The Bay State Monthly. Volume 2, No. 1, October, 1884

Read three several times and pass'd to be Engross'd

Sent up for Concurrence

T. Hubbard Spk

.

In Council April 5 1753 AM

Read a first and Second Time and pass'd a Concurrence

Tho

. Clarke Dp

. Secry

[Massachusetts Archives, cxvi, 360-362.]

THE BOSTON HERALD

The newspapers of America have had their greatest growth within the past quarter-century. Their progress in commercial prosperity during this period has been remarkable. Before the Civil War the journals in this country which returned large profits on the capital invested could almost be numbered upon the fingers of one hand. Now they can be counted up into the hundreds, and a well-established and successful newspaper is rated as one of the most profitable of business ventures. This advance in financial value has accompanied, and for the most part is due to, the improvement in the character of the publications, which has been going on steadily year by year. There has been a constant increase of enterprise in all directions, especially in that of gathering news, and with this has come the exercise of greater care and better taste in presenting the intelligence collected to the reading public. The quality of the work of reporters and correspondents has been vastly bettered, and the number of special writers engaged has been gradually enlarged; subjects which were once relegated to the monthlies and quarterlies for discussion are now treated by the daily press in a style which, if less ponderous, is nevertheless lucid and not unbefitting their importance. In short, the tone of the American newspaper has been elevated without the loss of its popular characteristics, and the tastes of its readers have thereby—unconsciously, perhaps, but none the less surely—been refined. For at least the length of time mentioned at the beginning of this article, journalism has been regarded as worthy to rank beside, if not exactly to be classed with, the "learned professions." The newspaper writer has emerged from the confines of Bohemia, never to return, and has taken a recognized position in the literary world. His connection with a reputable journal gives him an unquestioned standing, of which his credentials are the diploma.

In view of these great changes in journalism, the record of the progress of a successful newspaper during the last four decades contains much matter of general interest, and if excuse were needed, this would warrant the publication here of a brief history of The Boston Herald.

Like most, if not all, of the leading journals of the country, The Boston Herald had a very humble origin. Forty years ago some journeymen printers on The Boston Daily Times began publishing a penny paper, called The American Eagle, in advocacy of the Native American or "Know-nothing" party.

Its publishers were "Baker, French, Harmon & Co." The full list of proprietors was Albert Baker, John A. French, George W. Harmon, George H. Campbell, Amos C. Clapp, J.W. Monroe, Justin Andrews, Augustus A. Wallace, and James D. Stowers, and W.H. Waldron was subsequently associated with them. The Eagle was successful at the outset, but its fortunes declined with those of the party of which it was the exponent, and in the summer of 1846 it was found to be moribund. The proprietors had lost money and labor in the failing enterprise, and now lost interest. After many protracted discussions they resolved to establish an evening edition under another name, which should be neutral in politics, and, if it proved successful, to let the Eagle die. The Herald, therefore, came into existence on August 31, 1846, and an edition of two thousand was printed of its first number. The editor of the new sheet was William O. Eaton, a Bostonian, then but twenty-two years of age, of little previous experience in journalism.

The Herald, it must be admitted, was not a handsome sheet at the outset. Its four pages contained but five columns each, and measured only nine by fourteen inches. But, unpromising as was its appearance, it was really the liveliest of the Boston dailies from the hour of its birth, and received praise on all hands for the quality of its matter.

The total force of brain-workers consisted of but two men, Mr. Eaton having the assistance, after the middle of September, of Thomas W. Tucker. David Leavitt joined the "staff" later on, in 1847, and made a specialty of local news. The editorial, composing, and press rooms were the same as those of the Eagle, in Wilson's Lane, now Devonshire Street.

"Running a newspaper" in Boston in 1846 was a different thing altogether from journalism at the present day. The telegraph was in operation between Boston and New York, but the tolls were high and the dailies could not afford to use it except upon the most important occasions. Moreover, readers had not been educated up to the point of expecting to see reports of events in all parts of the world printed on the same day of their occurrence or, at the latest, the day following.

For several years before the extension of the wires overland to Nova Scotia, the newsgatherers of Boston and New York resorted to various devices in order to obtain the earliest reports from Europe. From 1846 to 1850 the revolutionary movements in many of the countries on the continent were of a nature to be especially interesting to the people of the United States, and this stimulated enterprise among the American newspapers. Mr. D.H. Craig, afterward widely known as agent of the Associated Press, conceived the idea of anticipating the news of each incoming ocean-steamer by means of a pigeon-express, which he put into successful operation in the year first named. He procured a number of carrier-pigeons, and several days before the expected arrival of every English mail-steamer took three of them to Halifax. There he boarded the vessels, procured the latest British papers, collated and summarized their news upon thin paper, secured the dispatches thus prepared to the pigeons, and fifty miles or so outside of Boston released the birds. The winged messengers, flying homeward, reached the city far in advance of the steamers, and the intelligence they brought was at once delivered to Mr. W.G. Blanchard, then connected with the Boston press, who had the brief dispatches "extended," put in type, and printed as an "extra" for all the papers subscribing to the enterprise. Sheets bearing the head "New York Herald Extra" were also printed in Boston and sent to the metropolis by the Sound steamers, thus anticipating the arrival of the regular mail.

It is interesting, in these days of lightning, to read an account of how the Herald beat its local rivals in getting out an account of the President's Message in 1849. A column synopsis was received by telegraph from New York, and published in the morning edition, and the second edition, issued a few hours later, contained the long document in full, and was put on the street at least a half-hour earlier than the other dailies. How the message was brought from Washington is thus described: J.F. Calhoun, of New Haven, was the messenger, and he started from the capital by rail at two o'clock on the morning of December 24; a steamtug in waiting conveyed him, on his arrival, from Jersey City to New York; a horse and chaise took him from the wharf to the New Haven dépôt, then in Thirty-second Street, where he mounted a special engine and at 10 P.M. started for Boston. He reached Boston at 6.20 the next morning, after an eventful journey, having lost a half-hour by a derailed tender and an hour and a half by the smashup of a freight-train.

The Herald, feeble as it was in many respects at first, managed to struggle through the financial diseases incident to newspaper infancy so stoutly that at the opening of 1847, when it had attained the age of four months, its sponsors were able to give it a New-Year dress of new type, to increase the size of its pages to seven columns, measuring twenty-one by seventeen inches, and to add a morning and a weekly edition. The paper in its new form, with a neat head in Roman letters replacing the former unsightly title, and printed on a new Adams press, presented a marked improvement.

Mr. Eaton continued in charge of the evening edition, while the new morning issue was placed in the hands of Mr. George W. Tyler. The Herald under this joint management presented its readers with from eight to ten columns of reading-matter daily. Two columns of editorials, four of local news, and two of clippings from "exchanges," were about the average. News by telegraph was not plenty, and, as has already been intimated, very little of it was printed during the first year. Yet, the Herald was a live and lively paper, and published nothing but "live matter." Much prominence was given to reports of affairs about home, and in consequence the circulation soon exhibited a marked improvement.

At this time the proprietors entered on a novel journalistic experiment. They allowed one editor to give "Whig" views and another to talk "Democracy." The public did not take kindly to this mixed diet, and Mr. Eaton, the purveyor of Democratic wisdom, was permitted to withdraw, leaving Mr. Tyler, the Whiggite, in possession of the field.

Meantime, Mr. French had bought out the original proprietors one by one, with the exception of Mr. Stowers, and in March their names appeared as publishers at the head of the paper. The publication-office was removed to more spacious quarters, and the press was thereafter run by steam-power rented from a neighboring manufactory. At the end of the month a statement of the circulation showed a total of eleven thousand two hundred and seventy.

In May, 1847, The American Eagle died peacefully. About this period Messrs. Tucker and Tyler left the Herald, and Mr. Stowers disposed of his interest to Samuel K. Head. The new editor of the paper was William Joseph Snelling, who acquired considerable local fame as a bold and fearless writer. He died in the December of the following year. Under a new manager, Mr. Samuel R. Glen, the Herald developed into a successful news gatherer.

Special telegrams were regularly received from New York, a Washington correspondent was secured, and the paper covered a much broader field than it ever had before. Eight to ten columns of reading-matter were printed daily, and it was invariably bright and entertaining. The circulation showed a steady increase, and on August 17, 1848, was declared to be eighteen thousand seven hundred and fifteen daily, a figure from which it did not recede during the autumn and winter. After the death of Mr. Snelling, Mr. Tyler was recalled to the chief editorial chair, and heartily co-operated with Mr. Glen and the proprietors in keeping the paper abreast of the times. On April 2, 1849, the custom of printing four editions daily was inaugurated. The first was dated 5 o'clock, A.M., the second, 8, the third, 12 M., and the fourth, 2.30 P.M. That day the force of compositors was increased by four men, and the paper was for the first time printed on a Hoe double-cylinder press, run by steam-power, and capable of producing six thousand impressions an hour. Mr. Head withdrew from the firm about this time, and Mr. French was announced as sole proprietor throughout the remainder of the year. In October the announcement was made that the Herald had a larger circulation than any other paper published in Boston or elsewhere, and the publisher made a successful demand for the post-office advertising, which by law was to be given to the paper having the greatest circulation.

During this year (1849) the Herald distanced its competitors and accomplished a feat that was the talk of the town for a long time afterwards, by reporting in full the trial of Professor Webster for the murder of Dr. Parkman. Extras giving longhand reports of this extraordinary case were issued hourly during the day, and the morning edition contained a shorthand report of the testimony and proceedings of the day previous. The extras were issued in New York as well as in Boston, the report having been telegraphed sheet by sheet as fast as written, and printed there simultaneously with the Herald's. The type of the verbatim report was kept standing, and within an hour after the verdict was rendered pamphlets containing a complete record of the trial were for sale on the street. The year 1850 found the Herald as prosperous as it had been during the previous twelvemonth. In September, the editorial, composing, and press rooms were transferred to No. 6 Williams Court, where they remained until abandoned for the new Herald Building, February 9, 1878, and the business-office was removed to No. 203 (now No. 241) Washington Street. Early in 1851, through some inexplicable cause, Mr. French suddenly found himself financially embarrassed. In July he disposed of the paper to John M. Barnard, and soon after retired to a farm in Maine. Mr. Tyler was retained in charge of the editorial department; but Mr. Glen resigned and was succeeded as managing editor by Mr. A.A. Wallace. During the remainder of the year the Herald did not display much enterprise in gathering news. Its special telegraphic reports were meagre and averaged no more than a "stickful" daily, and it was cut off from the privileges of the Associated Press dispatches. In 1852 there was a marked improvement in the paper, but it did not reach the standard it established in 1850. Two new presses, one of Hoe's and the other a Taylor's Napier, were this year put in use, which bettered the typography of the sheet. In 1853 the Herald was little more than a record of local events, its telegraphic reports being almost as brief and unsatisfactory as during the first year of its existence. But the circulation kept up wonderfully well, growing, according to the sworn statements of the proprietor, from sixteen thousand five hundred and five in January to twenty-three thousand two hundred and ten in December. The Herald of 1854 was a much better paper than that of the year previous, exerting far more energy in obtaining and printing news. On April 1 it was enlarged for the second time and came out with columns lengthened two inches, the pages measuring twenty-three by seventeen inches. The circulation continued to increase, and, by the sworn statements published, grew from twenty-five thousand two hundred and sixteen in January to thirty thousand eight hundred and fifty-eight in June. Success continued through the year 1855. In February, Mr. Barnard, while remaining proprietor, withdrew from active management, and Edwin C. Bailey and A. Milton Lawrence became the publishers. There were also some changes in the editorial and reportorial staff. Henry R. Tracy became assistant editor, and Charles H. Andrews (now one of the editors and proprietors) was engaged as a reporter. There were then engaged in the composing-room a foreman and eight compositors, one of whom, George G. Bailey, subsequently became foreman, and later one of the proprietors. Printers will be interested to know that the weekly composition bill averaged one hundred and seventy-five dollars. This year but one edition was published in the morning, while the first evening edition was dated 12 M., the second, 1.30 P.M., and a "postscript" was issued at 2.30 P.M., to contain the latest news for city circulation. Twelve to fourteen columns of reading-matter were printed daily, two of which were editorial, two news by telegraph, two gleanings from "exchanges," and the remainder local reports, correspondence, etc. The average daily circulation during 1855 was claimed to have been thirty thousand, but was probably something less.

Early in 1856 a change took place in the proprietorship, Mr. Barnard selling out to Mr. Bailey, and Mr. Lawrence retiring.

Mr. Bailey brought to his new task a great deal of native energy and enterprise, and he was ably seconded by the other gentlemen connected with the paper, in his efforts to make the Herald a thoroughly live journal. He strengthened his staff by engaging as assistant editor, Justin Andrews, who had for some years held a similar position on The Daily Times, and who subsequently became one of the news-managers of the Herald, holding the office until, as one of the proprietors, he disposed of his interest in 1873.

During Mr. Bailey's first year as proprietor he enlarged the facilities for obtaining news, and paid particular attention to reporting the events of the political campaign when Frémont was run against Buchanan for the presidency. The result of the election was announced with a degree of detail never before displayed in the Herald's columns or in those of its contemporaries. The editorial course of the paper that year is perhaps best explained by the following paragraph, printed a few days after the election: "One of our contemporaries says the Herald has alternately pleased and displeased both parties during this campaign. That is our opinion. How could it be different if we told them the truth? And that was our only aim." The circulation during election week averaged forty-one thousand six hundred and ninety-three copies daily; throughout the year it was nearly thirty thousand—considerably larger than during the preceding year—and the boast that it was more than double that of any other paper in Boston undoubtedly was justified by the facts. Mechanically, the paper was well got up; in July the two presses which had been in use for a number of years were discarded, and a new four-cylinder Hoe press, having a capacity of ten thousand impressions an hour, was set up in their place. Ten compositors were employed, and the weekly composition bill averaged one hundred and sixty dollars. In 1857 the Herald was a much better paper than it had ever been, the Messrs. Andrews, upon whom the burden of its management devolved, sparing no effort to make it newsy and bright in every department. Beginning the year with a daily circulation of about thirty thousand, in April it reached forty-two thousand, and when on the twenty-third of that month the subscription list, carriers' routes, agencies, etc., of The Daily Times were acquired by purchase, there was another considerable increase, the issue of May 30 reaching forty-five thousand one hundred and twenty. In 1858 the Herald continued its prosperous career in the same general direction. Its telegraphic facilities were improved, and events in all parts of the country were well reported, while local news was most carefully attended to. The editors and reporters this year numbered eleven, and the force in the mechanical departments was correspondingly increased. A new six-cylinder Hoe press was put in use, alongside the four-cylinder machine, and both were frequently taxed to their utmost capacity to print the large editions demanded by the public. The bills for white paper during the year were upwards of seventy thousand dollars, which, in those ante-war times, was a large sum. The circulation averaged over forty thousand per diem. In 1859 the system of keeping an accurate account of the circulation was inaugurated, and the actual figures of each day's issue were recorded and published. From this record it is learned that the Herald, from a circulation of forty-one thousand one hundred and ninety-three in January, rose to fifty-three thousand and twenty-six in December. Twelve compositors were regularly employed this year, and the weekly composition bill was two hundred dollars. The year 1860 brought the exciting presidential campaign which resulted in the election of Abraham Lincoln. Great pains were taken to keep the Herald's readers fully informed of the movements of all the political parties, and its long reports of the national conventions, meetings, speeches, etc., in all parts of the country, especially in New England, brought it to the notice of many new readers. The average daily circulation for the year was a little over fifty-four thousand, and the issue on the morning after the November election reached seventy-three thousand seven hundred and fifty-two, the largest edition since the Webster trial. E.B. Haskell, now one of the proprietors, entered the office as a reporter in 1860, and was soon promoted to an editorial position. A year later R.M. Pulsifer, another of the present proprietors, entered the business department.

The breaking out of the Civil War in the spring of 1861 created a great demand for news, and an increase in the circulation of all the daily papers was the immediate result. It is hardly necessary to say here that the Herald warmly espoused the cause of the Union, and that the events of that stirring period were faithfully chronicled in its columns. To meet a call for news on Sunday, a morning edition for that day was established on May 26; the new sheet was received with favor by the reading public, and from an issue of ten thousand at the outset its circulation has reached, at the present time, nearly one hundred thousand. The Herald's enterprise was appreciated all through the war, and as there were no essential changes in the methods of its management or in the members of its staff, a recapitulation of statistics taken from its books will suffice here as a record of its progress. In 1861 the average circulation was sixty thousand; the largest edition (reporting the attack on the sixth Massachusetts regiment in Baltimore), ninety-two thousand four hundred and forty-eight; the white paper bill, one hundred and eight thousand dollars; the salary list, forty thousand dollars; telegraph tolls, sixty-five hundred dollars. In 1862 the average circulation was sixty-five thousand one hundred and sixteen; the largest edition, eighty-four thousand; the white paper bill, ninety-three thousand five hundred dollars; the salary list, forty-three thousand dollars; telegraph tolls, eight thousand dollars. In 1863 the average circulation was thirty-six thousand one hundred and twenty-eight; the largest issue, seventy-four thousand; the paper bill, ninety-five thousand dollars; salaries, forty-six thousand five hundred dollars; telegraphing, eight thousand dollars. In July the four-cylinder Hoe press was replaced by one with six cylinders, from the same maker. In 1864 the average circulation was thirty-seven thousand and eighty-eight; largest issue, fifty thousand eight hundred and eighty; paper bill, one hundred and twenty-eight thousand dollars; salaries, fifty-eight thousand dollars; telegraph, ten thousand five hundred dollars. The cost of white paper rose to such a figure that the proprietors of Boston dailies were compelled to increase the price of their journals, and a mutual agreement was made on August 15 whereby the Herald charged three cents a copy and the others five cents. On June 1, 1865, the price of the Herald was reduced to its former rate of two cents. The average circulation that year was thirty-seven thousand six hundred and seventeen; the largest day's issue, eighty-three thousand five hundred and twenty; the paper bill was about the same as in 1864, but the telegraphic expenses ran up to fifteen thousand dollars. The circulation in 1866 averaged forty-five thousand eight hundred and forty-eight, and on several occasions rose to seventy thousand and more. Twenty-one compositors were regularly employed, and the average weekly composition bill was five hundred dollars. Paper that year cost one hundred and fifty-two thousand dollars, and the telegraph bill was fifteen thousand five hundred dollars. In 1867 seventy persons were on the Herald's payroll, a larger number than ever before. The circulation showed a steady gain, and the average for the year was fifty-two thousand one hundred and eighteen. The paper bill was one hundred and fifty-six thousand dollars, and the expense of telegraphing, twenty-three thousand dollars. In 1868 the circulation continued to increase, and the daily average reached fifty-four thousand seven hundred and forty; white paper cost one hundred and fifty-three thousand dollars, and telegraphing, twenty-eight thousand dollars.

In 1869 occurred an important event in the Herald's history. Mr. Bailey, who had acquired an interest in 1855 and became sole proprietor a year later, decided to sell out, and on April 1 it was announced that he had disposed of the paper to Royal M. Pulsifer, Edwin B. Haskell, Charles H. Andrews, Justin Andrews, and George G. Bailey. All these gentlemen were at the time and had for some years previously been connected with the Herald: the first-named in the business department, the next three on the editorial staff, and the last as foreman of the composing-room. In announcing their purchase, the firm, which was then and ever since has been styled R.M. Pulsifer and Company, said in the editorial column: "We shall use our best endeavors to make the Herald strictly a newspaper, with the freshest and most trustworthy intelligence of all that is going on in this busy age; and to this end we shall spare no expense in any department.... The Herald will be in the future, as it has been in the past, essentially a people's paper, the organ of no clique or party, advocating at all proper times those measures which tend to promote the welfare of our country, and to secure the greatest good to the greatest number. It will exert its influence in favor of simplicity and economy in the administration of the government, and toleration and liberality in our social institutions. It will not hesitate to point out abuses or to commend good measures, from whatever source they come, and it will contain candid reports of all proceedings which go to make up the discussions of current topics. It will give its readers all the news, condensed when necessary and in an intelligible and readable form, with a free use of the telegraph by reliable reporters and correspondents." That these promises have been sacredly fulfilled up to the present moment cannot be denied even by readers and contemporary sheets whose opinions have been in direct opposition to those expressed in the Herald's editorial columns. No pains or expense have been spared to obtain the news from all quarters of the globe, and the paper's most violent opponent will find it impossible to substantiate a charge that the intelligence collected with such care and thoroughness has in a single instance been distorted or colored in the publication to suit the editorial policy pursued at the time. The expression of opinions has always, under the present management, been confined to the editorial columns, and here a course of absolute independence has been followed.

The Herald, immediately upon coming under the control of the new proprietors, showed a marked accession of enterprise, and that this change for the better was appreciated by the reading public was proved by the fact that during the year 1869 the circulation rose from a daily average of fifty-three thousand four hundred and sixty-five in January to sixty thousand five hundred and thirty-five in December, the increase having been regular and permanent, and not caused by any "spurts" arising from extraordinary events. On New Year's day, 1870, the Herald was enlarged for the third time, to its present size, by the addition of another column and lengthening the pages to correspond. On September 3, of that year, the circulation for the first time passed above one hundred thousand, the issue containing an account of the battle of Sedan reaching a sale of over one hundred and five thousand copies. The average daily circulation for the year was more than seventy-three thousand. Finding it impossible, from the growing circulation of the paper, to supply the demand with the two six-cylinder presses printing from type, it was determined, early in the year, to stereotype the forms, so that duplicate plates could be used simultaneously on both. The requisite machinery was introduced therefor, and on June 8, 1870, was put in use for the first time. For nearly ten years the Herald was the only paper in Boston printed from stereotype plates. In 1871 the average daily circulatian was eighty-three thousand nine hundred, a gain of nearly eleven thousand over the previous year. On a number of occasions the edition reached as high as one hundred and twelve thousand. On October 1 George G. Bailey disposed of his interest in the paper to the other proprietors, and retired from the firm. In 1872 there was a further increase in the circulation, the daily average having been ninety-three thousand five hundred. One issue (after the Great Fire) reached two hundred and twenty thousand, and several were not much below that figure. The first Bullock perfecting-press ever used east of New York was put in operation in the Herald office in June, 1872; this press feeds itself from a continuous roll of paper, and prints both sides, cutting and delivering the papers complete. On January 1, 1873, Justin Andrews, who had been connected with the Herald, as one of its editors since 1856, and as one of the proprietors who succeeded Mr. Bailey in 1869, sold his interest to his partners, and retired from newspaper life altogether. Since that date, the ownership in the Herald has been vested in R.M. Pulsifer, E.B. Haskell, and Charles H. Andrews. The circulation in 1873 exceeded one hundred and one thousand daily; in 1874 one hundred and seven thousand; in 1875 one hundred and twelve thousand; in 1876 one hundred and sixteen thousand five hundred. On November 8, of that year, the day after the presidential election, the issue was two hundred and twenty-three thousand two hundred and fifty-six. The two six-cylinder Hoe presses had given place, in 1874, to two more Bullock machines, and a Mayall press was added in 1876; the four were run to their utmost capacity on the occasion just mentioned, and the magnitude of the day's work will be better understood when it is stated that between 4 A.M. and 11 P.M. fourteen tons of paper were printed and sold, an amount which would make a continuous sheet the width of the Herald two hundred and fifty miles long. In 1877 a fourth Bullock press was put in use, and the Mayall was removed to Hawley Street, where type, stands for fifty compositors, a complete apparatus for stereotyping, and all the necessary machinery, materials, and implements are kept in readiness to "start up" at any moment, in case a fire or other disaster prevents the issue of the regular editions in the main office.

On February 9, 1878, the Herald was issued for the first time from the new building erected by its proprietors at No. 255 Washington Street. This structure has a lofty and ornate front of gray granite with trimmings of red granite; it covers an irregular shaped lot, something in the form of the letter L. From Washington Street, where it has a width of thirty-one feet nine inches, it extends back one hundred and seventy-nine feet, and from the rear a wing runs northward to Williams Court forty feet. This wing was originally twenty-five feet wide on the court; but in 1882 an adjoining lot, formerly occupied by the old Herald Building, was purchased and built upon, increasing the width of the wing and its frontage on the court to eighty-five feet. The structure forms one of the finest and most convenient newspaper-offices in the country. In the basement are the pressroom, where at the present time six Bullock perfecting-presses (two with folders attached) are run by two 45-horse-power engines; the stereotype-room, where the latest improvements in machinery have enabled the casting, finishing, and placing on the press of two plates in less than eight minutes after the receipt of a "form"; the two dynamos and the engine running them, which supply the electricity for the incandescent lights with which every room in the building is illuminated; and the storage-room for paper and other supplies. On the first floor are the business-office, a very handsome and spacious apartment facing Washington Street, and finished in mahogany, rare marbles, and brasswork; the delivery and mailing rooms, whence the editions are sent out for distribution at the Williams-court door. On the second floor are the reception-room, the library, and the apartments of the editor-in-chief, managing editor, and department editors. On the third floor are the general manager's office and the rooms of the news and city editors and the reporters. The entire fourth floor is used as a composing-room, where stand "frames" for ninety-six compositors; the foreman and his assistants have each a private office, and a private room is assigned to the proofreaders. All the editors' and reporters' rooms are spacious, well lighted, and admirably ventilated; they are finished in native woods, varnished, and are handsomely furnished. Electric call-bells, speaking-tubes, and pneumatic-tubes furnish means of communication with all the departments, and no expense has been spared in supplying every convenience for facilitating work and the comfort of the employees.

With increased facilities came continued prosperity. The business depression in 1877 affected the circulation of the Herald, as it did that of every newspaper in the country, and the circulation that year was not so large as during the year previous; still, the daily average was one hundred and three thousand copies.

The array of men employed in the various departments of the Herald at the present time would astonish the founders of the paper. In 1846 the editorial and reportorial staff consisted of two men; now it comprises seventy-seven. Six compositors were employed then; now there are one hundred and forty-seven. One pressman and an assistant easily printed the Herald, and another daily paper as well, in those days, upon one small handpress; now forty men find constant employment in attending the engines and the six latest improved perfecting-presses required to issue the editions on time. The business department was then conducted with ease by one man, who generally found time to attend to the mailing and sale of papers; now twenty-one persons have plenty to do in the counting-room, and the delivery-room engages the services of twenty. Then stereotyping the forms of a daily newspaper was an unheard-of proceeding; now fourteen men are employed in the Herald's foundery. The salaries and bills for composition aggregated scarcely one hundred and fifty dollars a week then; now the weekly composition bill averages over three thousand dollars, and the payroll of the other departments reaches three thousand dollars every week, and frequently exceeds that sum. Then the Herald depended for outside news upon the meagre dispatches of telegraph agencies in New York (the Associated Press system was not inaugurated until 1848-49, and New England papers were not admitted to its privileges until some years later), and such occasional correspondence as its friends in this and other States sent in free of charge. Now it not only receives the full dispatches of the Associated Press, but has news bureaus of its own in London, Paris, New York, and Washington, and special correspondents in every city of any considerable size throughout the country. All these are in constant communication with the office and are instructed to use the telegraph without stint when the occasion demands. The Herald has grown from a little four-paged sheet, nine by fourteen inches in dimensions, to such an extent that daily supplements are required to do justice to readers as well as advertisers, and it is necessary to print an eight-paged edition as often as four times a week during the busy season of the year.

The Herald has achieved a great success; it has broadened from year to year since the present proprietors assumed control. It has been their steadily followed purpose gradually to elevate the tone of their paper, till it should reach the highest level of American journalism. They have done this, and, at the same time, they have retained their enormous constituency. The wonderful educating power of a great newspaper cannot easily be overestimated. It is the popular university to which thousands upon thousands of readers resort daily for intelligent comment on the events of the world—the great wars, the suggestions of science, the achievements of the engineers, home and foreign politics, etc. That such a great newspaper as the Herald, wherein the elucidating comment is kept up from day to day by cultivated writers trained in journalism, must perform many of the functions of a university is clear. The news columns of the Herald are a perfect mirror of the great world's busy life. The ocean-cable is employed to an extent which would have seemed recklessly extravagant ten years ago. It has its news bureaus in the great capitals of civilization; its roving correspondents may be found, at the date of this writing, exploring the Panama Canal, the interior of Mexico, studying the railway system of Great Britain, investigating Mormon homelife, scouring the vast level stretches of Dakota, traversing the great Central States of the Union for presidential "pointers," making a tour of the Southern States to secure trustworthy data as to the progress achieved in education there, and journeying along the coast of hundred-harbored Maine for the latest information as to the growth of the newer summer resorts in that picturesque region. In large and quiet rooms in the home office a force of copy-readers is preparing the correspondence from all over the world for the compositors; at the news desks trained men are working day and night over telegrams flashed from far and near, eliminating useless words, punctuating, putting on "heads," and otherwise dressing copy for the typesetters. The enormous amount of detail work in a great paper is not easily to be conveyed to the non-professional reader. From the managing editor, whose brain is employed in inventing new ideas for his subordinates to carry into execution, to that very important functionary, the proof-reader, who corrects the errors of the types, there is a distracting amount of detail work performed every day. The Herald is managed with very little friction; the great machine runs as if oiled. With an abundance of capital, an ungrudging expenditure of money in the pursuit of news, a great working-force well disciplined and systematized, it goes on weekday after weekday, turning out nine editions daily, and on Sundays giving to the public sixteen closely-crowded pages, an intellectual bill-of-fare from which all may select according to individual preference.

The organization of the Herald force is almost ideally perfect. Its three proprietors, all of whom are still on the ascending grade of the hill of life, share in the daily duties of their vast establishment. Colonel Royal M. Pulsifer is the publisher of the paper, and has charge of the counting-room, the delivery, press, and composition rooms, the three last departments being under competent foremen. A large share of the wonderful business success of the Herald is due to his sagacity and liberality. He is a publisher who expends at long range, not expecting immediate returns. Under this generous and wisely prudent policy of spending liberally for large future returns the Herald has grown to its present proportions. The editor-in-chief of the paper is Mr. Edwin B. Haskell, who directs the political and general editorial policy of the paper. He has the courage of his independence, and is independent even of the Independents. Since he assumed the editorial chair, the Herald has fought consistently for honest money, for a reformed civil service, for the purification of municipal politics, for freer trade, and local self-government. The editor of the Herald writes strong Saxon-English, believing that in a daily newspaper the people should be addressed in a plain, understandable style. He has an unexpected way of putting things, his arguments are enlivened by a rare humor, and clinched frequently by some anecdote or popular allusion. The third partner, Mr. Charles H. Andrews, is one of those newspaper men who are born journalists. He has the gift of common sense. His judgment is always sound. The news end of the Herald establishment is under control of Mr. Andrews, and to no man more than to him is due the wonderful development of the Herald's news features. The executive officer of the Herald ship is the managing editor, Mr. John H. Holmes, who is known to newspaper workers all over the country as a man of great journalistic ability. He has the cosmopolitan mind; is free from local prejudices, and can take in the value of news three thousand miles away as quickly as if the happening were at the office door. An untiring, sleepless man, prodigal of his energies in the development of the Herald into a great world-paper, Mr. Holmes is a type of that distinctively modern development, the "newspaper man." Men of adventurous minds, of breadth of view, and delighting in positive achievements, take to journalism in these days as in the sixteenth century they became navigators of the globe, explorers of distant regions, and founders of new empires.

Years ago the Herald outgrew the provincial idea that the happenings of the streets must be of more importance, and, consequently, demanding more space, than events of universal interest in the chief centres of the world. The policy of the paper has been, while neglecting nothing of news value at home, and while photographing all events of local importance with fulness and accuracy, to keep its readers au courant with the world's progress. In all departments of sporting intelligence the Herald is an acknowledged authority; its dramatic news is fuller than that of any paper in the country; it "covers," to use a newspaper technicality, the world's metropolis on the banks of the Thames not with a single correspondent, but with a corps of able writers; during the recent troubles in Ireland one of its special correspondents traversed that distracted country, giving to his paper the most graphic picture of Irish distress and discontent, and he capped the climax of journalistic achievement by interviewing the leading British statesmen on the Irish theme, making a long letter, which was cabled to the Herald and recabled back the same day to the London press, which had to take, at second-hand, the enterprise of the great New-England daily. At Paris, the world's pleasure capital, the chief seat of science, it is ably represented, and its Italian correspondence has been ample and excellent. When public attention was first drawn to Mexico by the opening up of that land of mystery and revolutions by American railway-builders, the Herald put three correspondents into that field, and made Mexico an open book to the reading public. It is one of the characteristics of the paper's policy to take up and exhaust all topics of great current interest, and then to pass quickly on to something new. In dealing with topics of interest of local importance, the paper has long been noted for exhaustive special articles by writers of accuracy and fitness for their task. Its New York City staff comprises a general correspondent, a political observer, a chronicler of business failures, an accomplished art critic, a fashion writer, a theatrical correspondent, and three general news correspondents, using the wires. The Herald is something more than a Boston paper. It has a wide reach, and employs electricity more freely than did the oldtime newspaper the post-horse.

In its closely-printed columns the Herald has, during the last decade, given to its readers a cyclopædia of the world's daily doings. Portraitures of men of affairs done by skilled writers, the fullest records of contemporaneous events, the gossip and news of the chief towns of the globe,—all this has made up a complete record to which the future historian may turn.

To manage such a paper requires a coördination of forces and an intellectual breadth of view deserving to be ranked with the work and attributes of a successful general. Not to wait for the slow processes of legislation, to be up and ahead of the government itself, to be alert and untiring—this is the newspaper ideal. How near the Herald has come to this, its enduring popularity, its great profits, and its wide fame and influence, best show.

WACHUSETT MOUNTAIN AND PRINCETON

By Atherton P. Mason

Almost the first land seen by a person on board a vessel approaching the Massachusetts coast is the summit of Wachusett Mountain; and any one standing upon its rocky top beholds more of Massachusetts than can be seen from any other mountain in the State. For these two reasons, if for no others, a short historical and sceno-graphical description of this lonely and majestic eminence, and of the beautiful township in which it lies, would seem to be interesting.

Wachusett, or "Great Watchusett Hill," as it was originally called, lies in the northern part of the township of Princeton, and is about fifty miles due west from Boston. The Nashaways, or Nashuas, originally held this tract and all the land west of the river that still bears their name, and they gave to this mountain and the region around its base the name of "Watchusett." Rising by a gradual ascent from its base, it has the appearance of a vast dome. The Reverend Peter Whitney[2 - History of Worcester County. Worcester: 1793.] speaking of its dimensions, says: "The circumference of this monstrous mass is about three miles, and its height is 3,012 feet above the level of the sea, as was found by the Hon. John Winthrop, Esq., LL.D., in the year 1777: and this must be 1,800 or 1,900 feet above the level of the adjacent country." More recent measurements have not materially changed these figures, so they may be regarded as substantially correct.

The first mention, and probably the first sight, of this mountain, or of any portion of the region now comprised in Worcester County, is recorded in Governor Winthrop's journal, in which, under the date of January 27, 1632, is written: "The Governour and some company with him, went up by Charles River about eight miles above Watertown." The party after climbing an eminence in the vicinity of their halting-place saw "a very high hill, due west about forty miles off, and to the N.W. the high hills by Merrimack, above sixty miles off," The "very high hill" seen by them for the first time was unquestionably Wachusett.

"On the 20th of October, 1759, the General Court of Massachusetts, passed an act for incorporating the east wing, so called, of Rutland, together with sundry farms and some publick lands contiguous thereto," as a district under the name of Prince Town, "to perpetuate the name and memory of the late Rev. Thomas Prince, colleague pastor of the Old South church in Boston, and a large proprietor of this tract of land." The district thus incorporated contained about nineteen thousand acres; but on April 24, 1771, its inhabitants petitioned the General Court, that it, "with all the lands adjoining said District, not included in any other town or District," be incorporated into a town by the name of Princeton; and by the granting of this petition, the area of the town was increased to twenty-two thousand acres.

The principal citizen of Princeton at this period was the Honorable Moses Gill, who married the daughter of the Reverend Thomas Prince. He was a man of considerable note in the county also, holding office as one of the judges of the court of common pleas for the county of Worcester, and being "for several years Counsellor of this Commonwealth." His country-seat, located at Princeton, was a very extensive estate, comprising nearly three thousand acres. Mr. Whitney appears to have been personally familiar with this place, and his description of it is so graphic and enthusiastic, that it may be interesting to quote a portion of it.

"His noble and elegant seat is about one mile and a quarter from the meeting-house, to the south. The mansion-house is large, being fifty by fifty feet, with four stacks of chimneys. The farmhouse is forty feet by thirty-six. In a line with this stands the coach and chaise house, fifty feet by thirty-six. This is joined to the barn by a shed seventy feet in length—the barn is two hundred feet by thirty-two. Very elegant fences are erected around the mansion-house, the outhouses, and the garden. When we view this seat, these buildings, and this farm of so many hundred acres under a high degree of profitable cultivation, and are told that in the year 1776 it was a perfect wilderness, we are struck with wonder, admiration, and astonishment. Upon the whole, the seat of Judge Gill, all the agreeable circumstances respecting it being attentively considered, is not paralleled by any in the New England States: perhaps not by any this side the Delaware."

Judge Gill was a very benevolent and enterprising man, and did much to advance the welfare of the town in its infancy. During the first thirty years of its existence, it increased rapidly in wealth and population, having in 1790 one thousand and sixteen inhabitants. For the next half-century it increased slowly, having in 1840 thirteen hundred and forty-seven inhabitants. Since then, like all our beautiful New-England farming-towns, it has fallen off in population, having at the present time but little over one thousand people dwelling within its limits. Yet neither the town nor the character of the people has degenerated in the last century. Persevering industry has brought into existence in this town some of the most beautiful farms in New England, and in 1875 the value of farm products was nearly a quarter of a million dollars. Manufacturing has never been carried on to any great extent in this town. "In Princeton there are four grist mills, five saw mills, and one fulling mill and clothiers' works," says Whitney in 1793. Now lumber and chair-stock are the principal manufactured products, and in 1875 the value of these, together with the products of other smaller manufacturing industries, was nearly seventy thousand dollars.