The copper country evening news. [volume] (Calumet, Mich.) 18??-1907, 1898-06-22
OUR NEW YORK LETTER
THE WRITER OF THE HOLLAND LET
TIERS is NOW OR. EDWARDS.
The Degree of LII. ID. Has just Been Con-
ferred Upon Him by Seton Hall College.
Brief Outline of Successful Newspaper
Correspondents Life Work.

ferred Upon Him by Seton Hall Coiieg
Brief Outline Of a Successful Newspap'
Correspondence Life Work.
q NEW YORK, June 2l.-[Special. l-E.
y Edwards, whose letters from this city
the Philadelphia Press, signed HOLLAND
have been daily feature of that paper fc
= several years and upon whom the author
titles of Seton Hall college have just cor
: ferred the degree Of LII. d., was admitte
10 the bar when a young man soon afte
his graduation from Yale Ii Is becaus
Of his achievements as a newspaper CORE
sp- ndent, however, that this honor ha
beer giTsn to him
That he might have won both fame an,
. fortune had he pursued the law is no
doubted in the least by those who know
him best. But he needed TO work in lega
harness for a short time only 90 under
stand that journalism, OF which he haC
some experience before passing his law ex
aminations, would be a far more con
genial life calling, and he embraced the
! first opportunity 70 exchange his rapidly
growing practice for the to him pleasanter
occupation Of gathering the news II
am not mistaken, he began on the New
| Haven Palladium, and from that paper
went to the Hartford Courant, graduating
| thence 70 New York, where he became a
reporter on The World when Manton Mar
| BILE held chief place IN the Office and made
| The World 1.-THE most scholarly paper In
America.
While on The World Edwards wrote an
account of the removal Of the New York
postoffice from ''the old Dutch church" to
its present quarters that was so vivid and
picturesque as 70 attract the special atten-
ton Of Charles A. Dana, then by long
odds the most commanding figure in the
New York newspaper field. AS a result
Mr. Edwards was called to The Sun, and
from that time until 1899, or possibly
1890, he served that paper continuously,
first as city reporter, then as star special
man, then as political correspondent, and
when Amos Cummings relinquished The
Evening sun, as managing editor of that
paper.
Some Things He Has Done.
One Of the most important pieces Of
work ever intrusted to Mr.. Edwards was
an investigation into the methods of the
Standard Oil company during the period
of its early and most rapid growth. He
over the entire oil country, visited prac-
tically every refinery and every locality
where hole had been bored in search of
petroleum and subjected hundreds of in
dividuals including John ID. Rockefeller
himself, TO the most searching inquisi-
tions The result was a lucid two page
narrative in The sun that threw more
light upon the nature and workings of
ha FIRST a n
other newspaper men in the country COM
bined had managed TO shed thereon.
Soon after that, in 1850, he was sent to
Albany, and it was his industry and in
tuition that discovered and spread before
the world the earliest news of Judge Rob-
ertson's plan for uniting the so called
half breeds" of New York state with the
minority of the Pennsylvania delegation
and boiling the ''unit rule" at the ma
tional convention, which resulted in de-
feating the nomination of General Grant
for the presidency. There are some among
my readers no doubt who will underrate
the significance of this achievement, but
they are not among the older ones, espe-
cially those who were interested in the poll
tics of the eighties.
From Albany Edwards went to Wash
thick of the fight against the swindles
which were then being perpetrated upon
the postal department and have gone down
into history as the "star route frauds. {"
The Hon. Thomas l.. James, then post
master general, has said more than once
that the services rendered at that time by
MIR. Edwards were of inestimable value.
His Work as n Correspondent.
But the work by which he is best
known has most of it been done since he
began his Holland letters. Several of the
stronger newspapers of the country main
tain correspondents here. In the main
they gather and summarize the news of
the day, and some of them do this excel
lently well. But through the liberal pol
icy inaugurated by the Hon. Charles EN-
DRY Smith, the editor of the Philadelphia
Press, who engaged Mr.. Edwards, this
sort of work is attended to for that paper
by some one else, leaving Edwards to
treat of current affairs by broader meth
DDS than those of chronicler of facts. 1t
Is his province TO give opinions as well as
facts on the assumption that while facts
are the basis of all news opinions are not
only also news, but often the most valu-
able of all news. Sometimes the opinions
set forth i'm the Holland letters are those of
their writer, but oftener those of the men
who are the real powers in New York, Of
men engaged in the greater affairs of life,
scholars, scientists, flnanciers, princes Of
and kings of industries.
News beats, too, of the most important
sort are frequently TO be found in the Hol-
land letters, and occasionally though
rarely, he makes a short trip away from
New York to follow up promising lead.
He did this when it became apparent to
him in 1893 that the operations of the Sug
ar trust at Washington were likely to de-
velop news of exceptional Importance,
spending some days at the national capital
just before publishing the now famous
letter detailing the results of his investi-
cations. Newspaper men generally and
thousands of readers besides remember
well the strenuous efforts made little
later to punish the correspondent for re-
fusing to "give away" the sources of his
Information and the plucky and successful
Eight he put up in his own behalf
DIR. Edwards as He Is.
Personally he is of modest and unas-
suming demeanor, and he blushcd like
student who has just won prize the first
time he was oddrecSad M nr Edwardc