Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1921-08-01
AS ONE WOMAN SEES IT
The Informal Interview, skIIlfuIiy
Praetleed In France, Has Women,
its Pioneers In This Country,
as Successful Exponents
by SARAH ID. LOWRIE

| NViy 10 get Jne material tnat goes
| TO make up this column, seeing that l am
very little down at the newspaper Office,
| where news items of Importance of all sorts
| are flowing In. certainly miss a good deal
| or interesting talk as well as news by not
| being much where reporters "most do con
gregate." and I admire the art and the
| cleverly concealed labor that go to make
up good journalistic interview, but what
| comes my way is also of value, chiefly be-
cause 1t comes by it's own initiative and has
at least the grace Of unhurried spontnnety.
People have their minds on this column
when they talk Of their great interests or
occupations that they wish to share in some
sense with the general public, and what they
say they hope or intend shall filter through
| TO that public, but the conversation gen.
orally takes place in such surroundings and
subject to such unbusinesslike interruption
and diversions that they are at once less cut
and dried and more frankly natural. As a
consequence, though 1t is perhaps tacitly un-
derstood between us that l am trustee Of
their ideas-pro tem.--until l deliver them
over to the public, the facts are not come by
In an interview, but in the course of a
general conversation; and unless figures or
dates or names are involved nothing is
written down, and my position is, for the
purposes OF the hour, nothing more than one
OF an interested group Of casual takers
more or less engaged in general discussion.
DO not think that this form of journal.
ism Is as well known or as skillfully or
generally practiced in this country no IN
france ana 1t has always seemed to me that
the Philadelphia PUBLIC LEDGER set the
pace years ago for that very distinctive
nranch OF public service in America. And
Mrs. cornelius Stevenson, as Peggy Shippen.
ia mas maae a very unique place for the woman
journalist by her daily column in that she
mas been able to keep her own personal
values and those of the persons she writes
about, and at the same time she gives moth
ing to the general public that did not belong
to It. She Is like a person who reads a
letter out loud before group of persons that
include others besides the family, and man
ages to skip the details only meant by the
writer for the family without an apparent
break In the sense. As a consequence she
Innate social life and pure her functions
as trustee or official in many semi private
organizations, and yet in her journalism she
has never been interesting to her large group
OF readers at the expense of her large group
of friends.
There have been other men and women
journalists in this country who have fol-
lowed her wise example, but they have all Of
them-so far as Philadelphia is concerned
reaped the benefit of the quiet understand
Ing which she has imperceptibly arrived ut
with the general public. She has done for
the short, personal editorial and interview
IN this city among women what the Irwins
did among head mistresses Of private schools
She gave the position publicity without
losing any dignity, and she proved that the
art Of journalism for women can be COM
bined with other duties not less broadening.
The fact that she does not sign her name
to her column has never from the first few
years, suppose, been meant to blind any
one.
A MOTHER very notable woman who has
"A given the lustcr of great personality
to editorial writing, in Philadelphia, but
tx-hn tfokI
to the end Of her days "incog" so far as her
newspaper work went, was Rcbecca Harding
Davis. Her husband was, Of course, widely
known for his editorial work on the PUBLIC
LEDGER, and for many years during the
Charles Warburton ownership no was one OF
the editorial writer's on the Evening Tele.
graph. Her sons, Richard Harding Davis
and Charles Belmont Davis, of course, made
regulations of their own as journalists and
novelists; and Mrs. Davis, both for whnt
days of st. Nicholas and her more fugitive
stories and essays of later years had a wide
place In American letters, but in the later
years Of her life she wrote regular editorials,
which were unsigned and unacknowledged.
This was from a feeling on her part,
judged-from her impatient words on the
subject-that II they were known to be the
opinion of woman they would have less
value to the public that reads the news
payers; %nn;., u.r. No. t,on .,nnosos b.. ,o,..
the information or the judicial minds to
form opinions on the subjects fit for edi-
torial writing Of the gravely responsible
sort. She was well aware that she had the
requisites for the work or she would GER
tainly not have undertaken 1t even under tho
pressure of the editors in chief who insisted
on her help, but she thought Of herself as
being rather the exception In the matter OF
journalistic lore, not so much, fancy, be-
cause of her personal acumen as from the
~ har
And indeed her life was an exceptional
one both for its interests and its friendships.
MY Personal contact with her came
ANl when l was n young girl and she was n
sad and somewhat crippled old woman. So
that the varied experiences that had made
up her life and the interesting personalities
that had peopled 1t l knew about chiefly
from hearsay, although to the last the fire.
side with the blue Dutch tiles In the long
downstairs sitting room Of the Davis house
on Twenty first street was a place to which
old friends from all ends of the earth and
some passing strangers came as though II
were still-in spite Of her protestations TO
the contrary--the most worth while spot to
visit In Philadelphia
Yet, fancy, never at It's acme Of hos
pitality was her house the sort of social
Mecca that Philadelphia quite understood
how to duplicate. The hours for those in
formal gatherings, the casual nature Of the
TcITPsHllleulsI tHc lilIIOllplu responsiveness
OF the guests, the informaity of the hosts,
and at the same time the short shrift given
to bores or to mere onlookers, the easy talk
of professionals Of many arts on the behind
the-scenes episodes Of their day. the quick,
stern, critical talk-not for pubIication-of
one artist on another artists performance,
the curious, almost impatient shutting out
OF the general public for the hour, by these
purveyors to the pleasure of general pub
lie, and above all the world wide point Of
view of the travellers and students and art
lists and writer's who, passing that way,
dropped in for sane hour Of real at-home-
ness-all this made that little house
unique place in the history Of the town.
The Tacott WILLIAMS circle came nearer
to it than any other, but was at once more
serious and less intimate In Its atmos-
phere.
TIER interest in her chldren's stirring and
IL az urous interests made Mrs. Davis
q curiOua mixture Of Puritan and pagan.
bo bad IN Spt nm aNamnln hu aba nj baJ