The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1903-08-09
HoWe's Concert
How Kansas Editor Entertained
His Town.


Last Sunday, in the public park Of
Atchison. Ed. Howe, the editor, sat in
the midst of his subscribers and listened
TO a band concert. The band was Itsl-
ian, called Eilerys. and excellent. The
audience was probably the most polite
ever assembled in Kansas. and accord
| ingly prodigal Of applause. Howe had
given the concert TO them, paid for It.
In addition to Atchison, the countryside
| was in. During an intermiss'on, after
the governor OF the state had made
speech. the crowd called for Howe. He
climbed up on chair and spoke four
teen words. and climbed down again
amid tremendous applause. During the
afternoon he sat around on the grass
with his friends and guests and listened
TO the music. Not once during the af-
ternoon was the identifying forehnger
of any one leveled at him. Everybody
knew him. He served, on the lawn. dur
ing the afternoon a picnic lunch to his
guests and the members of the band.
When they had done, Howe stood over
Jumbo ice Cream can and ladlcd out
cream to about 200 boys.
The twenty-ifth anniversary Of the
Atchison Globe arrived with a snow
storm last winter. 1t was postponed for
the purposes OF celebration until last
Sunday. This band concert was the cele-
bration.
Howes distinctive feature lies In his
eyes-they are Of the softly luminous va
riety. dark and full of vague lights. the
kind OF eyes that you rarely find in men.
you occasionally find In women, and
never on the stage. Howe wrote book
which had a great vogue. 1.-The Story of
a Country Town" he wrote a great So
Geological treatise called The Anterior
tenn Statement" which the world won't
read. though It might better. Every day
in the year he writes fifteen hundred or
two thousand words for his Atchison
( Globe. scattered through all depart
ments. The average reader of the Atchi-
son Globe, after one weeks familiarity
with the paper, gets face TO face with
Howes personality. The reader may ap-
plaud or disapprove, endorse or be pro-
voked into instant opposition, but in
either event he desires to read again, 10
approve or be provoked. So everybody
in Atchison and its vicinity reads the
Globe. 1t is said that it's revenue equals
annually the value OF its plant. II is
quoted all over the United States.
The success of the paper is due to
Howes personality and his method.
Msny papers have a personality. the
quicksilver backing Of q news mirror, but
very few indeed have Howes method.
The elemental basis OF an irresistible
local newspaper is gossip. The first dis
seminator of local new. was an old wo-
man in some town who knew all the
news Of the neishborhood and could tell
it well, politely, decently and with ac-
curacy. The gossip who is vicious and
inaccurate can have no permanency.
Neither can the local paper which is
vicious and inaccurate. But the nearer a
newspaper In its local field keeps to the
detail, the color and the mildly inform
ing rudimentary methods OF accurate
gossip. the more 1t pleases its readers.
The Globe is never guilty of a bare
chronicle OF barren facts; it has always
the detail, the atmosphere, the color, the
angle and the art to make a news item
readable.
The method Is free to any one who has
the wit and industry. But the personal
ity can not be acquired. And IL was be-
cause of this. because OF his personality
that the crowd around the Atchison ed
itor last Sunday was devoted to him
BY the nature OF things, by the part per-
sonality plays In it, a newspaper is
ephemeral. Personality can not be deed
ed, willed or entailed. In our generation
Of department store tendencies there is
saved something from the commercial
cyclone, that individuality can be found
on no mans counter that personality
isn't yet upon price list and Bradstreet
doesn't rate talent.
So back in the mind of that crowd
around the editor in Atchison's part was
the concept that the man was the news
paper, that Howe was the Globe. that
the day Howe is buried the Globe will
be buried with him, that the Globe is no
more property than is Howe's arm or his
brain or his heart. This is what the
crow felt And greater praise or honor
no man may have.
There may have been this other thought
in the minds OF some of this vast news
paper family. that in a period when no
lifetime a public address counselling and
praising frugality. when In the greater
centers of population the man with
500 90 stands agape at the excuses Of
the socially vain multi millionsires wife
and the commercially ambitious multi
millionaire himself, when one man. with
prodigious commercial instinct. Is seek
ing before the eyes Of all men TO build
for himself road up the sleeps whore
Fames proud temple shines afar. by paw
ing il smoothly with signatured libraries,
and the automobillng rich play with
$1,000 toys. the thought may have come
20 some that perhaps there il in the
Howes OF the smaller centers OF populs-
ton, the Hoves who are frank enough
and brave enough 70 criticise 70 stem
and overcome IN public currents unwise
tendencies. some brake on svii ilclina-
tons.
THE KANSAS WHEAT.
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