All good newspaper reporters have two qualifications well developed; they are able to recognize news values—having "a nose for news," it is called—and they are able to run down a "story" with the instinct of a detective. G. P. Chipman had been a good reporter—a good police reporter particularly. He had the detective's instinct and it did not take him long to recognize that he was facing a situation which could be uncovered only by detective work.
In the first place, he reasoned, the letters were too cleverly written—so cleverly, in fact, that they could be the product of a professional writer only, most likely a Winnipeg man. This narrowed the search at once. By process of elimination the list of possible "Observers" was soon reduced to a few names. It was an easy matter to verify the suspicion that the "letters" were paid for at advertising rates and the question uppermost became: "Who are the greatest beneficiaries of these attacks?"
"The elevator interests, of course!" was Chipman's answer to his own question. He began to make progress in his investigations and before long he became very much interested in an office which happened to be located in the Merchant's Bank Building, Winnipeg. Here a certain bright newspaper man with some farming experience had taken to business as a "Financial Agent"—telephone, stenographer and all the rest of the equipment.
So sure was Chipman that he was on the right track in following this clue that finally he shut the door of his private office and wrote up the whole story of the "deal" which he expected to have been made between certain elevator men and this clever editorial writer who knew so much about money that he had opened up a Financial Agency. With the whole "exposure" ready for publication and the photograph of the "suspect" handy in a drawer of the desk, Chipman asked the "Financial Agent" to call at the Guide office.
"Thought you might like to look over that copy before we use it," explained the editor casually when his visitor's pipe was going well. He handed the write-up across his desk. "I want to be fair and there might be something——"
There decidedly was!—a number of things, in fact! Not the least of them was the utter surprise of the pseudo Financial Agent. He did not attempt to deny the truth of the statements made for publication.
According to the story which he told the editor of the Guide, it had been the original intention to have these "letters to the press" signed by leading elevator men themselves; but when it was decided to hire an expert press agent to mould public opinion in such a way as to offset the "onesidedness" of the farmers' movement, none of the elevator men cared to assume the publicity. The name, "Observer," would do just as well. A committee was organized to direct and supervise the work of the press agent and the chairman of this committee conducted the negotiations with the newspaper man who was to undertake the preparation of the "letters" and other material.
By the terms of his contract the press agent was to be paid in equal monthly instalments at the rate of $4,000 per year, with a contract for two years. For this he was to write letters which would turn public opinion against this Grain Growers' Grain Company, which was getting so much of the farmers' grain, and minimize the growth of sentiment in favor of government ownership of internal and terminal elevators. These communications he was to have published in the various papers of Winnipeg and the West. Such was the story.
The better to conceal the wires beneath this publicity campaign and the identity of the writer, Mr. "Observer" opened his office as a Financial Agency and became a subscriber to the Grain Growers' Guide—one paper, of course, which could not be approached for the purpose in view. It was necessary, nevertheless, to clip and file the Guide very carefully for reference; hence the subscription.
The space used by the "correspondence" was paid for at regular advertising rates. The advertising bill each week amounted to about $150. But one factor in the success of the plan had been overlooked—the influence of the Guide. No sooner had the official paper of the Grain Growers pointed out the situation to its readers and suggested that papers which accepted material antagonistic to the farmers' cause were no friends of the farmers—no sooner was this pointed out than letters began to arrive in batches at the offices of all the papers which were publishing the "Observer" attacks. Most of these letters cancelled subscriptions and so fast did they begin to come that one after another the papers refused to publish any more "Observations," paid for or not.