ciated with the Journal. Charles L. Wilson was sent to London as secretary of the United States legation there soon after the inauguration of Lincolu, of whom he had been a devoted supporter. John L. Wilson, his brother, conducted the paper during his absence and remained as its business manager after his return.

To-day the ownership of the Evening Journal is vested in John R. Wilson, nephew of the three brothers who joined in the management of the paper in its early days, and Slason Thompson, who is its editor-in-chief. The paper has lost nothing of its political prestige under Mr. Thompson's editorship. It is unquestionably the only newspaper in Chicago to the editorial page of which people turn first upon picking it up. The dullness of an editorial page, which too many newspaper men mistake for dignity, Mr. Thompson abhors. His writing is always clear, lucid and forceful, often relieved by a touch of humor, usually very personal. The Journal is held a newspaper of surpassing dignity, but its editorial page is a sort of perpetual Donnybrook fair. As the Republicanism of the paper has never wavered in its half century of existence, the heads that suffer are usually those of Democrats, though on occasion the recalcitrant Republican feels the bludgeon. Mr. Thompson is a young man, a native of New Brunswick, a man of much literary cultivation, a lover of the classics and a good fighter. His newspaper experience has been extensive, he having served in New York, San Francisco and Chicago, and filled almost every position on a newspaper. In collaboration with Clay Greene he wrote the successful comedy, Sharps and Flats," in which Robson and Crane appeared some fifteen years ago. For some time he edited in Chicago a weekly newspaper of violent Knownothing proclivities called America, which went the way of most weekly newspapers in that city.

66

The Evening Journal of to-day is an ultra conservative newspaper. There are those who think it a trifle sleepy, and it is certainly saved from being commonplace only by its editorial page. But its very conservatism is its chief value. Its circulation, which is small in comparison with that of some of its rivals, is of the very highest character. If it is sold little on the streets, it is still read widely in the homes. Advertisers declare that it produces for them excellent results, and something of its character may be judged from the fact that it alone among Chicago afternoon dailies has a considerable amount of book advertising from the eastern publishers. Its owners have wisely maintained its price at two cents a copy, and it is now and long has been a profitable property.

THE "MAIL" AND THE "DISPATCH."

The Evening News, with its enormous circulation, superb mechanical facilities and practically inexhaustible revenues, has so thoroughly dominated the afternoon field in Chicago that its rivals, though they have been many, have usually met an early death. To-day, however, two 1-cent afternoon papers dispute with the

News the mastery of the field. Of these the Mail is the older, having been founded more than a decade ago by the late Frank Hatton, Postmaster-General and, later, editor and part proprietor of the Washington Post. The tone of the Mail has always been light and vivacious. Though Republican in politics to-day it has in its not very long career represented every shade of politics. At one time it was connected with the Chicago Times, published in the same building and owned by the same people. The Times was then strongly Democratic and its owners made the doubtful experiment of conducting the afternoon paper as

a bitter partisan Republican sheet. This policy unquestionably injured both papers. Indeed, it would have been a serious reflection upon the people of Chicago had not so glaring an instance of conscienceless journalism been rebuked. The chief proprietor of the Mail to-day is F. S. Weigley, a lawyer, who gives scantly of his leisure time to the paper. C. M. Pepper, for many years Washington correspondent of the Chicago Tribune, and C. M. Schultz, who made a notable success of the St. Joseph, Mo., Daily News, are largely interested in the paper, and act respectively as editor and business manager. During its existence the Mail has been served by some of the brightest minds in Chicago journalism. Stanley Waterloo, now a successful writer of fiction, was once its managing editor. Kirk La Shelle, writer of graceful poetry and to-day achieving success and fortune as a theatrical manager, served it long as dramatic critic. Clinton Snowden, who was managing editor of the Times under Storey, had at one time a considerable interest in the Mail and was its business manager at the time Frank Hatton was editor.

The paper is now housed in the old Herald building, and is well equipped with all necessary machinery. It is a client of the United Press.

The Chicago Dispatch is sui generis. Scarcely three years old, it is undeniably a success, though its victory has been won by methods repugnant to many newspaper men. It is an ultra-sensational newspaper of a sort of which New York is not without prosperous examples. Its owner and editor, Joseph R. Dunlop, has had a long career in Chicago journalism, having been city editor of the Inter-Ocean and managing editor and editor-in-chief of the Chicago Times. His managing editor to-day is John C. Eckel. It may be said for the Dispatch that it is independent and fearless and has rendered more than one good service to the community. The remarkable success it has attained in so brief a time affords interesting illustration of the profit which sometimes is won in journalism merely by Bystematically calling a spade a spade.

..

THE GERMAN PRESS.

The leading German paper of Chicago is the Illinois Staats-Zeitung, of which Postmaster Washington Hesing is the editor-in-chief. It was established in April, 1848, by Robert Bernhard Hoeffgen, but it was not until it came into the possession of George Schneider, in 1851, that it began to exert an influence in the community. Schneider was sent abroad in 1861 and Anthony C. Hesing, father of the present editor, became the owner of the paper. Then it became a positive power in politics and began a stormy Its editor was called in the opposition press the "Republican Boss of Chicago," and he certainly was the "power behind the throne" in the old Whig and Republican politics in Cook County. He recently died at a ripe age.

career.

When the war broke out President Lincoln sent Mr. Hesing a commission as Provost Marshal of the Chicago district, but he declined it in favor of Col. James. Later in life General Grant offered Mr. Hesing the post of internal revenue collector of Chicago, which he also declined. In 1870 he went to Europe and did not return until one week after the great fire of 1871. He was an ardent supporter of his brother editor, Joseph Medill, for Mayor on the fireproof ticket of 1871. In 1873, Mr. Hesing was the hero of the people's party. Through the influence of his paper and by great personal effort he united the Germans, the Irish, Scandinavians and Bohemians, and was instrumental in electing H. D. Calvin Mayor by a majority of ten thousand votes.

He retired from the active management of the paper soon after the fire, and since that time Washington Hesing has directed its course. Editor "Wash" Hesing has long since become a national character, and while the forceful conduct of his paper has assisted in bringing this about, the paragraphers and funny men have done their share. Mr. Hesing has been blessed with a luxuriant growth of side whiskers, and the jokers of the press have seized upon this fact and exploited it until Mr. Hesing and his whiskers have become household words.

Washington Hesing entered public life at the age

prosperous now than ever before in its history. While his duties as Po-tmaster take the greater portion of his time, Mr. Hesing is able to devote some attention to the affairs of the paper and a very considerable share of his time to the activities of municipal politics. He is frank in declaring his ambitions, has twice sought the Democratic nomination for Mayor and is not wholly unsuspected of planning to enter the lists again when occasion offers.

No notice of the German press in Chicago, however brief, would be complete without some mention of Herman Raster, the brilliant chief editorial writer of the Staats-Zeitung, whose untimely death at Baden Baden four years ago removed a significant figure from Chicago journalism and a trusted leader from the large German colony.

The Freie Presse and the Abendpost fill the German afternoon field. Nearly every language of Europe is represented in the Chicago daily press, but most of the papers are of small and exclusively local circulation.

LITERARY PHASES OF CHICAGO JOURNALISM. An article on the literary movement in Chicago has come to be nearly as regular an annual feature

in every Chicago newspaper as is the eulogistic editorial on Chicago as a summer resort in the Chicago Tribune. It cannot be said that the literary movement has by its extent and force fully repaid the fostering care of the press. True, a considerable catalogue of books by Chicago authors may be compiled by a painstaking investigator, and it is always easy to fill a fair share of a newspaper page with portraits of Chicago authors. Some sifting, however, is necessary to separate that which is true literature from the mass which is mediocre, and but little will stand the test. The newspaper press, however, may fairly claim credit for having nurtured most of the writers who are identified with the beginnings of literature in Chicago. The connection of Eugene Field, George P. Upton and Elwyn A. Barron with daily newspapers has already been noted. Harry B. Smith, the librettist of "Robin Hood" and other operas, was long dramatic critic of the Evening Journal. The late Joseph Kirkland, author of "Zury" and "The Captain of Company K," held the position of literary editor of the Tribune, a post which at another time was filled by Miss Harriet Monroe, whose poems have won for her the esteem of the keenest critics. Henry D. Lloyd, author of that telling indictment of monopoly, "Wealth Against Commonwealth," prophet of the co-operative common wealth, leader of the Chicago radicals and idol of Chicago workingmen, served the Tribune as night editor, financial editor and editorial writer and in later years wrote for the Chicago Herald those stinging letters from the starving mining village of Spring Valley, which, published under the title "The Strike of Millionaires Against Miners," ought to be read by every American who is ignorant of the barbarities and oppression of which rich men, reputed upright and even philanthropic, will be guilty when banded together in a corporation for profit. No longer actively associated with any newspaper, but living in scholarly leisure at Winnetka, Mr. Lloyd is frequently appealed to by Chicago editors for articles or interviews on economic or industrial subjects.

EUGENE FIELD.

Among writers of fiction Leroy Armstrong, Stanley Waterloo, John McGovern and Richard Linthicum have held prominent place upon the daily newspapers of Chicago. Henry B. Fuller, author of The Chevalier of Pensieri Vani" and "The Cliff-Dwellers," who has perhaps brought Chicago its chief literary renown, cannot justly be accredited to journalism, although a series of articles by him upon architecture has been published in the Chicago Record. The editors of the Dial, a fortnightly journal of literary criticism, which has maintained the very highest ideals and has won favor far beyond the confines of Chicago, have sustained intimate relations with the daily press. The senior editor, Mr. Francis F. Browne, has been a frequent editorial contributor to the principal newspapers, while Mr. William

Morton Payne, his associate, was for some years reviewer upon the Morning News, now the Record. It may be noted in passing as a singular fact that almost the only established successes in the field of secular weekly journalism in Chicago are two distinctively literary publications, the Dial and the Chap Book. The former is a serious review, written by men of high standing in the literary world. Its judgments upon new books are always well considered, dignified and temperate. It has won success by its intellectual force. The Chap Book for its part is dainty, light, witty, Gallic. Founded a year ago by Herbert Stone and H. I. Kimball, Jr., then students of the senior class in Harvard, it made an instant and unexpected success. "We thought there were lots of bright young men in literature about whom nothing

was being said, and we started the Chap Book to say things about them," said one of the publishers to the writer. "We had no idea the paper would have other than a limited circulation and made no preparation for it. But it grew rapidly, and we found that instead of a plaything we had a considerable business enterprise on our hands."

WOMEN IN CHICAGO JOURNALISM.

Many women have made notable successes in Chicago journalism. One of the most widely known of them is Mrs. Margaret F. Sullivan, a lady of Irish birth, the wife of Alexander Sullivan, the widely known lawyer and Irish politician, and now an editorial writer on the Times-Herald. Mrs. Sullivan's first journalistic experience was upon the old Evening Post under Dr. C. H. Ray, who had been impressed by some editorials she had been contributing through a third party, and offered her a position without ever having seen her or even having suspected that the writer of such vigorous articles on abstruse themes was a woman. In turn she wrote for the Tribune, the Times and the Herald, being engaged by Horace White, Wilbur F. Storey and Martin J. Russellall skilled editorial writers themselves, whose com mendation is as convincing a stamp of approval as could be desired. Mrs. Sullivan reported the opening of the Paris exposition of 1889 for the Associated Press and was the only woman and only press representative on the floor of the Beaux Arts Building that day. She also supplied the New York Tribune with letters from Paris and, when the exposition had become an old story, went over to London to do the Parnell trial for the New York Sun. Besides constant newspaper work she has written two books, Ireland of To-day" and, in collaboration

HENRY D. LLOYD.

with Mary E. Blake, "Mexico, Picturesque, Political and Progressive." Perhaps the highest compliment ever paid a newspaper writer was the inclusion of Mrs. Sullivan's unsigned report of the Chicago Republican convention of 1884 in the first edition of Bryce's "American Commonwealth" as the most graphic picture possible of an American political convention.

66

No woman writer of Chicago has so large a personal following as Mrs. M. E. Holden, Amber," who has been called "the Fanny Fern of the West and the B. F. Taylor among women." She is a native of Hartford, N. Y., near the Vermont boundary line. Her father was a Baptist clergyman of remarkable eloquence. "Amber" first attracted attention by a series of brilliant letters in the Chicago Evening Journal. Her work for that paper continued until she transferred her pen to the Herald, where she now, under the title of " Musings," continues to write bright, cheering, chatty thoughts that help to lighten the hearts of thousands of women readers. Miss Frances E. Willard wrote of "Amber:" "She has bubbled up and over into a thousand sparkling pages; strewn charming metaphors with positive recklessness, and given a tone of home life and a color of warm hearth glow to all her scenes that must purify and comfort every one who reads." The late James W. Scott said once to the writer that the writings of "Amber" brought more correspondence into the office than any other feature of the paper, and that omission of her matter was always productive of a great volume of those protests from subscribers by which an editor is apt to gauge the popularity of a regular feature.

Two years ago Mrs. C. P. Abbott began writing literary reviews for the Chicago Evening Post and

made an instant and positive success. To-day she is the reviewer of the Times-Herald and shows great discrimination in the selection of the books for extended review, as well as a notable critical faculty in their treatment. She is the author of two published romances, "Alexia" and "The Beverlys."

Isabel McDougall, art critic of the Evening Post, educated to art in a Parisian atelier, an illustrator of no mean order and a chatty, discursive writer, is a new but growing figure in Chicago journalism. Eve H. Brodlique, the "Peg Woffington" and "Matinée Girl" of the Evening Post, is a clever journalist, but does not allow the rush and grind of newspaper work to coarsen her talent for graceful verse and dainty Mary H. Krout, of the Inter-Ocean,

romances.

conducts the "woman's page," but turned from it to war correspondence from Honolulu at the time of the overthrow of the queen. Amy Leslie, of the Evening News, may justly be credited with the brightest dramatic column in Chicago. Dr. Julia Holmes Smith conducted in the brief leisure left from her extended practice a woman's page in the Times and the Times-Herald until its change of ownership, which differed widely from the conventional woman's page in its dignity and its sincerity of purpose.

Not all the working women journalists of Chicago these, but a fairly representative group of their most shining lights. Every day sees new ones added to the list. Every day brings new laurels to those already enrolied.

for oratory. So far as we are aware, no one has ever attempted a general estimate of the causes or the results of this unexampled devotion on the part of at least a hundred student communities through the entire period since the war to the art of public address. But to deny the fact itself would be to confess total ignorance of all the springs and motives of the life that has long dominated the undergraduate groups from Ohio to Colorado. To some extent this ardent student passion for proficiency in public speaking has been encouraged by the college authorities. But for the most part it has been neither encouraged nor recognized by the faculties of instruction. Like college athletics in the East, the cause of college oratory in the West has been promoted by the unofficial co-operation of the students themselves, with the tolerance rather than the full approbation of teachers who have been jealous of anything that threatened to weaken the allegiance of students to class-room drill or laboratory work.

Yet in spite of the cold shoulder or the active opposition of presidents and professors, the students of every Western college havo persisted in attaching an enormous importance to their self-directed, selftaught, co-operative schools of debating and oratory. The so-called literary societies of the Western colleges are in fact for the most part training schools in the art of public speaking. The extemporaneous debate, carried on under the strictest possible parliamentary discipline, has always been the favorite exercise of the literary societies. Most colleges have several of these associations which compete with each other for the acquisition of the brightest of the new lads at the opening of the year. The student who does not join one or another of the societies is a very exceptional fellow; and the older members consider it their loyal

OTTO A. HAUERBACH,

Winner of the Interstate Prize in Oratory.

and brotherly duty to help every new member, no matter how timid and tongue-tied he may be at first, to acquire the art of expressing himself in the presence of an audience with some degree of freedom and confidence.

It does not follow that all Western students become