Custer chronicle. [volume] (Custer City, Black Hills, D.T. [S.D.]) 1880-1890, 1889-08-24
NEWSPAPER SCOOPS"
Some Of the Feats Performed by Wide
awake and Ambitious Reporters.

y history Of scoops would form very
good history Of journalism from the time
newspapers first began o be issued. One
OF the @teat scoops Of history was a pre-
diction, The particulars of this scoop
are so historical that they a be found
in "Kinglake's History of the Crimean
War" The London Times predicted the
battle Of Alma. 1t called the battle that
had not yet been fought by the name it
has been known in history. 1t pointed
out where it would be fought and pointed
out what would be the result. This re-
markable prediction vas verified in every
particular, and, although The Times
afterwards kept on the predicting bust
ness as to the fall of Sebastopol, none of
its other predictions came true. This
shows the beauty of stopping predicting
when you have made one big success.
A scoop which involved n good deal Of
personal danger was accomplished a few
years ago by the correspondent Of The
New York Times in London. Mr.. Harold
Frederic yer through the cholera smit-
ten districts of France and Spain, and
cabled a page to his paper. giving an ac-
curate history of the plague, and show
ing for the first time what was to be-
feared from the cholera epidemic and
what was not. In fact, 1t gave people
for the first time an accurate estimate Of
the situation.
When the Prince Of Wales visited
America The New York Herald man got
n pcap, ON oil bic Dotao,,nJ n,rc~.
ries by holding a wire against all corners.
This was at Niagara Falls and there was
but one wire at that time to New York.
The Herald reporter started sending In
his message, and, until he had finished,
o Of the other men could send In
theirs. He telegraphed every mortal
thing that he could think of, described
all the suits the Prince Of Wales wore
and what the Duke of Newcastle said and
did, aud what every member of the suite
thought and were likely to think about,
and finally he had to fall back on the
only book available, a copy OF the New
Testament, most Of which was tele-
BY the time he had finished with the
volume 1t was then too late for any of
the other newspaper men TO send in a
special. If the men in The Herald office
read all the dispatches that came in from
the New Testament, the big sum Of
money paid for the telegraph bill would
not have been altogether wasted.
NJ. Quad, in his younger days, char
tered a locomotive TO bring in the gov
ernor's message to The Detroit Free
Press. He had a wild ride against time,
and not only delivered the message in
good shape, but wrote an account Of the
affair which, 1t Is not too much to say,
was infinitely more interesting and very
much more widely read than was the
message Of which he was the carrier.
In a recent issue Of an American maya
zine, Mr.. Blowitz, the Paris c%orrespon-
dent of The London Times, gives q very
interesting account of how he scooped
all his esteemed contemporaries by tele-
graphing TO London a copy Of the Berlin
treaty. Not the least difficulty which he
had to overccnie was the getting of IA
permit to send by telegraph the matter
which he had the good luck and good
management to secure. He had to get
into Belgium To do 1t, and even then he
had to have an order from q very high
authority or otherwise his message would
not have been taken.
In America the only trouble that CORE
~spondents have is to get the news. Once
they have that, there is no doubt about
its being t~elegraphed. In Europe the
correspondents have another difficulty
10 contend with, and that Is, even after
they have their special information, and
after they hand it in to the telegraph
office, it is sometimes not sent. During
the troublesome times in Spain awhile
ago, a newspaper correspondent found
that no matter what information he man
aged to get 1t was never forwarded from
the Spanish telegraph office. The gov
eminent Of the day took care that no
news that 1t did not wish to go abroad
should be sent This correspondent then
wrote TO his friend In London that when
he received the next dispatch he was to
count every fifth word and cable only
| every fifth word to New York. He wrote
his dispatches after that on this principle.
Whenever he got a good piece Of news
he telegraphed a long ~rigmarole to his
friend in London, which when read as
it was sent appeared to be a long talk of
financial and domestic troubles which
were bothering him at that time, but
when every fifth word was taken out it
gave the news he wanted to send. This
the Spanish people never got "on to-"
Ind SO the correspondent secured many
scoops for his paper.-Detroit Free Press.