It is scarcely possible to close a chapter upon American prose writers without referring to at least one of the great editors who have done so much to mould American public opinion. To James Gordon Bennett and Charles A. Dana only passing reference need be made; but Horace Greeley deserves more extended treatment.
GREELEY
Early in the last century, on a rocky little farm in New Hampshire, lived a man by the name of Zaccheus Greeley, a good neighbor, but a bad manager—so bad that, in 1820, when his son Horace was nine years old, the farm was seized by the sheriff and sold for debt. The proceeds of the sale did not pay the debt, and so, in order to escape arrest, for they imprisoned people for debt in those days, Zaccheus Greeley fled across the border into Vermont, where his family soon joined him. He managed to make a precarious living by working at odd jobs, in which, of course, the boy joined him whenever he could be of any use.
He was a rather remarkable boy, with a great fondness for books, and when he was eleven years old, he tried to get a position in a printing office, but was rejected because he was too young. Four years later, he heard that a boy was wanted in an office at East Poultney, and he hastened to apply for the position. He was a lank, ungainly and dull-appearing boy, and the owner of the office did not think he could ever learn to be a printer, but finally put him to work, with the understanding that he was to receive nothing but his board and clothes for the first six months, and after that forty dollars a year additional.
The boy soon showed an unusual aptitude for the business, and finally decided that the little village was too restricted a field for his talents. With youth's sublime confidence, he decided to go to New York City. He managed to get a position in a printing office there, and two years later, at the age of twenty-two, he and a partner established the first one-cent daily newspaper in the United States. It was ahead of the times, however, and had to be abandoned after a few months.
But he had discovered his peculiar field, and in 1840 he established another paper which he called the "Log Cabin," in which he supported William Henry Harrison through the famous "log cabin and hard cider" campaign. The paper was a success, and in the year following he established the New York "Tribune," which was destined to make him both rich and famous. For more than thirty years he conducted the "Tribune," making it the most influential paper in the country. He became the most powerful political writer in the United States, and in every village groups gathered regularly to receive their papers and to see what "Old Horace" had to say. He was to his readers a strong and vivid personality—they had faith in his intelligence and honesty, and they believed that he would say what he believed to be right, regardless of whose toes were pinched. It was as different as possible to the anonymous journalism of to-day, when not one in a hundred of a newspaper's readers knows anything about the personality of the editor.
We have already referred to the fact that, at the beginning of secession, Greeley doubted the right of the North to compel the seceding states to remain in the Union. Indeed, he counselled peaceful separation rather than war, as did many others, but he was later a staunch supporter of President Lincoln's policy.