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LIB    R    A    R   Y 

BOS    TON 
UNIVERS I TY 


ADMINISTRATION 


CUwNo. 

Book  Ito. .& 

Ace.  No. 3-  JL 

Date ULz 


AP 

The  Story  Of  News 


COPYRIGHT,  1940,  BT  OLIVER  CRAWLING 

PRINTED  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES  OF  AMERICA 

BT  J.  J.  LITTLE  AND  IVES  COMPANY,  NEW  YORK 

ALL  RIGHTS  RESERVED 


To 

FRANK  B.  NOYES 


A  NOTE  BY  THE  AUTHOR 

The  idea  of  putting  this  story  into  words  goes  back  a  dozen  years. 
It  was  then  that  the  author  began  to  learn  that  honest  news  reporting 
didn't  just  happen — that  even  though  the  "freedom  of  the  press" 
ideal  had  been  incorporated  in  the  Bill  of  Rights  more  than  a  hundred 
years  before,  systematic  news  gathering  had  to  earn  its  place  as  a  self- 
respecting  public  service  through  slow  but  dramatic  evolution. 

The  actual  writing  and  refining  of  AP — The  Story  of  News  re- 
quired two  years,  but  other  years  of  research  and  study  preceded  that 
final  effort.  Even  two  years  may  seem  a  long  time  to  devote  to  such  a 
work,  yet  the  fact  is  that  the  author  alone  could  not  have  produced  the 
story  as  it  now  appears  in  that  length  of  time.  Indeed,  the  chances  are 
he  never  could  have  produced  it  without  the  assistance  of  William  A. 
Kinney,  now  of  the  Washington  staff  of  The  Associated  Press,  whose 
brilliant  research  abilities  and  keen  perception  as  to  detail  contributed 
so  much. 

Many  sources  were  drawn  upon  in  tracing  the  story  to  its  end. 
Bits  turned  up  in  odd  places:  from  yellowed,  time-worn  records;  from 
various  books  and  publications  of  one  sort  or  another,  many  of  them 
long  since  out  of  print ;  from  hundreds  of  newspaper  files  going  back 
as  far  as  1800,  and  from  all  AP  organizational  reports  and  news  files 
over  a  period  of  many  years.  No  attempt  is  made  here  to  list  all  such 
references  and  authorities,  which  fill  a  score  of  closely  typed  pages, 
but  it  can  be  said  that  more  than  three  thousand  books  and  publications 
were  examined  and  that  the  search  of  AP  records  alone  entailed  the 
reading  of  more  than  twenty  million  words. 

And  while  it  is  not  practical  to  list  all  the  individuals  who  con- 
tributed in  one  way  or  another  to  the  story,  the  author  wishes  to  express 
thanks  for  their  interest  and  help.  To  all  of  them,  and  the  total  runs 
to  hundreds,  he  expresses  the  especial  hope  that  in  the  following  pages 
they  will  find  some  reward  for  their  wholehearted  co-operation  in  help- 
ing to  make  possible  this  story  of  news. 

O.G. 

New  York,  N.  Y. 
June  25,  1940. 

vii 


CONTENTS 

A  NOTE  BY  THE  AUTHOR vii 

PRELUDE 3 

i! 

I     MILESTONES 19 

II     HESITANT  YEARS 26 

III  WE  WILL  GO   ON J2 

IV  BUGLES    BLOW 36 

V     THE    LONG   CAMPAIGN 44 

VI     THUNDER   IN   THE  WEST 60 

VII     THEY  CALLED   IT   PEACE 69 

VIII     BLACK    YEARS 78 

IX     STRING  CORRESPONDENT 84 

X     THE  LAST  TRUCE 88 

XI     EXPANSION    AND    DISASTER 99 

XII     FOR  THE  ALMIGHTY   DOLLAR ICX) 

XIII  CHAOS  AND  CRUSADE Il6 

XIV  THE  FIGHT  IS  OVER 126 

XV     REMEMBER  THE   MAINE! 136 

XVI     THE  NEW  CENTURY 148 

1900 

I     PEACE  AND  PROPAGANDA l6l 

II     WAR  IN  THE  EAST t 175 

III     LEAD  WASHINGTON 187 

iv    FLASH! 194 

V     SURVEY  AND  CRITICISM 199 

ix 


CONTENTS 

VI   THE  AIRPLANE  MAKES  NEWS 2O5 

VII     A    NEW    PERSONALITY 214 

VIII     STANDARD    OIL 220 

IX     HEADLINE    YEARS 228 

X     COVERING  THE  FIRST  ARMAGEDDON 237 

xi    "HE  KEPT  us  OUT  OF  WAR" 249 

XII     THE  UNITED  STATES  AT  WAR 2j6 

XIII     FALSE  ARMISTICE 277 

xiv   "BACK  TO  NORMALCY" 284 

XV     THE  ORDER  CHANGES 294 

1925 

I     SPEED  AND   PROSPERITY 313 

II     PICTURES  ARE   NEWS 328 

III     LINDBERGH    APPEARS 336 

iv   "MORE  MARGIN,  MORE  MARGIN" 343 

V     INTO  THE  DEPRESSION 354 

VI     KIDNAP 364 

VII     ANOTHER    ROOSEVELT 374 

VIII     THE    FIGHT   OVER    PICTURES 383 

ix    DATE  LINE:  FLEMINGTON 398 

x   "URGENT" — FROM  ETHIOPIA 407 

XI     MATTERS  OF  MOMENT 417 

XII     BEFORE  THE  SUPREME  COURT 423 

xiii    "THE  PUBLIC  MUST  BE  FULLY  INFORMED" 441 

xiv    "PEACE  FOR  OUR  TIME" 458 

XV     "BY  THE  ASSOCIATED  PRESS" 489 

INDEX       .........     t.      . 495 


PRELUDE 


PRELUDE 


A  CHILL  November  rain  blew  in  from  Boston  harbor.  It  swept 
across  Long  Wharf,  up  State  Street  and  past  the  seven  floors  of  the 
Exchange  Coffee  House,  in  1 8 1 1  the  tallest  building  in  the  country. 

Below,  on  the  drenched  cobblestones,  merchants  and  citizens  hur- 
ried by  twilight  to  the  recently  established  Reading  Room  on  the  sec- 
ond floor.  They  asked  questions  of  one  another  and  of  travelers  who 
had  just  arrived  by  schooner  and  stagecoach.  They  studied  the  dog- 
eared European  newspapers.  But  they  found  no  fresh  news. 

Down  the  seaboard,  past  New  York  and  the  southern  shore  line, 
lights  flickered  in  farmhouses  and  in  fishing  shacks,  and  in  the  busy 
towns  of  this  New  World  of  five  million  people.  Out  on  the  Atlantic 
there  were  other  and  more  ominous  lights.  They  dipped  and  rolled 
with  the  dark  hulls  of  British  men-of-war.  American  commerce  was 
being  blockaded  and  Yankee  seamen  were  seized  for  the  service  of  the 
crown  on  the  grounds  that  they  were  British  subjects.  Every  incoming 
merchantman  brought  tales  of  warlike  acts,  and  at  the  end  of  the  day 
people  gathered  to  wonder  and  to  speculate. 

In  England  George  III  brooded  over  the  loss  of  his  American 
colonies,  and  on  the  continent  Napoleon  traced  new  campaigns  on  his 
crinkling  maps. 

In  Washington  a  young,  ill-knit  Congress  was  convened  in  the 
half-finished  Capitol  demanding  war  to  avenge  repeated  indignities 
at  the  hands  of  Great  Britain  and  France.  Precise  President  Madison 
rocked  in  the  newly  invented  swivel  chair  and  pondered.  Henry  Clay 
and  his  "War  Hawk"  followers  had  served  their  ultimatum — Madison 
must  see  to  it  that  war  was  declared  or  he  would  not  be  renominated. 

Official  Washington  could  feel  the  state  of  affairs,  but  even  there 
citizens  could  only  speculate  on  what  the  next  day  held.  These  were 
crucial  times.  Events  moved  in  some  puzzling  world  pattern,  yet  the 
people  had  no  news. 

3 


AP —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 


There  was  no  news  because  there  were  no  real  newspapers.  True, 
newspapers  and  newsletters,  of  a  sort,  had  existed  for  years.  But  the 
news  they  printed  was  old  and  almost  always  inaccurate.  They  took 
what  little  information  came  to  them  and  made  no  effort  to  gather  it 
for  themselves.  They  found  much  else  to  print — flowery  verses,  erudite 
essays,  political  bombast,  or  solemn  dissertations  on  religion. 

Front  pages,  most  of  them,  were  given  over  to  advertisements 
urging  the  purchase  of  slaves  and  livestock,  of  secondhand  furniture, 
and  of  curious  medicines.  The  size  of  the  pages  was  often  large  and 
the  number  of  pages  few.  These  large  pages  were  called  blanket" 
sheets  because,  when  opened,  they  were  almost  as  large  as  a  blanket. 
The  reason  for  their  size  was  partly  a  holdover  from  pre-Revolutionary 
days  when  papers  were  taxed  on  the  number  of  pages  they  contained, 
and  partly  because  the  crude  printing  presses  were  operated  by  hand 
and  it  was  easier  and  quicker  to  run  off  a  few  large  sheets  than  many 
small  ones.  A  strong  pressman,  without  interruption,  could  produce  as 
many  as  two  hundred  copies  an  hour.  The  large  journals  did  not  hesi- 
tate to  make  capital  of  their  size.  One  of  them  proclaimed  itself:  "The 
Largest  Paper  In  All  Creation."  But  in  the  matter  of  circulation  not 
even  the  most  prosperous  papers  had  more  than  a  few  hundred. 

The  problem  of  hand  presses  and  large  pages  was  not  the  only  one 
confronting  printers.  There  was  no  telegraph,  typewriter,  or  telephone. 
Copy  was  written  out  by  pen,  or  set  directly  in  type  by  hand.  The  only 
method  of  communication  was  by  schooner  or  stagecoach.  Public  in- 
telligence, more  likely  than  not,  traveled  by  word  of  mouth.  The 
tavern  or  the  coffeehouse,  rather  than  the  newspaper,  was  the  best 
pkce  to  find  out  what  was  going  on  and  Boston  was  the  trading  center 
of  the  New  World. 

This  was  the  condition  of  newspapers,  with  few  exceptions,  until 
that  November  night  in  1811  when  the  rain  whistled  in  from  the  har- 
bor and  Boston  citizens  hurried  along  to  the  Exchange  Coffee  House 
Reading  Room  in  quest  of  whatever  intelligence  they  might  find. 


The  popular  Reading  Room  had  been  established  a  year  before 
by  Samuel  Gilbert,  one  of  the  proprietors  of  the  Exchange  Coffee 
House,  in  an  attempt  to  attract  merchants  and  shipmasters  to  the  trad- 


PRELUDE  5 

ing  center  on  the  second  floor.  After  the  practice  of  European  establish- 
ments of  a  similar  kind,  Gilbert  stocked  it  with  whatever  old  journals 
he  could  obtain.  But  he  also  was  an  innovator.  He  kept  on  hand  two 
large  books,  in  one  of  which  he  recorded  marine  intelligence  and  in 
the  other  incidental  information. 

The  idea  of  recording  news  was  immediately  popular.  Patrons 
thought  so  well  of  it  that  they  donated  a  rowboat  which  Gilbert  had 
used  on  occasions  to  meet  incoming  craft  and  learn  details  of  their 
cargoes  and  voyages. 

Things  went  along  satisfactorily  enough  until  Gilbert  found  the 
Reading  Room  was  taking  too  much  of  his  time.  He  decided  he  needed 
a  helper.  The  merchants  and  patrons  learned  of  his  selection  with 
pleasure.  Boston's  foremost  newspaper,  the  semiweekly  Columbia  Cen- 
tinel,  printed  an  obscure  announcement  on  November  20: 

EXCHANGE  COFFEE  HOUSE  BOOKS.  These  news-books  &c 
commenced  and  so  satisfactorily  conducted  by  Mr.  Gilbert  are  now  trans- 
ferred to  the  care  of  Mr.  Samuel  Topliff,  Junr.,  a  young  gentleman  of 
respectability,  industry  and  information;  and  who  will,  we  doubt  not,  con- 
tinue the  Marine  and  General  News  Books  with  great  satisfaction  to  the 
patrons  and  friends  of  the  Reading  Room. 

% 

The  son  of  a  sea  captain,  this  young  Samuel  Topliff,  Jr.,  was  born 
in  a  wooden  house  in  Orange  Street  in  1789.  His  childhood  was 
prosaic.  He  did  the  things  other  boys  of  his  time  did — sang  in  the 
choir  at  Hollis  Street  Church,  marched  in  a  memorial  procession  for 
George  Washington  in  1800,  and  went  to  school.  He  dreamed  of  a 
life  at  sea,  but  then  in  1811  his  father  was  murdered  by  a  mutinous 
crew.  When  this  news  finally  reached  Boston  Topliff  knew  that  his 
earlier  plans  must  be  abandoned.  He  must  support  his  mother  and 
brothers  and  so  he  lost  little  time  in  undertaking  his  unusual  assignment. 

Topliff  soon  observed  that  the  stories  of  travelers  and  seafarers 
became  magnified  with  each  retelling.  He  decided  that  the  best  way 
to  make  sure  the  information  was  reasonably  accurate  was  to  obtain  it 
promptly  and  record  it  in  the  News  Books  before  constant  repetition 
destroyed  its  value. 

He  was  completing  his  News  Book  entries  for  the  day  when  the 
Reading  Room  door  was  thrown  open  by  a  runner  who  panted  out 
that  an  unidentified  boat  was  trying  to  negotiate  the  harbor.  The 
runner,  as  was  customary,  had  been  stationed  on  the  observation  roof 
near  the  big  dome  of  the  coffeehouse.  It  was  his  duty  to  study  the 
harbor  by  glass  and  report  all  arrivals  and  departures.  Because  of 


6  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

the  descending  darkness,  he  had  been  unable  to  distinguish  the  colors 
of  the  incoming  craft,  but  unquestionably  something  unusual  must  be 
afoot,  otherwise  it  was  doubtful  if  any  craft  would  attempt  the  harbor 
in  such  a  squall. 

This  information  caused  an  uproar  among  the  readers  in  the 
room.  For  all  they  knew,  the  British  might  be  planning  an  attack  or 
the  ship  might  be  bringing  word  of  more  warlike  acts  against  Yankee 
shipping  and  commerce. 

Topliff  listened  to  the  hum  of  curious  voices  and  made  up  his 
mind.  The  harbor  was  dark  and  treacherous,  but  he  had  handled  a 
rowboat  in  bad  weather  before.  While  the  Reading  Room  crowd  con- 
tinued its  excited  speculation,  he  left  the  coffeehouse  and  headed  for 
Long  Wharf,  where  the  Reading  Room  rowboat  was  moored.  He 
unshipped  the  oars  and  pulled  out. 

He  was  gone  what  seemed  an  interminable  time.  The  cold  raii> 
continued  to  blow.  Dim  lights  flickered  in  the  storm  and  slipped  deeper 
into  the  night.  Then  the  blur  of  the  small  boat  reappeared,  zigzagging 
its  way  to  Long  Wharf  with  the  bedraggled  young  man  still  at  the 
oars. 

Soon  he  was  back  at  his  desk  in  the  Reading  Room  and  while  those 
nearest  crowded  around  to  read  over  his  shoulder,  he  entered  in  the 
News  Book  the  story  of  what  he  had  learned. 

The  arriving  boat  was  the  brig  Latona.  She  had  had  a  stormy 
68-day  voyage  from  Archangel.  Her  master  was  Captain  Blanchard, 
and  he  brought  disturbing  tidings.  A  few  days  before,  in  longitude  65, 
the  Latona  was  running  before  moderate  winds  when  she  was  over- 
hauled by  an  English  sloop-of-war  which  immediately  broke  out  a 
signal  for  the  brig  to  heave  to.  The  sloop  ran  out  her  starboard  guns 
to  emphasize  the  order  and  when  she  came  alongside  a  longboat  of 
British  marines  boarded  the  Latona. 

A  cocky,  talkative  second  officer  ordered  Blanchard  to  muster  his 
crew  while  the  brig  was  searched  for  "deserters  from  His  Majesty's 
Navy."  The  officer  spoke  in  belligerent  tones.  He  told  Blanchard  that 
six  British  line-of-battle  ships  and  twenty  frigates  already  had  arrived 
off  Halifax,  and  that  twenty  more  were  expected.  England  was  bringing 
her  naval  forces  in  North  America  up  to  wartime  strength. 

"To  be  prepared,"  the  officer  had  explained  condescendingly,  "in 
case  of  a  rupture  with  America.  .  .  ." 

Before  Topliff  had  finished  writing  there  were  shouts  and  commo- 
tion. These  Boston  citizens  could  understand  the  inevitable.  Britain 


PRELUDE  7 

was  ready  to  risk  another  war  with  her  former  colonies,  New  England's 
rich  commerce  at  sea  faced  destruction,  and  eventually  America  might 
even  lose  the  independence  it  had  won  thirty  years  before. 

The  patrons  of  the  Reading  Room  knew  that  Topliff  had  risked 
danger  in  order  to  bring  back  news  at  a  time  when  everyone  was  eager 
for  news.  They  toasted  him  for  his  courage  and  he  knew  that  he  had 
made  a  good  beginning.  But  it  is  doubtful  if  any  one  of  them  realized 
the  full  significance  of  his  act. 

Topliff  in  his  rowboat  had  started  systematic  news  gathering. 


The  young  man  continued  to  meet  incoming  craft  in  the  harbor. 
He  also  employed  correspondents  to  send  him  regular  newsletters  from 
abroad.  He  kept  his  information  as  accurate  as  he  could  make  it,  and 
before  long  he  was  persuading  a  few  newspapers  to  subscribe  to  regular 
reports  which  he  wrote  out  in  longhand  and  delivered  by  messenger 
or  stagecoach.  Newspapers  themselves  also  slowly  began  to  gather  and 
print  news. 

The  War  of  1812  came  and  the  rowboat  method  was  adopted 
by  others.  A  rowboater  for  the  Charleston  (S.  C.)  Courier  obtained 
word  of  the  war's  end  seven  weeks  after  the  treaty  was  signed  at 
Ghent,  Belgium,  the  Christmas  Eve  of  1814.  That  seemed  an  amaz- 
ing feat,  receiving  word  in  such  a  comparatively  short  time,  yet  there 
was  irony  in  it.  In  the  last  battle  of  the  war  Andrew  Jackson  won  an 
overwhelming  victory  over  the  British  at  New  Orleans,  but  it  was  a 
battle  that  would  never  have  been  fought  had  there  been  an  adequate 
news  system  $  peace  had  been  declared  two  weeks  previously. 

By  1828  Boston  had  yielded  to  New  York  in  news  gathering  as 
well  as  commerce.  The  vigorous,  rough-and-tumble  young  metropolis 
sprawled  along  the  lower  tip  of  Manhattan  and  laughed  at  its  growing 
pains.  Plagues  of  yellow  fever  ravaged  the  populace,  pigs  roamed  the 
thoroughfares,  and  brothels  flourished  along  the  water  front.  The 
shore  line  was  a  forest  of  spars,  masts,  and  riggings,  wagons  rattled 
through  Wall  Street,  and  the  graves  of  Potter's  Field  covered  the 
meadow  that  is  now  Washington  Square. 

Rowboats  were  still  being  used,  but  owing  to  the  jealousy  and  in- 
trigue of  rival  publishers  the  harbor  was  a  perilous  place  to  venture, 
even  in  broad  daylight. 

The  hurrying  population  of  180,000  had  halfheartedly  supported 


8  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

nine  daily  newspapers  until  a  year  before,  when  a  tenth — unwelcome 
to  the  others — made  its  appearance.  Among  the  nine  were  the  Com- 
mercial Advertiser,  the  Post,  the  Standard^  and  the  Morning  Courier, 
the  last  published  by  violent,  overbearing  Colonel  James  Watson  Webb. 
The  tenth  was  the  Journal  of  Commerce.  It  was  owned  by  merchant- 
philanthropist  Arthur  Tappan  and  was  managed  by  37-year-old  David 
Hale. 

The  nine  papers  originally  had  fought  among  themselves  to  be 
the  first  with  the  news.  Constant  threats  that  additional  newspapers 
might  enter  the  growing  field,  however,  finally  had  drawn  them  to- 
gether in  a  harbor  combine  served  by  the  toughest  collection  of  row- 
boaters  who  ever  pulled  an  oar,  more  concerned  with  crushing  outside 
opposition  than  with  collecting  and  speeding  the  highly  important 
intelligence  from  abroad. 

It  was  against  the  cutthroat  activities  of  this  combine  that  David 
Hale  and  the  new  Journal  of  Commerce  had  to  struggle. 

Hale,  a  New  Englander,  was  religious  and  would  not  gather  news 
on  Sunday.  He  had  worked  on  an  uncle's  paper  in  Boston  about  the 
time  Topliff  was  starting.  He  had  taught  school.  He  had  started  an 
importing  business.  He  had  tried  auctioneering.  He  had  invested  in  a 
powder  mill  only  to  have  it  blow  up.  During  one  brief  period  of  pros- 
perity he  had  lent  a  few  hundred  dollars  to  a  friend,  Gerard  Hallock, 
who  shortly  after  became  the  editor  of  the  weekly  New  York  Observer. 
That  loan  to  Hallock  was  a  fortunate  one,  for  it  was  Hallock  who 
recommended  Hale  to  owner  Tappan  as  a  likely  manager  of  the  Jour- 
nal of  Commerce. 

Hale  was  accustomed  to  failure  and  after  several  months  with 
the  unpopular  Journal  of  Commerce  he  faced  it  again.  He  could  not 
get  past  the  harbor  combine  to  gather  news  from  Europe.  His  boatmen 
regularly  came  back  from  the  waterfront  with  their  heads  laid  open 
by  belaying  pins.  As  soon  as  they  set  foot  on  a  ship's  ladder  they  were 
knocked  back  into  their  rowboats.  If  the  paper  could  not  obtain 
news  it  could  not  survive.  Owner  Tappan  was  tired  of  his  venture  and 
wanted  to  sell  out. 

Early  one  morning  in  October,  1828,  a  small  sloop  sailed  down  the 
East  River.  It  slipped  past  the  spot  where  Brooklyn  Bridge  now  stands 
and  headed  toward  the  entrance  of  the  lower  harbor  and  Sandy  Hook. 
It  was  Hale's  boat  and  on  her  side  was  painted  the  legend:  JOURNAL 

OF  COMMERCE,    1828. 

The  Journal  of  Commerce  manager  had  fitted  up  the  craft  in  a 


PRELUDE  9 

desperate  effort  to  beat  the  harbor  combine.  He  had  tried  to  keep  his 
intentions  a  secret,  but  word  leaked  out.  The  other  papers  accepted 
the  challenge  by  rigging  out  a  fast  sloop  they  called  the  Thomas  H. 
Smith.  The  Journal  of  Commerce  then  announced  its  plan  in  a  notice 
which  said: 

An  opportunity  now  wfll  be  offered  for  an  honorable  competition.  The 
public  will  be  benefited  by  such  extra  exertions  to  procure  marine  news,  and 
we  trust  the  only  contention  between  the  two  boat  establishments  wfll  be 
which  can  outdo  the  other  in  vigilance,  perseverance  and  success.  .  .  . 

The  two  boats  raced  the  eighteen  miles  to  Sandy  Hook  and  when 
the  Journal  of  Commerce  hove  to  in  the  rolling  swells  the  combine 
craft  was  far  behind.  News  gatherers  never  had  ventured  that  far  be- 
fore, but  Hale  saw  that  it  was  an  excellent  spot.  Arriving  merchantmen 
started  to  trim  their  sails  there  and  his  sailboat  could  obtain  whatever 
budgets  of  intelligence  they  brought  and  scuttle  back  to  port. 

The  success  of  the  Journal  of  Commerce  jolted  rival  editors  out  of 
their  lethargy  and  set  the  whole  town  talking.  The  bankers  and  mer- 
chants who  foregathered  at  Holt's  Hotel  on  Water  Street  discussed  the 
commercial  advantages  that  might  come  from  this  unprecedented  enter- 
prise in  news.  But  there  was  more  to  it  than  the  excitement  it  created 
in  New  York.  Hale  and  his  Journal  of  Commerce  had  introduced 
the  vital  stimulant  of  competition  into  the  sluggish  world  of  news 
gathering. 


The  Journal  of  Commerce  went  down  the  harbor  many  times. 
Larger,  more  seaworthy  boats  soon  were  cruising  for  news  as  far  as 
a  hundred  miles  off  Sandy  Hook. 

The  harbor  combine,  fighting  back  with  all  its  resources,  began 
to  make  use  of  a  new  marine  telegraph  which  was  constructed  between 
the  harbor  entrance  and  the  Battery  at  the  lower  end  of  Manhattan. 
This  was  a  semaphore  device  of  flagstaff  stations.  A  man  at  Sandy  Hook 
identified  the  incoming  boats  and  signaled  word  to  the  next  station, 
where  it  was  picked  up  and  resignaled  to  stations  along  the  route  all  the 
way  to  the  city. 

But  the  difficulty  with  this  system  was  that  it  could  relay  little 
more  than  the  bare  identity  of  the  approaching  ship.  The  news  those 
ships  carried  was  the  thing,  and  Hale  meant  to  have  it  first.  There- 
after his  boat  put  in  at  the  outer  tip  of  Staten  Island,  which  sprawled 


IO  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

between  New  York  and  Sandy  Hook,  and  a  waiting  horseman  took 
the  news  and  galloped  to  the  Manhattan  ferry. 

The  contest  still  waged  unabated  with  every  man  for  himself 
after  the  old  harbor  combine  finally  disintegrated  under  the  pressure  of 
Hale's  efforts.  The  Journal  of  Commerce,  however,  was  prepared  to 
cope  with  this  multiplication  of  opponents.  Hale  and  his  friend  Gerard 
Hallock  purchased  the  paper. 

The  era  of  evening  newspapers  had  not  arrived,  but  Hale  and 
Hallock  gave  New  York  its  first  "extra"  by  running  off  important 
news  on  their  old  hand  presses  for  distribution  during  the  afternoon 
hours.  They  broke  precedent  by  putting  their  biggest  news  on  page 
one,  and  they  introduced  credit  lines  proclaiming  "25  DAYS  LATER 
FROM  EUROPE"  to  stress  the  speed  with  which  they  were  obtaining 
the  latest  foreign  reports. 

The  nation  was  growing.  Domestic  news  was  becoming  more  im- 
portant. The  Journal  of  Commerce  met  this  situation  by  inaugurating 
a  pony  express. 

Andrew  Jackson's  attack  on  the  Bank  of  the  United  States  was 
the  exciting  topic  of  1830  when  the  two  publishers  announced  they 
would  run  a  special  express  from  Washington  to  New  York  in  order 
to  obtain  the  presidential  message  to  the  opening  of  Congress.  James 
Watson  Webb,  who  had  not  hesitated  to  attack  the  methods  of  his 
rivals,  hastily  organized  an  express  for  his  Courier,  bewailing  the  fact 
that  it  cost  him  $300.  The  remaining  papers  pooled  their  interests  in 
a  third.  New  Yorkers  marveled  to  read  that  Jackson's  message  reached 
the  city  in  less  than  two  days  in  spite  of  badly  mired  roads. 

Yet  the  pony  express  remained  only  an  occasional  service  until 
Hale  and  Hallock  once  more  jogged  the  pace  of  progress.  In  1833  they 
started  a  regular  express  from  Washington  with  twenty-four  horses 
racing  day  and  night  over  a  distance  of  227  miles.  It  was  a  notable  feat, 
for  the  paper's  black  ponies  covered  the  distance  in  twenty  hours,  regu- 
larly beating  the  government's  own  express  by  one  to  two  days. 


While  these  exploits  were  increasing  the  importance  of  the  owners 
of  the  Journal  of  Commerce,  another  newspaper  personality  moved 
boldly  on  the  scene.  He  was  a  squinting  Scotsman  and  his  name  was 
James  Gordon  Bennett.  He  did  not  hesitate  to  tread  on  the  touchy  toes 


PRELUDE  i i 

of  all  the  New  York  publishers,  and  before  he  was  through  he  became 
the  first  to  gather  and  print  all  kinds  of  news — fit  or  otherwise. 

Bennett  had  emigrated  to  America  as  a  youth  in  1819  and  found 
a  shilling  in  the  streets  of  Boston,  which  fed  him  for  a  day.  After 
working  in  Boston  and  New  York  he  became  Washington  correspondent 
for  Webb's  Courier.  Years  later  people  spoke  of  him  as  the  first  Wash- 
ington columnist,  but  at  the  time  he  was  more  concerned  with  the  prob- 
lem of  eating.  He  roamed  the  Capitol  corridors  gobbling  information. 
Sometimes  there  was  small  importance  in  the  facts  he  gathered — that 
the  wife  of  a  certain  Cabinet  officer  was  addicted  to  port  laced  with 
brandy,  that  Andrew  Jackson  was  a  good  trencherman,  or  that  people 
were  calling  the  Executive  Mansion  the  White  House  since  it  had  been 
painted  to  cover  the  scars  left  by  the  War  of  1812.  Often  enough, 
however,  the  information  he  obtained  was  important,  and  when  it  was 
he  made  the  most  of  it. 

Vigorous,  inquisitive  almost  to  the  point  of  being  obnoxious,  Ben- 
nett appeared  just  the  man  choleric  Webb  was  seeking  as  editor  when  he 
consolidated  his  Courier  with  the  Enquirer  in  a  determination  to  outdo 
Hale  and  Hallock.  The  Scotsman  went  to  New  York  as  a  $i2-a-week 
editor  of  the  Courier  and  Enquirer.  From  the  beginning  the  two  per- 
sonalities clashed.  Webb's  shifty  policies  grated  on  the  Scotsman  and  the 
two  parted  in  1832. 

Bennett  tried  other  newspaper  enterprises,  but  none  of  them  suc- 
ceeded. By  1835  his  writing  of  cheap  newspaper  fiction  had  netted  $500. 
He  attempted  to  persuade  a  young  printer  to  join  him  in  the  publica- 
tion of  a  penny  paper.  The  printer  was  Horace  Greeley  and  he  curtly 
declined.  Bennett  trudged  down  to  the  printing  plant  of  Anderson  and 
Smith  at  34  Ann  Street.  His  $500  talked  and  the  partners  agreed  to 
print  his  paper  as  long  as  he  could  pay  cash  in  advance. 

The  morning  of  May  6,  1835,  saw  the  birth  of  the  Herald.  It  was 
a  one-penny  paper — a  fact  calculated  to  appeal  to  the  masses  who  could 
not  afford  the  six-penny  price  of  the  established  journals.  The  penny 
press  had  made  its  first  positive  appearance  in  New  York  two  years 
earlier  with  the  birth  of  the  Sun  and  Bennett  was  shrewd  enough  to 
observe  that  such  a  popular-priced  publication  had  a  definite  appeal. 
The  city  now  had  a  population  of  270,000,  yet  the  combined  circulation 
of  all  New  York  dailies  was  only  42,000.  There  was  room  for  another 
paper. 

Bennett  resolved  to  become  a  real  news  gatherer.  He  actually  did 
become  the  first  reporter  in  the  modern  sense  of  the  word.  He  promised 


12  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

to  report  the  shady  transactions  in  Wall  Street,  where  the  six-penny 
papers  got  their  biggest  support.  He  promised  to  print  political  news 
only  for  what  it  was  worth.  He  said  he  would  mirror  the  world  in  all 
its  freaks  and  vagaries,  that  he  would  record  facts  on  every  public  and 
proper  subject.  They  were  promises  he  kept  for  the  remainder  of  his 
life. 

This  vigorous  start  of  the  Herald  served  notice  on  Hale  and 
Hallock  that  they  must  look  to  their  news-gathering  laurels.  To  meet 
so  boisterous  a  menace,  the  six-penny  papers  put  forth  redoubled  efforts. 
Still  faster  newsboats  were  built,  more  pony  expresses  were  run.  It 
was  a  formidable  competition  because  Webb's  Courier  and  Enquirer^ 
with  a  circulation  of  3,300  and  an  advertising  revenue  of  $65  daily, 
was  accounted  the  most  powerful  paper  in  the  country. 

But  Bennett  was  not  to  be  annihilated.  His  news  touch  was  like 
magic.  He  was  thrashed  in  the  streets,  denounced  from  pulpits,  and 
still  the  Herald's  circulation  climbed  until  it  reached  20,000  by  1836. 
No  matter  what  the  six-penny  papers  did,  Bennett  outdid  them.  His 
newsboats  were  faster,  his  expresses  quicker,  his  genius  sharper.  He 
used  the  few  rattletrap  railroads,  canal  barges,  runners,  any  and  all 
conceivable  methods  of  getting  news. 

Brazen  cock  of  the  journalistic  walk,  the  ill-looking  Scotsman 
crowed  long  and  loud  over  his  triumphs.  He  mixed  fact,  fiction  and 
fancy  with  an  indiscriminate  hand  and  served  up  the  spicy  melange 
under  the  name  of  news. 

And  that  was  the  salient  weakness  of  the  cause  he  did  so  much  to 
help.  He  might  get  the  news  anywhere — in  Wall  Street  and  on  the 
Exchange,  in  the  police  station  and  at  church,  at  the  theater  and  in 
court,  at  home  and  abroad — but  when  he  gave  it  to  the  public  in  his 
rowdy,  shocking  way  the  news  became  a  subordinate  vehicle  to  express 
the  incorrigible  flamboyance  of  the  man  who  presented  it. 

7 

Back  in  Boston  the  urgency  of  ,a  swifter  method  of  delivery  had 
impressed  Daniel  Craig,  an  ambitious  printer's  apprentice  from  New 
Hampshire.  He  had  planned  to  start  a  penny  paper  in  Boston,  but 
instead  he  made  himself  one  of  the  great  news  gatherers  of  his  time. 

"Carrier  pigeons  have  been  used  for  years  in  Europe  to  transmit 
messages,"  the  heavy-set,  square-jawed  young  man  reflected.  "They 
are  fastj  they  can  fly  forty  to  seventy-five  miles  an  hour.  Why  can't 
they  be  used  to  transmit  news?" 


PRELUDE  13 

He  ordered  a  consignment  of  pigeons  from  Europe,  and  once  the 
birds  had  been  trained,  he  inaugurated  his  pigeon  post.  It  was  not  long 
before  newspapers  were  subscribing  to  the  service.  Craig  met  ships 
miles  out  at  sea  off  Boston,  summarized  the  news  from  abroad,  and 
sent  copies  winging  shoreward. 

The  pigeon  service  spread  from  Boston  to  New  York  and  Balti- 
more. Moses  Beach  of  the  New  York  Sun  was  the  first  to  appreciate 
the  advantages  that  Craig  could  offer  a  metropolitan  newspaper.  In 
Maryland  the  New  Englander  found  an  enthusiastic  supporter  in 
Arunah  S.  Abell,  who  had  just  launched  the  Baltimore  Sun. 

James  Gordon  Bennett,  unwilling  to  mark  time  while  any  opposi- 
tion editor  enjoyed  a  faster  delivery  of  news,  bought  himself  dozens 
of  pigeons  and  before  long  he  was  shipping  his  birds  to  Craig,  who 
loaded  them  with  news  and  sent  them  winging  back.  At  one  stage 
Bennett  was  offering  Craig  $500  an  hour  for  each  hour  that  a  pigeon 
could  deliver  news  to  the  Herald  ahead  of  its  rivals.  The  Herald 
publisher  also  augmented  his  pony  express  routes  with  pigeon  posts 
from  Washington,  Baltimore,  Philadelphia,  and  the  state  capitol  at 
Albany. 

8 

Only  the  highly  successful  journals  could  afford  the  heavy  expense 
necessary  to  maintain  the  trinity  of  pigeons,  ponies,  and  boats.  The 
problem  was  a  scientific  one  and  Samuel  Finley  Breese  Morse,  a  painter 
of  international  reputation  with  several  minor  inventions  to  his  credit, 
had  the  solution.  By  1847  his  revolutionary  new  communications  sys- 
tem, the  electro-magnetic  telegraph,  was  clattering  away  in  a  dozen 
or  more  cities. 

There  were  real  newspapers  now — real  enough  for  the  times.  The 
hand  press  had  been  replaced  by  faster  but  still  crude  mechanical 
presses. 

Although  the  future  of  the  telegraph  was  a  foregone  conclusion,  it 
was  expensive  and  its  facilities  still  were  too  inadequate  to  handle  all 
press  dispatches  with  any  degree  of  speed,  even  for  papers  in  the  few 
cities  it  connected.  Until  it  could  expand  on  a  nation-wide  scale — and 
the  first  pony  express  had  not  even  reached  the  Pacific  Coast — news- 
papers found  it  necessary  to  operate  longer  express  routes,  bigger  news- 
boat  systems,  and  more  elaborate  pigeon  posts. 

The  War  with  Mexico  did  not  simplify  matters.  Bennett,  still 
the  most  daring  news  gatherer,  was  running  a  special  pony  express  all 


14  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

the  way  from  the  border.  With  the  collaboration  of  the  Baltimore  Sun, 
the  Philadelphia  Public  Ledger  and  the  New  Orleans  Picayune,  his 
efforts  to  obtain  news  of  the  Mexican  struggle  were  leaving  other 
publishers  far  behind. 

David  Hale  watched  the  Herald's  expensive  activities  and  realized 
the  time  had  come  to  end  the  blind,  cutthroat  competition  in  which  the 
New  York  papers  had  so  long  indulged.  He  didn't  like  Bennett  any 
better  than  did  the  others  among  the  so-called  "Wall  Street  Press." 
Nevertheless,  he  had  to  admit  that  Bennett's  contribution  to  news-gather- 
ing enterprise  had  been  considerable.  He  saw  that  the  progress  of 
systematic  news  gathering  had  made  newspapers  indispensable  in  the 
lives  of  the  people  as  the  world  grew  slowly  larger,  extending  difficult 
news  frontiers.  He  was  convinced  that  no  one  paper  could  continue 
indefinitely  to  meet  the  multiplying  problems  of  individual  news  col- 
lection. 

Others  among  the  aloof  New  York  press  might  continue  to  belittle 
Bennett  in  print  and  thrash  him  in  the  streets,  as  old  James  Watson 
Webb  had  done  on  more  occasions  than  one.  They  might  continue  a 
"moral  war"  in  which  they  had  labeled  him  with  such  epithets  as 
"obscene  vagabond,"  "leperous  slanderer,"  "rogue,"  "polluted  wretch," 
and  the  like.  But  Hale  did  not  propose  to  continue  to  do  so.  He  felt 
that  there  was  disaster  ahead  if  the  New  York  papers  continued  their 
headstrong  course,  and  that  there  was  no  point  in  waiting  longer  to 
propose  to  Bennett  what  he  had  in  mind. 

He  put  on  his  tall  hat,  left  the  Journal  of  Commerce  office  and 
presently  was  at  the  corner  of  Nassau  and  Fulton,  where  the  Herald 
building  stood. 

A  few  minutes  later  there  was  a  knock  on  the  door  of  Bennett's 
office. 

"Come  in,"  called  the  publisher. 

He  looked  up  from  his  desk,  squinted  his  type-tired  eyes,  and 
finally  recognized  Hale.  He  got  to  his  feet  and  stood  waiting.  Hale 
lost  no  time  getting  to  the  point. 

"Mr.  Bennett,"  he  said,  "I  have  called  to  talk  about  news  with 
you.  Do  you  have  any  objection?" 

The  publisher  nodded  his  visitor  to  a  chair. 

"I  am  always  pleased  to  talk  on  that  subject,"  he  said. 

At  last  one  of  the  publishers  of  the  holier-than-thou  Wall  Street 
press  had  come  to  the  offices  of  the  despised  penny  paper. 

Hale  proposed  that  he  and  Bennett  pool  resources  to  cover  the 


PRELUDE  15 

Mexican  War  and  the  other  big  news  of  the  day  and  Bennett,  the 
Scotsman,  accepted.  That  was  the  first  positive  step  toward  co-operative 
news  gathering  after  years  of  fumbling,  groping,  and  bitter  competi- 
tion. The  next  step  came  a  year  later. 


184 


I.  MILESTONES 


TEN  men,  representing  the  six  most  important  New  York  newspapers, 
sat  around  a  table  in  the  office  of  the  Sun  one  day  early  in  May,  1848. 
They  had  been  in  session  for  more  than  an  hour  and  all  that  time  they 
had  been  in  stubborn  argument.  Some  of  them  were  belligerent,  some 
were  conciliatory,  some  were  unconcerned,  and  some  were  worried. 
They  were  the  autocrats  of  the  city's  newspaper  world  and  one  room 
never  before  had  been  big  enough  to  hold  them. 

Bennett  was  there  with  his  assistant,  Frederic  Hudson,  for  the 
Herald.  Webb  attended  with  his  managing  editor,  Henry  Raymond, 
of  the  Courier  and  Enquirer.  Gerard  Hallock  and  Hale  represented 
the  Journal  of  Commerce.  Greeley  of  the  Tribune,  Moses  Beach,  pub- 
lisher of  the  Suny  and  Eustace  and  James  Brooks  of  the  Express  com- 
pleted the  ten. 

The  meeting  was  the  outcome  of  Hale's  efforts  over  a  period  of 
months  to  bring  the  competing  publishers  together.  He  and  Bennett 
had  been  pleased  with  the  success  of  the  co-operative  effort  which  grew 
out  of  their  meeting  the  year  before,  and  Hale  gradually  had  come 
to  see  a  possible  union  of  the  foremost  New  York  newspapers,*  each 
contributing  its  share  to  a  general  fund  which  could  be  used  in  a  con- 
certed effort  to  provide  readers  with  wider  coverage  of  all  important 
world  events.  Now  at  the  critical  moment  of  his  campaign  he  was  tired 
and  ill.  He  knew  how  difficult  it  would  be  to  persuade  the  news  titans 
to  forget  their  antagonisms  in  the  interests  of  the  common  good.  But 
he  faced  the  meeting  and  talked  of  news,  its  problems,  and  his  pro- 
posal. 

There  was  plenty  of  news  to  talk  about.  In  Europe  there  were 
revolutions  in  progress  and  others  brewing.  At  home  the  Mexican 
War  was  over,  but  the  drums  of  another  presidential  campaign  were 
beating  for  the  war's  two  heroes,  Zachary  Taylor  and  Winfield  Scott. 
The  antislavery  movement  was  growing  daily  5  out  in  the  wilderness 
of  Utah  the  Mormons  were  establishing  themselves  on  the  shores  of 

19 


2O  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Salt  Lake,  and  from  Chicago,  a  rough,  frontier  city  of  24,000,  the  rail- 
road was  pushing  slowly  into  the  green  prairies  of  the  West. 

But,  aside  from  Hale  and  Bennett,  the  overlords  of  the  New  York 
press  were  suspicious  and  reluctant.  Hale  outlined  his  plan  and  saw 
marked  signs  of  resentment.  The  rival  publishers  had  not  been  pleased 
at  the  strides  of  the  Herald  and  Journal  of  Commerce  through  their 
co-operative  efforts.  There  were  gruff  questions  and  vigorous  dissent. 

James  Watson  Webb  heard  the  plan  through  impatiently  and 
reared  to  his  feet.  He  had  never  forgiven  Hale  for  breaking  the  har- 
bor news  monopoly  with  his  sailboat  years  before,  and  he  never  would 
forgive  Bennett  for  violating  established  newspaper  practice  by  pub- 
lishing a  penjjy  paper  which  gave  the  reader  more  than  he  was  paying 
for.  His  Courier  and  Enquirer,  he  said,  never  would  join  any  organi- 
zation which  contained  Bennett  and  his  Herald.  He  accused  Hale  and 
Bennett  of  concocting  a  scheme  which  had  been  so  costly  that  they  were 
now  trying  to  bamboozle  others  into  paying  the  bill.  Puffing  and  angry, 
he  turned  to  Henry  Raymond  for  approval  only  to  find  Raymond's 
attention  fixed  on  Hale,  who  had  picked  up  the  interrupted  discussion. 

Hale  turned  patiently  to  another  phase  of  the  problem.  The  situa- 
tion on  telegraph  news  was  highly  complicated.  Each  paper  arranged 
for  this  news  independently  and  paid  the  full  rate  to  the  company  j 
there  was  only  one  wire  available  to  serve  all  the  New  York  papers  j 
it  had  its  terminus  across  the  Hudson  River  on  the  New  Jersey  shore  j 
the  papers  had  to  take  fifteen-minute  turns  on  the  facilities,  and  all  but 
the  first  in  line  were  out  of  luck.  News  was  read  aloud  from  the  crude 
Morse  ticker  to  a  representative  of  the  receiving  paper  and  there 
was  deliberate  eavesdropping  and  pilfering.  The  telegraph  companies 
were  in  a  precarious  position  because  of  their  own  competitive  struggles 
and  consequently  they  charged  every  penny  the  traffic  would  bear. 

Although  telegraph  news  already  was  expensive,  Hale  warned  it 
might  well  become  even  more  costly.  It  was  common  knowledge  that 
the  telegraph  companies  were  selling  news  from  their  various  offices 
to  anyone  with  the  price  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  it  had  been  gathered 
by  representatives  of  the  papers  themselves.  Hale  also  had  been  re- 
liably informed  that  certain  wire  enterprises  were  secretly  toying  with 
the  idea  of  setting  up  regular  subsidiary  organizations  to  gather  and 
transmit  news  for  sale.  The  dangers  were  obvious;  with  no  govern- 
mental supervision,  the  telegraph  companies  could  make  it  virtually  im- 
possible for  any  news  but  their  own  to  move  on  limited  wire  facilities} 
papers  would  be  forced  to  surrender  the  vital  function  of  news  gather- 


MILESTONES  21 

ing,  and  news  itself  would  be  reduced  to  a  purely  commercial  and  un- 
reliable commodity  dished  up  for  a  price  by  outsiders  on  a  take-it-or- 
leave-it  basis. 

As  Hale  concluded,  Webb  was  drawn  aside  from  the  group  by  his 
able  assistant.  Raymond,  who  founded  the  New  York  Times  three  years 
afterward,  was  convinced  of  the  wisdom  of  the  proposal  Hale  had  just 
made.  A  few  minutes  later  the  old  stalwart  of  the  Courier  and  En- 
quirer returned  to  the  table  and  one  glance  told  Hale  and  the  others 
that  the  battle  was  over. 

So  in  the  Sun  office  in  May,  1 848,  the  first  real  co-operative  news- 
gathering  organization  was  formed.  Its  concept  was  limited  and  largely 
selfish.  There  was  no  immediate  thought  of  benefiting  any  but  these 
six  papers  and  there  was  no  disposition  to  look  upon  the  collection  of 
news  as  a  great  public  service.  The  organization  was  by  no  means  all 
that  it  might  have  been,  but  it  was  a  beginning. 

They  called  it  The  Associated  Press. 


The  first  step  taken  by  the  new  organization  was  to  perfect  operat- 
ing procedure.  Hallock  was  named  president  and  the  office  of  "general 
agent"  was  created.  The  man  to  fill  this  job  would  be  responsible  for 
actively  collecting  and  distributing  the  news,  so  important  a  position 
that  time  was  necessary  to  fill  it.  Therefore  a  committee  was  imme- 
diately named  to  supervise  the  first  news-gathering  efforts.  Frederic 
Hudson,  Bennett's  editorial  right-hand  man,  and  Raymond,  the  bril- 
liant managing  editor  of  Webb's  Courier  and  Enquirer,  were  the  two 
men  selected. 

The  committee  quickly  began  functioning.  First  it  arranged  for  the 
charter  of  the  steamer  Euena  Vista  at  Halifax  to  intercept  all  European 
boats,  obtain  what  news  they  brought  and  rush  it  on  to  Boston,  the 
northernmost  terminus  of  the  telegraph.  Then  it  began  negotiations 
with  the  wire  company  to  secure  precedence  for  the  transmission  of  this 
news  to  New  York  at  attractive  rates.  Raymond  outlined  what  was 
needed  in  a  letter  on  May  13,  1848,  to  F.  O.  J.  Smith,  a  tight-fisted 
promoter  then  in  charge  of  the  Boston-New  York  telegraph  line.  He 
wrote: 

The  Journal  of  Commerce,  Express,  Courier  and  Enquirer,  Herald, 
Sun,  and  Tribune,  of  this  city  have  agreed  to  procure  foreign  news  by  tele- 
graph from  Boston  in  common  and  have  appointed  a  committee  to  make 
arrangements  with  you  for  its  transmission. 


22  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Acting  on  behalf  of  that  committee  of  the  Association,  I  beg  to  propose 
that  you  give  us,  from  the  moment  our  dispatch  shall  be  received  at  the  tele- 
graph office  in  Boston,  the  use  of  all  the  wires  that  may  be  in  working  order 
for  the  uninterrupted  transmission  of  all  the  news  we  may  wish  to  receive. 

Upon  its  receipt  here,  we  will  make  copies  for  each  paper  entitled  to  it 
and  shall  desire  authority  to  prevent  any  part  of  the  news  leaving  the  office 
until  we  choose  to  send  it  out. 

The  arrangement  is  also  intended  to  apply  to  steamer's  news  that  may 
reach  Boston  for  us  by  express  from  Halifax. 

Upon  what  terms  will  you  secure  for  us,  for  one  year  from  the  present 
date,  the  use  of  the  telegraph  as  specified  above?  An  immediate  reply  will 
greatly  oblige  Your  obedient  servant. 

Smith  realized  the  increased  business  such  an  arrangement  would 
bring  and  two  days  later  he  outlined  a  plan,  quoting  tolls.  Raymond 
confirmed  the  contract  on  May  18.  His  communication  to  Smith  said: 

I  have  received  your  letter  of  the  I5th  and  have  submitted  it  to  Mr. 
Hudson,  of  the  Herald,  who  with  myself  form  the  committee  to  act  in  behalf 
of  The  Associated  Press.  The  object  in  making  the  arrangement  proposed  is 
to  prevent  the  competition  and  the  frequent  changes  of  which  you  complain. 
We  intend  to  forward  the  news  so  received,  at  once,  to  Philadelphia  and 
Baltimore,  so  that  the  press  of  those  cities  will  also  be  interested  in  the 
arrangement. 

We  understand  your  offer  to  be  this:  that  our  news  shall  come  through 
without  interruption;  that  for  the  first  3,000  words  we  pay  a  gross  sum, 
$100,  without  reference  to  the  parties  using  it;  and  that  for  the  excess,  we 
pay  the  regular  rates,  one  full  price  and  as  many  half  prices  as  there  are 
copies  used,  less  one. 

We  therefore  accept  the  offer  and  assent  to  the  conditions  you  have 
named. 

As  the  spring  days  moved  on  into  another  summer,  it  became  ob- 
vious that  Raymond  had  had  definite  plans  in  mind  when  he  mentioned 
to  Smith  the  possibility  of  forwarding  news  to  other  papers.  The  Phil- 
adelphia Public  Ledger  and  the  Baltimore  Sun  began  receiving  dis- 
patches. They  were  not  members  of  The  Associated  Press — the  New 
York  organization  restricted  that  privilege — but  they  were  its  first  paying 
clients,  and  as  the  association  grew  the  profitable  practice  of  selling  news 
to  outside  papers  was  greatly  expanded. 

Once  the  channel  was  clear  for  foreign  intelligence,  the  committee 
turned  its  attention  to  news  at  home.  Already  there  were  independent 
"telegraph  reporters"  scattered  through  the  country  who  wrote  and 
transmitted  copy  to  any  newspaper  that  would  buy.  The  system  under 
which  they  operated  was  unsatisfactory,  but  some  of  the  men  were 


MILESTONES  23  * 

good.  There  was  serious  need  now  for  a  man  who  was  familiar  not 
only  with  these  free-lance  sources,  but  also  with  the  general  operation 
of  the  telegraph.  The  association  found  the  man  for  its  general  agent 
in  Dr.  Alexander  Jones,  a  graduate  in  medicine  whose  early  interest  in 
communications  had  lured  him  into  journalism.  He  had  been  a  news 
gatherer  on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic  and  he  had  devised  the  first 
cipher  code  to  effect  savings  in  telegraph  tolls. 

Jones  opened  a  simple  office  at  the  top  of  a  long,  dim  flight  of 
seventy-eight  stairs  at  the  northwest  corner  of  Broadway  and  Liberty 
Street.  This  served  as  the  headquarters  of  The  Associated  Press  for 
more  than  two  decades.  The  annual  rental  was  less  than  $500  and  the 
weekly  administrative  expense  less  than  $50.  The  general  agent's  sal- 
ary was  $20  a  week  and  the  entire  cost  of  operations  the  first  year  was 
between  $10,000  and  $20,000.  Payment  for  foreign  news  was  the  larg- 
est single  item. 

At  first  the  entire  New  York  staff  consisted  of  Jones  and  one 
assistant,  but  later  there  was  a  second.  Trained,  capable  men  were  few 
and  those  available  needed  months  of  instruction.  Besides  his  work  in 
New  York,  Jones  was  kept  busy  engaging  correspondents,  or  "agents" 
as  they  were  called,  to  obtain  and  telegraph  news  to  New  York.  The 
major  duties  of  the  general  agent  were  to  receive  and  distribute  the 
intelligence  received  from  these  men,  to  pay  telegraph  tolls  and  other 
expenses  necessary  to  conduct  the  business,  and  to  see  to  collections  from 
the  six  member  newspapers  and  the  hinterland  clients.  Sufficient  copies 
of  each  incoming  dispatch  were  made  on  manifold  tissue  paper  to  cover 
the  list  of  subscribers. 

These  were  the  first  days  of  the  sticky  postage  stamp — an  innova- 
tion which  seemed  a  curiosity — and  the  mails  carried  such  obscure  family 
tidings  as  the  wedding  of  young  Lieutenant  Ulysses  S.  Grant  and  word 
that  fifteen-year-old  James  A.  Garfield  had  found  a  job  as  a  mule 
driver. 

The  great  rush  was  on  to  California  and  fantastic  tales  of  for- 
tunes in  gold  trickled  overland  to  the  East.  But  the  exciting  announce- 
ment of  this  discovery  did  not  reach  readers  along  the  Atlantic  until  late 
in  1848  because  pieces  of  ore,  sent  to  the  New  York  Herald  by  its 
Pacific  Coast  correspondent,  lay  for  months  before  anyone  thought 
to  have  them  assayed. 

But  gold  was  only  one  story.  The  Associated  Press  covered  its  first 
presidential  campaign;  a  Woman's  Rights  Convention  at  Rochester  de- 
manded suffrage;  President  Polk  offered  to  buy  Cuba  for  $100,000,000; 


24  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Garibaldi's  red  shirts  battled  the  French  j  the  King  of  Prussia  became 
the  hereditary  emperor  of  the  Germans  j  the  latest  census  showed 
Parkersburg,  West  Virginia,  the  center  of  the  nation's  25,000,000  pop- 
ulation. 

The  1848  presidential  election  was  the  first  major  assignment 
undertaken.  It  had  a  spectacular,  if  premature  beginning.  Public  in- 
terest centered  on  the  Whig  National  Convention  at  Philadelphia  where 
four  men  were  in  the  running  for  the  party's  nomination:  General 
Zachary  Taylor,  Henry  Clay,  General  Winfield  Scott,  and  Judge  Mc- 
Lean. 

The  New  York  terminus  of  the  telegraph  line  still  was  in  Jersey 
City — the  problem  of  bridging  wide  rivers  baffled  the  wire  companies — 
and  General  Agent  Jones  intended  to  get  the  convention  news  across 
the  Hudson  as  fast  as  possible.  Flag  signals,  he  decided,  would  do  it. 
He  went  to  Jersey  City  himself  to  make  sure  there  would  be  no  slip-up- 
At  a  pier  near  the  Cortlandt  Street  Ferry  on  the  New  York  side  he 
stationed  a  boy  from  the  Courier  and  Enquirer.  The  youngster  had 
careful  instructions.  A  white  flag  said  Taylor;  a  red,  Clay.  Two  white 
flags  on  the  same  staff  meant  Scott,  and  two  reds,  McLean. 

Forty  minutes  after  Jones  crossed  the  river,  the  boy  saw  a  white 
flag  being  waved  vigorously  from  the  New  Jersey  side.  He  raced  off  to 
notify  the  New  York  papers  that  General  Taylor  had  been  nominated. 
The  news  fled  north  along  the  telegraph  to  New  England,  arousing 
great  excitement,  and  in  Portland  a  salute  of  a  hundred  guns  was  fired. 
Meanwhile,  Jones  was  waiting  patiently  in  Jersey  City.  The  signal  the 
boy  had  seen  was  the  white  flag  of  a  broker's  representative  in  New 
Jersey  wigwagging  the  latest  Philadelphia  stock  quotations  to  a  lookout 
on  the  Merchants'  Exchange  building  in  New  York.  Fortunately,  Gen- 
eral Taylor  was  nominated  the  next  day. 

Coverage  of  the  election  was  an  epochal  thing.  It  cost  more  than 
$1,000 — an  awesome  amount  for  1848 — to  report  General  Taylor's 
election.  For  the  first  time  telegraph  offices  remained  open  all  night, 
Dr.  Jones  went  seventy-two  hours  without  sleep  before  the  story  was 
cleaned  up. 

Everything  considered,  the  organization  was  off  to  a  good  start, 
but  the  man  who  began  it  did  not  live  to  see  The  Associated  Press 
through  its  first  crucial  years.  Hardly  a  month  after  the  meeting  in  the 
Sun  office,  David  Hale  had  a  stroke.  He  regained  strength  for  a  time, 
but  in  January,  1849,  death  &me  to  the  pioneer  of  co-operative  news 
gathering. 


MILESTONES  25 

There  were  many  difficulties  those  first  years.  Now  that  the  asso- 
ciation had  been  launched  with  a  general  agent  to  handle  its  affairs, 
the  publishers  wanted  to  believe  their  news  troubles  were  over.  Almost 
every  successful  newspaper  was  aligned  with  one  political  party  or 
another,  and  without  partisan  support  they  would  have  had  trouble 
making  ends  meet.  But  the  political  picture  was  changing  and  the 
real  beginning  of  an  independent  press  imminent.  The  old  party  of 
Whigs,  long  so  powerful,  was  on  the  decline. 

Jones  did  his  best  with  his  modest  organization.  He  was  handi- 
capped by  a  lack  of  experienced  help,  the  slow  expansion  of  the  tele- 
graph, and  the  shortage  of  finances.  The  publishers  saw  the  association 
as  a  money-saving  creation  and  the  $50  weekly  allowed  for  office  ex- 
pense was  not  enough.  Jones  was  kept  busy  day  and  night,  Sundays 
and  holidays.  Years  later  he  complained: 

Our  services  were  severe,  and  help  with  the  proper  tact  and  necessary 
prior  instruction  could  not  be  had.  Often  on  stormy  nights  in  winter,  when 
our  errand  boys  were  ill  or  absent  in  Jersey  City  [which  still  was  the  New 
York  terminus  of  the  telegraph]  have  we  gone  around  at  twelve  and  one 
o'clock  and  delivered  messages  with  a  snow  or  sleet  storm  beating  in  our 
face;  and  having,  at  many  of  the  offices,  to  climb  three  or  four  pairs  of  stairs 
to  find  the  composing  room.  For  months  at  a  time,  we  seldom  retired  before 
one  o'clock  and  then  had  to  be  on  duty  through  the  next  day. 

He  gave  The  Associated  Press  all  his  energy  and  ability,  but  with- 
out Hale's  support  and  encouragement  the  strain  soon  began  to  tell.  In 
May,  1851,  he  submitted  his  resignation. 


II.  HESITANT  YEARS 


DANIEL  CRAIG,  the  hard-bitten  Yankee  who  had  started  the  first 
pigeon  post,  stood  on  the  steps  of  the  telegraph  office  in  Halifax,  Nova 
Scotia,  one  day  in  1851.  He  could  hear  the  industrious  stutter  of  a 
Morse  key  and  he  could  see  in  front  of  him  the  blue  of  the  tumbling 
Atlantic.  At  any  minute  now  his  outgeneraled  rivals  would  come  racing 
up  uneven  Hollis  Street  to  find  they  had  been  beaten  once  more. 

He  was  a  hard  man  to  beat,  this  Craig.  For  the  first  several  months 
of  existence,  The  Associated  Press  had  exerted  every  resource  to  outdo 
him,  but  had  failed.  The  sensible  thing,  then,  was  to  use  him,  so  two 
years  earlier  he  had  become  the  association's  first  regular  correspondent 
on  foreign  soil.  He  operated  out  of  Halifax  because  that  had  become  the 
first  port  of  call  of  the  new  Cunard  steamers,  which  were  slowly  re- 
placing the  sail.  By  boarding  the  craft  there  he  could  obtain  any  in- 
coming news  and  rush  it  on  to  Boston  and  New  York,  first  by  pigeon 
post  and  pony  express,  and  then  by  telegraph  as  the  lines  expanded 
north. 

Fifteen  years  of  news  gathering  had  taught  Craig  to  ignore  the 
angry  outbursts  of  his  worsted  opponents.  But  those  rivals  and  their 
confederates  were  not  above  cutting  telegraph  wires,  and  Craig  found 
it  wise  to  be  watchful  until  his  budget  of  intelligence  had  cleared.  He 
turned  for  a  reassuring  look  at  the  lines  which  stretched  from  the 
office.  Just  then  a  clerk  stepped  up  to  him  with  a  message.  Craig  read 
it.  The  Executive  Committee  of  The  Associated  Press  wanted  him 
to  come  to  New  York  immediately. 

In  the  two  years  since  Raymond  and  Hudson  had  prevailed  upon 
him  to  act  as  foreign  news  agent,  Craig  had  done  well.  He  established 
the  first  Associated  Press  office  on  foreign  soil  at  Halifax  early  in 
1849.  He  arranged  for  the  first  Associated  Press  pony  express  that 
June  to  rush  the  exclusive  news  of  an  attempt  to  assassinate  Queen 
Victoria  in  London.  He  sent  The  Associated  Press's  first  all-wire  mes- 
sage of  European  news  from  Halifax  in  November.  He  successfully 
advocated  the  first  Associated  Press  controlled  wire  from  New  York 

26 


HESITANT  YEARS  27 

to  Boston  to  St.  John  to  Halifax.  And  he  brought  The  Associated 
Press  its  first  large  bloc  of  outside  clients  when  he  induced  the  papers 
in  Boston  to  subscribe  to  the  Halifax-European  pony  express  before  the, 
telegraph  reached  Nova  Scotia. 

At  the  time  Craig's  assignment  began,  the  telegraph  lines  extended 
only  as  far  north  as  Portland,  Maine,  and  getting  the  news  to  the  wires 
was  a  headlong  race.  Once  Craig's  budget  reached  shore,  an  express 
rider  was  off  with  it  at  a  breakneck  gallop  on  the  first  lap  of  the  144- 
mile  trip  across  the  Nova  Scotian  peninsula  from  Halifax  to  Digby 
on  the  Bay  of  Fundy.  Every  eight  miles  a  fresh  mount  waited.  It  took 
the  express  eight  hours  to  cover  the  distance — a  mile  every  three  and  a 
half  minutes.  The  riders  aroused  terrific  excitement  as  they  pounded 
across  the  country,  and  villagers  lined  the  roadsides  to  cheer  them  when 
they  passed.  Several  miles  outside  of  Digby  a  cannon  was  fired  to  notify 
the  boat  captain  at  Digby  that  the  express  had  been  sighted.  The  cap- 
tain got  up  steam  and  sent  a  yawl  ashore  to  meet  the  rider.  Then  the 
fast  Digby  boat  dashed  down  the  Maine  coast  to  Portland  and  the 
telegraph. 

Several  months  later  the  telegraph  wires  reached  St.  John,  New 
Brunswick,  and  Craig  sent  his  Digby  packet  to  that  port.  The  ship 
made  the  trip  in  three  hours,  enabling  Craig  to  get  his  news  to  Boston 
on  an  average  of  thirty-five  hours  ahead  of  the  ten-knot  Cunarders  on 
the  Halifax-Boston  run.  Late  in  1849  the  telegraph  bridged  the  gap 
between  St.  John  and  Halifax  and  direct  wire  communication  was  estab- 
lished with  New  York. 

The  hostility  of  the  telegraph  people  interfered  greatly  with 
Craig's  use  of  pigeons  overland,  even  before  the  Halifax  line  was  com- 
pleted. They  considered  the  birds  unfair  competition,  and  went  to 
great  lengths  to  harass  anyone  using  them.  At  sea,  however,  it  was 
different  and  the  pigeons  flew  the  most  important  news  ashore.  In  calm 
weather  Craig  could  board  the  incoming  Cunarders,  obtain  his  package 
of  European  papers,  then  return  to  his  own  boat  and  prepare  the  dis- 
patches as  he  made  for  shore.  When  the  seas  were  stormy,  the  steamers 
threw  the  packages  overboard  in  water-tight  half-gallon  cans  for  Craig 
to  pick  up.  During  the  daytime,  the  cans  carried  a  small  flag  on  a  stick, 
and  at  night  a  flare  to  guide  the  news  gatherer. 

Innumerable  hard  knocks  in  the  unending  struggle  to  be  first 
with  foreign  news  had  toughened  Craig.  One  of  his  fiercest  battles  had 
been  with  a  telegraph  promoter  who  had  schemed  to  create  and  con- 
trol a  foreign  news  monopoly.  Somehow  the  promoter  always  seemed  to 


28  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

have  first  call  on  the  wire  out  of  Halifax  whenever  Craig  reached  the 
office  with  news  from  the  latest  incoming  boat.  Craig's  material  accord- 
ingly was  sidetracked.  But  Craig  was  equal  to  the  emergency.  As  soon 
as  a  steamer  was  sighted  off  Halifax,  he  had  an  undercover  employe 
send  a  cryptic  message  to  another  agent  at  Amherst,  the  next  telegraph 
office  along  the  line.  The  agent  at  Amherst  understood  what  was  then 
expected  of  him.  He  immediately  passed  a  copy  of  the  Bible  over  to 
the  Amherst  telegraph  operator  with  word  that  he  was  to  start  sending 
"Associated  Press  Steamer  News." 

With  a  sigh  the  operator  began  sending:  "Associated  Press,  New 
York,  N.  Y.:  In  the  beginning  God  created  the  heaven  and  the  earth. 
And  the  earth  was  without  form  and  void."  While  this  sending  was 
being  made,  Craig  was  meeting  the  steamer  at  Halifax  and  dispatching 
his  news  by  pony  express  to  Amherst.  It  took  five  hours  for  the  express 
to  reach  Amherst  and,  during  that  whole  time,  the  Amherst  operator 
continued  his  sending  of  Scripture  to  The  Associated  Press  in  New 
York.  Sometimes  he  got  through  Genesis  and  well  into  Exodus  before 
the  express  arrived  and  the  local  Amherst  agent  took  back  his  Bible 
and  substituted  the  newly  arrived  news. 

Craig's  job  was  to  obtain  the  news  and  send  it  in  the  most  ex- 
peditious way  possible,  and  that  was  what  he  did. 

"The  advance  receipt  of  European  news  by  steamer  at  Halifax 
was  so  important,"  he  said  bluntly,  "that  no  consideration  of  money  or 
effort  would  have  excused  me  for  a  single  failure." 

As  his  train  rattled  southward  over  the  rough  roadbed  which  set 
its  smoky  oil  lamps  swaying,  Craig  may  have  wondered  why  he  was 
being  called  to  New  York.  Before  his  interview  with  Hudson  and  Ray- 
mond was  ended,  however,  the  first  foreign  correspondent  of  The  Asso- 
ciated Press  had  become  its  second  general  agent. 


Craig  had  barely  cleared  a  desk  and  established  himself  in  the 
Broadway  headquarters  when  another  force  entered  the  growing  field 
of  news.  Raymond,  who  had  resigned  as  editor  of  Webb's  Courier , 
founded  the  New  York  Times,  and  he  was  so  well  liked  that  The 
Associated  Press  immediately  welcomed  his  paper  into  membership. 

The  Times  proved  a  beneficial  influence.  A  definite  division  was 
slowly  splitting  the  ranks  of  the  membership.  The  Herald,  the  Tribune^ 
and  the  Sun  believed  that  the  activities  of  the  association  should  be  in- 


HESITANT  YEARS  29 

creased.  The  Express,  the  Courier  and  Enquirer >  and  the  Journal  of 
Commerce  were  satisfied  with  things  as  they  were.  Raymond's  Times, 
with  its  policy  of  initiative,  broke  the  deadlock. 

Another  important  factor  appeared.  In  the  earlier  days  of  the 
Morse,  the  swelling  volume  of  news  had  been  a  nightmare  for  editors 
who  found  their  antiquated  printing  equipment  incapable  of  handling 
it.  Machinery  had  failed  to  keep  pace  with  the  abruptly  increased  speed 
and  volume  of  news.  Just  as  the  trouble  was  becoming  acute,  Robert 
M.  Hoe  discovered  that  the  secret  of  rapid  printing  was  to  take  the 
type  from  the  flat  bed  on  which  it  had  reposed  so  many  centuries  and 
put  it  on  a  cylinder.  His  first  rotary  press  appeared  two  years  before 
The  Associated  Press  was  founded,  but  only  now  was  the  improved 
equipment  replacing  outmoded  machinery  in  the  plants  of  the  larger 
papers. 

The  revolving  cylinder  brought  an  era  of  faster  editions,  larger 
papers,  and  a  greater  use  of  news. 

Activities  of  news  pirates  and  bids  of  short-lived  opposition  agencies 
failed  to  check  The  Associated  Press  and  the  number  of  subscriber 
papers  increased  as  urban  centers  enlarged.  Payments  from  these  "out- 
side" sources  supplied  funds  for  expansion  and  at  the  same  time  made 
it  possible  for  the  seven  New  York  members  to  receive  a  steadily  larger 
report  at  a  fraction  of  the  expense  that  would  have  been  necessary  had 
the  news  organization  been  restricted  to  New  York  alone. 

Gradually  the  subscriber  papers  began  to  gravitate  into  loosely 
defined  geographical  groups.  Two  major  reasons  prompted  the  rise  of 
these  groups.  Their  news  was  distributed  to  them  on  a  regional  basis, 
and  a  regional  grouping  facilitated  their  dealings  with  New  York.  In 
time  these  local  associations  were  referring  to  themselves  by  such  names 
as  the  Philadelphia  Associated  Press,  New  York  State  Associated  Press, 
Southern  Associated  Press,  Western  Associated  Press,  and  the  like. 
Sometimes  the  word  "Associated"  was  omitted  and  the  papers  were 
spoken  of  merely  as  the  Baltimore  Press,  or  the  Southern  Press. 

To  distinguish  the  pareijt  organization  from  these  loosely  formed 
groups,  the  newspaper  world  began  to  speak  of  it  as  the  New  York 
Associated  Press.  It  remained  the  only  association  which  endeavored 
to  obtain  all  important  domestic  and  foreign  news  and  the  others 
looked  to  it  for  coverage  on  everything  outside  their  various  geograph- 
ical divisions. 

The  telegraph  slowly  expanded,  but  Craig  never  completely  aban- 
doned a  belief  that  his  organization  should  take  over  communications 


30  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

facilities  as  subsidiary.  He  saw  the  telegraph  as  a  logical  "tail  to  The 
Associated  Press  kite."  He  feared  the  attempts  of  the  telegraph  com- 
panies to  gather  and  sell  news.  Under  the  pretext  of  necessity — and  he 
had  a  free  hand  most  of  the  time — he  went  as  far  as  he  dared  in  efforts 
to  convert  the  association's  members  to  his  point  of  view.  Once,  to 
assure  delivery  of  his  news  without  interference,  he  took  a  half  interest 
in  a  line  for  a  small  amount  and  disposed  of  it  in  a  few  years  at  a 
profit  of  $100,000.  He  subsequently  helped  build  other  lines  and  con- 
trolled them  temporarily  in  his  capacity  as  general  agent. 

Dealing  with  the  staff,  he  had  considerably  more  success  in  en- 
forcing his  views.  He  was  a  stickler  for  correctness  and  insisted  his  men 
be  likewise.  He  knew  that  it  was  a  general  practice  for  a  reporter  in 
one  city  to  telegraph  a  few  lines  on  the  main  facts  of  an  event,  leaving 
it  to  an  imaginative  editor  on  the  receiving  end  to  "blow  up"  the  story 
into  several  hundred  words  with  whatever  "details"  came  to  mind. 
Craig  issued  orders  that  if  a  story  was  important  enough  to  warrant 
details  the  details  were  worth  the  wire  costs.  The  rule  shocked  an  ex- 
perienced "telegraph  reporter,"  who  protested  that  editors  did  not 
know  the  difference  between  real  and  imaginary  news.  But  the  re- 
porter did  not  raise  the  point  a  second  time.  He  did  things  Craig's 
way. 

Another  reform  was  the  end  to  the  practice  of  sending  news  re- 
ports in  bewildering  codes  or  highly  skeletonized  jumbles.  Codes  and 
ciphers  had  been  the  first  reaction  to  the  high  cost  of  telegraphy.  With 
words  costing  so  much  each,  an  attempt  was  made  to  compress  phrases 
and  even  parts  of  sentences  into  one  polysyllabic  combination.  This 
produced  such  amazing  "words"  as  caserovingedsable,  hoveesness, 
rehoeingedableness,  and  retackmentativeness.  Craig  put  a  stop  to  that. 
He  ordered  all  the  association's  dispatches  sent  in  full,  and  woe  betide 
telegraph  men  who  took  liberties  with  them.  The  change  was  a  nine-day 
wonder  in  the  newspaper  world. 


In  1856  Craig  pointed  out  to  the  seven  New  York  member  papers 
that  it  was  dangerous  for  the  association  tq  continue  operations  without 
more  definitely  defined  rules  of  procedure.  A  meeting  was  held  on 
October  21  and  out  of  it  came  a  formal  reorganization  which  set  the 
association  on  a  more  businesslike  basis,  promulgated  a  code  of  regula- 
tions and  redefined  methods.  The  reorganization  emphasized  the  essen- 


HESITANT  YEARS  31 

tially  selfish  purpose  of  the  association.  It  was  a  union  of  seven  morning 
papers — there  were  still  few  afternoon  editions — and  the  news  collected 
was  designed  solely  to  meet  their  needs,  without  any  consideration  for 
the  wants  of  subscriber  papers.  The  subscribers,  in  effect,  were  journal- 
istic vassals  who  dutifully  paid  tribute  for  such  news  as  their  New  York 
overlords  saw  fit  to  provide. 

One  of  the  outstanding  results  of  the  reorganization  was  an  order 
to  the  general  agent  to  establish  the  first  two  formal  Associated  Press 
bureaus  in  the  United  States — at  Washington  and  Albany.  The  associa- 
tion already  had  correspondents  in  most  major  centers  and  now  it  was 
logical  to  establish  them  in  offices  and  to  provide,  in  some  cases,  for 
assistants. 

The  Washington  bureau,  or  "agency"  as  it  was  called,  was  put  in 
charge  of  Lawrence  Augustus  Gobright,  a  veteran  who  had  been  re- 
porting the  capital's  news  for  The  Associated  Press  since  1848.  He  had 
been  a  familiar  newspaper  figure  since  the  dim,  half-forgotten  days  of 
Clay,  Webster,  and  Calhoun.  His  service  had  been  so  long  that  they 
called  him  "Father"  Gobright,  though  he  was  not  yet  forty. 

With  authority  better  defined,  Craig  did  not  hesitate  to  crack  down 
vigorously.  Even  James  Gordon  Bennett  had  no  immunity  and  twice 
when  he  was  disciplined  by  the  general  agent  he  threatened  to  with- 
draw the  Herald  from  membership.  There  was  little  attempt  to  dis- 
guise the  fact  that  the  object  of  the  association  was  to  create  and  per- 
petuate a  news  monopoly,  and  Craig  bluntly  stated:  "We  succeeded  and 
compelled  the  editors  to  abandon  their  arrangements  and  come  into 


ours." 


However  much  he  might  be  occupied  with  the  details  of  adminis- 
tration, the  general  agent  never  forgot  that  his  prime  concern  was  news 
— lifeblood  of  the  association.  He  had  been  compelled  to  devote  most  of 
his  time  to  the  development  of  domestic  news,  but  he  retained  a  keen 
interest  in  the  European  budget.  When  he  left  Halifax  he  had  com- 
missioned William  Hunter,  a  resourceful,  pugnacious  man  like  himself, 
to  represent  The  Associated  Press.  Craig  could  find  no  fault  with  the 
way  the  foreign  news  was  sent  to  New  York  once  it  reached  Canadian 
soil.  But  all  of  Hunter's  efforts  and  all  the  swiftness  of  the  telegraph 
could  not  change  the  fact  that  European  news  was  weeks  late.  The 
telegraph  had  conquered  the  land  but  not  the  seas.  Any  news  report 
was  a  mixture  of  fresh  domestic  intelligence  and  stale  date  lines  from 
abroad. 


III.  "WE  WILL  GO  ON" 

IT  WAS  the  evening  of  August  17,  1858.  President  Buchanan,  in  shirt 
sleeves,  examined  a  remarkable  message  before  him  and  drummed  his 
fingers  on  the  arm  of  his  chair.  He  was  sixty-eight  and  on  this  occa- 
sion he  looked  it  because  of  the  sultry  heat  of  summer.  Members  of 
the  Cabinet  lounged  about  the  White  House  study.  The  secretary  of 
the  treasury,  Howell  Cobb,  relaxed  on  a  sofa,  shook  his  head  in  dis- 
belief for  the  dozenth  time.  It  was  a  hoax,  he  declared,  and  in  these 
days  of  growing  agitation  there  was  sufficient  deceit  in  the  land  without 
swallowing  another  fraud. 

The  brief,  unexplained  message  purported  to  be  a  greeting  com- 
posed abroad  only  that  day  by  Queen  Victoria  and  already  delivered  in 
Washington  to  the  President  of  the  United  States! 

Everyone,  however,  did  not  agree  that  the  message  was  a  hoax. 
The  messenger  said  he  had  come  from  Agent  Gobright  of  The  Asso- 
ciated Press.  Moreover,  there  had  been  word  from  Cyrus  Field  a  fort- 
night before  that  he  had  brought  the  North  American  end  of  his 
Atlantic  cable  ashore  at  Trinity  Bay,  linking  Newfoundland  and  Va- 
lentia,  Ireland.  Buchanan  read  the  message  again: 

THE  QUEEN  DESIRES  TO  CONGRATULATE  THE 
PRESIDENT  UPON  THE  SUCCESSFUL  COMPLETION  OP 
THE  GREAT  INTERNATIONAL  WORK,  IN  WHICH  THE 
QUEEN  HAS  TAKEN  THE  GREATEST  INTEREST. 

That  was  what  the  message  said  and  Secretary  of  the  Interior 
Thompson,  most  active  of  the  indolent  group,  had  been  dispatched  to 
the  Associated  Press  office  to  find  out  the  truth  of  the  matter.  The 
Cabinet  idled  on  until  he  returned  with  Gobright,  who  soon  cleared  up 
the  puzzle. 

The  greeting  had,  in  truth,  come  by  Field's  new  cable  under  the 
ocean  from  Valentia  to  Trinity  Bay,  and  thence  by  land  telegraph  from 
Newfoundland.  It  had  been  received  from  Field  along  with  other  mes- 
sages to  The  Associated  Press.  Although  it  was  unknown  at  the  time, 
the  one-sentence  message  did  not  contain  all  that  the  queen  had  said. 
The  following  addition  came  through  the  next  day: 

32 


"WE  WILL  Go  ON"  33 

. . .  THE  QUEEN  IS  CONVINCED  THAT  THE 
PRESIDENT  WILL  JOIN  WITH  HER  IN  FERVENTLY 
HOPING  THAT  THE  ELECTRIC  CABLE,  WHICH  NOW  AL- 
READY CONNECTS  GREAT  BRITAIN  WITH  THE  UNITED 
STATES,  WILL  PROVE  AN  ADDITIONAL  LINK  BETWEEN 
THE  TWO  NATIONS,  WHOSE  FRIENDSHIP  IS  FOUNDED 
UPON  THEIR  COMMON  INTERESTS  AND  RECIPROCAL 
ESTEEM.   THE  QUEEN  HAS  MUCH  PLEASURE  IN  THUS 
DIRECTLY  COMMUNICATING  WITH  THE  PRESIDENT,  AND 
IN  RENEWING  TO  HIM  HER  BEST  WISHES  FOR  THE 
PROSPERITY  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES. 

The  President  and  his  perspiring  Cabinet  finally  were  persuaded 
as  to  the  authenticity  of  the  Queen's  brief  greeting  and  the  chief 
executive  drafted  a  reply  which  he  asked  Gobright  to  send. 

"I'll  make  a  copy,"  the  agent  told  the  President,  *"and  keep  the 
original." 

Secretary  Cobb,  still  at  ease  on  the  sofa,  felt  that  the  original  should 
be  deposited  in  the  public  archives.  But  Gobright  wanted  it  for  him- 
self and  the  President  made  the  decision. 

"It's  yours,  sir,"  he  said. 

The  correspondent  glanced  at  the  first  official  message  ever  to  be 
cabled  from  this  country  and  hurried  along  to  follow  Buchanan's  re- 
quest. The  message,  which  Gobright  later  donated  to  a  historical  col- 
lection, read: 

THE  PRESIDENT  CORDIALLY  RECIPROCATES  THE 
CONGRATULATIONS  OF  HER  MAJESTY  THE  QUEEN  ON  THE 
SUCCESS  OF  THE  GREAT  INTERNATIONAL  ENTERPRISE 
ACCOMPLISHED  BY  THE  SKILL,  SCIENCE  AND  INDOM- 
ITABLE ENERGY  OF  THE  TWO  COUNTRIES.   IT  IS  A 
TRIUMPH  MORE  GLORIOUS  BECAUSE  FAR  MORE  USEFUL 
TO  MANKIND  THAN  WAS  EVER  WON  BY  A  CONQUEROR  ON 
THE  FIELD  OF  BATTLE.   MAY  THE  ATLANTIC  TELE- 
GRAPH UNDER  THE  BLESSING  OF  HEAVEN  PROVE  TO  BE 
A  BOND  OF  PERPETUAL  PEACE  AND  FRIENDSHIP  BE- 
TWEEN THE  KINDRED  NATIONS  AND  AN  INSTRUMENT 
DESTINED  BY  DIVINE  PROVIDENCE  TO  PURSUE  ITS 
RELIGION,  CIVILIZATION,  LIBERTY  AND  LAW  THROUGH- 
OUT THE  WORLD.   IN  THIS  VIEW  WILL  NOT  ALL  THE 
NATIONS  OF  CHRISTENDOM  SPONTANEOUSLY  UNITE  IN 
THE  DECLARATION  THAT  IT  SHALL  BE  FOREVER  NEUTRAL 
AND  THAT  ITS  COMMUNICATIONS  SHALL  BE  HELD 
SACRED  IN  PASSING  TO  THE  PLACE  OF  THEIR  DESTI- 
NATION EVEN  IN  THE  MIDST  OF  HOSTILITIES? 

This  had  been  a  casual  incident  in  the  White  House,  but  there  was 
nothing  matter-of-fact  in  the  exuberant  reception  the  nation  gave  the 


34  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

news  that  Field  had  succeeded  after  two  costly  failures.  Papers  clarioned 
the  triumph  by  which  Europe  and  America  were  linked  by  one  slender 
wire  snaking  across  the  bottom  of  the  Atlantic.  In  New  York  Bennett's 
Herald  shouted  its  loudest,  and  city  after  city  joined  in  the  plans  for  a 
nation-wide  celebration  on  September  i.  Field  was  toasted,  given  medals 
and  lionized.  Cannon  boomed,  bells  rang,  and  whistles  shrieked.  There 
were  parades,  dinners,  and  fireworks.  Poets  wrote  flowery  odes  and  red- 
faced  orators  declaimed  on  the  new  union  of  the  two  continents.  Gen- 
eral Agent  Craig  was  personally  very  happy.  He  felt  that  the  cable 
would  immediately  solve  the  problem  of  slow  receipt  of  foreign  news. 
In  the  midst  of  this  great  rejoicing  the  first  European  cable  news  in 
the  history  of  the  world  spanned  the  Atlantic.  It  was  addressed  to  The 
Associated  Press.  The  essence  of  condensation,  it  read: 

EMPEROR  OF  PRANCE  RETURNED  TO  PARIS  SATUR- 
DAY.  KING  OP  PRUSSIA  TOO  ILL  TO  VISIT  QUEEN 
VICTORIA.   HER  MAJESTY  RETURNS  TO  ENGLAND  31ST 
AUGUST.   SETTLEMENT  OF  CHINESE  QUESTION:  CHINESE 
EMPIRE  OPENS  TO  TRADE;  CHRISTIAN  RELIGION  AL- 
LOWED.  MUTINY  BEING  QUELLED,  ALL  INDIA  BECOM- 
ING TRANQUIL. 

The  next  day,  August  28,  the  station  on  the  North  American  main- 
land was  answering  with  a  budget  of  American  news  which  included 
yellow  fever  statistics  from  the  South  and  brief  details  of  the  plans  for 
formal  celebration  of  the  successful  cable. 

But  cable  signals  were  growing  fainter  and  the  operators  were  find- 
ing it  difficult  to  understand  them.  The  message  was  long  in  transit. 
There  were  uneasy  periods  during  which  the  two  stations  could  not  hear 
each  other  and  then,  just  as  the  September  celebration  was  at  its  height, 
the  last  faint  signals  came  over  the  lines. 

The  cable  was  dead. 

The  disappointment  was  tremendous.  Those  who  had  most  loudly 
acclaimed  Cyrus  Field  and  his  assistants  damned  the  cable  as  a  gigantic 
hoax.  They  claimed  that  no  messages  ever  had  been  received  or  trans- 
mitted. There  even  was  talk  that  the  cable  was  a  subterfuge  for  a  stock- 
selling  swindle.  But  the  line  was  dead  and  The  Associated  Press  was 
forced  to  lay  aside  its  hurriedly  formulated  plans  for  use  of  the  new 
link  in  international  communications.  The  old  reliable  newsboats  con- 
tinued their  assignments  off  Halifax  and  Cape  Race. 

Field  met  dejectedly  with  the  directors  of  his  company  soon  after 
the  blow  had  fallen.  Large  sums  of  money  had  been  lost  and  the 


"WE  WILL  Go  ON"  35 

failure  would  make  it  difficult  to  find  public  backing  for  another  at- 
tempt. Peter  Cooper,  the  noted  inventor,  threw  a  consoling  arm  over 
Field's  shoulder.  As  a  director  of  the  cable  company,  he  had  invested 
heavily  in  the  venture. 

"Do  not  give  up  hope,"  he  said,  "we  will  go  on." 
But  black  thunderheads  were  filling  the  horizon.  The  storm  was 
inevitable  and  when  its  fury  broke  the  nation  and  its  news  gatherers  had 
little  attention  for  Field  or  his  persevering  efforts.  The  storm  had  been 
brewing  a  long  while.  Its  first  cloud  had  appeared  over  Jamestown, 
Virginia,  one  August  day  two  hundred  and  forty-nine  years  before. 
John  Rolfe,  husband  of  the  Indian  princess  Pocahontas,  had  recorded 
the  fact: 

About  the  last  of  August,  came  in  a  Dutch  man  of  Warre  that  sold  us 
twenty  negars. 


IV.  BUGLES  BLOW 


WHAT  would  Lincoln  do? 

General  Agent  Craig  stood  at  the  news  pulse  of  the  anxious  na- 
tion in  the  large,  dingy,  carpetless  headquarters  of  The  Associated  Press 
in  New  York.  He  weighed  the  question.  The  mass  of  dispatches  in  his 
hand  was  far  from  reassuring  that  gloomy  November  day  of  1860. 
They  told  of  southern  students  quitting  classes  at  Harvard  to  return 
home,  of  the  Richmond  Enquirer  screaming  "An  Act  of  War"  at  Lin- 
coln's election  as  President,  and  of  General  Scott's  warning  on  the 
dangers  of  secession.  National  tension  was  mounting  hourly  and  Craig 
debated  his  problem. 

Some  persons  felt  that  the  whole  tide  of  sectional  differences  arose 
because  a  humanitarian  North  wished  to  free  the  slaves  of  a  feudal 
South,  but  hardheaded  Craig  could  see  there  was  more  to  it  than  that. 
There  were  fundamental  differences  in  the  two  sections  and  long  years 
of  ignorance  had  not  helped  to  bring  about  an  understanding.  The  dif- 
ferences between  the  two  suspicious,  badly  informed  sections  were  too 
many  to  be  overcome.  A  truthful,  alert  press  would  have  helped,  but 
much  of  the  press  had  been  anything  but  that.  The  warped,  fanatical 
opinions  and  the  twisted  reports  in  news  columns,  North  and  South, 
were  almost  as  much  to  blame  as  any  other  single  factor.  In  this  atmos- 
phere of  sectional  recrimination,  Craig  knew  it  was  too  late  to  do  any- 
thing about  the  shortcomings  of  the  past.  The  day  had  not  yet  arrived 
when  newspapers  drew  a  distinct  line  between  the  news  columns  and  the 
editorial  page,  but  he  intended  to  use  his  influence  to  prevent  distortion 
of  Associated  Press  reports. 

Craig  could  not  recall  when  a  president-elect  had  assumed  such 
sudden  importance  in  the  destinies  of  the  country.  Overnight  the  home 
of  the  furrow-faced  lawyer  in  Springfield,  Illinois,  had  become  the 
focal  point  for  a  troubled  people's  attention.  In  1852  and  again  in 
1856  the  general  agent  had  found  that  successful  candidates  produced 
news  only  occasionally  in  the  preinaugural  months  and  consequently 
required  only  casual  attention.  But  with  Lincoln  it  was  different.  Craig 

36 


BUGLES  BLOW  37 

decided  the  time  had  come  when  the  association  must  keep  a  corre- 
spondent constantly  with  the  President-elect. 

The  unprecedented  assignment  went  to  a  25-year-old  Mid-wes- 
terner, Henry  Villard,  who  was  excited  by  his  novel  and  important  mis- 
sion. He  received  a  warm  welcome  at  Springfield.  Lincoln  held  many 
conferences  those  fateful  weeks  and  Villard  reported  them  all.  It  be- 
came known  that  the  President-elect  would  accept  almost  any  com- 
promise with  the  disaffected  southern  states  except  one  sanctioning  ex- 
tension of  slavery  to  the  territories  not  yet  ready  for  admission  to  the 
Union.  That  stirred  up  a  furor  5  then  the  announcement  of  some  mem- 
bers of  his  Cabinet  brought  another  blast  of  condemnation. 

Villard  reported  the  facts,  but  no  facts  during  those  preinaugural 
days  could  stay  the  relentless  march  of  events.  On  December  20,  1860, 
South  Carolina  adopted  the  first  ordinance  of  secession  and  the  Charles- 
ton Mercury  shouted:  "The  Union  Is  Dissolved."  Before  1861  was  a 
week  old  other  states  followed  and  the  office  at  Broadway  and  Liberty 
was  flooded  with  dispatches  which  told  of  the  seizure  of  federal  arsenals 
and  forts,  of  regiments  being  raised,  of  bellicose  speeches. 

Lincoln  stood  on  the  train  platform  at  Springfield  and  looked  down 
into  the  faces  of  the  group  of  friends  gathered  to  bid  him  good-bye  as 
he  left  for  Washington.  He  was  somber  with  worry  and  the  demon- 
stration touched  him.  In  a  few  brief  sentences  he  said  farewell.  The 
speech  caught  Villard  unprepared  and  as  soon  as  the  train  pulled  out 
the  Associated  Press  man  came  to  him  and  explained  his  predicament. 
Lincoln  reached  out,  took  the  correspondent's  pad  and  pencil,  and 
while  the  train  jolted  eastward  he  carefully  set  down  the  words  he  had 
spoken.  At  the  first  telegraph  station  Villard  filed  the  dispatch,  which 
concluded  with  the  eloquent  words  of  Lincoln's  parting: 

MY  FRIENDS,  NO  ONE  NOT  IN  MY  POSITION  CAN 
APPRECIATE  THE  SADNESS  I  PEEL  AT  THIS  PARTING. 
TO  THIS  PEOPLE  I  OWE  ALL  THAT  I  AM.   HERE  I 
HAVE  LIVED  MORE  THAN"  A  QUARTER  OP  A  CENTURY; 
HERE  MY  CHILDREN  WERE  BORN  AND  ONE  OP  THEM  LIES 
BURIED.   I  KNOW  NOT  HOW  SOON  I  SHALL  SEE  YOU 
AGAIN.   A  DUTY  DEVOLVES  ON  ME  WHICH  IS,  PER- 
HAPS, GREATER  THAN  THAT  WHICH  HAS  DEVOLVED 
UPON  ANY  OTHER  MAN  SINCE  THE  DAYS  OP  WASHING- 
TON.  HE  NEVER  WOULD  HAVE  SUCCEEDED  EXCEPT  POR 
THE  AID  OP  DIVINE  PROVIDENCE,  UPON  WHICH  HE  AT 
ALL  TIMES  RELIED.   I  PEEL  THAT  I  CANNOT  SUC- 
CEED WITHOUT  THE  SAME  DIVINE  AID  WHICH  SUS- 
TAINED HIM,  AND  IN  THE  SAME  ALMIGHTY  BEING  I 
PLACE  MY  RELIANCE  POR  SUPPORT; AND  I  HOPE  YOU, 


38  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

MY  FRIENDS,  WILL  ALL  PRAY  THAT  I  MAY  RECEIVE 
THAT  DIVINE  ASSISTANCE,  WITHOUT  WHICH  I  CANNOT 
SUCCEED,  BUT  WITH  WHICH  SUCCESS  IS  CERTAIN. 
AGAIN  I  BID  YOU  ALL  AN  AFFECTIONATE  FAREWELL. 

It  was  easy  for  many  newspapers  to  overlook  that  little  speech  in 
the  thickening  sheaf  of  dispatches  that  passed  over  Craig's  desk  that  raw 
February.  Jefferson  Davis  was  inaugurated  the  first  President  of  the 
Confederate  States  of  America.  In  Charleston  harbor  guns  under  the 
brave  new  palmetto  flag  pointed  menacingly  across  the  water  toward 
Fort  Sumter.  "The  Southern  Excitement"  or  "The  Southern  Troubles" 
became  standing  headlines  in  the  North,  and  the  secession  spirit  spread 
even  to  New  York  where  the  council  was  asked  to  declare  Manhattan 
a  free  city,  independent  of  the  wrangling  states. 

On  a  melancholy  March  day  the  telegraph  clicked  and  the  story 
went  chattering  into  scores  of  newspaper  offices  that  the  one-time  rail 
splitter  had  taken  his  oath  of  office.  Then  came  the  text  of  the  inaugural 
address  with  its  somber  admonition:  "In  your  hands,  my  dissatisfied 
fellow  countrymen,  and  not  in  mine,  is  the  momentous  issue  of  civil 
war."  Word  for  word  the  document  went  to  Associated  Press  members 
and  clients.  Lincoln  had  furnished  his  own  printed  copy  with  its  nu- 
merous corrections  and  extensive  interlineations  so  that  it  might  be 
telegraphed  in  full. 

March  swept  on  into  April  and  there  was  nothing  to  report  except 
that  the  tense  nation  hovered  on  the  brink.  The  animosities  did  not 
appear  to  have  touched  all  the  people  everywhere,  and  in  the  Asso- 
ciated Press  office  at  Louisville,  headquarters  for  the  South,  a  repre- 
sentative of  the  client  papers  below  Mason  and  Dixon's  line  still  worked 
amicably  enough  with  old  Tyler,  the  Yankee  agent  there.  The  duty 
of  the  southern  representative  was  to  select  from  the  incoming  tele- 
graph report  of  the  New  York  Associated  Press  a  daily  budget  of  news 
for  his  own  subscribers. 

Then,  at  Washington,  Gobright  obtained  the  first  authentic  story 
of  the  administration's  complete  policy  toward  the  seceded  states — and 
two  days  later  the  four  long,  red  years  began. 

They  began,  not  in  Washington,  but  miles  southward.  It  was  four- 
thirty  in  the  morning  of  April  12,  1861.  The  agent  at  Charleston 
watched  a  signal  rocket  arch  out  over  the  harbor  toward  the  Union 
garrison  of  Fort  Sumter  and  a  second  later  saw  the  first  Confederate 
shell  go  screaming  across  the  water.  He  sent  his  dispatch.  Thirty-four 


BUGLES  BLOW  39 

hours  later  he  reported  the  fort's  surrender  and  in  New  York  Bennett 
wrote  an  editorial  in  a  single  line:  "Civil  War  has  begun." 

Resourceful  as  Craig  might  be,  he  had  no  precedent  on  which  to 
model  the  activities  of  the  association.  The  technique  for  reporting  mili- 
tary action  had  to  be  learned  by  trial  and  error.  Even  by  the  loose 
standards  of  the  day  the  number  of  experienced  reporters  in  the  service 
was  few,  for  most  of  the  agents  who  manned  Craig's  scattered  outposts 
had  been  chosen  primarily  because  of  their  ability  to  use  the  telegraph. 
Battles  were  not  fought  conveniently  in  the  backyard  of  telegraph  offices 
and  wire  facilities  were  rambling  and  insufficient. 

Thus  far,  however,  the  agents  were  acquitting  themselves  well. 
Through  the  worried  weeks  since  the  1860  election,  while  the  crisis 
mounted  and  prejudices  ran  wild,  their  dispatches,  even  as  read  now, 
show  factual  directness  and  great  restraint.  These  were  the  days  of 
flowery,  declamatory  journalism,  and  frequently  the  correspondents  for 
individual  papers  wrote  with  undisguised  bias.  In  the  news  columns, 
side  by  side  with  such  excitable  accounts,  the  association's  dispatches 
seemed  strangely  calm,  direct,  and  terse.  As  the  long  bloody  miles  to 
Appomattox  unrolled,  many  a  successful  skirmish  was  hailed  by  writers 
representing  one  journal  or  another  as  "a  glorious,  overwhelming  vic- 
tory," and  many  a  sorry  rout  excused  as  "a  strategic  withdrawal  before 
a  vastly  superior  enemy."  But  somehow  Craig's  agents  managed  to  cling 
close  to  a  factual  sanity  and  keep  their  dispatches  reasonably  free  of 
gaudy,  artificial  heroics. 

Gobright  summed  up  the  creed  effectively: 

My  business  is  to  communicate  facts;  my  instructions  do  not  allow 
me  to  make  any  comment  upon  the  facts  which  I  communicate.  My  dis- 
patches are  sent  to  papers  of  all  manner  of  politics,  and  the  editors  say  they 
are  able  to  make  their  own  comments  upon  the  facts  which  are  sent  them. 
I  therefore  confine  myself  to  what  I  consider  legitimate  news.  I  do  not  act 
as  a  politician  belonging  to  any  school,  but  try  to  be  truthful  and  impartial. 
My  dispatches  are  merely  dry  matters  of  fact  and  detail.  Some  special  cor- 
respondents may  write  to  suit  the  temper  of  their  organs.  Although  I  try 
to  write  without  regard  to  men  or  politics,  I  do  not  always  escape  censure. 

On  April  15,  1861,  Lincoln  called  for  75,000  militia  "to  suppress 
obstructions  to  Federal  laws  in  the  seceded  states,"  and  in  Boston  the 
bells  rang  all  day.  Jefferson  Davis  retorted  with  an  appeal  for  42,000 
men  to  serve  in  the  ranks  of  the  Confederacy,  and  the  South  dreamed 
of  a  short,  glorious  fight  to  victory.  In  New  York  a  mob  marched  on  the 
Journal  of  Commerce  demanding  that  Gerard  Hallock,  its  pacifist 


40  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

editor  and  president  of  The  Associated  Press,  display  the  union  em- 
blem. He  quickly  did  so.  Earlier  the  crowd  had  marched  down  to  Ful- 
ton Street,  where  Bennett  was  not  quite  so  well  prepared.  While  they 
stormed  the  Herald's  door  and  shouted  threats,  the  agitated  office  staff 
sought  frantically  for  a  flag  and  the  nervous  publisher  paced  the  floor. 
The  frenzied  search  failed  to  produce  a  banner  and  an  office  boy  was 
sent  out  the  back  door  to  the  nearest  Broadway  department  store.  The 
crowd's  temper  had  reached  the  boiling  point  by  the  time  the  youngster 
returned.  The  hastily  purchased  Stars  and  Stripes  was  broken  out  from 
a  flagpole  and  then  Bennett  himself  appeared  smiling  at  the  window. 

War  fever  spread,  and  North  or  South  it  was:  Follow  the  Flag  or 
Wear  Petticoats. 

Then  two  awkward,  amateur  armies  met  near  Bull  Run  in  the 
blazing  heat  of  July  21.  The  sloppy  blue  lines  rolled  forward  in  a 
fumbling  attack  which  nevertheless  seemed  assured  of  victory  and  an 
officer  in  gray  was  shouting:  "Look!  There  stands  Jackson  like  a  stone 
wall!"  To  Washington  by  courier  and  telegram  went  the  exultant 
prediction  of  triumph  and  a  raw  agent  with  the  Union  Army,  after 
seeing  the  Confederate  forces  so  badly  hammered,  set  off  for  the  capital 
at  a  mad  gallop  with  the  details  of  the  unfinished  battle.  It  was  his  first 
experience  under  fire  and  he  was  so  unstrung  when  he  reached  Wash- 
ington that  he  was  unable  to  write  his  account.  Gobright  took  charge, 
pieced  the  story  together,  and  dispatched  the  first  eyewitness  account 
to  New  York.  He  started  writing  at  nine  o'clock  that  night  and  it 
was  after  eleven  before  he  finished. 

The  distraught  correspondent  would  have  preferred  some  whisky 
for  his  nerves,  but  Gobright  ordered  the  telegraph  line  kept  open  and 
dragged  his  tired  companion  off  to  seek  later  arrivals  from  the  field 
who  might  have  additional  news.  It  was  just  then  that  the  first  panic- 
stricken  fugitives  began  to  straggle  into  the  city  and  from  them  Go- 
bright  learned  the  incredible  news  that  the  tide  of  battle  had  turned, 
transforming  an  apparent  Union  victory  into  decisive  Union  defeat.  The 
details  were  sketchy  but  enough  to  send  Gobright  racing  for  the  tele- 
graph office  to  dispatch  a  description  of  the  reversal  of  federal  fortunes; 

Gobright  counted  himself  lucky  in  having  held  his  night  wire  open 
long  enough  to  obtain  and  send  such  important  information,  but  the 
next  day  he  discovered  that  not  a  single  paper  had  printed  his  mo- 
mentous story  of  the  Union  defeat.  Instead,  they  had  printed  only  the 
earlier  material  brought  in  by  the  field  correspondent. 

The  North  was  hailing  this  incomplete  report  as  the  first  "glorious 


BUGLES  BLOW  41 

victory"  for  the  Union  and  the  exuberant  populace  was  celebrating  with 
clanging  bells  and  wild  hurrahs.  Gobright  learned  what  had  happened. 
As  soon  as  Winfield  Scott,  general  in  chief  of  the  northern  forces,  had 
heard  of  the  disastrous  turn  in  the  battle's  t;de  he  dispatched  a  rider  to 
the  telegraph  office  with  orders  to  prevent  the  transmission  of  any 
word  of  the  defeat.  Gobright's  story  never  had  left  the  wire  company's 
office.  It  was  the  first  instance  of  official  censorship,  but  it  was  an  unmis- 
takable warning  of  what  was  to  come. 


The  war  was  on  in  grim  earnest  and  the  federal  government, 
lacking  an  adequate  telegraph  service  of  its  own,  commandeered  the 
facilities  of  The  Associated  Press  to  handle  military  communications. 
This  imposed  a  heavy  handicap  on  the  association.  Henceforth  military 
messages  took  precedence  and  the  flow  of  news  was  increasingly  re- 
stricted as  the  volume  of  these  messages  grew.  Craig  saw  one  advantage 
to  be  gained.  His  agents  would  be  brought  into  close  daily  contact  with 
the  army  and  since  many  of  them  were  telegraphers,  they  frequently 
would  be  privy  to  the  contents  of  the  messages  they  handled.  Craig 
felt  confident  that  in  this  way  his  men  in  the  various  cities  would  be 
able  to  keep  well  informed  of  facts  throughout  a  war  which  already 
was  spawning  endless  rumors  and  alarms. 

But  the  campaigns  were  not  fought  in  the  cities,  and  Craig 
methodically  set  out  to  organize  his  corps  of  war  correspondents  to 
accompany  the  Union  armies  into  the  field.  He  began  recruiting  new 
men  and  dispatching  them  to  the  ill-defined  fronts  which  were  slowly 
taking  shape — to  Missouri,  to  Kentucky,  to  the  strategic  points  along  the 
Ohio,  to  West  Virginia  where  the  cocky  star  of  McClellan  had  started 
its  rise,  and  into  Virginia  where  the  Bonnie  Blue  Flag  whipped  defiantly 
over  the  Confederate  outposts.  His  preparations  went  ahead  independ- 
ent of  the  pretentious  individual  efforts  of  the  New  York  publishers. 

For  the  first  time  in  many  years  the  hurried  plans  of  the  jour- 
nalistic powers  were  minus  the  loud  and  bullying  influence  of  one 
famous  old  personality.  James  Watson  Webb  no  longer  was  on  the 
scene.  He  had  disposed  of  his  paper  and  it  was  consolidated  with  the 
newly  founded  World,  which  acquired  the  Courier's  Associated  Press 
membership.  The  indefatigable  Bennett  was  mapping  a  coverage  cam- 
paign which  cost  him  $525,000  and  put  sixty  Herald  correspondents  in 
the  field.  Greeley's  Tribune,  Raymond's  Times,  and  the  others  likewise 


42  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

were  assembling  their  forces.  The  private  news  armies  they  marshaled 
were  large,  but  Craig's  forces  were  even  more  numerous.  One  of  the 
Herald's  staff,  surveying  the  war  zones,  wrote:  "The  special  corre- 
spondents of  the  several  New  York  papers  are  nearly  if  not  quite  as 
numerous  as  the  agents  of  The  Associated  Press." 

They  were  a  picturesque  lot,  these  correspondents,  some  smooth- 
shaven  youths,  some  with  long  Quakerlike  beards,  some  mustached  in 
the  approved  style  of  the  day.  Kossuth  hats  and  fancy  vests  were  uni- 
versal favorites  and  all  wore  stiff  collars.  Campaign  kits  were  not 
elaborate — revolver,  field  glasses,  notebook,  blanket,  haversack — 
although  a  good  mount  was  indispensable.  For  the  risks  and  arduous 
living  demanded,  the  monetary  return  was  not  great.  Salaries  ranged 
from  $10  to  $25  a  week  for  the  men  in  the  field,  out  of  which  they  had 
to  pay  their  own  expenses,  to  a  maximum  of  $35  for  key  men  in  such 
centers  as  Washington  and  Louisville.  General  Agent  Craig  received 
$3,OOO  annually. 

From  the  flatlands  of  Virginia  to  the  muddy  Mississippi  unsea- 
soned armies  maneuvered  and  feinted  for  advantage.  But  before  an- 
other major  battle  followed  the  rout  of  Bull  Run  there  was  trouble  on 
the  home  front  which  ended  the  career  of  Gerard  Hallock,  president  of 
The  Associated  Press  since  its  foundation. 

Under  Hallock's  personal  direction,  the  Journal  of  Commerce  had 
been  outspoken  in  its  opposition  to  the  Lincoln  administration  and  the 
prosecution  of  "the  present  unholy  war"  with  the  South.  He  himself 
wrote  most  of  the  editorials  which  so  offended  fiery  Union  supporters. 
With  the  war  fever  at  fanatical  heat,  a  federal  grand  jury  stepped  in 
with  a  presentment  denouncing  the  Journal  of  Commerce  as  disloyal 
and  recommending  that  the  paper  be  prosecuted  along  with  several 
others.  Later  it  was  said  that  the  foreman  of  the  jury  had  reason  to 
nurse  a  grudge  against  Hallock  because  of  the  editor's  refusal  to  accept 
a  bribe  for  publishing  a  "puff."  A  patriotic  boycott  was  unloosed  against 
the  Journal  of  Commerce.  Its  circulation  suffered,  but  Hallock  stuck  to 
his  course,  unmindful  of  threats  against  his  life.  Then  came  the  second 
blow.  The  postmaster  general  barred  the  paper  from  the  mails.  Hal- 
lock  fought  the  order  as  in  violation  of  the  Bill  of  Rights,  but  it  was 
not  revoked  and  the  Journal  of  Commerce  faced  the  certain  loss  of  its 
profitable  out-of-town  circulation.  Its  evening  edition  was  suspended  and 
the  morning  edition  was  distributed  only  to  those  who  did  not  receive 
their  paper  through  the  mail. 

It  was  obvious  that  the  Journal  of  Commerce  could  not  continue  to 


BUGLES  BLOW  43 

publish  under  such  a  handicap  and  so  on  August  31,  1861— the  day  the 
publication  completed  its  thirty-fourth  year— the  editor  stepped  down 
to  save  the  life  of  his  paper.  He  disposed  of  his  interest  to  David  M. 
Stone,  head  of  the  Journal's  commercial  news  department,  and  to 
William  Cowper  Prime,  author  and  traveler,  who  immediately  suc- 
ceeded him  as  president  of  The  Associated  Press.  Beyond  Hallock's 
embarrassment  at  the  stigma  of  "disloyalty"  to  the  Union,  his  retire- 
ment had  no  consequences.  The  beliefs  expressed  in  his  columns  rep- 
resented his  own  personal  feelings  and  were  not  reflected  by  the  press 
association. 

But  Hallock  never  lost  his  absorbing  interest  either  in  the  Journal 
of  Commerce  or  in  The  Associated  Press.  For  the  next  several  years, 
even  after  he  retired  with  his  family  to  Connecticut,  he  watched  news 
gathering  pursue  its  uneven  course.  He  wrote  letters  to  the  editor  and 
from  time  to  time  he  offered  advice  to  his  former  colleagues. 

He  sat  one  winter  afternoon  beside  the  smoldering  fire  in  the 
living  room  of  his  home  overlooking  the  Connecticut  River.  A  blanket 
rested  across  his  legs  and  he  was  intent  on  the  current  edition  of  his 
favorite  paper.  Presently  he  called  the  members  of  his  family  to  join 
him.  He  talked  with  them  of  the  past  and  of  the  future  and  then 
asked  if  he  might  be  alone. 

When  they  returned  ten  minutes  later  the  first  president  of  The 
Associated  Press  was  dead. 


V,  THE  LONG  CAMPAIGN 


NORTH,  south,  east  and  west  men  marched  and  countermarched 
through  1 86 1.  Generally  overlooked  in  those  hectic  days  was  the  part 
the  special  correspondents  of  many  northern  newspapers  were  playing 
by  disclosing  Union  strategy  to  the  Confederacy.  Not  content  with 
attempts  to  get  news  first,  they  tried  to  anticipate  it  and  unwittingly 
served  the  Confederate  cause.  For  a  long  time  their  stories  kept  the 
South  remarkably  well  informed  on  federal  plans.  Southern  spies  in 
the  North  watched  the  newspapers  closely,  forwarding  any  important 
information  they  contained,  sometimes  even  maps  of  projects,  cam- 
paigns, or  fortifications.  In  the  South  this  problem  did  not  develop  so 
acutely.  An  official  agency  supplied  the  papers  there  with  war  news 
and  the  authorities  were  better  able  to  control  the  information  published. 

It  was  not  only  this  aiding  of  the  enemy  that  was  turning  Union 
generals  against  the  war  correspondents  as  a  group.  Too  many  reporters 
were  writing  fantastic,  erroneous  stories.  They  embroidered  "atrocity" 
reports.  They  set  themselves  up  as  experts  in -military  strategy  and 
they  railed  at  any  officer  whose  ideas  on  a  campaign  differed  from  their 
own.  And  woe  to  the  general  who  did  not  acknowledge  their  dignity. 

The  Department  of  the  Cumberland,  the  military  designation  for 
the  area  with  Union  headquarters  at  Louisville,  had  more  than  its 
share  of  these  so-called  correspondents  in  the  autumn  of  1861.  William 
Tecumseh  Sherman,  the  general  commanding,  made  no  attempt  to 
conceal  his  contempt  for  them.  The  only  two  men  he  trusted  were 
quiet  old  Tyler,  the  Associated  Press  agent,  and  Henry  Villard,  who 
had  joined  the  Herald  since  his  preinaugural  press  association  work  with 
Lincoln.  Because  the  government  had  commandeered  the  association's 
telegraph  facilities,  the  Associated  Press  agency  in  Louisville  virtually 
became  a  part-time  headquarters  for  Sherman.  He  was  there  night 
after  night,  tall,  sharp-eyed,  brusquely  abstracted.  When  he  talked  at 
all,  it  was  to  Tyler  or  Villard. 

Sherman  was  worried.  He  saw  that  the  war  would  be  a  long  and 
bloody  one  and  he  was  afraid  the  Confederates  would  seize  the  strategic 

44 


THE  LONG  CAMPAIGN  45 

vantage  points  in  Kentucky  and  along  the  Ohio  before  he  had  sufficient 
men  to  hold  them.  The  special  correspondents  continued  to  ridicule 
him.  One  of  them  wrote  that  Sherman  had  the  manners  of  a  Pawnee 
Indian  and  when  the  general  upbraided  him  the  correspondent  apolo- 
gized in  print — not  to  Sherman,  but  to  the  Indipns! 

Then  many  reporters  for  the  private  press  seized  upon  his  moodi- 
ness  and  whispers  began  to  circulate  that  the  general  was  suffering 
from  mental  depressions,  spells,  and  aberrations.  The  whispers  grew 
until  they  reached  Washington.  Sherman  was  relieved  of  his  command 
and  sent  to  an  inconsequential  "safe"  post  in  Missouri.  Then  on  Decem- 
ber n,  1 86 1,  the  most  abusive  of  all  libels  was  splashed  across  certain 
front  pages.  "General  William  T.  Sherman  Insane!"  was  the  headline 
in  the  Cincinnati  Commercial,  over  a  story  which  began: 

The  painful  intelligence  reaches  us  in  such  form  that  we  are  not  at 
liberty  to  disclose  it,  that  General  William  T.  Sherman,  late  commander 
of  the  Department  of  the  Cumberland,  is  insane.  It  appears  that  he  was  at 
the  time  while  commanding  in  Kentucky  stark  mad. 

.  After  months  under  a  cloud,  Sherman  fought  his  way  back  as 
one  of  the  greatest  military  figures  of  the  war,  but  he  never  forgave 
that  "slanderous  insanity  story."  Two  years  later,  at  Vicksburg,  three 
special  correspondents  were  erroneously  reported  lost.  The  general 
received  the  news  with  caustic  sarcasm.  "That's  good,"  he  exclaimed. 
"We'll  have  dispatches  now  from  hell  before  breakfast." 

Although  Associated  Press  men  themselves  had  nothing  to  do  with 
the  libel,  the  entire  press  without  distinction  suffered  the  consequences 
for  the  remainder  of  the  war.  It  multiplied  the  difficulties  of  obtaining 
official  news  and  it  made  army  officers  openly  hostile.  Associated  Press 
agents  and  other  correspondents  who  tried  to  be  accurate  labored  under 
as  much  disrepute  as  their  careless,  vindictive  colleagues. 

The  first  war  Christmas  passed  and  the  New  Year  came — 1862. 
In  New  York  the  association's  headquarters  had  grown  to  five  rooms 
and  the  office  staff  was  enlarged  to  meet  the  demands  which  had  come 
with  the  conflict.  The  general  agent  had  two  assistants  and  a  corps 
of  six  copyists,  or  manifolders,  who  transcribed  dispatches  by  hand  on 
the  flimsy,  carbon-smeared  tissue  sheets  which  were  distributed  by  four 
messengers  to  members  and  clients  in  the  city. 

Before  the  costly  spring  campaigns  got  under  way  the  truculent 
new  secretary  of  war,  Edwin  M.  Stanton,  clamped  down  on  news 
gathering.  "All  newspapers  publishing  military  news,  however  obtained, 


46  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

not  authorized  by  official  authority,  will  be  excluded  thereafter  from 
receiving  information  by  telegraph  and  from  transmitting  their  publi- 
cations by  railroad."  That  was  his  order,  aimed  primarily  at  the  papers 
which  had  been  disclosing  military  secrets  to  the  enemy.  It  aroused  so 
much  editorial  opposition  that  he  modified  the  regulations  the  next 
day  to  permit  the  publication  of  "past  facts,  leaving  out  details  of 
military  forces,  and  all  statements  from  which  the  number,  position 
and  strength  of  the  military  forces  of  the  United  States  can  be  inferred." 
Editors  continued  to  storm,  but  Stanton  was  not  to  be  trifled  with. 
Already  he  had  thrown  one  special  correspondent  into  prison  and, 
moreover,  he  was  the  wartime  czar  of  both  the  telegraph  and  the 
railroad. 

From  Craig's  agents  in  Virginia  came  accounts  of  defeat  after 
defeat — the  fierce  Peninsular  campaign,  another  rout  at  Bull  Run,  the 
awful  slaughter  at  Antietam,  and  Burnside's  butchery  of  an  army  before 
the  heights  of  Fredericksburg.  Only  from  the  West  came  tidings  to 
relieve  the  Union's  gloom.  A  new  leader,  Ulysses  S.  Grant,  was 
shouldering  his  way  in  a  slam-bang  fashion  through  the  back  door  of 
the  South.  And  that  superannuated  sea  dog,  Admiral  Farragut,  captured 
New  Orleans.  The  London  Times  put  mourning  borders  around  the 
news  when  it  reached  Europe  many  days  later. 

Special  writers  signed  their  accounts  with  fancy  pseudonyms,  but 
there  were  no  "by-lines"  for  the  Associated  Press  agents  on  the  many 
fronts.  Occasionally  a  copyist  might  absently  include  the  name  of  the 
agent  at  the  end  of  a  dispatch — McGregor  with  the  Army  of  the 
Potomac,  Weir  with  the  Army  of  Tennessee,  Tyler  in  Kentucky — but 
those  were  exceptions.  For  every  exception  there  were  hundreds  of 
accounts  which  submerged  the  identities  of  the  men  on  the  battle 
lines  with  the  impersonal  description:  "From  the  Associated  Press 
Agent." 

The  dispatches  which  came  to  the  general  agent  ordinarily  were 
brief.  The  curtailment  of  wire  facilities  limited  his  correspondents  to 
terse  bulletins  on  important  engagements.  These  were  followed  a  day 
or  more  later  by  more  extended  eyewitness  accounts.  In  the  East  the 
agents  often  found  it  quickest  to  jump  a  train  immediately  after  a 
battle  and  write  their  stories  en  route  to  New  York  or  some  intermediate 
city  where  telegraphic  transmission  could  be  arranged.  Sometimes  they 
used  messengers,  sometimes  they  galloped  the  long  miles  themselves, 
and  sometimes  they  relied  on  the  mails.  It  was  even  more  difficult  for 
the  men  in  the  West  where  train  service  was  erratic  and  infrequent. 


THE  LONG  CAMPAIGN  47 

They  had  to  trust  to  the  mails  or  the  good  graces  of  a  military  courier 
to  carry  the  dispatches  which  supplemented  the  meager  intelligence 
the  army  allowed  on  the  telegraph.  But,  East  or  West,  the  anonymous 
agents  somehow  contrived  to  get  their  news  through  with  a  promptness 
that  was  creditable. 


Like  the  troops  in  the  winding  blue  columns  they  accompanied, 
Associated  Press  agents  were  mystified  that  year  by  the  peculiar-looking 
two-horse  wagon  which  followed  the  army.  The  soldiers  called  it  the 
"What-is-it-wagon" — a  name  that  stuck — and  jested  about  the  short- 
bearded  man  who  rode  after  it  in  a  battered  buggy.  He  was  Matthew 
B.  Brady,  the  "What-is-it-wagon"  was  his  traveling  darkroom,  and 
together  they  were  the  quiet  heralds  of  the  beginnings  of  news  photog- 
raphy. In  those  days  a  camera  still  was  an  oddity  and  pictures  had  to 
be  developed  within  five  minutes  after  exposure  or  else  they  would 
spoil.  Brady  used  the  primitive  equipment  expertly  to  produce  a  pictorial 
history  of  the  war.  The  newspapers  were  not  equipped  for  engraving 
and  reproduction,  so  Brady's  photographs  did  not  appear  to  illustrate 
dispatches  from  the  field  of  battle. 

The  year  dragged  on  to  its  end,  and  when  the  general  agent 
totaled  his  expenditures  for  1862  the  amount  reached  the  unheard 
peak  of  $123,408.  The  assessments  against  the  seven  papers  had  risen 
to  $214  a  week,  and  the  afternoon  papers  in  the  city — three  in  number — 
were  paying  $119  each.  Out-of-town  subscribers  were  charged  from  $7 
a  week  upward  for  the  little  they  received.  Craig  accompanied  his 
financial  accounting  with  a  report  setting  forth  that  he  had  been  able 
to  save  $20,000  by  various  news  arrangements.  "Indeed,"  he  told  the 
members,  "holding  practically  a  monopoly  of  the  telegraphic  news  of 
the  country,  you  are  saving  the  expenditure  of  many  thousands  of  dollars 
which  would  be  required  in  case  you  had  determined  opposition."  He 
also  reminded  them  that  more  than  half  the  association's  entire  expense 
was  met  by  subscribers  who  had  no  say  about  the  report  they  received. 
.  News-gathering  difficulties  in  New  York  were  taking  an  unfore- 
seen turn.  There  had  been  a  steady  drain  of  city  reporters  to  the 
various  fronts  and  the  seven  member  papers  soon  found  themselves 
hard  put  to  arrange  for  adequate  coverage  of  local  news.  Because  of 
this  shortage  of  man  power,  the  newspapers  filled  some  positions  with 
women,  but  the  problem  still  remained  acute.  The  situation  finally 
prompted  an  organizer  named  Thomas  Stout  to  establish  a  private 


48  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

service  which  years  later  was  considered  a  forerunner  of  the  present 
New  York  City  News  Association,  which  gathers  the  news  of  the 
metropolis.  He  called  it  Stout's  Agency  and  recruited  a  staff  of  ten 
men  to  cover  local  assignments  ordered  by  short-handed  city  editors 
or  the  general  agent. 

The  war  went  on  and  it  was  1863.  The  price  of  newsprint  soared. 
Small  change  had  virtually  disappeared  and  people  paid  streetcar  fares 
with  postage  stamps.  There  was  talk  about  an  unknown  "scribbler" 
named  Walt  Whitman  who  had  burst  upon  thp  literary  horizon,  and 
there  were  advertisements  for  artificial  limbs.  Out  in  the  West  the 
dogged  Grant  was  stubbornly  hammering  away  at  Vicksburg,  and  in 
Virginia  the  genius  of  Robert  E.  Lee  seemed  never  surer. 

June  came  and  the  whole  anxious  North  was  asking:  "Where  is 
Lee?"  No  one  seemed  to  know.  Gobright  scurried  about  Washington, 
trying  one  official  source  after  another.  Then  among  the  straggling 
crowds  on  Pennsylvania  Avenue  he  met  a  friend  who  was  with  the 
army  as  a  staff  officer.  After  a  hard  ride  from  western  Maryland  the 
official  had  just  arrived  with  a  message  for  the  secretary  of  war.  Lee 
had  invaded  the  Free  State  and  was  moving  north  on  Pennsylvania  at 
the  head  of  an  army  of  80,000  men!  The  officer  had  few  particulars, 
but  what  he  had  sent  Gobright  hurrying  off  to  the  room  high  up  in  the 
National  Hotel  where  Stanton's  censors  operated.  Gobright  wrote  his 
alarming  dispatch  that  Lee  was  invading  the  North — it  was  not  more 
than  twenty  lines — and  pressed  it  upon  the  censor. 

"It  can't  go,"  said  the  War  Department  official. 

"But  why?"  asked  Gobright. 

"Because  it  gives  information  to  the  enemy." 

Gobright  was  exasperated. 

"Colonel,"  he  asked,  "do  you  suppose  the  enemy  does  not  know 
what  he  himself  is  doing?  And  besides,  is  it  not  important  that  the 
people  of  Pennsylvania  and  New  York  should  know  of  their  danger?" 

In  the  face  of  this  logic,  the  censor  finally  agreed  to  pass  the 
dispatch  if  Gobright  qualified  it  with  the  cautious  prefix:  "It  is  said." 
So  the  dispatch  sped  to  New  York  with  the  first  staggering  news  that 
Lee  and  his  gray  legions  were  sweeping  north. 

Just  one  week  from  the  day  Gobright  sent  the  news,  the  North 
was  wildly  rejoicing  at  the  first  meager  tidings  of  the  victory  at  Gettys- 
burg. Church  bells  tolled  and  then  a  telegraph  key  tapped  out  a  terse 
Associated  Press  message  from  the  West:  "Grant  has  captured  Vicks- 


THE  LONG  CAMPAIGN  49 

burg."  No  single  day  in  three  years  had  brought  such  news,  and  the 
day  happened  to  be  the  Fourth  of  July. 

Battles  were  obvious  things,  and  it  took  no  great  reportorial 
discernment  to  recognize  an  advance  or  a  retreat,  a  victory  or  a  rout. 
But  too  often  news  judgment  was  wanting  a^d  correspondents  and 
editors  alike  stood  unseeing  in  the  presence  of  important  history.  It  had 
been  that  way  in  January,  1861,  when  Confederate  batteries  drove  off 
the  relief  ship  bringing  supplies  and  reinforcements  to  Fort  Sumterj 
editors  did  not  realize  that  those  were  the  opening  shots  of  civil  war. 
It  had  been  that  way  in  March,  1862,  when  the  Monitor,  that  "cheese 
box  on  a  raft,"  fought  the  Merrimac  in  Hampton  Roads  5  editors  did 
not  see  that  the  long  history  of  wooden  navies  was  over.  And  it  was 
that  way,  too,  in  November,  1863,  when  Lincoln  delivered  his  Gettys- 
burg address. 

It  was  almost  an  afterthought  that  Lincoln  had  been  asked  to 
attend  the  dedication  of  a  national  cemetery  on  the  battlefield.  The 
President  was  given  to  understand  that  his  part  would  be  quite  second- 
ary. "It  is  desired,"  he  was  told,  "that  after  the  oration  you,  as  chief 
executive  of  the  nation,  finally  set  apart  these  grounds  to  their  sacred 
use  by  a  few  appropriate  remarks." 

So  Lincoln  sat  on  the  platform  and  listened  to  the  Honorable 
Edward  Everett's  elegant  periods.  Pencils  of  journalists  raced.  For 
more  than  an  hour  the  famous  orator  spoke  and  when  he  reached  his 
peroration  there  was  a  storm  of  applause.  So  intent  were  many  on 
congratulating  Everett  that  they  missed  the  solemn  opening  words  of 
the  President.  "Four  score  and  seven  years  ago,"  he  was  saying,  "our 
fathers  brought  forth  upon  this  continent  a  new  nation  .  .  ." 

The  next  day  newspapers  published  long,  laudatory  columns  on 
Everett's  address,  and  most  accounts  ended  with  the  brief  sentence: 
"The  President  also  spoke."  Here  and  there  an  editor  gave  some 
obscure  position  to  the  text  of  what  the  President  had  said  because 
The  Associated  Press  had  delivered  it  to  his  newspaper.  Indeed,  years 
afterward  a  story  persisted  that  an  unsung  agent  for  The  Associated 
Press  was  the  only  one  to  telegraph  Lincoln's  words  just  as  he  delivered 
them. 


After  three  years  of  civil  war  it  was  1864  and  Lee  was  still  master 
of  the  snowy  Virginia  flatlands.  Across  the  Potomac  political  veterans  of 
three  years1  hard  campaigning  at  the  Willard  bar  gulped  their  neat 


5O  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

whiskies  on  cold  January  nights  and  conceded  Lincoln  little  chance  of 
re-election.  Perennially  hopeful,  Cyrus  Field  haunted  London,  seeking 
funds  and  waiting  for  the  war  to  end  so  he  might  make  still  another 
attempt  to  lay  an  Atlantic  cable.  And  young  Henry  Villard,  one-time 
Associated  Press  agent  with  Lincoln,  was  back  in  Washington  after  his 
siege  as  a  war  correspondent. 

The  general  agent  in  New  York  presently  heard  of  Villard's 
return  and  of  what  he  was  doing.  The  ambitious  Midwesterner  had 
conceived  the  idea  for  a  news  service  to  rival  The  Associated  Press  in 
Washington  news.  It  was  not  long  before  he  had  five  papers  subscribing 
to  his  report  and  The  Associated  Press  was  in  arms  at  the  temerity  of 
this  upstart.  Competition  might  be  the  life  of  trade,  but  at  this  stage 
neither  Craig  nor  the  seven  members  he  served  liked  the  idea.  Villard 
was  an  interloper  and  they  attacked  him. 

While  Villard  and  Craig  fought,  the  secretary  of  war  was  still 
cudgeling  his  brains  for  a  foolproof  method  of  combating  the  misin- 
formation which  appeared  with  increasing  frequency  in  some  publica- 
tions. Censorship  had  not  proved  enough  and  there  was  no  use  in 
suppressing  papers  when  Lincoln  permitted  them  to  resume.  Stanton 
hit  upon  a  solution.  He  would  write  a  "war  diary."  Perhaps  Lincoln 
himself  had  something  to  do  with  the  inauguration  of  the  official 
communiques,  for  he  believed  the  people  should  have  the  news  and 
on  more  than  one  occasion  he  made  sure  that  important  intelligence 
was  given  to  The  Associated  Press. 

Stanton  acted  on  his  idea  immediately.  Each  night  he  wrote  a 
dispatch  summarizing  the  day's  military  events.  The  "war  diary" 
dispatches  were  addressed  ostensibly  to  General  John  A.  Dix,  the  chief 
military  authority  in  New  York,  but  actually  were  prepared  for  The 
Associated  Press.  Dated  variously  between  eight  o'clock  in  the  evening 
and  two  in  the  morning,  the  bulletins  set  forth  with  brevity  and 
restraint  the  daily  progress  of  each  command. 

The  entire  Union  perhaps  never  was  so  anxious  for  news  as  during 
the  first  week  of  May,  1864,  after  Grant  disappeared  into  the  tangled 
underbrush  of  the  Wilderness  to  start  his  campaign  against  Lee  and 
Richmond.  All  communications  were  cut  and  for  two  days  there  was  no 
word.  Then  Henry  J.  Wing  of  the  New  York  Tribune,  after  a 
dangerous  all-day  journey,  reached  Washington  with  the  first  account 
of  the  opening  of  a  bloody  battle.  Lincoln  was  so  overjoyed  at  the 
information  and  at  a  private  message  Wing  gave  him  from  General 
Grant  ("Tell  him  for  me  that  whatever  happens,  there  will  be  no 


THE  LONG  CAMPAIGN  51 

turning  back")  that  he  impulsively  kissed  the  youthful  correspondent. 
Then  apologetically  the  President  told  Wing  he  had  robbed  the  Tribune 
of  the  beat.  "He  told  me,"  the  correspondent  related,  "that  to  relieve 
the  anxiety  of  the  whole  country  regarding  Grant's  first  contest  with 
Lee,  he  had  arranged  with  my  managing  editor  to  give  a  summary  to 
The  Associated  Press  to  appear  in  all  the  papers." 

The  fierce  campaign  in  the  Wilderness  remained  the  biggest  news 
one  night  two  weeks  later  when  a  nervous  messenger  made  the  rounds 
of  the  newspaper  offices  in  New  York.  He  carried  several  copies  of 
the  same  story.  All  bore  the  heading,  "To  The  Associated  Press,"  and 
told  under  a  Washington  date  line  that  President  Lincoln  had  issued 
a  surprise  call  for  400,000  more  troops  and  had  appointed  a  national 
day  of  fasting  and  prayer  for  victory. 

ThelDoy  stopped  at  the  Times,  at  the  World,  at  the  Sun,  at  the 
Herald,  and  then  at  the  Express.  When  he  reached  the  Tribune  build- 
ing the  door  he  tried  was  locked  and  he  scuttled  away.  In  a  few  minutes 
he  was  at  the  office  of  the  Daily  News,  which  only  recently  had  begun 
to  buy  the  news  report.  The  boy  passed  the  pages  across  the  counter 
and  was  starting  for  the  door  when  the  editor  hailed  him.  Why  wasn't 
this  dispatch  in  the  usual  Associated  Press  envelope?  The  messenger 
stuttered,  then  blurted  out  that  the  supply  of  envelopes  had  run  out 
and  the  dispatch  was  too  important  to  be  delayed. 

A  presidential  proclamation  was  important  news.  Although  dead- 
lines were  near,  grumbling  editors  began  to  rip  out  front  pages  to  make 
room  for  it.  But  deadline  or  no  deadline,  the  editor  at  the  Daily  News 
was  dubious.  The  Times  office  was  the  nearest,  so  he  sent  a  copy  boy 
there  to  see  if  that  paper  had  the  same  dispatch.  The  Times  had  the 
proclamation,  but  the  inquiry  aroused  suspicion  and  an  editor  went 
hurrying  to  the  Tribune.  The  mysterious  messenger  had  tried  the  wrong 
door  and  consequently  the  Tribune  men  knew  nothing  about  the  story. 
There  was  a  hurried  dash  to  the  Associated  Press  offices  and  there  the 
dispatch  was  immediately  branded  a  forgery. 

The  presses  already  were  printing  at  the  Herald,  the  Express,  the 
Journal  of  Commerce,  and  the  World,  but  the  Herald  discovered  the 
truth  in  time  to  destroy  its  edition.  The  Express,  too,  learned  in  time, 
but  word  reached  the  Journal  of  Commerce  and  the  World  too  late. 
The  papers  already  were  on  the  street,  in  the  mails,  and  on  steamers 
for  delivery  abroad.  Rewards  were  posted  for  the  perpetrator  of  the 
hoax  and  the  general  agent  hurriedly  sent  off  telegrams  warning  all 
subscribers  not  to  pick  up  the  counterfeit. 


52  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

But  the  damage  had  been  done  and  War  Secretary  Stanton's  orders 
crackled  over  the  telegraph  to  General  Dix  in  New  York.  Blue-coated 
troops  went  tramping  into  the  World  and  Journal  of  Commerce  offices 
and  publication  was  suspended.  Manton  Marble,  editor  of  the  World, 
and  William  C.  Prime,  Journal  of  Commerce  editor  and  president  of 
The  Associated  Press,  were  clapped  into  the  military  prison  at  Fort 
Lafayette. 

For  four  days  the  bogus  proclamation  was  a  major  mystery.  Then 
the  culprit  was  discovered.  He  was  Joseph  Howard,  publisher  of  the 
struggling  New  York  Daily  Star.  Acting  at  the  behest  of  Wall  Street 
promoters,  his  aim  was  to  create  a  disturbance  in  the  stock  market  and 
he  had  deliberately  withheld  delivery  of  his  false  intelligence  until  the 
early  morning  hours  when  it  was  unlikely  that  the  copy  would  be 
carefully  examined  before  use. 

The  Journal  of  Commerce  and  the  World  were  not  the  only  papers 
to  suffer.  In  New  Orleans,  then  in  Union  hands,  the  Picayune  picked 
up  the  proclamation  from  a  mail  edition  and  fared  even  worse.  General 
Banks  suppressed  the  paper  from  May  23  until  July  9,  while  Prime 
and  Marble  were  exonerated  at  Lincoln's  order  and  their  publications 
resumed  in  a  week.  But  there  was  a  certain  curious  irony  about  the 
whole  affair.  Before  two  months  were  over  Lincoln  not  only  called 
for  additional  troops,  but  also  set  aside  a  national  day  of  prayer  for 
victory. 

As  soon  as  Howard  had  been  thrown  into  prison,  The  Associated 
Press  took  steps  to  protect  members  and  subscribers  against  a  recurrence 
of  such  fraud.  A  special  iron  stamp  was  made  and  henceforth  all 
dispatches  bore  its  imprint. 

The  civil  conflict  was  almost  over  now  and  the  news  reports  added, 
day  by  day,  the  final  details.  Sherman  reached  the  sea  in  December, 
1864.  Then  bugles  sang  in  the  April  dawn  and  Richmond  fell.  A  week 
later — April  9,  1865 — it  was  Palm  Sunday  and  at  half  past  one  in  the 
afternoon  Grant  and  Lee  met  in  the  home  of  Wilmer  McLean  on 
a  dusty  road  near  Appomattox.  At  four  o'clock  they  shook  hands. 
McGregor,  the  Associated  Press  agent  with  the  Army  of  the  Potomac, 
watched  them  as  they  came  out.  Lee  had  surrendered. 

Only  a  few  newspapermen  were  awake,  keeping  the  watch,  when 
the  news  reached  Washington.  Telegraph  keys  began  to  click,  and  at 
dawn  a  tremendous  thunder  broke  all  the  windows  in  Lafayette  Square. 
Five  hundred  cannon  were  roaring  out  a  salute.  Even  Stanton  was 
affable. 


THE  LONG  CAMPAIGN  53 

The  city  was  in  a  gala  mood  and  when  John  Francis  Coyle, 
editor  of  the  National  Intelligencer,  encountered  John  Wilkes  Booth 
shortly  before  noon  on  Good  Friday  he  did  not  think  it  strange  that 
the  handsome  actor  should  invite  him  to  share  a  bottle  of  wine.  Over 
their  glasses  Booth  expressed  anything  but  satisfaction  with  the  outcome 
of  the  Union  efforts  and  fumed  against  the  i  resident,  the  government, 
and  the  North. 

"What  would  happen,"  he  said,  "if  Lincoln  were  removed?" 

The  editor  answered  that  and  many  other  questions  on  the  same 
subject.  But  Booth  obviously  had  been  drinking  and  Coyle  did  not 
bother  to  wonder  what  prompted  such  sudden  technical  interest. 

They  talked  on  into  the  afternoon  until  the  actor  tossed  off  his 
last  glass  of  wine  and  then  made  his  departure.  He  seemed  in  great 
spirits. 

4 

"Father"  Gobright  puffed  on  the  big  cigar  that  had  been  given 
him  by  a  tipsy  captain  at  the  Willard  bar  and  leaned  back  in  his  chair  to 
scan  the  out-of-town  editions.  The  Washington  agent  had  written  his 
last  dispatch  for  the  night  and  already  it  was  on  its  way  to  the  New 
York  office.  It  stated  that  General  Ulysses  Grant  had  changed  his  mind 
and,  instead  of  attending  the  play,  Our  American  Cousin,  at  Ford's 
Theatre,  as  advertised,  had  departed  with  Mrs.  Grant  for  New  Jersey. 

In  the  few  days  since  Appomattox  the  ill-kempt  city  had  taken  on 
a  crude  and  garish  atmosphere  of  rejoicing.  The  dreary  years  of  conflict 
and  uncertainty  had  given  way  to  a  surging  relief  and  even  Lincoln 
was  joining  in  the  celebration.  Along  with  other  dignitaries,  he  and 
Mrs.  Lincoln  were  at  Ford's  Theatre.  Although  General  Grant  had 
been  able  to  persuade  Mrs.  Grant  to  go  north  instead,  the  President 
had  not  been  successful  with  his  suggestion  to  Mrs.  Lincoln  that  an 
old  newspaper  friend,  Noah  Brooks,  accompany  her  in  his  place. 

Gobright  sat  in  his  office  until  the  hands  of  the  clock  dragged  to 
nine-thirty  and  on  toward  the  hour.  Just  as  he  was  turning  another 
page,  the  office  door  burst  open  and  a  friend  rushed  in  shouting.  The 
story  came  in  snatches.  The  man  had  raced  from  Ford's  Theatre  by 
hack.  He  was  upset,  but  Gobright  began  to  ask  questions. 

A  few  seconds  later  the  agent  was  hurrying  off  the  dispatch: 

WASHINGTON,  APRIL  14,  1865 

TO  THE  ASSOCIATED  PRESS: 

THE  PRESIDENT  WAS  SHOT  IN  A  THEATRE 
TONIGHT  AND  PERHAPS  MORTALLY  WOUNDED. 


54  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Minutes  after  the  assassin  leaped  from  Lincoln's  box  Gobright 
was  standing  beside  the  chair  in  which  the  President  had  been  shot. 
The  military  was  in  command  and  a  cordon  of  bayonets  and  blue 
uniforms  circled  the  theater.  All  doorways  and  passages  were  barred. 
A  crowd  materialized  in  the  streets  outside,  but  the  assassin  was  gone. 

Gobright  had  just  entered  the  presidential  box  when  William 
Kent,  a  theater  employee,  stooped  beneath  one  of  the  seats,  picked  up 
a  pistol,  and  placed  the  stubby  firearm  in  the  agent's  hand.  The  audience 
was  still  horrified  below.  A  young  naval  officer  demanded  that  the  gun 
be  surrendered,  but  Gobright  would  give  it  to  no  one  but  the  police. 

He  quickly  got  the  picture  of  the  attack  as  it  had  occurred.  He 
examined  the  torn  flag  in  which  the  assassin's  spur  caught  as  he  jumped 
from  the  box  to  the  stage  to  scream,  "Sic  semper  tyranms!"  Then  he 
followed  the  path  of  escape  out  a  back  door.  Gobright  was  leaving  the 
theater  to  get  back  to  the  telegraph  office  when  he  heard  that  Secretary 
of  State  Seward  also  had  been  attacked  as  he  lay  sick  at  home.  In  his 
commandeered  hack  Gobright  hurried  to  the  Seward  residence.  There 
he  obtained  all  the  information  available  and  was  off  to  the  boarding- 
house  to  which  the  President  had  been  carried.  Then  he  returned  to 
his  office  to  send  additional  details. 

Months  afterward  when  there  was  time  for  reminiscing  the  agent 
recalled: 

Returning  to  the  office,  I  commenced  writing  a  full  account  of  that 
night's  dread  occurrences.  While  thus  engaged,  several  gentlemen  who  had 
been  at  the  theater  came  in,  and,  by  questioning  them,  I  obtained  additional 
particulars.  Among  my  visitors  was  Speaker  Colfax,  and  as  he  was  going  to 
see  Mr.  Lincoln,  I  asked  him  to  give  me  a  paragraph  on  that  interesting 
branch  of  the  subject.  At  a  subsequent  hour,  he  did  so.  Meanwhile  I  carefully 
wrote  my  despatch,  though  with  trembling  and  nervous  fingers,  and,  under 
all  the  exciting  circumstances,  I  was  afterward  surprised  that  I  had  succeeded 
in  approximating  so  closely  to  all  the  facts  in  those  dark  transactions. 

Long  before  Gobright  began  to  prepare  his  full  story  of  the 
attacks,  his  first  dispatch  had  galvanized  the  New  York  office.  Copyists 
on  duty  wrote  furiously.  Sleepy  messengers  were  rushed  out  to  deliver 
the  news  to  the  offices  of  member  papers  in  other  parts  of  the  city, 
and  there  was  driving  haste  to  prepare  the  information  for  telegraphing 
to  client  papers.  All  this  took  time,  yet  the  speed  was  considered 
exceptional. 

Greeley's  Tribune  was  ready  to  go  to  press  as  the  messenger 
dashed  in  with  the  wrinkled  sheet  of  copy.  It  was  the  first  bulletin 


THE  LONG  CAMPAIGN  55 

from  Washington  and  page  one  was  hurriedly  dismantled.  Typesetters 
went  to  work,  headline  writers  scribbled,  and  the  story  was  thrown 
together  in  the  extreme  left  column — then  the  preferred  front-page 
space.  So  sensational  was  the  news  that  the  Tribune  crammed  into  its 
columns,  in  the  order  of  arrival,  every  scrro  of  information  that  it 
received.  Shortly  after  the  first  Associated  Press  dispatch,  the  Tribimefs 
own  correspondent  in  Washington  was  heard  from,  first  in  a  message 
to  "stop"  the  press  association  bulletin  and  later  in  dispatches  that  were 
not  always  accurate,  particularly  in  the  premature  report  of  the  Presi- 
dent's death.  And  so  details  of  the  story  appeared  as  received,  the 
erroneous  bulletins  intermingled  with  the  accounts  from  Gobright. 
Next  morning  the  Tribune's  left  column  read: 

HIGHLY  IMPORTANT! 

The  President  Shot! 
Secretary  Seward  Attacked 

First  Dispatch 

Washington,  April  14,  1865 
To  The  Associated  Press: 

The  President  was  shot  in  a  theatre  tonight  and  perhaps  mortally 
wounded. 

Second  Dispatch 

To  Editors:  Our  Washington  agent  orders  the  dispatch  about  the 
President  sent  "stopped."  Nothing  is  said  about  the  truth  or  falsity  of  the 
report. 

Third  Dispatch 

Special  to  the  New  York  Tribune: 

The  President  was  just  shot  at  Ford's  Theatre.  The  ball  entered  his 
neck.  It  is  not  known  whether  the  wound  is  mortal.  Intense  excitement. 

Fourth  Dispatch 

Special  to  the  New  York  Tribune : 
The  President  expired  at  a  quarter  to  twelve. 

Fifth  Dispatch 

Washington,  April  15,  12:30  A.M. 
To  The  Associated  Press: 

The  President  was  shot  in  a  theatre  tonight  and  perhaps  mortally 
wounded. 


56  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

The  President  is  not  expected  to  live  through  the  night.  He  was  shot 
at  a  theatre. 

Secretary  Seward  was  also  assassinated. 
No  arteries  were  cut. 
Particulars  soon. 

Then  came  Gobright's  long  story  under  the  heading  "Particulars." 
Through  the  night,  as  additional  reports  were  available,  the  details 
moved  from  Gobright's  office  to  the  office  of  the  general  agent  and 
thence  to  subscribers.  Secretary  of  War  Stanton  also  sent  an  official 
announcement  to  Major  General  Dix  in  New  York.  It  reached  General 
Agent  Craig  in  the  early  morning. 

Gobright's  longest  telegram,  the  "Particulars,"  was  unusually 
detailed  and  stood  for  many  years  as  a  model  of  the  reportorial  style 
of  the  day.  It  read: 

Washington,  April  14. 

President  Lincoln  and  wife,  with  other  friends,  this  evening  visited 
Ford's  Theatre,  for  the  purpose  of  witnessing  the  performance  of  the  "Amer- 
ican Cousin." 

It  was  announced  in  the  papers  that  General  Grant  would  be  present. 
But  that  gentleman  took  the  late  train  of  cars  for  New  Jersey. 

The  theatre  was  densely  crowded,  and  everybody  seemed  delighted 
with  the  scene  before  them.  During  the  third  act,  and  while  there  was  a 
temporary  pause  for  the  actors  to  enter,  a  sharp  report  of  a  pistol  was  heard, 
which  merely  attracted  attention,  but  suggesting  nothing  serious,  until  a  man 
rushed  to  the  front  of  the  President's  box,  waving  a  long  dagger  in  his  right 
hand,  and  exclaiming,  "Sic  semper  tyrannis"  and  immediately  leaped  from 
the  box,  which  was  in  the  second  tier,  to  the  stage  beneath,  and  ran  across 
to  the  opposite  side,  making  his  escape,  amid  the  bewilderment  of  the  audi- 
ence, from  the  rear  of  the  theatre,  and  mounting  a  horse,  fled. 

The  screams  of  Mrs.  Lincoln  first  disclosed  the  fact  to  the  audience 
that  the  President  had  been  shot;  when  all  present  rose  to  their  feet,  rushed 
toward  the  stage,  many  exclaiming,  "Hang  him!  Hang  him!" 

The  excitement  was  of  the  wildest  possible  description,  and  of  course 
there  was  an  abrupt  termination  of  the  theatrical  performance. 

There  was  a  rush  toward  the  President's  box,  when  cries  were  heard, 
"Stand  back  and  give  him  air!"  "Has  any  one  stimulants?"  On  a  hasty 
examination,  it  was  found  that  the  President  had  been  shot  through  the  head, 
above  and  back  of  the  temporal  bone,  and  that  some  of  the  brain  was  oozing 
out.  He  was  removed  to  a  private  house  opposite  to  the  theatre,  and  the 
Surgeon-General  of  the  Army,  and  other  surgeons,  were  sent  for  to  attend 
to  his  condition. 

On  an  examination  of  the  private  box,  blood  was  discovered  on  the 
back  of  the  cushioned  chair  in  which  the  President  had  been  sitting;  also  on 


THE  LONG  CAMPAIGN  57 

the  partition,  and  on  the  floor.  A  common  single-barrelled  pocket-pistol  was 
found  on  the  carpet. 

A  military  guard  was  placed  in  front  of  the  private  residence  to  which 
the  President  had  been  conveyed.  An  immense  crowd  was  in  front  of  it,  all 
deeply  anxious  to  learn  the  condition  of  the  President.  It  had  been  previously 
announced  that  the  wound  was  mortal,  but  all  hoped  otherwise.  The  shock 
to  the  community  was  terrible. 

At  midnight  the  Cabinet  went  thither.  Messrs.  Sumner  Colfax,  and 
Farnsworth;  Judge  Curtis,  Governor  Oglesby,  General  Meigs,  Colonel  Hay, 
and  a  few  personal  friends,  with  Surgeon-General  Barnes  and  his  immediate 
assistants  were  around  his  bedside.  The  President  was  in  a  state  of  syncope, 
:  totally  insensible,  and  breathing  slowly.  The  blood  oozed  from  the  wound 
at  the  back  of  his  head. 

The  surgeons  exhausted  every  possible  effort  of  medical  skill,  but  all 
hope  was  gone! 

The  parting  of  his  family  with  the  dying  President  is  too  sad  for  de- 
scription. The  President  and  Mrs.  Lincoln  did  not  start  for  the  theatre  until 
fifteen  minutes  after  eight  o'clock.  Speaker  Colfax  was  at  the  White  House 
at  the  time,  and  the  President  stated  to  him  that  he  was  going,  although 
Mrs.  Lincoln  had  not  been  well,  because  the  papers  had  announced  that 
General  Grant  and  they  were  to  be  present,  and,  as  General  Grant  had 
gone  north,  he  did  not  wish  the  audience  to  be  disappointed. 

He  went  to  the  theatre  with  apparent  reluctance,  and  urged  Mr.  Colfax 
to  accompany  him;  but  that  gentleman  had  made  other  engagements,  and 
with  Mr.  Ashmun,  of  Massachusetts,  bade  him  good-bye. 

When  the  excitement  at  the  theatre  was  at  its  wildest  height,  reports 
were  circulated  that  Secretary  Seward  had  also  been  assassinated. 

Reported  Assassination  of  Mr.  Seward 

On  reaching  this  gentleman's  residence,  a  crowd  and  military  guard 
were  found  at  the  door,  and  on  entering,  it  was  ascertained  that  the  reports 
were  true. 

Everybody  there  was  so  excited,  that  scarcely  an  intelligible  word  could 
be  gathered;  but  the  facts  are  substantially  as  follows: 

About  ten  o'clock,  a  man  rang  the  bell,  and  the  call  having  been  an- 
swered by  a  colored  servant,  he  said  he  had  come  from  Doctor  Verdi,  Secre- 
tary Seward's  family  physician,  with  a  prescription,  at  the  same  time  holding 
in  his  hand  a  small  piece  of  folded  paper,  and  saying  in  answer  to  a  refusal, 
that  he  must  see  the  Secretary,  as  he  was  instructed  with  particular  direc- 
tions concerning  the  medicine.  He  still  insisted  on  going  up,  although  re- 
peatedly informed  that  no  one  could  enter  the  chamber.  The  man  pushed 
the  servant  aside,  and  walked  heavily  toward  the  Secretary's  room,  and  was 
then  met  by  Mr.  Frederick  W.  Seward,  of  whom  he  demanded  to  see  the 
Secretary,  making  the  same  representation  which  he  did  to  the  servant.  What 
further  passed  in  the  way  of  colloquy  is  not  known,  but  the  man  struck  him 
on  the  head  with  a  billy,  severely  injuring  the  skull,  and  felling  him  to  the 


58  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

floor  almost  senseless.  The  assassin  then  rushed  into  the  chamber  and  attacked 
Major  Seward,  Paymaster  United  States  Army,  and  Mr.  Hansell,  a  mes- 
senger of  the  State  Department,  and  two  male  nurses,  disabling  them  all.  He 
then  rushed  upon  the  Secretary,  who  was  lying  in  bed  in  the  same  room, 
and  inflicted  three  stabs  in  the  neck,  but  severing,  it  is  thought  and  hoped, 
no  arteries,  though  he  bled  profusely.  The  assassin  then  rushed  downstairs, 
mounted  his  horse  at  the  door,  and  rode  off  before  an  alarm  could  be 
sounded,  and  in  the  same  manner  as  the  assassin  of  the  President. 

It  is  believed  that  the  injuries  of  the  Secretary  are  not  fatal,  nor  those 
of  either  of  the  others,  although  both  the  Secretary  and  the  Assistant  Secretary 
are  very  seriously  injured. 

Secretaries  Stanton  and  Welles,  and  other  prominent  officers  of  the  gov- 
ernment, called  at  Secretary  Seward's  house,  to  inquire  into  his  condition, 
and  there,  for  the  first  time,  heard  of  the  assassination  of  the  President.  They 
then  proceeded  to  the  house  where  he  was  lying,  exhibiting,  of  course,  intense 
anxiety  and  solicitude.  An  immense  crowd  was  gathered  in  front  of  the 
President's  house,  and  a  strong  guard  was  also  stationed  there,  many  persons 
supposing  that  he  would  be  brought  to  his  home. 

The  entire  city  to-night  presents  a  scene  of  wild  excitement  accom- 
panied by  violent  expressions  of  indignation  and  the  profoundest  sorrow. 
Many  shed  tears.  The  military  authorities  have  dispatched  mounted  patrols 
in  every  direction,  in  order,  if  possible,  to  arrest  the  assassins.  The  whole 
metropolitan  police  are  likewise  vigilant  for  the  same  purpose. 

The  attacks,  both  at  the  theatre  and  at  Secretary  Seward's  house,  took 
place  at  about  the  same  hour,  ten  o'clock,  thus  showing  a  preconcerted  plan 
to  assassinate  those  gentlemen.  Some  evidences  of  the  guilt  of  the  party  who 
attacked  the  President  are  in  possession  of  the  police.  Vice-President  Johnson 
is  in  this  city,  and  his  headquarters  are  guarded  by  troops. 

The  story  written,  Gobright  took  up  his  vigil  outside  the  house 
in  which  the  dying  President  lay.  More  than  once  he  had  swapped 
stories  with  the  chief  executive  and  during  the  long  early  morning  hours 
many  pictures  of  the  man  came  to  mind.  There  was  the  Lincoln  who 
could  enjoy  a  joke  even  when  it  was  on  himself — the  Lincoln  who 
could  fill  with  emotion  at  the  sight  of  suffering — the  Lincoln  whose 
ready  wit  could  be  devastating  in  driving  home  an  argument.  Gobright 
had  been  a  veteran  in  Washington  even  before  Lincoln  appeared  on 
the  scene  as  an  Illinois  congressman  and  at  one  time  or  another  he 
had  had  occasion  to  write  about  every  one  of  those  Lincolns  he  now 
remembered. 

Nevertheless,  he  did  not  write  the  final  lines  of  the  assassination. 
With  other  correspondents,  he  was  excluded  from  the  house.  War 
Secretary  Stanton  took  everything  into  his  own  hands. 

Day  dawned  and  it  was  raining.  More  hours  of  waiting.  Another 


THE  LONG  CAMPAIGN  59 

of  the  secretary's  military  couriers  emerged  from  the  shuttered  house, 
swung  into  a  saddle,  and  clattered  off.  No  one  knew  at  the  time,  but 
he  was  riding  to  the  telegraph  office  and  he  carried  one  of  the  last 
of  Stanton's  hastily  scribbled  "war  diary"  messages.  The  message  was 
for  the  New  York  Associated  Press  and  it  read: 

ABRAHAM  LINCOLN  DIED  THIS  MORNING  AT 
TWENTY-TWO  MINUTES  AFTER  SEVEN  O'CLOCK. 


VI.  THUNDER  IN  THE  WEST 


THE  long  siege  between  the  Union  and  the  Confederacy  had  obscured 
events  which  ultimately  exerted  a  decisive  influence  on  the  course  of 
news  gathering.  During  the  war  years  hinterland  publishers  first  began 
to  chafe  at  the  journalistic  servitude  in  which  they  were  held  by  the 
New  York  Associated  Press.  The  most  important  stirrings  of  discontent 
were  in  the  West. 

As  a  geographical  designation,  "West"  was  a  vague  expression. 
Because  the  nation  had  been  born  along  the  Atlantic  seaboard,  anything 
beyond  the  Alleghenies  was  the  West,  and  even  before  Chicago  existed 
there  were  such  thriving  centers  as  Pittsburgh,  Cleveland,  Louisville, 
Cincinnati,  Detroit,  and  St.  Louis.  Just  as  in  other  areas,  the  journals 
of  the  West  had  risen  with  the  growth  of  populations  and  the  increase 
of  literacy.  Like  all  the  other  "outside"  papers,  they  paid  their  money 
as  clients  to  the  New  York  Associated  Press  and  took  whatever  was 
doled  out  to  them. 

The  inequity  of  this  condition  became  greater  as  the  West  grew 
stronger.  By  the  second  year  of  the  Civil  War  the  publishers  of 
western  papers  had  started  to  prepare  for  journalism's  own  internal 
conflict.  The  call  to  arms — necessarily  a  discreet  one — was  sounded  by 
Joseph  Medill,  the  erect,  sharp-featured  publisher  of  the  Chicago 
Tribime. 

The  lot  of  MedilPs  Tribune  was  neither  better  nor  worse  than 
that  of  its  major  western  contemporaries.  In  spite  of  the  feverish  public 
interest  in  Civil  War  news,  the  service  supplied  by  the  New  York 
Associated  Press  was  far  from  adequate.  Dispatches  came  by  telegraph 
only  four  hours  nightly — between  six  and  ten  o'clock — and  Medill 
knew  they  represented  only  a  minor  portion  of  the  daily  file  collected 
primarily  for  the  New  York  papers.  The  arbitrary  price  exacted  for 
that  sketchy  budget  was  out  of  all  proportion. 

A  lawyer  before  he  became  a  publisher,  Medill  realized  the  futility 
of  protest.  He  was  at  the  mercy  of  a  firmly  entrenched  news  oligarchy 
and  it  would  be  absurd  to  attack  it  singlehanded.  As  matters  stood,  he 

60 


THUNDER  IN  THE  WEST  61 

was  helpless.  He  must  have  news,  however  inadequate,  and  if  he 
refused  to  meet  New  York's  demands,  he  would  be  cut  off  in  the  midst 
of  the  biggest  news  period  of  the  nation's  history.  General  Agent  Craig, 
spokesman  for  the  owners  in  the  East,  tolerated  no  opposition. 

Together  with  other  papers  beyond  the  Alleghenies,  the  Chicago 
Tribune  belonged  to  the  loosely  grouped  affiliation  of  journals  known 
as  the  Western  Associated  Press.  This  was  primarily  a  regional  associa- 
tion which  had  not  thought  of  mutual  protection  and  advancement. 

Medill  took  the  initiative  late  in  the  war  year  of  1862.  A  letter 
went  out  from  the  Chicago  Tribune  to  fellow  publishers.  It  was  time, 
it  hinted,  for  Westerners  to  unite  in  a  real  alliance,  but  they  must  do 
it  warily  so  as  not  to  arouse  the  suspicions  of  New  York  or  to  provoke 
reprisals.  Medill  suggested  a  meeting.  To  all  appearances  it  would  be 
a  casual,  regional  gathering  to  discuss  limited,  routine  problems. 

That  meeting  was  held  in  Indianapolis  late  the  same  year.  Medill 
and  his  colleagues  took  special  care  to  let  New  York  hear  of  it  and 
they  welcomed  the  representative  sent  by  Craig.  A  model  of  circum- 
spection, the  meeting  appointed  an  Executive  Committee  with  Medill 
as  chairman,  to  represent  the  group  in  all  negotiations  with  the  East. 
So  discreet  were  requests  that  the  New  York  representative  was  able 
to  report  that  it  had  been  a  very  friendly  meeting  in  which  entirely 
"satisfactory  agreements"  were  reached  for  continuation  of  the  existing 
relationship. 

New  York  dismissed  the  meeting  with  little  thought,  but  it  marked 
the  formal  start  of  a  real  Western  Associated  Press. 

The  first  tentative  steps  of  organization  begun,  a  meeting  in  1863 
at  Dayton  produced  more  tangible  results.  The  Western  Associated 
Press  felt  strong  enough  to  experiment  and  voted  to  send  a  committee 
to  New  York  to  seek  a  larger  and  better  prepared  report.  Medill 
described  what  was  accomplished: 

We  succeeded  in  being  allowed  to  put  a  news  agent  in  the  office  of  the 
New  York  Associated  Press  with  authority  to  make  up  and  send  a  three  hun- 
dred word  extra  dispatch  to  afternoon  papers  and  a  one  thousand  word 
message  to  be  put  on  the  wire  after  ten  P.M.  for  the  morning  papers.  It  was 
called  the  midnight  dispatch  and  was  published  in  an  extra  edition.  We 
secured  it  at  low  tolls.  The  extra  day  dispatch  was  comparatively  expensive 
as  the  wires  were  occupied  at  that  time  on  commercial  business. 

Medill  continued  his  interest  and  when  the  1864  meeting  convened 
in  Cincinnati  he  urged  that  the  Western  Associated  Press  be  put  on  a 
legal  basis.  After  some  discussion,  the  decision  was  made  to  seek  a 


(>2  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

charter  of  incorporation.  H.  N.  Walker  of  the  Detroit  Free  Press  was 
chosen  to  apply  to  the  Michigan  legislature  for  a  special  act  making  the 
charter  possible. 

Once  the  uncertainties  of  the  Civil  War  had  been  banished,  the 
West  entered  upon  a  truly  epic  period  of  expansion.  Pioneers  and  their 
covered  wagons  were  rumbling  westward  from  the  Mississippi,  onward 
to  the  Rockies  and  the  Sierras.  Chicago  was  the  hub  from  which  the 
spokes  of  expansion  radiated  west.  It  was  the  capital  of  a  broad  new 
empire  in  which  there  were  now  103  daily  journals.  On  the  plains 
sledge  rang  on  spike  as  sweating  labor  gangs  pushed  forward  the  road 
of  steel  and  ties. 

Side  by  side  with  the  advancing  rails  marched  the  telegraph,  but 
in  many  places  it  struck  out  boldly  for  itself  across  prairie  and  mountain. 
The  lines  strung  on  into  the  purple  distance  and  suspicious  Indians 
inspected  the  strange  strands.  They  listened  to  the  hum  of  the  wires 
and  in  time  they  learned  how  the  magic  of  the  telegraph  could  summon 
the  "Long  Swords"  of  the  palefaces.  This  "talking  wire"  was  evil 
medicine,  and  war  parties  went  whooping  forth  to  cut  the  wires,  fell 
the  poles  and  massacre  the  men  in  the  isolated  stations  where  the 
talking  wire  spoke.  And  in  the  Southwest,  cowboys  were  finding  the 
telegraph  a  source  of  sport.  The  insulators  on  the  poles  proved  irre- 
sistible targets  and  blazing  six-shooters  kept  linesmen  busy  repairing 
damaged  lines.  But  the  poles  and  wires  kept  moving  onward. 

The  West  was  on  the  march.  Yet  when  the  publishers  filed  into 
Masonic  Temple  at  Louisville  on  November  22,  1865,  to  perfect  their 
recently  chartered  organization,  there  was  a  strange  lack  of  belligerency 
and  outspoken  criticism  on  the  subject  of  New  York.  The  growing  dis- 
content in  the  Western  Associated  Press  was  well  underground — a  calm 
before  the  storm  that  broke  within  a  year. 

The  meeting  adopted  resolutions  designed  to  leave  General  Agent 
Craig  under  the  impression  that  everyone  was  well  content.  In  the  light 
of  later  events,  two  of  them  stood  out  as  shrewdly  conceived.  One  was 
a  friendly  gesture  to  the  publishers  of  the  prostrate  South,  expressing 
disappointment  that  they  had  been  unable  to  meet  with  the  Westerners 
and  suggesting  that  either  they  attend  future  sessions  or  "that  they 
organize  a  Southern  Associated  Press."  The  other  resolution  outlined 
for  the  West's  special  agent  in  New  York  the  factors  he  should  take 
into  consideration  in  selecting  the  limited  reports  he  was  permitted 
to  send.  It  contained  four  rules  for  news  handling  which  stood  for 
many  years  to  come: 


THUNDER  IN  THE  WEST  63 

Telegraph  reports  should  above  all  else  be  reliable;  they  should  be  as 
brief  as  possible;  information  should  be  selected  for  its  interest  to  the  sub- 
scribing papers,  not  for  its  importance  in  New  York,  and  in  most  cases 
editorial  comment  of  New  York  papers  should  be  disregarded;  also  news 
items  should  be  compiled  without  giving  credit  to  papers  except  where  the 
authority  is  an  essential  part  of  the  news. 

Small  papers  as  well  as  large  were  represented  in  the  Western 
Associated  Press  and  it  was  necessary  that  action  be  taken  to  dispel 
any  fears  of  the  little  publishers  that  the  wealthier  newspapers  would 
dominate.  This  feeling  had  manifested  itself  the  year  before.  The  small 
papers  then  were  receiving  the  same  budget  as  more  affluent  contem- 
poraries, although  at  lower  assessments,  and  in  most  cases  the  wordage 
was  ample  for  their  needs.  They  were  afraid  that  a  larger  report  would 
saddle  them  with  increased  expense  for  news  which  only  the  big  papers 
could  handle. 

To  reassure  them,  a  resolution  was  adopted  specifying  that  news- 
papers having  the  need  and  the  large  resources  could  obtain  more  news 
without  obligating  proprietors  of  the  small  papers.  This  regulation  was 
made  part  of  the  working  constitution  in  1865.  In  order  to  allay  any 
other  fears,  Medill  stepped  aside  and  J.  D.  Osborne,  of  the  Louisville 
Journal,  was  chosen  president  to  succeed  him. 


The  first  big  event  of  1866  was  Cyrus  Field's  final  triumph  over 
the  Atlantic.  He  had  bounded  back  from  his  failure  of  years  before 
with  new  backers  and  many  more  hundreds  of  miles  of  cable. 

Dissatisfaction  in  the  Western  Associated  Press  was  reaching 
intolerable  proportions  just  about  the  time  of  Field's  success.  The  papers 
felt  confidence  in  the  strength  of  their  organization  and  they  knew  they 
could  rely  on  the  financial  support  of  the  bulk  of  their  membership. 
The  end  of  the  Civil  War  had  removed  their  fears  of  being  arbitrarily 
cut  off  from  vital  news  and  they  were  free  to  assert  themselves.  With 
the  new  cable  opening  up  broader  news  horizons,  there  was  an  added 
incentive  to  seek  a  voice  in  the  management  of  news  gathering  and  an 
end  to  the  inequities  which  galled  them. 

The  discontent  was  not  confined  to  the  West.  Trouble  was  brewing 
among  the  seven  members  of  the  New  York  Associated  Press.  The 
balance  of  power  was  now  in  the  hands  of  the  ultra  conservatives.  The 
four  members  who  held  the  reins  underestimated  the  force  which 


64  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

was  rising  elsewhere  in  the  country.  They  were  blind  to  the  necessity 
for  initiative  in  news  gathering  and  failed  to  comprehend  the  ferment 
agitating  the  "outside"  clients. 

Back  of  the  New  York  dissension  was  the  old  rule  of  the  association 
forbidding  any  one  of  its  members  to  publish  telegraph  news  from 
any  part  of  the  world  without  first  making  it  available  to  all  six  others. 
This  was  a  discouraging  burden  for  the  minority  because  the  less 
ambitious  papers  could  sit  back  and  feel  perfectly  assured  that  they 
would  receive  all  the  news  the  others  compiled  at  great  individual 
expense. 

The  cleavage  thrust  General  Agent  Craig  into  the  most  anomalous 
position  of  his  regime.  He  agreed  with  the  minority,  yet  he  was  forced 
to  act  counter  to  his  beliefs.  The  strong-minded  Yankee  grew  increas- 
ingly restive.  Little  by  little  rumors  began  to  seep  west  that  Craig  was 
at  loggerheads  with  the  men  who  were  dictating  the  policies  at  New 
York. 

The  Western  Associated  Press  had  waited  a  long  time,  but  now 
the  psychological  moment  had  arrived  and  it  was  in  an  atmosphere 
of  resentment  that  the  membership  convened  in  Detroit  on  August  7, 
1866.  Some  members  were  for  a  quick  and  open  action,  but  the  knowl- 
edge that  there  was  disagreement  in  New  York — it  was  probable  that 
the  information  had  come  from  Craig  himself— counseled  more  subtle 
tactics. 

On  the  vital  issue  before  the  organization — independence  of  New 
York  or  equality  with  it — the  entire  course  of  action  was  placed  in  the 
hands  of  the  Board  of  Directors.  The  breach  in  New  York  was  becoming 
daily  wider  and  the  Western  directors  bided  their  time. 

The  bombshell  exploded  on  November  5.  To  every  client  of  the 
New  York  Associated  Press  went  a  telegraphic  note  declaring  that 
Daniel  Craig,  for  fifteen  years  the  monarch  of  news  gathering,  "is 
discharged  by  unanimous  vote  of  the  members,"  and  that  "Mr.  James 
W.  Simonton  has  been  appointed  General  Agent"  in  his  place.  It  was 
signed  by  W.  C.  Prime,  as  president  of  the  New  York  association,  and 
Joseph  P.  Beach,  as  secretary. 

The  wires  sizzled  with  a  heated  rejoinder  by  Craig  denouncing  the 
Prime-Beach  statement  as  "utterly  and  infamously  false."  He  denied 
he  had  been  dismissed  and  volunteered  the  startling  information  that  he 
was  planning  a  new  and  better  news  service. 

"My  resignation,"  he  declared,  "has  been  in  the  hands  of  the 
Executive  Committee  for  several  weeks,  and  whether  accepted  or  not, 


THUNDER  IN  THE  WEST  65 

I  should  have  retired  at  the  end  of  this  time,  at  which  time,  as  I  have 
good  reason  to  believe,  every  agent  or  reporter  of  the  association  will 
earnestly  co-operate  in  the  new  movement,  which  I  assure  you  is  started 
with  the  most  ample  backers,  and  its  results  will  largely  promote  the 
interests  of  all  the  papers  outside  of  this  city,  and  I  shall  confidently 
hope  for  your  earnest  approval." 

The  secret  was  out.  Craig  confidently  expected  to  take  with  him 
all  the  employes  of  the  New  York  Associated  Press  both  at  home 
and  abroad.  The  seven  squabbling  New  York  members  did  not  know 
every  detail  of  his  quietly  devised  plans,  but  the  dominant  faction  had 
acted  with  lightning  swiftness  to  oust  him  as  soon  as  it  learned  that 
he  proposed  to  start  another  news-gathering  organization.  Craig's  sum- 
mary dismissal  ruined  his  plan  to  keep  his  project  under  cover  until 
everything  was  ready  and  he  could  leave  the  stunned  New  York 
members  in  the  lurch.  He  was  forced  to  leave  his  old  job  at  once  and 
he  turned  all  his  energy  to  his  audacious  new  undertaking. 

Simonton,  the  new  general  agent  and  a  close  friend  of  Raymond 
of  the  Times,  was  catapulted  overnight  into  a  trying  position.  He  was 
suddenly  expected  to  do  all  things.  He  must  direct  the  operation  of 
the  news  report  without  interruption.  He  must  meet  the  menace  of 
Craig's  bold  promise  to  raid  the  profitable  ranks  of  his  news  customers. 
And  he  must  maintain  control  of  the  restless  "outsiders"  who  already 
were  eager  to  do  business  with  Craig. 

The  New  York  Associated  Press  had  been  maneuvered  into  a 
perilous  spot  and  the  Westerners  did  not  see  how  they  could  lose.  Either 
New  York  must  grant  them  the  full  concessions  they  were  prepared  to 
demand  or  else  they  could  sever  all  relations  and  join  Craig.  Each 
passing  day  made  the  old  association  more  vulnerable,  and  the  strate- 
gists of  the  West  watched  for  New  York  and  its  new  general  agent 
to  make  some  overture.  But  New  York  was  too  busy  fending  off  Craig's 
forays  among  its  near-by  clients. 


On  the  day  Craig's  new  service  began  the  Executive  Committee  of 
the  Western  organization  was  on  its  way  to  New  York.  Murat  Halstead 
of  the  Cincinnati  Commercial,  and  Horace  White  of  the  Chicago 
Tribune  carried  with  them  complete  authority  to  obtain  the  concessions 
desired  or  to  "make  such  other  arrangements  as  they  should  deem 
advisable"  for  another  news  service. 


66  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

The  envoys  from  the  West  were  both  young  men.  Halstead,  a 
stubborn,  fiery  individual  with  the  mustache  and  goatee  of  the  tradi- 
tional southern  colonel,  was  thirty-eight  and  his  companion  several 
years  younger.  Both  were  experienced  journalists  and  White  had  the 
added  advantage  of  five  years'  experience  as  agent  for  the  New  York 
Associated  Press  in  Chicago.  He  took  the  post  in  1855  and  covered  the 
famous  Lincoln-Douglas  debates  for  the  organization  he  was  now  ready 
to  fight. 

Halstead  and  White  found  New  York  an  industrious  city  with  a 
population  close  to  the  million  mark.  The  wires  from  telegraph  poles 
laced  through  the  branches  of  shade  trees  along  Broadway.  Office 
forces  worked  ten  hours  a  day,  six  days  a  week,  and  there  were  no 
female  employes.  The  basement  of  the  modest  J.  P.  Morgan  building 
in  Wall  Street  was  stacked  with  the  wares  of  a  retail  wood  and  coal 
dealer,  and  inflated  rubber  bosom  pads  were  the  latest  boon  to  the 
feminine  figure. 

The  two  Westerners  went  straight  to  the  New  York  Associated 
Press  offices  on  lower  Broadway  where  boxlike  containers  rattled  back 
and  forth  above  the  street  on  three  miniature  aerial  railways,  shuttling 
dispatches  from  the  association's  headquarters  to  the  wires  of  the  near-by 
telegraph  company.  The  aging,  one-time  schoolmaster  who  presided 
over  the  messenger  boys  greeted  them  and  led  the  way  to  the  committee 
room. 

There  the  powers  waited — President  Prime;  Joseph  P.  Beach,  man- 
ager of  the  Sun;  George  Jones,  business  manager  of  the  Times;  Samuel 
Sinclair,  publisher  of  the  Tribune;  Manton  Marble,  of  the  World,  and 
Simonton,  the  new  general  agent.  The  Express  was  not  represented, 
but  Halstead  and  White  already  knew  that  Erastus  Brooks  was  on  a 
hurried  trip  upstate  in  an  effort  to  hold  the  wavering  New  York  State 
Associated  Press  in  line.  Nor  was  there  anyone  from  the  Herald.  Young 
James  Gordon  Bennett,  who  had  succeeded  his  father,  was  busy  getting 
his  sleek  yacht  Henrietta  ready  for  a  transatlantic  race. 

Halstead,  as  spokesman  for  the  West,  told  the  New  Yorkers  that 
his  association  wanted  an  equal  voice  in  all  news-gathering  affairs.  Such 
a  proposal  shocked  the  monopolistic  group. 

"Any  such  proposal  is  out  of  the  question,"  Prime  declared. 
"Such  an  idea  cannot  even  be  considered." 

"Why  not?" 

Baldish  and  slightly  hunched,  the  president  of  the  New  York 
Associated  Press  wrinkled  his  brow  and  attempted  to  explain. 


THUNDER  IN  THE  WEST  67 

"The  New  York  Associated  Press,"  he  said,  "was  founded  by  six 
publishers  who  have  sponsored  organized  news  gathering  since  1848. 
We  have  facilities  for  carrying  on  the  work  and  we  do  not  propose  to 
delegate  any  of  our  authority.  It  is  unthinkable  that  an  outside  group 
should  presume  to  feel  it  can  have  any  voice  in  our  affairs.  News 
gathering  is  our  business  enterprise  and  we  do  not  propose  to  share  it 
with  others.  Consideration  of  your  plan  would  imply  that  the  Western 
Associated  Press  is  entitled  to  be  treated  as  an  equal,  and  that  would 
be  an  intolerable  humiliation." 

Halstead  and  White  objected  to  such  a  narrow  concept  of  news 
gathering,  but,  making  no  impression,  suggested  another  meeting  the 
next  day.  Prime  and  his  colleagues  consented — it  would  give  these 
Westerners  time  to  realize  New  York  could  not  be  frightened  into 
agreement  with  their  plan.  The  second  meeting  was  inconclusive  and 
a  third  was  arranged. 

But  Halstead  and  White  were  not  bluffing.  They  had  proceeded 
cautiously  pending  an  opportunity  to  appraise  the  preliminary  success  of 
Craig's  new  independent  agency — the  United  States  and  Europe  Tele- 
graph News  Association,  which  was  backed  by  the  Western  Union. 

The  new  service  had  begun  auspiciously  on  November  24  and  the 
reports  for  the  first  four  days  were  workmanlike  and  promising.  One 
of  Craig's  initial  policies  had  been  to  provide,  by  way  of  the  new  cable, 
a  good  budget  of  foreign  news,  a  large  portion  of  it  from  sources 
formerly  controlled  by  the  New  York  Associated  Press.  This  assured 
the  West  of  some  improvement  in  cable  coverage  and  Craig  had  further 
promised  to  make  up  a  special  daily  western  report  designed  solely  for 
the  particular  needs  and  requirements  of  that  section. 

The  two  Westerners  spent  no  time  on  formalities  at  the  third 
meeting.  They  put  a  prepared  statement  on  the  table  in  front  of  Presi- 
dent Prime.  It  served  notice  that  the  West  planned  to  assume  control 
of  its  own  news  report  and  that  it  would  obtain  news  on  its  own  behalf 
from  any  outside  organization  which  could  provide  what  they  wanted. 
It  said: 

To  The  New  York  Associated  Press: 

The  Executive  Committee  of  the  Western  Associated  Press  propose 
to  get  news  from  all  parties  who  have  news  to  sell,  and  to  provide  for  its 
transmission  to  their  respective  journals.  They  propose  to  take  the  regular 
report  of  the  New  York  (Associated)  Press  at  Buffalo,  and  provide  for 
its  transmission  to  the  various  Western  cities.  For  this  news  they  will  pay 
their  own  equitable  proportion  of  the  cost  of  collection.  They  propose  also 


68  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

to  appoint  their  own  agent  in  New  York  to  collect  and  buy  additional  news 
from  all  sources  accessible  to  him  and  to  provide  for  the  transmission  of  the 
same  to  the  various  cities. 

A  hubbub  broke  loose.  There  were  sharp  words,  loud  threats,  and 
a  noisy  storm  of  voices.  Halstead  and  White  sat  through  the  turmoil, 
calm  and  unmoved,  making  no  attempt  to  reply.  The  New  York  group 
quickly  adopted  a  resolution  prohibiting  any  subscriber  from  taking 
dispatches  from  a  rival  organization  under  the  penalty  of  being  cut  off 
instantly  from  its  news  report.  But  this  time  the  threat  did  not  work. 
The  two  young  men  from  the  West  rose. 

"Gentlemen,"  Halstead  said,  "my  colleague  and  I  have  made  a 
most  thorough  examination  of  the  entire  situation.  As  matters  now 
stand  the  press  of  the  West  is  subservient  to  and  dependent  upon  the 
New  York  Associated  Press  for  all  its  news.  We  are  not  getting  the 
kind  of  news  we  want  and  we  have  no  voice  in  the  direction  of  your 
organization.  Our  decision  is  that  it  would  best  serve  the  interests  of 
the  West  if  we  aid  in  the  establishment  of  another  news  service.  Then 
we  can  get  the  kind  of  news  we  want.  Accordingly  we  have  made  plans 
to  supply  ourselves  with  news  without  any  further  assistance  from  you. 
Gentlemen,  we  bid  you  good  day." 

The  two  men  quit  the  room.  They  could  hear  another  wrathful 
outbreak  as  they  descended  the  stairs.  The  angry  voices  died,  but  Hal- 
stead  and  White  would  have  been  interested  to  hear  the  carefully 
studied  observation  of  one  of  the  men  they  left  behind.  General  Agent 
Simonton  had  watched  these  Westerners  in  action.  He  saw  they  were 
progressive  and  might  be  impressed  by  some  startlingly  new  develop- 
ment. The  struggle  was  on,  but  he  believed  he  could  produce  a  news 
report  that  might  play  some  part  in  bringing  it  to  an  end. 

"Mr.  President,"  he  began,  "I  have  a  plan  .  .  ." 


VII.  THEY  CALLED  IT  PEACE 


GENERAL  AGENT  SIMONTON'S  plan  was  to  take  advantage  of 
the  new  cable  and  improve  New  York's  foreign  news  report.  He  would 
do  this  by  sending  an  American-trained  reporter  to  Europe — something 
the  association  had  never  done  before.  He  looked  around  for  a  likely 
man  and  called  in  the  son  of  a  New  Jersey  senator. 

When  Alexander  Wilson  left  Simonton  and  climbed  down  the 
long  flight  of  stairs  all  had  been  decided.  There  was  a  raw,  wintry  bite 
in  the  early  December  air  of  1866  as  he  stepped  out  onto  Broadway 
and  looked  down  Liberty  Street  toward  the  East  River.  He  could  see 
the  graceful  masts  of  clipper  ships  and  California  packets  towering  above 
the  low  water-front  buildings,  and  the  sooty  columns  of  smoke  from  the 
less  glamorous  steamships.  Wilson  now  felt  a  new,  personal  interest 
in  these  trim  vessels.  Somewhere  along  the  docks  of  South  Street  was 
his  transport  to  a  great  adventure. 

This  new  foreign  assignment  at  first  had  seemed  a  very  ambitious 
experiment  in  news  gathering,  but  as  Simonton  carefully  explained  its 
purpose  Wilson  realized  how  logical  and  inevitable  it  was.  The  foreign 
report  of  the  past  had  been  contributed  by  Europeans  with  no  firsthand 
knowledge  of  what  American  papers  needed.  In  consequence  much  copy 
of  comparatively  little  interest  was  received  at  considerable  expense. 
The  completion  of  the  cable  brought  the  long-awaited  opportunity  to 
obtain  foreign  intelligence  while  it  still  was  news  and  Simonton  saw 
that,  by  sending  his  own  man  abroad,  he  would  have  a  strong  point  in 
bargaining  with  the  West. 

Once  his  plan  was  approved  by  the  New  York  majority,  Simonton 
offered  Wilson  the  assignment.  The  new  correspondent  had  had  expe- 
rience on  the  New  York  Times  and  before  that  had  been  associated 
with  both  Simonton  and  Henry  J.  Raymond  on  the  Courier  and 
Enquirer.  Now  he  was  in  his  late  forties  and  once  he  had  recovered  from 
his  surprise  at  such  an  unexpected  change  he  was  impatient  to  begin 
his  duties  abroad. 

A  few  days  later  he  stood  on  the  deck  of  an  outbound  vessel  and 

69 


70  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

watched  the  ragged  Manhattan  sky  line  fade  into  the  morning  mist.  It 
would  be  his  task  henceforth  to  write  Europe's  daily  history — the  wary 
duels  of  the  great  Disraeli  and  Gladstone,  the  negotiations  with  Russia 
for  the  purchase  of  Alaska,  Garibaldi's  invasion  of  the  Papal  States, 
the  rise  of  a  strong  German  nation  under  Bismarck,  and  the  troubled 
destiny  of  France. 

He  set  up  the  first  Associated  Press  office  in  London,  and  he  did 
it  in  time  to  cable  news  of  a  contest  which  had  all  the  East  talking — the 
first  transatlantic  yacht  race  from  Sandy  Hook  to  Cowes.  Young  James 
Gordon  Bennett  brought  his  Henrietta  in  victorious  on  Christmas  Day, 
1866,  with  a  record  of  13  days,  21  hours,  and  55  minutes  for  a 
tempestuous  winter  crossing  of  3,106  miles.  Bennett's  two  rivals,  Pierre 
Lorillard,  Jr.,  and  George  Frank  Osgood,  scudded  in  a  day  later  to 
pay  off  the  $30,000  stake  each  had  posted. 

As  European  agent  for  The  Associated  Press,  Wilson  inherited 
what  Craig  had  left  of  a  loosely-knit  staff  of  foreign-born  representa- 
tives. These  were  his  lieutenants  and  to  supplement  them  he  had  the 
reports  of  the  foreign  agencies,  originally  largely  commercial  in  char- 
acter, which  were  developing  as  news  gatherers.  There  was  the  agency 
which  Charles  Havas  established  in  Paris  in  1836  to  obtain  financial 
intelligence,  the  German  organization  founded  in  Berlin  by  Dr.  Bern- 
hard  Wolff  in  1849,  Guglielmo  Stefani's  Italian  enterprise  which  had 
its  beginnings  in  Turin  in  1854,  and  most  important,  the  service  Julius 
de  Reuter  launched  in  London  in  1858. 

But  Wilson's  job  was  to  do  as  much  actual  reporting  as  possible, 
and  Simonton  also  wanted  him  to  Americanize  the  foreign  news  for 
American  consumption.  Wilson  had  to  do  the  job  alone  and  the  news 
conflict  raging  back  home  made  his  task  an  exacting  one. 


That  conflict  had  been  on  in  grim  earnest  for  weeks.  Immediately 
upon  quitting  the  New  York  meeting  of  November  28,  1866,  Halstead 
and  White  dispatched  to  their  fellow  members  a  full  announcement 
of  the  break  with  New  York.  They  reported  that  arrangements  had 
been  consummated  with  Craig  to  provide  the  service  of  his  United 
States  and  Europe  Telegraph  News  Association,  and  they  instructed 
the  publishers  to  refuse  henceforth  the  budgets  transmitted  by  the  old 
organization. 

Craig  made  his  debut  as  the  paladin  of  the  "outside"  papers  he 


THEY  CALLED  IT  PEACE  71 

so  often  had  chastised.  On  November  29  he  was  designated  general 
agent  of  the  Western  Associated  Press.  The  news  gathering  machinery 
of  the  country  was  in  a  turmoil  as  the  contest  began.  Both  Craig  and 
Simonton  transmitted  complete  reports,  day  and  night,  not  only  to 
the  West  but  to  other  clients.  The  agents  of  the  New  York  Associated 
Press  in  other  cities  were  bombarded  first  by  this  faction,  then  by  that. 
For  a  month  they  hardly  knew  which  side  they  served. 

The  prophets  who  had  been  saying  the  West  was  courting  destruc- 
tion in  its  split  with  New  York  soon  changed  their  opinions.  Craig 
had  lost  none  of  his  old  skill.  The  superiority  of  his  report  was  apparent 
almost  from  the  outset.  The  rank  and  file  of  his  old  correspondents 
rallied  to  him  and  many  dissatisfied  clients  of  the  New  York  association 
came  under  his  banner.  The  close  of  his  first  day  of  operations  found 
him  proudly  enumerating  the  imposing  list  of  papers  he  was  serving: 

The  leading  journals  of  Cincinnati,  St.  Louis,  Chicago,  Louisville, 
Cleveland,  Pittsburgh,  Indianapolis,  Nashville  and  Memphis  in  the  West,  the 
majority  of  the  newspapers  in  Arkansas,  Mississippi  and  Texas  in  the  South- 
west, every  paper  in  Louisiana  with  a  single  exception  in  New  Orleans, 
all  the  newspapers  in  Virginia  with  but  three  or  four  exceptions,  four-fifths 
of  the  press  of  Georgia,  one-half  of  the  press  of  Baltimore,  all  the  news- 
papers of  Washington  City,  eight  out  of  the  thirteen  Philadelphia  papers 
which  publish  news  by  telegraph,  two  of  the  three  of  the  prosperous  city  of 
Newark,  the  entire  press  of  Brooklyn,  and  three  of  the  nine  of  New  York. 

New  York,  pushed  suddenly  to  the  wall,  fought  back  doggedly.  A 
shrewd  statement  was  rushed  to  all  members  of  the  Western  Associated 
Press  charging  that  Halstead  and  White  had  sought  to  betray  the 
interests  of  their  fellow  publishers  at  the  price  of  preferential  arrange- 
ments for  their  own  papers. 

Nevertheless,  the  tide  continued  strongly  toward  Craig.  The  New 
York  State  Associated  Press  debated  the  wisdom  of  casting  its  lot  with 
the  rebellious  West.  The  New  England  association  also  threatened  to 
desert,  and  the  few  clients  remaining  in  the  South  grew  restive.  The 
elder  Bennett  left  his  semi-retirement  for  secret  conferences  with  Hal- 
stead  and  White,  who  had  remained  in  New  York  to  direct  operations 
with  Craig.  Then  came  the  first  actual  break  in  the  solidarity  of  the 
New  York  Associated  Press.  The  Worldy  long  sympathetic  to  the 
insurgents,  announced  its  withdrawal  from  membership. 

It  was  at  this  juncture  that  the  shaken  New  York  majority  actually 
ordered  all  its  own  news  reports  withheld  from  papers  using  Craig's 
service.  At  the  direction  of  Halstead  and  White,  Craig  retorted  with  a 


72  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

broadside  notifying  his  subscribers  they  could  not  continue  to  receive 
the  new  Western  news  budget  if  they  also  took  service  from  the  New 
York  Associated  Press.  There  was  ironic  inconsistency  in  this  policy. 
Halstead  and  White  had  been  vehement  in  denouncing  just  such  tactics 
on  the  part  of  the  old  monopoly.  But  this  was  one  of  those  battles  in 
which  the  better  part  of  valor  seemed  to  be  to  fight  the  enemy  with  his 
own  weapons. 

The  old  association's  service  began  to  show  a  lack  of  live  news, 
particularly  from  the  Mississippi  Valley.  Yet  New  York  stubbornly 
showed  no  signs  of  yielding.  It  redoubled  its  attacks  on  Craig,  Halstead, 
and  White,  revived  the  old  bugaboo  of  New  York's  ability  to  dominate 
the  telegraph,  and  preyed  on  the  fears  of  the  timid  small  publishers 
who  feared  the  split  eventually  would  mean  an  entire  loss  of  telegraph 
news.  Nor  was  New  York  above  stooping  to  sabotage.  When  Lincoln's 
successor,  President  Andrew  Johnson,  delivered  his  important  message 
to  a  hostile  Congress  that  December,  trees  were  felled  across  the  wires 
being  used  by  Craig  to  transmit  the  news. 

Although  Craig  made  no  effort  to  conceal  his  desire  for  revenge 
on  New  York,  he  demonstrated  that  he  also  had  the  good  interests 
of  news  gathering  at  heart  by  offering  to  turn  over  ownership  of  his 
United  States  and  Europe  Telegraph  News  Association  to  its  subscribers 
the  moment  they  organized  on  .a  national  front.  There  were  no  strings 
attached  to  the  offer  and  had  the  opportunity  been  seized  the  old 
monopoly  probably  could  not  have  survived.  Halstead  and  White  pon- 
dered the  proposal  but  felt  they  could  not  accept  without  assuming 
greater  responsibility  than  their  Board  of  Directors  had  authorized. 
So  the  offer  was  soon  forgotten  in  the  rush  of  other  events. 

Simonton,  the  opposing  field  marshal,  meanwhile  was  laboring  to 
hold  together  a  disintegrating  news  empire  until  Wilson  could  re- 
establish the  association's  old  dominance  abroad.  The  new  general  agent 
placed  great  store  in  the  importance  of  Wilson  to  help  turn  the  tide. 
The  other  factor  on  which  he  relied  was  the  mounting  bill  the  West 
was  being  called  upon  to  meet  for  the  expenses  of  its  adventure  in  news 
independence.  Despite  the  forbidding  immediate  outlook,  he  was 
inclined  to  be  optimistic.  Already  the  subtle  New  York  propaganda 
campaign  had  begun  to  bear  fruit  among  the  apprehensive  small  papers 
in  the  West.  Halstead  and  White  were  being  called  selfish  con- 
spirators by  fellow  members,  their  authority  was  being  questioned,  and 
there  was  grumbling  about  expenses. 

Halstead  and  White  were  so  stung  by  this  sniping  back  home  that 


THEY  CALLED  IT  PEACE  73 

they  issued  an  indignant  rejoinder,  defending  their  course  and  denying 
they  had  sacrificed  the  smaller  papers  to  their  personal  advantage.  They 
realized,  however,  that  eventually  their  actions  of  the  past  feverish 
fortnight  must  be  formally  ratified,  and  definite  plans  mapped  for  the 
future.  They  recommended  a  special  meeting  and  the  Western  Board 
of  Directors  called  one  for  December  12  at  Crosby's  Opera  House  in 
Chicago. 

No  sooner  had  the  meeting  convened  than  J.  E.  Scripps,  testy 
managing  editor  of  the  Detroit  Advertiser  and  Tribune >  leaped  into  the 
fray.  He  called  upon  the  association  to  disavow  responsibility  for  every- 
thing Halstead  and  White  had  done  and  lashed  the  two  envoys  for 
their  "unwarrantable  assumption  of  power." 

Halstead  met  the  attack  with  a  spirited  reply. 

"The  question  goes  beyond  journalism,"  he  declared.  "It  is  a  ques- 
tion of  importance  to  every  merchant  and  every  man  who  deals  in 
securities.  Every  community  in  the  Western  country  has  been  robbed 
of  its  intelligence  by  this  monopoly,  and  what  we  have  to  do  is  to  break 
it  up — to  establish  competition.  I  do  not  expect  to  be  able  to  crush  the 
New  York  Associated  Press,  but  I  do  expect  to  be  able  to  release  the 
Western  Press  from  its  despotism." 

Scripps's  motion  was  thrown  out  after  an  animated  debate  and  the 
chairman  recognized  Erastus  Brooks,  who  had  come  from  New  York  to 
plead  for  amity.  Questions  were  fired  at  him  from  all  sides  and  when 
asked  point-blank  if  the  West  would  be  given  a  voice  in  the  New 
York  Associated  Press,  he  replied  firmly  that  this  could  be  done  only 
on  matters  pertaining  to  its  own  territory. 

Joseph  Medill  of  the  Chicago  Tribune,  who  had  been  the  leading 
influence  in  the  foundation  of  the  Western  Associated  Press  four  years 
before,  made  short  work  of  Brooks's  arguments. 

First  he  reproved  the  smaller  papers  for  distrusting  the  motives 
of  Halstead  and  White,  and  then  he  charged  New  York  with  foment- 
ing such  a  feeling  in  order  to  weaken  the  West  so  that  the  old  monopoly 
could  divide  and  conquer  the  insurgents  piecemeal. 

"This  New  York  Association  is  a  monopoly  in  the  worst  sense  of 
the  word,"  Medill  declared,  "the  denial  of  Mr.  Brooks  to  the  contrary 
notwithstanding.  It  is  one  of  the  most  pernicious  and  crushing  monopo- 
lies that  ever  existed.  It  contracts  and  collects  the  telegraphic  news  to 
suit  its  own  wants  and  tastes,  and  then  deals  out  scraps  of  it  to  others 
on  such  conditions  and  at  such  prices  as  it  chooses  to  affix.  What  voice 
have  we  in  that  New  York  association?  We  are  told  that  we  pay  but  a 


74  AP —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

trifle  toward  its  expenses.  I  contend  that  we  have  paid  more  than  our 
full  quota  on  all  the  dispatches  we  have  received.  When  the  cable  dis- 
patches were  added  as  a  portion  to  the  news  of  the  day,  the  New  York 
Associated  Press  apportioned  out  to  the  various  places  their  quota  of 
the  expenses.  Did  they  take  five-sevenths  of  the  cost  to  themselves? 
Not  exactly.  They  charged  one  full  third  to  the  association  represented 
on  this  floor  5  another  third  on  the  papers  south  of  New  Yorkj  an  addi- 
tional fraction  on  those  west  and  north  of  New  York,  and  the  residue, 
if  any,  they  pay  themselves! 

"I  am  in  favor  of  confirming  the  action  of  the  Executive  Commit- 
tee," he  continued.  "It  is  necessary  for  the  protection  of  our  interests 
as  Western  publishers  to  carry  this  action  through.  Gentlemen,  you 
represent  and  speak  to  twelve  millions  of  free  people!  You  speak  in 
the  name  of  twelve  states  $  they  in  the  name  of  one  city!  How  much 
longer  shall  we  permit  this  minority  to  rule  over  the  majority?  Don't 
be  afraid  of  independence.  It  is  not  going  to  hurt  you.  It  will  not  take 
long  before  these  New  York  birds  of  paradise  will  come  down  from 
their  lofty  trees  and  roost  lower.  Let  us  simply  be  united  and  all  the 
rest  will  be  easy!" 

The  meeting  voted  21  to  n  to  approve  the  action  of  Halstead 
and  White.  The  divorce  from  New  York  had  been  duly  ratified. 


Victory  was  in  the  air.  Halstead  successfully  proposed  the  crea- 
tion of  a  three-man  committee  to  correspond  with  publishers  outside 
of  New  York  City  with  a  view  to  organizing  a  United  States  Asso- 
ciated Press.  Then  the  meeting  ended,  confident  the  power  of  New 
York  had  been  blasted. 

The  New  Yorkers  were  not  so  easily  annihilated,  however.  Wil- 
son's presence  in  London  was  giving  Simonton  the  advantage  abroad 
which  he  had  awaited.  Now  the  conflict  grew  even  more  expensive  for 
both  antagonists.  Although  cable  rates  had  been  reduced  from  $10  to 
$5  per  word,  transatlantic  dispatches  remained  the  most  costly  con- 
venience in  newsdom.  The  fighting  factions  found  their  cable  bills  run- 
ning over  $2,000  weekly,  an  outlay  which  threatened  bankruptcy  if 
continued.  Craig  struggled  to  overcome  Simonton's  advantage,  but  it 
was  an  uneven  contest  because  Wilson's  presence  in  England  made 
New  York's  foreign  budget  superior  to  that  provided  the  West  by 
European  correspondents  ignorant  of  American  newspaper  practice. 


THEY  CALLED  IT  PEACE  75 

Thus  the  battle  seesawed,  with  Craig  pre-eminent  in  domestic  intelli- 
gence and  Simonton  the  leader  in  the  foreign  field. 

For  another  fortnight  the  rivalry  continued  sharp  and  intense  and 
then,  surprisingly  enough,  it  was  the  stiff-necked  New  York  majority 
that  finally  unbent  and  made  the  first  real  move  for  peace.  As  1866 
ended  they  advanced  the  suggestion  that,  if  the  Western  Associated 
Press  would  send  some  of  its  "old  heads"  back  east  along  with  the 
"young  men"  of  the  Executive  Committee,  an  agreement  might  be 
reached.  Just  when  the  Westerners  might  have  held  out  a  little  longer 
and  perhaps  emerged  victorious,  an  unexplained  blindness  descended. 
They  seemed  too  preoccupied  with  the  considerations  of  the  immediate 
present — the  fight  was  proving  immensely  expensive,  Wilson's  foreign 
news  report  had  created  a  tremendous  impression,  and  the  grumbling 
small  papers  were  sulky  in  their  support  of  hostilities.  At  any  rate, 
the  Westerners  overlooked  the  past  abuses  and  received  the  New  York 
overture  favorably.  They  named  Medill,  H.  N.  Walker  of  the  Detroit 
Free  Press,  and  Richard  Smith  of  the  Cincinnati  Gazette  as  the  "old 
heads"  to  accompany  Halstead  and  White  to  the  eastern  metropolis. 

A  great  show  of  tactful  politeness  and  diplomacy  characterized 
the  first  several  days  of  the  revived  conference.  New  York  made  nu- 
merous efforts  to  win  back  the  West  without  making  major  conces- 
sions, but  the  insurgents  sat  tight,  counting  heavily  on  the  apparent 
friendliness  of  the  New  York  World  and  Herald  and  the  presumed 
support  of  both  the  New  England  and  the  New  York  State  Asso- 
ciated Press.  Again  an  impasse  threatened.  Then  the  New  Yorkers 
broke  the  deadlock  by  resorting  to  the  old  divide-and-conquer  strategy. 
Simonton  slipped  away  one  night  to  Boston  and  negotiated  a  new  con- 
tract which  brought  New  England  once  more  under  the  old  standard. 
Bennett's  Herald  was  cozened  back  and  the  upstate  publishers  were 
persuaded  to  return. 

Robbed  of  their  fancied  advantages,  the  Westerners  settled  down 
to  earnest  efforts  to  reach  an  agreement.  General  Anson  Stager,  super- 
intendent of  Western  Union  Telegraph  Company,  was  invited  to  act 
as  mediator.  For  some  reason  Western  Union  had  lost  its  initial  en- 
thusiasm for  the  Craig  venture.  The  company  had  been  hard  put  to 
handle  the  voluminous  reports  of  the  rival  agencies.  Soon  a  pact  was 
worked  out  which  the  Westerners,  however  mistakenly,  considered  a 
major  concession.  Craig,  the  veteran  of  more  than  thirty  years'  news 
gathering,  was  sacrificed  to  the  agreement  and  under  the  terms  of  the 
treaty  Simonton  also  was  to  retire  in  the  interests  of  harmony.  The 


76  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

pact  was  drawn  on  January  n,  1867.  It  contained  the  following  pro- 
vision, among  others: 

1.  Those  papers  that  left  either  association  during  the  difficulties  are 
re-admitted. 

2.  The  New  York  Association  is  to  furnish  all  its  news,  for  the  exclusive 
use  of  the  Western  Associated  Press  within  its  territory,  to  the  Western 
agent  in  the  New  York  office. 

3.  The  Western  Associated  Press  is  to  collect  and  furnish  all  news  of 
its  territory  to  the  agent  of  the  New  York  Associated  Press  at  Cleveland 
or  Pittsburgh. 

4.  Delivery  of  news  is  to  be  made  as  rapidly  as  received. 

5.  Both  associations  agree  not  to  compete  for  papers  in  the  other's 
territory. 

6.  The  Western  Association  is  to  pay:  For  general  news,  $8,000  per 
annum;  for  cable  news  22  per  cent  of  the  expense  of  obtaining  the  same, 
but  not  exceeding  in  gross  expense  $150,000  per  annum;    for  California 
news,  20  per  cent  of  the  whole  cost  to  the  New  York  Associated  Press  at 
Chicago. 

7.  The  Western  Associated  Press  is  to  deliver  at  Chicago  its  report 
for  California  customers  of  the  New  York  Associated  Press  and  for  cus- 
tomers at  other  points  west  of  the  territory  of  the  Western  Associated  Press. 

Prime,  as  president,  and  Beach,  as  secretary,  signed  the  agreement 
for  New  York.  H.  N.  Walker  affixed  his  signature  as  president  for  the 
West. 

That  same  day  Walker  also  signed  a  contract  with  Western  Union 
for  transmission  of  news  under  the  new  agreement.  Buffalo  was  desig- 
nated the  eastern  relay  point  for  news  to  the  West's  afternoon  papers, 
and  New  York  for  the  morning.  The  day  file  from  Buffalo  consisted 
of  a  foo-word  "early  morning  report"  and  a  30O-word  "noon  report." 
The  night  report  contained  the  more  imposing  volume  of  3,500  words 
and  went  to  Pittsburgh,  Cincinnati,  Indianapolis,  Louisville,  Chicago, 
Detroit,  Toledo,  Cleveland,  and  Milwaukee.  A  night  "pony"  report 
of  1,500  words,  abstracted  from  the  larger  report,  was  filed  out  of 
Cleveland  to  Wheeling,  Zanesville,  Columbus,  Dayton,  Madison,  Ind., 
New  Albany,  and  Sandusky. 

The  local  news  from  all  large  and  small  points,  aggregating  2,000 
words  daily,  went  to  the  major  cities.  An  additional  budget  called 
"River  news"  was  serviced  to  Pittsburgh,  Cincinnati,  Louisville,  and 
St.  Louis  only.  The  complete  Western  report  averaged  6,000  words 
daily  and  for  its  transmission  that  association  paid  Western  Union 
$60,000  a  year  in  $5,000  installments. 


THEY  CALLED  IT  PEACE  77 

To  replace  Craig,  an  experienced  telegrapher  named  George  B. 
Hicks  was  appointed  general  agent  for  the  West  and  headquarters  were 
established  in  Cleveland. 

They  called  it  peace,  but  the  settlement  left  New  York  still  mas- 
ter in  the  field  of  news.  Although  the  old  organization  had  lost  some 
prestige,  it  still  retained  a  tight  grip  on  the  highly  important  cable 
news,  Washington  news,  and  the  news  of  financial  New  York.  Further- 
more, it  remained  in  a  position  to  control,  if  not  to  dictate,  the  news 
output  of  most  of  the  regional  associations. 

Besides  such  psychological  advantages  as  the  West  reaped,  it  also 
won  a  more  satisfactory  financial  agreement  with  New  York  and  a 
limited  degree  of  recognition.  But  it  had  surrendered  much  for  these 
concessions.  The  loudly  urged  claim  for  a  voice  in  the  operations  of 
the  New  York  association  was  quietly  jettisoned  $  the  stubbornly  as- 
serted right  to  obtain  news  from  other  sources  was  forgotten,  and  there 
were  no  specifications  as  to  the  quality  of  the  news  report  itself,  long 
the  subject  of  agitation. 

Disillusioned  and  embittered,  Craig  retired  from  the  news  field, 
but  not  so  Simonton.  New  York  blandly  forgot  its  pledge  to  eliminate 
him — the  new  general  agent  had  proved  himself  equal  to  a  great 
emergency. 


VIII.  BLACK  YEARS 


BY  THE  time  of  Grant's  inauguration  as  President,  Simonton  had  set- 
tled down  in  the  old  New  York  headquarters,  which  remained  in  the 
same  building  on  Broadway  occupied  since  the  days  of  the  first  general 
agent.  There  was  a  large  force  of  assistants  now  and  the  association 
had  agents  in  London,  Liverpool,  Montreal,  Quebec,  Boston,  Phila- 
delphia, Chicago,  New  Orleans,  Washington,  Albany,  San  Francisco, 
"and  in  all  the  principal  cities  and  towns  of  the  United  States."  News 
flowed  in  at  the  rate  of  35,000  words  daily.  It  came  by  Atlantic  cable, 
by  Cuba  cable,  by  land  telegraph,  by  ships  from  South  American  ports, 
by  clippers  on  the  China  run.  Busy  copyists  with  carbon-grimed  fingers 
transcribed  it  all  on  the  thin  manifold  sheets,  stuffed  it  into  envelopes 
for  delivery  to  the  dozen  metropolitan  papers,  or  handed  it  to  waiting 
regional  agents  who  prepared  the  reports  transmitted  to  the  auxiliary 
associations.  . 

There  was  much  news  for  the  hard-working  copyists  during  1869. 
Wall  Street  had  its  famous  "Black  Friday"  when  the  market  went 
crashing  in  a  cloud  of  confusion,  bankruptcy,  and  ruin.  On  Promontory 
Point,  out  in  Utah,  Governor  Leland  Stanford  and  Thomas  Durant 
drove  the  last  spike  connecting  the  railroads  which  first  linked  the 
Atlantic  and  the  Pacific.  Arthur  Cummings  was  hailed  as  the  man  who 
introduced  curve  pitching  in  baseball.  Sweating  English  troops  invaded 
Ethiopia  to  punish  the  Lion  of  Judah.  John  D.  Rockefeller  was  laying 
the  foundation  for  his  oil  empire,  and  from  Europe  the  rising  tide  of 
immigration  kept  rolling.  The  country's  population  was  close  to  39,- 
000,000. 

Simonton's  worries  were  multiplying.  There  was  a  running  con- 
troversy with  the  cable  company  over  rates  and  the  priority  of  press 
dispatches.  Another  source  of  trouble  was  the  emergence  of  a  struggling 
rival — the  Hasson  News  Association — which  was  providing  unaccus- 
tomed competition.  Then,  too,  there  were  the  activities  of  the  Western 
Union  which  sold  brokers  and  countinghouses  a  service  of  commercial 
and  market  news  abstracted  from  the  Associated  Press  report.  Such  lib- 

78 


BLACK  YEARS  79 

cities  were  taken  under  a  vague  agreement  between  the  company  and 
the  New  York  association,  but  there  were  constant  complaints  from  the 
West  on  the  ground  that  the  wire  concern  was  invading  the  regular 
news  field. 

Soon  the  general  agent  was  finding  Western  Union  the  cause  for 
more  grievous  embarrassment.  Although  close  alliance  with  the  tele- 
graph company  had  undeniable  advantages  in  assuring  the  best  com- 
munication facilities,  it  left  the  news-gathering  organization  vulnerable 
to  repeated  attack.  Throughout  the  seventies  the  names  of  the  New 
York  Associated  Press  and  the  Western  Union  were  coupled  again 
and  again  in  Congress  and  denounced  as  "co-conspirators  in  building  a 
press  monopoly." 

In  those  graft-ridden,  ruthless  days,  Western  Union,  by  controlling 
the  most  important  telegraph  system,  held  the  whip  hand  and  New 
York  was  expected  not  to  send  out  anything  inimical  to  its  powerful 
ally.  If  necessary  the  news  could  be  painstakingly  selected  or  colored, 
and  all  criticisms  by  client  papers  were  prohibited.  At  one  stage  the 
president  of  Western  Union  acknowledged  before  a  Congressional  in- 
vestigation that  the  New  York  Associated  Press  was  under  an  agree- 
ment to  use  its  wires  exclusively,  and  that  all  papers  receiving  its  re- 
ports were  forbidden  to  have  any  dealings  with  rival  wire  systems. 

In  the  face  of  these  incessant  assaults,  the  members  who  controlled 
the  New  York  Associated  Press  maintained  an  unworried  complacency. 
The  harried  general  agent  was  left  to  make  such  defense  as  the  inci- 
dents demanded.  Eventually  it  became  necessary  that  a  formal  answer 
to  the  monopoly  charge  be  made  and  Congress,  after  almost  ten  years 
of  talking,  summoned  Simonton  to  appear  before  a  Senate  committee. 
There  were  six  counts  in  the  indictment  of  the  press  association's  rela- 
tions with  the  telegraph  company: 

1.  News  associations  are  compelled  by  The  Associated  Press  to  use 
only  Western  Union  wires. 

2.  By  their  contracts  with  Western  Union,  The  Associated  Press  is 
pledged  to  oppose  other  wire  companies. 

3.  The  inability  of  New  York  Evening  Post  to  use  a  dispatch  from 
its  own  correspondent  until  it  has  given  the  dispatch  to  other  members  of 
the  New  York  Associated  Press. 

4.  News  originating  in  New  York  is  sometimes  sent  to  Washington 
for  distribution  so  that  those  receiving  it  will  think  it  originated  in  Washington. 

5.  The  New  York  Associated  Press  censors  the  papers  of  the  country 
by  cutting  off  news  reports  to  papers  who  have  criticized  The  Associated 
Press. 


8o  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

6.  The  New  York  Associated  Press  is  engaged  in  public  business  and 
therefore  is  amenable  to  the  laws  governing  corporations  transacting  public 
business. 

Simonton  made  a  lengthy  and  vigorous  reply,  stoutly  defended  the 
organization  he  headed,  and  did  not  hesitate  to  lecture  the  investigating 
committee.  He  said: 

The  Associated  Press  is  a  private  business,  carried  on  under  the  same 
moral,  legal  and  constitutional  rights  which  permit  any  one  paper,  in  a 
country  village  or  in  a  metropolis,  to  collect  and  publish  its  local  news.  The 
charge  of  monopoly  rests  upon  the  single  fact  that  here  and  there  some 
newspapers,  which  did  not  share  in  the  labor  or  risk  of  establishing  The  Asso- 
ciated Press,  are  not  permitted  to  come  in  and  share  its  facilities,  now  that 
the  day  of  experiment  and  risk  has  passed.  As  well  might  they  demand  to 
force  their  way  into  a  share  of  the  already  created  business  of  any  bank  or 
dry  goods  house,  or  other  mercantile  establishment,  which,  like  The  Associated 
Press,  had  spent  thirty-one  years  in  perfecting  its  plans,  securing  its  customers 
and  their  confidence,  and  creating  its  opportunities  for  doing  business  with 
profit.  The  profit  of  the  bank  or  mercantile  business  is  in  cash  dividends;  the 
profits  of  The  Associated  Press  are  in  the  use  of  the  news  which  it  collects, 
as  the  profits  of  the  fisherman  are  in  the  fish  which  he  captures  and  takes 
from  the  rivers  and  the  sea,  just  as  we  take  that  in  which  we  deal  from  the 
great  ocean  of  human  events. 

He  declared  that  the  New  York  Associated  Press  was  merely  a 
customer  of  Western  Union,  denied  the  association  was  pledged  to  fight 
opposition  telegraph  companies,  and  pleaded  ignorance  of  a  mutuaJ 
defense  agreement.  There  were  some  concessions  in  rates,  considering 
the  large  volume  of  business  Western  Union  received'  from  the  asso- 
ciation. Were  it  not  for  these  rate  concessions,  the  general  agent  said, 
the  New  York  Associated  Press  would  be  unable  to  continue  its  liberal 
practice  of  supplying  news  at  low  cost  to  the  many  sections  of  the  nation 
where  populations  were  sparse  and  small  journals  were  struggling  for 
existence.  His  exact  words  were:  "The  Press  and  the  telegraph  com- 
pany both  agree  to  give  lower  rates  to  the  poor  and  recoup  by  higher 
compensation  from  the  well-to-do." 

He  dismissed  the  old  monopoly  charge  by  pointing  out  that  the 
auxiliary  associations,  with  few  exceptions,  made  their  own  rules  and 
determined  who  should  and  who  should  not  receive  New  York's  report 
in  the  various  territories.  As  to  the  charge  that  New  York  maintained 
a  rigid  censorship  over  the  press  of  the  country  under  the  threat  of 
cutting  off  their  news  reports,  Simonton  explained  that  the  so-called 


BLACK  YEARS  81 

censorship  in  reality  was  punishment  for  infractions  of  rules  and  regu- 
lations. He  upheld  the  association's  right  to  cut  off  the  news  report — 
"our  readiest  defense" — whenever  a  subscriber  had  the  hardihood  to 
criticize  it  in  print: 

I  submit  that  there  is  not  a  gentleman  here  who  would  sell  dry  goods, 
groceries,  or  anything  else  day  after  day  to  a  man  who  told  him  every  time 
he  came  in,  "You  are  a  thief,  a  swindler  and  a  liar."  You  would  very  soon 
say,  "If  you  can't  come  in  and  behave  yourself,  I  do  not  want  your  trade 
and  you  can  get  out."  That  is  the  sort  of  censorship  we  exercise.  When 
papers  insist  that  they  have  grievances  against  us  and  give  us  an  opportunity 
for  explanations,  they  very  often  learn  that  they  have  been  in  error.  But 
when  papers  will  persist  in  abusing  us  for  the  alleged  grievances  in  advance 
of  inquiry,  we  simply  say  to  them,  "We  do  not  want  to  serve  you.  If  we 
cannot  be  treated  like  decent  men,  you  had  better  get  your  news  service 
elsewhere." 

The  general  agent  recapitulated  his  testimony  in  four  categorical 
statements: 

I.  The  Associated  Press  is  not  a  monopoly.  2.  It  is  a  private  business. 
3.  It  is  independent  of  the  Western  Union  Telegraph  Company.  4.  It  has  no 
franchise  from  the  government  and  no  legislation  within  the  power  of 
Congress  can  take  from  it  the  tools  of  its  creation. 

Simonton  acquitted  himself  well,  presenting  his  organization  in 
the  best  possible  light,  and  the  committee  hearings  were  productive  of 
no  untoward  results. 


All  these  troubles  which  beset  Simonton  represented  only  one  side 
of  the  picture.  It  was  a  period  of  great  news  events  and  the  general 
agent  proved  himself  a  capable  administrator.  He  was  zealous  for  the 
improvement  of  the  report  and  under  his  direction  it  did  improve  in 
spite  of  the  handicaps  imposed  by  the  structural  nature  of  the  organiza- 
tion. His  efforts  did  much  to  atone  for  the  shortcomings  of  the  ser- 
vice. This  was  particularly  true  when  the  news  was  not  of  a  contro- 
versial nature,  and  1871  produced  an  outstanding  demonstration. 

That  was  the  year  of  the  most  famous  bovine  in  history — Mrs. 
O'Leary's  cow  and  the  lantern  she  was  said  to  have  kicked  over.  It 
was  half  past  nine  on  an  October  Sunday  night  when  the  flames  started 
to  race  through  Chicago  before  a  strong  wind.  Through  seventy-three 
miles  of  streets  they  roared  in  one  mighty,  appalling  conflagration.  Two 
hundred  lives  were  lostj  98,500  were  homeless;  17,500  buildings  were 


82  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

destroyed,  and  some  $200,000,000  worth  of  property  went  up  in  smoke. 

Together  the  New  York  and  Western  associations  brought  the 
country  the  story  of  Chicago's  disaster.  When  special  correspondents 
arrived  in  the  stricken  city  they  found  telegraph  offices  would  not  per- 
mit their  accounts  to  interfere  with  the  transmission  of  the  thousands 
of  messages  being  sent  for  relief.  There  was  only  one  exception — The 
Associated  Press — and  its  dispatches  received  the  right  of  way.  In  order 
to  get  their  stories  out,  other  correspondents  found  it  necessary  to  send 
the  copy  by  train  to  Cleveland. 

The  next  year  also  there  was  a  great  volume  of  news,  including 
the  extraordinary  presidential  campaign  which  gave  Grant  his  second 
term,  the  malodorous  Credit  Mobilier  scandal  investigation,  and  a 
host  of  other  occurrences.  Cable  tolls  alone  exceeded  $200,000  and 
special  assessments  were  imposed  generally  on  both  New  York  and 
auxiliary  Associated  Press  groups. 

The  mad  postwar  spree  of  spending  and  speculation  was  over  and 
hard  times  were  beginning  to  pinch. 

William  Henry  Smith,  who  had  succeeded  Hicks  in  1869  as  gen- 
eral agent  of  the  Western  Associated  Press,  was  beset  by  pleas  for  lower 
assessments  from  his  members  who  protested  they  could  not  weather 
the  depression  unless  the  reductions  were  granted.  Occasional  evi- 
dences of  friction  cropped  up  between  the  West  and  New  York,  and 
the  old  cry  for  cheaper  telegraph  tolls  was  raised  again,  though  without 
encouraging  results. 

Telegraph  rates  had  always  been  a  subject  of  concern,  but  in  1872 
Simonton  was  occupied  with  an  entirely  different  aspect  of  the  associa- 
tion's transmission  problems.  Always  in  the  past  the  telegraph  company 
had  controlled  the  wires  over  which  the  association  moved  its  news. 
Simonton  wanted  to  lease  a  wire  outright  between  New  York  and 
Washington  to  use  in  moving  the  heavy  volume  of  news  between  those 
two  cities  and  the  intermediate  points  of  Philadelphia  and  Baltimore. 
He  thought  it  would  be  more  economical  and  would  speed  the  report. 
The  telegraph  company  scouted  the  request  as  impracticable.  Simonton 
persisted  in  his  campaign,  with  steadfast  encouragement  from  his  young 
assistant,  Walter  Polk  Phillips,  who  later  became  known  as  the  author 
of  the  "Phillips  Code"  of  telegraphic  abbreviations.  The  company  de- 
layed action  for  several  years,  but  in  1875  Simonton  won  and  the  first 
leased  wire  in  press  association  history  began  operating. 
,v  The  wire  was  taken  over  under  a  straight  leasing  arrangement,  a 


BLACK  YEARS  83 

practice  that  grew  as  the  need  for  exclusive  news-transmission  facilities 
steadily  increased. 

"It  was  my  good  fortune  as  one  of  the  lieutenants  of  James  W. 
Simonton,"  Phillips  recounted,  "to  select  the  men  to  work  that  pioneer 
leased  system  between  New  York  and  Washington.  There  were  eight 
of  them,  two  each  at  New  York,  Philadelphia,  Baltimore  and  Washing- 
ton." The  men  Phillips  picked  were  Fred  N.  Bassett,  P.  V.  De  Graw, 
W.  H.  C.  Hargrave,  W.  J.  Jones,  Thomas  J.  Bishop,  H.  A.  Wells, 
W.  N.  Grave,  and  E.  C.  Boileau. 

This  first  leased  wire  was  226  miles  in  length  and  was  followed  by 
similar  lines  to  Boston,  Buffalo,  then  to  Chicago  and  eventually  to  the 
Pacific  Coast.  The  inauguration  of  the  system  was  one  of  the  great 
achievements  of  Simonton's  administration. 

The  same  year  that  brought  the  leased  wire  saw  the  New  York 
Associated  Press  change  its  quarters  for  the  first  time  since  1848.  The 
new  home  was  at  Broadway  and  Dey  Street  on  the  eighth  floor  in  the 
imposing  building  Western  Union  had  just  erected.  The  flow  of  news 
turned  into  this  new  center — the  famous  "stolen"  presidential  election 
of  Hayes  versus  Tilden,  the  expensive  Russo-Turkish  War,  the  reign 
of  the  "Molly  Maguires"  in  Pennsylvania,  and  the  election  of  Pope 
Leo  XIII. 

History  quietly  repeated  itself  that  decade,  for  another  great  ad- 
vance in  the  science  of  communications  passed  with  scant  notice.  Alex- 
ander Graham  Bell's  attorney  appeared  in  Washington  in  1875  and 
filed  application  for  a  patent  on  a  new  device  called  the  telephone.  It 
was  several  years,  however,  before  the  instrument  came  into  general 
use,  even  on  a  small  scale,  and  its  quickening  effect  on  news  gathering 
was  not  immediate. 

It  was  an  important  year,  but  the  event  that  caught  popular  in- 
terest was  not  BelPs  invention.  A  cavalry  officer  with  a  reputation  for 
insubordination  was  riding  toward  the  valley  of  the  Little  Big  Horn 
in  Montana.  And  with  him  and  his  Seventh  Cavalry  went  a  lone  news- 
paperman— an  Associated  Press  correspondent  on  a  nimble  gray  mule. 


IX.  STRING  CORRESPONDENT 

IT  WAS  May,  1876,  and  Philadelphia  buzzed  with  last-minute  plans 
for  the  greatest  celebration  in  the  history  of  the  nation — the  hundredth 
anniversary  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence.  The  exposition  was 
imposing  and  the  agents  of  the  New  York  Associated  Press  who  drew 
the  assignment  to  report  the  spectacle  began  sending  out  their  stories 
telling  of  the  wonders  in  store  for  those  who  planned  to  attend. 

All  this  was  worlds  removed  from  life  in  the  frontier  town  of 
Bismarck,  North  Dakota.  On  May  14,  just  four  days  after  the  ex- 
position threw  open  its  gates,  there  was  a  small  gathering  in  the  home 
of  Bismarck's  town  druggist,  John  P.  Dunn.  The  occasion  was  a 
farewell  dinner  for  the  quiet,  middle-aged  man  who  had  become  a  close 
friend  of  the  family  in  the  three  years  he  had  been  a  reporter  for  the 
weekly  Bismarck  Tribune.  His  name  was  Mark  Kellogg  and  he  was 
preparing  to  accompany  General  George  Armstrong  Custer  and  his 
regiment  into  the  badlands  westward  to  punish  Sitting  Bull  and  his 
warlike  Sioux.  Colonel  Clement  A.  Lounsbury,  owner  of  the  Bismarck 
Tribune  and  a  part-time  correspondent  for  the  Western  Associated 
Press,  had  intended  making  the  trip,  but  last-minute  illness  in  the  family 
compelled  him  to  delegate  the  assignment. 

The  Dunn  family  knew  little  of  Kellogg  except  that  he  had 
moved  from  town  to  town  along  the  frontier  since  his  wife  died  some 
years  before.  He  was  greatly  attached  to  children  and  he  had  been 
attracted  to  the  Dunns  by  their  rollicking  youngsters.  His  presence  at 
the  Sunday  dinners  had  become  a  custom  and  the  entire  family  looked 
forward  to  having  him  there. 

The  Dunns  lingered  as  long  as  possible  over  the  meal  because  they 
would  miss  their  friend.  He  had  to  leave  at  three  o'clock  to  ferry  the 
Missouri  and  join  Custer  at  old  Fort  Lincoln,  so  dinner  had  been 
served  earlier  than  usual.  Mrs.  Dunn  inquired  about  his  preparations 
for  the  trip  and  he  displayed  a  little  black  satchel.  In  it  were  tobacco, 
pipes,  underwear  and  other  pieces  of  light  clothing.  There  were  pencils 
tqo,  and  a  supply  of  paper  on  which  to  write  his  accounts  of  the  cam- 
paign against  Sitting  Bull,  for  relay  by  pony  across  the  plains  to  the 
nearest  newspaper  and  telegraph  offices,  many  miles  away. 

84 


STRING  CORRESPONDENT  85 

Jokingly  he  told  the  Dunns  that  General  Alfred  H.  Terry,  com- 
mander of  the  expedition,  had  assigned  him  a  gray  mule.  As  soon 
as  he  arrived  at  Fort  Lincoln  the  animal  was  turned  over  to  him.  The 
sure-footed  little  beast  was  so  small  that  Kellogg's  feet  touched  the 
ground,  but  throughout  the  campaigning  he  was  able  to  keep  up  with 
the  big  chargers  of  the  troopers. 

The  winding  blue  and  yellow  column  flowed  over  the  Dakota 
hills.  Somewhere  over  the  silent  horizon  were  the  upper  waters  of  the 
Yellowstone  where  the  Sioux  were  gathered  for  one  last  determined 
stand  against  the  invasion  of  the  Black  Hills. 

All  along  the  dusty  march,  Kellogg  sent  back  his  dispatches  while 
the  expedition  pushed  slowly  across  the  wild,  rugged  country.  Terry 
had  ignored  orders  in  permitting  Kellogg  to  accompany  the  troops. 
The  grizzled  old  general  of  the  armies,  William  Tecumseh  Sherman, 
was  very  specific  in  the  instructions  he  sent  from  Washington  before 
the  expedition  started.  "Advise  Custer  to  be  prudent,"  he  wrote,  "and 
not  to  take  along  any  newspapermen."  But  Custer  wanted  a  journalist 
with  him. 

The  correspondent  spent  almost  a  month  in  the  saddle  before  the 
column  entered  the  hostile  region  along  the  Yellowstone  where  scout- 
ing parties  found  the  fresh  trail  of  the  Sioux  and  their  abandoned 
campsites.  On  June  21  Terry  held  a  council  of  war  where  the  pebbly- 
bottomed  Rosebud  empties  into  the  Yellowstone  River.  Custer  would 
push  south  down  the  Rosebud  with  his  Seventh  Cavalry  and  circle 
westward  into  the  valley  of  the  Little  Big  Horn  River  where  the  In- 
dians were  believed  to  be  gathering. 

He  was  not  to  attack  from  the  south,  however,  until  Terry  and 
General  Gibbon's  forces  arrived  from  the  north  on  June  26.  Kellogg 
had  his  choice.  He  could  stay  with  Terry's  forces,  or  he  could  ride  in 
the  advance  alongside  the  impetuous  young  cavalry  leader.  Custer's 
carefree  assurance  dispelled  any  indecision  and  Kellogg  went  with  the 
Seventh.  On  June  24  Custer  made  ready  to  cross  the  Rosebud  and  strike 
out  for  the  Little  Big  Horn,  so  Kellogg  sent  back  a  last  dispatch  de- 
scribing  preparations  for  the  march.  He  wrote: 

We  leave  the  Rosebud  tomorrow  and  by  the  time  this  reaches  you  we 
will  have  met  and  fought  the  red  devils,  with  what  result  remains  to  be  seen. 
I  go  with  Custer  and  will  be  at  the  death. 

The  next  morning  commands  rattled  out  and  the  Seventh  went 
cantering  out  of  camp,  some  six  hundred  strong.  At  the  head  of  the 


86  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

column  with  the  commander  rode  Kellogg.  His  little  gray  mule  was 
comical  beside  the  officers'  big  chargers,  and  the  black  satchel  lent  a 
most  unmilitary  note  as  it  slapped  against  the  mule's  flank. 

There  were  thin  clouds  in  the  Montana  sky  on  June  25  and  the 
air  shimmered  with  heat  as  the  dust-powdered  Seventh  pressed  toward 
Little  Big  Horn.  The  trail  of  the  Sioux  hourly  became  plainer  and 
Custer  studied  the  signs  with  impatience.  There  could  be  no  doubt 
now.  A  large  concentration  of  Sioux  was  at  hand.  Then  the  scouts  came 
galloping  back  with  the  news  that  an  immense  encampment  of  lodges 
had  been  sighted.  Custer  saw  glory  and  the  opportunity  to  whip  the 
Sioux  without  waiting  for  his  supporting  columns  to  come  up.  It  would 
be  routine  work  for  the  Seventh  which  had  scattered  just  such  hostile 
bands  many  times  before. 

No  one  ever  knew  what  strategy  Custer  had  in  mind  that  day,  but 
he  split  the  regiment's  twelve  companies  into  three  detachments.  Kel- 
logg knew  infallibly  that  all  the  color  and  dramatics  would  be  with  the 
five  companies  that  formed  Custer's  personal  command,  so  he  stayed 
with  the  cavalry's  beau  sabreur.  Holster  flaps  were  opened,  sabers  clat- 
tered, carbines  were  loosened  in  their  boots,  and  Custer's  detachment 
went  swinging  forward  at  a  fast  trot  up  the  dusty  rise  that  lay  between 
the  Seventh  Cavalry  and  the  Sioux  encampment.  Kellogg  urged  his 
mule  along  and  the  animal  struggled  to  keep  up. 

They  were  on  the  crest  now  and  below  spread  the  valley  of  the 
Little  Big  Horn  with  its  rolling  ridges  and  hills.  Custer  ordered  his 
adjutant  to  instruct  one  of  the  other  detachments  to  move  up  imme- 
diately with  the  ammunition  packs.  A  trooper  saluted  and  went  gallop- 
ing off  with  the  order.  Then  Custer's  red-and-blue  personal  flag  with 
its  crossed  silver  sabers  disappeared  below  the  rise  and  the  column  rode 
down  into  an  amphitheater  of  sudden  death. 

In  an  hour  it  was  all  over.  An  officer's  charger  was  the  only  living 
thing  in  the  command  to  escape.  But  for  two  days  no  one  knew  what 
had  happened  in  the  bloody  valley  beyond  the  crest.  The  other  seven 
companies  of  the  Seventh  were  too  hard  pressed  elsewhere  fighting 
off  the  Sioux  hordes  which  surrounded  them.  Then  General  Terry  ar- 
rived with  the  main  column  and  his  troopers  found  the  field  of  Big 
Horn  silent  in  the  hot  sun,  with  225  bodies  dotting  the  ridges.  They 
found  the  body  of  reckless  Custer  and  they  found  the  crumpled  body 
of  the  correspondent  who  had  trotted  gallantly  to  death  on  his  small 
gray  mule.  Only  those  two  had  escaped  scalping  and  mutilation.  The 
red  man's  code  had  dictated  that  the  body  of  the  yellow-haired  warrior 


STRING  CORRESPONDENT  87 

should  not  be  disfigured,  and  they  did  not  touch  "the  man  who  could 
make  the  paper  talk,"  as  the  Indians  of  Dakota  had  called  Kellogg. 

True  to  his  promise,  Kellogg  had  been  there  "at  the  death"  but 
the  big  story  of  one  of  news  gathering's  first  part-time,  or  "string,"  cor- 
respondents never  was  written. 

They  found  his  black  satchel  where  he  fell  and  eventually  it  was 
returned  to  the  Dunn  family  in  Bismarck.  The  motherly  woman  who 
had  been  so  solicitous  for  his  comfort  the  day  he  departed  came  upon 
the  pipes,  tobacco,  and  what  was  left  of  the  blank  writing  paper. 


X.  THE  LAST  TRUCE 


A  NEW  decade — the  elegant  eighties — was  filled  with  trouble  for  the 
formidable  old  New  York  Associated  Press.  There  was  discontent  once 
more  in  the  Western  association. 

Nevertheless,  the  tide  of  news  flowed  on.  The  tenth  census  showed 
50,155,783  persons  in  the  thirty-eight  states.  Boston  was  ready  to  cele- 
brate her  25<Dth  anniversary,  and  Ben  Hur  was  the  literary  rage  of  the 
season.  There  were  a  half  dozen  marine  disasters,  and  far  across  the 
oceans  the  Boers  had  begun  their  mutterings  against  England.  In  Ger- 
many a  wave  of  anti-Semitism  was  sweeping  Jews  from  Berlin,  and  in 
Ireland  the  despotic  actions  of  a  landlord's  agent,  Captain  Boycott,  were 
about  to  make  his  name  a  new  word  in  the  English  language. 

It  was  a  tired  and  ailing  general  agent  who  scanned  the  miscellany 
of  changing  stories.  Simonton's  constitution  never  had  been  robust  and 
fourteen  years  at  the  helm  of  an  ill-contrived  organization  had  left  their 
mark.  The  general  agent  was  expected  to  be  all  things  to  all  men,  a 
symbol  of  the  tenuous  union  in  which  all  the  auxiliary  associations  were 
linked. 

But,  for  all  its  inherent  weaknesses,  the  news-gathering  empire 
Simonton  ruled  was  apparently  flourishing  and  prosperous.  In  addition 
to  its  seven  members,  the  New  York  Associated  Press  was  serving  348 
clients  and  spending  $392,800  annually  on  domestic  telegraph  tolls. 
The  foreign  service  was  expanding  and  the  general  agent  boasted  for 
the  association: 

Its  London  offices  are  never  closed.  By  means  of  a  double  corps  of 
agents,  the  news  of  Europe,  chiefly  concentrated  at  the  British  capital,  is 
forwarded  at  all  hours  as  rapidly  as  received.  By  contracts  with  the  great 
European  news  agencies,  The  Associated  Press  receives  their  news  collections 
from  every  part  of  civilized  Europe,  Asia,  Africa  and  South  America. 

Cable  tolls  rarely  were  less  than  $300  a  day  and  frequently 
mounted  as  high  as  $2,000. 

Even  the  assessments  seemed  reasonable  for  the  service  Simonton 

88 


THE  LAST  TRUCE  89 

had  built  up.  Outside  of  New  York  the  papers  paid  from  $15  to  $250 
a  week  each,  and  in  the  metropolis  itself  from  $300  to  $1,500. 

As  the  new  decade  moved  forward,  Simonton  found  himself  once 
more  with  the  exacting  responsibility  of  directing  coverage  of  a  hard- 
fought  presidential  campaign.  The  Republican  James  A.  Garfield  won 
by  the  slender  popular  plurality  of  9,500  votes  and  the  cynical  specu- 
lated on  how  many  of  those  ballots  had  been  influenced  by  biased  dis- 
patches. Suspicion  fixed  likewise  on  the  powerful  Western  Union  Tele- 
graph Company  which  gathered  the  returns  jointly  with  the  New 
York  Associated  Press,  for  it  was  no  secret  that  the  corporation  desired 
a  Republican  victory. 

Inauguration  came  swiftly  on  the  heels  of  election,  and  then  only 
a  few  months  later — on  July  2,  1881 — a  shocking  Washington  dispatch 
was  thrust  into  Simonton's  hands. 

A  disgruntled  office  seeker,  Charles  Guiteau,  had  shot  and  mor- 
tally wounded  the  new  president. 

Chester  A.  Arthur,  the  vice-president,  took  over  the  duties  of  the 
nation's  chief  executive  and  there  arose  the  wild  talk  that  the  assassina- 
tion had  been  plotted  for  the  sole  purpose  of  putting  Arthur  in  power. 
The  feeling  against  Arthur  grew  bitter  and  editorial  tom-toms  throbbed 
to  keep  it  alive.  American  journalism  had  not  progressed  much  from 
the  hate-ridden  Reconstruction  days. 

For  three  months  Garfield  lingered.  Death  came  on  September 
19.  Like  most  news  stories,  however,  it  was  all  over  in  a  few  days  and 
then,  without  warning,  the  publishers  in  the  West  were  surprised  and 
disquieted  by  confidential  advices  from  the  East.  General  Agent  Simon- 
ton  no  longer  directed  New  York's  news-gathering  machine. 

Inquiries  brought  assurance  that  the  absence  was  only  temporary 
and  that  Simonton  would  return  as  soon  as  he  regained  his  health. 
Meanwhile  Erastus  Brooks,  of  the  Mail  and  Express,  and  James  C. 
Huston  had  been  designated  to  take  direct  charge  of  the  New  York 
Associated  Press  activities.  The  Westerners  did  not  like  the  change. 
They  had  come  to  have  a  sincere  respect  for  Simonton.  He  could  be 
counted  upon  to  do  his  utmost  to  satisfy  them  and  on  many  occasions 
he  had  acted  as  their  friend  at  court. 


Simonton's  disappearance  from  the  news  scene  was  not  the  only  dis- 
turbing factor  in  1881.  Papers  which  could  not  buy  The  Associated 


90  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Press  service  had  been  dissatisfied  with  the  makeshift  reports  they  re- 
ceived from  a  succession  of  ineffectual  agencies,  and  now  a  concerted 
movement  was  launched  to  unite  all  these  journals  under  one  banner. 

Arthur  Jenkins  of  the  Syracuse  Herald  summoned  the  dissatisfied 
group  to  meet  in  his  city.  Out  of  that  meeting  came  the  decision  to 
set  up  another  news-gathering  agency  as  a  strictly  private,  money-mak- 
ing enterprise.  Thus  an  organization  called  the  United  Press  was  born 
and  one  of  its  three  incorporators  was  Walter  Polk  Phillips,  Simonton's 
former  aide.  Francis  X.  Schoonmaker  was  named  general  agent  and 
the  organization  got  under  way  early  in  1882.  This  United  Press  had 
no  connection  whatever  with  the  news  organization  which  was  to  be 
established  in  1907  under  the  name  of  the  United  Press  Associations. 

The  emergence  of  this  new  agency  and  the  continued  absence  of 
Simonton  fed  the  agitation  in  the  Western  Associated  Press.  The  1866 
peace  treaty  with  the  eastern  monopoly  had  proved  an  empty  coup  in 
most  respects  and  an  unending  succession  of  differences  continued. 
Convinced  that  it  still  occupied  a  position  of  nominal  servitude,  the 
West  again  debated  whether  to  try  wresting  recognition  from  New 
York  or  to  make  one  more  attempt  at  a  national  co-operative  service 
of  its  own.  There  were  some  members  who  favored  preserving  the 
status  quo,  but  the  majority  wanted  action,  especially  since  content  of 
the  news  report  was  suffering  under  the  indifferent  Brooks-Huston 
management. 

Once  more  the  time  seemed  propitious  for  the  West  to  reassert 
itself.  The  activities  of  the  new  commercial  agency  had  become  suffi- 
ciently vigorous  to  cause  concern,  and  again  New  York  was  embroiled 
in  a  quarrel  with  Western  Union. 

The  seven  members  of  the  New  York  Associated  Press  were  not 
long  in  hearing  the  rumblings  of  this  new  uprising.  Realizing  that  their 
own  position  was  weak,  they  sought  to  catch  the  West  off  guard  by 
offering  unsolicited  minor  concessions.  The  strategy  failed,  and  the 
New  York  Board  of  Directors  met  to  consider  the  problem. 

David  Marvin  Stone,  of  the  Journal  of  Commerce,  who  had  suc- 
ceeded Prime  as  president  in  1869,  was  one  of  the  few  who  saw  the 
justice  of  the  West's  demands.  He  proposed  immediate  recognition  of 
their  claim  for  full  partnership  and  the  creation  of  a  joint  board  of 
control  of  seven  Westerners  and  seven  New  Yorkers  to  administer 
the  combined  organization. 

This  was  too  much  of  a  surrender  for  most  of  his  colleagues  and 
Charles  A.  Dana,  now  editor  of  the  Sun,  called  for  a  "more  specific 


THE  LAST  TRUCE  91 

and  guarded  substitute."  He  suggested  an  arrangement  by  which  both 
associations  would  pool  their  news  under  the  direction  of  a  five-man 
executive  committee,  two  members  from  each  association  and  a  chair- 
man chosen  by  the  New  York  association.  Such  a  plan,  he  pointed  out, 
still  would  give  the  old  organization  a  three-to-two  balance  of  power. 

The  Dana  proposal  failed  to  appeal  to  the  Western  Associated 
Press  at  its  next  meeting  in  October,  1882.  Old  Joseph  Medill,  long 
one  of  the  West's  moving  spirits,  dictated  the  reply.  Flourishing  his 
black  ear  trumpet,  the  publisher  of  the  Chicago  Tribune  introduced  a 
resolution  which  would  serve  the  required  notice  that  the  West  would 
not  renew  its  contract  which  expired  that  December  31.  He  coupled  this 
notice  with  the  threat  that,  unless  New  York  granted  equality  and 
sanctioned  expansion  of  the  West  into  certain  disputed  areas,  the  or- 
ganization would  strike  out  for  itself  again  with  its  own  news  service. 

The  gage  of  battle  was  flung  at  the  feet  of  the  New  York  Asso- 
ciated Press.  The  Easterners  were  badly  prepared  for  a  recurrence  of 
the  costly  conflict  of  1866. 

Two  new  converts  to  the  cause  of  equality  now  came  forward. 
The  Times  and  the  Herald  fathered  a  plan  which  proposed  to  give 
recognition  not  only  to  the  West  but  also  to  the  other  leading  auxili- 
aries. Here,  at  last,  was  a  definite  step  in  the  direction  of  a  truly  repre- 
sentative co-operative,  but  it  was  far  too  liberal  for  the  controlling 
bloc  and  was  decisively  voted  down. 

There  was  more  negotiating  between  committees  representing  both 
associations  and  presently  the  New  Yorkers  learned  that,  if  they  would 
make  territorial  concessions,  the  West  might  be  prevailed  upon  to 
agree  to  a  union  under  the  five-man  joint  committee  plan  advanced  by 
Dana.  The  New  York  committeemen  seized  the  chance  and  offered 
to  surrender  considerable  territory  in  the  South  and  West.  This  made 
the  bargain  appear  more  attractive  to  the  Western  committee  and  a  five- 
year  contract  eventually  was  ratified  on  January  i,  1883. 

The  New  York  Associated  Press  named  Charles  A.  Dana  as  chair- 
man of  the  five-man  governing  committee.  Its  other  two  members  were 
representatives  of  the  Herald  and  the  Tribune. 

The  Western  Associated  Press  named  Walter  N.  Haldeman,  of 
the  Louisville  Courier-Journal,  and  Richard  Smith,  of  the  Cincinnati 
Gazette,  both  members  of  the  Western  Board  and  its  Executive  Com- 
mittee, as  its  representatives. 

Again  the  West  hailed  a  great  victory,  minimizing  the  fact  that 


92  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

the  three-to-two  committee  alignment,  carefully  stipulated  by  Dana, 
gave  veto  power  to  New  York. 


The  most  important  result  of  this  latest  realignment  was  the 
selection  of  William  Henry  Smith  to  fill  the  vacancy  left  by  General 
Agent  Simonton.  The  choice  was  calculated  to  inspire  confidence  in  the 
West  where  Smith's  ability  was  well  known.  As  proof  of  the  new 
unity  in  news  gathering,  Smith  also  retained  his  position  as  general 
agent  of  the  Western  Associated  Press.  Thus  he  became  the  unifying 
head  of  the  two  organizations  with  the  new  title  of  general  manager. 

Smith  was  born  in  upstate  New  York  in  1833,  the  year  the  penny 
press  made  its  first  positive  appearance  with  the  birth  of  the  New  York 
Sun.  Before  the  Civil  War  he  published  a  small  weekly  in  Cincinnati 
and  by  the  time  hostilities  began  he  was  on  the  staff  of  the  Cincinnati 
Gazette.  His  newspaper  work  gave  him  opportunities  for  numerous 
political  contacts  and  he  used  them  to  such  advantage  that  in  1863 
he  was  made  secretary  to  Governor  Brough  of  Ohio.  The  next  year 
he  was  chosen  secretary  of  state  in  the  same  election  which  seated 
Rutherford  B.  Hayes  in  the  governor's  chair — first  major  step  in  a 
career  which  brought  Hayes  to  the  White  House.  Hayes  and  Smith 
became  fast  friends  and  the  close  association  led  political  foes  to  carica- 
ture Smith  as  "the  keeper  of  the  governor's  conscience."  Subsequently 
he  resumed  his  newspaper  work  and  in  1869  he  joined  the  Western 
Associated  Press  in  Chicago  as  general  agent. 

In  his  new  position  as  general  manager  for  both  associations  under 
the  direction  of  the  five-man  governing  committee  Smith  soon  showed 
results.  He  began  substituting  trained  newspapermen  for  the  telegraph 
operators  who  had  been  agents  for  New  York  in  strategic  cities.  Most 
important,  he  abandoned  the  old  practice  of  restricting  the  association's 
field  almost  entirely  to  news  that  could  be  picked  up  from  or  supplied 
by  member  and  client  newspapers.  He  believed  in  a  staff  of  trained 
reporters  who  would  show  initiative  in  getting  news. 

If  one  weakness  could  be  found  in  his  qualifications  as  general 
manager  it  was  Kis  political  background.  In  1876  his  old  friend  Hayes, 
as  President  of  the  United  States,  rewarded  him  with  an  appointment 
as  Collector  of  the  Port  of  Chicago.  It  was  a  political  sinecure  with  a 
salary  that  greatly  increased  the  $5,000  a  year  he  then  received  from 
the  Western  Associated  Press.  In  the  face  of  criticism,  he  held  on  to 


THE  LAST  TRUCE  93 

the  post  until  he  lost  it  a  year  before  he  assumed  joint  management  of 
the  two  Associated  Press  bodies.  In  his  new  position,  just  as  in  the  old, 
he  cultivated  his  political  connections  and  thereby  left  the  political  re- 
porting of  the  association  open  to  suspicion. 

'The  same  months  which  witnessed  the  industrious  beginnings  of 
Smith's  regime  saw  the  further  rise  of  the  United  Press.  Schoonmaker 
lasted  only  a  short  time  as  its  general  agent  and  then  a  new  commander 
took  charge,  began  improving  the  service  and  recruiting  new  clients.  He 
was  the  former  Associated  Press  employe,  Walter  Polk  Phillips,  and 
he  had  the  resourcefulness  needed. 

From  his  several  years  of  employment  in  The  Associated  Press, 
Phillips  was  aware  of  the  drawing  power  of  news  from  abroad.  Since 
the  New  York  Associated  Press  held  exclusive  contracts  with  such 
foreign  agencies  as  Reuters,  Havas,  and  Wolff,  making  their  reports 
unavailable  to  him,  Phillips  set  about  under  cover  to  create  his  own 
foreign  service.  He  organized  a  separate  agency  called  The  Cable 
News  Company  and  placed  Schoonmaker  in  charge.  Soon  this  disguised 
subsidiary  was  supplying  its  report  not  only  to  United  Press  clients 
but  also  to  some  of  the  Associated  Press  papers. 

Phillips  ostensibly  was  the  sole  guiding  genius  of  the  United 
Press,  but  actually  he  was  not.  His  fellow  triumvirs,  discreetly  in  the 
background,  were  John  R.  Walsh,  financier  and  part  owner  of  the 
Chicago  Herald,  and,  unaccountably,  William  Laffan,  a  dramatic  critic 
who  had  risen  to  be  business  manager  of  Dana's  New  York  Sun. 

In  the  beginning  the  identity  of  these  latter  two  remained  un- 
known. In  time  Walsh's  connection  could  be  logically  explained,  for  his 
publishing  partner,  James  W.  Scott,  had  been  one  of  the  founders 
of  the  United  Press.  Moreover,  as  a  financier,  he  had  a  finger  in  nu- 
merous business  pies.  But  the  caustic  Laffan  was  by  all  odds  the  most 
important  of  the  three,  and  when  his  part  in  the  undertaking  finally 
was  exposed  the  anomalous  situation  presented  a  mystery.  As  business 
manager  of  the  Suny  he  enjoyed  the  full  confidence  and  support  of 
Dana,  and  Dana  was  chairman  of  the  Joint  Executive  Committee  and 
kingpin  of  the  renovated  Associated  Press. 

Phillips's  disguised  Cable  News  Company  continued  to  expand  its 
list  of  clients  until  it  had  added  Medill's  Chicago  Tribune.  General 
Manager  Smith  quickly  called  the  Tribune  to  task  for  using  a  rival's 
report  in  violation  of  regulations.  He  assailed  Cable  News  as  "only 
an  annex  to  the  United  Press"  and  charged  it  had  been  organized  as  a 


94  AP —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

subterfuge  by  the  other  news  agency  in  an  attempt  to  inveigle  Asso- 
ciated Press  members  away  from  their  own  association. 

The  Tribune  confronted  Schoonmaker  with  the  charges  and  he 
denied  them. 

"The  United  Press  has  no  possible  connection  with  the  Cable 
News  Company,"  he  declared,  "and  my  special  cables  are  not  only  be- 
yond the  reach  of  The  United  Press  but,  as  you  will  soon  see,  in  hot 
opposition  to  their  cable  service." 

When  Smith  heard  this  he  threatened  to  cut  the  Tribune  off  from 
the  report  if  it  did  not  discontinue  the  cable  service.  No  epithet  was  too 
strong  for  Schoonmaker  j  he  was  a  "scoundrel,"  "the  prince  of  liars," 
and  a  news  thief  who  "systematically  debauched  an  employe  of  the 
Western  Union  Telegraph  Company  to  steal  Associated  Press  cables 
for  the  benefit  of  the  United  Press  Association."  In  the  face  of  Smith's 
barrage,  which  he  backed  by  documentary  evidence,  Schoonmaker 
finally  admitted  the  Cable  News  was  connected  with  the  United  Press, 
and  the  Tribune  dropped  the  report. 

Considering  Smith's  scathing  denunciation,  many  publishers  were 
amazed  in  1884  when  this  same  Schoonmaker  quit  his  Cable  News  posi- 
tion and  was  taken  into  the  employ  of  The  Associated  Press  at  a  salary 
of  $4,000  a  year.  Significantly,  on  that  very  same  date — August  17, 
1884 — the  jointly  operated  Associated  Press  itself  became  a  subscriber 
to  the  Cable  News  Company  reports — reports  which  General  Manager 
Smith  so  recently  had  described  as  "bogus  cable  dispatches  prepared  by 
a  set  of  sharpers." 

Strange  things  were  going  on  behind  the  scenes. 


The  presidential  year  of  1884  was  a  poor  one  for  the  prestige  of 
the  New  York  Associated  Press.  The  Republican  party,  after  almost  a 
quarter  of  a  century  in  power,  nominated  James  G.  Elaine,  "the  plumed 
knight"  of  Maine,  and  the  Democrats  selected  Grover  Cleveland,  the 
Buffalo  bachelor  who  enjoyed  a  game  of  pinochle  in  the  back  room  of 
his  favorite  German-American  beer  garden. 

When  news  of  Cleveland's  nomination  reached  the  offices  of  the 
usually  Democratic  New  York  Sun,  Dana,  the  autocrat  of  The  Asso- 
ciated Press,  stamped  up  and  down  the  room. 

"It  isn't  Cleveland  ...  It  can't  be  Cleveland  ...  It  shan't  be 
Cleveland!" 


THE  LAST  TRUCE  95 

He  muttered  the  words  over  and  over,  pounding  his  palm  with 
his  fist,  and  throughout  the  campaign  the  Sim  fought  Cleveland  with 
savage  fury. 

Dana  was  only  one  in  the  powerful  battalions  arrayed  against 
Cleveland.  Jay  Gould,  the  singular  figure  of  American  finance  who 
then  controlled  the  Western  Union  Telegraph  Company,  contributed 
enormous  amounts  to  the  Elaine  war  chest.  Other  Wall  Street  operators 
added  to  the  golden  stream,  and  the  Elaine  forces  spent  their  funds 
lavishly.  There  was  uncontradicted  testimony  that  the  editor  of  one  in- 
consequential weekly  paper  received  $60,000  and  the  disillusioned  could 
calculate  the  sums  spent  elsewhere.  To  bolster  their  cause  further,  the 
Republicans  seized  upon  Cleveland's  private  life — he  was  declared  the 
father  of  an  illegitimate  child — and  dragged  his  name  through  the 
political  mire. 

While  the  campaign  swept  along,  the  typewriter  made  its  un- 
heralded debut  in  the  newspaper  world.  Until  that  year  reporters 
laboriously  wrote  their  news  in  longhand  and  telegraphers  copied  the 
wire  dispatches  in  their  fast  scrawl.  A  few  business  houses  were  using 
the  new  machine,  but  little  attention  had  been  paid  to  the  invention 
generally.  Then  one  day  word  reached  the  Chicago  office  of  the  West- 
ern Associated  Press  that  John  Paine,  the  association's  telegraph  op- 
erator at  Nashville,  was  using  the  newfangled  contraption  and  that  the 
editors  there  were  hailing  the  cleaner,  more  legible  copy.  Addison  C. 
Thomas,  the  wire  chief  at  Chicago,  saw  the  possibilities  and  arranged 
to  have  all  his  men  supplied.  Soon  the  telegraph  companies  followed 
suit  and  the  typewriter  played  a  steadily  greater  part  in  the  production 
of  news. 

The  primitive  typewriters  clacked  and  as  the  presidential  campaign 
progressed  increasing  interest  attached  to  the  state  canvasses  held  prior 
to  the  November  vote.  They  were  looked  to  as  barometers  of  popular 
feeling.  The  Maine  primary  was  held  in  September  and  the  jointly 
operated  associations  reported  the  Republican  majority  as  19,739  when 
it  was  only  12,082.  Again,  in  Ohio  the  association's  figures  were  out  of 
line  with  official  totals.  Many  of  the  unofficial  returns  had  been  gath- 
ered by  Gould's  Western  Union  j  the  New  York  Associated  Press  and 
the  telegraph  company  tabulated  the  votes  jointly  as  they  had  done 
for  years  past. 

The  cry  arose  that  The  New  York  Associated  Press  was  falsifying 
returns  in  Elaine's  favor.  The  Buffalo  Courier  on  October  27,  1884, 


96  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

carried  a  special  dispatch  from  Washington  which  began  pointedly  with 
this  quotation: 

"Well,"  said  a  prominent  Elaine  Republican  tonight,  "it  does  look  as 
though  The  Associated  Press  were  in  our  interest." 

The  story  cited  the  reasons  behind  the  opinion  and  over  another 
special  despatch  from  the  national  capital  the  Courier  headlined:  "The 
Associated  Press  Severely  Criticized  For  Its  Rank  Partisanship."  The 
story  stated: 

The  conduct  of  The  Associated  Press  in  working  systematically  in  the 
interest  of  Elaine  continues  to  be  severely  commented  on  here  by  persons 
having  facilities  for  obtaining  inside  information.  As  an  illustration  of  the 
methods  pursued  by  it  during  the  campaign,  the  action  of  the  management 
in  employing  one  of  Elaine's  stenographers  to  represent  The  Associated  Press 
during  Elaine's  tours  is  cited.  The  reports  of  Elaine's  speeches  and  the  inci- 
dents of  his  travels  came  from*  this  stenographer  after  careful  revision  by 
Elaine  himself.  This  Associated  Press  agent  was  in  the  employ  of  Elaine  for 
Several  months  preceding  and  also  after  his  nomination.  This  is  but  a  speci- 
men of  the  inner  workings  of  a  partisan  news  agency  theoretically  supposed 
to  be  non-partisan. 

Newspapers  in  the  past  had  been  punished  with  lightning  swift- 
ness for  much  milder  criticism  of  the  association.  They  were  as  sternly 
punished  for  similar  transgressions  in  the  future.  Yet  this  time  there 
was  no  punitive  action.  General  Manager  Smith  did  not  attempt  a 
reply. 

When  Elaine  arrived  in  New  York  City  the  week  before  election 
the  odds  were  2  to  I  in  his  favor.  It  appeared  that  New  York  State 
probably  would  decide  the  contest  and  both  parties  concentrated  their 
final  efforts  there.  Although  it  was  his  home  state,  Cleveland  labored 
under  a  disadvantage.  As  governor  he  had  estranged  the  Tammany, 
labor,  and  Catholic  votes.  Elaine's  managers,  who  had  been  wooing  the 
church  vote  throughout,  assembled  a  meeting  of  ministers  to  greet 
their  candidate  and  pledge  support.  It  was  such  a  minor  campaign  func- 
tion that  the  local  papers  did  not  bother  to  cover  it.  Nevertheless,  the 
New  York  Associated  Press  sent  along  Frank  W.  Mack,  a  young  man 
of  twenty-three. 

The  Reverend  Samuel  Dickinson  Burchard,  seventy-two  years  old, 
addressed  Elaine  on  behalf  of  the  assemblage.  His  speech  in  the  main 
was  newsless  until  he  uttered  the  dynamite-laden  final  sentence:  "We 
are  Republicans,  and  do  not  propose  to  leave  our  party  and  identify 


THE  LAST  TRUCE  97 

ourselves  with  those  whose  antecedents  have  been  rum,  Romanism,  and 
rebellion !" 

Seated  in  the  rear  of  the  meeting  place,  young  Mack  saw  the 
sensational  importance  of  Burchard's  phrase.  His  story  fanned  out  over 
the  wires.  In  many  parts  of  the  country  "Rum,  Romanism,  and  Re- 
bellion" was  a  good  vote-getting  slogan  for  Elaine,  but  ironically 
enough  it  also  was  the  most  deadly  ammunition  that  could  have  been 
given  the  underdog  Democrats.  They  jumped  to  the  attack.  Burchard 
had  represented  the  Republican  party  inferentially  as  hostile  to  Cath- 
olicism. That  alienated  the  Catholic  support  on  which  Elaine's  managers 
had  been  counting  so  heavily.  Furthermore,  Elaine's  mother  was  a 
Catholic,  and  Democratic  orators  were  quick  to  point  out  that  the  Re- 
publican candidate  had  suffered  Burchard's  oblique  slur  on  her  to  go 
unrebuked.  In  three  days  the  2  to  i  odds  disappeared  and  Cleveland 
became  a  10  to  9  favorite. 

Election  day  came  and  in  spite  of  ballot  box  stuffing,  vote  stealing 
and  vote  buying,  the  first  tabulations  showed  Cleveland  carrying  the 
all-important  New  York  metropolis  by  a  vote  of  almost  three  to  two. 
Throughout  the  country  crowds  gathered  outside  newspaper  offices 
to  read  the  hastily  lettered  bulletins.  Cleveland  appeared  sure  of  vic- 
tory and  Democrats  quickly  organized  jubilant  torchlight  parades. 

The  New  York  State  vote  still  was  in  doubt,  but  Cleveland  seemed 
to  have  an  edge.  Dana's  Stmy  which  had  fought  Cleveland  so  fiercely, 
surprised  everyone  by  conceding  his  victory.  Then  one  ominous  fact 
began  to  stand  out.  A  great  bloc  of  rural  New  York  districts,  which 
normally  tabulated  early,  had  failed  to  report. 

Rumors  began  to  fly  that  Jay  Gould's  telegraph  company  was  out 
to  steal  the  election.  Crowds  outside  the  newspaper  offices  grew  denser, 
excitement  mounted  to  a  fever  pitch,  and  still  the  Associated  Press- 
Western  Union  returns  gave  the  lead  to  Elaine. 

On  the  day  after  election  the  outcome  remained  in  doubt.  Elaine 
wired  party  chiefs:  "Claim  everything."  The  next  day  came.  Most  New 
York  districts  had  reported  and  a  Cleveland  victory  appeared  certain. 
And  still  the  New  York  association  placed  the  state  in  Elaine's  column. 
All  day  long  Elaine  leaders  conferred  with  Jay  Gould  and  when  the 
session  ended  shortly  before  seven  that  evening  a  Gould  lieutenant 
assured  waiting  reporters:  "The  state  is  safe  for  Elaine." 

Almost  immediately  the  wires  were  carrying  a  New  York  Asso- 
ciated Press  bulletin  stating  that  Elaine  had  carried  New  York  State 
by  a  margin  of  more  than  572  votes.  With  thirty  districts  still  missing, 


98  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

the  count  given  was  Elaine  555,531,  Cleveland  554,959,  and  the  dis- 
patch asserted  the  unreported  districts  were  staunchly  Republican  and 
would  swell  Elaine's  plurality. 

In  the  streets  there  was  a  sullen,  angry  rumble  as  the  throngs  read 
the  newly  posted  dispatch.  The  rumble  swelled  into  a  roar  and  a  mob 
poured  down  Broadway  toward  the  Western  Union  building  which 
housed  the  offices  of  both  Gould  and  the  New  York  Associated  Press. 
A  great  roar  went  up: 

"Hang  Jay  Gould!  Hang  Jay  Gould!" 

Uptown  another  wrathful  crowd,  five  thousand  strong,  went  surg- 
ing along  Fifth  Avenue  to  storm  the  Gould  mansion.  It  marched 
to  the  same  fierce  cry: 

"Hang  Jay  Gould!  Hang  Jay  Gould!" 

Elsewhere  other  crowds  roamed  the  streets  and  as  the  night  re- 
echoed their  cries  an  editorial  writer  on  the  New  York  Herald  was 
writing: 

.  .  .  Gould  controls  the  Western  Union  Telegraph  Company.  During 
the  last  two  days  Gould,  by  false  reports  through  his  telegraphic  agencies, 
has  been  executing  his  share  of  the  plot  of  preparing  Republican  partisans  for 
a  fraudulent  claim  that  the  vote  of  New  York  has  been  cast  for  Elaine.  .  .  . 
It  is  the  official  returns  of  the  ballot  of  the  people  of  New  York  honestly 
computed,  and  it  is  not  Jay  Gould  and  his  Western  Union  Telegraph  Com- 
pany that  are  to  determine  the  electoral  vote  of  this  state. 

At  the  Western  Union  building  police  action  prevented  violence. 
A  guard  was  thrown  around  the  Gould  mansion.  That  night  the  finan- 
cier quit  the  city  for  the  safety  of  his  yacht  in  the  middle  of  the  Hudson. 

Soon  after  Gould  had  removed  himself,  the  New  York  Associated 
Press  announced  that  Cleveland  had  carried  New  York  State  by  a  scant 
margin.  The  official  plurality  was  1,149,  which  emphasized  how  close 
the  contest  was  and  how  damaging  to  Elaine  had  been  Burchard's  inept 
speechmaking.  With  New  York  in  his  column,  Cleveland  had  219  elec- 
toral votes  to  Elaine's  182.  Had  Elaine  carried  the  state  the  count 
would  have  been  Elaine  218,  Cleveland  183. 

So  the  turbulent  election  of  1884  passed  into  history.  It  saw  the 
New  York  Associated  Press  accused  of  complicity  in  an  unsavory  elec- 
tion-stealing plot,  and  yet  in  contradiction  it  saw  the  same  organization 
break  the  **Rum,  Romanism,  and  Rebellion"  story  which  proved  so 
fatal  to  the  hopes  of  the  plot's  beneficiary. 


XL  EXPANSION  AND  DISASTER 


GROVER  CLEVELAND  was  inaugurated  the  twenty-second  Presi- 
dent of  the  United  States  on  March  4,  1885.  Washington  had  never 
seen  such  a  jubilant  assemblage.  More  than  half  a  million  Democrats 
flooded  the  banks  of  the  Potomac. 

The  size  of  the  Associated  Press  staff  on  duty  was  in  impressive 
contrast  to  the  one  when  Buchanan  took  his  oath  of  office  in  1857. 
Only  Gobright  had  been  present  for  The  Associated  Press  to  report 
that  story.  Now  a  half  dozen  reporters  were  assigned.  The  recent  cor- 
ruption and  fraud  charges  still  were  fresh  as  they  knuckled  down  to 
write  about  the  colorful  occasion,  but  no  subversive  influences  were  in- 
terested in  the  coverage  of  such  a  straightforward  event. 

The  reports  of  the  inauguration  sped  across  the  country.  Although 
the  era  of  newspaper  pictures  had  not  dawned,  the  Los  Angeles  Times 
seized  upon  the  occasion  to  publish  a  humorous  pen  sketch  of  Cleveland 
mounting  the  "administration  horse."  The  drawing  was  jokingly  con- 
ceived by  an  artist  in  the  newspaper's  office,  but  the  caption  accompany- 
ing the  sketch  was  an  unwitting  prophecy  of  the  amazing  picture  de- 
velopment that  revolutionized  American  journalism  fifty  years  later. 
The  caption  read: 

This  special  Photogram  to  The  Times,  wired  from  Washington  at 
enormous  expense,  is  Short  (name  of  the  artist  who  did  the  drawing)  but 
sweet,  and  gives  a  graphic  idea  of  Mr.  Cleveland's  appearance  as  he  mounted 
the  administration  charger.  A  slight  roughness  in  the  lines  is  due  to  bumping 
against  the  insulators  as  it  came  buzzing  along  on  the  overland  wires. 

With  the  news  pulse  quickening,  reports  were  pouring  into  the 
New  York  headquarters  at  the  rate  of  more  than  40,000  words  daily 
at  the  time  of  Cleveland's  inauguration.  The  dispatches  came  from  a 
fair-sized  staff,  yet  the  names  of  the  reporters  themselves  never  had 
been  identified  publicly  with  any  of  the  work  they  did.  Now  occurred  an 
innovation. 

Employees  of  the  Missouri  Pacific  and  Iron  Mountain  Railway 
were  on  strike.  The  walkout,  sponsored  by  the  Knights  of  Labor, 

99 


100  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

threatened  a  stoppage  on  other  railroads  as  well.  The  one  man  who 
could  point  the  way  to  a  settlement  was  Jay  Gould,  magician  of  so  many 
business  deals.  For  a  long  time  he  could  not  be  found.  Then  word 
reached  New  York  that  he  was  in  Florida.  Charles  Sanford  Diehl,  of 
the  Chicago  office  of  the  Western  Associated  Press,  happened  to  be 
on  vacation  there  and  the  formidable  task  of  interviewing  Gould  was 
delegated  to  him. 

Diehl  finally  got  the  interview  and  his  story  contained  a  statement 
from  Gould  which  prevented  a  general  walkout.  The  story  was  so  im- 
portant, and  Diehl  presented  his  information  so  well,  that  the  associa- 
tion carried  his  name  at  the  end  to  indicate  it  was  an  exclusive  dispatch, 
obtained  and  written  by  one  of  its  own  staff  men.  That  was  a  great 
departure  from  tradition,  marking  the  first  intentional  appearance  of  a 
correspondent's  by-line  in  the  news  report. 

DiehPs  good  work  in  the  past,  climaxed  by  this  Florida  interview, 
was  responsible  for  his  almost  immediate  promotion.  A  short  time  later, 
when  the  Western  Associated  Press  found  it  imperative  to  open  a 
division  headquarters  on  the  Pacific  Coast,  he  received  the  assignment. 
The  papers  of  the  Far  West  were  dissatisfied  with  the  service  they  re- 
ceived and  two  influential  clients  had  withdrawn.  A  tactful  hand  was 
needed  on  the  scene  to  Ijold  the  others  in  line  and  to  ensure  adequate 
Pacific  news  protection. 

Diehl  was  no  newcomer  to  the  newspaper  business.  Born  in  Mary- 
land in  1854,  he  was  a  seventeen-year-old  typesetter  in  Chicago  at 
the  time  of  the  great  fire.  In  an  attempt  to  allay  the  fears  of  the 
populace  he  began  printing  a  handbill  newspaper.  Later  he  became  a 
$10  a  week  reporter  on  the  Chicago  Times  and  a  month  after  the  Custer 
massacre  the  paper  sent  him  into  the  Northwest  to  cover  the  redoubled 
drive  against  the  Indians.  There  he  operated  with  the  column  of  Gen- 
eral Terry,  whose  instructions  Custer  had  so  tragically  disobeyed,  and 
there  he  learned  firsthand  the  story  of  Kellogg's  end.  He  was  impressed 
by  the  part  that  special,  or  string,  correspondents  such  as  the  Bismarck 
reporter  might  play  in  a  large  news-gathering  system.  Soon  after 
joining  The  Associated  Press  he  encouraged  the  organization  of  a  sys- 
tem of  part-time  men  in  the  Chicago  area  and  it  paid  news  dividends 
from  the  start. 


When  Diehl  arrived  in  San  Francisco  in  May,  1887,  he  brought 
energy  that  was  badly  needed.  The  Pacific  coast,  glamorous  and  ro- 


EXPANSION  AND  DISASTEI^  101 

mantic,  was  also  a  neglected  stepchild.  The  newbudget  it  received  was 
haphazardly  assembled  and  irregularly  delivered.  Diehl  saw  the  possi- 
bilities and  for  the  first  time  a  detailed  report  began  to  appear  west 
of  Kansas  City,  transmitted  over  regular  telegraph  lines. 

The  Associated  Press  picked  the  right  time  to  open  a  Pacific  Coast 
headquarters.  Diehl  scarcely  had  established  himself  and  adjusted  the 
complaints  of  disgruntled  editors  before  the  first  in  a  series  of  important 
news  events  occurred  in  a  remote  part  of  his  vast  territory. 

In  Hawaii — many  miles  from  communication  facilities — revolt  over- 
threw Queen  Liliuokalani  and  her  island  court.  Diehl  made  special 
arrangements  for  a  roving  correspondent  in  Honolulu  to  report  the 
revolution. 

The  correspondent  got  his  story  all  right,  but  he  couldn't  get  it 
out.  Two  boats,  the  Australia  and  the  United  States  revenue  cutter 
Richard  Rush,  were  leaving  for  the  mainland  the  same  night.  The 
Australia  was  San  Francisco  bound  and  would  carry  mail,  but  the  com- 
mander of  the  Richard  Rush,  on  a  shorter  run  to  San  Diego,  would 
neither  carry  the  correspondent's  story  nor  permit  anyone  aboard  to 
do  so. 

Other  reporters  decided  their  only  choice  was  to  send  their  stories 
by  the  slower  Australia,  but  Diehl's  man  had  different  ideas.  In  the 
bar  of  the  Royal  Hawaiian  Hotel  he  saw  a  sailor  whose  cap  bore  the 
lettering  "Richard  Rush."  The  seaman  was  quick.  A  bargain  was  made. 
For  $75  he  concealed  a  copy  of  the  dispatch  inside  his  undershirt  and 
filed  it  with  the  telegraph  company  as  soon  as  he  reached  San  Diego. 
In  that  way  Diehl  secured  the  story  of  the  Hawaiian  insurrection 
twenty-four  hours  before  the  Australia  arrived  at  San  Francisco — even 
before  the  government  in  Washington  received  its  official  report. 


While  Diehl  was  organizing  the  Coast,  activities  of  an  entirely  dif- 
ferent kind  were  under  way  in  the  East.  The  five-year  joint  manager- 
ship contract  between  the  New  York  and  Western  associations  was  to 
expire  at  the  close  of  1887.  Its  renewal  was  vital  to  the  furtherance  of 
the  secret  plans  of  certain  of  the  five-man  governing  committee  and  the 
undercover  owners  of  the  United  Press.  Therefore,  early  that  year 
those  concerned  began  to  look  to  the  future. 

As  chairman  of  the  Joint  Committee,  Dana  took  steps  to  see  that 
there  was  no  hitch.  The  New  York  Associated  Press  accordingly  pro- 


102  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

posed  a  five-year  renewal  and  praised  the  effectiveness  of  the  existing 
union.  Dana  himself  urged  the  Western  association  to  accept  it  at  once. 
He  was  seconded  by  Richard  Smith  and  W.  N.  Haldeman,  who  repre- 
sented the  West  on  the  Joint  Committee,  and  the  arguments  they 
presented  so  hoodwinked  the  Western  directors  that  they  ratified  the 
extension  six  months  earlier  than  necessary. 

The  decade  moved.  Cleveland  accepted  the  Statue  of  Liberty  as 
a  gift  from  the  French;  the  Interstate  Commerce  Commission  was 
authorized;  an  ambitious  individual  completed  a  trip  around  the  world 
by  bicycle;  the  phonograph  was  invented,  and  the  first  paper  bottles 
appeared  and  were  laughed  at. 

In  a  Baltimore  basement  a  German  immigrant  named  Ottmar 
Mergenthaler  had  been  trying  for  several  years  to  perfect  a  machine 
suggested  by  the  idea  of  James  O.  Clephane,  the  Washington  stenog- 
rapher who  had  first  thought  of  the  typewriter.  His  object  was  to  per- 
fect a  mechanism  that  would  set  newspaper  type  automatically,  thereby 
replacing  the  old  hand-type  method. 

His  first  machine  was  tried  out  in  the  office  of  the  New  York 
Tribune.  It  was  christened  the  Lin-o-type.  By  1888  the  apparatus  was 
ready  for  more  widespread  use  and  publishers  spoke  of  it  as  the  most 
significant  printing  development  since  the  introduction  of  movable 
type  ii>  the  middle  of  the  fifteenth  century. 

Until  the  invention  of  movable  type  in  1450  printing  had  been 
difficult.  It  was  necessary  to  carve  the  whole  text  on  a  solid  block  and 
after  that  laborious  process  the  block  was  worthless  once  it  had  been 
used.  Movable  type  made  it  possible  to  fashion  each  letter  separately 
on  a  small  block  and  these  individual  pieces  could  be  properly  reassem- 
bled over  and  over  again  as  other  documents  required  printing.  That 
was  the  first  major  advance  in  typesetting  and  now,  with  the  advent 
of  the  Lin-o-type,  the  composing  rooms  of  newspapers  began  a  new 
day  of  rapid  operations. 

In  the  beginning  the  Lin-o-type  was  an  expensive  addition  to 
newspaper  equipment;  it  was  several  years  before  it  came  to  be  regarded 
as  a  necessity.  But  news  could  not  wait. 


Out  in  Samoa  in  March,  1889,  an  international  controversy  had 
developed  over  governmental  control  of  the  South  Sea  Islands.  War- 
ships of  the  disputing  nations  assembled  threateningly  in  Apia  harbor* 


EXPANSION  AND  DISASTER  103 

Diehl,  in  San  Francisco,  scented  a  story  of  potentially  great  importance 
and  dispatched  a  staff  man.  John  P.  Dunning  drew  the  assignment. 
In  the  absence  of  cable  facilities  in  that  part  of  the  world,  he  was  forced 
to  relay  his  stories  to  San  Francisco  by  boat.  But  it  was  the  violence 
of  nature  and  not  of  nations  that  made  the  biggest  news. 

On  March  16  the  most  devastating  hurricane  ever  to  strike  in 
that  tropical  latitude  swept  the  islands  with  a  fury  that  took  many  lives 
and  wrecked  Samoa  and  the  battleships  alike.  For  a  month  the  world 
knew  nothing  of  it,  and  then  on  April  13  a  story  running  several 
thousand  words  reached  Diehl.  It  was  from  Dunning,  by  the  Australian 
steamer  Alemada^  and  it  contained  first  word  of  the  tragedy.  After 
helping  with  rescue  work  Dunning  had  written  his  story  in  the  midst  of 
the  wreckage.  Regular  leased  wire  facilities  of  The  Associated  Press 
still  had  not  reached  San  Francisco,  and  Diehl  had  to  feed  the  big  news 
over  the  regular  commercial  lines  at  a  cost  of  six  cents  per  word. 

The  eighties,  with  their  wealth  of  spontaneous  news,  had  made 
trained  newspapermen  more  than  ever  conscious  of  how  words  could 
paint  a  quick  picture  for  the  reader.  Men  like  Diehl  now  were  schooling 
their  men  to  tell  all  the  salient  facts  in  the  first  inclusive  paragraph — 
later  called  the  "lead" — of  any  story.  It  was  the  seal  beginning  of  a 
modern  newspaper  style  and  The  Associated  Press'  was  beginning  to 
answer,  in  the  first  few  lines,  those  five  most  pertinent  questions — who, 
when,  where,  why,  what. 

Dunning's  opening  sentence  on  the  Samoan  disaster  was  long,  but 
it  told  the  complete  story  in  less  than  a  hundred  words.  It  said: 

Apia,  Samoa,  March  30 — The  most  violent  and  destructive  hurricane 
ever  known  in  the  Southern  Pacific  passed  over  the  Samoan  Islands  on  the 
1 6th  and  ijth  of  March,  and  as  a  result,  a  fleet  of  six  warships  and  ten 
other  vessels  were  ground  to  atoms  on  the  coral  reefs  in  the  harbor,  or 
thrown  on  the  beach  in  front  of  the  little  city  of  Apia,  and  142  officers  and 
men  of  the  American  and  German  navies  sleep  forever  under  the  reefs  or 
lie  buried  in  unmarked  graves,  thousands  of  miles  from  their  native  lands. 

The  reporter  could  have  let  that  paragraph  stand  alone.  The 
essential  facts  had  been  presented.  But  Dunning  went  on  to  the  details. 
He  gave  the  names  of  the  ships  and  their  loss  of  personnel.  Then  he 
returned  to  the  terrifying  storm  itself,  describing  its  intensity  and  pic- 
turing the  great  struggle  to  survive  the  catastrophe.  He  told  of  natives 
holding  up  wooden  shingles  as  protection  against  a  rain  so  fierce  that 
it  cut  their  faces,  of  the  heroic  activities  of  rescuers,  and  of  the  valiant 
efforts  at  reconstruction. 


104  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

It  was  the  longest  story  that  ever  had  moved  by  telegraph  across 
the  continent. 

The  news  editor  of  the  San  Francisco  Chronicle,  standing  over 
DiehPs  shoulder  as  the  agent  edited  the  copy  for  the  wires,  exclaimed: 
"My  God,  that  is  a  wonderful  picture!"  Diehl  subsequently  said:  "If 
I  were  to  prepare  a  primer  for  young  writers,  not  omitting  some  who 
are  more  mature,  I  would  offer  Dunning's  opening  paragraph  of  a 
memorable  sea  tragedy  as  a  code  to  observe."  United  States  Senator 
Don  Cameron  told  his  colleagues:  "When  I  want  to  shed  tears  I  read 
Dunning's  story  of  the  heroism  of  the  human  race,  as  it  developed  in 
Apia  harbor."  The  New  York  Tribune  reproduced  the  story  in  pam- 
phlet form  to  satisfy  the  requests  of  readers,  and  in  London  the  Times 
called  it  one  of  the  most  perfect  bits  of  English  ever  written. 


May,  1889,  arrived  cheerlessly,  bringing  rains  which  deluged  the 
eastern  states.  For  three  weeks  the  downpour  continued,  hampering 
communications  and  swelling  rivers.  The  rain  was  still  falling  on  May 
31  when,  toward  evening,  the  vague  report  reached  Colonel  William 
Connolly,  Associated  Press  agent  in  Pittsburgh:  "Something  has  hap- 
pened at  Johnstown." 

Telegraph  lines  and  the  new  telephone  circuits  were  already 
crippled.  There  was  only  one  possible  way  of  reaching  Johnstown,  in 
the  mountains  of  western  Pennsylvania  and  ninety  miles  away,  and 
that  was  by  special  train.  This  meant  enormous  expense,  but  the  Pitts- 
burgh papers  and  Agent  Connolly  pooled  resources  to  engage  a  one-car 
special. 

Before  the  train  pulled  out  the  first  shred  of  news  arrived — reports 
that  a  flood  had  taken  as  many  as  a  hundred  and  fifty  lives.  The  agent 
hurried  the  word  off  to  New  York  and  then  with  Harry  W.  Orr,  his 
best  telegrapher,  set  out  by  train  against  the  advice  of  railroad  officials. 
The  special  crept  into  the  darkness  with  frequent  halts  while  train- 
men splashed  ahead  with  lanterns  to  inspect  the  track.  The  water  kept 
mounting  until  it  reached  the  driving  rods  and  the  engineer  announced 
he  could  go  no  farther. 

Connolly,  Orr,  and  two  others — Claude  Wetmore,  a  free  lance 
ordered  to  the  scene  by  the  New  York  World,  and  a  reporter  for  one 
of  the  Pittsburgh  papers — plunged  into  the  black  water  over  the 
roadbed.  Three  timid  colleagues  stayed  behind.  Connolly  waded  off  in 


EXPANSION  AND  DISASTER  105 

search  of  a  farmer  who  might  drive  them  the  remaining  miles.  While 
he  was  away  the  others  were  attracted  by  the  dim  light  of  lanterns. 
They  sloshed  over  to  a  rickety  bridge  which  spanned  the  raging  Cone- 
maugh  River. 

The  lanterns  were  being  carried  by  rescuers  fishing  for  human 
bodies.  The  workers  were  using  lassos  to  catch  arms  or  legs  as  bodies 
hurtled  past  in  the  river.  More  than  two  score  corpses  were  piled  on 
the  planks  and  the  gruesome  work  continued. 

Several  miles  up  the  river  from  Johnstown  a  dam  had  made  the 
Conemaugh  a  vast  lake  for  many  years.  The  weeks  of  ceaseless  rain 
had  piled  up  eighteen  million  tons  of  water.  Late  that  afternoon  the 
dam  had  given  way  and  a  liquid  wall,  seventy-five  feet  high,  swept 
down  the  valley  on  the  low-lying  town.  A  railroad  engineer  tied  down 
his  locomotive  whistle  and  raced  the  water  toward  Johnstown.  But 
he  was  too  late. 

Connolly  returned  presently  with  a  farmer  who,  for  $50,  said  he 
would  attempt  to  take  the  four  newspapermen  across  the  mountains. 
They  were  six  hours  covering  the  few  miles  and  it  was  seven  o'clock 
in  the  morning  when  they  reached  the  south  bank  of  the  Conemaugh 
three  miles  from  Johnstown.  No  conveyance  could  go  farther.  They  had 
to  make  their  own  way,  slipping  and  sliding  through  the  muck,  slime 
and  water,  past  half-buried  bodies  and  the  hideous  jumble  of  debris. 
One  of  the  party  sickened  and  turned  back.  Connolly,  Orr  and  Wet- 
more  struggled  on. 

Feeling  his  way  along  the  flooded  roadbed,  Connolly  stumbled 
over  an  abandoned  cattle  guard  and  floundered  into  the  rushing  water. 
When  he  tried  to  get  to  his  feet  he  found  his  ankle  badly  wrenched. 
The  pain  was  so  great  he  could  not  even  hobble.  Orr  and  Wetmore 
managed  to  get  him  to  a  farmhouse  on  a  near-by  hillside  where  he 
collapsed.  The  injured  man,  however,  refused  to  let  them  waste  time 
with  first-aid  efforts.  The  only  thing  that  counted  was  the  story  of 
Johnstown's  tragedy. 

Orr  and  Wetmore  split  up,  each  with  the  determination  to  find 
some  way  to  get  out  a  few  positive  words.  As  the  representative  of  a 
member  paper,  Wetmore  promised  Connolly  to  see  that  the  first  news 
sent  out  would  be  to  The  Associated  Press.  In  the  next  few  horror- 
filled  hours  the  reporter  and  the  telegrapher  slogged  through  muck, 
scaled  barricades  of  debris,  and  brushed  past  countless  bodies  of  dis- 
aster victims.  Wetmore  had  the  first  luck.  He  spied  a  lineman  on  a  pole 
cutting  in  on  a  wire  preparatory  to  sending  a  message  with  a  pocket 


106  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Morse  instrument.  The  free  lance  begged  him  to  send  a  dispatch  for 
him. 

"Hell,  no!"  the  operator  yelled  down.  "This  is  railroad  business." 

But  Wetmore  was  not  willing  to  give  up. 

"Just  a  few  words,"  he  pleaded.  "Ask  your  superintendent  at  the 
other  end." 

The  telegrapher  reluctantly  consented.  A  prompt  answer  came 
ticking  back  and  the  lineman  shouted  down. 

"All  right!  Get  it  up  to  me!" 

Wetmore  scribbled  on  a  piece  of  wet  paper,  found  a  long  pole  and 
passed  up  his  dispatch: 

OVER  TWO  THOUSAND  DEAD.   DEVASTATED  JOHNS- 
TOWN APPEALS  TO  THE  NATION  FOR  POOD  AND  SHELTER 
FOR  OTHER  THOUSANDS  WHO  ARE  HOMELESS  AND 
STARVING . 

Orr  encountered  Wetmore  shortly  afterward,  and  then  both  were 
surprised  to  see  Connolly  hobbling  toward  them,  supported  by  two 
bedraggled  farmers.  He  had  not  received  any  medical  attention,  but  was 
determined  to  get  back  to  the  story.  Choosing  a  vantage  point,  he  found 
a  large  board,  lay  down  on  his  stomach  and  began  to  write. 

After  midday  relief  trains  started  to  arrive  and  on  their  return 
trips  Connolly  sent  out  great  wads  of  copy  for  relay  outside  the  flood 
zone.  During  the  afternoon  three  wire  lines  were  strung  into  Johns- 
town. One  was  set  aside  for  official  messages,  one  for  military  instruc- 
tions on  troop  movements  and  supplies,  and  one  was  given  to  The 
Associated  Press.  Connolly  set  up  headquarters  in  an  abandoned  grist- 
mill on  the  east  side  of  the  Conemaugh,  and  there  Orr  took  charge 
of  the  wire,  moving  Connolly's  continuing  story  directly  from  the 
scene. 

Unknown  to  the  two  staff  men,  General  Manager  Smith  spent 
that  day  and  most  of  the  next  trying  to  join  them.  The  flood  had  caught 
him  near  Altoona  en  route  by  rail  to  Chicago.  He  made  his  way  over 
the  mountains,  stopping  to  report  the  death  of  thirteen  passengers  in  a 
train  that  had  been  wrecked  by  the  floods. 

Connolly  was  in  a  pitiful  condition  by  the  time  the  general  manager 
arrived.  He  had  been  working  without  rest  and  next  to  no  food  for 
seventy-two  hours.  His  injured  ankle  was  much  worse  because  he  in- 
sisted on  walking.  Smith  found  that  part  of  the  Associated  Press  head- 
quarters had  been  pressed  into  service  as  a  morgue.  At  an  improvised 


EXPANSION  AND  DISASTER  107 

desk  made  of  a  narrow  board  on  two  upturned  barrels,  Connolly  wrote 
his  story  and  passed  it  to  Orr  at  his  elbow.  The  rest  of  the  room  was  a 
mortuary. 

Not  long  after  Smith  appeared,  Connolly  collapsed  and  the  gen- 
eral manager  took  him  back  to  Pittsburgh,  leaving  the  coverage  in 
charge  of  Alexander  J.  Jones,  the  first  additional  staff  man  ordered  to 
the  scene.  Orr  refused  to  leave  his  telegraph  key.  A  slight,  frail  man, 
Jones  was  not  so  vigorous.  He  could  not  get  anything  to  eat  and  twenty- 
four  hours  in  the  nightmare  of  destruction  unnerved  him.  He  called 
for  help  from  Chicago — the  only  direct  point  on  the  Associated  Press 
wire. 

Help  arrived,  but  it  was  intended  for  Orr  and  not  Jones.  J.  Her- 
bert Smythe,  a  young  telegrapher  in  his  twenties,  had  started  from  Chi- 
cago to  act  as  relief  operator  for  Orr.  When  he  reached  Johnstown, 
Orr  broke  down  after  ninety-six  hours  under  pressure  and  had  to  be 
put  on  a  train  for  Pittsburgh.  Jones  departed  on  the  same  train. 

Smythe  proved  equal  to  the  emergency.  Lacking  a  pair  of  rubber 
boots,  he  tied  strings  around  the  bottom  of  his  trousers  to  keep  out  the 
mud  and  then  tackled  the  story.  The  first  day  he  sent  two  thousand 
words,  writing  in  pencil  on  copy  paper  and  telegraphing  it  when  he  got 
back  to  the  gristmill.  He  was  meticulous  about  making  corrections  if 
he  saw  an  opportunity  to  improve  the  account  as  he  went  over  it  a  second 
time  while  operating  the  Morse  key.  For  a  while  the  only  food  was 
soda  crackers  and  black  coffee.  On  that  diet  Smythe  turned  in  a  brilliant 
reportorial  performance  which  won  him  regular  assignment  to  the 
news  staff. 

A  few  days  after  Smythe  arrived  another  Associated  Press  man 
reached  the  makeshift  headquarters.  The  newcomer  was  Lewis  from 
New  York,  and  it  had  taken  three  days  and  nights  to  wade  and  flounder 
from  Harrisburg,  a  little  more  than  a  hundred  miles  away.  He  had 
been  attending  a  formal  dinner  in  New  York  when  ordered  to  the 
flood  zone  and  the  full  dress  suit  he  wore  was  an  amazing  sight.  He 
had  cut  the  tails  off  his  coat  to  facilitate  his  progress.  His  collapsible 
silk  hat  was  battered,  and  his  boiled  shirt  was  black. 

Johnstown  was  slowly  reviving.  The  remaining  houses  on  higher 
ground  were  crowded  with  refugees  and  a  small  dynamic  woman  named 
Clara  Barton  had  taken  charge  of  relief  operations  for  the  Red  Cross. 

Lewis  and  Wetmore,  unable  to  find  any  other  sleeping  place,  ap- 
propriated some  of  the  boxes  that  had  been  brought  in  by  relief  trains 
and  stacked  near  the  mill  for  use  by  the  Red  Cross.  They  lined  them 


AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

s^;;'  __ 

with  straw  and  moved  them  into  the  windowless  building.  For  the  next 
two  weeks,  while  the  full  story  unfolded,  they  led  a  harsh  existence, 
eating  what  little  they  could  obtain  and  suffering  from  the  scarcity  of 
drinking  water.  They  slept  occasionally — and  the  boxes  into  which  they 
tumbled  for  bed  were  cheap  pine  coffins.  Smythe  was  more  fastidious. 
He  used  a  board  stretched  across  two  kegs. 

From  the  standpoint  of  straight  news  reporting,  the  Johnstown 
flood  tested  the  working  newspaperman's  determination  to  obtain  first- 
hand information  despite  all  odds. 

Although  news  gathering  itself  was  coming  of  age,  the  little 
handful  of  men  behind  the  old  New  York  monopoly  continued  to 
take  liberties  with  the  facts  whenever  they  dealt  importantly  with  poli- 
tics, the  almighty  dollar,  or  any  of  the  other  major  controversial  issues 
which  exerted  national  influence.  Late  that  same  year  of  1889  the  Mon- 
tana copper  kings  spent  more  than  a  million  dollars  to  influence  voting 
and  once  again  the  association  was  accused  of  disseminating  biased 
reports. 


XII.  FOR  THE  ALMIGHTY  DOLLAR 


THE  country  was  greedy  for  quick  money  as  the  nation  moved  into  the 
closing  decade  of  the  nineteenth  century.  Slick  promoters  and  market 
manipulators  lured  the  small  investor  and  shady  financial  circles  in 
New  York  were  careful  to  see  that  no  news  leaked  out  that  would  dis- 
turb the  gullible.  New  states  were  being  admitted  to  the  Union,  new 
industries  developed  and  the  magic  of  a  dawning  machine  age  brought 
the  promise  of  a  better  future.  Legislators  were  so  interested  in  their 
own  private  affairs  that  enactment  of  wise  regulatory  laws  was  neg- 
lected. The  entire  press  was  threatened  by  a  news  monopoly  controlled 
by  moneyed  interests. 

The  period  was  one  of  critical  transition  in  the  conception  of  a 
newspaper's  obligations  to  its  readers  and  in  journalism's  financial  read- 
justment to  the  nation's  pace.  This  era  of  change  had  begun  in  the 
eighties  during  the  most  rapid  expansion  of  population  and  industry  in 
the  history  of  the  United  States.  Until  that  time  the  press  of  the  coun- 
try had  been  a  comparatively  small,  personalized  business.  But  the 
development  of  the  telegraph  and  the  cable,  the  introduction  of  the 
telephone,  the  constantly  increasing  appetite  for  news,  and  the  eventual 
perfection  of  rapid  printing  facilities  changed  the  entire  complexion  of 
newspapering.  Gradually  the  future  of  news  gathering  itself  came  to 
be  involved.  Either  it  was  to  become  entirely  the  instrument  of  forces 
concerned  with  profits  and  special  causes  or  it  would  emerge  as  an  hon- 
est, self-respecting  public  service. 

From  Chicago  the  strongest  new  figure  in  the  Western  Associated 
Press  surveyed  the  whole  uncertain  panorama.  Victor  Fremont  Lawson 
was  editor  and  publisher  of  the  Chicago  Daily  News.  He  had  entered 
the  newspaper  field  several  years  before  the  beginning  of  this  headlong 
time  and  had  had  opportunity  to  study  the  pyramiding  of  the  nation's 
financial  structure.  He  had  watched  the  growth  of  co| 
until  they  controlled  almost  every  conceivable  comr 
barbed  wire,  oil,  rubber,  cordage,  even  ice  and  kindling  wood.  And  he 
had  seen  the  news  from  financial  New  York  phrased  or  delayed  so  that 
interested  men  profited  to  the  extent  of  millions. 

109 


no  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Lawson  knew  how  the  press  could  influence  the  masses.  His  father 
had  printed  foreign-language  papers  for  the  large  Scandinavian  popu- 
kitJbns  of  the  Middle  West,  and  Lawson  continued  the  business  after 
his  father's  death.  His  papers  had  brought  him  in  contact  with  the 
financially  unstable  Chicago  Daily  News,  founded  by  an  old  school- 
mate, Melville  E.  Stone.  Lawson  bought  it  and  gave  Stone  freedom 
as  editor.  It  was  an  effective  partnership,  Stone  with  his  editorial  abil- 
ities and  Lawson  with  his  idealistic  conception  of  a  newspaper's  mission, 
and  it  lasted  until  Stone  relinquished  his  position  in  1888  because  of 
poor  health.  Together  the  pair  made  the  Daily  News  one  of  the  most 
respected  papers  in  the  country.  Lawson  outlined  his  views  on  what 
the  publication  should  stand  for: 

Candid — That  its  utterances  shall  at  all  times  be  the  exact  truth.  It  is 
independent  but  never  indifferent; 

Comprehensive — That  it  shall  contain  all  the  news; 

Concise — The  Daily  News  is  very  carefully  edited,  to  the  end  that  the 
valuable  time  of  its  patrons  shall  not  be  wasted  in  reading  of  mere  trifles; 

Clean — That  its  columns  shall  never  be  tainted  by  vulgarity  or  obscenity; 

Cheap — That  its  price  shall  be  put  within  the  reach  of  all. 

Lawson  wondered  if  these  principles  could  not  be  applied  to  news- 
gathering,  where  reform  plainly  was  needed. 


Under  the  terms  of  the  last  truce,  the  Western  Associated  Press 
continued  in  alliance  with  the  old  New  York  organization  and  the 
combined  operations  of  the  two  were  still  directed  by  the  same  Joint 
Executive  Committee  of  three  New  Yorkers  and  two  Westerners 
which  had  taken  over  the  dual  management  at  the  conclusion  of  the 
1882  hostilities.  In  the  great  surge  of  national  development  and  the 
wealth  of  news  which  followed  that  rapprochement,  there  had  been 
little  inclination  to  question  the  arrangement.  There  had  been  com- 
plaints, but  the  West's  own  William  Henry  Smith  was  the  general 
manager  of  the  affiliated  associations  and  the  two  Western  representa- 
tives on  the  Joint  Executive  Committee  had  n  voice.  Superficially  this 
partnership  appeared  sound.  But  when  th$|Western  Associated  Press 
members  gathered  for  their  annual  meeting 'in  1890  there  was  increas- 
ing belief  that  appearances  were  deceptive. 

For  several  years  the  members  had  watched  with  misgivings  the 
phenomenal  growth  of  the  new  agency — the  United  Press.  Publishers 


FOR  THE  ALMIGHTY  DOLLAR  in 

beyond  the  Alleghenies  had  been  worried  when  this  rival  first  appeared 
in  1882,  but  the  apprehension  subsided  with  the  Western-New  York* 
Associated  Press  realignment  a  few  months  later.  Now  they  realize^ 
they  should  have  given  this  upstart  organization  more  attention.  It 
continued  to  grow  stronger  in  spite  of  the  apparent  opposition  of  the 
more  solidly  entrenched  Associated  Press. 

On  top  of  everything  else,  there  was  a  mystery  shrouding  both  its 
control  and  its  method  of  operation.  The  Westerners  had  heard  rumors 
that  a  small  clique  of  financiers  owned  the  United  Press,  lock,  stock, 
and  barrel.  In  retrospect  a  few  noted  that  one  of  the  greatest  periods 
of  unreliability  and  distortion  in  their  own  news  report  paralleled  the 
rise  of  this  agency.  Most  disturbing  of  all  was  the  suspicion  that  the 
United  Press  had  secretly  perfected  an  arrangement  to  siphon  news 
from  Associated  Press  reports.  Some  Westerners  bluntly  charged  that 
such  a  state  of  affairs  existed  and  that  there  was  connivance  between 
the  shadowy  commercial  interests  and  some  members  of  their  own 
Joint  Committee. 

The  Western  membership  decided  at  their  1890  meeting  on  an 
official  inquiry.  The  investigation  was  entrusted  to  Victor  Lawson  as 
head  of  a  committee  of  three. 

Lawson  himself  did  not  know  the  extent  of  his  undertaking.  His 
immediate  commission  was  rather  limited  in  scope — to  discover  what 
he  could  about  the  growth  of  the  United  Press  and  to  establish  any 
hidden  connection  it  might  have  with  The  Associated  Press. 

Lawson  was  assisted  by  Colonel  Frederick  Driscoll,  of  the  St.  Paul 
Pioneer-Press,  and  R.  W.  Patterson,  Jr.,  of  the  Chicago  Tribune, 
among  others.  During  the  long  months  of  careful,  puzzling  research 
there  were  repeated  attempts  to  unseat  the  committee  and  to  discredit 
its  efforts.  At  one  stage  I.  F.  Mack,  now  president  of  the  Western 
Associated  Press,  even  attempted  to  stop  Lawson.  Others  whom  Lawson 
had  trusted  most  implicitly  turned  out  to  be  among  the  most  culpable. 
Individuals  in  high  places  were  involved  in  the  most  complicated 
scheme.  Even  the  majority  of  the  seven  members  of  the  old  New  York 
Associated  Press  had  not  been  aware  of  what  was  going  on. 

Lawson  made  his  preliminary  report  to  the  regular  1891  meeting 
and  then  hurried  off  to  Ng|f  York  to  complete  his  investigation.  Interest 
ran  so  high  that  only  one  member  of  the  entire  Western  Associated 
Press  failed  to  attend  the  special  meeting  called  in  Detroit  on  August  18 
of  the  same  year  to  hear  the  whole  shocking  story  of  betrayal  and  deceit 

The  meeting  was  stunned  by  Lawson's  revelations. 


112  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

He  presented  documentary  evidence  showing  that  all  of  the  news- 
gathering  facilities  of  the  country  were  in  the  control  of  a  trust  domi- 
nated by  John  Walsh,  the  financier,  William  Laffan,  business  manager 
and  publisher  of  Dana's  New  York  Swny  and  Walter  Phillips,  directing 
head  of  the  United  Press. 

These  men — principal  owners  of  the  United  Press — controlled  all 
the  news  by  virtue  of  a  secret  trust  agreement  between  the  United 
Press  and  members  of  the  Joint  Executive  Committee  of  the  New  York 
and  Western  associations. 

They  had  contrived  this  agreement  with  the  Joint  Executive  Com- 
mittee and  they  had  given  stock  valued  at  many  thousands  of  dollars 
to  the  committee  members  privately  in  order  to  effect  their  plan. 

Not  only  was  part  of  this  stock  held  personally  by  Charles  Dana, 
president  of  the  New  York  Associated  Press  and  chairman  of  the  Joint 
Executive  Committee,  but  Richard  Smith  and  W.  N.  Haldeman, 
Western  representatives  on  the  committee,  and  General  Manager 
William  Henry  Smith  also  had  been  given  large  financial  interests. 

The  total  holdings  of  all  the  Associated  Press  men  involved — until 
now  considered  entirely  loyal  to  the  best  interests  of  the  jointly  operated 
associations — were  as  follows: 

Charles  A.  Dana,  Editor  of  the  Sun  and  chairman  of  the  Joint 

Executive  Committee  $  72,500 

Whitelaw  Reid,  New  York  Associated  Press  representative  on  the 

joint  committee,  in  the  name  of  Henry  W.  Sackett 72,500 

W.  N.  Haldeman,  Western  Associated  Press  representative  on  the 

joint  committee 50,000 

Richard  Smith,  Western  Associated  Press  representative  on  the 

joint  committee,  in  the  name  of  J.  D.  Hearne 50,000 

William  Henry  Smith,  General  Manager  of  the  combined  New 

York  and  Western  Associated  Press 50,000 

William  M.  Laffan,  business  manager  and  publisher  of  the  Sun  ...  72,500 

Total    $367,500 

It  took  Lawson  more  than  ten  thousand  words  to  recount  the 
entire  story  and  his  report  explained  for  the  first  time  many  mystifying 
incidents  of  the  past. 

3 

The  incredible  situation  had  its  beginning  back  in  1884  when  the 
rising  young  United  Press  in  a  masterpiece  of  salesmanship  prevailed 
upon  the  Joint  Executive  Committee  to  buy  the  bothersome  report  ofc 


FOR  THE  ALMIGHTY  DOLLAR  113 

its  European  news  subsidiary,  the  Cable  News  Company.  Ostensibly 
the  move  was  designed  to  strengthen  The  Associated  Press's  own  foreign 
news  service,  but  there  were  other  shadowy  details  in  the  transaction. 
It  was  then  that  the  New  York  Associated  Press  employed  Francis  X. 
Schoonmaker  who  had  been  head  of  the  Cable  News.  Many  publishers 
now  recalled  that,  at  the  time,  they  had  been  surprised  by  this  sudden 
change  of  front  by  General  Manager  Smith  who  had  previously 
denounced  Schoonmaker  as  a  "scoundrel"  and  "thief,"  and  the  Cable 
News  Company  as  a  purveyor  of  bogus  dispatches. 

The  Cable  News  Company  proved  the  entering  wedge  and  for  a 
while  the  Joint  Executive  Committee  and  the  United  Press  worked 
together  privately  in  the  field  of  foreign  intelligence.  The  first  arrange- 
ment also  called  for  the  New  York  Associated  Press  to  supply  its 
theoretical  rival  with  news  of  the  New  England  area,  but  presently 
Congressional  and  Albany  reports  were  added,  and  soon  The  Associated 
Press  was  supplying  its  news  on  a  national  scale.  The  news  usually  was 
made  available  to  the  United  Press  in  New  York  through  a  scheme 
which  kept  the  overt  act  well  concealed. 

In  return  for  the  news  it  received  from  The  Associated  Press,  the 
United  Press  exchanged  some  of  the  news  it  gathered,  but  there  was 
more  than  reciprocity  in  the  partnership.  To  cement  the  union,  the 
men  who  controlled  the  United  Press  presented  thirty  per  cent  of  their 
organization's  stock  to  four  members  of  the  Joint  Executive  Committee 
in  1885.  Technically,  the  committeemen  "bought"  the  stock,  but  an 
immediate  hundred  per  cent  "dividend"  refunded  the  purchase  money. 
Since  the  co-operation  of  the  general  manager  of  the  combined  Asso- 
ciated Press  organization  was  necessary,  the  two  Western  committee 
members  reissued  one-third  of  their  holdings  to  Smith. 

The  theory  was  simplicity  itself.  The  men  who  directed  the  oper- 
ations of  the  New  York  and  Western  associations  would  supply  the 
United  Press  the  great  bulk  of  their  news  secretly  and  at  virtually  no 
cost.  The  operating  expense  of  the  United  Press  accordingly  would  be 
at  a  minimum  and  an  imposing  percentage  of  its  receipts  would  represent 
profits — profits  to  be  distributed  as  dividends  to  the  coterie  behind  the 
scenes;  Furthermore,  the  United  Press  would  increase  its  number  of 
clients  by  recruiting  Associated  Press  papers  to  take  its  report  under 
threat  of  subsidizing  opposition  publications  in  their  territories.  Thus, 
in  effect,  those  Associated  Press  papers  which  were  coerced  into  sub- 
scribing to  the  United  Press  would  be  paying  twice  for  substantially 
the  same  news  service. 


114  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Once  the  1885  stock-distributing  trust  agreement  had  been  ratified, 
the  plan  proceeded,  successful  and  surreptitious.  In  1887,  however,  the 
first  five-year  contract  of  the  Western  Associated  Press  with  New  York 
expired.  Failure  to  renew  it  not  only  would  cut  off  the  United  Press 
from  the  news  gathered  by  the  West,  but  also  might  affect  the  personnel 
of  the  all-important  Joint  Executive  Committee  and  bring  about  a 
change  of  general  managers.  That  was  why  the  interested  parties  set 
about  assuring  a  renewal  of  the  agreement  between  New  York  and 
the  West. 

All  this  while  the  dividends  had  been  rolling  in.  The  returns  had 
surpassed  anticipations  and  carried  the  promise  of  even  more  lucrative 
operations.  The  United  Press  had  found  itself  handicapped  by  its 
modest  capitalization.  As  soon  as  the  West  renewed  its  New  York 
contract,  Walsh  and  his  group  felt  free  to  remedy  this  deficiency.  Ac- 
cordingly, in  1887  a  new  United  Press  was  chartered  with  a  $1,000,000 
capitalization.  The  financier,  Walsh,  as  treasurer,  immediately  bought 
back  the  old  United  Press  stock  from  the  Associated  Press  officials, 
thereby  repaying  their  initial  "investment"  a  second  time. 

Then  he  distributed  to  them  gratis  $300,000  worth  of  the  new 
stock,  and  the  name  of  William  M.  Laffan  appeared  on  the  list  of 
stockholders  for  the  first  time  along  with  those  of  Dana,  Reid,  Richard 
Smith,  Haldeman,  and  General  Manager  Smith.  Dana,  Laffan,  and 
Reid  each  purchased  an  additional  $22,500,  so  that  the  total  Joint 
Executive  Committee  holdings  were  $367,500.  Just  as  with  the  1885 
agreement,  this  stock  was  pooled  with  that  held  by  Walsh  and  a  few 
others  to  assure  continued  control  of  the  expanded  United  Press.  Walsh 
again  filled  the  powerful  position  of  trustee. 

With  operations  on  a  big  scale  and  the  profits  mounting,  the 
manipulators  realized  the  need  for  putting  their  news  juggling  partner- 
ship on  a  legal  basis.  Hitherto  everything  had  been  done  by  informal 
arrangement.  On  May  28,  1888,  a  formal  contract  was  executed  and 
it  was  Lawson's  discovery  of  this  document  which  started  him  on  the 
trail  leading  to  all  the  scandalous  revelations. 

In  the  course  of  his  report  Lawson  told  of  President  Mack's 
efforts  to  sabotage  the  committee's  work.  He  also  called  for  the 
resignations  of  Richard  Smith  and  Haldeman  as  the  West's  representa- 
tives on  the  joint  committee. 

Mack  took  the  floor  for  an  explanation  of  his  strange  behavior. 
But  the  membership  rebuked  him  by  electing  William  Penn  Nixon, 


FOR  THE  ALMIGHTY  DOLLAR  115 

publisher  of  the  Chicago  Inter-Ocean,  to  replace  him  as  the  Western 
president. 

Richard  Smith  and  Haldeman  entered  an  extended  defense, 
extolling  the  progress  of  news  gathering  during  their  ten-year  service 
on  the  committee.  But  there  was  no  explaining  away  the  embarrassing 
possession  of  stock. 

Then  General  Manager  William  Henry  Smith  asked  for  indul- 
gence to  review  his  twenty-two  years  in  the  association.  "I  have 
endeavored  to  be  faithful,"  he  protested,  "and  have  given  to  the  work 
of  creating  this  great  and  honorable  news  service  the  best  years  of  my 
life."  But  the  members  were  not  to  be  moved  by  touching  pleas. 

The  Lawson  report  was  accepted  and  all  its  recommendations 
adopted.  Lawson  was  elected  to  head  the  West's  reconstituted  Executive 
Committee  and  the  membership  referred  the  whole  involved  business 
of  the  projected  trust  and  the  future  status  of  General  Manager  Smith 
to  that  body. 

Those  members  of  the  monopolistically  inclined  New  York  Asso- 
ciated Press  who  had  not  known  what  was  going  on  also  were  incensed 
and  disillusioned.  At  last  they  saw  that  monopoly,  carried  to  its  logical 
conclusion,  meant  a  national  news  system  operated  for  the  dollar  first 
and  news  integrity  second.  The  New  York  majority  made  some  feeble 
efforts  to  recoup  their  former  prestige  as  a  news-gathering  combination, 
but  they  realized  that  the  arrogant  association  they  had  so  jealously 
fostered  had  been  virtually  stolen  from  under  their  noses  by  a  profit- 
hungry  element  of  their  own  membership  in  league  with  outright 
commercial  interests.  The  New  York  Associated  Press,  historic  old  trail 
blazer,  was  doomed,  and  they  made  little  attempt  to  save  it. 

The  day  of  reckoning  had  come,  but  the  struggle  was  only  just 
beginning. 


XIII.  CHAOS  AND  CRUSADE 


THE  nation  rushed  heedlessly  along  toward  a  financial  debacle  and, 
as  the  forces  of  the  Western  Associated  Press  left  the  significant  Detroit 
meeting,  the  first  scattered  signs  of  the  panic  of  1893  began  to  appear. 
The  price  of  silver  started  its  decline,  the  Treasury's  gold  reserve  was 
shrinking,  there  were  occasional  bank  failures,  and  in  some  industries 
the  fear  of  unemployment  no  longer  could  be  disguised. 

It  was  at  such  a  critical  time  in  national  life  that  Lawson  and  the 
other  Western  publishers  started  their  struggle  to  wrest  control  of 
news  from  the  private  money  interests.  On  every  side  was  uncertainty 
and  confusion.  Many  publishers,  still  shocked  by  the  scandal  which 
Lawson  had  unearthed,  seemed  too  dazed  to  realize  the  serious  plight 
into  which  the  nation's  news-gathering  machinery  had  been  maneuvered. 
There  still  were  strong  elements  of  opposition  among  some  of  the 
publishers  themselves.  The  complexity  of  motives  and  the  ambitions 
of  selfish  interests  did  not  make  the  future  a  bright  one. 

In  the  next  months  this  clash  of  interests  was  bitter.  There  were 
many  times  when  Lawson  himself  wavered  and  was  unsure,  but  the 
inevitable  fact  remained  that  the  men  behind  the  United  Press  controlled 
most  of  the  news  of  the  world  and  were  driving  resolutely  ahead  in  a 
determination  to  control  all. 

Under  such  circumstances  it  behooved  the  West  to  compose  its 
own  internal  differences  and  strengthen  that  portion  of  news  gathering 
which  it  still  controlled.  One  of  the  first  steps  was  to  employ  repre- 
sentatives in  many  important  centers  where  the  Western  Associated 
Press  was  not  already  represented.  This  marked  the  official  introduction 
of  the  large-scale  string  correspondent  system  into  Associated  Press 
coverage,  extending  the  plan  which  Diehl  had  instituted  in  Chicago 
several  years  before.  Another  step  was  to  increase  the  leased  wire 
facilities.  Heretofore  the  wires  had  operated  only  nineteen  hours  a  day, 
but  now  began  the  practice  of  delivering  news  to  big  newspapers  around 
the  clock. 

The  resignation  of  William  Henry  Smith  as  general  manager  had 

116 


CHAOS  AND  CRUSADE  117 

not  been  accepted,  though  there  was  little  doubt  that  he  had  lost  much 
of  his  old  initiative  and  spirit.  He  kept  protesting  that  the  United  Press 
stock  in  his  name  actually  was  the  property  of  Walter  Haldeman  and 
Richard  Smith,  and  that  he  had  been  incriminated  merely  for  accepting 
dividends.  The  administration  had  become  sluggish.  The  news  report 
suffered  and  Dana,  now  in  the  United  Press  fold,  gloated  editorially: 

Those  journals  of  The  Associated  Press  that  are  distressed  by  reason 
of  the  superior  and  more  accurate  news  that  is  regularly  supplied  by  the 
United  Press  are  hereby  informed  that  there  is  no  necessity  for  their  remain- 
ing in  such  a  state  of  unhappiness. 

The  United  Press  is  prepared  to  furnish  the  news,  foreign  and  domestic, 
to  any  newspaper  that  is  ready  and  willing  to  pay  a  reasonable  rate  for  the 
same;  and  that  without  discrimination  on  account  of  race,  complexion  or 
previous  condition  of  servitude. 

There  were  many  factors,  however,  which  made  General  Manager 
Smith's  continuance  necessary.  Not  the  least  reason  was  that  a  large 
number  of  papers  in  worried  auxiliary  associations  had  come  to  know 
him  personally  and  to  rely  upon  him  for  their  news. 

This  was  especially  true  in  the  South.  Adolph  S.  Ochs,  the  young 
publisher  of  the  Chattanooga  Timesy  was  secretary  of  the  regional 
Southern  Associated  Press.  He  was  a  stanch  supporter  of  the  principles 
for  which  Lawson  was  fighting,  and  Lawson  did  not  wish  to  take  any 
step  which  might  alienate  so  important  a  block  of  newspapers. 

Lawson's  committee  set  to  work  to  weld  the  Western  Associated 
Press  and  its  affiliates  into  a  more  compact  front.  It  held  meetings  with 
representatives  of  the  Southern,  New  England,  and  New  York  State 
Associated  Press  organizations  in  the  hope  of  convincing  them  that  they 
should  all  join  forces  and  face  the  future  together. 

The  full  significance  of  that  future  was  becoming  increasingly 
apparent  in  Lawson's  mind.  He  saw  its  inevitable  climax  must  be  a  finish 
fight  to  decide  whether  control  of  news  should  be  in  the  hands  of  those 
who  gathered  it  or  whether  it  was  to  be  held  by  a  trust  whose  primary 
concern  was  profit. 


The  first  step  was  to  perfect  plans  looking  forward  to  the  trans- 
formation of  the  Western  Associated  Press  into  a  potentially  representa- 
tive national  association.  This  represented  an  ambitious  undertaking 
and  progress  was  slow.  It  was  decided,  however,  to  incorporate  a  new 


u8  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

organization  under  the  laws  of  the  state  of  Illinois.  The  name  of  the 
projected  organization  was  to  be  The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois. 

The  second  step  was  an  exceedingly  delicate  operation.  It  involved 
maneuvering  the  United  Press  into  a  disadvantageous  position  which 
would  neutralize  its  superiority  in  strength  and  financial  resources — an 
operation  which  must  be  performed  without  arousing  suspicion.  The 
United  Press  still  wished  to  do  business  with  the  West  and  Lawson 
had  suffered  negotiations  to  continue.  Now  he  saw  that  these  negotia- 
tions gave  him  an  excellent  means  to  advance  toward  his  second 
objective.  Accordingly,  he  welcomed  the  growing  anxiety  of  United 
Press  officials  for  an  understanding.  The  Laffan- Walsh-Phillips  trium- 
virate had  become  concerned  lest  no  new  working  compact  be  agreed 
upon  before  the  end  of  the  year,  when  the  one-time  secret  Associated 
Press-United  Press  contract  formally  expired.  They  were  ready  to 
absorb  the  legally  nonexistent  New  York  Associated  Press,  and  they 
privately  felt  it  imperative  to  keep  the  West  quiescent  by  any  sort  of 
concessions  until  that  conquest  had  been  accomplished. 

Laffan  and  Phillips  therefore  went  to  Chicago  in  October,  1892, 
to  expedite  matters.  The  mission  had  greater  magnitude  than  they 
realized. 

A  provisional  "unifying"  agreement  was  drawn.  Under  it  the 
United  Press  was  to  retire  from  the  territory  of  the  old  Western 
Associated  Press  and  confine  its  operations  to  the  states  east  of  the 
Alleghenies  and  north  of  Virginia.  The  news  exchange  agreement  was 
to  be  revived  officially,  the  United  Press  supplying  foreign,  eastern 
seaboard,  and  Gulf  states  news  in  return  for  the  news  of  the  rest  of 
the  country,  to  be  furnished  by  the  projected  Associated  Press  of  Illinois. 
The  proposed  contract,  which  was  to  be  for  a  fantastic  term  of  ninety- 
three  years,  ostensibly  promised  a  perpetual,  peaceful  alliance,  and  at 
the  time  the  United  Press  was  eager  to  encourage  this  delusion.  Hence 
the  emissaries  agreed  readily  to  an  innocently  phrased  stipulation  by 
Lawson  that  the  tentative  contract  should  not  restrict  The  Associated 
Press  of  Illinois  to  any  specific  territory  in  the  collection  or  distribution 
of  news.  Colonel  Driscoll,  of  Lawson's  committee,  summed  up  the 
West's  attitude:  "Bear  in  mind  it  was  not  as  though  we  were  treating 
with  honorable  gentlemen." 

Once  the  "unifying"  .provisional  agreement  had  been  drawn, 
Lawson's  committee  accelerated  preparations  for  the  appearance  of  The 
Associated  Press  of  Illinois. 

The  organization  they  contemplated   was   a  bold   and   radical 


CHAOS  AND  CRUSADE  119 

departure  from  anything  ever  before  undertaken  in  journalism.  It  was 
to  be  a  complete  co-operative,  making  no  profits  and  declaring  no 
dividends.  Its  sole  purpose  was  to  be  the  collection  and  distribution  of 
news  for  its  newspapers,  which  were  to  be  members  rather  than  clients. 
Each  paper  was  to  have  a  voice  in  its  affairs.  Above  all,  it  was  to  serve 
the  cause  of  truth  in  news. 

On  November  10,  1892,  the  application  was  made  for  a  charter  of 
incorporation.  The  objects  were  set  forth  as  follows: 

...  to  buy,  gather  and  accumulate  information  and  news;  to  vend, 
supply,  distribute  and  publish  the  same;  to  purchase,  erect,  lease,  operate  and 
sell  telegraph  and  telephone  lines  and  other  means  of  transmitting  news;  to 
publish  periodicals;  to  make  and  deal  in  periodicals  and  other  goods,  wares 
and  merchandise. 

The  hastily  drawn  charter  scarcely  had  been  issued  before  Lawson 
learned  confidentially  that  at  last  the  United  Press  had  arranged  to 
take  over  everything  that  remained  of  the  old  New  York  Associated 
Press  at  the  beginning  of  1893.  It  was  to  obtain  most  of  the  old 
organization's  members,  its  excellent  foreign  report,  its  wires  and  news- 
gathering  facilities,  its  New  York  and  Washington  budgets,  as  well 
as  all  the  "outside"  clients. 

That  same  day  the  first  meeting  of  the  new  Associated  Press  of 
Illinois  was  held  in  Chicago.  Sixty-five  newspapers  were  listed  as 
charter  members  entitled  to  stockholding  privileges.  They  speedily 
agreed  upon  a  set  of  by-laws  embodying  the  revolutionary  principle 
of  nonprofit,  co-operative  news  gathering.  William  Penn  Nixon  was 
elected  president,  and  Lawson,  Knapp,  and  Driscoll  were  named  to  the 
Executive  Committee.  The  major  business  was  the  question  of  agreeing 
to  the  proposed  "unifying"  contract  with  the  United  Press  which 
Lawson  had  negotiated.  The  session  was  a  closed  one  and  the  delibera- 
tions secret — facts  against  which  indignant  United  Press  officials  later 
inveighed — but  before  it  ended  the  members  ratified  Lawson's  tentative 
agreement  and  authorized  the  execution  of  a  "general  contract"  to 
make  it  effective. 

Qn  December  31,  1892,  the  old  New  York  Associated  Press 
slipped  almost  unnoticed  from  the  national  scene  after  forty-four  event- 
ful years.  As  the  sabotaged  institution  passed,  it  was  significant  that  a 
majority  of  its  staff — the  rank  and  file  of  the  scattered  news  army  which 
had  made  it  great  in  its  day — aligned  themselves  under  the  standard 
of  the  new  Associated  Press  of  Illinois.  To  them  the  change  simply 


120  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

represented  a  phase  of  evolution  which  left  the  continuity  of  co-operative 
news  gathering  unimpaired  and  they  regarded  themselves  as  the  heirs 
or  colleagues  of  those  who  had  contributed  so  much  to  Associated  Press 
history  since  1848. 

The  Laffan-Walsh-Phillips  triumvirate  counted  on  the  disappear- 
ance of  the  New  York  organization  to  leave  the  outlook  serene  for 
the  United  Press.  With  the  control  of  all  foreign  and  most  eastern 
news  now  believed  secure,  they  expected  to  be  free  to  proceed  with  the 
subjugation  of  the  West.  Then  quite  accidentally  they  learned  shocking 
news  which  the  West  had  not  intended  them  to  know  at  that  stage. 

The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois,  which  they  had  marked  for 
destruction,  already  was  active  in  a  quiet  campaign  aimed  at  the  destruc- 
tion of  the  United  Press. 

The  United  Press  chieftains  made  a  further  discovery  which  was 
additional  proof  of  what  they  immediately  termed  "double-dealing." 
At  the  time  the  tentative  "unifying"  contract  was  negotiated,  they  had 
nominated  their  own  general  manager,  Walter  P.  Phillips,  as  the  man 
to  administer  the  revamped  affairs  of  the  two  associations.  With  Phillips 
in  this  position,  future  moves  against  the  West  would  be  greatly  facili- 
tated. Lawson's  committee  had  received  the  nomination  and  the  United 
Press  negotiators  had  departed  with  the  belief  that  it  had  tacit  approval. 
Now,  to  their  anger,  they  learned  The  Associated  Press  had  no  inten- 
tion of  countenancing  Phillips  in  such  a  role. 

On  the  contrary,  The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois  already  had 
another  candidate  in  mind  as  its  general  manager.  The  man  was 
Melville  E.  Stone,  Lawson's  former  partner  on  the  Chicago  Daily  News. 

Whether  or  not  Lawson  and  his  committeemen  were  aware  that 
the  United  Press  had  all  this  information,  they  appeared  at  the  Sun 
office  in  New  York  on  February  15,  1893,  t°  execute  the  previously 
drafted  unifying  agreement.  But  it  became  obvious  that  the  United 
Press  had  no  intention  of  going  through  with  it.  Laffan,  as  vice-president 
of  United  Press,  declined  to  agree  to  the  contract,  promising  to  make 
explanations  in  writing. 

The  explanations  came  two  days  later  in  an  aggrieved  letter  from 
Laffan,  not  to  the  Lawson  committee  but  to  Laffan's  fellow  triumvir, 
John  R.  Walsh  of  Chicago.  Laffan  accused  The  Associated  Press  of 
Illinois  of  bad  faith  and  charged  the  Westerners  had  regarded  the 
tentative  agreement  merely  as  a  "temporary  expedient"  whereby  the 
United  Press  should  be  "belittled,  restricted  and  ultimately  destroyed." 
The  committee's  motive,  he  declared,  "was  to  secure  our  signatures  to 


CHAOS  AND  CRUSADE  121 

the  agreement  and  then  open  their  ambuscade  upon  us  when  we  were 
no  longer  in  a  situation  to  defend  ourselves."  The  broadside  was  read 
to  the  Board  of  Directors  of  The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois  in  the 
presence  of  Lawson's  committee  and  went  uncontradicted. 

The  collapse  of  the  contract  parley  ended  all  pretense  of  nego- 
tiations. Then  in  one  last  attempt  at  intimidation  Laffan  boastfully 
informed  Lawson  that  the  United  Press  had  just  closed  an  agreement 
with  the  English  agency,  Reuters,  for  exclusive  American  rights  to  all 
European  news.  This  dismayed  Lawson  and  his  colleagues,  who  had 
understood  that  Reuters  planned  to  deal  with  them  at  least  on  an 
equal  footing  with  the  commercial  agency  which  held  the  expiring 
contract  between  the  old  New  York  Associated  Press  and  Reuters. 

For  several  days  the  outlook  for  the  West  appeared  gloomy.  Then 
came  a  turn.  Ironically,  The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois  had  William 
Henry  Smith  to  thank.  The  old  general  manager,  whose  loyalty  was 
reasserting  itself  after  his  fall  from  grace,  was  responsible.  As  soon  as 
Laffan  had  announced  his  negotiation  of  the  foreign  contract  the 
thoroughgoing  Smith  had  cabled  Walter  Neef,  former  agent  in  London, 
asking  him  to  investigate.  Neef  cabled  back  on  February  21,  1893,  ^at 
the  United  Press  contract,  although  discussed  with  Herbert  de  Reuter, 
the  European  news  power,  had  not  yet  been  executed.  The  concluding 
details  had  been  deferred  until  Laffan  could  reach  London  in  person. 
Meanwhile  Reuter  had  heard  of  the  news  battle  in  the  States,  and  it 
made  him  adverse  to  signing  any  contract  which  failed  to  include  the 
co-operative  Illinois  association.  He  told  Neef  that  he  was  willing  to 
treat  with  the  Lawson  organization. 

Laffan  was  not  due  in  London  for  six  weeks  and  Lawson's 
committee  moved  warily  so  as  not  to  betray  their  valuable  information. 
An  agreement  must  be  concluded  with  Reuter  at  once.  The  Board  of 
Directors  decided  the  opportune  moment  had  arrived  to  bring  in  Stone 
as  general  manager  and  to  send  him  to  London,  if  necessary,  to  obtain 
a  contract  at  least  as  favorable  as  any  Laffan  might  get. 

Lawson's  committee  sought  out  Stone  that  night  and  he  was  with 
them  when  they  met  the  next  day.  It  was  an  important  meeting. 
William  Henry  Smith  received  a  letter  from  Neef  amplifying  the 
information  he  had  previously  cabled.  Lawson  immediately  cabled  Neef, 
appointing  him  London  agent  for  The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois  and 
authorizing  him  to  take  steps  at  once  for  a  contract  with  Reuter. 

Within  twenty-four  hours  the  new  general  manager,  too,  was  on 
his  way  to  London. 


122  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 


Melville  E.  Stone  was  born  in  1 848,  the  same  year  which  saw  The 
Associated  Press  founded  by  the  six  wrangling  New  York  publishers. 
The  son  of  a  circuit-riding  Methodist  minister,  he  was  attracted  early  to 
newspaper  work  and  at  the  age  of  ten  he  had  learned  to  set  type.  The 
family's  peregrinations  finally  brought  him  to  Chicago  and  there  he 
supplemented  a  haphazard  education  in  the  same  public  school  attended 
by  Victor  Lawson.  A  few  years  later  he  became  a  reporter  on  the  staff 
of  the  Chicago  Republican  and  at  the  age  of  twenty  he  covered  General 
Grant's  nomination  for  the  presidency. 

By  1871  reporting  temporarily  lost  its  charm  and  Stone  tried  to 
build  up  a  business  selling  theater  seats.  The  great  Chicago  fire  wiped 
him  out.  With  the  slenderest  of  resources,  he  founded  the  Chicago 
Daily  News  in  1876.  His  great  ability  was  strictly  in  the  field  of  news 
— the  business  of  operation  never  appealed  to  him — and  he  could 
not  keep  his  publication  on  a  firm  footing.  Its  financial  fortunes  went 
from  bad  to  worse  and  it  had  reached  the  end  of  the  road  when  Lawson 
stepped  in  to  save  it. 

Unhampered  by  money  worries,  Stone  concentrated  on  the  news 
department  and  soon  the  Chicago  Daily  News  yron  a  commanding 
reputation.  It  was  an  exciting  life,  but  in  1888  ill  health  forced  him  to 
sell  his  share  of  the  paper  to  Lawson.  He  spent  two  years  abroad  and 
when  he  returned  he  became  an  officer  of  a  Chicago  bank.  It  was  from 
this  post  that  Lawson's  committee  summoned  him  on  March  3,  1893. 
He  set  forth  his  motives: 

I  had  a  secret  longing  to  return  to  the  printers'  craft.  And  much  more 
controlling  than  any  personal  interest  was  the  question  of  public  duty.  My 
friends  of  the  press  and  I  talked  it  over. 

It  was  quite  true  that  control  of  the  press  was  wrested  from  governments 
at  the  beginning  of  our  Republic.  The  first  amendment  to  our  Federal  Con- 
stitution did  this.  It  forbade  any  attempt  in  the  United  States  to  stop  free 
speech  or  a  free  press.  But,  unhappily,  this  was  not  sufficient.  Government 
might  not  enchain  the  press,  but  private  monopoly  might.  The  people,  for 
their  information — indeed,  for  the  information  upon  which  they  based  the 
very  conduct  of  their  daily  activities — were  dependent  upon  the  news  of  the 
world  as  furnished  by  the  newspapers.  And  this  business  of  news  gathering 
and  purveying  had  fallen  into  private  and  mercenary  hands.  Its  control 
by  three  men  was  quite  as  menacing  as  that  of  the  governmental  autocrats  of 
the  ages  agone.  There  could  be  no  really  free  press  in  these  circumstances. 
A  press  to  be  free  must  be  one  which  should  gather  news  for  itself. 

A  national  co-operative  news-gathering  organization,  owned  by  the 


CHAOS  AND  CRUSADE  123 

newspapers  and  by  them  alone,  selling  no  news,  making  no  profits,  paying 
no  dividends,  simply  the  agent  and  servant  of  the  newspapers,  was  the  thing. 
Those  participating  should  be  journalists  of  every  conceivable  partisan, 
religious,  economic,  and  social  affiliation,  but  all  equally  zealous  that  in  the 
business  of  news  gathering  for  their  supply  there  should  be  strict  accuracy, 
impartiality,  and  integrity.  This  was  the  dream  we  dreamed.  .  .  . 


The  new  general  manager's  trip  abroad  proved  largely  unneces- 
sary. Neef  had  carried  out  instructions  with  far  greater  success  than 
Lawson  could  have  hoped.  The  contract  he  had  concluded  was  an 
exclusive  one.  It  was  for  ten  years  with  an  automatic  renewal  clause. 
It  placed  at  Associated  Press  disposal  the  complete  reports  of  Reuter's 
Telegram  Company,  the  formidable  British  organization  j  the  Agence 
Havas  of  Paris,  its  French  counterpart,  and  the  Continental-Tele- 
graphen-Compagnie  of  Berlin,  which  collected  the  news  of  Germany 
and  of  middle  and  southern  Europe. 

When  Stone  arrived  in  London  on  St.  Patrick's  Day,  1893,  ^ 
details  had  been  agreed  upon.  There  was  nothing  left  to  do  but  sign. 

But  now  a  tremendous  new  factor  was  thrust  into  the  picture.  The 
nation  was  on  the  eve  of  panic.  All  through  the  spring  of  1893  g°ld 
had  been  fleeing  the  country  and  prices  melted  on  the  New  York  Stock 
Exchange  and  in  commodity  markets.  It  was  in  this  uneasy  atmosphere 
that  Grover  Cleveland,  back  in  the  White  House  after  four  years  of 
private  life,  pressed  a  button  on  May  i  to  open  the  Chicago  World's 
Fair. 

The  fair  was  expected  to  be  the  outstanding  event  in  national  life 
that  year,  but  Wall  Street  dispatches  carried  warnings  of  much  grimmer 
things.  There  came  the  resounding  collapse  of  the  $10,000,000  National 
Cordage  Company,  one  of  the  vast  new  systems  of  grasping  trusts. 
Wall  Street  values  toppled  under  an  avalanche  of  selling,  depositors 
stormed  banks,  factory  after  factory  suspended  operations,  frightening 
rumors  flew,  and  the  public  nerve  was  badly  shaken.  The  cataclysm 
smote  the  West  with  crushing  force  and  banks  closed  in  dizzy  succession. 
On  July  25,  1893,  ^e  Erie  Railroad  went  bankrupt  and  one  of  the 
strongest  remaining  inland  banks  failed  to  open. 

The  panic  became  a  mad  rout  and  despair  settled  over  the  country. 

This  series  of  jolting  financial  blows  spread  confusion  in  the  ranks 
of  The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois.  Most  of  its  members  were  western 
publishers  and  their  communities  were  so  hard  hit  that  their  only 


124  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

thought  was  to  save  their  newspapers.  This  was  no  time  for  a  conflict 
which  would  impose  severe  strain  on  badly  straitened  resources.  The 
United  Press  likewise  drew  back,  although  far  better  buttressed  finan- 
cially. So  preoccupied  were  the  opposing  associations  by  the  stress  of  the 
emergency  that  hostilities  were  temporarily  suspended. 

In  spite  of  the  panic,  throngs  flocked  to  Chicago.  J.  P.  Morgan 
strode  through  the  Palace  of  Fine  Arts  and  snorted  that  the  French 
exhibit  must  have  been  selected  by  a  committee  of  chambermaids. 
Crowds  filled  the  Midway  to  marvel  at  James  J.  Corbett,  the  "gentle- 
man" pugilist  who  had  conquered  mighty  John  L.  Sullivan.  Blushing 
women  turned  their  heads  when  they  passed  the  concession  where 
"Little  Egypt"  entertained  with  her  danse  du  ventre. 

The  fair  helped  ease  the  strain  in  Chicago,  but  the  slight  relief 
did  not  blind  Lawson  to  conditions  elsewhere.  News,  more  than  ever, 
had  tremendous  importance.  But  the  news  most  likely  to  affect  the 
progress  of  panic — the  news  of  Washington,  of  the  New  York  money 
markets,  of  the  industrial  East — still  was  dominated  by  the  opposition 
agency.  The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois  had  not  had  the  time  or  the 
resources  firmly  to  establish  services  out  of  those  centers.  Even  if  it 
could  have  done  so,  the  bulk  of  the  country's  papers  still  were  under 
contract  to  the  United  Press  and  received  its  service.  No  one  could 
say  how  much  damage  had  been  done  by  news  reports  which  many 
people  did  not  trust. 

At  this  disturbing  moment  the  United  Press,  in  violation  of  the 
temporary  understanding  to  cease  hostilities,  began  raiding  Associated 
Press  papers  in  the  West  and  elsewhere.  The  Associated  Press  met  the 
challenge.  Panic  or  no  panic,  the  long-deferred  battle  was  on. 

Fights  cost  money  and  The  Associated  Press  soon  found  itself 
seriously  handicapped  by  insufficient  funds.  The  United  Press,  on  the 
other  hand,  had  $2,000,000  in  resources  on  which  to  draw. 

While  the  United  Press  boldly  extended  its  lines  into  Associated 
Press  territory  and  intrigued  with  telegraph  companies  in  an  effort  to 
embarrass  the  new  co-operative,  Stone  was  improvising  a  news-gathering 
system  of  old  New  York  employes  to  cover  the  East  and  Washington. 
Temporary  New  York  headquarters  were  set  up  in  the  Mail  and 
Express  building  at  Fulton  Street  and  Broadway,  but  later  moved  to 
the  Western  Union  building  near  by.  Stone  also  called  Charles  Sanford 
Diehl  from  California  where  he  had  labored  so  capably  as  Pacific  Coast 
superintendent. 

The  first  month  favored  the  United  Press.  When  Stone  chanced 


CHAOS  AND  CRUSADE  125 

to  meet  Laffan  in  Columbus  at  the  beginning  of  October,  Laffan 
arrogantly  told  him  that  The  Associated  Press  might  as  well  disband 
and  turn  over  its  papers.  Stone  laughed  at  him. 

Diehl  was  waiting  in  Chicago  when  the  general  manager  returned. 
He  heard  the  story  of  the  encounter  with  Laffan  and  said  he  was  glad 
Stone  had  given  his  antagonist  no  encouragement. 

"You  want  to  fight?"  asked  Stone. 

"No." 

"You  will  have  to  fight,"  Stone  declared. 

Diehl  offered  no  objections. 

"Wanting  to  fight  and  fighting  are  two  different  things,"  he  said. 
"I  have  known  for  ten  years  we  would  have  to  fight." 

Stone  made  Diehl  assistant  general  manager. 

Willingness  to  fight,  however,  was  not  enough.  Lawson,  who  had 
to  provide  the  finances,  saw  other  obstacles  ahead.  He  knew  the  United 
Press  report  generally  was  inferior,  but  he  knew  also  how  cleverly  the 
enemy  had  distracted  attention  from  this  weakness  by  spreading  defeat- 
ist whispers  that  The  Associated  Press  was  on  the  verge  of  financial 
collapse. 

Those  whispers  were  all  too  true.  On  October  4,  1893,  members 
of  The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois  gathered  at  Chicago.  With  the 
burden  of  the  panic,  it  did  not  seem  that  their  new  organization 
could  survive  much  longer.  The  membership  might  not  be  able  to 
make  the  sacrifices  necessary  to  carry  on  the  campaign.  In  such  a 
critical  moment  in  their  own  affairs,  it  would  be  easy  for  them  to 
abandon  the  new  association  and  beg  for  peace  on  whatever  terms  the 
United  Press  might  grant. 

The  financial  difficulties  already  were  well  known  and  as  Lawson 
walked  through  the  corridors  on  his  way  to  the  meeting  room  he  saw 
bigwigs  of  the  United  Press  lounging  about.  They  had  come  from  New 
York  by  special  railroad  car.  Lawson  gave  them  one  last  look  and  then 
went  into  the  meeting. 


XIV.  THE  FIGHT  IS  OVER 


VICTOR  LAWSON  was  the  man  the  members  waited  to  hear  as  their 
meeting  got  under  way.  The  chairman  of  the  Executive  Committee 
was  grave  as  he  faced  them.  He  had  watched  the  specter  of  defeat 
draw  nearer  and  nearer.  Since  the  last  meeting  the  panic  had  sucked 
the  nation  deep  into  its  vortex.  Men  labored  all  day  for  the  price  of 
a  bowl  of  soup.  Business  failures  continued  and  with  them  suicides, 
distress,  and  starvation.  In  Washington  a  wrangling  Senate  kept  block- 
ing the  repeal  of  the  Sherman  Silver  Purchase  Act  which  was  proving 
so  ruinous  to  commerce  and  industry. 

Lawson  masked  his  misgivings  as  best  he  could  and  opened  his 
report.  The  audience  sat  in  sober  silence  while  he  presented  one  blunt, 
uncontradictable  fact  after  another.  The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois 
was  facing  the  end,  almost  before  it  had  begun  to  fight.  Its  news  report 
might  be  a  marked  improvement  over  anything  the  United  Press  could 
offer;  the  new  exclusive  contract  with  Reuters  provided  an  undenied 
advantage  in  foreign  dispatches,  but  this  superiority  had  been  bought 
and  maintained  at  a  great  price.  Already  there  was  a  deficit.  Ensuing 
months  were  certain  to  produce  larger  ones.  The  campaign  could  not 
continue  without  better  financing. 

Lawson  had  no  way  of  gauging  the  temper  of  the  members  as 
he  looked  from  face  to  face. 

To  carry  the  fight  to  United  Press  strongholds  in  the  East,  he  said, 
would  require  an  immediate  increase  in  the  association's  capitalization 
from  $30,000  to  $100,000.  This  was  the  first  step  toward  placing 
operations  on  a  proper  basis,  and  he  advocated  it  strongly. 

There  was  a  buzz  of  conversation  at  this  recommendation  and 
Lawson,  hearing  it,  stopped  speaking  and  sat  down,  still  without  men- 
tion of  the  major  feature  of  the  war-to-the-death  program  he  had 
prepared.  What  he  had  told  them  was  enough  for  the  time  being  and 
he  wanted  their  reaction  to  this  initial  proposal  before  outlining  the 
second  essential  point  which  would  call  for  great  personal  sacrifice  on 
the  part  of  everyone  present. 

126 


THE  FIGHT  Is  OVER  127 

"Mr.  Chairman!" 

The  speaker  was  James  E.  Scripps,  of  the  Detroit  Tribune,  stormy 
petrel  of  so  many  other  meetings.  Older  members  could  recall  how,  as 
far  back  as  1866,  he  had  vigorously  opposed  the  first  bid  of  the  Western 
Associated  Press  for  equity  with  New  York.  They  also  remembered 
that  in  the  past  decade  he  had  actually  deserted  their  ranks  to  become 
a  United  Press  client,  only  to  return  to  the  fold  when  he  found  himself 
at  odds  with  the  aims  and  administrations  of  the  commercial  agency. 
The  appearance  of  the  bearded  old  scholar  on  the  floor  was  usually  a 
danger  signal. 

"Mr.  Chairman!" 

There  was  a  scraping  of  chairs  and  more  craning  of  necks  as 
President  Nixon  recognized  Scripps  and  he  took  the  floor. 

He  opened  with  a  resume  of  the  principles  for  which  The  Asso- 
ciated Press  was  fighting  and  declared  the  opposition  was  seeking  to 
make  secure  "another  Trust  even  more  lucrative  than  the  sugar,  the 
oil,  the  cordage,  or  any  of  the  other  numerous  modern  monopolies 
which  have  grown  fat  at  the  expense  of  the  legitimate  trade  of  the 
country." 

Lawson,  intent  on  all  the  Detroit  man  was  saying,  perceived  he 
was  re-stating  the  case  so  ably  set  forth  in  a  recent  attack  on  the  United 
Press  which  he  had  mailed  to  all  Western  publishers.  This  was  a 
salutory  thing  and  Scripps  was  doing  it  most  effectively. 

The  white-haired  publisher  warmed  to  his  theme.  He  told  of  the 
evolution  of  the  profit-hungry  United  Press  to  its  present  state  of 
affluence,  of  the  free  distribution  of  stock  as  "bribes"  to  Associated 
Press  officials  in  the  past,  and  of  more  recent  attempts  to  demoralize 
the  co-operative  by  private  offers  to  Lawson  and  others. 

"Gentlemen,"  he  declared,  "the  issue  clearly  is:  Shall  the  news- 
gathering  business  be  permitted  to  fall  into  the  hands  of  a  syndicate 
of  mercenary  sharks  who  will  use  it  simply  to  plunder  the  press  of 
the  country,  or  shall  the  newspapers  continue,  as  in  the  past,  to 
co-operate  in  the  collection  of  their  own  news  and  to  enjoy  the  advan- 
tages of  controlling  the  service  and  getting  it  at  actual  cost?  .  .  . 

"It  is  a  dangerous  opponent  we  are  confronted  with,"  he  continued, 
"and  the  more  so  as  the  men  who  dominate  the  United  Press  are 
without  question  as  able  as  they  are  unscrupulous.  They  are  not  the 
inferiors  in  any  way  of  the  great  schemers  who  have  created  previous 
gigantic  trusts  and  they  are  not  to  be  met  with  children's  weapons. 

"It  is  a  life  or  death  struggle  for  the  great  principle  of  control 


128  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

of  the  news  by  the  parties  most  concerned  in  its  purity  and  cheapness, 
and  to  prevent  the  service  from  becoming  a  mere  instrument  in  the 
hands  of  unscrupulous  and  hungry  sharks  for  the  thraldom  of  the 
press  of  the  nation!" 

There  was  a  storm  of  applause  when  Scripps  finished.  Large  and 
small  publishers  alike  were  noisily  demonstrating  one  determination — 
to  close  ranks  and  carry  on  the  battle. 

General  Manager  Stone  was  next  and  they  cheered  him  as  he 
reported  on  the  extended  reconnaissance  he  had  made,  seeking  out 
the  weak  points  in  the  enemy  lines.  He  told  of  the  progress  of  the 
hastily  improvised  news-gathering  system  in  the  East. 

There  was  an  ovation,  too,  for  Diehl,  whom  the  United  Press 
twice  had  sought  to  lure  away  with  tempting  offers  to  double  the  salary 
he  received.  The  Pacific  Coast  papers,  he  assured  them,  could  be  counted 
upon.  Other  regional  groups,  he  said,  would  give  their  support  if  they 
could  be  brought  together  and  given  the  entire  story.  As  for  the  enemy's 
news  service,  he  pointed  his  finger  at  its  great  shortcoming. 

"Their  conception,"  he  said,  "is  that  news  can  be  taken  out  of 
newspaper  composing  rooms  after  somebody  else  has  obtained  it  and 
written  it.  The  Associated  Press  is  already  procuring  and  distributing 
its  most  important  news  through  its  own  staff  correspondents,  and  shall 
continue  to  do  so." 

By  the  time  Diehl  finished  speaking,  there  was  no  question  regard- 
ing Lawson's  recommendation  for  an  increase  in  the  association's 
capitalization.  The  meeting  which  had  assembled  in  an  atmosphere  of 
apprehension  had  become  an  enthusiastic  rally. 

Lawson  took  the  floor  to  make  a  "suggestion." 

The  fight  against  the  United  Press,  he  reminded  the  members, 
was  certain  to  be  a  series  of  emergencies.  The  United  Press  had  circu- 
lated reports  that  The  Associated  Press  was  on  the  verge  of  bankruptcy. 
To  lay  these  rumors  once  and  for  all  and  to  provide  the  necessary 
funds,  he  proposed  that  voluntary  contributions  be  made  here  and  now. 

"Mr.  President,"  he  declared,  addressing  Nixon,  "I  am  ready  to 
start  such  a  fund  with  a  subscription  of  $20,000  for  the  Chicago  Daily 
News" 

It  was  a  call  to  arms.  In  an  instant  men  in  all  parts  of  the  room 
were  clamoring  for  recognition.  Parliamentary  decorum  vanished. 
Subscriptions  poured  in:  $10,000  here,  $5,000  there,  $20,000  more,  and 
on  down  the  line.  Even  the  smaller  papers  fought  for  a  place  on  the 
list  although  their  pledges  of  $1,000  represented  a  tremendous  sacrifice 


THE  FIGHT  Is  OVER  129 

in  the  deepening  depression.  Before  the  meeting  ended  $320,000  had 
been  raised  and  subsequent  subscriptions  swelled  the  total  to  $550,000. 

It  was  a  great  profession  of  faith,  for  all  knew  they  stood  to  lose 
every  cent  of  their  subscriptions  if  the  United  Press  emerged  victorious. 
Nor  was  that  all  5  the  enemy  already  had  threatened  that,  in  the  event 
of  victory,  it  would  exact  heavy  indemnities  from  the  losers  to  pay  the 
costs.  It  also  promised  to  punish  the  conquered  further  by  hiking  the 
rates  for  the  service  that  all  would  be  compelled  to  take. 

Lawson  wasted  little  time  in  getting  the  renewed  drive  under  way. 
Two  days  later  he  was  writing  to  Adolph  Ochs  of  the  Chattanooga 
Times: 

By  this  time  you  are,  of  course,  fully  advised  of  the  magnificent  meeting 
held  day  before  yesterday  by  the  members  of  The  Associated  Press  and  the 
raising  of  the  volunteer  guarantee  fund  of  over  three  hundred  thousand  dol- 
lars toward  any  possible  contingencies  growing  out  of  the  present  contest 
with  the  United  Press.  If  any  of  our  friends  on  the  outside  have  at  any  time 
held  any  doubt  or  question  as  to  the  purpose  and  ability  of  The  Associated 
Press  to  maintain  its  rights  as  against  the  United  Press,  I  think  every  one 
must  agree  that  the  meeting  this  week  has  definitely  and  positively  settled 
all  such  questions.  The  fight  we  are  making  for  the  preservation  of  the 
independence  of  the  American  Press  is  in  my  judgment  substantially  won 
today. 

Ochs,  prime  mover  in  the  Southern  Associated  Press  and  long 
sympathetic  to  the  West,  joined  The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois  at 
once.  He  stipulated  only  that  the  other  southern  papers  should  be 
eligible  for  admission  on  the  same  terms  as  those  given  his  Chattanooga 
Times. 


A  week  later  Victor  Lawson  closed  his  desk  in  Chicago  and  packed 
his  bags.  His  destination  was  the  East  and  his  purpose  was  to  bring 
a  hundred  newspapers  then  receiving  United  Press  service  into  The 
Associated  Press.  Stone  and  Diehl  had  preceded  him  to  open  the  grand- 
scale  undertaking. 

These  aggressive  tactics  put  the  United  Press  on  the  defensive 
and  the  enemy  captains  issued  a  statement  setting  forth  the  financial 
stability  of  their  organization.  It  carried  an  impressive  list  of  signatures, 
including  the  names  of  Dana  and  many  other  leading  eastern  editors. 
Long  held  in  awe  by  the  struggling  smaller  papers,  these  men  repre- 
sented the  backbone  of  United  Press  strength  and  many  of  them 
publicly  acknowledged  that  private  motives  prompted  their  actions. 


130  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Throughout  the  years  these  leading  newspapers  had  created  their 
own  elaborate  systems  of  "special"  correspondents,  with  which  no  small 
paper  could  hope  to  compete,  and  it  was  in  their  interest  to  foster  no 
press  association  improvement  which  would  jeopardize  that  superiority. 
The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois  threatened  to  do  so  by  making  available 
to  all  its  members,  large  and  small,  the  extensive  news  resources  pre- 
viously enjoyed  only  by  the  big  publications. 

Lawson's  invasion  of  the  East  was  audacious.  He  struck  first  at 
the  opponent's  greatest  stronghold — New  York  City.  The  key  men  on 
three  of  the  papers  there  once  had  been  connected  with  the  Western 
Associated  Press.  John  A.  Cockerill,  formerly  of  St.  Louis,  managed 
the  New  York  Advertiser.  Horace  White,  who  had  been  one  of  the 
West's  emissaries  in  the  1866  break  with  the  New  York  Associated 
Press,  was  a  director  of  the  New  York  Post.  The  one-time  Hungarian 
immigrant  boy,  Joseph  Pulitzer,  had  expanded  his  journalistic  efforts 
from  the  St.  Louis  Post-Dispatch  to  include  the  New  York  World. 
All  three  of  these  men  seemed  ready  to  pick  sides  and  it  was  on  them 
that  Lawson  and  Stone  concentrated  immediate  efforts. 

Cockerill  was  the  first  convert  and  he  brought  in  both  the  morning 
and  evening  editions  of  the  Advertiser.  Aided  by  Stone,  Lawson  next 
laid  siege  to  the  World }  and  Pulitzer  joined.  Then  the  two  Associated 
Press  men  walked  into  the  office  of  the  Posty  where  they  found  Horace 
White  busy  on  an  editorial.  Scarcely  glancing  up  from  his  work,  the 
editor  greeted  them. 

"I  am  with  you,"  he  said.  "I  do  not  believe  in  an  association  which 
is  controlled  by  three  or  four  men.  The  Evening  Post  will  join  your 
company.  But  I  am  under  pledge  to  make  no  move  in  the  matter  with- 
out consulting  my  friends  of  the  New  York  Staats-Zeitung  and  the 
Brooklyn  Eagle." 

Within  a  few  days  the  Posty  Sta&ts-Zeittwg,  and  the  Eagle  came 
into  The  Associated  Press.  St.  Clair  McKelway,  editor  of  the  Eagley 
took  occasion  to  issue  an  invitation  to  others. 

"The  latchstring  is  out,"  he  said.  "Come  and  toast  your  tired  toes 
at  the  family  hearthstone." 

Two  more  New  York  City  papers,  the  Commercial  Advertiser  and 
the  Pressy  transferred  their  allegiance.  Then  a  number  of  upstate  papers 
joined  and  not  the  least  of  them  was  the  Syracuse  Her  aid  y  in  1881  the 
prime  mover  in  the  foundation  of  the  now  embattled  United  Press. 
Lawson  shifted  operations  to  Philadelphia  and  most  of  the  papers  in 
that  city  became  converts. 


THE  FIGHT  Is  OVER  131 

Diehl  was  busy  in  New  England.  The  Worcester  Spy  and  the  New 
Haven  Union  joined.  It  was  difficult  territory  but  the  important  Boston 
Herald  set  an  example  others  soon  followed. 

From  New  England  Diehl  moved  on  to  Washington.  He  obtained 
an  interview  with  Frank  B.  Noyes,  a  young  man  of  thirty  who  shared 
in  the  management  of  the  Washington  Star,  of  which  his  father  was 
editor. 

The  Star  was  served  by  the  United  Press.  Located  outside  the 
territory  in  which  The  Associated  Press  had  been  making  its  biggest 
drive,  it  had  listened  to  the  blandishments  of  the  opposition  agency, 
which  had  sought  to  convince  Noyes  and  his  associates  that  the  Illinois 
organization  was  doomed  to  failure. 

Diehl  found  Noyes  a  quiet  listener.  He  began  the  interview  by 
discoursing  on  the  principles  for  which  the  news  struggle  was  being 
waged,  but  after  some  time  he  realized  he  had  done  all  the  talking — 
that  Noyes  had  not  asked  a  single  question.  The  young  man,  neverthe- 
less, seemed  to  be  listening,  so  Diehl  plunged  on.  He  was  still  plunging 
on  when  Noyes  interrupted. 

"I  am  convinced  of  the  justice  of  your  cause,"  he  said.  "The  prac- 
tical question  now  has  to  do  with  your  hope  for  success." 

Diehl  spoke  of  the  financial  stability  of  The  Associated  Press  and 
of  the  spirit  of  the  men  who  had  made  voluntary  contributions.  He 
told  Noyes  that  the  United  Press,  rather  than  his  own  organization, 
would  collapse.  Pulling  a  pencil  from  his  pocket  he  listed  the  papers 
lost  by  the  commercial  agency  in  recent  months,  computed  the  conse- 
quent decrease  in  revenue,  and  worked  out  what  he  believed  to  be  the 
probable  financial  condition  of  the  other  agency. 

Noyes  was  on  the  way  to  New  York  the  next  day  to  call  at  the 
elegantly  furnished  office  of  the  United  Press  in  the  Western  Union 
building.  Finding  Dana  and  Laffan  in  conference,  he  asked  a  question. 

"I  would  like  to  know  something  about  the  financial  condition  of 
the  United  Press,"  he  said. 

Dana  attempted  to  laugh  the  matter  off,  declaring  such  questions 
should  not  concern  the  young  man  from  Washington  or  any  other 
client  of  the  United  Press.  But  Noyes  was  insistent  and  finally  Dana 
instructed  that  the  books  be  produced. 

Diehl  was  waiting  at  a  New  York  hotel  for  the  Washington  Star 
man  to  return  from  his  visit  to  the  opposition  headquarters.  He  was 
certain  the  figures  he  had  computed  on  the  deficit  in  the  United  Press 
were  reasonably  accurate,  but  he  was  not  so  sure  the  commercial  agency 


132  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

would  permit  inspection  of  its  books,  or  that  it  might  not  loose  another 
blast  against  The  Associated  Press  in  an  effort  to  cool  the  Noyes  interest. 
He  waited  impatiently.  Then  Noyes  appeared. 

"You  have  told  me  the  truth,"  the  Washington  man  said,  and 
extended  his  hand. 

Immediately  thereafter  Noyes  convinced  his  associates  that  the 
Star  should  cast  its  lot  with  The  Associated  Press. 

Once  convinced  of  the  justice  of  a  cause,  Noyes  was  not  a  man 
for  a  passive  role.  He  joined  in  the  campaign  and,  with  Diehl,  made  a 
trip  to  Baltimore.  Owing  largely  to  his  efforts,  the  Sun  and  the 
American  in  that  city  were  quickly  inducted  into  membership,  followed 
later  by  the  Philadelphia  Ledger. 

The  success  of  the  whirlwind  invasion  aroused  the  United  Press. 
Dana  used  his  editorial  page  for  vicious  attacks  on  Lawson,  Stone, 
and  finally  Noyes.  Damage  suits  were  instituted  against  deserting 
clients.  A  heavy  news-war  tax  was  levied  on  the  big  New  York  papers 
which  remained  in  the  United  Press  and  an  intensive  new  drive  for 
customers  was  launched  in  the  West.  But  the  co-operative  lines  held 
firm.  Early  in  1894,  the  four  Chicago  papers  which  had  formed  such 
a  strong  United  Press  bloc  in  the  midwestern  metropolis  shook  off  the 
commercial  yoke. 

In  an  atmosphere  of  rejoicing  the  association  gathered  for  its  annual 
meeting  in  Chicago  on  February  14,  1894,  and  elected  Lawson  presi- 
dent to  succeed  William  Penn  Nixon.  The  list  of  eastern  papers  which 
had  become  members  since  the  previous  October  filled  three  closely 
printed  pages  and  Lawson  reported  that  these  gains  meant  a  loss  to 
United  Press  of  over  $300,000  a  year.  No  one  believed  the  opposition 
could  survive  and  the  Board  of  Directors  congratulated  the  member- 
ship "upon  the  happy  issue  of  this  contest." 

But  the  self-congratulations  were  premature.  The  opposition  was 
underrated.  For  all  its  reverses,  the  commercial  agency  was  still  backed 
by  many  big  papers.  The  conflict  continued,  sometimes  flaring  furiously, 
sometimes  lagging.  At  various  times  proposals  for  peace  were  advanced 
by  some  quarters  and  individual  United  Press  clients  made  overtures  for 
compromise,  but  all  contemplated  a  division  of  territory. 

There  was  no  letup  in  the  heavy  financial  drain  on  both  sides. 
While  Coxey's  Army  was  marching  on  Washington,  hostilities  raged 
through  1894 — then  on  into  1895  as  the  nation  headed  into  better  times. 
The  United  Press  made  frantic  efforts  to  have  the  strife  halted  before 
everything  was  lost.  Pressure  was  exerted  on  neutral  parties  to  arrange 


THE  FIGHT  Is  OVER  133 

negotiations  with  The  Associated  Press,  but  Lawson  said  it  would  be 
a  mistake  to  make  concessions  merely  for  the  sake  of  hastening  the 
inevitable  end. 

In  the  fall  of  1895  the  United  Press  had  difficulty  maintaining  its 
service.  General  Manager  Stone  discovered  that  it  was  stealing  Asso- 
ciated Press  dispatches.  The  membership  was  notified. 

The  thievery  continued  and  the  general  manager  saw  his  chance 
for  a  dramatic  expose.  One  day  a  dispatch  arrived  from  India  telling  of 
a  native  revolt.  Before  relay  of  the  story  to  member  papers,  Stone 
inserted  a  sentence  naming  the  leader  of  the  revolt  as  one  Siht  El 
Otspueht.  The  dispatch  promptly  appeared  in  United  Press  papers  and 
Stone  lost  no  time  in  publicizing  the  fact  that  the  name  of  the  mythical 
chieftain — spelled  backward — proclaimed  the  galling  indictment:  "The 
UP  stole  this." 

Early  in  1896  an  event  occurred  in  New  York  which  exerted 
great  influence.  Adolph  S.  Ochs  of  Chattanooga  bought  the  New  York 
Times,  which  had  been  staggering  under  a  heavy  burden,  not  the  least 
of  which  was  the  heavy  tax  exacted  by  the  United  Press.  Ochs  made  no 
secret  of  the  fact  that  he  intended  to  bring  the  Times  back  into  The 
Associated  Press  as  soon  as  contracts  with  the  United  Press  could  be 
terminated.  To  distract  attention  from  this  threatened  defection,  General 
Manager  Phillips  of  United  Press  blanketed  the  country  with  stories 
that  The  Associated  Press  was  prejudiced  in  favor  of  the  gold-standard 
Republican  party  and  would  distort  the  news  in  the  feverish  presidential 
campaign  about  to  begin.  Only  the  United  Press,  he  announced,  could 
be  counted  upon  to  give  equal  justice  to  free-silver  Democrats  as  well 
as  to  gold-standard  Republicans.  It  was  about  this  time,  too,  that  United 
Press  enlarged  its  own  name  to  United  Associated  Presses.  But  the 
change  made  small  impression  and  the  agency  remained  best  known  as 
United  Press. 

The  presidential  campaign  of  1896,  waged  on  the  controversial 
monetary  issue,  momentarily  eclipsed  the  prolonged  news  revolution. 
On  July  6  a  35-year-old  congressman  stampeded  the  Democratic  con- 
vention with  his  impassioned  cross-of-gold  speech.  William  Jennings 
Bryan  shouted:  "You  shall  not  press  down  upon  the  brow  of  labor 
this  crown  of  thorns  j  you  shall  not  crucify  mankind  on  a  cross  of  gold." 
It  was  Bryan  for  the  Democrats  and  free  silver  j  William  McKinley  for 
the  Republicans  and  gold.  The  victory  went  to  the  Republicans,  and 
after  the  election  was  over  both  Bryan  and  McKinley  sent  The  Asso- 


134  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

elated  Press  unsolicited  letters  of  commendation  for  the  fairness  with 
which  the  strenuous  campaign  had  been  reported. 

Even  before  McKinley  was  inaugurated  in  1897  The  Associated 
Press  announced  its  readiness  to  take  all  eligible  United  Press  clients 
into  its  membership  provided  the  battered  profit  agency  would  retire 
from  the  field.  Laffan  countered  with  a  proposal  to  withdraw  the 
United  Press  in  the  West  if  The  Associated  Press  would  withdraw 
from  the  East.  He  put  on  a  bold  front  but  the  situation  was  beyond  the 
bluffing  stage. 

On  March  27,  1897,  the  New  York  Herald,  the  Tribune,  the 
Times,  and  the  Telegram  went  over  to  The  Associated  Press.  In  the 
once  formidable  stronghold  of  New  York  City  the  United  Press  had 
only  two  papers  left — Dana's  Sun,  which  had  rejected  a  cordial  invitation 
to  become  a  member,  and  the  New  York  Journal,  which  had  been 
purchased  two  years  earlier  by  William  Randolph  Hearst. 

Lawson,  his  health  impaired  by  the  demands  of  the  struggle,  had 
come  to  New  York  to  take  personal  command  of  The  Associated  Press 
forces.  But,  even  the  wholesale  departure  of  the  Herald,  Tribune, 
Times,  and  Telegram  failed  to  wring  from  the  United  Press  any  ad- 
mission of  defeat,  and  Lawson  could  not  help  admiring  the  stubborn 
determination  of  his  three  major  foemen — Laffan,  Dana,  and  Phillips. 
They  might  be  wrong  in  their  cause,  but  they  were  as  pugnacious  as 
ever  and  Lawson  wondered  how  much  longer  they  could  continue. 

There  was  endless  rumors  and  speculation,  and  finally — on  March 
29,  1897 — President  Dana  filed  a  petition  of  bankruptcy  for  the  United 
Press,  listing  assets  of  $38,040  and  liabilities  of  $129,415.  A  receiver 
was  appointed. 

Lawson  was  at  his  desk  all  the  next  day  in  the  cramped  cubbyhole 
of  an  office  on  the  gloomy  fifth  floor  of  the  Western  Union  building 
where  headquarters  of  The  Associated  Press  were  now  housed.  The 
office  was  in  shabby  contrast  to  the  sumptuous  United  Press  establish- 
ment two  floors  below,  with  its  expensive  furniture,  rugs,  wrought-iron 
accessories,  and  stained-glass  windows. 

But  Lawson  was  interested  in  what  might  be  happening  in  those 
fine  offices,  not  in  the  fine  furniture  they  contained.  What  did  United 
Press  plan  to  do  next? 

His  office  door  was  flung  open  and  an  editor  handed  him  a  piece 
of  paper.  He  adjusted  his  pince-nez  and  read  the  notice.  It  was  from 
the  elegant  offices  below,  it  was  dated  March  31,  1897,  ^d  it  was 
addressed  "To  Whom  It  May  Concern."  It  said: 


THE  FIGHT  Is  OVER  135 

The  News  service  of  the  United  Press  will  be  discontinued  after  the 
night  of  April  yth,  at  about  two  o'clock  A.M.  on  April  8th.  No  news  dis- 
patches will  be  received  from  correspondents  or  news  agencies  or  paid  for, 
and  the  services  of  all  employees  will  be  dispensed  with  after  that  time. 


XV.  REMEMBER  THE  MAINE! 


BY  THE  time  the  United  Press  disappeared  unmourned  from  the  world 
of  news  gathering  on  April  8,  1897,  Lawson's  organization  was  badly 
battered  after  four  years  of  conflict.  The  menace  of  a  gigantic,  mer- 
cenary news  trust  had  been  destroyed  j  the  co-operative,  non-profit 
principle  had  been  vindicated,  but  the  difficulties  of  reconstruction  were 
many.  The  fight  had  cost  The  Associated  Press  nearly  $1,000,000 
over  and  above  the  ordinary  expenditures  necessary  to  maintain  normal 
news  service.  That  was  a  staggering  sum  in  days  when  $50  would  buy 
a  first-class  passage  to  Europe. 

Lawson  and  his  colleagues,  however,  considered  the  success  of 
their  crusade  worth  all  the  effort  and  money  it  had  taken. 

The  organization  set  about  binding  up  the  wounds  of  war  and 
consolidating  its  imperfect  condition.  Although  a  great  majority  of  the 
clients  who  had  been  with  the  United  Press  were  taken  into  member- 
ship, the  brilliant  but  aging  Dana  stubbornly  rebuffed  all  invitations. 
He  announced  that  the  Sun  would  go  it  alone,  relying  on  the  service 
of  a  news  bureau  of  its  own  under  the  direction  of  the  indomitable 
Laffan.  Dana  died  a  few  months  later,  leaving  Laffan  in  control  of  the 
Sun's  destinies. 

There  were  other  papers  which  could  not  be  admitted  on  the 
terms  they  sought,  and  they  began  arrangements  to  meet  their  own 
particular  needs.  An  additional  group  of  disgruntled  losers  who  pur- 
posely stayed  out  of  the  co-operative  threatened  to  be  a  future  source 
of  trouble. 

However  pressing  the  problems  of  reconstruction,  the  forces  of 
The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois  found  time  to  celebrate  their  triumph. 
It  was,  of  course,  described  as  a  gay  and  festive  occasion  when  the 
hundred  and  eight  leaders  in  the  long  fight  gathered  in  Chicago  on 
May  19,  1897,  for  the  banquet.  There  was  a  huge  silver  loving  cup, 
brimming  with  champagne,  and  each  guest  drank  to  a  round  of 
applause.  North,  South,  East,  and  West  were  represented,  and  there 
were  toasts,  speeches,  laughter,  and  badinage.  In  honor  of  the  occasion, 

136 


REMEMBER  THE  MAINE!  137 

a  medallion  was  struck  off.  Its  inscription  read:  "To  commemorate  the 
triumph  of  the  co-operative  principle  in  news  gathering." 

The  year  1897  seemed  ideal  for  "back-to-normalcy"  efforts  in  the 
news  report.  The  times  had  a  strangely  placid  air  about  them,  a  certain 
deceptive  promise  that  the  world's  tomorrows  would  be  serene.  In 
London  Captain  Ames,  the  tallest  man  in  the  whole  British  Army,  led 
the  Diamond  Jubilee  procession  as  the  empire  paid  its  extravagant 
tribute  to  "the  Widow  of  Windsor." 

It  was  the  heyday  of  the  bicycle  built  for  two;  "Mr.  Dooley" 
philosophized  while  his  devotees  chuckled  j  Weber  and  Fields  were 
climbing  to  popularity,  and  audiences  jammed  theaters  to  hear  De  Wolf 
Hopper  recite  "Casey  at  the  Bat";  music  lovers  talked  of  Victor  Her- 
bert, and  John  Philip  Sousa  led  the  United  States  Marine  Band;  the 
biggest  beer  in  town  was  a  nickel,  and  small  boys  jeered  "Get  a  horse!" 
at  the  first  noisy  automobiles. 

To  newspaper  readers  generally  life  at  home  seemed  uncommonly 
good. 


At  Key  West  on  February  15,  1898,  it  was  a  quiet  night.  The 
cable  operator  sat  at  his  idle  instrument  yawning  as  the  minutes 
dragged  by. 

Then  the  sounder  on  the  desk  jumped  from  silence  into  sudden 
life  like  some  mechanical  cricket.  Havana  calling  Key  West — Havana 
calling  Key  West.  The  operator  opened  his  key. 

Havana  was  urgent.  The  Key  West  operator  decoded  the  message 
as  it  came  off  the  noisy  instrument: 

THERE  HAS  BEEN  A  BIG  EXPLOSION  SOMEWHERE 
IN  THE  HARBOR. 

Then  the  instrument  lapsed  abruptly  into  silence  and  it  was  minutes 
before  Havana  came  pounding  through  again: 

THE  MAINE  HAS  BEEN  BLOWN  UP,  AND  HUNDREDS 
OP  SAILORS  HAVE  BEEN  KILLED. 

While  the  sounder  danced  at  Key  West,  F.  J.  Hilgert,  Associated 
Press  correspondent  at  Havana,  already  was  out  in  the  wreckage-strewn 
harbor,  hurriedly  assembling  the  facts  of  the  disaster  which  had  over- 
taken the  American  battleship  as  she  rode  at  anchor.  One  after  another 
he  questioned  dazed  survivors.  He  saw  the  warship's  wrecked  super- 
structure and  watched  the  little  fleet  of  rescue  craft  scurry  about. 


138  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Then  the  Key  West  sounder  started  again,  spelling  out  Hilgert's 
story,  and  the  cable  operator  bent  excitedly  over  his  typewriter,  copying 
the  hastily  written  narrative  of  the  explosion  which  had  taken  the  lives 
of  266  men. 

Hilgert's  story  was  published  throughout  the  world  and  the  head- 
lines shocked  the  nation.  Although  the  Maine's  captain  cautioned  that 
"Public  opinion  should  be  suspended  until  further  report,"  a  Spanish 
mine  was  immediately  blamed.  War  fever  swept  the  streets  and  in  a 
Broadway  bar  a  man  raised  his  glass  and  gave  the  country  its  battle 
cry.  "Gentlemen,"  he  said,  "remember  the  Maine!" 

For  some  years  past  the  United  States  had  been  watching  conditions 
in  insurrection-torn  Cuba,  where  the  natives  were  waging  a  seemingly 
hopeless  fight  for  independence  from  Spain.  Popular  opinion  was  horri- 
fied at  the  rule  of  General  Valeriano  Weyler,  the  military  governor 
who,  according  to  rumor,  ruthlessly  put  down  insurrectors  and  mal- 
treated noncombatants.  Americans  and  their  property  frequently  suffered 
and  for  some  time  William  Randolph  Hearst  and  his  New  York 
Journal  had  been  demanding  intervention. 

As  early  as  1896  The  Associated  Press  decided  that  a  staff  man 
was  needed  in  Cuba.  Hilgert  was  assigned  to  Havana,  a  post  normally 
filled  by  a  string  correspondent.  The  association  took  elaborate  pre- 
cautions to  protect  his  identity,  and  not  even  to  inquiring  members 
would  the  general  manager  divulge  the  name  of  the  man  ordered 
under  cover  to  this  dangerous  field  of  news.  From  the  outset  Hilgert 
worked  against  endless  difficulties  and  at  great  personal  risk.  General 
Weyler  forbade  all  newspaper  work  under  threat  of  the  firing  squad, 
but  for  two  years,  by  employing  all  sorts  of  ingenuity,  Hilgert  had 
managed  to  smuggle  out  his  thrilling,  factual  accounts  of  Cuba's 
struggle.  The  night  of  the  Maine's  destruction  he  threw  caution  to  the 
winds  and  used  the  cable. 

As  soon  as  the  news  was  received,  Assistant  General  Manager  Diehl 
saw  that  quick  preparations  were  necessary.  He  anticipated  a  rigid 
censorship  on  the  Cuban  cables.  If  The  Associated  Press  was  to  cover 
a  war  in  the  Caribbean,  it  would  be  necessary  to  assemble  a  flotilla  of 
dispatch  boats  to  carry  all  news  to  the  nearest  neutral  cable  heads  at 
Jamaica  or  Haiti.  He  outlined  his  plans  to  General  Manager  Stone, 
who  was  reluctant  to  approve  lest  any  undue  activity  by  the  association 
inflame  an  already  aroused  public.  Stone  had  watched  the  vociferous 
efforts  of  some  newspapers  to  whip  the  nation  into  a  military  frenzy 


REMEMBER  THE  MAINE!  139 

and  precipitate  war,  and  he  was  unwilling  that  The  Associated  Press 
do  anything  which  might  set  the  drums  beating  louder. 

Nevertheless,  if  news  occurs  it  must  be  covered.  Diehl  pointed  out 
that,  if  war  came  and  found  The  Associated  Press  unprepared,  press 
and  public  alike  would  charge  the  management  with  neglect  and  incom- 
petence. The  preparations  he  suggested  were  precautionary  and  could 
be  carried  out  without  attracting  attention. 

Stone  saw  the  logic  of  this  reasoning  and  the  assistant  general 
manager  was  off  to  Washington  to  lay  siege  to  official  quarters  with 
an  audacious  request.  He  wanted  permission  to  place  staff  men  on  the 
flagships  of  the  two  American  fleets  most  likely  to  see  active  service. 
Secretary  of  the  Navy  John  D.  Long  would  not  hear  of  the  idea. 
Diehl  presented  his  case  directly  to  the  President.  McKinley  knew 
of  no  precedent  for  such  an  extraordinary  application  and  thought  to 
dispose  of  it  tactfully  by  getting  Diehl  to  acknowledge  that  such  a 
thing  never  had  been  done  before.  He  asked  a  question: 

"Has  a  war  correspondent  ever  actually  been  permitted  on  board 
a  flagship  in  wartime  and  in  action?" 

For  the  moment  Diehl  was  stopped.  Then  in  some  vague  corner 
of  his  mind  a  forgotten  scrap  of  information  bobbed  up. 

"Yes,"  he  told  the  President,  "a  London  Times  correspondent  was 
on  the  Chilean  flagship  Esmeralda  during  the  war  between  Chile 
and  Peru." 

McKinley  consented  without  further  hesitation. 

The  war  hysteria  mounted  in  the  weeks  after  the  Maine's  destruc- 
tion, while  a  Naval  Board  of  Inquiry  investigated  the  explosion.  Business 
and  the  President  were  averse  to  war,  but  the  pressure  of  public  opinion 
had  become  almost  overwhelming.  Theodore  Roosevelt,  assistant 
secretary  of  the  navy,  lost  patience  with  the  hesitation  and  snorted: 
"McKinley  has  no  more  backbone  than  a  chocolate  eclair."  He  pre- 
dicted: "We  will  have  this  war  for  the  freedom  of  Cuba  in  spite  of  the 
timidity  of  the  commercial  interests." 

And  already  military  bands  were  blaring  the  marching  song  of 
>9g— "There'll  Be  a  Hot  Time  in  the  Old  Town  Tonight." 

Although  Hilgert's  position  in  Havana  had  become  more  perilous 
than  ever,  he  stuck  to  his  duties.  In  spite  of  official  secrecy  surrounding 
inquiries  on  the  Maine's  destruction,  he  learned  that  evidence  gathered 
by  the  experts  who  had  examined  the  wrecked  hulk  established  that  the 
battleship  had  been  blown  up  "from  the  outside." 

The  dispatch  doubtless  would  have  been  a  death  warrant  if  found 


140  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

in  Hilgert's  possession.  Use  of  the  cable  was  out  of  the  question  and 
so  he  succeeded  in  smuggling  out  his  story  by  mail.  Its  authenticity 
was  confirmed  March  21  when  the  Navy  Board's  report  blamed  the 
disaster  on  the  detonation  of  a  submarine  mine  by  unknown  persons. 
That  report  sealed  the  issue,  though  its  accuracy  was  later  questioned. 

Diehl  was  assembling  a  flotilla  of  dispatch  boats  and  a  competent 
war  staff.  After  scouring  shipyards  along  the  coast,  he  chartered  five 
vessels:  the  Wanda,  a  yacht,  and  the  Dauntless,  the  Dandy,  the  Cynthia, 
and  the  Kate  Spencer,  all  tugs. 

The  staff  included  Elmer  E.  Roberts,  J.  B.  Nelson,  Arthur  W. 
Copp,  Byron  R.  Newton,  A.  W.  Lyman,  J.  W.  Mitchell,  Howard  N. 
Thompson,  H.  L.  Beach,  Harold  Martin,  A.  C.  Goudie,  G.  E.  Graham, 
W.  A.  M.  Goode,  N.  C.  Wright,  Albert  C.  Hunt,  J.  C.  Marriott,  E. 
R.  Johnstone,  Oscar  Watson,  R.  B.  Craemer,  and  John  P.  Dunning, 
the  journalistic  hero  of  the  Samoan  disaster  of  1889  and  the  only 
American  correspondent  to  cover  the  Chilean  Civil  War  in  1891. 

The  preparations  were  completed  none  too  soon.  On  April  20 — 
the  day  before  formal  declaration  of  war — Associated  Press  dispatch 
boats  hurried  into  Key  West,  the  concentration  point  for  the  main 
American  fleet.  When  Goode  climbed  aboard  Admiral  Sampson's  flag- 
ship, the  New  York,  to  which  he  had  been  assigned,  the  greeting  was 
not  reassuring. 

"So  you  want  to  come  aboard  and  get  your  head  blown  off,  do 
you?"  asked  Sampson  gruffly.  "It's  foolish." 

At  daybreak  two  days  later  the  fleet  steamed  out,  headed  for  Cuba, 
and  seaman  Patrick  Walton  on  the  cruiser  Nashville  fired  the  first  shot 
of  the  war  to  capture  a  Spanish  merchantman. 

It  was  the  beginning  of  a  conflict  such  as  never  had  been  seen 
before,  nor  has  been  seen  since.  From  the  standpoint  of  news  gathering, 
it  was  a  correspondent's  war.  The  newsboats  of  The  Associated  Press 
cruised  at  will  through  the  battle  lines  at  sea,  maneuvered  for  the  best 
vantage  points  regardless  of  the  fire  of  opposing  sides,  and  scurried 
back  and  forth  delivering  their  stories  to  the  nearest  usable  cable  heads. 
The  boats  of  individual  newspapers  performed  similarly.  All  sorts  of 
journalistic  personalities  were  attracted  and  at  times  the  whole  fray 
took  on  a  comic  opera  complexion.  More  frequently  than  not  the  cor- 
respondents risked  their  lives  out  of  all  keeping  with  the  over-all 
importance  of  the  facts  they  sought,  but  there  was  high  interest  back 
home  and  the  news  gatherers  meant  to  satisfy  it  by  one  means  or 
another. 


REMEMBER  THE  MAINE!  141 


The  first  big  news  came  not  from  Cuba  or  the  southern  seas,  but 
from  the  far-off  Philippines.  Admiral  George  Dewey  with  the  Asiatic 
squadron  swooped  down  on  Manila  harbor  on  May  i.  "You  may  fire 
when  ready,  Gridley,"  he  said  to  the  commanding  officer  of  his  flag- 
ship, and  proceeded  to  destroy  the  Spanish  fleet  without  the  loss  of  a 
single  American  bluejacket.  The  news,  rushed  to  Hong  Kong  by  cutter 
and  cabled  across  the  Pacific,  did  not  reach  the  United  States  until 
May  7.  The  country  went  wild  with  rejoicing  and  almost  everyone 
sported  a  large  celluloid  button  boasting:  "Dewey  Did  It." 

In  the  preliminary  naval  operations  around  Cuba  correspondents 
reported  the  bombardment  of  enemy  works  at  Matanzas  and  later  the 
shelling  of  the  forts  at  Havana.  Besides  the  men  on  the  dispatch  boats 
and  with  the  fleet,  Diehl  also  had  correspondents  in  sultry  Tampa 
where  the  army  drank  gallons  of  iced  tea  and  groused  at  repeated  post- 
ponement of  its  departure  for  Cuba. 

A  big  question  mark  kept  the  army  immobilized  at  Tampa.  The 
whole  country  was  asking:  Where  is  Cervera?  The  Spanish  admiral, 
with  the  main  enemy  fleet,  had  sailed  from  the  Cape  Verde  Islands 
across  the  Atlantic  on  April  29.  Then  there  was  no  word  and  the  uncer- 
tainty spawned  nervous  rumors.  One  panicky  report  had  it  that  he 
planned  to  attack  the  New  England  coast  5  another,  that  he  would 
bombard  New  Yorkj  still  another,  that  his  objective  was  to  engage 
Sampson's  fleet  off  Cuba. 

For  one  staff  correspondent  this  news  meant  a  welcome  chance  to 
get  to  the  exciting  scene  of  hostilities.  George  E.  Graham  had  been 
assigned  to  the  Brooklyn,  flagship  of  the  flying  squadron  commanded 
by  Commodore  Winfield  S.  Schley. 

"Can  you  fight?"  Schley  asked  when  Graham  came  aboard.  "We 
don't  allow  any  loafers  aboard  a  man-of-war,  and  if  a  lot  of  men  on 
this  ship  are  killed  during  a  combat,  you'll  have  to  help  take  their 
places."  To  a  subordinate  he  added  with  a  twinkle,  "Put  him  to  work 
with  a  six-pounder  gun  crew.  He'll  be  handy." 

But  Graham  had  had  a  very  dull  time.  The  flying  squadron  was 
kept  at  Hampton  Roads,  Virginia,  as  a  precaution  against  the  possible 
appearance  of  Cervera  off  the  New  England  or  the  Middle  Atlantic 
coast.  The  news  that  the  Spanish  fleet  was  in  southern  waters  slipped 
the  leash  which  had  held  Schley  in  port  and  the  flying  squadron  steamed 
toward  Key  West  to  co-operate  with  Sampson. 


142  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

But  where  was  Cervera  now?  More  rumors  flew  as  American 
warships  scouted  for  the  elusive  Spaniards.  Goode,  on  Admiral  Samp- 
son's flagship,  was  in  a  position  to  appreciate  how  little  both  Navy 
Department  and  fleet  commander  knew  of  the  enemy's  whereabouts. 
Finally,  on  his  own  initiative,  he  went  ashore  at  Haiti  on  one  of  the 
Association's  newsboats  and  sent  cable  after  cable  to  Associated  Press 
correspondents,  first  in  the  Caribbean-South  American  area,  and  then 
in  strategic  cities  elsewhere.  All  the  messages  asked  for  information 
on  Cervera. 

Tense  days  passed  and  on  May  20  the  long-awaited  news  came  in 
an  Associated  Press  dispatch  from — of  all  places — the  Spanish  capital  of 
Madrid.  Member  newspapers  published  the  announcement  that  Cer- 
vera's  fleet  had  arrived  in  the  harbor  of  Santiago  twenty-four  hours 
before.  At  Washington  the  Navy  Department  acknowledged  the  news 
by  issuing  the  bulletin:  "The  Department  has  information,  which  is 
believed  to  be  authentic,  that  the  Spanish  squadron  is  at  Santiago  de 
Cuba."  And  far  to  the  southward  Sampson  ordered  Commodore  Schley 
to  Santiago  with  all  speed  to  bottle  up  the  enemy  in  port. 

Events  moved  to  a  more  rapid  tempo  and  at  4  A.M.  on  June  3 
Lieutenant  Richmond  P.  Hobson  and  his  crew  sank  the  Merrimac  in 
the  harbor  entrance  at  Santiago  under  shell  fire  from  Spanish  guns. 
Before  departing  Hobson  gave  Correspondent  Goode  the  only  interview 
he  permitted,  and  as  the  Merrimac  dashed  for  the  harbor  in  the  bright 
moonlight,  Graham  stood  on  the  bridge  of  the  Brooklyn  peering  through 
his  binoculars  for  an  eyewitness  account  of  the  exploit. 

No  one  who  saw  the  young  lieutenant  and  his  men  set  out  on  their 
mission  expected  them  to  escape  with  their  lives,  but  late  that  afternoon 
Goode  was  scribbling  the  news  that  all  had  been  captured  uninjured 
by  the  Spanish. 

Mauser  bullets  raked  the  news  yacht  Wanda  on  June  9  as  she  stood 
by  off  Guantanamo  while  the  marines  went  splashing  ashore  in  the 
first  large-scale  landing  of  troops  on  Cuban  soil.  Through  the  surf  with 
them  floundered  Harrison  L.  Beach,  the  first  of  Diehl's  correspondents 
to  get  his  baptism  of  fire  on  land.  It  was  almost  a  fatal  baptism.  A 
Spanish  regiment  fought  the  landing  in  spite  of  shelling  by  three 
American  warships  and  as  the  marines  drove  forward  a  Spanish  sharp- 
shooter in  the  dense  chaparral  saw  Beach  before  his  rifle  sights  and 
squeezed  the  trigger.  The  bullet  tore  across  the  bridge  of  his  nose  just 
below  the  line  of  his  eyes.  Blood  streaming  down  his  face,  Beach  kept 


REMEMBER  THE  MAINE!  143 

going  and  the  wound  was  still  fresh  when  Diehl  watched  him  write 
his  account  of  the  fighting  back  aboard  the  Wanda. 


The  correspondents  on  the  co-operative's  dispatch  boats  with  the 
blockading  fleet  off  Santiago  were  having  an  equally  hazardous  time. 
When  the  harbor  forts  were  bombarded,  the  boats  were  constantly 
exposed  to  the  enemy's  return  fire.  Navigation  at  night  was  particularly 
dangerous,  for  all  ships  had  to  run  without  lights,  and  frequently 
American  warships  opened  fire  on  the  dispatch  boats,  mistaking  them  for 
Spanish  scouts. 

The  news  craft  had  been  unwelcome  when  they  made  their  first 
appearance,  but  this  hostile  feeling  was  not  long-lived.  After  a  few 
weeks  the  navy  was  pressing  the  dispatch  boats  into  service  whenever 
circumstances  warranted,  to  carry  messages  and  to  tow  or  convoy  crippled 
warships  to  port  for  repairs.  On  one  occasion  the  Associated  Press  tug 
Dauntless  was  commissioned  to  take  a  captured  schooner  back  to  Key 
West. 

The  long-delayed  army  expeditionary  force  arrived  off  Cuba  in 
thirty  transports  on  June  20  and  debarkation  began  two  days  later  at 
Daiquiri,  east  of  Santiago.  The  Wanda,  with  Diehl  aboard,  and  the 
Dauntless  were  on  hand  for  the  preliminary  bombardment  of  the 
Spanish  land  positions,  and  as  soon  as  the  troops  started  ashore  in  open 
boats,  correspondents  Lyman,  Mitchell,  and  Dunning  were  landed  to 
report  the  army  advance  on  Santiago.  Diehl  subsequently  reinforced 
them  with  Thompson,  Martin,  Goudie,  and  Beach,  who  still  wore  a 
bandage  from  the  wound  at  Guantanamo.  It  was  Lyman's  last  assign- 
ment. He  contracted  yellow  fever  and  died  upon  returning  to  the  States 
after  the  fall  of  Santiago. 

Four  days  after  the  landing  at  Daiquiri,  Dunning  was  pushing 
forward  through  dense  tropical  undergrowth  with  the  Rough  Riders 
of  Colonel  Leonard  Wood  and  Theodore  Roosevelt.  A  blazing  sun 
beat  down  and  the  sweating  troops  discarded  piece  after  piece  of  equip- 
ment as  they  pressed  on  along  the  narrow  tortuous  trail.  There  was  no 
sign  of  the  enemy  and  the  tangled  mass  of  trees,  vines,  high  grass,  and 
chaparral  crowded  close  to  the  path.  Men  began  to  drop  under  the 
intense  heat.  The  trail  grew  steeper  as  the  column  neared  Las  Guasimas. 
Dunning  plodded  in  the  van  not  far  from  Roosevelt.  It  was  a  perfect 


144  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

* 

place  for  an  ambush.  Suddenly  from  a  thicket  a  Mauser  cracked,  and 
another,  and  another. 

"It's  up  to  us,  boys!"  shouted  Roosevelt, 

"Deploy,  lie  down!"  Wood  called  along  the  line  of  the  Rough 
Riders,  and  Krag-Jorgenson  carbines  began  to  rattle.  It  was  the  regi- 
ment's first  experience  in  battle  and  Dunning  saw  some  men  waver  as 
comrades  dropped  wounded  or  dying.  For  an  hour  the  fighting  raged. 
Then  reinforcements  came  up  and  the  whole  line  swept  forward  in  a 
charge  which  routed  the  Spaniards. 

Dunning  hurried  back  to  find  the  army  base  at  Siboney  seething 
with  erroneous  reports  of  the  action  at  Las  Guasimas.  Colonel  Wood 
had  been  killed.  The  Rough  Riders  were  being  wiped  out.  Stragglers 
had  brought  in  fantastic  stories.  The  Wanda  had  just  arrived  offshore 
and  Dunning  got  aboard  to  begin  writing  his  account  of  the  first  major 
fighting  of  the  campaign.  By  the  time  the  yacht  made  a  fast  run  to 
Guantanamo  he  had  four  hundred  words  ready  for  filing  in  the  section 
of  the  Cuba-Haiti  cable  which  the  navy  had  seized.  Then  the  Wanda 
pointed  her  bow  into  the  teeth  of  a  tropical  storm  and  set  out  for 
Jamaica.  Through  the  night  Dunning  wrote  additional  details  while 
the  sea  threatened  to  engulf  the  buffeted  vessel.  The  dispatch  was 
ready  when  they  arrived  and  with  it  went  the  only  accurate  list  of  dead 
and  wounded  published  until  official  reports  were  released  after  the  war. 

Las  Guasimas  was  merely  a  prelude.  On  July  i  the  American 
forces  began  their  attack  on  the  blockhouses  and  outer  works  of  Santiago. 
Diehl  had  Beach,  Thompson,  and  Mitchell  on  the  firing  line  throughout 
the  fighting  which  added  the  names  of  El  Caney  and  San  Juan  Hill 
to  American  military  history.  The  Spanish  swept  the  American  lines 
with  a  hail  of  bullets  from  fortified  positions,  Cervera  turned  the  heavy 
guns  of  the  fleet  on  the  advancing  troops,  and  sharpshooters  hidden  in 
treetops  picked  off  men  like  flies. 

5 

Back  in  the  States  newspaper  circulations  climbed  dizzily  and  the 
nation  reveled  in  a  delirium  of  flag-waving  patriotism.  The  war  brought 
with  it  the  day  of  shrieking  headlines — nowhere  shriller  than  in  New 
York.  Battling  to  outdo  one  another,  some  papers  turned  front  pages 
into  typographical  nightmares.  Larger  and  larger  type  was  used  until 
the  big  block  letters  were  four  inches  high.  When  the  blackest  ink 
seemed  inadequate  to  scream  the  latest  sensation,  drums  of  red  were 
rolled  into  pressrooms  and  even  gaudier  headlines  appeared. 


REMEMBER  THE  MAINE!  145 

The  biggest  news  of  the  war,  however,  was  yet  to  come.  On  July  3 
the  blockading  American  fleet  off  Santiago  prepared  for  Sunday  morning 
inspection.  On  the  bridge  of  the  battleship  Brooklyn,  Correspondent 
Graham  chatted  with  Commodore  Schley.  Off  to  the  east  the  Dauntless 
and  the  Wanda  rode  easily  in  calm  seas.  With  Dunning  aboard,  the 
Wanda  was  just  back  from  the  Jamaica  cable  and  fortunate  to  be  back 
at  all.  Port  authorities  had  threatened  to  quarantine  her  for  three  days 
because  of  the  prevalence  of  yellow  fever  in  Cuba.  Diehl,  alarmed  lest 
his  dispatch  fleet  be  tied  up,  stayed  behind  to  cable  Associated  Press 
offices  in  London  instructions  to  appeal  to  the  British  Cabinet  for  an 
order  exempting  his  boats  from  the  Jamaican  regulations. 

It  was  a  perfect  Sunday  with  a  blue  sky  and  a  hot  sun.  Graham 
talked  on  with  the  commodore.  Then  a  voice  bawled:  "The  enemy  ships 
are  coming  out!"  The  Spanish  fleet,  bottled  up  in  Santiago  harbor  for 
weeks,  was  steaming  out.  It  was  led  by  Admiral  Cervera's  flagship,  the 
Maria  Theresa. 

Schley  grabbed  his  binoculars. 

"Come  on,  my  boy,"  he  exclaimed  to  Graham.  "We'll  give  it  to 
them  now!" 

Orders  exploded  like  a  string  of  firecrackers.  Bells  jangled. 

"Clear  ship  for  action!" 

"Signal,  cThe  enemy  is  escaping!7" 

"Signal  the  fleet  to  clear  ship!" 

With  Graham  at  his  heels,  Schley  went  up  the  ladder  to  the  con- 
ning tower.  Midway  he  pulled  out  a  watch — one  he  had  borrowed 
from  Graham  a  few  days  ago. 

"It's  just  9:35,"  he  said. 

The  guns  of  the  American  fleet  roared  into  action.  The  tornado  of 
sound  on  the  Brooklyn  almost  deafened  Graham.  Through  glasses  he 
could  see  the  harbor  mouth  choked  with  black  smoke  from  the  enemy's 
funnels  and  the  brilliant  yellow  splashes  of  flame  from  exploding 
American  shells.  The  escaping  Spaniards  turned  westward  in  column. 
They  were  going  to  run  for  it. 

While  Graham  watched  from  the  Brooklyn  and  a  hurtling  storm 
of  shot  and  shell  churned  the  waters,  the  Wanda  and  the  Dauntless 
came  steaming  into  the  zone  of  fire,  maneuvering  recklessly  with  the 
fleet  to  get  the  best  possible  view.  So  close  was  the  Wanda  that  she  was 
able  to  save  an  officer  and  eight  sailors  from  a  Spanish  torpedo-boat 
destroyer  which  was  sinking  under  heavy  gunfire.  The  rescued  officer 
startled  Dunning  by  kissing  him  on  both  cheeks. 


146  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Before  long  Cervera's  flagship  was  disabled  and  caught  fire,  and 
the  Spanish  admiral  himself  was  picked  up  from  the  sea  by  the  U.S.S. 
Gloucester.  Dunning  boarded  her  to  interview  the  dripping  enemy  com- 
mander. Although  Cervera  had  lost  almost  all  his  clothes,  his  com- 
posure was  unshaken  and  he  told  briefly  from  a  Spanish  viewpoint  the 
story  of  the  battle  that  still  raged. 

To  the  west,  at  the  head  of  the  column,  the  Brooklyn  and  the 
Oregon  kept  pouring  a  devastating  fire  into  the  fleeing  vessels  which 
had  escaped  destruction  in  the  terrific  first  hour  of  fighting.  On  the 
Brooklyn  Graham  stood  with  several  others  just  in  front  of  the  con- 
ning tower  from  which  Commodore  Schley  was  directing  the  action.  In 
the  group  with  the  correspondent  was  a  seaman  who  was  taking  the 
enemy's  range. 

"It's  twelve  hundred  yards,  sir,"  the  sailor  called  to  Schley. 

Graham  heard  a  thud  on  the  deck  beside  him  and  warm  blood  spat- 
tered his  face  and  clothes.  Before  him  sprawled  a  shapeless  heap — the 
seaman  who  had  been  calling  out  the  range  a  moment  before.  A  Spanish 
shell  had  decapitated  him. 

At  1 115  P.M.  that  July  3,  1898,  the  ensign  of  Spain  fluttered  down 
in  surrender  on  the  last  ship  of  Cervera's  fleet.  The  Wanda  came  up  in 
time  to  witness  the  final  act  of  the  victory.  Then,  after  collecting  the 
stories  written  by  the  men  on  the  Daimtless,  Graham  on  the  Brooklyn, 
and  Goode  on  the  New  York,  the  yacht  made  her  run  to  the  Jamaica 
cable. 

Dunning,  who  had  woven  all  the  accounts  into  one  complete  story 
while  en  route,  stepped  ashore  at  Jamaica  at  I  A.M.  July  4.  Diehl  met 
him  with  news  that  the  dispatch  boat  of  one  of  the  New  York  papers 
had  arrived  an  hour  before. 

"We  are  beaten,"  Dunning  said  wearily.  Diehl  thought  so  too  until 
he  learned  that  the  whole  Spanish  fleet  had  been  destroyed.  His  dejec- 
tion immediately  vanished.  The  rival  boat  had  left  the  battle  after  only 
two  enemy  ships  had  been  sunk. 

But  that  rival  correspondent  intended  to  do  everything  to  protect 
his  time  advantage  on  the  news  of  the  battle's  start.  As  soon  as  his 
first  "urgent"  story  had  been  cleared,  he  filed  a  long  unimportant  dis- 
patch at  low  press  rates  to  hold  the  cable  exclusively.  Diehl  was  equal 
to  the  emergency.  He  served  notice  on  the  cable  company  that,  if  it 
failed  to  accept  Dunning's  story  at  the  "urgent"  rate  of  $1.67  a  word 
as  soon  as  the  special's  first  story  had  been  transmitted,  he  would  sue 
for  damages.  The  threat  was  effective  and  Dunning's  complete  story 


REMEMBER  THE  MAINE!  147 

of  Santiago  was  promptly  put  on  the  cable.  At  the  urgent  rate,  the  tolls 
were  $8,000. 

6 

The  naval  victory  at  Santiago  virtually  ended  the  war.  The  city 
of  Santiago  surrendered  on  July  17  and  an  Associated  Press  correspon- 
dent preceded  the  troops  into  the  city  despite  refusal  of  military  authori- 
ties to  permit  newspapermen  to  enter  before  the  formal  occupation  took 
place.  The  correspondent  was  Alfred  C.  Goudie.  When  permission  was 
denied,  Goudie,  who  spoke  both  Spanish  and  French,  put  on  peasant 
clothes  and  joined  a  crowd  of  Cuban  refugees  who  were  being  allowed 
to  return  to  their  homes  in  the  city.  Carrying  a  parrot  cage  on  one  arm 
and  on  the  other  a  baby  entrusted  him  by  a  tired  mother,  Goudie 
passed  through  the  lines  without  being  stopped.  Once  in  the  city,  he 
filed  three  thousand  words  describing  the  arrangements  for  the  sur- 
render, the  march  of  refugees,  the  plight  of  the  city,  and  the  approach 
of  the  American  forces. 

The  press  corps  had  been  much  depleted  by  that  time.  Of  the 
two  hundred  correspondents  who  had  landed  with  the  troops  in  June 
to  cover  operations  ashore,  only  nine  remained.  Three  of  them — Goudie, 
Martin,  and  Thompson — represented  The  Associated  Press.  The  vicissi- 
tudes of  campaigning,  the  tropical  climate,  and  the  peril  of  yellow 
fever  had  driven  the  others  home. 

Thompson  stayed  on  for  four  years,  and  in  1902,  when  the  Ameri- 
can flag  was  hauled  down  from  the  palace  in  Havana  and  the  flag  of 
the  new  independent  Cuban  Republic  hoisted  in  its  place  he  wrote 
such  a  brilliant  description  of  the  occasion  that  the  Congress  of  the 
United  States  by  joint  resolution  unanimously  ordered  it  printed  in 
the  Congressional  Record  as  the  official  history  of  the  event. 

With  the  fall  of  Santiago,  national  interest  shifted  to  the  final 
drives  against  Spain  in  Puerto  Rico  and  the  Philippines,  where  other 
correspondents  were  on  the  scene. 

The  guns  which  started  to  rumble  on  other  fronts  drowned  out  the 
navy's  parting  shots  off  Santiago.  Several  days  after  the  destruction 
of  Cervera's  fleet  the  U.S.S.  Potomac  sighted  a  small  craft  near  the 
wreck  of  one  of  the  Spanish  warships.  The  suspicious  gunboat  opened 
fire  and  three  shots  splashed  perilously  close  to  the  little  target.  Then 
the  officers  saw  the  attacked  vessel  break  out  her  pennant. 

The  last  three  "careless"  shots  of  the  war  off  Santiago  had  been 
fired  at  the  Cynthia — one  of  the  five  dispatch  boats  of  The  Associated 
Press. 


XVI.  THE  NEW  CENTURY 


THE  second  that  comes  once  every  hundred  years  had  arrived.  It  was 
January  i,  1900,  and  there  was  the  clink  of  many  glasses  and  the 
echo  of  hopeful  toasts.  For  all  the  optimism  and  rejoicing,  however,  it 
was  a  disturbed  world  that  greeted  the  new  century.  In  the  South 
African  veld  black  clouds  of  disaster  trailed  British  arms  in  their  war 
with  the  stubborn  Boers.  In  far-off  China  the  stage  was  set  for  the  Boxer 
uprising.  From  Berlin  came  a  dispatch  saying  Kaiser  Wilhelm  had 
chosen  the  first  day  of  the  new  century  to  deliver  a  strident,  sabre- 
rattling  speech  to  his  garrison  officers. 

The  turn  of  the  century  found  The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois 
growing  stronger.  Nevertheless,  the  organization  was  apprehensive 
over  the  outcome  of  litigation  which  struck  at  the  very  purpose  and 
spirit  of  its  existence.  One  of  its  own  member  papers  had  brought  a 
lawsuit  charging  that  its  charter  and  by-laws  were  unconstitutional. 
An  adverse  decision  would  destroy  the  hard-won  gains  realized  after 
the  long,  bitter  struggle  against  the  peril  of  a  commercial  news  trust 
and  might  so  impair  the  character  of  the  association  as  to  kill  it. 

Curiously  enough,  this  legal  threat  was  an  outgrowth  of  something 
entirely  foreign  to  the  field  of  news — the  defeated  efforts  of  a  Chicago 
utility  magnate  to  obtain,  without  adequately  compensating  the  city, 
a  fifty-year  extension  of  his  street  railway  franchises. 

Charles  T.  Yerkes  for  years  had  been  able  by  devious  ways  to 
obtain  whatever  he  wanted  from  the  corrupt  majority  of  the  Chicago 
city  council.  But  finally  the  indignant  public,  backed  by  all  the  city's 
newspapers,  rose  up  in  arms  to  fight  him.  A  citizens'  league  was  formed. 
In  the  forefront  of  the  fight  was  Victor  Lawson.  His  Chicago  Daily 
News  editorially  assailed  the  corruption  which  Yerkes  had  exploited 
and  his  checkbook  gave  support  to  the  forces  crusading  for  honesty  in 
government. 

Yerkes  realized  he  could  not  count  upon  the  venal  members  of  the 
city  council  to  do  his  bidding  unless  they  had  the  encouragement  of 
an  outspoken  champion.  He  needed  a  newspaper  to  advocate  his  cause. 

148 


THE  NEW  CENTURY  149 

With  the  press  of  Chicago  arrayed  against  him,  there  was  only  one 
way  to  get  such  support.  On  November  21,  1897,  the  none  too  successful 
Chicago  Inter-Ocean  announced  that  a  "party  of  Chicago  gentlemen" 
headed  by  Charles  T.  Yerkes,  had  purchased  the  paper.  Equally  sig- 
nificant was  the  statement  that  George  Wheeler  Hinman  was  the  new 
editor.  Hinman  came  direct  from  the  staff  of  the  most  implacable  of 
Associated  Press  enemies,  Laffan's  New  York  Sun. 

The  policy  of  the  Inter-Ocean  immediately  changed.  At  the  outset 
Hinman  declared  editorially  that  the  twofold  platform  of  the  new 
management  was  to  "oppose  the  Chicago  newspaper  trust" — the  anti- 
Yerkes  publications — and  to  advocate  the  supplying  of  Associated  Press 
news  to  any  and  all  papers  applying  for  it. 

Hinman  quickly  singled  out  Lawson  as  the  one  man  in  the  city 
pre-eminently  identified  with  both  the  causes  the  Inter-Ocean  was 
attacking.  As  owner  of  the  Chicago  Daily  News  he  was  the  most  promi- 
nent anti- Yerkes  publisher  and  as  President  of  The  Associated  Press 
he  personified  all  that  the  organization  represented.  Here  was  a  target 
and  on  it  Hinman  concentrated  his  fire. 

In  the  beginning  the  broadsides  were  against  Lawson  personally 
and  as  a  Chicago  publisher.  There  were  baseless  charges  that  he  sought 
to  profit  at  the  city's  expense  in  a  schoolsite  land  "grab,"  and  Hinman 
sneeringly  dubbed  him  "Rice  Water  Lawson"  because  of  the  free  nurs- 
ing care  which  the  Daily  News  provided  for  sick  children  from  tenement 
districts.  Then  Lawson's  Associated  Press  affiliations  were  introduced 
into  the  civic  tempest,  and  on  December  2,  1897,  Hinman  wrote: 

It  is  well  to  remind  our  readers  that  Mr.  Rice  Water  Lawson  is  the 
soul  of  the  newspaper  trust  of  this  city,  that  the  sandbagging  methods  adopted 
by  him  in  his  editorial  capacity  have  become  the  methods  of  the  trust,  largely 
through  his  influence,  and  that  as  President  of  The  Associated  Press  he  has 
striven  to  bolster  monopoly  and  bolster  the  boycott,  even  to  the  point  of 
dictating  the  sources  of  information  to  which  the  newspapers  of  the  country 
shall  turn.  Do  the  people  of  Chicago  regard  a  man  of  his  ways  and  means  as 
the  one  to  dictate  the  selection,  suppression  and  manipulation  of  the  news 
of  this  great  country,  city  and  state? 

The  next  day  Hinman,  ignoring  the  fact  that  the  Inter-Ocean  was 
a  member,  further  assailed  The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois  and  spoke 
acidly  of  Lawson,  "wrapped  in  the  cloak  of  religion,  exhaling  the  odor 
of  sanctity."  This  time  Melville  Stone's  name  figured  in  the  diatribe. 
The  Inter-Ocean  declared: 


150  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

The  leader  of  the  [Associated  Press]  gang  is  Mr.  Rice  Water  Lawson; 
his  henchman  and  accomplice  is  Melville  E.  Stone.  To  suit  the  personal  and 
financial  interests  of  these  two  men  the  news  of  the  country  has  been  mis- 
interpreted, mangled  and  suppressed. 

Abuse  and  attack,  whether  directed  at  him  personally  or  at  The 
Associated  Press,  left  Lawson  unruffled.  In  his  judgment,  the  only 
intelligent  way  of  dealing  with  Hinman  was  to  ignore  him.  Much 
earlier  he  had  told  Yerkes  that  the  Daily  News  would  treat  him  and 
his  utility  enterprises  impartially  and  fairly  in  its  news  columns.  On  one 
occasion  he  even  wrote  the  traction  company  head  that,  if  he  changed 
his  methods,  the  Daily  News  would  be  "quite  as  ready  to  commend 
you  as  we  now  are  to  criticize."  Discussing  one  of  Hinman's  denuncia- 
tions, Lawson  commented: 

The  attacks  of  the  Inter-Ocean  on  The  Associated  Press  are  quite  con- 
sistent with  the  personal  antecedents  of  the  new  editor  and  the  personal 
feeling  of  the  new  ownership.  I  do  not  imagine  that  the  New  York  Sun  and 
the  Chicago  Inter-Ocean  can  hurt  The  Associated  Press. 

The  municipal  battle  continued  until  April,  1898,  and  the  anti- 
Yerkes  forces  emerged  victorious.  The  utilities  operator  failed  to  get  his 
franchise  extension  and  soon  left  Chicago  after  disposing  of  his  traction 
interests  and  his  newspaper,  Hinman,  however,  stayed  on  as  the  con- 
trolling power  on  the  Inter-Ocean  and  there  was  no  diminution  of  his 
condemnation  of  the  Illinois  association  and  its  president. 

Lawson  was  wrong,  however,  when  he  said  he  did  not  believe  Hin- 
man and  his  former  associates  on  the  New  York  Sun  could  hurt  The 
Associated  Press.  He  had  underestimated  the  power  for  discord  which 
existed  in  the  Chicago  Inter-Ocean  by  virtue  of  its  Associated  Press 
membership.  Hinman's  editorial  hostility  could  be  ignored  indefinitely, 
but  when  he  carried  his  fight  into  the  courts  the  situation  immediately 
assumed  a  serious  character. 

The  trouble  actually  began  before  the  elections  which  ended 
Yerkes's  power.  At  Hinman's  direction,  the  Inter-Ocean  had  been 
using  dispatches  syndicated  by  the  Laffan  News  Bureau  which  had  con- 
tinued since  the  disappearance  of  the  old  United  Press.  During  the  bitter 
news  war  of  1893-1897  the  Laffan  bureau  had  been  pronounced  "an- 
tagonistic" to  the  co-operative,  and  all  members  were  enjoined  against 
subscribing  to  it.  As  soon  as  the  Laffan  dispatches  were  noticed  in  the 
Inter-Ocean,  General  Manager  Stone  pointed  out  to  Hinman  that  their 
use  was  a  violation  of  the  agreement  under  which  the  paper  enjoyed 


THE  NEW  CENTURY  151 

its  Associated  Press  membership.  Hinman  showed  his  defiance  by  con- 
tracting for  a  complete  special  service. 

Such  a  challenge  could  not  go  ignored  and  the  directors  of 
The  Associated  Press  met  it  by  invoking  the  penalty  provided  by  the 
by-laws — the  suspension  of  the  news  report  received  by  the  offender. 
The  Inter-Ocean,  however,  had  anticipated  this  action  and,  before  it 
could  be  taken,  Hinman  went  into  the  state  courts  for  an  injunction 
restraining  The  Associated  Press  from  stopping  the  news  report  or 
enforcing  the  terms  of  its  contract. 

The  paper  argued  the  corporate  charter  of  The  Associated  Press 
of  Illinois  was  so  worded  that  it  made  the  organization,  in  effect,  a 
public  utility,  obligated  to  give  its  service  without  discrimination  to  any 
newspaper  which  sought  it.  The  Inter-Ocean  maintained  further  that 
The  Associated  Press,  by  forbidding  its  members  to  obtain  news  from 
"antagonistic"  sources,  acted  in  restraint  of  trade  and  therefore  un- 
lawfully. In  reply,  The  Associated  Press  contended  it  was  a  co-operative, 
not  conducted  for  profit,  and  therefore  had  a  right  to  limit  and  govern 
its  membership. 

The  Circuit  Court  upheld  The  Associated  Press.  The  Inter-Ocean 
was  suspended  from  membership  and  on  May  16,  1898,  it  was  declared 
antagonistic  to  The  Associated  Press.  But  Hinman  carried  the  fight  to 
the  Appellate  Court,  and  when  he  lost  there  he  appealed  to  the  Supreme 
Court  of  Illinois.  For  almost  two  years  the  issue  went  undecided,  and 
the  resultant  uncertainty  colored  the  outlook  in  1900. 


From  the  date  of  the  organization  of  The  Associated  Press  of 
Illinois — on  December  15,  1892 — it  was  inevitable  that  sooner  or 
later  its  basic  membership  principle  would  be  subjected  to  a  rigorous 
test.  There  always  was  the  likelihood  that  an  ineligible  paper  would 
resort  to  legal  action  in  an  effort  to  force  admission  to  membership, 
and  there  was  the  other  possibility  that  a  member  paper  such  as  the 
Inter-Ocean^  disciplined  for  a  major  violation  of  the  by-laws,  might 
seek  to  compel  the  resumption  of  its  suspended  report. 

Lawson,  Driscoll,  Knapp,  and  the  others  responsible  for  the  evolu- 
tion of  The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois  believed  their  theory  of  organi- 
zation fundamentally  sound.  The  association  was  to  be  made  up  only  of 
those  papers  elected  to  membership  and  to  be  governed  by  those  papers. 
Its  news  report  would  stem  from  two  main  sources — the  mutual  ex- 


152  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

change  of  the  local  news  collected  by  the  member  papers  themselves, 
and  the  news  gathered  by  the  correspondents  of  The  Associated  Press 
throughout  the  world.  The  cost  of  obtaining  and  disseminating  the 
report  would  be  borne  pro  rata  by  the  members,  and  finances  would  be 
administered  on  a  strictly  non-profit  basis.  The  purity  of  the  news — such 
an  important  factor  in  the  controversy  with  the  defunct  United  Press 
and,  earlier,  with  the  old  New  York  Associated  Press — would  be  pro- 
tected by  the  independence  of  the  active  management  and  by  the  very 
diversity  of  political,  social,  and  religious  beliefs  among  the  members 
receiving  the  reports. 

As  with  any  co-operative,  the  association  would  be  a  defensive  and 
offensive  alliance,  acting  for  the  benefit  of  those  who  enjoyed  its 
privileges,  and  in  this  connection  certain  precautionary  measures  were 
necessary.  Among  these  was  the  right  of  a  member  to  protest  the 
admission  of  too  many  other  papers  in  the  same  city. 

The  protest  right  had  a  twofold  purpose:  It  served  not  only  to 
protect  existing  enterprise  but  also  to  exclude  financially  and  editorially 
irresponsible  publications  in  an  era  when  fly-by-night  newspapers  were  all 
too  common.  Many  times  the  Board  of  Directors  wisely  overruled  pro- 
tests emanating  from  selfish  motives  and  admitted  desirable  papers. 
A  number  of  times,  too,  protest  rights  were  sustained,  particularly 
where  the  paper's  financial  stability  figured  in  the  challenge. 

In  his  attacks  Hinman  repeatedly  denounced  the  organization 
as  a  "monopoly,"  emphasizing  the  word  which  had  sinister  connota- 
tions in  the  mind  of  the  contemporary  public.  Lawson  realized  that  noth- 
ing could  be  gained  by  replying  to  such  charges.  The  facts  spoke  for 
themselves.  Far  from  being  a  monopoly,  The  Associated  Press  was 
serving  roughly  one-third  of  the  2,ooo-odd  newspapers  then  published 
in  the  country.  The  remainder  was  supplied  by  various  other  news- 
gathering  agencies  and  most  papers  appeared  quite  satisfied. 

Under  the  energetic  William  M.  Laffan,  the  New  York  Sun's 
Laffan  News  Bureau  had  stepped  out  boldly  after  the  1893-1897  strife 
as  a  collector  of  news,  serving  a  sizable  list  of  paying  clients.  William 
Randolph  Hearst  also  made  arrangements  to  supply  news  for  his  New 
York  Journal  and  San  Francisco  Examiner,  as  well  as  others.  Still 
another  agency  was  the  Scripps-McRae  Press  Association,  which  had  for 
its  nucleus  four  midwestern  newspapers  owned  by  Milton  McRae  and 
Edward  W.  Scripps,  the  latter  a  brother  of  the  Detroit  Scripps  so  active 
in  the  fight  against  the  old  United  Press. 

At  the  time  the  United  Press  went  out  of  existence  Edward  W. 


THE  NEW  CENTURY  153 

Scripps  had  applied  for  membership  in  The  Associated  Press  for  all 
his  papers.  Some  of  them  were  in  cities  in  which  all  available  member- 
ships already  were  taken  and  Scripps  said  that,  if  The  Associated  Press 
could  not  accept  all  his  papers,  it  could  not  have  any  of  them.  He 
began  the  development  of  his  own  news  service. 

Additional  services  also  appeared  and,  although  they  were  all 
strictly  commercial,  operating  for  profit,  their  very  number  provided 
insurance  against  monopoly.  Moreover,  the  evolution  of  The  Associated 
Press  had  given  all  the  publishers  of  the  country  a  dependable  yard- 
stick by  which  the  truth,  accuracy,  and  cost  of  any  news  enterprise 
could  be  quickly  and  honestly  measured. 

But  the  courts  moved  slowly.  During  the  first  week  of  1900 
Secretary  of  State  John  Hay  made  news,  announcing  completion  of 
negotiations  for  the  "open  door"  in  China.  The  $35,000,000  contract 
for  New  York's  first  subway  was  awarded.  Then  on  February  19  the 
Supreme  Court  of  the  State  of  Illinois  handed  down  the  long-awaited 
decision  in  the  Inter-Ocean  case. 

The  decision  was  a  thunderbolt.  Hinman  and  the  Inter-Ocean  won 
a  smashing  victory.  On  every  major  point  the  court  found  against 
The  Associated  Press.  Its  foes  were  jubilant,  but  hundreds  of  papers 
over  the  country — non-members  of  the  co-operative  as  well  as  members 
— printed  editorials  deploring  the  decision  out  of  which  might  come 
another  news  monopoly.  Ignoring  the  ruling  of  the  Illinois  Supreme 
Court,  a  similar  case  in  Missouri  shortly  thereafter  was  declared  in 
favor  of  The  Associated  Press. 

However,  the  court  of  the  association's  home  state  had  spoken.  The 
hasty  and  loose  language  used  in  1892  when  the  nonprofit  co-operative 
was  formed  had  proved  its  legal  undoing.  The  sweeping  decision  cited 
the  fatal  portion  of  the  corporate  charter  which  included  among  the 
organization's  purposes  the  right  "to  erect,  lease,  or  sell  telegraph  or 
telephone  lines."  Although  this  right  never  had  been  exercised,  the 
court  ruled  that  it  gave  The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois  the  nature  of 
a  public  utility  and  in  consequence  the  organization  was  legally  bound 
to  supply,  without  distinction,  any  persons  "who  wish  to  purchase 
information  and  news,  for  purposes  of  publication,  which  it  was  created 
to  furnish."  All  the  damage,  immediate  and  potential,  was  in  that  sweep- 
ing ruling. 

It  was  of  minor  importance  that  the  decision  also  struck  at  the 
"antagonistic"  section  of  the  by-laws.  The  court  held  that  provision 
to  be  in  restraint  of  trade  and  declared  it  null  and  void. 


154  AP —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

The  Associated  Press  sought  in  vain  for  a  rehearing  of  the  case 
while  the  victorious  Inter-Ocean  took  steps  to  realize  everything  it 
believed  the  decision  guaranteed.  The  paper  applied  for  reinstatement 
as  a  member,  sought  a  receiver  for  the  association,  sued  for  indemnifica- 
tion of  alleged  losses  sustained  during  the  period  of  suspension,  and 
petitioned  for  an  injunction  to  prevent  dissolution  of  The  Associated 
Press  of  Illinois  in  the  event  the  organization  so  attempted  to  escape 
the  result  of  the  protracted  court  fight.  Papers  hitherto  excluded  began 
to  press  for  admission  on  the  strength  of  the  decision,  and  legal  actions 
against  the  co-operative  multiplied. 


It  was  a  disheartened  membership  that  convened  in  Chicago  on 
May  1 6,  1900,  to  hear  the  formal  reports  on  the  stunning  setback  and 
to  consider  what  was  to  be  done.  Nominally,  the  members  still  were 
masters  of  their  association,  but  it  was  debatable  for  how  long.  The 
spirit,  concept,  and  purpose  of  the  organization  had  been  dramatically 
altered  by  legal  fiat,  and  it  was  likely  that  the  mechanics  of  operation 
would  have  to  change  accordingly. 

It  was  apparent  that  the  membership  was  unwilling  to  continue 
on  that  basis.  All  recommendations  for  the  amendment  of  the  by-laws 
were  rejected.  Individual  publishers  said  what  they  thought.  They  had 
fought  a  bitter  war  to  organize  a  press  association  free  of  the  evils  which 
had  beset  news  gathering  in  the  past.  Many  of  them  had  pledged 
personal  fortunes  and  had  contributed  unsparingly  of  time  and  energy 
in  the  struggle.  When  the  hard-won  victory  finally  came,  they  thought 
they  had  earned  recognition  for  the  principles  they  served.  Now  their 
gains  had  been  swept  away  or  jeopardized.  Some  urged  the  preserva- 
tion of  the  spirit  and  methods  of  the  association,  but  in  the  mesh  of 
existing  legal  entanglements  they  frankly  acknowledged  uncertainty 
as  to  how  that  could  be  accomplished. 

When  the  time  came  for  the  annual  election  of  officers,  some  sig- 
nificant things  happened.  Victor  Lawson  declined  re-election  as  presi- 
dent. Melville  Stone  resigned  as  general  manager.  Other  officers  with- 
drew their  names  from  nomination.  The  men  who  had  guided  The 
Associated  Press  of  Illinois  through  a  great  news-war  revolution  had 
mapped  their  plans. 

Charles  Knapp,  of  the  St.  Louis  Republic,  absent  on  account  of 
illness,  was  elected  president  to  succeed  Lawson,  and  Diehl  was  named 


THE  NEW  CENTURY  155 

general  manager  to  replace  Stone.  Writing  to  Knapp  the  next  day, 
Lawson  hinted  of  the  strategy  in  preparation: 

I  understand  that  certain  ex-directors  and  other  people  of  their  kind 
are  pursuing  their  machinations  at  this  moment  within  the  corporate  limits  of 
Chicago  with  the  fell  purpose  of  doing  disrespect  to  our  Supreme  Court. 
All  of  which  grieves  me  much.  I  am  guessing  that  the  developments  of  the 
near  future  will  bring  us  face  to  face  again  in  New  York. 

That  same  week  all  newsdom  knew  the  steps  that  were  being  taken. 
On  May  22,  1900,  a  certificate  of  incorporation  of  a  technically  new 
association,  bearing  The  Associated  Press  name,  was  filed  in  New  York. 
It  carried  the  signatures  of  Stephen  O'Meara,  of  the  Boston  Journal, 
Adolph  S.  Ochs,  of  the  New  York  Times,  St.  Clair  McKelway,  of  the 
Brooklyn  Eagle,  William  L.  McLean,  of  the  Philadelphia  Bulletin, 
Frank  B.  Noyes,  of  the  Washington  Star,  and  Alfred  H.  Belo,  of  the 
Dallas  News.  So,  by  coincidence,  six  papers  were  represented  in  this 
fresh  start,  as  six  papers  had  been  represented  in  the  beginning  in  1848. 

New  York  had  a  law  applying  specifically  to  co-operative  and  non- 
profit organizations  and  the  decision  of  Lawson  and  his  group  had  been 
made  to  seek  incorporation  under  that  statute.  This  time,  however, 
the  legal  technicalities  received  the  most  thoroughgoing  attention.  The 
incorporators  were  determined  not  only  to  avoid  the  pitfalls  which 
had  made  the  Inter-Ocean  suit  possible,  but  also  to  correct  the  defects 
and  inequities  which  had  manifested  themselves  in  the  structure  of 
The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois.  Great  care  was  taken  to  make  the 
membership  character  of  the  organization  so  specific  as  to  admit  of  no 
contention.  The  certificate  of  incorporation,  after  first  describing  how 
newspapers  might  be  elected  to  membership,  stipulated  plainly: 

No  person  not  so  elected  shall  have  any  right  or  interest  in  the  corpora- 
tion or  enjoy  any  of  the  privileges  or  benefits  thereof. 

Another  unequivocal  expression  of  policy  was: 

The  corporation  is  not  to  make  a  profit  or  to  make  or  declare  dividends, 
and  is  not  to  engage  in  the  business  of  selling  intelligence  nor  traffic  in 
the  same. 

This  phrased  a  cardinal  principle  of  the  new  policy — that  the  mem- 
bers would  co-operate  in  gathering  the  news  of  the  world  for  their 
mutual  benefit,  each  contributing  his  respective  share  and  each  defray- 
ing his  portion  of  the  total  cost  5  they  would  not  buy  their  news  from 


156  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

the  association,  but  would  be  part  owners,  each  with  an  equal  voice  in 
all  Associated  Press  affairs. 

There  were  other  important  changes  in  the  constitution.  In  the 
Illinois  organization  memberships  had  been  divided  into  two  classes 
of  unequal  rights  and  privileges.  This  distinction  was  eliminated.  The 
incorporators  decided  against  the  issuance  of  capital  stock  for  financing 
the  association,  as  had  been  done  in  1892.  Instead  they  substituted 
first-mortgage  bonds,  for  which  the  membership  might  subscribe  in 
varying  amounts. 

Not  unexpectedly,  Melville  E.  Stone  was  designated  general  man- 
ager and  he  was  soon  busy  sending  out  invitations  to  membership. 


A  special  meeting  of  The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois  was  called  in 
Chicago,  September  12,  1900,  and  by  unanimous  vote  it  was  decided  to 
disincorporate.  The  details  connected  with  the  dissolution  required  time, 
so  the  Board  of  Directors  was  empowered  to  take  the  necessary  step 
to  close  out  the  business.  Significantly,  the  directors  were  specifically 
authorized  to  dispose  of  the  organization's  news-gathering  facilities 
to  "such  other  news  association,  as,  in  the  opinion  of  the  Board  of 
Directors,  it  is  deemed  wise  to  have  relations  with."  The  way  was 
cleared  for  the  legal  transfer,  of  the  essential  working  equipment  to 
The  Associated  Press  which  was  ready  to  carry  on  the  traditions  of 
the  service. 

The  Chicago  meeting  was,  to  all  intents  and  purposes,  the  actual 
finale  of  The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois.  Legally  it  continued  in 
existence  several  months  more  during  which  time  the  directors,  among 
other  things,  paid  $40,500  to  the  Inter-Ocean  to  satisfy  its  claims  and 
to  effect  a  dismissal  of  additional  suits  brought  by  that  paper  and  the 
New  York  Sun. 

To  lead  the  transformed  Associated  Press,  the  Board  of  Directors 
chose  as  president  Frank  Brett  Noyes,  the  37-year-old  Washington  Star 
executive  who  had  taken  such  a  decisive  role  in  the  struggle  with  United 
Press  and  whose  influence  had  helped  the  reorganization.  He  was 
young  for  this  important  job,  considering  the  number  of  older  men 
available.  Moreover,  some  observers  considered  him  too  daring  because 
the  Washington  Star  printed  society  and  sports  news  in  unprecedented 
volume.  But  time  proved  otherwise. 

Quiet,  austere,  and  judicial,  Noyes  already  commanded  the  respect 


THE  NEW  CENTURY  157 

of  the  membership  at  large.  They  knew  he  had  an  unswerving  devotion 
to  the  best  interests  of  news  gathering  and  that,  under  him,  The  Asso- 
ciated Press  would  scrupulously  discharge  its  mission.  Time  and  again 
he  declared:  "News  must  be  non-partisan  in  its  highest  sense.  It  must 
have  no  tinge  of  bias  whether  political,  economic  or  religious.  It  must 
neither  advocate  nor  oppose  causes."  In  view  of  the  public  trust  which 
reposed  in  the  press,  he  believed  that  no  individual  had  the  right  to 
impose  any  sort  of  censorship,  direct  or  indirect,  upon  the  free  dissemi- 
nation of  public  intelligence. 

"And,"  he  said,  "I  don't  care  whether  that  man  is  the  nation's 
ruler,  the  head  of  a  news  agency,  or  the  publisher  of  an  individual  paper. 
Newspapers  are  business  enterprises,  and  they  must  make  money  to  sur- 
vive, but  any  newspaper  that  distorts  news,  or  resorts  to  that  even 
more  deadly  form  of  distortion — suppression  of  essential  facts — has  no 
more  right  to  continued  existence  than  any  other  business  enterprise 
which  persistently  defrauds  its  customers." 

The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois  delivered  its  last  news  report 
on  September  3,  1900.  The  next  day,  over  the  same  wires,  the  new 
Associated  Press  started  the  first  dispatches  of  the  transformed  service. 
The  change-over  was  challenged.  Court  action  was  instituted  on  behalf 
of  some  non-member  papers,  attacking  the  legality  of  the  transfer  to 
New  York.  It  was  some  time  before  the  matter  was  adjudicated,  but 
the  verdict  upheld  the  right  of  Associated  Press  members  to  take  the 
course  they  had  followed.  The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois,  the  decision 
stated,  was  under  no  obligation  to  continue  when  it  found  it  could  not 
achieve  its  proper  purposes  under  the  laws  of  that  state.  The  associa- 
tion likewise  was  free  to  dispose  of  all  its  property  and  there  was 
nothing  to  bar  its  former  members  from  incorporating  the  successor 
association  in  New  York,  which  in  turn  acquired  that  property. 

After  years  of  slow  evolution  and  battle,  The  Associated  Press  had 
reached  its  goal  as  the  world's  only  non-profit,  co-operative  news-gather- 
ing organization.  The  ideal  of  truth  in  news  had  emerged  and  the 
association  dedicated  to  that  ideal  now  stood  on  solid  ground. 


I.  PEACE  AND  PROPAGANDA 


BUNDLED  in  a  heavy  overcoat,  Guglielmo  Marconi,  then  a  young 
man  of  twenty-seven,  moved  about  giving  orders  while  a  huge  kite 
strained  at  its  cord  of  wire  in  the  high  winds  over  Newfoundland. 
It  was  Saturday,  December  21,  1901. 

There  had  already  been  three  failures.  On  Tuesday  Marconi  and 
his  assistants  had  flown  their  first  kite  but  they  had  not  heard  signals 
from  the  English  station  at  Poldhu  in  Cornwall.  The  next  day  they 
tried  a  balloon.  Both  the  balloon  and  the  aerial  it  supported  were  car- 
ried away  in  a  squall.  Then  another  kite  and  its  aerial  were  lost, 
whipped  out  to  sea  by  the  high  winds. 

By  11:30  that  Saturday  morning  Marconi  and  his  half  dozen 
helpers  got  a  third  kite  up  and  the  crew  paid  out  the  wire  until  it 
stretched  four  hundred  feet  into  the  wintry  sky.  Then  they  walked  back 
to  the  barracklike  building  where  a  primitive  wireless  receiving  appar- 
atus had  been  set  up.  A  tense  wait  began  among  the  jumble  of  extra 
supplies — the  zinc  sheets,  gas  cylinders,  deflated  balloons,  and  spare 
kites. 

For  days  now,  by  prearrangement,  the  experimental  station  seven- 
teen hundred  miles  away  in  Cornwall  had  been  repeating  the  same  test 
signal — the  simplest  possible.  It  was  the  letter  S,  three  dots  in  tele- 
graph code. 

For  almost  an  hour  Marconi  sat  listening,  a  single  headphone 
clamped  to  his  ear.  The  five  men  watched  him.  At  12:30  his  numbed 
fingers  trembled.  The  instrument  on  the  table  moved  almost  imper- 
ceptibly and  the  headphone  weakly  whispered  three  dots — the  letter  S! 
The  signal  was  repeated,  once,  twice,  several  times.  It  was  faint  but 
unmistakable. 

Marconi  was  on  his  feet  gesticulating.  "Avete  sentito?  Avete  sen- 
tito?"  he  shouted.  "Did  you  hear  it?  Did  you  hear  it?" 

They  passed  the  headphone  around  and  one  after  another  con- 
firmed the  signal.  Even  the  fishermen  who  helped  with  the  kites  had 
their  chance  to  listen.  The  absence  of  sending  equipment  prevented 

161 


1 62  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Marconi  from  replying.  He  dashed  to  the  cable  office  and  his  jubilant 
message  to  co-workers  abroad  proclaimed  that  wireless  no  longer  was 
limited  to  small  distances.  It  could  range  the  earth! 

Marconi's  1901  successes  prompted  the  United  States  Navy  to  dis- 
continue the  use  of  pigeons  for  communications  in  the  fleet  and  to 
substitute  wireless  telegraphy.  But  before  the  navy  took  this  step, 
even  before  Marconi  projected  the  transatlantic  signal  test,  The  Asso- 
ciated Press  with  the  co-operation  of  the  New  York  Herald  had  used 
the  inventor  and  his  wireless  to  report  a  news  event.  The  story  was  the 
first  covered  by  wireless  in  this  country  and  marked  the  initial  public 
demonstration  of  the  invention  in  America.  That  was  in  1899.  Marconi 
had  been  experimenting  in  Europe  for  four  years,  receiving  and  sending 
messages  over  limited  distances.  James  Gordon  Bennett,  Jr.,  of  the 
Herald  contracted  with  him  to  come  to  New  York  and  demonstrate  an 
attempt  to  report  the  international  yacht  races  that  October.  He  brought 
his  equipment  in  two  trunks.  About  the  same  time  another  distinguished 
visitor  arrived.  He  was  the  trim,  amiable  sportsman,  Thomas  Lipton, 
here  for  his  first  attempt  to  lift  the  symbol  of  international  yachting 
supremacy,  the  America's  cup. 

Marconi  had  his  opportunity  to  demonstrate  wireless  in  reporting 
the  competition  between  Lipton's  Shamrock  and  the  American  Columbia. 
A  tall  receiving  mast  was  erected  on  the  Atlantic  Highlands.  A  cor- 
responding mast  was  erected  on  a  building  in  34th  Street  and  two 
ocean  going  liners  were  chartered  to  follow  the  races,  carrying  Mar- 
coni's equipment.  The  Columbia  defeated  the  English  contender  in 
three  straight  races  off  Sandy  Hook  on  October  16,  17  and  20,  and 
detailed  accounts  were  transmitted  to  the  land  stations.  The  cost  ex- 
ceeded $25,000,  a  considerable  sum  in  those  days  for  a  single  story,  but 
the  demonstration  was  highly  successful. 

A  year  later  Marconi's  wireless  again  assisted  The  Associated 
Press  in  covering  the  1900  sailing  of  the  international  classic.  In  1902,  a 
rival  appeared  in  the  person  of  Lee  De  Forest,  young  pioneer  of 
American  wireless  development.  He  raised  enough  money  to  get  from 
Chicago  to  New  York  and  offered  his  services  to  The  Associated  Press 
for  reporting  the  races  with  equipment  he  had  perfected.  General 
Manager  Stone  already  had  contracted  with  Marconi  again  and  De 
Forest  found  employment  with  one  of  the  commercial  agencies. 

From  a  yachting  standpoint,  the  first  race  went  off  smoothly 
enough,  but  this  time  the  wirelessed  news  did  not  fare  so  well.  The 
Marconi  and  De  Forest  boats  docked  after  the  finish  only  to  learn  that 
not  one  understandable  word  had  been  received.  The  two  primitive 


PEACE  AND  PROPAGANDA  163 

spark  sets,  operating  in  such  close  proximity  with  their  ear-splitting, 
crackling  noise,  had  set  up  such  a  field  of  interference  that  they  com- 
pletely jumbled  each  other's  signals. 

Later,  with  Stone's  co-operation,  the  inventor  introduced  the  first 
regular  daily  news  service  on  the  high  seas  while  conducting  experiments 
on  the  Cunarder  Lucania.  At  the  close  of  each  day  Stone  sent  Marconi 
a  summary  of  important  news.  Reception  was  uninterrupted  all  the 
way  across  the  Atlantic  and  the  daily  news  budget  Marconi  received 
was  posted  in  the  steamer's  smoking  room. 


Marconi's  experiments  during  the  frigid  December  days  at  New- 
foundland made  1901  historic  in  the  annals  of  science,  but  for  America 
the  year  marked  a  national  sorrow  in  President  McKinley's  assassination 
on  September  6  at  the  Pan-American  Exposition  in  Buffalo.  At  the 
President's  side  when  Leon  Czolgosz  fired  through  a  handkerchief 
stood  a  young  string  correspondent  who  had  been  assigned  to  cover 
the  reception.  The  reporter  ran  to  the  only  telephone  in  the  vicinity 
and  blurted  out  his  story  to  an  editor  in  the  Buffalo  bureau.  Then,  to 
keep  his  story  exclusive  as  long  as  possible,  he  ripped  out  all  the  wires 
and  wrecked  the  telephone.  He  thought  it  an  ingenious  move  until  he 
realized  a  few  minutes  later  that  he  had  destroyed  his  own  line  of 
communication.  It  required  a  full  half  hour  to  relay  further  informa- 
tion from  the  scene  of  the  assassination. 

In  1902  a  greater  tragedy  made  the  year's  big  story.  The  night  of 
May  2  brought  the  first  meager  tidings — a  telegram  from  St.  Thomas 
in  the  Danish  West  Indies.  It  reported  that  Mount  Pelee,  the  volcano 
on  near-by  Martinique,  was  erupting  and  the  town  of  Saint-Pierre  was 
shrouded  in  smoke  and  covered  an  inch  deep  with  volcanic  ashes.  All 
cable  communications  were  broken  before  The  Associated  Press  could 
hear  from  its  two  correspondents  on  Martinique,  one  at  Saint-Pierre  and 
the  other  at  Fort-de-France,  nine  miles  away. 

Through  the  night  New  York  headquarters  endeavored  to  devise 
some  way  to  get  the  news.  Correspondents  at  St.  Vincent,  St.  Thomas, 
Puerto  Rico,  Barbados,  Trinidad,  and  St.  Lucia  were  ordered  to  send 
any  information  which  might  have  reached  them,  and  also  to  make  every 
effort  to  reach  Martinique.  Then  Stone  discovered  that  an  old  news- 
paper friend,  Ayme,  was  the  American  consul  at  Guadeloupe,  a  small 
island  a  dozen  miles  from  Martinique.  The  general  manager  appealed 


164  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

to  Washington  to  grant  a  leave  of  absence  and  then  cabled  the  consul 
to  charter  a  boat  for  Martinique. 

All  the  w*y  from  Guadeloupe  Ayme's  boat  navigated  through  a 
thick  cloud  of  falling  ashes  and  cinders.  It  was  a  dangerous  night  trip 
and  when  the  boat  finally  reached  Saint-Pierre,  Ayme  was  aghast  at 
what  he  saw.  The  entire  population  of  the  town,  some  thirty  thousand, 
had  been  buried  under  the  burning  mass  of  hot  ashes,  and  among  the 
victims  was  the  regular  correspondent  that  New  York  had  tried  so  hard 
to  reach.  Saint-Pierre  was  a  charnel  house  and  even  Ayme's  long  news- 
paper experience  did  not  immunize  him  to  the  horror  he  found.  He 
began  to  assemble  the  story.  He  was  joined  presently  by  the  correspon- 
dent from  Fort-de-France,  Jose  Ivanes,  who  had  escaped  unhurt, 
and  together  these  two  men  worked  in  the  blazing  cinders.  Ayme  pieced 
the  narrative  together  as  his  boat  dashed  back  to  Guadeloupe. 

Stone  called  the  story  "worthy  of  the  younger  Pliny,"  who  wrote 
the  classic  description  of  the  destruction  of  Pompeii  and  Herculaneum. 


The  performance  of  The  Associated  Press  during  those  first  few 
years  of  the  new  century  spoke  well  for  the  administration  of  the  new 
organization,  but  General  Manager  Stone  was  dissatisfied  with  one 
important  phase  of  the  report,  the  propaganda  in  and  the  censorship  of 
European  news. 

An  autumn  day  in  1902  found  him  in  Paris,  walking  briskly  toward 
the  Quai  d'Orsay.  The  minister  of  foreign  affairs,  M.  Theophile  Del- 
casse,  was  expecting  him. 

With  the  end  of  the  Spanish-American  War,  the  United  States 
emerged  as  a  modern  world  power  and  Stone  noticed  the  heightened 
interest  of  Americans  in  international  affairs.  Nevertheless,  correspon- 
dents abroad  still  labored  under  great  handicaps.  In  some  countries 
there  was  the  strictest  censorship,  in  others  there  was  unofficial  yet  none 
the  less  rigid  regulation,  and  almost  everywhere  in  Europe  there  was 
the  hopeless  drawback  of  government-controlled  telegraph  systems 
which  delayed  or  withheld  America-bound  dispatches. 

The  co-operative  had  competent  American  correspondents  in  some 
European  capitals  and  in  several  of  the  more  important  cities,  but  the 
twin  handicaps  of  censorship  and  poor  telegraphic  service  had  defeated 
attempts  to  gather  European  news  at  first  hand.  M.  Jules  Cambon,  the 
French  ambassador  at  Washington,  expressed  concern  over  the  need  for 


PEACE  AND  PROPAGANDA  165 

faster,  more  adequate  news  from  France  and  Stone  tactfully  reminded 
him  of  the  obstacles  France  herself  interposed.  The  Republic  had  no 
formal  censorship,  but  it  achieved  the  same  effect  by  refusing  cor- 
respondents access  to  the  news  of  many  of  its  most  important  depart- 
ments. Service  of  the  government-controlled  telegraph  was  so  poor 
that  it  frequently  took  a  dispatch  six  or  seven  hours  to  get  from  a  pro- 
vincial city  to  Paris,  and  there  the  story  was  likely  tp  encounter  a  like 
delay  before  being  routed  to  the  United  States. 

The  ambassador's  desire  to  help  improve  conditions  gave  Stone  his 
first  chance.  Cambon  forwarded  Stone's  views  and  added  his  own 
opinion  that,  if  the  news  of  France  could  be  collected  and  written  by 
unhindered  Associated  Press  correspondents,  relations  between  the  two 
nations  would  benefit. 

Stone's  reception  at  the  Quai  d'Orsay  was  cordial.  M.  Delcasse 
manifested  much  interest  and  appeared  well  informed.  He  listened 
attentively  as  Stone  cited  numerous  instances  when  correspondents  had 
filed  dispatches  only  to  have  them  thrown  aside  by  a  clerk  in  a  gov- 
ernment telegraph  office  until  all  government,  commercial,  even  family 
death  telegrams  first  had  been  cleared. 

M.  Delcasse  assured  Stone  he  was  in  agreement  that  the  situa- 
tion was  bad.  However,  one  could  understand  that  it  would  be  an 
extremely  serious  matter  to  make  changes.  The  minister  of  foreign 
affairs  apologized,  but  it  was  something  he  must  first  discuss  with  his 
confreres,  especially  with  the  minister  of  telegraphs.  He  would  do  that 
immediately  and  would  like  Stone  to  have  breakfast  with  him  the  next 
morning  so  that  he  might  meet  the  other  members  of  the  Cabinet. 

The  breakfast  was  served  in  M.  Delcasse's  private  room  in  the 
palace  set  apart  for  the  Department  of  Foreign  Affairs.  Stone's  atten- 
tion was  attracted  by  a  piece  of  furniture  in  the  apartment — an  old  ma- 
hogany table — and  he  was  told  that  it  had  played  an  important  part  in 
American  history  three  times.  On  it  three  documents  had  been  signed: 
the  agreement  by  which  Benjamin  Franklin  had  obtained  financial  aid 
from  France  for  the  struggling  thirteen  colonies  5  the  treaty  of  peace 
which  ended  the  War  of  1812;  lastly,  the  treaty  which  brought  to  a 
close  the  Spanish-American  War  of  1898.  The  discussion  turned  tem- 
porarily to  historical  subjects,  but  when  it  returned  to  news,  Stone  spoke 
out. 

"If  The  Associated  Press  is  to  gather  the  news  of  France  at  first 
hand,"  he  told  the  ministers,  "then  our  correspondents  must  be  abso- 
lutely free  and  there  must  be  no  attempt  to  influence  them.  I  under 


1 66  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

stand,  of  course,  that  in  order  to  be  useful  the  representative  of  The 
Associated  Press  accredited  to  any  capital  must  be  on  friendly  terms  with 
the  government  at  that  capital,  but  under  no  consideration  will  he  be  a 
servile  agent  of  that  government.  The  Associated  Press  will  not  sur- 
render the  right  to  free  and  accurate  statement  of  the  news,  and  any- 
thing the  association  may  do  in  the  future  must  be  done  with  the  dis- 
tinct understanding  that  the  government  of  France  will  not  attempt  to 
influence  the  impartial  character  of  the  service.  If  the  French  govern- 
ment can  see  its  way  to  expedite  our  dispatches  on  the  state  telegraph 
system,  if  it  will  throw  open  all  departments  of  the  government  to  us 
so  we  can  obtain  the  facts,  then  I  shall  be  very  glad  to  establish  a  full- 
sized  bureau  in  Paris  and  take  all  our  French  news  from  Paris  direct." 

Things  moved  slowly  in  the  Paris  of  1902  and  Stone  saw  it  would 
be  some  time  before  action,  if  any,  was  taken.  So  he  returned  to 
America. 

One  day  less  than  a  month  later,  a  bulky  communication  reached 
him  in  New  York.  It  was  from  M.  Delcasse. 

First  and  foremost,  the  French  government  pledged  that  its  offi- 
cials henceforth  would  supply  representatives  of  the  co-operative  with 
all  pertinent  information.  Officials  would  answer  any  questions  that 
might  be  of  interest  to  the  United  States  and  would  do  everything  in 
their  power  to  expedite  the  news  thus  obtained.  To  eliminate  delays, 
the  Ministry  of  Telegraphs  had  prepared  three  special  blanks  for  the 
exclusive  use  of  The  Associated  Press.  The  first,  which  had  "Associated 
Press"  printed  across  its  face  in  red  ink,  was  for  routine  stories  and 
took  precedence  over  everything  but  government  telegrams.  The  second, 
bearing  the  inscription  "Associated  Press,  tres  presse,"  was  for  more 
important  matter  and  assured  transmission  immediately  after  any 
government  message  then  on  the  wire.  The  third,  labeled  "Associated 
Press,  urgent?  was  for  news  of  outstanding  importance  and  superseded 
all  other  telegrams. 


The  success  of  this  system  so  pleased  the  French  Foreign  Office 
that  it  offered  to  Bassist  Stone  in  the  plans  he  already  had  in  mind  to 
break  down  the  barriers  in  other  countries.  During  his  conferences  with 
M.  Delcasse  the  general  manager  had  mentioned  the  possibility  of 
treating  with  Italy  and  Spain  on  the  same  subject.  Accordingly,  as  soon 


PEACE  AND  PROPAGANDA  167 

as  the  reforms  were  effected  in  France,  the  minister  of  foreign  affairs 
suggested  that  Stone  might  find  the  moment  opportune  to  approach  the 
other  two  governments.  To  be  helpful,  he  issued  instructions  to  the 
French  ambassador  at  the  Quirinal  to  pursue  the  matter  with  Italian 
authorities. 

So  in  1903  Stone  went  abroad  once  again.  Italy  had  been  tried  by 
a  disastrous  Ethiopian  War  and  the  assassination  of  a  king  since  he  had 
been  there  as  a  tourist  after  he  left  the  Chicago  News.  The  new  mon- 
arch, Victor  Emmanuel  III,  and  dominant  Giovanni  Giolitti  held  the 
reins  of  government. 

Stone  learned  that  the  French  ambassador,  M.  Barrere,  had  done 
much  to  prepare  the  way  for  him.  The  first  solution  offered  was  to  have 
correspondents  in  Italy  send  dispatches  on  the  government-owned  tele- 
graph to  the  border  for  relay  on  the  French  wires  to  Paris.  That  would 
improve  matters  somewhat,  but  there  was  a  better  way — sending  the 
dispatches  direct  from  Rome  to  New  York.  Stone  said  so  in  his  con- 
ference with  officials  of  the  Italian  Foreign  Office  and  then  came  a  com- 
mand to  an  audience  with  the  King. 

The  conversation  between  Stone  and  Victor  Emmanuel  was  with- 
out formality,  but  it  soon  reached  a  delicate  point.  Rome,  in  effect,  was 
the  capital  of  two  sovereigns — Victor  Emmanuel,  temporal  ruler  of 
Italy,  and  Leo  XIII,  spiritual  head  of  the  Catholic  Church.  For  years 
relations  between  the  government  and  the  papacy  had  been  strained — 
it  would  be  more  than  a  quarter  of  a  century  before  they  were  satis- 
factorily adjusted — and  the  pontiffs  during  that  period  remained  volun- 
tary "prisoners"  in  the  Vatican.  Stone  realized  that  the  man  he  placed 
in  charge  of  a  Rome  Bureau  he  planned  to  establish  would  be  in  a  diffi- 
cult position  because  it  would  be  necessary  for  him  to  be  persona  grata 
both  at  the  Quirinal  and  at  the  Vatican. 

He  voiced  his  thoughts  frankly  and  Victor  Emmanuel  assured  him 
that  he  entertained  nothing  but  the  kindliest  of  personal  feelings  toward 
the  Pope.  Of  course,  officially,  the  Quirinal  and  the  Vatican  were 
estranged,  but  the  estrangement  should  not  hamper  the  co-operative. 

A  few  days  after  his  audience  with  the  King, 
at  the  Vatican  by  the  aging  Pope  who  had  reigned, 
talked  for  an  hour. 

Then  he  opened  the  new  Rome  Bureau,  anc 
head  it  was  Salvatore  Cortesi,  who  had  been  doiij 
for  The  Associated  Press  since  the  mid-nineties. 


1 68  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 


A  few  weeks  later  Stone  was  in  Berlin.  He  had  met  Kaiser  Wil- 
helm's  brother,  Prince  Henry  of  Prussia,  during  the  latter's  visit  to  the 
United  States  in  1902,  and  he  was  "commanded"  to  attend  a  special 
Ordenfest  given  by  the  Emperor.  After  the  banquet  Stone  was  sum- 
moned to  an  anteroom  for  his  private  audience  with  the  Kaiser. 

The  Kaiser  gave  the  general  manager  assurances  he  would  issue 
the  necessary  orders  to  place  The  Associated  Press  in  a  satisfactory 
position  in  Germany  as  regarded  both  censorship  and  prompt  trans- 
mission. He  turned  the  details  over  to  Postmaster  General  Sydow  who 
agreed  on  a  small  red  label  bearing  the  word:  "America."  Pasted  on  a 
press  message  anywhere  in  the  Fatherland,  it  guaranteed  the  telegram 
first  place  on  all  wires. 

That  same  year  the  association's  new  European  organization  re- 
ceived its  first  major  test.  It  came  almost  before  Cortesi  had  become 
settled  as  chief  of  the  Rome  Bureau  and,  because  of  the  nature  of  the 
event,  it  caused  the  Italian  government  to  proclaim  a  special  censor- 
ship. In  the  silence  of  the  Vatican  Pope  Leo  XIII  lay  dying.  At  the 
time  of  his  election  as  pontiff  everyone  had  expected  his  reign  to  be 
short.  He,  himself,  had  jested  while  being  robed  on  that  occasion: 
"Hurry,  or  I  shall  die  before  you  have  finished."  That  was  a  quarter 
of  a  century  earlier  and  he  had  lived  to  bury  all  but  one  of  the  car- 
dinals who  participated  in  the  conclave  which  selected  him.  Now,  how- 
ever, the  end  was  at  hand  and  the  Italian  government  notified  all  corre- 
spondents that  no  dispatch  of  the  Pope's  passing  could  be  transmitted 
for  two  hours  after  his  death.  This  was  to  permit  the  Vatican  sufficient 
time  to  notify  papal  legates  in  other  lands. 

Ever  since  he  had  begun  work  for  The  Associated  Press  in  the 
nineties,  Cortesi  had  cultivated  sources  and  contacts  in  the  Vatican. 
For  ten  years  he  had  paid  weekly  visits  to  Dr.  Giuseppe  Lapponi,  the 
Pope's  personal  physician,  and  the  two  men  had  become  close  friends. 
He  also  had  made  it  a  point  to  become  acquainted  with  the  Pope's  rela- 
tives outside  the  Vatican  and  as  many  members  of  the  papal  house- 
hold as  possible,  until  he  had  a  small  army  of  unofficial  reporters  ready 
for  any  emergency. 

Leo  XIII  fell  ill  during  the  intolerably  hot  Rome  weather  of 
July.  Some  of  the  organization's  best  correspondents  immediately  were 
ordered  to  Cortesi's  aid,  among  them  William  A.  M.  Goode,  who 
had  been  on  Admiral  Sampson's  flagship  during  the  Spanish-American 


PEACE  AND  PROPAGANDA  169 

War,  and  Charles  T.  Thompson,  the  new  chief  of  the  Paris  Bureau. 
They  found  Cortesi  had  the  situation  well  in  hand.  In  spite  of  official 
silence  on  what  was  happening  in  the  sickroom,  he  was  able  to  report 
every  detail  during  the  eighteen  days  of  the  Pope's  illness. 

The  world  followed  the  hourly  accounts  with  anxious  suspense. 
In  the  United  States  both  Protestant  and  Catholic  churches  offered 
prayers  for  recovery.  To  show  the  importance  of  quick  coverage,  Stone 
cabled  Cortesi  an  account  of  these  services  and  the  correspondent  trans- 
mitted the  message  to  the  Vatican  where  Monsignor  della  Chiesa — the 
future  Benedict  XV — showed  it  to  Leo  XIII.  The  sinking  Pope  scanned 
it  with  dim  eyes  and  exclaimed:  "I  die  satisfied,  as  this  shows  that  my 
idea  of  the  reunion  of  all  Christian  churches  is  not  a  dream." 

Tension  increased  as  the  end  neared  and  for  weeks  Cortesi  had 
been  perfecting  a  plan  whereby  he  not  only  hoped  to  have  the  news 
promptly,  but  also — and  this  was  hardly  less  important — to  be  able 
to  transmit  it  to  "Melstone,  Newyork,"  the  cable  address  of  the  gen- 
eral manager. 

The  last  day  came.  In  the  little  Vatican  room  a  Pope  passed  away. 
Then  there  was  an  age-old  ceremony  to  be  observed.  Before  the  Pope 
could  be  declared  officially  dead,  his  private  physician  first  must  pass 
a  lighted  candle  before  the  still  lips  to  show  the  pontiff  breathed  no 
more.  Dr.  Lapponi  stepped  into  an  adjoining  room  to  obtain  the  candle 
for  the  ceremony.  It  took  only  a  moment  to  pick  up  the  telephone  there 
and  whisper  a  few  words.  In  the  Rome  Bureau  two  miles  away,  Cortesi 
heard  the  few  words,  wrote  down  three  numbers  and  dashed  out. 

Those  who  braved  the  blazing  heat  of  that  July  day  stared  at  the 
apparently  demented  man  who  tore  past  them  in  the  streets,  running 
for  the  Central  Telegraph  Office.  He  slapped  the  message  on  the  counter 
and  a  perspiring  clerk,  mystified  at  the  need  for  such  excited  haste, 
read  the  innocuous  words: 

MELSTONE,  NEWYORK 
NUMBER  MISSING  BOND  404 
(SIGNED)  MONTEFIORE. 

"Send  it  all  routes,"  panted  Cortesi.  "Urgent!" 

Nine  minutes  later  The  Associated  Press  in  New  York  learned 
what  no  one  in  Rome  and  few  in  the  Vatican  yet  knew.  Leo  XIII  had 
died  at  4:04  A.M.  The  news  was  flashed  across  the  United  States  to  San 
Francisco  and  from  border  to  border.  It  went  back  on  the  cables  to 
Europe,  giving  London,  Paris,  Berlin,  even  Rome,  the  first  news  of 
the  Pope's  death. 


170  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Stone  and  Cortesi  had  prearranged  the  harmless-appearing  code 
message  to  circumvent  the  special  censorship.  Only  the  numerals  had 
to  be  filled  in— and  the  numerals  told  the  precise  minute  of  the  Pontiff's 
passing. 

The  death  of  Leo  XIII  demonstrated  the  remarkable  change  which 
had  occurred  in  the  handling  of  foreign  news.  When  Leo's  predecessor 
died  in  1878,  only  ten  lines  were  carried.  On  Leo's  death  the  co-opera- 
tive cabled  enough  to  fill  a  complete  newspaper  page,  approximately 
eight  thousand  words. 

6 

In  America  that  late  summer  of  1903  the  first  automobile  crossed 
the  continent  in  fifty-two  days.  Joseph  Pulitzer  gave  Columbia  Uni- 
versity $2,000,000  to  found  a  School  of  Journalism.  Samuel  P.  Langley 
failed  in  his  attempt  to  fly  a  heavier-than-air  machine  over  the  Potomac 
River.  The  obstacles  blocking  the  construction  of  the  Panama  Canal 
were  at  last  being  surmounted.  Nor  was  news  the  only  thing.  Stone's 
thoughts  once  more  turned  toward  Europe,  this  time  to  Russia. 

Up  to  this  time  the  empire  of  the  Czars  had  been  the  despair  of 
news  gathering.  Every  conceivable  obstacle  was  put  in  the  way  of  corre- 
spondents. The  censorship  was  the  most  stringent  in  the  world.  Tolls 
on  the  government  telegraph  were  exorbitant  and  the  service  itself  so 
slovenly  that  messages  frequently  were  delayed  for  days.  Until  some- 
thing was  done  about  Russia,  The  Associated  Press  could  not  pretend  to 
supply  a  complete  and  accurate  news  picture  of  Europe.  Previously, 
however,  the  time  had  not  seemed  propitious  to  carry  the  crusade  to 
Muscovy.  Now  Stone  believed  the  success  of  his  experiment  in  the 
other  countries  would  help  show  Russia  the  way. 

He  enlisted  the  support  of  Count  Cassini,  the  Russian  ambassador 
at  Washington,  and  also  obtained  the  help  of  the  French  and  German 
offices. 

It  was  the  dead  of  winter  when  he  reached  St.  Petersburg.  Bells 
jingled  as  droshkies  whirled  along  Nevsky  Prospekt.  The  river  Neva 
was  thick  with  ice,  and  snow  blanketed  its  many  islands.  An  agent 
whom  Stone  had  met  in  London  had  preceded  him  to  the  Russian 
capital  so  the  Czar's  ministers  might  know  in  advance  of  the  general 
manager's  proposals. 

Count  Lamsdorff,  the  Minister  of  Foreign  Affairs,  was  cordial, 
but  protested  he  was  powerless  to  give  active  help.  The  question  of 
cen$pi*hip  and  the  telegraph  was  wholly  in  the  hands  of  Minister  of 


PEACE  AND  PROPAGANDA  171 

the  Interior  Viatscheslav  Plehve,  who  was  answerable  only  to  the  Czar. 
Stone  met  Plehve,  who  also  headed  the  dread  secret  police,  and  his 
hopes  at  once  suffered  a  setback.  The  minister  made  no  secret  of  the 
fact  that  any  change  in  existing  conditions  might  be  dangerous  in  a 
country  harried  by  assassinations,  secret  societies,  and  Nihilist  plots  to 
overthrow  the  government. 

"Frankly,"  he  said,  "I  am  not  prepared  to  abolish  the  censorship. 
To  my  mind  it  would  be  a  very  imprudent  thing  to  do.  However,  I 
will  go  as  far  as  I  can  toward  meeting  your  other  wishes." 

The  telegraph  service?  The  press  rate?  Plehve  promised  to  make 
arrangements  for  dispatches,  but  of  course  they  could  not  take  prece- 
dence over  government  messages  or  telegrams  from  a  member  of  the 
imperial  family.  As  for  the  press  rate,  that  unfortunately  was  not  the 
province  of  the  minister  of  the  interior.  Stone  would  have  to  consult 
with  the  minister  of  finance. 

Shuttled  from  bureau  to  bureau,  struggling  with  official  red  tape 
and  procrastination,  Stone's  mission  seemed  hopeless.  He  talked  with 
the  timid  foreign  censor — who  also  had  time  to  be  government  censor 
of  the  Russian  stage — and  found  him  fearful  to  pass  a  single  line  that 
might  offend  anyone. 

As  the  bleak  Russian  winter  grew  deeper,  Stone  slowly  began  to 
win  a  few  concessions.  Rapidity  of  transmission  first  was  assured.  Next, 
a  satisfactory  press  rate  was  negotiated.  Then,  a  little  later,  two  de- 
partments agreed  to  receive  the  regular  correspondent  assigned  to  St. 
Petersburg.  But  the  citadel  of  censorship  still  stood  unshaken.  Stone 
was  almost  ready  to  confess  defeat  when,  on  January  18,  1904,  he  was 
asked  to  an  audience  with  the  Czar  in  the  famous  Winter  Palace. 

At  the  end  of  a  labyrinth  of  wide  halls  and  endless  corridors,  lined 
with  guards,  functionaries,  and  attendants,  the  general  manager  was 
ushered  into  a  library  to  meet  the  Czar  of  All  the  Russias,  an  unassum- 
ing man  of  thirty-five  dressed  in  the  braided  white  jacket  and  blue 
trousers  of  the  navy. 

Stone  explained  the  desire  of  his  organization  to  collect  the  news 
of  Russia  accurately  and  swiftly  and  to  transmit  it  to  the  United 
States. directly  from  St.  Petersburg  and  not  from  neighboring  nations. 

"We  come  as  friends,"  he  said,  "and  it  is  my  desire  that  our 
representatives  here  shall  treat  Russia  as  a  friend  j  but  it  is  the  very 
essence  of  the  proposed  plan  that  we  be  free  to  tell  the  truth.  We  can- 
not be  the  mouthpiece  of  Russia,  we  cannot  plead  her  cause,  except  in 
so  far  as  telling  the  truth  will  do  it." 


172  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

"That,"  replied  the  Czar,  "is  all  we  could  ask  of  you." 

He  asked  Stone  to  enumerate  the  reforms  sought. 

"It  seems  to  me,  your  Majesty,"  Stone  said,  "that  censorship  is 
not  only  valueless  from  your  own  point  of  view,  but  works  a  positive 
harm.  A  wall  has  been  built  up  around  the  country,  and  the  fact  that 
no  correspondent  for  a  foreign  paper  can  live  and  work  here  has  re- 
sulted in  a  traffic  of  false  Russian  news  that  is  most  hurtful.  Today 
there  are  newspapermen  in  Vienna,  Berlin  and  London  who  make  a 
living  by  peddling  out  the  news  of  Russia,  and  it  is  usually  false.  If  we 
were  free  to  tell  the  truth  in  Russia,  as  we  are  in  other  countries,  no 
self-respecting  newspaper  in  the  world  would  print  a  dispatch  from 
Vienna  respecting  the  internal  affairs  of  Russia,  because  the  editor  would 
know  that,  if  the  thing  were  true,  it  would  come  from  Russia  direct. 
All  you  do  now  is  to  drive  a  correspondent  to  send  his  dispatches  across 
the  German  border.  I  am  able  to  write  anything  I  choose  in  Russia, 
and  send  it  by  messenger  to  Wirballen,  across  the  German  border,  and 
it  will  go  from  there  without  change.  You  are  powerless  to  prevent 
my  sending  these  dispatches,  and  all  you  do  is  to  anger  the  correspond- 
ent and  make  him  an  enemy,  and  delay  his  dispatches,  robbing  the 
Russian  telegraph  lines  of  a  revenue  they  should  receive.  So  it  occurs 
to  me  that  the  censorship  is  inefficient  5  that  it  is  a  censorship  which  does 
not  censor,  but  annoys." 

The  Czar  requested  Stone  to  embody  his  ideas  in  a  formal  memo- 
randum which  he  might  study  before  issuing  any  orders.  The  man's 
sincerity  seemed  patent  and  Stone  might  have  been  optimistic  had  not 
the  monarch  been  so  preoccupied  over  the  crisis  in  Russia's  relations 
with  Japan  in  the  Far  East.  With  the  vast  empire  teetering  on  the 
brink  of  war,  Stone  knew  all  too  well  that  his  memorandum  might  be 
lost  in  the  shuffle. 

Little  happened  that  the  secret  police  did  not  learn  and  Plehve 
soon  was  advised  that  Stone's  memorandum  was  in  the  hands  of  the 
Czar.  Unrelenting  in  his  antagonism  to  any  proposal  he  considered 
"revolutionary,"  he  asked  Stone  to  agree  to  a  halfway  measure  provid- 
ing for  nominal  censorship.  The  suggestion  was  rejected. 

No  word  came  from  the  Czar  and  the  crisis  with  Japan  hourly 
grew  worse.  Stone  quit  St.  Petersburg  for  a  few  days  in  Berlin.  There 
he  met  the  Kaiser  again  and  in  a  strangely  prophetic  conversation  the 
German  ruler  said  of  Czar  Nicholas:  "Poor  chap.  I  think  he  is  likely 
to  lose  his  throne!" 

Before  Stone  got  back  to  St.  Petersburg  Japan  launched  a  crippling 


PEACE  AND  PROPAGANDA  173 

surprise  attack  on  the  warships  of  the  Russian  Far  Eastern  squadron  at 
Port  Arthur.  Two  days  later  the  government  of  the  Mikado  declared 
war.  Stone  foresaw  an  indefinite  wait  before  he  could  get  a  decision 
from  the  Czar.  He  discussed  his  predicament  with  Robert  McCormick, 
the  American  ambassador,  and  asked  him  to  make  inquiries  of  Count 
Lamsdorff  in  the  Foreign  Office. 

The  count  was  surprised  when  the  subject  was  mentioned. 

"Why,  the  thing  is  done!"  he  exclaimed. 

"I  do  not  follow  you,"  the  ambassador  said. 

"Mr.  Stone  left  a  memorandum  of  his  wishes  with  his  Majesty, 
did  he  not?  Well,  the  emperor  wrote  'approved*  on  the  corner  of  the 
memorandum,  and  all  will  be  done.  There  may  be  a  slight  delay 
incident  to  working  out  the  details,  but  it  will  be  done." 

The  news  was  received  with  mixed  feelings.  Stone  could  rejoice 
over  the  victory  which  the  Czar's  approval  represented,  but  he  was 
dubious  at  the  mention  of  "a  slight  delay  incident  to  working  out  the 
details."  That  might  cover  a  multitude  of  postponements  and  give 
hostile  ministers  opportunities  to  circumvent  the  purpose  of  the  im- 
perial order.  But  there  was  nothing  to  be  gained  by  staying  in  Russia 
and  Stone  had  business  in  Vienna.  He  departed,  leaving  the  St.  Peters- 
burg Bureau  in  charge  of  a  man  he  had  been  training  for  that  assign- 
ment. The  correspondent  was  Howard  N.  Thompson,  the  same  staff 
man  who  had  won  notable  recognition  for  his  work  in  the  Spanish- 
American  War  and  its  sequel  of  Cuban  independence. 

Stone  stepped  off  the  train  at  Vienna  to  find  a  lengthy  telegram 
waiting.  It  was  from  Thompson  at  St.  Petersburg  and  it  said: 

I  KNOW  YOU  WILL  BE  GRATIFIED  TO  LEARN  THAT 
ON  MY  RETURN  TO  THE  OFFICE  AFTER  BIDDING  YOU 
ADIEU,  AND  BEFORE  YOUR  FEET  LEFT  THE  SOIL  OF 
ST.  PETERSBURG,  WE  WERE  SERVED  WITH  NOTICE  THAT 
THE  CENSORSHIP  WAS  ABOLISHED  SO  FAR  AS  WE  WERE 
CONCERNED.   BUT  COUNT  LAMSDORFF  FEELS  THAT  IT 
IS  A  MISTAKE,  AND  THAT  WE  SHALL  BE  CHARGED 
-WITH  HAVING  MADE  A  BARGAIN,  AND  ANY  KINDLY 
THINGS  WE  MAY  SAY  OF  RUSSIA  WILL  BE  MISCONSTRUED. 
HE  THINKS  IT  WOULD  BE  MUCH  WISER  IF  THE  CENSORSHIP 
•  WERE  ABOLISHED  AS  TO  ALL  FOREIGN  CORRESPONDENTS 
AND  BUREAUS,  AND  DESIRES  YOUR  INFLUENCE  TO  THAT 
END. 

Stone  wired  back  that  he  was  in  full  agreement  with  Lamsdorff. 
The  Associated  Press  had  no  desire  to  monopolize  this  new  privilege. 


174  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Within  forty-eight  hours  after  censorship  restrictions  were  rescinded 
for  The  Associated  Press,  they  were  rescinded  also  for  all  foreign  cor- 
respondents. 

But  the  world  was  not  standing  still.  The  streets  of  Tokyo  were 
already  resounding  to  shouts  of  "Dai  Nippon  Banzai!  Dai  Nippon 
banzai!  Banzai,  banzai,  banzai!"  The  Mikado's  troops  were  starting  for 
the  front,  and  in  Manchuria  on  the  Asiatic  mainland  the  ponderous 
columns  of  the  Czar  were  on  the  march. 

Another  war  demanded  reporting. 


II.  WAR  IN  THE  EAST 


THERE  were  strange  date  lines  and  strange  names  on  the  front  pages. 
Dispatches  spoke  of  Port  Arthur,  Chemulpo,  Chefoo,  and  the  Yellow 
Sea.  Readers  struggled  with  problems  of  correct  pronunciation  as  they 
learned  about  General  Kuropatkin,  Admiral  Vityeft,  and  the  Japanese 
Kuroki,  Nogi,  and  Togo.  The  unpredictable  limelight  of  news  had  fixed 
upon  a  new  stage  and  the  popular  interest  of  America  shifted  with 
it  to  focus  on  the  clash  of  Russo-Japanese  arms  in  a  distant  corner  of 
the  Far  East. 

It  was  an  America  of  76,000,000  that  read  the  first  scattered  war 
bulletins  in  February,  1904.  The  four  years  that  had  passed  since  the 
transformation  of  The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois  into  the  non-profit 
co-operative  of  New  York  had  given  the  organization  time  to  con- 
solidate its  new  position.  The  number  of  member  papers  now  totaled 
648  and  the  budget  for  annual  operations  exceeded  $2,000,000.  The 
leased  wire  network  had  expanded  to  34,000  miles.  The  news  report 
averaged  60,000  words  daily,  moving  into  editorial  rooms  by  Morse  at 
the  rate  of  35  words  a  minute. 

To  General  Manager  Stone  only  news  of  gravity  was  worthy  of 
notice  and  he  had  reproved  a  youthful  member  of  the  Washington  staff 
who  made  the  first  slight  deviation.  Jackson  S.  Elliott  wrote  a  humorous 
story  about  a  Congressional  fashion  plate  who  had  provoked  much 
merriment  by  appearing  absent-mindedly  on  the  Senate  floor  sporting 
a  tan  shoe  on  one  foot  and  a  black  one  on  the  other.  The  story  got  on 
the  wires  while  the  regular  wire  editor  was  at  lunch.  Although  papers 
from  coast  to  coast  seized  eagerly  on  the  sprightly  piece,  Stone  called 
it  "too  trivial"  for  the  report  and  issued  orders  against  any  repetition. 
The  incident,  however,  was  a  straw  in  the  wind. 

During  Stone's  extensive  travels  for  the  organization,  active  com- 
mand devolved  on  Diehl,  Stone's  capable  right  hand/The  two  men 
were  thousands  of  miles  apart — Stone  back  in  St.  Petersburg  and  Diehl 
in  New  York — when  the  Russo-Japanese  War  broke,  but  they  were  im- 
mediately working  in  unison  to  complete  the  mobilization  of  forces  to 

175 


176  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

report  the  conflict.  From  the  Russian  capital,  Stone  ordered  men  post- 
haste to  the  Far  East:  Henry  J.  Middleton  of  the  Paris  Bureau,  who 
had  done  brilliant  reporting  on  the  Dreyfus  case,  Frederick  McCor- 
ipick,  Robert  M.  Collins,  Lord  Brooke,  journalist  son  of  the  Earl  of 
^Warwick,  Kravschenko,  an  eminent  writer  who  had  covered  wars  in 
China,  and  Nicholas  E.  Popoff,  a  young  Russian  who  wrote  under  the 
name  of  Kiriloff .  To  supplement  the  regular  staff,  he  engaged  a  number 
of  Russian  correspondents  to  serve  as  string  men  for  the  others.  Simul- 
taneously in  New  York  Diehl  was  issuing  assignments  which  sent  an- 
other corps  to  Asia — Paul  Cowles,  of  the  San  Francisco  Bureau,  Chris- 
tian Hagerty,  from  New  York,  George  Denny,  from  Chicago,  and 
Richard  Smith,  who  had  covered  the  Boer  War. 

The  power  of  military  censorship  made  itself  felt  early,  with 
varying  severity.  Russia  invoked  it  in  the  war  zone,  but  its  application 
was  not  unreasonable  and  both  the  men  in  the  field  and  Thompson  in 
St.  Petersburg  were  able  to  obtain  and  transmit  their  news  without 
difficulties.  The  Japanese,  on  the  other  hand,  imposed  stifling  restric- 
tions. They  forbade  correspondents  with  some  of  the  Mikado's  armies 
to  send  a  single  line  and  they  hospitably  "detained"  other  newspaper 
men  in  Tokyo  until  the  campaigns  were  well  under  way. 

The  focal  point  of  one  main  Japanese  attack  was  the  Russian 
stronghold  of  Port  Arthur  where  the  Czar's  Pacific  fleet  lay  under  the 
protecting  guns  of  the  forts.  With  the  Japanese  fleet  controlling  the 
waters  outside  the  Manchurian  port  and  the  first  operations  all  naval 
in  character,  it  was  obvious  that  some  reliable  way  must  be  devised  to 
get  out  uncensored  news  of  the  warfare  in  that  whole  area.  The  task  fell 
to  Paul  Cowles,  the  Pacific  Coast  superintendent  who  had  come  to  the 
Orient  to  supervise  the  news-gathering  operations. 

A  laconic  cable  gave  New  York  the  first  inkling  of  the  way  Cowles 
did  things.  J.  R.  Youatt,  then  cashier  and  later  treasurer,  blinked  when 
he  read  the  bland  message  that  reached  his  desk.  It  was  from  Cowles: 

DRAWING  ON  YOU  FOR  $80,000. 

This  was  impossible!  Youatt,  flabbergasted,  went  hurrying  to 
Stone,  the  fantastic  cablegram  in  his  hand.  Stone,  too,  exploded. 

"The  man  must  be  crazy.  This  is  insane.  $80,000!  Cable  him  im- 
mediately for  an  explanation.  What  can  Cowles  need  that  amount  of 
money  for?" 

TO  BUY  A  YACHT. 


WAR  IN  THE  EAST  177 

Succeeding  inquiries  vindicated  Cowles's  sanity.  Across  the  Gulf 
of  Pechili — ninety  miles  from  Port  Arthur — was  the  neutral  Chinese 
city  of  Chefoo  where  news  could  be  put  uncensored  on  the  cable  for 
Shanghai  and  the  United  States.  Cowles  had  established  headquarters 
there  and  he  bought  the  yacht  not  only  to  serve  as  a  dispatch  boat 
between  Port  Arthur  and  Chefoo  but  also  to  provide  a  means  for  re- 
porting any  naval  engagements  in  that  vicinity. 

Youatt  honored  the  draft  and  when  the  war  ended  Cowles  sold 
the  vessel  at  a  profit. 


Dispatches  from  a  dozen  correspondents  gradually  brought  into 
outline  the  strategy  dictating  the  conflict.  On  land  the  Japanese  aim  was 
a  quick  decisive  victory  over  the  main  Russian  Army  under  General 
Kuropatkin.  The  Russians  were  vaguer,  delaying  decisions  until  the 
arrival  of  endless  reinforcements  would  give  them  an  overwhelming 
superiority. 

But  it  was  apparent  that  the  nation  supreme  on  the  sea  would  be 
victorious.  Admiral  Togo  had  the  Czar's  Pacific  squadron  blockaded  in 
Port  Arthur,  but  he  was  anxious  to  destroy  it  piecemeal  before  arrival 
of  the  new  enemy  fleet  which  was  preparing  to  come  halfway  round 
the  world  from  Europe.  The  Russian  hope  was  to  inflict  as  much  dam- 
age as  possible  without  jeopardizing  their  forces  unnecessarily,  so  that 
Togo's  depleted  fleet  would  be  no  match  for  the  combined  Russian 
Navy  when  the  new  squadron  reached  Asiatic  waters. 

After  some  initial  successes,  Togo  found  himself  with  a  foeman 
of  no  mean  caliber.  Admiral  Makaroff,  a  tall,  bearded  daredevil  of  a 
man,  took  command  of  the  Russian  fleet  at  Port  Arthur,  and  the  two 
Associated  Press  correspondents  there,  George  Denny  and  Kravschenko, 
saw  the  squadron  transformed  from  a  demoralized  aggregation  into  a 
confident  fighting  force.  Makaroff's  torpedo  boats  harassed  Togo,  caus- 
ing considerable  losses.  Other  Russian  cruisers,  based  at  Vladivostok, 
went  into  action,  making  the  Sea  of  Japan  unsafe  for  troop  transports 
and  shipping.  Togo  began  to  sow  mines,  and  Paul  Cowles's  $80,000 
dispatch  yacht  had  to  thread  dangerous  waters  between  Chefoo  and 
Port  Arthur. 

Knowing  MakarofPs  impetuous  temperament,  Correspondent 
Kravschenko  felt  certain  that,  sooner  or  later,  he  would  sally  forth  for 
a  lightning  thrust  at  the  enemy  when  the  Japanese  fleet  was  not  present 
in  full  force.  He  tried  to  persuade  the  admiral  to  grant  him  permission 


178  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

to  be  on  board  the  flagship  Petrofavlovsky  when  she  put  out  to  fight. 
At  first  Makaroff  was  favorably  inclined,  but  he  was  a  quick-tempered 
person  and  the  two  got  into  a  quarrel.  The  admiral  banned  Kravschenko 
from  the  flagship. 

If  Kravschenko  could  not  see  the  action  from  the  bridge  of  the 
flagship,  he  could  watch  from  shore.  Golden  Hill,  outside  of  Port 
Arthur,  commanded  the  surrounding  waters,  and  Kravschenko  went 
there  on  April  10,  1905.  For  three  days  and  nights  he  watched  distant 
ships  of  the  Japanese  through  binoculars.  The  weather  was  bleak,  with 
snow  squalls  and  cold  winds,  and  on  one  night  fog  was  so  thick  that 
searchlights  of  the  near-by  forts  could  not  pierce  it. 

It  was  daybreak  on  April  13  when  Kravschenko  picked  out  a  Rus- 
sian torpedo  boat  racing  for  the  harbor.  Her  sister  ship  had  been 
attacked  by  one  of  Togo's  flotillas.  Makaroff  immediately  dispatched  a 
cruiser  to  the  aid  of  the  stricken  vessel  and  when  another  enemy  division 
appeared  on  the  scene,  he  ordered  all  available  units  out  against  the 
Japanese.  Kravschenko  saw  them  steam  out,  the  Petropavlovsky  lead- 
ing the  way  with  MakarofFs  flag  snapping  at  the  masthead. 

In  a  few  minutes  guns  were  roaring  and  Kravschenko  followed  the 
running  battle  between  the  two  fleets  which  had  closed  in  to  ten  thou- 
sand yards.  He  was  not  alone  on  the  hill  now.  Grand  Duke  Boris,  his 
staff,  and  other  officers  had  arrived  to  watch  the  engagement.  The  Jap- 
anese slowly  withdrew  with  Makaroff  following.  Then  smoke  on  the 
horizon  told  of  the  approach  of  Togo's  main  fleet,  and  Makaroff,  realiz- 
ing his  inferiority  to  the  combined  enemy  forces,  turned  for  the  harbor 
with  Togo  on  his  heels. 

Kravschenko's  watch  said  9:43.  The  Petrofavlovsky  had  reached 
the  protection  of  the  forts  and  was  maneuvering  into  the  harbor  en- 
trance. Without  warning  there  were  four  tremendous  explosions.  The 
flagship  was  ripped  asunder,  her  foremast  came  smashing  down,  her 
bow  plunged  into  the  sea,  and  her  stern  pointed  skyward,  propellers 
spinning  in  the  air.  Then  she  vanished,  carrying  the  intrepid  Makaroff 
and  631  men  to  death.  Togo's  mines  had  done  their  work  well. 

On  Golden  Hill  beside  Kravschenko  Grand  Duke  Boris  fainted 
when  the  battleship  disappeared.  All  along  the  shore  officers  and  men 
who  had  witnessed  the  disastrous  spectacle  began  to  weep  and  pray. 

Kravschenko's  graphic  account  of  the  destruction  of  the  Petropav- 
lovsky  was  one  of  the  most  important  stories  to  come  out  of  the  Far 
East  during  the  opening  months  of  the  struggle,  and  American  readers 
read  of  MakarofFs  end  the  next  day. 


WAR  IN  THE  EAST  179 

The  news  was  not  always  so  swift.  On  May  15  the  Japanese  bat- 
tleship Yachima  struck  a  mine  off  Dalny,  near  Port  Arthur,  and  sank. 
It  was  not  until  early  June  that  The  Associated  Press  was  able  to 
authenticate  the  story  and  cable  it  to  America.  Japanese  authorities  im- 
mediately denied  the  dispatch  and  insisted  that  the  Yachima  continued 
with  the  fleet.  The  same  authorities,  however,  officially  confirmed  the 
accuracy  of  the  news  in  November  when  they  formally  notified  foreign 
governments  of  the  ship's  loss. 


In  Manchuria  the  opposing  armies  had  come  to  grips  and  in  April, 
May,  and  June  the  dispatches  from  Middleton,  McCormick,  Collins, 
Kiriloff,  Brooke  and  the  others  described  the  Japanese  successes  at  the 
Yalu  River,  Nan  Shan,  and  Tolissu.  Middleton,  a  Foreign  Service 
veteran,  did  not  see  the  campaign  through.  He  contracted  dysentery 
and  collapsed.  They  took  him  back  to  a  little  Red  Cross  hospital  at 
Liang-chia-Shan,  near  the  squalid  city  of  Liaoyang,  headquarters  for 
Russian  operations,  and  there  under  alien  skies,  he  died  a  week  later — 
on  June  25,  1904. 

A  Russian  firing  squad  volleyed  over  his  grave  when  they  buried 
him  with  full  military  honors  two  days  later.  Three  colleagues  stood 
by  in  silence. 

But  Liaoyang  was  not  Middleton's  last  resting  place.  At  Stone's 
cabled  request,  the  Czar's  representative  in  the  Far  East,  Viceroy 
Alexieff,  had  the  remains  disinterred  and  sent  through  the  lines.  The 
roar  of  field  artillery  ceased  and  the  rattle  of  rifles  stilled  as  the  little 
procession  with  the  plain  wooden  coffin  left  the  Russian  entrenchments. 
The  warring  troops  halted  in  a  silent  armistice  while  Middleton  took 
his  final  leave  of  the  battle  front  that  was  his  last  assignment. 

Middleton's  death  almost  cost  the  co-operative  another  of  its  best 
correspondents.  To  fill  the  vacancy  with  the  Russian  armies,  Cowles 
picked  Denny,  who  had  reported  the  Japanese  assaults  on  Port  Arthur. 
To  reach  General  Kuropatkin's  headquarters  at  Liaoyang,  Denny  was 
compelled  to  go  around  the  Japanese  lines  and  make  a  perilous  journey 
through  wild  country  west  of  the  fighting  zone.  He  traveled  for  days 
in  a  jolting  cart  through  territory  swarming  with  Manchurian  bandits, 
and  in  one  encounter  he  narrowly  escaped  with  his  life. 

Denny  reached  Kuropatkin's  headquarters  safely,  but  Liaoyang 
remained  unlucky  for  staff  men.  Throughout  July  and  August  the 


180  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Japanese  armies  kept  battering  away  toward  Liaoyang  in  three  converg- 
ing columns.  Everyone  was  asking:  "Will  Kuropatkin  stand  at  Liao- 
yang?" They  were  answered  the  last  week  in  August,  1904,  when  the 
troops  of  the  Mikado  reached  the  area  and  found  the  Russian  forces 
drawn  up  in  strong  positions.  The  bloody  six-day  engagement  began 
August  29  and  the  world  waited  to  hear  how  the  troops  of  the  Czar, 
now  greatly  superior  in  numbers,  would  acquit  themselves  against  a 
foe  that  had  been  monotonously  successful. 

On  a  rocky  spur  in  the  jumble  of  heights,  ridges,  and  tortuous 
valleys  surrounding  the  town,  Collins,  who  was  with  the  Japanese  army 
of  General  Kuroki,  could  sweep  the  whole  field  of  action  with  his 
glasses  as  the  ground  shuddered  under  the  greatest  storm  of  artillery 
fire  history  had  yet  seen.  Wheel  to  wheel,  the  Japanese  had  five  hun- 
dred guns — many  of  them  captured  Russian  pieces — hurling  destruction 
into  Kuropatkin's  lines.  Thundering  back  came  the  shells  of  Russian 
batteries,  fully  as  numerous.  The  hazy  summer  air  was  filled  with  the 
ugly  orange  and  red  flashes  from  the  mouths  of  guns,  smoke  from  ex- 
ploding shells,  and  the  pyres  where  the  Japanese  were  burning  their 
dead. 

All  day  August  30  the  duel  raged  while  wave  after  wave  of 
Japanese  infantry  shattered  on  Kuropatkin's  right.  Within  these  lines, 
Denny,  Kiriloff,  McCormick,  Brooke,  and  seven  others  followed  the 
battle.  On  August  31  the  hammer  of  massed  artillery  continued  un- 
abated. The  blazing  forenoon  saw  more  ammunition  expended  than  in 
the  whole  three  days  of  the  Battle  of  Gettysburg. 

Collins  could  watch  from  his  splendid  vantage  point,  but  his 
colleagues  on  the  other  side  had  a  more  difficult  task,  particularly  Kiri- 
loff who  found  himself  covering  the  hottest  sector  of  the  Russian  front. 
He  was  assigned  to  the  corps  commanded  by  Baron  Stakelberg — the 
general  who  had  arrived  in  the  Far  East  with  his  wife,  her  companion, 
two  maids,  a  French  chef,  a  milch  cow,  and  one  hundred  and  twenty- 
seven  pieces  of  luggage.  It  was  Stakelberg's  division  that  was  bearing 
the  brunt  of  the  Japanese  bombardment. 

Kiriloff  rode  out  for  his  second  perilous  day  in  the  front  lines 
at  dawn  on  August  31.  All  along  the  five  miles  of  the  Haichong  Road 
he  saw  the  wounded  coming  back,  carts  piled  with  dead,  and  long 
ammunition  trains  moving  up.  Shrapnel  raked  the  road  methodically 
and  there  was  no  lull  in  the  thunder  of  artillery. 

Kiriloff  made  his  way  to  one  of  the  most  exposed  spots  in  the 
sector,  where  the  field  pieces  of  one  battery  kept  hammering  away  at 


WAR  IN  THE  EAST  181 

the  blue  Japanese  lines  below.  The  position  was  a  shambles.  Out  of 
sixty  gunners  in  the  unit,  forty  had  been  killed  or  wounded  in  the  first 
day's  fighting.  No  food  had  been  sent  up  for  twenty-four  hours,  but 
the  guns  kept  firing  and  the  piles  of  empty  cartridge  cases  grew  higher. 

Kiriloff  shared  what  provisions  he  had  brought  along,  talked  to 
officers  and  men,  then  decided  to  stay  in  the  shell-smashed  emplacement 
because  it  gave  a  view  of  all  Stakelberg's  entrenchments.  While  guns 
roared  and  recoiled  around  him,  he  found  a  discarded  ammunition  box 
and  began  to  write  his  narrative. 

Time  after  time  he  saw  the  Japanese  infantry  roll  up  to  the 
Russian  lines  only  to  fall  back  broken.  A  storm  of  protective  rifle  fire 
covered  the  charges  and  bullets  rained  about  Kiriloff  as  he  wrote. 

Thousands  of  miles  away,  in  the  Russian  capital  of  St.  Petersburg, 
Chief  of  Bureau  Thompson  matched  together  the  fragmentary  dis- 
patches that  dribbled  in  from  the  men  at  Liaoyang.  Sketchy,  incon- 
clusive, they  left  the  outcome  of  the  fighting  in  doubt.  Then  the  long 
quiet  trans-Siberian  wire  in  the  Central  Telegraph  Office  came  to  life. 
Kiriloff  had  filed  his  story.  Thompson  edited  the  account  as  rapidly  as 
the  sheets  came  to  his  hand. 

"Prudence  urged  me  to  leave  the  spot,"  KirilofPs  dispatch  said, 
"but  I  was  fascinated." 

There  it  broke  off  abruptly  and  Thompson  waited  for  the  next 
"take"  to  come  through.  But  the  "take"  was  not  from  Kiriloff.  It  was 
signed  by  a  Russian  artillery  officer,  and  it  said: 

KIRILOFF  WAS  SHOT  THROUGH  THE  RIGHT  LUNG 
WHILE  STANDING  BY  OUR  BATTERY,  AND  PELL  BACK, 
SUFFERING  INTENSE  AGONY.   HE  INSISTED  UPON 
BEING  PLACED  ON  A  HORSE,  SO  THAT  HE  COULD  GET 
TO  LIAOYANG  AND  FILE  HIS  DISPATCH.   IT  TOOK 
HIM  FIVE  HOURS  AND  A  HALF  TO  COVER  THE  FIVE 
MILES  TO  THE  TELEGRAPH  STATION.   WHEN  HE  REACHED 
THERE  HE  WAS  SO  EXHAUSTED  AND  WEAK  FROM  LOSS  OF 
BLOOD  THAT  WE  GOT  HIM  TO  A  HOSPITAL,  ALTHOUGH 
AGAINST  HIS  PROTEST.   HE  ASKED  ME  TO  COMPLETE 
HIS  MESSAGE  FOR  HIM.   I  AM  A  SOLDIER,  AND  NO 
WRITER;  BUT  I  WILL  SAY  THAT  AFTER  THE  AWFUL 
FIGHTING  TODAY  WE  WERE  STILL  HOLDING  OUR  POSITION. 
JAPANESE  BODIES  BESTREW  ALL  THE  HEIGHTS.   THEIR 
LOSSES  MUST  HAVE  RUN  INTO  TENS  OF  THOUSANDS. 
WE  HAVE  LOST  FIVE  THOUSAND  THUS  FAR. 

While  this  message  came  into  St.  Petersburg  telling  what  had 
happened  to  Kiriloff,  Collins  was  writing  the  story  of  the  day  as  seen 
from  the  Japanese  side,  unaware  of  what  had  befallen  his  fellow  corre- 


1 82  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

spondent.  He  had  been  something  of  a  hero  himself  that  day.  A  Jap- 
anese officer  who  had  become  his  friend  was  shot  down  at  the  height  of 
the  battle.  Heedless  of  danger,  Collins  dashed  into  the  thick  of  the 
fray  and  carried  the  wounded  man  to  safety. 

The  battle  went  on  three  days  more.  The  Russians  were  beaten, 
hurriedly  evacuated  Liaoyang  and  fell  back  on  Mukden. 


The  next  big  story  of  the  conflict  broke,  not  on  the  remote  battle 
fronts  of  the  Far  East,  but  on  the  Dogger  Bank  fishing  grounds  off 
Hull,  England.  It  was  news  that  threatened  to  plunge  Great  Britain 
and  Russia  into  a  European  war. 

For  months  the  Russians  had  been  building  an  imposing  fleet 
at  their  European  naval  base  on  the  Baltic.  This  fleet  was  to  sail  half- 
way around  the  world,  combine  with  the  Pacific  squadron  and  then  give 
battle  to  Admiral  Togo. 

It  left  on  October  14,  1904,  with  Admiral  Rojestvensky  in  com- 
mand. Uneasy  tension  marked  the  departure.  Rumors  were  rife  that 
the  Japanese  had  torpedo  boats  in  European  waters  to  attack  the  ships 
as  soon  as  they  were  out  of  the  Baltic.  Worried  officers  and  men,  keyed 
to  the  breaking  point,  sought  to  guard  against  the  invisible  dangers. 
This  psychology  made  possible  the  celebrated  "Dogger  Bank  Affair" 
on  October  21. 

Nobody  knew  where  the  rumors  came  from,  although  the  French 
Foreign  Office  suspected  they  came  from  Germany.  It  was  a  fantastic 
business  from  the  start  because  Lansdowne,  the  British  foreign  minis- 
ter, pointed  out  it  was  impossible  for  a  squadron  of  Japanese  warships 
to  have  reached  the  North  Sea  from  Japan  without  being  reported 
somewhere  en  route.  Unofficially  most  people  who  had  anything  to  do 
with  the  affair  were  inclined  to  agree  with  Prince  Radolin  that  vodka 
must  have  played  some  part  in  what  Rojestvensky  said  he  saw. 

Rojestvensky  was  steaming  through  the  North  Sea  that  night 
when  one  of  his  repair  ships  wirelessed:  "Foreign  torpedo  boats  are 
attacking."  Vigilance  was  redoubled.  A  little  later  the  fleet  encountered 
an  indistinct  flotilla.  Russian  guns  went  into  action  and  several  "enemy" 
boats  were  sunk  or  disabled.  Later,  however,  they  turned  out  to  be 
English  fishing  trawlers,  although  Rojestvensky  maintained  to  the  end 
that  he  had  sunk  a  Japanese  torpedo  boat. 

By  daybreak  the  association's  cable  report  was  carrying  what  had 


WAR  IN  THE  EAST  183 

happened  at  Dogger  Bank.  "English  Fishing  Fleet  Sunk  By  Russian 
Guns,"  headlines  announced.  Great  Britain  was  incensed.  Her  navy  re- 
ceived orders  to  be  ready  for  active  duty.  War  was  freely  predicted, 
but  the  Russian  government  refused  to  take  any  steps  until  it  had 
Rojestvensky's  version.  For  days  no  one  knew  what  that  might  be. 
The  limited  range  of  wireless  equipment  prevented  the  Czar's  ministers 
from  communicating  with  the  admiral,  who  was  steaming  for  a  coaling 
stop  in  Spain,  totally  unaware  of  the  storm.  When  the  crisis  seemed  at 
its  worst,  Associated  Press  papers  were  able  to  print  word  that  calmer 
counsel  had  prevailed  and  Great  Britain  had  agreed  to  submit  the  mat- 
ter to  international  arbitration. 

The  situation  continued  grave,  however,  in  the  absence  of  any 
statement  from  Rojestvensky.  Then  on  October  26  the  Czar's  fleet 
reached  the  Spanish  port  of  Vigo  and  two  launches  quickly  put  out  for 
the  flagship.  One  carried  the  agitated  Russian  consul-general  from 
Madrid  and  the  other  the  co-operative's  chief  of  bureau  at  Paris,  Charles 
T.  Thompson,  who  had  hurried  to  Vigo.  Rojestvensky  was  astounded  to 
learn  of  the  crisis  which  had  arisen  from  the  affair  at  Dogger  Bank. 
To  Thompson  he  gave  substantially  the  same  account  he  transmitted 
in  his  official  report  to  St.  Petersburg,  and  the  interview,  setting  forth 
Rojestvensky's  explanation  and  defense  in  detail,  did  much  to  relieve 
the  international  tension. 

The  high  significance  attached  to  the  news  was  emphasized  in 
Paris  the  next  day  when  the  attitude  of  the  government  there  was  de- 
scribed in  this  statement: 

The  French  officials  attach  much  importance  to  The  Associated  Press 
interview  at  Vigo  with  Vice- Admiral  Rojestvensky  as  giving  the  most  reason- 
able explanation  of  the  circumstances.  The  Russian  embassy  takes  a  similar 
view.  Therefore  the  authorities  have  taken  steps  to  have  The  Associated 
Press  interview  reach  the  French  press,  as  a  means  of  calming  public  appre- 
hension over  the  affair. 


In  the  East,  Port  Arthur,  without  food  and  supplies,  held  out 
until  January  I,  1905.  Internal  conditions  in  Russia  had  grown  critical 
and  Denny  was  detached  from  the  Manchurian  front  to  assist  Thomp- 
son at  St.  Petersburg.  He  arrived  in  time  to  help  cover  "Bloody  Sun- 
day," January  22,  when  troops  fired  on  demonstrators  who  were  seeking 
political  reforms,  killing  several  hundred  and  wounding  nearly  three 
thousand.  The  "Revolution  of  1905"  followed. 


1 84  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Then  the  Japanese  decisively  defeated  Kuropatkin  at  Mukden  in 
March — and  still  the  war  dragged  on.  Russia  had  one  slim  chance. 
It  rested  with  Admiral  Rojestvensky  who  was  leading  the  new  fleet 
eighteen  thousand  miles  around  the  world  to  challenge  Togo.  Eight 
months  after  he  put  out  from  the  Russian  naval  base  at  Libau  on  the 
Baltic,  he  kept  his  rendezvous  with  history  off  the  Island  of  Tsushima 
in  the  Korean  Strait  between  Japan  and  the  Asiatic  mainland. 

Throughout  all  those  months  dispatches  reported  every  stage  of 
Rojestvensky's  odyssey  through  European  waters,  round  the  continent 
of  Africa,  into  the  Indian  Ocean,  on  past  the  Malayan  Peninsula,  and  at 
last  into  the  Pacific.  The  world  knew  Togo  was  waiting  and  that  one 
fleet  or  the  other  would  have  to  be  destroyed  before  the  war  could 
be  won. 

The  day  that  made  Japan  a  major  naval  power  was  May  27,  1905. 
With  the  strictest  censorship  in  force,  Martin  Egan,  chief  of  the  Tokyo 
Bureau,  cabled  the  dispatch  American  papers  printed  that  day.  The 
Russian  fleet  had  been  sighted  in  the  Strait  of  Korea  $  the  whereabouts 
of  Togo  was  a  mystery.  But  as  readers  scanned  that  news,  one  of  the 
greatest  naval  battles  of  all  time  was  being  fought  at  Tsushima,  where 
Togo  and  Rojestvensky  met.  In  one  hour  the  Russians  were  defeated, 
but  it  took  Togo  thirty-one  hours  to  destroy  them. 

Egan  had  the  news  in  Tokyo  the  next  day  but  the  censor  was  un- 
yielding. As  far  as  the  Japanese  government  was  concerned,  the  Battle 
of  Tsushima  technically  continued  in  progress.  Egan  might  cable  that 
the  enemy  fleet  had  entered  the  Strait  of  Korea,  but  any  further  details 
were  strictly  forbidden.  Egan  thought  a  moment  and  wrote  the  dis- 
patch which  gave  the  first  hint  that  the  battle  had  been  fought  and 
that  the  Japanese  had  won.  He  hid  the  great  story  in  two  words — 
"Historic  events" — and  the  censor  passed  the  harmless-appearing  item: 

TOKIO,  MAY  28,  9  P.M.  --  TRANSMITABLE  INFORMA- 
TION CONCERNING  TODAY'S  HISTORIC  EVENTS  IN  THE 
NEIGHBORHOOD  OP  THE  TSU  ISLANDS  IS  LIMITED  TO 
THE  BARE  FACT  THAT  RO JEST YEN SKY f S  MAIN  FLEET, 
STEAMING  IN  TWO  COLUMNS  WITH  BATTLESHIPS  ON  THE 
STARBOARD  AND  CRUISERS  AND  MONITORS  ON  THE  PORT 
SIDE,  APPEARED  IN  THE  STRAITS  OF  KOREA.   ALL 
OTHER  INFORMATION  IS  WITHHELD  BY  THE  JAPANESE 
AUTHORITIES  AND  CABLE  TRANSMISSION  IS  REFUSED 
TO  ANY  OTHER  REFERENCE  TO  THE  MOVEMENTS  OF  THE 
RUSSIAN  OR  JAPANESE  FLEETS. 

In  New  York  headquarters,  the  two  significant  words  were  a  sig- 
nal that  mobilized  all  the  resources  of  the  association  to  get  the  story. 


WAR  IN  THE  EAST  185 

Egan's  cable  did  not  long  stand  alone.  Other  dispatches  arrived — from 
Nagasaki,  from  Chefoo,  from  Tokyo.  In  St.  Petersburg,  Chief  of  Bu- 
reau Thompson  gave  the  Czar  and  his  ministers  first  tidings  of  the  com- 
plete destruction  of  Russia's  fleet.  From  Washington,  Edwin  M.  Hood 
supplied  the  first  detailed  account  of  the  Russian  losses,  as  reported  by 
American  naval  attaches  in  the  Orient.  When  the  few  Russian  warships 
which  escaped  reached  the  safety  of  Vladivostok,  Thompson  had  a  cor- 
respondent there  for  the  survivors'  stories.  From  a  dozen  date  lines  the 
story  of  Tsushima  was  completed. 


The  disaster  was  the  end  of  Russian  hopes  in  the  Far  East.  At  the 
invitation  of  President  Theodore  Roosevelt,  representatives  of  the 
warring  powers  met  in  a  peace  conference  at  Portsmouth,  New  Hamp- 
shire, early  in  August,  1905.  To  report  it,  General  Manager  Stone 
brought  Cortesi  from  Rome,  Thompson  from  St.  Petersburg,  and 
James  T.  Williams  and  R.  O.  Bailey  from  Washington.  The  three 
Japanese  commissioners,  Baron  Komura,  Baron  Takahira,  and  Baron 
Kaneko,  and  the  two  Russians,  Count  Sergius  Witte  and  Baron  Rosen, 
all  were  personal  friends  of  Stone.  He  saw  them  frequently  after  their 
arrival  in  the  United  States  and  as  the  conference  at  Portsmouth  pro- 
gressed he  could  not  resist  the  temptation  to  take  the  role  of  peace- 
maker as  well  as  news  gatherer. 

The  Japanese  insisted  that  Russia  pay  a  large  indemnity.  Witte 
and  Rosen  would  not  consider  it.  Both  believed  Japan  had  passed  the 
high-water  mark  of  success  and  was  economically  unequal  to  continuing 
the  war.  Witte  felt  resumption  of  hostilities  on  a  grand  scale  would 
bring  about  the  destruction  of  the  Japanese  armies  in  Manchuria. 

Stone  learned  privately  from  Witte  and  Rosen  that  the  question 
of  indemnity  was  causing  the  deadlock.  If  that  was  removed,  the  Rus- 
sians could  not  in  good  faith  reject  a  peace  treaty,  for  they  already  had 
reached  agreement  with  the  Japanese  on  all  other  questions.  Stone  went 
to  President  Roosevelt.  He  outlined  the  terms  on  which  he  thought 
peace  could  be  reached  and  suggested  that  the  President  cable  the  Ger- 
man Kaiser  to  use  his  influence  with  the  Czar  to  have  them  accepted. 

Ultimately  The  Associated  Press  reported  that  the  Japanese  were 
about  to  waive  all  claims  for  indemnity,  and  other  correspondents  at 
Portsmouth  were  loud  in  ridicule.  That  was  inconceivable.  Everybody 
knew  that  when  the  conference  resumed  on  September  5,  Baron  Komura 


1 86  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

would  repeat  his  demands.  The  Russian  commissioners  regarded  the 
story  as  a  ruse.  Their  plans  were  already  made.  If  the  indemnity  de- 
mands were  repeated,  as  they  expected,  Witte  would  leave  the  confer- 
ence room  and  say  casually  to  one  of  his  secretaries,  "Send  for  my 
Russian  cigarettes."  That  was  the  prearranged  signal  for  a  code  mes- 
sage to  flash  to  Manchuria.  The  heavily  reinforced  Russians  awaited 
only  that  word  to  loose  a  smashing  offensive. 

The  conference  met  in  strictest  secrecy  that  day.  The  Associated 
Press  men  there  knew  Witte  had  set  1 1 150  A.M.  as  the  hour  he  would 
leave  the  conference  room  and  speak  the  words  which  might  mean  a 
new  deluge  of  blood  in  the  Far  East.  Suspense  mounted  as  the  ap- 
pointed time  neared. 

Promptly  at  1 1 150  the  door  of  the  room  opened.  Witte  stepped 
out.  He  did  not  ask  for  his  cigarettes. 

"Gospoda,  mir,"  he  said  in  Russian.  "Gentlemen,  peace!" 


III.  LEAD  WASHINGTON 


WASHINGTON'S  emergence  as  the  news  center  of  America  was  one 
of  the  notable  journalistic  phenomena  in  the  first  decade  of  the  twen- 
tieth century.  There  were  several  factors  involved.  The  first  was  the 
confidence  in  the  nation's  destiny  which  followed  the  war  with  Spain 
and  gave  Washington  significance  as  a  symbol  of  a  united  democracy. 
Second,  a  period  of  social  consciousness  and  readjustment  had  dawned 
and  Washington  was  the  grand  arena  for  its  issues,  reforms,  and  legis- 
lation. And  there  was  a  third  major  force — the  vigorous  news  person- 
ality of  President  Theodore  Roosevelt,  who  seemed  able  to  dramatize 
himself  or  a  platform  plank  with  equal  ease.  For  the  United  States  and 
for  other  lands,  this  combination  gave  Washington  date  lines  a  new 
magic. 

To  the  United  States  it  was  the  news  of  social  and  economic 
changes  which  most  concerned  and  affected  everyday  life.  Dispatches 
from  the  capital  described  the  stormy  progress  of  pure  food  and  drug 
legislation,  the  continued  efforts  at  trust  busting,  the  controversy  over 
railroad  rates,  the  measures  for  conservation  of  natural  resources,  the 
exposure  of  graft,  and  the  countless  concurrent  developments  which 
marked  those  years. 

Newspapers  reflected  the  changes  that  were  taking  place,  some  im- 
perceptibly and  some  with  noticeable  swiftness.  By  and  large,  discern- 
ing journals  arrived  at  a  serious  realization  of  the  responsibilities  which 
their  public  character  imposed.  A  more  definite  code  of  ethics  and 
standards  was  established.  Many  editors  and  legislators  united  in  a 
drive  on  fraudulent  and  misleading  advertisements,  abuse  of  the  news 
columns,  dangerous  personal  notices,  and  other  evils.  Revised  postal 
regulations,  stricter  libel  laws,  and  other  statutes  implemented  the  cam- 
paign. An  increasing  number  of  newspapers  began  extending  a  helping 
hand  to  the  underprivileged — a  practice  encouraged  as  early  as  1886 
when  Victor  Lawson's  Chicago  Daily  News  established  a  sanitarium  for 
sick  children  from  the  tenement  districts.  At  last  the  possibilities  of  such 
public  service  were  receiving  more  widespread  recognition  and  news- 

187 


1 88  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

paper-sponsored  campaigns  were  helping  to  provide  the  needy  with 
free  milk,  ice,  coal,  hospitalization,  and  other  necessities.  At  the  same 
time  the  papers  became  aware  of  the  tremendous  number  of  women 
among  their  readers,  and  columns  on  household  hints,  menu  sugges- 
tions, and  departments  devoted  to  women's  activities  were  inaugurated. 

Things  were  happening,  but  the  process  was  gradual.  The  times 
moved  to  a  leisurely  tempo.  It  was  the  day  of  Spencerian  penmanship 
and  Delsarte  speakers.  Good  whisky  was  $2  a  gallon  and  the  British 
were  building  the  largest  steamer  in  the  world — the  Lusitania. 

The  chronicle  of  such  a  period  was  not  spectacular.  The  news  relied 
for  its  significance,  not  so  much  on  any  one  outstanding  story,  or  any 
dozen,  as  on  the  great  cumulative  effect  built  up  month  after  month. 
In  retrospect  the  period  seemed  landmarked  more  by  incidents  side- 
lighting  the  news  and  by  stories-behind-stories  than  by  anything  dra- 
matic or  heroic. 

There  always  was  "copy"  in  the  President.  The  hearty  New 
Yorker  with  the  high-pitched  voice — "Teddy"  to  the  people,  although 
he  despised  the  nickname — had  been  on  front  pages  more  than  ever 
since  his  picturesque  Rough  Riders  landed  in  Cuba  in  '98.  His  penchant 
for  phrasemaking  caught  public  fancy  and  there  was  applause  every  time 
"T.R.  got  off  another  one." 


The  man  in  the  street  credited  the  President  with  "another  one" 
in  June,  1904 — a  fighting  one,  this  time,  and  the  man  in  the  street  was 
wrong.  The  Republican  National  Convention  had  assembled  in  Chi- 
cago for  the  formality  of  ratifying  Roosevelt  as  the  party's  presidential 
standard-bearer  in  the  approaching  election,  but  newspaper  readers 
momentarily  were  more  exercised  over  something  that  had  happened  in 
faraway  Morocco.  A  wealthy  American,  Ion  Perdicaris,  had  been  seized 
and  held  for  ransom  by  a  bandit  chieftain,  Raisuli.  The  duty  of  making 
the  usual  diplomatic  representations  fell  to  Secretary  of  State  John  Hay. 

He  was  completing  a  draft  of  his  note  when  Edwin  M.  Hood 
dropped  in  on  his  customary  State  Department  round.  Hood,  of  the 
Washington  staff,  had  been  reporting  the  activities  of  the  government 
for  years.  He  had  entree  everywhere,  was  the  confidant  of  many  high 
officials,  and  once  in  the  early  days  of  the  McKinley  administration  he 
had  been  offered  the  post  of  assistant  secretary  of  the  navy — the  office 
Roosevelt  held  before  the  war  with  Spain.  Hay  and  Hood  were  old 


LEAD  WASHINGTON  189 

friends  and  the  secretary  welcomed  an  outside  opinion  on  the  message. 

Hood  scanned  the  document.  The  message  was  long,  formal,  and 
full  of  the  phraseology  dictated  by  protocol  and  diplomatic  usage.  Hood 
shook  his  head. 

"Well?"  asked  Hay. 

"I'm  afraid  you're  slipping,  Mr.  Secretary,"  the  correspondent 
smiled.  "If  I  were  you,  Pd  boil  all  this  down  to  five  words." 

He  produced  a  pencil  and  scribbled  five  words  which  reduced 
Hay's  long  note  to  the  simplest  terms.  He  handed  his  suggestion  to 
the  secretary: 

"Perdicaris  alive  or  Raisuli  dead." 

Very  much  as  the  cry  "Remember  the  Maine!"  captured  the  pub- 
lic imagination,  the  terse  message  to  the  Sultan  of  Morocco  dramatized 
the  "incident."  Roosevelt  liked  the  idea  so  much  that  he  dispatched 
a  copy  to  the  Chicago  convention.  Although  the  ultimatum  to  Morocco 
bore  Hay's  signature,  everyone  said  that  only  the  two-fisted  man  in 
the  White  House  could  be  the  author  of  such  a  laconic  line. 

The  successful  Rough  Rider  President  went  back  to  the  White 
House  after  the  election  of  1904  with  Charles  W.  Fairbanks,  one-time 
Pittsburgh  correspondent  of  The  Associated  Press  as  his  vice-president, 
and  the  Washington  Bureau  settled  down  to  four  more  years  of  the 
unpredictable  "Teddy." 

This  was  before  the  day  of  modern  press  conferences,  and  both 
the  President  and  his  Cabinet  officers  had  their  own  special  favorites 
among  the  newspapermen.  Usually  they  saved  the  richest  news  plums 
for  these  reporters.  However,  the  advantage  was  not  always  so  attrac- 
tive as  it  seemed,  particularly  where  the  President  was  concerned.  He 
frequently  gave  certain  correspondents  important  stories  credited  to  "an 
informed  authority"  or  some  such  anonymous  source — the  President 
could  not  be  quoted  directly — and  when  public  reaction  was  unfavorable 
he  would  disclaim  the  story  and  straightaway  elect  the  "offending"  re- 
porter to  his  famous  Ananias  Club.  He  didn't  call  them  liars. 

One  of  the  best  known  members  of  the  Washington  staff  was  John 
Gross.  His  assignments  were  diversified,  but  somehow  when  a  promi- 
nent person  was  dying  John  Gross  invariably  drew  the  deathwatch. 
Cabinet  members,  senators,  representatives,  Supreme  Court  justices,  ad- 
mirals, generals,  and  a  host  of  retired  officials  who  made  Washington 
their  home  all  passed  on  with  John  Gross  keeping  patient  watch  near 
the  sickroom  door.  Unless  John  Gross  wrote  a  man's  obituary,  his 
political  prominence  was  open  to  question. 


190  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

The  wife  of  a  former  Cabinet  officer  telephoned  one  day  to  say  her 
husband  was  extremely  ill. 

"I  know  you  must  send  someone  to  the  house  to  get  the  news," 
she  said  understandingly,  "but  please  don't  send  that  terrible  Mr. 
Gross." 

The  editor  who  took  the  call  expressed  surprise  at  the  request. 
He  said  Gross  was  well  liked,  tactful,  and  considerate. 

"I  know,"  was  the  reply,  "but  people  say  that  whenever  Mr. 
Gross  is  placed  to  watch  over  a  sick  man,  the  patient  always  dies." 

The  editor  assured  her  again  that  Gross  was  the  most  under- 
standing soul  he  knew  and  added  that  most  households  found  him  a 
help  instead  of  a  nuisance. 

"Oh,  then  I  have  done  Mr.  Gross  an  injustice,"  the  lady  ex- 
claimed. "Please  send  him." 

Gross  got  the  assignment  and  the  former  Cabinet  member's  wife 
was  so  impressed  by  his  consideration  that  she  depended  on  him  to  give 
out  all  the  news  of  her  husband's  condition.  Everything  went  along 
nicely  for  a  few  days — and  then  the  patient  died. 


The  hard  and  fast  regulations  governing  both  the  content  of  the 
news  report  and  its  preparation  sometimes  imposed  handicaps  on  the 
Washington  staff.  The  same  strict  rules  applied  to  the  story  of  a  routine 
fatality  as  to  important  accounts  of  Congressional  maneuvering  on 
major  legislation.  The  precepts  ranged  from  taboos  on  "all  slang 
phrases"  and  vulgarity  down  to  admonitions  against  the  use  of  "phone" 
for  telephone  and  similar  abbreviations.  Such  regulations  encouraged 
an  uninspired  style  of  writing  and  a  sameness  of  treatment  in  the  daily 
news  budgets. 

Exhaustive  as  the  code  was,  it  did  not  prove  equal  to  all  occasions 
and  situations  arose  where  the  rules  were  inadequate  or  precedent  was 
lacking.  Working  at  top  speed  and  usually  too  far  from  headquarters 
to  seek  official  pronouncement,  the  perplexed  reporter  had  only  one 
choice  in  such  emergencies — to  use  his  best  judgment  and  trust  that 
the  decision  was  proper.  New  York  would  be  prompt  to  let  him 
know  if  it  wasn't. 

In  1905  Jackson  S.  Elliott  faced  the  dilemma.  The  President  was 
away  at  the  time  on  a  combined  hunting  and  speaking  trip  through  the 
Southwest  and  Elliott  went  along.  The  tour  was  without  noteworthy 


LEAD  WASHINGTON  191 

incident  until  the  party  reached  San  Antonio,  Texas,  where  state  Re- 
publican leaders  had  arranged  a  banquet  in  Roosevelt's  honor. 

The  affair  was  held  in  the  patio  of  a  local  hotel  and,  although  there 
were  no  women  among  the  diners,  the  wives,  daughters,  and  friends  of 
many  of  the  men  attending  listened  from  surrounding  balconies  and 
windows.  The  toastmaster,  a  man  of  political  importance,  took  the 
occasion  to  poke  sly  fun  at  the  President's  frequent  attacks  on  the  evils 
of  "race  suicide."  Introducing  the  chief  executive,  he  made  a  play  on 
the  words  of  an  old  nursery  rhyme.  Originally,  he  told  his  audience, 
the  verse  had  run: 

There  was  an  old  woman  who  lived  in  a  shoe; 

She  had  so  many  children  she  didn't  know  what  to  do. 

But  today,  he  said,  the  couplet  had  been  revised  in  the  light  of 
modern  conditions  to  run  this  way: 

Now  there  is  a  young  woman;  she  lives  in  no  shoe; 
She  hasn't  any  children — she  knows  what  to  do. 

Elliott  was  watching  the  President,  whose  dislike  for  anything 
off-color  was  well  known.  Roosevelt's  jaw  snapped  and  his  body  stiff- 
ened. He  appeared  so  indignant  that  Elliott  thought  for  a  moment  he 
intended  to  interrupt  the  speaker.  Instead,  he  turned  to  the  guest  at  his 
right,  opened  an  animated  conversation  and  paid  no  further  attention. 
Then,  when  he  spoke,  he  made  no  mention  of  the  offending  toast- 
master  beyond  deploring  the  fact  that  one  of  the  speakers  had  chosen 
such  an  inappropriate  occasion  to  recite  a  rhyme  which  he  said  he  hoped 
was  "homemade." 

Elliott  realized  the  ticklish  story  he  had  on  his  hands.  There  was 
great  interest  generally  in  Roosevelt's  reception  at  San  Antonio,  and 
member  papers  in  Texas  particularly  were  desirous  of  a  complete  ac- 
count. The  turn  of  events  heightened  the  value  of  the  story,  but  how 
was  the  correspondent  to  tell  it?  Elliott  cudgeled  his  brains  for  ideas 
on  the  best  approach  and  the  most  judicious  words.  He  must  not  trans- 
gress the  bounds  of  good  taste  which  regulations  insisted  upon,  and 
yet  an  incident  not  in  good  taste  was  the  mainspring  of  the  whole  story. 

There  was  no  time  for  extended  deliberations,  so  Elliott  solved 
his  dilemma  by  writing  a  story  based  on  the  President's  displeasure  with 
certain  unfortunate  remarks  of  a  crude  nature  by  one  of  the  speakers. 
He  appended  to  the  dispatch  a  private  "Note  to  Editors,"  giving  the 
text  of  what  the  offending  toastmaster  had  said.  This  was  primarily 


192  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

for  the  information  of  editors,  but  papers  were  free  to  use  it  or  not  as 
they  saw  fit.  In  some  places  the  nursery  rhyme  parody  was  printed. 
The  policy  of  the  individual  member  was  the  determining  factor. 


Member  newspapers  had  widely  divergent  beliefs  and  policies  and 
Washington  saw  countless  examples  every  day.  In  that  period  of  con- 
troversial legislation  and  much-debated  crusades,  the  task  of  staff  men 
in  the  capital  was  to  report  events  factually,  objectively,  and  completely, 
without  editorializing,  without  coloring.  Member  papers  might  use  the 
material  as  they  pleased  as  long  as  they  did  not  change  the  facts  pre- 
sented. Given  truthful  news,  they  could  use  their  individual  editorial 
columns  to  interpret  it,  evaluate  it,  and  uphold  or  attack  the  issues  it 
set  forth. 

Frequently  there  were  two  or  more  camps  of  editorial  opinion 
and  they  all  relied  on  the  same  factual  dispatches  for  the  arguments 
and  proofs  they  cited  in  support  of  their  positions.  In  the  co-operative 
this  multiplicity  of  political,  social,  economic,  and  religious  opinion  pro- 
vided a  constant  guard  for  the  integrity  of  the  report.  Every  dispatch 
was  subject  to  endless  scrutiny  from  all  sorts  of  viewpoints. 

No  one  better  appreciated  the  value  of  such  a  news  report  than 
publicity-seeking  pressure  groups  eager  to  have  a  cause  presented  in  the 
best  possible  light.  Washington  swarmed  with  them  and  they  were 
eternally  besieging  members  of  the  staff  to  include  favorable  material 
or  to  suppress  anything  unfavorable.  Charles  A.  Boynton,  chief  of  the 
Washington  Bureau,  issued  explicit  instructions  on  how  to  deal  with 
such  individuals: 

If  anybody  should  ever  come  to  you  and  ask  for  the  publication  or  sup- 
pression of  anything  on  the  ground  of  some  alleged  acquaintance  or  rela- 
tionship with  me  or  with  any  other  official  or  person  supposed  to  be  influential 
in  The  Associated  Press,  throw  him  out  of  the  window  and  report  the  case 
to  the  coroner. 

Theodore  Roosevelt's  second  term  was  in  full  career.  Washington 
date  lines  were  more  numerous  than  ever  and  the  morgue  envelopes 
which  preserved  the  day-by-day  history  of  the  President's  activities  grew 
fatter  as  new  clippings  were  added  by  George  Wyville,  the  librarian  in 
the  New  York  office  who  kept  the  files  up  to  date.  At  the  time  no  one 
realized  it,  but  the  files  held  one  story  Roosevelt  was  to  regret  politi- 
cally. 


LEAD  WASHINGTON  193 

The  piece  was  written  the  night  of  his  sweeping  victory  over  Alton 
B.  Parker  in  the  1904  presidential  election.  Even  before  the  votes  had 
been  counted  much  speculation  had  arisen  as  to  the  course  of  Roosevelt's 
political  future  in  the  event  he  won  as  expected.  Some  pointed  out  that 
he  might  have  three  terms  without  violating  the  tradition  that  no  man 
be  elected  to  the  office  more  than  twice.  They  argued  that,  since  his 
first  term  had  been  as  successor  to  the  assassinated  McKinley,  a  victory 
over  Parker  would  mark  the  first  time  he  had  been  elected  by  the  peo- 
ple, and  therefore  he  would  be  free  to  seek  the  office  again  in  1908. 

The  outcome  of  the  1904  election  was  not  long  in  doubt.  As  soon 
as  returns  assured  victory,  the  elated  Roosevelt  took  a  few  minutes  out 
to  write  a  statement  for  The  Associated  Press.  The  first  two  paragraphs 
voiced  gratitude  to  the  American  people  and  a  promise  to  serve  them 
well.  Then  he  replied  to  the  1908  speculation: 

On  the  4th  of  March  next  I  shall  have  served  three  and  one-half  years, 
and  the  three  and  one-half  years  constitute  my  first  term. 

The  wise  custom  which  limits  the  President  to  two  terms  regards  the 
substance  and  not  the  form,  and  under  no  circumstances  will  I  be  a  candidate 
for  or  accept  another  nomination. 

Years  later  he  deplored  the  voluntary  promise.  Discussing  the  mat- 
ter with  a  close  friend  and  adviser,  Herman  Kohlsaat,  he  pointed  to  his 
wrist  and  exclaimed: 

"I  would  cut  my  hand  off  right  there  if  I  could  recall  that  written 
statement !" 


IV.  FLASH! 


THREE  men  were  on  duty  in  the  Associated  Press  bureau  in  the  West- 
ern Union  Building  in  downtown  San  Francisco  at  five  o'clock  in  the 
morning  April  18,  1906. 

On  the  main  trunk  wire  to  the  East,  Chief  Operator  Robert  Geist- 
lich  sent  the  signal  for  "30" — telegraph  symbol  for  "signing  off."  Then 
he  stretched  and  pulled  on  his  coat  to  go  home.  On  the  circuit  serving 
California  morning  papers  another  operator,  Ben  Mclnerney,  sent  "10" 
— the  sign  for  the  telegraphers'  regular  ten-minute  rest  period.  He 
reached  for  his  usual  bottle  of  early  morning  coffee.  Editor  John  Fin- 
lay  was  in  the  midst  of  a  ham-and-egg  sandwich. 

"See  you  tonight,"  said  Geistlich,  nodding  to  the  two  others  whose 
tour  of  duty  had  not  ended. 

The  hands  of  the  clock  on  the  wall  moved  to  5:10.  Mclnerney  re- 
sumed sending  on  the  state  circuit,  methodically  relaying  the  news 
which  Finlay  selected  and  edited  from  the  trickle  of  late  dispatches. 

Suddenly  the  building  rocked  and  trembled,  the  walls  cracked, 
plaster  showered  down,  the  ceiling  light  dropped,  and  the  clock  crashed, 
face  up,  to  the  swaying  floor. 

"Earthquake!" 

"Bulletin  it!  "yelled  Finlay. 

He  jumped  to  his  teetering  typewriter  and  pounded  out: 

"Bulletin:  San  Francisco,  April  18 — San  Francisco  was  shaken  by 
an  earthquake  at" — he  took  a  hurried  glance  at  the  silent  clock  on  the 
floor — "5:15  this  morning." 

Operator  Mclnerney  worked  with  his  state  wire.  Then  he  jumped 
over  to  the  telegraph  instrument  on  the  trunk  wire  east.  He  turned  to 
the  telephone. 

"All  dead!"  he  shouted,  grabbing  the  bulletin  and  dashing  for  the 
Western  Union  office  on  a  floor  above. 

Pelted  by  chunks  of  plaster,  Finlay  looked  out  the  window  at  the 
crumbling  city  and  kept  pounding  the  typewriter  keys. 

Mclnerney  rushed  back  into  the  office  and  behind  him  came 

194 


FLASH!  195 

Geistlich,  who  had  dodged  the  rain  of  brick  and  stone  to  get  back  to 
the  men  he  had  left  a  few  minutes  earlier. 

"All  telegraph  company  wires  are  out!"  panted  Mclnerney.  "I 
left  the  bulletin  in  case  they  ever  get  a  wire  through." 

"All  right,  let's  go!"  said  Geistlich,  snatching  the  copy  Finlay  had 
written.  "If  we  can  get  to  the  Oakland  ferry,  maybe  we  can  get  some- 
thing through  on  the  wires  over  there." 

Geistlich  and  Mclnerney  raced  through  a  nightmare  of  demol- 
ished streets,  clambering  over  ruins,  and  making  mental  note  of  the 
devastation  as  they  ran.  The  downtown  area  was  filling  with  the  panic- 
stricken.  Some  were  mad  with  fear  that  the  world  was  coming  to  an 
end.  Everyone  who  could  stampeded  for  the  ferry.  Geistlich  and  Mc- 
lnerney jumped  aboard  the  boat  just  as  she  was  pulling  away.  By  6:30 
they  reached  the  deserted  office  of  the  telegraph  company  across  the 
bay.  Conditions  there  were  almost  as  bad  as  in  San  Francisco.  All  lines 
were  down.  They  left  a  copy  of  the  story  and  headed  back  to  what  was 
left  of  San  Francisco. 


When  the  earthquake  shook  the  city,  Superintendent  Cowles  of  the 
Pacific  Coast  Division  was  asleep  at  home.  Like  thousands  of  others, 
he  was  pitched  from  bed  by  the  first  mighty  shock.  He  finished  dressing 
as  he  sprinted  through  the  streets  toward  the  bureau.  He  reached  the 
partially  wrecked  Western  Union  building  at  5:45.  No  wires.  He  hur- 
ried to  the  Postal  Telegraph  a  few  blocks  away.  Swayne,  chief  operator 
for  that  company,  was  tinkering  distractedly  with  a  broken  circuit  to 
Chicago. 

"Barely  possible  I  can  get  something  through  soon,"  said  Swayne. 

Cowles  wrote  a  bulletin  and  stood  waiting  while  the  telegrapher 
tested  and  tested.  The  click  of  the  Morse  was  so  faint  that  it  was  scarcely 
audible  above  the  pandemonium  outside.  The  wire  refused  to  work. 
Cowles  called  to  Swayne  to  keep  trying  and  made  for  the  Pacific  Cable 
Company  office  in  the  same  building. 

"Your  cable  functioning?"  he  demanded. 
.  "Seems  to  be." 

Cowles  seized  a  blank  and  wrote  out  a  brief  message  on  the  dis- 
aster, addressing  it  to  The  Associated  Press  in  New  York. 

The  attendant  shook  his  head. 

"I  can't  send  a  cable  to  New  York,"  he  protested.  "Our  wires  are 
under  the  Pacific  to  the  Far  East." 


196  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

"Route  it  around  the  world!"  snapped  Cowles. 

"Sony,"  faltered  the  clerk,  "Fd  do  it  for  you  if  I  could,  but  the 
company  doesn't  have  any  regulations  covering  such  an  unusual  pro- 
cedure, and,  besides,  I  don't  know  the  rate." 

Cowles  exploded. 

"Never  mind  the  rules,"  he  bellowed.  "I'll  pay  any  rate  the  com- 
pany  sees  fit  to  charge  j  but,  please,  for  God's  sake,  send  it  immedi- 
ately!" 

"I  can't,  I  can't,"  the  man  insisted.  "You  know  I  would  if  I  could, 
but  I've  got  my  own  job  to  think  of." 

"Well,  then,  send  it  to  Honolulu,  at  least." 

The  frightened  attendant  agreed  and  Cowles  ran  back  to  the 
Postal  office  where  Swayne  still  was  coaxing  the  wire  to  Chicago. 
Cowles  paced  the  floor.  After  a  long  wait  the  line  came  to  life.  Both 
men  hunched  closer. 

"Got  'em!"  exclaimed  Swayne. 

Then  first  word  of  the  appalling  disaster  was  swiftly  tapped  to  the 
outside  world. 

Cowles  returned  to  the  ruined  office  in  the  Western  Union  build- 
ing, collected  the  members  of  his  staff  who  had  arrived  and  shifted  the 
scene  of  activities  to  the  Postal  building.  As  fast  as  typewriters  could 
hammer  it  out,  the  story  was  relayed.  The  lone  wire  was  too  good  to 
last.  It  failed  and  the  fire  which  had  followed  the  earthquake  was  sweep- 
ing closer.  The  torn  pavement  outside  was  almost  melted  and  the 
scorching  walls  made  the  building  like  an  oven.  The  Chicago  wire 
eventually  was  re-established  for  a  brief  time,  but  by  eleven  that 
morning  it  was  out  again.  The  heat  was  so  intense  the  building  had  to 
be  evacuated. 

The  flames  had  not  yet  reached  the  abandoned  Western  Union 
building,  and,  for  want  of  a  better  place,  Cowles  and  his  helpers  re- 
turned there.  More  members  of  the  staff  had  reached  the  old  office  and 
Cowles  took  a  mental  roll  call  to  make  sure  all  were  accounted  for. 

Morse  operators?  All  present — Harry  Collins,  Fred  Burnell,  W. 
F.  Lynch,  J.  K.  Brown,  W.  Mitchell,  and  Ben  Mclnerney  and  Robert 
Geistlich,  who  had  returned  from  their  dash  to  Oakland. 

Editorial  men?  There  was — Karl  von  Wiegand,  the  future  foreign 
correspondent  for  Hearst  newspapers,  Hershel  McDonald,  Robert 
Johnson,  E.  E.  Curtis,  and  Finlay  who  had  written  the  bulletin  at  the 
moment  of  the  quake. 

Where  was  Jerry  Carroll? 


FLASH!  197 

No  one  had  seen  or  heard  from  him.  He  might  be  one  of  the 
hundreds  who  had  been  crushed  under  falling  walls.  Police,  firemen, 
and  volunteers  already  were  at  work  in  the  ruins.  They  might  find  him 
later.  The  staff  had  no  time  to  search  for  the  missing  editor.  Their 
urgent  job  was  to  find  a  means  for  re-establishing  contact  with  the  out- 
side world. 

Anticipating  that  troops  would  take  over  control  of  the  stricken 
city,  Cowles  sent  one  man  to  obtain  passes  from  General  Frederick 
Funston,  commanding  officer  for  the  area.  He  sent  others  in  search 
of  a  launch  to  transport  men  and  news  to  Oakland,  now  that  ferry 
operations  had  ceased.  No  launch  could  be  found,  but  the  hurriedly 
procured  army  passes  induced  the  captain  of  the  government  tug 
McDowell  to  take  Geistlich  and  Lynch  across  the  bay  and  to  stand  by 
for  any  help  he  could  give.  In  Oakland  both  Western  Union  and  Postal 
had  been  busy,  and  workable  wires  were  set  up  that  afternoon.  Official 
communications  swamped  the  improvised  facilities,  but  Associated  Press 
dispatches  were  given  right-of-way. 

Back  in  San  Francisco  Cowles  assigned  others  of  the  staff — op- 
erators and  editors  alike — to  each  section  of  the  flaming  city  to  obtain 
every  scrap  of  information  and  rush  it  to  him  for  inclusion  in  the 
"leads"  he  began  to  write. 

By  one  o'clock  in  the  afternoon  Cowles  was  ordered  from  the 
shattered  Western  Union  building  so  authorities  could  dynamite  it  in 
an  attempt  to  halt  the  fire.  He  could  not  wait  until  his  staff  returned  to 
headquarters,  where  all  were  agreed  to  meet,  so  he  made  his  way  to 
the  office  of  the  Bulletin  on  Bush  Street.  There  he  resumed  writing  and 
sent  off  the  copy  by  messengers  to  the  wire  offices  in  Oakland.  All  he 
could  do  was  to  hope  the  remainder  of  the  staff  might  find  him. 

Dusk  fell  and  still  none  of  the  staff  had  found  him.  Just  as  he  was 
abandoning  hope,  he  looked  up  from  his  work  and  saw  a  limping  bun- 
dle of  bandages  hobbling  toward  him.  He  peered  at  the  gauze-swathed 
features,  heard  an  attempted  laugh,  and  knew  that  Jerry  Carroll  had 
been  found.  A  wall  had  tumbled  on  Carroll's  home,  burying  him  and 
his  wife  under  an  avalanche  of  bricks  and  mortar.  Dug  out  by  passers-by, 
the  editor  had  spent  most  of  the  day  getting  patched  up  so  that  he 
could  walk.  Then  he  set  out  to  reach  the  office.  Someone  who  knew 
Cowles's  whereabouts  directed  him  to  the  Bulletin  office.  His  shoes  had 
been  burned  and  his  feet  were  cut  by  glass  and  blistered  by  the  hot 
pavements. 

Carroll  received  an  assignment  immediately.  Cowles  sent  him  out 


198  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

to  write  a  "color"  story  of  the  disaster.  Carroll  went  back  into  the  streets, 
noting  the  names  of  destroyed  buildings  and  the  despairing  efforts 
to  check  the  flames,  which  then  were  roaring  into  the  Chinese  section. 
On  all  sides  he  heard  the  cries  of  injured  and  homeless,  and  frequently 
he  saw  silent  rows  of  blanket-covered  dead.  In  an  hour  he  had  the 
horrible  picture  and  he  sat  down  in  a  Chinatown  doorway  to  write  his 
story  in  the  light  of  a  fire  that  was  costing  a  thousand  dollars  a  second. 
The  Associated  Press  was  the  only  organization  to  relay  news 
of  the  earthquake  that  day  and  night.  In  the  twenty-four  hours  after 
the  first  shock  the  staff  wrote  and  relayed  21,300  words. 


The  San  Francisco  earthquake  served  to  dramatize  the  need  for  a 
definite  method  for  rushing  out  the  first  brief  fact  on  a  news  event  of 
first  importance.  In  the  past  the  traditional  "bulletin"  had  been  con- 
sidered satisfactory,  but  in  a  day  of  many  extra  editions  newspaper 
editors  required  even  quicker  notice  that  a  story  of  extraordinary  char- 
acter was  breaking.  Some  old-time  telegraphers  had  developed  the  habit 
of  tapping  out  the  word  F-L-A-S-H  before  the  relay  of  an  out-of-the- 
ordinary  news  item.  The  custom,  however,  was  haphazard  and  too  often 
abused  on  cheap  sensations. 

The  Associated  Press  put  the  Flash  on  a  hard  and  fast  official  basis 
less  than  two  weeks  after  the  San  Francisco  disaster.  In  a  general  order 
to  all  its  employes  throughout  the  world  these  instructions  were  issued 
May  i,  1906: 

News  matter  of  supreme  importance  which  would  necessitate  the  issuance 
of  extra  editions  should  be  sent  first  as  a  "Flash"  in  a  message  not  to  exceed 
ten  words,  and  should  go  on  all  leased  wires.  Such  "Flash"  must  take 
precedence  over  all  bulletins,  must  go  upon  each  wire  of  a  double  or  triple 
wire  system,  must  be  sent  instantly  upon  the  development  of  the  news,  and 
must  never  exceed  ten  words  in  length. 

Accuracy  had  been  the  first  watchword.  Now  speed  officially  be- 
came the  second. 


V.  SURVEY  AND  CRITICISM 


ROOSEVELT  would  not  run  again.  This  was  plain  from  his  unequivo- 
cal election  night  statement  four  years  before.  Although  the  1908  po- 
litical picture  had  been  complicated  by  the  panic  which  broke  the  pre- 
ceding October,  shrewd  observers  looked  for  another  Republican 
victory  when  voting  time  came.  William  Jennings  Bryan  was  out  for 
his  third  nomination  as  the  Democratic  standard-bearer  and  it  seemed 
certain  that  Roosevelt's  mantle  would  fall  either  on  New  York's 
Governor,  Charles  Evans  Hughes,  or  on  the  broad  35Opound  frame  of 
William  Howard  Taft. 

While  the  country  at  large  waited  for  the  campaigns  to  open, 
members  of  The  Associated  Press  met  at  the  old  Waldorf-Astoria  in 
New  York  for  another  of  their  annual  meetings.  Peacock  Alley  was  in 
all  its  glory  and  the  sight  of  fashionably  dressed  women  smoking 
cigarettes  in  public  shocked  more  than  one  inland  publisher.  There  was 
time  for  chats  with  old  friends  and  evenings  at  the  theater.  A  spirit  of 
camaraderie  predominated  and  the  members  looked  forward  to  these 
gatherings  with  genuine  pleasure. 

Although  the  members  were  proud  of  the  association  they  had 
fostered,  they  were  practical  newspapermen  and  experience  had  taught 
them  the  folly  of  taking  things  for  granted. 

With  this  in  mind,  the  1908  meeting  unanimously  voted  creation 
of  a  special  committee  of  ten  members  charged  with  appraising  the 
excellences  and  shortcomings  of  the  entire  report,  the  possibilities  for 
extension  of  the  service,  and  the  desirability  of  any  changes  in  the 
by-laws. 

Once  the  business  calendar  had  been  cleared,  the  members  turned 
to  the  annual  banquet,  with  its  speechmaking,  and  the  traditional  loving 
cup.  Each  year  there  had  been  something  about  the  occasion  which  caused 
publishers  and  editors  to  remember  it. 

Two  years  before  it  had  been  the  sparkling  address  of  Mark 
Twain.  He  said:  "There  are  only  two  forces  that  can  carry  light  to 
all  corners  of  the  globe — the  sun  in  the  heavens  and  The  Associated 
Press  down  here." 

199 


200  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Last  year  it  had  been  the  classic  story  which  passed  with  chuckles 
from  mouth  to  mouth — the  story  of  Sam  Davis,  a  Nevada  string  corre- 
spondent who  interviewed  Sarah  Bernhardt  for  the  Carson  Appeal,  his 
own  little  paper  j  for  the  San  Francisco  Examiner;  and  for  the  co- 
operative. The  actress  liked  him  so  much  that,  when  her  train  was 
ready  to  leave,  she  put  her  hands  on  his  shoulders,  kissed  him  on  each 
cheek,  and  then  squarely  on  the  mouth.  She  said:  "The  right  cheek 
for  the  Carson  Affeal,  the  left  for  the  Examiner,  the  lips,  my  friend, 
for  yourself."  Davis  displayed  no  trace  of  bashfulness.  "Madam,"  he 
exclaimed,  "I  also  represent  The  Associated  Press,  which  serves  three 
hundred  and  eighty  papers  west  of  the  Mississippi  River  alone!" 

And  this  year  it  was  William  Jennings  Bryan  holding  forth  in 
his  best  oratorical  form. 

There  were  endless  other  topics  for  informal  shop  talk.  The 
American  Mining  Congress  considered  Associated  Press  metal  market 
quotations  so  accurate  that  it  voted  them  the  standard  on  which  all 
settlements  be  made  in  the  industry.  The  news  of  the  birth  of  an  heir 
to  the  Spanish  throne  had  been  whisked  from  Madrid  to  Chicago  in 
ninety  seconds — a  notable  demonstration  in  swift  transmission.  There 
was  the  celebrated  Stanford  White-Harry  K.  Thaw  murder  case  and 
the  dramatic  Hay  wood  trial  in  Montana — the  labor  leader  for  whom 
"T.R."  coined  the  phrase  "undesirable  citizen." 

Much  interest  centered  on  Canada  where  an  embattled  group  of 
papers  had  taken  first  steps  in  the  direction  of  a  co-operative  which, 
molded  closely  after  The  Associated  Press,  eventually  became  The 
Canadian  Press.  And  in  the  United  States  another  agency  was  entering 
the  domestic  field,  although  as  a  privately  owned  commercial  enter- 
prise. The  Scripps-McRae  Press  Association,  founded  in  1897,  the 
Scripps  News  Association,  an  affiliated  combination,  and  the  Publishers' 
Press  Association  joined  forces  and  formed  the  United  Press  Asso- 
ciations. The  three  previously  had  divided  the  country  between  them, 
covering  one  another's  areas  by  virtue  of  a  news  exchange  arrangement. 
In  their  discussions  editors  and  publishers  saw  the  consolidation  as  a  de- 
velopment which  would  supply  news  to  papers  ineligible  or  undesirous 
of  becoming  members  of  The  Associated  Press.  They  saw  also  that  the 
very  existence  of  this  agency  was  irrefutable  evidence  against  any  absurd 
charges  that  their  co-operative  had  monopolistic  inclinations. 


SURVEY  AND  CRITICISM  aoi 


When  the  members  departed  for  home,  the  Special  Survey  Com- 
mittee remained  behind  to  work.  Headquarters  were  set  up,  a  program 
drafted,  questionnaires  prepared,  and  one  committeeman  detailed  to 
tour  the  country  studying  bureau  operations  at  first  hand. 

While  another  presidential  campaign  occupied  the  politicians,  the 
public  found  some  respite  in  the  great  to-do  which  followed  the  classic 
"bonehead"  play  of  major  league  baseball — Fred  Merkle's  failure  to 
touch  second  base  in  the  crucial  New  York-Chicago  game  that  Sep- 
tember. For  days  the  pros  and  cons  of  the  discussion  occupied  enough 
wire  space  to  rival  developments  on  the  political  front,  and  the  word 
"boner"  took  its  place  in  the  language. 

Then  the  co-operative's  committee  put  the  finishing  touches  on  its 
report  and  the  thoroughgoing  study  was  ready  for  the  Board  of  Di- 
rectors on  December  i. 

The  integrity  and  reliability  of  the  news  report  was  rated  "ad- 
mirable," but  the  committee  called  for  the  cultivation  of  a  more 
sprightly  and  concise  style  and  more  skillful  editing.  The  report  tact- 
fully reminded  the  members  that,  since  much  Associated  Press  news 
originated  in  their  own  offices  because  of  the  mutual  exchange  principle, 
the  desired  improvement,  like  charity,  should  begin  at  home. 

A  second  recommendation  called  for  the  appointment  of  assistant 
superintendents  for  each  of  the  six  geographical  divisions  of  the  serv- 
ice— New  England,  New  York,  Washington,  Chicago,  Denver,  and 
San  Francisco.  Their  principal  duty  was  to  keep  in  close  touch  with 
member  papers  to  ascertain  their  needs  or  criticisms.  The  committee 
saw  in  these  assistant  superintendents  an  opportunity  to  weld  the  ser 
vice  into  a  more  coherent  whole. 

Closely  connected  with  the  problem  of  improving  the  news  report 
was  the  widespread  demand  among  the  members  for  greater  localization 
of  their  service.  At  the  time  the  association's  facilities  were  divided  into 
three  major  classifications:  There  was  the  main  coast-to-coast  trunk 
circuit,  which  carried  only  dispatches  of  general  importance.  Supple- 
mentary to  this  were  the  regional  wires,  which  served  as  the  arteries 
for  geographical  divisions  comprising  several  states.  There  also  were 
the  few,  comparatively  recent,  "side  circuits,"  operating  off  the  main 
leased  wire  or  its  regional  counterpart  and  serving  papers  in  one  state 
or  occasionally  two. 

Editors  in  the  bureaus  controlling  these  side  or  state,  circuits  had 


202  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

been  able  to  anticipate  the  trend  toward  a  more  localized  report.  Serv- 
ing a  limited  group  of  papers  whose  interests  were  similar,  the  editors 
of  these  circuits  could  prepare  a  report  made  up  of  trunk  and  regional 
material  which  met  the  needs  of  the  locality  and  at  the  same  time  in- 
cluded more  state  or  bi-state  news. 

Members  who  received  their  news  budget  only  on  the  main  leased 
wires  were  not  so  fortunate.  They  expressed  the  need  for  extension  of 
facilities  to  provide  more  localized  news  coverage,  but  the  committee 
was  not  inclined  to  encourage  this  agitation,  declaring  that  general  news 
alone  was  the  province  of  the  association.  The  thorough  exposition  of 
this  subject,  however,  served  a  purpose.  It  focused  attention  on  the 
success  of  the  few  side  circuits  in  supplying  a  combination  of  general  and 
state  news,  and  it  raised  in  some  minds  the  thought  that  a  system  of 
state  circuits  which  would  pay  more  attention  to  vicinage  news  might 
represent  the  ideal  fundamental  unit  for  the  organization's  future  op- 
erations. 

The  committee  reminded  the  members  that  they  were  receiving 
a  telegraphic  service  which,  taken  as  a  whole,  never  had  been  equaled. 
"This  report,"  they  noted,  "has  become  the  cheapest  commodity  that 
enters  into  the  making  of  the  daily  newspaper."  They  pointed  out  that 
the  general  news  of  the  entire  world  was  delivered  to  member  papers 
at  a  cost  less  than  that  of  gathering  the  news  in  their  own  circulating 
areas.  Some  were  assessed  as  little  as  52  cents  for  each  thousand  words, 
while  the  highest  rate  was  $4.60. 

The  question  of  finances  likewise  was  involved  in  the  report.  Many 
of  the  reforms  recommended  called  for  additional  expenditures  and  it 
behooved  the  organization  to  move  cautiously  in  this  respect.  Since 
1900  the  association  had  been  oscillating  annually  from  surplus  to 
deficit— a  $94,708  deficit  for  the  last  half  of  1907  was  particularly  dis- 
quieting— and  important  commitments  for  the  future  must  be  weighed 
with  a  practical  eye  on  the  extra  outlay  involved. 


If  an  occasional  skeptic  in  the  membership  ranks  was  inclined  to 
question  the  committee's  pronouncement  on  the  general  excellence  of 
the  news  service,  the  staff  soon  afterward  supplied  a  brilliant  demon- 
stration on  two  of  the  biggest  stories  in  the  opening  decade  of  the 
century's  history. 

The  first  occurred  during  the  1908  Christmas  season.  On  Decem- 


SURVEY  AND  CRITICISM  203 

her  28  there  was  a  convulsive  earthquake  in  the  Italian  province  of 
Calabria.  The  earthquake  and  the  accompanying  tidal  wave  took  200,000 
lives.  Joseph  Pierce,  the  correspondent  at  Messina,  perished  before  he 
could  get  his  story  through.  In  Rome  Cortesi  left  a  sickbed  to  write 
his  account  of  a  catastrophe  unparalleled  in  European  history.  On  the 
first  five  days  he  cabled  37,780  words. 

Cortesi  was  Cortesi,  and  the  membership  had  come  to  expect 
superlative  work  from  him.  It  was  not  always  the  front-rank  men, 
however,  who  were  on  the  spot  the  moment  important  news  occurred 
unexpectedly  in  one  place  or  another.  Sometimes  it  was  an  obscure 
correspondent — an  ordinary  string  correspondent  such  as  Jack  Irwin 
on  Nantucket  Island. 

Irwin  was  one  of  those  restless  men  never  content  to  stay  in  one 
place.  An  Australian  by  birth,  he  had  a  daredevil  disposition  which  took 
him  to  many  places  in  search  of  adventure.  He  was  in  Africa  during  the 
Boer  War  and  saw  fighting  at  Magersfontein  and  Spion  Kop.  Eventu- 
ally he  came  to  the  United  States  and  was  attracted  by  the  wizardry  of 
wireless  telegraphy.  He  settled  down  for  a  while  as  an  .operator  in  the 
Marconi  station  at  Siasconset  on  Nantucket  Island,  one  of  the  lonely 
outposts  which  gave  the  first  and  last  greetings  to  Atlantic  steamers. 
While  at  Siasconset  he  became  a  stringer  for  the  co-operative,  occasion- 
ally passing  along  a  small  story  that  came  his  way,  but  never  anything 
of  consequence. 

There  was  no  promise  of  anything  of  consequence  on  January  23, 
1909,  as  he  sat  at  his  key,  keeping  the  early  morning  tour  of  duty. 
The  Atlantic  was  a  thick  white  wall  of  fog  which  came  swirling  in, 
blanketing  Nantucket.  It  was  5 140  in  the  morning. 

A  thin,  faint  signal  whispered  unexpectedly  in  Irwin's  earphones. 
It  was  repeated  again  and  again  .  .  .  CQD  .  .  .  CQD  .  .  .  CQD — 
the  international  signal  for  a  ship  in  distress. 

Two  hundred  miles  out  on  the  Atlantic  Jack  Binns,  an  operator 
on  the  White  Star  liner  Republicy  was  desperately  sending  out  the  call. 
The  Republic  had  collided  with  the  freighter  Florida  and  was  sinking. 

Irwin  at  Siasconset  was  the  first  to  pick  up  the  call  from  the  sinking 
Republic  and  her  440  passengers.  From  that  moment  on,  he  kept  repeat- 
ing the  weak  CQD  and  Binns's  subsequent  messages,  utilizing  Siascon- 
set's  stronger  power  to  broadcast  the  calls  over  a  wider  area  than  the 
Republic  could  cover.  Busy  as  he  was,  he  acted  promptly  in  his  capacity 
as  a  string  correspondent,  rushing  word  of  the  Republic?*  peril  to  the 
Boston  Bureau. 


2O4  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

For  hours  the  fate  of  the  Republic  remained  in  doubt  while  rescue 
ships  groped  through  the  fog.  The  White  Star  liner  sank,  but  thanks  to 
the  CQD,  only  four  lives  were  lost.  Irwin  continued  to  relay  details 
of  the  great  drama  and  the  country  thrilled  to  the  heroism  and  courage 
of  the  first  \videly  publicized  ship  rescue  by  wireless. 


In  the  weeks  which  saw  the  Calabrian  earthquake  and  the  S.S. 
Re-public  disaster,  no  group  among  the  members  studied  the  survey  of 
the  Special  Survey  Committe  with  keener  interest  and  hope  than  the 
limited  service,  or  "pony"  papers.  For  many  of  these  small  newspapers, 
published  in  remote  inland  towns,  the  earthquake  and  ship  disaster 
stories  merely  demonstrated  again  an  old  handicap  which  plagued  them. 
They  could  not  afford  regular  leased  wire  facilities  which  delivered 
a  large  volume  of  news  direct  to  their  offices  and  the  exasperating 
delays  in  receiving  abbreviated  reports  over  ordinary  commercial  tele- 
graph lines  persisted  even  when  public  interest  in  the  news  was  at  fever 
pitch.  The  result  was  that  many  of  these  pony  members  failed  to 
obtain  enough  news  with  sufficient  speed  to  make  a  showing  with  their 
readers. 

Examining  the  committee's  report,  these  small  members  discovered 
grounds  for  both  hope  and  discouragement.  The  committee  confessed 
that  it  recognized  their  plight  and  wanted  to  do  something  about  it. 
But  the  committee  could  advance  no  constructive  plans  to  eliminate  the 
delays  in  news  delivery.  There  was  no  point  in  further  complaints  to 
the  wire  companies.  Repeated  representations  in  the  past  had  proved 
futile.  The  facilities  of  the  wire  companies  already  were  burdened  with 
commercial  traffic  which  made  impossible  the  promise  of  split-second 
news  service  to  widely  separated  small  papers.  Some  solution  must 
exist,  but  it  had  not  been  found. 


VI.  THE  AIRPLANE  MAKES  NEWS 


THE  Associated  Press  man  at  Dayton,  Ohio,  had  been  inclined  to 
joke  when  they  showed  him  the  Wright  family's  prepared  statement 
and  the  telegram  which  had  prompted  it: 

176    C   KA   CS   PAID 

KITTY  HAWK  N  C    DEC  17 

BISHOP  M.  WRIGHT 

7  HAWTHORNE  ST 

SUCCESS  FOUR  FLIGHTS  THURSDAY  MORNING  ALL 
AGAINST  TWENTY  ONE  MILE  WIND  STARTING  FROM 
LEVEL  WITH  ENGINE  POWER  ALONE  AVERAGE  SPEED 
THROUGH  AIR  THIRTY  ONE  MILES  LONGEST  57  SECONDS 
INFORM  PRESS  HOME  CHRISTMAS.   OREVELLE  WRIGHT 
52  5P 

"Huh,"  the  correspondent  commented.  "Fifty-seven  seconds!  If 
it  were  fifty-seven  minutes  it  might  be  worth  talking  about." 

On  the  chance  that  it  might  be  news  in  some  eyes,  nevertheless, 
he  copied  the  message  and  the  statement  which  old  Bishop  Wright, 
father  of  the  sender,  had  helped  prepare.  Many  editors  snorted  as  they 
read  the  dispatch.  Perfunctorily  it  reported  that  the  two  Wright  brothers 
claimed  to  have  made  man's  first  successful  flights  in  an  airplane.  A 
large  number  of  papers  ignored  the  news  as  humbug,  others  poked  fun 
at  it,  and  even  some  people  in  Dayton  believed  it  a  hoax  designed  to 
attract  attention  to  the  local  bicycle  business  the  Wright  brothers 
conducted. 

It  was  the  biggest  kind  of  news,  however,  and  except  for  two 
minor  errors  it  was  accurate.  The  commercial  telegraph  operator  who 
transmitted  the  message  had  misread  the  time  of  flight,  clipping  two 
seconds  from  the  actual  performance,  and  had  misspelled  Orville 
Wright's  first  name. 

The  dispatch  from  Dayton  was  one  of  the  two  accounts  the  co- 
operative carried  that  day  on  the  Wrights.  The  second,  an  item  of 
some  four  hundred  words,  appeared  under  a  Norfolk,  Virginia,  date 
line  and  gave  a  remarkably  good  description  of  the  test  flights. 

205 


206  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

People  scoffed  at  those  1903  stories  of  what  Wilbur  and  Orville 
Wright  had  done  at  Kitty  Hawk,  and  for  more  than  four  years  few 
took  much  stock  in  the  claims  that  man  could  navigate  the  sky  in  a 
flying  machine.  Nevertheless,  the  Wrights,  returning  to  Dayton,  went 
forward  with  their  experiments  and  the  local  correspondent,  who  had 
revised  his  first  notions  on  the  subject,  kept  anxiously  after  them.  Con- 
sidering the  general  atmosphere  of  continuing  disbelief,  he  showed 
unusual  zeal,  following  their  tests  and  asking  questions. 

"Any  news  on  the  airship  today,  Wilbur?" 

"No,  nothing  special." 

"You  and  Orville  been  flying?" 

"Just  about  as  usual.  Couple  of  fights." 

"How  far?" 

"Halfway  down  the  field." 

"Not  so  much,  eh?  Well,  you  be  sure  to  let  me  know  if  anything 
special  happens." 

There  were  stories  from  Dayton  as  the  months  rolled  by,  yet  not 
until  May,  1908,  when  the  Wrights  conducted  a  fresh  series  of  flights 
at  Kitty  Hawk  did  the  world  awake  to  the  great  news  that  had  been 
happening  completely  unrecognized. 


The  tardy  public  recognition  of  aviation  news  was  accompanied  by 
a  realization  that  the  story  of  aircraft  development  had  international 
scope.  A  few  months  after  the  Wright  brothers  returned  to  Kitty 
Hawk,  cables  were  telling  of  aerial  experiments  along  a  different  line 
in  Germany,  where  Count  Ferdinand  von  Zeppelin  was  striving  to 
perfect  the  dirigible.  The  24-hour  flight  of  his  LZ4  was  an  epochal 
achievement  in  the  history  of  lighter-than-air  craft,  even  though  the 
cruise  ended  in  misadventure.  A  staff  correspondent,  Joseph  Herrings, 
almost  succeeded  in  an  ambitious  plan  to  cover  the  entire  3OO-mile  test 
flight  singlehanded  from  the  ground. 

The  zeppelin  was  docked  in  a  floating  hangar  on  Lake  Constance. 
Herrings  had  been  sent  to  Switzerland  to  watch  developments.  No  an- 
nouncement was  made,  and  Herrings's  inquiries  brought  vague  replies 
that  the  strange  cigar-shaped  craft  would  not  be  prepared  to  take  off 
for  several  days.  The  information  sounded  unconvincing  to  the  reporter. 
He  arranged  for  a  swift  motorboat  and  the  fastest  automobile  available 
and  then  settled  down  to  watch  the  hangar  in  case  Count  Zeppelin 


THE  AIRPLANE  MAKES  NEWS  207 

decided  on  an  unheralded  departure.  It  was  a  wise  forethought.  Early 
one  August  morning  the  nose  of  the  zeppelin  poked  out  of  the  floating 
shed. 

As  soon  as  he  saw  the  airship  being  moved  out,  Herrings  tumbled 
into  his  motorboat  and  started  across  the  lake  toward  her.  The  zeppelin 
took  off  smoothly,  circled  and  headed  toward  Constance  with  the  motor- 
boat  skimming  in  pursuit  on  the  water  below.  The  dirigible  had  not 
picked  up  speed  and  the  correspondent  was  able  to  keep  her  in  sight. 
While  the  motorboat  rushed  along,  he  scratched  off  a  descriptive  account 
of  the  LZ4*s  takeoff.  By  the  time  the  zeppelin's  shadow  left  the  lake 
at  Constance  and  headed  overland,  the  reporter  had  ready  the  dispatch 
which  he  hurried  to  the  telegraph  office  the  moment  he  jumped  ashore. 

Then  the  wild  part  of  the  day  began.  He  set  out  in  the  waiting 
automobile  to  continue  the  breathless  chase  overland.  The  LZ4  was 
cruising  at  a  speed  of  between  35  and  40  miles  an  hour  and  a  1908 
model  automobile  had  a  hard  time  keeping  up.  At  towns  along  the 
route  Herrings  stopped  to  pass  hurriedly  written  copy  to  open-mouthed 
telegraph  operators. 

Other  correspondents  in  places  over  which  the  zeppelin  passed 
also  had  been  systematically  reporting  its  progress  and  across  the  sea 
in  New  York  cable  editor  Harold  Martin  assembled  the  dispatches 
into  one  co-ordinated  story. 

All  morning  Herrings  roared  across  Germany  in  his  reckless  chase, 
and  on  into  the  afternoon.  He  managed  to  keep  the  zeppelin  in  sight 
until  two  o'clock  when  she  disappeared  beyond  a  range  of  hills  near 
Laufen.  From  correspondents  at  other  points,  however,  bulletins  kept 
flowing  in  to  New  York,  telling  of  the  ship's  continued  progress,  her 
stop  for  repairs  at  Nackenheim,  her  landing  near  Echterdingen  the 
next  day,  and  her  destruction  by  fire  while  moored  there. 


Perhaps  because  distance  lent  enchantment,  aeronautical  adventures 
and  misadventures  abroad  appeared  to  command  greater  attention  from 
American  newspapers  than  those  at  home.  Even  Wilbur  Wright  seemed 
to  have  greater  news  value  when  he  went  to  France  to  demonstrate 
his  flying  machine  to  the  French  government.  And  when  Louis  Bleriot 
flew  the  English  channel  July  25,  1909,  editors  in  the  United  States 
hailed  the  feat  as  "one  of  the  greatest  news  events  of  a  generation." 

For  a  time  it  seemed  likely  that  aviation  would  enable  man  to 


208  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

succeed  at  last  in  his  long  attempt  to  reach  the  North  Pole.  Walter 
Wellman,  newspaperman  and  explorer,  was  convinced  that  an  aerial 
trip  to  the  top  of  the  world  was  practicable.  Using  ships  and  dog  sleds, 
he  had  led  polar  expeditions  in  1894  and  again  in  1898.  Back  from 
the  arctic,  he  went  to  work  as  a  Washington  correspondent  for  one  of 
Victor  Lawson's  newspapers.  When  he  mentioned  his  daring  belief  that 
the  North  Pole  might  be  discovered  by  air,  he  found  Lawson  interested. 

The  Chicago  publisher  discussed  Wellman's  plans  with  Frank  B. 
Noyes,  president  of  The  Associated  Press,  and  together  the  two  decided 
to  finance  the  expedition  as  a  private  venture  on  the  part  of  their 
newspapers. 

A  dirigible,  America,  was  built  in  Paris,  and  Wellman  made  the 
first  aerial  voyage  over  the  Arctic  Ocean  in  September,  1907,  only  to 
have  the  weather  balk  a  final  dash  to  the  pole.  By  the  time  Bleriot  was 
preparing  for  the  celebrated  Calais-to-Dover  flight,  however,  Wellman 
was  heading  for  Spitsbergen  and  a  second  attempt  to  fly  to  the  pole. 
The  flight  ended  in  failure  when  the  America  was  badly  damaged 
after  a  forced  landing  among  ice  hummocks  on  August  15.  One  of  the 
Americans  four-man  crew  was  Nicholas  Popoff.  He  was  the  same  Russian 
who  had  been  shot  while  covering  the  Russo-Japanese  War  under  the 
pen  name  of  Kiriloff . 

The  possibilities  of  aerial  exploration  suffered  a  temporary  eclipse 
after  Wellman's  failure,  but  before  a  month  had  passed  the  North  Pole 
was  proving  one  of  the  year's  biggest  and  most  controversial  stories. 
Associated  Press  wires  carried  the  first  bulletin  September  i.  From  the 
island  of  Lerwick,  via  Copenhagen,  came  the  announcement  of  Dr. 
Frederick  Cook,  a  Brooklyn  explorer,  that  he  had  discovered  the  North 
Pole  on  April  21.  The  news  touched  off  a  rush  of  reportorial  activity. 
Robert  M.  Collins,  chief  of  the  London  Bureau,  and  R.  E.  Berry,  of 
the  Berlin  staff,  were  ordered  to  Copenhagen  where  Albert  Thorup, 
the  resident  correspondent,  waited  Cook's  arrival. 

In  New  York  there  was  skepticism  of  Cook's  claims  and  the  scien- 
tific to-do  over  the  alleged  exploration  assumed  great  proportions.  The 
explorer  was  being  lionized,  interviewed,  and  toasted  in  Copenhagen. 
And  then  in  New  York  on  September  6  this  telegram  was  delivered. 

62  NX  B   COLLECT  116P 
INDIAN  HR  VIA  CAPE  RAY  NP  6 
ASSD  PRESS  NY 

STARS  AND  STRIPES  NAILED  TO  NORTH  POLE. 
PEARY. 


THE  AIRPLANE  MAKES  NEWS  209 

The  message  immediately  created  another  sensation.  The  second 
claim  to  the  discovery  of  the  North  Pole  within  a  week?  A  telegram 
flashed  back  to  Indian  Harbor,  Labrador,  asking  for  verification  and  in 
it  The  Associated  Press  called  attention  to  Dr.  Cook's  claims. 

The  answer  came  back: 

INDIAN  HR  VIA  CAPE  RAY  NF  SEPT  6 
MELVILLE  E  STONE 
ASSD  PRESS  N  Y 

REGRET  UNABLE  DISPATCH  DETAILS.   MY  DISPATCH 
STARS  AND  STRIPES  NAILED  TO  NORTH  POLE  AUTHOR- 
ITATIVE AND  CORRECT.   COOK!S  STORY  SHOULD  NOT 
BE  TAKEN  TOO  SERIOUSLY.   THE  TWO  ESKIMOS  WHO 
ACCOMPANIED  HIM  SAY  HE  WENT  NO  DISTANCE  NORTH 
AND  NOT  OUT  OP  SIGHT  OP  LAND.   OTHER  MEMBERS 
OP  THE  TRIBE  CORROBORATE  THEIR  STORY.   PEARY. 

The  new  discovery  story  splashed  across  front  pages  within  an  hour. 
Instructions  from  New  York  headquarters  went  north  to  W.  C.  Jefferds, 
correspondent  in  Portland,  Maine,  Peary's  home  town,  and  to  J.  W. 
Regan,  correspondent  at  Halifax.  With  John  Quinpool,  another  staff 
man,  they  had  previously  received  orders  to  get  ready  to  search  for 
Peary,  who  had  been  overdue.  The  three  men  hired  the  Douglas  H. 
Thomasy  the  only  oceangoing  tug  available  in  Nova  Scotia,  and  set  out 
on  their  hazardous  475-mile  voyage  to  Battle  Harbor.  Regan's  assistant, 
W.  G.  Foster,  made  a  fourth  in  the  party. 

Before  they  started  Jefferds  delivered  the  news  of  Peary's  dis- 
covery to  the  explorer's  wife,  who  was  at  a  summer  home  on  an  island 
off  the  Maine  coast.  She  was  skeptical  because  she  thought  her  husband 
would  have  communicated  with  her  at  the  same  time.  However,  she 
entrusted  the  reporter  with  a  message  to  deliver  at  Battle  Harbor.  Her 
daughter  Marie — the  famous  "Snow  Baby"  born  in  the  far  North  on 
one  of  Peary's  previous  arctic  trips — was  so  overjoyed  that  she  hugged 
and  kissed  Jefferds.  An  hour  and  a  half  after  the  correspondent 
departed  the  proprietor  of  the  country  store  on  the  mainland  arrived 
with  a  telegram  from  Peary  confirming  the  news  Jefferds  had  brought. 

The  Associated  Press  tug  reached  Battle  Harbor  on  September  13 
and  moored  alongside  the  ice-scarred  Roosevelt,  Peary's  expedition  boat. 

Fortunately  no  communication  difficulties  hampered  relay  of  the 
story  from  Labrador.  A  low-power  wireless  station  sent  out  the  news 
to  relay  points  along  the  bleak  mountainous  coast.  Thence  they  were 
forwarded  to  New  York. 


210  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

The  redoubtable  Dr.  Cook  was  aboard  the  steamer  Oscar  II >  en 
route  home  from  Denmark,  and  Berry  of  the  Berlin  staff  accompanied 
him.  Controversy  raged  more  fiercely  than  ever.  On  special  request, 
the  Canadian  Marconi  Company  agreed  to  transmit  Peary's  version  of 
the  discovery  to  Cook  in  mid-Atlantic,  and  to  bring  in  the  stories  Berry 
wrote  on  the  Brooklyn  explorer's  reaction.  When  Cook's  comment  was 
received,  it  was  relayed  to  the  staff  at  Battle  Harbor  for  Peary's  infor- 
mation and  reply. 

Although  separated  by  thousands  of  miles,  the  rival  claimants 
carried  on  a  stubborn  debate  and  the  public  read  the  exchange  of  state- 
ments and  contradictions.  The  four  men  at  Battle  Harbor,  joined  later 
by  Carl  Brandebury  of  the  New  York  staff,  had  the  unique  story  there 
to  themselves  until  a  steamer  arrived  with  American  and  Canadian 
correspondents. 

The  Peary-Cook  dispute  made  news  until  a  National  Geographic 
Society  commission  sustained  Peary's  claims  as  the  true  discoverer  of 
the  North  Pole.  Cook's  purported  proofs  were  submitted  to  the  Uni- 
versity of  Copenhagen  for  adjudication  and  ruled  insufficient. 


Aviation  bounded  back  into  the  limelight,  and  again  it  was  the 
newspaperman-explorer  Wellman  who  provided  a  story  with  no  rival 
for  drama  and  suspense.  Early  in  1910  he  was  soliciting  financial  back- 
ing for  an  unheard-of  exploit.  He  proposed  to  cross  the  Atlantic  from 
the  United  States  to  Europe  in  the  rebuilt  dirigible  America.  Lawson 
could  not  resist  the  lure  of  the  great  news  such  a  flight  might  yield 
and  once  more  he  advanced  funds.  The  New  York  Times  and  the 
London  Daily  Telegraph  likewise  became  interested  and  helped  to 
raise  $40,000.  In  return  the  three  papers  received  exclusive  rights  to 
all  details  of  this  first  attempt  at  a  transoceanic  airship  flight. 

From  the  outset  the  story  presented  coverage  difficulties  for  the 
co-operative  because  Wellman  had  contracted  to  give  the  official  infor- 
mation on  his  venture  only  to  the  syndicate  financing  him.  The  Asso- 
ciated Press  was  left  to  its  own  devices  to  get  a  story  which  momentarily 
transcended  all  others. 

Wellman  selected  Atlantic  City  as  the  starting  point  for  the  flight 
and  workmen  began  to  reassemble  the  dismantled  dirigible  as  soon  as 
it  arrived  by  boat  from  Paris  on  August  6.  Reporters  from  the  New 
York  office  wrote  reams  of  copy  describing  the  construction  of  the 


THE  AIRPLANE  MAKES  NEWS  211 

America,  the  principle  of  its  "equilibrator,"  and  the  lifeboat  which  was 
to  be  carried,  slung  under  the  car  of  the  airship,  well  away  from  the 
inflammable  hull  of  the  ship,  to  accommodate  a  short-range  wireless 
set,  a  stove,  and  other  equipment.  Progress  in  preparing  the  America 
was  slow.  August  passed.  Then  September.  Many  people  were  calling 
Wellman  a  "fake." 

At  last,  on  October  12,  Columbus  Day,  the  work  was  finished.  Less 
than  sixty  hours  later,  Saturday  morning,  October  1 5,  Wellman  shouted 
"Let  go  all!"  to  an  improvised  ground  crew  and  the  America  disap- 
peared into  a  dense  fog,  Europe  bound.  She  carried  a  crew  of  five,  a 
wireless  operator,  and  a  mascot  kitten,  "Kiddo."  The  wireless  operator 
was  Jack  Irwin. 

Up  and  down  the  coast  and  in  cities  abroad  the  association's  forces 
were  alert  for  word  of  the  airship's  progress. 

Crouched  in  the  lifeboat  precariously  suspended  beneath  the  dirigi- 
ble's car,  Irwin  contacted  an  Atlantic  City  station  two  and  a  half  hours 
after  the  take-off  and  the  first  wireless  messages  exchanged  between  a 
shore  station  and  an  airship  were  sent.  "Headed  northeast.  All  well  on 
board.  Machinery  working  well."  Swift  bulletins  relayed  the  informa- 
tion. A  few  minutes  later  Wellman  sent  a  dispatch  in  code  giving  details 
of  the  flight  up  to  that  point,  but  it  went  exclusively  to  the  syndicate 
financing  him. 

Then  silence  descended  and  for  twenty-four  hours  no  further 
reports  came  from  the  ocean  fog  which  held  the  America.  Men  stopped 
one  another  in  the  streets  to  inquire  if  there  was  any  news.  From  wire- 
less stations  all  along  the  coast,  from  operators  on  ships  at  sea,  calls 
went  out  to  the  America.  But  there  was  no  answer. 

Irwin  in  his  swaying  aerial  lifeboat  could  hear  the  calls,  but  all  his 
efforts  to  raise  one  of  the  stations  failed.  His  dynamo  stopped  working, 
forcing  him  to  switch  to  batteries  and  their  limited  power  reduced  his 
signal  range.  One  or  two  vessels  were  sighted  through  the  fog,  but 
apparently  they  carried  no  wireless  equipment.  Finally  on  Sunday 
afternoon,  he  got  through  an  "All's  well"  message  to  Siasconset— the 
America  was  then  off  Nantucket— and  Wellman  sent  a  code  dispatch 
to  the  syndicate  enumerating  difficulties  that  were  developing.  Then 
the  long  hours  of  silence  returned. 

All  Sunday  night  the  airship  battled  a  storm  which  threatened  to 
destroy  her.  Irwin  flashed  CQD  after  CQD,  but  the  distress  signals 
were  never  picked  up.  The  "equilibrator,"  a  long  metal  device  towed 
along  the  ocean's  surface  like  a  huge  sea  serpent  to  control  the  airship's 


212  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

altitude  and  to  compensate  for  changes  in  her  buoyancy,  kept  pulling 
the  America  down  toward  the  crest  of  the  waves.  The  wind  changed 
and  drove  the  dirigible  southward,  off  her  course. 

Throughout  Monday  the  battle  against  disaster  went  on.  Gasoline, 
oil,  supplies,  even  parts  of  the  motors  were  jettisoned  to  lighten  ship 
and  keep  her  from  crashing  into  the  ocean.  Monday  night  was  the  last 
night.  The  five  aboard  realized  it  as  they  ate  a  meal  of  cold  ham, 
biscuits,  and  water.  They  might  be  able  to  keep  the  airship  in  flight 
another  day,  but  when  the  sun  set  again  and  the  gas  cooled,  she  would 
plunge  into  the  sea.  They  would  have  to  risk  launching  the  lifeboat 
sometime  Tuesday,  dropping  it  from  mid-air  and  running  the  double 
risk  of  having  it  capsize  or  be  smashed  by  the  equilibrator  below. 

The  wireless  operator  stood  watch  in  the  drifting  airship  until 
3  A.M.  Tuesday,  when  Wellman  relieved  him.  Shouts  roused  him  some 
time  later.  A  steamer  had  been  sighted.  Irwin  tumbled  down  into  the 
life  boat  and  started  calling,  but  got  no  answer. 

Seizing  a  flashlight,  he  commenced  signaling  in  Morse  code,  blink- 
ing out  dots  and  dashes. 

Then,  suddenly,  the  steamer  was  signaling  back  by  the  same 
method.  Irwin  asked  if  they  had  a  wireless  aboard  and  the  steamer — 
she  was  the  Bermuda  liner  S.S.  Trent — replied  her  Marconi  man  would 
be  routed  out  at  once.  In  a  few  minutes  Irwin  was  talking  by  wireless 
with  Louis  S.  Ginsberg,  the  Trent's  operator,  arranging  the  details 
of  a  perilous  rescue. 

Down  came  the  America.  The  lifeboat's  lashings  were  loosened. 
The  last  two  release  hooks  were  snapped  open  and  the  boat  plummeted 
into  the  rough  ocean  with  the  airship's  crew  and  Kiddo.  It  almost 
capsized,  righted  itself,  and  crashed  into  the  dreaded  equilibrator. 
Seconds  later  the  Trent  almost  ran  them  down  as  she  maneuvered  and 
they  were  in  danger  of  being  cut  to  pieces  by  the  propellers.  Lines 
finally  were  thrown  down  and  the  America's  bedraggled  crew  was 
pulled  aboard  the  Trent.  The  abandoned  airship  drifted  away  derelict 
over  the  ocean. 

Battered  and  weary,  Irwin  made  his  way  immediately  to  the 
Trends  wireless  room.  Standing  beside  the  steamer's  operator  the  one- 
time string  correspondent  stole  a  march  on  Wellman  by  dictating  a 
straightforward  report  of  the  America's  ill-starred  aerial  odyssey  and 
the  rescue  375  miles  east  of  Cape  Hatteras. 

In  a  matter  of  minutes  the  dispatch  reached  the  New  York  head- 
quarters of  The  Associated  Press.  It  was  flash  news  all  wires.  The  two 


THE  AIRPLANE  MAKES  NEWS  213 

American  newspapers  which  had  contracted  with  Wellman  for  the 
exclusive  story  of  his  adventure  got  their  first  tidings,  not  from  him 
but  from  the  co-operative  in  which  they  held  membership.  Similarly, 
an  Associated  Press  dispatch,  relayed  to  Europe,  gave  the  London 
Telegraphy  the  third  syndicate  member,  its  first  information. 

The  America's  wireless  operator  might  have  signed  his  dramatic 
dispatch  from  the  Trent  "Irwin,"  and  that  would  have  been  sufficient 
for  the  news  editor  who  first  read  it  in  New  York.  Apparently  he 
thought  more  complete  identification  necessary.  After  his  name  he  added 
three  words,  and  the  complete  signature  read:  "Irwin,  Associated  Press 
correspondent." 


VII.  A  NEW  PERSONALITY 


".  .  .  the  revenues  for  the  twelve  months  of  1910  were  $2,728,- 
888.64  and  the  expenses  $2,742,492.18."  This  was  another  deficit,  the 
fifth  in  seven  years. 

The  Associated  Press  had  celebrated  its  tenth  anniversary  as  a 
non-profit  co-operative.  Its  prestige  stood  high  and,  as  far  as  externals 
went,  the  organization's  position  was  an  enviable  one.  Yet  there  were 
danger  signals. 

The  financial  condition  worried  General  Manager  Stone.  For  the 
most  part,  his  efforts  had  been  concentrated  on  the  performance  of  the 
association  as  an  impartial  news  gatherer.  The  report  was  the  thing 
by  which  members  and  newspaper  readers  alike  judged  the  organization, 
and  to  the  report  he  devoted  his  genius.  Expense,  extension  of 
facilities,  and  costly  commitments  were  no  major  objects  with  him 
when  it  was  a  question  of  maintaining  Associated  Press  pre-eminence. 
The  results  bore  tribute  to  his  energetic  direction  and  his  unusual  per- 
sonality found  valuable  expression  in  dramatizing  the  new  principle 
for  which  the  co-operative  stood.  Yet  the  demands  of  actual  news 
gathering  made  it  difficult  for  him  to  turn  his  notable  abilities  to  less 
spirited  organizational  problems.  Business  details  never  captured  his 
imagination  and  he  was  happier  in  the  midst  of  a  great  news  emergency 
than  while  struggling  with  the  intricacies  of  a  balanced  budget. 

The  difficulty  of  making  ends  meet  while  operating  a  non-profit 
organization  on  the  same  assessment  basis  which  went  into  effect  in 
1900,  before  the  demands  of  news  gathering  began  to  increase,  was 
acute.  The  basis  of  prorating  expenses  during  the  first  ten  years  was 
purely  experimental.  But  inasmuch  as  the  formula  was  based  on  the 
population  in  each  member  paper's  circulating  area,  there  was  no  chance 
of  revising  figures  until  the  1910  Federal  Census  became  available.  At 
that  time  Stone  and  the  Board  of  Directors  planned  to  review  the 
existing  scales  and  readjust  wherever  necessary.  In  the  meantime  the 
general  manager  could  do  little  more  than  refer  the  recurrent  vexations 

214 


A  NEW  PERSONALITY  215 

to  Treasurer  J.  R.  Youatt  for  such  inconclusive  preliminary  action  as 
could  be  taken. 

As  for  savings  through  a  realignment  of  leased  wire  facilities — one 
of  the  largest  items  of  expense — these  possibilities  eluded  Stone.  But  he 
did  realize  that  the  question  of  improving  the  lot  of  the  harried  pony 
papers  was  important.  This  was  essentially  a  news  detail  because  it  was 
necessary  that  they  be  served  efficiently  if  they  were  to  remain  in  mem- 
bership and  contribute  the  important  news  of  their  territories.  If  he 
ever  did  forget  the  plight  of  these  papers,  it  was  not  for  long.  Day  in 
and  day  out  their  messages  reached  his  desk: 

"No  telegraph  budget  today  until  after  we  had  gone  to  press." 

"Today's  report  not  only  late  but  garbled." 

"Help.  Help.  No  news  telegram  today." 

"If  we  can't  get  news,  how  can  we  pay  our  assessment?" 

Spurred  by  these  complaints,  Stone  ventured  into  the  communi- 
cations' field  to  seek  a  remedy.  He  sounded  out  telegraph  companies 
once  again  on  the  possibility  of  an  arrangement  which  would  guarantee 
expeditious  commercial  delivery  without  an  increase  in  expense.  Com- 
pany officials  could  promise  nothing. 

Then  he  attempted  to  arrange  for  "short-hour"  leased  wire  facilities 
over  which  important  news  could  be  speeded  to  the  small  papers.  But 
wire  companies  reported  this  was  not  feasible  except  at  more  expense 
than  the  papers  could  afford. 

Just  when  the  pony  outlook  seemed  blackest,  help  appeared  from 
an  unexpected  source. 

The  general  manager  was  at  his  desk  one  day  shortly  before 
Thanksgiving  in  1910,  when  C.  H.  Wilson,  general  manager  of  the 
American  Telephone  and  Telegraph  Company,  telephoned  that  he  was 
sending  over  a  young  man  who  had  some  practical  ideas  about  trans- 
mitting news  rapidly  to  small  papers  in  isolated  places. 

The  young  man  was  Kent  Cooper,  from  Indiana.  Stone  promised 
to  see  him,  but  he  was  not  convinced  that  the  solution  of  the  co-opera- 
tive's problem  of  delivering  world  news  to  distant  papers  of  only 
modest  means  could  come  from  such  an  unknown  source,  particularly 
when  it  was  something  that  had  puzzled  the  best  minds  in  the  trans- 
mission business.  Nevertheless,  the  general  manager  had  an  effective 
method  of  dealing  with  visitors.  He  greeted  them  graciously  but  with 
his  body  barring  the  doorway  to  his  private  office  while  he  made  tentative 
appraisal.  If  sufficiently  impressed  he  could  step  back  in  his  most  cordial 


216  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

manner  and  permit  them  to  enter.  But  if  not,  he  could  dismiss  them 
without  having  them  suspect  that  he  did  not  wish  to  be  bothered. 

It  was  in  this  way  that  he  greeted  Cooper. 

"I  understand  you  have  the  solution  of  the  problem  of  getting  news 
to  small  papers  which  cannot  afford  leased  wires,"  he  said  with  a 
quizzical  smile. 

Cooper  replied  that  he  believed  he  did. 

Stone  still  stood  in  the  doorway. 

"Well,"  he  said,  selecting  a  point  about  which  a  Midwesterner 
normally  would  not  be  expected  to  have  first  knowledge,  "just  exactly 
what  could  you  do  for  Burlington,  Vermont?" 

Cooper  thought  for  a  moment. 

"You  can't  serve  Burlington  economically  from  Boston,  which 
is  your  nearest  New  England  Bureau,"  he  replied,  "because  of  the 
distance." 

Stone  was  surprised  that  his  visitor  was  that  well  informed,  but  the 
Burlington  problem  still  was  not  solved. 

"So  what  could  you  do?"  he  asked. 

"Well,"  observed  Cooper,  "why  not  serve  them  by  telephone  out 
of  your  Albany  Bureau,  which  is  closer?  From  Albany  it  would  involve 
only  156  miles  of  wire  as  against  233  from  Boston,  and  the  cost  to 
deliver  1,500  words  daily  over  this  route  would  be  only  $16  a  week." 

Stone  gave  the  young  man  another  once  over. 

"Come  on  in,"  he  said. 


Stone  did  not  know  it  then,  but  Cooper's  experience  in  newspaper 
work  had  begun  when  he  was  a  boy  of  thirteen — the  same  year  Victor 
Lawson  and  his  publishing  associates  started  the  "revolution  of  1893" 
out  of  which  had  come  the  non-profit  co-operative  principle  in  news. 

The  son  of  an  Indiana  congressman,  Cooper  began  as  a  carrier 
boy  and  a  year  later  became  a  fledgling  reporter  on  the  Columbus 
Republican.  His  editor  belonged  to  the  school  which  believed  that 
"names  make  news"  and  Cooper's  first  assignment  was  to  ride  his 
bicycle  to  the  railroad  station  daily  and  get  the  names  of  all  arrivals 
and  departures.  In  time  he  came  in  contact  with  the  resurgent  Associated 
Press  and  the  Chicago  Bureau  made  him  a  string  correspondent  at 
Columbus.  He  continued  this  part-time  work  in  addition  to  his  duties 
on  the  local  paper  until  he  left  to  attend  the  University  of  Indiana.  His 


A  NEW  PERSONALITY  217 

father  died  in  1899  and  he  was  forced  to  leave  college  to  earn  his  own 
living. 

The  Indianapolis  Press  gave  him  his  start  at  $12  a  week.  Later 
he  joined  the  Scripps-McRae  Press  Association  and  established  its 
Indianapolis  Bureau.  Most  papers  served  from  that  office  were 
small  and  Cooper  came  to  know  the  problems  which  beset  them.  In 
1905  he  struck  out  for  himself  with  a  state  or  vicinage  news  service 
of  his  own,  set  up  with  $50  of  his  own  money  and  a  similar  amount 
invested  by  a  friend.  He  incorporated  his  enterprise  as  the  United 
Press  News  Association  and  a  year  later  sold  it  to  Scripps-McRae, 
which  merged  with  two  other  agencies  in  1907  to  form  the  United 
Press  Associations. 

Cooper  continued  as  Indianapolis  Bureau  manager  and  soon  he  was 
experimenting  with  a  telephone  talking  circuit  serving  news  to  several 
small  papers  simultaneously.  Up  to  that  time  the  telephone  companies 
had  no  special  press  rates  but  charged  on  a  private-message,  point-to- 
point  basis.  Cooper  convinced  them  that  it  was  to  their  advantage  to 
fix  a  rate  which  would  enable  them  to  compete  with  the  telegraph  as 
a  news  distribution  medium  and  also  demonstrated  that  the  problem 
of  linking  a  number  of  papers  together  on  a  talking  news  circuit  was 
feasible. 

The  idea  behind  the  telephone  pony  circuit  was  that  a  press  asso- 
ciation employee  made  up  an  abbreviated  news  report  in  a  centrally 
located  bureau  and  then  read  it  over  a  long-distance  line  extending  into 
the  offices  of  small  newspapers  several  miles  to  hundreds  of  miles 
away.  In  each  of  the  offices  the  local  editor  listened  into  the  receiver 
and  copied  down  the  news  at  it  was  being  read.  One  appealing  feature 
was  that  the  receiving  editors  developed  the  habit  of  volunteering  to 
the  others  on  the  circuit  the  news  of  their  communities,  thus  exchanging 
much  neighborhood  or  vicinage  news  which  ordinarily  would  not  have 
found  its  way  into  a  press  association  report. 

In  spite  of  the  success  of  these  early  efforts,  Cooper  was  not  satis- 
fied. He  knew  of  the  abuses  to  which  commercially  controlled  news 
had  been  subjected  back  before  the  emergence  of  the  non-profit  prin- 
ciple, in  news,  and  he  felt  that  The  Associated  Press  offered  unique 
opportunity  on  the  side  of  truthful,  unbiased  reporting.  He  was  familiar 
with  the  practical  obstacles  which  had  hindered  its  expansion  into  the 
more  isolated  areas  such  as  those  he  had  learned  to  serve  by  telephone, 
and  so  it  was  through  telephone  officials  that  he  obtained  his  introduction 
to  Stone.  He  began  his  assignment  on  December  5,  1910. 


2i8  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 


Although  the  young  Indianian  had  demonstrated  his  knowledge 
of  transmission  conditions,  he  still  had  to  convince  Stone  that  news 
actually  could  be  sent  by  ordinary  telephone  to  scattered  newspapers 
without  losing  anything  in  accuracy — a  question  about  which  the  general 
manager  had  his  worst  fears. 

"You'll  have  my  resignation  if  I  can't  deliver  stories  by  telephone 
more  rapidly  and  with  greater  accuracy  and  efficiency  than  you  can 
deliver  them  by  overhead  telegraph,"  Cooper  told  Stone  soon  after 
he  took  up  his  duties  in  New  York. 

The  general  manager  accepted  the  stipulation. 

"You  are  to  make  your  test  on  two  real  'guinea  pigs'  I'll  select  for 
you  out  in  Michigan,"  he  said. 

Owing  to  cumbersome  wire  systems  and  the  burden  of  commercial 
traffic,  telegraphed  delivery  of  the  association's  pony  news  reports  to 
the  Houghton  Gazette  and  the  Marquette  Journal  had  been  haphazard 
and  uncertain  at  best.  Their  news  budgets,  prepared  in  the  Chicago 
office,  averaged  five  thousand  words  nightly  and  the  long  telegraph 
files  were  both  expensive  and  subject  to  frequent  garbling. 

Cooper  lined  up  his  circuit  and  looked  on  as  the  first  telephone 
news  report  was  read  to  the  two  papers  by  an  editor  in  the  Chicago 
office.  In  Houghton  and  Marquette,  miles  away,  the  two  member 
editors  simultaneously  copied  down  dispatch  after  dispatch  as  the  man 
in  Chicago  read  the  news  into  the  mouthpiece  at  the  sending  end.  The 
news  not  only  was  delivered  more  rapidly,  but  a  study  of  the  received 
copy  showed  it  was  completely  accurate.  Moreover,  one  telephone  circuit 
linking  both  papers  was  less  expensive  than  the  double  filing  necessary 
to  deliver  the  copy  to  both  papers  by  overhead  telegraph. 

Stone  was  pleased. 

"You  win,"  he  said.  "Now  go  to  work  and  serve  all  the  papers 
that  have  been  giving  us  so  much  trouble." 

He  started  to  wave  Cooper  away,  but  on  the  spur  of  the  moment 
called  him  back. 

"Tell  me,"  he  smiled,  "how  in  the  name  of  the  devil  did  you 
happen  to  have  the  answer  on  Burlington  that  day  you  came  to  see 
me?  You  even  knew  the  exact  wire  mileage  from  Albany." 

Cooper  explained. 

"It  was  very  simple,"  he  said.  "I  studied  the  situation  before  I  came 


A  NEW  PERSONALITY  219 

to  see  you  and  memorized  the  figures  on  the  more  isolated  places  because 
they  were  the  ones  I  thought  you'd  be  likely  to  ask  about!" 

First  in  the  Midwest,  then  in  the  East,  the  Rocky  Mountain  area, 
and  other  sections  of  the  country,  Cooper  set  up  the  special  telephone 
pony  circuits  to  supplant  the  unsatisfactory  commercial  telegraph  trans- 
missions. Before  he  had  been  in  the  service  four  months  thirty-six 
additional  papers  were  receiving  their  news  over  telephone  talking 
circuits  and  the  program  had  only  begun. 


VIII.  STANDARD  OIL 


WHILE  Cooper  was  improving  the  lot  of  the  association's  smaller 
newspapers  Stone  and  the  Board  of  Directors  were  occupied  with  trouble 
that  was  brewing  elsewhere. 

There  were  alarming  charges  affecting  the  integrity  of  the  news 
report  and  the  probity  of  the  general  manager.  The  most  serious  accu- 
sation was  made  by  Frank  B.  Kellogg,  the  government  attorney  who 
later  became  secretary  of  state.  He  had  been  engaged  in  prosecuting 
the  Standard  Oil  Company  under  the  Sherman  antitrust  law,  and  during 
that  litigation  he  wrote: 

Melville  E.  Stone  is  controlled  absolutely  by  the  Standard  Oil  people. 
He  will  not,  of  course,  send  out  any  reports  of  the  testimony  that  he  is  not 
obliged  to,  at  least  that  is  my  opinion  from  all  that  I  have  seen.  ...  It  is 
astonishing  that  that  concern  can  control  The  Associated  Press. 

John  D.  Rockefeller's  oil  empire  had  been  under  attack  ever 
since  the  trust-busting  era  began  in  earnest  with  Theodore  Roosevelt's 
second  term  in  the  White  House.  Roosevelt's  vigorous  language  put 
the  Standard  Oil  on  the  defensive  in  the  public  eye.  The  oil  company 
had  a  bad  press  editorially,  and  as  early  as  1905  some  of  its  people 
were  suggesting  that  it  "start  a  backfire"  to  counteract  unfavorable 
publicity.  At  that  time  Congressman  J.  C.  Sibley  of  Pennsylvania,  who 
was  interested  in  Standard  Oil,  wrote  confidentially  to  John  D.  Arch- 
bold,  the  corporation's  vice-president,  proposing  a  definite  plan:  "An 
efficient  literary  bureau  is  needed,  not  for  a  day  but  [for]  permanent 
and  healthy  control  of  The  Associated  Press  and  other  kindred  avenues. 
It  will  cost  money,  but  it  will  be  the  cheapest  in  the  end  and  can  be 
made  self-supporting." 

No  action  was  taken  on  Sibley's  suggestion  and  The  Associated 
Press,  unaware  of  the  possible  schemes  of  lobbyists  and  press  agents, 
continued  to  report  news  concerning  the  oil  company  in  an  objective, 
factual  manner. 

A  few  years  later,  however,  Kellogg,  as  government  prosecutor, 
instituted  the  lengthy  proceedings  which  ultimately  brought  the  dis- 

220 


STANDARD  OIL  221 

solution  of  the  parent  corporation  in  the  Rockefeller  structure,  the 
Standard  Oil  of  New  Jersey.  During  this  litigation  attempts  were 
made  to  influence  the  report  in  favor  of  the  company.  Kellogg  was 
unaware  of  this  when  he  made  his  charges  against  Stone,  but  it  was 
his  accusation  that  started  an  inquiry. 

At  the  request  of  member  papers  in  New  York  City,  the  Board  of 
Directors  appointed  a  five-man  committee,  headed  by  Oswald  Garrison 
Villard  of  the  New  York  Post,  for  a  thorough  investigation  not  only 
of  Kellogg's  allegations  but  also  of  any  complaints  reflecting  on  the 
integrity  of  the  news.  None  of  the  committee  men  was  a  board  member 
and  the  fact  that  several  of  them  privately  disliked  Stone  was  a  guar- 
antee that  nothing  would  be  left  undone  to  uncover  evidence  of 
collusion. 

Kellogg's  letter  attacking  Stone  obviously  was  one  of  the  first 
points  of  inquiry.  Attempts  to  have  Kellogg  appear  before  the  committee 
proved  unsuccessful.  The  attorney  refused  and  when  the  Villard  com- 
mittee visited  him  in  a  body  he  denied  he  had  written  the  letter.  The 
committee  confronted  him  with  the  original  which  bore  his  signature 
and  he  reluctantly  acknowledged  its  authenticity.  The  letter,  he  said, 
stated  his  opinion  of  the  situation  as  he  recalled  it.  He  offered  to 
produce  "proof"  of  the  co-operative's  failure  to  carry  adequate  stories 
setting  forth  the  government's  side  of  the  oil  case. 

To  obtain  this  proof,  Kellogg  had  his  secretary  check  on  Associated 
Pre.ss  stories  appearing  in  a  single  state.  Minnesota  was  the  state  selected. 
The  survey  disclosed  that  few  dispatches  on  the  subject  were  printed 
there,  and  the  few  appearing  had  been  brief.  Kellogg  soon  found, 
however,  that  this  survey  established  nothing  except  the  fallacy  of  the 
conclusion  on  which  he  had  made  his  charge  of  bias.  There  was  little 
interest  attached  to  the  Standard  Oil  case  in  Minnesota  and  editors  of 
member  papers  consequently  had  made  sparing  use  of  the  stories  they 
had  received.  An  examination  of  The  Associated  Press  files  disclosed 
that  the  case  had  been  reported  thoroughly,  and  a  check  of  papers 
nationally  showed  there  had  been  extensive  use  of  the  material  which 
Minnesota  editors  had  trimmed  down  or  discarded. 

This  phase  of  the  investigation  had  no  sooner  ended  than  Villard's 
committee  learned  with  surprise  from  the  general  manager  that  a 
correspondent  who  indirectly  covered  one  phase  of  the  Standard  Oil 
case  for  The  Associated  Press  had  been  in  the  pay  of  a  Standard  Oil 
press  agent,  Captain  P.  C.  Boyle,  of  Oil  City,  Pennsylvania.  Unaware 
of  these  facts  before,  Stone  volunteered  the  information  as  soon  as  he 


222  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

obtained  it  from  Boyle.  Some  members  of  the  committee  were  disposed 
to  be  suspicious.  It  was  common  knowledge  that  Boyle,  who  held  mem- 
bership in  the  association  as  publisher  of  the  Oil  City  Derrick,  was  a 
friend  of  Stone. 

The  investigators  sought  information  on  how  the  Standard  Oil 
case  had  been  covered  both  in  the  extended  hearings  at  New  York  and 
in  the  final  arguments  at  St.  Louis.  It  developed  that  Carl  Brandebury, 
city  editor  of  the  New  York  staff,  had  been  assigned  to  the  case  when 
it  opened  in  New  York.  He  covered  forty-four  of  the  ninety-five  hear- 
ings and  was  withdrawn  only  after  all  the  major  witnesses  had  testified. 
The  remaining  fifty-one  hearings  were  routine  and  for  coverage  on 
these  the  co-operative  depended  on  the  reports  of  the  City  News  Asso- 
ciation, the  local  news-gathering  agency  owned  and  controlled  by  the 
New  York  newspapers.  City  News  maintained  its  own  staff  and  supplied 
the  New  York  papers  and  The  Associated  Press  with  the  daily  routine 
and  secondary  news  of  the  metropolis.  Like  the  co-operative,  all  but 
one  of  the  New  York  papers  recalled  their  staff  men  after  the  important 
witnesses  had  been  heard  and  relied  on  City  News. 

Captain  Boyle,  appearing  before  the  committee,  told  of  his  asso- 
ciation with  the  City  News  reporter  who  covered  the  case.  As  soon  as 
the  oil  company  hearings  were  under  way,  he  testified,  he  felt  that 
Standard  Oil  was  not  receiving  fair  play  in  the  accounts  published  by  the 
New  York  papers.  He  said  he  felt  that  the  government's  case,  on  the 
other  hand,  received  too  favorable  attention.  "For  accuracy  in  report- 
ing," as  he  called  it,  he  arranged  with  the  reporter  to  give  the  Standard 
Oil's  side  of  the  controversy  "proper"  treatment  in  the  City  News 
reports.  These,  he  knew,  would  go  to  the  local  papers,  whether  or  not 
they  had  staff  men  present,  and  he  hoped  they  might  influence  editors. 

Boyle  paid  the  reporter  "never  less  than  $100  a  week,"  although 
he  claimed  that  the  results  were  so  negative  that  the  expense  was  hardly 
justified.  When  it  was  pointed  out  to  the  witness  that  The  Associated 
Press  might  have  been  victimized  by  misrepresentations  in  the  City 
News  report,  Boyle  insisted  he  was  thinking  only  of  the  local  papers 
when  he  retained  the  City  News  man.  He  also  declared  that  the  re- 
porter was  paid  to  report  the  Standard  Oil  side  of  the  case  "accurately" 
and  not  to  distort  any  facts. 

The  City  News  reporter's  status  changed  when  the  Standard  Oil 
litigation  shifted  to  St.  Louis  for  argument.  The  involved  nature  of 
the  case  made  it  desirable  that  the  man  covering  the  argument  be  thor- 
oughly familiar  with  all  the  background,  and  there  was  no  one  in  the 


STANDARD  OIL  223 

St.  Louis  Bureau  so  qualified.  While  Stone  was  considering  the  matter 
of  the  assignment,  the  City  News  man  offered  his  services.  He  said  he 
had  a  vacation  coming  and  that  he  would  be  glad  to  utilize  the  time  to 
cover  the  brief  St.  Louis  proceedings  for  The  Associated  Press.  Stone 
felt  that  this  offered  an  excellent  opportunity  to  arrange  for  authorita- 
tive coverage  since  the  man  was  familiar  with  the  case,  and  so  he 
engaged  him.  Unknown  to  Stone,  the  reporter  then  got  in  touch  with 
Boyle  and  for  $500  promised  to  "look  after"  Standard  Oil  interests. 

Boyle  acknowledged  this  in  his  testimony,  but  again  insisted  he 
was  aiming  at  the  local  press  in  St.  Louis  and  not  at  The  Associated 
Press.  The  local  men,  he  said,  would  naturally  turn  to  the  New  York 
reporter,  as  one  well  grounded,  to  clarify  the  intricate  phases  of  the 
case.  He  denied  that  the  City  News  man  had  made  clear  his  Associated 
Press  connection  or  that  this  consideration  figured  in  the  bargain.  He 
said  that  he  had  gone  to  Stone  promptly  with  all  this  information  as 
soon  as  he  learned  the  general  manager  was  under  investigation. 

These  facts  established,  the  Villard  committee  turned  to  the  news 
reports  to  ascertain  what  effect  the  secret  Boyle  understanding  had 
had  on  the  coverage.  The  findings,  however,  suggested  that  Boyle  had 
made  a  bad  bargain.  The  New  York  reporter's  accounts  of  the  New 
York  hearings  had  been  rewritten  by  Associated  Press  men  before  relay 
on  the  leased  wires.  His  stories  at  St.  Louis  had  contained  editorializing 
in  favor  of  the  Standard  Oil,  but  the  files  showed  that  Melvin  Coleman, 
vigilant  head  of  the  bureau  there,  had  deleted  all  such  references  before 
the  copy  reached  the  wires. 

Both  Boyle  and  the  City  News  reporter  testified  that  Stone  was 
ignorant  of  their  private  arrangement. 

After  the  Boyle  conspiracy  had  been  exposed,  the  investigators 
turned  to  less  sensational  indictments  urged  against  the  general  manager. 
Foreign  governments  had  bestowed  decorations  on  Stone  in  recognition 
of  his  efforts  to  break  down  censorship.  Some  of  his  critics  contended 
that  these  honors  disposed  The  Associated  Press  to  give  preferential 
treatment  to  news  involving  governments  which  hadsj^gggired  the 
general  manager. 

Another  attack  centered  on  the  fact  that  S$nfeJ 
his  social  acquaintances  such  men  as  J.  P.  M^gar^' 'Judge  Elbert^H. 
Gary,  head  of  the  United  States  Steel  Corpcfhtip^ayl  vdt&fohfr^ 

nent  in  finance  and  business.  These  relatioiH,^  }was^argu$I, ' 

li  n\  v     V  *  •  "  •)  ^* 

suspicion  that  the  co-operative  was  primarily  ronoCTnea  ratl^jgrptectjiig 

the  interests  with  which  these  men  were  iaintifafld.  otbne's 


224  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

arranging  the  Russo-Japanese  peace  at  the  Portsmouth  Conference  in 
1905  also  was  criticized  as  improper  activity  for  a  general  manager, 
regardless  of  his  good  intentions. 

The  investigation  seemed  more  and  more  like  a  hostile  expedition 
looking  for  anything  to  discredit  the  general  manager.  Stone  found 
some  consolation  in  the  fact  that,  although  the  entire  membership  had 
been  canvassed,  no  charges  had  come  from  its  ranks.  The  accusations, 
both  serious  and  trivial,  emanated  from  private  sources.  Nevertheless, 
the  general  manager's  position  became  a  trying  one,  for  until  the  com- 
mittee submitted  its  findings  he  lived  under  a  cloud. 


Under  the  strained  circumstances  the  service  inevitably  suffered. 
Among  the  things  overlooked  was  the  special  work  Cooper  had  been 
doing.  His  duties  had  taken  him  into  most  parts  of  the  country  and 
his  study  of  wire  facilities  was  bringing  to  light  conditions  long  un- 
noticed. In  many  places  he  found  that  the  association  was  paying  for 
wires  it  was  not  actually  using.  In  others,  mileage  could  be  saved  by 
more  direct  routing  of  wires,  and  in  still  others  the  association  was 
paying  higher  rates  than  commercial  competitors.  In  numerous  instances 
efficiency  and  economy  could  be  served  by  combining  or  realigning 
existing  wire  setups.  Cooper  discovered,  too,  that  outdated  or  faulty 
mechanical  equipment  was  responsible  for  costly  wire  delays  and  that  on 
a  number  of  overtaxed  circuits  the  report  should  be  overhauled. 

Individually  the  potential  economies  were  not  always  imposing — a 
few  hundred  dollars  here,  a  thousand  there — but  taken  together  they 
made  a  sum  of  more  than  $100,000  yearly,  no  small  amount  in  the 
affairs  of  an  organization  with  an  annual  budget  of  $2,846,812. 

There  were  the  immediate  demands  of  the  news  report  for  first 
consideration — the  coronation  of  King  George  of  England,  troubles 
in  Mexico,  revolution  in  China,  a  Franco-German  crisis,  and  extension 
of  the  service  into  South  America.  But  the  Cooper  plan  soon  was 
adopted  with  the  active  encouragement  of  V.  S.  McClatchy,  of  the 
Sacramento  Bee,  and  Adolph  S.  Ochs,  of  the  New  York  Times.  By 
1912  the  realignment  program  was  in  full  swing  and  during  a  period 
of  recurrent  deficits  the  savings  were  most  welcome.  Together  with 
a  revision  of  the  assessment  schedules  by  which  the  expenses  of  the 
association  were  prorated  among  the  member  newspapers  on  the  basis 
of  population  figures  compiled  by  the  1910  Federal  Census,  these 


STANDARD  OIL  225 

savings  helped  the  financial  affairs  of  the  association  return  to  an  even 
keel. 


The  investigation  of  Villard's  committee  entered  its  closing  stages 
and  the  Board  of  Directors  instituted  action  against  Captain  Boyle  as 
the  owner  of  a  member  paper.  His  admissions  involving  coverage  of 
the  Standard  Oil  litigation  had  subjected  the  news  report  to  question. 
The  board  termed  his  conduct  "most  reprehensible,"  fined  him  $1,000, 
and  publicly  rebuked  him  for  his  actions. 

After  almost  a  year  of  testimony,  Villard's  committee  at  length 
submitted  its  final  report  on  the  whole  investigation.  Although  the 
language  of  the  report  was  not  friendly  to  Stone,  it  vindicated  his 
integrity  and  the  integrity  of  the  news  report  he  administered.  The 
accusations  and  unsavory  insinuations  were  considered  seriatim  and  dis- 
missed as  unfounded.  The  committee  stated  that  most  of  the  charges 
against  the  news  report  had  come  from  laymen  who  had  jumped  to 
conclusions  that  The  Associated  Press  had  suppressed  news  on  contro- 
versial subjects  simply  because  no  dispatch  appeared  in  a  (certain 
newspaper.  In  every  such  instance  the  committee  found  that  the  story 
had  been  carried  fully  and  factually  on  the  wires  serving  member 
papers. 

The  investigators  termed  Kellogg's  statement  that  Stone  was 
"owned"  by  Standard  Oil  "inexcusably  reckless  and  unwarranted  by 
the  fact,"  and  added: 

Your  committee  is  convinced  that  whatever  the  individual  faults  of 
reporting  may  have  been,  or  whatever  attempts  were  made  by  the  Standard 
Oil  to  color  the  report,  nothing  was  carried  during  this  long  hearing  which 
violated  the  integrity  of  the  service. 

The  subsidization  of  the  City  News  reporter  was  mentioned  at 
some  length,  and  the  committee  commented: 

It  is  the  best  possible  testimony  to  the  efficiency  and  integrity  of  The 
Associated  Press  that  his  efforts  were  in  vain. 

As  to  charges  that  Stone's  decorations  from  foreign  governments 
or  that  his  personal  acquaintance  with  influential  figures  led  him  to 
favor  their  interests,  they  declared: 

...  it  is  our  judgment  that  the  social  relations  of  the  General  Man- 
ager with  individuals  in  powerful  financial  circles  and  likewise  his  acceptance 


226  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

of  decorations  from  foreign  governments  without  objection  from  the  Board 
of  Directors  have,  not  unnaturally,  aroused  unjust  suspicion  of  the  indepen- 
dence and  impartiality  of  his  administration  of  the  news  service.  Nevertheless, 
we  are  convinced  that  Mr.  Stone  has  not  been  influenced  by  these  circum- 
stances in  his  conduct  of  the  business  of  The  Associated  Press.  On  the 
contrary,  we  think  that  he  has  been  indefatigable  in  developing  its  services.  .  .  . 
He  is  entitled  to  great  credit  for  the  present  efficiency  of  the  news  organiza- 
tion which  has  been  created  largely  under  his  leadership  and  direction. 

The  attitude  of  the  committee  was  that  The  Associated  Press,  like 
Caesar's  wife,  should  be  above  suspicion.  The  fact  that  serious  charges 
had  been  preferred  aroused  great  concern,  even  though  the  allegations 
had  been  discredited.  It  therefore  recommended  that  the  general  man- 
ager and  all  those  connected  with  the  co-operative  in  future  avoid 
anything  that  would  give  even  the  uninitiated  the  least  grounds  to 
question  the  honesty  of  the  service.  It  stated: 

We  consider  that  the  head  of  The  Associated  Press  should  not  only  in 
fact  be  devoted  solely  to  its  interests,  but  that  he  should  also  by  his  personal 
conduct  and  relations  give  no  ground  for  a  suspicion  of  his  independence 
and  incorruptibility  as  the  agent  and  representative  of  the  Press. 

The  committee  discouraged  both  the  future  acceptance  of  foreign 
decorations  and  too  great  familiarity  with  individuals  who  figured  in 
controversial  news. 

Stone  had  held  his  peace.  He  had  welcomed  the  fullest  publicity 
for  all  phases  of  his  administration,  and  he  had  met  all  criticisms  with- 
out resentment.  After  the  official  findings  had  been  submitted,  he  felt 
free  to  act.  The  news  report  had  been  vindicated,  his  personal  integrity 
had  been  upheld,  and  he  appreciated  the  wisdom  of  the  constructive 
suggestions  advanced.  One  thing,  however,  he  said  he  could  not  ignore 
— Kellogg's  accusation  that  he  was  owned  by  Standard  Oil.  He  notified 
the  Board  of  Directors  that  he  intended  to  sue  Kellogg  for  libel  on 
behalf  of  both  himself  and  The  Associated  Press. 

Kellogg  retracted  and  apologized.  He  wrote  the  general  manager: 

At  the  time  I  wrote  that  statement  I  felt  I  was  justified  in  making  it. 
I  have  since  made  further  investigation  and  am  now  satisfied  I  was  mistaken 
and  was  not  justified  in  making  the  imputation  upon  the  integrity  of 
The  Associated  Press  or  of  its  General  Manager. 

I  wish  therefore,  in  justice  to  you  both,  to  withdraw  the  accusation 
and  to  express  my  sincere  regret  that  I  was  ever  betrayed  into  what  I  now 
believe  was  an  act  of  injustice. 


STANDARD  OIL  227 

He  also  repeated  his  regrets  in  person. 

"I  was  hot  when  I  wrote  this  letter,"  he  said,  referring  to  the  note 
which  contained  the  libelous  charges.  "I  thought  I  was  writing  it  to 
a  personal  friend,  and  I  was  pretty  free  in  what  I  said,  and  I  didn't 
look  into  it  very  much." 

Stone  accepted  the  apology  and  the  furor  of  the  Standard  Oil 
allegations  slipped  into  history. 


IX.    HEADLINE  YEARS 


ON  the  eve  of  the  annual  meeting  of  1912  the  Titanic  disaster  called 
forth  every  news-gathering  resource  to  obtain  a  great  story  against 
overwhelming  odds,  and  the  next  years,  with  their  wealth  of  drama 
and  excitement,  brought  still  more  developments  in  the  methods  of 
news  collection  and  transmission. 

The  Titanic  was  the  largest  ship  the  world  had  ever  known  and 
she  was  making  her  maiden  voyage. 

Far  out  on  the  Atlantic  three  bells  clanged  sharply  in  the  night. 
The  lookout  called  to  the  bridge  frantically: 

"Iceberg!  Right  ahead!" 

Seconds  later  the  big  ship  trembled  as  a  knife  of  ice  sliced  into 
her  like  some  gigantic  can  opener.  The  time  was  almost  midnight, 
Sunday,  April  14.  Many  of  the  2,201  people  aboard  did  not  know  what 
the  ship  had  struck.  Blue  sparks  crackled  and  hissed  in  the  wireless 
cabin. 

Sitting  in  the  supply  room  of  the  Boston  Bureau,  J.  D.  Kennedy, 
a  night  telegrapher,  heard  the  first  electrifying  whisper  of  calamity. 
It  was  his  lunch  hour  and  he  was  eating  in  the  supply  room  so  he 
could  tinker  with  the  crude  wireless  set  recently  installed  for  emergency 
use.  He  heard  the  Charlestown  Navy  Yard  station  repeat  the  call  and 
then  dashed  back  to  the  newsroom,  blurting  out  the  story. 

From  that  moment  the  Titanic  disaster  pre-empted  the  leased 
wires.  The  service  was  made  continuous  for  both  morning  and  evening 
papers. 

Other  calls  from  the  Titanic  followed  the  first  burst  of  distress 
signals.  Kennedy  and  other  staff  men  hunched  at  the  wireless  apparatus 
and  strained  ears  for  the  meager  bits  of  information  that  came  through 
the  ether. 

"Come  at  once,  we  have  struck  a  berg." 

"It's  a  CQD,  old  man.  Position  41-46^  5014  W." 

"Sinking;  cannot  hear  for  noise  of  steam." 

"Engine  room  getting  flooded." 

Typewriters  rattled  out  the  bulletins.  More  CQD's,  and  then  the 

228 


HEADLINE  YEARS  229 

Titanic's  operator  suddenly  switched  to  the  newer  international  call 
of  distress: 

SOS  .  .  .  SOS  .  .  .  SOS  .  .  . 

At  2:17  A.M.  the  signal  stopped. 

After  that  there  were  hours  of  suspense  until  the  Carfathia  reported 
she  had  arrived  on  the  scene  at  dawn  and  was  picking  up  survivors. 
In  New  York  the  Marconi  Wireless  Company  gave  The  Associated 
Press  the  only  complete  list  of  those  rescued  by  the  Cwpathia  and  later 
offered  the  co-operative  exclusive  rights  to  all  the  disaster  news  its 
facilities  could  obtain.  The  general  manager  felt  the  story  was  too  big 
for  such  an  arrangement,  however  advantageous  it  might  be  to  The 
Associated  Press. 

"It  is  a  thing  of  such  widespread  interest  that  you  ought  not  to 
bottle  it  up  at  all,"  he  told  the  Marconi  man. 

All  that  day  the  news  was  fragmentary,  incomplete,  and  often 
conflicting.  Communication  with  the  Carpathia  was  sharply  restricted, 
for  its  wireless  was  heavily  overburdened  with  official  traffic.  Messages 
late  Monday  gave  the  first  definite  information,  and  it  was  not  until 
Thursday  night,  when  the  Carfathiay  with  711  survivors  aboard,  reached 
her  New  York  pier,  that  the  whole  story  became  known. 

The  Associated  Press  set  up  an  emergency  "Titanic  Bureau"  in  a 
hotel  facing  the  pier.  Special  telegraph  and  telephone  lines  were  in- 
stalled and  they  carried  two  widely  praised  eyewitness  stories  written 
for  the  co-operative  by  Lawrence  Beasley,  an  Oxford  student,  and 
Colonel  Archibald  Gracie,  who  leaped  from  the  stern  of  the  Titanic 
just  as  she  made  her  plunge.  Dick  Lee,  ships  news  reporter  for  The 
Associated  Press  since  1878,  arranged  for  both  accounts  after  boarding 
the  Carfathia  at  Quarantine.  From  others  among  the  rescued,  Lee  also 
gathered  material  for  a  story  of  his  own  and  produced  what  was  called 
the  best  detailed  narrative  of  the  disaster. 


The  sinking  of  the  Titank  proved  the  wisdom  of  the  Board  of 
Directors  in  immediately  authorizing  what  it  termed  "Extraordinary 
Occasion  Service,"  which  was  designated  EOS  for  short.  Prior  to  this 
time  a  member  paper  had  not  been  permitted  to  publish  after  its 
regular  morning  or  afternoon  hours  of  publication,  no  matter  how 
important  the  news  might  be.  The  board  realized  there  were  times 
when  the  character  of  the  news  was  so  momentous  that,  as  a  public 


230  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

service,  all  papers  should  be  free  to  publish  it  immediately,  whether 
it  broke  within  their  hours  of  publication  or  not.  Thereafter  all 
dispatches  of  extraordinary  importance  were  designated  EOS  and  that 
slug  told  editors  that  they  could  publish  the  news  immediately  if  they 
desired. 

Soon  the  board  took  another  step  in  its  program  of  readjusting 
operation  methods  to  the  advanced  requirements  of  news  gathering. 
Recognizing  that  the  organization  had  become  too  complex  to  be  admin- 
istered by  one  man,  it  decided  to  provide  the  general  manager  with 
executive  assistance.  The  administration  was  divided  into  three  branches: 
News,  Finance,  and  Traffic.  The  men  picked  to  head  these  departments 
were  to  direct  all  activities  in  their  respective  spheres,  reporting  directly 
to  the  general  manager.  Treasurer  Youatt  was  assigned  to  head  the 
Finance  Department,  Cooper  was  the  choice  for  Traffic,  and  a  newly 
created  post  of  chief  of  the  News  Department  went  to  Charles  E. 
Kloeber,  who  had  won  his  spurs  in  the  Boxer  Rebellion. 

At  the  same  time  the  board  remedied  another  managerial  weakness 
by  appointing  Frederick  Roy  Martin,  editor  of  the  Providence  Journal, 
to  be  assistant  general  manager,  an  office  vacant  since  DiehPs  resigna- 
tion a  short  time  before.  They  were  grooming  him  to  succeed  Stone. 
Martin  had  been  one  of  the  five  members  of  the  Villard  investigating 
committee  and  in  1912  the  membership  had  elected  him  to  the  Board 
of  Directors.  He  resigned  that  position  to  take  up  his  new  duties  on 
September  i. 

With  organizational  and  financial  troubles  largely  corrected,  the 
co-operative  was  amply  prepared  to  cover  the  famous  three-cornered 
presidential  election  of  1912  in  which  Woodrow  Wilson  was  victorious 
over  William  Howard  Taft  and  Theodore  Roosevelt's  insurgent  Bull 
Moose  party.  Then  the  news  report  went  on  to  other  things  —  the  rati- 
fication of  the  Income  Tax  Amendment  to  the  Constitution,  another 
revolution  in  Mexico,  suffragette  agitation,  floods  in  Ohio  and  Indiana, 
the  death  of  J.  Pierpont  Morgan,  the  landing  of  American  bluejackets 
at  Veracruz. 


The  return  to  a  balanced  budget  made  possible  another  innovation. 
The  report  of  the  Special  Survey  Committee  back  in  1908  had  taken 
cognizance  of  the  need  for  greater  concentration  on  sports  news.  In  the 
past  these  stories  had  been  handled  by  the  regular  news  staff  and,  while 
coverage  had  been  fair,  it  was  not  in  keeping  with  the  rapidly  increasing 


HEADLINE  YEARS  231 

public  appetite  for  detailed  sports  information.  The  Sports  Page  had 
made  its  appearance  before  the  turn  of  the  century  and  the  volume  of 
such  news  expanded  with  the  heightened  interest  in  Major  League 
baseball,  horse  racing,  and  prize  fighting.  The  growth  of  the  educational 
system,  the  fact  that  the  average  citizen  had  more  leisure,  the  improved 
standards  of  living,  all  contributed. 

The  game  of  baseball  had  been  invented  back  in  1839  and  had 
established  itself  so  firmly  that  "Casey  at  The  Bat"  was  a  favored 
recitation  well  before  news  gathering  itself  came  of  age.  Horse  racing 
attracted  as  well,  prize  fighting  was  still  illegal  in  some  states,  though 
gaining  in  popularity,  and  generally  each  nationality  had  brought  with 
it  the  games  of  its  own  homeland  during  the  great  surges  of  immigra- 
tion. The  growth  of  professional  sports  and  the  steady  rise  of  amateur 
and  collegiate  activities  were  assured. 

Owing  to  financial  stringencies,  the  co-operative  had  been  unable 
to  enlarge  its  routine  sports  coverage  to  any  noticeable  extent  at  the 
time  the  Special  Survey  Committee  made  its  report.  But  now  the  time 
had  come  when  something  could  be  done.  A  general  sports  editor  was 
appointed  to  co-ordinate  and  expand  the  service.  The  man  selected  for 
the  job  was  Edward  B.  Moss,  who  had  been  sports  editor  of  the  New 
York  Sun  for  the  past  eight  years. 

Moss  set  about  establishing  a  small  staff  to  assist  him  and  the  leased 
wires  began  carrying  more  sports  detail — stories  on  all  major  events, 
expanded  boxes,  summaries  of  results,  and  the  like. 

From  the  outset,  this  quick  and  detailed  coverage  attracted  atten- 
tion, in  such  interesting  contrast  to  what  had  gone  before.  Until  the 
telegraph  and  other  communications  methods  had  been  so  highly 
developed,  the  physical  difficulties  of  speedy  coverage  had  been  great 
because,  by  their  very  nature,  so  many  of  the  events  were  held  in 
places  where  immediate  wire  facilities  were  not  always  available.  But 
there  still  were  a  few  employes  who  could  remember  one  classic 
example  of  ingenious  earlier  sports  reporting  in  spite  of  communications 
handicaps.  It  had  occurred  on  July  8,  1889,  when  prize  fighting  was 
illegal  in  most  states.  It  was  the  last  bare-knuckle  championship  bout 
under  London  prize  ring  rules  and  it  was  between  John  L.  Sullivan 
and  Jake  Kilrain.  It  went  seventy-five  rounds,  lasted  two  hours  and 
sixteen  minutes,  and  was  held  in  the  woods  near  the  little  town  of 
Richburg,  Mississippi,  in  an  attempt  to  avoid  legal  complications. 

The  nearest  telegraph  office  was  in  New  Orleans,  a  hundred  miles 


232  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

away,  and  the  problem  of  relaying  the  result  was  accentuated  by  the 
great  public  interest  in  the  contest. 

Because  it  was  primarily  a  mechanical  problem,  Addison  Thomas, 
wire  chief  of  the  Western  Associated  Press  Chicago  office,  was  assigned 
to  direct  the  coverage. 

By  the  time  the  eagerly  awaited  day  arrived  Thomas  had  made  his 
plans.  With  the  co-operation  of  The  Associated  Press  papers  in  New 
Orleans,  he  had  arranged  for  a  chartered  railroad  engine  and  two  cars 
to  race  the  result  back  to  New  Orleans  ahead  of  the  special  fight  trains 
on  which  spectators  flocked  to  Richburg.  It  was  a  train  reserved  for 
the  exclusive  use  of  Thomas  and  the  representatives  of  the  interested 
New  Orleans  papers  and  it  stood  with  steam  up  and  ready  to  go  on  a 
siding  a  short  distance  from  the  ringside. 

But  that  was  not  the  only  preparation  needed.  Thomas  and  his 
associates  knew  that  the  excited,  shoving  spectators  would  jam  the 
ringside  for  the  long,  knuckle-battering  contest,  perhaps  making  it 
impossible  for  anyone  to  get  away  quickly  with  details  to  the  waiting 
train.  And  it  was  necessary  to  put  the  news  on  the  train  the  moment 
the  fight  was  over  so  that  the  special  could  get  under  way  ahead  of  the 
returning  passenger  trains. 

They  met  that  situation  by  obtaining  hollow  balls  which  were  con- 
structed so  that  they  could  be  opened  in  halves  and  then  screwed  back 
together.  Then,  as  a  quick  report  was  written  at  the  conclusion  of  each 
round,  they  put  the  copy  inside  the  balls,  screwed  the  halves  together 
and  threw  the  balls  over  the  heads  of  the  spectators  to  an  assistant  who 
caught  them  on  the  outside  fringe  of  the  crowd.  The  assistant  then  could 
rush  them  to  the  train  at  the  conclusion  of  the  bout  and  the  special 
would  be  off  in  a  hurry  to  the  waiting  telegraph  at  New  Orleans. 

The  plan  operated  like  clockwork.  The  loaded  balls  were  tossed 
over  the  crowd  and  at  the  end  of  the  battle  the  assistant  rushed  to  the 
train  which  quickly  got  under  way. 

The  plan,  however,  had  overlooked  one  detail.  There  were  opposi- 
tion news  men  present  and  in  some  manner  they  got  through  the 
crowds  quickly.  Before  the  train  had  raced  many  miles  they  were  dis- 
covered concealed  in  one  of  the  two  cars  of  the  speeding  special.  That 
called  for  some  more  quick  action. 

The  Associated  Press  man  hurried  up  to  the  engine,  cut  the  two 
cars  loose  and  left  the  opposition  stranded  on  the  tracks.  Then  the 
engine  ran  full  speed  the  hundred  miles  to  New  Orleans. 

That  had  been  an  exciting  and  ingenious  stunt,  but  by  1913  tele- 


HEADLINE  YEARS  233 

graph  lines  could  be  strung  direct  to  the  scene  of  almost  any  sports 
event,  irrespective  of  locale,  and  the  reports  written  by  the  new  general 
sports  editor  and  his  small  staff  could  go  speeding  direct  to  newspaper 
offices. 


This  step  in  widespread  coverage  of  still  another  phase  of  news 
had  not  been  under  way  long  before  there  came  other  developments 
in  news  transmission  methods. 

The  tide  of  news  by  telegraph  had  continued  with  the  years.  Facili- 
ties had  been  improved,  the  Morse  clicked  into  virtually  every  town  in 
the  country,  but  the  old  method  was  the  same.  Day  in  and  day  out, 
sending  operators  took  dispatches,  translated  them  into  the  dash-dot  of 
code,  and  the  telegraph  keys  sent  the  signals  on  the  circuits  at  a  rate  of 
twenty-five  to  thirty-five  words  a  minute.  In  member  newspaper  offices 
along  the  line  the  Morse  sounders  clack-clacked  busily  and  receiving 
operators  translated  the  code  symbols  back  into  words,  copying  the 
stories  in  jerky  spurts.  The  news  of  more  than  half  a  century  had  been 
handled  that  way. 

For  some  time,  however,  Charles  L.  Krum,  a  Chicago  cold-storage 
engineer,  and  his  son  Howard  had  been  working  to  perfect  an  automatic 
machine  which  would  send  the  printed  word  by  wire  at  greater  speed 
without  the  intermediary  of  code.  They  called  their  invention  the  Mor- 
krum  Telegraph  Printer — coining  the  word  Morkrum  by  combining 
the  inventor's  name  with  the  first  syllable  in  the  last  name  of  Joy 
Morton,  a  Chicago  businessman  who  financed  them. 

Several  other  automatic  telegraphic  devices  were  being  promoted, 
but  Cooper  and  engineers  in  the  Traffic  Department  decided  Krum's 
machine  held  the  most  promise  for  their  purposes.  Tests  got  under  way. 
In  the  Associated  Press  headquarters,  which  had  been  moved  seven 
blocks  from  the  old  Western  Union  building  to  51  Chambers  Street, 
a  sending  operator  sat  at  a  keyboard  similar  to  that  of  an  ordinary  type- 
writer. As  he  struck  the  keys,  copying  the  dispatches  before  him,  the 
machine  perforated  a  paper  tape  with  a  series  of  holes,  each  combina- 
tion representing  a  letter.  The  tape  fed  into  a  boxlike  transmitter  which 
transformed  the  tape  perforations  into  electrical  impulses  and  sent  them 
along  the  wires  into  the  receiving  machines  in  newspaper  offices.  These 
impulses  actuated  telegraph  relays  and  set  the  receiving  Morkrum  ma- 
chines automatically  reproducing  the  letters  which  the  sending  operators 
were  typing  miles  away. 


234  AP  —  THE,  STORY  OF  NEWS 

The  tests  demonstrated  that  the  Morkrum  could  transmit  news 
hour  after  hour  at  the  rate  of  sixty  words  a  minute  and  the  copy  was 
delivered  clean  and  uniform.  Thus  began  the  slow  extension  of  Mor- 
krum transmission  to  the  whole  leased  wire  system,  replacing  the  "brass 
pounding"  Morse  keys.  It  was  a  transition  that  required  years  and  until 
it  was  completed  both  Morse  and  Morkrum  worked  side  by  side  in 
many  places. 

5 

There  were  faint  rumblings  of  unrest  abroad,  but  in  1913  it  was  an 
incident  concerning  a  simple  matter  of  office  routine  in  one  of  the  asso- 
ciation's European  bureaus  that  set  the  year  apart  for  the  staff  itself 
and  produced  a  chuckle  wherever  the  story  was  told. 

The  story  began  staidly  enough  with  an  action  by  the  Board  of 
Directors  requiring  the  bonding  of  all  chiefs  of  foreign  bureaus  who 
handled  funds.  Treasurer  Youatt  diligently  mailed  out  the  bonding 
forms  which  specified  that  each  bureau  chief  applying  for  a  bond  give 
two  character  references  well  known  in  America. 

Like  many  other  men  abroad,  Cortesi  in  Rome  seriously  wrote 
his  answers  to  the  endless  questions.  When  he  reached  the  place  where 
the  character  references  were  to  be  named,  however,  a  mischievous  spirit 
seized  him. 

Cortesi  mailed  the  application  back  to  Youatt  and  forgot  it.  Sev- 
eral weeks  later  he  had  an  audience  with  Pope  Pius  X  and  in  the  midst 
of  their  conversation,  the  Pontiff  exclaimed: 

"By  the  way,  I  have  received  a  letter  from  an  American  surety 
company  asking  for  information  about  you.  Why  should  they  apply 
to  me?" 

Bewildered  for  a  moment,  Cortesi  sheepishly  remembered  the 
bonding  application  and  confessed  he  had  tried  to  play  a  joke  on  the 
treasurer  of  The  Associated  Press.  He  had  filled  out  the  reference 
blank  as  follows: 

NAME  OCCUPATION      ADDRESS 

GIUSEPPE  SARTO  POPE  VATICAN  PALACE, 

ROME  (ITALY) 

VICTOR  EMMANUEL  OP  SAVOY  KING   QUIRINAL  PALACE, 

ROME  (ITALY) 

Pius  assured  Cortesi  that  he  would  give  him  a  good  character. 
That  was  in  1913  and  the  spring  of  1914  ran  on  into  a  summer  that 
shook  the  world. 


HEADLINE  YEARS  235 

6 

The  chief  of  the  Vienna  Bureau,  Robert  Atter,  cabled: 

SARAJEVO,  BOSNIA,  JUNE  28  -  ARCHDUKE 
•  FRANCIS  FERDINAND,  HEIR  TO  THE  AUSTRO- HUNGARIAN 
THRONE,  AND  THE  DUCHESS  OF  HOHENBERG,  HIS 
MORGANATIC  WIFE,  WERE  SHOT  DEAD  TODAY  BY  A 
STUDENT  IN  THE  MAIN  STREET  OF  THE  BOSNIAN 
CAPITAL,  A  SHORT  TIME  AFTER  THEY  HAD  ESCAPED 
DEATH  FROM  A  BOMB  HURLED  AT  THE  ROYAL  AUTO- 
MOBILES . 

IT  WAS  ON  THE  RETURN  TRIP  OF  THE  PROCESSION 
THAT  THE  TRAGEDY  WAS  ADDED  TO  THE  LONG  LIST  OF 
THOSE  WHICH  HAVE  DARKENED  THE  PAGES  OF  THE 
RECENT  HISTORY  OF  THE  HAPSBURGS. 

AS  THE  ROYAL  AUTOMOBILE  REACHED  A  PROM- 
INENT POINT  IN  THE  ROUTE  TO  THE  PALACE,  AN 
EIGHTH  GRADE  STUDENT,  GARIO  PRINZIP,  SPRANG 
FROM  THE  CROWD  AND  POURED  A  DEADLY  FUSILLADE 
OF  BULLETS  FROM  AN  AUTOMATIC  PISTOL  AT  THE 
ARCHDUKE  AND  PRINCESS.  .  .  . 

"Another  mess  in  the  Balkans,"  readers  commented.  But  that  dis- 
patch became  the  lead  to  a  story  that  beggared  anything  that  had  hap- 
pened before.  It  saw  65,000,000  soldiers  mobilized  on  battlefields  over 
the  world  and  before  the  war  ended  there  were  9,000,000  dead  and 
22,000,000  wounded  in  armed  forces  alone.  The  casualty  list  of  non- 
combatants  was  as  large,  if  not  larger,  and  the  cost  was  $337,000,000,000. 
It  was  a  story  that  covered  both  hemispheres  and  took  four  years 
to  unfold. 

The  cables  hummed  with  the  ominous  overture.  Bureau  chiefs, 
staffs  and  correspondents  throughout  the  Continent  worked  during  the 
days  of  tension — Robert  Collins,  the  chief  at  London j  Atter,  at  Vienna; 
Roger  Lewis,  in  charge  at  St.  Petersburg ;  Seymour  B.  Conger,  at  Ber- 
lin 5  Elmer  Roberts,  at  Paris  j  Ed  Traus,  at  Brussels  j  Cortesi  at  Rome, 
and  the  men  assigned  with  them.  At  first  the  story  was  of  Austria's 
diplomatic  moves  against  Serbia.  Inexorably  it  expanded. 

Then  came  the  last  week  of  July  and  the  bulletins  flew: 

Austria's  ultimatum  to  Serbia  .  ,  .  Russia  Warns  Austria  .  .  . 
Germany  Backs  Austria  .  .  .  Austria  Declares  War  on  Serbia  .  .  . 
Russia  Mobilizes  .  .  .  Germany  Begins  Invasion  of  France  .  .  .  Ger- 
many Demands  Free  Passage  of  Troops  Through  Belgium  .  .  .  Great 
Britain  Protests  Violation  of  Belgian  Neutrality  .  .  .  Britain  Declares 
War  .  .  . 


AP —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Armageddon  had  begun. 

As  the  crisis  mounted,  The  Associated  Press  rushed  some  of  its 
best  men  abroad  to  reinforce  the  European  staff.  George  A.  Schreiner, 
who  had  been  covering  a  revolution  in  Mexico,  was  sent  to  Belgium. 
Walter  C.  Whiffen,  another  of  the  staff  reporting  the  Mexican  troubles, 
went  to  St.  Petersburg.  Robert  Berry,  day  cable  editor  at  New  York, 
took  the  first  boat  for  France.  Charles  Stephenson  Smith,  of  the  Wash- 
ington staff,  and  four  others  were  ordered  to  London.  Assistant  Gen- 
eral Manager  Martin  hurriedly  embarked  for  Europe,  carrying  $20,000 
in  gold  in  a  leather  hatbox  to  tide  foreign  bureaus  over  the  financial 
stringency  which  accompanied  the  outbreak  of  war. 

Endless  gray  German  columns  swept  through  Belgium  and  with 
them  went  Conger  of  Berlin.  Covering  the  hopeless  efforts  of  the  Bel- 
gians to  halt  the  juggernaut  were  Schreiner  and  Hendrik  Willem  Van 
Loon,  who  entered  the  foreign  service  in  1906.  The  stories  Schreiner 
and  Van  Loon  wrote  on  the  destitution  and  suffering  of  invaded  Bel- 
gium were  generally  credited  with  providing  much  of  the  initial 
stimulus  for  the  relief  funds  raised  in  the  United  States. 

Without  official  sanction  Smith  reached  Belgium  after  the  British 
Expeditionary  Force — the  "contemptible  hundred  thousand" — and  Rob- 
erts and  Berry  followed  the  French.  On  the  eastern  front  Whiffen 
arrived  in  time  to  join  the  Russians  for  their  early  battles,  while  Atter, 
his  colleague  from  Vienna,  reported  the  same  fighting  from  the  Austro- 
Hungarian  lines.  On  the  other  side  of  the  world  A.  M.  Bruce  used 
carrier  pigeons,  native  runners,  and  the  wireless  to  report  the  Japanese 
siege  of  the  German  fortress  of  Tsingtao. 

America  read  of  Liege,  Namur,  Mons,  Louvain,  Rheims,  Lemberg, 
Tannenberg,  in  lightning  succession.  Editors  and  readers  alike  followed 
the  seemingly  irresistible  German  advance  which  swept  almost  to  the 
gates  of  Paris  before  it  was  rolled  back  in  the  First  Battle  of  the  Marne 
and  the  western  front  settled  down  to  the  long  months  of  trench 
warfare. 


X.  COVERING  THE  FIRST  ARMAGEDDON 


THE  immensity  of  the  war  assignment  and  all  its  attendant  difficulties 
became  increasingly  clear.  The  old  barriers  of  censorship  returned,  more 
stringent,  more  unreasoning  than  ever.  Communications  were  a  gamble, 
what  with  warring  governments  pre-empting  telephone,  telegraph,  cable, 
and  wireless  facilities  for  official  and  military  use.  Propaganda  mills 
ground  out  their  atrocity  stories.  Ministries  issued  communiques  which 
could  not  be  confirmed.  Except  on  favorable  occasions,  none  of  the 
belligerents  welcomed  factual,  objective,  and  unbiased  reporting.  In  a 
conflict  that  was  waged  with  publicity  as  well  as  powder,  the  integrity 
of  the  news  report  was  a  prime  consideration.  The  old  adage  has  it  that 
"Truth  is  the  first  casualty  in  any  war,"  and  the  management  labored 
to  find  the  truth. 

The  Associated  Press  obviously  could  not  assume  responsibility  for 
the  correctness  of  government  statements  in  formal  communiques  and 
documents.  It  could  and  did  vouch  for  the  fact  that  such  releases  were 
issued  and  what  official  was  authority  for  them.  In  all  practical  circum- 
stances, effort  was  made  to  have  staff  men  either  obtain  facts  at  first 
hand  or  confirm  them  personally. 

The  war  staff  had  no  easy  time  of  it.  Fortunately  only  one  of  the 
staff  was  wounded  during  the  opening  months,  but  even  outside  the 
battle  zone  correspondents  were  subject  to  repeated  harassment  and 
trouble.  One  of  the  London  staff  was  arrested  as  a  spy  while  covering 
the  hit-and-run  bombardment  of  English  Channel  towns  by  German 
cruisers.  That  he  could  read  and  write  German  was  considered  con- 
clusive proof  of  espionage  until  higher  authorities  stepped  in.  Others 
were  "detained"  on  different  occasions  by  civil  or  military  authorities. 
The  German  occupation  of  Belgium  forced  Schreiner  and  Van  Loon  out 
of  the  country  into  Holland,  where  they  set  up  a  special  bureau  to 
handle  the  exchange  of  news  between  the  occupied  areas,  Germany, 
London,  and  New  York.  Schreiner  later  was  accredited  to  the  Austro- 
Hungarian  armies  in  Galicia  and  returned  to  active  duty  in  the  war  zone. 
Ill-health  forced  Van  Loon  to  resign  in  1915. 

The  belligerents  were  mindful  of  the  authority  which  firsthand 

237 


238  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

stories  by  Associated  Press  staff  correspondents  carried.  When  both 
French  and  German  High  Commands  claimed  possession  of  Hartmans- 
Weilerkopf,  an  important  strategic  position  in  Alsace,  Chief  of  Bureau 
Roberts  went  to  the  sector  and  reported  what  he  saw.  The  French  War 
Office,  realizing  the  value  of  this  impartial  testimony,  issued  a  com- 
munique, saying:  "The  correspondent  of  The  Associated  Press  visited 
today  the  summit  of  Hartmans-Weilerkopf,  which  the  enemy  has  not 
attacked  for  the  last  two  days."  There  were  similar  cases  in  both  Eng- 
land and  Germany.  When  reports  circulated  that  each  of  those  powers 
had  lost  well-known  battleships  during  North  Sea  naval  operations, 
Admiralty  officials  in  London  and  Berlin  invited  staff  men  to  visit  the 
vessels  in  question  and  report. 


Abruptly  in  the  spring  of  1915  the  conflict  abroad  ceased  to  be 
remote  for  Americans.  Until  2:08  P.M.  on  May  7,  the  national  sentiment 
was  "Keep  out  of  it."  Then  came  the  Lusitania. 

The  actual  beginning  of  that  story  antedated  May  7.  Six  days 
earlier,  copy  boys  in  New  York  headquarters  distributed  the  first  edi- 
tions of  the  morning  papers.  Editors  checked  their  pages  for  any  local 
news  that  might  not  have  been  included  in  the  report.  The  attention  of 
several  was  arrested,  not  by  anything  in  the  regular  columns,  but  by 
two  advertisements  on  the  ship  news  pages.  The  first  was  a  single-column 
display  announcing  that  the  Cunarder  Lusitania,  "Fastest  and  Largest 
Steamer  now  in  Atlantic  Service,  Sails  Saturday,  May  i,  10  A.M." 
Directly  below  was  another  advertisement,  with  the  one-word  heading: 
"Notice!"  It  was  so  unusual  that  a  story  was  prepared,  telling  how 
the  announcement  of  the  Lusitania's  sailing  that  day  had  been  accom- 
panied by  an  extraordinary  warning.  The  story  concluded  with  its  text: 

Travellers  intending  to  embark  on  the  Atlantic  voyage  are  reminded 
that  a  state  of  war  exists  between  Germany  and  her  allies  and  Great  Britain 
and  her  allies;  that  the  zone  of  war  includes  the  waters  adjacent  to  the 
British  Isles;  that,  in  accordance  with  formal  notice  given  by  the  Imperial 
German  Government,  vessels  flying  the  flag  of  Great  Britain,  or  of  any  of 
her  allies,  are  liable  to  destruction  in  those  waters  and  that  travellers  sailing 
in  the  war  zone  on  ships  of  Great  Britain  or  her  allies  do  so  at  their  own  risk. 

(Signed)   Imperial  German  Embassy 
Washington,  D.  C. 

Although  Germany  had  announced  in  February  her  intention  of 
waging  submarine  warfare  on  allied  shipping,  the  May  i  "Notice!" 


COVERING  THE  FIRST  ARMAGEDDON  239 

went  unheeded.  General  Manager  Stone  paid  as  little  attention  to  it 
as  anyone  else.  His  son  Herbert  was  sailing  and  Stone  with  his  family 
went  down  to  the  pier. 

On  Friday,  May  7,  off  the  Old  Head  of  Kinsale,  Ireland,  the 
unthinkable  happened.  At  2:08  P.M.  Unterseeboot  20,  commanded  by 
Leutenant-Kapitan  Schwieger,  sent  a  torpedo  into  the  Lusitanta's  star- 
board side  just  aft  of  the  bridge.  She  went  to  the  bottom  in  twenty 
minutes.  Of  the  1,924  persons  aboard,  1,198  were  lost,  among  them 
114  Americans. 

James  Ryan,  resident  correspondent  at  Queenstown,  flashed  the 
first  news  to  London  and  then,  with  W.  A.  Herlihy,  the  Cork  cor- 
respondent, went  to  work  on  the  story.  Additional  staff  men  were  started 
for  Ireland.  In  spite  of  the  magnitude  of  the  news,  the  censors  in 
Whitehall  held  up  the  first  bulletin  fifty-two  minutes. 

When  the  bulletin  did  reach  New  York,  Stone  was  at  lunch  with 
a  friend.  He  hurried  to  the  office.  Late  that  night  he  knew  that  his  son 
was  lost. 

Within  a  few  hours  after  the  torpedoing,  the  London  Bureau, 
co-ordinating  point  for  the  coverage,  found  the  demands  of  the  occasion 
far  transcended  the  limits  of  news  requirements.  Countless  inquiries 
rushed  in  by  telephone  and  cable  from  relatives  and  friends  of  those 
aboard  the  Cunarder.  In  order  that  there  might  be  as  little  confusion 
as  possible,  a  card  index  was  started,  listing  both  survivors  and  recovered 
bodies  as  they  were  reported.  For  days  personal  inquiries  and  requests 
kept  coming  in  from  America,  asking  the  bureau  to  confirm  identifica- 
tions, to  verify  reports  of  the  lost,  to  take  charge  of  the  effects  of  the 
drowned  and  even  to  make  arrangements  for  the  burial  of  recovered 
bodies. 


The  destruction  of  the  Lusitania  and  the  diplomatic  notes  between 
the  United  States  and  Germany  that  followed  put  Washington  cover- 
age on  something  like  a  wartime  footing.  The  policy  of  the  White 
House  assumed  tremendous  importance  and  the  State,  Navy,  War  and 
Treasury  departments  became  more  vital  news  sources  than  ever.  Neu- 
trality, contraband,  diplomatic  representations,  emergency  legislation, 
the  need  for  protection  of  American  shipping — subjects  such  as  these 
took  a  place  in  the  Washington  report. 

Among  the  first  major  repercussions  of  the  Lusitania  affair  in 
Washington  was  the  resignation  of  William  Jennings  Bryan  as  secretary 


240  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

of  state  because  of  his  disagreement  with  President  Wilson's  firm 
attitude  toward  Germany.  Hood,  dean  of  the  capital  staff,  learned  on 
June  8  that  Bryan  had  resigned,  but  the  information  was  given  him 
in  confidence  and  he  could  not  use  it. 

Hood  walked  into  a  pressroom  set  aside  for  the  association  in  the 
War  Department  building. 

"Boys,"  he  said,  "there  is  a  big  story  here  that  you  have  got  to  get. 
I  know  what  it  is  but  I  cannot  say  a  word  more  than  that  it  is  BIG.  The 
AP  has  got  to  break  it.  You  have  to  get  it.  Use  your  heads  and  your 
legs." 

David  Lawrence,  Stephen  Early,  Kirke  Simpson,  and  the  two 
other  staff  men  he  was  talking  to  had  never  seen  Hood  so  excited. 
There  was  a  dash  for  the  door,  each  man  mentally  reviewing  the  con- 
tacts that  might  give  him  some  clew. 

Hood  let  all  except  Simpson  go.  "This  is  not  on  your  War  De- 
partment run,  Kirke,"  he  explained.  "I  have  got  to  tell  somebody.  I 
can't  hold  it.  Bryan  just  sent  for  me  to  tell  me  in  strict  confidence  that 
he  had  resigned  because  of  the  Lusitania  note.  President  Wilson  has 
accepted,  but  Bryan  says  announcement  or  even  a  hint  must  await 
White  House  pleasure.  I  don't  know  why  he  told  me,  but  he  did." 

"What  can  I  do  now?"  Simpson  asked.  "I  can't  even  tap  any 
Cabinet  sources  because  you've  tied  me  up." 

"I  know,"  Hood  replied,  "but  you  and  I  are  going  now  to  enjoy  a 
rare  treat.  We  are  going  to  stroll  about  and  watch  the  AP  staff  work 
like  hunting  dogs.  They'll  get  it  before  night  and  we'll  watch  them 
do  it." 

Hood  and  Simpson  walked  the  corridors,  watching  fellow  staffers 
hurry  from  office  to  office.  Other  correspondents,  sensing  the  suppressed 
excitement,  joined  in  the  blind  chase. 

Lawrence  paused  to  reason  the  thing  out. 

First,  he  thought  of  the  possibility  of  a  rupture  of  diplomatic  rela- 
tions between  the  United  States  and  Germany.  He  dismissed  that  be- 
cause the  German  note  on  the  Lusitania  had  not  yet  been  answered 
by  thp  State  Department.  It  must  be  something  else.  What  else?  Then 
it  occurred  to  him  that  it  might  be  a  story  involving  Secretary  of  State 
Bryan  because  there  had  been  friction  between  Bryan  and  Wilson. 
Lawrence  played  the  hunch.  He  sought  out  Secretary  of  War  Garrison. 

"What  do  you  think  about  Bryan's  resignation?"  he  asked. 

Disarmed  by  the  blandness  of  the  question,  Garrison  told  him  the 
story.  Lawrence  hustled  off  to  the  White  House,  confirmed  the  Presi- 


COVERING  THE  FIRST  ARMAGEDDON  241 

dent's  acceptance  of  the  resignation,  and  most  important,  obtained 
permission  to  release  the  news.  At  5:26  that  afternoon  the  leased  wire 
network  flashed  Bryan's  resignation. 


When  Germany  answered  the  Lusitania  note  which  caused  Bryan's 
resignation,  Conger  at  Berlin  transmitted  the  complete  text  of  the  reply 
to  the  United  States  in  time  for  member  newspapers  to  publish  it  almost 
forty-eight  hours  before  it  was  officially  delivered  to  the  State  Depart- 
ment. Conger's  reportorial  activities  had  been  hampered  during  1915 
by  the  new  restrictions  German  authorities  enjoined  on  foreign  cor- 
respondents. Newspapermen  were  barred  from  the  fronts  except  on 
officially  supervised  visits.  A  summary  of  war  news,  giving  the  High 
Command's  version,  was  issued  three  times  weekly  by  the  General  Staff 
office  in  Berlin,  and  correspondents  were  held  personally  responsible 
not  only  for  the  dispatches  they  wrote,  but  also  for  headlines  and  pic- 
tures which  might  accompany  those  dispatches  when  they  were  printed 
in  America.  Berlin  officials  had  been  irked  by  headlines  and  pictures 
unfavorable  to  Germany's  cause,  and  they  would  make  no  exception  for 
Conger  even  though  the  use  of  headlines  and  pictures  in  member  news- 
papers was,  of  course,  beyond  his  control. 

On  the  whole,  the  news  during  1915  seemed  to  favor  the  Central 
Powers.  On  the  western  front  a  year  of  costly  French,  British,  and  Bel- 
gian attacks  had  failed  to  weaken  the  German  positions.  In  the  east 
the  ponderous  Russian  Army  had  been  flung  back  almost  to  Riga.  The 
belated  Allied  thrust  at  Gallipoli  produced  nothing  but  a  casualty  list 
exceeding  100,000.  Bulgaria  had  cast  her  lot  with  Germany,  Austria- 
Hungary,  and  Turkey.  The  Allied  nations  in  the  Balkans  were  overrun. 
Italy  had  entered  the  war,  but  her  first  blows  against  Austria  had  been 
repulsed  with  the  loss  of  a  quarter  of  a  million  men. 

The  staff  suffered  its  second  casualty  when  Whiffen  was  wounded 
on  the  Russian  front,  which  he  was  covering  with  D.  B.  McGowan. 
Cortesi  got  his  baptism  of  fire  with  General  Cadorna  in  th&Alps. 
Schreiher  reported  successes  of  the  Central  Powers  at  the  Dardanelles 
and  in  the  Balkans,  while  Paxton  Hibben  served  with  the  Allied 
armies  that  were  thrust  back  into  Greece.  Thereon  J.  Damon,  the  Con- 
stantinople correspondent,  wrote  the  story  of  the  Gallipoli  campaign 
and  Turkish  operations  in  Mesopotamia.  Conger  and  S.  M.  Bouton,  of 
the  Berlin  staff,  and  men  from  the  London  and  Paris  bureaus  cabled 


242  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

accounts  of  the  costly  French  and  British  offensives  in  France  and 
Flanders,  where  poison  gas  was  used  for  the  first  time  in  modern 
warfare. 

If  1915  had  been  an  epochal  year,  1916  outdid  its  sensations. 
Abroad  there  was  no  slackening  in  the  furious  pace  and  at  home  the 
tempo  accelerated  under  the  triple  pressure  of  strained  relations  with 
Germany,  an  expeditionary  force  in  Mexico,  and  the  approach  of  a 
critical  presidential  campaign.  Editors  lived  in  an  avalanche  of  Flashes 
and  EOS  bulletins. 

Verdun  —  the  Somme  —  Irish  Rebellion  —  Jutland  —  Trentino  — 
Russian  Successes  in  Galicia  —  Arabia  —  Pancho  Villa  —  U-boat  Deutsch- 
land  in  Baltimore  —  Black  Tom  Explosion  —  Washington  Warns  Kaiser 
on  Submarines. 

Jutland  was  the  first  great  naval  battle  the  association  had  been 
called  upon  to  report  since  Togo  blew  the  Russian  fleet  out  of  the  water 
at  Tsushima  in  1905.  The  first  bulletins,  giving  the  German  version 
of  the  sea  fight  off  Denmark,  came  from  Berlin  by  wireless.  British 
accounts  arrived  later  by  cable  from  London,  and  member  papers  all 
over  the  country  scored  on  "Der  Tag" — the  day  the  British  Grand 
Fleet  and  the  German  High  Sea  Fleet  should  meet  in  a  fight  to  deter- 
mine maritime  supremacy. 

Der  Tag,  however,  proved  indecisive  j  the  German  fleet  inflicted 
heavier  losses,  but  Britain  retained  command  of  the  sea.  Controversy 
burst  forth  immediately  and  the  staffs  in  Berlin  and  London  set  to  work 
to  clarify  the  conflicting  claims  as  far  as  censorship  would  permit. 
For  the  first  time  since  the  war  started,  Captain  Hall,  of  the  Naval 
Intelligence  Bureau  in  London,  permitted  the  association  to  quote  him 
in  a  statement  saying  that  neither  the  dreadnought  Warspte  nor  the 
Marlborough  had  been  sunk  as  the  enemy  claimed.  Then  followed  an 
authoritative  interview  with  Winston  Churchill,  former  first  lord  of 
the  admiralty,  and  a  naval  expert's  description  of  the  battle  written 
from  Admiralty  reports.  Most  London  papers  reprinted  these  exclusive 
features,  crediting  them  to  The  Associated  Press.  The  staff  in  Berlin 
exhibited  similar  enterprise.  When  the  German  Admiralty  refused  to 
withdraw  its  claim  that  the  Warspte  had  been  sunk  at  Jutland  The 
Associated  Press  sent  a  correspondent  to  see  the  Warspte  and  inter- 
view her  captain  who  declared,  a  bit  superfluously:  "I  am  still  com- 
mander of  the  largest  warship  in  the  world." 

Another  of  the  top-ranking  stories  that  spring  was  the  Irish  Rebel- 
lion—"Bloody  Easter  Week"  in  Dublin.  DeWitt  Mackenzie  arrived 


COVERING  THE  FIRST  ARMAGEDDON  243 

in  Dublin  while  the  Irish  Republican  forces  still  held  the  Post  Office 
and  Four  Courts  buildings  against  the  artillery,  machine  guns,  and  rifles 
of  the  British  military. 

Mackenzie  drove  into  the  city  after  nightfall  and  the  assignment 
came  near  costing  him  his  life.  Under  rigid  martial  law  all  civilians 
were  forbidden  on  the  streets  after  six  o'clock  and  troops  were  ordered 
to  shoot  violators  on  sight.  The  British  patrol  Mackenzie  encountered 
luckily  disobeyed  instructions  and  fired  over  his  head.  No  sooner 
had  the  auto  stopped,  however,  than  an  officer  rushed  up,  cursing  the 
men  because  Mackenzie  and  the  chauffeur  had  not  been  shot. 

Hands  high  in  the  air  and  a  bayonet  against  his  stomach,  Mackenzie 
tried  to  convince  the  officer  he  was  a  newspaper  correspondent.  But  the 
officer  thought  otherwise.  He  had  already  decided  that  his  prisoner  was 
a  Sinn  Feiner  with  fraudulent  credentials,  and  he  ordered  him  taken 
to  the  barracks.  There  the  rifles  of  firing  squads  were  cracking  as  rebels 
were  led  out  to  the  barracks  wall. 

Mackenzie  was  doing  the  most  persuasive  talking  of  his  life.  His 
insistence  that  he  was  an  American  at  first  did  not  impress  his  judges,  for 
some  Americans  were  taking  active  part  in  the  rising.  However,  there 
was  the  chance  of  international  complications  if  a  wrong  man  were 
executed,  and  the  reluctant  military  finally  released  him  and  his 
chauffeur.  Mackenzie's  freedom  was  short-lived.  The  next  day  police 
interned  him  for  the  duration  of  his  stay  in  Ireland  and  at  the  end  of 
the  adventure  he  learned  with  a  shock  that  he  actually  had  carried  a 
death  warrant  with  him  that  night  in  Dublin.  His  taciturn  chauffeur, 
who  had  let  him  do  all  the  talking,  was  a  rabid  Sinn  Feiner. 


On  the  Continent  the  war  wallowed  on  through  another  year. 
Frederick  Palmer,  the  only  American  correspondent  with  the  British 
Army  on  the  western  front,  wrote  such  graphic  dispatches  on  the  great 
Somme  offensive  and  the  debut  of  "tanks"  that  The  Associated  Press 
set  a  precedent  by  having  them  copyrighted.  With  the  exception  of 
Palmer's  copyrighted  stories,  it  was  optional  with  a  member  paper 
whether  any  dispatch  be  printed  with  credit. 

News  from  the  fronts,  however,  had  no  unchallenged  monopoly  of 
front  pages.  The  slaughter  at  Verdun  dropped  to  secondary  importance 
when  Pancho  Villa,  the  Mexican  revolutionist,  crossed  the  border  in 
a  night  raid  and  attacked  the  town  of  Columbus,  New  Mexico. 


244  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

George  L.  Seese,  of  the  Los  Angeles  Bureau,  was  in  Columbus 
when  the  bandits  struck.  For  several  years  Mexican  disorders  had  caused 
the  loss  of  American  lives  and  property  and  had  necessitated  the  special 
assignment  of  staff  men  in  the  turbulent  areas.  When  the  situation 
south  of  the  Rio  Grande  again  assumed  threatening  aspects,  Seese  was 
ordered  to  El  Paso  in  case  Villa's  activities  immediately  across  the 
border  in  Chihuahua  became  of  major  significance. 

Having  seen  duty  in  Mexico  in  1911,  he  knew  how  to  keep  in- 
formed on  Villa's  movement.  Two  days  before  the  raid  he  received 
information  that  the  bandit  leader's  forces  were  in  closer  proximity 
to  the  border  than  usual.  He  promptly  moved  to  Columbus,  on  the 
border  near  the  camp  of  the  Thirteenth  U.S.  Cavalry.  Once  there, 
he  sent  for  Edwin  L.  Van  Camp,  the  leased  wire  operator  at  El  Paso, 
to  join  him  in  anticipation  of  a  story. 

In  the  early  morning  hours  of  March  10  the  two  men  were  routed 
from  their  sleep  by  the  crash  of  shots  as  Villa's  raiders  descended  on 
the  town  and  the  adjacent  cavalry  encampment.  Seese  assisted  some 
women  and  children  to  safety  and  sent  Van  Camp  through  bullet- 
swept  streets  to  the  local  telegraph  office  while  he  went  out  to  get  the 
news.  When  the  day  leased  wires  opened  Seese  and  Van  Camp  had  a 
complete  story  ready,  giving  an  eyewitness  account  of  Villa's  foray,  the 
list  of  killed  and  injured,  and  details  of  the  cavalry  pursuit  of  the 
raiders  into  Mexico. 

Seese's  presence  at  Columbus  for  the  raid  proved  too  much  of  a 
coincidence  for  army  officers  on  duty  along  the  border.  Department  of 
Justice  agents  tried  unsuccessfully  to  learn  if  he  had  had  advance 
knowledge,  but  he  never  would  tell  them  how  it  happened  that  he  was 
on  the  exact  spot  and  waiting  for  the  Villa  story  to  break. 

On  April  1 8  Morkrum  printers  and  telegraph  instruments  spelled 
out  the  bulletin  that  the  United  States  had  threatened  to  sever  diplo- 
matic relations  with  Berlin  unless  Germany  abandoned  her  policy  of 
unrestricted  submarine  warfare  on  merchant  shipping. 

There  was  an  apprehensive  wait  of  two  weeks.  Then  the  Berlin 
Bureau  advised  that  a  reply  was  in  preparation  and  news  circuits  all 
over  the  United  States  were  held  fully  manned  to  handle  the  story 
when  it  arrived.  The  first  "take"  began  moving  shortly  after  7  A.M.  on 
May  5.  It  announced  that  Germany  would  comply  with  President 
Wilson's  demands  and  cease  sinking  ships  without  warning.  In  keeping 
with  the  practice  it  had  inaugurated,  The  Associated  Press  brought  in 


COVERING  THE  FIRST  ARMAGEDDON  245 

by  wireless  the  complete  text  of  the  3,ooo-word  note,  which  temporarily 
forestalled  termination  of  diplomatic  relations. 


June  added  the  presidential  campaign  to  the  heavy  roster  of  con- 
tinuing stories  to  be  covered  for  908  member  papers.  At  St.  Louis  the 
Democrats  renominated  Woodrow  Wilson  with  the  slogan:  "He  kept 
us  out  of  war."  Supreme  Court  Justice  Charles  Evans  Hughes  was 
picked  by  the  Republicans  and  the  country  plunged  into  the  closest  na- 
tional contest  of  modern  times. 

As  the  campaign  got  under  way,  the  name  of  an  old  news-gathering 
pioneer  was  restored  to  its  place  on  Associated  Press  rolls.  The  New 
York  Suny  one  of  the  six  founders  of  the  original  organization,  returned 
to  the  co-operative.  For  almost  a  quarter  century,  ever  since  the  break 
in  1893,  the  Sim  had  been  conducting  a  proprietary  news-gathering 
agency  of  its  own.  When  Dana  died  in  October,  1897,  Laffan  assumed 
complete  command  of  the  Laffan  Bureau,  as  the  service  was  called,  and 
carried  on  the  undertaking  until  his  own  death  in  1909.  With  diminished 
vigor  the  agency  survived  for  several  years  until  Frank  Munsey  pur- 
chased the  Sun  on  June  30,  1916,  and  four  days  later  brought  it  back 
into  Associated  Press  membership.  The  rancor  and  bitterness  of  the 
feud  started  two  decades  before  by  other  owners  of  the  Sim  was 
forgotten,  and  the  paper  was  welcomed  back. 

The  return  of  the  Sun  was  not  the  only  memorable  event  that 
month.  The  German  merchant  submarine  Deutschland  appeared  un- 
heralded at  Baltimore  with  a  cargo  of  dyes  and  chemicals.  It  was  an 
astonishing  story  and  disquieting  for  those  who  hitherto  had  regarded 
submarine  warfare  as  something  possible  only  in  European  waters.  In 
less  than  two  weeks  San  Francisco  flashed  the  Preparedness  Day 
Parade  bombing  and  the  name  of  Tom  Mooney  first  appeared  in  the 
report.  Then  the  $22,000,000  munitions  plant  on  Black  Tom  Island, 
Jersey  City,  exploded. 

After  a  summer  of  war  news,  political  oratory,  preparedness 
speeches,  bombings  and  explosions,  readers  turned  with  genuine  relief 
to  the  approach  of  the  World  Series.  Debating  the  relative  merits  of 
the  Brooklyn  Nationals  and  Carrigan's  Boston  Red  Sox  was  one  way 
to  escape  talk  of  bloodshed  and  violence.  Sports  Editor  Moss  headed 
the  five-man  staff  assigned  to  report  the  series,  but  it  was  a  Traffic 
Department  triumph  which  made  coverage  of  the  1916  World's  Cham- 
pionship games  a  sensation  in  the  newspaper  world. 


246  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Ordinarily  the  leased  wire  circuits  were  broken  at  strategic  points 
in  order  that  the  report  might  be  readjusted  for  regional  needs  and 
relay.  Even  when  the  play-by-play  story  of  the  World  Series  took 
precedence  over  all  other  news,  this  transmission  method  had  been 
followed.  As  preparations  began  for  the  1916  edition  of  the  baseball 
classic,  Cooper  conceived  the  ambitious  idea  of  delivering  the  play-by- 
play story  direct  from  the  baseball  park  to  every  point  on  the  main 
leased  wire  system  without  any  intervening  relay  or  delay. 

Nothing  of  the  kind  had  ever  been  attempted  before  in  either 
news  or  commercial  transmission.  Cooper's  Traffic  Department,  however, 
set  out  to  make  telegraphic  history  by  arranging  for  an  unprecedented 
single  circuit,  26,000  miles  in  length,  to  operate  from  the  ball  parks  in 
Boston  and  Brooklyn  into  the  office  of  every  leased  wire  member  news- 
paper. The  plan  worked  flawlessly.  When  John  A.  Bates,  the  chief 
operator  assigned  to  the  World  Series  staff,  tapped  out  the  play-by-play 
story  dictated  by  Moss,  operators  in  member  offices  across  the  country 
received  the  Morse  code  signals  simultaneously. 

Members  were  impressed  by  the  feat,  but  one  of  the  greatest  ex- 
pressions of  praise  came  from  an  inventor: 

KENT   COOPER 

TRAFFIC  AGT  AP  NY 

THE  ASSOCIATED  PRESS  MUST  BE  WONDERFULLY 
WELL  ORGANIZED  TO  BE  ABLE  TO  ACCOMPLISH  WHAT 
WAS  DONE  IN  THE  BALL  GAMES.   UNCLE  SAM  HAS  NOW 
A  REAL  ARTERIAL  SYSTEM  AND  IT  IS  NEVER  GOING  TO 
HARDEN 

EDISON 

The  World  Series  opened  in  Boston  on  a  Saturday  and  hundreds 
of  operators  began  copying  the  play-by-play  account.  The  first  inning 
and  a  half  had  been  played  and  Bates  in  the  press  box  at  Braves  Field 
was  sending  evenly: 

BOSTON,  OCT.  7  -  SECOND  INNING,  SECOND 
HALF:  LEWIS  UP.   BALL  ONE.   FOUL.   STRIKE  ONE. 
BALL  TWO.   BALL   THREE.   LEWIS  WALKED.   GARDNER 
UP.   GARDNER  BUNTED  SAFELY  - 

Just  as  Gardner  bunted  safely  the  smooth  flow  of  signals  was 
interrupted.  Then: 

P-L-A-S-H 

NEWPORT,  R.I.,  OCT.  7  -  A  GERMAN  SUB- 
MARINE HAS  ARRIVED  HERE. 


COVERING  THE  FIRST  ARMAGEDDON  247 

Frank  M.  Wheeler,  string  correspondent  at  Newport,  had  tried 
vainly  to  reach  the  Boston  Bureau  by  telephone  with  news  that  the 
U-53,  flying  a  German  man-of-war  ensign,  had  just  put  into  Newport 
harbor.  In  desperation  he  ordered  the  operator  at  the  Newport  Herald 
to  break  in  on  the  play-by-play  with  a  flash  and  bulletin.  This  was  no 
Deutschland,  such  as  had  turned  up  at  Baltimore,  but  a  fighting  sub- 
marine. Wheeler  was  positive  of  his  facts;  he  had  confirmed  them  with 
Rear-Admiral  Austin  M.  Knight  and  the  U.S.  Engineers'  office  in 
Newport. 

Once  he  had  crowded  all  the  information  he  had  onto  the  special 
World  Series  wire,  he  put  out  in  a  motorboat  to  the  U-boat's  anchorage, 
exhibited  his  credentials  and  was  the  first  person  permitted  on  board. 
Leutenant-Kapitan  Hans  Rose,  her  commander,  gave  Wheeler  the  story 
of  the  transatlantic  trip,  explained  that  he  had  entered  the  port  "to  pay 
his  respects,"  and  asked  the  reporter  to  post  a  letter  for  him  to  the 
German  embassy  at  Washington.  He  said  he  planned  to  sail  again  in 
a  few  hours. 

It  was  not  pure  chance  that  gave  the  association  immediate  informa- 
tion on  the  U-53's  arrival.  Conger  at  Berlin  had  confidentially  advised 
headquarters  some  weeks  earlier  that  another  transatlantic  submarine 
voyage  was  likely  and  correspondents  along  the  coast  had  been  in- 
structed to  watch. 

Wheeler  followed  the  U-53  well  out  to  sea  by  motorboat  and  was 
the  only  newspaperman  to  report  the  halting  of  the  American  freighter 
Kansan  off  Nantucket  Lightship.  Although  the  Kansan  was  permitted  to 
proceed,  the  news  served  warning  that  Leutenant-Kapitan  Rose  had  a 
definite  mission  off  New  England.  Day  and  night  staffs,  twenty  men 
in  all,  were  mobilized.  All  shipping  in  the  danger  zone  was  charted 
so  accurately  that  the  Boston  staff  figuratively  watched  the  liner 
Stephana,  first  of  the  U-boat's  victims,  steam  toward  her  doom. 

The  submarine's  torpedoes  sent  five  ships  in  all  to  the  bottom, 
some  of  them  within  sight  of  American  shores,  but  outside  the  three-mile 
limit.  Utilizing  wireless  stations,  marine  observers,  ships  at  sea,  the 
British  Atlantic  squadron,  American  destroyers,  shore  correspondents 
and  staff  men,  Boston  covered  the  U-53's  daring  raid  with  a  10,000- 
word  budget  in  the  Sunday  night  report  and  14,000  words  on  Monday. 
Staff  men  went  miles  offshore  in  fast  motorboats  to  meet  rescue  vessels 
and  get  the  stories  of  the  survivors. 

Editors  called  the  U-53  the  biggest  story  to  develop  this  side  of 
the  Atlantic  in  connection  with  the  European  war.  It  brought  the  terror 


248  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

of  submarine  warfare  into  American  waters,  revived  the  public  indigna- 
tion that  had  smoldered  since  the  sinking  of  the  Lusitania  and  imposed 
a  further  stress  on  the  government's  policy  of  neutrality. 

In  this  uneasy  atmosphere  the  nation  looked  ahead  to  the  climax 
of  a  presidential  campaign  in  which  the  war  had  been  a  major  issue. 


XL  "HE  KEPT  US  OUT  OF  WAR" 


ON  THE  New  York  Curb  Exchange  the  odds  were  10  to  7  that  Charles 
Evans  Hughes  would  be  the  next  president.  The  Republican  National 
Committee  confidently  claimed  358  of  the  country's  531  electoral  votes. 
Political  soothsayers  prophesied  certain  defeat  for  Wilson.  The  air  was 
full  of  partisan  clamor  through  the  final  week  of  electioneering,  and 
even  a  second  American  trip  of  the  submarine  Deutschland  failed  to 
displace  politics  as  the  top  story  of  the  day. 

The  zero  hour  was  the  closing  of  the  polls  on  the  night  of  Novem- 
ber 7,  and  The  Associated  Press  had  been  four  years  preparing  for  it. 
The  co-operative's  new  election  service,  devised  and  directed  by  Wilmer 
Stuart  of  the  New  York  office,  faced  its  first  real  test  on  a  national  scale. 
For  months  Stuart  had  traveled  all  over  the  country,  setting  up  the 
machinery  by  states  and  instructing  bureau  staffs  on  how  the  service  was 
to  operate.  It  was  painstaking  and  undramatic  work,  stressing  accuracy 
first  and  then  speed  in  the  collection  and  tabulation  of  the  vote. 

Until  Stuart  began  his  survey,  election  coverage  had  little  uniform- 
ity in  plan  or  in  method.  The  organization  first  undertook  to  report  a 
presidential  election  with  some  independence  in  1888.  Before  that  time 
the  management  had  relied  unquestioningly  on  the  returns  collected  by 
commercial  telegraph  companies.  The  ugly  charges  provoked  by  the 
famous  Cleveland-Elaine  contest  in  1884  led  The  Associated  Press  to 
cover  the  next  national  election,  as  far  as  possible,  on  its  own  resources. 
The  procedure  was  improvised  and  experimental,  varying  from  state  to 
state  and  often  changing  between  one  election  and  another.  All  the 
elections  covered  in  this  patchwork  way  were  decided  by  comfortable 
margins  j  only  this  kept  attention  from  the  inherent  weakness  in  election 
service  operations. 

State  by  state  Stuart  examined  the  existing  machinery.  In  some 
the  association  depended  on  returns  compiled  by  county  clerks  or  secre- 
taries of  state,  and  the  vote  totals,  while  accurate,  were  likely  to  be 
extremely  slow.  In  others,  notably  the  Solid  South  and  traditional 
Republican  territory,  the  reports  of  the  dominant  party  were  utilized, 

249 


250  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

the  figures  gathered  by  the  minority  party  providing  the  basis  for  a 
reasonable  check  of  accuracy.  Then  there  were  a  few  states  in  which 
member  papers  pooled  resources  to  set  up  election  services  of  their 
own  and  the  returns,  as  tabulated,  were  made  available  to  the  co-opera- 
tive. Stuart  also  found  that  returns  in  any  election  were  zealously  com- 
pared with  the  vote  polled  by  the  party  in  the  same  district  in  the 
previous  election  to  determine  the  gain  or  loss.  This  made  for  a  cum- 
bersome and  confusing  procedure,  but  politicians  and  editors  generally 
were  firmly  convinced  that  election  returns  without  these  comparative 
figures  were  worthless. 

After  much  study  Stuart  evolved  a  system,  and  in  the  1904 
Roosevelt  election,  using  New  York  State  as  a  guinea  pig,  he  subjected 
it  to  its  first  limited  test.  The  county  was  made  the  basic  unit  of  the 
machine.  A  correspondent  or  member  newspaper  was  instructed  to 
collect  the  returns  directly  from  every  precinct  in  the  county  by  tele- 
phone, telegraph,  messenger,  or  other  means.  These  were  reported 
cumulatively  to  a  central  bureau  where  a  special  force  of  accountants  and 
calculators  added  the  votes  to  those  being  received  from  all  the  other 
counties  in  the  state.  The  voting  results  were  thus  obtained  not  only 
swiftly,  but  also  with  remarkable  accuracy.  Stuart  introduced  the  system 
experimentally  into  several  other  large  states  for  the  1908  and  1912 
elections,  and  again  it  functioned  with  smooth  and  accurate  efficiency, 
justifying  a  thoroughgoing  test  on  a  major  scale.  The  1916  election 
offered  the  first  opportunity. 

Long  before  the  campaign  ended  Stuart  had  perfected  the  ma- 
chinery for  the  service  in  almost  thirty  states,  among  them  all  those  with 
large  electoral  votes  and  those  which  surveys  listed  as  doubtful. 

The  time-honored  practice  of  carrying  the  comparative  vote  of  the 
preceding  election  was  discarded — much  to  the  horror  of  those  who  be- 
lieved there  was  no  way  like  the  old  way — and  the  association  decided  to 
report  the  election  on  the  principle  that  the  votes  spoke  for  themselves, 
regardless  of  how  rival  parties  had  fared  four  years  before. 


On  November  7  the  election  army  swung  into  action.  The  East 
came  in  rapidly.  By  6:03  P.M.  New  York  was  definitely  in  Hughes's 
column.  Maine,  Massachusetts,  Rhode  Island,  Vermont,  Connecticut, 
New  Jersey,  Pennsylvania  were  going  Republican  also.  New  Hamp- 
shire, too,  had  Hughes  in  the  lead,  but  by  a  surprisingly  small  figure. 


"HE  KEPT  Us  OUT  OF  WAR"  251 

The  first  scattering  returns  from  the  nearer  Midwestern  states  began 
to  trickle  in  with  Hughes  ahead. 

By  eight  o'clock  two  New  York  papers  which  had  supported  Wilson 
conceded  his  defeat.  Others  followed  suit.  A  number  of  wire  services 
flashed  a  Republican  "victory"  and  bragged  of  being  so  many  minutes 
ahead  of  competitors  in  announcing  the  result.  Presses  spewed  "extras" 
that  carried  editorials  on  the  Democratic  downfall.  Opposition  cables 
from  abroad  gave  Europe's  reaction  to  the  Hughes  "triumph."  Wilson, 
who  had  returned  to  New  Jersey  to  vote,  heard  the  reports  with  dejected 
resignation.  Theodore  Roosevelt  said:  "It  appears  Mr.  Hughes  is 
elected."  In  the  suite  on  the  eighth  floor  of  the  Hotel  Astor,  Mrs. 
Hughes  embraced  her  husband  and  exclaimed:  "Mr.  President!" 

All  the  while  65,000  miles  of  Associated  Press  wires  carried  the 
returns  as  fast  as  they  were  compiled.  There  were  no  flashes  that  the 
election  had  been  decided.  No  "overwhelming  defeat"  bulletins.  Just 
facts  and  figures  as  they  materialized.  State  by  state  the  report  carried 
the  number  of  districts  counted,  the  total  number  of  districts  involved, 
and  the  vote.  As  Democratic  chairmen  and  pro-Wilson  newspapers  in 
state  after  state  conceded,  stories  recorded  only  the  facts. 

The  storm  broke.  Messages  poured  in  from  member  papers,  de- 
manding an  immediate  story  on  the  election's  outcome.  The  Associated 
Press  was  a  laughingstock!  Everybody  was  conceding  a  Republican 
victory!  One  news  agency  after  another  had  flashed  the  Hughes  land- 
slide! The  Associated  Press  was  pro- Wilson  and  too  stubborn  to  admit 
its  man  had  been  beaten!  The  sheaf  of  angry  telegrams  on  the  general 
manager's  desk  grew  larger  and  the  telephone  jangled  insistently. 

Stone  talked  with  Stuart  and  together  they  studied  the  incomplete 
electoral  jigsaw.  The  East,  of  course,  was  clearly  Republican,  except 
for  New  Hampshire  where  a  nip-and-tuck  fight  was  in  progress.  Wilson 
led  in  Ohio  and  Minnesota,  but  the  greater  part  of  the  midwest  appeared 
safe  for  Hughes.  Even  with  such  a  commanding  bloc  of  states  assured, 
however,  the  Republicans  were  still  short  of  mathematical  certainty. 
Returns  from  Rocky  Mountain  and  far  western  states  were  too  meager 
to  be  conclusive,  and  an  abrupt  change  in  the  tide  there  could  throw 
everything  into  doubt. 

Women  were  voting  for  the  first  time  in  many  of  those  states  and 
they  were  an  unknown  political  quantity.  Furthermore,  the  Progressives 
were  strong  in  this  area  and  their  support  could  be  decisive.  A  check 
of  available  returns  showed  that  Wilson  had  a  nest  egg  of  157  electoral 
votes,  largely  contributed  by  the  Solid  South. 


252  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

"The  Associated  Press  will  make  no  statement  on  the  outcome  of 
the  election  until  the  result  has  been  definitely  decided,"  the  general 
manager  said  after  his  conference  with  Stuart  ended. 

In  the  early  morning  hours  the  picture  began  to  change.  Missouri 
and  Kansas  plumped  for  Wilson.  The  tide  was  running  strongly  to  him 
in  the  Rocky  Mountains  and  the  Northwest.  And  California,  which  the 
Republicans  claimed  by  40,000,  had  started  to  report. 

California,  1,264  out  °f  5)9J7  precincts:  Wilson  60,734;  Hughes 
59,OOO  .  .  ,  1,557  precincts:  Wilson  79,136;  Hughes  78,849  .  .  „ 
1,784  precincts:  Wilson  106,445;  Hughes  107,846.  .  .  . 

By  3  A.M.  Wednesday  the  vote,  contrary  to  all  expectations,  was 
running  so  unbelievably  close  in  California,  Minnesota,  West  Virginia, 
and  New  Hampshire — states  where  clear-cut  Republican  victories  had 
been  generally  anticipated — that  Stuart's  faith  in  the  accuracy  of  his 
machine  faltered  momentarily.  Urgent  instructions  were  wired  to  the 
staff  to  recanvass  every  district  already  counted  and  verify  the  totals. 
The  rechecks  left  the  figure  unchanged.  Only  in  California  did  a 
difference  occur  and  it  was  a  mere  20  votes. 

The  "landslide"  ceased  to  be  a  landslide. 

Toward  dawn  papers  which  had  been  on  the  street  with  headlines 
blazoning  Hughes's  election  issued  new  extras  that  the  result  was  in 
doubt.  Editorials  which  had  been  written  on  the  "new  president"  were 
thrown  out  and  noncommittal  substitutes  inserted.  The  enthusiasm  of 
"victory"  celebrations  gave  way  to  misgivings  and  pay-offs  on  election 
wagers  halted  abruptly. 

All  Wednesday  the  suspense  and  doubt  continued.  Wilson's  original 
lead  of  10,000  in  Minnesota  melted  away  and  Hughes  crept  out  in 
front  by  803  votes.  Hughes  went  ahead  in  New  Mexico  by  258,  and 
in  West  Virginia  by  1,538.  In  California  Wilson's  advantage  varied 
erratically.  In  the  afternoon  it  climbed  from  1,538  to  2,945,  then 
to  4,694,  and  then  slumped  back  to  1,490.  By  2:30  A.M  Thursday,  with 
5,347  out  of  5,917  precincts  reporting,  the  count  stood:  Wilson  439,896; 
Hughes  438,486.  Another  lead  from  San  Francisco  stressed  that  most 
of  the  returns  were  from  an  area  where  the  Democrats  could  hope 
for  the  greatest  support.  Very  little  had  been  heard  from  southern 
California  or  from  the  northern  section  of  the  state.  A  bloc  of  more 
than  a  hundred  precincts  in  Los  Angeles,  where  Republicans  hoped  for 
gains,  had  been  locked  up  for  a  second  night. 


KEPT  Us  OUT  OF  WAR"  253 


The  staff  in  New  York  labored  on  into  Thursday,  poring  over  the 
latest  batches  of  returns.  Wilson  started  the  day  in  California  with  a  lead 
of  more  than  3,000  votes,  but  before  noon  additional  returns  from  Los 
Angeles  and  from  Alameda  County  whittled  it  down  to  500.  Hughes 
pushed  farther  in  front  in  Minnesota  and  New  Hampshire  flopped  back 
into  his  column.  Wilson  was  ahead  in  North  Dakota  and,  by  the  nar- 
rowest of  margins,  in  New  Mexico.  It  was  obvious  that,  without  Cali- 
fornia, Wilson  would  lose. 

In  southern  California  men  on  horses  and  mules  went  out  into  the 
isolated  areas  to  get  news  of  how  the  vote  had  gone.  Where  storms 
had  interrupted  makeshift  communications  with  back  counties,  cor- 
respondents set  out  on  foot  to  bring  in  the  delayed  tabulations. 

With  tension  at  the  breaking  point,  the  day  wore  on.  New  Hamp- 
shire swung  back  to  Wilson.  Hughes  edged  out  in  front  in  New 
Mexico,  but  then  the  substantial  Democratic  votes  from  the  back  settle- 
ments arrived — by  all  manner  of  conveyances — and  Wilson  was  never 
again  headed. 

Before  long  the  outstanding  California  districts  began  to  come  in, 
at  first  slowly  and  then  at  a  quicker  pace.  District  after  district  from 
southern  California  served  only  to  strengthen  Wilson's  lead.  By  night- 
fall the  belated  votes  of  northern  California  were  being  tabulated  and 
the  bulletins  flew  along  the  leased  wires  to  the  offices  of  911  member 
newspapers.  Northern  California  was  sustaining  Wilson's  advantage. 
More  districts  in.  More  counties  complete.  Figures  for  two-thirds  of 
the  state  were  back-checked  and  found  correct. 

But  still  the  election  hung  in  the  balance.  There  had  been  so  many 
lightning  changes  in  the  two  days  since  the  polls  closed  that  anything 
still  might  happen.  The  hours  dragged  by.  More  missing  districts  were 
reported  during  the  evening.  In  New  York  Stuart  and  Stone  waited* 
Nine  o'clock.  Ten  o'clock.  Eleven  o'clock.  Eleven-twenty  .  .  . 

"FLASH!" 

The  operator  manning  the  main  transcontinental  wire  yelled  it 
across  the  newsroom  and  began  to  copy  the  sudden  fast  burst  of  signals. 
Men  fell  over  chairs  and  wastebaskets  to  crowd  around  him  as  the  type 
bars  of  his  machine  flipped  out  the  rapid  words: 

SAN  FRANCISCO  -  WILSON  CARRIES  CALIFORNIA 
AND  IS  RBELECTED. 


254  AP —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

On  the  heels  of  the  Flash  rode  a  bulletin  giving  the  vote:  Wilson, 
465,194$  Hughes,  462,224.  A  few  minutes  later  another  bulletin — 
Chester  A.  Rowell,  Republican  state  chairman  for  California,  reluctantly 
conceded  the  state  to  Wilson  "on  the  face  of  the  returns  as  compiled  by 
The  Associated  Press." 

The  news  was  rushed  to  the  special  wire  which  had  been  strung 
to  the  President's  temporary  residence  in  New  Jersey  and  when  Joseph 
Tumulty,  his  secretary,  read  the  first  brief  report  he  seized  The  Asso- 
ciated Press  operator  and  waltzed  him  around  the  room  in  a  boisterous 
whirl  of  jubilation.  Wilson  had  left  on  the  presidential  yacht  May- 
flower to  keep  a  speaking  engagement  in  New  England,  so  Tumulty 
dispatched  a  wireless  message. 

Toward  midnight,  while  Wilson's  staff  rejoiced  at  Long  Branch,  an 
editor  in  New  York  picked  up  a  telephone  to  break  the  news  to  the 
man  the  nation  had  hailed  as  the  next  president  only  two  days  ago. 
Someone  in  the  Hughes  suite  at  the  Hotel  Astor  answered  the  call. 

"The  President-elect,"  he  said  officiously,  "has  retired  for  the  night 
and  cannot  be  disturbed." 

That  was  too  much  for  the  patience  of  the  editor. 

"Well,"  he  replied,  "when  the  President-elect  wakes  up  in  the 
morning,  tell  him  he  isn't  President-elect  any  more." 

It  was  several  days  before  every  precinct  in  the  country  was 
accounted  for  and  the  verdict  of  sixteen  million  voters  confirmed.  The 
electoral  vote  was:  Wilson,  2775  Hughes,  254.  California  represented 
the  difference  between  victory  and  defeat.  Had  Hughes  carried  the 
state,  he  would  have  had  one  more  electoral  vote  than  the  number 
necessary  for  election.  Political  experts,  trying  to  explain  away  their  bad 
guesses,  blamed  the  loss  of  the  state  on  Hughes's  failure  during  the 
campaign  to  make  peace  with  Hiram  Johnson,  the  Republican  candidate 
for  the  United  States  Senate  in  California,  who  carried  the  state  by  the 
enormous  majority  of  296,815. 

The  1916  election  was  a  triumph  for  the  efficiency  of  Stuart's 
service.  In  several  states  the  pluralities  were  only  a  few  hundred  votes 
and  the  smallest  percentage  of  error  in  tabulating  the  count  would  have 
given  a  totally  inaccurate  result. 

The  machinery  which  had  proved  so  efficient  at  a  time  when 
others  were  busy  "electing"  the  unsuccessful  candidate  was  continued, 
expanded,  and  refined  for  other  national  elections.  It  became  the  only 
service  of  its  kind  in  existence,  the  only  one  to  operate  on  a  nation-wide 
scale,  and  the  government  at  Washington  placed  so  much  confidence 


f 


"HE  KEPT  Us  OUT  OF  WAR"  255 

in  it  that  it  accepted  The  Associated  Press  returns  as  conclusive  proof 
of  the  election  of  one  candidate  or  another  weeks  in  advance  of  the 
completion  of  the  official  count. 

"He  kept  us  out  of  war,"  had  been  Wilson's  1916  slogan  but 
within  weeks  after  his  re-election  the  war  clouds  became  blacker  than 
ever.  The  campaign  slogan  had  been  phrased  in  the  past  tense. 


XII.  THE  UNITED  STATES  AT  WAR 


Front  pages  carried  staggering  news  on  the  morning  of  March  i, 
1917,  and  from  that  date  events  marched  to  the  climax. 

There  had  been  some  confidence  as  the  new  year  began.  Wilson 
formally  appealed  to  the  belligerent  powers  "on  behalf  of  humanity" 
to  cease  the  slaughter  and  agree  to  a  lasting  peace.  That  was  on  January 
22.  Nine  days  later  the  White  House  knew  the  futility  of  the  proposal. 

Tumulty  brought  the  disillusioning  information  to  the  President's 
private  office.  The  Washington  Bureau  had  just  rushed  a  bulletin  from 
Berlin  to  the  Executive  Mansion.  Tumulty  laid  the  slip  of  paper  on 
Wilson's  desk  and  watched  him  as  he  read  it. 

The  President's  face  turned  gray  and  when  he  looked  up  he  said: 
"This  means  war.  The  break  that  we  have  tried  so  hard  to  avoid  now 
seems  inevitable." 

The  Berlin  bulletin  announced  that  Germany  would  begin  abso- 
lutely unrestricted  warfare  on  all  sea  traffic  to  Europe  within  twenty- 
four  hours.  When  Ambassador  von  Bernstorff  delivered  the  formal 
note  later  in  the  day,  Washington  already  knew  its  contents. 

On  February  3  Wilson  went  before  Congress  to  announce  severance 
of  diplomatic  relations  with  Germany  and  a  few  minutes  later  von 
Bernstorff  was  handed  his  passport.  The  big  question  everyone  kept 
asking  was:  "What  next?" 

The  experts  of  the  State  Department  decoding  room  got  the  first 
astounding  hint  of  the  answer  on  February  24  and  before  the  month 
ended  Hood  of  the  Washington  staff  learned  what  the  closely  guarded 
messages  contained. 

Secretary  of  State  Lansing  called  the  reporter  at  six  o'clock  the 
night  of  February  28  and  asked  him  to  come  to  his  house.  Hood  realized 
that  something  was  in  the  air,  for  Lansing  pledged  him  to  secrecy  even 
before  their  talk  got  beyond  greetings.  Then  the  secretary  of  state 
proceeded  to  give  Hood  one  of  the  most  amazing  stories  of  the 
reporter's  career — a  story  which,  had  it  not  been  backed  by  documentary 
proof,  Hood  certainly  would  have  branded  as  outright  propaganda 
although  it  came  from  a  high  government  source.  Coming  from  Lan- 

256 


THE  UNITED  STATES  AT  WAR  257 

sing  under  the  circumstances  it  still  may  have  been  propaganda,  but  it 
also  was  authentic  news  of  a  most  sensational  nature. 

The  administration,  Lansing  explained,  had  obtained  a  copy  of  a 
coded  German  communication  from  Dr.  Arthur  Zimmermann,  the 
Kaiser's  foreign  secretary,  to  Count  von  Bernstorff,  ambassador  at 
Washington,  for  relay  to  von  Echardt,  the  German  Minister  in  Mexico 
City.  The  message,  the  secretary  said,  was  dated  January  19  and  stated 
Germany's  intention  to  resume  unrestricted  submarine  warfare  twelve 
days  later,  regardless  of  Wilson's  peace  moves  then  being  discussed. 

But  all  that  was  merely  incidental.  Zimmermann's  coded  note 
directed  von  Echardt  to  propose  to  Mexico  secretly  that  she  ally  herself 
with  Germany  and  make  war  on  the  United  States  if  the  nation  failed 
to  remain  neutral.  Germany  would  supply  financial  support  and  Mex- 
ico's reward  would  be  the  states  of  Texas,  New  Mexico,  and  Arizona, 
the  territory  she  lost  back  in  the  dim,  forgotten  days  when  James  Gor- 
don Bennett  and  David  Hale  were  co-operating  on  the  pony  express 
shortly  before  the  formation  of  The  Associated  Press  in  1848.  The  final 
point  in  the  plan  was  that  Japan  should  be  persuaded  to  forsake  the 
Allies  and  join  in  the  attack  on  the  United  States. 

Lansing  produced  proof  that  the  information  had  been  in  the 
hands  of  the  administration  for  four  days  and  that  its  authenticity  had 
been  established  beyond  question.  How  the  cipher  message  was  obtained 
and  decoded  was  something  that  could  not  be  divulged  at  the  time,  but 
the  secretary  in  the  strongest  possible  language  pledged  his  word  that 
it  was  genuine. 

Lansing  thereupon  told  Hood  he  could  have  the  story,  but  that 
its  source  could  not  be  disclosed.  No  administration  official  could  be 
quoted  and  the  origin  of  the  news  must  be  vigorously  protected  at  all 
costs.  Lastly,  it  even  might  be  necessary  for  the  State  Department 
to  deny  knowledge  of  the  document  after  the  story  had  been  published. 
An  official  release  had  been  considered,  but  Lansing  had  advised  against 
such  a  course  because  it  might  appear  that  the  government  was  using 
the  news  to  bring  pressure  on  recalcitrant  members  of  Congress,  then 
fighting  the  administration  bill  for  arming  American  merchant  ships 
against  U-boat  attacks. 

Hood  debated.  For  The  Associated  Press  to  carry  such  an  explosive 
story  solely  on  its  own  authority  was  contrary  to  regulations.  Never- 
theless, this  news  was  too  big  to  wait  on  precedent. 

"I  think  we  can  use  it,"  he  said. 

Immediately  upon  leaving  Lansing,  Hood  called  Jackson  S.  Elliott, 


258  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

his  chief  of  bureau,  and  repeated  the  information  he  had  obtained. 
Elliott  weighed  the  facts,  reflected  on  the  responsibility  The  Associated 
Press  would  assume  by  carrying  the  story,  and  made  his  decision. 

"Go  ahead.  I'll  be  right  down,"  he  said. 

Hood  promptly  telephoned  Lional  C.  Probert,  news  editor  at  the 
bureau.  Realizing  his  own  regular  assignment  to  the  State  Department 
would  prove  a  fatal  clew  if  word  leaked  out  that  he  had  anything  to 
do  with  the  preparation  of  the  story,  he  requested  Probert  to  take  it 
over.  He  told  the  news  editor  that  Lansing  had  promised  to  have  the 
text  of  the  intercepted  note  ready  later  in  a  sealed  envelope. 

It  was  a  heavy  news  night,  with  a  dying  Congress  grinding  out 
its  final  grist  in  a  late  session  preparatory  to  adjournment  and  Wilson's 
second  inauguration.  Probert  looked  around  the  room.  Byron  Price 
was  needed  on  the  desk.  The  night  editor,  Horace  Epes,  already  had 
his  hands  full.  David  Lawrence  was  busy. 

Probert  saw  young  Stephen  Early. 

"You're  to  go  to  Secretary  Lansing's  home  on  Eighteenth  Street," 
he  instructed,  "and  bring  back  whatever  Lansing  gives  you.  Then  you're 
to  forget  you  ever  saw  the  secretary  tonight.  That's  all.  No  questions." 

Early  got  to  the  old  red-brick  house  in  record  time.  A  servant 
ushered  him  into  a  reception  room  and  left  him  to  catch  his  breath. 
Presently  Lansing  came  down  the  stairway.  Reaching  inside  his  long 
dressing  robe,  he  drew  out  a  big,  unmarked  envelope. 

Probert  had  the  envelope  the  minute  Early  came  back  into  the 
office.  Shirt-sleeved,  an  uptilted  cigar  clamped  between  his  teeth,  he 
hustled  Lawrence,  Epes,  and  Price  into  an  inner  office  and  plumped 
down  before  a  typewriter.  There  were  a  few  moments  of  discussion  with 
Elliott  on  the  form  and  wording  to  be  used  in  the  opening  paragraphs 
of  the  story.  Then  Probert  began  typing  in  his  one-finger  newsroom 
manner. 


It  had  been  decided  not  to  start  the  dispatch  on  the  wires  until  very 
late  that  night  so  that  other  correspondents  would  be  unable  to  check 
government  officials  once  the  news  was  out.  For  that  reason  the  need 
for  haste  was  not  pressing.  The  facts  were  there  and  Probert  went  to 
work  on  them.  He  made  no  effort  to  heighten  the  story  by  emphasis — 
the  material  itself  was  too  sensational.  Hammering  away  at  the  keys, 
he  turned  out  a  straightforward,  factual  story  which  marshaled  every 
fact  that  could  be  printed  without  exposing  the  source.  As  Probert's 


THE  UNITED  STATES  AT  WAR  259 

typewriter  rattled,  Price  prepared  a  detailed  "Add"  which  reviewed 
past  difficulties  with  Mexico  and  the  known  facts  on  German  activities 
south  of  the  Rio  Grande. 

Elliott  went  off  in  search  of  the  secretary  of  state.  He  wanted  to 
talk  to  Lansing  before  the  story  was  actually  released,  particularly  in 
view  of  Lansing's  statement  that  he  might  have  to  deny  the  news  after 
it  appeared.  Elliott  found  the  secretary  at  a  diplomatic  reception  and 
they  retired  to  an  anteroom. 

"You  feel,  Mr.  Secretary,  that  because  of  circumstances  you  may 
have  to  deny  all  knowledge  of  this  Zimmermann  story?"  the  Bureau 
chief  asked. 

Lansing  nodded. 

"Yet  you  agree  for  us  to  carry  it?" 

"Yes." 

"Then  we'll  do  it  on  one  condition.  You  will  be  asked  all  sorts  of 
things  about  this  story  at  your  press  conference  tomorrow.  I  don't 
care  how  you  reply.  The  Associated  Press  man  will  ask  you  three  ques- 
tions. We  will  carry  the  story  if  you  will  answer  those  questions  as  I 
request." 

Lansing  hesitated  until  he  heard  the  questions,  then  agreed. 

It  was  almost  midnight  when  Probert  walked  into  the  newsroom 
of  the  Washington  Bureau  with  the  wad  of  copy  in  his  hand.  He  had 
written  more  than  two  columns.  A  confidential  note  had  just  been  sent 
to  all  member  papers  notifying  them  that  news  of  surpassing  impor- 
tance would  be  transmitted  shortly.  A  clear  wire  and  a  ready  telegrapher 
were  waiting. 

Probert  dropped  the  pages  before  the  telegrapher: 

BY  THE  ASSOCIATED  PRESS 

WASHINGTON,  D.  C . ,  FEB .  28-THE  ASSOCIATED 
PRESS  IS  ENABLED  TO  REVEAL  THAT  GERMANY,  IN 
PLANNING  UNRESTRICTED  SUBMARINE  WARFARE  AND 
COUNTING  ITS  CONSEQUENCES,  PROPOSED  AN  ALLIANCE 
WITH  MEXICO  AND  JAPAN  TO  MAKE  WAR  ON  THE  UNITED 
STATES,  IP  THIS  COUNTRY  SHOULD  NOT  REMAIN  NEUTRAL. 

JAPAN,  THROUGH  MEXICAN  MEDIATION,  WAS 
TO  BE  URGED  TO  ABANDON  HER  ALLIES  AND  JOIN  IN 
THE  ATTACK  ON  THE  UNITED  STATES. 

MEXICO,  FOR  HER  REWARD,  WAS  TO  RECEIVE 
GENERAL  FINANCIAL  SUPPORT  FROM  GERMANY,  RECONQUER 
TEXAS,  NEW  MEXICO  AND  ARIZONA-LOST  PROVINCES- 
AND  SHARE  IN  THE  VICTORIOUS  PEACE  TERMS 
GERMANY  CONTEMPLATED.  .  .  . 


260  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Paragraph  after  paragraph  the  story  went  out  over  the  wires,  and 
with  it  the  text  of  the  document  which  is  now  known  as  the  Zimmer- 
mann  Note.  In  scores  of  member  offices  editors  read  the  dispatch.  As  un- 
believable as  the  story  was,  they  were  even  more  astonished  at  the  fact 
that  The  Associated  Press,  on  its  own  authority,  was  making  such  state- 
ments. It  was  the  first  time  member  papers  had  been  asked  to  take 
momentous  news  on  nothing  more  than  the  co-operative's  word,  but 
they  did  have  that  word,  for  the  story  was  accompanied  by  a  confidential 
note  saying  the  facts  had  been  thoroughly  authenticated. 

No  sooner  had  the  story  appeared  than  telephone  and  telegraph 
wires  began  to  hum  as  commercial  agencies  and  individual  newspapers 
flooded  their  Washington  offices  with  insistent  queries.  Unable  to  con- 
firm the  news  anywhere,  other  correspondents  called  the  whole  thing 
a  fraud. 

The  next  morning  a  hundred  newspapermen  jammed  Lansing's 
office  to  find  out  about  this  Zimmermann  Note.  There  were  shouted 
questions.  Lansing  parried  and  sidestepped.  He  said  he  knew  only 
what  had  appeared  in  the  papers.  A  murmur  went  through  the  room: 

"The  Associated  Press  has  stubbed  its  toe!" 

Lansing  managed  the  interview  deftly.  Just  as  he  was  about  to 
bring  it  to  a  close,  The  Associated  Press  man  stepped  forward  and 
quietly  posed  the  only  questions  asked  that  day  by  the  co-operative. 

"Mr.  Secretary,  did  you  know  The  Associated  Press  had  this  story 
last  night?" 

Lansing  studied  for  a  moment. 

"Yes." 

"Did  you  deny  its  authenticity?" 

"No." 

"Did  you  object  to  The  Associated  Press  carrying  the  story?" 

"No." 

With  that  Lansing  stepped  through  the  draperies  which  hid  the 
door  of  his  private  office  and  the  press  conference  ended. 

Confirmation  was  forthcoming  later  in  the  day.  The  Senate, 
aroused  by  the  disclosures,  called  upon  the  President  for  whatever  in- 
formation he  had.  Wilson  answered  by  transmitting  a  memorandum 
from  Lansing  that  the  Zimmermann  Note  was  authentic  and  had  been 
in  possession  of  the  administration  for  several  days.  But  the  most  con- 
vincing proof  of  all  came  when  Chief  of  Bureau  Conger  cabled  from 
Berlin  that  Zimmermann,  the  foreign  minister,  volunteered  the  admis- 
sion that  he  had  sent  the  note.  As  though  to  justify  himself,  Zimmer- 


THE  UNITED  STATES  AT  WAR  261 

mann  ingeniously  stressed  that  "the  instructions  were  to  be  carried  out 
only  after  declaration  of  war  by  America." 

The  story  of  how  the  United  States  government  obtained  the  text 
of  the  Zimmermann  note  was  not  made  public  until  years  later.  The 
British  Intelligence  Service  had  intercepted  a  copy  of  Zimmermann's 
instructions  to  von  Bernstorff  and  it  was  turned  over  to  Admiralty 
experts  for  decoding.  The  contents  were  so  astounding  that  the  informa- 
tion was  given  to  the  American  ambassador  at  London  on  February  24, 
and  he  immediately  cabled  it  to  the  State  Department.  The  State  De- 
partment later  said  that  the  necessity  for  concealing  Britain's  knowledge 
of  German  codes  was  a  major  reason  why  Lansing  withheld  from  Hood 
any  facts  on  how  the  Zimmermann  message  came  into  the  administra- 
tion's possession. 


The  United  States  entered  the  World  War  on  April  6,  1917.  Presi- 
dent Noyes  and  General  Manager  Stone  called  on  Wilson  and  the  sub- 
ject of  wartime  censorship  was  discussed.  They  suggested  that  any 
American  arrangement  include  provision  for  competent  newspapermen 
on  the  censorship  boards  so  that  the  people  would  be  assured  of  receiv- 
ing all  the  news  the  publication  of  which  was  not  actually  injurious 
to  the  country's  interests. 

Army  and  Navy  officials,  they  pointed  out,  were  instinctively  dis- 
posed to  suppress  almost  everything  and  might  automatically  forbid  dis- 
patches which  obviously  were  of  value  to  the  people  at  home.  Wilson 
agreed  and  to  a  great  degree  the  suggestion  was  incorporated  in  censor- 
ship methods. 

The  declaration  of  war  touched  off  a  great  surge  of  patriotism. 
Seen  from  the  headquarters  of  the  association,  however,  the  outlook 
was  hardly  as  bright  as  orators  painted  it.  Private  advices,  the  reports 
of  men  on  furlough  from  the  front,  and  what  could  be  read  between  the 
lines  of  closely  censored  dispatches  gave  a  dark  picture.  Britain's  spring 
offensive  in  Artois  had  been  a  costly  failure,  and  the  French  thrust  in 
Champagne  had  been  hurled  back  with  such  terrific  slaughter  that  six- 
teen army  corps  mutinied  and  refused  to  attack.  The  news  from  Whiff  en 
at  Petrograd  was  no  less  disquieting.  The  Czar  had  abdicated  in  the  face 
of  revolution  and  a  shaky  coalition  of  moderates  were  struggling  to 
keep  Russian  armies  in  action.  On  the  seas  submarine  warfare  was  tak- 
ing an  appalling  toll  of  shipping.  Allied  fortunes  were  at  a  low  ebb. 

America's  entry  redoubled  the  importance  of  news  coverage  abroad 


262  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

The  general  manager  started  the  first  contingent  of  additional  staff  men 
to  Europe  and  selected  others  to  sail  as  soon  as  troop  movements  started. 
Overseas  the  continued  collection  of  news  of  enemy  nations  was  a  definite 
problem.  The  expulsion  of  staff  men  made  neighboring  neutral  coun- 
tries the  substitute  channels  for  obtaining  the  news  of  the  Central 
Powers,  and  reporters  regularly  assigned  to  key  neutral  centers  were 
brought  to  New  York  for  special  instructions. 

Ulrich  Salchow,  for  years  correspondent  in  Stockholm,  was  one 
of  those  recalled.  When  he  was  ready  to  embark  from  Brooklyn  to 
return  to  Sweden,  he  had  trouble  boarding  his  boat.  A  crowd  of  Rus- 
sians jammed  the  pier,  listening  to  a  fiery  speech  from  a  man  who  ha- 
rangued them  in  their  native  tongue  from  the  ship's  rail.  Salchow, 
who  understood  Russian,  was  surprised  by  what  he  heard,  yet  the 
police  and  secret-service  men  present  made  no  move  to  interfere. 

"I  go  to  Russia  to  help  the  revolution,"  he  was  yelling.  "Russia 
will  make  peace  with  Germany.  We  will  see  to  that,  and  we  will  end 
the  loss  of  Russian  lives  in  a  war  in  support  of  capitalism.  I  shall  be 
back,  my  comrades,  to  join  you  in  the  destruction  of  the  capitalistic 
system  in  America.  England,  France,  Italy  will  fall  before  our  cause. 
Communism  is  the  call  for  the  world  revolution." 

Salchow  struck  up  an  acquaintance  with  the  speaker  when  the  boat 
left  port  and  told  him  he  marveled  that  he  spoke  so  plainly  in  the 
presence  of  the  police. 

"The  officers  of  the  law  are  idiots,"  the  Russian  said.  "They  did 
not  know  what  I  was  saying." 

The  British  Intelligence,  however,  learned  what  had  been  said. 
When  the  ship  touched  at  Halifax  two  days  later  the  Russian  was 
arrested  and  taken  ashore.  Unperturbed,  he  promised  Salchow:  "I  shall 
charm  these  fools  and  I  will  see  you  in  Stockholm." 

Three  weeks  later  the  Russian  walked  into  Salchow's  office  in 
Stockholm. 

"How  in  the  world  did  you  make  it?"  asked  the  correspondent. 

"Easy,"  the  visitor  replied.  "I  merely  told  them  how  I  was  going 
back  to  Russia  to  end  the  revolution  and  throw  the  force  of  Russia 
back  into  the  war  wholeheartedly  against  Germany.  That  assurance  was 
all  they  wanted.  They  not  only  released  me,  free  to  take  the  next  ship, 
but  they  furnished  me  some  funds  as  a  bon  voyage." 

The  Russian  was  Leon  Trotsky, 


THE  UNITED  STATES  AT  WAR  263 


America's  first  shot  of  the  war  was  fired  April  19,  the  anniversary 
of  the  Battle  of  Lexington.  A  naval  gun  crew  on  the  American  liner 
Mongolia  opened  fire  on  an  attacking  U-boat  in  British  waters  and  sank 
her.  Captain  Rice,  the  Mongolia's  commander,  gave  the  co-operative  an 
eyewitness  account  as  soon  as  the  ship  reached  port — an  account  which 
was  such  big  news  that  commercial  competitors  pirated  it  as  soon  as  it 
appeared. 

By  this  time  piracy  of  news  had  reached  such  proportions  that  the 
association  instituted  legal  action  against  the  major  offender,  Hearst's 
International  News  Service.  The  piracy  demonstrated  the  need  for  hav- 
ing the  association's  dispatches  regularly  credited,  instead  of  leaving 
the  matter  to  the  discretion  of  individual  members,  for  pirates  could 
always  offer  the  defense  that  they  did  not  know  an  uncredited  item 
was  Associated  Press  news.  Accordingly,  on  April  26  the  Board  of 
Directors  issued  orders  that  all  Associated  Press  matter  should  be 
credited  and  that  all  members  should  daily  carry  printed  notice  of  the 
paper's  affiliation  with  the  co-operative. 

Besides  the  problem  created  by  piracy,  the  association,  like  so 
many  enterprises  in  different  fields,  encountered  operation  difficulties 
as  staff  men  left  to  join  the  colors.  The  Traffic  Department  suffered 
heavily.  The  Signal  Corps  was  in  need  of  trained  telegraph  men 
and  within  the  first  months  a  hundred  of  the  six  hundred  and  sixty 
regular  telegraphers  had  joined.  A  number  of  the  men  were  in  France 
three  weeks  after  their  enlistment.  Some  two  hundred  others,  unable 
to  serve  because  of  age  or  disability,  devoted  spare  time  to  the  instruc- 
tion of  Signal  Corps  recruits. 

The  editorial  staff  also  was  involved.  Seventy-five  men  joined  the 
armed  forces  and  others  volunteered  for  Red  Cross  and  Y.M.C.A.  units 
overseas.  Washington  lost  three  front-rank  men  when  Steve  Early, 
Byron  Price,  and  W.  F.  Caldwell  enlisted,  and  other  bureaus  suffered 
in  proportion  to  their  size. 

The  first  drawing  of  the  draft  imposed  a  tremendous  burden  on 
wire  facilities,  already  hampered  by  government  demands  on  com- 
munications. At  9:49  one  summer  morning,  in  the  public  hearing  room 
of  the  Senate  office  building,  Secretary  of  War  Newton  D.  Baker  drew 
out  the  first  draft  number— 258— and  a  minute  later  it  went  out  over 
the  news  network.  To  the  men  numbered  258  in  each  of  4,500  draft 
precincts  it  was  notice  they  had  been  chosen  to  fight.  In  all,  io,5Qp 


264  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

numbers  were  drawn  in  the  two  days  of  the  draft  lottery,  and  the  report 
carried  every  one  of  them.  To  handle  the  story  which  meant  so  much 
personally  to  the  able-bodied  men  of  the  nation,  four  special  parallel 
trunk  wires  were  set  up.  From  9:50  A.M.  one  day  until  2:18  P.M.  the 
next,  the  numbers  streamed  across  the  continent,  until  the  last  one  was 
flashed  ten  minutes  after  it  had  been  drawn.  One  Traffic  man,  John 
Mooney  at  the  Scranton  Republican,  stayed  on  duty  twenty-six  hours 
and  fifteen  minutes.  At  8  A.M.  the  second  day  one  number  ticked  off  the 
sounder  that  made  Mooney  grin — it  was  his  own. 


The  first  troops — Regular  Army  units — sailed  for  France  a  few 
weeks  after  General  Pershing's  arrival  in  England  in  June,  and  Stanley 
W.  Prenosil,  from  the  Boston  Bureau,  made  the  trip  in  one  of  the  trans- 
ports. The  news  of  troop  departures  was  suppressed  as  a  military 
measure,  but  when  the  first  transport  reached  France  with  Prenosil 
aboard,  he  cabled  a  story  that  touched  off  unbounded  enthusiasm 
throughout  the  United  States.  Phillip  Powers  of  the  Paris  Bureau  also 
sent  a  story  on  the  landing  of  the  troops  on  French  soil.  These  dis- 
patches were  the  only  ones  that  came  through. 

Then  a  tempest  burst.  The  wartime  Committee  on  Public  Infor- 
mation criticized  the  association  for  carrying  the  stories.  It  charged  that 
the  news  had  been  sent  in  defiance  of  censorship  regulations  through 
the  bribery  of  a  telegraph  operator.  Publication  of  the  dispatches,  it 
said,  gave  the  enemy  information  which  jeopardized  the  lives  of  troops 
still  in  the  danger  zone  at  sea  on  other  transports. 

Stone  instituted  an  investigation.  Prenosil  and  Powers  were  in- 
structed to  forward  sworn  statements  regarding  the  charge  that  they 
bribed  an  operator  to  violate  censorship  regulations,  and  a  request 
was  made  to  the  Intelligence  Section  of  the  American  Expeditionary 
Force  for  any  information  its  inquiry  uncovered. 

Developments  proved  that  the  exclusive  stories  were  exclusive  only 
by  virtue  of  an  accident.  Censorship  orders  had,  in  truth,  been  issued, 
directing  that  all  dispatches  dealing  with  the  arrival  of  the  first  Amer- 
ican units  in  France  be  withheld  for  simultaneous  release  after  the 
last  of  the  transport  fleet  docked.  The  Intelligence  section  reported: 

.  .  .  the  fault  was  not  with  any  correspondent,  but  with  some  one  who 
permitted  these  telegrams  to  go  through  to  London  before  the  word  of  release 
was  given. 


THE  UNITED  STATES  AT  WAR  265 

No  retraction  of  the  charges  came,  however,  and  in  less  than  two 
weeks  an  even  wilder  teapot  episode  occurred.  On  July  3,  after  all  ships 
of  the  first  transport  fleet  had  safely  reached  France,  The  Committee 
on  Public  Information  released  in  the  name  of  Secretary  of  Navy 
Josephus  Daniels  a  stirring  story  of  two  battles  between  the  troopships 
and  destroyers  under  Admiral  Cleaves  and  enemy  submarines.  The  at- 
tack, the  release  said,  "was  made  in  force,  although  the  night  made 
impossible  any  exact  count  of  the  U-boats  gathered  for  what  they 
deemed  a  slaughter."  On  the  authority  of  the  wartime  information 
czar,  the  Daniels  story  was  carried,  but  it  aroused  the  doubts  of  staff 
editors  informed  on  submarine  warfare.  Since  U-boats  were  blind  when 
submerged,  they  traveled  alone  to  avoid  the  dangers  of  collision  and 
no  one  had  ever  heard  of  an  attack  in  flotilla  force. 

A  copy  of  the  story  was  relayed  to  London  and  Frank  America, 
one  of  the  staff  there,  sought  comment  from  British  naval  experts  and 
at  the  European  headquarters  of  the  American  naval  forces  under 
Admiral  Sims.  Two  days  later  New  York  headquarters  received  the 
following: 

JULY  5,  1917.   LONDON.   THURSDAY  CONFIDEN- 
TIAL FOLLOWING  AMERICAS  NAVAL  BASE  PASSED  FOR 
PUBLICATION  USA  ONLY  QUOTE  PRIVATE  ATTITUDE 
OFFICIAL  CIRCLES  HERE  THAT  DANIELS  STORY  MADE 
OUT  OF  WHOLE  CLOTH  THERE  NO  SUBMARINE  ATTACK 
WHATEVER  NO  TORPEDOES  SEEN  NO  GUNFIRE  FROM 
DESTROYERS  STOP  OUR  DESTROYERS  DROPPED  EX- 
PLOSIVE CHARGE  AS  PRECAUTION  BUT  NO  SUBMARINE  OR 
WRECKAGE  SEEN  STOP  EXPLAINED  DESTROYERS  FRE- 
QUENTLY FIRE  AT  LOGS  OR  ANYTHING  WHICH  MIGHT 
PROVE  PERISCOPE  STOP  OFFICIALS  HERE  THEREFORE 
DECLINE  PERMIT  AFTERMATH  STORY  FROM  THIS  END. 

To  the  general  manager  and  the  news  editors  alike  the  preliminary 
phrasing  of  the  dispatch  proved  puzzling.  It  was  marked  "confiden- 
tial" but  it  also  bore  the  censor's  release:  "Passed  for  publication  USA 
only."  After  discussion,  the  conclusion  was  finally  reached  that  the 
London  Bureau  had  labeled  the  message  confidential  because  of  doubt 
that  the  censor  would  permit  its  transmission  for  publication.  As  long 
as  the  British  censor  had  passed  it  for  publication,  they  reasoned,  there 
was  nothing  to  prevent  its  use.  In  a  matter  of  minutes  the  story  was  on 
the  wire,  exploding  the  original  story  of  submarines  attacking  in  fleets. 

Washington  questioned  Secretary  Daniels  about  the  London  dis- 
patch, and  Daniels,  whose  newspaper,  the  Raleigh  (N.  C.)  News  and 


266  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Observery  was  a  member  of  The  Associated  Press,  immediately  called 
Stone  by  long-distance  telephone.  He  asked  that  the  story  be  killed 
quickly.  The  request  was  an  official  demand  from  the  wartime  govern- 
ment and  Stone  had  no  alternative.  A  mandatory  notice  to  kill  the  story 
went  out  immediately,  but  in  most  places  the  dispatch  was  in  print. 

Once  more  the  Committee  hurled  its  charges.  The  London  dispatch 
was  damned  as  "a  cruel  lie  ...  the  work  of  a  correspondent  in  search 
of  a  story,  and  the  British  Court  of  Inquiry  branded  him  a  liar  and 
expelled  him  from  the  fleet."  President  Wilson  was  so  incensed  that 
he  said  he  never  again  would  speak  to  Melville  Stone.  Daniels  was 
too  philosophical  to  quarrel,  but  he  told  Stone  that  Admiral  Cleaves, 
like  Wilson,  would  never  forgive  him  either.  Stone  expressed  his  re- 
grets, but  explained  that  the  story  had  come  from  a  staff  man  and 
The  Associated  Press  believed  it. 

Another  investigation  was  ordered  and  while  it  was  in  progress 
Stone  attended  a  reception  in  honor  of  one  of  the  Allied  missions 
which  had  arrived  in  New  York  to  help  co-ordinate  war  efforts. 

"Mr.  Stone,"  said  a  voice  at  his  elbow,  "is  there  any  reason  why 
you  and  I  can't  have  a  cocktail  together?" 

The  general  manager  found  himself  facing  Admiral  Cleaves,  who 
had  just  returned  from  convoying  the  first  troopships  to  France. 

"Mr.  Stone,"  said  the  admiral,  "I  owe  you  a  debt  that  I  never  can 
repay.  I  mean  for  denying  that  silly  story  given  out  from  Washington 
respecting  two  fierce  battles  with  submarines.  I  am  a  plain  common 
sailor  and  not  given  to  that  kind  of  statement.  I  could  not  be  responsible 
for  the  hysterical  rhapsody.  Of  course,  the  order  to  all  our  boats  was 
that  if  anything  like  a  periscope  appeared  to  fire  at  it,  and  that  was 
done.  The  officers  on  the  individual  boats  saw  evidences  of  periscopes 
and  torpedoes  and  took  a  shot  at  them.  That  was  the  whole  story." 

The  investigation  abroad  upheld  the  truth  of  Frank  America's 
dispatch.  He  had  obtained  the  information  from  officers  at  Admiral 
Sims'  base,  where  convoy  destroyers  frequently  took  on  supplies.  Pub- 
lication of  the  story  in  the  United  States,  however,  was  a  mistake. 
America  had  meant  the  information  to  be  confidential,  but  the  censor's 
stamp,  "Passed  for  publication  USA  only,"  which  should  not  have 
been  transmitted,  was  incorporated  as  part  of  the  cabled  message.  As 
for  America  himself,  the  British  Admiralty  exonerated  him  and  he  con- 
tinued welcome  at  Admiral  Sims'  headquarters. 


THE  UNITED  STATES  AT  WAR  267 


Not  long  after  the  submarine  episode  the  general  manager  went 
to  Europe  to  supervise  arrangements  for  the  increased  news  demands 
that  would  arise  when  American  troops  began  active  fighting.  He 
toured  the  lines,  sloshing  through  muddy  trenches  with  a  sergeant  of 
marines  as  his  guide.  The  costly  British  Passchendaele  offensive  was 
bogging  down  in  the  quagmire  of  Flanders.  Bled  white  by  heavy  cas- 
ualties, the  French  had  reverted  to  defensive  tactics,  and  on  the  eastern 
front  the  last  fitful  Russian  drive  flickered  out  under  the  hammering 
of  German  counterattacks. 

Shifting  his  men  to  meet  the  war  situation  as  it  existed,  Stone 
sent  Charles  T.  Thompson  to  the  Italian  front.  Because  of  the  growing 
acuteness  of  affairs  in  Russia,  Charles  Stephenson  Smith,  correspondent 
at  Peking,  was  ordered  to  Petrograd  to  relieve  Whiffen.  Robert  T. 
Small,  with  the  British  in  Flanders  for  some  time,  was  transferred  to 
Pershing's  headquarters  where  he  was  later  reinforced  by  Norman  L. 
Draper. 

Just  before  his  reassignment,  Small  almost  lost  his  life  in  the 
Somme  during  the  limited  advance  which  took  Peronne.  Crossing  a 
ruined  bridge  he  plunged  through  a  camouflaged  section  into  the  river. 
A  party  of  British  engineers  rescued  him. 

SmalPs  successor  with  the  British  and  Belgian  forces  was  DeWitt 
Mackenzie,  the  only  American  correspondent  to  see  what  was  happening 
in  the  Egypto-Arabic  theater  of  war.  Captain  John  Yardley,  D.W.O., 
one  of  England's  World  War  heroes  and  then  aide-de-camp  to  the 
British  commander  in  chief  in  the  Near  East,  said  of  his  work: 

It  was  well  known  to  us  at  General  Headquarters  that  Mackenzie's  dis- 
patches, not  only  from  Egypt,  but  from  other  theaters  of  war,  were  the  most 
potent  written,  for  they  lifted  the  veil,  and  revealed  to  the  American  public 
the  true  facts. 

As  the  autumn  waned,  William  Gibson,  an  operator,  was  killed  in 
London  during  an  air  raid  and  Frank  America  had  a  narrow  escape 
when  a  zeppelin  bomb  burst  so  close  that  he  was  knocked  down  and 
covered  by  falling  debris. 

In  London  Stone  devoted  himself  to  a  firsthand  study  of  the  cha- 
otic cable  conditions  which  were  playing  havoc  with  efforts  to  get  news  to 
the  United  States  promptly.  Government  messages  took  precedence  and 
their  volume  was  extremely  heavy.  "Urgent"  rates  no  longer  existed, 


268  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

so  the  association  began  filing  a  large  number  of  dispatches  at  the  full 
commercial  rate  of  25  cents  a  word.  This  boosted  cable  tolls  to  $2,000 
a  day,  but  failed  to  improve  conditions  materially.  Western  Union  de- 
clined to  guarantee  delivery  of  any  press  messages  in  less  than  forty- 
eight  hours,  and  the  French  cable  company  refused  newspaper  dispatches 
because  it  was  unable  to  provide  satisfactory  service. 

Stories  sent  at  the  full  commercial  rate  often  took  from  seventeen 
to  fifty-two  hours  in  transmission.  Frequently  dispatches  filed  at  the 
slower  ly-cents-a-word  press  rate  arrived  in  New  York  long  before  full- 
rate  stories.  Communications  with  Russia  were  wholly  unpredictable. 
Some  stories  never  reached  New  York  at  all,  and  many  times  instruc- 
tions from  New  York  never  reached  Petrograd.  One  message  from 
the  Russian  capital  to  New  York  was  sixty-two  days  in  transit.  Through- 
out the  remainder  of  the  conflict  the  erratic  cables  destroyed  many  clean 
beats  and  on  any  number  of  occasions  gave  scoops  to  dispatches  which 
normally  should  have  been  hours  behind. 


Back  home  in  the  United  States,  the  nation  was  trying  to  forget 
its  war  worries  momentarily  by  reading  of  the  World  Series,  and  again 
Cooper  lined  up  his  26,ooo-mile  circuit  to  report  the  Chicago  White 
Sox-New  York  Giants  games  direct  from  the  ball  parks.  Despite  the 
keen  competition  of  other  news,  the  baseball  classic  could  still  command 
position  on  American  front  pages,  and  it  had  one  less  story  to  contend 
with  that  October,  thanks  to  one  of  the  co-operative's  staff. 

Upheavals  in  Mexico  no  longer  made  the  stories  they  once  did 
now  that  America  was  embroiled  in  Europe,  but  Pancho  Villa  continued 
active  in  Chihuahua  and  was  anxious  to  impress  the  United  States  by 
defeating  President  Carranza.  An  attack  on  the  federal-held  town  of 
Ojinaga  seemed  to  offer  a  good  opportunity,  and  Villa  laid  plans  for  an 
assault  early  in  October.  Just  as  he  finished  preparations,  Norman 
Walker,  a  staff  correspondent,  reached  his  camp.  Villa  had  known  the 
reporter  during  several  years  of  assignments  south  of  the  Rio  Grande, 
and  therefore  confided  his  plans  to  Walker  and  asked  if  he  considered 
the  date  propitious. 

Smiling,  Walker  told  Villa  he  could  not  have  chosen  a  worse  time. 
The  World  Series,  he  pointed  out,  was  just  starting  and  what  space 
American  newspapers  had  for  news  other  than  baseball  would  be  pre- 
empted by  war  dispatches. 


THE  UNITED  STATES  AT  WAR  269 

"If  you  wait  until  after  the  World  Series,"  Walker  said,  "you 
might  make  the  front  pages." 

Villa  waited,  and  when  he  finally  took  Ojinaga  he  did  make  the 
front  pages. 

But  there  was  far  greater  news  that  October  than  the  1917  World 
Series  or  a  postponed  Mexican  battle.  On  October  24,  in  a  thick  fog 
intensified  by  snow  and  rain,  a  spearhead  of  six  German  and  nine  Aus- 
trian divisions  smashed  through  on  the  Caporetto  sector  and  the  entire 
Italian  front  collapsed.  Thompson  was  caught  in  the  rout  which 
streamed  back  toward  the  River  Piave  in  confusion.  The  second  day 
of  the  swift  Austro-German  advance  found  him  on  the  crumbling  front 
at  Gorizia,  which  was  being  mercilessly  pounded  by  massed  enemy 
artillery.  He  had  mounted  the  highest  available  rampart  to  get  a  better 
view  of  operations,  when  a  shell  burst  near  by,  burying  him  and  sev- 
eral companions  under  an  avalanche  of  earth  and  mud.  Rescuers  dug 
out  the  party.  Thompson  was  the  only  one  wounded  j  a  piece  of  shrap- 
nel had  hit  him  in  the  head.  The  wound  was  dressed  at  a  first-aid 
station  and  he  returned  to  his  task  of  reporting  the  offensive  which 
hurled  the  Italians  back  more  than  sixty  miles  and  at  one  time  threat- 
ened the  utter  destruction  of  their  armies.  As  it  was,  General  Cadorna 
lost  800,000  effectives. 

On  the  heels  of  the  Italian  breakdown  came  the  black  news  from 
Russia.  For  weeks  the  cables  that  got  through  from  Whiffen,  Chief 
of  Bureau  Smith,  H.  L.  Rennick,  and  other  members  of  the  staff  at 
Petrograd  or  at  the  Russian  front  had  been  alarming.  They  told  of 
rioting,  unrest,  demonstrations  for  a  separate  peace  and  the  ugly 
atmosphere  pervading  the  country.  The  report  began  to  mention  the 
unfamiliar  names  of  Nikolay  Lenin  and  Leon  Trotsky,  Salchow's 
shipboard  companion  of  a  few  months  earlier.  When  Associated  Press 
dispatches  described  how  Russian  troops  were  shooting  their  officers  and 
parading  under  red  flags  to  shouts  of  "Down  with  the  war!"  the  State 
Department  at  Washington  felt  sufficiently  concerned  to  issue  a  counter- 
statement  that  diplomatic  advices  from  Russia  indicated  no  grounds 
for  worry  and  that  full  confidence  continued  in  Russia's  loyalty  to 
the  Allies. 

The  bloody  Russian  Revolution  which  broke  on  November  7 
proved  how  well  the  Petrograd  staff  had  been  reporting  true  condi- 
tions. Throughout  the  Red  Terror  the  men  daily  took  their  lives  in  their 
hands  when  they  got  their  news  and  arranged  for  its  transmission.  Smith 
saved  an  American  consular  official  from  being  bayoneted  by  a  berserk 


270  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

soldier  and  was  promptly  felled  by  a  clubbed  rifle.  Soldiers  pounced 
on  him  and  beat  him  up  badly.  Another  member  of  the  staff  was  shot 
in  the  knee  by  a  sniper.  But  the  news  came  out — the  spread  of  the 
revolution,  the  conclusion  of  an  armistice  between  the  Central  Powers 
and  Russia,  and  finally  on  December  27  the  full  text  of  the  treaty  of 
Brest-Litovsk,  first  Teutonic  peace  terms  formulated  since  the  begin- 
ning of  the  war. 

Just  as  the  Board  of  Directors  opposed  carrying  the  by-lines  of 
staff  men,  it  likewise  vetoed  any  wartime  relaxation  in  the  hard  and  fast 
rules  governing  the  handling  of  cabled  dispatches.  The  policy  was  to 
carry  nothing  under  a  foreign  date  line  which  did  not  come  by  cable,  and 
the  board  ordered  that  this  regulation  continue  to  be  strictly  observed. 
Even  when  half  of  a  story  arrived  in  the  day  report  and  the  other 
half  at  night,  there  was  to  be  no  rewriting  of  the  previously  published 
portion  so  that  the  night  report  might  have  a  slightly  different  lead 
from  that  carried  on  the  day  wires.  The  practice  was  sharply  at  variance 
with  that  of  commercial  agencies  and  individual  newspapers,  for  many 
regularly  rewrote  and  expanded  the  cables  they  received,  incorporating 
matter  the  original  dispatches  did  not  contain,  drawing  conclusions 
from  war  maps,  and  giving  the  stories  a  literary  polish  not  likely  to 
appear  in  copy  written  in  haste  under  fire. 

The  only  concession  made  to  the  war  was  the  introduction  of 
Undated  War  Leads,  written  in  New  York,  which  rounded  up  all  in- 
formation into  one  comprehensive  story.  Undated  Leads  subsequently 
became  the  approved  newspaper  method  of  handling  any  major  story 
involving  a  multiplicity  of  date  lines  and  developments. 

8 

General  Manager  Stone  returned  from  Europe  late  in  the  year  to 
an  America  which  had  settled  down  in  earnest  to  the  serious  business  of 
being  at  war.  New  York  was  singing  "Over  There,"  "Tipperary,"  and 
"Oh,  How  I  Hate  to  Get  Up  in  the  Morning,"  a  catchy  air  written  by 
a  Camp  Upton  sergeant,  Irving  Berlin.  The  advertising  signs  along 
Broadway  were  darkened  by  order  of  the  federal  fuel  administrator. 
People  joked  about  wheatless  Mondays,  meatless  Tuesdays,  sugarless 
coffee,  and  coalless  furnaces.  Herbert  Hoover  had  become  the  nation's 
food  czar,  and  wartime  Prohibition  was  around  the  corner. 

The  war  moved  on  into  1918.  The  collapse  of  Russia  had  freed 
thirty  German  divisions  from  the  eastern  front  for  service  in  France, 


THE  UNITED  STATES  AT  WAR  271 

Every  sign  pointed  to  a  gigantic  struggle  for  a  decision  on  the  western 
front.  Charles  Kloeber,  chief  of  the  News  Department,  had  relieved  the 
general  manager  in  Europe  as  active  director  of  the  staff,  and  Cooper, 
the  Traffic  Department  head,  went  abroad  to  attempt  improvement  in 
the  erratic  cable  conditions.  American  troops  were  almost  ready  for  battle 
lines  and  once  they  went  into  action  there  would  be  an  additional  heavy 
burden  on  the  jammed  cables. 

Early  in  March  confidential  advices  began  to  trickle  into  New 
York  headquarters  that  a  German  drive  on  the  western  front  was  immi- 
nent. Soon  after  the  first  advices  there  came  a  publishable  cable:  The 
German  High  Command  had  invited  neutral  correspondents  to  start 
for  the  west  "to  witness  the  German  offensive."  The  dispatch  aroused 
little  attention.  Military  authorities  in  Washington  expressed  the  opinion 
that  an  Allied  offensive  was  more  likely,  and  the  public  looked  on  the 
story  as  a  Teutonic  ruse.  Nevertheless,  Jackson  Elliott,  who  had  been 
brought  from  Washington  to  command  the  News  Department  in 
Kloeber's  absence,  took  all  precautions  and  ordered  preparation  of  a 
background  story  outlining  the  exact  military  situation  in  France  so 
that  it  would  be  ready  for  use  if  the  Germans  unleashed  their  drive. 

The  advance  information  from  neutral  sources  proved  all  too  cor- 
rect. At  9:30  A.M.,  March  21,  the  leased  wires  hummed  with  a  bulletin 
from  Mackenzie  telling  of  the  pulverizing  German  bombardment  on 
the  sixty-mile  Arras-Cambrai-Saint-Quentin  front.  Other  cables  added 
further  details:  The  enemy  was  hurling  a  force  of  approximately  half 
a  million  men  against  the  British.  An  hour  and  a  quarter  after  the  first 
bulletin  there  came  further  confirmation  of  the  importance  of  the 
offensive.  From  Amsterdam  Correspondent  Thomas  Stockwell  for- 
warded a  dispatch  quoting  the  Kaiser  as  saying:  "We  are  at  the  de- 
cisive moment  of  the  war,  and  one  of  the  greatest  moments  in  German 
history." 

The  tremendous  drive  was  the  beginning  of  LudendorfPs  March 
break-through  and  the  sagging  British  lines  were  thrust  relentlessly 
backward.  As  Ludendorff  hammered  out  an  ever-deepening  salient  into 
the  Somme  sector,  the  cables  on  March  23  brought  from  Roberts  in 
Paris  something  so  improbable  that  news  editors  in  New  York  hesi- 
tated to  use  it.  The  story  stated  that  a  heavy  siege  gun  had  been 
bombarding  the  French  capital  throughout  the  forenoon,  firing  at  fif- 
teen-minute intervals.  What  made  the  news  almost  incredible  was  the 
fact  that  the  office  war  maps  showed  the  nearest  German  lines  to  be 


272  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

twenty-six  miles  away— a  far  greater  distance  than  the  range  of  any 
known  artillery  piece. 

The  dispatch  was  withheld  and  a  hurried  check  made  through 
Washington  with  War  Department  ordnance  experts.  They  called  the 
story  absurd.  To  bombard  Paris  from  such  a  distance  a  gun  would  have 
to  hurl  its  projectile  at  least  twenty  miles  into  the  air,  and  no  such 
weapon  was  known  to  exist. 

Stone  was  in  St.  Louis  at  the  time  and  Elliott  passed  the  dilemma 
to  him.  The  story  gave  Stone  pause.  If  the  news  were  not  true,  he 
realized  that  the  consequences  would  be  most  serious.  On  the  other 
hand,  he  knew  Roberts  was  not  a  man  to  lose  his  head.  The  times  given 
in  the  dispatch  showed  the  correspondent  had  waited  five  hours  after 
the  start  of  the  bombardment  before  filing  his  story,  and  that  was  evi- 
dence he  had  not  acted  on  the  spur  of  the  moment.  Lastly,  the  cable 
had  been  passed  by  the  French  censor.  Stone  made  his  decision: 

"Release  Roberts  story.  We'll  stand  pat  on  it." 

The  appearance  of  the  news  that  day  provoked  an  outburst  of  scorn 
and  disbelief.  Commercial  agencies  ridiculed  the  notion  of  such  a  siege 
gun,  calling  it  an  "absurd  invention"  and  a  "plain  blunder." 

At  a  dinner  that  evening  Stone  was  publicly  twitted. 

"Well,"  he  said  good-naturedly,  "back  in  New  York  I  have  a 
friend,  the  Reverend  Dr.  Minot  J.  Savage,  who  holds  with  a  Cape  Cod 
farmer  that  the  religious  faith  of  the  Evangelical  Christian  is  'believin' 
in  the  thing  that  you  know  ain't  so.'  Such  is  my  position.  I  believe  this 
story  'that  I  know  ain't  so,'  because  The  Associated  Press  says  it." 

For  forty-eight  hours  the  co-operative  "stood  pat,"  and  then  the 
critics,  military  and  journalistic,  belatedly  discovered  that  the  facts  set 
forth  were  correct.  Not  airplanes,  but  a  monster  long-range  gun  had 
been  bombarding  Paris. 

Cable  tolls  more  than  doubled  as  the  German  March  offensive 
smashed  forward  forty  miles  before  Mackenzie  and  Roberts  cabled  that 
the  break-through  had  been  finally  halted.  From  the  Paris  Bureau  came 
equally  significant  news:  Ferdinand  Foch  had  been  appointed  to  co- 
ordinate Allied  operations,  his  first  step  toward  becoming  generalissimo 
a  few  weeks  later. 

There  was  little  respite  for  Mackenzie.  Hardly  had  LudendorfPs 
offensive  been  checked  on  one  sector  than  Germany  loosed  a  new  drive 
at  another  part  of  the  British-held  front  and  shook  eleven  divisions  into 
the  clear  in  an  April  break-through  which  menaced  the  vital  Channel 
ports.  It  was  then  that  the  report  carried  General  Haig's  famous  order: 


THE  UNITED  STATES  AT  WAR  273 

"There  must  be  no  retiring.  With  our  back  to  the  wall  and  believing  in 
the  justice  of  our  cause,  each  one  of  us  must  fight  to  the  end." 

American  divisions  by  this  time  had  taken  over  three  front-line 
sectors,  mostly  quiet  in  character,  and  four  correspondents  were  as- 
signed to  cover  them — Norman  Draper,  John  T.  Parkerson,  Samuel  F. 
Wader,  and  Philip  M.  Powers  who  had  served  at  one  time  or  another 
on  every  front  in  Europe  except  the  Dardanelles.  Wader  wrote  the 
story  of  the  first  real  engagement  of  American  troops  on  April  20  at 
Seicheprey,  when  the  Germans  took  the  town  and  held  the  position  for 
half  a  day  before  they  were  dislodged.  It  was  a  month  before  cables 
told  of  the  capture  of  Cantigny,  which  served  to  atone  for  the  initial 
reverse  of  United  States  arms  at  Seicheprey. 


While  the  British  were  battling  desperately  to  halt  the  year's 
second  "big  push"  by  Ludendorff  and  conditions  in  France  grew  more 
critical,  the  members  of  The  Associated  Press  convened  in  New  York 
for  the  annual  meeting.  This  was  no  routine  assembly.  Melville  E. 
Stone,  now  seventy,  had  completed  a  quarter  of  a  century  of  service  as 
general  manager  and  they  gathered  to  fete  him.  The  aging  Victor  Law- 
son  was  there  to  pay  him  tribute,  and  there  was  praise,  too,  from  Adolph 
Ochs,  Noyes,  and  others  of  the  group  that  had  fought  with  him  in  behalf 
of  honest  news  gathering  during  the  turbulent  1890*8.  Stone  spoke  of 
the  testimonial  celebration  as  "a  fine  funeral,"  but  even  this  attempt 
at  levity  could  not  conceal  how  deeply  he  was  touched. 

The  war  seemed  far  away  during  the  festive  celebration,  but  before 
many  weeks  had  passed  Stone  was  packing  his  bags  to  resume  direction 
of  the  report  in  Europe.  Matching  their  March  and  April  drives,  the 
Germans  broke  through  again  in  May,  this  time  on  the  French  Chemin 
des  Dames  front  which  Berry  covered,  and  the  gray  tide  rolled  on 
toward  Paris  as  it  had  in  the  crucial  autumn  of  1914.  Philip  Powers  and 
Burge  McFall,  formerly  of  the  Washington  staff,  accompanied  the 
Second  Division  at  Chateau-Thierry  and  Belleau  Wood  early  in  June 
when  United  States  regulars  and  marines  dramatically  stopped  the  Ger- 
man left  at  the  Marne.  The  brilliant  counterattack  of  the  Second  Divi- 
sion marked  the  debut  of  large-scale  American  action  on  the  western 
front  and  the  cables  carried  every  word  censors'  blue  pencils  permitted 
to  go.  By  the  time  Stone  arrived  in  Europe  the  May  break-through  had 


274  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

been  completely  halted,  more  American  divisions  were  going  into  the 
lines  and  the  stage  was  almost  set  for  the  Second  Battle  of  the  Marne. 

The  association's  entire  attention,  however,  was  not  focused  on 
France.  Much  closer  to  home  a  covert  bloodless  war  was  being  waged 
by  the  Central  Powers  in  South  America,  and  in  it  the  name  of  The 
Associated  Press  had  suffered. 

Immediately  upon  the  outbreak  of  hostilities  in  1914,  Germany 
had  invaded  the  Latin-American  nations  with  a  government-subsidized 
propaganda  service  which  masqueraded  as  a  news  agency  under  the 
name  of  Prensa  Asociada — Spanish  for  Associated  Press.  Supplied  to 
South  American  papers  more  or  less  gratis,  the  news  was  strongly  pro- 
German  and  the  directors  of  the  service  cultivated  the  belief  that  the 
dispatches  actually  came  from  The  Associated  Press.  Until  the  United 
States  entered  the  war,  the  propaganda  was  directed  against  the  Allies, 
but  in  April,  1917,  the  service  extended  its  operations  to  minimize  and 
deprecate  America's  part  in  the  conflict. 

The  tardiness  of  The  Associated  Press  in  expanding  into  South 
America  was  due  primarily  to  an  old  agreement  between  the  major 
news-gathering  organizations  of  the  world.  It  dated  back  to  the  days  of 
William  Henry  Smith.  Under  this  pact  the  Reuter  Agency  had  Great 
Britain,  her  colonies,  Egypt,  Turkey,  China,  and  the  countries  within 
Britain's  sphere  of  influence.  The  Havas  Agency  of  Paris  took  for  its 
territory  France,  Switzerland,  Italy,  Spain,  Portugal,  Central  and  South 
America.  The  German  Wolfe  Bureau  was  given  jurisdiction  over  the 
Reich,  Scandinavian  countries,  Holland,  Russia,  Austria-Hungary,  and 
the  Balkans.  The  Associated  Press  had  the  United  States.  Foreseeing 
that  closer  relations  between  the  United  States  and  South  America 
were  essential,  Stone  declined  to  agree  in  1912  to  a  long-term  extension 
of  the  agreement,  but  the  war  in  1914  interrupted  plans  for  a  definite 
program. 

Havas,  therefore,  continued  to  serve  South  America,  although  its 
war  news  was  almost  as  one-sided  as  the  German  Prensa  Asociada.  Con- 
trolled by  the  French  government,  Havas  carried  no  news  of  enemy  suc- 
cesses, enemy  communiques,  or  similar  material.  When  South  American 
papers,  desirous  of  getting  both  sides  of  the  story  on  an  important 
event,  demanded  American  Associated  Press  dispatches,  Havas  repre- 
sentatives in  New  York  abstracted  the  required  copy  from  the  co-opera- 
tive's report,  in  contravention  of  the  existing  agreement,  and  relayed  it 
to  Havas  men  in  South  America.  Except  for  these  occasions  when  actual 
Associated  Press  news  was  demanded,  South  American  papers  were 
largely  dependent  on  Havas  and  Prensa  Asociada.  Furthermore,  Havas 


THE  UNITED  STATES  AT  WAR  275 

was  interested  solely  in  distributing  news  in  South  America  and  not  in 
gathering  South  American  news  for  the  rest  of  the  world.  To  get  any- 
thing approaching  adequate  coverage,  The  Associated  Press  had  found 
it  necessary  to  assign  its  own  staff  men  to  the  continent. 

With  Prensa  Asociada  redoubling  its  efforts  after  America's  entry 
into  the  war,  it  was  obvious  to  the  Board  of  Directors  of  The  Associated 
Press  that  they  could  not  combat  such  an  agency  through  the  medium  of 
Havas.  The  State  Department,  concerned  over  the  influence  wielded  by 
the  German  propaganda  service,  urged  The  Associated  Press  to  give 
the  nation's  Latin-American  neighbors  factual  news  both  about  the  war 
and  the  United  States.  Notice  accordingly  was  served  on  Havas  that  the 
co-operative  would  terminate  its  agreement,  and  on  June  8,  1918, 
Cooper  sailed  for  South  America. 

News  of  Cooper's  coming  preceded  him.  When  he  reached  Val- 
paraiso, the  first  person  to  seek  him  out  was  an  agent  of  Prensa  Aso- 
ciada. The  man  came  to  the  point  at  once.  He  wanted  to  negotiate  a 
contract  that  would  give  Prensa  Asociada  exclusive  South  American 
rights  to  the  name  of  The  Associated  Press  and  distribution  of  its  news 
report.  He  named  an  attractive  figure.  Cooper  told  him  Prensa  Asociada 
might  multiply  its  offer  a  thousand  times,  but  neither  that  sum  nor  any 
other  astronomical  amount  could  buy  The  Associated  Press. 

Cooper  spent  three  months  in  South  America.  He  found  the  im- 
portant newspapers  anxious  to  obtain  a  genuine  Associated  Press  report. 
They  were  disgusted  with  both  Havas  and  Prensa  Asociada  and  they 
had  lost  reliance  in  the  accuracy  of  one  American  commercial  agency 
because  of  such  major  blunders  as  the  reporting  of  the  fall  of  Soissons 
thirty  days  before  the  city  actually  fell.  Cooper  left  behind  a  discredited 
Prensa  Asociada  which  collapsed  a  few  months  later. 


10 

In  the  busy  cable  room  in  New  York  the  flood  of  cables  was  end- 
less. On  July  1 5  Ludendorff  launched  Germany's  final  bid  for  victory 
in  a  great  Friedensturm,  or  "peace  offensive,"  on  the  Marne.  Burge 
McFall,  James  P.  Howe,  Norman  Draper,  and  Samuel  Wader  were 
with  the  A.E.F.  divisions  which  helped  turn  the  tide.  Roberts  and  Berry 
were  on  the  French  front  to  the  American  left,  and  in  Paris  Stone  him- 
self could  hear  the  thunder  of  artillery  in  the  battle  that  was  the  begin- 
ning of  the  end. 

After  the  second  Marne  the  tide  flowed  back,  and  in  France  alone, 
from  the  North  Sea  to  Switzerland,  operations  became  so  continuous 


276  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

that  no  one  man,  however  capable,  could  hope  to  cover  them  adequately. 
The  story  called  for  a  tried  and  co-ordinated  staff,  each  man  contributing 
his  part  to  the  broad  sweep  of  a  narrative  that  pounded  toward  its 
climax.  As  the  repeated  Allied  counterblows  beat  Ludendorff  stagger- 
ing back,  only  those  in  the  cable  department  in  New  York  knew  from 
day  to  day  which  of  the  men  on  the  front  did  the  outstanding  work  in 
any  one  twenty-four  hours. 

Dispatches  from  Stockwell  in  Holland  and  Bouton  in  Sweden  gave 
added  significance  to  the  German  retreat  when  they  told  of  seething 
unrest  on  the  home  fronts  of  the  Central  Powers,  mutinies  in  the  Ger- 
man fleet,  the  insistent  demands  for  peace.  And  there  were  many  more 
— reports  of  the  Central  Powers'  reverses  in  the  Balkans,  Whiffen's 
stories  on  the  White  Army  in  Siberia,  Smith's  cables  from  the  turmoil 
of  Petrograd,  the  news  Rennick  sent  from  the  Allied  anti-Bolshevik 
forces  at  Archangel,  Frank  King's  dispatches  from  another  Allied  com- 
mand at  Vladivostok,  and  all  the  rest  of  the  heavy  transoceanic  tide  of 
copy. 

The  pins  on  the  map  moved. 

American  First  Army  Destroys  Saint-Mihiel  salient  .  .  .  British 
Take  Nazareth  .  .  .  Hindenburg  Line  Broken  .  .  .  Bulgaria  Surren- 
ders .  .  .  Argonne  Forest  .  .  .  Germany  Asks  Peace  Terms  .  .  . 
Kaiser's  Abdication  Demanded  .  .  .  Italians  Crush  Enemy  on  Austrian 
Front  .  .  .  Ludendorff  Resigns  .  .  .  Americans  Take  Sedan  .  .  . 
E.O.S.  Bulletin  .  .  .  E.O.S.  Bulletin  .  .  . 

In  France,  McFall  and  Powers  "captured"  the  German  stronghold 
of  Stenay,  entering  the  town  alone  well  before  the  advancing  troops  they 
had  accidently  outdistanced.  In  Belgium,  Mackenzie  appealed  directly 
to  Field  Marshal  Haig  when  no  transportation  was  available  to  enable 
him  to  keep  pace  with  the  rapid  British  gains.  To  his  bewilderment  he 
got  not  one  but  seven  touring  cars.  From  a  temporary  post  in  neutral 
Denmark,  Bouton  slipped  across  the  German  frontier  and  started  on 
his  risky  way  to  Berlin.  And  to  the  southward  W.  C.  Hiatt  followed 
the  fleeing,  disorganized  Austrians  in  a  strenuous  race  to  be  the 
first  newsman  to  reach  Vienna. 

The  general  manager  returned  to  the  United  States  November  3, 
two  days  before  Germany  was  informed  that  the  Allies  had  designated 
Marshal  Foch  to  receive  delegates  and  communicate  armistice  terms. 
The  pins  kept  moving  on  the  big  cable  department  map.  On  the  53,000- 
mile  leased  wire  network  1,033  newspapers  were  waiting  around  the 
clock. 


XIII.  FALSE  ARMISTICE 


NOVEMBER  7,  1918. 

The  lunch-hour  crowds  flowed  tranquilly  along  Broadway  and  Park 
Row.  Then  suddenly  everyone  seemed  to  go  mad  in  a  frenzy  of  hys- 
terical noise.  With  incredible  speed  the  tidings  raced  through  New 
York.  Church  bells  clanged,  whistles  shrilled,  and  a  storm  of  ticker  tape 
and  paper  swirled  down. 

They  could  see  all  this  happening  from  The  Associated  Press  win- 
dows at  51  Chambers  Street.  Below,  City  Hall  Park  swarmed  black 
with  people.  Crowds  were  climbing  on  top  of  surface  cars,  stalled  in  the 
pack  of  humanity  which  jammed  Broadway  to  the  right  and  Park  Row 
to  the  left.  Urchins  scaled  the  scrubby  trees  behind  the  Post  Office, 
waving  flags  which  had  materialized  from  nowhere.  Office  buildings 
disgorged  an  elbowing  tumult  of  men  and  women  into  the  bobbing  sea 
of  heads. 

The  men  who  looked  down  from  51  Chambers  Street  wore  wor- 
ried expressions.  They  knew  what  had  touched  off  the  explosion  of  noise 
and  emotions,  and  with  that  knowledge  had  come  a  hopeless,  sinking 
feeling  of  defeat.  Even  before  the  jubilant  clamor  shattered  Broad- 
way's lunchtime  serenity,  a  dumbfounded  editor  tore  across  the  news- 
room with  the  message  which  told  the  story.  Inarticulately  he  thrust 
it  into  the  hands  of  Elliott,  chief  of  the  News  Department. 

Just  five  words  which  had  come  pounding  through  from  an  alert 
bureau: 

UNITED  PRESS  PLASHING  ARMISTICE  SIGNED. 

Elliott  frowned,  unbelieving.  In  a  trice  another  urgent  message 
was  on  his  desk — "Opposition  Has  Armistice" — and  the  wires  were 
buzzing  with  a  dozen  more.  They  all  were  the  same. 

The  Associated  Press  was  beaten  on  the  biggest  story  of  the  war! 

The  moment  of  sick  paralysis  ended  in  an  instant,  and  then  there 
was  Elliott's  voice,  tense  but  unexcited: 

"Get  cables  after  London  and  Paris!  Full  rate!" 

"Open  a  line  to  the  State  Department!  Pll  talk  to  Frank  Polk!" 

"Bring  me  a  map!" 

277 


278  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

He  kept  rapping  out  instructions  to  check  every  possible  source. 
An  oppressive  silence  descended  on  the  newsroom  like  some  physical 
weight,  magnifying  the  staccato  of  the  Morkrum  battery,  the  impor- 
tunate voices  of  the  men  working  telephones,  the  monotonous  rattle  of 
Morse  keys.  In  the  Cable  Department  tight-lipped  editors  hung  over 
every  incoming  news  wire.  A  staff  man,  back  from  lunch,  burst  into  the 
office,  hurrahing  that  the  Armistice  had  been  signed,  but  the  look  on 
every  face  smothered  his  jubilation. 

Elliott  sat  grimly  at  the  desk  which  had  become  the  focal  point 
not  only  of  the  office  but  of  the  entire  domestic  service.  By  leased  wire 
and  telegram  a  storm  of  complaint  and  criticism  was  rolling  in. 

Why  didn't  The  Associated  Press  have  the  Armistice?  Badly 
beaten  here  .  .  .  The  Associated  Press  is  pro-German — withholding  the 
news  .  .  .  Resigning  our  membership  as  soon  as  possible  .  .  . 

The  stacks  of  outraged  communications  grew  with  the  minutes. 
The  telephone  clamored  repeatedly  and  Elliott  listened  to  the  abuse 
and  imprecations  which  members  near  and  far  shouted  into  his  ear. 

To  all  verbal  inquiries,  he  gave  the  same  stock  answer,  repeating 
it  quietly,  almost  by  rote: 

"We  have  no  news  that  an  armistice  has  been  signed.  Our  men 
abroad  are  on  the  job.  The  State  Department  has  made  no  such  an- 
nouncement. When  The  Associated  Press  gets  the  news,  we  will  carry 
it,  but  not  before!" 

All  the  while  the  clock  hands  crept  onward,  and  the  thunderous 
roar  that  beat  in  from  the  sunlit  early  afternoon  was  an  incessant 
reminder  that  deepened  the  gloom  of  the  newsroom. 

One  by  one,  each  source  failed  to  provide  the  story.  Elliott  talked 
with  Undersecretary  of  State  Polk:  the  State  Department  knew  nothing 
.  .  .  Collins  in  London  could  not  confirm  .  .  .  Still  no  word  from 
Paris  .  .  . 

The  chief  of  the  News  Department  bent  over  the  large-scale  map 
spread  on  the  desk.  Around  him  was  a  knot  of  intent  men — L.  F.  Cur- 
tis, Elliott's  assistant  j  Harry  Romer,  day  cable  editor  j  Harold  Martin, 
news  superintendent  for  the  Eastern  Division}  and  M.  A.  White  night 
general  editor.  With  a  pair  of  dividers  Elliott  measured  off  miles  on 
the  map  while  Romer  thumbed  through  a  thick  file  of  cable  dispatches, 
meticulously  checking  time  elements  or  facts  concerning  the  projected 
visit  of  German  plenipotentiaries  to  Foch  to  negotiate  an  armistice. 

The  opposition  flash  had  stated  flatly  that  the  armistice  had  been 
signed  at  n  A.M.,  yet  the  big  map  emphatically  told  the  group  at 


FALSE  ARMISTICE  279 

Elliott's  desk  that  it  was  impossible.  Romer  produced  his  cables.  At 
12:30  that  morning  the  German  High  Command  had  wirelessed  Mar- 
shal Foch  the  names  of  its  emissaries  and  requested  that  he  designate  the 
point  along  the  front  where  they  would  be  permitted  to  enter  the 
Allied  lines.  Foch's  reply,  sent  at  1:25  A.M.,  informed  the  enemy  that 
the  party  would  be  passed  through  the  French  outposts  near  the 
Chimay-Fourmies-La  Capelle-Guise  road.  While  this  exchange  oc- 
curred, and  for  at  least  three  hours  longer,  the  German  emissaries  were 
known  to  be  still  at  German  General  Headquarters  in  Spa,  Belgium. 
Moreover,  the  latest  advices,  although  without  specific  timing,  had  the 
general  Allied  advance  smashing  forward  unchecked. 

The  map  gave  the  rest  of  the  story.  The  air-line  distance  between 
Spa  and  Foch's  headquarters  in  the  forest  of  Compiegne  was  roughly 
105  miles.  By  road  it  would  be  almost  half  as  far  again,  and  a  speedy 
automobile  trip  was  the  remotest  of  possibilities.  Heavy  shellfire  and 
aerial  bombardments  had  been  smashing  the  roads  behind  the  German 
front,  and  those  in  any  sort  of  repair  were  clogged  with  troops,  supply 
lorries,  and  great  quantities  of  equipment  the  Germans  were  trying  to 
save. 

Elliott  shook  his  head. 

"It  couldn't  be  done,"  he  said.  "The  Germans  could  not  have 
reached  there  from  Spa  in  time  to  sign  an  armistice  at  that  hour." 

The  clocks  kept  moving,  the  bedlam  of  noise  from  the  streets  beat 
against  the  windows,  and  the  tension  of  uncertainty  tightened.  It 
couldn't  be  true,  it  wasn't  true,  yet  ... 


The  general  manager  had  been  at  lunch  with  President  Noyes 
when  the  first  report  flew  through  downtown  New  York.  They  battled 
their  way  through  the  delirious  crowds  to  reach  the  office.  Stone's  first 
question  was  on  the  story. 

"How  did  we  make  out?"  he  asked  Elliott. 

"We  didn't,  Mr.  Stone.  We  don't  have  the  story." 
."What?" 

"No,  Mr.  Stone,  and  I'm  convinced  the  story  is  wrong,  that  no 
armistice  has  been  signed." 

Elliott  quickly  sketched  everything  that  had  been  done  since  first 
word  had  come  of  the  opposition's  flash.  Stone  nodded  as  he  heard  the 
exhaustive  check  made  in  all  conceivable  quarters  and  was  impressed 


280  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

by  the  evidence  found  in  the  map  and  in  the  hours  of  the  Franco- 
German  exchange  of  messages  early  that  morning. 

"What  have  you  put  out  on  the  wire?"  the  general  manager 
demanded. 

"Nothing,  sir." 

"H-m.  We  should  carry  an  informative  note  giving  members  the 
status  of  this  thing  as  we  know  it." 

He  thought  a  moment. 

"Put  out  a  Note  to  Editors  at  once,  and  one  every  half  hour  until 
we  get  to  the  bottom  of  this.  I  want  to  see  all  copy.  Go  ahead." 

The  informative  message  hit  the  wires  as  soon  as  Elliott  finished 
writing  it.  In  member  offices  people  read: 

NOTE  TO  EDITORS 

AT  THIS  HOUR  THE  GOVERNMENT  AT  WASHINGTON 
HAS  RECEIVED  NOTHING  TO  SUPPORT  THE  REPORT  THAT 
THE  ARMISTICE  HAS  BEEN  SIGNED  AND  WE  HAVE  RE- 
CEIVED NOTHING  PROM  OUR  CORRESPONDENTS  ABROAD 
TO  SUPPORT  IT. 

STREET  DEMONSTRATIONS  ARE  TAKING  PLACE  IN 
NEW  YORK,  AS  IS  PROBABLY  THE  CASE  IN  OTHER 
CITIES,  BUT  WE  ARE  NOT  REPORTING  THEM  UP  TO 
THIS  MOMENT  BECAUSE  WE  HAVE  BEEN  UNABLE  TO 
CONFIRM  THE  REPORT  ON  WHICH  THEY  ARE  BASED. 

By  that  time  even  the  man  in  the  street  had  come  to  know  that  The 
Associated  Press  had  not  carried  any  news  of  an  armistice.  In  some 
cities  this  failure  acted  as  a  brake  on  demonstrations  after  the  first 
spontaneous  outbursts. 

In  San  Francisco,  Mayor  James  Rolph,  addressing  an  exuberant 
crowd  which  descended  upon  the  City  Hall,  said:  "The  United  Press 
has  been  informed  that  the  armistice  has  been  signed.  I  have  received 
no  confirmation  of  this  from  The  Associated  Press,  and  until  I  do  I 
suggest  that  celebration  plans  be  suspended."  A  few  minutes  later, 
speaking  to  the  San  Francisco  Bureau  by  telephone,  he  declared:  "I 
will  wait  until  I  hear  from  you  before  giving  the  order  for  any  peace 
celebration." 

In  New  York,  however,  the  reaction  assumed  an  ugly  character 
and  an  angry  phalanx  of  demonstrators  marched  on  51  Chambers  Street. 
The  cry  of  "Damned  Huns"  went  up  to  the  windows  and  fists  were 
brandished  when  one  bibulous  patriot  shouted:  "Come  on,  let's  clean 
out  the  rats."  Upstairs,  Elliott  told  a  reporter  to  call  police  headquar- 
ters and  arrange  for  a  detail  to  guard  the  building. 


FALSE  ARMISTICE  281 

Still  no  word,  and  still  no  halt  in  the  succession  of  heated  tele- 
grams, messages,  and  telephone  calls.  Not  even  the  Hughes-Wilson 
election  had  provoked  such  a  violent  outpouring. 

Then  the  suspense  snapped.  For  more  than  an  hour  City  Editor 
Carl  Brandebury  had  been  sitting  with  an  ear  glued  to  a  telephone 
receiver  on  the  line  which  had  been  kept  open  to  the  State  Depart- 
ment in  Washington.  Undersecretary  Polk  had  promised  word  as  soon 
as  any  definite  information  came  from  abroad,  and  the  department  was 
working  the  cables  unsparingly.  Brandebury  watched  the  clock  hands 
tick  toward  2:15.  The  receiver  clicked  in  his  ear. 

"Elliott!" 

The  shout  brought  Stone  to  the  door  of  his  private  office. 

"Polk  will  be  on  here  in  a  second!" 

Everyone  watched  Elliott's  face  as  he  jammed  it  close  to  the 
telephone  mouthpiece  to  shut  out  the  noise  of  the  room.  Everyone 
watched  his  pencil  fly  across  a  piece  of  copy  paper. 

"Bulletin!  All  Wires!  Bulletin!" 

Telegraphers  waited,  ready  fingers  hovering  over  suddenly  idle 
keys. 

Copy  boys  scrambled  across  the  room. 

Filing  editors  grinned  with  relief. 

Morse  keys  vibrated  and  the  sounders  chorused: 

BULLETIN 
(BY  THE  ASSOCIATED  PRESS) 

WASHINGTON,  NOV.  7  -  IT  WAS  OFFICIALLY 
ANNOUNCED  AT  THE  STATE  DEPARTMENT  AT  2:15  0' CLOCK 
THIS  AFTERNOON  THAT  THE  GERMANS  HAD  NOT  SIGNED 
ARMISTICE  TERMS. 

All  other  events  that  day  were  anticlimactic.  It  did  not  even  seem 
important  that  Elliott  and  his  aides  had  their  dinners  interrupted  the 
same  evening  in  Whyte's  Restaurant  and  were  hurried  through  a  back 
door  to  save  them  from  attack  by  a  bellicose  group  of  drunken  revelers 
who  brandished  water  carafes. 

The  end  came  four  days  later.  Everyone  knew  then  that  the  Ger- 
man emissaries  were  conferring  with  Foch.  Everyone  knew  that  the 
long-awaited  news  was  only  a  matter  of  hours.  When  the  regular 
"Good  Night"  was  given  on  leased  wire  circuits  at  2:30  A.M.,  November 
n,  operators  remained  at  their  keys,  lights  burned  on  in  newspaper 
offices,  and  composing  room  crews  waited  in  readiness.  It  might  come 
any  minute. 


282  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

From  Washington.  Two  words.  2:46  A.M.: 

F-L-A-S-H  F-L-A-S-H 
ARMISTICE  SIGNED 

Then  the  first  bulletin: 

BULLETIN 

(BY  THE  ASSOCIATED  PRESS) 

WASHINGTON,  MONDAY,  NOV.  11  -  THE  ARMISTICE 
BETWEEN  GERMANY,  ON  THE  ONE  HAND,  AND  THE  ALLIED 
GOVERNMENTS  AND  THE  UNITED  STATES,  ON  THE  OTHER, 
HAS  BEEN  SIGNED. 

ADD  BULLETIN 

THE  STATE  DEPARTMENT  ANNOUNCED  AT  2:45 
O'CLOCK  THIS  MORNING  THAT  GERMANY  HAD  SIGNED. 

ADD  BULLETIN 

THE  WORLD  WAR  WILL  END  AT  6  O'CLOCK  THIS 
MORNING,  WASHINGTON  TIME,  11  O'CLOCK  PARIS 
TIME. 

ADD  BULLETIN 

THE  ARMISTICE  .  .  . 

The  first  whistles  started  to  shriek.  Bonfires  flared.  Gongs  clanged. 
Cannon  boomed.  And  papers  slithered  in  a  damp  flood  from  the  whirl- 
ing plates. 

Extra  .  .  .  Extra  .  .  .  Extra  .  .  . 

Washington  functioned  with  the  smooth  precision  of  a  highly 
geared  machine.  Before  sunset  that  day  the  bureau  poured  11,582 
words  onto  the  leased  wires.  Treading  on  the  heels  of  the  first  Washing- 
ton bulletins  came  the  rush  from  abroad  which  swept  in  on  the  Cable 
Department.  Paris.  Berlin.  Amsterdam.  Hohenzollern  in  Holland. 
Rome.  Vienna.  The  Front.  A.E.F.  .  .  . 

The  emotional  jag  of  November  7  was  a  mere  rehearsal  for  the 
paroxysm  of  jubilant  celebration  which  took  the  country  by  storm.  This 
time  it  was  real.  This  time  it  was  authentic.  This  time  there  was  no 
question  of  the  facts. 

As  the  cheering,  screaming  throngs  took  possession  of  the  streets 
once  more  for  a  hysterical  holiday  of  triumph  and  relief,  telephones 


FALSE  ARMISTICE  283 

jangled  in  a  thousand  editorial  rooms.  Readers  who  had  been  misled 
November  7  wanted  to  know  if  they  could  trust  this  latest  news. 

At  a  desk  in  the  office  of  the  Tribune  Herald  at  Rome,  Georgia, 
J.  D.  McCartney  sat  before  a  telephone,  answering  the  endless  queries. 

"Yes,  madam,  it's  right  this  time.  .  .  .  Yes,  it's  correct.  .  .  .  It's 
all  in  the  extra  that's  on  the  street  now.  .  .  .  Oh,  no,  no  doubt  what- 
soever. .  .  .  Yes  .  .  .  Yes  .  .  .  Yes  .  .  ." 

It  was  a  boring  job  when  everyone  else  was  out  celebrating. 

Another  call.  A  staid,  elderly  woman  by  the  tone  of  her  voice. 

"Who  says  the  Armistice  has  been  signed?"  she  asked  briskly. 

"The  State  Department  at  Washington,"  intoned  McCartney  for 
the  hundredth  time. 

"Oh,  pshaw!"  the  voice  exclaimed  impatiently,  "Does  The  Asso- 
ciated Press  say  it?" 


XIV.  "BACK  TO  NORMALCY" 


WITH  twenty-five  miles  of  delirious  noise  New  York  welcomed  the 
first  troops  home  from  France  on  December  23,  1918.  That  same  day 
Mr.  Justice  Pitney  in  Washington  delivered  an  opinion  of  the  United 
States  Supreme  Court.  The  case  of  The  Associated  Press  versus  the 
International  News  Service  had  been  in  litigation  for  two  years  before 
the  decision  was  handed  down. 

Back  in  the  rough-and-tumble  days  of  early  nineteenth  century 
journalism  when  Hale  and  Hallock  were  outdoing  the  New  York  har- 
bor news  combine,  competitors  regularly  filched  news  from  the  Journal 
of  Commerce.  Bennett  and,  later,  Greeley  both  suffered  at  the  hands 
of  news  thieves,  but  in  that  era  the  tendency  was  to  look  upon  piracy 
as  an  oblique  compliment.  Some  editors  even  boasted  in  print  that  rivals 
found  it  necessary  to  steal  their  news  in  order  to  keep  pace.  "We  rather 
like  it,"  Greeley  acknowleged. 

This  attitude  did  not  long  survive  the  period  of  individual  jour- 
nalism. Although  outright  news  piracy  came  in  time  to  be  looked  upon 
with  disfavor,  the  practice  continued  uncurbed  and  for  a  long  while  no 
consistent  efforts  were  made  to  stop  it. 

As  newspaper  production  methods  speeded  up  and  transmission 
facilities  improved,  the  operations  of  the  pirates  assumed  more  dam- 
aging proportions.  Editors  saw  their  news,  gathered  at  considerable 
effort  and  expense,  regularly  pirated  by  agencies  of  various  types  which 
made  no  comparable  attempt  to  cover  the  world.  Most  of  these  agencies 
were  short-lived  in  spite  of  their  wholesale  appropriation  of  dispatches, 
but  the  evil  remained.  At  first  individual  publishers  hoped  that  the 
national  copyright  laws  might  be  extended  to  protect  the  contents  of  a 
daily  paper.  Congress,  however,  showed  no  disposition  to  oblige,  and 
the  bill  died  in  committee. 

Ignoring  previous  failures,  The  Associated  Press  in  1899  desig- 
nated a  special  committee  to  investigate  the  possibility  of  having  a  news 
copyright  law  enacted.  The  committee's  work  proved  ineffectual. 

The  World  War  tremendously  stimulated  the  activities  of  the 

284 


"BACK  TO  NORMALCY"  285 

pirates.  Without  an  extensive  news-gathering  organization  abroad,  it  was 
impossible  for  some  agencies  to  cover  the  conflict  adequately  or 
promptly,  so  the  appropriators  of  news  began  to  prey  more  than  ever 
on  the  reports  of  The  Associated  Press.  If  the  news  thefts  were  to  be 
stopped,  the  organization  would  have  to  strike  at  the  practice  itself  and 
not  at  the  devices  by  which  it  was  carried  on. 

Late  in  1916,  because  of  what  it  termed  "continued  garbling  of 
messages  and  breach  of  faith,"  the  British  government  debarred  Inter- 
national News  Service  from  securing  any  news  in  Great  Britain  or  from 
using  cable  lines  running  from  Great  Britain.  France,  Canada,  Portugal, 
and  Japan  followed  suit.  The  actions  were  based  on  the  publication  in 
the  United  States  of  stories  purporting  to  be  International  cable  dis- 
patches which  contained  statements  not  appearing  in  the  cables  passed 
by  the  censors.  The  prohibitions  became  effective  November  17,  and 
after  that  date  the  agency  was  denied  the  opportunity  to  obtain  or  cable 
the  news  from  any  one  of  the  five  countries.  Despite  this,  International 
continued  to  supply  this  news  regularly  and  promptly  as  if  it  were 
being  normally  received  by  cable. 

A  discharged  employee  of  the  International  News  Service  at  Cleve- 
land confided  to  Traffic  Chief  Cooper  that  an  editorial  man  of  the 
Cleveland  News  was  selling  the  Associated  Press  war  news  to  the  com- 
mercial agency  at  so  much  per  week.  Cooper  went  to  Cleveland,  got 
written  statements,  and  dictated  affidavits  to  which  the  signatures  were 
affixed.  He  returned  to  New  York  and  told  Stone:  "Here's  the  basis 
for  your  legal  test  of  the  property  right  in  news." 

Armed  with  these  affidavits,  The  Associated  Press  took  its  case 
into  the  Federal  District  Court  at  New  York  on  January  4,  1917,  and 
petitioned  Judge  Augustus  N.  Hand  for  an  injunction  restraining  Inter- 
national from  further  piracy. 

International  News  Service  contested  the  action,  disclaiming  all 
guilt  of  pre-publication  piracy. 

An  injunction  granted  by  Judge  Hand,  as  modified  by  the  Circuit 
Court  of  Appeals,  covered  all  points  raised  by  The  Associated  Press. 
International  News  Service  then  took  the  fight  before  the  United  States 
Supreme  Court.  There  the  contest  centered  on  a  single  issue:  Whether 
the  commercial  agency  had  the  right  to  appropriate  Associated  Press 
dispatches  once  these  items  had  been  printed.  The  Supreme  Court  held 
that  it  did  not,  thereby  establishing  the  property  right  in  news. 

For  The  Associated  Press  in  particular  and  for  news-gathering 
enterprise  in  general,  the  decision  was  a  major  triumph.  The  Board  of 


286  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Directors  spoke  of  it  as  a  victory  that  "may  well  be  celebrated."  A 
mutual,  permanent  injunction  was  obtained. 

As  a  supplementary  action  the  Board  of  Directors  renewed  its 
insistence  that  all  Associated  Press  news  be  properly  credited,  so  that 
no  pirate  could  plead  ignorance  of  its  origin.  Accordingly  all  members 
of  the  co-operative  began  to  credit  the  news,  either  with  the  established 
line,  "By  The  Associated  Press"  or  with  a  logotype — (JP) — which 
could  be  carried  in  the  dateline  of  each  story.  The  logotype  became  the 
more  popular  method  and  in  time  The  Associated  Press  came  to  be 
known  universally  as  "AP." 


General  Manager  Stone  learned  of  the  Supreme  Court  decision 
in  Paris  where  he  had  gone  December  3  to  organize  the  special  staff 
being  assembled  to  cover  the  most  momentous  peace  conference  of 
modern  history.  The  conference  was  not  to  open  until  January,  but 
already  delegations  were  foregathering  to  study  the  intricate  and  com- 
plex problems  left  by  the  war. 

The  Paris  Peace  Conference  proved  an  unparalleled  assignment. 
The  subject  matter  presented  a  distinct  departure  from  the  accepted 
range  of  news  in  prewar  days.  There  were  questions  of  economics, 
ethnography,  geography,  history.  Experts  collated  masses  of  material 
on  Mandates,  Demilitarization,  Self-determination,  War  Guilt,  and 
Reparations.  The  place  of  a  League  of  Nations  in  postwar  civilization 
was  envisaged  and  discussed. 

The  fact  that  secrecy  shrouded  so  much  of  the  negotiations  imposed 
a  heavy  handicap  on  all  efforts  to  obtain  complete,  accurate,  and  honest 
accounts  of  what  was  happening.  The  world-wide  interest  was  tremen- 
dous, for  mankind  looked  hopefully  to  the  peace  conference  to  lay  the 
foundations  for  a  new  era  of  international  order  on  the  wreckage  of 
"the  war  to  end  war." 

For  all  its  surpassing  importance,  however,  the  conference  was 
merely  a  news  island  in  a  troubled  Europe.  At  Rome,  Thomas  Morgan 
heard  members  of  the  Italian  Parliament  sing  the  "Red  Flag"  and  hiss 
the  King.  Bouton  and  Enderis  in  Berlin  had  days  of  street  fighting  to 
report  as  Communists  and  Independent  Socialists  loosed  a  determined 
effort  to  seize  the  government.  W.  S.  Hiatt,  the  correspondent  with  the 
most  luxurious  mustache  in  the  service,  led  a  peripatetic  existence  from 
Warsaw  to  Prague,  back  to  Poland,  to  Galicia,  and  then  to  the  Ukraine 
as  the  news  currents  shifted.  The  virtual  state  of  war  in  Ireland  sent 


TO  NORMALCY"  287 

Guy  Moyston  and  Thomas  W.  Morris  from  London  to  join  W.  H. 
Brayden,  resident  correspondent  at  Dublin.  Nor  was  that  all.  There 
were  the  armies  of  occupation  along  the  Rhine,  the  patient  watch  at 
the  gates  of  the  Kaiser's  refuge  in  Holland,  the  luckless  campaigns  of 
White  Russian  armies,  the  revolt  in  Hungary,  and  the  ferment  in  the 
Near  East. 

In  the  Cable  Department  at  New  York  the  expectation  had  been 
that,  with  the  end  of  the  war,  European  news  would  gradually  revert 
to  the  proportions  of  the  days  of  1914.  On  the  contrary,  before  the 
Peace  Conference  was  well  under  way  it  became  apparent  that  Europe 
had  assumed  a  new  and  vast  importance  in  American  affairs.  The  multi- 
colored pins  on  the  big  Cable  Department  map  moved  as  frequently 
as  they  had  before  the  Armistice.  The  staff  abroad  was  greater  than  at 
any  time  during  the  war  years,  and  still  growing. 

In  recognition  of  this  great  development,  the  general  manager  ap- 
pointed Charles  T.  Thompson  to  assume  immediate  supervision,  under 
the  chief  of  the  News  Department,  of  the  service  from  Europe  and 
Asia.  In  spite  of  the  costly  burden  of  all  the  extensive  war  coverage  and 
the  even  heavier  expenses  of  the  exacting  postwar  period,  however,  the 
co-operative  could  boast  that  it  had  been  able  to  deliver  an  outstanding 
report  to  member  papers  without  once  raising  assessments.  Commercial 
agencies,  on  the  other  hand,  had  found  it  necessary  to  levy  additional 
charges  on  clients  for  the  reports  they  furnished. 

In  all,  war  coverage  expenses  totaled  $2,685,125.12,  and  meeting 
that  bill  without  assessment  increases  was  quite  an  achievement  for  an 
organization  with  an  annual  income  from  all  sources  of  approximately 
$3,000,000.  Foreign  Service  costs  for  1913,  the  lasfc  prewar  year,  were 
$225,543.  From  August  I,  1914,  when  the  war  broke  out,  until  the 
end  of  the  year — a  matter  of  only  four  months — expenses  were  $258,- 
551.  In  1915  the  figure  was  $518,875,  or  more  than  double.  The  bill 
for  1916  was  $541,935$  for  1917,  $564,604.  Large-scale  American  par- 
ticipation in  1918  boosted  costs  for  the  final  year  to  $801,157 — or  almost 
one-third  of  the  entire  annual  news  budget. 

Owing  to  the  war,  the  domestic  branch  of  the  service  had  been  in 
temporary  eclipse,  but  by  1919  it  was  resuming  its  place.  The  greatest 
immediate  expansion  occurred  in  the  Southern  Division  with  extension 
of  wire  circuits,  enlarged  bureaus,  and  reorganized  facilities.  The  re- 
turn to  something  approaching  a  peacetime  footing  was  accelerated  by 
the  return  of  editorial  and  traffic  employees  who  had  left  their  desks 
or  telegraph  keys  to  join  the  armed  forces. 


288  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 


Like  the  draft  drawing  of  1917,  the  news  of  the  home-coming 
troops  in  1919  provided  a  succession  of  stories  which  intimately  touched 
the  lives  of  millions  of  readers.  So  numerous  were  special  coverage  re- 
quests that  The  Associated  Press  in  co-operation  with  the  War  Depart- 
ment worked  out  a  detailed  system  to  handle  the  service.  Each  day  the 
report  carried  a  cumulative  abstract  of  the  homeward  bound  troops, 
giving  the  names  of  the  transports,  dates  of  sailing,  ports  of  embarka- 
tion, the  number  of  troops  on  each  ship  and  their  units,  the  ports  of 
debarkation  and  the  names  of  the  camps  to  which  the  men  were  to  be 
sent  before  departing  for  demobilization  centers.  Two  staff  men  from 
the  New  York  office  were  assigned  to  meet  the  incoming  ship  and  one 
of  them  was  Stanley  W.  Prenosil,  who  had  sailed  with  the  first  A.E.F. 
transports  for  France  two  years  before. 

The  general  news  of  the  domestic  scene  had  a  tenor  of  unrest 
and  uncertainty.  Labor  disturbances  were  widespread,  and  the  curve  of 
unemployment  mounted  as  industrial  production  was  sharply  slashed 
from  the  peaks  of  wartime  pressure.  Boston  had  its  celebrated  police 
strike  which  projected  Governor  Calvin  Coolidge  into  the  national  lime- 
light. The  high  cost  of  living  added  to  distress,  and  there  were  endless 
items  dealing  with  arrests,  speechmaking  and  legislative  action  concern- 
ing the  postwar  "Red  scare." 

From  a  coverage  point  of  view,  the  Boston  police  strike  showed 
all  the  difficulties  which  arose  in  so  many  of  the  labor  controversies  that 
year.  Feeling  ran  righ  and  contending  forces  read  every  line  of  news 
with  hypercritical  eyes.  When  the  strike  ended,  James  H.  Vahney, 
counsel  for  the  policemen's  union,  in  an  unsolicited  statement,  praised 
the  Boston  Bureau  for  "utmost  fairness,"  and  Governor  Coolidge  wrote 
his  appreciation  of  the  "efficient  and  faithful"  manner  in  which  the  news 
had  been  treated. 

Men  who  returned  to  their  positions  with  The  Associated  Press 
that  year  after  the  war  found  that  a  forward-looking  step  had  been  taken 
in  their  absence.  The  Board  of  Directors  had  established  a  comprehen- 
sive system  of  employes'  insurance,  pensions,  disability  and  sick  benefits. 
Heretofore  only  commercial  and  industrial  corporations  with  large 
financial  resources  had  undertaken  to  set  up  such  a  plan  for  the  welfare 
of  employes,  and  the  introduction  of  the  idea  into  the  field  of  journal- 
ism on  an  extensive  scale  aroused  considerable  comment. 

Until  the  evolution  of  the  organization  into  a  non-profit  co-opera- 


"BACK  TO  NORMALCY"  289 

tive,  the  lot  of  men  who  made  news  gathering  their  career  had  been 
a  precarious  one.  The  precursors  of  the  modern  press  association  gave 
scant  thought  to  the  welfare  of  employes.  Sickness  or  disability  was 
looked  upon  as  an  individual's  private  concern.  Long  and  faithful  serv- 
ice was  of  little  help  to  men  whose  value  had  been  impaired  by  age. 
As  for  death,  it  was  a  calamity  survivors  had  to  meet  with  such  savings 
as  the  deceased  had  been  able  to  build  up  from  salaries  which  never 
had  been  extravagant. 

Under  President  Noyes  and  General  Manager  Stone  the  co-opera- 
tive began  to  recognize  the  association's  responsibility  toward  employes. 
In  spite  of  the  deficits  and  financial  stress  of  the  first  decade  of  the  cen- 
tury, the  board  made  numerous  individual  provisions  for  pensions,  sick 
pay,  and  disability  allowances.  Adolph  Ochs,  of  the  New  York  Times, 
consistently  advocated  the  most  liberal  attitude.  There  was  no  well- 
formulated,  universal  policy,  however.  Each  case  was  considered  sep- 
arately on  the  special  set  of  facts  involved. 

When  the  association's  fortunes  became  financially  stabilized 
shortly  before  the  World  War,  the  board  gave  more  thought  to  the 
establishment  of  a  workable  plan.  Traffic  Department  Chief  Cooper, 
who  had  been  an  advocate  of  such  a  system  since  his  second  year  in  the 
service,  began  a  study  of  various  actuarial  plans  and  devised  the  pro- 
gram which  the  board  put  into  effect  on  July  i,  1918.  Besides  sick  pay 
and  disability  allowance,  the  plan  provided  for  pensions  for  retiring 
employes  and  death  benefits  to  surviving  families.  By  the  start  of 
1920  the  plan  protected  1,038  employes,  editorial,  clerical,  and  traffic 
alike. 

In  April,  1920,  Melville  E.  Stone  relinquished  active  duties  as 
general  manager  to  take  an  extended  leave  of  absence  at  his  own  request 
for  reasons  of  health.  The  Board  of  Directors  appointed  the  assistant 
general  manager,  Frederick  Roy  Martin,  to  be  acting  general  manager 
in  Stone's  absence,  and  the  next  day  brought  further  administrative 
changes.  Cooper  was  promoted  to  assistant  general  manager  5  Jackson 
Elliott  became  general  superintendent  in  immediate  charge  of  the  news 
report  j  Milton  Garges  succeeded  Cooper  as  chief  of  the  Traffic  De- 
partment. 


And  so  it  was  1920.  The  war  was  done,  peace  treaties  had  been 
signed,  but  the  man  in  the  street  summed  up  the  times  with  a  rare  apt- 
ness when  he  used  the  new  slang  phrase,  "the  cockeyed  world."  Na- 


290  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

tional  Prohibition  was  ushered  in.  New  England  buzzed  about  Ponzi's 
extravagant  financial  manipulations.  The  KuKlux  Klan  rode  again. 
Douglas  Fairbanks  and  Mary  Pickford  got  married.  F.  Scott  Fitz- 
gerald wrote  of  the  younger  generation.  A  mysterious  explosion  rocked 
Wall  Street,  killing  thirty-eight.  And  a  cause  celebre  began  with  the 
arrest  of  two  Italian  workmen,  Nicola  Sacco  and  Bartolommeo  Van- 
zetti,  for  a  fatal  Massachusetts  holdup. 

Abroad  the  turmoil  never  slackened.  Gabrielle  d'Annunzio  seized 
Fiume,  the  port  denied  Italy  in  the  peace  settlement,  and  Morgan  of 
the  Rome  Bureau  buried  himself  under  the  coal  of  a  locomotive  tender 
to  get  into  the  city  and  obtain  the  first  authentic  news.  Germany  bat- 
tled through  another  revolution,  the  Kapp  uprising,  and  automobiles 
placarded  "The  Associated  Press  of  America"  were  passed  through  the 
lines  by  both  rebel  and  government  factions.  An  amazing  Red  army 
smashed  the  Poles  back  to  the  very  gates  of  Warsaw,  and  James  P. 
Howe  found  himself  with  a  35omile  front  to  patrol.  In  the  Near  East 
Allied  armies  occupied  Constantinople,  and  Charles  Stephenson  Smith 
saw  Turkey's  new  man  of  destiny,  Mustapha  Kemal. 

The  Black  and  Tan  terror  was  loose  in  Ireland,  and  four  staff  cor- 
respondents carried  on  in  the  face  of  unconcealed  hostility  from  both 
Crown  and  republican  forces.  At  Amerongen  in  Holland  Rennick  and 
Berry  alternated  in  the  patient  wait  for  a  moment  that  never  came — 
the  opportunity  to  interview  the  secluded  ex-Kaiser.  Experts  struggled 
with  the  question  of  what  reparations  the  Central  Powers  should  pay, 
and  Correspondent  Kloeber  in  Vienna  found  himself  covering  Sir  Wil- 
liam A.  Goode — the  British  reparations  commissioner  for  Austria  but  the 
same  "Billy"  Goode  whom  Diehl  had  assigned  to  Admiral  Sampson's 
flagship  back  in  the  days  of  the  Spanish-American  War.  Monarchist 
uprisings  in  Portugal,  maneuvers  for  King  Constantine's  return  in 
Greece,  the  White  Armies  in  the  Ukraine,  agitation  in  Italy,  pleb- 
iscites in  the  Balkans — the  bulky  log  ran  on  from  day  to  day. 

The  only  sustained  break  in  the  heavy  character  of  the  news  came 
with  the  Olympic  Games  at  Antwerp  where  Correspondent  Salchow  of 
Stockholm  doubled  in  brass  by  winning  the  world's  figure  skating  cham- 
pionship on  the  ice  and  serving  on  the  four-man  sports  staff  which  cov- 
ered the  events. 

Throughout  the  year  in  Europe  the  coverage  of  Russia's  news  re- 
rri^ined  a  continual  source  of  concern.  Since  the  enforced  departure  of 
the  Petrograd  staff  late  in  1918,  the  association  had  no  regular  corre- 
'spbjidents  in  the  vast  country,  except  for  those  with  the  Allied  forces 


"BACK  TO  NORMALCY"  291 

operating  against  the  Bolsheviks.  Attempts  to  reach  some  agreement 
with  the  government  encountered  a  succession  of  failures.  Maxim  Lit- 
vinoff,  commissar  of  foreign  affairs,  refused  to  grant  visas  to  any  cor- 
respondents not  "of  known  sympathy"  with  Soviet  rule.  This  imposed 
an  impossible  condition  for  The  Associated  Press.  For  a  time  an  im- 
provised service  of  fair  regularity  was  maintained  by  a  special  under- 
cover correspondent,  Mrs.  Marguerite  Harrison,  but  eventually  she  was 
imprisoned  and  the  news  halted.  Thereafter  the  association  was  forced  to 
rely  on  staff  correspondents  assigned  to  strategic  spots  along  Russia's 
borders  and  such  news  as  could  be  smuggled  out  of  the  country  from 
time  to  time. 

America  was  again  preoccupied  with  the  concerns  of  a  presidential 
year.  The  bitterly  debated  League  of  Nations  issue,  the  disillusionment 
which  accompanied  postwar  reaction,  and  the  temper  of  political  feelings 
gave  the  contest  an  unusual  character  and  placed  a  premium  on  accurate, 
factual  reporting. 

The  conventions  were  the  first  Stone  had  missed  as  general  man- 
ager since  the  McKinley-Bryan  nominations  in  1896.  Acting  General 
Manager  Martin  took  charge  of  the  staff  first  at  the  Chicago  gathering, 
which  selected  Warren  G.  Harding,  and  then  at  the  Democratic  con- 
vention in  San  Francisco,  where  James  M.  Cox  was  chosen.  But  he  was 
not  the  familiar  figure  that  the  old  chief  had  been.  The  fact  proved  em- 
barrassing to  J.  C.  Godfrey,  one  of  the  operators  on  the  traffic  force  at 
the  Chicago  convention.  Arriving  early  in  the  press  section  the  opening 
day,  he  found  a  man  sitting  quietly  there,  apparently  a  spectator  who 
had  wandered  into  the  wrong  benches.  As  Godfrey  tested  and  checked 
the  telegraph  wires,  he  ordered  the  stranger  about  casually,  telling  him 
"ease  over  here,"  "slip  over  there,"  and  "you'll  have  to  move."  The 
spectator  obliged  without  comment.  Then  Godfrey  began  talking  by  wire 
to  the  Chicago  Bureau  where  the  convention  hall  circuits  fed  onto  the 
news  network. 

"Any  AP  man  there?"  asked  the  bureau. 

Godfrey  turned  to  the  man  sitting  near  by. 

"You  happen  to  be  an  AP  man?"  he  asked. 

"Yes,  sir." 

Impressed  by  the  politeness,  Godfrey 

"Yes,  one  fellow  here.  Guess  he's  a  r <j 

He  turned  to  the  man  again. 

"This  guy  wants  to  know  your  name,"  | 
the  Morse  key. 


292  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

"Fm  Mr.  Martin,"  said  the  acting  general  manager  of  The  Asso- 
ciated Press. 

Before  the  electorate  cast  the  ballots  which  produced  the  great 
Coolidge-Harding  landslide  in  November,  the  country — or  at  least  the 
part  of  it  that  read  the  sports  pages— was  shocked  by  the  sensational 
Chicago  "Black  Sox"  scandal,  which  exposed  the  "throwing"  of  the 
World  Series  baseball  games  between  Chicago  and  the  Cincinnati  Reds 
the  previous  autumn.  Charlie  Dunkley  and  Don  M.  Ewing  of  the  Chi- 
cago staff  "broke"  the  story  that  Eddie  Cicotte  and  Joe  Jackson,  two  of 
the  best  known  Chicago  players,  had  confessed,  and  it  was  Ewing  who 
witnessed  the  moving  scene  outside  the  criminal  courts  building  where 
several  hundred  small  boys  loyally  waited  for  their  idol,  Joe  Jackson, 
to  appear  after  testifying  before  the  grand  jury. 

Ewing  left  with  Jackson  and  as  they  made  their  way  through  the 
hushed  crowd,  one  tiny  youngster  timidly  stepped  up  to  the  outfielder 
and  tugged  at  his  sleeve. 

"Say  it  ain't  so,  Joe,"  he  pleaded. 

Joe  Jackson  looked  down. 

"Yes,  kid,  I'm  afraid  it  is." 

The  crowd  of  little  fans  parted  silently  to  make  a  path. 

"Well,  Pd  never  thought  it,"  gulped  the  youngster.  "Pd  never 
thought  it." 

The  Chicago  story  of  Joe  Jackson's  disillusioned  admirer  and  the 
pathetic  "Say-it-ain't-so-Joe"  entreaty  that  became  a  national  expression 
were  typical  of  the  humanizing  sidelights  which  were  appearing  occa- 
sionally in  the  report.  Not  yet  numerous  enough  to  be  considered  essen- 
tial, they  indicated  a  definite  trend. 

Superintendent  Elliott  summed  up  the  record  in  the  accounting  of 
operations  submitted  to  the  Board  of  Directors  a  few  weeks  before  1920 
passed  into  history.  Discussing  the  march  of  events,  he  said: 

A  notable  feature  of  our  news  service  of  late  has  been  the  large  number 
of  remote  and  rather  inaccessible  points,  far  removed  from  the  old  news 
centers,  which  seem  to  have  developed  into  important  news  fields — Athens, 
Constantinople,  Warsaw,  Fiume,  Lucerne,  Geneva,  Riga  and  Dublin.  This 
has  given  an  exceptional  diversity  of  datelines,  and  has  led  to  the  more  gen- 
eral use  of  AP  dispatches  from  the  outlying  points,  as  individual  newspapers 
have  their  staffs  concentrated  at  the  old  centers — London,  Paris  and  Berlin, 
and  are  dependent  on  The  AP  when  important  news  breaks  elsewhere.  .  .  . 

This  general  policy  of  covering  news  from  the  scene  of  action  is  a  trans- 
formation from  the  old  system  of  covering  practically  all  news  largely  from 


"BACK  TO  NORMALCY^  293 

London  and  Paris.  Editors  no  longer  want  news  filtered  through  the  old 
capitals.  They  want  it  direct  from  the  scene. 

To  the  man  in  the  street  the  news  was  still  of  a  "cockeyed"  world. 
In  Chicago  a  staff  correspondent  eluded  a  cordon  of  guards  and  inter- 
viewed the  legendary  John  D.  Rockefeller  in  his  long  underwear.  The 
first  Prohibition  agent  was  slain  in  New  Jersey.  Cortesi  watched  the  rise 
of  a  black-shirted  Fascist  party  recently  founded  by  a  prewar  Socialist 
named  Mussolini.  And  in  the  beer  halls  of  Munich  a  former  corporal 
harangued  crowds,  denouncing  the  Versailles  Treaty,  the  French,  the 
Jews,  the  capitalists.  Handbills  identified  the  speaker  as  Herr  Adolf 
Hitler. 

President-elect  Warren  G.  Harding  only  recently  had  coined  the 
phrase:  "Back  to  normalcy." 


XV.  THE  ORDER  CHANGES 


AROUND  the  long  conference  table,  members  of  the  Board  of  Di- 
rectors were  discussing  the  possibility  of  increasing  employes'  insurance 
benefits  when  Stone  entered  the  room.  He  was  almost  seventy-three, 
yet  he  seemed  almost  as  alert  and  commanding  as  ever. 

"At  my  time  of  life,"  he  said,  "it  must  be  obvious  to  anybody  that 
in  the  comparatively  near  future  my  career  must  be  over.  I  should  be  a 
fool  if  I  hung  on  here  as  general  manager  like  the  Old  Man  of  the 
Sea  until  an  hour  when  death  thrust  someone  suddenly  into  my  posi- 
tion. 

"That  is  why  I  asked  for  a  leave  of  absence  last  year  so  it  could 
be  determined  whether  the  personnel  that  I  had  gathered  around  me 
was  capable  of  running  the  service.  Not  alone  whether  they  were  capable 
of  running  it,  but  whether  the  Board  of  Directors  felt  they  were  capable 
of  running  it.  And  not  alone  that  the  Board  of  Directors  felt  that,  but 
the  membership  of  the  association. 

"Now  I  have  purposely  avoided  going  to  the  office.  They  have 
consulted  me  from  time  to  time.  I  have  the  very  warmest  regard  for 
the  personnel  here.  The  responsibility  is  upon  you.  It  must  be  you 
who  exercise  the  judgment,  but  my  own  feeling  is  if  you  agree  with  me 
that  Mr.  Martin  has  shown  a  capacity,  that  these  other  gentlemen  have 
shown  a  capacity  to  carry  on  the  work,  then  I  think  it  is  due  Mr.  Martin 
that  he  be  made,  not  the  acting,  but  the  real  general  manager.  I  should 
like  to  resign." 

In  a  few  minutes  the  thing  was  done.  Melville  E.  Stone  ceased  to 
be  the  general  manager  of  The  Associated  Press.  But  the  board  was 
not  willing  that  resignation  should  sever  all  his  ties.  President  Noyes 
proposed  that  the  office  of  counselor  be  created  and  that  Stone  be  ap- 
pointed to  fill  it.  There  were  some  feeble  attempts  at  levity  which  did 
not  quite  come  off. 

"The  title  of  counselor  suggests  a  fountainhead  of  wisdom,"  ob- 
jected John  R.  Rathom  of  the  Providence  Journal  with  mock  serious- 
ness. 

294 


THE  ORDER  CHANGES  295 

"Mr.  Stone  is  not  rejecting  that,"  smiled  Noyes,  and  the  resolu- 
tion was  unanimously  adopted. 

Henceforth  it  would  be  Counselor  Stone. 

That  same  day,  April  29,  1921,  Frederick  Roy  Martin  was  ap- 
pointed general  manager.  Theoretically,  the  assignments  of  the  execu- 
tive family  lapsed  with  the  naming  of  a  new  general  manager,  but  Mar- 
tin immediately  reappointed  Assistant  General  Manager  Cooper  and 
Traffic  Chief  Garges,  and  within  two  weeks  Jackson  Elliott  was  raised 
from  general  superintendent  to  be  a  second  assistant  general  manager. 

Like  Hale,  Hallock,  and  Craig,  Martin  was  a  New  Englander  by 
birth.  A  man  of  independent  means,  he  had  devoted  himself  to  news- 
paper work  since  his  graduation  from  Harvard  in  1893 — the  same  year 
Stone,  his  predecessor,  took  the  helm  of  The  Associated  Press  of  Illinois. 
For  six  years  Martin  worked  in  Boston.  Then  he  joined  the  Providence 
Journal  and  presently  became  its  editor  and  treasurer.  During  his  ad- 
ministration the  paper's  prestige,  circulation,  and  finances  advanced  ma- 
terially and  Martin's  reputation  gained  such  influence  that  in  April, 
1912,  he  was  elected  to  the  Board  of  Directors  of  The  Associated  Press. 

The  most  immediate  administrative  problem  of  the  new  general 
manager  was  the  steady  loss  of  able  and  experienced  staff  men.  The 
wartime  development  of  propaganda  had  been  an  object  lesson  to  busi- 
ness, big  and  small,  in  the  possibilities  of  publicity,  and  trained  news- 
papermen were  eagerly  sought  as  press  agents.  Most  attractive  salaries 
were  offered — sometimes  double  what  a  man  earned  with  the  co-opera- 
tive— and  some  men  on  the  staff  were  sorely  tempted.  In  a  period  when 
the  cost  of  living  soared  to  uncomfortable  heights,  it  was  difficult  to 
refuse  the  commercial  propositions,  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  so  many  of 
the  positions  were  obviously  transitory. 

Martin,  Stone,  Cooper,  and  Elliott  brought  the  matter  to  the 
attention  of  the  board  and  urged  that  the  management  be  given  a  free 
hand  to  readjust  salaries  in  order  to  anticipate  or  at  least  meet  the  bids 
of  commercial  enterprises  for  staff  men.  The  point  carried  and  the  raids 
on  the  personnel  were  checked  to  a  degree.  Another  aspect  of  publicity's 
development,  however,  continued  a  nuisance.  The  postwar  crop  of  press 
agents  utilized  all  sorts  of  artifices  in  their  attempts  to  get  publicity 
stories  on  the  leased  wires,  and  endless  vigilance  was  required  to  keep 
the  report  free  from  advertising  matter  skillfully  disguised  as  news. 

The  character  of  contemporary  news,  moreover,  left  no  space  in 
the  report  for  anything  not  essential.  Even  the  humanizing  little  features 
had  to  compete  against  a  welter  of  prime  dispatches.  Congressional  de- 


296  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

bate  on  a  soldiers'  bonus  and  tax  legislation  kept  Washington  busy. 
Sports  had  the  "Battle  of  the  Century"  when  Jack  Dempsey  and 
Georges  Carpentier  met  at  Boyle's  Thirty  Acres.  Rum  Row  set  up  busi- 
ness off  the  coast.  The  depression  which  began  in  1920  sagged  toward  its 
low,  with  5,735,000  unemployed.  The  demand  for  economic,  business, 
and  financial  news  continued  without  abatement,  necessitating  further 
expansion  in  that  department  of  the  report.  A  number  of  members  were 
especially  insistent  that  the  association  enlarge  its  Wall  Street  coverage 
to  include  stock  and  bond  quotations,  together  with  a  longer  list  of  other 
markets. 


The  story,  however,  which  made  1921  so  memorable  for  the  news 
report  belonged  to  Kirke  L.  Simpson  of  the  Washington  Bureau. 

But  for  the  impressive  solemnity  of  the  occasion,  Simpson's  assign- 
ment might  have  been  considered  routine.  The  nation  was  bringing  its 
Unknown  Soldier  home  from  France  to  a  final  resting  place  in  Arling- 
ton National  Cemetery,  and  Simpson  was  assigned  to  write  the  stories 
on  the  final  obsequies  for  the  nameless  man  whom  the  country  paused  to 
honor. 

Simpson  was  only  one  of  the  scores  of  newspapermen — many  of 
them  journalists  of  reputation — who  stood  under  the  sodden  skies  in 
the  gray,  chilling  rain  at  Washington  Navy  Yard  on  November  9  when 
the  Olympia,  Admiral  Dewey's  flagship  at  Manila  Bay,  slowly  swung 
up  the  Potomac  bringing  the  dead  Unknown  home  from  the  wars. 
Minute  guns  boomed  in  salute. 

Simpson  wrote  the  first  of  his  seven  Unknown  Soldier  stories  that 
afternoon.  The  next  day  he  described  the  steady  tide  of  humanity  which 
flowed  in  silence  past  the  catafalque  under  the  vast  rotunda  of  the  Cap- 
itol. Then  on  the  third  anniversary  of  the  Armistice  there  were  the 
final  ceremonies  at  the  Unknown's  tomb  on  the  wooded  ridge  high  above 
the  Potomac.  Simpson's  first  story  read: 

Washington,  Nov.  9. — (By  The  Associated  Press). — A  plain  soldier, 
unknown  but  weighted  with  honors  as  perhaps  no  American  before  him  be- 
cause he  died  for  the  flag  in  France,  lay  to-night  in  a  place  where  only  mar- 
tyred Presidents  Lincoln,  Garfield  and  McKinley,  have  slept  in  death. 

He  kept  lonely  vigil  lying  in  state  under  the  vast,  shadowy  dome  of  the 
Capitol.  Only  the  motionless  figures  of  the  five  armed  comrades,  one  at  the 
head  and  one  facing  inward  at  each  corner  of  the  bier,  kept  watch  with  him. 

But  far  above,  towering  from  the  great  bulk  of  the  dome,  the  brooding 


THE  ORDER  CHANGES  297 

figure  of  Freedom  watched  too,  as  though  it  said  "well  done"  to  the  servant 
faithful  unto  death,  asleep  there  in  the  vast,  dim  chamber  below. 

America's  unknown  dead  is  home  from  France  at  last,  and  the  nation 
has  no  honor  too  great  for  him.  In  him,  it  pays  its  unstinted  tribute  of  pride 
and  glory  to  all  those  sleeping  in  the  far  soil  of  France.  It  was  their  home- 
coming to-day;  their  day  of  days  in  the  heart  of  the  nation  and  they  must 
have  known  it  for  the  heart  beat  of  a  nation  defies  the  laws  of  space,  even  of 
eternity. 

Sodden  skies  and  a  gray,  creeping,  chilling  rain  all  through  the  day 
seemed  to  mark  the  mourning  of  this  American  soil  and  air  at  the  bier  of 
this  unknown  hero.  But  no  jot  of  the  full  meed  of  honor  was  denied  the  dead 
on  that  account.  From  the  highest  officials  of  this  democratic  government  to 
the  last  soldier  or  marine  or  bluejacket,  rain  and  cold  meant  nothing  beside 
the  desire  to  do  honor  to  the  dead. 

The  ceremonies  were  brief  to-day.  They  began  when  the  far  boom 
of  saluting  cannon  down  the  river  signalled  the  coming  of  the  great  gray 
cruiser  Olympia.  The  fog  of  rain  hid  her  slow  approach  up  the  Potomac, 
but  fort  by  fort,  post  by  post,  the  guns  took  up  the  tale  of  honors  for  the 
dead  as  she  passed. 

Slowly  the  ship  swung  into  her  dock.  Along  her  rails  stood  her  crew 
in  long  lines  of  dark  blue,  rigid  at  attention  and  with  a  solemn  expression 
uncommon  to  the  young  faces  beneath  the  jaunty  sailor  hats.  Astern,  under 
the  long,  gray  muzzle  of  a  gun  that  once  echoed  its  way  into  history  more 
than  twenty  years  ago  in  Manila  Bay,  lay  the  flag-draped  casket.  Above,  a 
tented  awning  held  off  the  dripping  rain,  the  inner  side  of  the  canvas  lined 
with  great  American  flags  to  make  a  canopy  for  the  sleeper  below.  At  atten- 
tion stood  five  sailors  and  marines  as  guards  of  honor  for  the  dead  at  each 
corner  and  the  head  of  his  bier.  .  .  . 

They  were  simple  stories,  unpretentious  in  style.  The  exigencies  of 
wire  conditions  kept  them  comparatively  short  and  they  were  written 
with  the  haste  news  usually  dictates.  Yet  for  all  that,  Simpson's  accounts 
of  those  three  solemn  days  seemed  to  catch  the  spirit  of  all  that  lay  in  the 
tributes  to  the  Unknown  Soldier.  The  restraint,  the  emotion,  the  sin- 
cerity with  which  he  wrote  made  his  words  a  fitting  commentary. 

Not  in  a  long  time  had  any  news  story  made  such  a  deep  impres- 
sion on  millions  of  Americans.  The  co-operative's  general  offices  were 
overwhelmed  by  the  outpouring  of  praise.  Editors,  public  officials, 
clergymen,  professors,  schoolteachers,  former  staff  men,  average  news- 
paper readers,  wrote  in  to  express  appreciation.  From  all  sides  came 
inquiries  as  to  the  identity  of  the  author — the  stories  carried  no  by-line — 
and  so  insistent  was  the  demand  that  the  general  manager,  relaxing 
the  age-old  rule  of  anonymity,  disclosed  Simpson's  name.  To  meet  nu- 
merous requests,  The  Associated  Press  published  a  special  booklet  con- 


298  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

taining  the  seven  Unknown  Soldier  stories.  In  Illinois  and  other  states 
superintendents  of  public  instruction  issued  a  similar  brochure  for  class- 
room use.  Permission  was  granted  for  republication  of  the  series  in 
school  readers.  From  pulpits  ministers  extolled  the  simple  beauty  of  the 
work,  and  students  in  public  speaking  learned  the  sentences  by  heart. 
The  requests  for  copies  continued  for  the  next  eighteen  years. 

Simpson's  brilliant  handling  of  the  Unknown  Soldier  assignment 
was  formally  recognized  when  he  was  voted  the  Pulitzer  prize,  the  first 
press  association  man  ever  to  receive  the  award. 


The  day  after  the  Unknown  Soldier  was  entombed,  the  Interna- 
tional Arms  Limitation  Conference  called  by  Secretary  of  State  Hughes 
met  in  the  capital  and  Simpson  was  one  of  the  twelve-man  staff  or- 
ganized for  its  coverage.  The  conference  made  diplomatic  history  when 
Hughes  proposed  a  ten-year  naval  holiday  and  the  scrapping  of  sixty- 
six  capital  ships  in  the  interests  of  world  peace. 

The  heart  of  the  Hughes  proposal  was  that  the  foremost  naval 
powers — United  States,  Great  Britain,  and  Japan — "freeze"  their  navies 
at  the  ratio  of  their  existing  strength,  one  to  the  other.  For  several  days 
news  writers  generally  groped  for  some  terse  expression  to  describe  the 
formula,  which  provided  for  fleet  equality  between  the  United  States 
and  Great  Britain,  and  a  Japanese  navy  of  40  per  cent  less  strength.  A 
number  of  different  phrases  were  tried  but  none  proved  apt. 

Simpson  was  specializing  in  the  technical  aspects  of  the  conference 
and  on  November  1 8  he  talked  over  the  American  proposals  with  Rear 
Admiral  Sir  Ernie  Chatfield,  chief  British  technician.  In  the  course  of 
that  talk  Chatfield  referred  offhand  to  the  Hughes'  "big  three"  formula 
as  the  "50-5030  ratio"  plan.  Simpson,  writing  his  story  that  night, 
simplified  Chatfield's  chance  description  by  eliminating  the  zeros.  The 
paragraph  in  which  the  well-known  phrase  first  appeared  read: 

It  is  certain  that  British  naval  experts  regard  their  country  as  already 
committed,  through  Mr.  Balfour's  speech  of  acceptance,  to  what  might  be 
called  the  "5-5-3  ratio"  of  naval  strength  as  between  Great  Britain,  the 
United  States  and  Japan.  That  is  regarded  by  both  British  and  American 
experts  as  the  heart  of  the  matter. 

The  expression,  "5-5-3  ratio,"  was  invariably  used  thereafter.  Other 
correspondents  picked  it  up  and  soon  it  appeared  also  in  the  official 
press  statements  released  by  the  conference  itself. 


THE  ORDER  CHANGES  299 

The  basis  on  which  Japan  ultimately  agreed  to  the  Five-Power 
Navy  Treaty  negotiated  at  Washington  was  described  in  the  report 
weeks  before  the  conference  got  under  way.  When  the  Japanese  delega- 
tion sailed  for  the  United  States,  it  was  accompanied  by  Joseph  E.  Shar- 
key,  chief  of  bureau  at  Tokyo.  One  night,  as  the  boat  fought  its  way 
through  a  typhoon,  Admiral  Kato,  Japan's  chief  plenipotentiary,  sent 
word  to  Sharkey  that  he  would  like  to  see  him. 

"I  am  disposed,"  began  the  admiral  when  Sharkey  reached  his 
cabin,  "I  am  disposed — if  you  fancy  it  has  news  value— to  tell  you  the 
basic  principle  of  the  Japanese  policy  at  the  Washington  conference." 

Sharkey  fancied  it  would  have  news  value. 

"All  right,"  said  Kato.  "Here  it  is  in  a  few  words:  Japan  will 
agree  to  negotiate  an  arrangement  concerning  capital  ships,  provided 
the  United  States  agrees  not  to  increase  the  fortifications  of  her  posses- 
sions in  the  Far  East." 

There  was  a  little  more,  but  that  was  the  crux  of  the  story.  It 
created  a  stir  in  Washington.  Many  congressmen  commented  that  the 
condition  was  utterly  impossible  of  acceptance,  but  eventually  it  was 
incorporated  in  the  naval  and  political  accords  reached  at  the  confer- 
ence. 


Sharing  interest  with  the  disarmament  conference  were  the  nego- 
tiations in  London  looking  to  the  end  of  the  bitter  warfare  in  Ireland 
between  the  Sinn  Feiners  and  the  military  forces  of  the  British  crown. 
For  the  better  part  of  three  years  the  men  on  that  assignment  had 
worked  under  nerve-racking  peril  and  difficulty  in  an  atmosphere  of 
ambushes,  raids,  killings,  and  reprisals. 

Like  so  many  of  his  colleagues,  Guy  Moyston,  of  the  London  Bu- 
reau, led  a  hectic  life  the  many  months  he  spent  in  Ireland.  Mistaken 
for  an  English  agent  one  night  when  he  arrived  late  in  a  rural  town, 
he  was  awakened  to  find  himself  blinking  sleepily  into  the  muzzles  of 
Sinn  Fein  rifles  and  revolvers.  On  another  occasion  a  British  patrol 
arrested  him  and  hustled  him  off  at  bayonet  point  to  Bridewell  prison 
in  Cork.  Information  found  in  his  possession  on  the  attempted  assassi- 
nation of  the  commander  of  the  crown  forces  in  Southern  Ireland  gave 
rise  to  the  suspicion  that  he  was  a  rebel  dispatch  bearer.  His  arrest 
turned  out  to  be  a  fortunate  happening,  for  upon  his  release  he  en- 
countered a  talkative  constable  who  supplied  him  with  additional 
details  of  the  assassination  attempt  the  British  wanted  to  suppress. 


300  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Moyston  sought  for  weeks  to  arrange  for  an  interview  with  Eamon 
De  Valera,  the  President  of  the  Irish  Republic  who,  like  so  many  active 
in  the  rebellion,  was  "on  the  run."  Negotiations  were  highly  dangerous. 
They  involved  secret  meetings  with  outlawed  members  of  the  Irish 
Republican  Army  whom  the  Black  and  Tans  were  ready  to  shoot  at 
sight,  and  the  men  with  whom  he  dealt  would  not  have  hesitated  to 
kill  him  on  the  least  suspicion  of  treachery.  The  efforts  to  arrange  the 
interview  seemed  foredoomed  to  failure,  but  Moyston  kept  trying. 

Another  meeting  was  arranged.  Moyston  found  two  men  in  trench 
coats  and  low-pulled  caps  waiting  for  him  at  the  rendezvous.  In  a  trice 
he  was  blindfolded,  bundled  roughly  from  the  house,  and  thrust  into 
a  waiting  automobile  which  set  off  at  breakneck  speed.  Moyston  could 
feel  the  bulky  shoulders  of  his  two  guards  against  him  as  the  car 
careened  along.  Many  an  informer  and  government  spy  had  been  taken 
out  like  this  and  his  body  found  later  with  an  I.R.A.  death  warrant 
pinned  to  his  coat.  There  was  no  quarter  in  the  fierce  warfare  and  there 
was  no  assurance  that  the  men  in  the  automobile  had  not  decided  that 
Moyston  was  a  secret  agent  with  fraudulent  credentials.  One  bogus 
correspondent  had  fled  Dublin  just  in  time  to  escape  execution. 

It  was  a  torturing  ride  until  the  swaying  automobile  eventually 
skidded  to  a  stop.  Hands  gripped  Moyston's  arms  and  hurried  him 
stumbling  along  an  unseen  path.  He  tripped  through  a  doorway  and 
into  a  room.  There  the  blindfold  was  whipped  away  and  he  found  him- 
self standing  before  a  spare,  scholarly  figure. 

The  man  was  De  Valera  and  it  was  only  then  that  Moyston  knew 
for  certain  that  the  brusque  handling  to  which  he  had  been  subjected 
was  all  incidental  to  obtaining  his  long-sought  interview. 

A  truce  halted  the  fighting  during  the  negotiations  at  London 
which  led  to  the  establishment  of  the  Irish  Free  State.  The  co-operative 
had  a  staff  of  thirteen  men,  Moyston  among  them,  covering  the  various 
phases  of  the  conference  which  led  to  the  signing  of  the  Anglo-Irish 
Treaty,  a  highly  controversial  subject  even  in  the  United  States.  The 
story  on  the  signing  of  the  agreement  was  complete  enough,  but  it  by 
no  means  spelled  the  end  of  extraordinary  staff  arrangements  in  Ire- 
land. The  treaty  created  a  schism  in  Irish  ranks  and  the  country  plunged 
into  a  civil  war  which  made  the  task  of  coverage  just  as  hazardous  as 
ever. 

5 

Throughout  the  year  leased  wire  facilities  were  steadily  enlarged 
to  cope  with  the  burden  of  news  which  assumed  heavier  proportions. 


THE  ORDER  CHANGES  301 

The  cable  report  approximated  6,500  words  each  twenty-four  hours, 
and  a  survey  showed  that  the  co-operative  brought  in  an  average  of 
fifty-eight  foreign  items  daily  as  compared  with  eleven  for  commercial 
agencies.  Although  the  service  from  the  Orient  increased  considerably, 
Europe  remained  the  major  continent  in  the  foreign  report,  what  with 
the  nightmare  of  German  inflation,  the  beginning  of  the  Fascist  regime 
in  Italy,  the  crushing  Greek  defeat  at  the  hands  of  Kemal,  the  League 
of  Nations,  and  the  perennial  maneuverings  of  Old  World  diplomacy. 

The  domestic  report  had  its  own  sensations  with  the  bloody  Herrin 
mine  war,  New  Jersey's  spectacular  Hall-Mills  murder  case,  and  the 
beginning  of  the  grim  gang  wars  which  marked  Prohibition.  The  pattern 
of  news  was  unpredictable — flappers,  the  crystal  radio  set  craze,  dawn 
of  the  night  club  era,  Gallagher  and  Shean,  and  Abie's  Irish  Rose. 

The  year  saved  its  greatest  journalistic  surprise  until  the  last  weeks 
when  it  made  a  4,ooo-year-old  Egyptian  king  the  most  exceptional  news 
carried  in  many  a  day.  The  tomb  of  King  Tutankhamen  was  found  De- 
cember i  near  Luxor,  Egypt.  Experts  termed  it  "the  greatest  archaeo- 
logical discovery  of  all  time,"  and  so  closely  did  people  follow  the  story 
that  reference  to  "King  Tut"  cropped  up  daily  in  ordinary  conversation. 

A  syndicate  headed  by  the  London  Times  had  paid  $100,000  to 
the  British  archaeologists  excavating  at  the  tomb  site,  and  the  contract 
carried  exclusive  rights  to  all  news  and  photographs.  No  other  corre- 
spondents had  the  right  to  enter  the  rockhewn  royal  tomb  while  the 
scientists  were  cutting  through  the  wall  which  was  believed  to  separate 
the  richly  furnished  anteroom  from  the  actual  mortuary  chamber  where 
they  hoped  to  find  the  sarcophagus  and  mummy  of  the  King  who  ruled 
in  the  fourteenth  century  before  Christ. 

As  far  as  the  archaeologists  were  concerned,  Valentine  Williams 
was  merely  one  of  some  forty  correspondents  who  had  no  choice  but 
to  wait  daily  in  the  blazing  heat  outside  the  hidden  tomb  and  labori- 
ously piece  stories  together  from  such  scraps  of  information  as  could  be 
coaxed  from  secondhand  sources.  All  firsthand  news  went  to  the  Lon- 
don Times  syndicate. 

That  the  archaeologist  expected  any  day  to  broach  the  rock  wall 
into  the  mortuary  chamber  ceased  to  be  news  5  it  only  served  to  deepen 
the  gloom  which  pervaded  the  press  corps.  On  February  16,  1923,  Wil- 
liams was  racking  his  brains  for  some  forlorn  plan  to  circumvent  the 
syndicate's  monopoly  on  the  story.  He  happened  to  notice  an  Egyptian 
official  who  had  just  emerged  from  the  vault. 

Paying  no  attention  to  the  newspapermen  at  the  tomb  entrance, 


302  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

the  Egyptian  walked  over  the  sands  to  a  water  cooler  set  up  about  two 
hundred  feet  away.  Williams  recognized  him  as  one  of  the  party  which 
had  entered  the  excavation  with  the  archaeologists  more  than  an  hour 
earlier.  He  watched  the  man  for  a  moment  and  decided  that  he,  too, 
needed  a  drink  of  water.  Casually  he  strolled  after  the  Egyptian  with- 
out attracting  the  attention  of  rival  correspondents. 

Williams  smiled  disarmingly  and  the  Egyptian  nodded.  They  had 
a  drink  of  water  together.  The  desert  heat  made  one  thirsty. 

"Excuse  me,  sir,"  said  Williams  idly,  "a  controversy  has  arisen  as 
to  whether  you  found  one  coffin  or  two  coffins  inside  the  tomb.  Can  you 
put  me  straight  on  it?" 

He  drew  another  drink  of  water. 

"Two  coffins!"  exclaimed  the  official.  "Why,  no.  Of  course  not. 
We  found  only  one  coffin!" 

"Oh,"  said  Williams  innocently.  "The  coffin  of  King  Tutank- 
hamen?" 

"Yes,"  said  the  unsuspecting  Egyptian,  "we  believe  it  is.  The 
royal  seal  on  the  coffin  is  still  intact  and  the  sarcophagus  bears  the 
hieroglyphic  cartouche  of  Tutankhamen." 

Williams  nodded  understandingly. 

"And  you  believe  the  coffin  contains  the  mummy  of  the  King?" 

"Yes,  we  have  every  reason  to  think  so,"  replied  the  unwitting 
official,  describing  the  scenes  within  the  tomb. 

"Oh,  thank  you  very  much,"  Williams  said  politely. 

As  soon  as  the  Egyptian  returned  to  the  tomb,  the  correspondent 
was  racing  over  the  Theban  plain  in  a  small  automobile  to  the  nearest 
telegraph  office. 

In  a  matter  of  minutes  London  had  the  flash: 

TUTANKHAMEN'S   SARCOPHAGUS  AND  MUMMY  POUND. 

The  news  shot  over  the  cables  into  New  York.  Long  before  the 
archaeologists  emerged  from  the  tomb  to  prepare  their  official  com- 
munique, member  papers  had  the  story  of  how,  for  the  first  time  in 
history,  a  royal  Egyptian  sarcophagus  had  been  discovered  intact  and 
unprofaned  by  thieves  or  vandals. 

6 

Although  it  captured  popular  imagination  to  an  unusual  degree, 
the  news  of  King  Tutankhamen's  tomb  provided  little  more  than  a 
diversion  in  the  news  log  of  the  months  immediately  preceding  the 


THE  ORDER  CHANGES  303 

1923  annual  meeting.  Of  more  significance  were  the  dispatches  from 
James  P.  Howe,  Thomas  Topping,  Walter  Hiatt,  and  Clifford  L.  Day 
when  French  and  Belgian  troops  occupied  the  highly  industrialized 
Ruhr  Valley  to  enforce  German  reparations  payments.  Joseph  Sharkey, 
assigned  to  the  League  of  Nations  at  Geneva,  reported  the  efforts  of 
the  Lausanne  Conference  to  conclude  a  lasting  peace  for  the  turbulent 
Near  East.  And  at  home  the  Lick  Observatory  announced  that  it  had 
confirmed  Professor  Albert  Einstein's  theory  of  relativity. 

Looking  behind  the  externals  of  the  news  service,  the  members 
could  gauge  the  extent  of  the  association's  postwar  expansion.  The  leased 
wires  crisscrossing  the  continent  totaled  92,000  miles,  with  an  operator 
at  every  eighty-five  miles  along  the  circuit.  The  threads  of  the  vast 
web  linked  1,207  members  with  the  fifty-five  domestic  bureaus  which 
served  them  and,  by  cable,  with  the  twenty-seven  American-manned 
bureaus  abroad.  Employes  numbered  almost  two  thousand,  annual  ex- 
penditures exceeded  $6,000,000.  Member  papers  published  in  every 
one  of  the  forty-eight  states,  in  Alaska,  Hawaii,  the  Philippines,  Puerto 
Rico,  Cuba,  Mexico,  Central  and  South  America,  and  the  news  ap- 
peared in  English,  French,  Spanish,  German,  Portuguese,  and  Jap- 
anese. Telegraph  keys,  Morkrum  machines,  telephones,  cables,  and  wire- 
less sped  the  general  report,  totaling  75,000  words  daily,  over  more 
than  a  hundred  different  channels. 

The  Board  of  Directors  had  an  impressive  statistical  summary  to 
marshal  in  the  annual  report  presented  to  the  1923  meeting  of  the  mem- 
bership. President  Noyes,  who  had  just  returned  from  a  round-the- 
world  tour,  told  of  the  firsthand  study  he  had  made  of  news  conditions, 
particularly  in  China  and  Japan.  Then  President  Harding  addressed 
the  gathering  on  national  and  international  affairs. 

Two  months  after  Harding  spoke  at  the  annual  luncheon  he  left 
Washington  for  a  trip  to  Alaska.  The  country  was  singing  "Yes,  We 
Have  no  Bananas"  that  summer,  talking  about  marathon  dances,  or 
discussing  Rudolph  Valentino's  latest  movie.  Few,  even  among  the  in- 
formed, knew  definitely  the  proportions  of  the  political  scandals  brew- 
ing in  the  Veterans'  Bureau,  the  Interior  Department,  and  other  gov- 
ernmental quarters  at  Washington.  Perhaps  Harding  had  a  feeling  that 
all  was  not  well.  Stephen  Early  and  E.  R.  Bartley,  the  staff  men 
assigned  to  accompany  the  party,  remarked  how  weary  the  President 
seemed. 

The  first  four  weeks  of  the  trip  were  humdrum.  The  special  train 
rolled  across  the  country,  the  President  made  set  speeches,  audiences 


304  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

applauded  politely,  and  nothing  unusual  happened.  When  Alaska  was 
reached,  Harding  seemed  to  grow  more  tired  and  dispatches  spoke  of 
concern  over  the  President's  health.  The  concern  deepened  on  the 
return  trip  when  Harding  was  stricken  at  Seattle,  July  27.  His  physician 
attributed  the  attack  to  ptomaine  poisoning.  The  President  insisted  that 
the  journey  be  resumed,  however,  and  the  party  arrived  in  San  Fran- 
cisco on  July  29.  There  Harding  took  to  his  bed  and  his  condition 
failed  to  improve  over  the  weekend. 

Early  and  Bartley  understood  the  gravity  of  the  situation.  Hard- 
ing's  condition  had  not  yet  become  critical,  but  the  circumstances  war- 
ranted preparedness.  Paul  Cowles,  superintendent  of  the  Pacific  Coast 
Division,  cut  short  his  vacation.  Members  of  the  San  Francisco  staff 
were  assigned  to  work  with  the  Washington  men,  and  a  special  wire 
was  looped  to  the  seventh  floor  of  the  Palace  Hotel,  ten  feet  from  a 
private  back  stairway  leading  to  the  presidential  suite  on  the  floor  above. 
The  coast  traflic  chief,  Percy  Hall,  took  charge  of  the  telegraphers  at 
the  improvised  headquarters.  "Never  leave  the  wire  unmanned  for  a 
second,"  were  his  orders.  "The  man  who  leaves  this  room  without 
permission  leaves  the  service." 

On  Monday  night  Harding's  condition  took  a  turn  for  the  worse. 
Bronchial  pneumonia  developed  and  Early,  keeping  watch  outside  the 
sickroom,  saw  worried  doctors  come  and  go.  On  Tuesday  the  Presi- 
dent's heart  weakened  and  fears  for  his  life  became  acute.  Telegraphers 
ate  their  meals  while  they  kept  Morse  keys  clicking  off  the  news.  Every 
minute  of  the  day  and  night  someone  was  on  duty  at  the  chief  execu- 
tive's bedroom  door. 

Dispatches  Wednesday  were  better.  The  President  had  shown 
"remarkable  improvement."  By  the  afternoon  Dr.  Joal  T.  Boone,  one 
of  the  White  House  physicians,  announced  the  crisis  had  passed.  The 
ranks  of  reporters  assigned  to  the  story  by  individual  newspapers  began 
to  dwindle. 

For  The  Associated  Press,  however,  Superintendent  Cowles  was 
not  at  all  satisfied.  Even  after  the  encouraging  bulletins  Thursday  after- 
noon, he  thought  it  wise  to  consult  San  Francisco  physicians  for  their 
private  opinions.  They  told  him  that  any  patient  with  symptoms  similar 
to  those  described  in  the  presidential  bulletins  was  far  from  out  of 
danger.  Any  reduction  in  staff  precautions  was  out  of  the  question  after 
Cowles  received  that  information. 

Thursday  night  Early  waited  at  his  post  a  few  feet  away  from  the 


THE  ORDER  CHANGES  305 

President's  door.  Many  members  of  Harding's  party  were  out  attend- 
ing social  functions  in  the  city.  The  last  word  from  the  sickroom  had 
been  reassuring  and  most  correspondents  had  not  yet  returned  from 
dinner.  On  the  Pacific  Coast  it  was  about  seven-thirty. 

Just  then  the  door  of  the  room  flew  open  and  Early  saw  Mrs. 
Harding's  white,  distraught  face. 

"Call  Dr.  Boonej  call  Dr.  Boone!"  she  was  crying.  "Find  him  and 
the  others  quick!" 

Attendants  scurried  to  find  the  physician,  and  Early,  after  con- 
firming what  he  sensed  had  happened,  went  racing  down  the  back  stair- 
way to  the  seventh  floor.  Standing  over  the  operator,  he  rapidly  dic- 
tated a  series  of  bulletins  which  told  that  the  President's  condition  had 
taken  a  sudden  turn  for  the  worse.  It  was  the  first  intimation  that  the 
President's  life  was  in  danger. 

A  few  minutes  after  the  first  rush  of  bulletins,  Early  was  back 
again  in  the  wire  room,  breathlessly  dictating: 

FLASH-FLASH 

SAN  FRANCISCO   -  PRESIDENT  HARDING  DEAD 

The  flash  gave  official  Washington  the  shocking  news.  In  the 
confusion  at  the  hotel  in  San  Francisco  those  in  Harding's  party  forgot 
to  send  any  notification  to  the  capital.  Vice-President  Coolidge  was  away, 
vacationing  at  his  father's  home  in  Plymouth,  Vermont. 

But  Plymouth  had  not  been  neglected  in  the  association's  precau- 
tions. Days  earlier,  when  Harding  had  been  stricken,  W.  E.  Playfair, 
night  editor  in  Boston,  had  been  sent  to  the  Coolidge  homestead  with 
instructions  to  remain  close  to  the  vice-president  in  case  an  emergency 
arose.  He  found  two  of  Boston's  string  correspondents,  Arthur  Granger, 
of  Rutland,  and  Joseph  H.  Fountain,  of  Springfield,  Vermont,  already 
there,  and  they  worked  under  his  direction  as  Plymouth's  importance 
waxed,  then  waned  with  the  tenor  of  the  bulletins  from  the  San  Fran- 
cisco sickroom.  The  little  farming  hamlet  had  no  telephone  or  telegraph 
lines,  and  to  get  out  the  news  it  was  necessary  to  go  to  Rutland,  the 
nearest  leased  wire  point,  or  eleven  miles  to  the  slightly  nearer  com- 
munities, Bridgewater  and  Ludlow,  where  telephones  were  available. 

It  was  a  telephone  call  to  Ludlow  from  the  Boston  Bureau  that 
told  Playfair  of  Harding's  death  and  started  him  over  dark  country 
roads  to  the  Coolidge  farm.  The  vice-president  had  gone  to  bed  and 
Playfair  gave  his  news  to  the  elder  Coolidge  who  seemed  awed  by  the 
gravity  of  the  moment.  Other  reporters  started  to  arrive,  among  them 


306  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Granger  and  Fountain.  The  backfire  of  automobiles  shattered  the  still 
of  the  night.  Coolidge  and  his  wife  came  downstairs. 

"Good  morning,  Mr.  President,"  someone  said. 

Coolidge  did  not  reply. 

"Is  this  information  authentic  ?"  he  asked. 

Technically  still  vice-president,  Coolidge  issued  his  first  statement 
as  the  nation's  leader: 

Reports  have  reached  me,  which  I  fear  are  correct,  that  President  Hard- 
ing is  gone.  The  world  has  lost  a  great  and  good  man.  I  mourn  his  loss.  He 
was  my  Chief  and  my  friend. 

It  will  be  my  purpose  to  carry  out  the  policies  which  he  has  begun  for 
the  service  of  the  American  people  and  for  meeting  their  responsibilities 
wherever  they  may  arise. 

For  this  purpose  .  .  . 

As  soon  as  the  statement  was  issued  in  the  hushed  farmhouse  room, 
Playfair  left  for  Ludlow  to  telephone  it  to  Boston.  Granger  remained 
behind  to  gather  additional  details.  Then  he  was  off  to  Bridgewater. 
Other  correspondents  departed  in  haste  to  get  their  own  stories  in,  but 
Fountain  remained  behind.  Coolidge  had  not  yet  been  sworn  in  as 
president  and  it  was  Fountain's  assignment  to  stay  there  until  he  was. 

At  2:43  A.M.  on  August  3,  1923,  by  the  light  of  a  kerosene  lamp, 
Calvin  Coolidge  took  the  oath  of  office  as  President  of  the  United 
States,  repeating  the  words  as  his  father  read  them.  Seven  persons  wit- 
nessed the  ceremony.  The  only  newspaperman  among  them  was  Joseph 
H.  Fountain. 

7 

Harding's  death  was  the  forerunner  of  a  freshet  of  big  news  which 
continued  until  the  end  of  1923.  George  Denny,  the  veteran  of  the 
Russo-Japanese  War  who  had  replaced  Sharkey  as  bureau  chief  at 
Tokyo,  covered  the  earthquake  which  struck  Japan  on  September  i, 
taking  almost  100,000  lives.  There  also  was  the  Dempsey-Firpo 
fight,  one  of  the  early  events  in  the  so-called  "Golden  Age"  of 
professional  sports.  The  six-man  staff  was  directed  by  a  new  general 
sports  editor — Alan  J.  Gould,  who  had  been  appointed  to  the  post  in 
March  when  Moss  resigned.  Two  days  after  the  fight  interest  centered 
on  the  New  York  pressmen's  strike  which  left  the  metropolis  without 
its  regular  papers  for  a  week.  Then  Washington  took  first  place  in  the 
domestic  report  with  the  startling  disclosures  of  the  Teapot  Dome 
scandal  investigation,  and  in  the  cable  news  there  were  dispatches  from 
Elmer  Roberts  at  Munich  describing  an  abortive  beer-hall  Putsch  to 


THE  ORDER  CHANGES  307 

overthrow  the  government  in  Germany.  The  uprising  lost  its  news 
value  after  one  of  its  leaders,  Adolf  Hitler,  was  sentenced  to  five  years' 
imprisonment. 

With  the  coming  of  the  new  year  the  association's  headquarters 
was  moved  from  downtown  New  York,  where  so  much  bygone  jour- 
nalistic history  had  been  made,  to  larger  offices  at  383  Madison  Avenue, 
in  the  midtown  area.  The  transfer  of  operating  equipment,  the  change- 
over of  wire  circuits  controlling  the  leased  network,  and  other  details 
of  the  move  presented  a  complex  problem,  but  the  new  quarters  were 
occupied  on  March  2  without  interruption  in  the  service. 

The  presidential  campaigns  and  election  called  for  the  dominant 
news-gathering  efforts  in  1924  when  the  country,  swept  along  by  the 
tide  of  increasing  prosperity,  rallied  to  the  call:  "Keep  Cool  with 
Coolidge."  The  convention  staff  had  it  lengthiest  assignment  in  his- 
tory at  the  marathon  Democratic  sessions  in  Madison  Square  Garden, 
where  Alfred  E.  Smith  lost  his  first  bid  for  the  nomination  in  an  atmos- 
phere of  bitterness  and  acrimony.  The  leased  wires  flashed  the  No- 
vember verdict:  a  landslide  for  Coolidge  and  his  running  mate,  Charles 
G.  Dawes. 

As  the  headlines  of  1924  told  their  stories,  an  important  adminis- 
trative change  was  brewing  in  the  co-operative.  Vague  intimations 
reached  some  of  the  staff  and  the  better  informed  members  late  in  the 
year.  Confirmation  came  on  the  eve  of  the  1925  annual  meeting.  Fred- 
erick Roy  Martin  submitted  his  resignation  as  general  manager,  effec- 
tive the  end  of  April.  Private  publishing  opportunities  had  presented 
themselves,  and  Martin  also  had  other  interests  which  demanded  greater 
attention.  With  a  tribute  to  his  service,  the  board  accepted  the  resigna- 
tion which  closed  the  shortest  administration  since  the  days  of  Alexander 
Jones  in  the  middle  of  the  previous  century. 

The  unanimous  choice  of  the  board,  Kent  Cooper  stepped  in  as 
the  new  general  manager.  Frank  B.  Noyes,  whose  twenty-fifth  anni- 
versary came  the  same  year,  later  said  of  the  appointment:  "No 
chronicle  of  my  connection  with  The  Associated  Press  would  be  com- 
plete without  a  record  of  the  fact  of  the  importance  of  my  service  in 
bringing  forward  and  encouraging  the  energies  of  Cooper  through  a 
long  series  of  years,  of  my  recommendation  that  he  be  made  general 
manager  and  of  my  profound  satisfaction  at  his  subsequent  fulfilment 
of  my  every  hope." 

Under  ordinary  circumstances  such  an  important  administrative 
change  might  have  been  expected  to  monopolize  the  attention  of  an 


308  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

annual  meeting,  but  1925  was  not  an  ordinary  year.  Since  it  was  Noyes's 
twenty-fifth  anniversary,  the  uppermost  thought  of  the  publishers  who 
attended  in  record  numbers  was  to  memorialize  the  occasion. 

8 

For  a  quarter  of  a  turbulent  century  the  quiet,  distinguished-look- 
ing publisher  of  the  Washington  Star  had  guided  the  destinies  of  the 
organization.  Year  after  year  with  unfailing  regularity  he  had  been 
re-elected.  Managerial  changes  occurred,  directors  came  and  went,  but 
Frank  Noyes  continued.  There  were  many  among  the  membership  who 
could  not  remember  a  time  when  he  was  not  president  of  The  Asso- 
ciated Press,  and  there  were  others  who  had  come  to  consider  him  an 
indispensable  personality  in  the  life  of  the  association. 

Of  medium  stature,  military  in  bearing,  he  was  outwardly  a  stern 
but  nevertheless  benevolent  leader  among  his  fellow  publishers.  In  an 
even,  well-modulated  voice  he  could  parry  distasteful  questions  or  sud- 
den stabs  of  wit.  At  annual  meetings  he  spoke  in  conversational  tones 
and  his  words  flowed  with  an  ease  that  frequently  confounded  some  of 
the  more  fiery  and  excitable  members.  His  opening  lines  frequently 
gave  listeners  the  impression  they  were  in  for  a  deadly  serious  dis- 
course, yet  within  minutes  he  was  quietly  employing  a  sense  of  humor 
that  was  as  compelling  as  it  was  unexpected.  The  fund  of  stories  from 
which  he  drew  to  illustrate  any  pertinent  point  were  so  apt,  his  selec- 
tion of  words  so  precise,  that  any  utterance,  no  matter  how  impromptu, 
assumed  a  quality  of  polish  that  invariably  left  listeners  in  open  ad- 
miration. 

Yet  active  as  Noyes  was  in  the  inner  councils  of  the  association, 
well  known  as  he  was  in  high  places,  he  studiously  avoided  any  public 
act  which  conceivably  might  be  construed  as  reflecting  a  viewpoint  of 
the  nonpartisan  news-gathering  agency  he  headed.  He  diplomatically 
abstained  from  speaking  on  controversial  subjects,  and  on  only  one 
occasion  during  his  entire  regime  was  a  member  of  his  own  craft  able 
to  obtain  a  headline  from  him. 

On  that  occasion  Noyes  was  vacationing  in  Florida  and  one  of  the 
local  papers  sent  around  a  cub  reporter — an  inquisitive  little  lady  who 
charmingly  peppered  him  with  questions  on  politics,  world  affairs,  and 
his  own  personal  preference  in  the  fields  of  music,  the  arts,  and  the 
sciences. 

"My  dear  child,"  he  said,  "I  am  sorry,  but  I  really  can't  talk  on 
any  of  those  subjects." 


THE  ORDER  CHANGES  309 

The  young  reporter  was  determined.  She  asked  her  questions  over 
and  over  again  until  finally,  in  an  effort  to  have  her  understand  fully 
why  he  felt  he  should  not  express  opinions  for  publication,  he  tried 
again  to  state  his  position. 

"You  see,"  he  explained,  "as  head  of  The  Associated  Press  I  try 
to  maintain  a  detached  neutrality  on  all  public  matters  because  ours  is 
a  factual  organization  and  anything  I  say  personally  might  be  open  to 
misconstruction." 

He  paused,  mentally  framing  a  definition,  and  then  there  was  a 
barely  perceptible  twinkle  in  his  eye. 

"Because  of  my  position,"  he  smiled,  "I  suppose  that  for  the  past 
thirty-five  years  I  have  been  somewhat  of  an  intellectual  eunuch." 

The  young  interviewer  heard  him  through,  graciously  thanked 
him  for  his  kindly  reception,  and  made  her  departure.  Noyes  thought 
no  more  about  the  incident  until  shown  a  copy  of  the  reporter's  paper 
the  next  day.  There  on  the  front  page  was  the  young  woman's  story, 
one  sentence  of  which  read: 

"The  president  of  The  Associated  Press  says  he  is  an  intellectual 
UNIT." 

One  of  Noyes's  greatest  contributions  during  that  first  quarter 
century  was  the  way  he  maintained  the  association's  stability  in  the  in^ 
evitable  conflicts  of  interest  which  arose  between  the  large  and  the  small 
papers  making  up  the  membership.  He  said: 

There  have  always  been  two  schools  of  thought  as  to  the  membership 
makeup  of  The  Associated  Press.  One  has  held  to  the  desirability  of  having 
a  large  membership  consisting  of  a  great  number  of  small  papers  and  a  small 
number  of  large  papers. 

On  the  other  hand,  there  were  those  who  believed  that  the  membership 
should  be  confined  to  the  larger  papers. 

The  Board  of  Directors  almost  unanimously  has  believed  in  the  theory 
of  the  large  organization,  and  has  consistently  and  scrupulously  sought  to 
conserve  the  interests  of  the  smaller  units  of  the  membership. 

The  annual  meeting  was  held  April  2,  1925,  and  applause  swept 
the  room  when  Ralph  H.  Booth,  of  the  Saginaw  (Mich.)  News-Courier, 
on  behalf  of  the  membership,  presented  the  president  with  a  golden 
bowl  to  commemorate  the  anniversary. 

The  cheering  of  several  hundred  members  failed  to  drown  the 
voice  of  Victor  Lawson,  calling  for  the  floor.  The  old  fighter  had  lost 
much  of  his  vigor,  but  he  still  could  command  attention. 

"An  ideal  is  the  very  essence  of  any  great  endeavor  inspired  by  a 


3io  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

sincere  purpose,"  Lawson  said,  addressing  Noyes.  "The  conception  of 
an  Associated  Press  as  a  national  co-operative  news-gathering  and  dis- 
tributing agency,  charging  itself  in  the  conduct  of  a  business  enterprise 
with  the  high  responsibility  of  a  great  public  service  in  the  preservation 
of  the  sources  of  public  information  and  opinion  free  from  the  pollu- 
tion of  selfish  commercialism  and  political  ambition,  depended  for  its 
permanent  realization  upon  a  loyal  and  continuing  devotion  to  the  com- 
mon good.  This  high  conception  of  public  duty  has  been  from  the  first 
the  common  bond  of  the  membership  of  this  association,  and  in  response 
to  which  you  have  accepted  and  discharged  the  constant  and  exacting 
duties  of  your  leadership." 

He  paused,  then  added: 

"You  have  served  a  great  and  righteous  cause,  the  cause  of  Truth 
in  News,  and  served  it  faithfully." 

Visibly  touched,  Noyes  for  once  found  it  difficult  to  phrase  his 
feelings. 

"This  is  indeed  for  me  a  day  of  fulfillment,"  he  said.  "I  would 
not,  even  if  I  could,  conceal  how  deeply  I  am  affected  by  what  has  been 
said  here  and  by  those  outward  and  visible  signs  of  your  friendship  and 
good  will.  While  no  one  realizes  better  than  I  do  that  much  that  has 
been  said  by  my  dear  friends  who  have  spoken  applies  to  the  sort  of 
president  that  I  should  have  been  and  not  to  what  really  I  have  been, 
still  the  words  of  over-appreciative  friendship  and  tenderness  are  very 
dear  to  me — precious  beyond  any  words  of  mine  to  express.  .  .  ." 

To  the  right  of  the  dais  the  stenographer,  who  was  keeping  the 
usual  transcript  of  the  proceedings,  listened  to  the  spontaneous  outburst 
which  broke  loose  as  Noyes  concluded,  and  conservatively  entered  in  his 
notes: 

"Great  applause." 


I.  SPEED  AND  PROSPERITY 


A  QUARTER  of  a  century  of  tremendous  progress  had  transformed 
the  newspaper  world  into  a  marvel  of  high-speed  efficiency.  Dispatches 
were  turned  into  type  with  amazing  rapidity.  The  total  circulations  of 
American  newspapers  mounted  close  to  40,000,000  daily  and  the  in- 
come of  newspaper  enterprises  topped  $900,000,000  annually. 

The  afternoon  papers,  which  assumed  during  the  World  War  a 
position  they  had  never  held  before,  continued  to  advance  in  the  en- 
suing years.  Sunday  editions  grew  thicker.  Chain  organizations  extended 
their  holdings  and  consolidations  strengthened  the  publishing  field. 

In  content  and  appearance  the  majority  of  papers  strove  to  be  as 
attractive  as  possible.  The  development  of  photo-engraving  processes 
made  good  news  pictures  possible.  Typography  and  format  style  re- 
ceived a  larger  share  of  attention  in  the  interests  of  reading  ease,  and 
increased  departmentalizing  added  noticeably  to  newspaper  appeal. 

Day-to-day  news  continued  the  essential  commodity  and  its  volume 
kept  increasing  as  the  world  turned.  If  anything,  the  swift  march  of 
mechanical  progress  had  made  news  a  more  perishable  commodity  than 
ever.  In  keeping  with  the  pace  of  newspaper  manufacture,  communica- 
tions moved  toward  greater  perfection.  The  enormous  expansion  of 
telephone  systems  brought  many  previously  remote  regions  within  the 
periphery  of  speedy  news  gathering.  Technical  advances  had  given 
both  telegraph  and  cable  lines  higher  standards  of  reliability  and  effi- 
ciency. Radio,  that  comparative  newcomer  in  the  communications  fam- 
ily, provided  still  another  channel.  Even  such  a  pedestrian  department 
of  news  dissemination  as  the  mail  services  found  a  brisker  gait,  for 
postal  deliveries  were  quicker  and  air  mail  could  be  enlisted  whenever 
haste  was  essential. 

The  advent  of  this  high-speed  day  produced  a  series  of  opportuni- 
ties and  needs  which  The  AP  had  been  tardy  in  realizing.  Many  of  its 
members  felt  there  had  been  a  failure  to  catch  the  complete  significance 
of  all  the  changes  taking  place  in  the  newspaper  world.  In  the  past  the 
news  had  been  the  only  important  thing,  regardless  of  its  presentation. 
Now  editors  and  readers  were  critical  of  the  manner  in  which  a  story 


3  H  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

was  told.  They  wanted  their  news  written  in  the  most  interesting,  vivid 
style,  not  only  on  isolated  occasions  but  as  a  regular  thing.  There  was 
redoubled  insistence  that  the  brighter  and  curious  side  of  life  be  re- 
ported 5  the  fads  and  foibles  of  an  era  were  as  much  a  part  of  its  history 
as  were  its  politics  or  perils.  The  long  predominance  of  foreign  news 
on  front  pages  had  diminished,  and  as  balance  returned  neighborhood 
news  came  back  to  its  own — and  the  automobile  had  given  neighbor- 
hoods a  wide  area.  Not  only  had  people  become  picture  minded  but  they 
also  liked  diversions,  as  the  interest  in  feature  material  testified. 


It  was  at  this  time  that  Kent  Cooper  took  over  as  general  manager. 
He  was  loyal  to  the  principles  for  which  the  nonprofit  co-operative  stood 
in  the  field  of  news  and  he  already  had  declined  offers  by  commercial 
news  agencies  which  would  have  brought  financial  rewards  many  times 
beyond  what  he  ever  could  hope  for  with  The  AP.  Now  that  he  had 
been  given  his  opportunity,  he  stated  his  creed: 

I  believe  there  is  nothing  so  fascinating  as  the  true  day-to-day  story  of 
humanity.  Man,  what  he  feels,  what  he  does,  what  he  says;  his  fears, 
his  hopes,  his  aspirations.  And,  as  truth  is  stranger  than  fiction,  nothing  can 
be  more  engrossing  than  the  truthful  portrayal  of  life  itself.  The  journalist 
who  deals  in  facts  diligently  developed  and  intelligently  presented  exalts 
his  profession,  and  his  stories  need  never  be  colorless  or  dull.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  reporter  who  resorts  to  the  rouge  pot  to  make  his  wares  attractive 
convicts  himself  of  laziness  and  ineptitude.  The  head  of  another  press  associa- 
tion once  said  that  it  was  always  proper  to  qualify  the  news  with  color  in 
order  to  stimulate  reader  interest.  This  I  deny.  Artificiality  and  super- 
ficiality in  news  writing  not  only  are  unnecessary,  but  ultimately  must  have 
a  baneful  influence  on  the  reader.  Simple  honesty  and  good  business  demand 
from  the  newspaperman  an  uncolored  tale  of  what  is.  That  is  my  creed. 

Zealously  adhering  to  the  principle  of  factual  reporting,  neverthe- 
less Cooper  had  little  patience  with  the  old  myth  that  impartiality 
postulated  drab,  tedious  writing.  The  official  drive  for  livelier,  more 
interesting  presentation  of  the  news  was  a  foregone  conclusion.  That  a 
definite  part  of  the  staff  was  ready  for  such  a  change  was  demonstrated 
by  the  promptness  of  the  response.  The  stiff  and  sometimes  stodgy  writ- 
ing habits  were  not  to  be  rooted  out  overnight,  but  the  process  had  been 
started  and  it  continued  without  relaxation  as  part  of  the  fundamental 
policy  of  the  new  regime. 

The  second  emphasis  concerned  itself  with  extending  the  variety  in 


SPEED  AND  PROSPERITY  315 

the  report.  Human-interest  stories  ceased  to  be  regarded  as  decorative 
and  were  given  due,  if  belated,  recognition.  One  of  the  first  manifesta- 
tions of  the  new  trend  was  the  special  daily  wire  feature  called  "Flashes 
of  Life."  It  was  a  series  of  brief  items  side-lighting  the  humorous  and 
the  unusual  in  everyday  existence. 

At  the  outset,  these  departures  did  not  meet  with  universal  ap- 
proval. One  publisher  warned  tartly:  "We  will  soon  be  devoting  our- 
selves entirely  to  trivialities."  The  Board  of  Directors  thought  differ- 
ently, encouraging  the  trend  until  the  proportion  of  humanizing  stories 
in  the  report  had  risen  to  a  respectable  level. 

The  transformation  attracted  so  much  journalistic  attention  that 
papers  commented  editorially,  among  them  the  Kansas  City  Star  which 
said: 

The  AP  Reports  The  Human  Spectacle 

Until  recently  The  Associated  Press  has  conceived  its  field  to  be  restricted 
to  the  chronicling  of  serious  and  important  news.  From  its  standpoint,  a  catas- 
trophe, an  election,  a  congressional  debate,  the  death  of  a  distinguished  man, 
an  important  trial,  pretty  much  exhausted  the  topics  of  human  interest. 

Until  recently.  An  attentive  reader  of  The  Star  must  have  noticed  a 
change  in  the  last  few  months.  The  Associated  Press  by-line  now  is  appearing 
over  dispatches  that  are  gay  as  well  as  grave.  .  .  .  The  Associated  Press 
has  begun  to  live  up  to  the  Greek  philosopher's  saying  that  nothing  human 
is  alien  to  him.  It  has  not  lowered  its  standards.  It  has  simply  enlarged 
the  field  of  its  interests.  It  is  striving  to  report  every  phase  of  the  human 
spectacle. 

The  transformation  has  been  due  to  the  vision  and  imagination  of 
Mr.  Kent  Cooper. 

This  "vision  and  imagination"  was  by  no  means  an  overnight 
development.  The  disclosure  of  the  idea  of  humanizing  the  news  report 
went  back  to  1916  and  a  flagman's  shanty  along  a  railroad  right-of-way 
between  Utica  and  Syracuse  in  New  York. 

Melville  Stone  was  general  ^  manager  then  and,  together  with 
Cooper,  he  had  entrained  one  winter  night  to  attend  a  meeting  of 
Canadian  Press  members  in  Toronto.  While  the  two  men  sat  reading 
in  a  smoking  compartment  the  train  came  to  a  stop  between  the  two 
upstate  cities.  The  older  man  and  his  young  assistant  speculated  on  the 
cause  of  the  stop  and  soon  Stone  closed  his  book  with  the  suggestion 
that  they  alight  and  determine  the  trouble. 

They  climbed  down  the  steps  into  a  cold  rain  and  looked  up  and 
down  the  tracks.  There  was  nothing  in  sight  but  a  lighted  flagman's 


316  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

hut  and  Stone  suggested  they  go  there  to  inquire.  Inside  they  found 
three  railroad  employes  around  a  stove.  From  the  gruff  greeting  there 
was  no  doubt  but  that  the  two  passengers  were  considered  intruders. 
But  the  cool  reception  did  not  abash  Stone.  A  man  of  exceptional  per- 
sonality and  charm,  he  observed  that  one  of  the  men  was  chewing  to- 
bacco. The  general  manager  did  not  make  a  habit  of  tobacco  in  such 
form,  but  he  nevertheless  asked  if  he  might  borrow  a  chew.  The  plug 
was  grudgingly  offered  and  he  bit  off  a  sizeable  piece. 

Stone  then  stood  chewing  his  wad  and  conversing  lightly  with  his 
newly  made  acquaintances.  Within  a  few  minutes  he  had  the  three 
railroad  employees  and  Cooper  so  engrossed  in  his  humorous  anecdotes 
that  the  train  was  pulling  away  unnoticed. 

Stone  and  Cooper  hurriedly  swung  aboard  and  in  the  corridor  of 
their  car  they  met  a  former  Canadian  premier  who  was  an  old  acquaint- 
ance of  the  general  manager.  The  next  ten  minutes  were  given  over 
to  a  serious  discussion  of  international  affairs— the  World  War  and  the 
probability  of  conditions  at  its  termination.  The  discussion  with  the  one- 
time Canadian  official  was  totally  unlike  that  in  which  Stone  had  just 
indulged  with  the  tobacco-chewing  workers  in  the  stove-heated  shanty, 
yet  the  general  manager  seemed  equally  at  home  with  what  interested 
each,  talking  in  a  language  both  could  understand. 

Stone  and  Cooper  resumed  their  seats  in  the  smoking  compart- 
ment and  the  assistant  then  took  over  the  conversation.  They  laughed 
over  the  shanty  episode  and  Cooper  ventured  a  thought. 

"These  two  little  incidents  I  have  just  witnessed  have  a  direct 
bearing  on  what  I  think  The  Associated  Press  news  report  should  be," 
he  said.  "I  think  it  should  be  at  home  and  welcome  in  both  such  circles 
as  you  yourself  have  been  welcomed  tonight." 

The  two  men  discussed  the  suggestion  late  into  the  night  and  as 
the  general  manager  said  good  night  he  turned  to  Cooper. 

"Well,  if  I  were  a  younger  man  I  might  try  your  idea  as  an 
experiment,"  he  observed.  Then  he  added  with  a  wry  face: 

"But  that  certainly  was  strong  tobacco!" 

Cooper  little  thought  that  within  a  decade  he  himself  would  be 
trying  to  make  all  the  news  completely  at  home  to  both  such  circles  on 
a  world-wide  scale. 


Reporting  the  human  spectacle,  however,  sometimes  brought  hu- 
morous repercussions.  On  one  occasion  the  cables  carried  a  short  on  the 


SPEED  AND  PROSPERITY  317 

fact  that  soup  was  disappearing  from  the  menus  of  many  European 
hotels.  Widely  used,  this  harmless  enough  little  piece  aroused  the  in- 
dignation of  one  large  soup  manufacturer  who  protested  that  the  co- 
operative was  attacking  the  soup  industry. 

From  the  long-range  point  of  view,  Cooper's  most  significant  de- 
cision perhaps  was  to  concentrate  on  the  development  of  state  services. 
A  number  of  factors  were  involved,  notably  recognition  of  the  future  of 
vicinage  news,  the  consequent  extension  of  news-gathering  facilities,  and 
a  shift  in  the  basic  operating  methods  of  the  co-operative. 

Although  it  represented  a  logical  step  in  the  modern  co-operative, 
State  Service  development  had  been  slow.  When  member  papers  showed 
considerable  desire  in  1908  for  a  more  localized  report — something 
possible  only  through  the  creation  of  State  Services,  or  "side  circuits" 
as  they  then  were  called — the  Special  Survey  Committee  that  year  dis- 
couraged the  idea,  holding  that  the  co-operative's  sphere  was  news  of 
general  interest  only.  Nevertheless,  the  success  of  existing  side  circuits 
helped  to  keep  the  idea  alive. 

The  movement  took  on  fresh  vigor  in  the  postwar  years  and  no 
difficulties  were  placed  in  the  way  of  the  members  in  some  areas  who 
expressed  a  desire  for  the  development  of  state  services  to  supplement 
their  general  report.  On  the  contrary,  there  seemed  reason  to  believe 
that  the  projects  received  enthusiastic,  if  unofficial,  help  from  some 
members  of  the  management's  staff. 

By  the  time  he  became  general  manager,  Cooper  found  Noyes  and 
others  on  the  Board  of  Directors  sympathetic  to  the  State  Service- 
vicinage  news  trend  and  soon  the  possibilities  were  receiving  the  active 
stimulus  needed.  The  state  was  made  the  basic  unit  of  domestic  opera- 
tions, and  in  each  a  strategic  bureau  was  designated  to  serve  as  the 
control  point.  These  bureaus  siphoned  off  dispatches  of  general  im- 
portance from  the  regular  report  and  used  this  material  in  conjunction 
with  news  of  more  local  origin  to  build  up  a  special  report  for  the 
state  circuits  they  operated.  Bureau  chiefs  were  appointed  to  supervise 
activities  and  to  act  as  the  general  manager's  personal  representative  in 
each  of  the  states.  The  enlarged  scope  of  operations  necessitated  a  cor- 
responding increase  in  staff  personnel. 

The  full  development  of  the  state  services  had  a  salutary  effect 
on  the  attitude  of  members.  Where  the  organization  as  a  world-wide 
enterprise  might  be  too  vast  to  encourage  active  interest  or  personal 
enthusiasm,  the  more  compact  state  organization  represented  something 
tangible  and  close  to  home.  Members  showed  interest  in  the  betterment 


3i 8  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

and  success  of  these  smaller  units  and  one  manifestation  was  the  general 
introduction  of  periodical  state  meetings  at  which  members  gathered 
to  discuss  news  in  terms  of  the  circuits  which  served  their  newspapers. 
For  the  General  Service,  considered  in  its  strictest  sense  as  a  budget 
containing  only  the  most  important  news,  the  strengthening  and  the 
extending  of  state  services  had  an  obvious  advantage.  If  each  unit 
covered  all  its  own  news  thoroughly,  from  small  events  to  great  ones, 
there  was  little  likelihood  that  the  General  Service  would  fail  to  receive 
promptly  any  important  news  with  an  interest  that  transcended  state 
lines. 


Another  innovation  was  the  appointment  of  a  science  editor  to 
specialize  in  the  news  to  be  found  in  laboratory  research  and  experi- 
ment. The  new  general  manager  had  been  impressed  by  the  possibilities 
in  this  field  for  news  gathering,  not  in  the  random  manner  of  the  past 
when  a  single  important  discovery  or  invention  momentarily  attracted 
popular  attention,  but  rather  in  a  regular  day-to-day  manner.  He  talked 
of  the  possibility  to  the  president  of  Stevens  Institute  of  Technology. 

"People  even  sleep  better  because  of  the  scientific  study  of  bed- 
•springs,"  he  said.  "Don't  you  agree  there  is  a  field  for  science  news  in 
language  all  newspaper  readers  will  understand?" 

"Yes,"  said  the  professor,  "but  you'll  need  a  scientist  as  a  reporter." 

Cooper  considered  that. 

"No,"  he  decided  j  "instead  of  trying  to  make  a  reporter  of  a 
scientist,  we'll  make  a  scientist  of  a  reporter.  We'll  get  a  man  who  is 
smart  enough  to  know  science,  but  who  also  knows  how  to  write  for 
the  average  newspaper  reader." 

The  appointment  of  a  science  editor  followed.  John  Cooley  did 
pioneering  work  and,  after  him,  Coleman  B.  Jones.  The  science  editor 
responsible  for  the  development  of  the  new  department  to  full  stature 
was  its  third  editor,  Howard  W.  Blakeslee,  a  man  with  a  wide  range 
of  experience  in  all  phases  of  the  service.  He  developed  into  a  science 
specialist  of  top  rank,  winning  university  degrees  and  a  Pulitzer  prize. 

Coincident  with  the  expansion  of  the  scope  of  the  news  report,  the 
new  general  manager  made  another  departure  from  precedent.  He 
began  the  practice  of  using  "by-lines"  over  stories  of  unusual  interest 
and  importance.  In  the  past  the  writer  of  any  AP  story  had  been 
anonymous,  but  Cooper  felt  there  was  advantage  to  both  The  AP  and 
the  staff  to  have  the  man  identified  with  the  work  he  did.  The  practice 


SPEED  AND  PROSPERITY  319 

applied  only  on  outstanding  cases  and  the  papers  receiving  the  by-lined 
stories  could  carry  the  name  of  the  author  or  not,  as  individual  policy 
dictated. 


In  the  midst  of  all  this  activity,  planning,  and  improving,  The 
AP  lost  one  of  its  great  figures.  On  August  19,  1925,  Victor  Lawson 
died.  If  David  Hale  could  be  called  the  father  of  The  Associated  Press, 
then  Victor  Lawson  was  its  foster  father,  for  without  him  the  co- 
operative principle  never  would  have  been  preserved.  The  membership 
and  the  newspaper  world  at  large  mourned  him  as  one  of  the  foremost 
figures  ever  produced  by  his  profession. 

In  the  ranks  of  the  staff,  too,  old  familiar  figures  were  disappearing. 
Dick  Lee,  ship  news  editor  for  forty-seven  years,  died  within  a  few 
weeks  after  illness  forced  him  out  of  harness.  A  legendary  character, 
he  always  insisted  on  working  seven  days  a  week  and  until  the  end 
he  refused  all  offers  of  assistance. 

The  younger  staff  men  who  were  replacing  such  older  hands  as 
Lee  experienced  a  hectic  summer  in  1925,  particularly  in  the  sweltering 
heat  at  Dayton,  Tennessee,  where  the  Scopes  Evolution  Trial  made  the 
strangest  news  of  the  year.  The  epic  legal  battle  between  Clarence 
Darrow  and  William  Jennings  Bryan,  the  Bible's  champion,  kept  four 
staff  correspondents  busy  from  dawn  until  midnight  or  later.  W.  F. 
Caldwell,  news  editor  of  the  Southern  Division,  who  was  credited  with 
being  the  first  newsman  to  see  the  possibilities  of  the  story  when  Scopes 
was  arrested,  supervised  the  coverage,  assisted  by  Brian  Bell,  W.  B. 
Ragsdale,  and  P.  I.  Lipsey.  Bell,  who  had  been  on  the  story  even  before 
Scopes'  indictment,  became  so  well  known  that  when  the  trial  ended 
in  a  flood  of  oratory  Judge  Raulston  called  on  him  for  some  expression 
for  the  court  record. 

"Mr.  Bell,"  he  asked,  smiling  toward  the  AP  table,  "won't  you 
say  a  word?" 

"No,  sir,  judge,"  was  the  good-natured  reply. 

There  was  no  dearth  of  provocative  material  in  the  record  the 
times  produced.  There  were  the  navy  air  disasters:  the  Shenandoah  and 
the  rescue  of  Commander  Rodgers  from  the  navy  airplane  PN-9-No.i 
after  his  attempted  flight  to  Hawaii.  Florida  was  having  its  fabulous 
land  boom  and  the  Miami  Daily  News  printed  the  biggest  newspaper 
yet  in  journalistic  history— 504  pages.  Crossword  puzzles  had  become 
a  national  mania,  and  football  fans  chanted  the  praises  of  that  "galloping 


320  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

ghost"  from  the  University  of  Illinois,  Red  Grange.  There  was  the 
8-51  submarine  disaster  off  Block  Island,  the  great  anthracite  coal  strike 
in  Pennsylvania,  Germany's  entry  into  the  League  of  Nations,  and  the 
passing  of  baseball's  immortal  Christy  Mathewson. 


The  report  itself  was  feeling  a  new  exterior  pressure  and  by  1926 
it  became  serious.  Postwar  disillusionment,  moral  relaxation,  the  Pro- 
hibition era,  and  the  cult  of  ballyhoo  had  generated  influences  which 
were  producing  deleterious  effects  in  American  journalism.  One  mani- 
fest tendency  was  the  dramatization  of  cheap  heroics  and  the  sensa- 
tionalizing of  crime.  Old  standards  of  delicacy  disappeared  in  some 
published  accounts  of  unsavory  scandals.  Some  newspapers  began  hippo- 
droming  events  out  of  all  proportion  to  their  objective  news  value. 

To  preserve  the  balance  and  sanity  of  the  report  in  the  midst 
of  such  an  atmosphere  required  ceaseless  care.  The  Board  of  Directors 
and  the  general  manager  reiterated  the  standing  instructions  against 
the  glorification  of  criminals.  The  norm  of  good  taste  was  reaffirmed  for 
all  stories  whenever  the  subject  matter  transgressed  the  limits  of  common 
decency.  Artificial  sensations  were  ruthlessly  dealt  with  and  hysterical 
sentimentality  got  short  shrift  from  staff  editors.  Some  members,  who 
preferred  the  gaudy,  theatrical  trappings  of  the  journalistic  moment, 
may  not  have  been  pleased  with  the  attitude  of  the  administration,  but 
the  vast  majority  considered  it  a  levelheaded  stand. 

When  the  nineteen-year-old  Marion  Talley  made  her  operatic 
debut  on  February  17,  the  Metropolitan  broke  tradition  by  permitting 
the  installation  of  a  special  news  wire.  For  the  first  time  in  the  history 
of  the  opera  the  clicking  of  a  telegraph  key  mingled  with  coloratura 
arias.  The  wire  was  set  up  in  the  conductors'  room  on  the  stage  level 
across  a  narrow  passage  from  the  wings.  S.  A.  Dawson  wrote  the  story 
of  Miss  Talley's  performance  and  reception.  Ethel  Halsey,  the  first 
woman  reporter  on  the  New  York  staff,  obtained  interviews  with  Mrs. 
Talley  and  later  with  the  young  opera  star. 

Unknown  to  the  glittering  audience  of  4,100  which  jammed  the 
opera  house  and  the  crowd  of  5,000  gathered  outside,  it  was  Charles 
M.  Talley,  the  star's  father,  who  started  the  story  of  the  debut  onto 
the  leased  wires.  A  former  Associated  Press  telegrapher,  he  returned 
to  the  Morse  key  and  tapped  out  the  first  story. 

As  the  news  beginnings  indicated,  it  was  to  be  a  year  of  infinite 


SPEED  AND  PROSPERITY  321 

variety.  "Daddy"  Browning,  fifty-one,  wed  "Peaches"  Heenan,  fifteen, 
and  Germany  elected  General  von  Hindenburg  president.  Swimmers 
conquered  the  English  channel  and  Joseph  Stalin  was  rising  to  power 
in  Soviet  Russia.  President  Coolidge's  father  died  in  Vermont  and  a 
New  York  jury  heard  all  about  the  nude  chorus  girl  in  Earl  Carroll's 
bathtub.  Mabel  Walker  Willebrandt  directed  the  newest  federal  drive 
for  enforcement  of  the  Volstead  Act,  and  the  Charleston  dance  craze 
seemed  likely  to  stay. 

May  produced,  among  a  welter  of  other  things,  the  biggest  story 
from  England  since  World  War  days — the  British  General  Strike. 
Harry  H.  Romer,  of  the  New  York  cable  staff,  happened  to  take  a 
European  vacation  that  spring  and  it  turned  out  to  be  a  busman's  holi- 
day. He  landed  in  England  on  May  3 — the  day  the  first  of  4,000,000 
workers  walked  out — and  within  an  hour  he  was  busy  in  the  London 
office.  The  bureau  chief,  Charles  Stephenson  Smith,  mobilized  a  staff 
of  twenty-five  for  the  emergency  which  turned  Great  Britain  upside 
down,  brought  troops  in  full  field  kit  into  the  streets,  and  put  volunteers 
to  work  manning  the  nation's  vital  services. 

Assigned  to  labor  headquarters,  James  P.  Howe,  the  former  A.E.F. 
war  correspondent,  bought  out  a  little  notions  shop  in  order  to  have 
exclusive  use  of  the  nearest  telephone.  The  small  bewhiskered  shop- 
keeper sat  behind  the  locked  front  door,  waiting  to  pull  the  bolt  and 
admit  Howe  the  moment  he  appeared. 

Bureau  Chief  Smith  and  Frank  King  were  at  No.  10  Downing 
Street  on  May  12  for  the  meeting  between  Prime  Minister  Stanley 
Baldwin  and  the  Council  of  the  Trades  Union  Congress  which  ended 
the  strike.  Bowler  hat  and  notes  in  one  hand  and  the  inevitable  London 
umbrella  in  the  other,  King  won  the  race  to  get  first  word  to  the  wires. 


Before  the  echo  of  the  General  Strike  died,  news  exploded  on 
another  European  front.  Marshal  Josef  Pilsudski  staged  the  swift  coup 
d'etat  which  made  him  undisputed  master  of  Poland,  When  Pilsudski's 
forces  seized  power  on  May  15,  Louis  Lochner  of  Berlin  was  ordered 
to  Warsaw  to  assist  the  residential  correspondent,  Marylla  Chrzanowska, 
who  was  in  the  midst  of  the  fighting  which  accompanied  the  coup. 

Flying  to  the  Polish  frontier,  Lochner  got  a  foretaste  of  the 
difficulties  surrounding  the  story.  Not  only  had  the  strictest  military 
censorship  been  invoked,  but  the  border  itself  was  closed.  Lochner 


322  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

smuggled  himself  across  the  frontier  and  by  various  means  made  his 
way  to  the  Polish  capital,  which  was  swarming  with  Pilsudski's  troops. 
It  was  Sunday,  May  16. 

All  that  day  Lochner  and  Miss  Chrzanowska  pursued  the  grizzled 
old  marshal.  Pilsudski  remained  inaccessible.  Guards  watched  every 
approach  to  his  headquarters.  Soldiers  surrounded  his  car  as  he  hurried 
from  one  place  to  another.  Secret  police  pounced  on  anyone  who  dared 
approach  too  close  to  the  prime  minister's  palace,  another  center  of 
activity. 

By  nightfall  the  palace  had  assumed  greater  importance  than  ever. 
In  spite  of  the  secrecy,  Miss  Chrzanowska  had  ferreted  out  the  news 
that  the  first  meeting  of  the  new  Cabinet  was  in  session,  with  Pilsudski 
presiding.  Lochner  and  the  resident  correspondent  succeeded  in  talking 
their  way  into  the  palace.  There  they  encountered  fresh  obstacles. 
Palace  flunkies  declared  they  were  responsible  with  their  lives  for 
Pilsudski's  safety.  Furthermore,  no  foreigner  could  be  tolerated  in  the 
building.  The  newspaper  pair  found  themselves  back  on  the  street. 

Lochner's  companion  remembered  another  entrance  and  they  tried 
again.  Their  exit  was  hurried  and  unceremonious.  The  supply  of  palace 
doors  had  not  been  exhausted  however.  The  pair  entered  the  third 
time,  the  fourth,  the  fifth,  and  the  sixth,  only  to  be  ejected.  The  guards 
were  becoming  ugly. 

The  two  weary  correspondents  happened  to  encounter  a  director 
of  the  Polish  Telegraphic  Agency  whom  they  knew.  He  offered  to  get 
them  back  into  the  palace — for  the  seventh  time. 

For  two  hours  Lochner  and  Miss  Chrzanowska  sat  in  the  palace 
rotunda.  Presently  there  was  a  commotion.  The  guards  started  disap- 
pearing through  a  swinging  glass  door  leading  to  the  right  wing. 
Pilsudski  must  be  leaving.  The  two  correspondents  dashed  after  the 
guards.  In  a  few  more  seconds  the  opportunity  would  have  been  lost. 

"Please,  Mr.  Marshal,"  Miss  Chrzanowska  was  pleading  in  Polish, 
"don't  refuse  just  one  little  request  by  my  American  colleague." 

"My  dear  lady,"  Pilsudski  said,  "Pm  extremely  tired.  I  want  to 
sleep,  sleep,  and  sleep  again.  For  three  days  I  have  not  been  to  bed." 

He  looked  haggard  and  worn  as  he  stood  there  in  the  loose-fitting 
blue-gray  uniform  of  a  Polish  legionnaire. 

Lochner  spoke  up. 

"But  America  takes  the  liveliest  interest  in  Polish  events  and  is 
anxious  to  know  the  truth." 

"You  must  understand,"  Pilsudski  replied,  "that  I  must  consider 


SPEED  AND  PROSPERITY  323 

what  I  say,  and  in  a  moment  like  this  Pll  either  say  something  stupid 
or  pronounce  an  aphorism.  I'm  a  specialist  in  aphorisms,  you  know. 
Sometimes  I  can  roll  off  aphorisms  one  after  another,  but  today  I'm 
too  tired  even  for  aphorisms." 

Lochner  persisted. 

"May  I  know  for  my  American  readers  whether  you  are  of  the 
opinion  that  stable  conditions  will  now  result  for  Poland  after  your 
coup  d'etat?" 

An  animated  light  came  into  the  dictator's  eyes. 

"Why,  that's  been  the  purpose  of  all  this.  That's  what  I've  been 
working  for  all  this  time — and  I've  accomplished  it.  In  fact,  I'm  quite 
surprised  we  succeeded  so  quickly.  Everything  went  like  a  stroke  of 
lightning." 

It  was  because  of  that  final  phrase  that  the  brief  chat  became  known 
as  the  "lightning  interview." 

"Just  one  final  question,"  urged  Lochner,  walking  briskly  at 
Pilsudski's  side  as  the  marshal  hurried  from  the  palace.  "May  I  say, 
as  coming  from  you,  that  you  consider  the  country  pacified  and  further 
ructions  unlikely?" 

Knitting  his  shaggy  brows  and  snapping  his  jaws,  Pilsudski  an- 
swered with  a  single  English  word. 

"Yes!" 

Telephone  communication  to  points  outside  Poland  was  still  sus- 
pended. There  was  no  doubt  the  censor  would  hold  up  the  story. 
Lochner  left  immediately  for  Germany,  got  across  the  frontier  and 
telephoned  to  Berlin  the  only  statement  Pilsudski  made  for  publication 
in  the  first  five  days  of  the  coup. 

8 

Competing  with  the  London  and  Warsaw  date  lines  were  dozens 
of  top-flight  stories.  Sinclair  Lewis  created  a  domestic  furor  by  refusing 
the  Pulitzer  prize  for  his  novel  Arrowsmith.  The  dirigible  Norge 
reached  Alaska  after  carrying  the  Nobile-Ellsworth-Amundsen  party 
across  the  North  Pole  from  Spitzbergen.  The  Norg^s  flight  gave  the 
co-operative  a  barren  territory  of  some  4,000,000  square  miles  to  watch. 
Aimee  Semple  McPherson,  the  California  evangelist,  announced  that 
she  had  been  kidnaped  and  held  for  ransom  in  Mexico.  Philadelphia 
opened  its  Sesquicentennial  Exposition.  And  in  Morocco  Abd-el-Krim, 
the  Riff  rebel  chieftain,  surrendered  after  his  long,  amazing  war  on  the 
French  and  Spanish  armies. 


324  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

During  these  busy  months  the  service  also  was  developing  stories 
which  could  not  be  classified  as  spontaneous  news,  yet  were  important 
or  unusual  enough  to  command  preferred  positions  in  newspapers. 
Cooper  himself  took  the  lead  in  developing  these  stories,  arranging 
for  a  series  of  notable  interviews.  The  first  was  with  Golfer  Bobby 
Jones.  Of  greater  historical  value,  however,  were  the  extended  interview 
with  Mussolini  and  the  much-discussed  story  on  Calvin  Coolidge. 

White  House  precedent  was  against  an  interview  quoting  the 
President  of  the  United  States  and  Coolidge  at  first  was  against  it. 
Nevertheless,  Cooper  set  to  work. 

Invited  to  lunch  with  the  President,  he  ended  by  spending  the  day. 
He  found  the  so-called  "silent  New  Englander"  engrossing.  He  had 
the  assistance  of  Mrs.  Coolidge  and  the  presidential  adviser,  Frank 
W.  Stearns,  but  it  finally  became  evident  that  the  trio  were  not  making 
much  progress  in  their  attempt  to  show  the  President  he  would  be 
performing  a  service  to  newspaper  readers  generally  by  permitting  an 
extended  interview.  Cooper  pointed  out  that  few  actually  knew  the 
President  of  the  United  States  and  still  Coolidge  smoked  his  cigar  and 
was  adamant.  Cooper  tried  one  last  time. 

"Mr.  President,"  he  smiled,  "do  you  know  that  all  sorts  of  stories 
are  going  the  rounds  about  you — that  they  are  going  the  rounds  because 
people  don't  really  know  you." 

He  glanced  disarmingly  across  at  the  President  and  asked: 

"Would  you  like  to  hear  one  of  the  latest?" 

The  President  hunched  slightly  forward  in  his  chair. 

"Yes,"  he  said. 

"Well,"  Cooper  began,  "they  say  that  a  raw  young  congressman 
called  on  you  and  said:  <Mr.  President,  the  folks  back  home  don't  know 
much  about  my  job  here.  They  think  you  and  I  are  great  buddies,  that 
we  rub  elbows  every  day  and  that  you  call  me  in  for  advice  whenever 
you  have  a  problem  of  any  sort.  Of  course,  that's  not  the  case,  but  it 
would  help  me  no  end  if  I  could  have  some  memento  or  souvenir 
from  you  to  show  them  when  I  go  back  for  the  elections.' 

"So,  Mr.  President,"  Cooper  continued,  "they  say  that  you  asked 
what  he  would  like  and  he  replied:  'I  don't  want  anything  very  valu- 
able, Mr.  President,  just  a  band  off  one  of  your  cigars  would  do.' 

"With  that,  Mr.  President,"  Cooper  concluded,  "the  story  is  that 
you  pulled  out  your  big  box  of  cigars,  carefully  removed  one  of  the 
bands  and  handed  it  to  the  young  congressman.  Then  you  put  the 


SPEED  AND  PROSPERITY  325 

cigar  back  in  the  box  and  put  the  box  away — that  you  didn't  even  give 
him  the  cigar!" 

Coolidge  pondered  and  for  a  fleeting  moment  the  usual  mask  of 
seriousness  appeared  to  drop.  Then  he  was  in  character  again. 

"Well,  Mr.  Cooper,"  he  said,  smiling  faintly,  "that  congressman 
only  asked  for  the  band,  not  for  the  cigar!" 

The  Coolidge  story  appeared  in  the  co-operative's  report  a  short 
time  later,  authored  by  Bruce  Barton  at  the  request  of  Cooper.  It  filled 
five  columns  in  the  New  York  Times,  was  used  in  virtually  every 
member  paper,  and  in  editorial  circles  it  created  a  sensation.  It  gave  the 
country  a  picture  of  the  Coolidge  so  few  knew — his  home  life,  his 
philosophy,  and  the  human  side  of  his  official  character. 


In  the  field  of  spontaneous  news  Florida  produced  one  of  1926*8 
biggest  emergencies.  On  September  18  a  tropical  hurricane  roared  up 
the  east  coast,  smashing  a  score  of  communities. 

The  first  stages  of  the  storm  were  reported  in  dispatches  which 
flowed  northward  to  divisional  headquarters  at  Atlanta.  Then  one  after 
another  the  Florida  wires  began  to  fail.  The  last  bulletins  gave  Atlanta 
an  inkling  of  the  story's  proportions — scores  dead,  hundreds  injured, 
thousands  homeless,  and  vast  property  damage.  The  final  wire  went 
out  as  the  full  force  of  the  hurricane  struck.  At  Atlanta  the  south  circuits 
were  silent. 

As  the  hurricane  slashed  through  Florida,  staffers  were  already 
pushing  their  way  into  its  wake  to  get  the  news.  In  the  state  and  outside 
its  borders,  the  association  threw  every  available  resource  into  the 
breach.  At  the  first  warning,  Chief  of  Bureau  O.  S.  Morton  at  Jackson- 
ville ordered  men  at  once  into  the  region  and  Atlanta  started  additional 
reinforcements  by  airplane,  train,  and  automobile.  Traffic  Department 
crews  tackled  the  complicated  task  of  restoring  shattered  wire  facilities. 
No  one  knew  what  had  happened  to  Correspondent  Mitchell  at  Miami. 

Mitchell  was  all  right,  struggling  to  get  out  his  story.  When  the 
hurricane  tore  out  the  last  wire  to  Miami  on  that  disastrous  Saturday, 
he  and  telegrapher  Howard  Switzer  braved  the  storm  to  search  for 
an  automobile  to  carry  them  north.  Luckily  they  secured  a  truck,  and 
Reese  T.  Amis,  telegraph  editor  of  the  Miami  Daily  Newsy  joined  them 
as  they  set  out. 

Progress  was  slow  over  the  flooded,  debris-littered  roads.  Rain- 


326  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

whipped  darkness  added  to  their  difficulties.  Many  times  the  truck  was 
forced  to  leave  the  highway  and  crawl  through  fields  or  woods.  Water 
sloshed  over  the  running  boards.  Each  hamlet  they  passed  showed 
increasingly  greater  damage.  Pressing  doggedly  on  past  Hollywood, 
the  party  found  the  highway  blocked  by  a  barricade  of  trees  snarled 
with  telephone  and  telegraph  wires.  The  truck  mired  down  at  midnight 
in  a  ditch  six  miles  from  Fort  Lauderdale  and  the  trio  struck  out  on  foot 
in  the  heavy  rain. 

While  Mitchell,  Switzer,  and  Amis  were  trying  to  get  north  from 
Miami,  R.  S.  Pickens  and  M.  B.  Alexander  of  the  Atlanta  staff  were 
flying  south  through  the  turbulent  edges  of  the  storm.  Their  goal  was 
Miami  and  they  made  a  pact  to  stay  with  the  plane  "till  she  crashes." 

Alexander  never  forgot  the  wild  ride. 

"Through  crosscurrents,  air  pockets,  and  up  and  over  storms'  edges 
we  went  until  the  big  one  near  Lake  City,  Florida,"  he  related.  "There 
in  a  semicircle  ahead  was  the  blackest  cloud  we  ever  saw.  White  streaks 
of  wind-driven  rain  were  illuminated  by  vivid  flashes  of  lightning  and 
suddenly  the  little  plane  quivered,  dipped,  dropped,  and  then  under 
the  pilot's  masterful  handling  righted  herself  and  climbed.  We  fought 
varying  degrees  of  tropical  hurricane  for  over  two  hours  and  finally 
won  out  when  the  wind  changed  and  headed  for  Pensacola  to  continue 
its  work  of  destruction." 

The  daredevil  pilot  brought  the  ship  down  in  a  water-covered 
pasture  bordering  a  swamp.  The  men  waded  to  a  highway  and  pushed 
on  to  Miami.  They  found  streets  blocked  by  trees,  fallen  timbers,  and 
ruined  homes.  The  stench  of  dead  fish  made  the  air  nauseous.  Searching 
parties  looked  for  bodies.  There  was  no  safe  drinking  water  and  the 
food  was  impossible. 

Miami  was  merely  part  of  the  story.  At  Moore  Haven  alone  no 
had  been  killed.  Stephen  Early,  who  had  been  sent  from  Washington, 
and  A.  R.  Bird,  correspondents  at  Orlando,  worked  toward  the  wrecked 
community  from  different  directions. 

After  many  detours,  Early's  automobile  got  within  five  miles  of  the 
town,  and  there  the  road  vanished  under  water.  He  drove  on  cautiously 
through  the  black,  stinking  liquid  that  concealed  the  highway.  The  posts 
near  the  road  edges  were  the  only  guides  to  keep  the  car  from  plunging 
into  the  drainage  ditches  along  the  sides.  The  engine  finally  quit  and 
the  reporter  found  a  truck,  which  eventually  splashed  its  way  into  town. 

The  return  trip  was  a  nightmare.  A  mile  after  the  start,  the  truck 
swamped  and  there  was  no  choice  but  to  wade  through  the  dark  to 


SPEED  AND  PROSPERITY  327 

higher  ground.  Early  thought  of  saving  his  already  bedraggled  clothes. 
Before  plunging  from  the  truck,  he  bundled  them  up,  and  stood  there 
in  shirtail  and  underwear.  The  truckman  handed  him  creosote  and 
coal  oil  to  smear  on  as  protection  against  insects  and  the  foul  water. 
Not  long  after  Early  left  the  truck  he  lost  the  clothes  he  thought  of 
saving.  For  four  miles  he  labored  through  surging  waters  and  finally 
reached  the  automobile  he  had  abandoned  hours  earlier.  The  balky 
engine  started  and  Early  drove  back  to  Sebring  where  wire  facilities 
were  being  restored. 

All  that  week  the  staff  worked  to  bring  the  nation  the  news  of  a 
disaster  which  took  372  lives,  injured  6,281,  and  left  17,884  families 
homeless. 


II.  PICTURES  ARE  NEWS 


THE  co-operative  could  no  longer  ignore  the  fact  that  spot  news 
represented  only  a  part  of  the  content  of  the  modern  newspaper. 
Features  and  spot-news  pictures  were  important.  If  the  association 
expanded  the  scope  of  operations  to  include  supplemental  services  in 
these  auxiliary  .fields,  its  value  to  member  papers  would  be  greatly 
increased. 

In  both  prewar  and  postwar  newspapers,  extensive  use  of  feature 
material  marked  a  definite  journalistic  trend.  Editors  had  come  to  the 
conclusion  that  it  was  no  longer  enough  for  newspapers  to  be  informa- 
tive. They  must  entertain  and  divert  as  well.  At  first  only  the  larger 
publications  had  money  and  facilities  for  experimenting,  and  they  did 
most  of  the  pioneer  work.  The  development  of  feature  syndicates  was 
a  logical  sequel.  One  of  the  earliest,  in  the  modern  sense  of  the  word, 
was  organized  by  George  Matthew  Adams  in  1912  at  the  suggestion 
of  Victor  Lawson,  and  a  mushroom  growth  in  the  field  followed.  By 
the  mid-twenties  commercial  companies  were  supplying  papers  generally 
with  budgets  ranging  from  comic  strips  and  popular  fiction  to  picture 
matrices  and  personalized  columns  of  comment  by  leading  writers. 
With  a  large  clientele,  the  syndicates,  for  a  given  price,  could  supply 
subscribers  with  quantities  of  feature  material  which  no  average  paper 
could  duplicate. 

A  goodly  portion  of  the  budgets  furnished  by  these  commercial 
syndicates  duplicated  in  subject  matter,  although  not  in  treatment,  the 
material  carried  in  the  co-operative's  General  Mail  Service,  which  for 
years  had  been  sent  to  members  as  a  supplement  to  the  wire  report. 
There  was  this  difference,  however.  Instead  of  appearing  on  dreary 
mimeographed  paper,  the  commercial  features  were  presented  on  neatly 
printed  proof  sheets  with  headlines  already  written.  And  most  im- 
portant, the  features  were  accompanied  by  attractive  pictures,  line  draw- 
ings, or  layouts,  all  designed  to  make  them  as  visually  pleasing  as 
possible. 

This  illustrated  material  was  popular  from  the  start.  The  syndicates 
were  profit-making  ventures,  and  the  greater  the  margin  of  profit  the 

328 


PICTURES  ARE  NEWS  329 

more  satisfactory  the  business.  There  was  no  rigid  rule  of  thumb 
governing  the  prices  charged  for  budgets.  Some  salesmen,  working  on 
commission,  often  charged  any  price  they  could  get.  When  any  feature 
became  valuable  to  a  paper,  prices  were  frequently  raised  and  a  publisher 
had  the  choice  either  of  losing  a  circulation-getting  attraction  or  of 
paying  more  money. 

As  these  practices  grew,  members  who  had  been  victimized  began 
to  wonder  if  their  co-operative  could  not  enter  the  feature  field  in  a 
thoroughgoing  way  and  produce  just  as  good  a  budget  on  a  non-profit 
basis.  If  this  could  be  done,  they  realized,  it  would  give  them  good 
supplemental  material  at  actual  cost  and  would  protect  them  against 
arbitrary  withdrawals  of  features  once  they  had  been  established. 
Strangely  enough,  however,  they  did  not  seem  to  recognize  that  in 
the  General  Mail  Service  the  association  possessed  the  complete  ground- 
work for  an  efficient  feature  department.  All  that  was  lacking  was  the 
vision,  initiative,  and  the  modernizing  touch  to  effect  the  transformation. 


Cooper,  as  an  assistant  general  manager,  saw  the  great  possibilities. 
But  he  knew  that  the  association  at  that  time  had  not  sufficiently  adjusted 
itself  to  postwar  conditions  to  develop  the  plan.  He  stopped  in  at  the 
Chicago  Bureau  one  day  during  the  course  of  an  inspection  trip.  A 
young  editor  was  busy  preparing  an  issue  of  the  General  Mail  Service. 
Looking  over  his  shoulder,  Cooper  saw  the  stacks  of  mimeographed 
copy  paper. 

"Looks  pretty  dull,  doesn't  it?"  he  commented. 

The  editor  shrugged.  Single-spaced  typewriting,  mimeographed  on 
coarse  paper  did  not,  after  all,  make  an  exciting  appearance. 

Cooper  examined  several  sheets  and  dropped  them  back  on  the 
desk. 

"Well,"  he  said  with  characteristic  directness,  "what  would  you 
think  of  illustrating  it?" 

"I'd  think  very  well  of  it." 

The  assistant  general  manager  ventured  a  prediction. 

"Before  long  you  will  be  doing  it." 

Shortly  after  this  incident  Cooper  became  general  manager,  pressed 
the  matter  with  the  board,  and  was  directed  to  proceed.  One  of  his  first 
steps  was  to  bring  the  mail  editor  from  Chicago  to  organize  the  Feature 
Department.  The  young  man  was  Lloyd  Stratton,  a  Kansan  who  had 


330  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

joined  the  service  in  1920.  His  earlier  newspaper  experience  had  been 
in  the  Middle  West  except  for  a  wartime  interlude  in  France  where 
he  drove  an  ambulance  until  it  was  hit  by  a  shell,  sending  driver  and 
wounded  alike  to  the  hospital. 

The  first  Feature  Service  release  —  printed  proof  sheets  and  matted 
illustrations  —  was  mailed  to  1228  members  without  assessment.  The 
package  contained  a  letter  from  the  general  manager,  explaining  the 
plan  on  which  the  service  would  operate  and  the  assessment  base  for 
its  financing.  The  assessments  were  nominal  as  compared  with  the 
prices  of  commercial  syndicates,  which  ran  to  many  dollars  a  week 
in  some  cases.  The  maximum  assessment  for  the  proof  -sheets  was 
fixed  at  $6  a  week  for  papers  published  in  areas  of  more  than  100,000 
population.  From  the  maximum,  the  charge  scaled  down  to  $i  a 
week  for  papers  in  cities  of  less  than  20,OOO.  The  assessment  for 
mats  of  illustrations,  an  optional  part  of  the  service,  was  eventually 
fixed  at  $3.50  weekly  for  all. 

Editors  on  member  papers  opened  the  package  containing  the  first 
release  and  promises  of  support  poured  in  to  the  general  offices.  Of 
the  entire  membership,  only  78  papers  declined  to  participate. 


Like  the  history  of  news  gathering,  the  development  of  pictorial 
journalism  had  its  own  story.  Benjamin  Franklin  made  the  first  attempt 
to  provide  illustrations  with  reading  matter  when  he  printed  his  famous 
cartoon  in  the  Pennsylvania  Gazette  in  1754.  War  with  France  was 
rumored,  and  to  heighten  the  effect  of  his  editorial  appeal  for  a  united 
common  defense  Franklin  inserted  a  cartoon  showing  a  snake  cut  into 
eight  parts.  The  parts  represented  the  various  colonies  and  the  caption, 
"Join  or  Die,"  dramatized  the  need  of  the  moment. 

The  value  of  the  cartoon  impressed  other  colonial  editors  and  they 
copied  the  idea,  using  Franklin's  snake  with  variations.  When  the 
Boston  Massacre  occurred  in  1770  Paul  Revere  made  an  engraving  of 
five  coffins  to  illustrate  the  Boston  Gazette?*  account  of  the  funerals  for 
the  victims. 

Since  the  first  cartoon  was  employed  to  reinforce  editorial  opinion, 
it  was  perhaps  natural  that  editors  came  to  look  upon  such  illustrations 
solely  as  an  editorial  medium.  On  a  few  occasions  they  purported  to 
represent  a  news  event,  though  the  emphasis  was  always  on  editorial 
connotations. 


PICTURES  ARE  NEWS  331 

James  Gordon  Bennett  was  probably  the  first  to  use  a  real  news 
illustration.  In  1835  he  published  a  picture  of  the  old  Merchants' 
Exchange  which  had  burned  down  in  the  great  fire  of  that  year. 
Mechanical  difficulties  with  the  presses  of  the  day  made  for  poor, 
smudgy  reproduction  and  often  the  identity  of  the  rough  illustrations 
could  be  determined  only  by  reference  to  the  printed  caption.  Indeed, 
when  the  Herald  appeared  with  a  supposed  drawing  of  General  Jack- 
son's funeral,  in  1845,  rival  papers  pounced  on  Bennett,  charging  that 
the  same  engraving  already  had  done  duty  as  an  illustration  for  Queen 
Victoria's  coronation,  the  funeral  of  General  William  Henry  Harrison, 
and  the  Croton  Water  Celebration. 

While  Bennett's  efforts  may  have  been  worthy  of  some  note,  the 
real  pioneering  work  in  depicting  spot  news  occurrences  was  not  a  news- 
paper enterprise.  The  credit  belonged  to  Nathaniel  Currier.  As  a  boy  of 
fifteen  he  began  his  apprenticeship  with  a  Boston  firm  of  lithographers 
in  1828,  the  same  year  Hale  and  Hallock  were  making  news-gathering 
history  in  Manhattan.  Currier  came  to  New  York  and  set  up  a  small 
shop  in  Printing  House  Square,  the  journalistic  heart  of  the  city.  The 
newspaper  atmosphere  had  its  influence  and  when  the  steamboat  Lex- 
ington burned  with  heavy  loss  of  life  on  Long  Island  Sound  in  1 840, 
Currier  tried  an  experiment.  A  theatrically  graphic  picture  of  the 
disaster  was  drawn  and  three  days  later  Currier  had  prints  for  sale 
on  the  streets.  They  were  snatched  up  eagerly. 

The  1840  steamboat  disaster  decided  the  future  of  the  Currier 
lithographing  establishment.  Illustrations  of  spot  news  became  its 
specialty.  Currier  recruited  a  staff  of  artists  who  rushed  to  the  scene 
of  any  news  event  in  the  vicinity,  sketched  the  general  details,  and 
afterward  completed  the  more  careful  drawings  from  which  the  litho- 
graphs were  made. 

Currier  was  joined  by  James  Merritt  Ives  and  the  firm's  name 
became  Currier  &  Ives.  For  the  next  three  decades  they  flourished  as 
printmakers  to  the  American  public.  Pictures  were  sold  by  direct  mail, 
by  representatives  in  the  principal  cities,  and  by  peddlers  who  hawked 
them  through  the  streets.  Prices  ranged  from  6  cents  for  a  small  print 
to  $4  for  a  large  picture  in  full  color.  Prints  on  spot-news  events  were 
usually  available  in  New  York  a  day  or  two  after  the  news  appeared 
in  the  papers.  The  success  of  the  firm  gave  unmistakable  proof  of  the 
great  popular  appeal  of  pictorial  reporting. 

Even  before  young  Currier  began  issuing  his  dramatic  news-picture 
prints,  Daguerre's  experiments  in  photography  had  produced  the  first 


332  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

unheralded  examples  of  the  pictorial  reporting  process  which  ultimately 
exerted  such  a  profound  effect  on  the  concept  of  complete  news  pres- 
entation. Although  Samuel  Morse  and  a  few  others  later  became 
interested,  the  possibilities  Daguerre  opened  up  were  not  apparent  when 
the  Frenchman  announced  his  discovery  in  1838.  By  the  time  of  the 
Mexican  War  in  1 846,  however,  photography  had  advanced  sufficiently 
to  produce  the  first  actual  pictures  of  a  major  news  story.  Although  the 
few  daguerreotypes  taken  of  American  staff  officers  and  troops  had  no 
particular  spot-news  value,  they  were  part  of  the  history  of  pictorial 
reporting. 

So  few  people  saw  the  Mexican  War  daguerreotypes  that  they 
made  little  impression  on  the  journalistic  consciousness  of  the  day.  The 
accepted  pictorial  record  of  the  war  was  a  series  of  illustrations  prepared 
at  the  direction  of  George  Wilkins  Kendall,  the  only  reporter  to 
accompany  the  American  Army. 


The  undeniable  popularity  of  news  illustrations  encouraged  the 
appearance  of  illustrated  weeklies  in  the  next  decade.  Frank  Leslie's 
Illustrated  Newspaper  was  founded  in  1855  and  Harper's  Weekly 
entered  the  field  as  a  competitor  in  1857.  The  weeklies  covered  a  wide 
range  of  subjects — "current  events  of  interest  and  importance,  art  and 
story  illustrations,  portraiture,  the  humor  and  comedy  of  social  life, 
and  foreign  and  domestic  politics."  The  illustrations  were  all  line 
drawings,  and  both  publications  maintained  large  staffs  of  artists  and 
wood  engravers. 

When  the  Civil  War  came,  the  artists  of  the  illustrated  weeklies 
did  the  pictorial  reporting  for  the  country  at  large.  Their  "on  the  spot" 
sketches  were  scanned  almost  as  eagerly  as  newspaper  dispatches,  and 
army  officials  regarded  the  artists  as  an  integral  part  of  the  press  corps. 
The  weeklies  continued  to  be  the  sole  publications  which  attempted  to 
provide  news  pictures.  The  only  initiative  demonstrated  by  newspapers 
was  in  presenting  maps  of  major  battles  and  campaigns.  One  wood 
engraver  on  the  New  York  Herald  was  considered  phenomenal  because 
he  was  able  to  turn  out  a  half-page  war  map  in  twenty-four  hours,  but 
sometimes  as  many  as  twenty  men  worked  on  a  single  map  to  complete 
the  engraving  in  half  the  time.  Cartoons  disappeared  almost  entirely 
during  the  Civil  War  and  were  not  restored  generally  as  a  regular 
feature  until  the  New  York  World  revived  the  idea  in  the  i88o's. 


PICTURES  ARE  NEWS  333 

The  most  important  single  event  of  the  war  years  was  the  per- 
formance of  photography  as  a  vital  medium  for  recording  news.  The 
work  of  Matthew  B.  Brady  in  compiling  a  photographic  history  of  the 
conflict  remains  one  of  the  greatest  achievements  in  the  annals  of 
photography.  Although  these  photographs  made  a  vivid  record  for 
posterity,  the  pictures  had  comparatively  small  circulation  at  the  time. 
Very  much  as  Currier  &  Ives  lithographs  had  been  sold  to  supplement 
the  current  news,  prints  and  stereographs  made  from  the  Brady 
negatives  were  offered  for  sale  to  the  general  public. 

Newspapers  generally  continued  to  regard  illustrated  news  as 
something  alien  to  their  activities.  However,  the  New  York  Daily 
Graphic,  the  first  American  daily  to  use  illustrations  regularly,  appeared 
in  1873.  The  paper's  existence  was  bedeviled  by  mechanical  and  financial 
difficulties  arising  from  printing  problems.  Illustrations  were  black-and- 
white  line  drawings  exclusively,  for  no  practical  process  had  been 
discovered  to  make  possible  reproduction  of  the  intermediate  tones 
found  in  photographs. 

Stephen  H.  Horgan,  a  photographer  in  charge  of  the  Graphic's 
engraving  and  mechanical  equipment,  made  the  experiments  which  led 
to  the  appearance  of  the  first  halftone  photograph  in  an  American 
newspaper.  The  Graphic  printed  the  picture  on  March  14,  1880,  but 
Horgan's  successful  employment  of  the  screen  process  failed  to  clear 
the  way  for  regular  use  of  pictures  generally. 

When  Joseph  Pulitzer  acquired  the  New  York  World  in  1883 
he  transplanted  the  illustrated  weekly  technique  to  daily  journalism. 
He  engaged  two  artists  and  they  depicted  the  day's  important  news  in 
drawings.  The  pictorial  departure  had  a  magic  effect  on  the  World's 
circulation,  but  Pulitzer  feared  large  use  of  pictures  tended  to  lower 
the  paper's  dignity  and  he  ordered  the  woodcuts  gradually  eliminated. 
The  order  was  rescinded  quickly  when  circulation  declined  propor- 
tionately. 

The  effect  of  Pulitzer's  experiment  attracted  attention  and  other 
large  papers  imitated  his  methods.  Stone  borrowed  a  member  of  the 
World's  mechanical  force  to  help  him  introduce  the  idea  in  the  Chicago 
Daily  News.  Victor  Lawson  saw  a  great  future  for  such  a  news  medium, 
but  Stone  was  skeptical. 

"Newspaper  pictures  are  just  a  temporary  fad,"  he  remarked,  "but 
we're  going  to  get  the  benefit  of  the  fad  while  it  lasts." 

The  fad  was  far  from  temporary  and  before  long  many  papers 
were  printing  black-and-white  line  drawings  of  important  events.  Pho- 


334  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

tography  meanwhile  had  made  tremendous  strides  and  by  the  end  of 
the  eighties  action  pictures  were  an  established  reality.  Various  difficul- 
ties, however,  continued  to  delay  the  wide  employment  of  the  halftone 
process. 

5 

In  theory  there  was  little  difference  between  the  collection  and 
distribution  of  news  pictures  and  the  collection  and  distribution  of 
written  news  dispatches.  The  AP  was  in  a  position  to  gather  news  pic- 
tures as  well  as  news,  but  the  membership  as  a  whole  showed  no  great 
interest  at  first.  The  prevailing  opinion  seemed  to  be  that  news  pictures, 
for  some  obscure  reason,  did  not  represent  a  proper  field  for  the  co- 
operative. Many  publishers  held  to  this  view,  even  though  they  felt 
that  news  pictures  were  a  necessity  for  their  papers. 

When  a  News  Photo  Service  was  first  suggested  at  an  annual 
meeting  it  was  decisively  voted  down.  The  agitation  continued.  Most 
larger  papers  were  indifferent,  for  they  already  had  their  own  picture 
arrangements,  but  the  smaller  papers  needed  some  sort  of  service. 
Commercial  picture  syndicates  had  entered  the  field  and  the  news- 
picture  situation  had  become  similar  to  that  governing  the  operations 
of  the  commercial  feature  syndicates.  Prices  were  high  and  the  attitude 
of  the  syndicates  frequently  was  one  of  arrogance  and  independence. 

Cooper  wanted  to  extend  the  work  of  the  co-operative  to  pictorial 
reporting.  He  saw  that  the  news  photo  had  scarcely  begun  to  come  into 
its  own  and  he  was  convinced  that  there  had  been  a  change  in  the 
majority  opinion  that  pictures  were  not  properly  a  press  association 
concern.  More  than  anything  else,  he  wanted  to  extend  the  non-profit 
co-operative  principle  into  this  increasingly  important  phase  of  news 
gathering. 

"It  is  my  feeling/7  he  told  the  Board  of  Directors  in  1926,  "that 
The  Associated  Press  should  do  anything  that  is  a  proper  news  activity 
— whether  it  be  in  pictures  or  in  written  news." 

Nor  was  that  all.  He  added: 

"I  visualize  the  day  when  we  will  be  sending  pictures  over  our 
own  leased  wire  system,  just  as  we  now  send  the  news." 

That  seemed  much  too  visionary  at  the  time,  but  the  board  agreed 
that  a  mail  News  Photo  Service  should  be  established.  President  Noyes 
saw  the  possibilities. 

"We  are  going  to  recognize  frankly,"  he  said,  "that  the  whole 
trend  in  newspaper  work  is  toward  making  the  picture  a  news  medium. 


PICTURES  ARE  NEWS  335 

There  will  be  developments  all  along  and  we  ought  to  be  prepared  to 
meet  them." 

It  was  with  this  view  that  the  management  approached  the  task 
of  building  up  the  AP  News  Photo  Service  as  an  integral  part  of  the 
co-operative's  broadened  news-gathering  activities. 


III.  LINDBERGH  APPEARS 


THE  News  pattern  was  spoiling  for  a  change.  Crime,  scandal,  and 
ballyhoo  had  been  writing  a  lopsided  amount  of  top  news  of  the 
twenties. 

The  spring  of  1927  produced  one  forceful  demonstration  of  this 
popular  preference  in  news.  It  was  a  story  which  came  out  of  Paris — a 
story  that  in  itself  had  a  most  unusual  background  and  was  destined  to 
go  down  in  any  serious  history  of  the  times. 

Smith  Reavis,  a  member  of  the  Paris  staff,  had  a  note  on  his 
datebook  showing  that  April  6,  1927,  was  the  tenth  anniversary  of 
America's  entry  into  the  World  War.  In  charge  of  the  news  desk,  it 
was  his  job  to  plan  the  daily  report  from  the  French  capital.  He  noted 
the  penciled  memo  a  few  days  in  advance  and  decided  to  try  for  a 
message  of  peace  from  Foreign  Minister  Aristide  Briand  for  relay  to 
member  papers  in  the  United  States. 

He  sought  out  the  foreign  minister  and  outlined  his  conception 
of  the  sort  of  message  that  should  appeal  to  the  public  of  America.  M. 
Briand  listened  and  at  length  promised  to  prepare  something. 

Sitting  at  his  desk  on  the  morning  of  April  6,  Reavis  found  the 
promised  statement  in  his  mail.  He  hurriedly  scanned  the  message  and 
came  upon  this  significant  paragraph: 

"If  there  were  need  of  it  between  the  two  great  democracies 
[France  and  the  United  States]  in  order  to  give  high  testimony  of 
their  desire  for  peace  and  to  furnish  a  solemn  example  to  other  peoples, 
France  would  be  willing  to  enter  into  an  engagement  with  America 
mutually  outlawing  war,  to  use  your  [Reavis's]  way  of  expressing  it." 

The  dispatch  Reavis  wrote  that  day  was  credited  with  laying  the 
groundwork  for  the  famous  Kellogg-Briand  Pact  to  outlaw  war.  But 
so  preoccupied  was  the  country  that  the  story  was  little  more  than  a 
lost  chord  in  the  whole  blatant  symphony  of  national  interest.  It  found 
its  way  into  State  Department  files,  however,  and  months  later  Presi- 
dent Coolidge  started  a  series  of  representations  which  quickly  developed 
the  idea  of  a  world-embracing  peace  treaty. 

Though  time  proved  it  just  another  scrap  of  paper,  virtually  every 

336 


LINDBERGH  APPEARS  337 

civilized  nation  signed  the  pact  that  was  evolved.  Secretary  of  State 
Kellogg  received  the  Nobel  peace  prize  and  the  French  government, 
in  a  book  outlining  the  background  of  the  treaty,  officially  gave  the  AP 
correspondent  credit  for  the  idea. 

Reavis's  story  was  big  news,  but  at  the  time  many  people  were 
reading  about  something  else. 

That  "something  else"  was  the  sordid  drama  of  the  Snyder-Gray 
murder  case — a  crime  which  received  greater  space  and  display  in 
American  newspapers  than  the  sinking  of  the  Titanic.  Hordes  of 
curiosity  seekers  descended  on  Long  Island  City  for  the  trial,  and 
"special"  writers  turned  the  court  proceedings  into  a  Roman  holiday. 
In  this  hippodrome  atmosphere  the  co-operative's  responsibility  was  to 
report  the  case  as  completely  as  its  news  value  warranted  and  yet 
preserve  the  proper  balance  of  decency.  Brian  Bell's  handling  of  the 
trial,  in  which  so  much  testimony  was  unprintable,  brought  praise  from 
thinking  editors. 


The  Snyder-Gray  trial  ended  on  May  9,  but  the  news  spotlight 
remained  focused  on  Long  Island.  At  Roosevelt  Field  two  planes  were 
awaiting  favorable  weather  to  take  off  in  quest  of  the  $25,000  prize 
which  Raymond  Orteig  had  offered  back  in  1919  for  the  first  non-stop 
flight  between  New  York  and  Paris.  There  was  the  America  with 
Lieutenant  Commander  Richard  E.  Byrd  and  an  expert  crew.  There 
was  also  the  Columbia  piloted  by  Clarence  Chamberlin  and  Lloyd 
Bertaud. 

Another  story  in  the  making,  but  no  one  seemed  particularly 
excited  about  it. 

Then  suddenly  things  changed.  On  May  1 2  the  Spirit  of  St.  Louis 
flew  in  unheralded  from  the  Pacific  Coast.  Charles  A.  Lindbergh  was  at 
the  controls.  No  one  had  ever  heard  of  him,  his  chances  seemed  slim, 
but  there  was  something  about  him  that  captured  the  imagination  of 
a  public  wearied  by  the  tawdry  series  of  sensations  of  recent  years. 
Almost  overnight  he  became  the  symbol  of  something  new. 

From  that  point  on  the  story  was  "made."  The  uncertainty  as  to 
which  plane  would  be  the  first  to  take  off  whetted  popular  interest. 
There  was  the  spice  of  great  danger.  The  French  aces,  Nungesser  and 
Coli,  had  been  lost  on  a  Paris-New  York  flight  for  the  Orteig  prize. 
There  was  high  adventure.  And  there  was  Lindbergh. 

Bell  and  James  MacDonald  kept  the  vigil  at  Roosevelt  Field. 


338  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

There  were  days  of  rumors  and  reports,  but  weather  conditions  kept 
delaying  the  starts  and  heightening  the  suspense* 

At  dawn  on  May  20,  Lindbergh  glanced  apprehensively  at  the 
water-splotched  runway  and  studied  the  weather  reports.  Rain  had  been 
falling  and  there  was  a  murky  sky.  It  seemed  a  poor  day  to  start,  but 
reports  said  the  unfavorable  weather  was  only  local  in  character.  The 
flier  was  not  long  in  making  up  his  mind. 

"This  is  the  day,"  he  said. 

Five  hundred  people  had  waited  through  the  night  on  the  chance 
that  one  flier  or  another  might  take  off.  MacDonald  and  Bell  were  at 
Lindbergh's  elbow  as  the  tall  flier  prepared  to  climb  into  the  cockpit. 
Commander  Byrd  arrived  to  wish  his  rival  well. 

"Good  luck  to  you,  old  man,"  Byrd  said.  "I'll  see  you  in  Paris." 

The  crowd  milled  round. 

"Are  you  only  taking  five  sandwiches?"  someone  asked. 

"Yes,"  smiled  the  flier.  "That's  enough.  If  I  get  to  Paris  I  won't 
need  any  more,  and  if  I  don't  get  to  Paris  I  won't  need  any  more, 
either." 

At  7:52  A.M.  Lindbergh  lifted  the  Spirit  of  St.  Louis  into  the  air. 
In  a  hangar  near  the  end  of  the  runway  Bell  dictated  the  flash  which 
went  out  over  the  wire.  For  tense  seconds  the  fate  of  the  flight  hung 
in  the  balance.  The  plane,  loaded  with  458  gallons  of  gasoline,  rose 
sluggishly,  fighting  for  altitude.  The  crowd  waited  to  see  if  the  ship 
would  be  able  to  clear  the  string  of  telegraph  wires  which  skirted  the 
far  edge  of  the  field.  Then  there  was  a  gasp  of  relief. 

Bell  stood  beside  his  special  wire  describing  the  beginning  of  the 

flight: 

BULLETIN  E.O.S  NEW  LEAD 

ROOSEVELT  FIELD,  NEW  YORK,  MAY  20,  AP  -  CHARLES 
A.  LINDBERGH  COMMA  QUOTE  CAPTAIN  UNQUOTE  TO 
THE  MISSOURI  NATIONAL  GUARD  COMMA  BUT  QUOTE 
SLIM  UNQUOTE  TO  HIS  BUDDIES  COMMA  SET  OUT  TO 
DAY  ON  AN  UNMARKED  AIR  TRAIL  FOR  PARIS  PERIOD. 

MacDonald  kept  feeding  Bell  additional  information.  The  dicta- 
tion continued: 

ADD  NEW  LEAD  LINDY 

THE  MISSOURIAN  COMMA  WHO  PLAYS  A  LONE 
HAND  COMMA  HAD  NO  ONE  TO  SHOW  HIM  THE  WAY  AS 
HE  HURLED  HIS  RYAN  MONOPLANE  COMMA  THE  SPIRIT 
OF  ST.  LOUIS  COMMA  INTO  THE  MUGGY  AIR  OVER 
ROOSEVELT  FIELD  A  FEW  MINUTES  BEFORE  EIGHT 
O'CLOCK  THIS  MORNING  EASTERN  DAYLIGHT  TIME 
PERIOD . 


LINDBERGH  APPEARS  339 

MacDonald  shouted: 

"He's  cleared  the  trees  and  is  disappearing  into  the  northeast!" 
BelPs  story  flowed  on. 

ADD  NEW  LEAD  LINDY 

AT  THE  VERY  LAST  COMMA  HIS  PLANE  COMMA 
WEIGHTED  BY  A  LOAD  OF  FIVE  COMMA  NAUGHT  FIVE 
FIVE  POUNDS  COMMA  BARELY  CLEARED  A  STRING  OF 
TELEGRAPH  WIRES  PERIOD  A  FEW  SECONDS  BEFORE  IT 
HAD  ALMOST  STRUCK  A  ROAD  SCRAPER  AS  HE  WAS 
ATTEMPTING  TO  GET  IT  OFF  THE  GROUND  PERIOD 
PARAGRAPH  THREE  TIMES  COMMA  THE  PLANE  STRUCK 
ROUGH  SPOTS  AND  BOUNCED  INTO  THE  AIR  COMMA 
ALWAYS  COMING  BACK  TO  EARTH  AND  FINALLY 
STRAIGHTENING  OUT  PERIOD. 

After  7:52  that  morning  Lindbergh  was  the  only  news  the  nation 
wanted.  The  whole  country  was  gripped  by  a  common  emotion. 

In  the  New  York  office  George  Turner,  the  city  editor,  working 
with  W.  W.  Chaplin,  logged  the  flight  on  a  chart  designed  to  show 
hour  by  hour  the  plane's  position  if  it  kept  to  its  course.  Boston  reported 
the  first  stages  of  Lindbergh's  progress  as  he  headed  north  through 
New  England,  and  then  The  Canadian  Press  followed  him  up  the 
coast  until  he  passed  Newfoundland  and  headed  out  to  sea. 

The  world  waited  in  vain  that  night  for  some  further  word.  In 
the  Yankee  Stadium  forty  thousand  boxing  fans  at  the  Sharkey-Maloney 
fight  rose  in  silence  when  Joe  Humphreys,  the  veteran  announcer, 
asked  prayers  for  Lindbergh. 

A  few  hours  later  in  the  New  York  office  Tom  O'Neil,  the  early 
report  editor,  was  casting  about  for  some  fresh,  vivid  phrase  that  would 
do  justice  to  the  flier  who  was  somewhere  out  over  the  sea.  Finally  a 
thought  came  to  him  and  he  typed  out  the  words:  ".  .  .  the  Lone 
Eagle." 

The  second  day  wore  on  toward  noon.  Along  the  coast  of  Ireland 
at  thirty-six  strategic  points  correspondents  watched  for  the  high-wing 
monoplane  bearing  the  license  markings  NX-2H.  Each  man  was 
instructed  to  telephone  London  as  soon  as  he  sighted  and  positively 
identified  the  Spirit  of  St.  Louis.  The  precautions  proved  worth  while. 
When  Lindbergh  made  landfall  at  Dingle  Bay,  County  Kerry,  Stephen 
Williamson  called  London,  and  within  minutes  after  the  plane  had 
been  sighted  the  leased  wire  network  in  the  United  States  hummed  with 
the  flash  that  Lindbergh  was  over  Ireland. 

The  bulletins  came  faster  after  the  Spirit  of  St.  Louis  passed  over 
Dingle  Bay. 


34O  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Lindbergh  flying  high  over  Plymouth,  England  .  .  .  Lindbergh 
makes  French  coast  at  Bayeux  .  .  .  Lindbergh  reported  passing  Cher- 
bourg .  .  . 

Then: 

P-L-A-S-H 

PARIS  -  LINDBERGH  LANDED  5:21  P.M. 


For  Paris  the  Lindbergh  story  had  begun  days  before  the  flier 
hopped  off  from  Roosevelt  Field,  but  most  of  the  background  never 
found  its  way  into  print.  The  loss  of  Nungesser  and  Coli  on  their 
Paris-New  York  flight  on  May  9  had  shocked  the  French  people.  As 
hope  for  the  rescue  of  the  two  popular  aviators  dwindled,  the  fantastic 
rumor  began  to  circulate  that  they  had  been  killed  by  Americans  in 
order  to  keep  them  from  stealing  the  glory  from  the  fliers  poised  at 
Roosevelt  Field.  At  first  it  was  whispered  by  French  housewives  and 
servants  as  they  did  their  marketing.  Then  it  spread  in  ever-wider 
circles,  stirring  up  an  undertone  of  resentment  and  animosity.  Parisians 
manifested  an  ugly  feeling  for  American  tourists  and  on  one  occasion  a 
crowd  forced  the  newspaper,  Le  Matin,  to  take  down  the  United  States 
flag  displayed  at  the  building. 

In  some  quarters  the  temper  reached  such  a  pitch  that  it  aroused 
Myron  T.  Herrick,  United  States  ambassador  to  France.  He  feared  for 
the  safety  of  any  American  flier  who  might  reach  Paris.  He  telephoned 
the  AP  bureau  and  asked  John  Evans  to  cable  a  story  so  emphatic  that 
it  would  arouse  the  government  at  Washington  to  cancel  all  permission 
for  the  projected  flights. 

Evans  listened.  He  was  familiar  with  the  wild  rumors  and  mention 
of  them  had  already  been  made  in  the  bureau's  cable  dispatches.  An 
unqualified  story  of  the  type  Herrick  proposed,  however,  would  violate 
service  regulations.  Evans  offered  to  prepare  a  story  quoting  the 
ambassador's  strong  language,  but  Herrick  seemed  unwilling  to  com- 
mit himself  that  far.  After  discussion,  he  authorized  a  carefully  guarded 
statement  which  failed  to  throw  any  new  light  on  the  situation. 

At  Le  Bourget  Flying  Field  outside  of  Paris,  Evans  and  the  six-man 
staff  assigned  to  cover  Lindbergh's  arrival  found  Herrick's  anxiety  had 
not  diminished  since  the  telephone  conversation  a  few  days  before.  The 
ambassador  was  present  ostensibly  to  greet  Lindbergh,  but  Evans 


LINDBERGH  APPEARS  341 

learned  that  he  privately  feared  his  real  task  would  be  to  protect  the 
flier  from  rough  treatment  at  the  hands  of  a  hostile  crowd. 

Evans,  however,  had  noticed  a  distinct  change  in  popular  feeling 
since  Lindbergh  headed  out  over  the  ocean  from  the  North  American 
continent.  Little  by  little  animosity  gave  way  to  grudging  concessions 
of  admiration  and  then  to  worried  solicitude  for  Lindbergh's  safety. 

There  was  only  a  small  knot  of  people  at  Le  Bourget  when  Evans, 
Tom  Topping,  Hudson  Hawley,  Edward  Angly,  Sam  Wader,  and 
George  Langelaan  arrived  in  the  afternoon,  but  by  nightfall  25,000 
were  on  hand.  There  was  only  one  public  telephone  at  the  airdrome, 
but  one  of  the  men  had  been  able  to  arrange  for  the  use  of  a  direct  line 
from  a  private  office  in  the  administration  building. 

All  the  while  Evans  kept  his  fingers  on  the  pulse  of  the  waiting 
people,  and  the  reports  he  got  from  the  men  he  assigned  to  circulate 
among  the  throngs  left  no  doubt  in  his  mind  as  to  the  popular  feeling. 
All  hostility  had  disappeared.  There  was  admiration  now  and  genuine 
hope  that  nothing  would  stop  the  flier  short  of  his  goal. 

Then  the  drone  of  a  motor  was  heard.  Landing  lights  flooded  the 
field  and  once  more  the  searchlight  swept  the  sky,  groping  until  it 
picked  out  a  swift  silver  monoplane. 

In  an  instant  the  plane  disappeared  from  the  searchlight's  glare, 
but  not  before  eyes  caught  the  license  markings — NX-2I  i. 

Lindbergh! 

Evans  flashed  the  word  to  Paris  that  Lindbergh  was  over  Le 
Bourget  and  dictated  two  hundred  words  describing  the  scene.  Then  the 
telephone  line  suddenly  went  dead.  The  minutes  that  elapsed  between 
the  time  Lindbergh  was  sighted  and  his  landing  were  frantic  for  Evans. 
A  tremendous  story  was  breaking  and  his  line  of  communication  was 
gone.  Luckily,  the  erratic  telephone  came  to  life  again  a  few  minutes 
later  and  Evans  picked  up  with  the  flash  of  Lindbergh's  landing  and  a 
running  account  of  the  frenzied  welcome. 

Lindbergh's  New  York-to-Paris  flight  ushered  in  a  whole  new 
cycle  of  news.  The  headlines  belonged  to  aviation  and  there  seemed 
no  end  to  the  stories.  There  was  Byrd's  flight  to 
and  Chamberlin's  long  hop  to  Germany.  Brock 
made  a  fifteen-stop  air  jaunt  from  Harbor  Gracj 
was  rescued  at  sea  near  the  Azores  when  he 
forced  down.  In  the  Pacific,  Maitland  and 
from  Oakland  to  Honolulu.  The  FrenchmJ 


342  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

spanned  the  South  Atlantic  to  Brazil.  There  were  altitude  flights, 
endurance  flights,  speed  flights,  and  stunt  flights.  The  volume  of 
aviation  news  carried  on  the  leased  wire  system  set  a  record  that  was 
not  surpassed  for  years. 


IV.  "MORE  MARGIN,  MORE  MARGIN !» 


THE  nation  had  reached  the  threshold  of  a  fabulous  era,  but  there  was 
no  hint  of  anything  startling  on  August  2,  1927,  when  President 
Coolidge  held  his  regular  Tuesday  press  conference  at  Rapid  City, 
South  Dakota.  The  conferences  had  produced  nothing  noteworthy  in  the 
seven  weeks  the  chief  executive  had  been  vacationing  in  the  Black  Hills. 

Between  occasional  puffs  on  a  long  cigar,  Coolidge  discussed  the 
threatened  failure  of  the  Arms  Limitation  Conference  at  Geneva,  the 
encouraging  business  conditions,  governmental  problems,  Walter  John- 
son's twentieth  anniversary  in  baseball,  and  a  number  of  other  subjects. 

"If  the  conference  will  reassemble  at  twelve  o'clock  I  will  have  a 
statement,"  he  concluded. 

That  announcement  caused  no  stir.  Francis  M.  Stephenson,  the 
staff  man  assigned  to  Coolidge,  thought  the  President  probably  had 
something  to  say  which  would  be  of  interest  to  the  financial  world. 
There  was  a  three-hour  time  difference  between  Rapid  City  and  New 
York,  so  any  Coolidge  announcement  at  noon  would  not  reach  Wall 
Street  until  after  the  markets  had  closed  at  3  P.M. 

Promptly  at  noon  Stephenson  and  his  colleagues  returned  to  the 
school  building  in  which  the  President  had  set  up  summer  headquarters. 
Coolidge  waited  for  them  in  a  classroom  which  served  as  his  private 
office.  In  his  right  hand  he  held  a  bunch  of  paper  slips. 

"If  you  will  pass  in  front  of  me,"  he  told  the  reporters,  "I  will 
hand  these  to  you." 

The  slips,  Stephenson  found,  had  been  folded  twice  so  that  their 
message  was  not  visible.  He  opened  his  and  read  it: 

I  DO  NOT  CHOOSE  TO  RUN  FOR  PRESIDENT  IN  NINE- 
TEEN-TWENTY-EIGHT. 

There  were  exclamations  of  surprise.  The  question  of  Coolidge's 
standing  for  re-election  had  been  discussed  in  some  quarters,  but  without 
particular  urgency  because  his  term  had  a  year  and  a  half  to  go. 

"Is  there  any  other  comment,  Mr.  President?  Any  amplification?" 

Coolidge  shook  his  head. 

343 


344  AP —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

"None." 

Stephenson  dashed  for  his  wire.  The  bulletin  he  sent  touched  off 
a  rush  of  activity.  There  were  "follows"  from  a  score  of  cities.  Wash- 
ington reported  that  political  leaders  now  regarded  Secretary  of 
Commerce  Herbert  Hoover  as  a  leading  contender  for  the  Republican 
nomination  in  1928.  And  in  his  California  home  Hoover  cautiously  told 
a  staff  man: 

"It  is  too  soon  to  discuss  it.  I  must  think  over  the  President's 
announcement." 


While  the  country  speculated  over  the  proper  interpretation  of 
the  phrasing  of  the  President's  statement,  W.  E.  Playfair  of  the  Boston 
staff,  the  same  man  who  had  covered  Coolidge  the  night  Harding  died, 
kept  watch  over  a  far  more  contentious  story.  It  was  the  case  of  Nicola 
Sacco,  the  shoemaker,  and  Bartolomeo  Vanzetti,  the  fish  peddler.  Play- 
fair  had  been  assigned  to  the  story  in  1920  when  Sacco  and  Vanzetti  were 
arrested  on  a  charge  of  complicity  in  a  fatal  holdup.  Then  it  was  just 
another  crime  story,  of  little  interest  beyond  New  England.  Killings 
in  payroll  holdups  were  not  uncommon.  Sacco  and  Vanzetti  were  con- 
victed on  a  charge  of  murder  and  the  long  fight  to  save  them  from 
the  electric  chair  saw  their  case  become  one  of  the  most  controversial 
and  highly  publicized  in  the  history  of  American  jurisprudence. 

Playfair  was  at  the  State  House  in  Boston  early  on  August  3. 
Governor  Alvan  T.  Fuller,  who  had  conducted  a  final  investigation 
of  the  case  with  a  special  advisory  committee,  had  promised  to  give 
his  decision  during  the  day.  Some  expected  that  he  would  announce 
clemency,  or  even  pardon.  There  was  world-wide  interest  in  the  decision 
and  on  the  floor  above  the  Executive  Offices  the  gallery  of  the  Massa- 
chusetts House  of  Representatives  had  been  converted  into  a  pressroom. 

It  was  nine  o'clock  when  Playfair  took  up  his  watch  at  the 
governor's  offices.  The  day  dragged  along  and  night  came.  Still  no 
announcement  from  the  governor.  More  hours  of  waiting. 

It  was  almost  1 1 130  when  the  governor's  secretary,  Herman  Mac- 
Donald,  appeared  with  sealed  envelopes  containing  the  long-delayed 
decision.  Playfair  took  one  of  the  first  and  ran  to  the  press  gallery  on 
the  floor  above.  A  telegrapher  was  ready. 

F-L-A-S-H 

BOSTON  -  GOVERNOR  UPHOLDS  SACCO-VANZETTI 
DEATH  SENTENCE. 


"MORE  MARGIN,  MORE  MARGIN!"  345 

The  decision  had  world-wide  repercussions.  There  were  bombings 
in  New  York  and  Albany.  The  American  flag  was  burned  before  con- 
sulates abroad.  A  protest  strike  was  called  in  Czechoslovakia.  Appeals 
for  clemency  poured  into  Boston.  There  were  attempts  to  picket  the 
State  House.  The  men  were  to  die  at  Charleston  Prison  at  midnight 
of  August  12. 

Prison  regulations  limited  the  press  to  one  representative  at  the 
execution — and  that  assignment  had  been  given  Play  fair  in  1921  when 
Sacco  and  Vanzetti  were  convicted.  Ever  since  Massachusetts  took 
executions  from  the  hands  of  county  sheriffs  in  1901  and  turned  them 
over  to  the  warden  of  the  state  prison,  the  warden's  practice  had  been 
to  invite  an  AP  man  to  be  the  newspaper  representative  in  the  death 
chamber.  The  custom  had  the  approval  of  the  state's  newspapers  and 
the  only  condition  the  wardens  imposed  was  that  the  AP  man  supply, 
without  reservation,  all  the  details  of  executions  to  other  reporters  as- 
signed to  the  stories. 

It  was  through  Playfair's  eyes  that  the  whole  world  watched  the 
condemned  men  go  to  the  electric  chair.  But  they  did  not  die  the  night 
of  August  12.  At  11:12  P.M.,  less  than  an  hour  before  the  time  set  for 
the  electrocutions,  a  circuit  court  judge  intervened  and  a  ten-day  reprieve 
was  ordered.  The  news  reached  the  prison  at  11:25,  Just  as  Playfair 
was  about  to  start  for  the  death  chamber  with  Warden  William  Hendry. 

The  reprieve  brought  no  relaxation  of  tension.  The  Sacco-Vanzetti 
defense  organizations  opened  a  new  series  of  desperate  legal  efforts  to 
save  the  two  men.  One  by  one  their  forlorn  hopes  shattered. 

Playfair  found  Charlestown  Prison  a  veritable  fortress  the  night  of 
August  22.  All  near-by  streets  were  roped  off,  searchlights  cut  swaths 
through  the  darkness,  tear  gas  and  machine  gun  squads  stood  ready. 
An  uneasy  feeling  pervaded  the  prison.  The  dispatches  which  had 
come  into  Boston  that  day  were  disquieting — street  fighting  in  Paris 
and  in  Geneva  bomb  threats. 

Warden  Hendry  ordered  all  newspapermen  to  be  on  hand  by  ten 
o'clock.  For  almost  two  hours  there  was  nothing  to  do  but  wait  in  the 
Prison  Officers'  Club  which  had  been  converted  into  a  press  and  wire 
room.  All  windows  had  been  nailed  down,  and  the  room  was  stifling 
in  the  August  heat.  Then  Playfair  left  with  a  guard  for  the  death 
house. 

Sacco  was  the  first  to  go.  He  walked  the  seventeen  steps  from  his 
cell -to  the  chair  in  silence.  As  they  strapped  him  in,  he  cried  out  in 
Italian:  "Long  live  anarchy!"  Then  in  broken  English  he  spoke  again: 


346  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

"Farewell  my  wife  and  child  and  all  my  friends,"  There  was  a 
moment's  silence.  The  executioner  was  ready.  "Good  evening,  gentle- 
men," said  Sacco.  He  was  pronounced  dead  at  12:11  A.M. 

A  messenger  brought  Playfair's  bulletin  on  Sacco's  electrocution 
to  the  pressroom.  It  was  for  all  the  other  reporters,  as  well  as  for  the 
co-operative.  In  the  death  chamber  Playfair  was  listening  to  Vanzetti's 
farewell  words:  "I  wish  to  forgive  some  people  for  what  they  are  now 
doing  to  me."  Then  it  was  all  over. 


The  schoolroom  at  Rapid  City  and  the  death  chamber  at  Charles- 
town  Prison  made  news,  but  they  did  not  indicate  the  fantastic  days 
ahead.  As  conditions  changed,  the  co-operative  had  to  prepare  itself 
better  than  ever  to  separate  the  wheat  from  the  chaff.  It  was  a  difficult 
task  because  too  frequently  events  that  seemed  legitimate  news  were 
more  artificial  than  spontaneous,  and  already  in  one  field  the  fabulous 
days  had  come. 

One  month  after  the  Sacco-Vanzetti  executions  there  occurred  at 
Soldier  Field,  Chicago,  an  event  quite  unlike  anything  before.  Some 
150,000  persons  paid  in  a  gate  of  $2,650,000  to  watch  Gene  Tunney 
and  Jack  Dempsey  battle  for  the  World  Heavyweight  Championship. 
At  the  ringside,  the  association  had  the  largest  staff  ever  assigned  to  a 
sports  event — General  Sports  Editor  Alan  Gould  and  a  dozen  other 
sports  and  feature  writers.  Ten  people  died  of  excitement  while  listening 
to  a  radio  broadcast  of  the  fight,  and  for  days  thousands  debated  the 
pros  and  cons  of  a  referee's  decision  allowing  Tunney  a  "long  count" 
because  Dempsey  had  neglected  to  retire  to  a  neutral  corner  after  the 
knockdown. 

Perhaps  the  so-called  "golden  age"  of  sports,  with  its  hysterical 
following,  its  parade  of  heroes,  and  its  incredible  gate  receipts,  was  a 
good  advance  indication  of  the  dizzier  golden  age  of  prosperity  which 
followed.  At  least  it  hinted  at  the  strange  psychological  ferment  at 
work. 

In  Wall  Street  during  the  autumn  of  1927,  although  business 
generally  appeared  to  be  losing  headway  and  the  rediscount  rate  was 
lowered  to  assist  agriculture  and  industry,  the  market  developed  a 
buoyant  trend  upward.  Motor  and  radio  stocks  seemed  to  catch  the 
public  fancy.  The  AP  Financial  Service  recorded  the  day-to-day  fluctua- 
tions without  comment  or  editorializing,  letting  the  facts  speak  for 


"MORE  MARGIN,  MORE  MARGIN !"  347 

themselves.  By  the  closing  months  of  the  year  the  association's  aver- 
age for  sixty  selected  issues  on  the  New  York  Stock  Exchange— a  quick 
index  of  market  conditions — stood  in  the  vicinity  of  $70. 

When  the  moderate  rise  began,  the  Wall  Street  Bureau  was 
considered  equal  to  any  predictable  emergency.  Stanley  Prenosil,  finan- 
cial editor,  headed  a  staff  of  eight  specialists,  and  George  A.  Wyville 
directed  the  work  of  the  tabulators,  checkers,  and  operators  who  pre- 
pared the  quotations  of  the  stock,  bond,  and  other  markets  for  trans- 
mission. Until  late  in  1927,  three-million-share  days  on  the  New  York 
Stock  Exchange  had  been  rarities,  but  as  the  market  pushed  higher 
that  trading  mark  was  passed  and  the  Wall  Street  staff  felt  it  was 
working  under  abnormal  conditions. 

"What,"  someone  asked,  "would  ever  happen  with  a  four-million- 
share  day?" 

Nothing  better  demonstrated  the  absorbing  public  interest  in 
industrial  news  than  the  debut  of  the  new  Model  A  Ford  in  December, 
1927.  During  the  months  when  Ford  was  developing  the  automobile 
which  was  to  replace  the  old  Model  T,  people  devoured  every  rumor 
on  the  forthcoming  car.  So  tremendous  was  the  pressure  that  the  news 
report  carried  a  description  of  the  new  Ford  and  the  price  list  as  soon 
as  the  information  was  released. 

Under  any  other  circumstances,  such  material  would  have  been 
barred  from  the  wires  as  advertising,  but  the  strange  alchemy  of  the 
times  made  it  news  of  national  interest.  In  New  York  an  estimated 
one  million  people  tried  to  get  into  a  showroom  for  a  glimpse  of  the 
automobile  the  day  it  was  first  displayed.  In  Detroit,  Cleveland, 
Kansas  City,  and  other  cities  police  reserves  were  called  out  to  control 
the  crowds  which  fought  to  see  the  car. 


By  early  1928  papers  considered  stock  market  fluctuations  an 
essential  part  of  their  news  report.  The  general  manager  was  urged  to 
enlarge  the  size  of  the  Wall  Street  staff  and  to  develop  further  the 
entire  financial  and  commodity  market  service.  The  Traffic  Department 
wrestled  with  the  problem  of  arranging  wire  facilities  so  that  a  heavier 
list  of  daily  quotations  could  be  delivered  with  a  minimum  of  delay. 
Financial  writers  were  assigned  at  Washington,  Chicago,  and  San 
Francisco  to  supplement  the  Wall  Street  Bureau. 

The  new  year  brought  scattered  warnings  that  the  market's  advance 


348  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

was  too  swift.  The  news  wires  told  of  the  $500,00x3,000  increase  in 
brokers'  loans,  but  from  Washington  came  other  stories  quoting  Presi- 
dent Coolidge  as  saying  that  he  saw  "nothing  unfavorable"  in  this 
enormous  use  of  credit  for  "natural  expansion  of  business." 

There  were  1,228  members  receiving  AP  service  as  1928  began. 
The  leased  wire  web  which  linked  them  covered  160,000  miles,  and 
an  average  of  more  than  300,000  words  of  news  was  written  and  de- 
livered each  twenfy-four  hours.  The  staff  had  increased  33  per  cent  in 
three  years. 

In  the  supplemental  Feature  and  News  Photo  services  there  had 
been  sustained  progress.  The  Feature  Service  had  been  expanded  to 
include  a  special  budget  in  Spanish  for  Latin  America.  The  Photo 
Service  had  started  its  own  corps  of  photographers — Berk  Payne,  at 
Washington,  and  N.  B.  Harris,  at  New  York,  were  the  first  two  staff 
cameramen  engaged — and  news  pictures  were  made  available  to  the 
smaller  members  through  inauguration  of  a  matted  news  photo  service. 

If  the  management  had  one  major  problem  in  the  general  report, 
it  arose  from  the  welter  of  crime  news,  much  of  it  linked  with  Prohibi- 
tion. Advocates  of  the  Eighteenth  Amendment  protested  whenever  the 
news  showed  Prohibition  in  an  unfavorable  light.  Similarly,  anti-prohibi- 
tionists grew  angry  every  time  they  felt  the  case  against  Prohibition 
was  not  presented  in  the  strongest  possible  way.  Every  questioned  item 
was  investigated  as  a  matter  of  course  and  it  was  invariably  established 
that  the  criticism  came  from  those  who  felt  that  the  story  should  have 
taken  the  side  for  which  they  stood. 

All  signs  indicated  that  the  problem  of  Prohibition  and  crime  news 
would  increase  rather  than  lessen,  and  the  approach  of  a  presidential 
campaign  served  warning  that  the  Prohibition  issue  would  add  to  the 
difficulties  in  the  heat  preceding  a  national  election. 

The  stock  markets  kept  advancing  claim  to  recognition  as  big  news. 
Members  of  the  Wall  Street  staff,  who  had  wondered  what  a  four- 
million-share  day  would  be  like,  found  out  in  March.  Trading  exceeded 
that  amount  and  made  Stock  Exchange  history.  Brokers'  loans  continued 
to  climb,  and  some  papers  which  had  ignored  quotations  in  the  past 
began  to  print  the  lists  of  stock  prices  to  meet  the  public  demand. 
Before  the  World  War  five  hundred  words  a  day  had  sufficed  to  de- 
scribe gyrations  on  the  Exchange.  Now  it  was  a  dull  day  when  the  Wall 
Street  Bureau  produced  less  than  five  thousand  words,  and  on  "big 
days"  the  total  climbed  to  eight  and  ten  thousand. 

The  record  of  the  first  months  of  1928  was  as  varied  as  any  other 


"MORE  MARGIN,  MORE  MARGIN!"  349 

period  which  the  service  had  taken  in  stride.  There  were  the  Snyder- 
Gray  electrocutions  and  the  exile  of  Leon  Trotsky  from  Russia.  Sports 
fans  discussed  Heavyweight  Champion  Gene  Tunney's  interest  in 
literature,  music,  and  other  fine  arts,  and  the  annual  aviation  fever  be- 
gan with  the  conquest  of  the  North  Atlantic  by  two  Germans  and  an 
Irishman  in  the  Junkers  plane  Bremen. 

At  the  annual  meeting  of  the  co-operative  that  spring,  the  most 
important  business  was  the  unanimous  action  to  arrange  the  voting 
power  of  the  membership  more  equitably  by  a  better  distribution  of  the 
association's  bonds.  An  additional  bond  issue  was  authorized  so  that  all 
members  might  subscribe  in  proportion  to  the  amounts  they  contributed 
in  weekly  assessments.  The  bonds  carried  voting  privileges  in  election  of 
directors.  One  of  the  reasons  why  an  inequitable  distribution  had  arisen 
was  the  fact  that  the  Board  of  Directors  had  felt  itself  without  authority 
to  redistribute  bonds  held  in  the  treasury  after  being  redeemed  because 
of  membership  consolidations  or  other  reasons.  Thus,  until  the  change 
was  voted,  newly  elected  members  were  unable  to  participate  in  the 
bondholding  privilege.  As  far  as  the  actual  operation  of  the  co-operative 
was  concerned,  the  change  was  largely  technical  in  its  effects  and  the 
administration  continued  along  established  lines. 


The  Republicans  nominated  Herbert  Clark  Hoover  for  president 
at  Kansas  City  and  the  Democrats  selected  Alfred  E.  Smith  in  the 
June  heat  at  Houston.  At  both  conventions  Byron  Price,  the  chief  of 
bureau  at  Washington,  headed  a  specially  chosen  staff  of  seventy-five. 
As  the  campaign  got  under  way,  two  men  and  one  woman  were  assigned 
to  each  of  the  presidential  nominees,  and  one  reporter  to  each  of  the 
vice-presidential  candidates. 

It  was  not  long  before  the  usual  criticisms  and  complaints  began 
to  reach  Cooper  from  both  sides.  Republicans  charged  The  AP  either 
was  purposely  making  Smith  seem  more  interesting,  or  that  the  re- 
porters assigned  to  his  party  were  more  able  than  those  with  Hoover. 
The  critics  were  not  mollified  when  it  was  pointed  out  to  them  that 
Smith  talked  freely  with  correspondents  and  permitted  the  use  of 
question  and  answer  quotations  while  Hoover  imposed  a  strict  regula- 
tion that  nothing  he  said  was  to  be  quoted  without  specific  permission. 
One  member  of  the  Board  of  Directors  said  of  this  type  of  criticism: 


350  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

"It's  the  Republicans'  fault  if  Smith  is  making  more  news  and  delivering 
more  speeches." 

In  the  heat  of  the  campaign,  however,  the  Smith  adherents  were 
just  as  vociferous  as  their  Republican  foes.  They  charged  the  co-opera- 
tive with  aiding  Hoover's  candidacy  by  reporting  the  slang  Smith  used 
or  quoting  his  words  and  expressions  when  they  were  not  polished.  The 
whispering  campaigns,  the  religious  issue,  the  activities  of  the  Ku  Klux 
Klan,  all  contributed  to  the  difficulties  which  attended  a  fair,  accurate, 
and  unbiased  account  of  the  contest. 

The  campaign  ended  November  5.  The  air  rang  with  the  slogans 
on  the  prosperity  and  Prohibition  issues — with  catchphrases  such  as  "a 
chicken  in  every  pot,  two  cars  in  every  garage." 

Thirty-six  million  Americans  cast  their  votes  and  in  New  York  on 
election  night  the  Board  of  Directors  room  was  transformed  into  a  spe- 
cial election  headquarters  where  a  picked  staff,  working  under  the  im- 
mediate supervision  of  Price  and  Assistant  General  Manager  Elliott, 
tabulated  the  returns  and  prepared  the  election  leads. 

Cooper,  studying  the  figures  as  they  were  brought  to  his  office,  was 
leafing  through  a  fresh  batch  of  returns  when  his  door  opened.  Looking 
up,  he  was  surprised  to  see  the  white-haired  figure  of  Melville  E.  Stone. 

"Well,  I  just  couldn't  stay  away,"  the  former  general  manager 
explained  apologetically. 

For  a  while  the  two  men  sat  talking.  Then  Stone  took  his  leave. 
He  stood  for  a  few  minutes  on  the  busy  news  floor  and  made  his  way 
to  the  board  room  where  the  election  staff  was  hard  at  work.  His  entry 
passed  almost  unnoticed  and  he  found  a  chair  in  the  corner  of  the  room. 
Elliott  saw  him  and  nodded  a  greeting.  For  a  long  time  the  old  man 
watched  the  scene.  Finally  he  motioned  to  Elliott. 

"Isn't  this  beautiful,  Elliott?"  he  exclaimed.  "Here  is  the  staff  of 
The  Associated  Press  doing  the  same  work  that  has  been  done  in  our 
organization  in  preceding  elections  over  a  long  period.  The  staff  is 
made  up  of  new  blood,  young  men  whose  faces  are  new  to  me,  and  yet 
nothing  is  changed.  It  is  just  like  every  preceding  election  staff — an 
efficient  group  carrying  on  without  fluster  or  bluster." 

He  studied  the  room  again  and  nodded  his  head. 

"No,"  he  repeated,  "nothing  is  changed,  nothing  is  changed." 

A  few  months  later  Stone  died  and  messages  of  condolence  poured 
in  from  the  world's  great  and  near  great  who  had  known  him.  He  was 
buried  in  Washington  Cathedral  in  the  crypt  set  aside  for  the  nation's 
distinguished  dead.  He  had  said  he  wished  to  be  buried  as  a  plain 


"MORE  MARGIN,  MORE  MARGIN!"  351 

citizen,  but  the  cathedral's  trustees  offered  his  family  the  privilege  of 
having  him  entombed  there,  alongside  the  vaults  of  Woodrow  Wilson 
and  Admiral  Dewey. 

6 

The  Wall  Street  Bureau  was  the  first  to  feel  the  effects  of  the 
Hoover  landslide.  Markets  bounded  upward  at  the  opening  bell  on 
November  7  and  stories  of  the  broad  advances  competed  for  preference 
on  leased  wires  already  crowded  with  election  material.  The  "prosperity 
bull  market"  had  begun  its  spectacular  career.  Before  the  month  ended, 
trading  on  the  "big  board"  reached  the  unprecedented  daily  total  of 
6,900,000  shares,  and  transactions  in  other  markets  mounted  accord- 
ingly. 

It  was  only  a  beginning,  but  on  December  i  the  bureau's  files 
showed  how  great  the  gains  had  been  since  the  last  day  of  trading  in 
1927.  Montgomery  Ward,  which  sold  then  at  119,  had  skyrocketed 
to  434.  Radio  had  soared  from  90  to  382,  General  Motors  from  138  to 
211,  Wright  Aeronautical  from  81  to  263,  Adams  Express  from  185 
to  390.  Other  issues  followed  these  bell-wethers  with  large  gains. 
Brokers'  loans,  an  index  of  speculation,  exceeded  $6,OOO,OOO,OOO,  an  in- 
crease of  approximately  $2,000,000,000  in  the  space  of  eleven  months. 
Call  money  rates  had  climbed  as  high  as  8  and  9  per  cent. 

Economists  and  Wall  Street  spokesmen  told  reporters  that  1929 
would  be  a  most  prosperous  year.  Financial  analysts  expatiated  on  the 
"new  business  cycle."  Sports  reported  the  death  of  Tex  Rickard  and 
the  mass  funeral  service  for  him  at  Madison  Square  Garden,  where  his 
last  "gate"  was  a  big  success.  The  Philadelphia  Bureau  reported  that 
the  National  Association  of  Merchant  Tailors,  in  convention  assembled, 
gravely  decreed  that  the  well-dressed  man  should  have  at  least  twenty 
suits,  a  dozen  hats,  eight  overcoats,  and  twenty-four  pairs  of  shoes. 
And  in  her  New  York  night  club,  Texas  Guinan  sounded  one  ironic 
keynote  for  the  year  when  she  hailed  patrons  with  the  rowdy  greeting: 
"Hello,  sucker!" 

So  the  great  news  year  of  1929  began.  The  foreign  report  told  of 
Mahatma  Gandhi's  passive  resistance  campaign  in  India,  the  War  Rep- 
arations Conference  at  Paris  which  was  drafting  the  Young  plan  in  an 
effort  to  remedy  Germany's  financial  problems,  and  the  signing  of  the 
Lateran  Treaty  at  Rome,  ending  a  half  century  of  estrangement  be- 
tween the  Vatican  and  the  Italian  government.  The  cable  dispatches 
shared  front  pages  with  domestic  stories  of  Anne  Morrow's  engage- 


352  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

ment  to  Colonel  Lindbergh,  Chicago's  St.  Valentine  Day  massacre,  and 
the  skyward  progress  of  securities  and  commodity  markets. 

Through  the  spring  and  on  into  the  summer  the  Wall  Street  Bu- 
reau chronicled  the  sustained  advance  of  security  prices.  The  booms 
of  the  past  seemed  insignificant  by  comparison.  Public  participation  in 
the  market  had  never  been  so  tremendous.  From  the  Atlantic  to  the 
Pacific,  ticker  tape  quotations  had  become  the  symbols  of  sudden  and 
easy  wealth.  Where  once  people  had  bought  newspapers  to  read  of 
politics,  war,  achievement,  or  disaster,  now  they  looked  first  for  the 
closing  prices. 

As  the  market  soared  upward,  a  handful  of  experts  sounded  stern 
warnings  that  the  orgy  of  speculation  was  headed  for  disaster.  These 
represented  the  other  side  of  Wall  Street's  amazing  story,  and  the 
report  carried  them  just  as  it  did  the  counter  forecasts  of  bankers  who 
saw  boundless  prosperity  ahead. 

The  scattered  warnings  went  unheeded.  A  few  of  the  more  vigor- 
ous ones  caused  the  market  to  sell  off — the  Wall  Street  euphemism  for 
such  recessions  was  "technical  reaction" — but  they  had  no  lasting  effect. 
The  market  broke  sharply  in  March  when  the  unprecedented  total  of 
8,246,740  shares  were  traded  in  one  day  and  call  money  catapulted  to 
20  per  cent.  Recovery  was  swift,  however,  and  prices  soon  poked  back 
into  higher  levels.  After  that,  public  and  professional  confidence  in  the 
future  of  the  market  was  stronger  than  ever.  It  survived  a  sinking 
spell  in  May,  and  then  once  more  pushed  upward  resolutely  to  greater 
peaks. 

On  September  3,  1929,  The  AP  average  of  sixty  selected  stocks 
reached  an  all-time  high  of  $157.70,  more  than  double  the  $70  level 
of  late  1927.  Sales  that  day  were  a  mere  4,438,910  shares.  By  mid- 
September  the  co-operative's  average  began  to  drop  and  by  October  it 
was  sliding  several  dollars  a  day.  The  Wall  Street  staff  was  unable  to 
find  any  genuine  alarm  in  brokerage  circles.  The  slow  decline  was  re- 
garded as  a  repetition  of  the  March  break  which  the  market  had  soon 
overcome.  Brokers  realized  that  the  drop  in  prices  was  eating  away 
the  slim  margin  on  which  billions  of  dollars'  worth  of  stocks  were  held, 
but  the  consensus  was  that  the  technical  reaction  could  not  possibly 
go  much  further.  The  report  quoted  their  views. 

On  October  24 — "Black  Thursday" — a  torrent  of  liquidation  hit  the 
market  and  hammered  stocks  down  $5,000,000,000.  One  issue  plum- 
meted 96  points.  The  trading  floor  was  a  bedlam  and  tickers  fell  far 
behind  transactions,  adding  to  the  confusion  as  the  Wall  Street  Bureau 


M  I  I   I    C 


"MORE  MARGIN,  MORE  MARGIN!"  353 

struggled  to  keep  abreast  of  the  selling.  Trading  smashed  all  previous 
records  with  a  total  of  12,894,650  shares  and  it  was  nightfall  before 
the  last  quotations  were  cleared  on  the  special  financial  wires. 

Five  days  later  came  the  deluge  which  completely  swamped  wire 
facilities  and  all  but  engulfed  the  staff  in  its  effort  to  report  what  was 
happening.  Tickers  were  useless,  grinding  out  prices  which  were  hours 
behind  actual  trading.  On  the  Stock  Exchange  transactions  totaled 
16,410,030.  Curb  sales  exceeded  7,000,000.  Out-of-town  and  foreign 
markets  were  demoralized. 

The  crash  began  as  soon  as  the  Stock  Exchange  opened  on  October 
29  and  it  quickly  became  apparent  that  the  regular  Wall  Street  staff 
could  not  cope  with  the  collapse.  Claude  A.  Jagger,  acting  as  financial 
editor,  recruited  reinforcements  from  the  New  York  city  staff  and  as- 
signed them  throughout  the  financial  district.  Men  were  stationed  in  the 
office  of  J.  P.  Morgan,  in  all  the  big  banks  and  brokerage  offices,  with 
the  regular  members  of  the  Wall  Street  staff  working  in  key  positions 
at  the  various  markets.  Jagger,  a  seasoned  financial  writer,  did  the 
main  story  of  Wall  Street's  biggest  day.  He  alone  wrote  8,000  words 
before  the  day  finished. 

Those  8,000  words  told  the  story  of  collapse  which  wiped  out  bil- 
lions of  dollars'  worth  of  open  market  values  and  swept  prices  down  in 
panic.  They  told  of  wild  scenes  on  the  Stock  Exchange  floor  as  huge 
blocks  of  stock  were  dumped  on  the  market ;  of  the  tense,  white-faced 
customers  in  board  rooms  watching  paper  fortunes  melt  away;  of  the 
solemn  conferences  of  bankers  and  stock  exchange  officials ;  of  the  sober 
crowds  which  gathered  in  the  streets  of  the  financial  district  5  of  broker- 
age clerks  at  telephones  demanding  "More  margin,  more  margin !" 


V.  INTO  THE  DEPRESSION 


THE  big  story  was  a  thousand  stories.  Some  were  columns  long,  some 
a  few  sentences.  The  date  lines  were  legion.  The  basic  subject  matter 
was  monotonously  unvaried — a  deepening  world-wide  depression.  The 
domestic  report  told  recurrently  of  fresh  lows  in  security  and  com- 
modity prices,  of  tobogganing  earnings,  of  bank  closings,  mounting  un- 
employment and  distress.  The  news  by  cable  added  other  details — 
Europe's  precarious  financial  condition,  slackening  of  industry,  the  de- 
struction of  world  markets,  and  the  intricate  problems  of  international 
indebtedness.  Individually  most  of  the  dispatches  had  no  surpassing  sig- 
nificance y  collectively  their  weight  was  staggering. 

During  1930,  as  the  world  slid  deeper  into  the  economic  morass, 
the  report  was  studded  with  accounts  of  political  unrest.  In  South 
America  an  epidemic  of  revolutions  kept  correspondents  working  under 
pressure  and  peril.  When  the  Vargas  rebellion  broke  out  in  Brazil, 
E.  M.  Castro  of  the  Rio  de  Janeiro  staff,  raced  through  the  bullet- 
splattered  streets  to  flash  the  beginning  of  the  insurrection.  Paul  San- 
ders, the  bureau  chief,  was  routed  from  his  typewriter  by  a  fusillade 
of  shots  which  peppered  the  office  walls.  A  zealous  Boy  Scout,  intent 
on  rescuing  the  Brazilian  flag  on  the  building,  had  climbed  up  past  the 
office  window  in  human-fly  fashion,  drawing  the  fire  of  a  rebel  detach- 
ment in  the  street.  Censorship  added  to  difficulties,  as  it  had  in  Peru, 
the  Argentine,  and  other  South  American  countries. 

Chief  of  Bureau  Morris  J.  Harris  at  Shanghai  had  the  upheaval 
of  China's  civil  war  to  report,  and  in  India  there  were  the  violent  dis- 
orders of  Gandhi's  civil  disobedience  campaign  for  national  autonomy. 
In  Germany  Hitler's  National  Socialist  party  made  tremendous  gains 
in  the  September  election,  becoming  for  the  first  time  a  powerful  bloc 
in  the  Reichstag.  There  were  reports  of  impending  revolution.  The  un- 
easiness subsided  after  Chief  of  Bureau  Lochner  obtained  from  Presi- 
dent von  Hindenburg  a  statement  affirming  confidence  in  Germany's 
continued  stability  and  discounting  the  possibilities  of  a  radical  dic- 
tatorship. 

Although  member  papers  were  feeling  the  pinch  of  economic  con- 

354 


INTO  THE  DEPRESSION  355 

ditions — smaller  publications  had  been  complaining  as  early  as  the  au- 
tumn of  1929 — there  was  no  suggestion  that  service  be  curtailed.  The 
insistence  was  that  the  report  be  maintained  unimpaired.  This  was 
particularly  true  of  the  financial  service,  even  though  the  market  col- 
lapse had  robbed  security  and  commodity  prices  of  their  1929  circula- 
tion-building magic. 

The  daily  ledger  of  the  depression  made  a  drab  background,  but 
the  report  had  colorful  contrasts.  The  most  picturesque  copy  in  many 
months  came  from  Addis  Ababa  where  Haile  Selassie,  "Conquering 
Lion  of  Judah,  the  Anointed  of  God,  and  the  Lord  of  the  World," 
was  crowned  Emperor  of  Ethiopia  with  barbaric  ceremonials  and  splen- 
dor. The  extraordinary  coronation  in  Africa  meant  a  change  of  scene 
for  Jim  Mills,  roving  correspondent  of  the  Foreign  Service.  After 
five  years  in  the  Balkans,  he  had  been  sent  to  Moscow  as  chief  of 
bureau  in  1924  for  a  three-year  tour  of  duty  during  which  he  covered 
all  parts  of  the  Soviet  Union.  Then  he  came  back  to  Middle  Europe, 
once  more  as  chief  of  bureau  at  Vienna,  with  Austria,  Czechoslovakia, 
Hungary,  Yugoslavia,  Albania,  Greece,  Bulgaria,  and  Rumania  for  his 
territory.  During  this  period  he  secured  interviews  with  King  Constan- 
tine  of  Greece,  King  Boris  of  Bulgaria,  King  Alexander  of  Yugo- 
slavia, Queen  Marie  and  King  Carol  of  Rumania,  and  King  Zog  of 
Albania.  After  two  years  in  the  post,  he  was  reappointed  to  Moscow  and 
was  finishing  his  second  year  there  when  he  was  ordered  to  Africa  for 
the  coronation  of  Haile  Selassie  on  November  2,  1930. 

The  ceremonies,  which  lasted  a  week,  were  an  ordeal,  even  for  a 
seasoned  reporter  like  Mills.  The  rites  began  at  four  in  the  morning 
and  the  heat  in  the  small,  stuffy  cathedral  became  unbearable  as  the 
day  wore  on.  The  air  was  foul  with  the  smoke  of  mutton-fat  candles, 
the  nauseating  odor  of  strange  incense,  and  the  overpowering  stench  of 
Ethiopians,  greased  from  head  to  foot  with  rancid  butter  and  animal 
fat.  American  and  European  guests  needed  surreptitious  recourse  to 
flasks  of  brandy  in  order  to  stand  the  torture.  But  Mills  survived. 


Early  in  1931  the  foreign  report  produced  one  of  those  teapot 
tempests  which  demonstrated  the  scrutiny  to  which  dispatches  were 
subjected  by  editors  and  public  alike.  The  news  was  the  address  of  Pope 
Pius  XI  during  ceremonies  dedicating  the  Vatican  radio  station,  HVJ. 
An  international  hookup  of  250  stations  had  been  arranged  to  carry  the 
Pontiff's  message  of  peace  and  good  will  to  all  parts  of  the  world. 


356  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Andrue  Berding,  the  new  bureau  chief  at  Rome — Cortesi  had  just 
retired — was  at  the  Vatican  for  the  dedication  and  the  papal  broadcast. 
After  the  Pope  had  begun  his  talk,  Berding  hastened  to  the  Vatican 
telegraph  office  with  a  copy  of  the  speech.  The  Pope  made  his  address 
in  Latin,  but  the  prepared  copies  were  in  Italian.  Berding  translated  the 
text  into  English  and  filed  it  page  by  page  at  the  telegraph  office.  Pres- 
ently he  came  upon  a  Biblical  quotation.  There  was  no  time  to  rush 
around  the  Vatican  looking  for  a  Bible,  so  without  hesitation  he  trans- 
lated the  passage  into  simple,  direct  English. 

The  story  did  not  end  there,  however.  Soon  Berding  received  a 
sheaf  of  letters  from  Catholics  in  the  United  States,  saying,  in  effect: 
"You  have  made  the  Pope  quote  the  Protestant  version  of  the  Bible!" 
Accompanying  the  letters  was  the  general  manager's  request  for  an 
explanation.  Embarrassed  by  the  complaints  the  bureau  chief  checked 
on  the  Biblical  passage  the  Pope  had  used.  He  consulted  the  Catholic 
version  of  the  Bible,  then  the  Protestant  version.  The  critics  were  wrong. 
The  quotation,  as  Berding  had  translated  it,  did  not  appear  verbatim  in 
either.  It  was  his  own  version,  and  he  wrote  the  general  manager  that 
he  felt  it  was  as  good  as  either  of  the  other  renditions. 

All  this  while  the  many-sided  story  of  economic  distress  kept  un- 
folding. The  news  was  even  gloomier  than  in  1930.  Big  corporations 
announced  pay  cuts,  hunger  marchers  paraded,  Treasury  statistics 
showed  an  alarming  increase  in  money  hoarding,  the  army  of  unem- 
ployed grew  larger,  bank  failures  averaged  almost  a  hundred  a  month, 
and  the  price  of  wheat  in  the  Chicago  grain  pit  sank  to  the  lowest  levels 
since  1896.  From  South  America  cables  brought  tidings  of  fresh  revo- 
lutions. Madrid  reported  the  overthrow  of  King  Alfonso  and  the 
setting  up  of  a  Spanish  republic.  Dispatches  from  London,  Berlin, 
Vienna,  and  other  European  centers  set  forth  the  unchecked  develop- 
ment of  the  financial  crisis  which  menaced  the  Old  World. 

On  June  20,  1931,  the  report  announced  a  proposal  by  President 
Hoover  for  a  one-year  moratorium  on  all  payments  of  war  reparations 
and  intergovernmental  debts — the  administration's  effort  to  avert  a 
catastrophe,  inevitable  if  financial  collapse  occurred  in  Germany  and 
Central  Europe.  The  next  day  Washington  quoted  Secretary  of  State 
Henry  L.  Stimson  as  saying  a  personal  appeal  from  President  von  Hin- 
denburg  of  Germany  had  figured  importantly  in  Hoover's  decision.  The 
contents  of  Hindenburg's  letter,  however,  were  not  disclosed.  Hoover 
regarded  them  as  confidential  and  all  efforts  to  obtain  the  document 
proved  unavailing. 


INTO  THE  DEPRESSION  357 

Failing  in  Washington,  the  association  turned  to  Berlin.  Cooper 
cabled  Lochner  to  secure  the  text  of  Hindenburg's  appeal.  Lochner 
afterward  called  the  assignment  the  most  difficult  he  had  ever  received. 

He  sounded  out  Foreign  Minister  Julius  Curtius. 

"As  far  as  I  am  concerned,"  the  Cabinet  official  said,  "there  is  no 
objection  to  giving  publicity  to  the  letter.  But  the  letter  is  addressed  to 
President  Hoover  and  international  courtesy  demands  that  your  Amer- 
ican President,  rather  than  we,  give  it  out.  Besides,  this  is  really  a 
matter  which,  so  far  as  Germany  is  concerned,  only  President  von  Hin- 
denburg  can  decide." 

Lochner  went  to  the  presidential  palace,  but  got  nothing  there. 
After  days  more  of  trying,  he  gave  up  hope.  He  received  instructions 
to  accompany  Chancellor  Heinrich  Bruening  and  Foreign  Minister 
Curtius  to  London  for  the  Seven-Power  Conference  on  the  financial 
woes  of  Europe. 

The  departure  for  London  was  only  three  hours  distant  when 
Lochner  met  a  government  official  just  back  from  vacation.  There  were 
a  few  words  of  greeting,  and  then  the  official  said  enthusiastically: 

"That  was  certainly  a  great  message  your  President  Hoover  ad- 
dressed to  the  world  on  the  moratorium.  I  read  about  it  when  on  leave, 
but  now  I  must  find  out  just  how  it  came  about." 

Lochner  listened  with  a  poker  face. 

"By  the  way,"  he  interposed  idly,  "I  have  never  seen  President 
von  Hindenburg's  appeal  to  Hoover  published  anywhere,  yet  I  under- 
stand it  is  a  deeply  moving  document.  Can't  you  have  a  copy  made 
and  send  it  to  me  at  London?  It  seems  to  me  your  president  should  get 
some  credit  for  the  part  he  played." 

To  Lochner's  joy,  the  German  did  not  summarily  reject  the  idea. 

"Pd  rather  not  send  you  the  text  direct  because  it  might  be  mis- 
construed," the  official  said.  "Pll  simply  address  an  envelope  to  your 
wife  here  in  Berlin,  and  when  she  opens  it  she  will  find  the  text." 

Several  nights  later  Lochner  was  at  a  typewriter  in  the  London 
Bureau  tapping  out  his  story  on  the  progress  of  the  Seven-Power  Con- 
ference. The  telephone  operator  told  him  Berlin  was  calling. 

It  was  Mrs.  Lochner  with  the  5OO-word  German  text  of  President 
von  Hindenburg's  letter. 

Quitting  London  with  the  German  delegation  two  days  later, 
Lochner  picked  up  an  English  newspaper.  It  carried  a  dispatch  from 
New  York  saying  The  AP  had  succeeded  in  obtaining  for  exclusive 
publication  the  text  of  President  von  Hindenburg's  letter  to  President 


358  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Hoover.  The  paper  reprinted  most  of  the  message.  Mischievously, 
Lochner  passed  the  paper  over  to  Curtius  and  indicated  the  article. 

"Herr  Reichminister,"  he  said  in  tones  of  injured  innocence,  "that's 
what  happens  when  you  and  I  leave  the  country!" 

In  spite  of  the  Hoover  moratorium,  Europe's  economic  condition 
failed  to  improve.  Germany's  difficulties  became  so  acute  that  the  gov- 
ernment was  forced  to  close  all  stock  exchanges  and  banks.  Heavy  with- 
drawals of  gold  from  London  by  frightened  Swiss,  Dutch,  and  Belgian 
bankers  impaired  England's  financial  stability,  and  on  September  21, 
1931,  the  country  abandoned  the  gold  standard.  The  cables  were  heavy 
with  the  story  and  its  international  repercussions. 


Because  of  its  sheer  magnitude,  its  endless  ramifications  and  baffling 
complexity,  the  depression  produced  no  one  dominant  figure  who  drama- 
tized the  tremendous  story.  It  was  another  field  of  events  which  gave 
the  report  one  of  the  period's  most  vivid  personalities — Mahatma 
Gandhi.  The  graphic  dispatches  of  Jim  Mills,  who  had  gone  to  India 
from  Africa,  were  in  part  responsible. 

Mills  managed  to  win  the  confidence  and  respect  of  the  homely 
little  62-year-old  Hindu.  It  was  his  reportorial  treatment  of  Gandhi  as 
an  intensely  appealing  human  character,  rather  than  as  a  fanatic  or  freak, 
that  won  the  holy  man's  trust.  Gandhi  informed  him  in  advance  of 
every  move  he  planned  to  make,  and  the  co-operative  was  able  to  supply 
its  members  with  prompt  and  complete  coverage  on  all  important  de- 
velopments in  India's  struggle  for  independence. 

Mills  traveled  throughout  India  with  Gandhi,  reporting  the  prog- 
ress of  the  civil  disobedience  movement,  riots,  and  bloodshed.  When 
Gandhi  went  to  London  in  September,  1931,  for  the  India  Round 
Table  Conference,  Mills  went  with  him.  The  conference  failed  and 
Mills  was  forewarned  that  Gandhi's  return  to  India  would  be  the  signal 
for  a  spirited  resumption  of  the  civil  disobedience  campaign. 

The  British  authorities  in  India  moved  swiftly  to  meet  the  new 
challenge  and  on  January  3,  1932,  Gandhi  confided  to  Mills  that  he 
expected  to  be  arrested  again.  Seated  at  a  spinning  wheel  in  the  tattered 
tent  he  had  pitched  on  the  roof  of  a  Bombay  tenement,  Gandhi  pre- 
dicted that  a  reign  of  terror  would  follow  his  imprisonment. 

Jim  Mills  was  there  when  the  police  arrived  at  three  o'clock  the 
next  morning. 


INTO  THE  DEPRESSION  359 

"They  are  coming!  They  are  coming!"  the  leader's  disciples  cried. 

Gandhi,  roused  from  sleep,  was  told  the  police  were  outside.  "Usher 
them  in,"  he  said  sleepily.  "They  are  welcome." 

A  few  minutes  later  the  Mahatma  repaired  to  another  part  of  the 
roof  where  he  prayed  silently  with  his  followers  and  wrote  a  few 
notes  of  farewell.  Then,  spying  Mills,  he  motioned  him  to  approach. 

"I  do  not  know  when,  or  whether  ever,  I  shall  see  you  again," 
he  said  in  a  low  voice.  "The  Associated  Press  has  reported  the  political 
situation  in  India  as  no  other  news  organization  in  the  world  has  cov- 
ered it.  Therefore,  on  the  threshold  of  prison,  I  give  you  and  The  Asso- 
ciated Press  a  farewell  message.  It  may  be  that  I  shall  die  in  prison.  It 
may  be  I  shall  never  see  you  again.  Therefore,  I  want  to  thank  you 
and  The  Associated  Press  for  the  thorough  and  impartial  way  in  which 
you  have  always  reported  my  activities  and  the  progress  of  the  Indian 
Nationalist  movement. 

"I  hope  that  after  I  am  gone  The  Associated  Press  will  continue 
to  inform  the  American  people  of  the  exact  situation  in  India,  telling 
them  what  we  as  Indian  Nationalists  are  trying  to  do  to  emancipate 
India.  But  at  the  same  time  I  would  ask  you  to  do  the  fullest  justice 
to  the  British  side  of  the  controversy.  For  I  do  not  wish  to  hurt  as 
much  as  a  hair  on  any  English  head." 

With  that,  Gandhi  placed  himself  in  the  hands  of  the  police  who 
whisked  him  by  automobile  to  the  Yeroda  Prison  at  Poona,  seventy-five 
miles  away. 

On  this  occasion,  while  the  events  of  an  outside  world  crowded  one 
on  the  other,  the  Mahatma  remained  in  jail  for  months.  There  was  great 
secrecy  when  he  was  unexpectedly  given  his  freedom.  To  avoid  atten- 
tion the  release  was  effected  after  midnight  and  Gandhi,  with  his  pots, 
pans,  and  goat's  milk,  was  taken  by  car  to  a  distant  railroad  station.  He 
reached  the  platform,  squatted  down,  and  pulled  his  clattering  posses- 
sions about  him.  Peering  into  the  darkness,  he  discerned  someone  ap- 
proaching. With  a  toothless  smile,  he  recognized  a  familiar  figure. 

"I  suppose,"  said  he,  shaking  his  head  in  mock  resignation,  "when 
I  go  to  the  Hereafter  and  stand  at  the  Golden  Gate,  the  first  person 
I  shall  meet  will  be  a  correspondent  of  The  Associated  Press." 


To  the  general  public  the  news-gathering  activities  of  The  AP  at 
any  given  time  represented  the  sum  total  of  its  operations.  Outside  of 


360  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

journalistic  circles,  few  knew  in  1932  that  the  Board  of  Directors  and 
the  management  faced  an  acute  administrative  problem  which  directly 
involved  continued  news  gathering.  Two  years  of  depression  had  sharply 
reduced  the  financial  resources  of  the  member  papers,  and  the  member 
papers  defrayed  the  cost  of  the  entire  service.  Some  had  been  forced  to 
suspend  publication,  a  few  had  consolidated,  and  a  number  were  barely 
able  to  meet  their  weekly  share  of  the  association's  expenses.  The  board 
and  the  general  manager  were  fully  aware  of  the  distress  and  knew  the 
papers  looked  to  them  to  do  everything  possible  to  ameliorate  the  situa- 
tion. The  gravity  of  matters  could  not  be  exaggerated.  Unless  mem- 
bers were  able  to  meet  their  weekly  assessments,  the  association  would 
not  have  sufficient  funds  for  news  operations,  and  hundreds  of  employes 
would  be  without  jobs. 

One  publisher,  thinking  to  be  helpful,  approached  the  general 
manager  with  a  suggestion  for  a  flat  20  per  cent  reduction  in  all  assess- 
ments. It  required  a  lot  of  explanation  to  convince  him  there  was  no 
such  easy  short  cut  to  a  lightening  of  the  financial  burden. 

In  the  first  place,  the  member  learned,  more  than  60  per  cent  of 
all  the  association's  expenses  went  for  domestic  wire  charges.  Of  that 
amount,  at  least  half  was  obligated  under  unexpired  contracts  and  could 
not  be  touched.  The  remaining  wire  costs  could  be  slashed  to  effect  the 
desired  assessment  decrease,  but  this  would  entail  an  arbitrary  curtail- 
ment of  the  leased  network. 

The  next  major  budget  item  was  the  20  per  cent  spent  on  the  For- 
eign Service  and  incoming  news.  Here  again,  the  member  found  himself 
unwilling  to  urge  retrenchment.  He  knew  that  if  the  co-operative 
diminished  the  outlay  for  the  foreign  service  it  would  jeopardize  its 
position  in  that  field.  Similarly,  if  the  reductions  were  made  at  the  cost 
of  national  and  state  news,  papers  might  get  slightly  lower  assessments 
but,  on  the  other  hand,  they  would  be  forced  to  spend  several  times  the 
amount  saved  to  supplement  an  incomplete  report. 

The  only  other  sizable  item  on  the  balance  sheet  was  1 1  per  cent 
for  salaries  and  all  administrative  and  office  expenses.  Obviously  not 
even  a  10  per  cent  assessment  reduction  was  possible  here,  without 
virtually  wiping  out  all  payroll,  office  maintenance,  and  administrative 
costs.  During  the  discussion  on  the  subject  of  salary  cuts,  it  was  pointed 
out  to  the  member  that  if  all  salaries  in  the  service  were  reduced  20 
per  cent,  the  decrease  would  range  from  10  cents  weekly  in  small 
places  to  $10  or  $15  in  the  largest  cities. 

The  publisher  who  came  to  New  York  to  suggest  an  easy  way  to 


INTO  THE  DEPRESSION  361 

lower  assessments  was  a  much  better  informed  man  when  he  left.  As 
far  as  he  could  see,  the  books  held  no  promise  of  any  major  savings. 
For  the  first  time,  he  appreciated  the  tremendous  problem  with  which 
the  board  and  the  general  manager  were  grappling. 

After  a  study  of  the  problem,  the  Board  of  Directors  delegated 
General  Manager  Cooper  to  devise,  if  possible,  a  retrenchment  program 
which  would  permit  a  minimum  monthly  refund  of  10  per  cent  on 
assessments.  The  assignment  was  the  most  formidable  administrative 
task  Cooper  had  undertaken  since  1912  when  he  turned  a  threatened 
deficit  of  $50,000  into  a  $100,000  saving. 

No  department,  domestic  or  foreign,  escaped  scrutiny  in  the 
search  for  economies.  Wherever  possible,  transmission  facilities  were 
realigned  or  rerouted  so  that  each  mile  of  wire  delivered  the  maximum 
of  service  and  linked  as  many  papers  as  practicable.  This  was  a  start. 

The  greater  portion  of  transmission  savings,  however,  came  from 
the  duplexing  of  existing  wire  circuits.  Duplexing  was  a  communica- 
tions development  whereby  one  wire  could  carry  two  sets  of  signals 
simultaneously,  without  interference.  This,  in  effect,  made  one  wire  do 
the  work  of  two,  for  the  impulses  which  actuated  either  Morkrum 
printers  or  Morse  sounders  were  transmitted  in  separate  harmonic 
channels,  rendering  the  wire,  for  practical  purposes,  almost  the  equiva- 
lent of  a  double  circuit.  This  increased  the  cost  of  each  wire,  but  the 
amount  involved  was  less  than  the  price  of  two  outright  wires. 

Quite  apart  from  the  immediate  retrenchments  realized,  the  thor- 
oughgoing survey  of  wires  and  transmission  equipment  led  to  one  de- 
velopment of  long-range  value.  W.  J.  McCambridge,  a  man  who  had 
come  up  from  the  ranks  to  become  chief  of  the  Traffic  Department  in 
1928,  got  to  thinking  of  the  advantages  a  research  and  experimental 
laboratory  might  yield.  The  more  he  considered  the  idea  the  more  it 
impressed  him.  The  possibilities,  he  saw,  were  endless.  In  all  likelihood, 
a  laboratory  could  work  out  a  number  of  mechanical  refinements  to 
meet  the  present  need  for  economies.  McCambridge  knew  how  pressing 
that  need  was.  Equally  important,  however,  was  the  fact  that  the  co- 
operative would  have  a  unit  constantly  seeking  to  invent  and  perfect 
equipment  for  the  future. 

McCambridge  had  no  trouble  in  getting  approval  for  his  idea. 
His  department  contained  many  men  of  high  scientific  and  technical 
ability,  and  from  among  them  he  recruited  the  nucleus  of  an  able  labora- 
tory staff.  Laboratory  enterprise  on  the  part  of  a  press  association  was 
something  quite  novel,  yet  the  experiment  attracted  scant  attention. 


362  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

The  economy  hunt  went  on.  An  additional  necessary  saving  was 
effected  by  a  10  per  cent  reduction  in  the  salaries  of  the  entire  personnel. 
Cooper  authorized  the  cuts  reluctantly.  He  always  had  thought  staff 
salaries  were  lower  than  he  would  like  to  have  them,  and  only  the 
emergency  compelled  his  consent  to  a  decrease  in  the  existing  scale.  It 
was  the  only  reduction  ordered  during  the  whole  depression  period. 
Cooper,  incidentally,  was  the  first  to  have  his  salary  reduced.  Before 
directing  action  on  the  staff  payroll,  the  Board  of  Directors  reduced  the 
general  manager's  salary  by  a  like  percentage. 

Further  decreases  in  operating  costs  were  worked  out  by  a  one-year 
postponement  of  the  annual  allotments  to  the  Emergency  Reserve  Fund, 
the  Employes  Benefit  Fund,  and  the  fund  set  aside  for  amortization  of 
telegraphic  and  traffic  equipment.  All  three  reserves  were  in  sound  finan- 
cial condition  and  payments  could  be  suspended  temporarily.  Econo- 
mies ran  from  pencils,  paste,  paper  clips,  and  paper  towels  up  to  bigger 
items.  Typewriters  which  ordinarily  would  have  been  replaced  were 
made  to  last  a  little  longer.  Office  furniture  which  had  seen  its  best  days 
continued  to  do  duty.  Telephone  and  telegraph  tolls  were  watched  re- 
lentlessly and  even  the  outlays  for  postage  were  challenged. 

The  program  was  helped  by  a  sizable  personal  contribution  from 
President  Noyes.  For  several  years  it  had  been  the  custom  of  the  board 
to  vote  him  annually  an  honorarium  of  $10,000  in  appreciation  of  the 
amount  of  time  and  money  he  spent  in  discharging  his  duties  as  the  un- 
salaried  head  of  the  co-operative.  From  1932  on  Noyes  declined  the 
award. 

Member  newspapers  received  the  benefits  of  the  economies  in  two 
ways.  Assessments  generally  were  adjusted  downward — although  in 
most  cases  the  1930  census  figures  actually  called  for  increases — and, 
retroactive  to  January  i,  1932,  a  part  of  these  lowered  assessments  was 
returned  to  members  in  regular  weekly  refunds. 

In  the  first  thirty-three  months  of  the  emergency  budget's  opera- 
tion, the  membership  received  $1,391,066.78  in  cash  refunds  and 
$1,184,220.48  in  outright  assessment  reductions. 

The  emergency  depression  measures  wisely  did  not  ignore  ade- 
quate provisions  for  the  association's  expansion  and  growth.  Arrange- 
ment was  made  for  the  continued  support  of  two  new  subsidiaries — The 
Associated  Press  of  Great  Britain  and  The  Associated  Press  of  Ger- 
many— news  and  photo  organizations  which  had  been  set  up  abroad 
in  1930. 

In  spite  of  the  steps  that  had  been  taken,  some  members  were 


INTO  THE  DEPRESSION  363 

unable  to  weather  the  economic  collapse.  Others  found  it  necessary  to 
substitute  pony  reports  for  leased  wire  service. 

The  big  story  that  was  a  thousand  stories  went  on  through  the 
months  and  the  dispatches  kept  adding  somber  footnotes. 

Unemployed  demonstrators  converge  on  Washington  .  .  .  Farm- 
ers' Holiday  movement  spreads  .  .  .  Bankruptcies  .  .  .  "Frozen" 
credits  .  .  .  Currency  hoarding  .  .  .  Depression  .  ,  , 


VI.  KIDNAP 


IN  THE  Newark  Bureau  it  was  the  quietest  night  in  months.  Against 
one  wall  a  battery  of  four  Morkrums  droned  along.  The  last  top  items 
of  news  had  been  cleared  on  the  New  Jersey  wires  much  earlier.  The 
best  story  in  the  report  seemed  to  be  the  by-lined  account  of  Morris 
J.  Harris  on  the  fierce  fighting  at  Shanghai  in  the  undeclared  Sino- 
Japanese  War.  The  state  budget  offered  nothing  better  than  a  fire  at 
Pennsgrove. 

At  the  filing  editor's  desk,  Gregory  Hewlett  sifted  through  a  thin 
pile  of  secondary  material  edited  for  relay  on  the  double  circuit  which 
served  the  state's  morning  papers.  At  the  state  news  desk,  the  night 
editor,  W.  A.  Kinney,  relaxed  in  his  chair.  His  desk  was  clear,  all  the 
night  report  stories  were  up,  and  the  few  early  report  items  had  been 
written.  Dull  nights  like  this  were  few  and  far  between. 

The  Morse  wire  clicked  off  a  message.  Hewlett  read  it  and  pushed 
it  across  the  news  desk. 

"The  nightly  Lindbergh  rumor,"  he  announced. 

Kinney  glanced  at  the  message.  It  was  from  the  Atlantic  City  Press. 

"Hear  Lindbergh  in  accident  near  Hopewell,"  it  read.  "Any- 
thing?" 

The  night  editor  did  not  bother  to  comment.  Ever  since  Colonel 
Lindbergh  had  taken  up  residence  in  the  state,  the  bureau  had  been 
plagued  with  requests  to  check  reports  that  this  or  that  had  happened  to 
the  famous  flier.  After  two  years  of  that,  another  query  did  not  cause  a 
great  stir.  Lindbergh's  unlisted  telephone  number  was  in  the  card  index 
— as  a  matter  of  fact,  it  was  only  within  the  past  week  that  the  number 
of  his  new  estate  at  Hopewell  had  been  substituted  for  a  temporary 
Princeton  one — but  the  office  order  was  that  the  colonel  must  not  be 
bothered  in  checking  such  reports.  The  telephone  number  was  for  extra- 
ordinary emergencies  only,  and  there  never  had  been  occasion  to  use  it. 

The  time  was  almost  10:40.  The  Morse  operator,  George  Wil- 
liamson, copied  down  another  message  and  passed  it  to  the  filing  editor. 

"Here's  another  one,"  Hewlett  called  over  to  Kinney,  now  on  his 
way  to  the  telephone  booth  which  shut  out  the  drumming  noise  of  the 

364 


KIDNAP  365 

Morkrums.  "Paterson  wants  to  know  if  there's  anything  to  Lindbergh 
being  in  a  crash  somewhere." 

The  night  editor  went  into  the  telephone  booth  and  picked  up 
the  receiver. 

"Market  2-5400,"  he  told  the  operator. 

That  was  Newark  Police  Headquarters.  If  anything  important  was 
happening  in  the  state,  they  invariably  knew  it  there  quickly. 

Headquarters  listened  patiently. 

"No.  Nothing  tonight.  Switch  you  to  the  teletype  room,  but  if  they 
had  anything  we'd  know  before  this.  Hold  on." 

The  teletype  room,  where  police  communications  were  received, 
had  no  information. 

"The  only  State  Police  stuff  we've  had  in  the  last  hour  has  been 
routine — stolen  cars  and  a  few  alarm  cancellations.  They'd  have  had 
anything  like  that  before  this.  Yes,  a  couple  more  phonies,  I  guess  .  .  . 
Wait,  there's  something  starting  to  come  in  on  the  State  Police  printer 
now." 

Then  the  detective's  voice  exploded  in  Kinney's  ear. 

"My  God!  Listen,  AP!  Here's  the  State  Police  alarm.  The  Lind- 
bergh baby's  been  kidnaped!" 

The  editor  listened  as  the  detective  read  the  text  of  the  alarm  and 
then  bolted  out  of  the  booth.  Pulling  up  a  typewriter,  he  yelled  at  the 
top  of  his  voice. 

"Bulletin!" 

He  didn't  think  of  a  flash.  Just  get  the  news  out.  A  straightaway 
bulletin.  Hang  it  right  on  the  State  Police  flier. 

The  typewriter  banged  out  the  words: 

BULLETIN 

NEWARK,  N.  J.,  MARCH  1  -  (AP)  -  THE 
STATE  POLICE  TONIGHT  BROADCAST  THE  FOLLOWING 
TELETYPE  ALARM: 

"COLONEL  LINDBERGH'S  BABY  WAS  KIDNAPED 
PROM  LINDBERGH  HOME  IN  HOPEWELL,  N.  J.,  SOME 
TIME  BETWEEN  7:30  AND  10:00  P.M.  THIS  DATE. 
BABY  IS  19  MONTHS  OLD  AND  A  BOY.   IS  DRESSED 
IN  SLEEPING  SUIT.   REQUEST  THAT  ALL  CARS  BE 
INVESTIGATED  BY  POLICE  PATROLS." 

Hewlett  ripped  the  paper  out  of  the  machine  as  soon  as  the  last 
typebar  hit,  and  Kinney  darted  back  into  the  telephone  booth,  fumbling 
hurriedly  through  the  card  index  for  Lindbergh's  private  number.  In  a 
moment  Hewlett  joined  him,  and  sat  down  at  the  other  telephone. 


366  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

"I'll  get  after  Breckinridge  and  Hopewell  police,"  he  said. 

When  Kinney  finally  got  through  to  the  Lindbergh  home,  he  heard 
a  voice  filled  with  both  hope  and  anxiety.  He  recognized  it  immediately. 
He  had  covered  Lindbergh  on  numerous  assignments  before. 

"Colonel  Lindbergh,  this  is  The  Associated  Press  in  Newark.  We 
hesitate  to  bother  you  at  such  a  moment,  but  we've  just  received  the 
State  Police  alarm  that  your  son  has  been  kidnaped." 

The  colonel  interrupted. 

"I  have  no  statement  to  make  at  this  time,"  he  said. 

He  didn't  say  it  the  unworried  way  the  editor  had  heard  him  say 
it  often  before  at  the  airport.  There  was  time  for  only  a  few  other 
quick  questions  before  the  conversation  ended,  but  by  then  the  Newark 
editor  was  convinced  the  kidnaping  report  was  true. 

Hewlett  called  Colonel  Lindbergh's  attorney,  Henry  Breckin- 
ridge, and  got  positive  confirmation  of  the  story.  Then  the  Hopewell 
police  were  reached.  An  officer  had  been  sent  up  to  the  remote  white 
house  in  the  gloomy  Sourlands,  but  until  they  heard  from  him  there 
was  no  further  information. 

Hammering  away  at  typewriters,  the  two  men  pieced  out  the  story 
as  fast  as  they  could. 

As  the  story  began  to  roll,  Newark  raised  the  other  New  Jersey 
bureau,  in  the  State  House  at  Trenton,  so  that  staff  men  there  could  be 
started  for  Hopewell,  which  was  much  nearer  that  city  than  Newark. 

In  Trenton  Sam  Blackman  hustled  over  to  State  Police  headquar- 
ters. The  lieutenant  on  duty  told  him  that  Colonel  Lindbergh  per- 
sonally had  called  in  the  report  of  the  kidnaping,  but  that  was  all  they 
knew.  Troopers  already  were  at  the  estate  in  the  Sourlands.  Blackman 
started  for  Hopewell  with  Frank  Jamieson,  the  correspondent  in  charge 
at  Trenton.  Jim  Lawrence  was  assigned  to  the  police  headquarters  and 
W.  F.  Carter  manned  the  State  House  Bureau  so  that  the  men  could 
relay  their  news  through  Trenton  in  case  Newark's  telephones  were 
busy. 

To  know  that  Jamieson  and  Blackman  were  racing  toward  Hope- 
well  gave  a  lift  to  the  men  in  Newark,  but  it  might  be  an  hour  before 
the  first  word  was  received  from  them. 

Hewlett  remembered  a  young  woman  who  happened  to  be  a  friend 
of  Anne  Lindbergh's  sister.  Maybe  she  had  heard  something.  The  call 
woke  her.  Hewlett  started  to  tell  her. 

"Oh,"  she  exclaimed,  "and  Anne  is  expecting  another  baby!" 

Things  like  that  kept  happening. 


KIDNAP  367 

Another  try  at  the  Lindbergh  telephone  number  produced  a  quickly 
interrupted  few  words  with  the  state  trooper  who  answered,  but  the 
brief  seconds  developed  that  an  unspecified  ransom  had  been  asked, 
and  a  note  found. 

Newark  then  called  the  estate  of  Mrs.  Lindbergh's  mother  at 
Englewood  and  told  Mrs.  Morrow  that  The  AP  felt  it  might  be  helpful 
in  the  search  for  the  stolen  baby  if  she  would  supply  a  description  of 
the  child  for  immediate  nation-wide  distribution.  She  agreed  and  ex- 
pressed her  thanks  for  the  suggestion. 


The  Lindbergh  house  in  the  Sourland  mountains  was  a  difficult 
place  to  find  that  dark,  blustery  March  night,  but  Jamieson  and  Black- 
man  had  the  experience  of  two  previous  trips  over  the  winding,  bumpy 
road.  They  had  written  stories  of  the  flier's  isolated  estate  before  he 
took  up  residence. 

Whateley,  the  butler,  answered  the  door.  He  recognized  Black- 
man  but  the  smile  of  other  visits  was  gone. 

"What  about  the  baby  being  kidnaped?"  Blackman  asked. 

"All  we  know,"  the  servant  said  sadly,  "is  that  the  baby  isn't  here. 
Colonel  Lindbergh  is  out  on  the  grounds,  but  you  can  come  in  and 
wait." 

Jamieson  went  off  in  search  of  the  police.  Blackman  started  back 
toward  Hopewell  looking  for  a  telephone.  By  the  entrance  to  the  Lind- 
bergh estate,  about  a  half  mile  from  the  house,  he  found  the  home  of 
a  baker.  None  too  happy  at  being  roused  from  bed  at  midnight,  the 
man  grumblingly  permitted  the  use  of  his  party-line  telephone.  Black- 
man talked  to  Newark — Whateley's  few  words  proved  to  be  the  first 
positive  statement  obtained  from  a  member  of  the  Lindbergh  house- 
hold— and  then  started  back  up  the  dark  muddy  lane. 

From  the  blackness  of  the  estate's  entrance  four  figures  emerged 

"Are  you  troopers?"  Blackman  hailed. 

A  tall,  hatless  man  answered  him. 

"I'm  Colonel  Lindbergh." 

"I'm  Blackman  of  The  AP." 

The  aviator  shook  his  head. 

"I'm  sorry,  Blackman,  but  I  can't  say  anything  now." 

Accompanied  by  two  of  the  troopers,  Lindbergh  strode  on  up  the 
lane  toward  the  house.  Blinking  flashlights  marked  the  progress  of  the 


368  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

three  men.  Then  the  reporter  became  aware  that  one  trooper  had  re- 
mained near  the  gatehouse. 

"Let's  see  your  police  card,"  the  officer  asked. 

His  electric  torch  flickered  briefly  as  he  examined  the  credential. 
Then  he  flashed  it  for  a  moment  on  Blackman's  face. 

"O.K.,  AP,  Pll  tell  you  the  story,  but  you  don't  know  where  you 
got  it." 

While  Blackman  scribbled  notes,  the  trooper  told  what  had  hap- 
pened, filling  in  numerous  gaps  in  the  story  which  Newark  had  so 
quickly  assembled  by  telephone. 

He  told  how  Betty  Gow,  the  nurse,  had  found  the  child's  crib 
empty  at  ten  o'clock.  He  told  of  the  discovery  of  the  $50,000  ransom 
note  and  its  cryptic  signature,  of  the  mud  tracks  on  the  nursery  floor, 
of  the  footmarks  in  the  soft  earth  below  the  window,  and  of  the  three- 
piece  wooden  ladder  and  the  chisel  which  had  been  abandoned  near 
the  house. 

Blackman  sprinted  back  to  the  baker's  house.  He  told  his  story 
over  the  telephone  to  Newark  where  the  two  men,  working  in  relays, 
rushed  a  New  Lead  onto  the  wires  with  Blackman's  by-line.  It  was 
not  until  two  hours  later  that  the  State  Police  held  a  press  conference 
at  which  some  of  the  details  of  the  kidnaping  were  disclosed. 


Overnight,  Hopewell,  a  quiet  country  town,  became  the  news  center 
of  the  world.  The  shocking  story  aroused  universal  anxiety  and  horror, 
not  only  in  the  United  States  but  in  foreign  countries.  To  cover  develop- 
ments at  the  scene,  the  co-operative  assembled  a  special  staff.  New 
Jersey  contributed  Jamieson,  Blackman,  Lawrence,  and  Kinney.  New 
York  sent  Robert  Cavagnaro,  Morris  Watson,  Lorena  Hickok,  and 
Katherine  Beebe,  as  well  as  cameramen  Joe  Caneva,  Tom  Sande,  and 
Walter  Durkin. 

In  reality,  those  at  Hopewell  represented  only  a  small  portion  of 
the  news  force  which  had  a  part  in  the  story.  No  one  knew  in  what  part 
of  the  country,  or  even  in  what  part  of  the  world,  the  next  "break" 
might  occur.  Every  staff  man  considered  himself  assigned  to  run  down 
any  lead  which  might  have  a  bearing  on  the  case.  Hundreds  of  date 
lines  supplemented  the  stories  from  Hopewell.  There  were  dispatches 
on  the  reaction  of  foreign  capitals,  on  official  activity  in  Washington,  on 


KIDNAP  369 

police  operations  in  a  score  of  cities,  and  on  the  epidemic  of  crank 
"clues"  which  began  almost  immediately. 

At  Hopewell  it  soon  became  apparent  that  the  story  would  be  ex- 
tremely difficult  to  cover  accurately  and  promptly.  State  Police  sur- 
rounded their  activities  with  secrecy.  Silence  shrouded  every  develop- 
ment detectives  thought  important.  The  police  issued  official  com- 
muniques from  time  to  time,  but  the  information  was  carefully  selected 
and  usually  dealt  with  exploded  clues  or  secondary  detective  work. 

For  every  line  of  news  written  there  were  hours  of  wearisome,  un- 
productive digging.  Men  were  kept  on  duty  at  the  gatehouse  of  the 
estate,  watching  the  mysterious  goings  and  comings  of  uncommunica- 
tive officers.  Endless  time  was  spent  on  hopeful  amateur  detective 
work  in  the  vicinity.  And  there  were  the  frequent  wild  rides  over  back 
roads  at  breakneck  speed  to  run  down  "hot  tips"  which  never  survived 
investigation. 

But  there  was  real  news  somewhere  behind  the  barriers  which 
police  had  raised,  and  the  job  was  to  get  that  news  for  the  report.  The 
New  Jersey  members  of  the  staff  had  numerous  contacts  because  of 
their  service  in  the  state  and  these  were  quietly  canvassed  in  the  hope 
that  some  reliable  channel  of  information  could  be  found. 

Correspondent  Jamieson  in  particular  had  built  up  a  long  list  of 
confidential  news  sources  during  many  years  of  reporting  governmental 
and  political  activities.  Enlisting  the  co-operation  of  an  official  not  con- 
nected with  the  state  government,  he  ultimately  was  able  to  improvise 
a  roundabout  but  effective  and  trustworthy  way  of  learning  what  was 
happening  behind  the  scenes. 

He  reported  the  receipt  of  additional  ransom  notes,  the  entrance 
of  Dr.  John  F.  ("Jafsie")  Condon  as  an  intermediary  in  negotiations 
with  the  kidnaper  and  Colonel  Lindbergh's  personal  activities  in  the 
hunt  for  his  stolen  son.  His  sources  of  information  varied,  and  the 
news  might  come  at  any  hour  of  the  day  or  night.  To  protect  the  identity 
of  his  sources,  Jamieson  was  forced  to  take  every  precaution.  He  used 
out-of-the-way  telephones,  arranged  for  hurried  meetings  in  hotel  rooms, 
and  engineered  "casual"  encounters  in  places  where  conversations  could 
not  be  overheard. 

4 

In  spite  of  the  most  intensive  man  hunt  in  police  history,  days 

passed  without  recovery  of  the  baby  or  the  apprehension  of  the  kidnaper. 

There  was  a  flurry  of  activity  when  the  $50,000  ransom  was  paid 


370  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

at  St.  Raymond's  Cemetery  in  the  Bronx  the  night  of  April  2,  1932,  and 
when  Colonel  Lindbergh  searched  in  vain  off  the  Massachusetts  coast 
by  air  for  the  boat  on  which  the  baby  was  said  to  be  held.  The  failure 
to  recover  the  child  turned  Lindbergh  to  John  Hughes  Curtis,  the  Vir- 
ginia boatbuilder  who  claimed  to  have  been  in  contact  with  a  band  of 
kidnapers.  Confidential  information  from  police  sources  had  led  the 
staff  at  Trenton  to  doubt  the  veracity  of  his  stories,  but  events  in  the  kid- 
naping had  been  so  unpredictable  that  anything  might  happen.  The  boat- 
builder's  movements  were  watched  as  closely  as  possible. 

Another  month  passed  with  its  series  of  perfunctory  police  com- 
muniques and  occasional  alarms.  The  story  had  become  almost  routine 
when  the  air  suddenly  became  tense  again  with  a  new  epidemic  of  reports 
that  an  important  "break"  might  soon  occur.  Colonel  Lindbergh,  with 
Curtis,  was  on  a  yacht  off  the  New  Jersey  coast,  combing  the  sea  for 
the  vessel  on  which  the  Virginian  said  the  baby  would  be  found. 

At  the  State  House  in  Trenton,  May  12  droned  along  uneventfully 
until  late  in  the  afternoon.  Then  without  warning  Lieutenant  Walter 
Coughlin,  the  press  liaison  officer  of  the  investigation,  announced  that 
Colonel  H.  Norman  Schwarzkopf,  superintendent  of  the  State  Police, 
wanted  all  newspapermen  covering  the  story  to  be  at  the  Lindbergh 
estate  in  an  hour.  No  reason  was  given  for  the  abrupt  summons  but 
everyone  felt  it  meant  an  announcement  of  exceptional  importance. 

It  was  after  five  o'clock  and  Jamieson  decided  on  a  course  of 
action. 

"Sam,"  he  instructed  Blackman,  "you  go  on  down  to  Hopewell. 
Pm  going  to  try  to  get  Governor  Moore.  If  anything  big  is  doing, 
Moore  will  know  about  it.  I'll  get  down  to  Hopewell  then  as  quickly 
as  I  can." 

Blackman  remembered  that  the  nearest  telephone  to  the  Lindbergh 
estate  was  in  the  house  of  the  baker  he  had  routed  out  of  bed  the  night 
the  baby  was  stolen.  The  man  worked  in  Trenton,  so  Blackman  called 
him  at  the  bakeshop  and  arranged  to  hire  his  telephone  at  Hopewell 
for  as  long  as  necessary.  That  done,  he  started  over  the  familiar  road 
to  Sourland  Mountains.  At  the  baker's  house  he  stopped  and  telephoned 
New  York,  explaining  the  desirability  of  keeping  an  open  line  in  readi- 
ness for  whatever  Schwarzkopf's  press  conference  might  produce.  New 
York  put  a  member  of  the  local  staff  on  the  wire  to  chat  with  the 
baker's  wife  and  read  her  news  items  so  that  the  line  would  be  kept 
busy  until  needed.  With  the  nearest  line  of  communication  assured, 
Blackman  continued  up  the  lane  to  the  Lindbergh  estate.  The  State 


KIDNAP  371 

Police  headquarters  had  been  set  up  in  the  garage  and  correspondents 
were  already  gathering  there. 

Back  in  Trenton,  Jamieson  had  no  immediate  success  in  his  efforts 
to  reach  Moore.  The  governor  was  motoring  to  his  home  in  Jersey  City, 
some  fifty  miles  away.  The  governor's  own  office  seemed  to  guarantee 
the  greatest  privacy,  so  Jamieson  sat  down  there  and  started  telephon- 
ing. He  tried  to  get  the  governor  in  Jersey  City  but  without  success. 
Instructing  the  operator  to  keep  trying  until  she  reached  the  governor, 
he  called  several  private  sources  that  might  conceivably  have  an  inkling 
of  what  was  behind  the  summoning  of  reporters  to  the  Lindbergh  estate. 
No  one  knew. 

The  minutes  ticked  by  in  the  quiet  office.  Jamieson  sat  and  waited. 
The  governor  was  his  only  hope.  If  Moore  did  not  reach  Jersey  City 
soon,  Jamieson  would  never  be  able  to  get  to  Hopewell  for  Schwarz- 
kopf's conference.  The  telephone  rang. 

"On  your  call  to  Jersey  City,"  the  operator  said,  "we  are  ready." 

"Hello,  Governor,"  Jamieson  began  in  his  cheery  way,  "this  is 
Frank  Jamieson." 

"Yes,  Frank,  what's  on  your  mind?" 

"Governor,  has  there  been  any  big  development  in  the  Lindbergh 
case?  Colonel  Schwarzkopf  has  called  all  the  boys  to  the  Lindbergh 
estate  for  a  press  conference  within  the  next  hour  and  it  makes  us  think 
he  has  something  important  to  say." 

"I  haven't  heard  of  anything,  Frank,"  Moore  answered.  "Up  until 
the  time  I  left  the  State  House  there  was  no  indication  anything  excep- 
tional had  happened  or  would  happen." 

Jamieson  knew  the  governor  had  followed  the  case  with  intense 
interest.  He  suggested: 

"Couldn't  you  get  in  touch  with  Colonel  Schwarzkopf  and  find 
out?" 

"I'll  do  that  immediately,"  Moore  said. 

"And,  governor,"  Jamieson  asked,  "will  you  call  me  right  back  if 
it's  anything?  I'm  phoning  from  your  office." 

"I'll  call  you  right  back,"  Moore  promised. 

As  soon  as  Moore  hung  up,  Jamieson  picked  up  a  second  telephone 
and  put  in  a  call  for  New  York. 

Hastily  sketching  the  situation,  he  said: 

"I  don't  know  what's  coming,  but  it  might  be  big.  We'll  keep  this 
line  open,  so  when  the  governor  calls  back  on  the  other  phone,  I  can 
shoot  you  the  stuff  without  delay." 


372  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

More  minutes  of  waiting.  Then  the  other  telephone  jangled.  It 
was  6:10  P.M. 

"Hello!  Hello!" 

"Hello,  Frank?  This  is  Governor  Moore.  It's  horrible  news.  The 
Lindbergh  baby  has  been  found  dead — " 

Jamieson  shouted: 

"Hold  it,  governor,  hold  it!" 

Snatching  up  the  other  telephone,  he  fired  the  words  over  the 
open  line  to  New  York. 

F-L-A-S-H 

LINDBERGH  BABY  POUND  DEAD. 

Back  on  the  governor's  telephone,  he  heard  Moore,  obviously 
affected,  relate  all  he  had  learned  of  the  finding  of  the  body  that  after- 
noon in  a  thicket  just  off  the  Hopewell-Princeton  highway,  only  five 
miles  from  the  Lindbergh  home.  The  correspondent  halted  him  occa- 
sionally in  order  to  relay  the  details  to  New  York  over  the  other  line. 

Once  the  conversation  had  ended  and  the  last  facts  were  repeated 
to  New  York,  Jamieson  tumbled  into  a  taxi  for  a  mad  ride  to  get  to 
Hopewell  in  time  for  the  press  conference. 

In  the  garage  on  the  Lindbergh  estate  the  temporary  press  head- 
quarters buzzed  with  speculation  on  the  nature  of  the  information 
Schwarzkopf  had  to  reveal,  and  a  half  a  mile  away  near  the  estate  en- 
trance the  baker's  wife  sat  listening  to  news  items  still  being  read  to  her 
over  the  telephone  line  Blackman  had  opened  to  New  York. 

Jamieson  arrived  just  in  time  to  get  into  the  garage  before  the 
doors  were  closed.  He  greeted  acquaintances  with  a  disarming  smile  as  if 
nothing  had  happened. 

After  the  garage  doors  had  been  locked,  Colonel  Schwarzkopf  ex- 
plained that  he  had  ordered  the  action  because  he  wanted  no  news- 
papermen to  leave  the  building  until  he  had  concluded  his  announce- 
ment. Then  at  6:45  P.M.  he  began  a  lengthy  statement.  The  State  Police 
superintendent  read  slowly,  pausing  to  make  sure  reporters  had  time 
to  copy  the  words  verbatim. 

And  all  the  while  from  New  York  to  California,  the  presses  of 
member  papers  were  already  rolling,  and  the  flood  of  extras  was 
hitting  the  streets. 

When  the  garage  doors  were  flung  open,  there  was  a  pell-mell 
scramble  for  the  nearest  telephone.  But  the  nearest  telephone  was  at 
the  baker's  house,  and  Blackman  had  tied  it  up  an  hour  earlier.  Not 


KIDNAP  -  373 

only  that,  it  was  on  a  party  line  and  as  long  as  it  was  busy  other  tele- 
phones in  the  vicinity  could  not  be  used.  Jamieson  and  Blackman 
alternated,  dictating  Schwarzkopf's  official  statement. 

A  few  rivals  later  reproached  Governor  Moore  for  giving  Jamieson 
the  news.  Moore  reminded  them  that  the  AP  correspondent  was  the 
only  one  to  get  in  touch  with  him  in  quest  of  the  information,  and  that 
there  had  been  nothing  to  prevent  others  from  making  a  similar 
effort.  "He  caught  the  train,"  the  governor  said.  "The  others  stood 
waiting  on  the  platform  and  let  it  go  by." 

Jamieson's  work  throughout  the  eleven-week  search  for  the  stolen 
child  won  him  the  Pulitzer  prize  for  the  outstanding  example  of  do- 
mestic reporting  in  1932. 

After  the  finding  of  the  murdered  child,  John  Hughes  Curtis  was 
indicted  for  obstructing  justice  by  his  tale  of  negotiations  with  an 
imaginary  gang  of  kidnapers.  Lawrence  and  Kinney  reported  his  trial 
and  conviction  at  Flemington  the  last  week  in  June,  and  the  first  full 
chapter  of  the  bewildering  Lindbergh  kidnaping  mystery  reach  its  con- 
clusion. The  crime  was  the  first  of  a  series  of  spectacular  kidnapings 
which  scourged  the  country  through  the  early  thirties.  But  no  one  for- 
got Hopewell.  There  was  always  the  chance  that  sometime,  somewhere 
the  Lindbergh  case  might  break  open  again  with  the  capture  of  the 
kidnaper. 


VII.  ANOTHER  ROOSEVELT 


AT  ALMOST  any  other  time  the  news  of  the  smashing  Japanese  ad- 
vance into  the  Jehol  province  of  Manchuria  would  have  been  the  domi- 
nant story  in  the  report.  For  days  Jim  Mills  followed  the  Mikado's 
legions  on  the  unsheltered  top  of  an  ammunition  truck — the  best  trans- 
portation he  could  wheedle  from  the  army.  He  lived  on  hardtack  and 
melted  snow  except  when  bitter  tea  was  obtainable  at  dirty  Chinese 
inns.  An  occasional  rear-bound  truck  or  airplane  was  his  only  means  of 
communication,  and  many  of  his  stories  were  lost  entirely,  probably 
thrown  away  by  negligent  couriers.  Nevertheless,  Mills  plowed  on 
through  to  Jehol  City  to  write  of  the  final  phases  of  the  campaign. 

The  conquest  of  Jehol,  however,  was  all  but  eclipsed  by  the  suc- 
cession of  grave  domestic  events  which  filled  the  report  through  Feb- 
ruary, 1933. 

From  the  Detroit  Bureau:  Michigan  declares  an  eight-day  bank 
holiday. 

From  Baltimore:  Maryland  banks  closed  for  three  days. 

From  St.  Paul:  Minnesota  places  two-month  ban  on  mortgage  fore- 
closures. 

From  Pennsylvania,  Ohio,  and  Delaware:  Banks  authorized  to  re- 
strict withdrawals. 

Staff  men  all  over  the  country  saw  long  queues  standing  outside 
banks,  waiting  to  withdraw  savings.  State  by  state,  the  story  almost 
defied  writing.  The  causes  of  the  hysteria  were  obscure.  Its  spread  had 
been  stealthy.  Its  manifestations  were  unpredictable  and  deceptive.  Sta- 
tistics on  the  amount  of  money  in  circulation  provided  the  only  clue  to 
the  extent  of  hoarding,  but  any  attempt  to  compute  exact  figures  was 
conjecture.  No  one  could  report  authoritatively  on  the  psychology  of 
fear,  the  fatalism,  and  the  air  of  gloom.  Bread  lines,  idle  factories,  and 
empty  shops  were  so  commonplace  that  they  had  long  since  ceased  to 
be  news  in  themselves,  yet  each  contributed  to  the  strange  thing  hap- 
pening in  the  country.  It  was  a  struggle  to  keep  the  report  factual  with- 
out being  alarmist,  on  the  one  hand,  or  without  attempting  to  minimize 

374 


ANOTHER  ROOSEVELT  375 

conditions,  on  the  other.  Stripped  of  atmosphere  and  emotion,  the  con- 
firmable  facts  were  eloquent  and  ominous. 

Against  such  a  gray  national  background  Chief  of  Bureau  Price  at 
Washington  marshaled  his  staff  to  cover  the  inauguration  of  Franklin 
Delano  Roosevelt  as  President  of  the  United  States.  In  spite  of  anxiety 
and  faltering  confidence,  the  capital  tried  to  be  gay.  After  a  dozen  lean 
years  of  absence  from  power,  the  occasion  was  a  great  one  for  Democrats 
and  each  state  sent  its  delegation  of  high  officials  and  party  stalwarts  to 
participate  in  the  ceremonies.  Over  the  web  of  wires  went  story  after 
story  telling  of  the  arrival  of  inaugural  parties — from  Texas,  from 
Pennsylvania,  from  California,  from  New  York  .  .  . 

Chaplin,  city  editor  in  New  York,  picked  up  another  batch  of  copy, 
including  a  secondary  Washington  dispatch.  It  concerned  the  New  York 
delegation  to  the  inaugural,  and  one  line  noted  that  the  newly  elected 
governor,  Herbert  H.  Lehman,  was  not  among  those  present  although 
it  was  the  afternoon  preceding  inauguration  day.  Earlier  announcements 
that  Lehman  would  attend  made  his  absence  conspicuous.  It  might  be 
that  illness  had  interfered  with  the  governor's  plans.  In  that  case  there 
should  be  an  item  for  the  report.  Then  again  it  might  be  something 
else. 

"Here,  take  a  look  at  this,"  said  Chaplin,  handing  the  flimsy  copy 
to  a  member  of  his  city  staff.  "Better  check  the  Lehman  residence 
and  see  what's  the  matter." 

The  telephone  at  the  governor's  New  York  home  was  answered 
promptly.  The  reporter  thought  it  was  the  butler. 

"May  I  speak  to  Governor  Lehman's  secretary?" 

"He  isn't  here  just  now,"  the  voice  answered.  "Who  is  calling, 
please?" 

"This  is  The  Associated  Press.  We  wanted  to  ask  the  governor's 
secretary  .  .  ." 

"Well,"  said  the  voice,  "this  is  the  governor.  Perhaps  I  could  help 
you." 

Momentarily  surprised  to  find  that  Lehman  himself  had  answered 
the  telephone,  the  reporter  began  inquiries.  Why  had  the  governor 
changed  his  plans  for  attending  the  inauguration? 

"Oh,  so  that's  what  you  want  to  know?"  was  the  light  reply. 
"There's  really  nothing  to  it.  Some  personal  matters  arose  unexpectedly 
and  I  had  no  choice  but  to  stay  and  attend  to  them." 

"Then  there  is  no  chance  that  you  will  be  able  to  get  away  in  time 
for  the  inauguration?" 


376  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

"No,  Pm  afraid  not." 

"And  purely  personal  matters  are  detaining  you?  Nothing  con- 
cerning state  business?" 

"Oh,  no!" 

"Or  the  banking  situation?  We  understand  that  withdrawals  have 
been  particularly  heavy  today  in  some  parts  of  the  city." 

"Oh,  everything  seems  quite  all  right.  Nothing  to  worry  about. 
There  have  been  withdrawals  in  some  cases,  but  the  banks  seem  to  be 
meeting  demands  very  nicely." 

The  conversation  ended  there,  but  it  was  enough  to  send  the  staff 
into  action.  New  York  and  Washington  proceeded  on  the  theory  that  a 
banking  crisis  in  New  York  was  keeping  Lehman  away  from  the  in- 
augural. A  reporter  was  sent  to  the  governor's  residence.  Wall  Street 
was  enlisted  to  uncover  whatever  information  might  be  available  at  the 
Federal  Reserve  Bank  or  the  offices  of  leading  financial  figures.  A  mes- 
sage went  to  Albany  suggesting  that  the  bureau  there  start  working  on 
the  superintendent  of  banks'  department.  In  Washington  other  staff  men 
buttonholed  Treasury  officials. 

Through  the  afternoon,  into  the  evening,  and  on  into  the  night 
Governor  Lehman  held  conferences  at  his  Park  Avenue  home.  Bank 
officials  came  and  went.  Finally  at  4:15  A.M.  on  Saturday,  March  4 — 
Inauguration  Day — Governor  Lehman  issued  a  proclamation.  A  re- 
porter darted  for  a  telephone. 

P-L-A-S-H 

NEW  YORK  -  GOVERNOR  DECLARES  TWO-DAY 
BANK  HOLIDAY. 

On  the  heels  of  the  New  York  announcement,  Harrisburg  came 
through  with  news  of  a  similar  proclamation  in  Pennsylvania.  Then  Illi- 
nois, Massachusetts,  and  New  Jersey. 

Over  200,000  miles  of  leased  wires  shuttled  dispatches  telling  of 
a  national  crisis  which  found  all  banks  closed  or  operating  under  sharp 
restrictions.  From  every  important  foreign  date  line,  the  cables  brought 
the  reaction  to  the  financial  paralysis  which  had  gripped  the  United 
States. 


Perhaps  not  since  Gobright  reported  the  beginning  of  Abraham 
Lincoln's  second  term  in  the  dark  days  of  the  Civil  War  had  an  inaugu- 
ration assignment  been  so  important.  The  staff  gathered  the  story  of  the 


ANOTHER  ROOSEVELT  377 

capital  on  March  4,  1933 — the  end  of  the  last  "lame  duck"  session  of 
Congress  at  noon,  the  swearing-in  of  president  and  vice-president,  the 
1 7-minute  inaugural  address  pledging  swift  and  decisive  action,  the  color 
of  the  traditional  parade,  the  new  First  Lady,  the  somber  crowds,  and 
the  quiet  departure  of  Herbert  Clark  Hoover. 

That  night,  Francis  M.  Stephenson,  assigned  to  the  White  House, 
got  little  news  although  he  waited  hours  at  the  entrance  of  the  presi- 
dential offices  in  the  west  wing  of  the  executive  mansion.  There  was 
a  short  story  from  Stephen  Early,  who  had  become  Roosevelt's  press 
liaison  secretary,  but  nothing  from  the  White  House  itself  where  there 
was  much  coming  and  going  as  lights  burned  late  into  the  night. 

The  next  day — Sunday.  Guests  argued  with  hotel  managers  to  cash 
checks.  Others  counted  the  money  in  their  pockets,  grinned  and  accepted 
their  predicament  in  a  spirit  of  adventure.  Tension  began  to  appear. 
At  the  White  House  Stephenson  resumed  his  vigil  with  a  hundred 
other  newspapermen.  It  was  not  until  a  few  minutes  before  Sunday 
midnight  that  the  news  came  and  Stephenson  shouted  over  a  telephone: 

J-L-A-S-H 

WASHINGTON  -  PRESIDENT  ORDERS  NATIONAL 
4-DAY  BANK  HOLIDAY. 

The  holiday,  subsequently  extended  beyond  its  original  time  limit, 
created  a  story  of  vast  proportions,  demanding  accurate,  complete,  and 
prompt  coverage.  Not  only  in  Washington  but  in  each  of  the  forty-eight 
states  banking  and  government  officials  worked  with  their  tremendous 
problem.  The  news  was  of  vital  concern  to  everyone,  from  the  banker, 
wondering  when  his  institution  could  reopen,  to  the  storekeeper,  harassed 
by  the  lack  of  small  coins  for  making  change,  to  the  jobless  depositor, 
dependent  upon  his  savings  for  food  and  shelter. 

In  the  beginning  the  major  part  of  the  news  burden  fell  upon 
Washington  as  the  administration  worked  out  plans  for  a  reorganization 
of  the  country's  banking  system.  This  news  had  right  of  way,  and,  with 
rare  exceptions,  member  papers  received  the  information  long  before 
state  banking  departments  were  officially  advised  by  telegrams  from 
Secretary  of  the  Treasury  W.  H.  Woodin. 

New  York  took  over  the  task  of  co-ordinating  the  story  of  the 
banking  situation  as  it  changed  throughout  the  nation.  Each  state  pro- 
duced detailed  stories  on  its  own  condition  and  the  reconstructive  steps 
being  taken.  In  addition,  the  controlling  bureaus  regularly  sent  a  synop- 
sis of  the  latest  developments  in  their  territories.  From  this  material 


378  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

New  York  prepared  frequent  undated  leads  which  presented  the  na- 
tional picture  in  broad  outline  so  that  readers  might  get  a  general  pic- 
ture before  reading  the  dated  stories  which  gave  particularized  news  on 
the  crisis. 

As  the  progressive  resumption  of  banking  operations  began,  these 
leads  supplied  an  accurate  guide  to  the  day-to-day  conditions.  With  bu- 
reaus reporting  frequently,  the  leads  announced  how  many  of  the 
country's  17,600  banks  had  reopened,  how  many  were  state  and  how 
many  were  national  institutions,  the  number  operating  on  restricted  or 
unrestricted  basis,  and  the  number  remaining  closed. 

With  few  exceptions,  official  statements  issued  throughout  the 
emergency,  especially  the  national  and  state  regulations  governing  bank 
reopenings,  were  transmitted  in  full  on  the  wires.  To  clarify  the  numer- 
ous steps  being  taken  to  end  the  crisis,  Washington  turned  out  inter- 
pretive stories  which  explained  the  facts  in  language  the  man  in  the 
street  could  understand. 


The  banking  crisis  and  the  Roosevelt  inauguration  marked  the 
beginning  of  a  rush  of  events  which  imposed  an  unparalleled  load  on 
the  Washington  staff.  Governmental  activities  moved  at  a  speed  un- 
precedented even  in  wartime. 

The  New  Deal  had  arrived  and  story  followed  story. 

Special  Session  of  Congress  .  .  .  Emergency  Financial  Powers 
Given  President  ...  3.2  Beer  Legalized  .  .  .  Civilian  Conservation 
Corps  Authorized  .  .  .  Farm  Relief  .  .  .  Home  Mortgage  Refinan- 
cing .  .  .  Securities  Control  .  .  .  Nation  Abandons  Gold  Standard 
.  .  .  Industrial  Recovery  .  .  .  NRA  .  .  . 

News  gathering  in  Washington  entered  a  new  chapter.  A  vast 
program  involving  far-reaching  economic,  industrial,  and  social  changes 
was  being  launched  and  what  happened  in  Washington  affected  the  lives 
of  citizens  more  directly  than  ever  before.  The  reading  public  wanted 
to  know  more  about  the  how  and  why  of  what  was  happening  in  the 
capital.  It  wanted  to  be  told  not  only  a  law's  national  significance,  but 
also  what  it  would  mean  in  their  communities. 

This  need  influenced  the  co-operative  to  set  up  a  full-fledged  Wash- 
ington Regional  Service.  The  purpose  was  to  give  the  general  report  a 
counterpart  which  would  follow  governmental  news  from  the  view- 
points of  the  various  states.  It  was  the  principle  of  vicinage  news  applied 
to  the  whirl  of  events  on  the  banks  of  the  Potomac. 


ANOTHER  ROOSEVELT  379 

The  idea  was  not  born  of  the  moment.  In  a  limited  way  Paul  Weir 
of  the  Washington  staff  had  explored  the  field  informally  over  two 
decades  by  developing  stories  of  special  interest  to  individual  members 
on  census  returns  and  crop  reports.  Then  in  1929  the  pioneering  work 
was  put  on  a  definite  basis  when  the  management,  as  an  experiment, 
sent  a  correspondent  to  Washington  to  concentrate  exclusively  on  gov- 
ernment news  affecting  New  Jersey.  William  Wight,  of  the  Newark 
Bureau,  got  the  assignment  and  became  the  co-operative's  first  regional 
reporter  of  capital  news.  The  success  of  the  experiment  led  to  similar 
arrangements  for  several  other  states  but  it  was  not  until  1933  t^at  the 
Washington  Regional  Service  assumed  major  proportions. 

The  enlargement  of  the  regional  staff  enabled  Washington  to  con- 
sider major  stories  from  the  two  approaches  which  papers  desired.  A 
public  works  program  might  be  a  national  story  in  the  sense  that  it 
represented  a  detail  of  governmental  economics.  At  the  same  time  it 
was  an  important  local  story  in  every  community  which  was  to  receive 
or  hoped  to  receive  an  allotment.  Under  the  new  order  the  Washington 
Bureau  could  make  a  bifocal  examination  of  the  facts  and  gauge  its 
coverage  accordingly. 


Besides  the  great  volume  of  front-page  news  from  Washington, 
another  major  story  developed  with  unlooked-for  speed.  At  the  outset, 
1933  had  promised  to  be  an  off  year  for  the  Election  Service,  but  the 
rapid  progress  of  the  movement  for  the  repeal  of  the  Prohibition 
Amendment  to  the  United  States  Constitution  altered  the  situation. 
From  early  in  April,  when  Michigan  started  the  parade  of  states  voting 
for  repeal,  until  the  end  of  the  year,  the  Election  Department  was  es- 
pecially active.  In  all,  forty-three  special  election  services  were  set  up. 

The  1933  annual  meeting  saw  the  membership  adopt  tentative 
regulations  to  govern  the  use  of  the  association's  news  in  radio  broad- 
casting. The  subject  had  been  recurring  in  official  and  unofficial  discus- 
sions for  ten  years.  From  the  time  radio  appeared  there  had  been  a 
cleavage  of  opinion  respecting  its  relation  to  newspapers  and  the  co- 
operative. Some  regarded  the  new  medium  as  a  partner  in  their  pub- 
lishing enterprises  and  became  active  in  the  operation  of  broadcasting 
stations.  They  favored  considerable  latitude  in  the  use  of  the  news  report 
on  the  air.  Others— and  at  first  they  were  in  the  majority— were  inclined 
to  regard  radio  as  a  competitor  in  the  field  of  both  circulation  and  adver- 


380  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

rising  and  did  not  want  to  make  any  of  the  report  available  for  broad- 
casting purposes. 

Before  the  1925  annual  meeting  the  Board  of  Directors  had  for- 
bidden any  broadcasting  of  AP  news,  whether  general  or  local.  The 
board  penalized  two  members  who  transgressed,  one  of  them  being  Vic- 
tor Lawson.  The  enormous  interest  in  broadcasts  of  the  1924  presi- 
dential election  returns  caused  members  to  question  the  wisdom  of  the 
ruling  and  to  consider  the  advisability  of  permitting  a  restricted  use  of 
the  report  in  broadcasting  news  of  special,  outstanding  events.  At  the 
1925  meeting  the  board  was  permitted  to  allow  the  broadcasting  of 
news  whenever  it  was  of  transcendent  importance.  The  management 
supplied  radio  stations  with  AP  returns  in  the  1928  and  1932  presi- 
dential elections,  as  well  as  numerous  E.O.S.  bulletins  on  extraordinary 
news.  < 

At  the  1933  meeting  the  subject  was  thoroughly  examined  again 
and  a  resolution  was  adopted  setting  forth  the  co-operative's  current 
policy.  The  resolution  stipulated  that  no  news,  regardless  of  its  source, 
be  made  available  for  chain  broadcasting.  At  a  small  extra  assessment 
member  papers  might  broadcast  news  of  major  importance  with  credit 
to  The  AP  and  the  member  paper.  With  minor  changes,  those  regula- 
tions governed  the  association's  relations  with  radio  for  the  next  several 
years,  but  eventually  the  great  majority  of  members  saw  the  advantage 
of  a  more  liberalized  policy  and  AP  news  began  to  take  its  place  on 
the  air. 


By  1933  daily  operations  had  become  so  complex,  the  members  had 
become  so  numerous,  that  too  frequently  the  co-operative  was  taken 
for  granted  even  by  those  it  served  and  the  management  was  left  with- 
out much  positive  help  from  the  membership  at  large. 

Occasionally,  nevertheless,  the  times  produced  some  man  or  group 
of  men  of  high  editorial  integrity  who  became  fired  with  the  necessity 
of  active  support  of  the  practical  ideal  on  which  the  modern  association 
had  been  built,  and  sought  to  kindle  the  same  active  interest  among  the 
hundreds  of  others  who  daily  looked  to  the  co-operative  for  the  news 
which  constituted  the  "life  blood"  of  the  daily  newspaper* 

Such  a  man  was  produced  in  1933  an^  out  of  his  efforts  grew  one 
of  the  healthiest  journalistic  influences  of  the  times.  He  was  Oliver 
Owen  Kuhn,  managing  editor  of  the  Washington  Star,  and  he  came 
forward  with  a  suggestion  that  the  managing  editors  of  all  AP  papers 


ANOTHER  ROOSEVELT  381 

meet  annually  to  discuss  newspaper  trends  and  to  study  at  close  range 
the  activities  of  the  unsung  organization  which  supplied  the  bulk  of 
their  news.  The  gatherings  were  to  be  entirely  divorced  from  the  cus- 
tomary annual  meetings  of  the  publishers  in  whose  name  membership 
was  held,  and  were  to  discuss  practical  newspaper  problems  rather  than 
policy  or  theory  of  operation. 

General  Manager  Cooper  saw  so  much  potential  value  in  the  first 
such  meeting — held  at  French  Lick  in  the  autumn  of  1933 — that  he 
sent  the  heads  of  all  departments  to  listen  to  the  discussions  and  to 
answer  questions.  One  after  another  these  key  men  explained  how 
domestic  and  foreign  news  was  collected,  how  the  market  and  finance 
reports  were  compiled,  how  news  was  obtained  in  Washington,  the  trend 
in  sports,  and  other  kindred  subjects.  The  discussions  included  the  de- 
velopment of  the  News  Photo  and  Feature  services,  the  mechanics  of 
news  dissemination,  wire  facilities,  and  the  scientific  advances  which 
might  be  expected. 

Kuhn  himself  was  named  general  chairman,  a  position  to  which  he 
was  unanimously  re-elected  until  his  death  in  1937,  and  the  members  of 
the  first  executive  committee  were  M.  V.  Atwood,  of  the  Gannett  news- 
papers ;  C.  H.  Heintzelman,  of  the  Coatesville  (Pa.)  Record;  M.  H. 
Williams,  of  the  Worcester  (Mass.)  Telegram-Gazette,  and  J.  E. 
Murphy,  of  the  Baltimore  Evening  Sim. 

In  spite  of  the  heavy  emphasis  on  affairs  of  national  government, 
the  report  had  its  share  of  dramatics  and  unexpected  stories.  The  Reichs- 
tag burned  in  Berlin.  One-eyed  Wiley  Post  flew  alone  around  the 
world  in  less  than  eight  days.  Cuba  plunged  into  revolt  and  Seymour 
Ress,  a  staff  cameraman,  narrowly  escaped  a  Havana  firing  squad  be- 
cause he  photographed  the  fight.  The  same  months  produced  a  fresh 
series  of  front-page  kidnapings,  and  there  was  a  matter-of-fact  reminder 
of  1932*8  celebrated  case  in  a  short  piece  from  Washington  stating  that 
the  Lindbergh  mystery  had  been  turned  over  to  the  Department  of 
Justice  for  renewed  investigation. 

But  the  New  Deal  and  its  efforts  to  bring  about  a  return  of  pros- 
perity continued  the  standout  news  of  the  domestic  report.  As  the  daily 
file  of  the  Financial  Service  indicated,  conditions  had  improved  con- 
siderably since  the  bleak  days  of  February  and  March,  but  the  depres- 
sion was  not  over.  Harassed  by  problems  seemingly  more  complicated 
than  ever,  many  member  newspapers  struggled  to  regain  some  of  the 
ground  lost  during  four  years  of  economic  reverses.  Few  publishers 
were  willing  to  risk  heavy  financial  commitments  even  though  in  one 


382  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

field  of  news  particularly  there  was  a  crying  need.  The  great  public 
interest  in  pictorial  journalism  had  made  spot-news  pictures  just  as  im- 
portant as  the  written  word  in  rounding  out  coverage  on  almost  any 
news  event.  Yet  there  was  no  practical  way  of  rapid  transmission  of 
pictures  to  newspaper  offices  over  the  country  once  the  pictures  had 
been  taken  at  the  scene  of  one  event  or  another. 

Cooper  understood  the  situation  existing  in  the  newspaper  field, 
but  he  was  also  convinced  that  the  co-operative  could  not  survive  as  a 
static  organization.  Unless  it  kept  abreast  of  the  times,  unless  it  antici- 
pated them  whenever  possible,  it  was  certain  to  deteriorate.  Even  the 
forced  postponement  of  improvements  under  the  "deep  depression" 
economy  program  had  not  met  with  Cooper's  entire  approval,  for  in 
the  long  view  the  postponements  meant  lost  time  to  an  organization 
for  which  split  seconds  were  vital.  His  responsibility  was  to  plan  not 
only  for  the  present  but  for  the  future. 

The  moment,  he  realized,  could  not  be  worse  for  advancing  a  pro- 
gram that  would  be  as  revolutionary  as  had  been  the  introduction  of 
the  Morse  telegraph  almost  a  hundred  years  before.  The  tendency  was 
to  worry  about  the  present  and  let  the  future — even  the  immediate 
future — take  care  of  itself.  There  had  been  an  earlier  failure  by  others 
who  attempted  to  solve  the  picture  problem,  but  he  was  convinced  that 
The  AP  could  and  should  go  ahead.  To  wait  until  business  conditions 
became  prosperous  might  mean  waiting  too  long. 

He  wanted  to  send  pictures  into  member  newspaper  offices  by  wire 
just  as  the  news  was  sent. 


VIII.  THE  FIGHT  OVER  PICTURES 


WHEN  American  newspapers  first  began  to  print  news  pictures  from 
halftone  engravings,  Kent  Cooper  was  an  unknown  cub  reporter.  Pop- 
ular photography  was  a  novelty.  The  black  box  camera  recorded  scenes 
for  the  family  album,  and  tintype  snapshot  men  still  did  a  thriving 
business  at  fairs  and  amusement  parks. 

As  a  youngster  Cooper  had  sat  for  hours  studying  cardboard  views 
through  the  stereoscope  which  was  as  essential  then  in  any  well-furnished 
parlor  as  the  horsehair  sofa  and  antimacassars.  His  entry  into  journal- 
ism coincided  with  the  beginnings  of  modern  newspaper  photography. 
The  more  he  thought  of  pictures  the  more  convinced  he  became  that 
they  would  play  an  increasingly  important  part  in  the  newspaper  of  the 
future. 

All  through  his  developing  newspaper  career  he  had  felt  that 
a  way  must  be  found  to  deliver  pictures  to  newspapers  as  quickly  as 
the  written  word.  At  first  that  seemed  almost  impossible.  Ever  since 
the  early  fifties  inventors  and  scientists  had  labored  to  perfect  some 
reliable  method  for  telegraphing  pictures.  A  few  experimental  systems 
were  devised,  but  they  were  either  impractical  or  fell  far  short  of 
solving  the  problem. 

The  laboratories  of  communications  companies  persevered  and 
finally  were  able  to  announce  the  development  of  equipment  which 
would  transmit  pictures  by  wire.  A  commercial  system  was  set  up  by 
The  American  Telephone  &  Telegraph  Company  in  the  early  twenties, 
and  opened  irregular  operations  with  combination  sending-and-receiv- 
ing  stations  located  in  eight  of  the  metropolitan  centers. 

The  first  news  of  the  engineers'  success  excited  Cooper,  but  critical 
examination  of  the  invention  disappointed  him.  Almost  an  hour  was  re- 
quired to  prepare  a  picture  for  sending,  the  speed  of  transmission  was 
slow,  and  the  delivered  picture  invariably  came  out  blurred,  fuzzy,  and 
indistinct.  Detail  disappeared  and  the  total  effect  was  a  vague  shadow 
of  what  the  original  had  been. 

The  experience  of  the  News  Photo  Service,  after  its  formation  in 
1927,  brought  home  more  forcefully  the  handicaps  which  beset  the 

383 


384  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

prompt  handling  of  pictures  on  a  national  scale.  If  photos  were  sent  by 
fast  train  mail,  they  took  eighty-five  hours  to  cross  the  continent.  Even 
using  air  express,  it  was  twenty-four  hours  and  airplane  schedules  were 
at  the  mercy  of  weather,  particularly  in  winter.  Telephoto  transmis- 
sion might  expedite  fuzzy  reproductions  of  an  important  picture  to  the 
few  cities  which  happened  to  have  receiving  stations,  but  then  the 
problem  of  delivery  to  subscribers  elsewhere  began  all  over  again. 

Nevertheless,  telephoto  remained  the  only  wire  transmission 
method  and  the  News  Photo  Service  had  no  alternative  but  to  use  it 
whenever  a  picture  had  such  news  value  that  the  few  editors  benefited 
were  willing  to  sacrifice  quality  in  favor  of  speedier  delivery.  The  asso- 
ciation set  up  divisional  distribution  centers  at  Chicago,  Atlanta,  and 
San  Francisco,  but  there  was  little  acceleration  of  picture  delivery  as  a 
whole. 

Telephoto's  continued  unsatisfactory  operation  could  have  but  one 
result  even  in  a  picture-conscious  era.  In  June,  1933,  the  A.  T.  &  T. 
abandoned  the  system  after  spending  $2,800,000  in  an  attempt  to  make 
it  work  and  the  delivery  of  all  pictures  once  more  became  a  matter 
of  railroad  timetables  and  airplane  schedules.  The  problem  was  right 
back  where  it  had  been  before  the  introduction  of  telephoto. 


Cooper  refused  to  abandon  hope  that  engineering  research  would 
win  out.  This  time  he  did  not  have  long  to  wait.  Toward  the  end  of 
1933  Bell  Laboratories  reported  that,  after  ten  years  of  experiments 
along  entirely  different  scientific  lines,  it  had  developed  a  completely 
new  picture-sending  apparatus.  The  company  claimed  that  the  new 
machine  could  send  pictures  by  wire  at  two  and  a  half  times  the  speed 
of  the  telephoto  and  that  the  transmitted  picture  was  so  nearly  per- 
fect it  was  hard  to  detect  the  difference  between  it  and  the  original. 

In  common  with  all  other  news-picture  organizations,  the  AP 
Photo  Service  was  informed.  Costly  experience  in  the  business  of  com- 
mercial picture  transmission  had  convinced  the  sponsors  -that  the  han- 
dling of  pictures  as  news  was  essentially  a  newspaper  enterprise,  and  so 
it  offered  to  let  anyone  interested  take  over  the  mechanism  for  its 
own  use. 

The  new  equipment  fired  Cooper's  imagination.  Here  seemed  to 
be  the  scientific  miracle  he  had  been  awaiting.  He  had  President  Noyes 


THE  FIGHT  OVER  PICTURES  385 

watch  a  demonstration  between  San  Diego  and  New  York  and  Noyes 
was  amazed  at  the  fidelity  of  the  transmitted  picture. 

The  other  picture  agencies  also  inspected  the  apparatus.  Hearst's 
International  News  Photos,  Times  Wide- World,  and  Acme,  the  com- 
mercial picture  agency  controlled  by  the  owners  of  the  United  Press 
Associations,  were  not  interested  in  the  telephone  company's  proposal. 
In  the  depths  of  a  depression  there  was  no  eagerness  to  sponsor  such 
a  project. 

But  Cooper  was  working.  He  conferred  with  Norris  Huse,  his  pic- 
ture chief,  and  with  AP  laboratory  experts  who  had  examined  the  equip- 
ment from  a  scientific  standpoint.  He  already  had  told  the  Board  of 
Directors  what  he  had  in  mind. 

A  nation-wide  network  of  leased  wires  flashing  AP  pictures  to  AP 
newspapers  twenty-four  hours  a  day! 

Pictures  moving  into  newspaper  offices  simultaneously  with  the 
news,  appearing  in  print  side  by  side  with  stories  of  the  same  events! 

It  would  cost  money,  he  acknowledged,  probably  more  than  a 
million  dollars  a  year.  The  wire  tolls  alone  would  be  $560,000  an- 
nually, but  it  was  an  opportunity  for  The  AP  to  blaze  the  trail  into  a 
new  era  of  journalism. 

Some  members  of  the  Board  of  Directors  were  inclined  to  consider 
it  an  impossible  undertaking,  particularly  during  the  continuing  depres- 
sion, but  they  saw  nothing  to  be  lost  by  authorizing  Cooper  to  sound  out 
likely  subscribers. 

Cooper  selected  Photo  Editor  Norris  Huse  for  the  "impossible" 
task.  A  list  of  potential  subscribers  in  twenty-five  key  cities  was  pre- 
pared and  Huse  set  out  to  interest  the  members  in  those  places  in  the 
possibility  of  high  fidelity  pictures  on  an  exclusive  AP  network.  The 
cost  to  each  prospective  subscriber  was  based  on  the  same  pro-rata  prin- 
ciple the  co-operative  had  used  so  successfully  in  computing  other  assess- 
ments over  a  period  of  years. 

The  first  member  to  pledge  participation  in  the  outlined  service 
was  the  Baltimore  Sun. 

Huse  next  called  on  the  Washington  Star,  the  paper  owned  by  the 
co-operative's  president.  In  view  of  Noyes's  warm  personal  approval 
of  the  idea,  Huse  expected  that  interesting  the  Star  would  be  a  mere 
formality.  Instead,  he  found  that  Noyes  had  told  his  managers  nothing 
about  it.  He  wished  them  to  form  their  own  judgment  without  being 
influenced  by  his  opinion.  After  the  States  managers  had  heard  the 
details,  however,  they  became  enthusiastic. 


386  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

One  by  one  the  key  papers  pledged  support  until  the  roster  was 
imposing. 

3 

The  success  of  all  preparatory  moves  was  more  than  anyone  dared 
hope  for.  Huse  had  demonstrated  ably.  He  brought  back  to  New  York 
pledges  of  participation  from  more  than  thirty  papers,  a  sufficient  num- 
ber to  underwrite  a  minimum  of  five  years  of  operations  at  a  total  cost 
of  between  five  and  seven  million  dollars. 

The  news  of  what  The  AP  intended  to  do  began  to  leak  out  and 
a  number  of  the  members  became  agitated  at  the  reports  they  heard. 
Controversy  developed  as  to  the  desirability  of  the  association's  com- 
mitting itself  to  such  an  undertaking.  The  division  of  opinion  became 
sharper  as  the  weeks  passed. 

Led  by  the  Hearst  and  Scripps-Howard  members  within  the  ranks 
of  the  co-operative,  a  sizable  bloc  of  vigorous  opposition  took  form.  It 
was  more  militant,  better  organized,  and  more  capably  led  than  any 
previous  uprising.  The  insurgent  forces  went  out  industriously  to  recruit 
adherents.  All  sorts  of  charges  flew — that  the  management  proposed  to 
squander  funds  on  an  impracticable,  visionary  scheme  $  that  A.  T.  &  T. 
was  trying  to  foist  its  obsolete  telephoto  equipment  on  the  association  $ 
that,  even  if  the  apparatus  worked,  only  a  few  wealthy  papers  could 
afford  the  advantage j  that  the  vast  majority  of  the  membership  never 
would  receive  any  benefit. 

More  than  six  hundred  representatives  of  AP  papers  poured  into 
the  new  Waldorf-Astoria  for  the  annual  meeting  in  April,  1934,  and 
most  of  those  who  could  not  attend  were  represented  by  proxy.  The 
conflict  brewing  was  the  big  attraction. 

No  sooner  had  President  Noyes  called  the  meeting  to  order  than 
the  battle  began.  John  Francis  Neylan,  California  lawyer  and  general 
counsel  for  the  Hearst  newspapers,  fifteen  of  which  held  memberships 
in  the  co-operative,  took  the  floor.  Standing  beside  his  seat  in  the  front 
row,  he  demanded  a  showdown  on  the  whole  proposition  of  AP's 
projected  establishment  of  a  wire  picture-transmission  network  and 
charged  that  the  telephone  company  which  had  perfected  the  equip- 
ment was  attempting  to  salvage  the  money  it  had  invested  in  experi- 
ments over  a  period  of  years  by  persuading  The  AP  to  take  over  the 
equipment. 

Neylan  professed  to  have  only  the  best  interests  of  the  association 
at  heart,  but  there  were  doubts  about  his  altruism.  The  Hearst  papers 


THE  FIGHT  OVER  PICTURES  387 

and  their  Scripps-Howard  allies  had  their  own  picture  services  to  con- 
sider and  protect.  If  The  AP  Photo  Service  could  make  a  success  of 
telegraphing  pictures,  rival  agencies  would  find  themselves  hopelessly 
outdistanced  in  delivery  and  would  be  forced  to  enter  the  business  of 
picture  wire  transmission  in  order  to  keep  pace.  It  was  to  the  advantage 
of  these  agencies  to  see  that  AP  did  nothing  to  disturb  the  existing 
equality  of  competition. 

Neylan  made  a  brilliant  field  marshal  for  the  opposition.  He  called 
upon  the  board  to  furnish  the  membership  with  all  details  of  the  enter- 
prise. It  affected  the  association's  financial  credit,  he  asserted,  and  it 
never  should  have  been  sanctioned  without  the  approval  of  an  annual 
meeting. 

"Up  to  the  present  time,"  he  shouted,  "only  a  handful  of  AP 
members  have  even  had  unofficial  knowledge  of  the  undertaking,  and 
none  had  official  word." 

President  Noyes  informed  him  that  an  illustrated  booklet,  An- 
nouncing AP  News  Pictures  by  Wirey  was  ready  for  distribution  to  the 
members  at  the  meeting.  Then  he  called  on  the  general  manager  to 
report  on  what  had  happened. 

Cooper  outlined  the  growing  popularity  of  pictures  as  a  news 
medium  and  explained  the  impossibility  of  printing  them  along  with 
the  news  they  illustrated  so  long  as  no  speedy  delivery  system  was 
available. 

"There  are  no  exclusive  rights  to  the  proposed  wire  picture  service 
as  against  any  member  of  The  Associated  Press,"  he  said.  "It  is  avail- 
able to  any  member,  any  time.  Personally,  I  hope  to  see  the  entire 
membership  benefit  by  the  thing.  To  my  mind,  it  is  the  newest  and 
biggest  departure  in  newspaper  work  since  words  were  first  tele- 
graphed." 

Replying  to  Neylan's  demand  that  all  financial  details  with  the 
telephone  company  be  disclosed,  he  said: 

"I  am  sure  our  competitors  would  like  to  know  all  about  it." 

He  pointed  out  that  there  had  been  no  departure  from  precedent 
in  making  preparations  for  the  new  service.  In  every  instance,  dating 
as  far  back  as  1908,  the  management  had  submitted  its  plans  for  supple- 
mental services  to  the  Board  of  Directors.  Then  when  approval  had 
been  obtained,  member  participation  on  a  sufficient  scale  had  been 
sought  to  finance  the  cost  of  the  projected  service. 

"I  think  the  News  Photo  Service  of  The  Associated  Press,  alone, 
from  one  angle,  the  Feature  Service  from  another,  and  the  Financial 


388  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Service  from  another,  have  made  membership  ten  to  one  hundred 
times  more  valuable,"  he  concluded.  "If  we  had  let  our  competitors  do 
all  these  things,  I  don't  think  there  would  be  any  Associated  Press 
today.  This  idea  of  pictures  by  wire  can  go.  It  will  go  in  some  form. 
If  not  by  us,  then  by  our  competitors,  or  by  anybody  else  who  wants  to 
take  it  up  and  do  it." 

Neylan  returned  to  the  attack  with  all  his  oratorical  skill.  Twitting 
the  management  as  inexperienced  in  the  field  of  photo  distribution,  the 
Hearst  lawyer  reminded  his  audience  again  that  every  other  picture 
agency  had  been  offered  the  same  opportunity  to  take  over  the  equip- 
ment which  was  the  storm  center  of  the  present  fight. 

"Is  it  not  strange,"  he  inquired,  "that  all  these  institutions,  which 
had  had  so  much  more  experience  in  the  matter  of  photo  service  than 
The  Associated  Press  had,  went  into  this  matter  thoroughly  and  refused 
to  take  up  the  white  man's  burden  of  the  A.  T.  &  T.?" 

Neylan's  attack  occupied  all  but  a  few  minutes  of  the  morning  ses- 
sion. By  the  time  the  members  filed  out  for  the  annual  luncheon,  it 
was  obvious  that  the  future  of  the  co-operative's  administration  was  at 
stake.  If  Neylan  could  rally  a  majority,  it  would  mean  in  effect  a  repu- 
diation of  the  Board  of  Directors  for  having  given  the  general  manager 
authority  to  proceed  with  the  new  supplemental  service.  It  was  a 
crucial  situation. 

Clark  Howell,  publisher  of  the  Atlanta  Constitution  and  one  of  the 
elder  statesmen  of  the  board,  took  the  floor  in  the  afternoon  session. 
He  told  the  membership  that,  although  for  the  present  he  did  not 
intend  to  take  the  service  for  his  own  newspaper,  he  was  convinced  of 
the  association's  wisdom  in  entering  the  new  field. 

"Let  me  say,"  he  declared,  "that  if  Mr.  Hearst's  organization,  or 
any  other  organization,  had  got  to  this  first  and  had  made  the  proposi- 
tion to  establish  a  service  of  this  kind,  then  you  would  have  been  right 
to  have  criticized  your  general  manager  for  his  laxity." 

The  chair  recognized  Fred  Schilplin,  of  the  St.  Cloud  (Minn.) 
Times  and  Journal  Pressy  a  representative  smaller  paper.  He  went  to 
the  heart  of  the  matter. 

"Summing  this  thing  all  up,"  he  said,  "about  all  I  can  get  out  of 
it  is  that  a  group  of  member  newspapers,  which  is  probably  able  to  do 
it  even  in  these  reconstruction  times,  has  undertaken  to  underwrite 
this  experiment.  We  wish  them  all  success.  I  don't  see  anything  else 
to  it.  I  don't  see  that  any  of  this  means  that  they  are  going  to  get  a 


THE  FIGHT  OVER  PICTURES  389 

larger  assessment  out  of  us.  Eventually  we  are  going  to  get  some  of 
the  benefits  out  of  it." 

President  Noyes  took  this  opportunity  to  remind  the  members  that 
the  spearhead  of  the  opposition  was  the  Scripps-Howard  and  Hearst 
group  of  papers,  interested  in  their  own  picture  agencies  and  reluctant 
to  support  any  service  which  would  be  in  competition. 

"Pm  sure,"  he  commented,  "that  Mr.  Neylan  wouldn't  expect 
The  Associated  Press  or  the  general  manager  to  base  his  activities  on 
what  was  especially  pleasing  to  Mr.  Hearst's  picture  service  or  the 
Scripps-Howard  picture  interests." 

Turning  to  a  point  of  vital  interest  to  the  smaller  papers  which 
had  to  have  their  pictures  delivered  to  them  in  matted  form  because 
they  could  not  afford  to  operate  their  own  engraving  plants,  Noyes 
continued: 

"I  also  want  to  say  that,  because  of  this  service,  the  users  of  the 
picture  mat  service  will  be  immensely  advantaged.  There  is  an  element 
of  time  against  them  now,  in  that  a  mat  can't  be  made  and  delivered 
by  mail  as  quickly  as  a  photograph  can,  but  because  of  this  new  service 
every  one  of  them  will  benefit  by  faster  service." 


Roy  Howard,  chairman  of  the  Executive  Committee  of  Scripps- 
Howard  papers  which  controls  the  United  Press  Associations,  then  took 
the  floor.  He  made  no  fevered  emotional  appeal  in  urging  his  objections 
to  the  new  service.  He  said  its  inauguration  would  increase  the  costs  of 
newspaper  production  and  urged  its  rejection  for  that  reason. 

Mechanically  the  new  process  might  be  all  that  was  claimed  for  it, 
he  conceded,  but  operation  of  the  system  would  be  tremendously  ex- 
pensive and,  moreover,  there  were  not  enough  important  pictures  to 
justify  it. 

The  bitter  crossfire  of  arguments  had  lasted  all  day,  and  as  the 
debate  neared  its  close  the  scraping  of  chairs  and  the  hum  of  conversa- 
tion in  the  crowded  audience  showed  that  the  membership  was  im- 
patient to  have  the  question  put  to  a  vote.  It  was  almost  evening,  how- 
ever, before  the  last  man  had  been  heard  and  Frank  S.  Hoy,  of  the 
Lewiston  (Maine)  Sun-Journal,  moved  to  establish  the  attitude  of  the 
meeting  on  the  controversial  issue.  His  resolution  was  that  the  act  of 
the  Board  of  Directors  in  arranging  for  the  new  service  be  ratified  and 
confirmed.  The  motion  evoked  applause,  but  the  opposition,  fighting 


390  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

to  the  last  ditch,  proposed  that  the  entire  membership  be  polled  by 
mail  instead.  The  suggestion  was  lost  by  a  decisive  5-to-i  margin  and 
then  President  Noyes  put  the  question  of  ratifying  the  board's  action. 

There  was  a  chorus  of  "Ayes." 

The  immediate  threat  to  the  projected  wire  picture  service  was 
routed  by  the  overwhelming  vote  of  confidence,  but  its  foes  left  the 
meeting  as  determined  as  ever  in  their  opposition.  Some  predicted  the 
service  would  "die  within  a  year."  Others  were  frankly  skeptical  that 
it  would  perform  better  than  the  discarded  telephoto.  The  evidence  of 
laboratory  experiments  and  tests  between  two  points  might  be  com- 
pelling, but  conditions  would  be  vastly  different  operating  a  system  with 
twenty-five  stations  and  a  transcontinental  network  of  wires.  Then, 
too,  there  was  the  formidable  task  of  getting  equipment  manufactured 
and  installed,  and  of  training  personnel. 


The  responsibility  for  perfecting  the  complicated  arrangements 
necessary  to  start  the  unproved  wire  picture  system  rested  jointly  on 
the  Photo  Service  staff  and  the  Traffic  Department's  force  of  engineers, 
and  they  had  a  huge  job  cut  out  for  them.  They  hoped  to  have  the 
system  in  operation  by  a  tentative  fall  starting  date,  but  the  months 
passed  and  it  did  not  seem  that  their  goal  would  be  reached.  As  they 
redoubled  their  efforts  news  continued  to  follow  its  age-old  pattern. 
Much  of  it  was  ephemeral,  and  much  was  surrounded  by  the  drama 
which  marks  the  making  of  history. 

For  five  busy  weeks  that  summer  hour-by-hour  dispatches  from 
Europe  wrote  the  running  story  of  history-in-the-making  on  a  spectacu- 
lar scale.  When  Chancellor  Hitler  made  the  great  "blood  purge"  of 
disloyal  elements  in  his  National  Socialist  party,  Chief  of  Bureau  Loch- 
ner  circumvented  official  government  attempts  to  prevent  dispatches 
from  leaving  Germany  with  the  first  news  for  ninety  minutes  after  its 
release.  He  had  arranged  beforehand  to  have  London  telephone  Berlin 
every  half  hour  in  the  event  the  bureau  failed  to  hear  from  him.  The 
precaution  enabled  him  to  get  off  his  news  on  an  incoming  call  at  the 
very  time  the  Nazis  were  refusing  transmission  of  all  outgoing  press 
communications. 

After  the  blood  purge  there  was  the  drama  in  Vienna  where  the 
assassination  of  Chancellor  Dollfuss  in  an  abortive  Nazi  Putsch  on  Aus- 
tria gave  Chief  of  Bureau  Wade  Werner  and  Robert  F.  Schildbach  a 


THE  FIGHT  OVER  PICTURES  391 

succession  of  tense  days.  Then  the  date  lines  shifted  abruptly  back  to 
Germany  and  a  telephone  whisper  that  "a  very  old  gentleman  is  ex- 
tremely low"  gave  Lochner  his  first  hint  that  President  von  Hinden- 
burg  was  dying. 

In  spite  of  the  close  surveillance  of  secret  police,  G.  O.  Beukert 
of  the  Berlin  staff  got  prompt  news  of  the  old  field  marshal's  death  at 
Neudeck  a  few  days  later  and  rushed  it  through  to  Lochner  a  minute 
before  the  sole  Neudeck-Berlin  telephone  line  was  cut  off  for  an  hour 
by  government  order.  Hindenburg's  passing  cleared  the  way  for  Hit- 
ler's final  assumption  of  supreme  power  in  the  Reich,  and  the  corre- 
spondence from  the  Berlin  Bureau  began  a  fresh  and  amazing  chapter. 

There  were  no  doldrums  that  year  "in  the  domestic  report.  Staff 
men  at  San  Francisco  donned  trench  helmets  and  gas  masks  to  cover 
the  longshoremen's  strike  which  paralyzed  West  Coast  shipping.  Chi- 
cago bulletined  the  death  of  John  Dillinger,  Public  Enemy  No.  i,  at 
the  hands  of  federal  agents.  The  Jersey  staff  produced  another  front- 
page story  when  the  luxury  liner  Morro  Castle  burned  at  sea  with  a 
loss  of  134  lives. 

Then,  without  warning,  came  the  news  break  for  which  editors 
had  waited  two  and  a  half  years — the  arrest  of  a  Bronx  carpenter 
named  Bruno  Richard  Hauptmann  in  possession  of  ransom  money  paid 
in  the  Lindbergh  kidnaping  case. 

While  the  news  moved,  preparations  went  ahead  for  the  intro- 
duction of  the  telegraphed  picture  service.  Major  stories  such  as  the 
violent  West  Coast  strike,  Dillinger's  death,  the  Morro  Castle  disaster, 
and,  above  all,  the  arrest  of  a  suspect  in  the  Lindbergh  mystery,  accen- 
tuated the  acute  need  for  faster  picture  delivery.  Member  editors  wanted 
all  the  pictures  they  could  obtain  on  these  top-ranking  stories,  and  trains, 
planes,  or  special  messengers  could  not  deliver  them  swiftly  enough  to 
meet  the  rapidly  changing  newspaper  needs. 

The  intention  to  start  operations  of  the  new  picture  system  in  that 
fall  of  1934  turned  out  to  be  optimistic.  Manufacture  of  equipment  had 
been  slow.  The  installation  and  outfitting  of  the  twenty-five  sending  and 
receiving  stations  over  the  country  required  from  two  to  three  weeks 
each.  Training  personnel  to  handle  the  mechanism  proved  more  difficult 
than  anticipated  and  a  hundred  and  one  other  problems  had  to  be  met. 

The  fall  months  passed  without  inauguration  of  the  service,  and 
the  vigorous  opponents  recalled  their  earlier  predictions.  The  suspicion 
grew  that,  under  the  demands  of  actual  working  conditions,  the  new 


392  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

equipment  was  not  performing  with  the  precision  it  had  shown  in  the 
ideal  surroundings  of  the  laboratory. 

The  untried  service,  however,  had  acquired  an  official  name — 
Wirephoto.  After  weeks  of  search  for  some  distinctive  word  or  com- 
bination of  words  which  would  tersely  describe  pictures  by  telegraph, 
Norris  Huse  hit  upon  the  designation.  The  name  for  the  revolutionary 
new  service  was  all  very  well,  but  the  big  question  was  yet  to  be  an- 
swered. 

Would  Wirephoto  really  work? 


It  was  almost  3  A.M.  on  New  Year's  Day,  1935,  and  AP  Wire- 
photo — storm  center  of  debate — was  ready  for  its  crucial  test. 

Engineers  in  the  wire  control  room  at  New  York  headquarters 
made  last-minute  adjustments  on  the  eight-foot  panel  containing  bulbs, 
wires,  indicators,  and  wavering  needles.  Around  them  stood  intent  mem- 
bers of  the  staff,  smudgy  copy  boys,  radio  announcers,  busy  newsreel 
camera  crews,  and  a  cluster  of  smartly  turned  out  New  Year  revelers. 

Attention  was  focused  on  an  odd  machine  which  seemed  out  of 
place  in  the  newsroom  atmosphere.  The  contraption  rested  on  a  heavy 
metal  base  in  the  center  of  the  floor  and  supported  a  horizontal  cylinder. 
Nearby  was  the  large  panel  with  its  glowing  bulbs,  a  bank  of  dials,  a 
telephone,  and  a  loud-speaker.  Next  to  the  panel  stood  a  power  unit 
enclosed  in  a  latticed  cage  of  thin  steel. 

The  technicians  bent  over  the  machine.  The  onlookers  talked  in 
whispers.  Along  a  special  io,ooomile  network  of  leased  wires,  other 
engineers  and  technicians  stood  over  machines  in  twenty-five  cities  from 
coast  to  coast,  all  waiting  to  see  if  Wirephoto  could  send  high  fidelity 
pictures  over  a  nation-wide  circuit  just  as  news  was  sent. 

The  picture  selected  for  the  first  sending  reported  headline  news. 
A  transport  air  liner  had  crashed  deep  in  the  snow-covered  Adiron- 
dack Mountains.  Searchers  had  combed  the  wild  country  on  foot  and 
by  air  for  days  trying  to  find  the  wrecked  plane.  Finally  one  party, 
after  floundering  through  heavy  snows  in  subzero  weather,  reached  the 
spot  where  the  ship  had  crashed.  A  staff  cameraman  snapped  the  scene 
as  the  half-frozen  survivors  greeted  their  rescuers. 

Rushed  to  New  York  and  the  darkrooms,  the  wet  picture  came 
out  of  the  developing  tank  and  passed  the  photo  desk  for  an  identify- 
ing caption.  Then  it  went  to  the  experts  at  the  new  black  machine.  They 


THE  FIGHT  OVER  PICTURES  393 

took  the  picture— an  ordinary  print — wrapped  it,  face  up,  around  the 
horizontal  cylinder  and  snapped  the  cylinder  back  into  place. 

Out  across  the  continent — in  Chicago,  San  Francisco,  Atlanta, 
Kansas  City,  Boston,  Syracuse,  and  Philadelphia,  in  twenty-five  cities 
— attendants  also  made  their  receiving  machines  ready. 

At  New  York,  engineer  Harold  Carlson  gave  the  photo-encased 
cylinder  a  final  glance  and  stepped  to  the  control  board.  He  nodded  to 
an  assistant  at  the  network  telephone  and  out  of  the  loud-speakers  in  all 
twenty-five  cities  came  the  announcement: 

"This  is  New  York  calling  all  points.  The  first  picture  will  be  a 
shot  of  the  plane  survivors  just  rescued  in  the  Adirondacks.  Are  you 
ready?" 

Carlson  clicked  a  button.  The  picture  was  on  its  way  over  the  wires 
to  papers  in  cities  from  100  to  3,000  miles  away. 

The  cylinder  revolved  under  the  small  hoodlike  housing  which 
contained  a  photoelectric  cell — the  "eye"  which  was  transmitting  the 
photograph.  From  the  machine  came  a  high-pitched,  harmonic  whistle — 
the  sound  generated  when  the  network  was  in  use  for  transmission.  For 
eight  minutes  the  penetrating  whistle  continued,  then  faded  and  ceased. 

The  moment  the  cylinder  stopped  rotating  in  New  York,  the  re- 
ceiving cylinders  halted  simultaneously  in  the  twenty-five  cities  of  the 
network.  Attendants  carried  the  cylinders  into  darkrooms,  negatives 
were  developed  and  within  another  few  minutes  picture  editors  had  on 
their  desks  the  finished  photographic  print  of  the  air  disaster  scene 
which  New  York  had  transmitted. 

In  quality  and  fidelity  the  received  pictures  were  so  remarkable 
that  only  an  expert  could  detect  the  difference  between  them  and  the 
original  on  the  sending  cylinder.  There  was  no  trace  of  the  blurs,  fuzz, 
and  streaks  which  had  made  the  old  commercial  telephoto  so  unsatis- 
factory. 

The  first  transmission  was  followed  by  an  air  shot  of  the  wrecked 
transport  and  then  by  a  series  of  photographs  which  gave  a  pictorial 
account  of  the  New  Year  celebration.  New  York  sent  the  boisterous 
scene  at  Times  Square.  Los  Angeles  took  the  circuit  to  contribute  a 
picture  of  the  stars  in  Hollywood  welcoming  1935.  Miami  added  a 
picture  of  the  holiday  gaiety  on  the  beach  front.  Photos  of  half  a  hun- 
dred news  events  were  transmitted.  They  went  racing  across  the  coun- 
try even  as  the  news  circuits  were  carrying  the  dispatches  they  illus- 
trated. 


394  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 


Skeptics  who  had  contended  there  were  not  enough  important  news 
pictures  to  justify  a  Wirephoto  network  found  no  consolation  in  the  log 
for  the  ensuing  months.  The  day  after  the  new  service  began  operation, 
the  trial  of  Bruno  Hauptman  for  the  Lindbergh  kidnap-murder  opened 
at  Flemington,  New  Jersey.  Wirephoto  subscribers  all  over  the  coun- 
try were  able  to  publish  the  pictures  of  what  was  happening  at  Fleming- 
ton  the  same  day  the  events  took  place,  and  to  publish  them  side  by 
side  with  the  news  stories  on  developments  in  the  most  publicized  court 
case  in  the  history  of  American  jurisprudence.  It  was  a  compelling 
demonstration  of  the  new  service's  ability  to  deliver  pictures  day  after 
day  on  a  story  which  monopolized  front  pages. 

In  the  succeeding  weeks  and  months  there  was  no  lack  of  material 
— a  new  session  of  Congress  convened  at  Washington  ;  Amelia  Ear  hart 
flew  nonstop  from  Honolulu  to  California;  G-men  killed  Fred  and 
"Ma"  Barker,  long-sought  criminals,  in  a  furious  gun  battle  in  Florida; 
a  new  ship  disaster  took  forty-five  lives  off  the  Jersey  coast;  the  navy's 
dirigible  Macon  broke  up  and  sank  at  sea  near  Point  Sur,  California; 
the  Pacific  Northwest  had  its  Weyerhaeuser  kidnaping,  and  in  New 
York  James  J.  Braddock  staged  the  sports  upset  of  the  year  by  coming 
back  from  the  has-been  ranks  to  win  the  World  Heavyweight  Boxing 
Championship.  The  trunk  circuits  brought  the  written  stories  and  the 
Wirephoto  network  simultaneously  flashed  the  pictures. 

The  forty-six  papers  subscribing  to  Wirephoto  represented  only  a 
small  fraction  of  the  association's  1,340  members,  but  General  Manager 
Cooper  had  promised  from  the  very  first  to  make  the  new  service  benefit 
the  hundreds  of  papers  which  could  not  afford  its  initial  expense.  The 
vast  majority  of  members  had  no  engraving  plants  of  their  own,  and 
they  depended  on  matted  pictures  for  the  photographs  they  printed. 
The  AP  already  was  supplying  these  members  with  such  a  service, 
matted  at  strategic  centers  in  the  country  and  distributed  by  mail,  bus, 
train,  or  airplane,  as  the  subscriber  desired.  Until  the  advent  of  Wire- 
photo,  the  pictures  from  which  these  mats  were  made  were  collected 
by  the  old  slow  methods.  With  Wirephoto,  pictures  of  outstanding  news 
from  all  over  the  country  could  be  assembled  with  unprecedented  speed 
at  the  widely  separated  matting  points.  At  Cooper's  direction,  the  Photo 
Department  made  preparations  for  a  high-speed  mat  service,  called 
Telemats,  to  be  produced  from  pictures  transmitted  by  Wirephoto. 


THE  FIGHT  OVER  PICTURES  395 

8 

There  was  now  no  question  about  the  merits  of  Wirephoto.  It 
justified  the  great  claims  made  for  it,  and  it  introduced  a  new  stimulus 
into  the  field  of  newspaper  enterprise.  Nevertheless,  its  opponents  made 
one  last  attempt  to  halt  its  progress  at  the  1935  annual  meeting — even 
after  the  service  got  under  way.  Again  they  called  for  the  membership 
to  discredit  the  Board  of  Directors  and  the  management,  but  again 
they  were  voted  down. 

Out  of  their  oblique  onslaught,  however,  came  one  salutary  de- 
velopment. Seeking  to  gain  the  favor  of  the  smaller  members,  they 
introduced  a  resolution  calling  for  more  representation  of  the  smaller 
members  on  the  Board  of  Directors.  Until  that  time,  the  board  had 
been  composed  of  fifteen  members,  selected  from  among  the  various 
categories  of  membership.  The  opponents  to  Wirephoto  proposed  that 
the  number  be  increased  to  eighteen,  giving  the  small  members  three 
additional  representatives  on  the  board.  It  was  a  plan  the  board  already 
had  under  consideration  and  eventually  it  was  put  into  effect. 

As  for  the  Wirephoto  controversy  itself,  it  slipped  into  the  asso- 
ciation's historic  files  with  one  parting  thrust  by  a  representative  of  one 
of  the  smaller  papers  whom  the  opponents  had  thought  to  win  over  to 
their  program  of  opposition  to  pictures  by  wire.  Carl  L.  Estes  of  the 
Longview  (Tex.)  News,  listened  to  the  1935  debate,  seconded  a 
motion  to  table  one  of  the  opposition's  proposals,  and  declared: 

"I've  had  enough  of  this  self-appointed,  self-anointed  shepherd 
of  the  little  fellow.  The  issue  at  stake  is  one  of  progress.  Somebody 
has  got  to  pioneer  pictures  by  wire.  If  The  Associated  Press  paid  every 
dollar  in  its  treasury  to  sponsor  this  thing,  I,  as  one  of  the  smallest 
newspaper  publishers  in  the  country,  think  it  would  be  money  well 
spent." 

Pictures  by  wire  had  come  to  stay.  Day  in  and  day  out  the  system 
was  delivering  pictures  simultaneously  to  the  receiving  stations  over 
the  country  in  only  eight  minutes  each,  but  the  news  log  of  1935  still 
had  to  produce  the  transcendent  story  which  would  dramatize  Wire- 
photo  unforgettably  in  the  minds  of  the  public  as  a  whole.  Then  it 
came. 

Harold  Turnblad,  chief  of  bureau  in  Seattle,  was  about  to  leave 
the  office  late  the  afternoon  of  August  16  when  a  report  arrived  from 
a  correspondent  at  Fairbanks,  Alaska.  Wiley  Post,  the  round-the- 
world  flier,  and  Will  Rogers,  the  humorist  philosopher,  had  taken  off 


396  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

by  plane  for  Point  Barrow,  five  hundred  miles  away  near  the  rim  of  the 
Arctic  Ocean.  That  night  the  editor  on  duty  kept  in  frequent  touch 
with  the  United  States  Army  Signal  Corps  office  in  Seattle  on  the  chance 
that  some  word  might  come  through  from  one  of  the  Signal  Corps 
outposts  in  the  remote  reaches  of  Alaska.  There  was  no  news.  When 
the  editor  left  at  the  end  of  his  tour  of  duty,  he  instructed  the  night 
attendant  to  keep  calling  the  Signal  Corps  hourly  until  the  first  day 
editor  reported  at  6  A.M. 

Turnblad  was  fast  asleep  when  the  telephone  beside  his  bed  rang 
at  daybreak.  Drowsily  he  reached  for  the  phone  and  heard  an  apolo- 
getic voice  which  he  recognized  as  that  of  Captain  Frank  E.  Stoner  of 
the  United  States  Army  Signal  Corps. 

"I  hate  to  wake  you  up,"  the  officer  began  quickly,  "but  we've 
just  received  word  that  Post  and  Rogers  were  killed  last  night  near 
Point  Barrow." 

The  words  jolted  Turnblad  wide  awake. 

"Say  that  again!" 

As  soon  as  Stoner  hung  up,  Turnblad  called  the  bureau. 

"Put  on  a  flash!"  he  shouted. 

F-L-A-S-H 

SEATTLE  -  SIGNAL  CORPS  REPORTS  ROGERS 
AND  POST  KILLED  NEAR  BARROW  IN  A  PLANE  CRASH. 

As  Turnblad  and  his  staff  went  into  action  to  develop  further 
details  of  the  disaster — the  string  correspondents  in  Alaska  reported  to 
Seattle — things  were  happening  at  the  lonely  spot  where  Rogers  and 
Post  met  sudden  death.  At  Point  Barrow  the  co-operative  had  two 
stringers — a  medical  missionary,  Dr.  Greist,  and  a  grizzled  trading  post 
storekeeper  named  Brower.  As  soon  as  the  first  reports  of  the  crash 
reached  Point  Barrow,  Dr.  Greist  and  Brower  set  out  for  the  scene  with 
an  ordinary  folding  camera,  the  kind  so  frequently  used  to  record 
family  outings  or  picnics. 

The  news  that  Will  Rogers  and  Wiley  Post  had  been  killed  hit 
the  nation  hard.  No  one  had  to  tell  Photo  Editor  Wilson  Hicks  in 
New  York  that  here  was  the  greatest  picture  story  of  the  year — if  only 
pictures  had  been  taken  at  the  scene  of  the  crash  in  Alaska. 

Then  came  a  message.  The  two  stringers  at  Point  Barrow  had 
taken  pictures  and  they  were  on  their  way  to  Fairbanks  in  the  same 
plane  that  was  carrying  the  bodies  of  the  humorist  and  his  flier  com- 
panion from  Point  Barrow. 


THE  FIGHT  OVER  PICTURES  397 


A  relay  of  planes  was  arranged  to  speed  the  negatives  from  Fair- 
banks to  San  Francisco,  then  the  nearest  station  on  the  Wirephoto  net- 
work. While  the  leased  wires  were  carrying  stories  based  on  informa- 
tion supplied  by  the  medical  missionary,  the  trading  post  storekeeper, 
and  other  correspondents,  the  precious  negatives  were  on  their  way. 

In  New  York  Hicks  remained  at  the  Wirephoto  control  board. 
At  last  the  loud-speaker  of  the  network  came  to  life.  It  was  Sears, 
photo  editor  at  San  Francisco — FX  by  the  call  designation  given  to 
bureaus.  He  told  Hicks  that  the  Post-Rogers  negatives  had  arrived, 
were  in  the  darkroom  being  developed,  and  that  the  first  would  be 
ready  for  transmitting  within  a  few  minutes. 

The  loud-speaker  died  for  a  time  and  then  Sears  was  on  the  pic- 
ture network's  telephone  circuit  informing  all  points  that  the  first  pic- 
ture was  ready  for  sending. 

News  that  the  Post-Rogers  pictures  were  about  to  be  transmitted 
flew  about  the  newspaper  offices  and  editorial  workers  left  their  desks 
to  crowd  about  the  receiving  equipment. 

In  San  Francisco,  Sears  pushed  a  button  and  started  the  sending 
drum  rotating.  In  eight  minutes  the  receiving  machines  halted  in  unison, 
negative  cartridges  were  rushed  into  darkrooms  for  developing,  and 
soon  the  first  picture  was  in  print  in  subscribing  newspapers  through- 
out the  country. 

Through  the  night  other  pictures  of  the  tragedy  moved  over 
the  network — shots  of  the  wrecked  plane,  of  the  bodies  being  loaded 
into  a  whaleboat,  of  the  Eskimo  tent  where  Post  had  come  down  to 
ask  directions  a  few  minutes  before  the  fatal  crash.  Subscribing  member 
papers  printed  them  side  by  side  with  the  front-page  stories  which 
gave  columns  to  the  tragic  death  of  two  of  America's  beloved  figures. 

Wirephoto  had  scored  a  smashing  coup  on  a  story  of  surpassing 
reader  interest.  The  pictures  found  their  way  into  thousands  of  private 
scrapbooks,  readers  wrote  letters  to  editors  commenting  on  the  speed 
with  which  the  pictures  had  been  obtained  and  printed,  and  the  name  of 
Wirephoto  took  on  a  new  magic  whenever  people  saw  it  on  pictures  of 
other  news  events. 

Nor  were  the  two  Alaskan  stringers  forgotten.  The  two  men  who 
had  helped  make  the  Post-Rogers  coverage  so  spectacular  were  sent 
checks  for  $500  each  and — appropriately  enough — they  also  were  given 
a  dozen  rolls  of  film  for  their  all-important  little  box  camera. 


IX.  DATE  LINE:  FLEMINGTON 


SMALL  towns  often  produce  well-remembered  date  lines.  There  was 
Dayton,  Tennessee,  in  1925  with  its  Scopes  "monkey  trial."  In  1932 
came  Hopewell  and  the  Lindbergh  kidnaping.  Two  years  later  it  was 
Callander,  Ontario,  and  the  birth  of  the  Dionne  quintuplets.  And  in 
1935  it  was  Flemington  and  Bruno  Hauptmann. 

From  the  time  of  Hauptmann's  arrest  until  his  trial  opened  on 
January  2,  the  report  had  carried  a  tremendous  volume  of  copy  on  the 
Bronx  carpenter  accused  of  kidnapping  and  murdering  Charles  A.  Lind- 
bergh, Jr.  Hauptmann  was  front-page  and  every  scrap  of  news  about 
him  was  snapped  up.  Long  before  the  first  juror  was  chosen  it  was  evi- 
dent that  coverage  of  the  trial  would  have  to  be  both  superior  and 
comprehensive. 

The  mention  of  Flemington  subsequently  came  to  have  many  con- 
notations. For  some  it  meant  one  of  the  most  widely  publicized  and 
controversial  criminal  cases  in  court  history.  To  AP  men,  however, 
Flemington  was  synonymous  with  the  most  mysterious  blunder  in  the 
association's  records.  For  a  long  time  staffers  winced  when  they  heard 
the  name  spoken. 

Preparations  and  planning  for  covering  the  trial  began  weeks  in 
advance.  The  staff — news,  photo,  and  traffic — was  selected.  Flemington 
was  to  operate  as  a  full-sized,  specially  constituted  bureau. 

As  chief  of  bureau  at  Newark,  the  strategic  center  for  New  Jer- 
sey, Henry  E.  Mooberry  headed  the  trial  staff  of  seven  reporters. 
O.  K.  Price  was  in  charge  of  the  special  Traffic  force  assigned  to  handle 
the  transmission  of  copy.  Working  space  in  the  cramped  courthouse  was 
at  a  premium,  but  The  AP  obtained  the  use  of  half  the  sheriff's  private 
office,  which  was  located  immediately  outside  the  courtroom  door. 

The  trial  opened  January  2,  1935,  and  while  court  was  in  session 
the  Morkrum  in  the  sheriff's  office  raced  along  at  sixty-five  words  a 
minute,  pouring  the  running  story  directly  onto  the  news  network. 

As  the  end  of  the  trial  approached,  Mooberry  became  extremely 
anxious  to  have  the  seven  weeks  of  outstanding  work  on  the  story  cli- 
maxed by  the  speediest  possible  flash  on  the  jury's  verdict.  He  antici- 

398 


DATE  LINE:  FLEMINGTON  399 

pated  difficulty  in  getting  the  verdict  promptly.  In  all  likelihood,  the 
courtroom  doors  would  be  locked  from  the  moment  the  jury  returned 
until  after  it  was  discharged.  Anyone  who  devised  a  way  to  circumvent 
the  locked  doors  would  be  assured  a  beat  on  Hauptmann's  fate. 

The  problem  of  reporting  the  verdict  became  a  major  concern  in 
the  bureau  chiePs  mind.  There  was  the  established  method — written 
copy  coming  out  from  the  men  assigned  in  court,  just  as  throughout  the 
trial.  That  guaranteed  the  cardinal  consideration — accuracy — but  it 
might  mean  sacrificing  speed  if  the  anticipated  difficulties  arose.  Moo- 
berry  knew  that  others  were  exerting  every  resource  to  circumvent  the 
barriers  of  closed  courtroom  doors  and  he  disliked  the  possibility  that 
someone  else  might  stage  a  last-minute  coup  which  would  detract  from 
the  acknowledged  superiority  of  the  report  he  had  directed  throughout 
the  trial. 

The  intense  importance  attached  to  the  announcement  of  the 
Hauptmann  verdict  in  the  public  mind  strengthened  Mooberry's  pur- 
pose. He  determined  upon  an  alternate  method  of  getting  the  verdict 
out  of  the  courtroom. 

Without  writing  to  New  York  for  authorization  and  approval,  he 
worked  out  plans  for  the  use  of  a  short-range  radio  set.  The  arrange- 
ment called  for  Ralph  Smith,  a  Traffic  mechanic  and  amateur  radio 
operator,  to  be  in  the  courtroom  with  a  portable  set  concealed  under  his 
overcoat,  while  Price,  the  Traffic  chief,  was  to  station  himself  at  a  re- 
ceiving set  in  a  locked  storeroom  in  the  attic  of  the  building.  Price  had 
borrowed  a  teletype  and  installed  it  there  and  it  could  be  connected  to 
the  same  trunk  wire  as  the  Morkrum  in  the  sheriffs  office.  As  soon  as 
Price  received  the  short-wave  signals  from  Smith,  he  was  to  cut  in  on 
the  wire  and  flash  the  verdict.  Control  of  the  wire  would  then  revert  to 
the  Morkrum  downstairs  without  outsiders  in  the  sheriffs  office  being 
any  the  wiser  as  to  what  had  been  sent. 


February  13  was  the  last  day  of  the  trial  and  the  long  siege  of 
work.  Pressure  and  nerve  strain  were  almost  finished.  In  spite  of  the 
general  atmosphere  of  public  hysteria  pervading  the  courthouse,  it 
promised  to  be  the  easiest  day  of  the  trial— nothing  like  the  hectic  ses- 
sions when  Lindbergh  was  on  the  witness  stand,  or  Hauptmann,  or  Dr. 
"Jafsie"  Condon. 

The  jury  retired  at  11:15  A.M.  and  the  long  wait  began.  State 


400  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

troopers  cleared  the  courtroom  of  all  spectators  except  newspapermen. 
Outside  in  the  streets  crowds  gathered  around  the  courthouse  and  the 
adjoining  county  jail  where  Hauptmann  paced  his  cell.  The  day  dragged 
on  into  the  afternoon,  and  the  afternoon  into  the  night. 

In  mid-evening  Mooberry  summoned  Price  and  Smith  to  his  desk 
and  gave  them  each  a  small  card  bearing  the  code  signals  for  the  var- 
ious verdict  possibilities.  It  had  been  agreed  in  advance  that,  for  safety, 
the  signal  must  be  repeated  five  times  and  carry  a  prearranged  signa- 
ture. Any  message  not  fulfilling  all  those  requirements  was  to  be 
ignored. 

The  bailiffs  detailed  to  guard  the  jury  sent  for  the  sheriff.  Tension 
rose  in  the  courtroom.  There  was  a  commotion  at  the  doorway  leading 
to  the  jury  room.  At  10:20  the  sheriff  came  out.  He  announced  the  jury 
had  agreed  upon  a  verdict. 

The  two  staff  men  assigned  to  do  the  running  story  wrote  identical 
flashes  that  the  jury  was  ready  to  report  and  sent  the  copy  flying  out 
of  the  courtroom  by  messenger  boys.  Each  had  been  instructed  to  do 
independent  running  stories.  This  was  a  routine  precaution  against  any 
loss  of  copy  in  the  confusion  outside  the  courtroom.  With  duplicate 
flashes,  bulletins,  and  running  being  sent  out,  there  was  a  good  chance 
that  at  least  one  complete  set  could  be  counted  upon  to  reach  the  news 
desk — unless  all  copy  was  stopped  completely. 

Immediately  after  the  sheriff's  announcement,  state  troopers  took 
command  in  the  courtroom.  The  doors  were  locked  and  the  window 
shades  drawn.  At  every  door  and  window  a  trooper  mounted  guard. 
"No  one  will  be  permitted  to  leave  this  room  until  dismissed  by  the 
court,"  newspapermen  were  told. 

At  10:28  P.M.  the  bell  in  the  courthouse  cupola  began  to  toll  its 
traditional  signal,  that  a  murder  case  jury  was  returning  to  the  box 
with  a  verdict. 

In  the  locked  courtroom,  every  member  of  the  staff  was  at  his  post. 
Two  men  waited  at  the  locked  doors  ready  to  write  the  flashes  they 
hoped  to  be  able  to  slip  out  across  the  sill.  The  two  men  assigned  to 
the  running  bent  over  their  duplicate  stories.  A  relay  of  messengers 
lined  the  aisles  to  pass  each  sheet  back  as  soon  as  it  was  torn  from  the 
thick  yellow  pads.  Overcoated  and  perspiring,  Smith  with  his  con- 
cealed wireless  set  stood  near  the  rear  benches.  Beside  him  stood  a 
newsman,  pencil  and  paper  ready  to  scribble  off  the  verdict  whicl>  the 
operator  was  to  tap  out  in  code  on  the  hidden  sending  key  in  his 
pocket. 


DATE  LINE:  FLEMINGTON  401 

Only  a  wall  separated  Mooberry  in  the  sheriff's  office  from  the 
courtroom,  but  he  might  have  been  in  another  world.  The  regular  run- 
ning story  began  to  come  out,  describing  preparations  for  the  arrival 
of  the  jury,  Hauptmann,  and  Justice  Trenchard.  Mindful  of  what  had 
happened  during  the  judge's  charge  that  morning  when  copy  was  held 
up  almost  a  half  hour,  Mooberry  looked  for  a  time  lag  of  at  least 
several  minutes  between  events  in  court  and  the  appearance  of  copy. 
Unknown  to  Mooberry  and  everyone  else  outside,  however,  the  troopers 
behind  the  locked  doors  were  making  no  attempt  to  halt  news  copy  as 
they  had  done  in  the  morning.  The  running  story  was  being  slipped 
over  the  doorsill  with  only  negligible  delay. 


Hunched  at  his  desk,  Mooberry  worked  fast,  editing  the  copy 
shuttled  in  to  him  by  the  messengers  posted  outside  the  courtroom  door. 
Although  he  watched  closely,  he  found  no  indication  yet  as  to  the  size 
of  the  presupposed  time  lag.  The  copy  was  preliminary  descriptive  and 
recorded  nothing  requiring  a  time  element,  something  the  two  men 
had  been  instructed  to  incorporate  on  all  major  developments.  As 
rapidly  as  the  bureau  chief  finished  with  one  piece  of  copy,  he  passed 
the  "take"  over  to  the  Morkrum  in  the  corner  where  Sam  Patroff, 
the  operator,  kept  feeding  the  story  onto  the  trunk  wire. 

Everything  was  going  smoothly — like  clockwork. 

Patroff's  fingers  suddenly  jerked  off  the  keys  as  if  they  were  hot. 

"He's  breaking,  Henry,"  he  whispered.  "He's  breaking!" 

Mooberry  jumped  across  to  Patroff 's  side.  Price  was  cutting  in 
from  the  attic. 

Here  it  came! 

F-L-A-S-H 

•   FLEMINGTON  -  VERDICT  REACHED  GUILTY  AND 
LIFE 

The  Morkrum  pulsed,  idle  for  a  second,  then  the  typebars  flipped 
up  against  the  printer  paper  in  a  quick  flurry.  Price  timed  his  flash— 
10:31  P.M. 

For  one  jubilant  moment  Mooberry  hung  over  the  machine.  From 
coast  to  coast,  in  bureaus  and  member  offices,  that  flash  had  just  ham- 
mered out  on  hundreds  of  Morkrums  as  fast  as  the  letters  fed  onto  the 
circuit  from  the  secret  machine  in  the  attic  at  Flemington. 


402  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

The  verdict  was  out!  All  over  the  country!  And  the  courtroom 
doors  were  still  locked! 

The  bureau  chief  turned  back  to  his  desk.  His  immediate  job  was 
cut  out  for  him.  By  the  time  Patroff  took  back  control  of  the  wire, 
Mooberry  had  a  bulletin  ready  amplifying  the  flash  into  terse,  readable 
newspaper  copy  for  waiting  telegraph  editors  and  composing  rooms. 
Then  the  extras  could  roll.  Crowding  on  the  heels  of  the  bulletin  came 
bulletin  matter  explaining  that,  under  New  Jersey  law,  a  recommenda- 
tion of  mercy  made  life  imprisonment  mandatory. 

Borne  along  by  a  great  emotional  lift,  Mooberry  pieced  together 
the  story,  combining  the  explanatory,  or  "stock,"  material  he  wrote 
himself  with  the  available  running  copy  which  had  been  flowing  under 
the  locked  courtroom  door.  The  courtroom  copy  was  still  entirely  de- 
scriptive of  the  scenes  preceding  delivery  of  the  verdict.  A  few  minutes 
ticked  by  without  bringing  any  confirmation  of  the  verdict  through 
the  regular  channels.  To  Mooberry,  that  was  understandable  enough. 
The  duplicate  running  had  mentioned  the  State  Police  guards  at  all 
doors.  Apparently  the  troopers  were  holding  up  copy  as  they  had  done 
earlier. 

The  bureau  chief  looked  up  from  his  work  to  see  Price  hurry  into 
the  office. 

"You're  sure  you're  right,  aren't  you?"  he  asked  in  a  whisper 
when  the  Traffic  chief  reached  his  side.  "The  verdict  came  awfully 
quick."  He  paused  and  voiced  the  faint  suspicion  which  had  begun  to 
worry  him.  "Almost  too  quick." 

"Sure,  Henry,  sure."  Price  was  tense  but  positive.  "I  got  the  sig- 
nals. The  number  was  4,  and  4  means  life." 

With  Price  watching  over  his  shoulder,  Mooberry  returned  to  the 
scrawled  running  account  which  had  been  coming  out  under  the  court- 
room door.  In  the  light  of  Price's  positive  assurance,  this  copy  lagged 
at  least  eight  minutes  behind  actual  proceedings.  That  wasn't  bad.  Price 
read  a  few  pages,  and  left  to  return  to  the  attic. 

The  office  boy  darted  in  with  another  batch  of  courtroom  copy. 
Mooberry  had  his  thick  black  pencil  poised  to  continue  editing.  Then 
he  froze.  Time  elements  had  begun  to  appear  in  the  "takes"— time 
elements  impossible  to  reconcile  with  the  secret  wireless  verdict  which 
had  been  flashed  at  10:31.  Frantically  Mooberry  scanned  the  next  pages. 
Perhaps  one  of  the  men  had  made  a  mistake  in  noting  the  time.  A  glance 
dashed  that  desperate  hope.  Both  sets  of  running  copy  carried  the  times 


DATE  LINE:  FLEMINGTON  403 

of  events  in  court,  and  the  times  tallied.  At  10:31,  the  time  of  the  attic 
flash,  the  jury's  verdict  had  not  been  delivered. 

In  that  numbing  moment  Mooberry  reacted  instinctively.  His 
pencil  jabbed  down  on  a  clean  sheet. 

F-L-A-S-H 

KILL  HAUPTMANN  VERDICT  -  ERRONEOUS 

Functioning  like  an  automaton,  the  bureau  chief  got  off  the  bulletin 
obligatory  after  all  kills— a  bulletin  calling  editors'  attention  to  the 
transmission  of  a  mandatory  kill  and  directing  that  the  erroneous  copy 
be  destroyed  promptly.  Regardless  of  everything  else,  the  error  must 
be  caught  and  killed  without  delay. 

The  seconds  seemed  ages,  but  it  was  barely  a  few  minutes  before 
the  office  boy  was  thrusting  a  sheet  of  paper  into  Mooberry's  hand. 

P-L-A-S-H 

HAUPTMANN  GUILTY  DEATH  SENTENCE 

That  was  from  McGrady.  Identical  written  flashes  from  Ferris, 
Lawrence,  and  Kinney  arrived  almost  simultaneously. 

No  doubt  now.  The  correct  verdict  was:  Guilty — Death. 

The  accurate  verdict  went  out  at  10:46 — exactly  one  minute  after 
the  nervous  jury  foreman  announced  it  from  the  box. 

The  established  method  had  done  the  job  accurately  and  with  all 
the  speed  one  could  ask. 


The  erroneous  flash  had  stood  eleven  minutes.  In  New  York,  edi- 
torial and  traffic  men  alike  had  been  clustered  over  the  Morkrums 
when  the  typebars  printed  the  four  false  words.  All  the  main  wire  cir- 
cuits had  been  hooked  up  directly  to  Flemington  so  the  news  would 
have  instantaneous  distribution. 

Then — the  Kill.  Members  of  the  New  York  staff  went  about  their 
duties  with  set  faces.  No  one  felt  like  talking.  Elevenjrjiflutes  was  an 
infinitesimal  speck  of  time  for  an  organization 
seven  years,  but  this  error  seemed  almost  a 

The  circumstances  prevailing  that  niglj 
opportunity  to  obtain  the  details  behind  the 
verdict  had  been  killed,  the  first  conside 
story  cleared  quickly  and  smoothly. 


404  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Not  until  the  next  day  did  amazed  executive  editors  begin  to  learn 
of  the  disastrous  secret  scheme  which  had  caused  the  false  flash.  Assist- 
ant General  Manager  Elliott  instituted  an  investigation  as  soon  as  he 
received  intimations  that  irregularities  were  involved.  The  co-operative 
had  rigorous  rules  against  the  use  of  special  transmission  systems 
in  reporting  news,  unless  specifically  authorized  by  New  York,  and 
what  had  been  done  at  Flemington  was,  bluntly,  a  flagrant  violation  of 
regulations. 

On  his  own  initiative  and  without  authorization,  the  bureau  chief 
had  gone  ahead  with  a  scheme  which  placed  heavy  reliance  on  a  make- 
shift signal  system.  The  indictment  did  not  stop  there.  The  scheme 
required  a  special  installation  of  radio  and  telegraph  equipment,  some- 
thing strictly  forbidden  except  with  the  approval  of  a  Traffic  Depart- 
ment executive.  Other  regulations  had  been  ignored  in  the  unauthorized 
use  of  the  borrowed  teletype,  the  extension  of  the  news  wire  to  the 
attic  location,  and  even  the  unauthorized  employment  of  a  second 
operator  to  check  the  verdict  signals.  New  York  learned  that  Traffic 
Chief  Price  had  hired  a  second  operator  to  help  him  detect  the  wireless 
signals  in  the  attic  room  and  this  act  assumed  further  gravity  when  it 
was  learned  that  the  man  employed  was  a  former  Traffic  man  who  had 
been  dismissed  from  the  service  some  time  before. 

Mooberry  offered  no  defense  for  proceeding  without  approval  on 
a  plan  which  flouted  so  many  regulations.  All  his  thoughts  had  been 
concentrated  on  getting  the  verdict  the  instant  it  was  announced.  The 
consequences  left  him  dismayed. 

"It  is  almost  impossible,"  he  wrote  General  Manager  Cooper,  "for 
me  to  express  my  feelings  on  the  situation  into  which  I  have  thrown 
you  and  The  Associated  Press." 

The  general  manager  waited  until  all  the  facts  had  been  examined 
and  then  took  action.  There  was  no  alternative  but  to  discipline  the 
three  men  involved  in  the  unauthorized  undertaking.  Price  was  dis- 
missed, Mooberry  was  suspended,  and  Smith  was  transferred  to  work 
in  another  part  of  the  country. 


What  had  happened  in  the  attic  storeroom  during  those  fifteen 
eventful  minutes  immediately  preceding  the  announcement  of  the 
Hauptmann  verdict? 

Even  after  the  investigation,  no  one  knew  for  certain.  When  Smith, 


DATE  LINE:  FLEMING-TON  405 

the  mechanic,  left  the  courtroom  on  the  .verdict  night,  he  encountered 
Price  coming  down  the  stairs  from  the  top  floor.  "I  got  a  couple  of  4*8 
and  went  ahead,"  Price  explained.  In  the  next  breath  he  was  telling 
the  mechanic  that  he  wasn't  positive  the  signals  he  received  had  been  4*8. 
They  might  have  been  letter  V's,  a  somewhat  similar  combination  of 
dots  and  dashes.  He  said,  however,  that  the  second  operator  with  him 
in  the  attic  had  identified  them  as  4*8.  The  code  signal — whether  4  or 
V — recurred  only  twice  and  bore  no  signature,  he  acknowledged,  but 
he  sent  the  fatal  flash  on  the  strength  of  that  reception.  The  prearranged 
code  was:  i  for  the  death  verdict  j  4  for  guilty,  life  imprisonment 5  7  for 
acquittal  j  9  for  disagreement. 

Having  cleared  the  number  4  flash,  Price  made  his  trip  downstairs 
to  see  Mooberry,  became  uneasy  after  seeing  some  copy  and  returned 
to  the  attic.  Resetting  the  dial  to  the  wave  length  Smith  was  to  use, 
he  received  the  correct  verdict  signal  and  then  heard  it  repeated.  By 
that  time,  however,  a  correct  flash  in  writing  had  reached  Mooberry 
from  the  courtroom. 

The  origin  of  the  mysterious  signal  4  could  not  be  traced.  At 
first  some  of  the  staff  suspected  that  it  might  have  come  from  other 
portable  equipment  which  had  been  smuggled  into  the  court  by  the 
representative  of  one  of  the  metropolitan  papers.  The  man  who  operated 
it  was  detected  after  Hauptmann's  sentencing,  was  arrested  and  later 
released.  His  set,  however,  proved  to  be  for  voice  transmission  and  not 
Morse  code. 

The  erroneous  flash  was  a  sensation  not  only  in  the  pressrooms  at 
Flemington  but  in  newspaper  offices  over  the  country.  The  same  edi- 
tions which  blazoned  the  Hauptmann  death  verdict  also  gave  promi- 
nence to  accounts  of  the  flash  which  caused  so  much  confusion. 

The  Associated  Press  had  made  a  mistake — and  that  was  news. 

That  some  member  papers  would  be  highly  exercised  was  to  be 
expected.  What  was  totally  unlocked  for,  however,  was  the  spontane- 
ous outpouring  from  those  who  took  the  occasion  to  reiterate  their  con- 
fidence. While  regretting  the  mischance,  they  praised  the  over-all 
coverage  of  the  trial  and  the  efficiency  with  which  the  association  gath- 
ered the  news  of  the  world  day  after  day,  year  after  year.  A  letter 
from  George  B.  Armstead,  managing  editor  of  the  Hartford  Cowrant, 
the  country's  oldest  daily  newspaper,  was  typical  of  many.  Addressing 
Cooper,  he  wrote: 

It  must  be  grand  to  preside  over  an  organization  so  far  famed  for 
accuracy  and  speed  that  when  it  makes  a  slip,  it  becomes  a  national  sensation. 


406  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

We  all  regret  for  your  sake  and  that  of  the  men  on  the  story  that  luck  went 
against  you,  but  it  does  serve  to  point  out  the  great  record  of  The  Associated 
Press  and  the  tremendous  impression  its  accuracy  has  made  throughout  the 
years. 

Nevertheless,  the  memory  of  the  false  flash  remained  with  the 
staff.  Realization  that  the  slip  was  due  to  the  zealousness  of  an  indi- 
vidual rather  than  to  any  weakness  in  the  established  system  only  served 
as  a  poignant  reminder  that,  in  such  an  era  of  rapid  transmission  facili- 
ties, the  human  element  became  an  increasingly  significant  factor  in 
the  quick  marshaling  and  distribution  of  eagerly  awaited  fact.  As  long 
as  that  human  equation  was  involved  there  would  remain  the  possi- 
bility that  some  error  of  individual  judgment,  some  well-intentioned 
act,  might  produce  an  unwanted  result.  But  no  amount  of  effort  to 
minimize  such  possibilities  could  be  overemphasized  in  an  organization 
so  conscious  of  its  unique  position  in  a  nation's  daily  life. 


X.  "URGENT"— FROM  ETHIOPIA 


WAR  clouds  had  been  gathering  over  East  Africa  for  months.  There 
had  been  a  frontier  "incident"  in  December,  1934,  when  Italian  and 
Ethiopian  patrols  clashed  at  Ualual  in  disputed  territory  between  the 
boundaries  of  Italian  Somaliland  and  the  primitive  kingdom  of  Haile 
Selassie,  the  Conquering  Lion  of  Judah.  By  midsummer  of  1935  Pre- 
mier Benito  Mussolini  had  more  than  240,000  troops  and  labor  bat- 
talions concentrated  in  Italy's  East  African  colonies  adjoining  Ethiopia. 
The  League  of  Nations  threatened  to  invoke  sanctions  against  Italy  if 
II  Duce's  legions  invaded  Ethiopia.  Great  Britain  massed  naval  might 
in  the  Mediterranean  area  at  Suez  and  Gibraltar. 

Once  it  became  apparent  that  Mussolini  was  not  likely  to  abandon 
his  Ethiopian  plan,  The  AP  ordered  Jim  Mills  to  Addis  Ababa  to  report 
developments  there  and  to  be  on  the  spot  if  war  should  come.  For 
Mills  it  was  another  out-of-the-frying-pan-into-the-fire  assignment.  He 
had  just  finished  covering  the  revolt  in  Crete  and  Greece  which  resulted 
in  the  flight  of  Venizelos  and  the  restoration  of  King  George. 

Mills  arrived  at  Addis  Ababa  early  in  August.  He  found  it  the 
same  sprawling  collection  of  dirty  huts  and  haphazard  buildings  he 
had  seen  five  years  earlier  when  he  reported  the  spectacular  coronation 
of  Haile  Selassie.  The  news  in  the  African  capital  was  neither  abundant 
nor  weighty.  Ethiopia  was  anxious  to  bring  about  a  peaceful  settlement. 
Mills  renewed  his  acquaintance  with  the  Emperor  and  secured  several 
exclusive  interviews  with  him  and  with  Everett  A.  Colson,  Selassie's 
American  financial  adviser.  He  also  watched  the  bands  of  fierce  native 
warriors  troop  into  the  city  in  their  dirty  white  shammas,  savagely  eager 
for  the  conflict  their  monarch  wished  to  avoid. 

Little  happened  in  the  barbaric  city  that  escaped  Mills's  attention 
and  he  was  on  hand  when  a  plane  flew  in  from  Egypt  with  Francis  W. 
Rickett,  a  British  promoter  with  an  extraordinary  career.  Mills  knew 
him  of  old.  Rickett  had  become  known  as  the  "Lawrence  of  Finance" 
because  of  his  operations  in  Asia  and  Africa.  His  arrival  touched  off  a 
flurry  of  rumors  among  foreign  newspapermen  in  Addis  Ababa:  He 
had  come  to  arrange  a  gigantic  munitions  deal.  He  was  entrusted  with 

407 


408  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

a  secret  political  mission  bearing  on  the  Italo-Ethiopian  crisis.  He  had 
been  called  for  a  mysterious  conference  with  the  Emperor.  The  reports 
were  endless. 

Suave  and  debonair,  Rickett  dismissed  all  such  talk  with  a  tolerant 
smile.  There  was  nothing  spectacular  behind  his  visit.  He  said  he  had 
come  as  a  representative  of  the  Coptic  Church  of  Egypt  for  a  "benevo- 
lent" purpose.  The  Egyptian  Patriarch  of  that  church  had  instructed 
him  to  learn  how  the  Copts  of  Egypt  could  best  help  their  Ethiopian 
brethren  in  the  event  of  war.  As  proof  of  his  mission  he  exhibited  a 
letter  from  the  Patriarch  to  the  Abuna— or  "Pope" — of  the  Coptic 
Church  in  Abyssinia. 

Rickett  managed  to  disarm  suspicion  in  the  press  corps.  He  was 
taken  at  his  word  and  attracted  no  special  attention  thereafter. 

Mills,  however,  was  not  satisfied.  He  could  not  believe  that  a  man 
of  Rickett's  caliber  would  be  in  Addis  Ababa  to  find  out  whether  the 
Egyptian  Copts  should  send  money,  ambulances,  airplanes,  doctors,  or 
what  not.  The  more  he  speculated  the  more  he  became  convinced  that 
something  else  was  afoot.  He  discovered  that  he  was  not  the  only 
skeptic.  There  was  one  other — Sir  Percival  Phillips  of  the  London 
Daily  Telegraph. 

Over  the  rare  luxury  of  a  bottle  of  cold  beer,  the  two  corre- 
spondents compared  notes  in  the  humid  privacy  of  their  hotel  rooms. 
They  were  agreed  that  Rickett  was  in  Ethiopia  for  no  trivial,  "benevo- 
lent" reason.  Mills  and  Phillips  made  their  plans.  The  only  way  to  find 
out  just  what  Rickett  was  doing  was  to  keep  an  eye  on  him  all  the 
time,  wherever  he  went. 

During  his  first  week  in  Addis  Ababa,  Rickett  saw  the  head  of 
the  Coptic  Church,  the  Emperor  and  the  imperial  advisers.  Every  place 
he  went  he  found  himself  encountering  either  Mills  or  Phillips.  At 
first  he  pretended  not  to  notice  their  interest  in  his  movements,  hoping 
to  throw  them  off  the  trail  or  at  least  discourage  them  into  abandoning 
their  sleuthing.  But  the  effort  was  futile. 

Rickett  stood  up  under  the  surveillance  for  a  few  days,  then  made 
overtures  for  a  truce.  Slipping  into  Mills's  hotel  room  one  night  the 
British  promoter  laid  his  cards  on  the  table. 

"You  two  have  been  following  me  for  over  a  week  now.  In  an- 
other day  or  two  the  rest  of  the  reporters  are  going  to  wake  up  to  the 
fact.  That  is  apt  to  spoil  everything — for  you  as  well  as  for  me.  What 
I  have  to  do  here  makes  it  imperative  that  I  act  quietly  and  unob- 
served." 


"URGENT" — FROM  ETHIOPIA  409 

ccWell,  that's  your  worry,"  said  Mills  noncommittally.  <cWhy  come 
to  us  about  it?" 

"I  have  a  proposal  to  make.  If  you'll  stop  shadowing  me,  within 
a  few  days  I'll  give  you  one  of  the  biggest  stories  that  ever  happened  " 

Mills  and  Sir  Percival  exchanged  glances.  The  idea  of  any  Ethi- 
opian story  being  of  the  "biggest-that-ever-happened"  variety  was  a  bit 
too  much  for  them.  They  said  so.  However,  they  wanted  the  story  be- 
hind Rickett's  mission  and  now  they  knew  how  to  get  it. 

"I'll  go  along,"  said  Mills. 

Sir  Percival  nodded  agreement. 


A  few  nights  later  Addis  Ababa  slept  under  a  clear  sky.  The  full 
moon  shone  down  on  deserted  streets  and  dark  houses.  In  the  Em- 
peror's palace  four  intent  figures  moved  to  and  fro.  They  were  Francis 
M.  Rickett,  Haile  Selassie,  Everett  A.  Colson,  and  George  Herouy, 
son  of  the  Ethiopian  foreign  minister  who  acted  as  interpreter  for  the 
Emperor. 

Haile  Selassie  yawned.  He  looked  strained,  worried  and  tired.  For 
the  past  two  weeks  he  had  been  up  every  night  until  long  after  mid- 
night, negotiating  with  Rickett.  Because  of  the  need  for  secrecy  about 
the  bold  coup  by  which  he  hoped  to  forestall  an  Italian  invasion,  the 
Emperor  and  those  negotiating  with  him  had  worked  only  after  the 
city  was  asleep. 

Rickett  handed  the  Emperor  a  folio  of  typewritten  sheets. 

"There  is  the  revised  contract,  your  Majesty,"  he  said. 

The  document  represented  the  seventh  revision.  The  Emperor 
examined  it  page  by  page,  announced  his  approval,  and  affixed  the  im- 
perial seal. 

Mills  and  Phillips  waited  in  their  hotel  room.  They  knew  this 
was  the  night.  Rickett  had  told  them  to  be  ready  for  the  story  that  was 
to  be  the  "biggest  that  ever  happened,"  but  they  still  did  not  know  what 
it  was. 

Then  the  dapper  Englishman  appeared.  He  burst  into  the  room, 
smiling  and  elated.  Mills  and  Phillips  were  on  their  feet. 

"Here  it  is,  signed,  sealed,  and  delivered,"  he  said  triumphantly, 
throwing  the  document  on  the  table.  "It  will  make  history.  It  may  even 
make  war.  It  may  indeed  make  peace.  In  any  case,  it  will  be  a  triumph 
for  American  and  British  capital  and  industry." 


4io  AP-r-THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Mills  and  his  colleague  pounced  on  the  papers  and  began  to  study 
them  in  the  lamplight.  The  two  correspondents  were  astounded  by  what 
they  read. 

Haile  Selassie  had  signed  over  to  the  Standard  Oil  Company  and 
some  British  interests  the  exclusive  rights  for  the  exploitation  of  all 
Ethiopia's  oil  and  mineral  wealth  in  an  area  three  times  the  size  of 
New  England,  and  for  the  amazing  period  of  seventy-five  years.  The 
agreement  assured  the  Emperor  of  an  annual  return  far  greater  than 
the  whole  yearly  national  income  of  his  kingdom.  It  granted  the  Amer- 
ican-British interests  the  right  to  build  railroads,  pipe  lines,  bridges, 
refineries,  new  highways,  ports,  whole  cities,  and  a  hundred  other  great 
developments.  It  involved  the  ultimate  investment  of  several  hundred 
million  dollars. 

Sir  Percival  smothered  a  gasp.  He  turned  to  Mills. 

"This  thing  is  so  gigantic,"  he  said,  "I'm  afraid  to  send  it  to  my 
paper.  They  won't  believe  it." 

Mills,  too,  was  awed  by  the  contents  of  the  contract. 

"But  it's  signed  and  sealed  by  the  Emperor,  the  minister  of  mines, 
and  Rickett,"  he  pointed  out.  "There  can  be  no  question  of  its  authen- 
ticity." 

"You  can  accept  it  as  Scriptural  truth,"  Rickett  declared. 

The  significance  of  the  document  was  all  too  clear  to  the  two  corre- 
spondents. In  signing  away  the  richest  part  of  his  domains,  the  Emperor 
had  a  shrewd  motive.  With  this  great  area  in  the  hands  of  powerful 
American  and  British  interests,  he  believed  Mussolini  would  never 
attempt  to  challenge  their  claims  under  the  concession,  nor  even  dare 
to  invade  that  section  of  Ethiopia,  for  fear  of  antagonizing  the  two 
great  powers. 

Rickett  said  he  was  dog-tired  after  the  negotiations  of  the  past  two 
weeks.  He  was  going  to  bed,  but  he'd  entrust  the  main  points  of  the 
concession  to  them  until  daybreak  so  that  they  could  prepare  their  dis- 
patches. He  asked  them  to  frame  a  brief  communique,  based  on  the 
contract,  so  that  the  government  could  release  it  as  an  official  announce- 
ment when  the  proper  time  came. 

"I'm  leaving  by  airplane  for  Cairo  the  first  thing  in  the  morning," 
he  explained.  "Be  sure  to  have  everything  ready  before  I  go." 

Mills  and  Sir  Percival  went  to  work.  First  they  prepared  the 
"official  communique" — a  hundred-word  statement  reciting  the  broad 
general  facts  of  the  historic  contract.  Then  they  devoted  the  next  few 


"URGENT" — FROM  ETHIOPIA  411 

hours  to  their  own  dispatches  and  to  plans  for  keeping  the  explosive 
story  a  secret  from  competitors. 

The  government  wireless  station — sole  link  between  Addis  Ababa 
and  the  outside  world — opened  at  dawn  and  Mills  filed  a  i,6oo-word 
story.  Sir  Percival  sent  off  a  story  of  similar  length  to  his  paper  in 
London.  After  Rickett  departed,  Mills  secured  the  complete  text  of 
the  concession,  a  2,oooword  document,  and  dispatched  it  by  wireless, 
giving  a  copy  to  Sir  Percival.  Getting  out  the  story  was  comparatively 
costly — 25  cents  a  word.  Under  normal  circumstances  Mills  would  have 
sent  his  dispatch  at  the  even  more  expensive  "urgent"  rate,  but  he  and 
his  British  colleague  had  agreed  to  mark  their  stories  for  release  the 
next  day,  August  30,  so  that  The  AP  and  the  London  Daily  Telegraph 
would  be  able  to  break  the  news  simultaneously. 

By  nine  o'clock  that  morning,  Addis  Ababa  time,  Mills  had  his 
complete  story  cleared.  With  Sir  Percival  he  spent  the  next  few  hours 
in  nervous  anxiety  lest  any  hint  of  it  leak  out.  Their  fear  was  justified. 
Word  did  leak  out,  and  the  rest  of  the  press  corps  went  rushing  about 
the  city  seeking  confirmation  of  the  report  and  details.  Some  fifty 
correspondents  descended  in  turn  upon  the  Emperor,  the  minister  of 
mines,  the  foreign  minister,  Mr.  Colson,  the  American  legation,  the 
British  legation,  the  Abuna  of  the  Ethiopian  Church.  All  sources,  how- 
ever, disclaimed  knowledge  and  refused  to  comment.  Some,  like  the 
American  and  British  legations,  professed  complete  ignorance  of  the 
concession,  which  was  literally  true.  Other  legations  termed  the  reported 
story  pure  invention. 


Halfway  across  the  world  the  first  "takes"  of  Mills's  dispatch 
began  arriving  in  New  York.  The  time  difference  between  New  York 
and  Addis  Ababa  made  it  eight  hours  earlier  in  the  American  metrop- 
olis, and  the  result  was  that  the  story  reached  the  cable  desk  well  over 
a  dozen  hours  before  the  stipulated  time  set  for  its  release  in  the  night 
report  of  August  30.  Working  against  the  clock  as  he  did,  Mills  had 
written  his  dispatch  hurriedly,  but  there  could  be  no  mistaking  the 
significance  of  the  facts  he  had  set  down. 

The  story  was  promptly  brought  to  the  attention  of  Smith  Reavis, 
then  in  charge  of  the  Cable  Department,  and  Milo  Thompson,  execu- 
tive assistant  to  the  general  manager. 

Both  Reavis  and  Thompson  were  accustomed  to  the  shocks  and 
surprises  in  the  daily  news  of  the  world,  but  they  were  astounded  by 


412  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

this  Cfbreak"  in  Ethiopia.  They  saw  the  importance  of  the  transaction 
Mills  described.  They  studied  the  story  and  its  accompanying  text. 
Then  a  series  of  editorial  conferences  started.  One  of  the  first  subjects 
raised  was  the  question  of  trying  the  two  logical  domestic  sources  for 
"follows" — the  State  Department  at  Washington,  for  comment  on  the 
international  aspects  of  the  Rickett  concession,  and  the  Standard  Oil 
offices  in  New  York,  for  a  statement  of  the  corporation's  plans  in  the 
matter.  The  idea  was  weighed  arid  tabled.  Any  attempt  to  develop 
follows  might  result  in  the  story's  leaking  out  before  time  came  to 
release  it  in  the  night  report.  Mills  had  said  it  was  exclusive,  so  both 
Reavis  and  Thompson  felt  the  wisest  course  was  to  keep  it  a  secret 
and  not  try  any  follows  until  the  story  actually  began  to  move  out  on 
the  wires. 

As  for  the  story  itself,  the  more  it  was  studied  the  more  formid- 
able it  became.  Even  though  it  came  from  Jim  Mills,  a  staff  man  of 
twenty-five  years'  service,  some  of  the  men  found  the  news  almost  too 
overwhelming  for  belief.  Reavis  and  Thompson  had  confidence  in  Mills, 
but  the  dispatch  was  something  that  must  be  confirmed  and  double 
checked  thoroughly  before  a  single  word  was  transmitted.  They  con- 
sulted the  general  manager  and  he  sent  an  urgent  message. 

The  government-owned  wireless  station  in  Addis  Ababa  closed 
down  for  the  night  at  seven  o'clock.  At  five  minutes  before  seven  Mills 
was  handed  the  general  manager's  query.  The  message  said  it  was 
imperative  that  the  authenticity  of  the  story  be  confirmed  beyond 
conceivable  doubt  and  that  headquarters  have  complete  proof  for  every 
statement  in  the  dispatch  as  well  as  the  specific  source  of  all  the  in- 
formation. 

Mills  finished  the  cable,  upset  and  bewildered.  All  day  long  he  had 
been  looking  forward  to  the  nightly  closing  of  the  wireless  station,  be- 
cause then,  if  the  Rickett  story  should  come  out  into  the  open,  competi- 
tion would  have  no  means  of  communication  for  a  dozen  hours.  Now — 
five  minutes  before  the  station's  closing  time — came  this  bombshell 
from  headquarters. 

Mills  made  quick  calculations.  Unless  he  got  a  reply  off  to  New 
York  before  7  P.M.,  he  would  have  to  wait  until  7  A.M. — and  that 
would  be  ii  P.M.,  New  York  time.  It  meant  losing  almost  a  whole 
day.  Hatless  and  coatless,  he  sprinted  for  the  telegraph  office.  The 
operators  were  getting  ready  to  go  home  when  he  burst  into  the  station. 
In  two  minutes  he  scribbled  off  an  "urgent"  to  "Kenper,  New  York." 
He  told  the  general  manager  that  all  the  details  in  the  dispatch  had 


"URGENT" — FROM  ETHIOPIA  413 

come  "straight  from  the  horse's  mouth" — from  Rickett  himself}  that 
the  actual  text  of  the  concession  had  been  given  him  personally  by 
Colsonj  and  that  he  had  personally  seen  the  original  of  the  contract, 
bearing  the  seals  and  signatures  of  those  involved. 

Front  pages  the  next  morning  splurged  a  world  copyright  story — 
Mills's  detailed  disclosure  of  the  now  historic  Rickett  Oil  Concession. 


Haile  Selassie's  desperate  attempt  to  halt  an  Italian  invasion  with 
the  fantastic  concession  proved  a  failure.  At  5  A.M.  on  October  3  the 
gray-green  columns  of  Fascist  Italy  crossed  the  Ethiopian  border  from 
Eritrea  and  the  undeclared  Italo-Ethiopian  War  was  on. 

Andrue  Berding,  chief  of  the  Rome  Bureau,  was  in  the  field  to 
report  the  first  stages  of  the  main  Italian  advance.  The  assignment  was 
afterward  taken  over  by  a  new  recruit  in  the  Foreign  Service,  Edward  J. 
Neil,  a  breezy  young  man  with  prematurely  gray  hair,  an  infectious 
smile,  and  an  engaging  personality.  Another  seasoned  newspaperman 
from  New  York,  Mark  Barron,  covered  the  secondary  Fascist  thrust 
northward  from  Italian  Somaliland.  Joe  Caneva,  one  of  the  top-rank- 
ing cameramen  on  the  staff,  was  the  first  American  photographer  on  the 
scene.  He  followed  II  Duce's  legions  on  a  moth-eaten  donkey.  In  Addis 
Ababa,  Mills  was  joined  by  Al  Wilson,  of  the  London  Bureau,  who 
had  been  ordered  to  Egypt  when  the  massing  of  the  British  naval  force 
at  the  Suez  Canal  aroused  danger  of  an  open  clash  with  Italy. 

After  Wilson's  arrival,  the  AP  establishment  in  the  Ethiopian 
capital  went  on  a  semi-permanent  basis.  Mills  and  his  London  colleague 
leased  a  little  cottage  which  formerly  had  housed  the  Austrian  legation. 
The  cottage  was  only  two  blocks  from  the  wireless  station,  and  it 
boasted  a  small  truck  garden  and  a  barnyard  of  ducks,  chickens,  pigeons, 
and  rabbits — insurance  against  any  food  shortage.  Wilson  lined  up  string 
correspondents  in  the  major  Ethiopian  towns  and  helped  Mills  arrange 
with  foreign  free-lance  photographers  for  pictures.  The  cottage  head- 
quarters accumulated  a  staff  of  eight — Ethiopians  and  Arabs  who  acted 
.  as  messenger  boys,  runners,  and  men  of  all  work.  Airplanes  were  hired 
to  ferry  out  pictures,  and  the  two-man  Addis  Ababa  Bureau  soon  found 
itself  acquiring  a  truck,  an  automobile,  and  a  motorcycle. 

Once  hostilities  started,  the  topic  in  Addis  Ababa  was  the  Em- 
peror's projected  departure  for  the  front  to  take  personal  command  of 
his  warriors.  Until  the  Emperor  left  no  correspondent  was  permitted 


414  AP —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

to  leave  the  capital  for  the  war  zone  because  authorities  feared  the 
ignorant  tribesmen  would  mistake  them  for  enemies  and  kill  them. 
Mills  had  arranged  to  accompany  the  monarch.  When  the  day  finally 
came,  Wilson,  who  remained  behind,  found  himself  in  trouble  with  the 
government — very  much  as  he  expected. 

Weeks  before  the  King  of  Kings  started  for  the  front,  the  Gov- 
ment  Press  Bureau  notified  all  correspondents  that  the  censors  would 
pass  no  copy  dealing  with  his  Majesty's  departure,  the  route  he  would 
travel,  or  his  subsequent  whereabouts.  Officials  feared  the  Emperor's 
safety  would  be  jeopardized  by  Italian  bombing  planes.  Wilson  could 
appreciate  the  Ethiopian  attitude,  but  his  responsibility  was  to  report  the 
news.  When  the  Emperor  left  for  the  front,  it  unquestionably  would  be 
news.  The  job  was  to  get  it  out.  After  much  thought  he  and  his  superiors 
in  London,  by  a  mailed  exchange,  devised  a  plan  to  circumvent  the 
censor  by  disguising  the  information  in  a  routine  interoffice  message  re- 
garding bureau  supplies.  The  plan  worked.  No  sooner  had  the  imperial 
party  departed  in  mid-November  than  London  had  Wilson's  message 
and  cabled  New  York  that  Haile  Selassie  had  left  for  the  front,  travel- 
ing overland  via  Dessye. 

The  news  got  back  to  Addis  Ababa  within  a  short  time,  and  a  storm 
of  Ethiopian  wrath  descended  on  Wilson's  head.  The  correspondent 
offered  no  defense.  It  was  news.  His  job  was  to  get  it  out.  Unfor- 
tunately that  necessitated  outwitting  the  censor.  The  logic  was  unassail- 
able, but  Ethiopian  officials  could  not  be  expected  to  agree.  Wilson  was 
notified  that  all  AP  dispatches  henceforth  would  be  refused  at  the  wire- 
less station — and  the  wireless  station  was  the  only  channel  to  the  out- 
side world.  The  ban  remained  in  force  several  days  and  was  rescinded 
without  explanation.  Perhaps  the  fact  that  the  wireless  was  a  govern- 
ment monopoly  had  something  to  do  with  it — for  The  AP  spent  as  much 
as  $  1,000  a  day  in  wireless  tolls. 


Ethiopian  precautions  to  conceal  the  Emperor's  whereabouts  were 
unavailing.  On  December  6  a  fleet  of  nineteen  Capronis  roared  over  the 
imperial  field  headquarters  at  Dessye,  bombing  and  machine-gunning 
the  panic-stricken  natives.  Three  Italian  bombs  fell  within  a  few  feet  of 
Mills,  exploding  with  ear-shattering  roars  and  setting  fire  to  a  Red 
Cross  tent  immediately  adjoining  the  one  the  AP  correspondent  had 
been  occupying. 


"URGENT" — FROM  ETHIOPIA  415 

The  bombing  of  Dessye  was  the  first  air  raid  witnessed  by  any 
correspondent  attached  to  the  Ethiopian  armies.  It  inflicted  casualties 
of  84  killed  and  363  wounded,  but  Mills  came  through  it  unscathed, 
started  pictures  back  to  Addis  Ababa  on  one  of  the  AP  trucks,  and 
cleared  his  story  by  field  wireless  to  Wilson  at  the  capital.  Later  Mills 
was  the  first  correspondent  to  make  flights  over  the  northern  and  south- 
ern Ethiopian  fronts — a  dangerous  business  with  the  Italians  supreme 
in  the  air. 

For  the  staff  men  on  both  sides  there  were  plenty  of  hardships- 
The  temperatures  ranged  from  blistering  heat  in  the  day  to  below 
freezing  at  night,  and  the  high  altitude  imposed  a  severe  physical  strain. 
Eddie  Neil  had  a  bout  with  tropical  fever  and  later  suffered  a  chest 
hemorrhage  from  overexertion.  He  also  suffered  a  leg  injury  in  the 
crash  of  a  bomber  which  was  flying  him  over  enemy  lines.  The  altitude 
felled  Wilson  for  a  few  days,  inducing  an  acute  attack  of  appendicitis 
resulting  from  disturbed  metabolism.  Before  hostilities  ended  Barron 
contracted  a  virulent  tropical  disease  which  made  it  necessary  to  bring 
him  out  on  a  stretcher.  Only  Mills  and  the  durable  Caneva  seemed 
immune  to  sickness  and  altitude. 

Even  without  illness,  the  assignment  was  trying  enough.  Life  was 
made  up  of  storms,  swarms  of  insects,  omnipresent  vermin,  uncertain 
drinking  water,  and  bad  food.  The  men  with  the  Italians  lived  on  a 
monotonous  diet  of  spaghetti — with  a  few  Ethiopian  flies  mixed  in 
each  dish — and  uncontaminated  drinking  water  cost  forty  cents  a  bottle. 
Once  in  a  while  on  trips  back  to  the  Italian  base  in  Eritrea  they  pooled 
resources  for  a  "banquet" — a  huge  American-style  omelet  and  a  jug 
of  wine — and  these  rare  gastronomic  orgies  cost  each  the  equivalent  of 
a  week's  salary. 

Caneva  had  his  own  little  group  of  additional  troubles.  Working 
almost  entirely  in  the  field  with  the  army,  he  had  to  handle  his  photo- 
graphic plates  under  impossible  conditions.  Pictures  could  not  be  de- 
veloped during  the  day  because  the  heat  was  so  scorching  that  nega- 
tives would  melt,  and  even  at  night  developing  was  a  major  problem. 
There  were  no  darkrooms  or  any  other  photographic  facilities. 

As  the  campaign  wore  on,  the  main  source  of  news  became  more 
and  more  the  staff  men  with  the  Italian  troops.  Not  long  after  the 
bombing  of  Dessye,  the  Emperor  ordered  all  newspaper  men  back  to 
Addis  Ababa  and  they  were  kept  cooped  up  there  until  the  government 
collapsed. 

Flying  with  Italian  pilots,  slogging  along  on  foot  with  sweating 


416  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

columns,  or  bouncing  around  in  a  careening  army  truck,  Neil  had  oppor- 
tunities for  gathering  the  news,  but  getting  it  out  was  a  different  proposi- 
tion. Only  the  briefest  stories  were  accepted  over  the  military  communi- 
cations facilities.  The  bulk  of  the  material  had  to  be  sent  back  in  any 
manner  that  offered  itself — sometimes  by  courier,  sometimes  by  an 
ambulance  driver  or  returning  supply  truck,  and  sometimes  by  an 
obliging  aviator.  Neil  marveled  that  so  much  of  his  copy  got  through  to 
New  York.  Speaking  of  the  uncertainty  of  sending  dispatches,  he  re- 
marked: "Once  you  finished  a  story,  it  was  like  putting  it  in  a  bottle 
and  throwing  it  overboard  in  the  middle  of  the  ocean.  All  you 
could  do  was  to  hope  somebody  would  find  it  and  send  it  along  to  New 
York." 

It  was  all  over  in  a  comparatively  few  months,  and  Neil  went 
whirling  into  a  conquered  Addis  Ababa  with  the  mechanized  column 
that  formed  the  spearhead  of  the  final  Italian  advance. 

Prior  to  1914  the  conclusion  of  a  war  had  always  meant  an  inter- 
lude of  reasonable  normality  for  the  Cable  Department.  But  now  there 
was  nothing  but  turbulence.  In  Asia  the  scope  of  another  undeclared 
war  grew  wider  as  Japanese  troops  extended  operations  in  China.  Spain 
seethed  with  unrest,  in  England  King  George  V  had  died  and  Ger- 
many's Adolf  Hitler,  Der  Fuhrer  of  the  Third  Reich,  had  begun  his 
systematic  scrapping  of  the  Versailles  Treaty. 


XL  MATTERS  OF  MOMENT 


THROUGH  three  historic  decades  and  well  into  a  fourth,  Frank  B. 
Noyes  had  presided  as  president  of  The  Associated  Press.  In  all  that 
time  there  had  been  no  variation  in  the  procedure  each  year  when  the 
newly  constituted  Board  of  Directors  convened  the  day  after  the 
co-operative's  annual  meeting.  The  first  business  was  always  the  election 
of  officers.  On  April  21,  1936,  the  well-established  order  was  followed. 
The  name  of  Noyes  was  placed  in  renomination.  No  other  candidate 
was  offered. 

As  he  had  done  so  often  before,  Noyes  told  his  fellow  directors 
that  he  appreciated  the  honor  more  deeply  than  he  could  hope  to 
express. 

"Nevertheless,"  he  said  gravely,  "the  time  is  coming — if  indeed  it 
is  not  already  at  hand — when  I  shall  have  to  lay  down  the  cares  and 
obligations  of  this  high  office." 

The  board  was  reluctant  to  accept  any  suggestion  of  immediate 
retirement  and  one  after  another  the  directors  pressed  him  to  reconsider. 

In  the  face  of  their  pleas,  Noyes  finally  consented  to  accept 
re-election.  He  imposed  one  condition — that  some  younger  member  of 
the  board  be  elected  first  vice-president  and  in  that  capacity  assume  any 
part  of  the  president's  duties  and  responsibilities  which  might  be  passed 
on  to  him.  In  effect,  Noyes  was  asking  that  the  man  who  would  succeed 
him  be  designated  in  advance  so  that  he  might  work  with  him  for 
whatever  time  remained  before  he  relinquished  the  presidency. 

For  first  vice-president — and  ultimately  the  next  president  of  The 
Associated  Press — the  board  unanimously  selected  Robert  McLean, 
publisher  of  the  Philadelphia  Bulletin.  His  father,  W.  L.  McLean, 
had  been  a  member  of  the  board  from  1900  until  his  resignation  in 
1924,  and  thereafter  he  continued  an  active  interest  in  the  co-operative's 
affairs  until  his  death  in  1931.  The  new  vice-president  had  been  elected 
to  the  board  to  succeed  his  father  and  had  served  ever  since.  He  began 
his  newspaper  career  in  1913  when  he  was  twenty-one,  soon  after  his 
graduation  from  Princeton  University,  and  during  the  World  War 
served  as  a  major  of  artillery.  In  his  dozen  or  more  years  on  the  board 


41 8  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

he  had  been  close  to  Noyes,  particularly  in  the  fight  to  prevent  the 
defeat  of  Wirephoto. 

Noyes's  contemplated  retirement  was  only  one  of  the  noteworthy 
administrative  developments  in  the  twelve-month  period  since  the 
previous  Board  of  Directors  had  met  to  organize.  There  had  been 
several  executive  changes  in  the  management  owing  to  the  retirement 
of  men  whose  names  had  long  been  bywords  in  the  co-operative. 

The  first  major  change  involved  the  retirement  of  a  character  who 
had  become  an  AP  legend — Treasurer  James  R.  Youatt.  Back  in  April, 
1894,  Stone  had  offered  him  the  position  of  auditor.  For  forty-two  years 
he  was  the  vigilant  guardian  of  the  association's  finances.  He  watched 
pennies  as  closely  as  dollars  and  the  stories  about  his  thriftiness  multi- 
plied with  the  years.  Once  a  staffer  covering  General  Pershing's  pursuit 
of  Pancho  Villa  wired  him  that  a  fine  second-hand  automobile  could 
be  purchased  for  $800  if  approval  were  given,  and  that  it  might  facilitate 
coverage  in  Mexico.  In  those  days  second-hand  automobiles  were  not 
the  acme  of  mechanical  reliability.  Moreover,  desert  country  did  not 
present  ideal  operating  conditions.  Youatt's  reply  was  a  model  of 
economy  and  wisdom.  "Buy  a  mule,"  he  telegraphed. 

To  succeed  Youatt  the  board  elected  L.  F.  Curtis.  The  new 
treasurer  had  been  a  member  of  the  staff  for  twenty-five  years.  During 
that  time  he  handled  local,  national,  cable,  political,  and  financial  news 
assignments,  and  one  of  them  sent  him  with  President  Wilson  to  the 
Paris  Peace  Conference  in  1919.  Subsequently  he  was  news  editor  of 
the  Eastern  Division,  and  in  1921,  when  Wilmer  Stuart  died,  he  became 
superintendent  of  markets  and  elections. 

A  few  weeks  after  Youatt's  resignation,  Jackson  S.  Elliott,  another 
notable  figure,  relinquished  his  duties  as  assistant  general  manager 
preparatory  to  retiring  after  more  than  thirty  years  of  service. 


Demands  on  the  management  as  a  whole  had  assumed  such 
proportions  that  some  administrative  expansion  was  necessary.  For  this 
reason  two  assistant  general  managers — Lloyd  Stratton  and  William 
J.  McCambridge— were  appointed  by  General  Manager  Cooper  to  help 
him.  Stratton,  the  first  editor  of  the  Feature  Service,  was  assigned  to 
administrative  duties  in  the  field  of  news.  McCambridge  was  placed  in 
immediate  charge  of  all  matters  pertaining  to  transmission  and  engi- 
neering operations. 


MATTERS  OF  MOMENT  419 

Several  months  after  these  changes  were  made  effective,  the 
general  manager  began  consideration  of  a  step  looking  toward  a  more 
complete  unification  of  all  news-gathering  efforts.  As  matters  then  stood, 
the  active  direction  of  the  news  report  was  divided  among  three  super- 
vising general  editors — one  for  the  day,  one  for  the  night,  and  one  for 
the  Sunday  or  weekend  report.  Assignments  to  day,  night,  or  weekend 
duty  made  for  corresponding  divisions  of  the  staff.  Under  this  system 
there  was  sustained  staff  endeavor  around  the  clock,  seven  days  a  week, 
and  at  the  same  time  a  healthy  rivalry  was  fostered,  for  each  division 
strove  to  produce  a  better  report  than  the  other.  The  three  supervising 
editors — W.  F.  Brooks,  C.  E.  Honce,  and  J.  M.  Kendrick — worked 
under  the  personal  direction  of  the  general  manager. 

The  time  Cooper  could  devote  exclusively  to  the  news  report  day 
after  day  was  limited  and  he  finally  reached  the  conclusion  that  it  was 
desirable  to  appoint  an  executive  news  editor  who  would  be  able  to 
give  exclusive  attention  to  the  news.  For  the  position  he  needed  a  man 
of  wide  experience  and  proved  executive  ability.  He  wanted  someone 
who  would  not  disturb  the  rivalry  existing  among  the  day,  night,  and 
Sunday  staffs. 

Byron  Price,  chief  of  bureau  at  Washington,  had  the  talent  and 
training  to  fill  the  requirements  Cooper  had  in  mind.  He  had  joined 
the  staff  in  1912,  a  young  man  with  a  Phi  Beta  Kappa  key  recently  out 
of  Wabash  College.  He  got  his  start  in  the  Atlanta  Bureau,  served  as 
acting  correspondent  at  New  Orleans,  and  then  was  transferred  to 
Washington.  He  joined  the  army  during  the  World  War.  As  a  first 
lieutenant  and  later  a  captain  of  infantry,  he  served  overseas  with  a 
regiment  that  was  cited  for  conspicuous  service  during  the  Meuse- 
Argonne  offensive  immediately  preceding  the  signing  of  the  Armistice. 
Mustered  out  in  1919,  he  rejoined  the  Washington  Bureau.  His  subse- 
quent assignments  covered  all  fields  of  governmental,  political,  and 
diplomatic  activities. 


The  program  of  administrative  changes,  contemplated  or  already 
in  effect,  constituted  only  a  part  of  1 936*8  story.  Much  more  dramatic 
was  the  unscheduled  and  unheralded  debut  of  the  newest  servant  of 
modern  news  gathering — portable  Wirephoto. 

For  more  than  a  year  engineers  in  the  research  laboratory  had 
been  working  to  perfect  a  convenient-sized  picture-sending  machine 
which  could  be  hurried  to  the  scene  of  big  news  along  with  staff 


420  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

reporters  and  cameramen.  Size  was  not  the  only  problem.  They  wanted 
a  set  that  could  utilize  either  the  regular  Wirephoto  network  or  ordi- 
nary commercial  circuits,  and  thus  be  adapted  for  immediate  use  in 
any  place,  no  matter  how  isolated,  which  had  a  telephone. 

Progress  was  slow.  Telephone  company  experts  had  not  minimized 
the  difficulties  when  they  expressed  doubt  that  any  practical  portable 
apparatus  could  be  devised.  Nevertheless,  the  laboratory  kept  at  it. 
One  by  one  the  technical  difficulties  were  overcome,  new  mechanical 
parts  designed,  and  knotty  assembly  problems  worked  out.  At  length 
Assistant  General  Manager  McCambridge,  Chief  Engineer  Biele,  and 
their  research  staff  believed  they  had  developed  the  equipment  they 
sought. 

The  miscellany  of  parts,  vacuum  tubes,  and  wires  scattered  along 
a  laboratory  workbench  looked  like  a  hopeless  hodgepodge,  but  to  the 
men  who  had  spent  months  of  experimenting  they  represented  a 
splendid  achievement.  They  could  visualize  the  equipment  mounted 
ingeniously  in  two  small  traveling  cases  weighing  about  forty  pounds 
each — a  power  unit  in  one  case  and  the  sending  unit  in  the  other — 
ready  to  be  rushed  to  the  scene  of  any  news  emergency  so  that  pictures 
could  be  transmitted  onto  the  Wirephoto  system  with  a  minimum  of 
delay. 

The  first  experiments  had  produced  satisfactory  results.  The  picture 
transmissions  were  on  a  par  with  the  performance  of  the  stationary 
apparatus  in  the  regular  Wirephoto  stations.  The  experiments,  however, 
were  performed  under  ideal  laboratory  conditions  5  the  network  had 
not  been  utilized,  and  the  transmissions  were  over  relatively  short 
distances.  The  engineers  wanted  to  satisfy  themselves  that  the  portable 
would  perform  with  equal  fidelity  over  long  distances  after  being 
subjected  to  the  hard  knocks  and  rough  usage  incident  to  actual  field 
operations.  The  test  schedule  was  mapped  along  those  lines. 

But  news  has  never  respected  engineering  programs.  The  initial 
experiments  had  scarcely  started  when  a  succession  of  violent  spring 
floods  swept  the  eastern  United  States.  In  New  England,  New  York, 
Maryland,  Ohio,  and  particularly  in  Pennsylvania  and  West  Virginia, 
bureau  staffs  went  on  emergency  footing  to  report  another  national 
catastrophe.  Hour  by  hour  the  news  report  brought  accounts  of  the 
devastation  and  The  AP  News  Photo  Service  obtained  eloquent  pictures 
of  the  ruin  and  havoc. 

The  worst-hit  of  the  flood  areas  was  western  Pennsylvania  and 
West  Virginia.  Pittsburgh  was  virtually  isolated.  The  airport  there  was 


MATTERS  OF  MOMENT  421 

inundated  and  water  more  than  six  feet  deep  flowed  through  the 
business  district — "The  Golden  Triangle."  Johnstown,  scene  of  the 
terrible  flood  of  1889,  watched  the  rising  water  and  feared  an  even 
worse  disaster.  In  Wheeling  half  of  the  downtown  section  was  under 
water,  and  the  swollen  Ohio  rolled  over  Wheeling  Island,  submerging 
the  homes  of  hundreds  of  families. 

As  the  strategic  bureau  in  the  stricken  area,  Pittsburgh  became  the 
clearinghouse  for  the  news  and  pictures.  Once  again  a  staff  battled  the 
problem  of  getting  out  the  information  after  communications  had  been 
disrupted.  Most  telephone  and  telegraph  lines  were  down,  railroad  and 
motor  vehicle  traffic  was  virtually  suspended,  bridges  were  out,  power 
plants  had  failed,  and  planes  could  not  take  off  from  the  airport. 

In  spite  of  the  failure  of  regular  news  facilities,  Pittsburgh  man- 
aged to  keep  the  news  moving  out  by  one  means  or  another.  Sometimes 
it  was  a  roundabout  series  of  shaky  telephone  relays,  sometimes  a 
temporary  Morse  circuit,  sometimes  amateur  wireless  stations.  With 
pictures,  however,  the  difficulties  were  acute.  Although  four  staff  camera- 
men were  on  the  job,  most  of  their  pictures  accumulated  unserviced  at 
Pittsburgh.  The  city  was  not  then  on  the  Wirephoto  network  and 
there  was  no  means  of  getting  out  the  pictures  rapidly. 

For  photo  editors  in  New  York  the  situation  was  maddening.  They 
had  the  pictures,  any  number  of  pictures,  but  the  pictures  were  in 
Pittsburgh,  isolated  by  the  flood.  Until  the  waters  receded,  there  was 
little  chance  of  getting  them  out  by  the  usual  methods.  To  wait  until 
transportation  facilities  were  restored  might  mean  days,  and  member 
newspapers  did  not  want  to  wait  days. 

Photo  editors  at  headquarters  held  conference  after  conference  but 
were  unable  to  devise  any  workable  solution.  Finally  Assistant  General 
Manager  McCambridge  proposed  that  the  unassembled  portable  equip- 
ment on  the  laboratory  workbench  be  flown  to  Pittsburgh  on  the 
chance  that  it  could  meet  the  emergency.  There  was  considerable  doubt 
that  a  plane  could  negotiate  a  landing  on  the  flooded  Pittsburgh  field. 
Even  assuming  a  safe  arrival,  the  portable  would  have  to  be  able  to 
operate  under  the  most  adverse  conditions,  utilizing  an  uncertain  wire 
circuit  for  transmission  and  drawing  on  storage  batteries  for  power. 
The  odds  were  against  the  success  of  a  machine  which  was  little  more 
than  an  experimental  model. 

The  assortment  of  parts  were  hurriedly  stowed  away  in  two  pack- 
ing boxes  and  Harold  Carlson  and  Jim  Barnes,  who  had  worked  on  the 
portable  ever  since  research  began,  were  chosen  for  the  trip.  Their 


422  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

plane  was  forced  down  at  Harrisburg,  two  hundred  miles  short  of  its 
goal,  and  they  chartered  another  and  took  to  the  air  again.  The  second 
plane  made  a  splashy  landing  on  the  soggy,  treacherous  flying  field  at 
Pittsburgh  that  afternoon. 

The  men  headed  for  the  telephone  company  building  only  a  few 
hundred  feet  from  the  flood  crest.  They  found  conditions  as  bad  as 
they  had  feared.  There  was  no  regular  electric  power,  no  heat,  and 
no  assurance  that  a  wire  circuit  would  be  available.  Carlson  and  Barnes 
moved  in  their  packing  boxes,  tool  kits,  and  storage  batteries.  The  room 
placed  at  their  disposal  was  dark  and  the  only  illumination  came  from 
candles  and  storage  battery  lights. 

For  hours  they  tested,  changed,  adjusted  and  readjusted,  checking 
the  equipment  piece  by  piece.  Then  the  telephone  company  notified 
them  that  a  line  had  been  set  up  and  could  be  cut  into  the  regular 
transcontinental  Wirephoto  network. 

A  few  minutes  later  the  last  adjustment  had  been  made,  the  last 
connection  checked.  The  portable  was  as  ready  as  the  engineers  could 
make  it.  The  latest  pictures  had  arrived  by  messenger  from  the  Pitts- 
burgh Bureau.  Earphones  clamped  to  his  head,  Carlson  could  hear  the 
conversations  and  instructions  going  back  and  forth  over  the  Wirephoto 
circuit.  The  control  editor  in  New  York  gave  them  a  "Go  Ahead,"  and 
Barnes  flipped  a  switch. 

The  portable's  sending  cylinder  began  to  rotate. 

In  New  York,  Boston,  Miami,  Chicago,  Kansas  City,  San  Francisco, 
and  all  the  other  cities  on  the  picture  network  the  receiving  Wirephoto 
cylinders  revolved  turn  for  turn  with  the  Pittsburgh  portable.  Eight 
minutes  later  the  transmission  was  finished  and  the  first  negative 
developed.  Across  the  country  photo  editors  had  the  wet  print  of  the 
Pittsburgh  picture  before  them.  It  was  a  photograph  of  a  flooded  news- 
paper pressroom  in  the  heart  of  the  Golden  Triangle.  With  perfect 
clarity  it  showed  the  dark  waters  running  deep  across  the  floor,  the 
details  of  the  half-submerged  presses  and  the  rubber-booted  press  crews 
perched  high  on  the  machinery. 

Portable  Wirephoto  worked. 

During  1935-1936  the  series  of  administrative  changes  made  one 
major  theme  in  the  co-operative's  story.  The  development  of  portable 
Wirephoto,  together  with  other  inventive  accomplishments  of  Traffic 
Department  engineers,  supplied  a  second.  To  these  was  added  a  third. 
It  was  the  subject  of  labor,  although  The  AP  had  never  been  disposed 
to  regard  the  question  of  its  own  personnel  in  the  controversial  terms 
of  a  "labor  problem." 


XII.  BEFORE  THE  SUPREME  COURT 


THROUGHOUT  the  troubled  thirties  the  story  of  American  labor, 
its  plans  and  its  problems,  its  gains  and  its  losses,  its  champions  and  its 
critics,  took  a  more  prominent  place  in  the  news  report  than  ever  before. 
The  period  had  begun  with  the  story  of  labor's  struggle  against  unem- 
ployment and  then  it  turned  to  the  uncharted  field  of  economic  and 
social  construction  and  experimentation.  As  the  worst  rigors  of  the 
depression  began  to  pass,  labor  entered  a  complex  period  of  transi- 
tion. It  was  a  period  of  labor  legislation  and  great  resurgence  of  union 
activities.  Often  it  was  a  period  of  contradictions  and  puzzles,  and  it  saw 
organized  labor  for  the  second  time  split  into  two  hostile  camps  over 
the  issue  of  craft  and  industrial  unionism. 

The  controversial  nature  of  events  made  the  strictest  accuracy  and 
impartiality  so  imperative  that  particularized  instructions  were  issued 
to  the  staff,  admonishing  everyone  to  exert  the  most  scrupulous  care 
in  reporting,  writing,  and  editing  labor  news.  Both  sides  in  any  issue 
must  be  presented  correctly,  fully,  without  bias.  Given  the  facts  of 
any  case,  newspaper  readers  should  be  able  to  form  their  own  opinions. 

Recounting  the  story  of  labor  was  no  fresh  assignment.  In  the 
eighty-odd  years  since  the  association  began  its  career  the  staff  had  been 
called  on  to  report  most  of  the  history  of  the  labor  movement  in  the 
United  States,  but  only  once  did  that  movement  impinge  even  briefly 
on  the  operations  of  the  organization  itself.  At  the  founding  of  The 
Associated  Press  in  1848,  a  national  "labor  problem,"  in  the  modern 
understanding  of  the  term,  did  not  exist.  The  country  was  largely 
agricultural  in  character,  and  only  along  the  eastern  seaboard  were 
there  any  industrial  centers. 

During  those  early  years  the  subject  of  staff  personnel  was  one  of 
the  few  problems  which  caused  little  worry,  except  that  experienced 
newspapermen  were  difficult  to  find.  The  staff  was  small  and  salaries 
compared  favorably  with  the  standards  of  the  day.  Like  colleagues  on 
daily  publications,  the  men  considered  their  occupation  professional  or 
semi-professional  in  nature  and  looked  upon  it  with  a  professional  pride. 
People  spoke  of  them  as  "journalists"  and  in  the  popular  mind  they 

423 


424  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

constituted  a  class  apart — an  impression  which  most  "journalists"  con- 
sciously or  unconsciously  encouraged. 

Excepting  messenger  boys,  a  few  clerical  workers,  and  kindred 
employes,  the  staff  was  entirely  editorial  in  character.  With  leased 
news  circuits  unheard  of,  transmission  of  dispatches  was  the  province 
of  commercial  telegraph  companies  and  the  association  had  no  need 
to  maintain  its  own  corps  of  Morse  operators  although  many  of  the 
men  considered  a  knowledge  of  the  telegraph  as  essential  to  their  work 
as  the  modern  reporter  considers  the  ability  to  use  the  typewriter. 

Labor  news  was  negligible,  but  the  years  after  the  Civil  War 
brought  a  revival  of  union  activity  and  for  the  first  time  organization 
efforts  and  disputes  manifested  a  tendency  toward  a  national  scope.  By 
and  large  this  movement  was  political  rather  than  industrial  in  concept, 
representing  an  evolution  from  the  earlier  organizations  which  had 
preached  a  doctrine  of  class  harmony  and  humanitarianism  with  such 
slogans  as  "Union  for  power,  power  to  bless  humanity."  The  quasi- 
political  unions  were  the  forerunners  of  the  more  definitely  trade-union 
groups  which  developed  in  the  years  that  followed. 

In  1875 — two  years  before  The  Associated  Press  covered  the  first 
large-scale  industrial  dispute  in  the  country — there  came  a  change  in  its 
personnel  structure.  The  association  leased  its  first  news-wire  circuits 
and  manned  them  with  its  own  telegraphers.  This  introduced  a  new  class 
of  employe.  It  was  the  beginning  of  a  mechanical,  or  traffic,  department, 
although  that  formal  designation  was  not  applied  until  much  later. 

First  staff  telegraphers  were  engaged  at  salaries  identical  with 
those  being  paid  by  the  commercial  telegraph  companies — $17  a  week 
for  day  work  and  $19  a  week  for  night  work.  Then,  as  the  operating 
force  increased,  James  W.  Simonton,  the  general  agent,  became  con- 
vinced that  the  work  of  a  staff  telegrapher  was  more  exacting  than 
that  of  an  operator  with  a  commercial  company.  Accordingly  salaries 
were  increased  to  maintain  a  proper  differential. 


The  great  railway  strike  of  1877  introduced  a  new  type  of  news. 
Before  the  strike  ended  seven  persons  were  killed  and  millions  of 
dollars  in  property  destroyed.  From  then  on,  labor  became  increasingly 
productive  of  major  stories.  In  1885  there  was  the  dispute  affecting 
Jay  Gould's  Missouri  Pacific  and  Iron  Mountain  Railroad,  which  ended 
with  a  victory  for  the  Knights  of  Labor.  This  strike  was  memorable 


BEFORE  THE  SUPREME  COURT  425 

in  AP  history  both  because  Charles  S.  Diehl's  exclusive  interview  with 
Gould  in  Florida  was  credited  with  expediting  a  settlement  and  because 
DiehPs  story  was  the  first  ever  carried  in  the  report  with  an  official 
by-line.  The  eighties  saw  an  epidemic  of  strikes  waged  on  the  eight- 
hour-day  and  lockout  issues.  From  a  news  standpoint,  the  most  notable 
story  was  the  one  which  culminated  in  the  bloody  Haymarket  Square 
riot  in  Chicago  in  1886 — one  of  the  first  assignments  covered  by  John 
P.  Boughan,  later  one  of  the  association's  best  knbwn  writers. 

The  emergence  of  AP  as  a  non-profit  co-operative  coincided 
with  a  period  in  labor  history  both  important  and  turbulent.  The  move- 
ment was  divided  on  the  question  of  craft  versus  industrial  unions.  The 
industrial  Knights  of  Labor  had  begun  to  decline,  and  a  new  craft  union 
organization — the  American  Federation  of  Labor — was  gaining  strength, 
advocating  the  eight-hour-day.  The  panic  of  1893  was  responsible  for 
large-scale  disputes  and  disorders  and  the  strikes  produced  the  use  of 
injunctions  and  federal  troops. 

In  the  nature  of  things,  strikes  and  other  labor  disturbances  made 
more  news  than  the  peaceful  progress  of  the  union  movement  or 
industrial  amity,  just  as  an  international  crisis  made  more  news  than  a 
harmonious  world.  There  was,  inevitably,  a  certain  amount  of  criticism 
from  time  to  time  by  opposing  factions,  particularly  in  the  heat  of  strikes 
when  employers  and  employes  could  see  only  their  own  side  of  the 
conflict.  Proportionately,  however,  the  complaints  were  neither  greater 
nor  less  than  the  number  arising  from  political  questions  or  other 
controversial  matters. 

The  co-operative  was  zealous  to  maintain  its  disinterested  approach 
to  all  news,  whether  it  concerned  labor  or  some  other  topic,  and  anything 
that  might  raise  the  slightest  doubt  about  the  impartiality  of  the  staff 
was  a  matter  to  be  rectified  at  once.  The  Board  of  Directors  even  went 
so  far  as  to  discourage  social  relationships  of  General  Manager  Stone- 
with  some  of  the  prominent  people  of  his  day,  lest  they  create  any 
suspicions,  however  unjust,  affecting  the  integrity  and  independence 
of  the  news. 

The  return  of  prosperity  after  the  Spanish-American  War  gave 
organized  labor  fresh  stimulus.  Membership  in  unions  increased  and 
there  was  a  revival  of  interest  in  unionism  and  its  aims.  As  in  the  past, 
however,  these  activities  failed  to  arouse  any  perceptible  personal  interest 
among  the  co-operative's  staff.  There  was  an  operators'  union  in  the 
country — the  Commercial  Telegraphers  Union — but  it  had  enlisted 
only  a  few  of  the  association's  Morse  men.  The  salaries  of  staff  teleg- 


426  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

raphers  were  higher  than  those  paid  by  the  commercial  companies  and 
the  idea  of  unionization  for  editorial  personnel  had  never  been  broached 
either  by  labor  leaders  or  by  editorial  employes.  As  far  as  the  editorial 
men  were  concerned,  they  considered  themselves  specialists  engaged 
in  work  of  a  mental  and  creative  character  not  amenable  to  the  same 
hard  and  fast  rules  which  might  apply  in  purely  commercial  and 
industrial  pursuits. 

3 

The  first  few  years  of  the  twentieth  century  were  marked  by  the 
high  cost  of  living,  and  many  staff  telegraphers  felt  its  pinch.  Stone 
met  the  situation  by  increasing  the  salaries  of  operators  in  the  larger 
cities,  where  the  rise  in  living  costs  had  been  sharpest. 

When  living  conditions  failed  to  improve  by  1903,  however,  he 
received  a  petition  signed  by  254  of  the  374  telegraphers  in  the  service 
asking  a  blanket  increase.  The  request  came  at  a  bad  time,  for  the 
co-operative  was  operating  at  a  deficit.  Stone  ascertained  that  the  asso- 
ciation by  that  time  was  maintaining  a  differential  of  at  least  25  per  cent 
over  the  salaries  paid  by  commercial  companies  and  railroads.  Never- 
theless, he  recommended  that  the  telegraphers  be  given  two  weeks 
annual  vacation  with  pay — something  no  commercial  company  gave  its 
operators — and  that  the  men  be  relieved  of  the  obligation  of  supplying 
and  maintaining  their  own  typewriters,  a  practice  then  in  force 
universally. 

The  results  of  the  1903  petition  seemed  to  satisfy  the  majority 
of  the  telegraphers  and  a  number  told  Stone  they  thought  he  had 
obtained  an  equitable  adjustment  for  them. 

The  C.T.U.  continued  its  campaign  to  extend  its  strength  and  in 
1905  sought  a  written  contract,  although  it  represented  only  a  minority 
of  the  men.  It  presented  a  series  of  demands  which  included  salary 
increases  as  high  as  50  per  cent,  and  a  provision  whereby  the  assignment 
of  operators,  and  in  some  cases  their  employment  or  dismissal,  would 
be  entirely  in  the  hands  of  the  union.  The  Board  of  Directors  rejected 
the  contract  and  the  C.T.U.  retaliated  by  announcing  that  its  members 
thereafter  would  not  accept  employment  in  the  co-operative.  The  union's 
action  had  no  effect  and  the  attempt  to  impair  the  strength  of  the 
operating  force  ended  in  admitted  failure. 

In  July,  1907,  a  series  of  strikes  against  the  two  commercial  wire 
companies— Western  Union  and  Postal  Telegraph— began  throughout 
the  country.  Except  in  so  far  as  it  delayed  some  news  matter  being 


BEFORE  THE  SUPREME  COURT  427 

handled  over  commercial  facilities,  the  dispute  at  first  did  not  involve 
The  AP.  The  association  employed  only  about  one  per  cent  of  the 
40,000  telegraphers  in  the  United  States  and  there  had  been  no  requests, 
official  or  otherwise,  for  adjustments. 

Since  the  co-operative's  New  York  headquarters  were  then  housed 
in  the  Western  Union  building,  the  telegraph  staff  was  well  aware  of 
the  tension  and  the  disturbed  atmosphere.  The  news  report,  however, 
continued  to  move  out  over  the  leased  wires  with  accustomed  regularity. 
Then,  without  warning,  a  group  of  telegraphers  on  the  night  staff  took 
possession  of  the  circuits  on  August  n  and  canvassed  night  operators 
at  all  bureau  points,  asking  authority  to  sign  their  names  to  a  petition. 

Some  agreed  and  the  unexpected  petition  was  placed  before  Stone 
the  next  morning  with  an  ultimatum  that  its  demands  be  met  within 
twelve  hours.  It  called  for  increases  aggregating  $200,000  a  year — 
roughly  10  per  cent  of  the  whole  annual  budget  at  the  time — and  for 
a  higher  overtime  rate.  Stone  had  no  authority  to  grant  such  a  demand 
and  the  deadline  gave  him  no  opportunity  to  arrange  for  a  meeting 
of  the  board  to  consider  it.  He  offered  to  confer  with  a  representative 
of  the  men  pending  a  meeting  of  the  board. 

The  offer  went  unheeded  and  a  strike  was  ordered  at  7:30  P.M. 
that  same  day — August  12.  In  the  Eastern  Division,  the  largest  unit  of 
the  service,  59  of  1 80  telegraphers  quit  their  keys.  Some  divisions  were 
not  affected  at  all,  but  in  others  enough  quit  to  interrupt  temporarily 
the  local  transmission  of  the  report.  A  majority  remained  at  their  posts 
and  volunteered  to  work  additional  hours  to  keep  the  news  moving. 
Reporter-telegraphers  on  the  editorial  staff  manned  empty  Morse  posi- 
tions and  in  Albany  an  office  boy  who  had  been  studying  telegraphy 
handled  one  wire  like  a  veteran. 

From  the  outset  the  strike  failed  of  its  objective — a  nation-wide 
stoppage  of  the  news  report.  The  morning  after  the  strike  was  called 
every  member  of  the  New  York  day  telegraph  staff  reported  for  work. 
They  condemned  the  strike  as  merely  sympathetic  to  the  dissatisfied 
commercial  workers,  termed  it  an  unjust  action  by  a  minority  element 
of  their  fellow  telegraphers,  and  drafted  a  message  urging  the  strikers 
to  return  to  their  posts.  Stone's  permission  was  sought  for  the  trans- 
mission of  the  message  on  the  leased  wires,  but  he  declined. 

The  back  of  the  strike  was  broken  after  the  first  week,  but  it 
dragged  on  in  desultory  fashion  for  a  month.  Then  most  of  the  men 
applied  for  their  old  positions  and  were  taken  back  without  prejudice. 
The  Board  of  Directors  met  in  mid-September  and  Stone  expressed 


428  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

himself  in  favor  of  an  even  higher  wage  level,  irrespective  of  what  the 
commercial  companies  were  paying.  Although  an  annual  deficit  of 
$100,000  already  was  in  prospect,  the  directors  authorized  him  to 
proceed. 


In  terms  of  the  ensuing  years,  the  telegraphers'  strike  had  no 
lasting  effect.  It  did  not  signalize  the  beginning  of  an  era  in  which  the 
relations  between  management  and  personnel  were  to  assume  "labor 
problem"  proportions. 

The  policy  of  The  AP  had  been  to  maintain  the  relations  between 
employes  and  the  general  manager  (himself  an  employe)  on  a 
personal  basis.  The  size  of  the  staff  at  the  time  made  such  a  system 
practicable  and  the  general  manager  had  no  difficulty  keeping  in  close 
touch  with  the  men  and  their  work.  Both  Stone  and  Assistant  General 
Manager  Diehl  traveled  extensively  and  the  staff  knew  them  familiarly 
as  "M.E.S."  and  "Charley  Diehl." 

As  the  staff  grew,  however,  it  became  more  and  more  difficult  to 
maintain  these  personal  contacts.  Little  by  little,  personnel  relations 
became  decentralized  and  the  responsibility  was  divided  among  the 
superintendents  in  charge  of  the  four  main  geographical  divisions  which 
comprised  the  domestic  service.  Dealing  with  these  smaller  units,  the 
superintendents  were  able  to  handle  their  division  staffs  on  an  individual 
basis,  but  the  co-operative  as  a  whole  lost  something  in  the  suspension 
of  direct  relations  between  the  employe  and  the  management. 

By  1910,  when  Cooper  entered  the  service,  the  handling  of  per- 
sonnel had  become,  with  certain  limitations,  entirely  the  province  of 
the  division  superintendents.  Cooper's  duties  called  for  incessant  travel- 
ing and  the  assignment  unintentionally  served  a  twofold  purpose.  It 
restored  to  the  staff  at  large  a  personal  link  with  headquarters,  and  it 
gave  the  management  a  firsthand  contact  with  the  staff  without  the 
medium  of  division  superintendents. 

Several  things  impressed  Cooper.  The  first  was  the  widening 
difference  between  the  editorial  and  telegraph  departments  in  outlook, 
problems,  and  the  type  of  employe  attracted.  Once  ambitious  teleg- 
raphers had  made  editorial  positions  their  goal  but  now  the  younger 
members  of  this  staff  were  thinking  in  terms  of  scientific  and  engineer- 
ing opportunities.  It  was  clear  that  the  interests  of  the  service  would 
best  be  served  by  divorcing  the  news-gathering  and  news-disseminating 
staffs,  and  the  formal  organization  of  a  Traffic  Department  folloWed. 


BEFORE  THE  SUPREME  COURT  429 

Another  matter  Cooper  reported  was  a  tendency  toward  stagnation 
of  the  news  personnel  under  the  administration  of  division  superin- 
tendents. The  superintendents,  concerned  only  with  the  most  efficient 
operation  of  their  respective  divisions,  were  inclined  to  keep  their 
editorial  men  in  the  same  position  indefinitely  if  they  filled  it  well. 
With  few  exceptions,  advancement  depended  on  the  death  or  resigna- 
tion of  the  man  who  was  the  immediate  superior.  Such  a  system  mini- 
mized merit,  tended  to  discourage  initiative,  and  removed  the  stimulus 
of  opportunity.  Furthermore,  by  placing  divisional  considerations  above 
everything  else,  the  General  Service  was  being  deprived  of  able  men 
who  might  be  more  valuable  in  other  positions.  To  remedy  this 
situation,  Cooper  recommended  more  frequent  transfer  of  talented  men 
from  one  geographical  division  to  another. 


The  outbreak  of  the  World  War  had  a  tendency  to  "freeze"  the 
system  in  its  existing  state.  Attention  was  monopolized  by  the  problems 
of  war  coverage  and  there  was  little  time  to  study  ways  and  means 
of  restoring  any  semblance  of  the  old  direct  methods  in  personnel 
relations.  However,  a  higher  salary  scale  was  made  effective  to  meet 
the  increased  cost  of  wartime  living  and,  more  important,  the  Board 
of  Directors  inaugurated  the  general  pension,  insurance,  and  sick  benefit 
plan  which  Cooper  had  drawn  up. 

After  the  Armistice  and  the  break  in  war  prosperity,  labor  news 
came  back  with  a  wave  of  strikes  and  disputes  largely  precipitated  by 
the  reduction  of  wages  from  boom  peaks.  Living  costs  and  mounting 
unemployment  contributed  to  the  unsettled  conditions,  but  this  indus- 
trial unrest  left  the  co-operative  unaffected  because  its  affairs  were 
running  counter  to  the  general  trend.  The  postwar  years  saw  unprece- 
dented expansion  in  news  gathering,  wages  were  maintained  at  wartime  . 
levels,  and  the  staff  was  enlarged  rather  than  curtailed. 

The  sole  personnel  problem  was  the  loss  of  experienced  editorial 
men  who  were  being  sought  by  publicity-conscious  organizations  of  one 
sort  or  another.  The  salary  inducements  often  were  irresistible  and 
Stone  on  occasion  found  himself  reluctantly  advising  valued  editors 
to  accept  positions  which  offered  greater  compensation  than  he  could 
match.  Nevertheless,  these  raids  led  to  further  adjustment  of  salaries 
for  editorial  employes  generally.  The  management  could  not  always 
bid  dollar  for  dollar,  but  it  was  anxious  to  make  positions  as  attractive 


430  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

as  possible  because  the  general  manager  thought  the  association  could 
be  best  served  by  "career"  men  who  regarded  their  employment  as 
more  than  just  another  job. 

Throughout  the  twenties  unions  were  aggressive  in  campaigns  for 
wage  increases,  shorter  hours,  and  improved  working  conditions.  Key 
bureaus  developed  specialists  on  their  staffs  to  handle  the  news  so  that 
coverage  would  be  in  the  hands  of  men  thoroughly  familiar  with  the 
background  of  union  activities. 

Although  the  internal  affairs  of  The  Associated  Press  had  pro- 
gressed smoothly,  no  enduring  changes  had  been  made  in  the  status 
of  personnel  administration.  Division  superintendents  continued  to 
discharge  most  of  these  responsibilities,  and  the  undesirable  features 
of  such  a  system  persisted.  It  was  not  until  Cooper  became  general 
manager  in  1925  that  a  concerted  effort  was  made  to  restore  as  much 
of  the  old  "personal"  element  as  the  size  of  the  staff  would  permit. 

He  proceeded  on  a  twofold  principle.  He  wanted  to  centralize 
personnel  administration  at  headquarters  so  that  he  could  keep  con- 
stantly informed  on  the  staff  and  use  that  information  to  the  best 
advantage  of  the  service.  He  also  wanted  to  put  relations  between 
headquarters  and  staff  members  back  on  an  individual  basis,  in  so  far 
as  possible.  To  accomplish  these  ends,  he  assumed  complete  charge  of 
all  personnel  matters  and  instituted  a  new  system  of  personnel  ad- 
ministration. 

The  first  step  was  to  inaugurate  a  special  "personal"  file  at  New 
York  for  every  member  of  the  staff.  Into  these  individual  files  went 
the  complete  record  of  a  man's  service,  his  successes  and  setbacks,  salary 
increases  and  promotions,  the  report  of  superiors  on  his  work,  and  a 
confidential  letter  from  the  employee  himself  setting  forth  his  ambitions 
in  the  organization. 

Cooper  called  for  regular  reports  from  bureau  chiefs  on  each 
member  of  their  staffs  and  when  a  man  showed  ability  for  greater 
opportunity  he  tried  to  see  to  it  that  he  got  a  transfer  to  some  bureau 
where  opportunity  existed.  When  a  man  did  not  seem  to  be  advancing 
in  proportion  to  his  capabilities,  the  general  manager  wanted  to  know 
why.  All  recommendations  for  salary  increases  came  to  him  for  approval 
and  at  times  he  acted  without  recommendation. 

New  men  were  engaged  and  employes  dismissed  only  after  the 
general  manager  had  given  his  approval.  In  cases  where  a  discharge 
was  recommended,  the  employe  was  informed  by  his  superior  and 
given  opportunity  to  present  his  side  of  the  case.  Whether  an  employe 


BEFORE  THE  SUPREME  COURT  431 

protested  or  not,  the  general  manager  carefully  reviewed  his  file  before 
making  a  decision.  Sometimes  he  rejected  a  recommended  dismissal, 
either  because  of  the  case  set  forth  in  an  employe's  appeal  or  because 
of  the  record  disclosed  by  the  personal  file.  On  such  occasions  the 
superior  making  the  recommendation  was  called  to  task  for  failure  to 
understand  and  handle  his  men  properly. 


These  were  the  conditions  existing  at  the  advent  of  the  depression 
in  1929.  In  many  other  fields  the  accompanying  epidemic  of  unemploy- 
ment served  to  make  the  labor  problem  acute,  but  without  any  notice- 
able immediate  effect  on  The  AP.  There  were  no  dismissals,  wholesale 
or  otherwise,  to  reduce  the  staff  in  line  with  economic  conditions. 
Salaries  finally  were  cut  10  per  cent  in  1932,  but  as  soon  as  the  business 
outlook  showed  promise  of  improvement,  Cooper  resumed  his  practice 
of  giving  increases  on  merit. 

While  the  labor  problem,  as  such,  failed  to  involve  either  the 
co-operative's  personnel  or  its  management  during  the  worst  depression 
years,  the  nation's  efforts  to  cope  with  general  labor  distress  did  have 
definite  effects.  Roosevelt  called  on  American  enterprises  in  July,  1933, 
to  comply  with  the  President's  Re-employment  Agreement  until 
National  Recovery  Act  codes  were  ready.  The  AP  levels  were  above 
those  the  NRA  suggested  for  minimum  hours  and  wages,  but  the 
organization  complied  with  the  spirit  of  the  agreement  and  223  mem- 
bers were  added  at  a  monthly  payroll  increase  of  $15,960.61. 

When  the  newspaper  code  of  the  NRA  was  approved,  the  associa- 
tion made  certain  that  all  its  operations  conformed.  The  code  would 
have  permitted  a  30  per  cent  reduction  in  the  salaries  of  one  group 
of  employes,  but  the  general  manager  declined  to  take  advantage  of 
any  provision  which  sanctioned  wage  scales  below  AP  standards.  A 
five-day  workweek  was  introduced  for  bureaus  in  the  larger  cities  as 
President  Roosevelt  requested  and  the  general  manager  further 
directed  that,  in  any  other  city  where  member  papers  adopted  the 
five-day  week,  bureaus  should  be  guided  accordingly.  He  was  not 
pleased  to  make  such  a  distinction  which  benefited  the  staffs  in  some 
cities  and  not  in  others,  but  until  complicated  financial  arrangements 
could  be  worked  out  it  was  not  possible  to  put  the  entire  domestic 
service  on  five-day  week.  Then  the  Supreme  Court  declared  the  NRA 
and  its  codes  unconstitutional  and  the  association  not  only  maintained  its 


432  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

wage  and  hour  schedules,  but  continued  to  increase  the  number  of 
employes  and  the  payroll.  In  four  years  the  staff  increased  43  per  cent 
and  the  payroll  47  per  cent. 


Coincident  with  the  national  efforts  to  get  jobless  men  back  to 
work,  there  was  a  phenomenal  resurgence  of  activity  in  the  field  of 
organized  labor.  New  unions  appeared  and  for  the  first  time  the 
trade-union  principle  was  extended  to  the  editorial  departments  of 
newspapers  and  news  gathering.  The  American  Newspaper  Guild,  an 
organization  of  newspaper  editorial  workers,  was  formed  and  affiliated 
with  the  American  Federation  of  Labor,  a  craft  union  group.  Some  time 
later  the  Guild  transferred  its  allegiance  to  John  L.  Lewis's  Congress  of 
Industrial  Organizations  and  expanded  to  include  non-editorial  workers 
in  the  commercial  and  other  departments  of  newspapers.  The  new 
union  attracted  some  AP  employes,  mainly  in  the  larger  centers,  but 
its  following  in  the  service  failed  to  assume  large  proportions. 

In  November,  1933,  a  Guild  unit  was  organized  in  the  New  York 
office  with  Morris  Watson,  a  reporter-editor  as  chairman.  There  was 
no  secret  about  Watson's  efforts  to  enroll  members  of  the  staff.  The 
general  manager  was  aware  of  the  circumstances  and  as  early  as  1934 
personally  assured  Watson  and  a  Guild  committee  that  he  would 
countenance  no  discrimination  against  any  employe  because  of  union 
affiliations.  As  to  the  merits  of  an  editorial  union,  Cooper  pointed  out 
that,  because  of  his  responsibility  for  the  impartiality  of  the  news  report, 
he  could  not  express  opinions  which  might  be  used  either  pro  or  con 
by  those  who  favored  or  opposed  any  feature  of  union  programs. 

Watson,  an  experienced  newsman,  had  been  active  in  Guild  affairs 
for  more  than  a  year  when  his  editorial  supervisors  first  expressed 
dissatisfaction  with  his  work  on  the  grounds  that  it  was  not  up  to  its 
former  standard.  Subsequently  his  duties  were  twice  changed  and  then 
one  day  in  October,  1935,  he  was  informed  that  the  general  manager 
had  been  handed  a  memorandum  recommending  his  dismissal  with  a 
month's  salary. 

Although  Watson  himself  asked  for  no  review  of  his  dismissal  by 
the  general  manager,  it  produced  repercussions.  The  American  News* 
paper  Guild  charged  that  he  had  been  dismissed  for  no  reason  other 
than  his  union  activities — a  violation  of  the  recently  enacted  National 
Labor  Relations  Act — and  announced  it  would  contest  the  action.  If  filed 


BEFORE  THE  SUPREME  COURT  4.33 

complaint  with  the  Regional  Division  of  the  National  Labor  Relations 
Board  and  before  the  year  ended  the  co-operative  was  served  notice  of 
hearings  on  the  Watson  case. 

The  threat  of  litigation  automatically  brought  the  matter  to  the 
attention  of  the  Board  of  Directors  and  the  subject  was  referred  to 
counsel.  After  a  study  of  the  facts  involved,  counsel  decided  the  case 
should  be  contested,  not  on  the  specific  point  of  Watson's  discharge, 
but  on  the  ground  that  the  Labor  Relations  Act  was  unconstitutional 
and  hence  could  not  apply. 

The  hearings  began  in  New  York  on  April  7,  1936.  Charles  E. 
Clark,  dean  of  the  Yale  Law  School,  served  as  examiner  for  the  NLRB. 
At  the  request  of  that  body,  Assistant  General  Manager  Stratton 
testified  as  to  the  corporate  structure  of  the  co-operative,  its  non-profit 
character,  and  the  various  operations  involved  in  the  collection  and 
distribution  of  news.  As  stipulated  by  AP  counsel  at  the  outset,  no 
testimony  was  produced  by  the  co-operative  as  to  the  reasons  for 
Watson's  dismissal. 

Watson  himself  testified  at  length  concerning  his  career  with  the 
organization,  followed  by  Mrs.  Elinore  M.  Herrick,  regional  director 
for  the  Labor  Board,  and  it  was  from  their  testimony  that  the  co-opera- 
tive's asserted  reasons  for  the  dismissal  quite  incidentally  became  known. 

The  reporter-editor  said  that,  in  the  course  of  his  seven  years  of 
employment,  his  superiors  had  come  to  know  him  as  a  capable  newsman, 
but  that  more  recently  the  general  manager  had  told  him  that  "every 
time  my  by-line  was  used  in  the  report  it  brought  protests  from  Asso- 
ciated Press  members  because  I  was  Guild."  He  said  the  general 
manager  also  had  told  him  there  would  be  no  discrimination  against 
employes  because  of  their  union  activities,  but  that  a  desirable  Foreign 
Service  assignment  was  out  of  the  question  as  long  as  he  was  active  in 
the  Guild  "because  people  would  think  he  [the  general  manager]  was 
running  away  from  me  and  that  I  was  running  away  from  him." 

He  also  testified  concerning  a  number  of  talks  that  he  had  with  his 
superiors  about  his  Guild  activities  and  their  relation  to  and  effect  on  his 
work.  He  told  of  an  occasion  on  which  he  had  arranged  for  a  substitute 
to  do  his  work  so  that  he  could  attend  a  meeting  held  in  connection 
with  his  labor  activities,  and  expressed  the  opinion  that  his  union  work 
had  led  to  the  changes  in  his  assignment  and  his  eventual  dismissal. 

Questioned  on  the  circumstances  surrounding  his  discontinuance, 
he  said  he  asked  his  immediate  superior  to  tell  him  the  reason  for  the 
action  and  that  he  was  told: 


434  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

"Because  we  are  dissatisfied  with  your  work,  you  are  dissatisfied 
with  us,  and  I  am  convinced  that  you  will  be  happier  elsewhere." 

He  said  he  thereupon  "walked  out  of  the  office"  and  that  he  made 
no  efforts  to  secure  reinstatement  except  through  the  Labor  Board. 

The  regional  director  of  the  NLRB  told  of  the  examination  she 
had  made  of  Watson's  "personal"  file,  the  record  similar  to  that  kept 
on  all  employes.  She  said  it  had  been  made  available  to  her  by  the 
association  at  her  request  and  that,  with  the  knowledge  of  the  manage- 
ment, she  had  taken  notes  on  what  she  found. 

Her  testimony  constituted  a  lengthy  recital  of  complimentary  and 
critical  comments  by  Watson's  superiors  during  the  time  of  his  employ- 
ment and  was  climaxed  by  her  reference  to  having  had  access  to  the 
memorandum  of  October  18,  1935,  by  Watson's  superior  outlining  five 
reasons  for  recommending  the  discharge.  She  said  she  had  copied  the 
second  of  the  reasons  exactly  as  it  appeared,  and  quoted  it  as  having 
read: 

He  is  an  agitator  and  disturbs  the  morale  of  the  staff  at  a  time  when 
we  need  especially  their  loyalty  and  best  performance. 

She  said  that,  across  the  top  of  the  five-point  memorandum  in 
penciled  handwriting  and  initialed  "KC" — initials  of  General  Manager 
Cooper — was  a  further  notation  which  said: 

But  solely  on  grounds  of  his  work  not  being  on  a  basis  for  which  he  has 
shown  capability. 

"I  made  a  note  for  myself,"  she  said,  "that  the  'but'  was  heavily 
written  in  pencil  and  that  the  'solely'  was  underlined." 

The  hearing  lasted  two  days  and  the  Labor  Board  decision  was 
made  public  on  April  22.  Examiner  Clark  ruled  that  the  "sole"  reason 
for  Watson's  discharge  was  his  Guild  activities.  He  held  that  the 
association  had  engaged  in  "unfair  labor  practice,"  directed  it  to  "desist 
from  interfering  with,  restraining,  or  coercing  its  employes  in  the 
right  of  self-organization,"  and  ordered  that  Watson  be  reinstated. 

8 

The  legal  contest  proceeded  and  the  news  report  covered  all 
developments  factually  and  impartially,  just  as  though  the  co-operative 
had  no  interest  in  what  was  happening.  Then  The  AP  carried  the 


BEFORE  THE  SUPREME  COURT  435 

NLRB  ruling  to  the  United  States  Circuit  Court  of  Appeals  on  June  16. 
The  court  rendered  an  adverse  decision  a  month  later,  upholding  the 
constitutionality  of  the  Wagner  Act  and  ruling  that  it  "does  not  hamper 
the  legitimate  right  of  the  employer  who  may  discharge  his  employes 
for  inefficiency  or  any  other  cause  agreeable  to  him,"  provided  such  a 
dismissal  is  not  for  union  activity. 

The  decision  cleared  the  way  for  an  appeal  to  the  United  States 
Supreme  Court.  Briefs  were  filed  by  The  Associated  Press  and  on 
February  9-10,  1937,  the  court  heard  final  arguments.  John  W. 
Davis,  one-time  Democratic  candidate  for  President  of  the  United 
States,  appeared  for  the  co-operative,  Charles  Fahy,  general  counsel 
for  the  NLRB,  and  Charles  E.  Wyzanski,  special  assistant  to  the 
United  States  attorney  general,  represented  the  government. 

Davis  based  his  attack  on  the  Wagner  Labor  Relations  Act  on  three 
major  points:  that  it  was  invalid  under  the  First  Amendment  to  the 
Constitution  because  it  was  "a  direct  and  palpable"  invasion  of  the  free- 
dom of  the  press  5  that  it  was  invalid  under  the  Fifth  Amendment  be- 
cause it  deprived  The  AP  of  rights  and  liberties  without  due  process  of 
lawj  that  it  was  invalid  under  the  Tenth  Amendment  because  the 
legislation  undertook  to  deal  with  employer-employe  relationships,  a 
subject  matter  not  committed  to  Congress  under  the  commerce  provi- 
sions of  the  Constitution. 

Wyzanski  and  Fahy  divided  the  government's  argument.  Wyzan- 
ski concentrated  on  the  technical  legal  considerations  involved,  the 
propriety  of  the  Wagner  Act's  application  to  The  AP,  and  the  court 
decisions  which  bore  on  the  law's  constitutionality.  In  the  course  of  his 
argument  he  shrewdly  pointed  out  a  now-apparent  salient  weakness  in 
the  co-operative's  case — no  defense  had  been  offered  in  the  proceedings 
in  the  lower  courts  to  controvert  the  Labor  Board  charge  that  Watson 
had  been  dismissed  for  reasons  other  than  unsatisfactory  work.  Thus 
the  findings  of  the  lower  courts — that  the  dismissal  constituted  unfair 
labor  practice — stood  unchallenged  as  far  as  legal  considerations  were 
concerned. 

It  was  left  to  Fahy  to  answer  Davis's  arguments  respecting  the 
freedom  of  the  press.  He  also  pointed  out  that  the  association  had 
offered  no  testimony  in  the  lower  courts  to  disprove  the  contention 
that  Watson  had  been  discharged  only  because  of  his  union  activities. 
This  being  the  case,  he  said  the  argument  that  the  Wagner  Act  invaded 
the  First  Amendment  to  the  Constitution  was  not  a  valid  one. 


436  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 


The  Supreme  Court  announced  its  decision  on  April  12,  1937,  in 
one  of  the  celebrated  5-to-4  opinions  which  made  the  court's  general  atti- 
tude on  New  Deal  legislation  a  subject  of  heated  political  controversy. 
The  decision  upheld  the  constitutionality  of  the  Wagner  Labor  Rela- 
tions Act  and  made  Watson's  reinstatement  mandatory. 

Mr.  Justice  Owen  J.  Roberts  delivered  the  majority  opinion.  He 
noted  that  the  co-operative  "did  not  challenge  the  [Labor]  Board's 
findings  of  fact"  respecting  the  reason  for  Watson's  dismissal  and 
continued: 

We,  therefore,  accept  as  established  that  The  Associated  Press  did  not, 
as  claimed  in  its  answer  before  the  Board,  discharge  Watson  because  of 
unsatisfactory  service,  but,  on  the  contrary,  as  found  by  the  Board,  dis- 
charged him  for  his  activities  in  connection  with  the  Newspaper  Guild. 

The  question  of  the  freedom  of  the  press  received  extended  treat- 
ment in  the  majority  opinion.  In  part,  it  read: 

The  conclusion  which  the  petitioner  draws  is  that  whatever  may  be  the 
case  with  respect  to  employes  in  its  mechanical  departments,  it  must  have  abso- 
lute and  unrestricted  freedom  to  employ  and  to  discharge  those  who,  like 
Watson,  edit  the  news;  that  there  must  not  be  the  slightest  opportunity  for. 
any  bias  or  prejudice  personally  entertained  by  an  editorial  employe  to  color 
or  to  distort  what  he  writes,  and  that  The  Associated  Press  cannot  be  free 
to  furnish  unbiased  and  impartial  news  reports  unless  it  is  equally  free  to 
determine  for  itself  the  partiality  or  bias  of  editorial  employes. 

So  it  is  said  that  any  regulation  protective  of  union  activities,  or  the 
right  collectively  to  bargain  on  the  part  of  such  employes  is  necessarily  an 
invalid  invasion  of  the  freedom  of  the  press. 

We  think  the  contention  not  only  has  no  relevance  to  the  circumstances 
of  the  instant  case  but  is  an  unsound  generalization.  The  ostensible  reason 
for  Watson's  discharge,  as  embodied  in  the  records  of  the  petitioner,  is 
"solely  on  the  grounds  of  his  work  not  being  on  a  basis  for  which  he  has 
shown  capability."  The  petitioner  did  not  assert  and  does  not  now  claim 
that  he  has  shown  bias  in  the  past.  It  does  not  claim  that  by  reason  of  his 
connection  with  the  union  he  will  be  likely,  as  the  petitioner  honestly  believes, 
to  show  bias  in  the  future.  The  actual  reason  for  his  discharge,  as  shown  by 
the  unattacked  finding  of  the  Board,  was  his  Guild  activity  and  his  agitation 
for  collective  bargaining. 

The  statute  does  not  preclude  a  discharge  on  the  ostensible  grounds  for 
the  petitioner's  section;  it  forbids  discharge  for  what  has  been  found  to  be  the 
real  motive  of  the  petitioner.  These  considerations  answer  the  suggestion 
that  if  the  petitioner  believed  its  policy  of  impartiality  was  likely  to  be  sub- 
verted by  Watson's  continued  service.  Congress  was  without  power  to  Inter- 


BEFORE  THE  SUPREME  COURT  437 

diet  his  discharge.  No  such  question  is  here  for  decision.  Neither  before  the 
Board,  nor  in  the  court  below,  nor  here  has  the  petitioner  professed  such 
belief.  It  seeks  to  bar  all  regulation  by  contending  that  regulation  in  a  situa- 
tion not  presented  would  be  invalid.  Courts  deal  with  cases  upon  the  basis  of 
the  facts  disclosed,  never  with  non-existent  and  assumed  circumstances. 

The  act  does  not  compel  the  petitioner  to  employ  anyone;  it  does  not 
require  that  the  petitioner  retain  in  its  employ  an  incompetent  editor  or  one 
who  fails  faithfully  to  edit  the  news  to  reflect  facts  without  bias  or  prejudice. 
The  act  permits  a  discharge  for  any  reason  other  than  union  activity  or  agita- 
tion for  collective  bargaining  with  employes.  The  restoration  of  Watson  to  his 
former  position  in  no  sense  guarantees  his  continuance  in  petitioner's  employ. 
The  petitioner  is  at  liberty,  whenever  occasion  may  arise,  to  exercise  its 
undoubted  right  to  sever  his  relationship  for  any  cause  that  seems  to  it  proper, 
save  only  as  a  punishment  for,  or  discouragement  of,  such  activities  as  the 
act  declares  permissible.  .  .  . 

The  dissenting  opinion  was  delivered  by  Mr.  Justice  George 
Sutherland.  The  minority  held  that  the  Wagner  Act  as  applied  to  The 
AP  violated  the  First  Amendment  to  the  Constitution  in  that  it  re- 
stricted the  freedom  of  the  press.  Justice  Sutherland,  rendering  the 
opinion,  said: 

Freedom  is  not  a  mere  intellectual  abstraction,  and  is  not  merely  a  word 
to  adorn  an  oration  upon  occasions  of  patriotic  rejoicing.  It  is  an  intensely 
practical  reality,  capable  of  concrete  enjoyment  in  a  multitude  of  ways  day 
by  day.  When  applied  to  the  press,  the  term  freedom  is  not  to  be  narrowly 
confined,  and  it  obviously  means  more  than  publication  and  circulation.  If 
freedom  of  the  press  does  not  include  the  right  to  adopt  and  pursue  a  policy 
without  governmental  restriction,  it  is  a  misnomer  to  call  it  freedom.  And  we 
might  as  well  deny  at  once  the  right  of  the  press  freely  to  adopt  a  policy  and 
pursue  it,  as  to  concede  that  right  and  deny  the  liberty  to  exercise  an  uncen- 
sored  judgment  in  respect  to  the  employment  and  discharge  of  the  agents 
through  whom  the  policy  is  to  be  effectuated.  .  .  . 

For  many  years  there  has  been  contention  between  labor  and  capital. 
Labor  has  become  highly  organized  in  a  wide  effort  to  secure  and  preserve 
its  rights.  The  daily  news  with  respect  to  labor  disputes  is  now  of  vast  pro- 
portions: and  clearly  a  considerable  part  of  petitioner's  editorial  service  must 
be  devoted  to  that  subject.  Such  news  is  not  only  of  great  public  interest,  but 
an  unbiased  version  of  it  is  of  the  utmost  public  concern. 

To  give  a  group  of  employers  on  the  one  hand,  or  a  labor  organization 
on  the  other,  power  of  control  over  such  a  service  is  obviously  to  endanger 
the  fairness  and  accuracy  of  the  service.  Strong  sympathy  for  or  strong 
prejudice  against  a  given  cause  or  the  efforts  made  to  advance  it  has  too 
often  led  to  suppression  or  coloration  of  unwelcome  facts.  It  would  seem  to  be 
an  exercise  of  only  reasonable  prudence  for  an  association  engaged  in  part 
in  supplying  the  public  with  fair  and  accurate  factual  information  with  respect 
to  the  contests  between  labor  and  capital,  to  see  that  those  whose  activities 


438  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

include  that  service   are   free   from   either  extreme   sympathy  or  extreme 
prejudice  one  way  or  the  other.  .  .  . 

...  If  petitioner  concluded,  as  it  well  could,  that  its  policy  to  preserve 
its  news  service  free  from  color,  bias  or  distortion  was  likely  to  be  subverted 
by  Watson's  retention,  what  power  has  Congress  in  the  face  of  the  First 
Amendment? 

At  the  time  the  Supreme  Court's  decision  was  handed  down, 
Watson  was  director  of  the  Living  Newspaper,  a  Federal  Theatre 
Project  on  which  he  had  been  employed  since  his  dismissal  from  the 
staff.  He  expressed  his  gratification  and  returned  to  duty  April  19,  1937. 

Then  the  co-operative  announced  its  readiness  to  enter  into  collec- 
tive bargaining  negotiations  with  such  unions — mechanical  or  editorial — 
as  the  NLRB  might  certify  to  be  the  official  representatives  of  a  majority 
of  employes. 

After  working  two  weeks,  Watson  applied  for  and  was  granted 
the  customary  vacation  with  pay  to  which  all  regular  employes  were 
entitled.  On  returning  he  resigned,  explaining  that  he  wished  to  resume 
his  WPA  activities.  In  his  resignation,  dated  May  17,  he  wrote: 

I  would  be  remiss  if  I  did  not  express  here  my  sincere  appreciation  of 
the  good  grace  with  which  The  Associated  Press  accepted  my  return.  I  am 
convinced  now  that  there  never  will  be  any  discrimination  against  Associated 
Press  employes  for  organizing  or  being  active  in  a  union  formed  for  their 
economic  betterment  through  collective  bargaining. 


10 

The  possibility  of  a  misunderstanding  of  the  co-operative's  motives 
in  challenging  the  Wagner  Act  was  something  which  caused  concern  to 
the  management.  Yet  as  the  situation  developed  it  offered  little  oppor- 
tunity for  clarification  as  long  as  the  question  remained  one  for  purely 
legal  decision.  Although  the  National  Labor  Relations  Board's  decision 
was  not  unexpected,  since  the  strategy  of  the  co-operative's  counsel  was 
to  offer  no  testimony,  nevertheless  it  created  a  practical  problem  which 
could  not  but  be  regretted  by  the  management.  There  was  the  chance 
that  silence  as  to  the  reasons  for  the  co-operative's  action  might  lead  to 
the  belief  that  its  efforts  were  directed  against  unionism,  an  improved 
social  economy,  the  New  Deal  which  created  the  Wagner  Act,  and 
the  Democratic  Party  which  created  the  New  Deal. 

The  decision  of  the  Court  of  Appeals  cleared  the  way  for  the 
Supreme  Court  appeal  and  the  question  of  a  public  statement  by  the 


BEFORE  THE  SUPREME  COURT  439 

co-operative  setting  forth  its  case  was  considered.  Counsel  withdrew  an 
earlier  objection  to  such  a  course  and  Vice-President  McLean  and 
General  Manager  Cooper  set  about  preparation  of  the  document.  It 
reviewed  the  whole  case  and  stated  that  the  co-operative's  purpose  in 
challenging  the  Wagner  Act  was  to  make  sure  that  the  new  law  did 
not  destroy  its  right  to  supervise  the  work  of  its  employes  and  to 
discipline  them  for  cause  lest  it  lose  control  over  the  most  important 
element  of  its  existence — the  creation  of  the  unprejudiced  and  unbiased 
daily  news  record  on  which  millions  of  readers  of  all  complexions  and 
beliefs  had  come  to  depend. 

Circumstances,  however,  began  to  militate  against  the  release  of 
the  statement.  The  1936  presidential  campaign  was  under  way  and 
there  was  the  likelihood  that  anything  The  AP  said  might  be  seized 
upon  for  political  significance.  The  statement  was  reluctantly  discarded 
and  the  co-operative  continued  to  hold  its  silence. 

During  the  time  the  Wagner  case  was  pending  two  other  matters 
were  before  the  co-operative  for  action  or  decision.  The  first  was  a 
request  by  the  American  Newspaper  Guild  for  collective  bargaining. 
The  Board  of  Directors,  on  advice  of  counsel,  ruled  that  no  action 
should  be  taken  until  the  legal  proceedings  in  the  Wagner  Act  case 
had  been  concluded. 

The  question  of  a  universal  five-day  week,  however,  was  something 
on  which  action  logically  could  be  taken.  Contrasting  current  standards 
with  those  at  the  time  the  association  introduced  its  first  revolutionary 
pension  and  disability  plan  for  employes  back  in  1918,  Cooper  told 
the  Board  of  Directors  he  was  convinced  that  the  trend  toward  a  five- 
day  workweek  was  a  salutary  thing  and  that  he  hoped  the  association 
could  inaugurate  it  for  all  bureaus,  irrespective  of  what  others  might  do. 
The  financial  details  represented  a  considerable  item — a  universal  five- 
day  week  meant  an  increase  of  more  than  $300,000  annually  in  operating 
expenses — but  eventually  they  were  worked  out  with  board  approval. 
In  1936  the  shift  of  the  entire  Traffic  personnel  to  a  five-day  week 
started,  and  on  January  i,  1937,  the  process  began  with  the  editorial 
staff. 

That  the  Wagner  Act  case  and  all  that  it  came  to  involve  might 
have  some  effect  on  personnel  relations  in  the  co-operative  seemed  a 
foregone  conclusion,  but  the  general  manager  of  The  AP  could  not 
feel  that  it  should  disrupt  the  revived  personalized  basis  of  relations 
between  the  management  and  its  staff.  If  anything,  he  felt  more  than 
ever  that  the  strength  of  the  organization,  in  which  there  was  such  a 


440  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

definite  element  of  public  service,  lay  in  the  strength  of  a  keenly 
intelligent  editorial  staff.  The  Supreme  Court  decision,  while  upholding 
the  constitutionality  of  the  Wagner  Act,  nevertheless  had  defined  the 
rights  of  both  employer  and  employe,  and  those  rights  formed  a 
basis  for  future  relations. 

Regardless  of  union  affiliations,  the  court's  decision  made  continu- 
ance of  those  relations  dependent  upon  the  competence  of  the  employe 
and  his  ability  to  demonstrate  to  the  satisfaction  of  the  association  that 
no  act  of  his  constituted  any  threat  to  the  integrity  of  the  report  through 
bias  or  prejudice  in  the  handling  of  news.  For  the  text  of  this  phase  of 
the  opinion  clearly  read: 

The  Act  does  not  compel  the  petitioner  to  employ  anyone;  it  does  not 
require  that  the  petitioner  retain  in  its  employ  an  incompetent  editor  or  one 
who  fails  faithfully  to  edit  the  news  to  reflect  facts  without  bias  or  prejudice. 


XIII.  "THE  PUBLIC  MUST  BE 
FULLY  INFORMED" 


ACROSS  the  Manzanares  River  behind  the  Nationalist  lines  Richard 
Massock  listened  to  the  slam  of  artillery  as  Franco's  batteries  hurled 
the  first  shells  of  1937  into  beleaguered  Madrid.  The  guns  opened 
up  on  the  stroke  of  midnight  and  fired  a  dozen  times  in  grim  greeting 
to  the  New  Year.  Inside  Madrid,  Chief  of  Bureau  Alexander  Uhl  stood 
in  the  Puerta  del  Sol  and  heard  the  crash  as  the  shells  struck  the  center 
of  the  city.  About  him,  disdainful  of  the  explosions,  militiamen  were 
chewing  the  twelve  lucky  grapes  which  Madrilenos  traditionally  eat  as 
a  dying  year  is  tolled  out  and  a  new  year  in. 

Thus  the  Spanish  Civil  War  entered  its  second  year,  prolonging 
the  chronic  crisis  which  kept  Old  World  chancelleries  in  a  state  of 
nervous  apprehension  and  the  co-operative's  European  staff  constantly 
on  the  alert.  The  conflict  followed  five  years  of  dissension  after  King 
Alfonso  XIII  fled  into  exile  in  April,  1931.  The  Madrid  Republican 
government  was  a  "left"  government,  speaking  for  workers  and 
peasants.  The  insurgents,  under  General  Francisco  Franco,  grouped  the 
military,  the  big  landowners,  and  the  aristocracy  under  the  "right,"  or 
Fascist,  banner.  The  Pope  recognized  the  Franco  government. 

In  an  attempt  to  isolate  the  war,  the  British  sponsored  a  "Non- 
intervention Committee,"  but  in  spite  of  these  efforts  it  soon  became 
apparent  that  Italy  and  Germany  were  helping  Franco  and  the  Soviets 
were  giving  aid  to  the  Madrid  government.  The  Rome  and  Berlin 
bureaus  watched  Mussolini  and  Hitler  for  their  next  moves  and  the 
Moscow  Bureau  sought  a  better  line  on  the  Soviets'  future  course. 
Cables  from  London  and  Paris  described  the  concern  of  the  western 
powers. 

The  pieces  in  the  puzzling  jigsaw  that  was  the  map  of  Europe 
were  slowly  being  matched  and  put  together.  The  pattern  still  was  not 
clear,  but  there  were  many  who  said  that  Spain  was  a  mere  testing 
ground  on  which  some  of  the  Old  World  nations  were  trying  out 
their  modern  armaments  and  strategies. 

The  staff  men  in  Spain  had  the  riskiest  part  of  the  over-all 

441 


442  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

European  assignment,  but  months  of  bitter  warfare  had  inured  them 
to  the  perils  and  discomforts  incidental  to  the  task  of  getting  the  news. 
The  scream  of  shells,  the  rattle  of  machine  guns,  the  horror  of  air 
bombardment,  all  these  were  old  things  now.  Massock  and  Elmer 
Peterson  had  been  with  the  insurgents  since  Franco  raised  his  banner 
of  revolt.  They  accompanied  the  column  which  captured  Toledo  and 
relieved  the  Alcazar  after  the  72-day  siege,  and  their  eyewitness  stories 
were  frequently  written  under  fire. 

On  the  other  side,  Chief  of  Bureau  Uhl,  James  Oldfield,  and  H. 
E.  Knoblaugh  covered  the  government,  or  "Loyalist,"  forces.  In  the 
north,  where  the  Franco  forces  thrust  toward  the  Basque  cities  on 
the  Bay  of  Biscay,  Robert  B.  Parker,  Jr.,  watched  the  fall  of  Irun  and 
San  Sebastian. 

When  Franco's  advance  was  stubbornly  halted  on  the  outskirts 
of  Madrid,  the  AP  bureau  at  No.  4  Calle  Mejia  Lequerica  was  in  a 
section  of  the  city  often  bombarded  by  the  terrifying  insurgent  fire. 
Shell  splinters  pockmarked  its  walls  and  bomb  blasts  shattered  its 
windows.  The  dozen  shots  from  the  insurgent  batteries  as  January  i 
came  in  were  nothing  new,  for  the  staff  men  with  the  Loyalists  had  had 
plenty  to  report  during  the  weeks  in  which  the  government  forces  had 
made  their  heroic  defense. 

Early  in  the  war  it  had  become  obvious  that  one  of  the  major 
objectives  of  the  insurgent  Franco  forces  was  to  capture  Madrid  in 
an  effort  to  demoralize  the  seat  of  the  government,  and  in  various 
circles  it  was  freely  predicted  that  such  a  development  would  mean 
dissolution  of  the  "Non-intervention  Committee"  which  had  its  head- 
quarters in  London. 

The  staff  men  with  the  government  had  been  in  the  thick  of  things 
when  the  Madrid  forces  began  one  of  their  most  spectacular  defenses 
of  the  city  on  November  8  and  9,  1936.  The  assault  on  Madrid  had 
come  only  a  few  weeks  after  the  insurgents  relieved  the  Alcazar,  forty 
miles  away,  and  the  Franco  strategy  now  was  coming  into  the  open. 
His  forces  were  fighting  down  from  the  north  through  the  Guadarrama 
Mountains  and  up  from  the  south  and  west  in  an  effort  to  throw  a 
semicircle  of  steel  around  the  embattled  capital.  At  the  insurgent  head- 
quaters  in  Burgos,  General  Franco  had  been  proclaimed  "Chief  of  the 
Spanish  State"  and  had  organized  his  own  "government." 

But  the  terror  of  modern  aerial  warfare  on  November  8  and  9 
did  not  signal  the  end  of  Madrid.  Uhl  and  members  of  his  staff  scurried 
through  the  streets  dodging  bombs  and  explosions  as  the  missiles  of 


"THE  PUBLIC  MUST  BE  FULLY  INFORMED"  443 

death  rained  down  from  attacking  insurgent  planes  which  were  being 
engaged  by  the  determined  government  forces  both  on  land  and  in 
the  air. 

During  earlier  attacks  on  surrounding  towns,  Uhl  saw  pamphlets 
as  well  as  bombs  rain  down  and  in  Madrid  he  witnessed  hand-to-hand 
fighting.  From  balconies  and  windows  he  saw  women,  armed  with 
guns,  proudly  picking  off  the  first  Franco  troopers  as  they  battled  in 
the  streets  below,  and  from  others  he  saw  the  first  of  the  undercover, 
or  Fifth  Column,  Franco  sympathizers  firing  on  government  militiamen. 

While  the  fierce  fighting  continued,  the  government  forces  quickly 
converted  homes  and  public  buildings  into  miniature  forts  from  which 
to  defend  the  city.  Women  who  could  not  procure  guns  poured  hot  oil 
from  the  housetops  on  the  heads  of  attackers. 

On  the  insurgent  side  Elmer  Peterson  had  to  throw  himself  flat 
on  his  stomach  on  the  roof  of  a  suburban  house  to  escape  the  gun  fire, 
and  with  the  government  Uhl  and  his  staff  watched  crowds  in  the 
center  of  Madrid  run  panic-stricken  to  cover,  saw  ambulances  and  fire 
trucks  go  clanging  into  the  thick  of  the  fray,  and  listened  to  the  screams 
of  wounded  and  dying  women  and  children. 

Throughout  November  8  and  early  again  the  next  day  the  insur- 
gents continued  to  hurl  their  deadly  missiles  from  guns  and  planes. 
No  one  could  estimate  how  many  dead  and  wounded  they  left  in  the 
streets  and  in  the  wreckage  of  homes  and  public  buildings — but  still 
Madrid  stood. 

It  was  still  standing  on  January  i,  1937,  and  Uhl  and  the  others 
with  the  government  forces  listened  to  the  explosions,  heard  the  scream 
of  shells,  and  wondered  how  much  longer  Madrid  could  last. 


The  Spanish  War  lost  the  news  spotlight  temporarily  during  the 
spring  to  two  memorable  stories — the  coronation  of  George  VI  as 
King-Emperor  of  the  British  Empire,  and  the  wedding  of  Edward, 
Duke  of  Windsor,  to  the  twice-divorced  American  woman,  Mrs.  Wallis 
Warfield.  They  provided  the  final  chapters  to  one  of  the  great  news 
narratives  of  contemporary  times,  and  recalled  the  stirring  march  of 
events  not  so  many  months  earlier  when  Edward,  in  December,  1936, 
renounced  his  throne  rather  than  abandon  his  determination  to  marry 
Mrs.  Warfield,  "the  woman  I  love." 

Accounts  of  the  majestic  ceremonies  at  Westminster  Abbey  were 


AP —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

eagerly  read,  but  no  crowning  of  a  king-emperor  could  have  the  reader 
appeal  and  human  interest  inherent  in  the  romance  of  the  Duke  of 
Windsor  and  Wallis  Warfield.  People  called  it  the  "greatest  love  story 
of  our  time"  and  followed  with  rapt  attention  the  news  of  the  prepara- 
tions for  the  marriage  on  June  3  in  France. 

For  the  occasion,  the  association  set  up  a  special  five-man  staff, 
headed  by  John  Lloyd,  chief  of  the  Paris  Bureau.  With  him  were 
Louis  Matzhold,  Melvin  K.  Whiteleather,  Robert  Parker,  who  had 
just  been  relieved  from  duty  in  Spain,  and  Alice  Maxwell,  the  Paris 
Bureau's  style  specialist, 

Matzhold,  of  the  Vienna  Bureau,  had  been  with  Windsor  during 
the  duke's  exile  in  Austria  for  the  several  months  since  the  abdication. 
He  had  talked  with  him  daily,  followed  him  on  his  frequent  outing 
trips  and  traveled  with  him  to  Monts,  France,  when  the  duke  hurried 
there  to  join  Mrs.  Warfield  on  May  3,  the  day  her  second  divorce 
became  final.  Lloyd  was  one  of  the  five  correspondents  chosen  from 
the  world  press  to  attend  the  civil  and  religious  ceremonies  when  the 
marriage  took  place  in  the  Chateau  de  Cande  at  Monts. 


While  the  one-time  king  was  getting  married,  Edward  Neil,  back 
on  war  duty  after  his  experiences  in  Ethiopia,  was  plodding  along  in 
the  hot  June  sun  with  the  insurgent  legions  that  pushed  relentlessly  on 
to  the  Basque  stronghold  of  Bilbao  in  northern  Spain.  Neil  had  lived 
all  his  life  literally  against  an  AP  background.  Indeed,  he  and  his 
father  claimed  they  never  had  had  an  employer  other  than  The  AP. 
The  senior  Neil,  when  fourteen,  got  his  first  job  in  the  Boston  office 
as  a  copy  boy  before  the  turn  of  the  century,  and  later  became  a  telegraph 
operator.  The  younger  Neil  likewise  entered  the  service  in  Boston  and 
joined  the  sports  staff  in  New  York  in  1926.  A  vivid  style  and  a  wide 
knowledge  of  athletics  soon  made  him  one  of  the  association's  best 
known  writers,  and  sports  editors  on  member  papers  swore  by  his  signed 
stories. 

Through  the  so-called  "golden  age"  of  sports,  Neil  helped  cover 
most  of  the  major  events  and  in  1932  he  won  honorable  mention  for 
the  Pulitzer  prize  with  a  thrilling  account  of  a  mile-a-minute  ride  he 
took  down  the  bobsled  run  at  Lake  Placid  during  the  winter  Olympics. 
After  a  while  sports  began  to  pall  and  he  applied  for  a  Foreign  Service 
assignment.  He  went  to  Ethiopia  to  cover  the  Italian  conquest  and  after 


"THE  PUBLIC  MUST  BE  FULLY  INFORMED"  445 

that  came  an  assignment  in  the  Holy  Land,  where  Arab  bombs  and 
rifles  waged  war  on  returning  Jewish  colonists. 

Now  he  was  moving  along  toward  Bilbao  with  Charles  Foltz,  Jr., 
a  fellow  staffer  who  had  relieved  Parker  on  the  northern  front.  On 
June  19  Bilbao  fell,  and  Neil,  Foltz,  and  a  Latvian  newspaperman 
named  George  Timuska,  in  their  haste  not  to  miss  anything,  found 
themselves  entering  the  city  ahead  of  the  troops. 

With  escorts  of  Basque  militiamen,  the  three  newspapermen  set 
out  to  tour  the  shell-smashed  city  which  had  been  besieged  for  eighty 
days.  Bilbao's  communications  connection  with  Algorta,  the  cablehead 
fifteen  miles  to  the  northwest,  had  been  severed  when  the  Basques 
blew  up  the  bridges  surrounding  the  city  and  the  correspondents  had 
no  way  of  getting  their  news  out. 

By  late  afternoon  Foltz  had  rounded  up  five  cable  company 
employes  and  their  equipment.  He  had  a  plan  for  sending  the  news 
to  London  and  the  arrival  of  a  lone  insurgent  press  officer,  who  had 
followed  the  correspondents  into  the  city,  facilitated  matters.  The  first 
Franco  troops  had  just  started  to  move  into  Bilbao. 

The  plan  was  simple.  The  cable  company  employes  said  they 
could  set  up  their  equipment  at  the  cablehead  at  Algorta  and  reach 
London  within  an  hour.  That  would  mean  much  to  the  correspondents. 
It  was  Saturday  afternoon  and  other  correspondents,  who  had  not  yet 
entered  Bilbao,  would  send  their  stories  from  Vittoria  or  take  them 
across  the  French  frontier.  Vittoria  was  a  good  four  hours  away  and 
a  telegram  from  there  to  Vigo,  a  cablehead,  would  take  at  least 
eight  hours.  From  Bilbao  a  trip  to  the  frontier  would  require  five  hours 
and  there  was  no  guarantee  that  the  frontier  would  be  open. 

The  insurgent  captain,  who  acted  as  censor,  agreed  to  co-operate 
and  dragooned  all  the  able-bodied  men  in  the  vicinity  to  help  load  the 
cable  equipment  on  boats  for  a  trip  across  the  estuary  to  Algorta.  On 
the  other  side  automobiles  were  commandeered  and  the  party  roared 
away  up  the  coastal  road  to  the  deserted  cablehead.  It  was  a  small, 
forlorn  building  at  the  tip  end  of  a  low  and  barren  peninsula.  Except 
for  a  bluff  a  few  hundred  yards  away,  the  terrain  was  flat  and  unpro- 
tected. Potentially  it  was  not  a  healthy  spot,  for  anti-Franco  sharp- 
shooters still  held  the  opposite  shore  and  did  not  hesitate  to  open  fire 
on  any  suspected  insurgent  followers. 

Once  the  party  got  inside  the  building,  the  blinds  were  drawn, 
the  lights  lighted,  and  the  three  correspondents  started  to  pound  out 


446  „     AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

their  stories.  Assisted  by  two  chauffeurs,  the  five  cablemen  set  up  their 
sending  equipment. 

The  insurgent  captain  made  a  pretense  of  censoring  the  corre- 
spondents' copy,  but  that  night  he  was  too  weary  to  argue  and  the 
dispatches  passed  his  black  pencil  unedited.  Then  the  newspapermen 
waited  nervously  while  the  cablemen  tried  to  contact  London.  The 
London  cable  office  had  not  heard  from  Algorta  for  days,  but  some 
English  operator  had  left  the  Bilbao  wire  open. 

"Hello  Bilbao  Hello  Bilbao  Do  you  have  have  something  for 
us?"  were  the  first  words  from  London. 

Timuska  had  written  only  a  brief  story,  and  Neil  and  Foltz  offered 
to  let  him  clear  it  first. 

"No,"  declined  the  Latvian  in  his  broken  English.  "My  story,  she 
go  third.  If  I  say  to  my  editor  in  Riga:  'Timuska  sent  first  story  from 
Bilbao/  my  editor  say:  'Timuska  he  is  a  liar.'  But  if  I  say  Timuska  send 
third  story  from  Bilbao,  my  editor  say:  'H-m-m.  Third  story  from 
Bilbao.  Timuska  is  a  good  correspondent,  fine  correspondent.' " 

Neil's  story  went  first,  then  Foltz's,  and  then  Timuska's,  all  speed- 
ing into  London  at  an  eighty-word-a-minute  clip.  It  was  a  great  moment 
for  three  war  correspondents  who  had  been  accustomed  to  count  eight 
to  fifty-two  hours  good  transmission  time. 


They  were  congratulating  themselves  on  their  good  fortune  when 
there  was  a  loud  noise  in  the  rear  of  the  cable  building,  and  a  crash  of 
shattering  window  glass.  Foltz  and  Timuska  went  back  to  investigate. 
There  were  round  holes  in  the  curtains  and  bullets  buried  in  the  wood 
of  the  opposite  walls.  They  darted  back  and  pulled  the  power  switch, 
cutting  off  the  lights  and  the  cable. 

A  dark  shape  moved  on  the  waters,  heading  toward  the  shore  near 
the  cable  building.  It  was  a  boatload  of  government  militiamen  and  they 
had  opened  fire  on  the  cable  office,  believing  it  was  occupied  by  Franco's 
Nationalist  forces.  More  bullets  slapped  into  the  walls  and  more  glass 
showered  to  the  floor. 

The  insurgent  captain,  who  had  accompanied  the  reporters  to  the 
deserted  cablehead,  took  a  submachine  gun  and  gave  the  two  chauffeurs 
automatic  rifles.  The  cable  employes  asked  for  arms  as  well,  but  the 
captain  refused  them.  They  were  Basques  who  had  been  on  the  Loyalist 


PUBLIC  MUST  BE  FULLY  INFORMED"  447 

side  only  the  day  before.  "You  were  fighting  us  just  yesterday,"  the 
captain  said,  "so  you'll  get  no  chance  to  try  it  again  today." 

Neil,  Foltz,  and  Timuska  watched  from  a  window.  The  nearest 
Franco  troops  were  a  dozen  miles  away  and  the  three  armed  men  in  the 
two-room  frame  building  were  the  only  defenders  of  a  spit  of  land  on 
which  a  trawler  loaded  with  the  attacking  government  militiamen  in- 
tended to  come  ashore.  There  was  no  chance  of  dashing  out  and  escap- 
ing. The  flat,  barren  country  would  not  give  a  rabbit  cover  from  the 
sharpshooters  in  the  boat. 

The  rifle  fire  from  the  water  grew  heavier,  punctuated  by  vicious 
machine  gun  bursts.  The  bullets  thudded  into  the  outer  walls  of  the 
building,  just  under  the  window  frames.  The  captain  and  the  chauffeurs 
opened  up  in  return.  The  three  correspondents  exchanged  glances. 
There  was  no  question  what  would  happen  if  the  attackers  succeeded  in 
landing.  To  them  everyone  in  the  cable  station  was  an  enemy,  and  the 
correspondents  knew  what  army  officers  said:  "No  one  takes  prisoners 
in  night  attacks.  They're  too  much  trouble." 

The  trawler  came  on  deliberately  until  it  was  only  seventy  yards 
from  the  shore. 

For  another  ten  minutes  it  raked  the  station  with  rifle  and  machine 
gun  bullets,  as  it  maneuvered  for  a  landing  spot  not  in  a  direct  line 
of  fire  from  the  building.  Then,  without  warning,  a  new  sound  was 
heard  amid  the  firing — a  noise  like  Roman  candles  going  off  on  an 
American  Fourth  of  July.  A  battery  on  the  Franco-controlled  shore  had 
opened  fire  on  the  approaching  boat.  The  captain  yelled  excitedly. 

"Tracer  bullets!  Tracer  bullets  from  our  shore!" 

The  correspondents  dashed  to  the  door.  The  trawler  with  its  cargo 
of  militiamen  was  moving  at  full  speed  back  toward  the  opposite  shore. 
It  was  an  easy  target  for  the  white  balls  of  fire  which  streaked  after  it 
— a  blinding  stream  of  bullets  from  a  machine  gun  mounted  on  the 
bluff  a  few  hundred  yards  inland  from  the  cable  station.  The  bullets 
cut  a  dazzling  swath  across  the  water. 

Leaving  the  captain  and  chauffeurs  blazing  away  at  the  fleeing  ship, 
Neil,  Foltz,  and  Timuska  ran  to  the  bluff,  where  they  found  eight 
Nationalist  gunners  busy  with  two  machine  guns.  They  had  been  sta- 
tioned on  the  bluff  to  prevent  enemy  movements  in  the  area.  They 
grinned  a  greeting. 

"We  would  have  started  firing  sooner,"  explained  one  of  them, 
"but  we  all  went  back  to  the  village  for  some  food  and  they  came  while 
we  were  gone." 


448  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

"My  friend,"  said  Neil,  "if  you'd  had  an  extra  cup  of  coffee  after 
that  dinner,  we'd  have  haunted  you  for  the  rest  of  your  life!" 


Foltz  was  recalled  to  Paris  not  long  after  that  and  Neil  carried  on 
alone  on  the  northern  front. 

At  the  start  of  the  Santander  offensive,  the  next  major  operation 
in  the  north,  he  found  his  movements  sharply  circumscribed  by  official 
Franco  restrictions.  The  participation  of  Italian  "Volunteers"  in  the 
war  on  the  insurgent  side  had  become  an  open  international  issue,  par- 
ticularly since  the  rout  of  an  Italian  column  at  Guadalajara  on  the 
Madrid  front,  and  Franco's  generals  had  become  wary  about  permitting 
correspondents  to  learn  the  exact  composition  of  front-line  forces. 

When  the  Santander  offensive  got  under  way,  rumors  had  it  that 
a  large  number  of  Italian  legionnaires  were  fighting  at  the  front.  It  was 
virtually  impossible  to  confirm  these  reports.  Ubiquitous  press  officers 
on  the  insurgent  side  kept  the  correspondents  out  of  harm's  way  at 
headquarters  and  saw  to  it  that  they  got  only  such  information  as 
Franco  headquarters  thought  fit  to  release. 

For  days  Neil  chafed  at  the  inactivity  and  the  strict  supervision. 
He  bided  his  time  until  one  of  the  press  custodians  got  careless.  Then 
he  slipped  away  in  an  old  automobile  in  the  direction  of  the  front.  It 
was  not  long  before  he  encountered  two  Italian  divisions  moving  up.  He 
discovered  that  he  had  traveled  with  both  units  in  Ethiopia  and  soon 
renewed  acquaintances  with  the  officers  he  remembered.  They  obligingly 
gave  him  the  proper  directions  and  he  set  out  again  for  the  firing  line. 

A  few  miles  along  the  road  he  drove  up  to  a  railroad  track  lined 
by  a  long  stone  wall  behind  which  crouched  Italian  combat  troops  in 
full  field  kit.  There  was  no  sign  of  action,  so  the  correspondent  halted 
and  shouted  a  request  for  further  directions.  Two  of  the  soldiers  started 
toward  him  with  a  warning,  and  the  others  gestured  frantically  to  him 
to  seek  shelter. 

Just  then  Neil  heard  the  shrill  scream  of  shells.  He  froze  momen- 
tarily at  the  steering  wheel,  waiting  for  the  explosions.  The  first  struck 
with  a  deafening  roar  near  the  left  front  side  of  the  car,  flinging  out  a 
storm  of  jagged  splinters  and  dirt. 

Automatically  Neil  dived  out  of  the  battered  machine  and  made 
for  shelter. 

Another  salvo  shrieked  toward  the  railroad  line  and  a  second  later 


"THE  PUBLIC  MUST  BE  FULLY  INFORMED"  449 

a  direct  hit  landed  on  Neil's  abandoned  car.  One  of  the  soldiers  who 
had  run  out  to  warn  him  was  killed  and  the  other  lost  an  eye. 

Neil  had  found  the  front.  His  excursion  to  the  battle  zone  pro* 
duced  the  stories  which  positively  established  large-scale  Italian  partici- 
pation on  the  northern  front  and  brought  the  question  into  the  open. 
To  circumvent  censorship,  the  dispatches  were  sent  by  courier  to  the 
French  frontier. 


The  assignments  in  Spain  meant  constant  hard  work  and  a  great 
deal  of  drudgery.  As  in  Ethiopia,  the  perennial  nightmare  was  how  to 
get  dispatches  to  the  communications  point  once  they  had  been  written. 
Often  after  a  battle  Neil  had  to  climb  into  his  car  and  drive  back  as 
many  as  two  hundred  miles  to  the  nearest  telegraph  office.  Then,  before 
a  story  could  be  accepted,  he  had  to  hunt  up  a  translator  to  put  his  story 
into  Spanish.  After  that  there  was  always  the  exasperating  fight  against 
the  Franco  censors  and  the  long  wait  for  a  turn  on  wires  already  choked 
with  official  and  private  communications. 

Just  as  with  the  Franco  forces,  the  men  on  the  Loyalist  side  also 
had  their  troubles. 

On  one  occasion  an  American  flag  displayed  on  a  balcony  and  the 
quick-wittedness  of  a  Spanish  employee  saved  the  Madrid  Bureau  from 
attack  although  it  was  in  the  area  occupied  by  government  forces,  and 
its  staff  had  been  reporting  the  war  from  the  "Loyalist"  side  from  the 
beginning.  There  had  been  sniping  from  one  of  the  buildings  in  the 
vicinity  and  a  detachment  of  militiamen  moved  into  the  district  to 
crush  it.  Members  of  the  Fifth  Column — undercover  Franco  adherents 
— had  been  waging  a  guerrilla  warfare  against  the  government,  and 
there  was  no  mercy  for  them  when  they  were  caught. 

The  militiamen  decided  that  the  sniping  must  have  come  from  the 
building  occupied  by  the  AP  bureau.  One  group  deployed  to  storm  the 
door,  while  the  other  raised  rifles  and  took  aim  at  the  windows.  Staff 
men  working  at  their  desks  were  oblivious  of  the  danger,  but  Arturo 
Cardona,  a  clerk,  happened  to  pass  a  window  and  saw  the  situation. 
There  was  no  time  to  consult  anyone.  Risking  a  volley  of  bullets  he 
stepped  boldly  to  the  balcony. 

"Do  you  see  that  flag?"  he  shouted,  draping  a  flag  over  the  ledge. 
"This  is  the  office  of  the  naval  attache  of  the  United  States  of  America. 
You  will  lose  your  heads  if  you  molest  this  place!" 


450  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

The  untutored  milicianos  fell  back.  They  did  not  know  that  the 
United  States  had  no  naval  attache  in  Madrid. 

The  relentless  hunt  for  members  of  the  Fifth  Column,  suspected 
spies,  and  other  designated  enemies  of  the  government,  made  a  cor- 
respondent's life  hazardous,  nevertheless.  Once  in  Barcelona  a  man 
walking  a  few  paces  ahead  of  Knoblaugh  was  shot  dead  in  his  tracks 
when  he  failed  to  hear  a  sentry's  command  to  halt.  Another  time,  Knob- 
laugh  and  a  government  official  were  fired  on  while  on  an  automobile 
tour  of  Madrid  at  night.  At  one  time  or  another  Uhl,  Oldfield,  John 
Lloyd,  Edward  Kennedy,  Charles  Nutter,  Ramon  Blardony,  Henry 
Cassidy,  and  Robert  Okin  had  comparable  experiences. 

Most  of  the  news  was  routed  out  by  telephone  whenever  possible, 
and  that  meant  daily  danger  after  the  government  placed  an  artillery 
observation  post  in  the  tower  of  the  International  Telephone  Building, 
the  tallest  structure  in  Madrid.  The  building  was  hit  repeatedly  by 
shells.  One  day  while  Uhl  and  Knoblaugh  were  waiting  for  a  telephone 
connection,  a  six-inch  shell  smashed  through  the  wall  and  exploded  over 
their  heads. 

Living  in  constant  danger  of  aerial  and  artillery  bombardment, 
some  of  the  men  suffered  severe  nervous  strain — "bomb  jitters,"  as  they 
called  it — which  made  them  jump  at  a  slammed  door  or  duck  when  they 
heard  the  drone  of  an  airplane  motor.  Because  of  this  terrific  tension, 
the  replacements  in  Spain  were  frequent. 

Censorship  was  an  endless  source  of  trouble  and,  because  of  efforts 
to  circumvent  it,  Knoblaugh  eventually  found  it  necessary  to  leave  the 
country.  His  difficulties  arose  from  several  reasons.  He  ignored  taboos 
and  wrote  about  interparty  friction  and  the  part  foreign  intervention  was 
playing  on  the  "Loyalist"  side — two  subjects  authorities  did  not  wish 
discussed.  When  the  censors  began  striking  out  from  controversial  dis- 
patches such  qualifying  phrases  as  "the  government  claimed,"  or 
"according  to  the  government,"  he  protested.  He  pointed  out  to  press 
officers  that  such  deletions  had  the  effect  of  making  him  the  authority 
for  statements  of  disputed  fact.  It  was  against  AP  regulations  to  send 
any  controversial  material  without  stating  the  authority.  The  protests 
were  unproductive,  so  Knoblaugh  sent  out  a  letter  by  secret  courier 
informing  New  York  of  the  situation.  Once  advised,  the  cable  desk 
could  reinsert  the  qualifying  phrases  where  they  belonged. 

Kennedy,  sent  to  Valencia  to  replace  Knoblaugh,  also  had  a  hard 
time.  He  reported  that  the  activities  of  the  secret  police  became'  worse 
as  the  war  continued.  His  experience  was  that  officials  were  more  in- 


PUBLIC  MUST  BE  FULLY  INFORMED"  451 

terested  in  getting  correspondents  to  write  dispatches  that  would  be 
good  propaganda  than  they  were  in  preventing  military  information 
from  reaching  the  enemy.  His  hotel  room  was  searched,  some  of  his 
personal  effects  "disappeared,"  coat  linings  were  torn  in  a  search  for 
"documents,"  and  he  was  threatened  with  arrest. 

On  at  least  one  occasion,  however,  a  reporter  got  his  story  through 
without  official  hindrance. 

The  incident  occurred  one  evening  in  1937  when  Franco  batteries 
rammed  six  shells  into  the  century-old  Foreign  Office  in  Madrid.  By 
this  time  the  war  around  the  capital  had  settled  into  a  virtual  siege 
with  Franco  lines  running  three-quarters  of  the  way  around  the  city, 
cutting  off  all  railroads  and  six  of  the  seven  arterial  highways.  The 
city  was  slowly  starving  on  the  meager  supplies  that  could  be  brought 
in  by  truck  and  mule  cart,  yet  few  inhabitants  left — they  had  no  better 
place  to  go. 

The  censorship  office  in  Madrid  had  been  shelled  out  of  the  tele- 
phone building  by  the  Franco  artillery  perched  on  hills  across  the  nar- 
row Manzanares  valley  scarcely  a  mile  away.  Both  censors  and  cor- 
respondents sought  refuge  in  the  abandoned  Foreign  Office,  below  which 
was  a  labyrinth  of  dungeons  reputedly  used  during  the  Inquisition. 
The  walls  were  thick,  but  the  building  had  an  open  court  that  was  a 
constant  menace  because  of  the  danger  of  shells  dropping  into  the  patio. 

Charles  Nutter,  covering  the  government  side,  was  sitting  in  the 
pressroom  of  the  cold,  exposed  building  late  in  the  afternoon  of  October 
13.  He  had  just  prepared  his  dispatch,  had  had  it  approved  by  the  cen- 
sor, and  had  placed  a  telephone  call  for  London  to  transmit  the  story  to 
the  bureau  there  for  relay  to  the  United  States.  The  established  practice 
was  for  the  correspondent  to  telephone  his  approved  dispatch  from  one 
room  while  the  censor  listened  in  on  another  line.  Then,  if  the  corre- 
spondent deviated  from  his  copy,  the  connection  could  be  quickly  cut. 

The  call  from  London  came  through  simultaneously  with  a  loud 
report  just  outside  a  window  of  the  Foreign  Office.  The  Franco  artillery 
had  put  a  six-inch  shell  into  a  near-by  church  and  a  fragment  came 
bounding  through  the  window  past  Nutter's  desk.  Another  shell  hit  the 
Foreign  Office  itself,  seeming  to  rock  its  very  foundation.  A  third 
landed  in  the  patio  and  others  scooped  holes  in  the  heavy  walls.  It  was 
obvious  that  the  Foreign  Office  was  the  target. 

While  the  shells  burst  Nutter  sat  at  his  desk  going  through  the 
necessary  motions  preliminary  to  beginning  conversation  with  his  Lon- 
don office.  The  censor  crouched  at  his  own  desk  for  a  moment  as  the 


452  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

bombardment  began,  but  just  as  the  telephone  connection  was  established 
he  dropped  his  end  of  the  telephone  line  and  dashed  for  the  basement 
where  all  others  in  the  building  were  fleeing  for  safety.  It  was  an  uncere- 
monious departure,  but  he  paused  at  the  door  just  long  enough  to  yell 
to  Nutter,  still  busy  with  his  line: 

"Tell  them  anything  you  like  about  this  attack!" 

Nutter  hurriedly  dictated  to  the  London  office  the  story  as  it  de- 
veloped, pausing  occasionally  when  the  bombardment  drowned  out  his 
voice  so  that  the  man  on  the  receiving  end  in  London  could  hear  the 
noise  of  the  attack. 

The  shelling  lasted  for  an  hour,  but  the  death  toll  was  officially 
reported  at  only  six.  The  only  casualty  at  the  Foreign  Office  was 
the  AP  automobile,  which  got  a  piece  of  shrapnel  through  its  rear 
seat.  Although  no  more  shells  penetrated  the  office,  Nutter  had  to  aban- 
don his  call  after  several  minutes  because  of  the  acrid  fumes  of  the 
explosives. 

He  explained  his  predicament  to  London,  let  the  operator  on  the 
other  end  of  the  wire  listen  again  to  the  noise  of  the  shelling  and  then 
broke  the  connection.  His  story  of  another  of  Franco's  attempts  to  cap- 
ture Madrid  had  gone  through  without  official  interference. 

"Cheerio,"  said  the  man  on  the  London  end  as  Nutter  hung  up  his 
telephone. 


Outside  of  Spain  the  world  was  going  on.  Pugilism  acquired  a  new 
heavyweight  champion,  one  Joe  Louis,  whom  writers  dubbed  the 
"Brown  Bomber."  Clipper  ships  explored  the  sky  lanes  for  aerial  ser- 
vice across  the  Atlantic.  In  the  Far  East  the  undeclared  Sino-Japanese 
War  commanded  attention  after  a  temporary  lull,  this  time  with  both 
sides  serving  notice  that  it  was  a  fight  to  the  end.  Italy  joined  Ger- 
many and  Japan  in  the  Anti-Comintern  Pact  after  Mussolini  ostenta- 
tiously reaffirmed  the  strength  of  the  Rome-Berlin  Axis  with  a  tri- 
umphal visit  to  Adolf  Hitler  at  Munich  and  Berlin.  America's  recovery 
from  the  long  setback  of  the  depression  encountered  a  sharp  "recession" 
which  sent  business  indices  tumbling.  And  the  Soviets  celebrated  the 
twentieth  anniversary  of  nationhood — a  celebration  preceded  and  fol- 
lowed by  new  "purges"  of  "traitors,"  self-confessed  and  otherwise. 

The  Spanish  Civil  War,  like  so  many  stories  of  long  duration, 
temporarily  had  become  a  matter  of  routine  interest  by  mid-Decfember 
of  1937.  Major  developments  were  few,  for  winter  had  retarded  mili- 


PUBLIC  MUST  BE  FULLY  INFORMED"  453 

tary  operations  and  Franco  was  making  preparations  for  a  spring  offen- 
sive. Moreover,  front  pages  were  given  over  to  amazing  news  from  the 
Far  East — the  bombing  and  sinking  of  the  United  States  gunboat 
Panay  by  Japanese  war  planes  in  China.  But,  quiet  or  not,  there  was  no 
relaxation  of  coverage  efforts  in  Spain. 

The  interlude  was  short-lived.  On  December  19  the  government 
army  launched  a  terrific  offensive,  capturing  the  city  of  Teruel  and 
threatening  to  sever  Franco's  Aragon  salient  at  its  base.  The  fight  for 
Teruel  developed  into  one  of  the  severest  battles  of  the  war,  both  sides 
throwing  their  full  weight  into  the  fray. 

To  cover  the  seesawing  conflict,  Neil  was  with  Franco  and  Bob 
Okin  and  Ramon  Blardony  were  across  the  lines  in  the  government 
camp,  as  close  to  the  front  as  the  milicianos  would  allow.  The  first 
impact  of  the  government  drive  hurled  the  Nationalists  back  several 
miles,  and  for  days  all  correspondents  with  Franco  were  refused  per- 
mission to  go  near  the  fighting  zone. 

When  the  insurgent  counter  thrust  began  to  gather  headway,  Neil 
again  slipped  away  from  the  shepherding  press  officials  and  made  his 
way  to  the  front.  He  cabled  an  eyewitness  account  of  the  fighting  on 
December  29,  describing  the  assaults  of  Franco's  troops  on  the  govern- 
ment front  and  a  synchronized  mass  attack  by  two  hundred  insurgent 
airplanes. 

Two  days  later  the  Franco  headquarters  lifted  the  ban  on  corres- 
pondents at  the  front  and  Neil  and  his  colleagues  started  out  by  auto- 
mobile from  the  base  at  Zaragoza.  In  a  little  while  it  began  to  snow 
and  got  bitterly  cold.  The  road  was  pitted  with  shell  holes  and  choked 
with  military  traffic.  Troops  moving  up  shuffled  along  numbly  in  the 
freezing  winds,  and  the  press  car  passed  knots  of  peasants  huddled  to- 
gether to  keep  warm.  As  they  approached  the  front,  the  press  party 
stopped  in  each  village  to  forage  for  scraps  of  news  from  ahead. 

At  noon  the  press  cars  turned  off  the  shell-pocked  main  road  and 
jolted  toward  the  next  little  hamlet,  Caude.  Gunfire  became  louder 
and  louder.  Snow  sifted  gloomily  down.  The  cold  grew  so  intense  that 
hands,  feet,  and  ears  ached. 

In  Caude  the  cars  stopped  near  a  barn  and  the  correspondents 
piled  out  to  get  the  latest  news.  There  were  Franco  reserves  every- 
where waiting  for  the  command  to  move  into  action.  A  heavy  battery 
thundered  on  a  field  a  hundred  yards  away,  hurling  projectiles  toward 
Teruel.  Conversation  had  to  be  in  snatches,  between  the  blasts  of  the 


454  AI?  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

guns.  Four  mules  stood  woodenly  by  a  small  pond  near  the  barn  where 
the  press  cars  had  halted. 

The  news  in  Caude  was  quickening.  The  Franco  troops  had  fought 
their  way  to  the  outskirts  of  Teruel.  The  beleaguered  garrison  in  the 
seminary  would  be  relieved  and  the  city  recaptured  by  nightfall  at  the 
latest.  Neil  and  his  colleagues  were  disappointed  when  an  unyielding 
press  officer  refused  to  permit  them  to  go  on.  It  was  still  too  dangerous, 
he  said.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  they  were  too  near  the  fighting  zone  now. 
Someone  had  blundered  in  allowing  them  to  come  so  far. 

The  men  scattered  to  wait.  Some  went  off  to  watch  the  battery  and 
others  to  explore  the  village.  Neil,  Richard  Sheepshanks,  of  Reuters 
Agency,  and  H.  A.  R.  Philby,  of  the  London  Times,  returned  to  their 
car,  parked  some  distance  from  the  others.  Neil  and  Sheepshanks  had 
covered  the  Ethiopian  War  together  and  since  their  reunion  in  Spain 
had  been  almost  inseparable. 

Sheepshanks  slipped  into  the  front  seat  as  Neil  and  Philby  climbed 
into  the  back.  They  sat  talking,  smoking,  and  munching  chocolate. 
The  windows  were  closed  against  the  subzero  cold,  the  snow,  and  the 
bellow  of  the  heavy  artillery  near  by. 

Soon  they  were  joined  by  Brandish  Johnson,  a  young  American 
who  was  gathering  material  for  magazine  articles.  He  had  just  come 
back  from  photographing  the  heavy  artillery  in  the  field. 

Poring  over  a  map  alone  in  a  parked  automobile  across  the  way, 
Karl  Robson  of  the  London  Daily  Telegraph  heard  the  terrifying 
scream  of  another  shell.  There  was  a  stupefying  crash  and  a  terrific 
concussion.  Another  shell  exploded,  and  another,  and  another.  Soldiers 
shouted  and  fled  to  cover.  Robson  dived  out  of  his  car  and  raced  for 
the  barn.  The  road  rocked  under  a  new  burst  of  gunfire. 

As  abruptly  as  it  began,  the  shelling  ceased.  The  newsmen  and 
the  soldiers  who  had  taken  refuge  in  the  barn  looked  out.  Three  of  the 
mules  near  the  barn  lay  dead.  The  fourth  stamped  the  frozen  ground 
in  terror.  There  was  no  other  sign  of  life.  Then  a  man  appeared,  reel- 
ing toward  the  barn.  Blood  streaked  his  face  and  covered  his  clothes. 
It  was  Philby. 

"They're  in  there!  They're  in  there !"  he  yelled,  pointing  to  the 
shell-wrecked  automobile  down  the  road. 

The  press  officer  got  there  first,  with  Robson  at  his  heels.  They 
saw  three  motionless  figures  with  powder-blackened  faces  slumped  in 
their  seats.  A  shell  had  exploded  within  inches  of  the  left  front  wheel 
of  the  car. 


"THE  PUBLIC  MUST  BE  FULLY  INFORMED"  455 

When  the  door  was  opened,  Johnson's  body  tumbled  out  from  be- 
hind the  steering  wheel.  Sheepshanks,  who  had  been  seated  next  to 
him,  lay  back  unconscious,  his  temple  torn  open.  In  the  back  seat 
sprawled  Neil.  He  was  conscious,  but  speech  was  an  effort  and  he  could 
not  move.  He  had  been  hit  many  times.  His  left  leg  was  torn  and 
broken  by  dozens  of  shell  fragments. 

Stretcher-bearers  carried  off  Sheepshanks  to  a  dressing  station  up 
the  street.  Johnson's  body  lay  where  it  had  fallen.  Someone  threw  a 
rug  over  it.  The  rescue  workers  had  difficulty  getting  Neil  out  of  the 
car.  He  was  heavy  and  the  two-door  sedan  gave  little  room  for  man- 
euvering behind  the  front  seat.  The  Loyalist  artillery  resumed  bom- 
barding the  village  and  the  rescuers  were  interrupted  several  times  by 
the  thud  of  shells. 

"Good  work,  boys,"  Neil  said  when  they  finally  got  him  out. 
"Sorry  Pm  so  heavy.  Keep  an  eye  on  my  typewriter,  will  you?" 

He  saw  the  covered  body  on  the  ground. 

"Who's  that?  Robson?"  he  asked. 

They  told  him  and  hurried  him  off  to  the  first-aid  hut,  thence  into 
an  ambulance  with  Sheepshanks  for  the  journey  back  over  rutted  roads 
to  a  casualty  clearing  station  at  Santa  Eulalia. 

Philby,  who  had  been  sitting  with  Neil  in  the  back  of  the  car,  had 
had  a  narrow  escape.  His  head  wounds  proved  not  to  be  serious. 
Doctors  could  do  nothing  for  Sheepshanks.  He  died  that  night  without 
speaking  a  word.  It  was  New  Year's  Eve. 

Neil  was  not  told  of  Sheepshanks'  death.  He  was  in  good  spirits 
and  his  colleagues  hoped  that  he  was  not  critically  hurt.  He  joked 
with  them. 

"Well,"  he  said,  "I  guess  the  war  is  over  for  me." 

But  Neil  was  badly  wounded.  He  had  been  hit  by  thirty-four  shell 
fragments  and  his  condition  was  so  grave  that  doctors  at  the  casualty 
clearing  station  felt  he  could  be  attended  properly  only  at  the  base  hos- 
pital in  Zaragoza.  The  ambulance  made  the  slow  trip  in  a  blizzard  and 
it  was  not  until  one  o'clock  on  New  Year's  morning — more  than  twelve 
hours  after  he  had  been  wounded — that  Neil  reached  the  hospital.  Hal 
Philby  wrote  Neil's  story  that  night  and  filed  it  for  him  to  New  York. 

Philby  and  William  P.  Carney,  the  New  York  Times  correspondent 
with  Franco,  visited  Neil  on  New  Year's  Day.  They  found  him  semi- 
delirious.  Every  effort  had  been  made  to  prevent  his  learning  of 
Sheepshanks'  death,  but  somehow  he  had  heard  of  it  in  the  hospital. 

"They're  burying  poor  Dick  tomorrow,"  he  said,  "and  I'm  afraid 


456  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

I  can't  go  to  the  funeral.  They  keep  me  here  on  my  back,  and  I  am 
getting  so  sick  I  soon  won't  be  able  to  write  a  story  or  do  anything. 
But  old  Philby  has  told  everything  there  is  to  tell  by  now,  haven't  you? 
Tell  my  office  I'm  going  to  Paris  as  soon  as  I  can  and  I'll  soon  be  all 
right  again." 

Then,  when  his  visitors  were  leaving,  he  managed  one  of  his  flash- 
ing smiles. 

"So  long  until  tomorrow,"  he  whispered.  "I  wish  I  could  go  to  the 
nearest  cafe  with  you  guys  and  have  a  big,  cold  beer." 

Blood  transfusions  seemed  to  help  Neil,  but  by  the  next  morning 
gangrene  developed.  He  died  late  that  night. 


When  the  word  reached  The  AP  in  New  York,  it  was  a  hard 
shock.  From  copy  boy  to  general  manager,  everyone  had  known  Neil 
and  liked  him.  As  the  story  moved  out  over  the  wires  into  bureau  after 
bureau,  the  staff's  feeling  of  bereavement  increased. 

The  news  touched  not  only  the  staff.  It  affected  men  on  member 
papers  who  remembered  working  with  Neil  at  one  time  or  another  on 
the  numerous  news  and  sports  events  he  had  covered  before  entering 
the  Foreign  Service.  And  it  meant  something  personal  to  many  news- 
paper readers,  particularly  the  sports  enthusiasts  to  whom  Neil's  by-line 
had  long  been  familiar  in  the  days  before  he  gave  up  sports  writing. 

The  co-operative's  wires  were  silenced  for  two  minutes  on  January 
3,  1938,  the  day  Neil's  body  left  Spain  for  home.  Zaragoza  gave  Neil 
and  his  two  companions  in  death  a  solemn  farewell.  General  Jose  Mos- 
cardo,  hero  of  the  defense  of  the  Alcazar,  was  present.  With  members 
of  his  staff,  representatives  of  the  provincial  government,  a  delegation 
of  native  newspapermen,  and  a  large  group  of  foreign  correspondents, 
the  general  followed  the  flower-banked  hearses  afoot.  Crowds  lined  the 
city's  ancient  streets  and  saluted  as  the  cortege  passed.  In  the  famous 
Cathedral  of  La  Seo,  where  the  Kings  of  Aragon  were  once  crowned, 
a  funeral  mass  was  said  for  Neil.  Then  the  three  coffins  were  placed 
on  the  train  that  would  carry  them  to  France.  An  officer  called  for 
"Vivas,"  and  the  train  moved  away  to  the  echoes  of  "Viva  America!" 
.  .  .  "Viva  Inglaterra!"  .  .  .  "Arriba  Espana!" 

The  first  matter  for  consideration  when  the  Board  of  Directors 
met  nine  days  after  Neil's  death  was  the  question  of  extraordinary 
death  benefits  for  the  correspondent's  widow,  Mrs.  Helen  Nolan  Neil, 


"THE  PUBLIC  MUST  BE  FULLY  INFORMED"  457 

and  his  five-year-old  son,  Edward  J.  Neil,  III.  The  general  manager 
was  directed  to  make  special  financial  arrangements  for  Mrs.  Neil,  and 
to  set  up  an  annuity  fund  for  the  support  of  the  boy  and  his  education 
through  college.  Then  the  directors  adopted  this  resolution: 

The  Board  of  Directors  of  The  Associated  Press,  as  representatives 
of  the  entire  membership,  by  this  means  enter  into  the  permanent  records 
of  the  institution  this  memorial  to  Edward  J.  Neil,  Jr.,  gallant  reporter, 
who  died  in  The  Associated  Press  service  at  Zaragoza,  Spain,  as  the  result 
of  wounds  he  suffered  while  reporting  the  encounter  on  the  Teruel  front. 

If  democratic  institutions  are  to  prevail,  as  we  all  believe  they  will,  the 
public  must  be  fully  informed  as  to  what  is  happening  in  the  world.  We 
recognize  that  the  good  reporter  is  the  keystone  of  our  journalistic  edifice. 
Believing  this,  we  also  believe  that  Edward  J.  Neil's  death  was  not  in  vain. 
He  undertook  a  perilous  assignment  at  our  behest  and  he  carried  it  out 
gloriously. 

As  chroniclers  of  the  day's  events,  we  are  proud  to  pay  tribute  to  his 
memory.  In  him  we  find  a  justification  of  our  faith.  He  accepted  and  fulfilled 
that  ultimate  measure  of  devotion  which  is  so  rarely  found,  but  which,  when 
we  find  it,  helps  us  all  go  on. 

They  buried  Neil  in  his  native  Massachusetts  on  January  21,  with 
flowers  from  all  over  the  world  heaped  high  over  his  grave.  And  in 
the  snow  and  zero  cold  of  the  Teruel  front  another  staff  man,  Dwight 
L.  Pitkin,  took  up  the  assignment  Neil  had  begun. 


XIV.  "PEACE  FOR  OUR  TIME" 


THE  Spanish  Civil  War  staggered  on  toward  its  close  and  the  spot- 
light of  news,  more  than  ever,  remained  on  the  Old  World.  Those 
who  had  felt  that  Spain  was  a  mere  testing  ground  were  saying  they 
had  been  right.  More  than  one  government  talked  of  peace  and  pre- 
pared for  war.  The  European  jigsaw  had  become  a  desperate,  many- 
sided  contest  in  which  opposing  forces  were  hammering  on  toward  an 
inevitable  end. 

Adolf  Hitler,  in  whose  eyes  burned  the  fire  of  an  ambition  to 
restore  to  Germany  the  power  and  prestige  of  pre-World  War  days,  had 
become  one  of  the  biggest  news  personalities  since  1914.  While  in 
prison  for  his  attempt  to  overthrow  the  German  government  in  1923 
the  one-time  Austrian  corporal  had  written  Mein  Kampjy  and  by  1938 
it  was  becoming  increasingly  apparent  that,  as  Der  Fiihrer  of  the  Third 
Reich,  he  was  determined  to  pursue  his  course. 

Hitler  sensations  had  kept  the  foreign  staff  on  the  jump  ever  since 
his  appointment  as  chancellor  of  Germany  in  1933.  Each  move  he  made 
seemed  bolder  than  the  last,  touching  off  a  long  train  of  international 
repercussions. 

The  first  important  news  in  1938  came  on  February  12,  when 
Chancellor  Kurt  Schuschnigg  of  Austria  journeyed  suddenly  and  se- 
cretly to  Hitler's  Bavarian  mountain  retreat  at  Berchtesgaden  to  confer 
with  the  Fiihrer.  For  months  the  relations  between  the  two  countries 
had  been  marked  by  nervous  apprehension  and  suspicion  on  the  part 
of  Austria — in  spite  of  Hitler's  "guarantee"  of  Austrian  independence 
— and  the  unexpected  meeting  whipped  up  puzzled  speculation.  The 
official  communiques  were  vague.  The  Austrian  version  spoke  of  a 
"distinct  triumph"  for  Schuschnigg,  while  in  Germany  there  were  in- 
definite explanations  that  "improved"  Austro-German  relations  were 
likely  in  the  future. 

In  Berlin  and  in  Vienna  the  two  bureaus  went  to  work  to  learn  the 
truth  of  what  actually  had  happened  at  Berchtesgaden.  What  with  a 
controlled  press,  propaganda  ministries,  and  self-serving  government 
departments,  real  news  had  a  habit  of  going  underground  in  Central 

458 


"PEACE  FOR  OUR  TIME"  459 

Europe.  It  was  likely  to  come  in  many  ways.  Sometimes  a  hurried  tele- 
phone call  from  a  government  employee  who  could  not  speak  officially. 
Sometimes  a  penciled  message  on  the  back  of  a  crumpled  handbill  tossed 
negligently  into  a  correspondent's  parked  automobile.  Sometimes  a  few 
words  in  a  "chance"  meeting  in  some  out-of-the-way  cafe. 

Once  the  staffs  in  Austria  and  Germany  began  their  investigations, 
the  unexpected  meeting  at  Berchtesgaden  assumed  a  character  far  dif- 
ferent than  the  innocuous  communiques  had  indicated.  Vienna  was 
able  to  report  that,  far  from  being  a  "triumph"  for  Schuschnigg,  the 
conference  had  ominous  implications.  Hitler  had  served  the  equivalent 
of  an  ultimatum  on  the  Austrian  chancellor,  demanding  among  other 
things  that  he  include  Austrian  Nazis  in  his  Cabinet  under  the  threat 
of  invasion. 

From  Berlin  came  an  even  more  penetrating  series  of  stories.  Chief 
of  Bureau  Louis  Lochner,  who  had  been  building  up  his  contacts  in 
Germany  for  fourteen  years,  pointed  out  that  Hitler  had  shaken  up  the 
German  army  only  the  week  before,  ousting  some  of  its  old  leaders  and 
assuming  supreme  command  himself.  He  mentioned  the  general  "we- 
will-show-them"  resentment  in  Nazi  circles  against  the  foreign  tendency 
to  regard  the  drastic  shake-up  as  symptomatic  of  general  unrest  in  the 
Reich,  and  recorded  the  belief  in  official  quarters  "that  der  Ftihrer 
might  decide  on  a  dramatic  step  to  bolster  confidence  in  Germany's 
armed  forces."  Then  he  called  attention  to  the  fact  that  the  last  time 
Germany  had  threatened  Austria — in  1934  when  Dollfuss  was  assassin- 
ated— Mussolini  had  massed  the  Italian  army  at  the  Brenner  Pass, 
but  this  time  Mussolini  was  a  partner  in  the  Rome-Berlin  Axis  and  had 
sanctioned  the  Berchtesgaden  meeting.  The  dispatch  was  factual 
throughout,  and  the  facts  gave  evidence  that  an  important  coup  was  in 
the  offing. 

The  stories  of  the  next  several  days  from  Vienna  and  Berlin  began 
to  clarify  the  picture.  Schuschnigg  admitted  five  Austrian  Nazis  to  his 
Cabinet  after  German  troops  massed  along  the  frontier.  Hitler,  in  a 
Reichstag  speech  on  February  20,  not  only  failed  to  reaffirm  his  guaran- 
tee of  Austrian  independence,  something  he  had  promised  to  do  in 
return  for  Schuschnigg's  concessions,  but  he  spoke  pointedly  of  the 
"continuous  suffering"  and  the  "unnecessary  torture"  of  Germans  out- 
side the  Reich.  Simultaneously  in  London  the  British  foreign  secretary, 
Anthony  Eden,  resigned  because  of  his  opposition  to  Prime  Minister 
Neville  Chamberlain's  "appeasement"  policy  toward  the  dictator  na- 
tions. There  followed  a  deceptive  lull. 


460  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

The  climax  came  with  a  sudden  rush  of  cables.  On  March  9 
Schuschnigg,  finally  convinced  that  Hitler  intended  to  seize  Austria, 
made  a  last  desperate  effort  to  forestall  such  a  move  by  announcing  a 
plebiscite  to  determine  whether  the  nation  wished  to  join  the  Third 
Reich  or  remain  independent.  The  plebiscite  was  set  for  March  13. 
Almost  immediately  pressure  was  brought  on  Schuschnigg  to  rescind 
the  plebiscite  order,  but  he  held  firm.  Disorders  and  violence  broke 
out  in  Austrian  border  towns  which  had  large  pro-Nazi  elements.  In 
Berlin,  officials  told  Lochner  that  the  plebiscite  call  was  an  "unfriendly 
act"  toward  Germany  and  a  "betrayal"  of  the  Berchtesgaden  "agree- 
ment." Austria  began  to  mobilize. 

The  staff  in  Vienna— Chief  of  Bureau  Alvin  J.  Steinkopf,  Melvin 
Whiteleather,  Louis  Matzhold  and  A.  D.  Stefferud— wrote  the  story  of 
Austria's  last  hours  on  March  1 1.  The  first  break  came  in  mid-afternoon 
after  a  day  of  mounting  tension  and  sporadic  disorders.  Schuschnigg  an- 
nounced postponement  of  the  plebiscite  under  threat  of  Nazi  invasion. 
A  few  hours  later  Steinkopf  was  flashing  far  bigger  news.  Schuschnigg 
had  resigned  as  chancellor,  again  under  the  renewed  threat  of  invasion. 
Then  the  swift  final  impacts:  the  formation  of  a  new  pro-Nazi  govern- 
ment under  Seyss-Inquart  as  chancellor;  Seyss-Inquart's  request  to 
Hitler  to  send  troops  into  Austria  "to  preserve  order"  $  and  the  march 
of  the  German  army  into  Austria. 

The  next  seventy-two  hours  brought  a  whirlwind  of  news.  Storm 
Troopers  took  over  control  of  the  Austrian  capital.  Nazi  partisans 
filled  the  streets  in  wild,  cheering  demonstrations.  The  beating  and 
plundering  of  Jews  spread.  Wholesale  arrests  began,  and  a  purge  of 
"unfriendly  anti-Nazi  forces"  together  with  "traitorous  elements." 
Lochner  and  his  Berlin  staff  reported  the  Anschluss  as  Germany  saw 
it,  and  Wade  Werner  accompanied  Hitler  when  he  crossed  the  Salzach 
River  into  his  native  Austria  at  Braunau,  where  he  was  born,  and 
started  his  triumphal  progress  toward  Vienna. 


The  Nazi  seizure  of  power  in  Austria  multiplied  coverage  prob- 
lems. A  tight  censorship  was  imposed.  Local  telephone  conversations  had 
to  be  in  German  and  every  outgoing  call  was  tapped.  There  were  long 
delays  in  getting  calls  through  to  London  and  other  European  points, 
but  dispatches  routed  via  Berlin  were  transmitted  with  reasonable 
promptness.  Nazi  surveillance  extended  to  the  mails.  The  handicaps 


"PEACE  FOR  OUR  TIME"  461 

under  which  the  staff  worked  were  not  lessened  by  the  fact  that  Storm 
Troopers  generally  regarded  foreign  correspondents  with  hostility  and 
several  times  threatened  arrests. 

An  incident  occurred  on  March  1 5,  the  day  of  Hitler's  tumultuous 
entry  into  Vienna.  Steinkopf  and  Matzhold,  together  with  other  mem- 
bers of  the  foreign  newspaper  corps,  were  summoned  to  the  Chan- 
cellery to  obtain  the  permits  necessary  to  hear  Hitler  speak  on  the 
Heldenplatz  and  to  witness  the  ensuing  parade  of  the  Third  Reich's 
military  might. 

Steinkopf  and  Matzhold  got  their  permits  and,  with  other  cor- 
respondents, were  hurrying  downstairs  to  the  courtyard.  At  the  foot  of 
the  stairs  their  way  was  blocked  by  black-uniformed  SS  guards,  the 
elite  of  Nazi  organizations.  A  steel-helmeted  officer  waved  a  revolver 
at  the  correspondents. 

"Get  back  at  once,  every  one  of  you,"  he  shouted.  "Get  back! 
Unless  you  clear  these  steps  this  very  moment,  I  give  the  order  to  fire!" 

There  was  no  arguing  with  gun  muzzles  and  an  officer  of  uncertain 
temper.  Steinkopf  and  the  other  correspondents  retreated  up  the  stairs 
to  the  press  section  of  the  Foreign  Ministry  where  they  had  just  ob- 
tained their  permits.  It  became  apparent  that  the  press  chief  there  was 
as  much  a  prisoner  as  the  correspondents  themselves.  He  telephoned 
agitatedly  in  futile  efforts  to  secure  his  own  release  and  that  of  the 
newspapermen.  He  refused  explanations  and  the  best  idea  he  had  in 
the  emergency  was  the  suggestion  that,  by  leaning  well  out  the  window, 
the  men  could  see  the  Heldenplatz  in  the  distance. 

Steinkopf  telephoned  the  American  legation  and  explained  the 
predicament  of  the  men  in  the  Chancellery  building,  and  his  colleagues 
made  similar  appeals  to  the  diplomatic  representatives  of  their  govern- 
ments. Considerable  time  elapsed  and  Hitler's  speech  was  well  under 
way  before  the  correspondents  finally  were  permitted  to  leave.  The  ex- 
planation of  the  Gestapo — the  German  Secret  Police — was  that  "there 
was  reason  to  suspect  sudden  danger,  and  immediate  and  ruthless  meas- 
ures had  to  be  taken  to  counteract  it.  Someone  perhaps  went  too  far 
in  detaining  foreign  correspondents  so  long  in  the  building." 

The  temporary  "imprisonment"  of  Steinkopf  and  Matzhold,  how- 
ever, did  not  affect  coverage  of  Hitler's  speech.  Wade  Werner,  who  was 
accompanying  the  Fiihrer's  party,  was  on  hand  to  report  the  address 
from  the  beginning.  His  credentials  had  been  issued  in  Berlin  and  were 
not  subject  to  the  special  regulations  imposed  on  the  Vienna  press  corps. 


462  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 


The  efforts  of  the  Vienna  Bureau  to  tell  the  swiftly  moving  story 
of  Austria's  annexation  in  pictures  as  well  as  in  words  met  the  same 
difficulties.  As  rapidly  as  photographs  could  be  obtained,  they  were 
rushed  to  London  either  by  plane  or  by  wire  for  radio  transmission 
to  the  United  States.  A  surprisingly  complete  pictorial  report  went  out 
in  spite  of  the  fact  that  authorities  interposed  obstacle  after  obstacle, 
many  without  explanation.  In  one  instance  they  refused  to  permit 
the  wire  transmission  of  an  AP  picture  showing  Hitler's  troops  entering 
the  town  of  Graz,  and  the  messenger  was  threatened  with  a  prison 
camp.  On  another  occasion  an  employee  of  the  Vienna  Bureau  was 
arrested. 

Whiteleather  was  at  work  in  the  office  when  it  happened.  Busy 
typing  out  a  dispatch,  he  was  interrupted  by  the  sound  of  heavy  foot- 
falls in  the  corridor.  He  looked  up  as  a  jack-booted  Storm  Trooper 
planted  himself  on  the  threshold,  blocking  the  doorway. 

"Is  Willi  Jacobson  here?"  the  trooper  demanded. 

Whiteleather  nodded. 

Jacobson  was  a  staff  photographer  of  German-Jewish  parentage. 
Originally  he  had  been  attached  to  the  Berlin  Bureau,  but  when  the 
Nurnberg  anti-Semitic  laws  were  enforced  he  was  refused  the  permit 
necessary  for  all  subjects  of  the  Third  Reich  who  were  engaged  in 
newspaper  work.  Had  he  stayed  in  Berlin,  he  would  have  been  deprived 
of  his  regular  livelihood,  so  Lochner  transferred  him  to  Vienna.  The 
systematic  German  police,  however,  kept  a  careful  record. 

At  the  time  of  the  Storm  Trooper's  arrival,  Jacobson  was  develop- 
ing pictures  in  the  darkroom.  Whiteleather  called  him  out.  He  took 
one  look  at  the  Nazi  and  understood.  The  Storm  Trooper  ordered  him 
to  come  along,  and  he  gathered  up  his  coat.  Whiteleather's  attempt  to 
intervene  was  of  no  avail.  He  could  get  no  explanation  as  to  why  the 
photographer  was  being  taken  into  custody. 

Jacobson,  like  so  many  non-Aryan  Germans  in  Vienna,  was  clapped 
into  prison  and  kept  there  for  months  although  no  formal  charge  was 
made  against  him.  The  combined  efforts  of  the  Berlin  and  Vienna 
bureaus  to  bring  about  his  release  accomplished  nothing,  and  the 
photographer  remained  under  arrest  until  the  authorities  decided  to 
release  him.  He  returned  to  Berlin  but,  being  a  German  a'nd  subject  to 
the  country's  laws,  he  was  unable  to  continue  newspaper  work. 

The  tempest  whipped  up  by  Austria's  Anschluss  with  the  Reich  kept 


"PEACE  FOR  OUR  TIME"  463 

the  foreign  staff  on  an  emergency  footing  not  only  in  Vienna  and  Berlin, 
but  in  London,  Paris,  Rome,  Praha,  and  lesser  points.  Hitler's  coup 
shook  Europe  and  there  were  tense  days  during  which  no  one  knew 
what  might  come  next.  In  New  York  the  cable  and  wireless  teletypes 
turned  out  the  dispatches: 

Britain  and  France  Protest  in  "Strongest  Terms"  .  .  .  Berlin 
Retorts  They  Have  No  Right  to  be  Concerned  .  .  .  Mussolini  Ap- 
proves Hitler's  Action  .  .  .  Reinforcements  Rushed  to  Maginot  Line 
.  .  .  Czechoslovakia  Closes  Frontiers  .  .  .  Danzig  Nazis  Ask  Union 
With  the  Reich  .  .  .  Britain  to  Speed  Up  Rearmament,  Cautions  Hit- 
ler Against  Designs  on  Czechoslovakia  .  .  .  Russia  Proposes  Immediate 
Conference  to  Deal  With  Italo-German  "Menace"  .  .  .  Hitler  in 
Reichstag  Speech  Cites  Austria's  Fate  as  Warning  to  Czechoslovakia 
.  .  .  Franco  Continues  Advance  in  Spain  .  .  . 

The  most  succinct  summary  of  the  foreign  situation  appeared  not 
in  the  cable  report  but  in  a  story  by  one  of  the  New  York  staff's  ship 
news  reporters  who  interviewed  Herbert  Hoover  on  March  28  on  the 
return  of  the  former  President  of  the  United  States  from  an  extended 
trip  abroad.  Hoover  told  him:  "The  only  problem  not  acute  in  Europe 
is  that  of  parking  space." 


The  echoes  aroused  by  the  annexation  of  Austria  were  still  sound- 
ing when  the  members  of  The  AP  met  "on  April  25  for  their  1938 
meeting,  but  for  that  one  day  the  echoes  were  temporarily  forgotten. 
The  gathering  had  one  thought — to  do  honor  to  Frank  B.  Noyes,  who 
was  retiring  as  president  after  thirty-eight  years.  Since  he  first  intimated 
his  intention  to  step  down,  he  had  been  prevailed  upon  to  accept 
re-election.  But  now  the  inevitable  time  had  come  and  he  was  officially 
surrendering  to  Robert  McLean  the  gavel  he  had  wielded  since  1900. 
His  retirement,  however,  did  not  mean  a  leave-taking  from  the  asso- 
ciation's affairs.  The  members  were  anxious  that  the  75-year-old  Wash- 
ington publisher  continue  to  be  heard  in  the  councils  of  the  co-operative, 
and  Noyes  consented  to  accept  renomination  as  a  director. 

The  annual  luncheon  was  made  the  occasion  for  a  remarkable 
tribute.  A  precedent  was  broken  when  the  assemblage  rose  and  drank 
a  toast  to  the  publisher  and  his  wife  in  addition  to  the  traditional 
single  toast  to  the  President  of  the  United  States  and  the  First  Lady. 
In  the  principal  address,  Paul  Bellamy,  editor  of  the  Cleveland  Plain 
Dealer,  told  Noyes: 


464  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

"There  is  one  gift  we  can  give  you  today  which  will  gladden  your 
heart  more  than  any  other.  We  can  and  do  rededicate  ourselves  to  the 
cause  of  truth  in  the  news.  This  cause  was  never  in  direr  need  of 
defenders  than  today.  But  we  shall  tell  the  truth— and  more  resolutely 
than  ever." 

The  retiring  president  expressed  his  gratitude  for  the  "exaggera- 
tions" of  the  speakers  who  had  described  the  worth  of  his  long  service, 
and  said: 

First,  I  want  to  say  that  no  one  knows  better  than  I  that  whatever 
the  contribution  I  have  been  able  to  give  to  the  modern  Associated  Press, 
its  success  has  not  been  due  to  me,  but  as  all  of  you  know,  has  been 
through  the  staff  who  have  daily  gathered  the  news.  Under  the  direction  of 
two  great  men,  who  have  served  as  general  managers,  that  news  was  gathered 
under  the  principles  that  we  laid  down.  And  it  is  also  true  that  if  I  had 
attempted  to  interfere  with  that  unbiased  report  I  would  have  been  banished. 
If  it  were  the  general  manager  or  his  predecessor  who  had  attempted  to  color 
the  news  or  serve  a  biased  report  to  you,  he  would  have  been  banished, 
because  that  is  the  whole  basis  of  the  organization.  Fourteen  hundred  mem- 
bers of  The  Associated  Press,  as  well  as  the  Board  of  Directors,  are  on  watch 
hour  by  hour  and  day  by  day  to  see  that  that  report  is  not  contaminated,  is 
not  biased,  does  not  represent  the  beliefs  or  the  opinions  or  the  desires  of  any 
one  individual.  That,  after  all,  is  the  real  basis  of  what  The  Associated 
Press  is,  and  that  is  the  reason  why  in  these  days  at  times  some  of  us  seem 
unreasonably  opposed  to  private  control  by  a  private  organization  of  a 
dominant  news  service  serving  the  newspapers  of  the  United  States. 

I  certainly  think  that  Mr.  William  R.  Hearst  would  not  be  satisfied  to 
have  a  news  service  controlled  by  Mr.  Roy  Howard,  nor  would  I;  and  Mr. 
Roy  Howard  would  not  be  satisfied  to  have  a  news  service  that  was  controlled 
by  Mr.  William  R.  Hearst,  nor  would  I;  and  I  would  not  be  satisfied  to 
have  a  news  service  controlled  by  Frank  B.  Noyes,  and  neither  of  them  would 
either. 

The  truth  is  that  no  one  man  in  the  world  is  good  enough  to  be  trusted 
to  color  or  influence  the  report  that  comes  to  you  as  the  life  blood  of  your 
newspapers,  and  I  pray  to  God  that  the  time  may  never  come  when  any 
individual  can  dictate  to  the  newspapers  of  the  United  States  the  nature  of  the 
reports  that  they  give. 

Mr.  Bellamy  has  said  truly  that  nothing  could  make  me  happier  today 
than  to  know  that  this  generation  were  not  skeptics  as  to  the  things  that  were 
fought  for  in  1893  and  from  then  on.  It  would  be  tragic  to  me  if  I  did  not 
feel  that  the  same  belief  in  the  vital  necessity  for  a  free,  unhampered  press 
was  with  you  today  as  it  was  with  me  in  1893.  I  would  feel  that  forty-five 
years  had  been  wasted  so  far  as  I  am  concerned  and  that  the  press  of  the 
country  was  in  a  dire  situation.  But  I  have  no  such  thought  and  I  am,  as 
Mr.  Bellamy  said,  happy  in  the  belief  that  this  generation  goes  on  carrying 
the  banner  of  an  independent  press,  and  the  banner  of  The  Associated  Press 


"PEACE  FOR  OUR  TIME"  465 

as  the  representative  of  that  independent  press.  I  don't  mean  that  there  should 
be  a  dead  hand,  that  times  do  not  change,  that  there  shouldn't  be  changes 
in  the  organization,  that  you  don't  have  to  give  way  for  the  common  good, 
that  we  shouldn't  modify  our  hours  of  publication,  or  whatever  it  may  be. 
Those  things  are  the  price  of  living  together.  But  when  it  comes  to  the 
maintenance  of  the  principle  that  nobody  else,  save  the  newspapers  of  this 
country,  must  control  the  fountains  of  their  news,  I  hope  that  you  will  dedi- 
cate yourselves,  just  as  we  dedicated  ourselves  nearly  fifty  years  ago,  to  the 
defense  of  that  principle. 

I  thank  you  with  all  my  heart. 


There  was  no  doubt  but  that  there  were  formidable  forces  arrayed 
against  honest,  impartial  news  gathering  in  1938 — shrewdly  manipu- 
lated propaganda  machines,  the  tremendous  weight  of  pressure  groups, 
and  the  great  resources  of  those  whose  interest  it  was  to  suppress  facts. 
"In  no  previous  year,"  the  general  manager  said,  "has  a  graver  respon- 
sibility rested  on  the  shoulders  of  a  profession  vested  with  the  character 
of  a  public  service." 

One  unmistakable  index  of  that  responsibility  was  supplied  by 
newspaper  readers  themselves.  In  other  times  most  dispatches  were 
regarded  as  satisfactorily  complete  if  they  simply  recorded  the  outward 
or  official  aspects  of  a  situation  and  left  the  rest  to  conjecture.  But  that 
had  changed  drastically.  Now  readers  wanted  something  more.  They 
wanted  their  information  more  informative  than  the  immediate  current 
facts  could  be.  The  news  report  reflected  that  trend.  On  virtually  every 
significant  story  the  dispatches  incorporated  explanatory  background  ma- 
terial clarifying  the  latest  events,  or  they  went  beneath  the  surface 
indications  to  disclose  information  which  the  facts  obscured.  This  ex- 
planatory and  interpretive  treatment  of  the  news  was  not  an  innovation 
— The  AP  had  been  doing  it  for  some  time,  particularly  since  1933 — but 
only  now  had  it  become  an  essential  element  in  the  composition  of  the 
report. 

On  the  world's  news  fronts  the  uneasy  spring  was  followed  by  an 
uneasy  summer.  In  Central  Europe  the  Sudeten  German  Czechoslovak 
crisis  simmered.  Fierce  fighting  in  Spain  marked  the  second  anniversary 
of  the  Civil  War.  London  and  Paris  reported  Franco-British  efforts 
to  rearm.  On  the  other  side  of  the  world  bombers  droned  across  China, 
and  to  the  north  Russian  troops  battled  Japanese  along  the  ill-defined 
Manchukuo-Siberian  border.  Even  other  stories  which  appeared  in  the 


466  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

report  seemed  to  have  faint  overtones  of  remembered  conflict.  The 
Blue  and  Gray  survivors  of  1861-1865  held  their  reunion  at  Gettysburg, 
seventy-five  years  to  the  day  after  the  famous  battle.  At  a  rededication 
service  in  France,  the  bells  of  ancient  Reims  Cathedral,  silenced  by 
artillery  fire  in  the  World  War,  pealed  out  for  the  first  time  since  1914. 


As  the  first  day  of  September  drew  near,  the  wordage  of  the  cable 
report  began  to  climb  significantly.  The  pieces  of  the  news  pattern  one 
by  one  started  to  slip  into  place. 

From  Berlin:  Germany  Masses  Reservists  for  Maneuvers  with 
Regular  Army. 

From  London:  Britain  Warns  Hitler  She  Might  Fight  if  Czecho- 
slovakia Is  Attacked. 

From  Praha:  Czech  Government  Offers  "Final"  Terms  for  Settle- 
ment of  Sudeten  Grievances. 

From  Berlin:  Nazis  May  "Sponsor"  Sudeten  Demands  to  Speed 
Settlement. 

From  Paris:  French  Anxiety  Deepens,  Discuss  National  Defense. 

September  came  and  at  the  outset  the  main  burden  fell  on  the 
staff  at  the  two  trouble  spots — Berlin  and  Praha.  After  these  came  the 
other  European  centers  which  inexorably  were  being  drawn  deeper  into 
the  developing  story  with  each  passing  hour — London,  Paris,  Rome, 
Moscow,  Budapest,  Warsaw,  Geneva. 

For  the  first  several  days  of  the  month  the  news  moved  slowly. 
Efforts  to  bring  about  an  amicable  settlement  of  the  differences  of  the 
Sudeten  German  minority  in  Czechoslovakia  got  nowhere.  The  Sudeten 
Nazi  demand  stiffened  after  Hitler  pledged  support  to  Konrad  Henlein, 
their  leader. 

Germany  moved  troops.  France  moved  troops.  Czechoslovakia 
moved  troops. 

Lochner  heard  Hitler  call  the  turn  at  Niirnberg  on  September  12. 
The  German  Fiihrer  denounced  the  "shameless  ill-treatment"  of 
3,500,000  Sudetens,  demanded  they  be  given  self-determination,  and 
warned  "if  these  harassed  people  feel  they  are  without  rights  and 
aid,  they  will  get  both  from  us."  Two  days  before  Hitler's  Niirnberg 
address,  Lochner  had  written  a  story,  based  on  the  information 
obtained  from  confidential  sources,  that  Hitler  had  made  up  his  mind 
to  demand  the  annexation  of  Sudetenland.  The  NUrnberg  speech 
marked  the  beginning  of  the  story's  confirmation. 


"PEACE  FOR  OUR  TIME"  467 

The  stream  of  dispatches  in  the  next  forty-eight  hours  told  of  a 
continent  plunged  into  the  most  fearful  tension  since  1914.  From  one 
capital  after  another  came  accounts  of  military  preparations.  Disorders 
and  fighting  broke  out  in  the  Sudeten  areas.  At  Praha,  Steinkopf  and 
Larry  Allen  added  gas  masks  to  their  workaday  equipment  as  anti- 
aircraft batteries  were  moved  into  the  city  and  laborers  dug  shelters 
in  the  public  parks. 

Then  came  the  break.  On  Wednesday,  September  14,  the  teletypes 
in  New  York  began: 

BULLETIN 

LEAD  DAY  BRITISH 

LONDON,  SEPT.  14  -  (AP)  -  IT  WAS  OFFI- 
CIALLY ANNOUNCED  TONIGHT  THAT  PRIME  MINISTER 
CHAMBERLAIN  WOULD  PLY  TO  GERMANY  TOMORROW  TO 
SEE  REICHSPUHRER  HITLER  IN  AN  EFFORT  TO  ASSURE 
PEACE . 

PL  GB  410P 

BULLETIN  MATTER 

LONDON  -  FIRST  ADD  LEAD  DAY  BRITISH  X  X  X 
ASSURE  PEACE. 

THE  PRIME  MINISTER  HIMSELF  DRAMATICALLY 
ANNOUNCED  HE  INTENDED  TO  SEE  HITLER  AND  "TRY 
TO  FIND  A  PEACEFUL  SOLUTION  TO  THE  CRISIS 
WHICH  IS  MENACING  WORLD  PEACE." 
APL  GB  413P 

BULLETIN  MATTER 

LONDON  -  SECOND  ADD  LEAD  DAY  BRITISH  XXX 
WORLD  PEACE. 

THE  GERMAN  CHANCELLOR  NOTIFIED  CHAMBERLAIN 
HE  WOULD  "GLADLY  RECEIVE"  HIM  ON  SEPT.  15  AT 
BERCHTESGADEN,  HIS  RETREAT  IN  THE  BAVARIAN 
MOUNTAINS.   (MORE) 

APL  GB  41 6P 

When  Chamberlain,  carrying  the  umbrella  which  became  a  symbol, 
took  off  from  Heston  Airport  the  next  day,  DeWitt  Mackenzie,  one  of 
the  association's  Foreign  Service  specialists,  flew  after  him  in  a  chartered 
press  plane.  For  Mackenzie  the  assignment  had  an  ironic  significance. 
Twenty  years  before  he  had  witnessed  and  reported  the  birth  of  the 
new  Czechoslovak  nation  in  Paris  of  the  Versailles  Treaty  days.  Several 
years  later  he  had  been  a  guest  of  Thomas  G.  Masaryk,  Czecho- 
slovakia's first  president,  at  historic  Hradschin  Castle  in  Praha,  and  had 
heard  his  host  speak  of  the  little  republic's  future. 


468  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

It  was  foul  flying  weather.  The  Berchtesgaden-bound  planes  were 
pitched  about  in  the  turbulent  air.  Chamberlain,  making  his  first  trip 
by  air,  got  airsick,  so  much  so  that  his  plane  knded  outside  Munich 
to  permit  him  to  continue  his  journey  by  train.  He  was  not  the  only 
victim  of  the  rough  weather.  Mackenzie,  for  whom  air  travel  had  ceased 
to  be  a  novelty,  got  just  as  sick  as  the  prime  minister,  but  he  could  not 
indulge  in  the  luxury  of  getting  back  on  land  at  Munich.  His  job  was 
to  be  on  the  scene  at  Berchtesgaden  ahead  of  Chamberlain. 

The  British  prime  minister's  change  of  plans  did  not  catch  Lochner 
in  Berlin  by  surprise.  He  had  J.  A.  Bouman  at  the  Oberwiesenfeld  air- 
drome when  Chamberlain,  palely  clutching  his  umbrella  and  wearing 
a  weak  smile,  climbed  out  of  the  plane  to  be  greeted  by  Foreign  Minister 
Joachim  von  Ribbentrop  and  other  Nazi  dignitaries.  Bouman  accom- 
panied the  party  by  train  to  Berchtesgaden  where  he  joined  Mackenzie 
and  Edward  Shanke,  who  had  been  sent  from  Berlin. 

But  even  before  Bouman's  dispatch  reached  New  York  there  was 
another: 

BULLETIN 

FIRST  LEAD  CZECH 

PRAHA,  SEPT.  15  -  (AP)  -  SUDETEN  LEADER 
KONRAD  HENLEIN  ISSUED  A  PROCLAMATION  TODAY 
DEMANDING  ANNEXATION  OF  THE  SUDETEN  GERMAN 
REGIONS  OF  CZECHOSLOVAKIA  TO  GERMANY. 

OMH  918  A 

The  Praha  bulletin — which  further  confirmed  Lochner's  story  of 
September  10  on  Hitler's  Czechoslovakian  plans — served  advance 
notice  on  the  subject  matter  to  be  discussed  at  Berchtesgaden  when  the 
Fiihrer  and  Britain's  prime  minister  met. 

For  Mackenzie,  who  handled  the  main  story  there,  and  for  the 
two  Berlin  staffers  who  assisted  him,  the  assignment  meant  a  struggle 
against  twin  handicaps  of  inadequate  communications  and  official  secrecy. 
The  little  village  had  only  two  telephone  lines,  one  of  which  was 
monopolized  most  of  the  time  by  official  Nazi  business.  But  in  spite  of 
the  fierce  competition  for  the  single  remaining  line,  the  AP  men  fared 
exceptionally  well  in  getting  their  copy  through  to  Berlin  for  relay 
to  America.  Many  times,  however,  good  secondary  material  went  into 
the  wastebasket  because  there  was  no  hope  of  getting  it  on  the  wire. 

As  far  as  the  details  of  the  Hitler-Chamberlain'  discussions  were 
concerned,  each  correspondent  was  left  to  his  own  resources  to  find  out 
what  he  could.  The  official  communique  was  a  model  of  vagueness.  It 


"PEACE  FOR  OUR  TIME"  469 

took  fifty-four  words  to  state  that  there  had  been  an  "extended,  frank 
exchange  of  views  on  the  present  situation,"  and  that  "a  new  conversa- 
tion takes  place  within  a  few  days." 

Canvassing  private  resources,  Mackenzie,  Shanke,  and  Bouman 
were  able  to  establish  some  positive  facts.  No  great  enthusiasm  was 
evident  or  expressed  in  quarters  close  to  Hitler  or  Chamberlain.  It  was 
certain  that  the  prime  minister  had  obtained  no  guarantee  of  peace 
from  Germany.  Furthermore,  all  indications  were  that  Hitler  was 
adamant  in  supporting  the  Nazi  Sudeten  demand  that  Czechoslovakia's 
German  minority  be  united  with  the  Reich,  and  for  him  the  only 
question  was  how  this  might  be  accomplished.  The  one  hopeful  sign  was 
that  the  conversations  were  scheduled  to  continue  after  Chamberlain 
had  opportunity  to  confer  with  the  French.  All  this  went  into  the  stories 
from  Berchtesgaden.  Mackenzie's  impression  was  that  Chamberlain  left 
Germany  a  far  sicker  man  than  when  he  arrived. 


Chief  of  Bureau  Lochner  had  remained  in  Berlin.  His  long  expe- 
rience with  the  rigid  government  control  of  news  had  taught  him  that 
often  the  real  story  could  be  obtained,  not  on  the  scene,  but  in  apparently 
unlikely  places  miles  away.  Once  Chamberlain  took  off  for  home, 
Lochner's  story  was  the  one  that  the  New  York  cable  desk  wanted.  If 
anyone  could  pierce  the  veil  of  secrecy  surrounding  the  Berchtesgaden 
discussions,  New  York  felt  Lochner  could.  The  story  came  through 
from  Berlin  via  London : 

FIRST  LEAD  GERMAN 
BY  LOUIS  P.  LOCHNER 

BERLIN,  SEPT.  16  -  (AP)  -  ADOLF  HITLER 
WAS  SAID  TODAY  TO  HAVE  DEMANDED  BOTH  CESSION 
TO  GERMANY  OF  CZECHOSLOVAKIA'S  SUDETEN  AREA 
AND  BINDING  ASSURANCES  THAT  CZECHOSLOVAKIA'S 
FOREIGN  POLICY  SHOULD  BE  IN  HARMONY  WITH 
GERMANY ! S . 

THIS  INFORMATION  WAS  VOLUNTEERED  BY  A  MAN 
WHO  TALKED  TO  HIGH  CHANCELLERY  OFFICIALS  AT 
BERCHTESGADEN,  WHERE  HITLER  RECEIVED  PRIME 
MINISTER  CHAMBERLAIN  OF  GREAT  BRITAIN  YESTERDAY. 

ANOTHER  GERMAN  DEMAND,  THIS  SOURCE  SAID, 
WAS  THAT  AFTER  GERMAN  ABSORPTION  OF  THE  CZECHO- 
SLOVAK SUDETEN  AREA,  WHAT  IS  LEFT  OF  THAT  RE- 
PUBLIC SHOULD  FIT  ITSELF  INTO  GERMANY'S  ECONOMIC 
SYSTEM,  AT  LEAST  TO  THE  EXTENT  THAT  CZECHO- 


470  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

SLOVAKIA  DID  NOT  HINDER  REALIZATION  OP  GERMAN 
ECONOMIC  AIMS. 

THE  QUESTION  OP  UNION  OP  THE  SUDETEN  AREA 
WITH  GERMANY,  THIS  INFORMANT  SAID,  IS  NOT  EVEN 
REGARDED  AS  AN  ISSUE  BY  HITLER. 

IT  WAS  SAID  TO  HAVE  BEEN  HITLER'S  STARTING 
POINT  IN  DISCUSSIONS  WITH  ALL  OTHER  QUESTIONS, 
SUCH  AS  PROCEDURE  UNDER  WHICH  THE  CHANGE  COULD 
BE  EPPECTED  WITHOUT  WAR  GROWING  OUT  OP  IT. 
(MORE) 

ES-1135AED 

While  the  teletypes  reeled  off  Lochner's  story  that  Hitler,  in 
effect,  wanted  a  virtual  protectorate  over  Czechoslovakia,  events  in 
Europe  had  resumed  the  furious  pace  which  prevailed  before  the  brief 
respite  of  Berchtesgaden.  London  found  it  increasingly  difficult  to  com- 
municate with  Steinkopf  and  Allen  at  Praha.  Telephone  calls  were 
limited  to  six  minutes.  The  delays  in  getting  a  connection  mounted 
from  several  minutes  to  six  hours.  On  top  of  that,  a  new  scene  of  action 
had  developed  in  the  Sudeten  areas,  where  fighting  was  going  on 
between  members  of  the  Nazi  Free  Corps  and  Czech  gendarmes  or 
troops. 

Whiteleather  of  the  Berlin  Bureau  was  the  first  to  reach  the  fresh 
trouble  zone.  Armed  with  credentials  from  both  German  and  Czech 
authorities,  he  was  given  a  roving  assignment  to  work  on  both  sides  of 
the  disputed  frontier  in  the  Asch-Eger  district,  reporting  the  disorders 
and  the  stormy  Nazi  demonstrations  for  a  return  of  the  Sudetenland 
to  the  Reich.  Whiteleather  was  followed  by  Roy  Porter,  of  the  Paris 
Bureau,  who  took  over  the  task  of  patrolling  another  turbulent  section 
of  Sudetenland  by  auto.  Later  a  third  man,  Edward  Kennedy  of  Rome, 
was  moved  into  the  area.  Across  the  German  frontier  R.  F.  Schildbach 
took  up  the  job  of  covering  troop  concentrations,  the  arrival  of  Sudeten 
"refugees,"  the  activities  of  the  fugitive  Sudeten  Nazi  leader,  Konrad 
Henlein,  and  the  mobilization  of  the  "Free  Corps"  which  made  its 
headquarters  on  German  soil. 

The  border  districts  swarmed  with  secret  police  and  the  populace 
was  infected  with  a  spy  scare.  The  possession  of  pencil  and  paper,  and 
especially  a  map,  was  a  good  ticket  to  the  nearest  police  station.  Twice 
in  one  day  Whiteleather  found  himself  in  the  hands  of  the  police. 
Because  he  was  seen  asking  questions  in  Selb,  a  small  Bavarian  town, 
he  was  taken  into  custody  and  questioned  exhaustively  before  the  officer 
finally  agreed  to  release  him.  The  Czechs  were  just  as  suspicious.  A 
post-office  official  in  Eger,  Nazi  Sudeten  stronghold,  who  examined  the 


"PEACE  FOR  OUR  TIME"  471 

correspondent's  credentials,  jumped  to  the  conclusion  that  the  safe- 
conduct  letter  from  the  Czech  Foreign  Office  was  a  forgery.  He  sum- 
moned the  criminal  police  and  Whiteleather  was  taken  to  the  local 
headquarters. 

An  effort  to  obtain  an  interview  with  the  elusive  Henlein  led  to 
the  worst  experience.  Tipped  off  that  Henlein  would  address  an  un- 
scheduled Sudeten  rally  one  night  in  Dresden,  Germany,  Whiteleather 
set  out  by  automobile  with  Kenneth  Anderson,  a  Reuters  correspondent. 
They  did  not  find  Henlein,  but  there  was  plenty  of  news  in  the  fiery 
mass  meeting,  with  one  of  Henlein's  aides  proclaiming:  "With  gun  in 
hand  we  are  going  to  fight  for  our  freedom." 

The  meeting  hall  was  jammed  and  the  two  correspondents  joined 
the  overflow  throngs  gathered  outside  to  listen  to  the  harangue  over 
loud-speakers.  They  were  busily  taking  notes  when  a  Sudeten  loudly 
began  denouncing  them  as  spies.  The  crowd  set  upon  them  and  before 
the  police  arrived  the  reporters  were  roughly  handled.  The  local  police 
turned  the  pair  over  to  the  Gestapo  and  from  that  point  on  they  were 
unable  to  help  themselves. 

Whiteleather  and  Anderson  were  stripped  of  everything  they 
carried.  Requests  for  permission  to  communicate  with  an  American  or 
British  consul  were  a  waste  of  breath.  They  were  thrust  into  a  room.  A 
moment  later  an  officer  stalked  in,  planked  his  heavy  automatic  on  a 
table,  and  then  began  to  ask  questions. 

The  questioning  lasted  for  an  hour  and  a  half  and  all  the  while, 
Whiteleather  realized,  the  exclusive  Sudeten  rally  story  was  getting 
colder  and  colder.  Then  abruptly  the  officer  left  the  room,  the  two 
newspapermen  were  taken  back  to  another  part  of  the  station  where 
their  belongings  and  credentials  were  returned  without  comment.  They 
were  free  to  go. 

The  news  was  what  mattered,  and  the  tom-tom  of  events  grew 
faster  in  a  crisis  which  had  become  a  war  of  nerves.  The  cable  teletypes 
in  New  York  were  never  quiet: 

Czechoslovakia  Dissolves  Nazi  Sudeten  Party  .  .  .  Germany 
Accuses  Czechs  of  "Provocation"  .  .  .  Ten  Million  Men  Under  Arms 
in  Europe  .  .  .  French  and  British  Statesmen  Meet  in  London  to 
Draft  Answer  to  Hitler  .  .  .  Czechs  Decree  State  of  Emergency  .  .  . 

The  outcome  of  the  fateful  Franco-British  conference  at  London 
was  a  decision  to  support  Hitler  in  his  demands  concerning  the  German 
minorities  in  Czechoslovakia.  The  two  powers  jointly  "proposed"  that 
the  Czechs  agree  to  cede  the  Sudeten  areas  to  the  Reich.  While  Czecho- 


472  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

Slovakia's  answer  was  awaited,  the  teletypes  spelled  out  another  foot- 
note to  the  future: 

BULLETIN 

GENEVA,  SEPT.  21  -  (AP)  -  MAXIM  LITVINOFF, 
SOVIET  RUSSIA'S  FOREIGN  COMMISSAR,  TODAY 
BITTERLY  ACCUSED  BRITAIN  AND  PRANCE  OF  AVOIDING 
"A  PROBLEMATICAL  WAR  TODAY  IN  RETURN  FOR  A 
CERTAIN  AND  LARGE-SCALE  WAR  TOMORROW." 

GB  755A 

BULLETIN 

FOURTH  LEAD  CZECH 

PRAHA,  SEPT.  21  -  (AP)  -  THE  PROPAGANDA 
MINISTRY  DISCLOSED  INFORMALLY  TONIGHT  THAT 
CZECHOSLOVAKIA  HAD  ACCEPTED  THE  BRITISH 
FRENCH  PLAN  FOR  MEETING  REICHSFUHRER  ADOLF 
HITLER'S  PEACE  TERMS. 

OL145P 

BULLETIN  MATTER 

PRAHA  -  FIRST  ADD  FOURTH  LEAD  CZECH  XXX 
TERMS. 

AN  OFFICIAL  OF  THE  MINISTRY  SAID  AT  6:15 
P.M.  THAT  THE  GOVERNMENT  HAD  YIELDED  TO  THE 
PRESSURE  OF  LONDON  AND  PARIS. 

THE  BRITISH  AND  FRENCH  LEGATIONS  WERE 
NOTIFIED  OF  THIS  DECISION  IN  NOTES  DELIVERED 
LATE  THIS  AFTERNOON. 

GB  146P 


8 

Mackenzie,  Shanke,  and  Fred  Vanderschmidt  of  the  London  staff, 
were  at  Godesberg  on  September  22  for  the  second  of  Chamberlain's 
three  meetings  with  the  German  Chancellor.  As  far  as  coverage  prob- 
lems went,  it  was  another  Berchtesgaden  with  inadequate  communica- 
tions and  a  stone  wall  of  official  reticence.  The  hotel  where  Hitler 
stayed  was  surrounded  by  army  units,  Hitler  elite  guards  and  Gestapo 
men.  Correspondents  were  denied  all  access.  Nazi  officials  were  the  soul 
of  politeness,  but  where  news  was  concerned  their  co-operation  ended. 
A  few  secretly  contributed  some  information,  but  the  bulk  of  the  facts 
were  obtained  sub  rosa  from  Britishers  on  the  staff  accompanying 
Chamberlain. 

The  conference  dragged  through  two  nerve-racking  days.  Most  of 
the  co-operative's  news  was  routed  through  Berlin,  and  the  facilities 


"PEACE  FOR  OUR  TIME"  473 

left  much  to  be  desired.  The  German  capital  could  be  reached  only 
by  so-called  "lightning  calls"  which  cost  ten  times  the  ordinary  tolls, 
and  the  connections  were  arbitrarily  broken  after  a  certain  number  of 
minutes,  the  time  allotment  varying  unpredictably  from  hour  to  hour. 

The  story  that  Mackenzie,  Vanderschmidt,  and  Shanke  sent  from 
Godesberg  was  the  story  of  a  deadlocked  conference  with  Hitler  increas- 
ing his  Czechoslovakian  demands  and  insisting  they  be  met  by  October 
i  under  threat  of  war.  From  Praha,  Steinkopf  flashed  the  order  for 
a  general  mobilization  of  Czechoslovakia's  armed  forces,  and  on  the 
heels  of  that  news  came  John  Lloyd's  bulletin  from  Paris  that  Premier 
Edouard  Daladier  had  decided  to  decree  general  mobilization  the 
moment  Germany  marched  against  Czechoslovakia. 

Europe  began  to  black-out. 

Then  with  the  terrific  tension  close  to  the  breaking  point,  another 
respite — another  momentous  scrap  of  copy: 

THIRD  NIGHT  LEAD  CHAMBERLAIN 
BY  FRED  VANDERSCHMIDT 

GODESBERG,  GERMANY,  SEPT.  24  -  (AP)  -  (SAT- 
URDAY) -  PRIME  MINISTER  CHAMBERLAIN  SALVAGED 
THE  EPOCHAL  "PEACE  OR  WAR"  CONFERENCE  WITH 
ADOLF  HITLER  TODAY  WITH  A  MIDNIGHT  PROMISE  TO 
PUT  NEW  PRESSURE  ON  CZECHOSLOVAKIA,  MENACED  AND 
MOBILIZED. 

349AMA 

If  communications  with  Praha  had  been  erratic  before,  they  became 
virtually  impossible  once  the  Czechoslovakia  mobilization  was  decreed. 
More  calls  were  put  in  to  Praha  236:1 — SteinkopPs  telephone  number 
— than  to  any  other  single  staff  phone  in  Europe,  but  only  rarely  did 
one  get  through.  Nearby  Budapest  refused  even  urgent  calls  to  Czech 
points,  and  except  for  wireless,  the  little  republic  was  virtually  isolated. 
Marylla  Chrzanowska,  correspondent  at  Warsaw,  managed  to  get 
through  a  call  from  Poland,  but  it  was  quickly  interrupted.  Without 
success,  London  enlisted  the  help  of  amateur  wireless  stations  in  an 
effort  to  contact  Steinkopf  or  Allen.  One  story  did  come  through  to 
New  York  by  short  wave,  addressed  jointly  to  The  AP  and  one  of  its 
local  members,  the  Herald  Tribime. 

Other  facilities  developed  alarming  symptoms  of  disintegration 
on  September  25.  Telephone  calls  from  London  to  Paris  were  subject 
to  a  forty-minute  delay  and  were  limited  to  six  minutes.  The  London- 
Budapest  delay  was  at  least  an  hour.  The  London-Moscow  lines  were 


474  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

so  uncertain  under  normal  conditions  that  a  change  for  the  worse  there 
could  not  make  much  difference.  At  London,  peacetime  hub  of  the 
organization  in  Europe,  there  was  evidence  that  delays  might  soon 
extend  to  the  cables,  and  Chief  of  Bureau  J.  C.  Stark  warned  New 
York  to  stand  ready  to  handle  quick  transatlantic  telephone  calls.  To 
make  communications  trouble  complete,  atmospheric  conditions  badly 
hampered  the  radio  transmission  of  pictures. 

In  the  no  man's  land  of  the  Sudeten  regions,  Whiteleather,  Porter, 
and  Kennedy  were  finding  their  assignments  more  perilous  than  ever, 
what  with  land  mines,  snipers,  and  barbed-wire  entanglements.  Al- 
though instructed  to  take  no  unnecessary  risks,  the  men  frequently  faced 
machine  gun  and  rifle  fire  to  get  their  stories.  Regulations  became  more 
severe.  The  Nazi  Free  Corps  barred  all  correspondents  from  approach- 
ing within  gunshot  of  their  rear  guard  unless  they  had  special  passes, 
and  these  were  valid  for  only  a  few  hours.  Because  of  the  paralysis  of 
Czech  communications,  Whiteleather  had  to  drive  sixty  miles  to  get 
his  stories  out,  while  his  two  colleagues,  lacking  German  credentials, 
could  not  cross  the  border  and  were  forced  to  rely  either  on  couriers 
to  neighboring  countries  or  on  the  uncertain  telegraph. 

Whiteleather's  experience  with  spy  scares  and  police  of  one  sort 
or  another  convinced  him  it  might  be  wise  to  show  his  nationality 
plainly.  He  got  a  small  American  flag  and  pinned  it  to  his  coat  lapel. 
His  confidence  was  deflated  when  an  innkeeper  at  Asch  inquired 
curiously:  "What's  that  you  have,  a  German  war  flag?"  On  another 
occasion  he  got  a  lift  across  the  border  from  Anderson  of  Reuters,  who 
had  a  British  flag  on  his  car.  When  they  stopped  at  Selb  in  Germany 
to  file  their  stories,  a  peasant  girl  touched  the  AP  man's  arm  and 
pointed  to  the  Union  Jack.  "Is  that  the  new  Sudeten  German  party 
flag?"  she  asked.  After  that  Whiteleather  gave  up  the  flag  idea. 


The  anxiety  and  tension  before  the  Chamberlain-Hitler  meeting 
at  Godesberg  was  as  nothing  to  what  succeeded  it.  Dispatch  after  dispatch 
told  of  a  continent  sweeping  toward  a  precipice  which  all  those  con- 
cerned professed  every  desire  to  avoid.  Even  the  small,  traditionally 
neutral  nations  were  girding  for  an  emergency.  Occasional  items  such 
as  the  report  of  a  prize  fight  in  London  or  a  soccer  game  in  Dublin 
seemed  incongruous  news  indeed,  sandwiched  as  they  were  between 
stories  of  air  raid  scares  in  Paris  and  black-outs  in  Praha. 


"PEACE  FOR  OUR  TIME"  475 

Editors  in  New  York  swiftly  relayed  the  incoming  flood  of  copy, 
inserting  the  deleted  first  names,  articles  and  prepositions,  then  rushing 
the  dispatches  to  the  Morkrums: 

BULLETIN 

SECOND  LEAD  FRENCH 

PARIS,  SEPT.  24  -  (AP)  -  PRANCE  MOBILIZED 
270,000  RESERVISTS  TODAY  IN  THE  LAST  STEP 
BEFORE  GENERAL  MOBILIZATION  AS  EVACUATION  OP 
TOWNS  ALONG  THE  GERMAN  FRONTIER  BEGAN. 
RFH  523  AED 

BULLETIN  MATTER 

PARIS  -  FIRST  ADD  SECOND  LEAD  FRENCH  XXX 
FRONTIER  BEGAN. 

TWO  FULL  CLASSES  WERE  ORDERED  TO  THE  COLORS 
THIS  MORNING,  PUSHING  PRANCE'S  MEN  UNDER  ARMS 
TO  CONSIDERABLY  OVER  THE  2,000,000  MARK. 

AT  THE  SAME  TIME  IT  WAS  REPORTED  THAT 
PREMIER  DALADIER  WOULD  FLY  TO  LONDON  THIS 
MORNING  BECAUSE  OF  THE  INTERNATIONAL  SITUATION 
GROWING  FROM  GERMAN  EFFORTS  TO  TAKE  OVER 
CZECHOSLOVAKIA'S  SUDETENLAND  HAD  BECOME  MUCH 
WORSE . 

TFH  525AED 

More  copy: 

BULLETIN 

VICENZA,  ITALY,  SEPT.  25  -  (AP)  -  PREMIER 
MUSSOLINI  THREATENED  TODAY  TO  TAKE  MILITARY 
MEASURES  IF  OTHER  NATIONS  DO  NOT  CEASE  MOBILIZ- 
ING MEN  AND  WARSHIPS. 

MUSSOLINI  DID  NOT  MENTION  BY  NAME  EITHER 
FRANCE  OR  GREAT  BRITAIN,  BOTH  OF  WHICH  HAVE 
TAKEN  EMERGENCY  PRECAUTIONS,  BUT  IT  WAS  BELIEVED 
HIS  DECLARATION  WAS  DIRECTED  AT  THEM. 

BB  1242A 

By  this  time  the  situation  had  become  so  ominous  that  the  question 
of  evacuating  the  families  of  correspondents  arose.  Stark  of  London 
advised  the  general  manager  that  he  was  sending  the  wives  and  children 
of  his  staff  men  to  the  country,  pending  provisions  for  their  return  to 
the  United  States.  Boat  accommodations  were  at  a  premium,  he  cabled, 
but  Joseph  P.  Kennedy,  United  States  ambassador  to  England,  was 
canvassing  all  possibilities  before  asking  for  American  ships.  Chief  of 
Bureau  Lloyd  in  Paris  had  a  similar  problem,  with  the  wives  of  seven 
staff  men  and  their  nine  children  to  consider.  He  sent  them  off  to 


476  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

remote  French  villages  until  a  decision  was  reached  on  returning  them 
to  America.  From  Geneva  Charles  Foltz  cabled  his  family  to  cancel 
their  plans  to  sail  from  New  York  to  join  him.  Wives  of  the  men 
on  the  Berlin  staff  began  to  pack  up  and  make  ready  to  leave  Germany. 

Simultaneously  preparations  were  made  for  the  protection  of  the 
bureaus  in  event  of  war.  Those  responsible  had  to  think  in  terms  of 
sandbags,  black-out  paper  for  windows,  and  strips  of  criss-cross  tape  to 
keep  the  panes  from  shattering  should  bombers  strike.  Final  arrange- 
ments were  completed  in  cable  exchanges  with  New  York  for  the  staff 
abroad  to  revert  to  a  full  wartime  basis  at  a  minute's  notice,  filing  direct 
to  New  York  instead  of  to  London.  London  still  was  clearing  the  bulk 
of  European  copy,  but  an  increasing  proportion  of  dispatches  were  being 
sent  direct.  Stark  also  reported  that  everything  was  in  readiness  to 
shift  the  London  Bureau  to  a  previously  selected  secret  location  if 
war  came  and  air  raids  made  the  British  capital  untenable. 

All  this,  of  course,  was  incidental  to  the  main  task  of  reporting 
under  the  most  driving  pressure.  Yet  Lloyd  in  Paris  found  time  to 
worry  about  his  staff  and  the  fact  that  he  couldn't  procure  gas  masks 
for  them.  Foltz  at  Geneva  proved  the  hero  of  the  emergency.  He  found 
a  Swiss  shop  where  a  limited  supply  was  available  at  fifty  francs  each. 
He  sent  thirty  to  Paris  by  plane. 

And  the  teletypes  hammered  on: 

BULLETIN  -     v 

FIRST  LEAD  FRENCH 

PARIS,    SEPT.    25   -    (AP)    -   THE  FRENCH  CAB- 
INET AGREED  UNANIMOUSLY  THAT  REICHSFUHRER 
HITLER'S  MEMORANDUM  TO   CZECHOSLOVAKIA  DE- 
MANDING  QUICK  OCCUPATION  OF   SUDETENLAND  BY 
GERMANY  WITHOUT   GUARANTEES  FOR  NEW   CZECHO- 
SLOVAK FRONTIERS  WAS    "UNACCEPTABLE." 

BB1232P 

BULLETIN 

FIRST  LEAD  BRITISH 

LONDON,    SEPT.    25   -    (AP)    -   THE  CZECHO- 
SLOVAK GOVERNMENT'S  REPLY  TO  REICHSFUHRER  ADOLF 
HITLER'S    "FINAL  OFFER"   FOR  PEACE  WAS  REPORTED 
RELIABLY  TONIGHT   TO   CONSTITUTE  VIRTUAL  IF  NOT 
COMPLETE  REJECTION. 

OL  120P 

BULLETIN  MATTER 

LONDON  -  FIRST  ADD  FIRST  LEAD  BRITISH 
XXX  REJECTION. 

IT  WAS  STATED  THE  REPLY  WAS  HANDED  TO  THE 
-BRITISH  FOREIGN  OFFICE  BY  THE  CZECHOSLOVAK 


"PEACE  FOR  OUR  TIME"  477 

MINISTER,  JAN  MASARYK,  SHORTLY  BEFORE  FRENCH 
PREMIER  EDOUARD  DALADIER  AND  FOREIGN  MINISTER 
GEORGES  BONNET  ARRIVED  TO  CONSULT  WITH  BRITISH 
LEADERS . 

OL  12 7P 

Czechoslovakia's  isolation  had  become  more  complete  than  ever* 
Traffic  was  virtually  suspended  for  all  except  the  military.  Most  border 
points  were  closed  and  censorship  imposed  on  all  telephone  calls.  Each 
time  London  heard  from  the  men  in  the  Sudeten  region  it  was  a  relief. 
The  dispatches  Allen  sent  through  by  courier  to  Budapest  offered 
assurance  that  he  was  safe,  but  anxiety  was  felt  for  Steinkopf.  Louis 
Matzhold  prevailed  upon  the  American  legation  at  Budapest  to  put 
through  a  diplomatic  call  to  the  legation  at  Praha,  and  this  established 
that  Steinkopf  was  well  and  working  hard.  Later  the  Czech  legation  at 
Budapest  informed  The  AP  that  the  Foreign  Office  in  Praha  was 
making  special  arrangements  to  permit  Steinkopf  to  send  his  dispatches 
via  wireless. 

While  the  world  waited  on  September  26,  the  crisis  which  seemed 
to  have  no  end  pushed  to  more  terrible  peaks.  Mussolini  again  warned 
France  and  Britain  to  leave  the  Czechs  to  their  fate.  Chamberlain  sent 
a  new  appeal  to  Hitler.  And  in  the  huge,  swastika-draped  Sportspalast 
at  Berlin  the  German  Chancellor  took  the  rostrum  before  his  wildly 
heiling  followers  for  his  final  pronouncement  on  the  Sudeten  issue. 
Lochner,  Rudolf  Josten,  and  Bouman  were  there  to  handle  the  spot 
news,  leaving  the  color  to  Shanke  and  Mackenzie,  who  had  attached 
himself  to  the  Berlin  staff  after  Berchtesgaden. 

Copy — from  Paris,  not  Berlin: 

BULLETIN 

PARIS,  SEPT.  26  -  (AP)  -  AN  OFFICIAL 
STATEMENT  ISSUED  BY  THE  FOREIGN  OFFICE  TODAY 
SAID  THAT  IF,  IN  SPITE  OF  ALL  EFFORTS  MADE  BY 
PRIME  MINISTER  CHAMBERLAIN,  GERMANY  WERE  TO 
ATTACK  CZECHOSLOVAKIA,  FRANCE  WOULD  GO  TO  THE 
AID  OF  THE  LITTLE  REPUBLIC  AND  THAT  BRITAIN 
AND  RUSSIA  WOULD  STAND  BY  FRANCE. 
EDB  336  PED 

From  the  Sportspalast: 

NIGHT  LEAD  HITLER 
BY  LOUIS  P.  LOCHNER 

BERLIN,  SEPT.  26  -  (AP)  -  REICHSFUHRER 
ADOLF  HITLER  TONIGHT  TOLD  THE  WORLD  THAT  IJ 


478  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

CZECHOSLOVAKIA  DOES  NOT  GIVE  GERMANY  THE 
TERRITORY  HE  HAS  MARKED  AS  SUDETENLAND  BY 
OCTOBER  1,  HE  WILL  ACT. 

"THE  TIME  HAS  COME  TO  TALK  BUSINESS,"  HE 
SAID.   "THE  SUDETENLAND  IS  THE  LAST  TERRITORIAL 
DEMAND  I  HAVE  TO  MAKE  IN  EUROPE,  BUT  IT  IS  A 
DEMAND  PROM  WHICH  I  NEVER  WILL  RECEDE." 
2145  HTM  530P 

Take  after  take  of  the  story  flowed  across  the  cable  desk  in  New 
York  and  thence  to  the  domestic  wires.  Hitler  Text  .  .  .  Add  Hitler 
Descriptive  .  .  .  First  Add  Lochner  .  .  .  Second  Add  Lochner  .  .  . 
And  the  bank  of  cable  teletypes  kept  spelling  out  more. 

The  next  day  Ambassador  Kennedy  confidentially  advised  Stark 
to  get  the  families  of  the  London  staff  out  of  England  and  offered  to 
arrange  for  accommodations  on  a  Swedish  liner  sailing  September  29. 
The  British  government  started  the  final  preliminary  moves  for  the 
imposition  of  censorship.  Because  two  out  of  three  news  pictures  dealt 
with  war  preparations  or  subjects  of  a  military  nature,  they  had  to  be 
submitted  to  the  War  Office  for  approval  before  transmission.  Paris 
already  was  feeling  the  censor's  hand.  One  dispatch  was  held  up  two 
hours  and  thirty-seven  minutes.  Lloyd  switched  his  entire  urgent  file 
direct  to  New  York,  reporting  that  delays  on  all  channels  to  London 
had  become  several  hours  long. 

At  Praha  the  staff  got  ready  for  the  terrific  impact  of  the  German 
Blitzkrieg  which  everyone  expected.  Steinkopf  informed  New  York 
that  he,  Allen,  and  Porter,  who  was  just  back  from  Sudetenland, 
planned  to  divide  if  the  government  left  the  Czech  capital.  One  of 
them,  however,  would  remain  at  Praha  as  long  as  communications  held 
out.  The  news  would  go  out  by  radio  to  the  Paris  Bureau  for  relay 
to  the  United  States.  Steinkopf  had  no  direct  word  from  the  border 
regions  where  Kennedy  and  Whiteleather  were  still  on  assignment. 

Resentment  in  Praha  ran  high  against  France  and  Britain,  for  the 
Czechs  felt  that  they  had  been  "sold  out"  by  the  earlier  concessions  to 
Hitler.  Allen  was  spat  upon  by  one  group  of  Czechs  who  thought  he 
was  English,  but  they  apologized  when  they  learned  he  was  an 
American. 

Not  only  in  Czechoslovakia,  but  in  Hungary  and  other  Central 
European  countries,  the  money  problems  of  staff  and  resident  corre- 
spondents became  acute.  Government-controlled  communications  facili- 
ties were  insisting  on  prepaid  tolls  in  all  cases.  Banks  refused  to  cash 
checks,  and  in  some  instances  no  withdrawals  were  permitted.  Treasurer 


"PEACE  FOR  OUR  TIME"  479 

Curtis  got  a  steady  stream  of  urgent  requests  to  cable  dollars.  No 
foreign  exchange.  Dollars. 

And  all  the  while  the  news: 

SECOND  LEAD  BRITISH 
BY  RADER  WINGET 

LONDON,  SEPT.  27  -  (AP)  -  JAN  MASARYK, 
CZECHOSLOVAK  MINISTER  TO  LONDON,  TODAY  MADE 
PUBLIC  HIS  GOVERNMENT'S  NOTE  FLATLY  REFUSING  TO 
ACCEPT  ADOLF  HITLER'S  "FINAL"  TERMS  FOR  CUTTING 
UP  CZECHOSLOVAKIA  AS  THE  PRICE  OF  EUROPEAN 
PEACE . 

ADS  737A 

THIRD  LEAD  DEFENSE 

LONDON,  SEPT,  27  -  (AP)  -  THE  OFFICIAL 
GAZETTE  TODAY  PUBLISHED  A  ROYAL  ORDER  FROM 
KING  GEORGE  DECLARING  "A  CASE  OF  EMERGENCY 
EXISTS"  AND  AUTHORIZING  THE  CALLING  UP  OF 
AUXILIARY  AIR  FORCES  FOR  DEFENSE. 

OMH  154P 

BULLETIN 

FIRST  LEAD  CHAMBERLAIN 

LONDON,  SEPT.  27  -  (AP)  -  PRIME  MINISTER 
CHAMBERLAIN  DECLARED  TONIGHT  HE  WOULD  NOT  HESI- 
TATE TO  TAKE  A  THIRD  TRIP  TO  GERMANY  IF  HE 
THOUGHT  IT  WOULD  DO  ANY  GOOD,  BUT  AT  THE 
MOMENT  "I  CAN  SEE  NOTHING  FURTHER  THAT  I  CAN 
USEFULLY  DO  IN  THE  WAY  OF  MEDIATION." 

GB  211P 

LONDON  -  FIRST  ADD  FIRST  LEAD  CHAMBERLAIN 
XXX  MEDIATION. 

"IF  I  WERE  CONVINCED  THAT  ANY  NATION  HAD 
MADE  UP  ITS  MIND  TO  DOMINATE  THE  WORLD  BY  FORCE 
I  SHOULD  NOT  HESITATE  TO  RESIST  IT,"  THE  PRIME 
MINISTER  DECLARED  IN  A  BROADCAST  FROM  FAMED 
TEN  DOWNING  STREET. 

"I  FIND  HERR  HITLER'S  ATTITUDE  UNREASONABLE 
IN  HIS  FINAL  DEMANDS,"  HE  CONTINUED. 

"BUT  I  SHALL  NOT  GIVE  UP  MY  HOPE  FOR  A 
PEACEFUL  SOLUTION." 

GB  218P 

BULLETIN 

LONDON,  SEPT.  27  -  (AP)  -  THE  ADMIRALTY 
TONIGHT  ANNOUNCED  THE  IMMEDIATE  MOBILIZATION  OF 
THE  ENTIRE  NAVY. 

CCC  614P 


480  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

10 

The  night  of  September  27-28,  taut  and  weary  correspondents  knew 
the  explosive  situation  could  not  last  much  longer.  For  the  past  two 
weeks  they  had  been  battling  a  maelstrom  of  propaganda,  inspired 
untruths,  and  false  reports,  endeavoring  to  sift  out  truth  and  actual 
facts  and  to  report  them  honestly,  without  emotionalism  or  synthetic 
hysteria.  A  miscue,  a  lapse  in  levelheaded  thinking  under  those  circum- 
stances might  conceivably  have  disastrous  results. 

Stark  sent  a  message  the  morning  of  September  28,  saying  that 
Witt  Hancock  would  handle  the  running  story  and  Vanderschmidt  the 
leads  when  Prime  Minister  Chamberlain  appeared  in  the  House  of 
Commons  that  day  to  report  on  the  crisis  and  announce  Britain's 
readiness  to  go  to  war,  if  need  be.  Everyone  expected  that  to  mark 
the  beginning  of  the  end. 

Before  the  Parliament  session  started  the  news  indicated  how  near 
that  end  might  be.  Germany  recalled  all  her  shipping  from  the  seas. 
The  British  Air  Ministry  sent  up  fighting  planes  to  guard  against  any 
lightning  thrust  of  enemy  bombers.  France  ordered  a  new  partial 
mobilization  of  army  reserves.  The  Czechs  were  ready  to  resist  invasion 
to  the  last  ditch. 

The  impersonal  teletypes  in  New  York  mechanically  carried  on 
with  the  story  which  for  days  had  been  pouring  from  20,000  to  30,000 
words  across  the  sea  to  The  AP  each  twenty-four  hours. 

BULLETIN 
CHAMBERLAIN  RUNNING 

LONDON,  SEPT.  28  -  (AP)  -  PRIME  MINISTER 
CHAMBERLAIN,  OPENING  HIS  HISTORIC  DECLARATION 
TO  PARLIAMENT  TODAY,  SAID,  MWE  ARE  PACED  WITH 
A  SITUATION  WHICH  HAS  NO  PARALLEL  SINCE  1914." 

APL  GB 

And  a  little  later: 

BULLETIN 

LEAD  CHAMBERLAIN 

LONDON,  SEPT.  28  -  (AP)  -  PRIME  MINISTER 
CHAMBERLAIN  TOLD  PARLIAMENT  TODAY  THAT  ADOLF 
HITLER  HAD  INFORMED  HIM  AT  BERCHTESGADEN  THAT 
"RATHER  THAN  WAIT"  TO  HELP  THE  SUDETEN  GERMANS 
ACHIEVE  SELF-DETERMINATION  "HE  WOULD  BE  PRE- 
PARED TO  RISK  A  WORLD  WAR." 

GB  946A 


"PEACE  FOR  OUR  TIME"  481 

At  the  cable  desk  and  in  the  offices  of  member  papers,  editors 
gravely  watched  the  story  line  after  line  as  it  came  from  the  typebars. 
This  looked  like  the  end. 

Then  in  the  House  of  Commons,  as  Chamberlain  was  reaching 
the  close  of  his  speech,  a  cabinet  minister  hastily  passed  him  a  message 
on  a  folded  piece  of  paper. 

The  news  printers  jangled  with  the  bells  that  signaled  only  the 
most  urgent  news. 

BULLETIN 

SECOND  LEAD  CHAMBERLAIN 

LONDON,  SEPT.  28  -  (AP)  -  PRIME  MINISTER 
CHAMBERLAIN  DRAMATICALLY  ANNOUNCED  TODAY  THAT 
HE,  PREMIER  DALADIER  OP  PRANCE,  AND  PREMIER 
MUSSOLINI  OP  ITALY  WOULD  GO  TO  MUNICH  TOMORROW 
TO  MEET  CHANCELLOR  HITLER. 
APL  GB1024A 

BULLETIN  MATTER 

LONDON  -  PIRST  ADD  SECOND  LEAD  CHAMBERLAIN 
XXX  HITLER 

THE  PRIME  MINISTER  SAID  HITLER  HAD  AGREED 
TO  POSTPONE  MOBILIZATION  OP  THE  GERMAN  ARMY  POR 
24  HOURS  TO  PERMIT  THE  HOLDING  OP  THIS  CONPER- 
ENCE  IN  SEARCH  OP  A  WAY  TO  AVERT  A  EUROPEAN  WAR. 
APL  GB  1028A 

The  bureau  chiefs  abroad  drafted  plans  for  covering  the  Munich 
conference.  Lochner,  who  proceeded  at  once  to  the  Bavarian  city,  headed 
the  staff  chosen  for  the  assignment.  Mackenzie  accompanied  him. 
Vanderschmidt  flew  from  London.  His  particular  responsibility  was  the 
British  delegation.  Foltz  was  selected  for  similar  work  with  the  French. 
The  fifth  member  of  the  staff  was  Whiteleather,  who  knew  the  Italian 
end  of  the  axis  because  of  his  previous  experience  in  Rome.  He  got 
word  of  his  assignment  while  under  fire  during  one  of  the  numerous 
Czech-German  frontier  clashes  that  had  been  taking  place. 

The  staff  took  over  a  hotel  suite  for  its  Munich  headquarters.  A 
regular  news  desk  was  set  up  and  arrangements  perfected  for  routing 
the  bulk  of  the  story  to  London  by  telephone,  and  the  overflow  to 
Berlin  by  telegraph.  The  story  Lochner  wrote  on  the  eve  of  the  con- 
ference stated  on  authoritative  information  that  Hitler  would  insist  on 
getting  the  Sudetenland,  as  he  had  determined  all  along. 

Lochner  and  Mackenzie  watched  Hitler  and  Mussolini  arrive  by 


482  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

train  the  next  morning,  Thursday,  September  29.  Hitler  was  smiling 
and  self-assured.  His  axis  partner,  Mussolini,  was  heavy-eyed  and 
drawn.  The  German  officials  to  whom  Mackenzie  spoke  were  not 
optimistic,  but  they  all  manifested  a  hopeful  air.  Lochner  got  a  more 
positive  reaction  from  his  sources.  Bavaria's  governor,  General  Earl 
Ritter  von  Epp,  a  doughty  old  warrior,  had  no  misgivings.  "Herr 
Lochner,"  he  explained,  "Munich  today  is  the  center  of  the  world.  It's 
right  here  that  its  axis  is  going  to  be  greased!" 

At  the  airport  Foltz  flashed  the  arrival  of  the  two  Allied  spokes- 
men, Daladier  and  Chamberlain.  Daladier  was  the  first  to  land.  He  came 
armed  with  plenary  powers  under  which  he  could  place  France  on  a 
war  footing  by  a  single  telephone  call  if  the  conference  failed.  Cham- 
berlain's plane  landed  a  half  hour  later.  The  prime  minister  was  affable 
as  he  received  the  greeting  of  Foreign  Minister  von  Ribbentrop,  but 
his  smile  vanished  when  he  was  escorted  across  the  field  to  review  an 
honor  guard  of  black-uniformed  SS  troops. 

The  conferees  held  three  carefully  guarded  sessions  before  the 
final  agreement  was  signed,  sealing  the  fate  of  Czechoslovakia.  The 
first  began  at  12:45  P.M.  and  continued  until  2:45  P.M.  After  a  two- 
hour  interval  the  statesmen  convened  again  and  sat  until  8:20  P.M. 
The  final  conference  started  at  10  P.M.  and  lasted  until  after  midnight. 
Except  for  the  strictly  cautious  and  limited  announcements  of  govern- 
ment spokesmen,  the  progress  of  the  discussions  was  shrouded  with 
secrecy  and  uncertainty.  The  air  was  full  of  all  sorts  of  rumors,  sur- 
mises, and  speculation. 

The  interval  between  the  first  and  second  sessions  gave  Lochner 
the  opportunity  he  needed  and  he  went  behind  the  scenes,  as  he  had 
done  repeatedly  during  the  year,  to  determine  what  was  actually 
happening.  An  hour  after  the  second  session  began,  he  had  a  story  on 
the  cables  setting  forth  in  detail  an  authentic  summary  of  what  was  to 
be  the  outcome  of  the  conference.  Hitler,  his  information  ran,  would  get 
virtually  everything  he  demanded.  The  only  difference  was  that  the 
annexation  of  the  Sudetenland  would  be  effected  by  degrees  over  a 
period  of  ten  days,  instead  of  in  toto  on  October  i.  The  Polish  and 
Hungarian  claims  to  portions  of  the  Czech  state  were  to  be  settled,  and 
then  a  guarantee  by  the  four  powers  to  protect  what  was  left  of  the 
little  nation  against  unprovoked  aggression. 

The  succeeding  hours  produced  unofficial  confirmation  bit  by  bit, 
not  only  at  Munich  but  in  European  capitals  involved,  and  finally 
sixteen  minutes  before  the  formal  communique  was  issued: 


"PEACE  FOR  OUR  TIME"  483 

BULLETIN 
LEAD 

MUNICH,  SEPT.  30  --  (FRIDAY)  -  (AP)  - 
WESTERN  EUROPE'S  POUR  MAJOR  POWERS  EARLY  THIS 
MORNING  ANNOUNCED  AGREEMENT  "IN  PRINCIPLE"  ON 
PLANS  FOR  CEDING  TO  GERMANY  THE  SUDETEN  REGIONS 
OF  CZECHOSLOVAKIA  AND  THUS  KEEP  EUROPE  AT 
PEACE . 

WW  753P 

There  followed  the  terms  for  "peace  for  our  time" — terms  which 
Lochner  had  described  more  than  eight  hours  earlier — and  a  compre- 
hensive roundup  not  only  of  what  had  happened  at  Munich,  but  also 
an  explanation  of  the  events  and  their  effect  on  the  nations  of  Europe. 
Simultaneously  from  Berlin,  Rome,  London,  and  Paris  came  stories 
of  relief  at  the  settlement  of  the  crisis.  Only  the  dispatches  from 
Moscow  and  Praha  struck  a  contrary  note.  In  the  Soviet  capital  the 
Munich  powers  were  branded  "beasts  of  prey,"  and  in  Praha  there  was 
the  bitter  grief  of  a  nation  which  had  sacrificed  itself  to  "superior  force" 
in  order  "to  save  the  peace  of  Europe." 


ii 

Munich  produced  one  more  major  story  September  30— the  signing 
of  a  special  statement  by  Hitler  and  Chamberlain  as  earnest  "of  the 
desires  of  our  two  peoples  never  to  go  to  war  with  one  another  again." 

Whiteleather  and  Mackenzie  started  for  the  German-Czech  border 
to  join  Schildbach  and  cover  the  advance  of  the  German  army  of 
occupation  when  it  started  to  move  into  the  Sudeten  areas  on  October  i. 
They  found  strict  regulations  had  been  promulgated  to  govern  all 
correspondents.  Any  foreigner  not  officially  attached  to  headquarters 
or  not  accompanied  by  an  army  officer  was  subject  to  arrest.  Reporters 
were  promised  an  opportunity  to  see  everything,  but  warned  against 
independent  investigations.  Photographers  were  denied  permission  to 
accompany  the  troops.  The  only  pictures  available  would  be  made  by 
army  cameramen.  Across  the  border  with  the  Czech  troops  who  were 
waiting  to  fall  back  as  the  Germans  advanced  The  AP  had  Kennedy, 
Porter,  and  Allen.  They  were  not  subject  to  the  same  restrictions,  and 
photographers  had  the  opportunity  of  recording  the  story  from  the 
Czech  side  without  interference. 

The  hour  when  the  occupation  would  begin  on  October  I  was  left 
indefinite,  but  Lochner  had  his  resident  correspondents  alert  at  all 


484  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

points  in  case  the  move  was  made  at  some  place  not  immediately 
accessible  to  the  staff  men  with  the  army.  Konstantin  Kreuzer  at  Salz- 
burg stayed  up  all  night  and  flashed  the  first  word  when  a  reconnais- 
sance vanguard  of  infantry  battalion  strength  crossed  the  border  at 
2  A.M.  near  Aigen,  Upper  Austria.  Kreuzer's  news  of  the  start  of  the 
occupation — news  sharply  challenged  at  the  time  in  a  number  of 
quarters — was  confirmed  many  hours  later  by  both  the  Propaganda 
Ministry  in  Berlin  and  by  the  headquarters  of  the  army. 

After  that  the  story  settled  down  to  a  schedule  basis  with  the 
installment  occupation  of  the  ceded  zones,  the  Fuhrer's  triumphal 
progress  through  the  Sudetenland,  the  Polish  and  Hungarian  annexa- 
tions of  the  areas  they  claimed,  and  the  readjustment  of  Czecho- 
slovakia's national  life  to  meet  her  straitened  circumstances. 

In  the  judgment  of  the  general  manager,  the  Czech-German  crisis 
with  its  weeks  of  suspense,  upheaval,  and  uncertainty  was  one  of  the 
greatest  tests  the  co-operative's  foreign  staff  had  faced.  He  wrote  an 
appraisal  in  a  special  message  to  all  employes: 

It  has  been  a  time  when  calm,  sound,  and  accurate  reporting  in  the  midst 
of  rumors  and  alarms  was  a  requisite  of  highest  consequence.  Millions  of 
Americans  have  made  the  reports  of  The  Associated  Press  their  first  reliance 
in  their  eager  quest  for  the  truth.  The  staff  has  met  that  responsibility  fully. 
It  has  recorded  only  the  truth.  It  has  reported  no  wars  that  did  not  mater- 
ialize, and  no  peace  settlements  until  they  were  arrived  at. 

It  is  gratifying  to  know  that  developments  were  covered  with  uniform 
promptness — in  many  instances  with  surprising  and  unparalleled  speed. 

But  far  beyond  that,  it  is  more  satisfying  than  words  can  express  that 
nothing  you  have  written  need  be  erased,  but  can  stand  as  an  authentic  day 
to  day  history  of  one  of  the  great  international  episodes  of  our  times. 

The  Pulitzer  Prize  Committee  voted  Lochner  the  award  for 
outstanding  work  by  a  foreign  correspondent  during  1938. 


12 

As  the  reverberating  echoes  of  Munich  began  to  subside,  Mac- 
kenzie, free  to  assume  his  roving  assignment  as  a  Foreign  Service 
specialist,  set  out  to  visit  Eastern  and  Central  Europe  Jo  study  at  first 
hand  the  long-range  results  of  the  four-power  agreement.  The  question 
was:  What  next  in  Europe?  As  a  trained  observer,  he  sought  the  signs 
and  the  evidence.  What  Munich  had  meant  to  the  nations  most  vitally 


"PEACE  FOR  OUR  TIME"  485 

concerned,  and  what  officials  of  those  nations  thought  it  might  mean  in 
time  to  come — that  was  news. 

The  first  country  Mackenzie  visited  was  Poland.  He  found  the 
Poles,  although  jubilant  over  their  share  in  the  Czech  spoils,  suspicious 
of  what  Hitler  might  do  next.  They  did  not  discount  their  fears  of 
aggression,  and  they  seemed  to  have  little  confidence  in  the  power  of 
Britain  and  France,  under  "appeasement"  governments,  to  deter  the 
German  Chancellor  from  any  subsequent  move. 

In  Warsaw  the  correspondent  had  a  long  talk  with  an  authority 
who  had  been  close  to  the  late  Marshal  Pilsudski,  Poland's  "strong 


man." 


"Ah,  Mr.  Mackenzie,"  said  the  informant,  "Hitler  should  have 
been  stopped  long  ago.  In  1933,  the  year  he  became  the  power  in 
Germany,  Marshal  Pilsudski  urged  strongly  upon  our  ally,  France,  the 
great  need  for  waging  a  preventive  war  against  the  Reich.  It  would 
have  been  easy  then.  'Now  is  the  best  time,'  Pilsudski  told  the  French. 
'You'll  have  to  do  it  sooner  or  later.'  But  France  could  not  be  per- 
suaded." 

As  to  Poland's  future,  the  Pole  intimated  that  their  course  de- 
pended largely  on  Hitler's  attitude.  "He's  the  master  of  Central  Eu- 
rope. Poland  doesn't  have  much  choice.  It  is  prepared,  as  you  say,  to  play 
his  game  economically  and  in  other  ways  as  long  as  he  makes  no  efforts 
to  intrude  on  our  sovereignty.  It  can't  do  anything  else,  situated  as  it  is. 
But  if  it  ever  becomes  necessary  to  defend  Polish  sovereignty,  be 
assured  that  the  Poles  will  fight  to  defend  themselves." 

Throughout  the  Balkans,  government  officials  and  others  of  stand- 
ing in  the  little  nations  were  inclined  to  take  an  even  gloomier  view, 
Mackenzie  found.  He  talked  with  Cabinet  ministers,  diplomats,  army 
officers,  businessmen,  educators,  and  the  peasants  he  encountered  along 
the  roadsides.  Everywhere  he  found  the  same  feeling  that  Hitler  was 
the  dominant  figure  on  the  Continent,  that  all  Franco-British  influence 
in  Central  Europe  had  been  ended  by  the  "defeat"  at  Munich.  Govern- 
ments feared  that  their  nations  might  be  the  next  victims.  A  great  deal 
of  what  Mackenzie  learned  was  in  confidence  or  for  his  personal  infor- 
mation as  background  in  writing  interpretive  articles.  By  far  the  largest 
portion  of  the  material,  however,  appeared  in  the  series  of  first-person 
stories  he  wrote  on  conditions  during  the  course  of  his  travels. 

Christmastide,  1938,  was  approaching  when  Mackenzie  got  back 
to  London.  Almost  at  once  he  felt  that  something  fundamental  had 
changed  since  he  left  England  three  months  earlier  to  fly  to  Berchtes- 


486  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

gaden  for  the  first  of  the  conferences  which  were  climaxed  at  Munich. 
There  had  been  shouts  of  "Stand  by  Czecho!"  then,  but  the  vast 
majority  of  the  people  were  adverse  to  stiff  measures.  The  attitude 
toward  Hitler  had  been  a  mixture  of  tolerance,  indulgence,  and 
exasperation. 

This  old  attitude  had  disappeared.  Exactly  when  or  why,  Mac- 
kenzie could  not  ascertain.  The  new  feeling  was  still  extremely  vague, 
as  if  it  had  only  started  to  crystallize. 

In  search  of  reliable  information,  he  arranged  an  appointment  with 
one  of  the  most  important  single  figures  in  the  British  government — a 
man  who  delayed  his  appearance  in  Parliament  half  an  hour  for  the 
talk  which  occurred. 

"I  have  not  come  to  you  for  an  interview,"  Mackenzie  explained, 
"because  I  know  you  cannot  grant  one.  But  I  seem  to  have  sensed  the 
beginnings  of  a  change  in  British  sentiment  and  policy  toward  Germany. 
I  will  be  grateful  if  you  can  tell  me  if  I  am  right  or  wrong,  and  what 
it  all  means." 

The  statesman  did  not  resent  the  direct  approach. 

"You're  right,"  he  replied.  "The  British  government  reluctantly 
has  come  to  the  conclusion  that  the  policy  of  appeasement  is  a  failure, 
and  there  is  no  longer  any  use  to  pursue  this  policy.  We  reluctantly 
have  come  to  the  conclusion  that  Hitler  is  not  susceptible  to  any  moral 
influence.  He  is  a  man  with  a  dangerous  obsession.  We  have  decided 
that  we  must  smash  him.  We  hope  to  do  it  by  economic  or  political 
means — but  if  these  fail — we  shall  use  force!" 

Because  of  the  statesman's  high  position,  the  publication  of  the 
blunt,  unequivocal  statement  was  not  possible,  but  Mackenzie  was  given 
permission  to  use  the  information  guardedly  as  "background"  without 
positively  indicating  its  source.  Accordingly  in  one  of  his  last  first-person 
interpretive  stories  from  abroad  in  1938  he  wrote: 

I  am  in  a  position  to  state  with  assurance  that  many  officials  of  the 
democracies  have  now  adopted  the  view  that  Fiihrer  Hitler's  mind  is  so 
inflexibly  fixed  on  his  program  of  empire  building  that  nothing  will  stop  him 
short  of  defeat  in  war  or  the  collapse  of  his  regime. 

Advocates  of  a  policy  of  appeasement  toward  the  dictators  clung  to  the 
last  to  the  idea  that  they  could  bargain  with  Hitler. 

I  understand,  however,  this  hope  has  been  abandoned  very  generally 
and  it  is  now  agreed  that  the  only  value  of  such  an  appr6ach  to  Berlin  is 
to  postpone  an  ultimate  reckoning. 

That  pretty  well  sums  up  the  sentiment  with  which  England  entered 
the  Christmas  holidays.  There  is  a  fairly  grim  determination  to  get  down 


"PEACE  FOR  OUR  TIME"  487 

to  cases  and  have  an  end  to  war  scares,  even  if  it  takes  a  major  war  to 
establish  peace. 

Here  was  the  answer  to:  What  next  in  Europe? 


13 

Even  before  Mackenzie's  illuminating  confidential  talk  with  the 
member  of  the  British  Cabinet,  General  Manager  Cooper  had  been 
assaying  post-Munich  Europe  from  the  standpoint  of  the  news  demands 
it  might  be  likely  to  produce.  None  of  the  "peace  for  our  time" 
developments  had  caused  him  to  alter  his  opinion  that,  whether  it  be 
peace  or  war,  Europe  was  a  continuing  emergency,  certain  to  produce 
news  of  extraordinary  calibre. 

One  of  his  first  steps  was  the  leasing  of  a  special  cable  between 
New  York  headquarters  and  the  London  Bureau — something  for  which 
the  association  had  been  negotiating  without  success  over  a  period  of 
years.  This  represented  a  great  advance  in  transatlantic  communications. 
It  gave  The  AP  control  over  its  cable  line,  and  it  meant  that  an 
operator  could  sit  at  his  keyboard  in  the  London  Bureau  and  send 
directly  into  member  paper  offices  all  over  the  United  States,  for  the 
cable  and  the  domestic  leased  wire  system  could  be  hooked  together 
when  outstanding  foreign  news  warranted. 

Two  other  features  in  the  post-Munich  program  were  the  addi- 
tional assignments  of  picked  staff  men  to  the  bureaus  abroad,  and  an 
enlargement  of  the  cable  desk  force  at  home.  The  general  manager's 
final  decision  was  the  appointment  of  Milo  M.  Thompson,  bureau  chief 
at  Washington,  as  resident  European  executive.  Thompson's  duties  in 
the  post  were  to  act  as  co-ordinator  for  all  the  association's  efforts  in 
Europe  and  to  take  over  the  general  administrative  work  abroad  so 
that  bureau  chiefs  there  could  concentrate  on  the  news  exclusively. 

News  considerations  in  Europe  and  plans  for  the  year  ahead  were 
important  during  the  Christmastide  of  1938,  but  the  season  also  chanced 
to  witness  one  of  those  rare  occasions  when  the  co-operative  had  another 
job  which,  in  the  last  analysis,  was  quite  incidental  to  the  task  of 
gathering  and  distributing  news.  The  organization  was  moving  New 
York  headquarters  into  its  own  building. 

The  dream  of  a  special  building  to  house  the  organization's  general 
offices  and  related  agencies  was  not  a  new  one.  Years  earlier,  both 
Stone  and  Adolph  S.  Ochs,  as  a  member  of  the  Board  of  Directors, 
had  broached  the  idea,  but  the  discussions  had  been  indefinite.  Cooper, 


488  AP  — THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

as  general  manager,  had  the  same  idea  and  worked  toward  its 
realization. 

The  new  home  of  The  AP  was  a  fifteen-story  building  in  the 
Rockefeller  Center  group  off  midtown  Fifth  Avenue,  six  blocks  from 
the  old  Madison  Avenue  offices.  Four  floors  were  made  ready,  one  of 
them  an  immense  newsroom  of  some  34,000  square  feet  in  area.  There 
the  world's  most  complicated  news  control  board  and  an  intricate 
labyrinth  of  wires  were  installed  to  make  transmission  of  the  news 
virtually  instantaneous  to  member  newspapers  across  the  nation.  For  the 
first  time  in  any  New  York  building  the  power  lines  of  all  five  city 
power  stations  were  cut  into  the  switchboard.  Engineers  pointed  out 
that,  with  this  precaution,  although  the  metropolis  might  be  bombed 
or  ravaged  by  fire,  flood,  or  hurricane,  the  chances  were  almost  negli- 
gible that  all  five  power  stations  would  fail  simultaneously. 

The  move  meant  something  more  than  a  mere  shift  in  geographical 
location.  Cooper  expressed  it  in  a  note  to  the  staff: 

The  new  Associated  Press  Building  is  a  monument  to  the  association's 
newspaper  members  and  its  employes.  Through  90  years  they  have  mutually 
striven  that  an  accurate,  unbiased  chronicle  of  events,  interestingly  recorded, 
be  available  to  newspaper  readers.  .  .  . 

What  you  have  aided  in  accomplishing  in  the  past  must  continue  into  the 
future  so  that  "By  The  Associated  Press"  shall  prevail  as  long  as  the  rights 
of  a  free  press  continue  to  make  possible  an  uncensored,  unfettered  collection 
and  dissemination  of  truthful  news. 

The  future  of  which  he  spoke  even  then  had  started. 


XV.  "BY  THE  ASSOCIATED  PRESS" 


ALMOST  a  century  of  news  gathering.  .  .  . 

They  had  been  crowded,  busy  years.  The  news  was  always  the 
thing,  but  in  retrospect  the  unpretentious  beginnings  of  1848  seemed 
hopelessly  inadequate  for  the  task  undertaken.  Then  the  entire  regular 
news  staff  consisted  of  the  versatile  and  overburdened  Alexander  Jones 
and  an  inexperienced  assistant.  Only  six  papers  received  the  service. 
Except  on  rare  occasions,  the  report  never  exceeded  a  few  hundred 
words  a  day  and  the  total  of  all  expenses  was  less  than  $20,000  annually. 
The  organization  at  first  boasted  no  regular  foreign  correspondents  and 
the  coverage  of  domestic  news  depended  almost  entirely  on  the  enter- 
prise of  free-lance  "telegraphic  reporters"  who  peddled  their  dispatches 
at  so  much  a  word. 

By  the  end  of  the  first  forty-five  years,  when  The  Associated  Press 
became  a  non-profit  co-operative,  news  gathering  as  a  public  service  had 
come  far  indeed.  But  the  years  after  1893  wrought  a  much  greater 
transformation. 

The  contemporary  association  was  spending  more  than  $i  I,OOO,OOO 
annually  to  collect  the  world's  news  and  news  pictures  for  1,400  member 
newspapers  in  the  United  States  and  for  scores  of  others  over  the  world. 
Yet  it  had  no  capital  stock,  made  no  profits,  declared  no  dividends.  For 
its  tremendous  task  it  could  muster  a  staff  of  7,200,  supplemented  by 
the  auxiliary  army  of  editorial  workers  on  member  newspapers  and 
with  affiliated  news  agencies  in  other  countries.  To  produce  the  report 
of  a  single  day  approximately  100,000  men  and  women  contributed 
their  ability  and  effort,  directly  or  indirectly.  The  volume  of  news  had 
reached  staggering  proportions — 1,000,000  words  in  every  twenty-four 
hours,  more  than  any  one  member  newspaper  received,  more  than  any 
one  member  newspaper  could  print. 

Day  after  day,  on  general,  regional, 
flood  of  copy  poured  over  285,000  miles 
network  more  than  twice  the  size  of  any 
of  3,300  teletype  machines  busy  around 
item  after  item.  It  was  a  flood  that  came 

489 


490  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

— from  the  association's  own  world-wide  staff,  from  member  news- 
papers, from  string  correspondents,  from  bureaus  in  every  major  city 
in  the  United  States,  from  American-manned  bureaus  in  foreign  coun- 
tries, and  from  representatives  in  virtually  every  other  city,  town,  and 
hamlet  of  the  globe. 

At  first  news  had  but  one  medium — the  written  word.  Now  a 
second  had  developed— the  visual  medium.  The  same  forces  that  were 
on  the  alert  around  the  world  to  report  the  news  in  textual  form  were 
equally  vigilant  for  pictures  with  which  to  complete  the  story  told  by 
the  written  word.  Wirephoto,  the  only  regular  picture  network  in 
existence,  whisked  photographs  across  the  United  States  to  record 
pictorially  the  same  history  which  was  simultaneously  being  written  on 
the  news  wires. 


The  contrasts  between  the  first  year  and  the  current  year  seemed 
endless,  but  those  who  looked  had  no  difficulty  in  finding  one  sur- 
passingly important  element  common  to  both. 

The  big  story  was  the  same — the  fate  of  Europe. 

In  1848  the  Old  World  was  shaken  and  torn.  In  France,  Louis- 
Philippe  lost  his  throne.  Another  Louis  abdicated  in  Bavaria.  Ferdinand 
of  Austria  surrendered  his  scepter  to  Franz  Josef,  who  lived  to  see  the 
World  War.  There  were  uprisings  in  Ireland,  Hungary,  Italy,  and  the 
German  states.  There  was  unrest  in  England,  where  the  Chartist  move- 
ment constituted  an  assault  on  the  existing  order. 

Now  Europe  was  plunged  into  another  conflict  of  enormous  gravity 
and  consequence  for  the  entire  world.  The  key  figure  was  Adolf 
Hitler  and,  despite  Munich,  Hitler  was  not  through. 

The  vast  world-wide  resources  of  news  gathering,  all  of  the 
modern  facilities  afforded  by  the  expansion  of  The  AP  into  its  own 
new  building,  combined  to  keep  abreast  of  events  which  marched 
relentlessly  toward  one  climax.  Staff  men,  struggling  in  a  whirl  of 
contradictions  and  unbelievable  realities,  strove  harder  than  ever  for 
the  truth. 

The  mechanized  Nazi  legions  moved  into  Poland  on  September  i, 
i939,Vand  the  cables  rushed  news  of  the  crushing  invasion  to  the  new 
headquarters  in  New  York,  whence  it  sped  along  the  wires  and  through 
the  air  to  newspapers  in  virtually  every  country  in  the  world. 

As  recorded  by  the  news,  that  move  by  Hitler  marked  the  end 


"By  THE  ASSOCIATED  PRESS"  491 

of  one  era  and  the  beginning  of  another.  All  that  was  awaited  was  the 
official  Allied  declaration. 

Then  it  came — swiftly,  dramatically,  yet  almost  quietly  at  dawn 
in  the  newsroom  of  the  new  headquarters  of  The  AP  in  New  York. 

It  was  early  Sunday,  three  days  after  the  German  forces  moved 
on  Poland.  Outside  the  streets  were  gray  and  empty,  except  for  a  few 
worshipers  en  route  to  St.  Patrick's  Cathedral,  a  block  away.  In  the 
brilliantly  lighted  AP  headquarters  it  might  have  been  just  another 
Sunday  morning  except  that  the  men,  alert  for  the  momentous  words 
from  other  staff  men  abroad,  were  waiting  beside  the  pulsing  cable 
machines  for  news  they  knew  would  come. 

Everything  was  in  readiness  to  relay  on  the  news  and  picture  wires 
the  black-and-white  record  of  history  in  the  making. 

A  bell  jangled  on  the  cable  machine  and  the  men  hovered  to 
watch  the  words  as  they  spelled  out: 

F-L-A-S-H 

CHAMBERLAIN  PROCLAIMED  BRITAIN  AT  WAR  WITH 
GERMANY. 

The  great  story  of  the  generation  had  begun.  Immediately  it  was 
called  another  World  War.  Yet,  from  the  outset,  it  appeared  different, 
taxing  as  never  before  the  resources  of  those  whose  daily  duty  it  was 
to  go  beyond  mere  externals  in  search  of  all  the  newsworthy  facts.  The 
conflict  involved  the  same  clash  of  countries,  the  same  struggle  for 
territory,  the  same  brands  of  death  and  destruction.  But  those  concerned 
with  objective  reporting  had  to  realize  that  it  also  brought  into  battle 
both  physical  and  intellectual  forces  beyond  anything  yet  recorded. 

Whatever  the  issues,  propaganda  and  pronouncements  from  both 
sides  already  had  made  it  clear  that  there  no  longer  was  a  question 
merely  of  who  should  be  defeated.  The  story  loomed  larger,  con- 
cerning most  of  the  people  of  the  world  because  it  involved  the  kind 
of  governments  they  might  have  in  the  future.  Freedom  of  the  press 
and  of  speech,  intellectual  and  religious  problems,  and  the  problems 
of  world  trade,  in  the  minds  of  most  people  seemed  to  depend  upon 
the  outcome  of  the  conflict  pitting  Hitler,  a  world  power  after  a  com- 
paratively few  years  in  public  life,  against  the  British  with  their,  vast 
empire  "on  which  the  sun  never  sets." 

Against  such  a  background  of  world  interest,  the  forces  of  news 
gathering  were  called  upon  to  report  the  complex  struggle  between 
Hitler's  conception  of  Germany's  rights  in  the  world  and  Britain's 


492  AP  —  THE  STORY  OF  NEWS 

conception  of  what  might  follow  a  Nazi  rule  of  Europe  or  the  world. 

Later  that  same  September  3,  France  joined  the  conflict.  Canada 
issued  its  declaration  a  week  later. 

And  those  events  were  only  the  beginning. 


The  association's  foreign  correspondents  were  in  action.  In  Warsaw, 
Elmer  Peterson  and  Lloyd  Lehrbas  dodged  dive  bombers  and  the 
lightning-swift  destruction  of  a  modern  Nazi  Blitzkrieg  to  witness  the 
terror  of  a  military  attack  such  as  history  never  before  had  known. 
With  the  Germans,  Louis  Lochner  was  the  first  correspondent  to  follow 
the  Nazis  into  action.  Russian  troops  entered  Eastern  Poland  and  with 
them  went  Melvin  K.  Whiteleather. 

From  all  directions,  from  all  vantage  points,  staff  men  moved  to 
obtain  the  news,  hampered  by  censorship,  privation,  physical  dangers, 
and  all  the  conscienceless  dictates  of  those  to  whom  human  life  seemed 
suddenly  unimportant.  The  second  World  War  was  barely  under  way, 
yet  the  number  of  men  already  engaged  in  reporting  it  outnumbered 
many  times  over  those  on  duty  during  1914-1918. 

The  big  story  developed,  consuming  nation  after  nation  in  its 
relentless  flame: 

.  .  .  Germany  and  Russia  Agree  on  Partition  of  Poland  .  .  . 
Germany  Announces  Capitulation  of  Warsaw  .  .  .  Hitler  Narrowly 
Escapes  Bomb  in  Munich  Cellar  .  .  .  Russia  Invades  Finland  .  .  . 
Germany  Blows  Up  Own  Pocket  Battleship  Admiral  Graf  Spec  in 
Montevideo  Harbor  .  .  .  Moscow  Announces  Treaty  Ending  Russian- 
Finnish  War  .  .  .  German  Blitzkrieg  Overruns  Denmark,  Occupies 
Points  in  Norway  .  .  .  British  Land  Troops  in  Norway  .  .  .  Allies 
Begin  Withdrawal  from  Central  Norway  .  .  .  Germans  Invade  Neth- 
erlands, Belgium  and  Luxembourg  .  .  .  Winston  Churchill  Succeeds 
Neville  Chamberlain  as  Britain's  Prime  Minister  .  .  .  Dutch  Army 
Surrenders  after  Queen's  Flight  to  London  .  .  .  King  Leopold  III 
Orders  Surrender  Belgian  Army  .  .  .  Trapped  Allied  Troops  Begin 
Withdrawal  from  Dunkerque  ....  Italy  Declares  War  on  Britain  and 
France  .  .  .  Germans  Bomb  Paris,  254  Dead,  652  Wounded  .  .  . 
Norway  Surrenders  .  .  .  Germany  Occupies  Paris  ;  .  .  French  Sign 
Armistice  With  Germany,  Then  With  Italy  ... 

Britain  Fights  On  ... 

So  the  second  World  War  continued,  past  the  time  when  these 


"Bv  THE  ASSOCIATED  PRESS"  493 

words  were  written,  past  the  time  they  were  sent  to  press.  As  a  climax 
to  almost  a  century  of  reporting  daily  history,  Munich's  "Peace  for  our 
time"  had  seemed  a  beautiful  note  on  which  to  end  any  story  of  news. 
But  over  the  world  AP  men  were  busy — and  the  news  went  on. 

New  York,  N.  Y. 
June  25,  1940 


INDEX 


Abell,  Arunah  S.,  13 

Accuracy,  198 

Adams,  George  Matthew,  328 

Advertising  matter,  disguised  as  news,  295 

Airplane,  205-213 

Alaska,  purchase,  70,  395-397 

Alexander,  M.  B.,  326 

Allen,  Larry,  466,  470,  473,  477,  478,  483 

America,  dirigible,  208-213 

America,  Frank,  265-267 

American    Expeditionary   Force,    264,    267, 

271-276,  284,  288 

American  Federation  of  Labor,  425,  432 
American  Indians,  62,  84-87,  100 
American  Mining  Congress,  200 
American  Newspaper  Guild,  432,  433,  436, 

439 

American  Telephone  &  Telegraph  Company, 

A  3?3,  384 

Amis,  Reese  T.,  325,  326 

Anderson,  Kenneth,  471,  474 

Anglo-Irish  Treaty,  300 

Angly,  Edward,  341 

Anti-Comintern  Pact,  452 

Anti-Semitism,  88 

Ant isla very  movement,  19 

"Appeasement,"  4^9,  485,  486 

Appomattox,  52,  53 

Archbold,  John  D.,  220 

Argonne  Forest,  276 

Armistice,  281-283;  false,  277-281 

Arms  Limitation  Conference,  342 

Armstead,  George  B.,  405 

Arthur,  Chester  A.,  89 

Associated  Press,  The,  administrative  expan- 
sion, 418,  419;  annual  meetings,  381;  build- 
ing, new,  487,  488;  change  in  operating 
methods,  317;  election  _ service,  249-255; 
employes'  benefits,  28$,  289,  429,  430, 
439;  "Extraordinary  Occasion  Service," 
(EOS),  229,  230;  Feature  Service,  329, 
330,  348,  381;  Financial  Service,  230,  346, 
347;  Foreign  Service,  355,  360,  484;  Gen- 
eral Mail  Service,  328,  329;  General  Serv- 
ice, 318;  laboratory,  361;  leased  wires  (see 
Wires);  logotype,  286;  moves  (i9.24)» 
307;  New  York  meeting  (Stone  anniver- 
sary), 273;  news  credited,  263,  286;  News 
Department,  230,  271;  News  Photo  Serv- 
ice, 3?4,  335,  348,  381,  383,  387,  390,  394; 
1900  incorporation,  155-157;  non-profit  co- 
operative, I5S-IS7,  175,  3io,  3H;  person- 
nel administration,  428-431;  postwar  ex- 
pansion, 303,  317,  318;  radio  and,  379, 
380;  "reports  human  spectacle,"  315-31?; 


retrenchment  program,  359-363;  scienca 
editor,  318;  South  America,  274,  275; 
Special  Survey  Committee,  201,  204,  230, 
231,  report,  201,  202;  State  Services,  317, 
318;  Traffic  Department,  230,  233,  263, 
264,  390,  424;  war  coverage  expenses,  287; 
Washington  Regional  Service,  378,  379 

Associated  Press  of  Germany,  The,  362 

Associated  Press  of  Great  Britain,  The,  362 

Associated  Press  of  Illinois,  117-124;  con- 
flict with  Inter-Ocean,  148-155;  co-opera- 
tive non-profit,  119,  122,  123,  132,  136, 
I51-i56;  dissolution,  156,  157;  Eastern 
papers  join,  130-134;  meetings,  Chicago 
(1893),  125-129,  (iopo),i54;  struggle  with 
UP,  124-135;  "unifying  contract"  with  UP, 
119,  120;  victory  celebration,  136,  137 

Associated  Press,  New  York  (see  New  York 
Associated  Press) 

Atlanta  Constitution,  388 

Atlantic  cable,  32-35,  50,  63,  67,  69,  78 

Atlantic  City  Press,  364 

Atter,  Robert,  235,  236 

Atwood,  M.  V.,  381 

Austria,  Anschluss,  458-463;  first  World  War, 
235-237,  269,  276 

Aviation,  336-342 

Bailey,  R.  0.,  185 

Baker,  Newton  D.,  263 

Baldwin,  Stanley,  321 

Balfour,  Sir  Arthur,  298 

Balkans,  235,  241,  276,  290,  485 

Baltimore  American,  132 

Baltimore  Press,  29 

Baltimore  Sun,  13,  14,  22,  132,  354,  385 

Bank  failures  (1893),  116;  (1933):  374-3/6 

Barnes,  Jim,  421,  422 

Barrere,  M.  167 

Barron,  Mark,  413,  415 

Bartley,  E.  R.,  303,  304 

Barton,  Bruce,  325 

Barton,  Clara,  107 

Baseball,  78,  231,  245,  246,  292,  320,  342 

Bassett,  Fred  N.,  83 

Beach,  Harrison  L.,  140,  142-144 

Beach,  Joseph  P.,  64,  66,  76 

Beach,  Moses,  13,  19 

Beasley,  Lawrence,  229 

Beebe,  Katherine,  368 

Belgium,  235-238,  241,  276,  492 

Bell,  Alexander  Graham,  83 

Bell,  Brian,  319,  33^-339 

Belo,  Alfred  H.,  155 

Benedict  XV,  Pope,  169 


495 


496 


INDEX 


Bennett,  James  Gordon,  10-15,  19-21,  31,  34, 
39-41,  71,  75,  284,  331  f 

Bennett,  James  Gordon,  the  younger,  66, 
70 

Berchtesgaden,  Chamberlain's  visit,  467-470; 
Schuschnigg's  visit,  458-460 

Berding,  Andrue,  356,  413 

Berlin,  88,  123,  148,  168,  169,  260;  revolu- 
tion, 286 

Berlin,  AP  bureau,  70,  235-238,  241,  242, 
244,  247,  256,  441 

Bernhardt,  Sarah,  200 

Bernstorff,  Count  von,  256,  257,  261 

Berry,  R.  E.,  208,  210,  236,  273,  275,  290 

Bertaud,  Lloyd,  337 

Beukert,  G.  O.,  391 

Biele,  Chief  Engineer,  420 

Binns,  Jack,  203 

Bird,  A.  R.,  326 

Bishop,  Thomas  J.,  83 

Bismarck  Tribune,  84 

Black  and  Tans,  300 

"Black  Sox"  scandal,  292 

Black  Tom  explosion,  242,  245 

Blackman,  Sam,  356-368 

Blaine,  James  G.,  94-98,  249 

Blakeslee,  Howard  W.,  318 

"Blanket"  sheets,  4 

Blardony,  Ramon,  453 

Bleriot,  Louis,  207,  208 

Blitzkrieg,  478,  492 

"Bloody  Sunday,"  183 

Boers,  88,  148,  176,  203 

Boileau,  E.  C,  83 

Boone,  Dr.  Joal  T.,  304,  305 

Booth,  John  Wilkes,  53,  54 

Booth,  Ralph  H.,  309 

Boris,  Grand  Duke,  178 

Boston,  AP  Bureau,  228,  246,  247,  264,  305; 
early  news  gathering,  3;  police  strike,  288 

Boston,  newspapers:  Columbia  Centinel,  5; 
Gazette,  330;  Herald,  131;  Journal,  155 

Boughan,  John  P.,  425 

Bouman,  J.  A.,  468,  469,  477 

Bouton,  S.  M.,  241,  276,  286 

Boxer  uprising,  148,  230 

Boyle,  Captain  P.  C.,  221-225 

Boynton,  Charles  A.,  192 

Braddock,  James  J.,  394 

Brady,  Matthew  B.,  47,  333 

Brandebury,  Carl,  222,  281 

Brayden,  W.  H.,  287 

Brest-Litovsk,  treaty,  270 

Briand,  Aristide,  336 

Brooke,  Lord,  170,  179,  180 

Brooklyn,  flagship,  141,  142,  145,  146 

Brooklyn  Eagle,  130,  155 

Brooks,  Erastus,  66,  73,  89,  90 

Brooks,  Noah,  53 

Brooks,  W.  F.,  419 

Bryan,  William  Jennings,  133,  199,  200,  239- 
241,319 

Buchanan,  James,  32,  33,  99 

Buffalo  Courier,  95;  Pan- American  Exposi- 
tion, 163 


Bulletins,  194,  198,  248,  276,  281,  282 

Bull  Moose  Party,  230 

Bull  Run,  First  Battle  of,  40,  41-42;  Second 

Battle,  46 
Burchard,  Reverend  Samuel  Dickinson,  96, 

97 
"By-lines,"  46,  100,  270,  297,  315,  318,  319; 

first,  425 
Byrd,  Richard  E.,  337,  341 

Cable,  237,  303;  special,  London-New  York, 
487;  tolls,  88 

Cable,  Atlantic  (see  Atlantic  cable) 

Cable  dispatches,  74,  77,  78,  109,  276-282, 
287;  World  War,  239,  267-272 

Cable  News  Company,  The,  93,  94,  113 

Cadorna,  Arturo,  449 

Cadorna,  General,  241,  269 

Calabria,  earthquake,  202,  203 

Caldwell,  W.  F.,  263,  319 

California,  Wilson  election,  252-254 

Cambon,  Jules,  164,  165 

Cameron,  Senator  Don,  104 

Canadian  Press,  The,  200 

Caneva,  Joe,  368,  413,  415 

Carlson,  Harold,  393,  421,  422 

Carney,  William  P.,  455 

Carpathia,  liner,  229 

Carpentier,  Georges,  296 

Carranza,  President,  268 

Carrier  pigeons  (see  Pigeon  post) 

Carroll,  Jerry,  196-198 

Carson  Appeal,  200 

Carter,  W.  F.,  366 

Cartoons,  332;  first,  330 

"Casey  at  the  Bat,"  137,  231 

Cassini,  Count,  170 

Castro,  E.  M.,  354 

Cavagnaro,  Robert,  368 

Censorship,  79-81,  157,  223,  285,  323,  354; 
Civil  War,  44-46,  48;  Czech  crisis,  477- 
478;  Ethiopian,  414;  of  European  news, 
164-166;  first  official,  41;  Germany,  168; 
Nazi,  460;  Russia,  170-174;  Russo-Japa- 
nese war,  176,  184;  Spanish  war,  445-451; 
World  War,  237,  239,  241,  242,  261,  264- 
266,  272 

Census,  Federal,  24;  (1910),  214,  224 

Cervera,  Admiral,  141-146 

Chamberlain,  Neville,  appeasement,  459, 
485,  486;  Berchtesgaden,  467-470;  Godes- 
berg,  472-475;  declaration  to  Parliament, 
479-481;  Munich,  481-486;  war  declara- 
tion, 492;  succeeded  by  Churchill,  492 

Chamberlin,  Clarence,  337,  341 

Channel  ports,  272 

Chaplin,  W.Wy  339,  375 

Charleston  (S.C.)  Courier,  7 

Charleston  (S.C.)  Mercury,  37,  38 

Chateau-Thierry,  '273 

Chatfield,  Rear  Admiral  Sir  Ernie,  298 

Chattanooga  Times,  117,  129 

Chicago,  20,  62,  71,  73,  76,  78,  109,  125-129, 
293;  "Black  Sox"  scandal,  292;  fire  ( 1871), 
8 1,  82,  100,  122;  World's  Fair,  123,  124 


INDEX 


497 


Chicago,  AP  Bureau,  216,  218,  232 

Chicago,  newspapers:  Daily  News,  109,  no, 
120,  122,  128,  187,  333;  crusade,  148-150; 
Inter-Ocean,  115,  148-156;  Republican, 
122;  Tribune,  60,  65,  66,  73,  91,  93,  94, 
in;  Times,  100 

Chilean  Civil  War  (1891),  140 

China,  Boxer  uprising  (see  Boxer  uprising); 
civil  war,  453;  "open  door"  in,  153 

Chrzanpwska,  Marylla,  321-323,  473 

Churchill,  Winston,  242,  492 

Cincinnati,  61,  62,  71 

Cincinnati  Commercial,  45,  65 

Cincinnati  Gazette,  75,  92 

Cipher  code,  first,  23 

City  News  Association,  222-225 

Civil  War,  36-52,  60,  62,  64;  pictorial  re- 
porting, 332,  333 

Clark,  Charles  E.,  433 

Clephane,  James  0.,  102 

Cleveland,  Grover,  76,  77,  94-99,  102,  123, 
249 

Cleveland  News,  285 

Cleveland  Plain  Dealer,  463 

Cobb,  Howell,  32,  33 

Cockerill,  John  A.,  130 

Codes  and  ciphers,  30 

Coleman,  Melvin,  223 

Colfax,  Sumner,  54 

Collective  bargaining,  439 

Collins,  Harry,  196 

Collins,  Robert  M.,  176-179,  181,  208,  235 

Colson,  Everett,  409,  411,  413 

Columbia  Centinel,  Boston,  5 

Columbia  University  School  of  Journalism, 
170 

Columbus,  New  Mexico,  243,  244 

Columbus  Republican,  216 

Commercial  Advertiser,  New  York,  8,  130 

Commercial  Telegraphers'  Union,  425-427 

Committee  on  Public  Information,  264-266 

Communists,  286 

Condon,  Dr.  John  F.  ("Jafsie"),  369,  399 

Confederate  States  of  America,  38 

Conger,  Seymour  B.,  235,  236,  241,  247, 
260 

Congress  of  Industrial  Organizations,  432 

Connolly,  Colonel  William,  104-107 

Constance,  Lake,  206,  207 

Continental-Telegraphen-Compagnie,   123 

Cook,  Dr.  Frederick,  208-210 

Coolidge,  Calvin,  288,  292,  305-307,  321, 
324,  342,  343,  348 

Cooper,  Kent,  215,  216,  224,  233,  268,  357, 
361,  362;  appointments,  404,  418,  419;  as- 
sistant general  manager,  285-295;  general 
manager,  307,  3H,  3^5,  3*8,  324,  325,  329, 
334,  349,  350,  381;  post-Munich  program, 
487,  488;  Traffic  Department,  230,  246, 
271,  275,  428;  Watson  case,  434-439;  Wire- 
photo,  38 1-397,  424 

Cooper,  Peter,  35 

Copp,  Arthur  W.,  140 

Corbett,  James  J.,  124 

Corporations,  80 


Cortesi,  Salvatore,  167-170,  185,  203,  234, 
235,  241,  293,  356 

Costes  and  Le  Brix,  341,  342 

Courier,  New  York,  28,  41 

Courier  and  Enquirer,  New  York,  n,  12, 
19-21,  29,  69 

Cowles,  Paul,  176,  177,  179,  195-197,  3<H 

Cox,  James  M.,  291 

Coxey's  Army,  132 

Coyle,  John  Francis,  53 

Craig,  Daniel,  12,  13,  26-31,  34-43;  founds 
new  agency,  65,  67,  68,  70;  general  agent, 
Western  Associated  Press,  71-77;  resigna- 
tion, 64,  65;  second  general  agent,  AP,  28, 
45,  47,  50,  56,  61,  62,  70 

Credit  Mobilier  scandal,  82 

Crossword  puzzles,  319 

Cuba,  23,  188;  war  for  independence,  138- 

H7,  .173,  38i 
Cummings,  Arthur,  78 
Currier,  Nathaniel,  and  Ives,  James  Merritt, 

331 

Curtis,  E.  E.,  196 
Curtis,  John  Hughes,  370,  373 
Curtis,  L.  F.,  278,  478,  479 
Curtius,  Julius,  357,  358 
Custer,  General  George  A.,  83-87,  100 
Cynthia,  dispatch  boat,  140,  147 
Czechoslovakia,  463,  467-488;  British-French 

pressure,  472,  473 
Czolgosz,  Leon,  163 

Daguerre,  331,  332 

Daily  News,  New  York,  51 

Daily  Star,  New  York,  52 

Daladier,  Edouard,  473,  475,  482 

Dallas  News,  155 

Dana,  Charles  A.,  90,  91-95,  101,  102,  112, 

114,   117,    129,    131,    132,    134,    136,   245 

(see  also  New  York  Sun) 
Daniels,  Josephus,  265,  266 
Dauntless,  AP  tug,  140,  143,  145 
Davis,  Jefferson,  38,  39 
Davis,  John  W.,  435 
Davis,  Sam,  200 
Dawes,  Charles  G.,  307 
Dawson,  S.A.,  320 
Day,  Clifford  L.,  302 
d'Annunzio,  Gabrielle,  290 
De  Forest,  Lee,  162 
De  Graw,  P.  V.,  83 
DelcassS,  Theophile,  164-166 
Democratic  party,  90,  97,  99,  199,  245,  252, 

253,  291,  307,  349,  350,  438 
Dempsey,  Jack,  296,  346 
Dempsey-Firpo  fight,  306 
Denny,  George,  176,  177,  *79,  180,  183,  306 
Depression   (1929),  354-3^3,  452 
Detroit  newspapers :  Advertiser  and  Tribune, 

73;  Free  Press,  62,  75;  Tribune,  127 
Deutschland,  submarine,  242,  245-247,  249 
Dewey,  Admiral  George,  141,  296,  351 
De  Valera,  Eamon,  300 
Diehl,  Charles  Sanford,  100-103,  116,  125, 

127,  129,  131,  132,  175,  176,  230,  290,  428, 


498 


INDEX 


429;  assistant  general  manager,  138-146; 
first  by-line,  425;  general  manager,  154, 


Digby,  Bay  of  Fundy,  27 

Dillinger,  John,  391 

Dionne  quintuplets,  398 

Dirigible,  206-208 

Dix,  General  John  A.,  50,  52,  56 

Dogger  Bank  fishing  rounds,  182,  183 

Dollfuss,  assassination,  459 

Draft  lottery,  263,  264,  288 

Draper,  Norman,  273,  275 

Dreyfus  case,  176 

Driscoll,  Colonel  Frederick,  in,  118,  119, 

ISI 

Dunkerque,  492 
Dunkley,  Charles,  292 
Dunn,  John  P.,  84,  85,  87 
Dunning,  John  P.,  103,  104,  143-147 
Duplexing  of  wire  circuits,  361 

Earhart,  Amelia,  394 

Early,  Stephen,  240,  258,  263,  303-305,  326, 
327 

Echardt,  Heinrich  von,  257 

Eden,  Anthony,  459 

Edison,  Thomas  A.,  246 

Editorial  page,  36 

Edward,  Duke  of  Windsor,  443,  444 

Egan,  Martin,  184,  185 

Egypto-Arabic  war,  267 

Einstein  (Albert)  relativity  theory,  303 

Elliott,  Jackson  S.,  175,  190-209,  257-259, 
271,  272,  292,  295;  assistant  general  man- 
ager, 350;  chief,  News  Department,  277- 
281;  general  manager,  404;  general  super- 
intendent, 289 

Emergency  Reserve  Fund,  362 

Employes  Benefit  Fund,  362 

England  (see  Great  Britain) 

EOS  bulletins,  242,  276,  380 

Epp,  General  Earl  Ritter  von,  482 

Epes,  Horace,  258 

Erie  Railroad,  123 

Estes,  Carl  L,  395 

Ethiopia,  78,  167,  407^16,  444,  448,  454 
(see  also  Haile  Selassie) 

European  news,  21,  22,  31,  67-74,  "3,  354; 
censorship,  164-166;  first  all-wire  message, 
26;  post-Munish,  487;  post-war,  287; 
World  War,  261-283 

Evans,  John,  340,  341 

Everett,  Edward,  49 

Ewing,  Don  M.,  292 

Exchange  Coffee  House,  3-7;  Reading  Room, 

3-5 

Express,  New  York,  10,  29,  51,  66 
"Extraordinary  Occasions  Service"   (EOS), 

229,  230 

Fahy,  Charles,  415 
Fairbanks,  Douglas,  290 
Farragut,  Admiral,  46 
Fascist  party,  293 
Feature  syndicates,  328 


,  Cyrus,  32-35,  50,  63 
Fifth  Column,  Spanish,  443,  449,  450 
Finlay,  John,  194-196 
Fiume,  290 
Five-day  week,  439 
Five-Power  Treaty,  299 
Flanders,  242,  267 

Flash,  198,  242,  246,  247,  253,  254,  282 
"Flashes  of  Life,"  315 
Flemington,  Hauptman  trial,  373,  394,  398- 

406 

Floods,  420-422;  Pittsburgh,  420-422 
Florida,  hurricane,  325-327 
Florida  land  boom,  319 
Foch,  Marshal  Ferdinand,  272,  276,  279,  281 
Foltz,  Charles,  Jr.,  445-448,  476,  481,  482 
Ford,  Henry,  347 
Ford's  Theatre,  53-57 
Fort  Sumter,  38,  49 
Fountain,  Joseph  H.,  305,  306 
Four-power  agreement,  Munich,  481-484 
France,  70,  102,  182,  183,  466,  475;  AP  news 

from,     164-166;     appeasement,    458-488; 

World  War,  235-242,  261,  267,  271-274 
Francis  Ferdinand,  Archduke,  assassination, 

235 

Franco,  General  Francisco,  441-451,  463 
Franklin,  Benjamin,  165,  330 
Fuller,  Governor  Alvan  T.,  344 
Funston,  General  Frederick,  197 

Gallipoli  campaign,  241 

Gandhi,  Mahatma,  351,  354,  358,  359 

Garfield,  James  A.,  23,  89 

Garges,  Milton,  289,  295 

Garibaldi,  24,  70 

Garrison,  Lindley  M.,  240 

Gary,  Elbert  H.,  223 

Geistlich,  Robert,  194-197 

Geneva,  303,  342,  476 

George  III,  3 

George  V,  224,  416 

George  VI,  443,  479 

Germany,  70,  88,  123,  206;  aids  Franco,  44V 
annexes  Czechoslovakia,  458-488;  Anti- 
Comintern  Pact,  452;  armistice,  277-283; 
Hitler  (see  Hitler);  invades  Poland,  492; 
Lusitania  warning,  238-241;  moratorium, 
J56-358;  post-war,  351;  Propaganda  Min- 
istry, 484;  revolution,  290;  unrestricted 
submarine  warfare,  256-261;  Gestapo,  461, 

471 

Gettysburg,  48,  49,  466 
Ghent,  Treaty  of  (1814),  7 
Gibbon,  General,  85 
Gibson,  William,  267 
Gilbert,  Samuel,  4 
Ginsberg,  Louis  S.,  212 
Gobright,  Lawrence  A.,  31-33,  38-41,  48,  53- 

58,99,376 

Godfrey,  J.  C.,  291,  292 
Gold  rush,  23 
Gold  standard,  116,  133;  England  abandons, 

358;  United  States  abandons,  378 
"Golden  Triangle,"  421,  422 


INDEX 


499 


Goode,  Sir  William  A.  M.,  140,  142,  146, 
168,  290 

Goudie,  A.  C.,  140,  143,  147 

Gould,  Alan  J.,  306,  346 

Gould,  Jay,  94,  95,  98,  100,  425,  426 

Gracie,  Colonel  Archibald,  229 

Graham,  George  £.,  140-142,  145,  146 

Grange,  Red,  320 

Granger,  Arthur,  305,  306 

Grant,  Ulysses  S.,  23,  46-57,  78,  82,  122 

Graves,  Admiral,  265,  266 

Great  Britain,  abandons  gold  standard,  358; 
appeasement,  458-486;  Dogger  Bank  affair, 
182;  fights  on,  492;  Five-Power  Treaty, 
298,  299;  General  Strike,  321;  Intelli- 
gence service,  261,  262;  International 
News  Service,  barred  by,  285;  World  War, 
first,  235-238,  241,  242,  261,  267,  271-276; 
second,  407,  491 

Greeley,  Horace,  n,  19,  41,  54,  284 

Gross,  John,  189,  190 

Guiteau,  Charles,  89 

Hajg,  Field  Marshal  Douglas,  272,  273,  276 

Haile  Selassie,  355,  407-416 

Haldeman,  Walter  N.,  91,   112,   114,   115, 

117 
Hale,  David,  8-10,  12,  14,  24,  25,  284,  319, 

331;  Associated  Press  originated  by,  19-21; 

co-operative  news  gathering,  15,  19 
Halifax,  Nova  Scotia,  26 
Hall-Mills  case,  301 
Hall,  Percy,  304 
Hallock,  Gerard,  8,  10,  12,  284,  331;  first 

president  AP,  39,  40,  42,  43 
Halsey,  Ethel,  320 
Halstead,  Murat,  65-68,  70-75 
Hand,  Judge  Augustus  N.,  285 
Harding,  Warren  G.,  291-293,  303-306,  344 
Hargrave,  W.  H.  C.,  83 
Harper's  Weekly,  332 
Harris,  Morris  J.,  364 
Harris,  N.  B.,  348 
Harrison,  Mrs.  Marguerite,  291 
Hartford  Courant,  405 
Hasson  News  Association,  78 
Hauptmann,  Bruno  Richard,  391,  398-406 
Havana,  137-141 
Havas  (Charles)  agency,  70,  93,  123,  274, 

*75.. 

Hawaii,  101 
Hawley,  Hudson,  341 
Hay,  John,  153,  188,  189 
Hayes,  Rutherford  B.,  83,  92 
Haymarket  Square  riot,  425 
Haywood  trial,  200 
Hearne,  J.  D.,  112 
Hearst,  William  Randolph,  134,  138,  152, 

196,263,385-389 
Hemtzelman,  C.  H.,  381 
Hendry,  Warden  William,  345 
Henlein,  Konrad,  466-471 
Henrietta,  yacht,  66,  70 
Henry,  Prince,  of  Prussia,  168 
Herald,  New  York  (see  New  York  Herald) 


Herald  Tribune,  New  York  (see  New  York 

Herald  Tribune) 
Herlihy,  W.  A.,  239 
Herouy,  George,  409 
Herrick,  Mrs.  Elinore  M.,  433 
Herrick,  Myron  T.,  340 
Herrin  mine  war,  301 
Herrings,  Joseph,  206,  207 
Hewlett,  Gregory,  364-366 
Hiatt,  W.  C.,  276,  286,  302 
Hibben,  Paxton,  241 
Hickok,  Lorena,  368 
Hicks,  George  B.,  77,  82 
Hicks,  Wilson,  396,  397 
Hilgert,  F.  J.,  137-140 
Hindenburg,  Paul  von,  321,  354,  356-358, 

391 

Hinman,  George  Wheeler,  149-152 

Hitler,  Adolf,  293,  307,  354,  4*6,  441; 
Austrian  Anschluss  (see  Austria);  Berch- 
tesgaden,  467-470;  "blood  purge,"  390; 
"final"  terms,  476-479;  Godesberg,  472- 
475;  Munich,  481-486;  Mussolini  visit, 
453;  Sportspalast  speech,  477,  478;  su- 
preme power,  391,  458,  459 

Hoarding,  563,  374 

Hobson,  Richmond  P.,  142 

Hoe,  Robert  M.,  29 

Holland,  237,  276,  282,  287,  290,  492 

Honce,  C.  E.,  419 

Hood,  Edwin  M.,  188,  189,  240,  256-258, 
261 

Hoover,  Herbert,  270,  344,  349,  350,  377, 
463;  elected,  351;  moratorium,  356- 
358 

Horgan,  Stephen  H.,  333 

Houghton  Gazette,  218 

Howard,  Joseph,  52 

Howard,  Roy,  389 

Howe,  James  P.,  275,  290,  302,  321 

Howell,  Clark,  388 

Hoy,  Frank  S.,  389 

Hudson,  Frederic,  19,  22,  26,  28 

Hughes,  Charles  Evans,  199,  245,  249-254, 
281,  298 

Human-interest  stories,  314,  315 

Humphreys,  Joe,  339 

Hungary,  287,  482,  484,  490 

Hunt,  Albert  C.,  140 

Hunter,  William,  31 

Huse,  Norris,  385,  386,  392 

Huston,  James  C.,  89,  90 

Illinois  Supreme  Court,  151,  153 
Illustrations,  news,  328-335 
Independent  Socialists,  Germany,  286 
India,  354,   358,   359;   revolt,   133;  Round 

Table  Conference,  358 
Indianapolis,  61 
Indianapolis  Press,  217 
Inflation,  German,  301 
International  Arms  Limitation  Conference, 

298 

International  News  Service,  263,  284,  285 
Interviews,  324 


5oo 


INDEX 


Ireland,  88,  239,  286,  287,  339,  480;  Black 
and  Tans,  290;  Easter  Rebellion,  242,  243; 
Free  State,  299,  300 

Irwin,  Jack,  203,  204,  211-213 

Italy,  aids  Franco,  441,  448,  449;  Anti- 
Comintern  Pact,  452;  (1848),  490;  news 
from,  166-169;  World  War,  267,  276; 
second  World  War,  492 

I  vanes,  Jos6,  164 

'ackson,  Andrew,  7,  10,  n,  331 
ackson,  Joe,  292 
ackson,  Stonewall,  40 
"acobson,  Willi,  462 
Dagger,  Claude  A.,  353 
Jamieson,  Frank,  366-373 
Japan,  257,  259,  465;  Anti-Comintern  Pact, 
452;  earthquake  (1923),  306;  Five-Power 
Treaty,    298,    299;    invades    Manchuria, 
374;   war  with  Russia,    172-186;   World 
War,  236 

fefferds,  W.  C,  209 
[enkins,  Arthur,  90 
"ews,  persecution,  460,  462 
bhnson,  Andrew,  58,  72 
Johnson,  Brandish,  454,  455 
Johnson,  Hiram,  254 
Johnstown,    flood,    104-108;    second    flood, 

421 

'ones,  Dr.  Alexander,  23-25,  107,  307,  489 
ones,  Bobby,  324 
ones,  Coleman  B.,  318 
Josten,  Rudolf,  477 

'journal  of  Commerce  (see  New  York  Jour- 
nal of  Commerce) 
Jutland,  battle  of,  242 

Kansas  City  Star,  315 

Kato,  Admiral,  299 

Kellogg,  Frank  B.,  220,  221,  225-227 

Kellogg-Briand  Pact,  336,  337 

Kellogg,  Mark,  83-87,  100 

Kemal,  Mustapha,  290,  301 

Kendall,  George  Wilkins,  332 

Kendrick,  J.  M.,  419 

Kennedy,  Edward,  450,  470,  474,  483 

Kennedy,  Joseph  P.,  475,  478 

Kennedy,  J.  D.,  228 

Kent,  William,  54 

Kidnaping,    364-373,    381,    391;    Lindbergh 

case,  364-373,  38i,  39i,  398-406 
Kilram,  Jake,  231 
King,  Frank,  276,  321 
Kinney,  W.  A.,  364-366,  368,  373,  403 
Kiriloff  (see  Popoff,  Nicholas) 
Kloeber,  Charles  E.,  230,  271,  290 
Knapp,  Charles,  119,  151,  154,  155 
Knight,  Rear-Admiral  Austin  M.,  247 
Knights  of  Labor,  99,  424,  425 
Knoblaugh,  H.  E.,  442,  450 
Komura,  Baron,  185 
Kravschenko,  176-178 
Kreuzer,  Konstantin,  484 
Krum,  Charles  L.  and  Howard,  233 
Kuhn,  Oliver  Owen,  380,  381 


Ku  Klux  Klan,  290,  350 
Kuroki,  General,  175,  180 
Kuropatkin,  General,   175,    177,   179,    180, 
184 

Labor,  422,  423;  disturbances,  288 

Laffan,  William  M.,  93,  112,  114,  118,  120, 

121,  124,  125,  131,  134,  136,  149,  152 
Laffan  News  Bureau,  150,  152,  245 
Lamsdorff,  Count,  170,  173 
Langelaan,  George,  341 
Langley,  Samuel  P.,  170 
Lansing,  Robert,   Secretary  of  State,   256- 

261 

Lapponi,  Dr.  Giuseppe,  168,  169 
Las  Guasimas,  143,  144 
Lateran  Treaty,  351 
Latona,  brig,  6 
Lausanne  Conference,  303 
Lawrence,  David,  240,  258,  403 
Lawrence,  Jim,  366,  368,  373 
Lawson,  Victor  Fremont,  109-130,  187,  208, 

309,  3io,  333,  380;  Chicago  Daily  News 

crusade,    148-152;    co-operative   principle, 

319;  invasion  of  East,  130-134;  death,  319 
League  of  Nations,  286,  291,  301,  303,  407 
Leased  wires  (see  Wires) 
Lee,  Dick,  ship  news  editor,  229,  319 
Lee,  Robert  E.,  48,  49,  51,  52 
Lehman,  Herbert  H.,  375,  376 
Lehrbas.  Lloyd,  492 
Leo  XIII,  Pope,  83,  167-170 
Leopold  III,  King  of  the  Belgians,  492 
Leslie's     (Frank)     Illustrated    Newspaper, 

33.2 

Lewis,  John  L.,  432 
Lewis,  Roger,  235 
Lewis,  Sinclair,  323 
Liaoyang,  179-182 
Limited  service  papers,  204 
Lincoln,  Abraham^  36,  37,  39,  42,  44,  50-52, 

376;     assassination,    53-59;     farewell     at 

Springfield,   37,   38;   Gettysburg  address, 

49;  inaugural  address,  38 
Lincoln,  Mrs.,  53,  56,  57 
Lincoln-Douglas  debates,  66 
Lindbergh,  Charles  A.,  352;  flight,  337-341; 

son  kidnaped,  364-373,  381,  391,  398-406 
Lin-o-type,  102 
Lipsey,  P.  L,  319 
Lipton,  Sir  Thomas,  162 
Little  Big  Horn,  83-86 
Litvinoff,  Maxim,  472 
Lloyd,  John,  444,  450,  473,  475,  476,  478 
Lochner,  Louis,  321-323,  354,  357,  358,  391, 

459,  462,  466-469,  477-484,  492;  Pulitzer 

prize,  484 
Logotype,  286 
London,  123,  261,  357;  AP  bureau  in,  70,  74, 

78,  88,  208,  235-239,  241,  242,  265,  487; 

Diamond  Jubilee,  137;  Reuter  service,  70 
London  Daily  Telegraph,  210,  213,  408,  411, 

454 

London  Times,  46,  104,  139,  454 
Long,  John  D.,  139 


INDEX 


501 


Los  Angeles  Times,  99 
Louis,  Joe,  452 

Louisville,  Kentucky,  38,  44,  62 
Louisville  Journal,  63 
Lounsbury,  Clement  A.,  84 
Loyalists,  Spanish,  441-457 
Lucania,  Cunarder,  163 
Ludendorff,  Erich  von,  271-276 
Lusitania,  188,  238-241,  248 
Lyman,  A.  W.,  140,  143 
Lynch,  W.  F.,  196,  197 

McCambridge,  W.  J.,  361,  418,  420,  421 

McCartney,  J.  D.,  283 

McClatchy,  V.  S.,  224 

McClellan,  George  B.,  41 

McCormick,  Frederick,  176,  179,  180 

McCormick,  Robert,  173 

McDonald,  Hershel,  196 

McFall,  Burge,  273,  275,  276 

McGowan,  D.  B.,  241 

Mclnerney,  Ben,  194-196 

McKelway,  St.  Clair,  130,  155 

McKinley,  William,  133,  134,  139,  163,  188, 

193 

McLean,  Judge,  24 
McLean,  Robert,  417,  439,  463 
McLean,  William  L.,  155,  417 
McLean,  Wilmer,  52 
McPherson,  Aimee  Semple,  323 
McRae,  Milton,  152 
MacDonald,  Herman,  344 
MacDonald,  James,  336-339 
Mack,  Frank  W.,  96,  97,  in,  114 
Mackenzie,  DeWitt,  242,  243,  267,  271,  272, 

276,  467-473,  477,  481-487 
Macon,  dirigible,  394 
Madrid,  441-443,  45O,  45* 
Mail  and  Express,  New  York,  89,  124 
Mail  services,  313 
Maine,  95;  blown  up,  137-139 
Maitland  and  Hegenberg,  341 
Makaroff,  Admiral,  177,  178 
Manchukuo,  465 

Manchuria,  174,  176,  179,  183,  186,  374 
Manila  Bay,  141,  296,  297 
Marble,  Manton,  52,  66 
Marconi,  Guglielmo,  161-163 
Marine  telegraph,  9 
Marne,  First  Battle,  236;  Second,  274 
Marquette  Journal,  218 
Marriott,  J.  C.,  140 
Martin,  Frederick  Roy,  230,  236,  289,  291- 

295,  307 

Martin,  Harold,  140,  143,  147,  207,  278 
Martinique,  eruption,  163,  164 
Masaryk,  Jan,  477,  479 
Masaryk,  Thomas  G.,  467 
Mathewson,  Christy,  320 
Matzhold,  Louis,  444,  460,  461,  477 
Maxwell,  Alice,  444 
Medill,  Joseph,  60-63,  73,  75,  9*.  93 
Mein  Kampf,  458 
Mergenthaler,  Ottmar,  102 
Merrimac,  49,  142 


Messina,  earthquake,  202-204 

Mexico,  236,  242-244,  257,  259,  268,  269, 
418;  war  with,  13-15,  19 

Mexican  War  daguerreotypes,  332 

Miami  Daily  News,  319,  325 

Middleton,  Henry  J.,  176,  179 

Mills,  Jim,  355-359,  374,  407-415 

Missouri  Pacific,  99,  100 

Mitchell,  J.  W.,  140,  143,  144 

"Molly  Maguires,"  83 

Mongolia,  liner,  263 

Monitor,  49 

Montana  copper  kings,  108 

Moobeny,  Henry  E.,  398-405 

Mooney,  John,  264 

Mooney,  Tom,  245 

Moore,  Governor,  370-373 

Morgan,  J.  P.,  66,  124,  223,  230,  353 

Morgan,  Thomas,  286,  290 

Morkrum  Telegraph  Printer,  233,  234,  244, 
278,  303,  36i 

Mormons,  19,  20 

Morning  Courier,  New  York,  8,  II 

Morro  Castle,  burning,  391 

Morse,  Samuel  F.  B.,  13,  332 

Morse  telegraph,  20,  29,  233,  234,  246,  361 

Morton,  Joy,  233 

Morton,  0.  S.,  325 

Moss,  Edward  B.,  231,  245,  246 

Moyston,  Guy,  287,  299,  300 

Mukden,  184 

Munich,  293,  306,  481-486,  493 

Munsey,  Frank,  245 

Murphy,  J.  E.,  381 

Mussolini,  Benito,  324,  441,  463;  and  Czech 
crisis,  475,  477;  Ethiopia  invaded  by, 
407-416;  Hitler,  visit  to,  453;  at  Munich, 
481,  482;  Rome-Berlin  axis,  459 

National  Intelligencer,  Washington,  D.  C., 

National  Labor  Relations  Board,  433,  43 8 

National  Socialist  Party  (Nazis),  354,  390, 
459-488,  491,  492 

Neef,  Walter,  121,  123 

Neil,  Edward  J.,  413,  4*5,  4i6,  444-449, 
453-457 

Nelson,  J.  B.,  140 

Neutrality,  United  States,  238,  248 

New  Deal,  378,  438 

New  England,  papers  join  AP  of  Illinois, 
131;  submarine  raid,  247,  248 

New  England  Associated  Press,  71,  75,  "7 

New  Haven  Union,  131 

New  Orleans  Picayune,  14,  52 

Newton,  Byron  R.,  140 

New  York  Associated  Press,  60,  94,  95,  122, 
152;  agents,  23;  bureaus,  first  two,  31; 
code  of  regulations,  30,  31;  controlled  wire, 
first,  26,  27;  coverage,  116;  end  of,  119; 
European  agent  for,  69-74;  European 
news,  first  all-wire,  26;  first  office  on  for- 
eign soil,  26;  first  years,  23-35;  foreign 
service,  88;  founded,  19-21;  geographical 
groups,  29;  headquarters,  23,  45,  66,  78, 


502 


INDEX 


83;  military  messages,  Civil  War,  41; 
news  monopoly,  31,  78-81;  official  stamp, 
52;  Western  AP,  alliance  with,  110-115, 
117,  118,  127;  break  with  (1866),  66-71, 
130;  compact  with,  75-77;  conflict  with, 
71-75,  88;  contract  with  (1883),  91,  102; 
Western  Union  and,  78-80 
New  York  City  News  Association,  48 
New  York  City,  armistice,  281-283;  false 
armistice,  277-281;  news  getting,  early, 
7-10;  papers  join  AP  of  Illinois,  130; 
secession  sentiment,  38;  in  World  War, 
270 

New  York  City,  newspapers:  Advertiser, 
130;  Courier  and  Enquirer,  24;  Daily 
Graphic,  333;  Evening  Post,  79;  Express, 

19,  29,  51,  66;  Herald,  11-14,  19,  20,  23, 

28,  29,  31,  34,  40-42,  44,  51,  66,  75,  91.  98, 
134,  331;  Herald  Tribune,  473;  Journal, 
134,  138,  152;  Journal  of  Commerce,  8-10, 

20,  29,  39,  40,  42,  43,  51,  52,  284;  Mail 
and  Express,  89,  124;  Morning  Courier, 
8,    n;    Post,    8,    130,    221;    Press,    130; 
Staats-Zeitung,  130;  Standard,  8;  Sun,  n, 
13,  19-21,  28,  29,  51,  66,  90-95,  112,  120, 
134,   136,   I49-IS2,  156,  231,  245;   Tele- 
gram, 134;  Times,  21,  28,  29,  41,  51,  65, 

66,  69,  91,  133,  134,  155,  210,  224,  289, 
325,  455;  Tribune,  28,  29,  41,  50,  51,  55, 
56,  66,  91,  102,  104,  134;  World,  41,  51, 
52,  66,  71,  75,  104,  130,  332,  333 

New  York^State,  bank  holiday,  375,  376; 

papers  join  AP  of  Illinois,  130 
New  York  State  Associated  Press,  29,  66, 

67,  7i,  75,  U7 

New  York   Stock   Exchange,   52,   346-348, 

Newport  Herald,  246,  247 

News,  cumulative  effect,  188;  domestic,  31; 
European  (see  European  news);  explana- 
tory and  interpretive  treatment,  465; 
fields,  diversity  of,  292,  293;  first  carried 
by  wireless,  162;  first  European  cable,  34; 
humanizing  sidelights,  292,  295;  lively 
presentation,  314;  increasing  volume  of, 

29,  30;  local,  152;  monopoly,  31,  109-115, 
136;  property  right  in,  285,  286;  rules  for 
handling,  62,  63;  truthful  (see  Truth  in 
news);  vicinage,  317 

News  gathering,  7-15,  66-68,  152;  century 
of,  489;  co-operative  for,  21,  118,  119; 
monopoly,  31;  need  for  reform,  no;  sec- 
tionalism, 36;  systematic,  7 

News  Photo  Service,  334,  335,  348 

News  piracy,  263,  284,  285 

Newspapers,  afternoon  and  Sunday,  313; 
chain  organizations,  313;  circulation,  313; 
code  of  ethics,  187;  public  service,  187, 
188;  style,  presentation,  314 

Neylan,  John  Francis,  386,  388 

Nicholas  II.  Czar,  171-173;  abdication,  262 

Nixon,  William  Penn,  114,  119,  127,  132 

"Non-intervention  Committee,"  441,  442 

Norge,  dirigible,  323 

North  Pole,  207-213 


Noyes,  Frank  Brett,  131,  132,  155-157,  208, 
273,  279,  384-387;  AP  president,  261,  289, 
294,  295,  362;  employes'  welfare,  303- 
310;  re-election,  417-418;  retirement,  463- 
465;  twenty-fifth  anniversary,  307-310 

NRA,  378;  newspaper  code,  431 

Nungesser  and  Coli,  337,  340 

Nutter,  Charles,  451,  452 

Observer,  New  York,  8 

Ochs,  Adolph  S.,  117,  129,  155,  224,  273, 
487;  buys  New  York  Times,  133;  em- 
ployes' welfare,  289 

Ohio  river,  floods,  421,  422 

Oil,  Ethiopia,  410-412  (see  also  Standard 
Oil  Company) 

Oil  City  Derrick,  222 

Okin,  Bob,  453 

Oldfield,  James,  442,  450 

O'Leary,  Mrs.,  81 

O'Meara,  Stephen,  155 

O'Neil,  Tom,  339 

Olympia,  flagship,  296 

Olympic  Games,  Antwerp,  290 

Oregon,  battleship,  146 

Orr,  Harry  W.,  104-107 

Orteig  (Raymond)  prize,  337 

Osborne,  J.  D.,  63 

Paine,  John,  95 

Palmer,  Frederick,  243 

Panama  Canal,  170 

Panay,  gunboat,  453  . 

Panic  (1893),  116,  123,  124,  126,  129  (see 

also  Depression) 
Paris,  AP  bureau,  70,   166,  169,  176,  235, 

236,   241,   242,   264;   bombardment,   271, 

272;  Germans  occupy,  492;  mobilization 

(1938),    475;    Peace    Conference,    286, 

287 

Parker,  Alton  B.,  193 
Parker,  Robert  B.,  Jr.,  442 
Parkerson,  John  T.,  273 
Patroff,  Sam,  401,  402 
Patterson,  R.  W.,  Jr.,  in 
Payne,  Berk,  348 

"Peace  for  Our  Time,"  458-488,  493 
Peary,  .Robert  E.,  208-210 
Pel£e,  Mount,  eruption,  163,  164 
Pennsylvania  Gazette,  330 
Penny  press,  II,  12,  14,  20 
Perdicaris,  Ion,  188,  189 
Pershing,  General  John  J.,  264,  267,  418 
Peterson,  Elmer,  442,  443,  492 
Petrograd,  267-270,  276,  290 
Petropavloysky,  flagship,  178 
Philadelphia,   Centennial,    84;    papers    join 

AP  of  Illinois,  130;  Sesquicentennial,  323 
Philadelphia  Associated  Press,  29,  351 
Philadelphia  newspapers:  Bulletin,  155,  417; 

Public  Ledger,  14,  22,  132 
Philby,  H.  A.  R.,  454 
Phillips,  Sir  Percival,  408-413 
Phillips,  Walter  Polk,  83,  90,  93,  "2,  118, 

120,  133,  134;  code,  82 


INDEX 


503 


Photo-engraving,  313 

Photography,  331,  332,  483;  news,  47 

Picayune,  New  Orleans,  52 

Pjckens,  R.  S.,  326 

Pictures,  Anschluss,  462;  Czech  crisis,  483; 
sport-news,  328-335 

Pierce,  Joseph,  203 

Pigeon  post,  12,  13,  26,  27,  162,  236 

Pilsudski,  Marshal  Josef,  321-323,  485 

Pitkin,  Dwight  L.,  457 

Pitney,  Mr.  Justice,  284 

Pittsburgh,  104;  flood,  420-422 

Pius  X,  Pope,  234 

Pius  XI,  Pope,  355,  356 

Playfair,  W.  E.,  305,  306,  344-34$ 

Plehve,  Viatscheslav,  171,  172 

Poison  gas,  242 

Poland,  290,  321-323;  demand  on  Czechs, 
484,  485;  invasion  of,  490,  491 

Polk,  James  K.,  President,  23 

Polk,  Undersecretary  of  State,  278,  281 

Pony  circuit,  telephone,  216-219 

Pony  express,  10,  13,  14,  26-28,  84 

"Pony"  papers,  204,  215,  216 

Ponzi,  290 

Popoff,  Nicholas  E.  (Kiriloff),  176,  179-181, 
208 

Port  Arthur,  175-177 

Porter,  Roy,  470,  474,  478,  483 

Portsmouth  Conference,  224 

Post,  Wiley,  381,  395-397 

Post,  New  York  (see  New  York  Post) 

Postal  Telegraph,  strike,  426,  427 

Powers,  Philip  M.,  264,  273,  276 

Praha,  466-477 

Prenosil,  Stanley  W.,  264,  288 

Prensa  Asociada,  274,  275 

Press,  controlled,  458;  freedom  of,  122,  123, 
436-438,  491  (see  also  Censorship);  mon- 
opoly, 122,  127,  128 

Press,  New  York,  130 

Press  agents,  295 

Presses,  hand,  4;  first  rotary,  29;  mechani- 
cal, 13 

Pressure  groups,  465 

Price,  Byron,  258,  263,  349,  350,  375,  4'9 

Price,  0.  K.,  398-405 

Prime,  William  Cowper,  43,  52,  64,  66,  67, 
76,^90 

Printing  presses  (see  Presses) 

Prize  fighting,  231,  232,  296,  306,  339,  346, 
394,  452 

Probert,  Lional  C.,  258,  259 

Prohibition,  270,  290,   293,  301,  320,  348; 

repeal,  379  ,      .     ^ 

Propaganda,  295,  458,  465;  in  European 
news,  164;  German  World  War,  274, 
275;  South  America,  274,  275;  World 
War,  237,  238;  second  World  War, 
462 

Providence  Journal,  230,  294,  295 
Public  utility,  151,  153 
Publishers'  Press  Association,  200 
Pulitzer,  Joseph,  130,  170,  333 
Pulitzer  Prize,  318,  323,  373,  444 


Quinpool,  John,  209 


Radio,  313,  355,  379 

Ragsdale,  W.  B.,  319 

Railroads,  Civil  War,  46;  to  West,  20,  62,  78 

Raisuli,  188,  189 

Raleigh  (N.  C.)  News  and  Observer,  265, 

Rathom,  John  R.,  294 

Raulston,  Judge,  319 

Raymond,  Henry  J.,  19-21,  26,  28,  41,  65, 

69 

Reavis,  Smith,  336,  337,  411,  412 
Red  Cross,  107 
"Red  scare,"  postwar,  288 
Regan,  J.  W.,  209 
Reichstag  fire,  381 
Reid,  Whitelaw,  112,  114 
Rennick,  H.  L.,  269,  276,  290 
Reparations,  303;  moratorium,  356-358 
Reporter,  American,  in  Europe,  69,  70,  72, 

75;  Bennett  first,  n,  12;  Civil  War,  44,  47 
Reporting,  factual,  314 
Republic,  liner,  203,  204 
Republican  party,  95,  98,  133,  191,  199,  245, 

249-254,  349,  350;  conventions,  188,  291 
Ress,  Seymour,  381 
Reuter,  Herbert  and  Julius  de,  70,  121 
Reuters  Agency,  70,  93,  121,  126,  274,  454, 

Ribbentrop,  Joachim  von,  468,  482 

Richmond  Enquirer,  36 

Rickett,  Francis  W.,  oil  concession,  406-413 

"River  news,"  76 

Rober,  Harry  H.,  321 

Roberts,  Elmer  E.,  140,  235,  236,  271,  272, 
275,  306 

Roberts,  Justice  Owen  J.,  436 

Robson,  Karl,  454 

Rockefeller,  John  D.,  78,  220,  221,  293 

Rodgers,  Commodore,  rescue,  319 

Rogers,  Will,  395-397 

Rojestvensky,  Admiral,  182-184    \ 

Rolph,  Major  James,  280 

Rome-Berlin  Axis,  452,  459 

Rome,  Georgia,  Tribune  Herald,  283 

Romer,  Harry,  278 

Roosevelt,  Franklin  Delano,  and  bank  holi- 
day, 377,  378;  inauguration,  375-380,  431 

Roosevelt,  Mrs.  F.  D.,  377 

Roosevelt,  Theodore,  139,  143,  185-193,  199, 

200,  220,  230,  250,  251 

Rosen,  Baron,  185 

Rough  Riders,  143,  144,  188 

Rowboats,  5-8,  34 

Rowell,  Chester  A.,  254 

Ruhr  Valley,  303 

"Rum,  Romanism,  and  Rebellion,"  96-98 

Russia,  aids  Madrid  government,  441;  AP 
and,  170-174,  290;  Bolshevist  revolution, 
262.  269,  270;  invades  Finland,  492;  in- 
vaaes  Poland,  492;  and  Munich  settle- 
ment, 472;  Red  Army,  290;  "Revolution 
of  1905,"  183;  Soviet  twentieth  anniver- 
sary, 452;  war  with  Japan,  172-186,  224, 


INDEX 


465;  with  Turkey,  83;  World  War,  236, 
241,  242,  267-270 
Ryan,  James,  239 

Sacco,  Nicola,  and  Vanzetti,  Bartolomeo, 
290,  344-346 

Sackett,  Henry  W.,  112 

Sacramento  Bte,  224 

Saginaw  (Mich.)  News-Courier,  309 

St.  Cloud  (Minn.)  Times  and  Journal" 
Press,  388 

St.  Louis  Post-Dispatch,  130 

St.  Louis  Republic,  154 

Saint-Mihiel,  276 

St.  Petersburg,  AP  bureau,  170-175,  181, 
185,  235,  236,  261  (see  also  Petrograd) 

Saint-Pierre,  163,  164 

Salchow,  Ulrich,  262,  269,  290 

Samoa,  disaster,  102-104,  140 

Sampson,  Admiral,  140-142,  168,  290 

Sande,  Tom,  368 

Sanders,  Paul,  354 

San  Francisco,  AP  bureau,  100-104,  280, 
393;  earthquake  and  fire,  194-198;  Hard- 
ing, death  of,  291,  305;  Preparedness  Day 
bombing,  245;  Wilson  campaign,  252,  253 

San  Francisco  Chronicle,  104 

San  Francisco  Examiner,  152,  200 

San  Juan  Hill,  144 

Santiago,  144-147 

Sarajevo,  235 

Savage,  Dr.  Minot  J.,  272 

Schildbach,  Robert  F.,  390,  470,  483 

Schilplin,  Fred,  388 

Schley,  Commodore  Winfield  S.,  141,  142, 
145,  146 

Schoonmaker,  Francis  X.,  90,  93,  94 

Schreiner,  George  A.,  236,  237,  241 

Schuschnigg,  Kurt,  458-460 

Schwarzkopf,  Colonel  H.  Norman,  370-373 

Scopes  Evolution  Trial,  319 

Scott,  James  W.,  93 

Scott,  General  Winfield,  19,  24,  36,  41 

Scranton  Republican,  264 

Scripps,  Edward  W.,  152,  153 

Scripps,  James  E.,  73,  127,  128 

Scripps-Howard  papers,  387r  389 

Scripps-McRae  Press  Association,  152,  153, 
200,  217 

Sears,  photo  editor,  397 

Semaphore,  9 

Serbia,  235 

Seese,  George  L.,  244 

Seven-Power  Conference,  357 

Seward,  William  H.,  54-58 

Seyss-Inquart,  460 

Shamrock,  yacht,  162 

Shanke,  Edward,  468,  469,  472,  473,  477 

Sharkey,  Joseph  E.,  299,  303,  306 

Sheepshanks,  Richard,  454-456 

Shtnandoah,  319 

Sherman,  William  Tecumseh,  44,  45,  52,  85 

Sherman  antitrust  law,  220 

Sherman  Silver  Purchase  Act,  128 

Sibley,  J.  C.,  220 


Silver,  116,  133 

Simonton,  James  W.,  General  Agent,  64-78, 
88-90,  92;  leased  wire,  first,  82,  83;  and 
Senate  Committee,  79-81 

Simpson,  Kirke  L.,  240.  296-298 

Sims,  Admiral,  265,  260 

Sinclair,  Samuel,  66 

Sinn  Fein,  299,  300 

Sino-Japanese  War,  364,  452 

Six-penny  papers,  II,  12 

Slavery,  35,  37 

Small,  Robert  T.,  267 

Smith,  Alfred  E.,  307,  349,  350 

Smith,  Charles  Stephenson,  236,  267,  269, 
276,  290,  321 

Smith,  F.  0.  J.,  21 

Smith,  Ralph,  399,  400,  404,  405 

Smith,  Richard,  75,  91,  112-115,  117,  176 

Smith,  William  Henry,  82,  92,  93,  106, 
110-115,  117,  121,  274 

Smythe,  J.  Herbert,  107,  108 

Snyder-Gray  case,  337,  349 

Somme  offensive,  243 

Sousa,  John  Philip,  137 

South  America,  AP,  275;  German  propa- 
ganda, World  War,  274,  275;  revolutions, 

354 

Southern  Associated  Press,  29,  62,  71,  117, 
129 

Spain,  Civil  War,  441-457,  463,  465;  re- 
public. 356;  war  with  (1898),  138-147, 
164-169,  173,  187 

"Special"  correspondents,  130 

Special  Survey  Committee,  317 

Spies,  Civil  War,  44 

Spirit  of  St.  Louis,  337-340 

Sports,  news  of,  231-233,  296,  346,  394, 
>m 

SS  guards,  461,  482 

Stager,  General  Anson,  75 

Stakelberg,  Baron,  180 

Stalin,  Joseph,  321 

Standard,  New  York,  8 

Standard  Oil  Company,  220-227,  410,  412 

Stanford,  Leland,  78 

Stanton,  Edwin  M.,  45,  46,  48,  50,  52,  56, 
58,  59 

Stark,  J.  C.,  474,  478 

State  services,  317 

Stearns,  Frank  W.,  324,  325 

Stefani  (Guglielmo)  agency,  70 

Stefferud.  A.  D.,  460 

Steinkopt,  Alvin  J.,  460,  461,  466,  473,  477. 
478 

Stephenson,  Francis  M.,  342,  377 

Stevens  Institute  of  Technology,  318 

Stimson,  Henry  L.,  356 

Stockwell,  Thomas,  271,  276 

Stone,  David  Marvin,  43,  90 

Stone,  Herbert,  239 

Stone,  Melville  E.,  no,  120-133,  H9,  l$l> 
154,  214-230,  251-253,  261-281,  285,  286, 
289,  315,  3i6,  333,  350,  418;  European 
relations,  162-173;  General  Manager  AP, 
156,  175,  176,  179,  214-219,  239,  425;  re- 


INDEX 


505 


tires,  294,  295;  twenty-five  years,  anniver- 
sary, 273 

Stoner,  Captain  Frank  E.,  396 

Storm  Troopers,  460-462 

Stout  (Thomas)  Agency,  47,  48 

Stratum,  Lloyd,  418,  433 

Strikes,  railway  (1877),  423,  424 

String  correspondents,  116,  163,  200,  203, 
216,  490 

Stuart,  Wilmer,  249,  250-254 

Submarines,  German,  247,  248,  263,  265, 
266;  unrestricted  warfare,  238-242,  244, 
256-261 

Sudeten  Germans,  465-484 

Suez  Canal,  407,  413 

Sullivan,  John  L.,  124,  231 

Sun  (see  New  York  Sun) 

Sutherland,  Justice  George,  437 

Switzer,  Howard,  325,  326 

Sydow,  Postmaster  General,  Berlin,  168 

Syracuse  Herald,  90,  130 

Taft,  William  Howard,  199,  230 

Talley,  Charles  M.,  320 

Talley,  Marion,  320 

Tappan,  Arthur,  8 

Taylor,  Zachary,  19,  24 

Teapot  Dome,  306 

Telegram  (see  New  York  Telegram} 

Telegraph,  4,  23,  27-30,  39,  95,  104,  109, 
233,  244,  303;  Civil  War,  46,  47;  inven- 
tion, 13;  news,  14,  20,  21,  60-64,  72,  73, 
78,  79;  "Phillips  code,"  82;  rates,  80,  82, 
170;  to  West,  62;  World  War,  237 

'Telegraph  reporters,"  22 

Telephone,  83,  104,  109,  303;  dispatches, 
468,  472-474,  477,  48i;  invention,  83; 
Spanish  War,  450;  tolls,  362,  473;  World 
War,  237,  239  ^  ^ 

Telephone  pony  circuit,  216-219 

Telephoto,  283-286 

Terry,  General  Alfred  H.,  85,  86,  100 

Terucl,  453,  454,  457 

Thaw,  Harry  K.,  200 

Thomas,  Addison  C,  95,  232 

Thompson,  Charles  T.,  169,  181-183,  186, 
267,  269,  287 

Thompson,  Howard  N.,  140,  143,  144,  147, 
173,  176,  185 

Thompson,  Milo  M.,  411,  412,  487 

Thorup,  Albert,  208 

Tilden,  William,  83 

Timuska,  George,  445 

Titanic  sinking,  228,  229 

Togo,  Admiral,  175,  177,  178,  182,  184,  242 

Topliff,  Samuel,  Jr.,  5-7 

Topping,  Thomas,  302,  341 

Trades  Union  Congress,  321 

Traus,  Ed,  235 

Trent,  S.S.,  212,  213 

Tribune,  New  York  (see  New  York  Tribune) 

Trotsky,  Leon,  262,  269,  349 

Truth  in  news,  157,  192,  237,  238,  310,  488 

Tumulty,  Joseph,  254,  256 

Tunney,  Gene,  346,  349 


Turnblad,  Harold,  395,  396 
Turner,  George,  339 
Tutankhamen,  tomb  of,  301,  302 
Twain,  Mark,  199 
Typewriter,  4,  95 

U-boats,  239-242,  244,  245,  247,  263    (see 
also  Submarines) 

U-53,  247 

Uhl,  Alexander,  441-443,  450 

Undated  War  Leads,  270 

Unemployment,    116,    288,    354,   356,    363, 

4.23 
Unions,    craft    and    industrial,    423;    after 

Spanish  war,  424;  newspaper,  432-440 
United  Press,  90,  93,  94,  101,  110-121,  124, 
150,    152,    280;    bankruptcy,    134,    136; 
struggle    with   AP   of   Illinois,    124-135; 
"unifying  contract,"  119;  union  with  New 
York  AP,  110-115,  119;  United  Associated 
Presses,  change  to,  133 
United  Press  Associations,  90,  200,  285,  289 
United  Press  News  Association,  217 
United  States,  abandons  gold  standard,  378; 
Five^Power  Treaty,  298,  299;  Lusitania 
sinking,  239,  240,  248;  warning  to  Ger- 
many, 244,  245;  World  War,  256-283 
United  States  and  Europe  Telegraph  News 

Association,  67,  70,  72 
United  States  Associated  Press,  74 
United  States  Supreme  Court,  284-286,  431, 

435-440 
Unknown  Soldier,  296-298 

Vahney,  James  H.,  288 

Valentino,  Rudolph,  303 

Van  Camp,  Edwin  L.,  244 

Vanderschmidt,  Fred,  472,  473,  481 

Van  Loon,  Hendrik  Willcm,  236,  237 

Veracruz,  230 

Verdun,  242,  244 

Versailles  Treaty,  293,  416,  467 

Vicksburg,  45,  48,  49 

Victor  Emmanuel  III,  167 

Victoria,  Queen,  26,  32,  33 

Vienna,    Anschluss,    458-463;    AP    bureau, 

235,  236,  390 

Villa,  Pancho,  242-244,  268,  269,  418 
Villard,  Henry,  37,  43,  50 
Villard,  Oswald  Garrison,  221-225,  230 
Volstead  Act,  321 

Wader,  Samuel  F.,  273,  275,  341 

Wagner  Act,  435-440 

Walker,  H.  N,  62,  75,  76 

Walker,  Norman,  268,  269 

Wall   Street,   12,   52,  66,  95;   AP  Bureau, 

346-348,  351,  352;  "Black  Friday"  (1869), 

78;  explosion,  290;  1929  boom,  346,  347; 

break,  351,  352;  "Black  Thursday,"  352, 

353;  panic  (1893),  123 
Walsh,  John  R.,  93,  112,  114,  120 
Walton,  Patrick,  140 
Wanda,  news  yacht,  140,  142-145 
War  correspondents,  Civil  War,  41-50;  news 


5o6 


INDEX 


leaks   through,  44-46;    Spanish-American 
war,  I39-H7 
"War  diary,"  communiques,  Civil  War,  50, 

"War  Hawks/'  3 

War  of  1812,  3-7,  u 

War  Reparations  Conference,  351 

Warneld,  Mrs.  Wallis,  443,  444 

Warspite,  dreadnought,  242 

Washington,  D.  C.,  52-59;  AP  bureau,  31, 
78,  239-242,  256-259,  282,  283;  news  cen- 
ter, 77,  187-193  ^  o 

Washington  (D.  C.)  Star,  131,  132,  155, 
156,  308,  309,  380,  385 

Watson,  Morris,  368,  432-438 

Watson,  Oscar,  140 

Webb,  James  Watson,  8,  n,  12,  14,  19,  27, 
28,  41 

Weigan,  Karl  von,  196 

Wellman,  Walter,  207-213 

Wells,  H.  A,  83 

Werner,  Wade,  390,  460,  461 

Western  Associated  Press,  29,  60-68,  232; 
alliance  with  New  York  AP,  110-118,  127; 
contract  (1883),  91,  92;  new  friction  with, 
63-77,  88,  89,  102;  rules  for  news  han- 
dling, 62,  63 

Western  Union,  67,  75,  76,  78-81,  89,  90,  95, 
98,  194-198,  268,  426 

Wetmore,  Claude,  104-108 

Weyler,  General  Valeriano,  138 

Wheeler,  Frank  M.,  247 

Whiffen,  Walter  C.,  236,  241,  261,  267,  269, 
276 

White,  Horace,  65-68,  70-75,  130 

White,  M.  A.,  278 

White,  Stanford,  200 

White  Army,  276,  290 

White  House,  the,  n 

Whiteleather,  Melvin,  460,  462,  470,  471, 
474,  478,  481,  483,  492 

Whitman,  Walt,  48 

Wjegand,  Karl  von,  196 

Wilderness,  battle,  50,  51 


Wilhelm,  Kaiser,  148,  168,  172,  185,  271, 
276,  282,  287,  290 

Williams,  Tames  T.,  185 

Williams,  M.  H.,  381 

Williams,  Valentine,  301,  302 

Williamson,  George,  364 

Williamson,  Stephen,  339 

Wilson,  Alexander,  69,  70,  72,  75,  413,  414 

Wilson,  C.  H.,  215 

Wilson,  Woodrow,  240^255,  351;  1912  vic- 
tory, 230;  renomination,  245;  second  elec- 
tion, 249-255;  World  War,  240,  261; 
Zimmerman  Note,  261 

Wing,  Henry  J.,  50,  51 

Wireless  telegraphy,  203,  204,  237,  303;  first, 
161-163 

Wirephoto,  381-397,  418,  490;  portable,  419- 
422 

Wires,  leased,  82,  83,  116,  215,  216,  300, 
joi,  424 

Witte,  Count  Sergius,   185,   186 

Wolff  (Dr.  Bernhard)  agency,  70,  90,  274 

Wood,  Colonel  Leonard,  143,  144 

Woodin,  W.  H,  377 

Worcester  Spy,  131 

World,  New  York  (see  New  York  World] 

World  Series,  245,  246,  268,  269,  292 

World  War,  235-283,  316;  America's  entry, 
336;  second,  492 

Wright,  H.  C,  140 

Wright,  Orville,  205,  206 

Wright,  Wilbur,  207 

Wyzanski,  Charles  E.,  435 

Yacht  race,  first  transatlantic,  70 
Yardley,  Captain  John,  267 
Yerkes,  Charles  T.,  148-150 
Youatt,  J.  R.,  176,  177,  230,  234,  418 
Young  Plan,  351 

Zeppelin,  Count  Ferdinand  von,  206,  207 
Zimmermann,  Dr.  Arthur,  Note,  257,  250- 
261