “Hans Pfaall” spoiled by the Moon Hoax, <a href="#Page_90">90–93</a></li> -<li class="isub1">belief of, that the Moon Hoax firmly established penny newspapers, <a href="#Page_102">102</a></li> -<li class="isub1">returns to New York, <a href="#Page_148">148</a></li> -<li class="isub1">writes the Balloon Hoax for the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_149">149</a></li> -<li class="isub1">inspiration of, for “The Mystery of Marie Roget,” <a href="#Page_153">153</a>, <a href="#Page_155">155</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Post-Trader scandal, <a href="#Page_306">306</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Prall, William M., <a href="#Page_104">104</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Press, the <i>Sun’s</i> first, <a href="#Page_24">24</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Sun’s</i> second, <a href="#Page_52">52</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Sun’s</i> third, <a href="#Page_58">58</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Presses, Day buys two Napiers, <a href="#Page_118">118</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Price, Joseph, partner of R. A. Locke in <i>New Era</i>, <a href="#Page_116">116</a></li> -<li class="isub1">part owner <i>New Era</i>, <a href="#Page_134">134</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Price of the <i>Sun</i> changed from “one penny” to “one cent,” <a href="#Page_51">51</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Printers, union, in 1833, <a href="#Page_48">48</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Prize-fighting denounced, <a href="#Page_59">59</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Pulitzer, Joseph, is assigned by Dana to report the electoral controversy, <a href="#Page_240">240</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_451">451</span>correspondent of the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_312">312</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“The third yellow journalist,” <a href="#Page_413">413</a></li> -<li class="isub1">influence of, on journalism, <a href="#Page_419">419</a></li> - -<li class="ifrst">Railroads, extent of, in 1833, <a href="#Page_30">30</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Ralph, Julian, reports Borden trial, <a href="#Page_321">321</a></li> -<li class="isub1">long service of, on <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_331">331</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Grant’s funeral, report by, <a href="#Page_332">332</a></li> -<li class="isub1">books written by, <a href="#Page_334">334</a></li> -<li class="isub1">a football classic by, with the score left out, <a href="#Page_334">334</a>, <a href="#Page_335">335</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Molly Maguires, reported by, <a href="#Page_335">335</a></li> -<li class="isub1">is gifted with “sixth sense,” <a href="#Page_335">335</a></li> -<li class="isub1">describes reporting an inauguration, <a href="#Page_337">337</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Ramsey, Dave, originates the idea of a penny <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_21">21</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Rawlins, General John A., part of, in Dana’s assignment to report on Grant, <a href="#Page_218">218</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Raymond, Henry J., goes to the <i>Tribune</i>, <a href="#Page_160">160</a></li> -<li class="isub1">performs a great reporting feat, <a href="#Page_160">160</a></li> -<li class="isub1">leaves Greeley, <a href="#Page_160">160</a></li> -<li class="isub1">becomes the first editor of the New York <i>Times</i>, <a href="#Page_161">161</a></li> -<li class="isub1">calls Webb’s paper “the Austrian organ in Wall Street,” <a href="#Page_174">174</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Reamer, Lawrence, dramatic critic, <a href="#Page_411">411</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Reick, William C., becomes proprietor, <a href="#Page_430">430</a></li> -<li class="isub1">early career of, <a href="#Page_430">430</a>, <a href="#Page_431">431</a></li> -<li class="isub1">improves <i>Evening Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_431">431</a></li> -<li class="isub1">sells the <i>Sun</i> to Frank A. Munsey, <a href="#Page_431">431</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Reid, Whitelaw, succeeds Greeley, <a href="#Page_298">298</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Reporters, comparison of styles, <a href="#Page_315">315–322</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><i>Sun</i> staff in 1893, <a href="#Page_330">330</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><i>Sun</i>, anonymity of, almost complete, <a href="#Page_330">330</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“The <i>Sun</i> has no ‘stars,’” <a href="#Page_359">359</a></li> -<li class="isub1">a typical assignment list in 1893, <a href="#Page_359">359</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Rewey, Elijah M., night city editor, <a href="#Page_371">371</a></li> -<li class="isub1">exchange editor, <a href="#Page_372">372</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Riggs, Edward G., reports seven national conventions, <a href="#Page_343">343</a>, <a href="#Page_344">344</a></li> -<li class="isub1">wide acquaintance of, <a href="#Page_344">344</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Dana’s reliance on, <a href="#Page_344">344</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“Riggs is my Phil Sheridan,” <a href="#Page_345">345</a></li> -<li class="isub1">defines political correspondents, <a href="#Page_345">345</a>, <a href="#Page_346">346</a></li> -<li class="isub1">described by Samuel G. Blythe, <a href="#Page_346">346</a></li> -<li class="isub1">writes history of national conventions, <a href="#Page_346">346</a></li> -<li class="isub1">describes Lord’s discernment, <a href="#Page_373">373</a></li> -<li class="isub1">tells how Lord built up the Laffan bureau, <a href="#Page_375">375</a>, <a href="#Page_376">376</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“One story you [Chamberlin] can’t write,” <a href="#Page_341">341</a></li> - -<li class="indx">“Rigolo.” See <a href="#Thieblin">Thiéblin, N. L.</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Riis, Jacob A., chief police reporter, <i>Evening Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_398">398</a></li> -<li class="isub1">writings of, attract Roosevelt, <a href="#Page_398">398</a>, <a href="#Page_399">399</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Riots, the Bowery Theatre, <a href="#Page_55">55–56</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Ripley, George, lectures, <a href="#Page_205">205</a></li> -<li class="isub1">helps Dana to enter Brook Farm, <a href="#Page_206">206</a></li> -<li class="isub1">is chief of the cow-milking group, <a href="#Page_207">207</a></li> -<li class="isub1">editor of the <i>Harbinger</i>, <a href="#Page_207">207</a></li> -<li class="isub1">prepares, with Dana, the “New American Encyclopedia,” <a href="#Page_213">213</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Robeson, George M., accused by the <i>Sun</i> in the Navy scandal, <a href="#Page_304">304</a>, <a href="#Page_305">305</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Robinson, Lucius, <i>Sun</i> reporter and governor, <a href="#Page_104">104–105</a></li> - -<li class="indx"><a id="Rogers"></a>Rogers, Mary, disappearance of, announced in the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_153">153</a></li> -<li class="isub1">editorial comment on murder of, <a href="#Page_154">154</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Poe’s uses case of, in fiction, <a href="#Page_153">153</a>, <a href="#Page_155">155</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Root, Walstein, Spanish war correspondent, <a href="#Page_355">355</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Rosebault, Walter M., city editor and reporter, <a href="#Page_280">280</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Rosenfeld, Sidney, <i>Sun</i> reporter in 1870, <a href="#Page_280">280</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Ruhl, Arthur, <i>Evening Sun</i> reporter, <a href="#Page_399">399</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Rum, the <i>Sun’s</i> aversion to, <a href="#Page_43">43</a></li> - -<li class="ifrst">Safe Burglary Conspiracy, <a href="#Page_308">308</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Salary Grab, <a href="#Page_307">307</a></li> - -<li class="indx"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_452">452</span>Sam Patch, the <i>Sun’s</i> pigeon, <a href="#Page_147">147</a>, <a href="#Page_149">149</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Santa Claus editorial article, <a href="#Page_409">409</a>, <a href="#Page_410">410</a></li> - -<li class="indx"><i>Scientific American</i>, interest in, bought by Alfred E. Beach, <a href="#Page_162">162</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Secession, the <i>Sun’s</i> plan to emasculate, <a href="#Page_179">179</a>, <a href="#Page_180">180</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Serviss, Garret P., night editor, <a href="#Page_372">372</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Shaw, Henry Grenville, telegraph editor, <a href="#Page_280">280</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Shepherd, Alexander, accused by the <i>Sun</i> in the Washington paving scandal, <a href="#Page_307">307</a></li> -<li class="isub1">tries to hale Dana to Washington, <a href="#Page_307">307</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Short, Wm. F., <a href="#Page_60">60</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Shunk, James F., a <i>Sun</i> contributor, <a href="#Page_405">405</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Siamese Twins, arrest of, <a href="#Page_51">51</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Simonds, Frank H., editorial writer, the <i>Sun</i> and the <i>Evening Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_400">400</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Simonton, James W., associate of Raymond, <a href="#Page_174">174</a></li> - -<li class="indx">“Six-penny respectables,” <a href="#Page_110">110</a></li> - -<li class="indx">“Sixth sense,” examples of, <a href="#Page_335">335</a>, <a href="#Page_336">336</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Slavery, Missouri Compromise and Dred Scott decision rejected by the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>, <a href="#Page_176">176</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Smith, George M., night editor, 1904–1912, <a href="#Page_372">372</a></li> -<li class="isub1">managing editor <i>Evening Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_400">400</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Smith, Goldwin, a <i>Sun</i> contributor, <a href="#Page_404">404</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Space rates, <a href="#Page_380">380</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Spalding, James R., a <i>World</i> writer, <a href="#Page_182">182</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Spanish War, <i>Sun’s</i> news service in, <a href="#Page_353">353–356</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Sports, the <i>Sun’s</i> first prize-fight story, <a href="#Page_58">58</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Sports department, <a href="#Page_391">391–393</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Spears, John R., cruises around the world, <a href="#Page_349">349</a></li> -<li class="isub1">reports America’s Cup races, <a href="#Page_349">349</a></li> -<li class="isub1">covers Hatfield-McCoy feuds, <a href="#Page_349">349</a></li> -<li class="isub1">books written by, <a href="#Page_349">349</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Spears, Raymond S., reporter, <a href="#Page_349">349</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Speed, Keats, becomes managing editor, <a href="#Page_432">432</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Spencer, Edward, a writer of fiction for the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_405">405</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Stanley, William J., part owner of the <i>Transcript</i>, <a href="#Page_133">133</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Stanton, Henry Brewster, a <i>Sun</i> writer from 1868 to 1887, <a href="#Page_258">258</a>, <a href="#Page_259">259</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Beecher’s tribute to, <a href="#Page_259">259</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Stanton, Edwin M., asks Dana to enter War Department, <a href="#Page_215">215</a></li> -<li class="isub1">withdraws appointment, <a href="#Page_216">216</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Steamships, Great Western arrives at New York, <a href="#Page_119">119</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Sirius arrives at New York, <a href="#Page_119">119</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Sun’s</i> extras on arrival of, <a href="#Page_142">142</a></li> -<li class="isub1">loss of the President, <a href="#Page_143">143</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Stephens, Ann S., writes fiction for the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_196">196</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Stereotyping, adopted by the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_193">193</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Stetson, Francis Lynde, a <i>Sun</i> contributor, <a href="#Page_404">404</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Stevenson, Robert Louis, early successes of, first appear in the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_403">403</a>, <a href="#Page_404">404</a></li> -<li class="isub1">South Seas articles of, complete only in the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_403">403</a>, <a href="#Page_404">404</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Stewart, Alexander T., grave robbery of, <a href="#Page_322">322</a></li> - -<li class="indx"><a id="Stewart_William"></a>Stewart, William (“Walsingham”), first dramatic critic to adopt intimate style, <a href="#Page_411">411</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Stillman, Amos B., telegraph editor for forty-five years, <a href="#Page_280">280</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“Quite a fire in Chicago,” <a href="#Page_281">281</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Stokes, Edward S., conviction of, reported by Henry Mann, <a href="#Page_317">317</a>, <a href="#Page_318">318</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Stone, William L., conflict of, with Bryant, <a href="#Page_34">34</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Sun’s</i> quarrel with, <a href="#Page_56">56</a></li> -<li class="isub1">sketch of, <a href="#Page_112">112</a></li> -<li class="isub1">exposes Maria Monk, <a href="#Page_113">113</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Sullivan-Mitchell fight, Arthur Brisbane’s report of, <a href="#Page_347">347</a>, <a href="#Page_348">348</a></li> - -<li class="indx"><i>Sun</i>, the, reprints of the first issue, <a href="#Page_25">25</a></li> -<li class="isub1">size of the first issue, <a href="#Page_25">25</a></li> -<li class="isub1">extant copies of first issue, <a href="#Page_26">26</a></li> -<li class="isub1">second issue, contents of, <a href="#Page_38">38</a></li> -<li class="isub1">attacks shinplasters and phrenology, <a href="#Page_123">123</a></li> -<li class="isub1">sold by Day to Beach, <a href="#Page_127">127</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_453">453</span>plant, expenses, and circulation of, June, 1838, <a href="#Page_128">128</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Day’s period of ownership of, <a href="#Page_127">127</a></li> -<li class="isub1">editorial comment in 1837 on popularity of, <a href="#Page_129">129</a></li> -<li class="isub1">issues extras on the arrival of the Great Western, the British Queen, and other steamships, <a href="#Page_142">142</a></li> -<li class="isub1">uses horse expresses to bring Governor Seward’s message from Albany, <a href="#Page_143">143</a></li> -<li class="isub1">uses train, trotting horses, and boat to get the news of the steamer Caroline case, <a href="#Page_144">144</a>, <a href="#Page_145">145</a></li> -<li class="isub1">uses carrier pigeons to get ship news, <a href="#Page_146">146</a>, <a href="#Page_147">147</a></li> -<li class="isub1">moves to Nassau and Fulton streets, 1842, <a href="#Page_146">146</a>, <a href="#Page_147">147</a></li> -<li class="isub1">second home of, burned after it had moved, <a href="#Page_157">157</a></li> -<li class="isub1">buys a new dress of type every three months, <a href="#Page_158">158</a></li> -<li class="isub1">is seven columns wide in 1840, <a href="#Page_158">158</a></li> -<li class="isub1">title of, reads “<i>The New York Sun</i>” for a few months, <a href="#Page_158">158</a></li> -<li class="isub1">is eight columns wide in 1843, <a href="#Page_158">158</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><i>Weekly Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_169">169</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><i>American Sun</i>, for Europeans, <a href="#Page_169">169</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><i>Illustrated Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_169">169</a></li> -<li class="isub1">syndicates President Tyler’s Message in 1841, <a href="#Page_169">169</a></li> -<li class="isub1">value of, $250,000 in 1852, <a href="#Page_171">171</a></li> -<li class="isub1">becomes a two-cent paper August 1, 1864;</li> -<li class="isub2">a one-cent paper, July 1, 1916;</li> -<li class="isub2">a two-cent paper January 26, 1918, <a href="#Page_194">194</a></li> -<li class="isub1">size of, reduced to five columns in 1863, <a href="#Page_193">193</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><i>Weekly Sun</i>, continued by Dana, <a href="#Page_199">199</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><i>Semi-Weekly Sun</i> announced, <a href="#Page_199">199</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Dana and his associates pay $175,000 for, <a href="#Page_228">228</a>, <a href="#Page_229">229</a></li> -<li class="isub1">apologizes for issuing more than four pages, <a href="#Page_278">278</a></li> -<li class="isub1">city editors under Cummings, <a href="#Page_279">279</a></li> -<li class="isub1">telegraph editors, <a href="#Page_280">280</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Office Cat of, <a href="#Page_287">287–289</a></li> -<li class="isub1">only four pages for twenty years, <a href="#Page_301">301</a></li> -<li class="isub1">extraordinary sales, <a href="#Page_323">323–325</a></li> -<li class="isub1">success of, explained by E. P. Mitchell, <a href="#Page_325">325</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Sun</i> spirit, <a href="#Page_326">326</a>, <a href="#Page_379">379</a></li> -<li class="isub1">home of, for forty-seven years, <a href="#Page_369">369</a></li> -<li class="isub1">editors-in-chief, only three in fifty years, <a href="#Page_371">371</a></li> -<li class="isub1">managing editors, list of, <a href="#Page_371">371</a></li> -<li class="isub1">city editors, list of, <a href="#Page_371">371</a></li> -<li class="isub1">night city editors, list of, <a href="#Page_371">371</a></li> -<li class="isub1">night editors, list of, <a href="#Page_372">372</a></li> -<li class="isub1">news system, <a href="#Page_372">372</a></li> -<li class="isub1">ethics, <a href="#Page_380">380–383</a></li> -<li class="isub1">list of editorial writers, <a href="#Page_409">409</a></li> -<li class="isub1">price of, <a href="#Page_431">431</a>, <a href="#Page_432">432</a></li> -<li class="isub1">homes of, <a href="#Page_432">432</a></li> - -<li class="indx">“Sunbeams” column, <a href="#Page_315">315</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Sun cholera cure, <a href="#Page_173">173</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Swain, Wm. M., predicts Day’s ruin, <a href="#Page_24">24</a></li> -<li class="isub1">founds Philadelphia <i>Public Ledger</i>, <a href="#Page_135">135</a></li> -<li class="isub1">industry of, <a href="#Page_135">135</a></li> -<li class="isub1">makes $3,000,000, <a href="#Page_135">135</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Swift, John T., sends the <i>Sun</i> a beat on Port Arthur’s fall, <a href="#Page_376">376</a>, <a href="#Page_377">377</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Swinton, John, double intellectual life of, <a href="#Page_259">259</a></li> -<li class="isub1">makes speeches attacking Dana, <a href="#Page_260">260</a></li> -<li class="isub1">is managing editor of the <i>Times</i>, <a href="#Page_261">261</a></li> -<li class="isub1">starts <i>John Swinton’s Paper</i>, <a href="#Page_261">261</a></li> - -<li class="ifrst">Tammany Hall, old home of, bought by Dana for the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_229">229</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Taylor, Bayard, European correspondent of the <i>Tribune</i>, <a href="#Page_161">161</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Telegraph, comments on Morse’s new invention, <a href="#Page_145">145</a></li> -<li class="isub1">a report that the <i>Sun</i> tried to control, <a href="#Page_146">146</a></li> -<li class="isub1">extended to New York in 1846, <a href="#Page_146">146</a></li> -<li class="isub1">is opened from New York to Philadelphia, Boston, and Albany, <a href="#Page_164">164</a></li> -<li class="isub1">lines completed in 1846, <a href="#Page_165">165</a></li> -<li class="isub1">drives reprint from first page, <a href="#Page_171">171</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_454">454</span>first cable messages, <a href="#Page_197">197</a>, <a href="#Page_198">198</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Theatres, the Bowery riot, <a href="#Page_55">55–56</a></li> -<li class="isub1">attractions of the thirties, <a href="#Page_121">121</a>, <a href="#Page_122">122</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“Footlight Flashes,” <a href="#Page_315">315</a>, <a href="#Page_316">316</a></li> -<li class="isub1">list of <i>Sun</i> critics, <a href="#Page_411">411</a></li> - -<li class="indx"><a id="Thieblin"></a>Thiéblin, Napoleon L., critic and essayist, <a href="#Page_314">314</a>, <a href="#Page_315">315</a></li> -<li class="isub1">uses pen names of “Monsieur X,” “Azamet Batuk,” and “Rigolo,” <a href="#Page_314">314</a>, <a href="#Page_315">315</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Tilden, Samuel J., editor of <i>Daily News</i>, <a href="#Page_181">181</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Townsend, Edward W., writes <i>Chimmie Fadden</i> stories, <a href="#Page_330">330</a></li> -<li class="isub1">fiction characters created by, <a href="#Page_411">411</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Trains, special news, used by <i>Sun</i> and <i>Herald</i>, <a href="#Page_166">166</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Trowbridge, H. Warren, writes fiction for the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_195">195</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Tweed, William M., is boss of the city, <a href="#Page_234">234</a></li> -<li class="isub1">as a source of news, <a href="#Page_269">269</a></li> -<li class="isub1">statue of, a <i>Sun</i> joke, <a href="#Page_271">271–274</a></li> -<li class="isub1">declination by, <a href="#Page_273">273</a></li> -<li class="isub1">retains W. O. Bartlett as counsel, <a href="#Page_275">275</a></li> -<li class="isub1">denounced by the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_275">275</a>, <a href="#Page_276">276</a></li> -<li class="isub1">absolute power of, <a href="#Page_276">276</a></li> -<li class="isub1">stable of, described by the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_277">277</a></li> -<li class="isub1">escapes from keepers, <a href="#Page_277">277</a></li> - -<li class="ifrst">Van Anda, Carr V., night editor, 1893–1904, <a href="#Page_372">372</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Van Buren, Martha, <a href="#Page_51">51</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Vance, John, writes editorials, <a href="#Page_174">174</a></li> -<li class="isub1">leaves the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_192">192</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Vanderbilt, Cornelius, an advertiser in the first <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_27">27</a></li> -<li class="isub1">opposes Jay Gould, <a href="#Page_235">235</a></li> -<li class="isub1">a <i>Sun</i> interview with, in 1875, <a href="#Page_316">316</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Van Dyke, Dr. Henry, deception of, by Tweed statue joke, <a href="#Page_274">274</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Vila, Joseph, sports editor, <i>Evening Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_400">400</a></li> -<li class="isub1">Damon Runyon’s tribute to, <a href="#Page_393">393</a></li> -<li class="isub1">exposes huge betting, <a href="#Page_393">393</a></li> - -<li class="ifrst">Wall Street news, Bennett appreciates value of, <a href="#Page_109">109</a></li> - -<li class="indx">“Walsingham.” See <a href="#Stewart_William">William Stewart</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Wardman, Ervin, first used phrase “Yellow Journalism,” <a href="#Page_415">415</a></li> -<li class="isub1">becomes publisher of the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_432">432</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Warren, General Fitz-Henry, writes the phrase, “Forward to Richmond!”, <a href="#Page_213">213</a>, <a href="#Page_214">214</a></li> -<li class="isub1">career of, <a href="#Page_214">214</a></li> -<li class="isub1"><i>Sun</i> writer, soldier, and politician, <a href="#Page_257">257</a>, <a href="#Page_258">258</a></li> -<li class="isub1">article of, on Sumner’s death, <a href="#Page_258">258</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Watkins, James T., editorial writer, <i>Evening Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_399">399</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Watterson, Henry, “You [Dana] don’t make the <i>Sun</i>,” <a href="#Page_291">291</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“Mr. Dana is left alone,” <a href="#Page_293">293–295</a></li> -<li class="isub1">predicts no end to the “personality of journalism,” <a href="#Page_295">295</a></li> -<li class="isub1">first woman reporter of <i>Evening Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_400">400</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Webb, James Watson, journalist and a duellist, <a href="#Page_35">35–36</a></li> -<li class="isub1">editorial articles on, <a href="#Page_61">61</a>, <a href="#Page_62">62</a></li> -<li class="isub1">the <i>Sun’s</i> story of attack by, on Bennett, <a href="#Page_108">108</a></li> -<li class="isub1">charges the <i>Sun</i> with stealing a President’s message, <a href="#Page_110">110</a>, <a href="#Page_111">111</a></li> -<li class="isub1">second assault on Bennett described, <a href="#Page_114">114</a></li> -<li class="isub1">refuses Joseph Wood’s challenge, <a href="#Page_115">115</a></li> -<li class="isub1">retires from newspaper work, <a href="#Page_183">183</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Webster, Daniel, Bunker Hill speech of, reported by the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_158">158</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Weeks, Caleb, carries the Moon Hoax to Herschel in Africa, <a href="#Page_86">86</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Weston, Edward Payson, the best “leg man” in journalism, <a href="#Page_283">283</a></li> -<li class="isub1">feats of, in pedestrianism, <a href="#Page_283">283</a>, <a href="#Page_284">284</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Weyman, Charles S., editor of the “Sunbeams” column, <a href="#Page_228">228</a></li> - -<li class="indx"><a id="Wheeler"></a>Wheeler, Andrew Carpenter, (“Nym Crinkle”), dramatic critic, <a href="#Page_411">411</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Whisky Ring scandal, <a href="#Page_305">305</a></li> - -<li class="indx">White, Frank Marshall, brings the <i>Sun</i> a beat on the missing steamer Umbria, <a href="#Page_392">392</a>, <a href="#Page_393">393</a></li> - -<li class="indx"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_455">455</span>Whitman, Stephen French, <i>Evening Sun</i> reporter, <a href="#Page_399">399</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Wild pigeons, <a href="#Page_43">43</a></li> - -<li class="indx"><a id="Williams_Barney"></a>Williams, Barney (Bernard Flaherty), the <i>Sun’s</i> first newsboy, <a href="#Page_40">40</a></li> -<li class="isub1">makes first stage appearance, <a href="#Page_121">121</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Williams, John, city editor, <a href="#Page_279">279</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Willis, Nathaniel P., <a href="#Page_37">37</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Wilson, Alexander C., associate of Raymond, <a href="#Page_174">174</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Wilson, General James Harrison, quoted on Dana’s assignment to report on Grant, <a href="#Page_217">217</a></li> -<li class="isub1">says Grant declared Dana would be appointed collector, <a href="#Page_309">309</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Wisner, George W., the <i>Sun’s</i> first reporter, <a href="#Page_38">38</a></li> -<li class="isub1">becomes half owner of the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_46">46</a></li> -<li class="isub1">indicted for attack on Attree, <a href="#Page_61">61</a></li> -<li class="isub1">challenged to a duel, <a href="#Page_62">62</a></li> -<li class="isub1">retires from the <i>Sun</i>, <a href="#Page_64">64</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Wood, Benjamin, buys <i>Daily News</i>, <a href="#Page_135">135</a></li> -<li class="isub1">owns <i>Daily News</i>, <a href="#Page_181">181</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Wood, Fernando, proposes New York’s secession, <a href="#Page_180">180</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Wood, Dr. John B., “The Great American Condenser,” <a href="#Page_278">278</a></li> -<li class="isub1">condenses through a reader, <a href="#Page_279">279</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Wood, Joseph, feud over, and wife, challenge of, to Col. Webb, <a href="#Page_115">115</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Wood, Samuel A., originates rhymed news stories, <a href="#Page_351">351</a></li> -<li class="isub1">spring poem by, <a href="#Page_352">352</a></li> -<li class="isub1">“Snygless the Seas Are,” <a href="#Page_352">352</a></li> - -<li class="ifrst">Yale University, students of, investigate the Moon story, <a href="#Page_84">84–85</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Yellow Journalism, Col. Watterson’s statement on, <a href="#Page_413">413</a></li> -<li class="isub1">defined by E. P. Mitchell, <a href="#Page_415">415</a></li> -<li class="isub1">phrase, first used by Ervin Wardman, <a href="#Page_415">415</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Young, John Russell, orders of, enrage Cummings, <a href="#Page_266">266</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Young, Mr., charged by the <i>Transcript</i> with biting two of its carriers, <a href="#Page_119">119</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Young, William, city editor, <a href="#Page_279">279</a></li> -<li class="isub1">managing editor, <a href="#Page_282">282</a></li> -</ul> -</div></div> - -<hr class="wide" /> - -<div id="ip_455" class="newpage figcenter" style="max-width: 50em;"> - <img src="images/i_450l.jpg" width="3059" height="737" alt="" /> - <div class="caption">THE THIRD HEAD-LINE OF THE NEW YORK SUN</div></div> - -<hr class="wide" /> -<div id="ip_455b" class="newpage figcenter" style="max-width: 50em;"> - <img src="images/i_450r.jpg" width="3123" height="390" alt="" /> - <div class="caption">THE FOURTH HEAD-LINE OF THE NEW YORK SUN</div></div> -<hr class="wide" /> - -<div class="chapter"><div class="transnote"> -<h2 class="nobreak" id="Transcribers_Notes">Transcriber’s Notes</h2> - -<p>Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made -consistent when a predominant preference was found -in the original book; otherwise they were not changed.</p> - -<p>Simple typographical errors were corrected; unbalanced -quotation marks were remedied when the change was -obvious, and otherwise left unbalanced.</p> - -<p>Illustrations in this eBook have been positioned -between paragraphs and outside quotations. 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