Show WHAT I KNOW KNor ABOUT A NEWSPAPER By Thos E. E Pickrell Pickren What I dont don't know about a newspaper would make a longer story but what I do know about one is worth reading It took me three weeks to find out I didn't know anything about running a newspaper During that time I learned many things It was the Garden Grove Cal News an and it ft taught me methe methe the lesson of charity plain charity plain old fashioned charity charity better better than any other institution of which I know Charity toward the poor devils who have to get out newspapers on time and please every every- body Often I have wondered how the good Lord ever made men and women strong enough to withstand the petty things that that annoy annoy annoy an an- noy the publisher of a newspaper What I say here I think applies applies applies ap ap- plies also to the New York World The Chicago Tribune The Los Angeles Times as well as to the Messenger l The only difference between a daily and a weekly is that the former has potentially and in Leap Year grief spells while the latter gets by with 52 Above all all- newspaper people are human humbly human humbly human They must be or they arent aren't newspaper people The general public keeps them thern human even if their inclinations try to take flight into idealism I want to repeat what I said one time you expect a newspaper to rejoice with your parents when you are i born horn give you a column and a half all about the wedding gown and the minister and the wedding cake when you get married I and then pronounce serious eulogies about you when you pass on That's all right but what about that overdue subscription to the newspaper and the criticisms you direct toward the editor when he doesn't make Inake half as s bad a mistake You expect all the free advertising you can get and still keep on good terms with the editor but just let the dear editor step out 01 oi the path of holy action and you jump on him with both feet Mistakes Mistakes' l I stakes That's one of those serious crimes The kind that you cant can't get away with by pleading insanity or ignorance The wonder is that printers dont don't make more Sarcastically speaking every mistake every misprint every wrong initial or mis spelled mis-spelled sp word is the result of the editors editor's and the reporters reporter's conspiracy against you They lay awake nights hatching up something to make you feel hurt Seriously neither has time timeto timeto timeto to forget his own trouble and think of you If you thought twice you would know that every mistake an editor or printer makes hurts them and the paper far greater than it hurts the victim Now lets let's get forward looking and down to facts I know that a newspaper is absolutely indispensable in the every-day every life of the people Without the press we would hark back years or ages and ages in civilization or lack of it And the home newspaper news newspaper newspaper paper is the greatest solace of all Readers like personal and social items You like them because you are not going to find ail any scandal there trier c. c P Readers Leaders make up n many of the scandals from from facts they read That's pretty harsh against the reader but wedo we wedo I do not mean all readers nor even any considerable number of 1 them But locals are clean They are neighborly They save 1 many luany a talk over the back fence about Where Mrs 1 and So spent spent Sunday I tell telI you the newspaper is a time saver and a I I quarrel saver I Then theres there's the editorial page You may think only th high brows read editorials This is far from the truth Everyone Every Every- one likes a newspaper to have a policy tho it be a neutral one I like comment on current on-current current and nd community questions Even il If they do not agree with all that is said there is zest for mental arguments thrill of thinking for themselves The general and national news is not within the sphere of the local weekly paper but you couldn't do without the larger daily that d gives the spot news Kick for kick interest for interest joke for joke eye for eye and tooth for tooth you get more real pleasure out of ot the home paper than you do of the metropolitan metropolitan metropolitan met met- daily Why hY Because it is closer to your interest Now for the ads I will not say much about adv advertising ir lr it is a field all by itself I do know however that advertising in the home paper is valuable for the same reason that the local news is valuable Occasionally one finds a man in business bus ness who thinks his business will get along without advertising Well he may get along for awhile but the history of great business proves proves that advertising pays an and pays big All this and still I 1 haven't told you much of what I know about a newspaper I know it is the most fascinating game in inthe inthe inthe the world that comes under the head of being legitimate I know just enough about the mechanical end of a newspaper the newspaper the type and headline setting the up make-up of the pages the running of the press press just just enough I say to keep my inexperienced fingers off of the type and machinery The moral of this tale is this When you are about to criticise a newspaper or any of the people whose duty it is to get it to you just walk or ride down to the newspapers newspaper's plant and hang around there until you have seen the whole process of getting one single issue from the press and you'll go home a better more charitable more more forgiving and more sympathetic citizen |