The Butler County press. [volume] (Hamilton, Ohio) 1900-1946, 1936-09-18
/ 7heCherry
- Where with our
roo Little Hatchet
we tell the truth
about many things, sometimes pro-
foundly, sometimes fiippantly,
sometimes recklessly.

some kind of a fight, they lay great
store by trifes.
Thus, we find certain persons max
ing a great hullabaloo about whether
the skull of steer in a certain
drought photograph was a fake or
not.
The photographer tells his superior
officers that he took two pictures and
that he moved the skull about ten
feet so that it would show in the sec
ond picture.
But newspapers grab the silly issue
and maui it all over page one.
Now it appears that the pictures
were just what they purported to be,
except that that steel skull was NOV
ed ten feet.
At this point the overwhelming
temptation is to laugh.
Probably not a newspaper that has
printed these silly stories about the
genuineness of the drought pictures
is GUILTLESS of printing pictures
that were in one sense or another
faxed
There is still good deal of the
Royal Northwest Mounted about
news photographers. Get the
picture" is generally the idea.
Now the criticism Of these drought
pictures comes mainly from COP sup
porters. The main newspaper sup
porter of the present COP candidate
is Mr. Hearst. Does anybody in the
whole country think Hearst proto-
graphers haven't faxed pictures
right and left?
Ask any newspaper reporter, edi-
tor, OR PHOTOGRAPHER!
Some taking is good clean fun"
while some is vicious.
And often the moving Of props" !"
such as the steel skull, is not taxing
at all, but is legitimate help to
bringing out the truth, just as excla-
nation marks often help at the end of
a SENTENCED
Here is an example: During the
great textile strike Francis j. German
was either on duty or on call almost
"a hours day. He was under terrific
strain. He got to catching winks when
possible.
During press conference, at which
there were some 25 reporters and a
half dozen camera men, one of the
camera men said, Frank, lean back
in that chair, put your feet on the
desk and close your eyes"
Frank obliged. The bulbs flashed.
1t was a picture and it was printed in
reputable newspapers all over the
United States as a picture of Francis
]. German catching nap in the midst
of the strain Of the strike.
Twenty-Five newspaper reporters
and half dozen camera men knew the
picture was technically a fake, yet
every one of them thought it good
stunt" and while technically a fake,
true to the broad realities of the sit
uation. 1t was lot like moving the
steer skull 10 feet.
With all the hokum the papers are
printing about the campaign, it is
small business to pick on this one
picture.
Gov. Landon was pictured picking
berries at his boyhood home.
That was pure baloney and nothing
else but, like the pictures we used to
get of Calvin Coolidge riding dump
hayrake. They represent NO reality.
President Roosevelt has been pretty
careful about what can be called at
best unreal, unnatural or artificial
A partisanship that is driven to
such carping as we have read
about the steer skull is itself a
drought victim an idea drought.
1t was infinitely worse, for exam
pie, to offer that distorted and pal
pably untrue picture of indirect taxes,
in which Mr.. Landon utterly neglected
to specify the rise in such taxes under
Hoover.
1t would be nice if everyone kept to
the truth and relied on truth to win
the day.
But until everyone does that, let
not the kettle 60 picking on little
one-egg size skillet.
VENEZUELA TELEGRAPHERs