Joan of the Journal

by Helen Diehl Olds

She was. Now that she had gained permission from Uncle John and the editor, through Mr. Johnson, to “stick around” the office, she fairly camped there every waking moment. Of course, Miss Betty and Tim took advantage of having such a willing young worker around. Miss Betty let her copy the news from the suburban towns, which usually came in in longhand. Joan loved it and worked painstakingly. Tim grumbled at times, Mack teased, Cookie joked, and even the editor got used to seeing her around.

“Newspaper work is hard,” Cookie would tell her when she would make a little face about being sent on so many errands for Tim. “Make up your mind to get used to hard work and nothing else. You work as hard as you can on one story; then it’s printed and over with and you start on something else. Always some new excitement on a newspaper.”

Joan understood that, for look how soon every one had forgotten the episode of the mysterious mistake about the Albert Johnson story—or appeared to. But she and Chub had not. The office boy had a new solution to offer every day.

“The life of a newspaper is just ten minutes,” Cookie told her another time.

Ten minutes. She glanced around at the staff all working feverishly to get out the paper. And the actual interest in the paper lasted only about ten minutes. That was true, she guessed. Still, all the Journal family seemed to enjoy their jobs.

After a week, Joan suddenly realized that she had joined the staff just in time for the annual outing. June nineteenth was just June nineteenth to a lot of people in Plainfield, but to the members of the Journal family, it was the big day of the year—the one day when they dropped their labors of supplying the town with news and took an afternoon and evening off. The Journal members were jolly for the most part while they worked. But when they took time off to play they were a perfect circus. Joan looked forward to the picnic.

A neat “box,” that is, a little outlined notice, appeared on the front page of the paper at the beginning of the week, announcing that the Journal would come out early on Friday in order that the staff and all employees could attend the annual picnic. Of course, it would be an unusually slim paper that day, but the subscribers did not mind one day in the year. Always by one o’clock on June nineteenth the paper was out on the street and the staff ready to pile into the two big busses chartered for the occasion.

Now Joan could go along. She and Tim had both gone when Daddy was editor, but that was long ago. All the employees took their families, and Joan would go. Mother, too, perhaps. But no, Mrs. Martin declined the invitation immediately.

“Bounce around in those uncomfortable, crowded busses for an hour, get eaten alive by mosquitoes and things, and come home as tired as though I’d done two weeks’ washing? No, thank you. I’ll take the day off, too, but I’ll run out and see sister Effie. She’s thinking about having her appendix taken out, and wants my advice.”

The big event at the picnic was the baseball game, and this year the Journal team was scheduled to play the Star. The Journal team this year was excellent—Mack, Mr. Nixon, Lefty the photographer, Burke the bookkeeper, Cookie, the two advertising men, and one of the pressmen. Chub and Bossy always sat on the bench—that is, they were substitutes and hardly hoped for an opportunity to play. Would Tim get to play, Joan wondered. The first day he had come to work, Chub grabbed him. “You’ll try out for the team, won’t you? I bet you’re a peacherino pitcher.” Joan could easily see that Chub thought Tim mighty near perfection. Well, she thought so, too, most of the time, herself. He had been a star in the game at high school, but the men on the Journal team were all older than he was.