Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1885-12-09
OLD TIME ENTERPRISE.
PRINTING PRESIDENTS MES
SAGES THREE DECADES AGO.

! PRINTING EiSESADtNAS NAAA'S-
SAGES THREE DECADES AGO.
The Document Sent Ont Several Days
Ahead of Time and Printed on the CO.
operative Plan-HOw the Savannah
"Courier' DIstanced its Competition
"Reminiscences of an Old Printer.
While the Presidents message was
coming in last evening at the rate of 80
words a minute some gentlemen got TO
talking about the messages Of 80 years
ago. One of the gentlemen, who quarter
OF a century ago was a compositor, but
has long since laid aside the stick and
rule, gave a bit Of Renaissance that was
quite interesting.
Chimes change. and newspapers and
presidential messages change with them"
said he. 1.-The reading Of the Presidents
message was begun, l presume, rev
minutes after Congress was called to
order to-day, and l have no doubt but
that within half an hour after it was
finished the whole message had been
telegraphed to New York. Both Press
Associations were to have a copy,
and with two or three wires and
RELAYS of operators the message
could be sent as fast as delivered. When
! 90 you expect to get all Of it hereW be
asked, turning to the NEWS representa-
tive.
"About 10 O'Clock tonight. estimating
the message to contain 10000 words"
was the reply.
at was very different thirty-dve years
ago." the gentleman continued. 81 re-
member in 1853 | was an apprentice in
the office of the old Daily Courier. Col.
5. T. Chapman was the proprietor and
the Courier Office was in an old two-story
brick building on the site of the building
now occupied by the Savannah Bank and
| Trust Company. He was well-known and
did the State printing then, but he died
the next year of yellow fever. In those
days the Presidents message was sent
out several days before Congress met. 1t
was generally addressed to the Collector
of the Port or the Postmaster, and he gave
it to the newspapers on the day it was to
be read in Congress. Telegraph tolls were
heavy then, and anyhow a long message
would have made two days work for the
telegraph.
besides the Courier, Savannah had then
three other morning papers-the MORN
ING NEWS, the Republican, and the Daily
GeOyqidn, besides the EUenind Journal
and the Mirror. The day that the Presi-
dents message was received the papers
would divide it up between themselves
and each set up two or three columns.
That was kept up until 1853, when Presi-
lent Pierce sent out his first message.
The Republican, being the Oldest paper,
| always claimed the privilege of printing
It's papers from the forms first. On the
morning that President Pierce's first mes
sage was given out the Republican inti-
mated that it was to use the forms first, as
it had always done. The Courier want
ed the same privilege itself. 1t had
large Hoe cylinder press, bran new and
I II. \. L Co.
lt.was afterwards taken up to Columbia,
by the way, and was burned by Sherman
When his army went through there. The
Courier and Republican proprietOrs could
not agree and they quarreled, and finally
each paper determined TO go 1t alone and
set the message up, each one for itself
There was race, of course, to see which
would get out 6rst. The town was scour-
ed for printers Of any kind. Nobody was
turned away from a case that night. The
Courier had about twenty extra men do
ing the State work. The message was
distributed around among them, and with
| the men we had in the office, made up a
! pretty respectable force. Type few that
| night. Everybody worked as hard as he
| could, and at midnight we had the press
going.
scratching up half a dozen fresh pa
! pers, Col. Chapman handed them to me
each Office and present it to the foreman
with his compliments. l started of and
| dropped the first one on the foreman's
| desk in the NEWS office, which was then
| where Byck Il Sehg are now located on
| Bay street. The foreman thanked me,
and said we were very smart, or some
| thing of that kind. No paper down here
! had ever attempted to get the message
| out single-handed before. and we were a
| little proud of what we had done, went
| from the NEWS office over to the Repub-
| licdR office, which was where Fretwell g.
| Nichols now keep.
"Charlie O'Sullivan was the foreman of
the Republican composing room, and he
was pretty clever old fellow in his way.
! The boys, however, kept pretty straight
around him. | laid a Courier down be-
fore him, and l cut the presentation
speech very short. He didn't catch on
as the boys say now. until was half way
down the stairs. Luckily they wound
! around, and the mallets and shooting
sticks that came sailing down struck the
wall at the bottom OF the second fight.
After l left one for the Daily GeorgiaR,
which was issued from the building
now known as the city exchange, the
| bows in the Courier Office took me over
to Pat Cody's and we had a spread. Cody
kept in the rear of the Cotton Exchange,
and his place was quite popular. l was
put up on a table, and bottle OF cham
payne was opened in my honor. 1t must
have been for Drawing the fellows in the
Republican Office, who we're mad enough
at being beat. The NEWS got out that
morning about o'clock, and il was after
noon before the rest went TO press"
sin those days, the editors had an
agreement that they would all go home at
8 O'Clock in the afternoon, and not 20 back
to the office any more that night. If the
Charleston boat came in with the great
Southern mail after p. M, the newspaper
mail remained In the office over night.
After 8 in the evening everything was left
in charge of the compOsitOrs. That doesn't
strike you fellows who cover everything
up to or 3 o'clock in the morning as very
enterprising, does it?" concluded the
speaker, addressing the NEWS man.
For the convenience Of their patrons,
the FAMOUS" New York Clothing House