Category: Essays, Letters & Speeches

The Profession of Journalism A Collection of Articles on Newspaper Editing and Publishing, Taken From the Atlantic Monthly

The purpose of this book is to bring together in convenient form a number of significant contributions to the discussion of the newspaper and its problems which have appeared in the _Atlantic Monthly_ in recent years. Although these articles were intended only for the readers...

Chapters

13. Part 13

The “little item” was not printed in the _Herald_ (nor in the _Bulletin_, more used to such requests), and, as he had said, he was my biggest advertiser. It was my first experie...

14. Part 14

His relations to his subscribers are intimate. There is little mystery possible about the making of the paper; it is as if he stood in the market-place and told his story. Of co...

16. Part 16

There is no occasion to defend the American judiciary from charges of wholesale corruption. They might be passed over in silence if they were addressed merely to the educated an...

12. Part 12

The next question involves the integrity of the Associated Press service. The cases of alleged bias he cites are unfortunate. Any claim that the doings of the Progressives in 19...

17. Part 17

The line, however, is not very finely drawn, as may be seen by a comparison of the above case with Browning vs. Van Rensselaer, in which the plaintiff was the author of a geneal...

23. Part 23

The small-town paper must do this, and because its writers are forced so to look upon their field they obtain a broader comprehension of the community life than do those who are...

19. Part 19

Whatever their individual hurts, the publisher of books, the publisher of book-reviews, and the author should recognize that the entire sincerity of criticism, which is the cond...

8. Part 8

Mr. Mencken is entirely correct when he admits that this emotionalizing brings these problems down to a “man’s comprehension, and, what is more important, within the range of hi...

22. Part 22

So he finds himself altogether at sea for a while. No Latin Quarter welcomes him, for this community has no centre. His estimates of magazine values, formed at a distance, are q...

18. Part 18

I have spoken always of tendencies. Public criticism never has been and never will be wholly dishonest, even when in the toils of the Silent Bargain; it never has been and never...

10. Part 10

We are wont to hear of the superior integrity of those days. There will always be in direct accountability a certain sense of obligation lacking to the anonymous and impersonal....

3. Part 3

While all this is sorrowfully true,—to none so sorrowful as those who have it frequently borne in upon them by personal experience,—it is, after all, _du métier_. It is a condit...

9. Part 9

During labor disputes the facts are usually distorted to the injury of labor. In one case, strikers held a meeting on a vacant lot enclosed by a newly-erected billboard. Forthwi...

6. Part 6

This sort of conventional hypocrisy among the common run of people is easier to forgive than the same thing among the cultivated few whom we accept as mentors. I stumbled upon a...

20. Part 20

With “give the people what they want” the prevailing law of press and theatre, it is idle just now to look for dramatic criticism of value in our newspapers. We may flatter ours...

11. Part 11

The Associated Press is the child of the first effort at coöperative news-gathering ever made. Back in the forties of the last century, before the Atlantic cable was laid, newsp...

5. Part 5

What one newspaper did, that others were forced to do or be distanced in the competition. It all had its effect. A craving for excitement was first aroused in the public, and th...

15. Part 15

This, the most noticeable feature of yellow journalism, is indicative rather of its character than of its purpose. In considering, however, the present subject,—sensational jour...

2. Part 2

How the future will solve the problems of journalism must be largely a matter of conjecture. Temporarily the world war has given rise to peculiar problems, none of which, howeve...

4. Part 4

It is of course true that in the larger cities of the East there are other causes than the lack of advertising to account for the disappearance of certain newspapers. Many of th...

21. Part 21

In that dull summer season all the papers were filled with gossip about a subscription book that had been sold at astonishing prices to that unfailing resource of newspapers, th...

7. Part 7

This is what has happened over and over again in every large American city—Chicago, New York, St. Louis, Cincinnati, Pittsburg, New Orleans, Baltimore, San Francisco, St. Paul,...

1. Part 1

The purpose of this book is to bring together in convenient form a number of significant contributions to the discussion of the newspaper and its problems which have appeared in...

24. Part 24

Adams, Samuel Hopkins. The Great American Fraud. A series of articles in Collier’s Weekly, vv. 36 and 37. (Oct. 7, 1905, to Sept. 22, 1906.) Published as a book, with the same t...