The Waterbury Democrat., 1945-01-02
THE PRIVATE PAPERS or AN
 EXCRESCENCE

A New York publisher, one of this columns favorite excrcscences, devoted his entire editorial (the other ayem) to FDR's capsule cTiu- cisEn of columnists That was the comment of FDR at recent prog conference when he punched all oolumnists and called them rexcrescencee," which we hear IS a form of wart At any rate, the editorial remarked: What are Eolumnlsts and why2 The society rolumnists is an old timer in the newspaper business. but the gossip columnist and commentator column iSts are newcomers Eewcom- Ors722? This column started on Sept. IS. l924-almost a quar- ter of a century agol .... o, dear. How Tempus Fugitsl
 The editorial continues: They reached their current popularity partly because some newspapers are colorless, and the columnistS have more paprika Most of these col umnists came up the hard way from reporters to good reporters to ace by-line reporters to columnists and many of them are experts at reporting news or commenting on 1t or both"
 Thaynx, Daaaaddeeee.
 What interests us about Roose- velt's columnist crack" adds the editorial, "is that he took in all columnists but MT. R. .. Yet, Wal ter Winchell, one of the oldest tbut you called me a newcomer, Pop) and most successful, was as avid for MT. Roosevelt's 4th Term cleo ton as anybody we know or have heard of. Why crack at Winchell"
 Well, I dunno |. suspect 1t is to remind the people Gas well as the newspapers that Presidents integrity is like a newspapers which sometimes criticizes even its best friends.
 One of our pet stories about the newspaper publisher deals with his contempt for colyumistS In a chat at his offices few years ago, the publisher mentioned how he commuted between Chicago and New York when this colin started and So he never saw it." Paul Gall lico told me about you then" he added, "but I was too busy to mo- tice. However, when we were con- vinced over here--that people were buying the various papers you Co AnoiJ,1 t,, a similar feature This flattered me no end-until heard his opinion of all colyumiStS He added: Yes, we decided that If that was what New Workers wanted we'd give them enough Of them until they got good and sick of them!"
 YcM see? He considered them warts long ago.
 This reporter Is still wondering why Los Angeles newspapers and their staffers were content with the denial issued by Don Dougla.s-about this Sunday Night FlaSher's tip that MT. Douglas (and 27 other war in- dustTy execs) would visit FDR to stop Santa Anita from reopening q. circulated that tip almost month ago. It turned out to be the lead to the biggest sports scoop of the with all tracks closed to aid the war effort But the Los An- geles papers merely printed MT. Douglas false denial, instead of phoning and saying: MT. Douglas has denied your report. He says he can't understand why you even said it. Now we would like to learn and even demand-that you tell the public why you did report it. But no editor went that bother Some newspapers feel that way about stories that first appear in columns |. Instead Of confirming the tips some editors get rusty by saying That guy had 1t first. Let's knock it down ard get it denied to make him lool. unreliable" Hard to believe, but true said some" editors Some of whom are now ex-news- papermen |. And there are a few like them who've been saying it for 25 years.
 Had any editor or sports writer phoned to check it this is what I'd have said: "A feller named Genera