The Dallas daily herald. [volume] (Dallas, Tex.) 1873-1887, 1880-05-20
STATE SPECIALS.
Confined from First page.

that am really pleased to meet you here, j.
this great railroad center, this Indianapoli
of the South, this hospitable city Of Hous
ton, nor yet that feel vastly tlattered by tn
honor conferred on me to address this i'm
portant convention of representatives Of tn
Fourth estate in the realm" of responsibility
responsibility and power. This "fourth es
tate' of the press Of ours as well as Of othe
countries has only an unwrtten history
Whilst it has been more or less u reflex o
the days that were, it has never had q regular
history written of itself. Whilst 1t has beer
record Of heroes, it Is of itsel
an unrecorded hero. 1t was the
nursing mother of civilization, its mission Is
the advocacy of truth and of progress
Wherever II exists untrammeled, there is
civil and religious liberty, there are educa-
ton, Gu ture, and noble manhood; but wher
ever 1t is shackled into reticence or emascu.
lated into servlity there are ignorance and
slavery.
In this address l have divided the sub
tct INTO four parts First, the history Of the
Newspaper so far as II could be CLEANED from
'ragmentary records; second, some account
OF the methods and progress Of news gather
ing; third, the moral features of the Jour
nalistic profession; fourth, the mechanical
possibil lies Of the newspapers Of the future.
And what shall say, gentlemen, will be
characterized less by any attempt at orator..
cal effect than by an effort to benefit the
tause of our profession in the presentation
OF some facts and views that have occurred
10 my mind as pertinent to the occasion.
The newspaper of
CENTURY AGO,
with its few fonts of plea and primer type
its double-pull Rsmage hand-press that was
ut once the receptacle for any material from
s"space''' to the oil bottle, and its Ay.boy
and the buckskin linking balls to take off tho
few hundred of its miniature sheets of local
Items, Chi fly gotten up by one who was at
the same time editor, reporter, printer and
devil, was very different affair from the
magnf centy stereotyped broad sheets, con.
laining all kinds of news, from all parts of the
world, Issuing from the elaborate machinery
pf perfccting press of to-day, whose breath
Of steam and nerves of steel throw off
thousands of copies. per hour, cut, pasted and
folded. Vt u cost of thousands of dollars per
day. We have gradually become 50 used to
sonceiung of the press as 1t is
That we no more stop to
reflect upon the nature Of its existence nor
the extent of its op.n'ions than we do of
ihoseo the sun in It's diurnal rounds. So
accustomed are we TO these that it would re
quire some mental eff TT to conceive of the
condition Of things in their absence. There
are SO few of US of the craft, in this section of
thecountry at eas', Mt all acquainted with the
earlier history of the news paper in this ,oun-
t-y or of its character and progress, that
] have thought il would not
be uninterestng nor uninstruc,ive to
sou, gentlemen Of this convention. and 7
have therefore compiled resume of the
9a.a oy way OF Illustrating more fully the
mnerehce between the
NEWSPAPERS OF THE PAST
and ~ tho rre.snt FL. ..1
Tho n sysnanar " .,os -, o,;a;, .. A.
Enninv and ;npn;,,nn d;snn'is,nn ". W W. 1850 Ws,
nst,,re and in H. a,s, SO ,,os ar "; ,uA
iike anv nublcst;on ,ha, now hoa r ,h u,
while the writers 40 cIaas tbst r,;,,ht .1,anr
hronerlv be tarmod ,,a,,,nhiotaors ~. ,hn'o
Ionrnalists woro es,anI,,ii,, n'JaS Co. 't ~
wretched orthogrsnhp and wor.e srntav nr
tha,r co., ;.occss;nnai ;sSmas eau A. w
aha periedical sheet If news md la,tlv whs
NAV be denominateI the newsnansr tn
British statutcs, of the seventeenth century
thus defined newspaper: "Any psper con-,
lainlng public news, or occurrences
or any REMARKS tnereon printed IN
ssny part the ohitei hingdom,
ior saie, Nv ih'eryais not exceeding twenty-six |
t"ys' Plosiueu, however, that such papershall
~ ~ oAuuou w u'nons'ohs ana Quiz Two sheets
pl paper, eaen 'wehty,ohe inches IN length,
" lSs seventeen inches IN breadth, and provided
slso 'nat such paper snail De published 10,
'ais less sum than SIX pencs" All first
me
CHARACTER OF THESE SHEETS
was eminently sensational and possppv.
being almost exclusively made up of court
scandals and the like, under the general
name OF "weekly news books.o 1t was not
until near the middle of that century that
me Nathaniel Butter inaugura,ed
lew era by the regular re.
PORTING of parliamentary proceedings, cour,
totes, home and foreign affairs, and Ivy COM
on of to day. In sais wake followed the
PARTISAN press, witch, for coarseness and Bit
erness, eccen'rc'ties ana inaccuracies, be.
anne notorious, me natural offspring Of
DIS was the establishing OF official and semi
meA' Organs when subsequently bore their
egitmale irait OF patent right
MoNopoLIEs.
sounds o,r.roo,,, 70 ,,oao,n o h.
or ;astano., anch a,ot,'sa e' w.; W ne"',
~ dn hnr,i,r ',ran. =. 81" I 20 .i's an9
il Sors $3.50 ~ ;bs Par liz $3.50 - Es.'m'se anu
Us , ,ann, y, su0 % ''"hien.ay ln.ei''sehcer,
ha nonpo9 "a newspapers, ana
: n,;n S,o ' MH eAo,assH e, privilege