The Alaska daily empire., 1914-09-12
WAR DEVELOPS AN
 AMERICAN POET

-E-
 One of the compensadona of the war in Europe has been tho develop. ment Of an American poet heretofore unknown to fame B. r. Griffin, for I5 years news editor aud editorial writer on the Boston NewsBureau, one of the leading financial journals of the United States, through his two poems, 'lf'' and Our Losseil" has at- tractet the attention. of literary Amer ica to him.
 It was sometime after "If" was printed in modest manner in the magazine page of the Boston News Bureau before the authors identity was discovered, though the poem, which was not copyrighted made an instantaneous bit, and was reproduced by the New York Evening Post and other publications.
 Immediately the Boston. News-Bur- eau was besieged by inquiries as to the author of the poem, but Mir. Grif- fin modestly forbade the qualification of the desire for the information.
 However, finally the paper, refusing to be dictated to by an associate edi- tor longer published the following:
 Such complimentary notes have been received by the Boston News Bureau concerning the poem first pub lished in it's magazine page on Aug. 1, entitled IT and signed Boston News Bureau Poet that 1t seems be- coming now to say that the Boston News Bureau Poet is and has always been Bartholomew F. Griffin, to whom for 15 years the readers of the Boston News Bureau have been in- debted for large part of the masterly condensation and accuracy of the Bos- ton News Bureau Bulletins which are the foundation of the paper.
 "Mr. Griffin put himself through Harvard, dropped into the Boston News Bureau after graduation, and has refused ever since to budge from the news desk, although the governor has wanted him for public office and his employers have tried to push him into the street. He can write the most beautiful four pages of English to resist and to explain that his work at the ends of the wires and cables, receiving with one hand the news of the world and passing out with the other hand the vised and proof corrected bulletins, is quite as Important as meeting face to face the men of financial affairs.
 For recreation he writes poetry, makes up the magazine page, the major part of the best editorials and devotes himself to his home. This Is one of the few articles that he is not invited to pass upon or correct" 1"
 Richard Underwood Johnson, form CT editor of the Century, who, writing of "If" said;
 You would do a public service fl you would send 1t to the whole Ameri can press. It has the. war question in a nutshell and is. moreover, ad mirably written from poetic point of view"
 Ebert Hubbard says of iIt":
 Tt is the biggest and best thing in a literary way America has produced in decade, am going to pass it lalongn
 Francis G. Peabody, professor of theology at Harvard University, writ ing to the author, says:
 "Wil you allow me to express to you something of the satisfaction and gratitude I feel in reading your noble poem reprinted in the New York Ey ening Post from the Boston News Bureau? It is a most appealing and adequate expression of the fundament al emotion with which one must re gard the present crisis. The English poets, Bridges, Kipling, Austin and Moves, have all tried to meet the need ard all have lamentably failed I am proud not only that an American but that Harvard man, should have risen to the occasion"
 The two poems that have brought fame to Mir. Griffin follow: