The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1898-03-20
WOODRUFF JOURNALISM.
One Paper Specified as an HOnOrab BILE
Exception to the Rule.

More than any other profession has jour-
nalism declined during the last dozen
years. In part this is due to purely COM
mercial causes Fifteen years ago, with
paper at 10 cents a pound and before the
advent of kodaks, patent insides, jack
knife pictures and boiler iron reading mat
ter, journalism was pecuniarily a hazard
Gus undertaking. This had some influence
in keeping down the numbers But since
wood pulp paper can be had at a cent
pound and the inside of a, county news
paper can be printed at half the cost of
setting the type when pictures are substi-
tuted for editorials and reading matter can
be bought by the yard, all this has
changed. The great city dailies now come
to US by the pound, with flaming headlines
and vast welter of matter-undigeste
and undigestible-which make them bur-
den to the flesh. The county newspaper is
not better. 1t is a crude mixture of patent
insides, quack medicine advertisements and
local gossip. Twenty years ago we had pa
pers worth reading. They were small in
size, but big enough without pictures or
haring headlines, and of admirable tone
and temper. Now, cheap wood pulp gives
us papers as big and coarse as bed quilts.
And their most disagreeable features are
the mugs" large as life, of coarse men
and women who profess to have been
treated by some nostrum and who are will
ing to be turned into advertising pests
Even our quiet religious newspapers have
fallen into the evil kodac habit Hardly
one Of them but has upon it's outer page
the mug of some preacher, wise or unwise
or of some commonplace church building
in che place of that solid and dignied
reading matter which we have a right to
expect from such sources. There is not one
Pinkham.
Side by side with the increase in their
size and their jack-knife pictures has come
implied by the term yellow Grave and
stately newspapers have sold themselves
to advertisers. Two more vulgar newspa-
perS than the New York World and Herald
1t would be hard to find unless you go to
Chicago. Even Staid and correct Philadel-
phia and Boston are disgraced by this new
style of kodac and colored journalism I
bear cheerful witness to the honorable re-
Sist3nce which the indianapolis Journal has
shown to these vulgar Innovations. 1t has
not even yielded to the temptation of a
Jack-knife illustration of the Maine or Ha-
vana harbor. 1t never increases it's size and
always conoenses its matter. OF late it has
somewhat departed from its traditional
policy of limited headlines. But the war
with Spain will soon be off and over. In
stead of a weller of matter thrown into
nal, as a rule digests and condenses its
latest news. There is that inexpressible
something about it which constitutes the
tone Of a newspaper, just as there is some
thing about a man which fixes him in your
mind as either a gentleman or a blather-
skite. Fairness, courage, views and dig
nifty are as necessary to a journal as to a
person And they can't be had by blanket
sheet or by a paper whose aim is to fur
nish an armful of advertisements.
Bubbles in the Air. is to me the best
part of the Indianapolis Journal. Its funny
man has created gallery of takers that
it does one good to cultivate The Cheer
full Idiot" the ''Corn-fed Philosopher the
Man with the Ginger Beard, - Officer Nc
Cobb" with their queer sayings, are the
first thing that I read. Why don't this
same funny man add some female names
and faces to his repertory? / was glad to
see yesterday a letter from ~. l. See"
The old veteran would be surprised to
know what an army of friends he has in
Indiana and how welcome are all his ar
tices. / do not hesitate to place the In
ddanapolis Journal alongside of any daily
newspaper in the United States May 1t al
ways keep the jack-knife and kodac out of
its columns. So many advertisements are
the death Of a newspaper. ] mean that the
Journal is a perfect newspaper; there are
spots on the sun. Upon the whole, Indiana
could not profitably spare its Indianapolis
Journal, either at home or abroad
ID. p. BALDWIN.
ThomasyiIIe Ga. March IS