The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1896-03-18

paper. Advertisers are human, and la
BILE to err Even the news is sometimes
more new than authentic. And II you
ask why that is so, you will be told
that the public wants the very latest
news and is not over particular wheth-
er or not it be the truest or the clean
est.
/ do not believe that. The people, the
vast majority of the people, do not want
nauseous details Of crime. They do not
want unsavory scandals. And il they
did the most abandoned of them do not
want any of those foul things served
up to their children, This attempt to
shift responsibility is only another way
of juggling with the old question:;
(Which came first--the chicken or the
egg?" 1t does not matter which, so
long as we bear in mind that no chick
ems are ever Matched from rotten eggs
There is another and, to some minds,
more potent argument in favor OF
clean, sensationless journalism-it pays!
A couple of years ago there died q
journalist whose paper had never been
distinguished for what is mis-called
enterprise" In comparison with it's
live" metropolitan contemporaries it
was as the tortoise in the fable beside,
or rather, behind. But like the tor
toise it came out ahead in the long run.
And / like to believe that, when the
history of the American newspaper is
written, it will be recorded that, even
in the matter of mere worldly success,
as in the esteem of his generation, no
man stood higher than George w.
1Dl, 10 \ ~
1t has been urged that a success like
his could have been possible only in a
city like Philadelphia 1t may be true.
do not know Philadelphia well.
have visited it only in passing-in a
sleeping car-and, it is said, that a
sleeping man is not such a novelty as
| to attract any attention there.
| But l know, from statistics that
| Philadelphia is the only city in the
country where nearly every man owns
| his own home. They are justified in
sleeping long and late, where such a
condition prevails. Anyhow, thanks to
the somnolence of it's people, or the
| slowness of it's press, nobody there is
ever tempted to commit a gaudy, SEN
sational first class murder, just for
the sake of seeing his picture in the
paper next day.
This reminds me that it would be q
mistake in speaking of the press, tc
omit any reference to newspaper pic
lures, which form so important a feat
ure in contemporary journalism. Opin-
| ions differ as to their value artist
cally. 1 have none to offer; but per-
/ haps their effect on the untutored in
FAINT mind may furnish criterion; and
there have an instance to hand which
has the merit of being true. 1t oc-
Cured in my own family some little
/ while ago.
| For some reason, not necessary tt
mention-but wholly unconnected witt
the police court-it happened that my
own picture appeared one day in the
columns of an esteemed contemporary
My little boy saw it. He studied i
long and earnestly. He had not yet
learned to read; but he had a vivit
idea of why portraits are put in papers
/ At last he broke out, gravely and un'
grammatically
I Papa, what did they put your pic
/ ture in the paper for? Was you cured
of anything
Gentlemen, thank you for your kline
attention to these rambling remarks.