Evening star., 1898-10-22


| peneiled information received from The
headquarters man. with the suggestions the
iatter makes rs TO the best means 90 tack
nhs anu setting hold of the different
stories. The city edtor--or the night .ifv
euitor as the case may be-lookS over the
teiephoned slips and the penciled remarks
OF the headquarters man. and then sends
out reporters in quest OF the details and
| embellishments of all the noIico ..,,,i,
| the headquarters man has Nos.l bs,pr-
worthy OF investigation. So thar he real
sui,llg OF the New York newspapers daily
me!ange of criminal news Is dcne b,. M
headquarters men - ~
Used to he n Trust
In the old days the comnara,i,..,,. ,,,,.
men who covered police HEADQUARTERS for
'he New York newspapers used 10 work
IN what was called a Combination" That
Is to say. the men who became members
ot the headquarters combination entered
INTO an agreement with each other NOT IN
attempt to achieve beats" or ''scoops'' for
tnelr respective papers hut to work to-
G"ther, all hands I'm unison and not in
dependently. The combination system
made the work of covering police head
quarters comparatively easy for the men
Would take turns in going after police
stories ana what one man got hold OF I'm
the way of details was the common prom
erty or all the others. When this system
mds IN operation, the sameness OF the po-
nee news of New York in all of the New
York newspapers was remarkable Each
man would, of course, write IN the story
! secured by one man OF the combination I'm
ms own way hut all of the PAPERS con-
tanned exactly the same police news The
city editors of the newspapers "feIl' 90
lhe disadvantages of the comhlpatton game
after 1t had been worked for some years,
ana sat down upon II sorely The head
quarters men were absolutely forbidden TO
I enter into any sort of combination with
thelr fellows and, as the Headquarters men
knew that heir positions We're AT stake after
warnings. he
! was abandoned, to the profound regret OF
the oid-umers. Every Headquarters man
i hoW works quite independently of his fell
pWs, ana thlS accounts for the variety Of
CRIMINAL news in the New York ncwspapers
OF the present period. Under the present
system II often happens that one news
paper VIII only devote two or three lines
10 some criminal case to which another
newspaper surrenders as many columns
with elaborate illustrations-the simple re-
suit OF the slip editing performed by the
newspapers headquarters men. Some OF
the very best and most experienced OF the
headquarters men are occasionally caught
napplhg' ana pass over slips that their
lehoWs recognize the possibilities OF and
work up into elaborate stories. com
paratively young headquarters man beat
an OF his fellows not long ago owing to
the caution with which he went over tho
| blotter slips his office boy brought him
The especial slip that he achieved his VIC
tory on read something like this;
Scored "a Beat.
Edith Blank, % years of age. OF No.
Blank 2f'd street, arrested at No Blank
Pell street; charge, disorderly conduct"
The new headquarters man happened 10
remember that the Pell street number given
on the slip was a Chinese opium joint Of
the better sort, and he also remembered
having seen the name of the young woman
mentioned on the slip in the social notes
OF various newspapers He put the two
facts together followed the story up him
sell without telephoning it to his city cdi-
tor, and the next morning his paper came
out with a one-page illustrated account
sensattonally written, but strictly true,
nevertheless-of the arrest of a swell young
society woman in a Pell street Chinese
opium joint All of the other New York
papers were wholly and decisively beaten
on the story, simply because, in running
over the slips, the other headquarters men
carelessly figured it that the young woman
mentioned on the one especial slip was
probably an ordinary drunk and disorderly
case. Most likely every one of the head
quarters men knew that the number on
Pell street given on the slip was an opium
joint, hut they all just happened to over
look ii on this occasion. Hence their severe
beating" and their much more severe call
ing down at the hands of their managing
editors.
Reporters as Detectives.
When really big murder OF mys-
terious sort is revealed by the discovery of
a body, the headquarters man. on account
of his experience in the handling OF police
news is generally temporarily relieved OF
his headquarters duties by a reporter from
his office, and undertakes the big police
feature himself. TO the exclusion Of all
other work. When the headquarters re-
porter gets on to case of this kind his
work is mainly that of detective sort. and
all Of the newspaper reporters who have
within recent years unraveled murder cases
that puzzled the police have been head
quarters men. For example. the man who.
with nothing to work upon but a button
with bit of cloth clinging to 1t, found out
the identity of the man who, after demand
ing few millions of dollars from Russell
Sa &c some years back threw a bomb at The
tight-fisted old millionaire and only sue
ceeded in blowing himself into kingdom
come, a headquarters man. The re-
porter who discovered the identity of the
body of Guldensuppe, the Turkish bath
rubber, thus leading to the conviction and
execution of Martin Thorn and the life inn
prisonment of Mrs. Mack was a headquar-
ters man.
In the TendcrIoin.
In addition to the regular headquarters
reporter each Of the newspapers has a
''TenderIoin man" The Tenderloin mans
only duty is to cover the "Tenderloin pre-
cinct." the station of which is on 30th
street between 9th and eth avenues. The
Tenderloin, OF course is the most impor-
tant station in town, located, as 1t is, I'm the
heart of New York's dizzest community.
Scarcely day night elapses that nu-
merous citizens or citizenesses of the Ten
derloin are not enmeshed in the police web.
and the Tenderloin always teens with sem
sational stories. Sometimes the Tenderloin
reporters will yawn for as much as two
hours without anything big in the way OF
promising arrests occurring but every
morning newspaper in New York has. in
every edition. q sufficient number of Ten
derloin stories 10 indicate that the Tender
loin reporters are earning their pay. There
are some police stations in New York
wherein the victim of an arrest, II he be
of sufficient qua.4ly, can evade publicity,
but the Tenderloin is not one Of them. The
Tenderlon reporters are on the outlook for
the quality arrests, and the higher the
quality the better they Ike ii. The report
ers who cover the Tenderloin do A good
deal of strolling, in the course Of their long
nights, in Broadway and 9th avenue be-
tween G3d and 42d streets but they make
their headquarters at a neat little second
floor club, off 9th avenue, where they get
together and compare notes, and. when
Tenderon news is dearthful indite little