The morning call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1878-1895, 1894-02-18

NEW 1 DIX, HtD 1Z'-ICOUclb DOuuoI,
the founder Of The New York Ledger, in
many respects is a very remarkable man.
He was the first publisher in the United
States TO make a great success Of story
paper suitable for the whole family (the
circulation at one time reaching $4,000
copies). and secure for it contributors so
prominent that, in their time, they
eQualed in reDOwn the best writers for
the magazine of to-day. No publisher
of weekly periodical in the United
States-in fact no publisher now living
has come in contact with so many
famous writers or associated with them
on such terms of friendship. What fol
lows has been revised and corrected by
him.
Mr.. Bonner was born in Londonderry,
Ireland, and Is now 20 years of age He
came 10 this country in 1889. worked as a
printer and settled in New York ia 1874
where he bought the Merchants Ledg er
which was then a commercial paper, and
which be continued to publish as such for
two or three years, when he made it a
family story paper
AT the time the Ledger was started"
said Mr.. Bonner to me. There was pub
lished in Philadelphia family story paper
called the Saturday Evening Post; in Bos-
ton there was Geason's Pictorial In New
York there were no papers of this kind.
the nearest approach TO them being the
regular Sunday weekly journals, such as
NOah'S Weekly Times, the Sunday Atlas
and the Sunday Dispatch. Brother Jonathan
was published before this time. but it did
not last very long. The magazines OF the
day were the Knickerbocker IN New York
and Godey's and Peterson's in Philadel-
phis. For four years after / bought The
Ledger L conducted 1t as commercial
j1urDal. Ii onained market reports,
prices current aud. bank notices. In those
days there were so many State banks aud
banks of discount that We had to publish
a bank-nOte list for the benefit of country
merchants. We were not then blessed
with the uniform national currency that
we now have, where dollar in one stats
Is dollar in another In Those days the
bills On some banks-Ohio and Indiana,
for examp e-woud fluciuate in value from
2 TO per cent below par.
In making the Ledger a story paper OF
course l had certain ideal as to what
such journal should be. That ideal was
wrought out III my mind, in what most
people would call a yerv curious way. At
that time the leading Presbyterian Church
in New York was on the corner of Univer-
Sly place and Tenth street. The minister
was the Rev. Dr. Potts. The Presbyie-
rlans Ia those days were noted for being
more strict in their lotions of morality and
propTlety than the members of any other
church. In starting story paper, there
fore. | put myself in the position of an old
Presbyterian LADY, member of Dr. Potts
church.. l imagined myself having just
returned from the Wednesday evening
prayer meeting or FRIDAY night lecture.
Just before retiring / want to read some
infn nSfl fpL- mn nf hC
Ledger. In any essay, editorial. story,
sketch or jest that she finds in that paper
there must not appear word that she can !
not read aloud TO her children, ranging in |
age ali the way from 10 to 16 years. To |
illustrate, the words 'libertine and |
seduction were never allowed to appear
in the paper. My Ideal of story, first of
all, was that not word should appear in |
II that would cause the old DIV EN- barrass-
ment il. one of her children should stop |
her while she was reading, and ask:
Mamma what does that mean?'
wv hen l gradually substituted reading
matter in my journal its circulation was
increased and L was very much encour-
aged. My first feat of enterprise was in
1853, when l engaged Mrs. Sigourney TO
contribute a poem every week, which she
continued to do until the day Of her death.
Two years later l engaged Fanny Fern.
Aside from fiction l made il point to
have essays and biographical sketches
contributed by famous writers. l bad d
series By Edward Everett, called The
Mount Vernon Papers, essays by Henry
Ward Beecher, biographical sketches by
James Parton and the inimitable social
essays of Fanny Fern, his wife. She wrote
exclusively for the Ledger up to theday of
her death. She was the most popular
writer of her day. and her work was a
special feature in the Ledger. George
Bancroft would occasionally contribute a
nial oil /
Byron
Bishop Clarke of Rhode Island and
Rev. John Hall of New York for ten or
tw elve years each wrote an essay every
week. Bishop Clarke from the money he
received for his articles in the Ledger
built a country place near Providence,
r. l., on site overlooking the bay. he
determined to give II a name which would
combine my own and that OF The Ledger,
and so named it Bon-Ledge.
Henry j. Raymond, editor of the New
York Times. wrote a leading editorial for
every mum Der of the paper. Many of the
editorials | wrote myself, and editorials
that were written for me l changed to suit
the character of paper | was trying to
make. Edward Everett laid down the rule
that nothing must be changed in an article
written by man over bis own sign ature,
pit notifications could be made where the
article was not signed. My editorial con-
trlbutors understood this custom. Horace
Greeley, Beecher and Edward Everett
constantly furnished matter for the edito-
rial page, which / aimed to make a model
in weekly journalism. and l think sue
ceeded in doing so.
james Gordon. Bennett, Alice and
Pbehe Cary, Fitz Greene Halleck, George
ID: Prentice. Leon Lewis and his vile
Harriet Lewis. Miss Dupuy, William
Henry Peck and Mrs. Dallas, were other
famous contributors. paid Lord Tenny-
son $1,000 for one poem. l paid Charles
Dickens $1,000 for a story, the only story
lie ever wrote for an American publica-
ton. The great peculiarity about his
writing was the number of neerlineations
never saw so many interlineations in
the manuscript of any other contributor.
Greeley's manuscript was unintelligible
TO our compositors. and often wnen they
struck a very bad place the foreman would
send it over TO Tom Rocker, in the Tri-
bune's composing-reom, be being the only
man, aside from Greeley himself, who
could decipber il.
II found no trouble in negotiating with
Dickens, who was then at the height of
his fame. | told him what | wanted, of
fered him the price and sent draft for the