Evening star., 1924-09-15
ARTICLE VII.
Secretary

"A great many people DelleVe that
even though the statistician, the
traffic control expert, the city plan
ner, the engineer, or any one or all
or a dozen other classes of author
ittes may find 100 per cent effective
solution of the problem of street and
highway safety, it will be time vast
ed unless 1t can be sold to the pub
llc Some go so far as to say that
II is even waste of time to try
and sell the idea Of safety at all to
the present hard-boiled generation,
and that the only hope lies with
the next and its education in the
public schools. This may or may
sure. and that Is that any reform
must be tolerated and finally de-
manded by the public
II this is true, then the final solu-
tion OF the traffic problem lies in
education. Our experts can find out
what ought to be done, and can prove
that If it Is done 1t will save in
Vulnerable lives, but the public must
be educated to that fact. Children
must be educated in the elementary
grades to think in terms of safety;
safety as a part of the curriculum
must be continued in the high schools
and normal schools; our universities
must eventually install courses for
the training of traffic experts and
trafhc engineers; employers must
educate their employees; police de-
partmentS must educate their traffic
officers: and last, but by no means
the least, the public motorist and
pedestrian alike, must in some way
be educated or induced to practice
safety.
70
of 346 persons week, which is in
round figures so a day, killed by
motor vehicles, these fatalities seem
to have little or no news value. They
have as a matter of fact become
commonplace and the editorial atti-
tude can best be illustrated by an
old, old saying attributed to a num-
ber of different great editors. 1t is:
IF a dog bites a man that is not
news, but if a man should bite a
dog that most certainly would be
news" For example, a year or so
ago an elevated train ran OFF the
track in New York and seven people
were killed. The newspapers were
filed with the story for days. Some
times it occupied as much as four
columns, and whole pages were given
over to pictures of the wreck. Dur
ing that same week there was one
by automobiles in New York than
were killed in the elevated wreck.
The account of these fatalities was a
mere squib on the back pages of one
of the papers.
1t is the unusual, the uncommon,
the abnormal, which makes the front
page of the newspaper with jump
head to the inside pages. An elevated
train trying to get down into the
street doesn't happen every day, or
every week or every month, or even
every year. The fact that seven
people were killed in an unusual or
abnormal accident made news for
several days. Not so with automobile
fatalities.
The discoura ging fact is that the
news editor is right. The automobile
accident or fatality is not news.
They are happening every day, in
every community of any size, they are
all more or less alike and full ac-
counts Of them would keep the front
pages of our papers looking ike a
we'll kept cemetery. In 1910, there
were five times as many deaths In
Connecticut from typhoid as from
motor vehicle accidents, and the
automobile fatality in those days was
real news In 1928. the conditions
were reversed and there were five
times as many deaths from motor
accidents as from typhoid. The auto
mobile fatality is now infinitely more
commonplace than the death from
typhoid The discovery Of a case OF
smallpox would arouse more in
terest.
This makes the education or the
general public particularly difficult
The ONLY way it can be reached enec-
tiyely is through the daily press.
Editors all over the country have
shown their Willingness to cooper
ate heartily with any movement to
reduce traffic accidents. Two hum
dred and seventeen important news
papers scattered all over the United