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Show CITIES AND TOWNS JUDGED BY THE1 NEWSPAPERS PRINTED THEREIN. "Show me some copies of the paper published in your town and I will tell you some facts about, it and your people." The man who said that was , an nctivc business man, who was considering an expansive business proposition. The informa-i tion he wanted was all in issues of a weekly newspaper. He wanted to know about the stocks' of goods carried by the merchants, to judge of i their business capacity by the style and amount' of advertising they employed the paper Would show him. He wanted to know something of the social activities of the town, which the papor would show him. He wanted to know something of the pursuits of the people in the town and the condition of the surrounding country. The paper would show him. He would scan those papers carefully and would be able to give the information ns he had stated. He would judge the business prospects from' tho advertising columns, of prospective selling possibilities by tho local happenings, of the, tastes and intelligence of the people by tho read-: ing matter the paper gives its readers, and who-1 thcr they were a progressive, alert or an easy going and comparatively inactive sort. The lo-' cal newspaper tells the story fully to the active, obscrVnnt business mnn, who never snw your town or its people. If the town merchants are not all represented in its columns it would spell "liltlo business," a bad knock for the town. If i the local columns showed a scarcity of news and . little of the social life it would spell In glaring letters "nothing doing." If there was a lack of high-class, up-to-date reading matter on the i livest topics of the times, it would spell for him The Investigation would end and tho town' be passed over as not worth considering. So then ; tho weekly paper is for fifty-two times a year showing people who do not reside in the town just how to judge if it is a business and social center. |