The Minneapolis journal. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn.) 1888-1939, 1903-11-26

| be published, and controlled in ST.
| Paul for the people of Minneapolis
under the dreary heading, ''The st.
Paul and Minneapolis Pioneer. Press
was trouble! And opposition! And
excitement, objurgation and much 9TH
er foolishness. Minneapolis without
a daily newspaper of her own to fight
her battles!' WHOLLY at the mercy
of the Pioneer Press!" There were a
few gentlemen on the inside who tried
to quiet, the boiling waters, but the
opposition really embraced the whole
, town, and something had to be done.
At the acute stage it was discovered
that there was an old chattel mortgage
on the Tribune property, securing
notes past due. Twelve leading citi-
zens, afterwards called the Twelve
Apostles" were persuaded to buy this
chattel mortgage. Among them were
r. B. Langdon, John DeLaittre. l..
Fletcher, G. H. Petit, W. w. East
man, George A. Bracket, C. A. Pills
bury, II. G. Harrison, J. II. Thonp-
this paper, advised by competent
counsel, and accompanied by printers
! who knew their way about the Trib-
une office, they descended upon the
Tribune establishment in the dead
waste and middle of one eventful night
and seized the forms of the paper be-
ing made ready for the press and car
ried them to a place of concealment.
The subscribers who took the Tribune
with their coffee and egg were next
morning narrowed down to the coffee
and egg; there was no Tribune for
two days.
This could not continue. A COM
promise deal was fixed up with the
Twelve Apostles" whereby Minneapo-
lis was to have an evening paper, and
was to have a franchise for a morning
paper when the people of Minneapolis
chose to put up $4,000 for it. The
Morning Tribune was stopped, and it's
place was taken by the Pioneer Press
and Tribune. The Evening Tribune
was started under a franchise of it's
own as sop to the minority stock
holders and was run a year by John P.
Rea and the Hendryxes. They were
succeeded by Mr.. Blakely. Then it
was all harmony; a deadly peace pre-
vailed. The three men who had the
genius and the nerve to consummate
this merger which would not merge
were Frederick Driscoll of st. Paul,
David Blakely, and Colonel King, who
doubtless went in to unload.
How the Merger Worked.
The editorials of the paper in the
new zeal ana their PROMISES were very
sugary. On the st. Paul side it was
pointed out how much better it would
be to have one great, strong, forceful
morning paper, backed with enormous
capital, to represent both cities impair
TALLY, than a struggling, struggling lot
of uninfluential papers. Minneapolis
was to have the best of everything,
and the paper was to be issued from
such lofty throne of self-abnegation
and breadth that the citizens of Min
neapolis would be ashamed Of their
fears, and the city children at the
fails would cry for it.
The arrangement did not satisfy
anybody, but the militia were not
called out, and no cannon were placed
in the streets to overawe the plucky
city that had been SO rudely awakened.
The excitement quieted down. the pa
pers were tame enough to excite the
commiseration Of the press everywhere
outside and inside Of the twin cities,
and so continued until Oct. 20, when
the Pioneer Press quietly stole out Of
town without even saying good-by to
the dear place. The consolidation last
ed five years, when the $4,000 ar
rangennent was entered into whereby
the Tribune Recommended its career
on.its own ground, as a morning paper.
An Early Journal Episode.
While The journal was under
the management Of George K. Shaw
and the Nimocks brothers, along in
1884 and 1885, another rupture in the
party broke out. Your Uncle Loren
Fletcher was making his first CAM