The Farmington times. (Farmington, St. Francois County, Mo.) 1905-1926, 1919-08-01
BOnne Terre
Printers Object

Bonne Terre has for a number of
years, at frequent intervals, been af-
fiicted with multiplicity of newspa-
pers and job printing offices. The
two old established newspapers there,
the Star and the News-Register, both
of which have well-equipped job
plants in connection with their busi-
ness, have had rather hard time
keeping their nose above water on ac-
count of cheap competition on the
part of men who imagined they could
print. But they have not yet seen the
end of this kind of competition. Re-
Gently another "job shop" has been
started there by man who has been
trying with only Indifferent success to
break into the newspaper business in
this county.
A good newspaper is one of the
very best assets any community can
have. Newspapers, worthy of the
name are always "going to the front"
for the best interests of their re-
spective communities, and this has
been especially true of the st. Fran
co.'s county papers. On many differ
ent occasions they have prevented dis
aster to the business interests by re-
storing confidence when panicy condi-
tions were about to break out. One
notable instance was in the financial
panic of 1907, when the banks, with
out any warrant of law, withheld
money from depositors and the bulk
of the business for several weeks was
done on credit by the use of "John
Smith" checks. Had it not been for
the newspapers going to the front at
that time by advocating safe and
sane policy and admonishing their
readers net to "rock the boat" there
would have been but few of our finan-
cial institutions that would have been
able to weather the storm.
But it shows but little appreciation
on the part of business men, if they
invert their business from the news
papers who do real service for the
community to the "fy-by-night" job
offices. For banks to do this is es-
pecially reprehensible. We already
know of one bank in the Lead Belt
that is sending its business to this
Bonne Terre "job shop" However,
it is mighty long lane that hasn't
any turn. More anon.-Lead Belt
News.
We are inclined to think that the
bank the Lead Belt News refers to
has done this because the bank did
not understand the situation. We are
certain that the above junk print shop
will be very lightly patronized in
Bonne Terre We had understood
that the Wells Mercantile Company
refused positively to permit the junk
shop to enter any of their buildings
and that A. Gordon e. Co. did the
same, both these firms declaring that
they would not patronize it a dollars
worth if it came here. Another bus
mess man who brought us job this
week told us that he had been begged
for the work but that he told the beg
gers that the work was already con-
tracted. In fact we do not believe
there is a firm in town that will pat
ronize it.
This reminds us Of an experience
that was told at the Press Associa-
tion meeting by one of the Editors
from Poplar Bluff. One of the busi-
ness men had been patronizing the
job shop. The business man spent a
lot of money remodeling his store and
then had a big opening. Ordinarily
and without cost, the newspapers
would have given him big write-up.
In this case the write-up was about
three lines. He protested to the
newspaper men about it and was told
that inasmuch as he had his printing
done at the job shop he had better go
there for his free publicity.
In another case Y. NJ. G. A. "ped-
died" its printing and finally gave it
to the job shop, but those live ones
speedily awakened to the fact that
they were losing several times the
price of the job in the free publicity
they failed to get.--Bonne Terre Star.