The weekly north Iowa times. [volume] (McGregor, Iowa) 1857-1867, 1866-06-13
EDITORIAL ADDRESS.
BY A. T.. RICHARDSON.

BY A. +. RICHARDSON.
| First PREDATORY explanation: In 1859
the Editorial Association of Iowa instruct
ed the Editor of the NORTH Iowa TINES
Mct'rcgor) to prepare an Address for
delivery at Des Moines on the 18th Jan
uary, 1860. The copy was sent to the
then Secretary, J. G. Davenport ESQ.,, but
the coldness of the winter prevented a
general attendance and no meeting of Ed
itors was held-hence our first and last ef-
fort in the Lecture or Address line was
not read. The manuscript was returned
to Us: being unwilling to lose so long a
piece of "copy," we printed it in our pa
per on Franklin's Birthday (Jany. 17th)
1861, about the time when such documents
were in order. 1t was quite favorably re-
ceived by the press of the State and this
of course, pleased us. We reprint it now,
partly btcluse we want to correct some
typographical errors in the original publ
cation, partly because such Addresses will
soon be floating through our western ex-
changes and We want ours to be in good
company, and partly bccause-,ce rant to
To escape the charge of placing it before
the public without being officially invited
we would state that most editors print
their own opinions daily and weekly with
out comforting with anybody, and there is
certainly as little egotism in the acknowl-
edged authorship of one long article as
there is in the publication over your own
signature of many short ones. Since this
was written experience has been ours, but
we believed it to be true then and we see
nothing now to change. With this intro
duction to our Typographical Sermon we
thus hold forth:
Gentlemen My limited acquaintance
with the duties of the Press would justify
me in apologizing for the temerity impli-
ed IN the acceptance of so honorable a pO-
sition as the one assigned me by the Edit
orial Association of Iowa at its last rcgu-
lar meeting. Having no practical knowl-
edge of Printing, except that which is nee
essarily picked up in a small Office, where
my role, for four years. has been any part.
from Editor to Carrier, l am unable toin-
dulge in extensive laudations of 50 the
honor of being printer" The crafts
mans technicalities l am not conversant
with and hence l can make but poor play
on the terms which usually are freely pua-
ished in addresses of this character. The
apology which would become one so re-
Gently Unidentified with you, would here
make, only that am addressing body of
men who detest apologies you are so IA
miliar with the duties of u brother quill
driver that you will kindly overlook; the
errors into which he may fall. Your bus
mess is to lick the crudities of young or
old ambition into shape for the public eve
your daily routine is one ofcorrection, and
hence l have no fear that the errors into
which Inexperience may lead me, will
meet less indulgence at your hands than is
accorded to the humblest village! poet"
who sets harmony distracted by airing his
rythm and his nonsense in the good-na-
tured columns of the charitable press.
1t is usual on occasions like this to trav-
ei back some hundreds Of years and to
spoil several sheets of valuable paper
saying nothing of the waste of time
with carefully prepared documentary eyi-
dence relating to the discovery of Print
ing; its early history; examinations of
the claims of Faust, the Devil, and the
Chinese, as to priority of invention; with
proofs of the intimate association of the
tirst-named worthless. Having exhausted
the traditions of Germany and the pa
tience of his hearers, the orator crosses,
very slowly, to England, thence to our own
shores, where he again feeds the impa-
tience Of his auditors by treating them to
a history of the first American papcr;'
tells who founded it, how large it was,
where located, how much circulation it
had, where the Editor was born, who he
how many children he had,
what became of them all and how long
the paper was issued before it was obliged
to fall into the hands of Sheriff for debts
on account of delinquent pat
irons! These details may have been
properly given when men read Livy, and
Tacitus, and Josephus; but in this fast
ming Expressed Thought, such compara-
lively ante-diluvian matters have lost their
charms. The men of to day want to
nAON WANI VI tuc ~NOW w uuC JODS |
are before us and how shall we 'work
them off,
The visitor to Telegraph Office, bearing
! message to be transmitted to q cores
pondent, advertising rise or fall in the |
price of pork or -four would not be great
y pleased with the operator if that official i
should insist, prior to the transmission of
he dispatch, upon giving the sender a |
'uccint history of the Leydcn Jar, the
ialvanic battery, including of course,
he celebrated Italians experiments on
he nervous sensibility Of a frog,--thc kite
story Of the venerated FRANkLIN,-a
name that is spoken with equal claims to
by Printer, Philosopher,
and Statesman-the inven-
ion of a Morse and the improvements of
. House, with liberal spicing of inform-
alton relative to the various suits ut law
which have grown out of the wrangles of
hese patentecs Of Lightning. We assume
hat the message bearer would become con-
non-interested in this detail i'll
MS dispatch were delayed an hour by the i
ll-timed garrullity of the operator.
Plows are good things, and in this il
west there are many of them used
,ut the farmer cares much less about !,
where or by whom the first or the second |
,low was made than he does about the
'unning excellence of the one his hands
ire put to. So, indeed, with almost every
hing before us. This age is eminently
PRACTICAL, and modern taste places the
zeal of it's disapprobation upon all prosy
ivboy r,,,, H. - ~