18. Conclusion.—In conclusion, then, we have the editor-in-chief, who is responsible for the general policies of the paper. Immediately beneath him is the managing editor, who executes the editor-in-chief's orders. Responsible to the editor-in-chief or the managing editor are the editorial writers, the news, city, sporting, exchange, literary, and dramatic editors, and the cartoonist. Beneath the city editor are a few of the copy readers and all the reporters. Such is the organization of the editorial staff of a typical metropolitan newspaper.
III. THE MECHANICAL DEPARTMENT
19. Division.—Beyond the editorial rooms is the mechanical department, with which every reporter should be, but rarely ever is, acquainted. Because of the heavy machinery necessary for preparing and printing a paper, the mechanical department is often found in the basement. This department is divisible into three sub-departments, the composing room, the stereotyping room, and the press room.
20. The Copy Cutter.—When a story has been revised by the copy reader and given proper headlines, it is turned over to the head copy reader or the news editor, who glances over it hastily to see that all is rightly done and chutes it in a pneumatic tube to the basket on the copy cutter's table or desk in the composing room. The copy cutter in turn glances at the headlines and the two or three pages of copy, and records the story upon a ruled blank on his desk. Then he clips the headlines and sends them by a copy distributor to the headline machine to be set up. The two or three pages of copy he cuts into three or four or five "takes," puts the slug number or name on each, and sends the "takes" to different compositors, so that the whole story may be set up more quickly than if it were given all to one man. If the time before going to press is very short, the pages may be cut into more takes. The slug names, sometimes called guide or catch lines, are marked on each take to enable the bank-men to assemble readily all the parts after they have been set in type.
21. The Linotype Machine.—Each compositor on receiving his take places it on the copy-holder of his linotype or monotype machine and begins composing it into type. The linotype machine consists of a keyboard not unlike that of the typewriter, which actuates a magazine containing matrices or countersunk letter molds, together with a casting mechanism for producing lines or bars of words. By touching the keys, the compositor releases letter by letter an entire line of matrices, which are mustered automatically into the assembling-stick at the left and above the keyboard, ready to be molded into a line of type. When the assembling-stick is full of matrices, enough to make a full line, the operator is warned, as on the typewriter, by the ringing of a tiny bell. The machinist then pulls a lever, which releases molten lead on the line of matrices and casts a slug of metal representing the letters he has just touched on the keys. The machine cuts and trims this slug of lead to an exact size, conveys it to the receiving galley for finished lines, and returns the matrices to their proper places in the magazine for use in a succeeding line. When the operator has composed twenty or twenty-five of these slugs, his take is completed. He then removes the slugs from their holder, wraps them in the manuscript, and sends them to the bank to be assembled with the other takes of the same story. The proof of the compositor's take looks something like the matter at the top of the next page.
The big three's are the compositor's slug number. This take was set up by the workman operating machine number 3. The Loops is the catch line, or slug name, by which the story is known, every take of the story being named Loops, so that the bank-men may easily get the parts of the story together. The letters at the right of Loops, in the same line, are merely any letters that the compositor has set up at random by tapping the linotype keys to fill out the line.
San Diego, Cal., Sept. 25.—Sergt. William Ocher and Corporal Albert Smith, attached to the United States army aviation corps at North Island, made fifteen loops each while engaged in flights, shattering army and navy aviation records. Both officers used the same machine equipped with a ninety horsepower motor, and designed for long distance flying.
This take, which was picked up at random in the editorial rooms of the Milwaukee Journal, was followed by this: