Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1881-10-31

Hhl!e THIS arrangement "Ou'N -
and iust thing for newspaper writers, IL
would be defense for the public. IL is
sometimes true that things damaging to
nriyate character are said. Who is re-
snonsible? 1t is the we of the editorial
or the reportorial columns. Every man
in eyerv profession or occupation ought
Ia be reasonable for what he does. No
honorable man will ever write that
which he would be afraid to sign. But
thousands of people have suffered from
the impersonality OF newspapers. what
can one private citizen wronged IN MS
reputation do in a cor test with misrep-
1esentation multiplied into twenty or
ffty thousand copies? An injustice
done in print is illlmitably worse than
an injustice done in private lille. Dur
ing loss OF temper man may say that
tor when ne will be sorry in ten min
utes. But newspaper injustice has
first to be written, then set up in type,
then the proof taken of and read and
corrected, and then for six or ten hours
the presses are busy running of the ed
itiOn. Plenty OF time to correct. Pten-
tv of time to cool of. Plenty OF time to
repent. But all that is hidden by the
impersonality OF newspaper. 1t will
be long step forward when all is
changed and newspaper writers get cred
it for the good and are held responsible
for the evil.
Another step forward for newspaper
dom will be when in our colleges and
universities we open opportunities lor
preparing candidates for the editorial
chair. We have in such institutions
medical departments and law depart
ments, why not editorial departments? :?
Do the legal and healing professions de-
mand more culture and careful training
than the editorial and reportorlal pro-
fession? know men may tumble by
what seems accident into a newspaper
office rs they may tumble into other oc-
equations, but it will be an incalculable
advantage ii those proposing newspA-
per life had an institution to which they
might 60
To Learn the Qualifications,
the responsibilities, the trials, the temp
tations, the magnificent opportunities OF
newspaper life. Let there be lecture
ship in which there shall appear the
leading editors Of the United States
telling the story OF their struggles, their
victories, their mistakes, how they
worked and what they found out to be
the best way OF working. There will be
strong men who will climb up without
such aid into editorial power and eti-
cheney. Sodo men climb up to success
in other branches by sheer grit. But II
We want learned institutions to make
lawyers and artists and doctors and min
listers, We much more need learned IN
stitutlons to make editors who occupy
position OF influence hundred fold. l
do not put the truth too strongly when
| saw the most potent influence for good
on earth IS a good editor and the most
potent influence for evil is bad one.
The best wav TO reinforce and improve
the newspaper is TO endOw editorial pro-
fessorates. When will Princeton or
Harvard or Yale or Rochester lesd the
way?
Another blessing of the newspaper is
the foundation it laws for accurate histo.
rv OF the time in which We live. We for
the most part hlindly guess about the
ayes that ante. date the newspaper, and
are dependent upon the prejudices OF
this or that historian. But after hun
dred or two years what splendid oppor-
tunity the historian will have to teach
the people the lesson OF this day. Our
Bancroft got IRON the early newspapers
OF this country, from the Boston Nslrs-
Letter, the New York Gazette, and the
american Rag Bag, and the Royal Gd:e'-
ter, and the Independent Chronicle, and
the Massachusetts, Spg, and the Philadel-
phia .iUrOrn; accounts OF Perry's victory,
and Hamilton's duel, and Washington's
death, and Boston massacre, and the Op
pressive foreign tax on luxuries which
turned Boston harbor into teapot, and
Paul Revere's midnight ride, and Rhode
Island rebellion, and South Cardinals
nuilnCatlon. But what a field for ths
Chronicler of the great future when he
opens the files OF hundred American
pt wSpapers giving the minuti% OF all
things occurring under the social, poll.
tical, ecc 3iastical, international, hs M
spherical. Five hundred years irOm
now il the world lasts so long the stu
dent looking for stirring and decisive
history will pass by the misty corridors
of other centuries and say to the libra
risn: Find me the volume that gives
the century IN which the American
Presidents were assassinated, the civil
war enacted ard the CO ton gin, the
steam locomotive and telegraph and
electric pen and telephone, and Hoes
cylinder presses were invented. 1t is
not more what newspapers 40 for to-day
tbap tho fact that they make
A storehouse of History.
More than ali, the blessing OF a good
newspaper IS in it's evangelistic inttu-
ence. The secular press OF this coun-
try discusses all religious questions,
scatters abroad religions intelligence
and mulliplies sermons until the
gospel comes every week within the
reach OF every intelligent man and
woman in America. The good news
paper is to be the right wing OF the
ap1calyptic angel. On the Sabbath a
minister breaches to few hundred or
thousand people, and on Monday morn
ing and evening the printing press
breaches to millions. May God speed
it. The telegraph gathers up for il
matter on one side, and the express
mail train waits to be loaded with the
tons OF folded sheets on the other side,
| set it down as the mightiest force for
,hr worlds evangelzstion. An aged
woman earning her living by knitting
came to the END of her worsted bal
and found it wound round piece of old
newspaper, which she opened and read
an I 10 her amase e uent found in it an ad
vertisement announcing herself as heir
ess to large property. And alter the
thread OF time shall have run further
out, who knows but that through the
silent yet speaking newspaper is to be
found the yastinheritance OF the worlds
redemption.
Canada Ahead.