The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1898-08-03
MISCELLANY.
Costly News.Gathering.

tion long before actual war was a recog.
nized certainty. The big New York
papers were the first to recognize this
necessity. The Herald picked up a
powerful ocean tug at Havana, the Al
bert F. Dewey, really one of the most
seaworthy little craft of her kind. The
New York Journal followed with the
Echo, the crack tug of Pensacola, and
the World with the Confidence.
Then came the actual war and the
newspaper feet grew apace. Mr..
Hearst of the Journal had already
thrown his private yacht, the Bucca-
neer, into the service, and supplement-
ed her with the Aneita, an even larger
ocean-going yacht and reputed very
fast. The New York Sun brought into
the field what at frat looked like
bonanza in boats, the Somers N Smith,
a big steel pilot boat, built by one of
the pilot associations at q cost of S62,-
600. The Sun added to its service the
Premier, a small white tramp steamer
flying the English flag, but she resem-
bled The Smith both in advantages and
defects, and it was not till the Sun peo-
pie secured the Kanapaha that they
were in position to give their antago-
nists a hard run for the cable station.
The Kanapaha was Pierpont Morgan's
old Corsair and at one time the flag
ship of the New York Yacht Club.
The Associated Press went the whole
limit in boats when it once adopted
this policy. The Dauntless, which for
three years had been familiar to the
public for her filibustering exploits,
was one of the fastest, most seaworthy,
and altogether desirable boats in At
lantic waters. 1t was these qualities
that had forced the United States Gov
eminent to spend over 100000 in
coast patrol service to capture her and
her consorts, the Bermudas and the
Lauradu, and to make the Three
Friends and the Silver Heels very cir
cumspect in plying their vocation.
The Dauntless was in the hands of the
United States court at Jacksonville,
but the Associated Press put up $685. 900
bond for her good behavior and sent
her out as dispatch boat.
To the Dauntless was added the Kate
Spencer of Jacksonville, a speedy fair
weather boat, but not seaworthy, 30 che
soon went the way of the Echo and
Confidence. The Associated Press
then chartered the yacht Wanda. The
Dandy, of Savannah, small model of
the powerful Dauntless, aud the Gym
thie, quite as speedy, made the Asso-
ciated Press fotilla.
The New York World followed the
lead of the Associated Press and en-
listed the famous Three Friends, with
her old flibuster skipper, Captain
Lewis. The big ocean tug Triton of
New York was also added to the Worlds
staff, while the Journal secured the
Simpson, a sister tug to the Echo and
the Chicago Record completes the press
fleet with the Herculean under Captain
Moon of Baltimore.
The fleet of news gatherers repre-
sents an enormous daily expenditure.
Exact figures are hard to give, but the
big tugs will average fifteen men to
crew, and their pay roll, exclusive of
reporters aboard, may be taken roundly
at 81 900 a month. The charter price
of the tugs will run from $4,000 to
$500 month and to this must be
added coal, water and stores, port
charges and repairs. The Wanda is
one of the most economical boats of
the fleet, being furnished complete by
her owners, it is understood, at $4,000
month. The Kanapaha, which is re-
puted the biggest coal burner of the
lot, with the largest crew in the fleet,
must cost twice that.
Added to the cost of the press feet
itself is the enormous aggregate of tel
egraph tolls from out of the way points
through the West Indies. From
Kingston, JAM, to New York, via Hal
flax, there is an English cable on which
the press rate reduces the cost of dis
patches to fifteen cents per word. 1t is
about five hours shorter run, however,
to Port Antonio, and this difference
may mean "a beat" which, in news
paper vernacular, is getting your stuff
into your home Office ahead Of the other
fellow. Thus much of the news gath
cred on the south side of the island is
filed at Port Antonio, where an addi-
tional toll of twenty shillings for one
hundred words is charged to wire it
into the cable Office at Kingston. On
q message of several thousand words
this amounts to good deal, but in
these days few hundred dollars does
not count in furnishing news to the
public. On the day Lieutenant Hob
son sank the Merrimac in Santiago
harbor the New York Herald filed
1000 words from Port Antonio for
New York. The Associated Press filed
1900 and the other news interests rep
resented were not far behind in space.
The cost of this sort of service is hard
to calculate.
On the other cable lines accessible
the cost is much greater. There is
direct French cable to New York from
Mole st. Nicholas, Haiti, but it costs
ffty-one cents word, prepaid in gold,
to. file stuff. Out Of Kingston, when
the wire is banked forty-eight hours
ahead with press matter, there is hole
out by way OF the Panama cable through
Central America. This luxury costs
Sl.63 cents word, but there have
been numerous messages of 500 words
each filed via this route in the feverish
effort to get the news into home offices
ahead of the other competitors in the
field.
If high charges were all with which
the war correspondents had to contend,
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