Newspaper Writing and Editing

by Willard Grosvenor Bleyer

2. C. H. Hartman, cashier Miners’ Bank, commits suicide. 250.

3. Principal Walters of high school prohibits football. 100.

4. Mayor Altmeyer removes Health Commissioner Murphy for incompetency. 150.

5. Minister delivers strong sermon on “Is There a Devil?” 300.

R. N. Wilson.

The telegraph editor might reply to this schedule with the following instructions, which would indicate how much the correspondent is to send on each of the stories that he has scheduled, as well as the fact that nothing is wanted on story No. 5.

Philadelphia, Mar. 10.—R. N. Wilson, Erie, Pa. Rush one and two; 50 three; 100 four.

Times.

The correspondent is paid a regular salary if the amount of news that he sends daily is considerable, but more often he is paid every month at a regular space rate for the amount printed of the news that he sends during the month. On some papers the correspondents clip out all of their news stories and paste them together in a “string” which they send in once a month, so that the telegraph editor may pay them according to the length of the “string.” In many offices the telegraph editor keeps a record by crediting every correspondent with what he furnishes, and sends monthly a check for the amount due.

News Associations. Most of the news of the state, nation, and world generally is furnished to newspapers, not by their own correspondents, but through one of the several news or press associations, such as the Associated Press, the United Press, and the International Press Service. The Associated Press is a coöperative news-gathering and news-distributing organization with a membership consisting of many of the leading papers throughout the country. The expenses of the association are divided equally among the newspapers that are members. Each paper that belongs to the association agrees to furnish all the others with the news that it gets in the local field. The Associated Press also has correspondents everywhere in the world, most of whom are paid for what news they furnish, while others at important news centers are regularly employed to gather and send news to the association. To facilitate the handling of the news, the Associated Press has divided the country into four divisions with a central office and a superintendent in each; and in these divisions there is a bureau at every important news center with a correspondent who is responsible for all the news in his district of the division. Associated Press correspondents send the news of the cities, towns, or sections for which they are responsible to the district bureau, or the division office, where it is edited and distributed to the newspapers of the division, and is sent on to the other division offices to be edited and distributed to papers in these divisions. The United Press is a corporation which furnishes its news service to afternoon papers at a rate determined by the distance of the newspaper from the distributing point and by the amount of news sent. It differs from the Associated Press in the fact that it is not a coöperative organization. The International Press Service connected with the papers controlled by Mr. W. R. Hearst also furnishes newspapers generally with news service.