The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1898-04-06
THE DEAD ICONOCLAsT.
A Chicago Newspaper Mans RecOI-
Iections of Brann.

From the Chicago Inter-ocean.
81 knew w. c. Branu we'll said
Chicago newspaper man, who once work
ed in Texas His death was not sur
prise to any one who has read his com
ments on men and things. The intensely
personal style of the Iconoclast and the
virulent utterances of its editor made it
only a question of time when some one
would kill him. His escape for so long
was largely due to his constant refusal
to carry a pistol. / suppose that his af-
fair with Davis was the only one for
which he ever prepared. Everybody in
Texas knew that he was habitually I'M
armed and his encounters therefore were
| never deadly
"Brann was born in Coles county, Illi-
nois, about forty years ago. He appeared
in Texas in 1888 and was employed by the
Galveston News as telegraph editor. Sub
sequently he started the Iconoclast in
Austin, and it failed. He became then ed
itorial Photographer on the Houston Post,
but could not agree with the tame policy
of stockholders and quit the job in disgust.
He went to St. Louis and was a reporter
for the Globe-Democrat. That paper sent
fifteen men to the Chicago convention
which nominated Mr.. Cleveland in 1892.
They were directed by Walter B. Stevens,
the noted correspondent, and Brann was
easily the brightest, most facile and most
serviceable of them all. He was a hot
favorite with Joseph B. McCullagh and
made the Hotel Corridors column of the
Globe-Democrat copied from one end of
the country to the other.
I'm 1892 he went TO San Antonio, Tex,
as editor of the Express, which position he
held for two years. In that town of
clashing American and Spanish civilza-
ton he cut a wide swath, and had more
fun than anybody. After disagreement
with Frank Grice, the papers proprietor,
he was whipped by a one-armed giant
named Breaker and went to Waco as
Photographer on the Day There he reviv-
ed the Iconoclast and made 1T tremend-
our success. 1t was an unillustrated, cheap
ly printed magazine, issued once a month,
and its mission was to jump on everything
and everybody. 1t was sold at 10 cents
copy, circulated in every county in the
United States and grew to be a gold mine.
Brann was rapidly getting rich when the
end came.
Baylor University is a Baptist 'oo-ed'
institution at Waco. Dr. Burleson, its
president until recently, is the father of
Belle Starr the notorious female out
law. For many months grave accusa-
tons against Baylor University were
whispered in Waco, and Brann wrote up
the school in savage fashion. He was
decoyed into a carriage by some of the
male students. With a pistol to his head
he was driven to the campus There
rope was placed about his neck by the
maddened boys, who threatened to hang
him unless he signed a recantation and
promised to leave Waco. This he did.
When he got back to his office he sat
down and wrote stuff about the school
that scorched the paper. He was attack
ed by four men, one of whom was Bay
Tor trustee, He fought them for half
block, and finally fell insensible on the
car track, with dozen scalp wounds.
When he got out of his bed he wrote some
more. Judge Gerald, his friend, a man
nearly 20 years Old backed him up and
got into a row with the Harris brothers,
one of whom was editor of the morning
paper, and the other a real estate man.
They shot at him last November and Ger
aid killed them both, losing his left arm
in the fray Brann's opponent, Davis, will
make the fourth man sent TO a bloody
grave by the Baylor Write-up
THE dead editor would have been
remarkable person in any community or
country. He possessed a wonderfully
alert brain and a remarkable memory.
He had received no collegiate training
whatever, and is said to have been rail-
road brakeman when he struck Texas, vet
the mythologies of the Greeks and Ro-
mans were at his fingers ends, and he
would quote Homer, Horace, Virgil Ovid,
Catullus and Cicero by the yard. He was
apparently learned in Egyptian lore re-
ferred to Hindoo works with an easy
confidence, and his mind was stored with
copious extracts from the literatures of
France. Germany, Italy, and SPAIN He
had read all of these things in transla-
tons and never forgot. In person he was
tall and thin, not muscular in any way.
with a clean-shaven, ascetic face and
slight stoop. He much resembled the
common ideal of an oVerworked and I'M
derfed Catholic priest. which gave rise to
the statement that he was a Jesuit. He
was not even member of the Roman
church and died without the consolation
of any established religion He was. how
ever of a deeply religious nature and
worshipped his own conception of the God
head in mis- own manner. He was not at
all combative-out of print, and, with the
exception of the Breaker affair in San
antonio, which was more of a Joke than
anything else. had no personal encounters
in Texas or oht of it until the publication
of his fatal Baylor article Writing with
pen dipped in gall-unable In fact, to do
his best work in any other vein-he was
personally one of the gentlest. kindest.
most generous, and genial men that ever
lived, utterly dissimilar from any men
tai picture of his a stranger would form
from his writings. Much Of his money
was spent in charity He leaves a wife
and one child, a daughter"
Mixed MaxiTns.
Carolyn Wells in the Chan-Roo