The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-01-04
BOWED ONLY TO DANA.
IN HIM EDITOR WCULLAGH SAW
HIS "MATERIAL ONE"

to the Great EditOr-Simple in His
Management of Money Matters.
His Dislike For Pulitzer.
From the Washington Post.
Joseph B. McCullagh's life was an ar
gument against the utility of what is
| smartly called Bohemianism. Cynical and
caustie in the manner of his writing as
Dean Swift, with a tongue epigrammatic
poignant, like Votaire, isolated and in
sulated, he went unspeakably, almost dog
gedly through his latter years, masked
and cuirassed against emotions, bastie
defying the compassion born in the hearts
of men and women in common.
Had McCullagh taken to himself a help
! mate the glow of the hearthstone might
have softened and mellowed the unbend-
ing, austere spirit. But he chose to as
sumo a paternity over the Globe-Demo-
crat, his child, from sucking, nourished
on the pabulum of an alert, gigantic intel
lect. For McCullagh's attitude in the Of
! fees of the Globe-Democrat was Emer-
sons Man Behind the Book" The Globe
Democrat was his ruling passion, his
heart blood 1.-THE Globe-Democrat,"
spoken by McCullagh as if indeed it were
a deity rolled as generously from his
tongue as when Mr.. Dombey that POM
pous head of the Dombey house, muttered
'Dombey e Son." "Dom-bey and, Son."
AIcCullagh recognized but one above
him. He was an agnostic, and the ma
terial one to whom he bent was Charles
A. Dana. 1.-THE dean of our guild" was
| McCullagh's manner of touching on the
| editor of the Sun. Once he printed this
! title and Dana clipped it and reproduced
it In the editorial columns of the Sun.
! Water splashed against the wall re-
! bounds, but some of it sticks, and Dana
was not entirely bereft of flattery.
| When Dana was assistant secretary of
war under Edwin M. Stanton he met Nc
| Cullagh for the first time 1t was during
| the strife in the sixties when the two
editors met McCullagh, an understood
stripping, slim as a reed then, with gray
] eyes Irish eyes and a keen wit, was
winning his way to fame as the war cor
| respondent of the Cincinnati Commercial.
McCullagh's letters to the Commercial
| over the signature, Mac" were quoted
| far and wide, and are embodied in several
| histories of the late war as authorities.
During his career as the Commercials
/ special on the battle-felds of the south,
| McCullagh conceived the idea of the in
terview-that is, making his subject say
| something in the first person. The inter-
view of which he was the inventor was
| taken up by the American press, and soon
became an indispensable eXpedient of jour
nalism. McCullagh's falling out with Gen.
| Sherman was the beginning of feud be-
tween the great general and the great
editor that lasted through life. When Sher-
man was on his death bed the writer,
| then employed on a st. Louis newspaper,
was sent to interview McCullagh.
| The editor of the Globe-Democrat was
seated in his den--a musty rat hole of a
| place smeared with the dust of years and
! slouched with motley medley of books
| and newspapers.
Turning abruptly from a novel-he was
an eternal reader of everything-and I'M
folding his fat little legs that were tilted
on his desk on a level with his head, Nc
Cullagh muttered:
Sherman Oh, yes, Sherman. 1 believe
l had the pleasure of knowing him."
| Whereat he assailed the smoky ceiling
with his eyes: Sherman, let me see.
Knew him through the war. Says ] Of
Tended him when l went to him in quest
of news for my paper. No reason for
feeling offended. All uncalled for. Vain
man. Accused of being insane in the ear
ly days of the war when he wrote Sec
rotary Cameron that 1t required 100000
troops to conquer the south"
The great editor followed with an ar
raignment of Gen. Sherman that seemed
illy-timed, in view of the generals final ill
ness. But AlcCullagh's philosophy was
grim. Perhaps he held that death was as
natural as birth or marriage, though, per-
haps, more pathetic. and that one time
was as good as another for expressions of
opinion.
McCullaghs idea of a newspaper was
that it should encompass the news of the
world. The affairs abroad were of as
much moment as the chronicles of local
happenings. Localization he despised, and
so the Globe-Democrat was VIGOROUSLY
Indifferent to the small local news of the
town. Its pages were and are devoted TO
telegraph news. If Mary Jane Bung of
Barre, VT, fractured her left shoulder
blade the Globe-Democrat was noe with
out the news of the ladys mishap. The
Globe-Democrat pays more money to the
telegraph company than probably any
other newspaper in America.
But McCullagh's idea of universallsm
bore fruit, for the Globe-Democrat is one
of the much quoted of American newspa-
pers, OF McCullagh's whimsicalites,
those who were employed by him can re-
late many a story of which they were Of
ten the unfortunate heroes.
One afternoon as McCullagh walked
through the local room of the old Globe
Democrat Office on Pine street, a knot of
over the stories of one Cliff Saunders, and
irrepressible wag and wit and brilliant
writer
Saunders, come here" was McCullagh's
gruff command. whats all this noise?
What do you fellows mean by it?"
why this is a reunion OF the ex-city
editors of the Globe-Democrat. returned
Saunders. Those who worked on the
Globe-Democrat, and experienced a switch
Of the city editorship about three times a
week, will appreciate the point Of Saun-
ders' joke.
In money matters, McCullagh was as
simple as child, though contradictory
trait in his conception OF the value of a
dollar was that he wasn't by any means
over-hberal in paying salaries for local
work This probably arose from his de-
sire to lay out large sums for telegraph
news and correspondence, and a plan To
belittle the local end of the paper.
Once an independent reporter with sick
ness in his family approached McCullagh
and asked for S25 which was needed for
doctors bills.
Don't bother rue with your troubles.
Here" opening the drawer, take what
you want and nav me whom vOur ,,tfo