Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1873-04-09
HE wIsDOn OF ADVERTISING

Il is remarkable that so many business
men know little or nothing Of the wisdom
Of advertising those things which they
wish to sell, and those things which they
wish to buy.
Some years ago young man born and
educated in Scotland, came to this country
Nth no other capital than what existed in
his brain and muscles, and commenced
business as a news collector and writer for
the press, which naturally extended to the
publication of an advertising newspaper.
This man taught thousands of business
men and women in the city Of New York
the wisdom Of telling each other, and the
world in addition TO themselves, through
the columns of the Herald, what they had
for sale, what they desired to purchase;
whether a coachman, 2 We nurse, or
chamber maid, wanted place; some
gentleman needed a goodman or his wife
a servant. No clear head, accustomed to
thinking, can doubt the very great public
convenience of using type, ink and paper,
to communicate from one person to another
information of this kind for nothing can
well be more evident than the fact that no
one can sell his goods, wares, merchandise,
farm, wild land or city property, without
buyer; nor can one who wishes TO make an
advantageous purchase of any thing what
ever, do so without seller of the article
sought. 1t is a simple and practical ques-
ton, how to bring these parties
together, face to face, in the
easiest and cheapest way. Take up
any number of the New York Herald, look
over all its advertisements, and you can
hardly f4i to see precisely how this is done.
This business operation proved so useful to
the advertisers after thirty years. experience
of its value, that the Herald Office was esti-
mated as worth FIVE million dollars at the
death of James Gordon Bennett, the found
or of the paper; its advertising patronage
reaching nearly million dollars year.
Robert Bonner, the founder of the New
York Ledger, as a literary paper, is an
Irishman by birth, who has made a large
fortune by skilful advertising more
than by any other means. On
one occasion be paid the New York Herald
two thousand dollars, cash in hand, for the
advertisement Of the Ledger that appeared
one day only iu Benefits daily, covering
one page CT that paper. Probably two
thirds of the readers of the Herald that day,
who knew something of the price paid for
line of space in the Herald, thought that
Bonner was little insane. But the owner
OF the Ledger had studied his business
problem carefully, and the practical result
has been that one company engaged in sell
ing papers and periodicals takes every week
three hundred and fifty thousand copies of
the Ledger. How many are distributed by
mail we cannot say, but the number is large.
The horses in Bonner's stable kept for his
comfort, and in no way for sporting, are
said to be worth $4,000; and the building
that holds them, cost more money than any
palace in which the crowned heads of
Great Britain have lived, till within recent
times. There are some features in the
Ledger that deserve commentator. One
is that Bonner makes it exceptionally
moral in tone, and chaste as a repository of
American literature. he said, and we
have no doubt truthfUlly, that a million
dollars would not hire him 10 publish in
the Ledger Ms. Stoves efusion of the
Byron scandal; and to guard the purity of
his family hebdomsdal, no advertisement
on any subject is admitted.
Bonner shows great wisdom in buying ad
vertising space literally, and never selling
line of such space in bis own paper. HIS
journal is specially; and he is wise in
letting all the world know what that speci-
atty is. A few years ago, Bonner was
poor mechanic working at his trade, that