, 1884-07-13
THE LONG FELT WANT.
Bill Nye's Experience in Toying
with a Daily Paper.
A spirited Contest with n Formida-
BILE RIyal-vic:ory Mt Last
The Neral of
IL All.

Robert j. Burdette, having related his en-
perience with a young and struggling daily,
l move that other brethren present relate
their own little history. l think. it Is some
times a relief to unburder the soul by a con
fession.
Itoyed with a daily once which was incor-
porated to fill a long felt want. I did not
know it was loaded. There wa a rivel daily
that had been running two years, and we en-
tered the arena, hoping to win an easy vic
tory over this paper and become q great
power in the west We made it our
business to boom every thing that was
boomsble and to sneer at the lack Of
enterprise of our adversary. We got
specials by mail, press reports by slow
freight, and showed n style of fearless enter
prise that was the envy and the admiration
OF many large metropolitan journals. We
thought that our adversary wouldn't last
more than a month after election, but
Thanksgiving came and found The Evening
Squawker still on deck. The editor would
come and borrow print paper Of US and then
use it to call us the slime bedecked and putrid
exponent of u still more baneful political
faction. We would borrow font of BREWER
Of him and characterize his paper as the
wailing founding, dying in the poisonous
vapors of the deadly swamp of political filth,
wherein it had chosen its bed, edited by the
bitter foo of the laundress and Lindlcy
Murray, a man who had evaded justice for
forty years, and, not content with the out
rage of all moral sense, had declared war
the spelling book.
Thus we kept up a spirited contest for a
long time. Sometimes we couldn't get our
paper out of the freight Office, and sometimes
he couldn't, but we would loan each other
the last quire we had and keep friendly,
while through the columns of our respective
papers we spoke Of each other in language
Yrbfah nf~l I.r, .-
proachful to some people.
1t was an exciting time. One day The
Squawker would offend a subscriber, and he
would come over to us, and the next day we
would unwittingly tread on the toes OF one
of our great army OF subscribers, and he
would go over to the enemy.
The editor of the other paper and myself
saw that it was going to be a war of EXTERN
nation. We ground our teeth and our
shears and sailed in. At tine end of the first
year he had discharged his servant girl and
my paper owed me $500 salary. It the end
of the second year he had blown in his fine
brick residence and l had taken my salary
rs police justice and thrown it into the ra-
pacious NAV of my little hungry long felt
want.
One day the little, muddy, measly, long
suffering features of The Evening Squawker
failed to appear. We kept asking tue Office
boy why The Squawker didn't come. He
didn't know. Finally he went to the publica.
ton office The door was locked. A map
of Dakota was hung over one window and a
printers towel over the other. The office
boy raised the map and stole in. TIL uncer.
tain Light here and there broke in struggling
rays through the threadbare places in the
towel On the desk lay a letter from the ad-
v~ertiser OF a Collie Eraser in which he offered
to take a column in The Squawker a year,
folio wing pure reading matter and with
1900 lines of reading notices to be strung
along through editorials from day to day, in
bold-faced type, and in consideration there
for to furnish for two years to the editor, or
his order, fifty bottles Of the Collie Eraser at
publishers price, delivered on board the
cars.
Everything about the Office showed that
the work had been going bravely on when
the summons came. In fact the summons
lay there on tho desk among other papers,
along with a writ of attachment for 1858. IS.
This shows what a hold a paper gets on its
subscribers and also what a hold the sub
scriber gets on the paper. The sheriG had
been a subscriber to the Squnwlier ever since
it started, but we didn't know his attach.
ment for the paper was so great.
We won the day, but at what a sacrifice.
The smoke OF conflict cleared away and
showed that the victory was not worthy Of
the carnage. We had survived, but we were
not proud. The Squakwer had fought us
brayely, and now its still, cold form lay il
the basement Of the chief creditor, and the
usual notice OF attachment was tackled on the
door.
The editor and myself met on the following
day, and he was the more cheerful Of the two.
He said he felt sorry for me. AZ can use what
l get hereafter on my family" said he; "but
you can't. You will feel guilty if you buy u
barrel of -four for your own use, knowing
that it may imperil the next issue Of the
paper. l have passed all that" And he was
right. The quicker a man decides to cease
publishing a daily paper where it is not
needed, just simply through q high moral
sense of duty. the sooner he will become
light-hearted and joyous. l paid az, 900 for
the privilege Of knowing this, and 1 present
it to every paid-up subscriber of The Free
Press without money and without price. /
don't know very much, but il there's any
thing 1 do know, and know it hard, and
know it with one hand tied behind mo, IL is
that.