LITMIR.BIZ

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      OFFICE OF THE EDITOR-IN-CHIEF.

      About the “news,” I must speak more fully. The “editorial articles, reviews, and notes,” we shall happen upon when we visit the office.

      A part of the news comes by telegraph from all parts of the world. Some of it is telegraphed to the paper by its correspondents, and the editors call it “special,” because it is especially to them. Perhaps there is something in it which none of the other papers have yet heard of. But the general telegraphic news, from the old-world and the new, is gathered up by the “Associated Press.” That is to say, the leading papers form an Association and appoint men to send them news from the chief points in America and in Europe. These representatives of the Associated Press are very enterprising, and they do not allow much news of importance to escape them. The salaries of these men, and the cost of the telegraphic dispatches, are divided up among the papers of the Association, so that the expense to each paper is comparatively small. Owing to this association of papers, hundreds of papers throughout the country publish a great deal of matter on the same day which is word-for-word alike.

      Two devices in this matter of Associated Press dispatches save so much labor, that I think you will like me to describe them.

      One is this: Suppose there are a dozen papers in the same city which are entitled to the Associated Press dispatches. Instead of making a dozen separate copies, which might vary through mistakes, one writing answers for all the dozen. First, a sheet of prepared tissue paper is laid down, then a sheet of a black, smutty sort of paper, then two sheets of tissue paper, then a sheet of black paper, and so on, until as many sheets of tissue paper have been piled up, as there are copies wanted. Upon the top sheet of paper, the message is written, not with pen, or pencil, but with a hard bone point, which presses so hard that the massive layers of tissue paper take off from the black paper a black line wherever the bone point has pressed. Thus a dozen pages are written with one writing, and off they go, just alike, to the several newspaper offices. The printers call this queer, tissue-paper copy—“manifold.”

      REGULAR CONTRIBUTORS

      The other device is a telegraphic one. Suppose the Associated Press agent in New York is sending a dispatch to the Boston papers. There are papers belonging to the Association at, say, New Haven, Hartford, Springfield and Worcester. Instead of sending a message to each of these points, also, the message goes to Boston, and operators at New Haven, Hartford, Springfield, and Worcester, listen to it as it goes through, and copy it off. Thus one operator at New York is able to talk to perhaps a score of papers, in various parts of New England, or elsewhere, at once.

      But in a large city there is a great deal of city and suburban news. Take for example, New York; and there is that great city, and Brooklyn, and Jersey City, and Hoboken, and Newark, and Elizabeth, to be looked after, as well as many large villages near at hand. And there is great competition between the papers, which shall get the most, the exactest, and the freshest, news. Consequently, each day, a leading New York paper will publish a page or more of local news. The City Editor has charge of collecting this news. He has, perhaps, twenty or twenty-five men to help him—some in town, and others in the suburbs.

      His plan for news collecting will be something like this: He will have his secretary keep two great journals, with a page in each devoted to each day. One of these, the “blotter,” will be to write things in which are going to happen. Everything that is going to happen to-morrow, the next day, the next, and so on, the secretary will make a memorandum of or paste a paragraph in about upon the page for the day on which the event will happen. Whatever he, or the City Editor, hears or reads of, that is going to happen, they thus put down in advance, until by and by, the book gets fairly fat and stout with slips which have been pasted in. But, this morning, the City Editor wants to lay out to-day’s work. So his secretary turns to the “blotter,” at to-day’s page, and copies from it into to-day’s page in the second book all the things to happen to-day—a dozen, or twenty, or thirty—a ship to be launched, a race to come off, a law-case to be opened, a criminal to be executed, such and such important meetings to be held, and so on. By this plan, nothing escapes the eye of the City Editor who, at the side of each thing to happen, writes the name of the reporter whom he wishes to have write the event up. This second book is called the “assignment book;” and, when it is made out, the reporters come in, find their orders upon it, and go out for their day’s work, returning again at evening for any new assignments. Besides this, they, and the City Editor, keep sharp ears and eyes for anything new; and so, amongst them, the city and suburbs are ransacked for every item of news of any importance. The City Editor is a sort of general. He keeps a close eye on his men. He finds out what they can best do, and sets them at that. He gives the good workers better and better work; the poor ones he gradually works out of the office. Those who make bad mistakes, or fail to get the news, which some other paper gets, are frequently “suspended,” or else discharged out-and-out. Failing to get news which other papers get, is called being “beaten,” and no reporter can expect to get badly “beaten” many times without losing his position.

      HOW SOME OF THE NEWS IS GATHERED

      And now, Tom, and Jonathan, and even little Nell, we’ll all be magicians to-night, like the father of Miranda, in “The Tempest,” and transport ourselves in an instant right to one of those great newspaper offices.

      TYPE-SETTER’S CASE IN PI.

      It is six o’clock. The streets are dark. The gaslights are glaring from hundreds of lamp-posts. Do you see the highest stories of all those buildings brilliant with lights? Those are the type-setters’ rooms of as many great newspapers. In a twinkling we are several stories up toward the top of one of these buildings. These are the Editorial Rooms. We’ll make ourselves invisible, so that they’ll not suspect our presence, and will do to-night just as they always do.

      TYPE-SETTERS’ ROOM.

      Up over our heads, in the room of the type-setters, are a hundred columns, or more, of articles already set—enough to make two or three newspapers. The Foreman of the type-setters makes copies of these on narrow strips of paper with a hand-press, and sends them down to the Editor-in-Chief. These copies on narrow strips of paper, are called “proofs,” because, when they are read over, the person reading them can see if the type has been set correctly—can prove the correctness or incorrectness of the type-setting.

      TAKING “PROOFS.”

      The Editor-in-Chief runs rapidly through these proofs, and marks, against here and there one, “Must,” which means that it “must” be published in to-morrow’s paper. Against other articles he marks, “Desirable,” which means that the articles are “desirable” to be used, if there is room for them. Many of the articles he makes no mark against, because they can wait, perhaps a week, or a month. By having a great many articles in type all the time, they never lack—Jonathan will be glad to know—for something to put into the paper. Jonathan might well take the hint, and write his compositions well in advance. Against some of the articles, the word “Reference” is written, which indicates that when the article is published an editorial article or note with “reference” to it must also be published. Before the Editor-in-Chief is through, perhaps he marks against one or two articles the word “Kill,” which means that the article is, after all, not wanted in the paper, and that the type of it may be taken apart—the type-setters say “distributed”—without being printed.

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