The Birmingham age-herald., 1924-08-24
PAPERS. OF lN2 LACKED FASHION
 AND SPORT NEWS
They Also Had No Society Columns Or Tele-
 graphic Dispatches

Transcript. They are copies of the Coneordt Freeman, weekly paper pub Eshed in Concord, Mass, and devoted not so much to the local affairs of the town as to the interests of Middlesex county at large, as well as to those of the state and nation. The paper originated as vehement protest against Freemasonry--a protest which was apparently sought to be embodied in its name-and it is amusing to read in the early issues the fierce diatribes against Masonry and the dire predictions of evil which would follow the spread of the order.
 Eighty years is d short antiquity. Indeed, there are not few people now living whose memories go back that far and who would resent being classed as archaic, Yet glance through these old files emphasizes in really startling fash ion the enormous material advance ment which the world has made since these papers were published, It is un- occasionally fact that the record of the past eighty years in this respect outranks the record of the proceeding eight hundred years,
 In one respect, as concerns the busi, ness of newspaper making, these old papers reveal that there has been a pfogress backward, Eighty years ago such thing as wood pulp had not been heard of, and these papers were printed on an all-rag sheet, as is evidenced by the whiteness of the paper and it's per Sistent firmness of texture-material qualities in marked contrast to those of the great bulk of newsprint of today. Anyone who has observed how quickly our modern newspapers become. discol- ored and disintegrate cannot but admire the freshness and substantial quality of these old newspapers even after the passage of so many years.
 i.s ,.-s Filled the Times Needs
 As to the general literary quality of the paper, it is quite clear that the editor must have had hanging on the wall by his desk the motto, "Aut Scis. sors Aut -Nullus, for the, great bulk of the reading matter is clipped from other papers. The day of that useful though not always meritorious. invention known as the patent inside" had not yet ar rived, and country editors doubtless felt that they had reasonable justifica- tion in the frequent employment of that invaluable labor-saving device, the of- flee shears. The clippings which ap.. pear in the issues of the Concord Free man are well chosen as rule and give very little evidence of having been selected as mere space-fillers. The edi. torial ideal in those days was to make a paper which should supply informa- tion, first of all. There is almost an entire absence of the sensational ele- ment. Even political discussion holds second place. A bit of hulnor appears now and then. :. rt Naturally, there is no sporting page" not but that sports of various kinds were indulged in quite commonly, but they were not considered worthy of comment by the editorial mind. There is no "society" column, no advice to the lovelorn," no theatrical critique, no fashion department, no weather re. fport, no telegraphic despaEehes; no radio announcements.
 What fearfully dull paperi'' I hear somebody exclaim. Well, not so very considering the demands of the time. Concord, eighty years ago, was the shire town of Middlesex County, There was no communication with the rest of the world by railroad, telegraph, telephone or wireless All news must come by mail, and the mail was brought by the daily stage from Boston. The Concord Freeman eIldeavored to furnish the towns of Middlesex eounty with useful reading matter and with such news as it could obtain both of general and local interest. There were a few daily papers published in Boston, but these had small circulation among the farming population of the country. The modern town library at that time was barely out of its embryonic stage, and only few rudimentary specimens were in existence. Consequently the country newspaper naturally tended to possess more encyclopaedia character than would be at all necessary today.
 A Various Array
 Suppose we look over single copy of the Concord Freeman, taken at random. Here is the issue of March 10, 1S43, the name of the paper was set in Old En- glish type, with wood-cut of the Con. cord monument, erected on the battle ground in 1885, in the center of the title. This picture of the monument is the only illustration which ever ap. pears in the paper, with the exception of a very few small wood-cuts (whose artistic quality is more than doubtful) in the advertising columns. The date line gives the name of the publisher, Jlc 1SSuSp duu tue u1OIIOa "Vincit, qui patitur." The first col Earthly Hopes," by A. Huntington Clapp-in later years noted Conere- gattonal minister and newspaper core spondent.
 Then follows a bit of prose rnoraliz- ing, written in a young lady's album" entitled What Is True Religion !" Next comes a parapragh quoted from Ralgh Waldo Emerson, who had been a resident of Concord at this time for eight years, describing the barbarous character of the Cimbrian race--''What the Yankees sprang from" Then fol- low three or four short clippings one extolling the virtue of honesty, another referring to the volcano of Cartago, an. other giving 'Jack Tar's idea of a loco motive" Ca genuine curiosity in those days), and joke squib. Nearly all the rest of the page is taken up with a re- print of Natheniel Hawthorne's famous romance about "The Boston Serpent" :" which had just appeared in the Demo tratic Review. Hawthorne had become q resident of Concord in the summer of 1842 so there is local significance in the reprint of the story. The last col umn is filled out with a long series of Matrimonial Maxims" quoted from the Boston Transcript.
 Praises Van Buren.
 Prominence is given on the second page to a report of the recent Demo cratic legislative convention, concerning which principle seemed to be, Every thing for the cause, nothing for men," and the administration of President Van Buren, is warmly indorsed. An other editorial indorsement is given to the exhibition at the Boston museum of a remarkable fat boy. weighing 2Rh