After the ceremony there was a reception, followed by a wedding breakfast in the ballroom. The bridal party sat at a heart shaped table in the centre of a group of five tables. Mr. Battlesea and his bride left afterward for a short trip. They will live at 144 West Sixty-ninth street.
CHAPTER VIII
FOLLOW UP AND REWRITE STORIES
News Possibilities. The possibilities contained in a piece of news are seldom completely exhausted by the first story published concerning it. Causes, results, and significant phases many times cannot be ascertained when the first story is written. New facts sometimes develop from hour to hour, and very frequently from day to day. It is the constant aim in newspaper making to give in each edition the latest possible phase of every important event. Accordingly, news stories must be rewritten or must be given new leads as often as the character of the latest news warrants it. A story is worth rewriting or following up as long as it is likely to be of interest to any considerable number of readers.
Even when it is evident that the first story contains all the significant facts and that additional details cannot be obtained, the first story may, nevertheless, have sufficient interest to deserve a rewriting by papers which have not as yet had an opportunity to publish the news that it contains. A new feature is sought for in the first story, and this feature, when played up in the rewritten story, gives it a new turn. New significance, likewise, may be given to the event in the rewritten story by looking at it from a different point of view or by showing its relation to other events. Probable causes, possible results, or striking coincidences may be “played up” as new features. Often the next development can be anticipated to bring the rewrite up to the time of going to press. Imagination is necessary for success as a rewrite man, not in order to invent fictitious details, but to see the event in all its relations and to select the most significant of these for emphasis in rewriting.
Whether or not a story is worth “following up,” and how long it shall be “followed up,” as well as whether or not a story is worth rewriting, is determined by the newspaper man’s appreciation of news values. Editors must be keen and accurate judges of popular interest in current events to know when to continue to give space and prominence to developments of a piece of news and when to drop it.
The division of the twenty-four-hour day between morning and evening papers results in editors and reporters on papers of one of these groups depending, to some extent, on those in the other for part of the day’s round of news gathering. Consequently when the men on the evening papers begin work early in the morning, they read with great care all the morning papers, in order to find out what news has developed since the last edition of their papers went to press on the preceding day. The men on morning newspapers, likewise, scan every edition of the evening papers in order to watch the course of events during the day. This careful examination of newspapers is not confined to those of the city; papers published in other cities of the state or of adjacent states are gone over for any pieces of news that have local phases, or “local ends.” The reading of all these newspapers furnishes the editors with many stories that must be rewritten and brought up to the moment.
Rewriting. When news is to be rewritten without additional details, the stories clipped from other papers are turned over to rewrite men or to reporters to be put at once in a new form for publication. If the editor desires more facts or later phases, he gives the clipping to a reporter, who, taking the first story as a basis, proceeds to get the desired additions before writing the new story. In either case the first thing to do is to study carefully the first story to see what it contains and what are its possibilities. Every bearing of the piece of news on past, present, and future events must be carefully considered. The importance of every possible relation should be weighed so that the most timely and most interesting feature may be given due prominence.
Because of the rapid judgments on news values and the hurried writing of news stories that newspaper making necessitates, the first story may not bring out at all or may not give prominence to what is in reality the most interesting aspect of the story, and it remains for the man who is rewriting the story to take advantage of this neglected opportunity. In his effort to tell all the details of the event itself, the reporter who wrote the first story may not have considered ulterior causes and motives or he may not have had time to see the event in its relation to other events. With the perspective that a few hours often gives, the rewrite man can judge more accurately of these elements and in the rewritten story can give them the emphasis that they deserve.