It was near midnight then. All Bosco was asleep. Was Mr. Henry dreaming? And however wonderful his dream, could it surpass, in wonder, this gigantic organization which, for a tiny sum, tells him, daily, everything that happens everywhere?
Think of the men and the machines that work for Mr. E. J. Henry, resident of Bosco, in the Badger State! Think of the lumbermen who cut the logs; of the Eastern rivers down which those logs float; of the great pulp mills which convert them into paper. Think of the railroad trains which bring that paper to Chicago. Think of the factories which build presses for the ultimate defacement of that paper; and the other factories which make the ink. Think of the reporters working everywhere! Think of the men who laid the wires with which the world is webbed, that news may fly; and the men who sit at the ends of those wires, in all parts of the globe, ticking out the story of the day to the "Tribune" office in Chicago, where it is received by other men, who give it to the editors, who prepare it for the linotypers, who set it for the stereotypers, who make it into plates for the presses, which print it upon the paper, which is folded, addressed, and dropped into a mail bag, which is rushed off in a motor through the midnight streets and put aboard a train, which carries it to Bosco, where it is taken by the postman and delivered at the residence of Mr. E. J. Henry, who, after tearing the manila wrapper, opening the paper, and glancing through it, remarks: "Pshaw! There's no news to-day!" and, forthwith, rising from the breakfast table, takes up an old pair of shoes, wraps them in his copy of the Chicago "Tribune," tucks them under his arm and takes them down to the cobbler to be half-soled.
Up-stairs, on the roof of the "Tribune" Building, in a kind of deck-house, is a club, made up of members of the staff, and here, through the courtesy of some of the editors, my companion and I were invited to have supper. When I had eaten my fill, I had a happy thought. Here, at my mercy, were a lot of men who were engaged in the business of sending out reporters to molest the world for interviews. I decided to turn the tables and, then and there, interview them—all of them. And I did it. And they took it very well.
I had heard that the "Column"—that sometimes, if not always, humorous newspaper department, which now abounds throughout the country, threatening to become a pestilence—originated with the "Tribune." I asked about that, and in return received, from several sources, the history of "Columns," as recollected by these men.
Probably the first regular humorous column in the country—certainly the first to attract any considerable attention,—was conducted for the "Tribune" by Henry Ten Eyck White, familiarly known as "Butch" White. It started about 1885, under the heading, "Lakeside Musings." After running this column for some five years, White gave it up, and it was taken over, under the same heading, by Eugene Field, who made it even better known than it had been before.
Field had started as a "columnist" on the Denver "Tribune," where he had run his "Tribune Primer"; later he had been brought to Chicago by Melville E.
Chicago's skyline from the docks.... A city which rebuilt itself after the fire; in the next decade doubled its size; and now has a population of two million, plus a city of about the size of San Francisco
Stone (now general manager of the Associated Press) and Victor F. Lawson, who had together established the Chicago "Daily News," of which Mr. Lawson is the present editor and publisher. Field's column in the "News" was known as "Sharps and Flats." In it appeared his free translations of the Odes of Horace, and much of his best known verse. Also he printed gossip of the stage and of literary matters—the latter being gathered by him at the meetings of a little club, "The Bibliophiles," composed of prominent Chicagoans. This club used to meet in the famous old McClurg bookstore.