The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1893-08-12
The Manifold Duties and the Varied Re-
quirements of the MaD Who Runs
Paper The Struggle
for Glory.


counsels are valueless. With the
proper conditions any one of them
would lead paper to success, but
those conditions are an editor with
/ twenty-five million dollars and a pa
tent and enthusiastic public. Having
! noticed one of the qualities needed by
an editor to endure his trials, let NE
consider few other requirements Of
the man whom the general public pic
lures as person whose chief duties
, are to WELD the scissors and the paste
brush, wear out an Office chair behind
a door inscribed: This is my busy
day." and hurl paper weights and
curses at the printers devil, while his
only trial is to listen to the perpetra-
lions OF spring poets. In brief, the ed
itor of a struggling paper (for that in
dividual being the martyr Of journal
ism l shall take him as its representa-
tive must be printer, proof reader,
author, critic, politician, diplomat,
business man, hustler, scholar, ency-
clopedia and-but this will do for a
suggestion. Don't believe it? Let me
particularize.
''As printer he must be able to ex-
anime the proofs and see if the willy
typesetter has not double loaded the
matter or measured the type with a too
generous rule, and he must see that
the paper is produced in an artistic
form; as a writer he turns out those
jewels Of eloquence and intellect
known as editorials; as diplomat he
must devise measures to lift his paper
into popularity and keep it propped
up; and of course he must be a careful
critic, separating the grain from the
chaff of literary work. He under
stands the art of craftsmanship, for
the people expect him to unite the
gordian knot of politics for them; and
he must have an enormous bump of
agressiveness, for who but he must
champion the peoples cause? As
proof reader he reviews his paper, con-
tanning from thirtyfve thousand to
one hundred and sixty thou
sand words, from beginning to
end, looking for the smallest
errors, and proof reading as those
who have tried it know, requires more
endurance than the geometry tests
from which we are about to escape.
but pause here, for this list has al
ready assumed soporiic proportions.
To sum up, the editor must have
money, experience, influence and
brains, the meekness of Moses, the pa
tience of Job and the energy of a dy-
namo, and when he has done his best
he must bear the blame for the false
reports and bad English of his report
ers. The mere mention of these quail
ties is bad enough. But in order to
appreciate them fully it is necessary
for us to see them IN action in the ed
itor's sanctum. not the private office of
a journalistic magnate, who can avail
himself of the equivalency of time and
money. but that of the editor of pa
per with patent insides and circula-
ton of about fifty copies a week,
counting exchanges.
THE life of such an unfortunate is
a long and exquisite torture of bills,
complaints, refusals, book agents.
spring poems, indignant citizens and
accidents, resulting in a perpetual
headache, a rebellious digestion and
an intimate acquaintance with the
demon of insomnia. And the product
of all the pain and trouble is only
newspapers worthless thing that
lives for day, like May fly, and then
is lost and forgotten, leaving to its au-
thor no fame, no reward but the price it
sells for: and what sum of money, how
ever large, isa just recompense for art!
Poor unappreciated thingl Who when
he reads it will think of the trials that
were necessary to bring it out? Here's
the news OF great fire. Who stops TO
think that the man who wrote that
article braved danger and death to
serve the public? Here's an article by
the funny man. Would you laugh so
loudly If You knew that the man who
wrote that article was given a little
more space this week SO that he
might earn more money to pay doc
tors bills? Here's an account of an
embezzler captured. You never knew
the pangs that the editor felt as he
read the words that ruined the name
and family CT his best friends.
Lets see what sort OF an editorial
menu has been served up to-day. All!
Very spicy, that But the man who
wrote it hadn't slept night for
week and felt more like composing his
will This is the cost of our American
Is it too much. is it too
little? 1t appeals 20 me rs great
price for q great thing. In return for
self-sacriice and undaunted labor We
have received the embodiment OF ener-
gy. liberty, enterprise and originality
in word. Anericanisn- | shall not
enter into a eulogy OF the American
You need no one to tell
you what il has done. II IS the edu-
Gator OF our conrnon-People. the in
SEPARATION OF our youth, the censor OF
our morals. Mercenary? Yes. 1t IS
tut the articles Of the
authors who attack and de-
stroy pubic abuses, guard our liberty
and serve the nation. though written
for money, are quite as full OF true "a
trio1isEl as those bursts Of eloguenee
in legislative halls where the reward
is that food OF concentrated selEshness
glory