The Birmingham age-herald., 1910-03-29

From the Louisville Courier-Journal,
 ~ FORGE F. MELLEN, whose AJ knowledge of the newsDaDerd0m
 of the south and southwest. is encyclopedia. has an interesting article in the Knoxville Sentinel upon College struction and suggestion.
 MT. Mellen observes that the connec- ton of the contemporary press with the higher and more formal institutions of learning has become so close that, at sev- eral of the leading universities, depart ments of journalism have been estab- lished This is notably true of the state universities of Kansas and Missouri. To Columbia. in New York city, Joseph Pulit- ger has given an endowment fund of s2,- o0o,00O for department of practical jour- nalism. The common conception is that editors, like poets, are born, not made. It remains to be seen. remra1Ss MT. Mel len, how successful these new features of college work will be in turning out ready made editors.
 We quote the following from MT. Mel lens sketch:
 "The indebtedness to the colleges for the editors they have trained is large. In no part of the country is 1t larger or more influential than in the south. It Ia not alone from Southern institutions they have emerged with diplomas. The north- ern and eastern colleges have been gen. erous in the gifts of their graduates to the editorial corps
 Let one take survey of the editors now engaged in molding opinion in the south. and he will find many Of them with college diplomas or students for time in college. At the head of the Mobile Register is Erwin Craighead, Tennes- sean, who was graduated at the Univer- sty of Nashville and thereafter took a course abroad in Leipsic university James c. Hemphill. who has just gone from the Charleston News and Courier to the Richmond imes-Dispatch, is an alumnus of a South Carolina college. Frank P. Glass, long of the Montgomery Advertiser, who a few weeks ago broad ened his journalistic field by the purchase of an interest in the Birmingham News, assuming it's chief editorship. names Princeton as his alma mater. John Netherland Heislzel, of the Arkansas Gazette, belongs to the University of Ten nessee alumni. J. R. Gray. of the At lanta Journal: Clark Howell, of the Con stitution: Pleasant A. stovall. of the Sa- vannah Press are graduates of Georgia institutions. With some. like Gideon Il. Baskette, of the Nashville Banner, the Civil war interrupted a college course, while in the case of others, like Josephus Daniels of the Raleigh News and Ob- ser, CT, the sojourn in the university was brief. The list is capable of extension. "rhe fact of college training Is not to deny that some of the most worthy and influential men belong to the southern press who have no diplomas to attest their unoucstioned ability and learning How ever. when 1t Is considered that about | only one-haif of per cent of the Amerl- can people go through college, the posi- ton and influence of college editors as compared with the number of their con | freres who were deprived of the enjoy ment of such advantage Is striking. In itself 1t Is not to be disputed that pass age through all the gradations connected
 with the newspaper Is rightly considered good schooling. The setting of type has been known to make proficient styl-
 ists. It is not. therefore, matter of ac- cldent that some men who became re- rowned In the editorial chair acquired
 thei, first and best lessons in newspaper
 dom at the case.' 1 All this is most interesting and sen sibie. The late Charles O. Faxon oi
 the Courier-Journal, most brilliant writer and accomplished all-around
 journalist. was fine example, Mir. Faxon could go to the case and set up a hrst-class editorial leader in type With
 ou. having reduced 1t to writing. Hs
 came of distinguished and gifted tam lily. of whom Mr. John W. Faxon- ol
 Chattanooga alone survives. Henry Fax