Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1929-02-13
SOUTH POLE NEWS
METHOD DESCRIBED
Story Carried by Air Waves
1872 Miles as Reporter
Writes It.
BY r. L. DUFFUS,

NEW YORK, February 13.-It is
o'clock in the afternoon of fine Ant
arctic Summer day on the edge of the
great ice barrier 9,373.28 miles from
Times Square as the radio wave flies,
and 2,400 miles from Dunedin. New
Zealand. The whaler City of New York
lies anchored to the ice. A dog team
is being loaded.
From the direction of the ships
wardroom may be heard the sound Of
a typewriter-the first typewriter, no
doubt, that ever etched its clatter on
the silence at this lonesomest of all
harbors. Russell owen, who, as news
South Pole and its adjacent territories,
is at work on his daily story.
But long-distance reporting, even from
the far side of the Antarctic sea of ice,
is no longer a matter of months and
years. Owens story may be in the
hands of the copyreaders sooner than
that of the police headquarters reporter,
who at the same moment may be telling
a rewrite man over the telephone the
details of the latest murder. Some of
Owens dispatch will probably be in type
before he has finished the last para
graph. AS he concludes his story, the
sentence with which he began may al
ready be on the linotype in cities in
every quarter of the United States, and
possibly in cities as remote as Buenos
Aires, Toxic, London and Paris.
Across the Seasons to New York.
At the New York end of the wire
less circuit an operator sits with receiv-
erS to his ears, taking the words as
fast as the operator aon the City of
New York-the gods of static permit
ting-can send them.
All this takes a little less than one
twentieth of second. Five minutes
more and the first sheet of the dispatch
has been received, mimeographed and
handed to the waiting copy boys and
telegraph operators. Written in the mid
die of the afternoon, it is received al
most simultaneously all over the world,
all the way from 8 o'clock the same
morning to o'clock the next morning
to say almost" simultaneously, for
even the New Zealanders have to wait
until the story has come to New York
and then been sent back, over a route
more than $4,000 miles long.
How does an Antarctic reporter cover
his assignment? The best way to find
out is to ask Owen. The radio operator
gets the City of New York and puts
the question. 1t does not take him
much longer than it would to ask Owen
directly. Finally the operator on the
City of New York breaks through the
interference and Owen begins to chat
Supplies for Long Siege.
We can picture him bent over his
portable typewriter, with a fat pile of
copy paper at his side.
Getting news on an Antarctic ex-
petition" he explains, merely demands
going somewhere No matter where one
goes, there is news. This country is
strange and fantastic. Life is SO differ
ent from anything conceived at home
that everything is new by contrast. And
every day something exciting happens,
even though one never knows exactly
where it will occur.
'The base is eight miles inland, and
to get there one must go over q dog
trail-ride most of the way in and all
the way out. But most of the news
from the interior comes forth every day,
for the reporter must not remain long
away from ship and radio.
The difficulty is not to get news
but to keep up with it. There may
be an airplane fight, trip in a boat
such as the one when we met the kill
er whales. Or possibly in midst of a
serene midnight storm will come out
Of the south and threatening obscure
" close down around us.
Getting the news from day to day
S not half so difficult as finding place
If quiet in which to write it.
'News is written under every sort