Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-10-14
Written for The Star.

1.-THE newspaper of today is such a diff
| ferent thing from the newspaper of yester-
| day." said an alert looking chap who sat
in the corner. that it almost startles me
| when by chance l take a look at news
paper file of fifteen or twenty years ago. l
| was running over a bound newspaper vol
| ume of 1881 the other day and l was posi-
| lively dazed by the poor print, the compar-
alive lack of display type, the smaller size
| of the sheet and, above all, the entire ap-
sence of pictures.
"In the course of my examination came
across the account of the death and funeral
oe President Garfield. 1t was not illustrat-
ed of course, and the sight of 1t brought
wildly to my mind the circums tances under
| which the only Illustrations printed In any
daily paper were prepared. L know some
Thing about It, for it was I who made the
ketches for them. 1 was then a green
Soung illustrator employed by the first daily
paper that ever printed news pictures reg
ularlv
at was enabled to do so by the possess
sion of a secret photographic process, TOO
slow for these days, since at best the pa
per could not. illustrate the news of Mon
day before Wednesday, but great advance
over everything of the kind that had gone
before and undoubtedly one of the most i'm
portant stepping stones to the present state
OF newspaper illustration.
Il may say, by the way, that the making
of the Garfield funeral pictures was ac-
complished by string of personal eXpe-
riences that gave me a succession of per-
sonal shocks which l am not likely ever to
forget
Today the first step taken when a big
news event is to be illustra ted is to send
photographers out, but in 1881 the camera
had not been made a regular adjunct of
journalism, and the pencil of the draughtS-
man who could sketch rapidly was the ba-
Ci nj ri q
of the alert mans personal experiences In
c.dental to the making of the sketches to
illustrate the Garfield funeral services in
Elberon N j., the journey of the body to
Washington, the ceremonies there. the
further journey of the body to Cleveland
and the final ceremonies there. He was
piCneer among newspaper illustrators and
his work is widely known today, for he is
still drawing pictures for the papers,.
The news of Garfield's death was received
at the newspaper office in New York half
an hour perhaps, before the departure of
the next train for Elberon, where the
President died. There was at once a hurried
canvassing of the force of draughtsmen in
the office to who should be sent to Ell
beron. The alert young man had been at
work on the paper for SO short time that
there was a little hesitancy to whether
he could manage the assignment. but he
was the only artist within reach, had never
fallen down on any assignment that had
been intruSted to him, and he was told to
get ready at once. He had no time to go
to his boarding house and get a satchel
with a change of clothing, or even to go
out and buy: it took all the minutes left
before train time to gather and pack his
sketchng materials, to draw his expense
money, etc.
Thrill the First-Lost Money.
He got this latter-about SOON big
wad OF paper currency, much of it in 81
bills and very little of it in bills of larger
denomination than s.. He was young, you
must remember: he had never had so much
money in his hands at one time in his life
before. and 50 it was not surprising that he
mislaid his roll while packing up paper
and pencils, and failed to notice that he
was going away penniless till just as he
was stepping on the ferry boat Then he
almost tainted. He couldn't possibly go
on without money. He probably couldn't
find the wad if he went back to the Office,
and if he didn't, then what?
He was surely in quandary. but he
wasted no time over 1t. He didn't stand
still and shilly-shally. All the time he
was thinking about it he was sprinting
back to the Office as fast as his legs could
get him there. There was no elevator in
the place and he had to run up seven flights
of stairs at the end OF his breathless
sprint but he did 1t all right, went straight
to the spot where the money might be,
picked IL up, damned 1t into his pocket and
rushed back to the ferry just in time to
get the last boat that would catch the
train 1t was lucky that the office was not
very far away from the river.
Of his stay in Elberon he remembers
ONLY that it was hard work to get either
food or a chance to make sketches; that
when he left the place for Washington he
was both hungry and deathiy AFRAID that
when received at the offices his sketches
would be thought so bad that he would
lose his job. So far as his work in Wash
ington is concerned, his memory is almost
a blank He remembers crowds; how he
stroye, successfully sometimes, otherwise
sometimes to get good places from which
to make his sketches, and general dissatis-
faction with them when they were sent off.
He also remembers being upset by the crowd
on the Capitol steps and falling down and
Sprafning an ankle.
Another Thrilling Experience.
Then. on the second or third day, came
the second of his thrilling experiences.
The Washington services were over with,
his sketches had been mailed and he has
tened TO the old Baltimore and Potomac
railroad station, whence he understood the
funeral train would leave Washington for
Cleveland. Opposite the station he planted
himself to make sketch OF the building
in advance of the gathering OF the crowd,
which might serve as q background Tor
his sketch of the departure. AS he began
his sketch he noticed that the front of the
station was pierced by long row or doors
and windows. uniform in size and so fden-
teal in appearance that the windows could
hardly be told from the doors.
ing only windows said the alert man.
when / heard a noise the like of which l
had never heard before, l knew what 1t
was, however; no one ever fails to recog-
nlze II the very first time he ever hears IL.
'I got across the street almost In one
jump, the wind of my flight carrying my
straw hat from my head, though l hung
onto my sketching pad. I ran into one of
the window recesses, hoping it was door
1t wasn't, but I squeezed myself as far IN
as could, though at the best l projected
at least six inches beyond the wall Before
| could get myself slowed away that much.
even, bricks began to drop about me like
hailstorm. looked across the narrow street
and saw the wall of the front building OPP
posite bulge. sway and finally come down
upon the roadway with an awful crash and
a tremendous cloud of dust.
"The pile of debris made by the collapsed
wall reached from curb to curb. and was
fifteen or twenty feet high. At least hun
dred bricks lay at my feet. besides a ten
foot section of big beam. but neither 1
nor the window behind me had been hit.
though doubt whether there was another
window along the entire station front that
was not practically demolished. It was
lucky that / had lodged into that particu-
| lar window. I'd have been killed, probably,
had happened to be In front q any other