The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1914-06-18
TWO NOTABLE PUBLISHERS

Two of the greatest publishing suc- cesses in the history of Journalism have been achieved by sons of the Pine Tree State Cyrus Hermann Kotschmar Curtis, owner of the Sat- urday Evening Post, the Ladies Home Journal, the Country Gentleman and the Philadelphia Public Ledger, and Frank Andrew Munsey, whose mag azines and newspapers have made him a millionaire many times over. It is a curious coincidence that both Curtis and Munsey were born in Maine, both began their publishing careers with juvenile journals both failed in their early ventures, and both eventually turned dismal failure into glorious success.
 MT. Curtis, who has lately followed the example of MT. Munsey by turning his attention to daily Journalism, ar rived in the world at Portland, Me, sixty five years ago. and is a little over four years the senior of MT. 1dunsey. MT. Curtis made his pub fishing debut as the editor, proprie e. tor and staff of contributors of a ht- tie paper called Young America Ills first mature effort was a Boston pub lication. The Independent.s The Hub did not take kindly to this pub1ica- ton, and when 1t failed MT. Curtis, aged twenty-four and just married to Miss Louise Knapp of Boston, found himself pennilesss and saddled with debts. Incidentally, every one of those obligations have been paid, with interest, and on one occasion MT. Curtis made a long trip to the West to hunt up a creditor of those early days.
 It was in 1876. the year of the cen tennial exhibition. in Philadelphiass that MT. Curtis shook the dust of the left the vale of failure for the goal of his future success, Philadelphia There fa was associated with the Tribune and Farmer, and became it's publisher. Among his innoYat1ens was a department devoted to the i'm terests of the fair sex. This was an imm ediate success, and it gave MT. Curtis the idea of founding a. pubh- cation for women along new lines. He had no capital-no othing but debts but with the assistance or his wife as editor he managed to launch the Ladies' Home Journal Always a firm believer in the virtues of printers ink, for himself as well as others, Mr.. Curtis secured credit for $4O0 from an advertising agency, and spent the entire sum in one large advertise ment. Ills judgment was good, and almost from the publication of that ''ad'' the Ladies Home Journal was a financial success. Later he secur- ed the Saturday Evening Post the direct descendant of a periodical
 
 1T28, and made it one of the most prosperous and popular publications of it's kind in the world
 MT. Curtis attributes most of his success to his willingness to learn. He has made a close study of all the pub hcations in his field, and has sought to make his own journals represen- tative of the best features Of all. When he purchased that venerable Philadelphia daily paper, the Public Ledger, he followed the same plan. Lately he visited London to study newspaper conditions in that city, and also sent to England a. number of ed- itorial and mechanical experts to in- vestigate English methods, and to adept such as were suitable to the Public Ledger.
 Edward W. Box, who has edited the Ladies Home Journal for a guar ter of a century married a daughter of the publisher. MT. Curtis is him self an able editor, a keen judge of news and literary values, but he de- votes his time principally to the busi- ness end of his great enterprise. Hav- ing found the right men to edit his publications, he leaves them strictly alone, and this policy has been album dantIy justified by results.
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