Ellsworth American. [volume] (Ellsworth, Me.) 1855-current, 1869-09-02

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4 Newspaper.
Ii there Is any one thing more than
I another your free Amcrican-horn citi-
zen OF the aye of eighteen and upward
feels himself competent TO do, without
note of ofpIeparation or any study, It j.
t. edit new spapcr. Take the men rs
they come. upon the streets. aud oiFer
each ono the position Of editor. and
nine out of ten will express regret
that his other engagements prevent his
acceptance of Your tempting Offer. The
tenth man will probably suggest that.
not being able to read and write. prob
ably he had better not try. Poor fel-
low. he j. 50 ignorant A. not to know
that few editors read, and Vet more
limited lumber can write.
Whether am competent To- edit or
publish q paper or not, there are few
who have had more experience, and
therefore more right 10 express an
opinion on the subject. ! began At IN
agc when | ought 10 have been at
school. la 1910. Judge " ,rien. then
familiariy known a. Bob Warden.
turned up on the Mac at heck. with
the identical press the late Ben. Frank
lin learned his trade on. How Bob be-
came possessed Of this complicated
wonder Of wood and iron don't know.
but do know that il j. now on cNhibi-
tion as the Identical press Of franklin's
apprenticeship. for saw II 80 cNhibi-
ted. and assured the amazed iniividu-
al who had ii in charge that too had
served an apprenticeship. on the same
Internal machine. Robert had, with
hi- press, just enough type To set up
one side of AN eight by ten new spaper.
~ the political excitement waNed
warm We were drawn in. and soon as
tonl>h,d the valley of the Mac-a-C heck
with sheet that, iIatter IN, self. for
Niror of editorials. and industry and
enterprise oi publication. has had few
equals. III rccollect rightly. L. G..
Gallagher, X. Il. Warden and the IN
der-igned made up the firm. We wrote,
set up and worked off our editorials.
and Il eli distributing the type, set up
and worked off the other side. and then
mounting our horses. were our own
carriers.
Looking over the yellow pages of
the file before me, | must say that our
ideas Of writing were somewhat crude.
There is a personality that is positive
ly painful. Some of the above would
throw in the shade the famous quar-
rel Of the rural press chroniclcd bv
Pickwick. The specimens OF what was
intended As wit are rather forlorn. One
style was To print the name Of an OBJ
noNious opponent without the custom
airy capital letter. \ certain Doctor
Jones. for example, evidently an ac-
tive and pestiferous whig. j. spoken
of a. '.one jones" and as his name in
full was Hamilton O. Jones. no end Of
fun was supposed to exist in printing
il Hamilton Oh Jones" | am sor-
ry 10 confess it. but the wit of the
Democratic Club was of rather a mean
and low order | am sad To know that
it did not die with this little journal.
To get hold of n name and distort it
to shake and worry it as a pup will an
old boot. is to-day the same indication
OF mean. poverty-stricken intellect
as it was then.
The venerable adipose. who to this
day edits the rbana Citizen. seems TO
have been an object of great wrath to
the editors. proprietors. and publish
ers of the democratic club. His name
fearfully distorted. appears on every
page. and in nearly every column. The
entire range of zoology is exhausted
for epithets to define this inoiie ensive
gentleman. who was probably only a
| common instance of man,
| Whose head, being larger than common.
| Oer-baianced the re-t of his fat
| But on this rival the club eliminates
in doggerel that is a parody on Burns
and must have made the enemy wish
he were dead. They read as follows:
| In a former time it came TO pass,
| The dell got mud To maSc ass,
] A thing ihe:e is no tax on;
When suddenly ne changed his plan,
And turned his into
And called IL Joshua saNion.
And, in fact, the truth to tell,
| The de'il did his work 30 well,
| As well the devil can;
| Catch Joshua in a mood profound.
when the awkward brute got dnking round,
| You'd think il was a man.
| "But when filled ith vain conceit,
| He opes his ponderous jaws to speak
| He did the other day;
| You start back. filed with horrid fears,
And stick both fingers In your ears
You know it by the bray
Years after, when the editors an
} proprietors of the club found then
selves in the republican party, Char
!. ley Flood, then editing the Urban
, Union, suggested that an apology wa