The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1891-06-06
THE PASSING THRONG.
What Men Talk of in the Streets
and the Hotels.
NEW YORK PUBLISHER.
Mr. Clarence w. Bowen, of the ssInde.
pendent" In seattie-Port Town.
send Hospitality

Mr.. Clarence w. Bowen, of BROOKLYN,
assistant publisher of the New York Inde-
pendent, the greatest religious weekly in this
country, Is at the Rainier hotel. Mr..
Bowen, who Is yet young man, tall and
slender, Is son of Mr.. Henry G. Bowen,
the proprietor of the Independent. whose
Fourth of July celebrations at Woodstock,
Conn.,. have a national fame.
Mr.. Clarence Bowen began his work as q
reporter on the New York Tribune. After
q short time he was sent ont as their trav-
cling correspondent. In about a year he
went on the Independent doing editorial
work. OF late he has confined his atten-
ton to the publishing department. In
1859 his name was brought prominently
before the public, as he was the chairman
of the committee that managed the great
constitutional centennial in New York in
that year.
MY trip" said be. yesterday, ''is mostly
for pleasure, though have gotten one Of
your bankers. Mr.. Z. o. Graves. to promise
to write me an article on the financial
condition of the country. If a man is to
keep pace with events in this country, he
must give due proportion of attention to
the Northwest just as to the doings in
year, and this year / am making the trip
again.
"My notice has been called to this state
in particular, because my father is inter-
ested somewhat in the Northern Pacific.
noticed he was one of the first to become
interested in the project for that trans
continental line. remember when was
little boy that Jay Cooke came over from
Philadelphia with lot of maps and esti-
mates; and my father called meeting of
the New York capitalists at our own house
to discuss the scheme.
"We find as sharp a competition in run
ming weekly as the manager of daily
paper finds. The critical taste of the read
ing public is steadily improving, and we
must improve our paper with it. We
now get articles that rank in merit with
those of the best magazines. Should we
fail to do this we should lose our patron
age.
1.-THE Independent was started in 1S4S as
an anti-slavery organ. The Observer and
the Evangelist did not dare speak out
against slavery. and so half dozen New
York merchants raised the money to pur-
chase the Independent. DIR. Leonard
Bacon, DIR. Storrs and DR.. Thomp-
son were the hrst editors, and
they wrote in no uncertain tone
against slavery. Some years later there
was call for meeting at Castle Garden
to sympathize with the South. My father
made himself very unpopular then by re-
fusing to sign the call, and replying that
his goods, not his principles, were for sale.
He lost all his Southern trade, and
IN 1851 was forced out of his
business. Then he gave his whole atten-
ton to the Independent, buying out the in
terests of the other proprietors. The cost
was not very great, for the paper had been
an expense of $4,000 year apiece to the
proprietors, and some were glad to get rid
of the burden. That was the way the In
dependent began"
Mr.. Bowen returns TO his home in day
or two over the Canadian Pacific.