The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1867-11-13

tewspaper Enterprise-Past and Present.
4 The newspaper press, presenting the age
eth its own image, rejecting active life in all
5 moods and notifications, exhibits change
uowhere more remarkably than in the ever
feming advertising columns. The contrast
tetween the advertisements in the HERALD OF
P-day and those Of favorite journal when
pe career Of the HERALD began, illustrates at
tnce the growth Of city and country, the pro-
bress OF thought, the diffusion of knowledge,
he rapidity, impulse, freedom and ease with
khich society moves. II was the common
hshion once for advertisers to put in half a
column for year. Who can afford to do this
low in the HERALDi Such has been the in
lrease in the value Of space in the advertising
columns that the increase in the value of land
IN Broadway Is distanced by It. II New
FORK merchant Of thirty years ago had as
puch money as would now pay for column
p the HERALD for one year, the last thing he
you'd have thought Of would have been ad-
Eertising. He would have gone up town,
bought house, and retired to take his ease,
leaving the turmoil Of trade to poorer men.
But merchants do not retire on moderate for
lunes any more.
Advertising columns were q sort Of pic
furesque desert to the reader. He saw the
rows Of miniature effgies Of delinquent ap-
erentices advertised as runaways; he saw pic
Eurcd the dogs that had been lost the ships
fhat were sailing, the houses that were to let;
but 1t was all the same for weeks. He looked
lover the announcement Of SO many quintals OF
aogwood, so much dried cod and other valua-
pile articles for sale, and it was the same for
year. Now, however, one scarcely sees the
same advertisement twice. An advertisement
put once in the HERALD accomplishes the ad-
vertiser's object; it sells his old sewing ma
chine or his new piano; it puts him in imme-
Idiate communication with the man he wants to
'see and for whom he has vainly hunted year,
till some one suggested the HERALD personals;
II gets him tenant or gets him house; gets
him servant or . situation; in short, supplies
almost any and every social or commercial
want for this one advertisement is seen and
read by half million persons. Thus the
range of its influence is practically illimitable,
while any mere agent works in compare
Bively narrow sphere. II Is the extent to
which our citizens use the columns of the
HERALD as means OF REORGANIZATION that
gives these advertisements their great variety
and peculiar personal and vital character. In
khis respect these advertisements are news
news Of the most important kind, and that
which is hardest to get
(. These changes in the character Of advertise
ments have, of course, been only secondary to
those other changes in the newspaper that
have made it valuable medium for the diffu-
sion Of intelligence and q great educational
instrument-changes due to the infusion into
Newspaper management of the spirit OF enter
pris and progress. How, for instance, would
the passed-away Journalists have stared at ie-
GER numbers OF the HERALD. Garibaldi's re-
Ger Roman campaign, reported to US by our
spe al correspondent at the scene OF action,
ca all the way by telegraph. These tele-
gr. nc letters were read in the HERALD within
thrt days after the occurrence in Italy Of the
evcss they recorded. 1t is this energy and
rig use Of the great inventions of the age
fhs lake the press what il is. We intend to
car these principles still further in the man.
age, at Of the HERALD, and one of these days
sha rop even the locomotive and steamship
rs L ms of communication, and have our cor.
resp dence sent entirely by telegraph-so
giving Immediately the full details of events
WI now we give by telegraph only the out
Gin waiting for the mailed letters to tell the
VIII . story.