Honolulu star-bulletin. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1912-2010, 1913-03-19
SECRETARY LANE
A NEWSPAPER
CRUSADER

| TACOMA, Wasn.--It was some time
| back in the early eighties when Frank
| lin X. Lane, plain and transformations
newspaper man, came TO Tacoma from
| San Francisco with Laurie" Nasauit
and took charge Of the Tacoma News.
| row part of the News syndicate DOM
| mated by Samuel Perkins, who Tues
Cay was appointed by President TAFT
rs a commissioner for Annapolis as
recognition for his loyal service TO
the administration that way. -.
| In San Francisco today are some
men who remember Franklin K. Lane.
editor. ami remember with that which
! Goes not pass with days nor years
how good a newspaper man he was
| The Tacoma News had been run in
| the interest OF certain classes with
| small regard for the masses. 1t. was
a virulent but malicious newspaper.
| 1t was forceful but eminently unfair
| and welded the influence of the club
rather than the moral power that goes
with honest reform. 49,.
Lane Changed Policies.
Franklin K Lane stepped into the
editorial department of the News one
! morning-and it was a time when one
! might well have watch Tacoma
grow'-took off his coat and got down
| TO business. Laurie Vassault was his
able assistant and one who was also
financially interested in the New
! News" \: .... -. 3.
Franklin X. Lane, with the keen in
sight into things that are to be, saw
| at a glance that the city was ruled
by crooked gang of gamblers, head
ed by a man named Harry Morgan,
who operated large gambling house
iii Pacific avenue near Ninth street.
4 The chief of police, Zwickey, and his
assistant, a man named Flanagan,
| had been "skinning suckers in Opera
alley, a street paralleling the main
thoroughfare of Tacoma, Pacific alley.
Lane, the editor, fearless of conse-
quences, ordered his staff to clean up
the police department. He was then,
and always has been since, a foe of
crooks. ...~-..... ~ -. ~
Cleaning Up Town. ...s..:. ..
1t was hard job. A clever reporter
FAMED Ryan, with the assistance of
other newspaper men who are now
said to be working in San Francisco,
went at the task with will. Marked
cards put out by Zwickey's own men
were discovered in gambling resorts.
The police were found to be recipients
of all manner of graft. The fight was
on, and on in earnest. Us -. 49,
Then came all kinds of threats
against Franklin K. Lane, Ryan and
others of his loyal staff 1t was dan
gerous for any of the News men to
venture out at night in places where
they might be waylaid and beaten by
unknown thugs. The paper was
threatened and in some cases business
men refused to advertise. They were
afraid. But Franklin K. Lane was
not He fought the crooks to finish
until many of the police department
were landed in the penitentiary. The
, chief of police was deposed and worse
) Tacoma became a clean town.
This is just little sideiight out of
the past, but it illustrates the man
, Franklin K. Lane drifteda out of Ia
: coma during the great depression that
: enveloped part of the northwest, but
: ne did not lose any of his individual
} ity. But the early incident in his ca
reer as newspaper man seemed
like a vital thing that he had made
4 for him basis in life.