Omaha daily bee., 1916-11-12
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YES, THIS YEARS presidential

L produced more thrills than any election with
in the memory of any but the old-timers who go
back to 1860 and 1876 The presidential election OF
1884 is said to have been also thriller. When
making comparisons, however, it must not be
overlooked that the facilities for communication
and for the collection and compilation of the re-
turns have been marvelously improved and that
a three days delay in ascertaining the result in
the year 1916 would correspond to delay OF
weeks in the period that antedated the extension
OF the telegraph and telephone to nearly every
backwoods precinct. The real wonder is, when
we give it thought, not that it should take SO
long to gather and tabulate the figures that tell
who is elected, but that this task should be ac-
compshed with such speed and approximate ac-
curacy as II has been done.
The election has cast down from their pedes
tails all the high prophets and prognostcators
The number Of sure forecasts Of the distribution
OF the electoral votes put out could not be kept
track Of, but II single one of them hit anywhere
near the mark it has not been disclosed. Some
mathematical genius ought to figure out how
many different possible combinations Of the cleo
toral college allotments are scientifically possible
political necromancers. The accepted method of
arriving at totals by using first-received returns
as the basis for proportion has also sustained
severe jolt, for on the FIRST figures it was all over
for these spectators. The New York papers Of
the day after election, with their flaring head
majorities as result Of a republican landslide
democratic papers and ardent Wilson supporters
at that-are grim reminders of the danger of
jumping at conclusions and admonition that the
most time tried rule has its exceptions With the
election so close, it was succession of joys and
sorrows hopes and fears, for everybody interested
and from the way our telephones kept ringing
continually for three days and night with anxious
inquiries, that interest was well nigh universal.
These calls for information came from all over,
by phone and wire, from Omaha and surrounding
towns, and from adjacent states, and the tele
graph and telephone companies must have reaped
harvest l. responded to long-distance at my
home on getting up in the morning and on retir-
ing in the wee hours Of the night and in my Office
] had to disconnect my phone to secure little
time for other work.
An exceptional situation confronted the news
papers in this heyday Of excitement by reason Of
the shortage of available white paper supply and
the high cost OF the print paper used for extras.
Ordinarily the newspaper is only too eager to
push Its street and newsstand sales and it would
have been easy for us to have inflated our circu-
lation by thousands of copies each day, but the
more copies we put out, the more il would have
cost us. As this temporary circulation Is Of no
special value to the advertiser, we devised the
plan Of issuing merely four-page election spe-
ton Of the public, and held down on extras as
much as we could and our readers were in no
way the sufferers This Is what comes from hold
ing presidential election in the midst of Euro
pean war. In another country the election might
have been postponed
No man / know of possessed such buoyant
character in the face OF ups and downs as did
Max Meyer, whose funeral | attended a week ago.
There was a period in Omaha history when no
enterprise was projected and nothing was 60
without including Max Meyer among the leading
fuA III bad - L. L..
mere boy and made place for himself in the
forefront OF our business community. With his
brothers. associated with him, he had the finest
jewelry establishment and musical instrument
house west Of Chicago and he set the pace for
the city's retail expansion when he made the jump
about 1885, from his location on Eleventh and
Farnan to the corner of Sixteenth and Farnam
where he occupied most OF the ground floor Of
the then new Paxton block He was for some
time director OF The Bee Publishing company
He was optimistic, generous and publie-spirited
and to these very qualities must be ascribed his
financial reverses following the panic and de-
preston of 1898 and 1894, as result of over-ex-
pansion and accommodations to friends Max
Meyers great delight lay in his personal acquain-
lance with the celebrities of the opera and the
stage which his musical connections gave him
and he kept open house for them while he lived
here. When he relocated in baltimore, he main
tanned these friendships and ! remember him ex-
hibiting to me in his apartment there guest
book inscribed with the autographs Of many stage
notabies.
"The one condition" he said "for putting your
name here is that you must first have meal in
my house
DO you mean to say that all of these folks
have been your guests for meali'
yes" he insisted. why had Henry Irving
and Ellen Terry here the other night and |
showed them my book and Irving said, Where's
your pen, will put my name DOWN.
oh, no. Sir Henry l told him, you can.
not write in that book because you have not yet
taken meal with me. l want your autograph,
but / want il on separate sheet of paper
"And here are the signatures of Irving and
Terry" he exclaimed exultantly, "but not in the
book, as you see."
Whenever saw him, after he removed later
to New York, he manifested the same jovial spirit
unchanged by prosperity or adversely and Omaha
and Omaha friends were always the welcome
topic Of conversation The Omaha of today owes
to the energy and enterprise of Max Meyer in
the earlier days more than we reckon.