The Durham daily globe. (Durham, N.C.) 1889-1894, 1894-01-16

THE GUIDE BOOKS THAT ARE PUB
LlS4EO BY RAILROADS.

Vast Sums Are Spent in Hiring Capable
produce Scenery for Costly Volumes to
Advertise the Line.
men is in the getting out of guide books
Several years ago a rich southern rail-
road published a luxurlously gotten up
book as handsome as almost any example
of a nch edition of Shakespeare that men
and women display upon a parlor center
table. 1t was thought then that the
limit Of enterprise and expenditure had
been reached. and that there never would
be anything finer bearing the imprint of
a general passenger office.
But that elegant volume is almost for
gotten now. Its defects were that its
pictures were ready made, and repre-
sented a low grade of art, while the
letter press, or reading matter, wa the
work Of the general passenger agent-a
clever man but not a professional writer.
Today no SUCH pictures and no such
writing is accepted for a representative
guide book.
A school Of artists has grown up to
meet the demand for such work. and
they are salaried by the big printing and
bank note engraving companies that get
out these books. They produce careful.
artistic and clever pictures, and manage
to give them the appearance of the
choicest pictures in the magazine.
, AS a matter of fact, the latest guide
books are limitations of the magazine in
every particular except that they in
clude no advertising pages. But the
more wealthy railroads will not employ
these professional g1ide book illustrat-
ors. They secure high class artists who
are too independent to sign their names
to what they do, but provide the best
work of which they are capable, because
they are better paid for it than for any
other work that they do.
BIG PRICES PAID FOR WORE
Men who study such matters are able
to recognize the personality of the art
lists in their methods of drawing, and
such persons often see a painting or a
study of a picturesque place in of
the art galleries or at an art sale at the
! same time that they receive a copy of
some guide book illustrating other beau
ty spots in the same region in a set Of
drawings by the very same artist, who
has been whirled hither and thither in
that part of the country in a special car
at the expense of the railroad company
that monopolizes the traffic.
In that same car with the artist goes
the general passenger agent, but he no
longer writes the matter in the book.
He has secured the services Of some
we'll known literary man Of the second
or third class to describe the region with
his pen for a higher rate Of remunera-
ton than the writer could get for any
other work. Two thousand dollars is
below the highest price that has been
paid for the illustrations in a single guide
book, and in all probability no first class
book of the kind has been written for
less than 500.
These books have been poured from
the presses of the best printers in the
country in editions of from 5000 to TO-
900 copies, and have cost the railroads
from five to twenty cents a copy. Some
are designed to appear like novels, some
Ike STORIES III adventure ana SOuo Ike
books of travel. Their titles are such as
are likely to prove attractive to large
bodies IF citizens.
Not to quote any one of them, but to
show what sort of bait they throw to
the public. they may be said to be named
in some such way as these: "Where to
Camp Out" Where to Go This Sum
mer," Three Days and a Thousand
Trout" Hunting the Mountain Goat"
Pure Air and Balsam Pines" "Country
Board, Cheaper Than Staying Home
One enterprising western railroad man
has issued a little book ON etchings, ex.
quisitely printed, and made to close up
into a large envelope tied with a satin
bow knot.
SOME NOTABLE PECULIARITIES.