Last Tuesday afternoon a ragged and disreputable-looking man was
noticed standing on a corner of Main Street. Several persons who had
occasion to pass a second time along the street saw him still standing
there on their return.
He seemed to be waiting for someone. Finally a young man came down the
sidewalk, and the ragged man sprang upon him without saying a word and
engaged him in fierce combat.
The young man defended himself as well as he could, but he had been
severely handled before the bystanders could separate them. Of course
no policeman was in sight, and the affair ended with as little noise
and confusion as it began with. The young man slunk away with a black
eye and a bruised cheek, and the ragged man with a look of intense
satisfaction on his face turned off' down a side street.
A Post Man who had viewed the occurrence was struck with something
extraordinary in the man's appearance, and, satisfied that there was
more in the situation than appeared on the face of it, followed the
aggressor. As he came up behind him, the disreputable-looking man said
aloud to himself in a voice that expressed a deep and triumphant joy:
"That's the last of the lot. After all, the pursuit of revenge gives
more pleasure than its attainment. I have robbed my existence of its
aim."
The man continued his course, turning corners in a hesitating way,
with the manner of one unfamiliar with the town, and after a time
entered an obscure saloon on Congress Street.
The Post Man also entered, and sipping a glass of water, which he
begged of the saloon man, he saw the ragged man seat himself at a
small table. Although his attire was mean and torn, and his hair
disheveled and uncared for, his face showed evidence of much
intelligence that rather belied his uncouth dress.
Spurred by curiosity, the Post Man also took a chair at the table.
With the tact and enterprise of his craft he soon engaged the
mysterious stranger in conversation and found him, as he had expected,
to be a man of education and manners.
"When you tell me you are a newspaper man," said he with a graceful
wave of his hand, "you compel my confidence. I shall tell you my
story. I once ran a newspaper myself."
He rapped on the table, and when the waiter came he fished up from the
depths of his rags a lean pocketbook, from which he shook upon the
table a single dollar. Handing this to the waiter, he said:
"A bottle of your best wine and some good cigars."
"Really," said the Post Man, as he placed two fingers in his vest
pocket, "I can not allow you--you must let me--"
"Not at all," said the ragged man with dignity, "I have ordered."
The Post Man awaited with impatience the narrative of his strange
entertainer.
* * * * *
"My name is Binkley," said the ragged man. "I am the founder of
Binkley's Practical School of Journalism: the dollar I have just spent
is the last dollar I have in the world, and the man I licked up town
is the last one of the editorial and reportorial staff of my newspaper
that I have treated in the same manner.
"About a year ago I had $15,000 in cash to invest. I could have
invested it in many things that would have been safe and paid a fair
percent, but I unluckily conceived an original idea for making a good
deal more.
"I understood the newspaper business, as I had served eight or ten
years on a first-class journal before I fell heir to the $15,000 on
the death of an aunt. I had noticed that every newspaper in the
country is besieged with ambitious youths who desire a position in
order that they may learn journalism. They are for the most part
college graduates, and a great many of them care little for the
salaries connected with the positions. They are after experience.
"The idea struck me that they would be willing to pay handsomely for
situations where they could imbibe the art of practical journalism as
found in a first-class newspaper office. Several Schools of Journalism
had already been started in the country and were succeeding well. I
believed that a school of this nature, combined with a live,
prospering newspaper that had a good circulation would prove a gold
mine to its originator. In a school they could only learn a theory, in
my school both theory and practice would walk hand in hand.
"It was a great idea.
"I found a newspaper that would sell out. It was in a large Southern
city: I don't care to give its name. The proprietor was in ill health
and wanted to leave the country. It was a good plant, and it was
clearing $3,000 a year above expenses. I got it for $12,000 cash, put
$3,000 in bank and sat down and wrote out a neat little advertisement
to catch the young would-be journalists. I sent these advertisements
to some big Northern and Eastern papers and waited for responses.
"My paper was well known, and the idea of getting a place on it to
learn journalism seemed to strike the people just right. I advertised
that as there were only a limited number of places to be filled, I
would have to consider applications in the form of bids, and the one
bidding highest for each position got it.
"You wouldn't believe it if I told the number of answers I got. I
filed everything for about a week, and then I looked over the
references they sent me, sized up the bids and selected my force. I
ordered them to report on a certain day, and they were on time, eager
to go to work. I got $50 per week from my editorial writer; $40 from
my city editor; $25 each from three reporters; $20 from a dramatic
critic; $35 from a literary editor, and $30 each from night and
telegraph editors. I also accepted three special writers, who paid me
$15 per week each for doing special assignments. I was managing editor
and was to direct, criticize and instruct the staff.
* * * * *
"I discharged the old force, and after an hour's course of instruction
I turned my new staff loose upon their duties. Most of them had
graduated with high honors at college and were of wealthy families,
who could afford to pay well for the splendid advantage of entering
them in Binkley's Practical School of Journalism.
"When the staff dispersed, eager and anxious, to their several duties,
I leaned back in my revolving chair with a smile of satisfaction. Here
was an income of $1,400 per month coming from and not paid to my
staff, besides the $3,000 yearly profit from the paper. Oh, it was a
good thing.
"Of course, I expected a little crudeness and stiffness about the work
of my staff at first, but I calculated that they would err on the side
of fine writing rather than otherwise. I lit a cigar and strolled
through the editorial rooms. The leader writer was at his desk working
away, his high, intellectual forehead and broadcloth clothes
presenting a fine appearance. The literary editor was consulting an
encyclopedia with a knitted brow, and the dramatic critic was pasting
a picture of Shakespeare above his desk. The city force were out news
gathering.
"I began to feel sorry for people who were unable to think up such a
fine scheme as I had. Everything was working as smooth as you please.
I went downstairs and, rendered reckless by success, I hunted up an
old friend and confided to him my wonderful scheme. He was impressed,
and we hied ourselves to a caravansary and opened bottle after bottle
in honor of the idea.
"When I returned to the office, the entire staff was there with their
day's work turned in. The truth is I was so exhilarated by what I had
taken that I hardly knew what I was reading when I looked over their
copy, but with a mistaken confidence in the ability of my scholars, I
let the stuff all go on the file, and shortly afterward the foreman
carried it away. I instructed the night editor as to his duties and
went home, to dream of my good fortune.
"The next morning I came down town about 9 o'clock, and it seemed to
me I couldn't see anything but newsboys. The town was full of them,
and people were buying my paper as fast as the boys could hand them
out. I fairly swelled with satisfaction and pride. As I neared the
office I saw five men with shotguns standing on the sidewalk.
"One of them caught sight of me, and took a snap shot at me as I
turned the corner. A buckshot went through my ear and several through
my hat. I didn't wait for explanation, as the other four men also
tried to get a shot at me, and I cut around the corner and dodged into
a back lot full of empty dry goods boxes.
"A newsboy went by, calling the paper, and I whistled him up to a
crack in the fence and bought one. I thought perhaps there might be
something in the paper that had offended somebody.
"I crawled into a big box and opened the paper. The more I read the
wilder I became. Excuse me for changing the subject," continued the
ragged man, "but you said something a while ago in reference to this
liquid refreshment, which I perceive is already finished."
The Post Man stammered, hesitated, felt in his vest pocket once more
and then arose, and taking the saloon man aside, whispered with him
for about fifteen minutes. The result was that the saloon man brought
another bottle of wine, but with a very bad grace, slamming the bottle
and glasses upon the table in an ill-bred and ungracious manner. The
ragged man smiled, filled the glasses, and then, his face taking on a
deep frown as his mind reverted to his story, he continued.
"I turned first to the local page. The first item that met my eyes was
this:
"'Colonel J. Henry Gwinn, the administrator of the Perkins
estate, has robbed the family of the deceased of over
$75,000. The heirs will bring suit for that amount at an
early date.'
"I remembered that the man who fired at me looked a good deal like
Colonel J. Henry Gwinn. The next item was as follows:
"'A certain city alderman residing not many miles from No.
1204 West Thirty-Second Street, has recently built a
$10,000 residence. Votes in the city council must be
getting higher.'
"There were about fifteen items of the same kind and every one of them
was a dead shot for big damages. I glanced at the society columns and
saw a few harmless little squibs like the following:
'Mrs. General Crowder gave a big ball last night on
Johnson Avenue. It does seem like she would get a divorce
from that ticket agent in Kansas City before she tried to
cut such a swell as old Crowder's wife.'
"'Henry Baumgarten beat his wife again last night.'
"'The Ladies' Histrionic Society met last evening over
Klein's music store. Miss Sadie Dodson was overcome by the
heat and was taken home in a hack. Heat! That's a new name
for it.'
"These are some of the least objectionable items. There were some that
made my hair rise slowly on my head as I read them.
"Mechanically I turned to the editorial page, thinking it hardly
possible there could be anything wrong with it. The first article
charged every city and county official with corruption in office,
calling them by name, and wound up by offering to give $10,000 to any
charity fund if the paper did not prove every charge within ten days.
"I crept through the lot, knocked a board off the next fence and made
my way to the back stairway of the office. I found two of my reporters
cursing and kicking in the back yard. One of them was in a heap of
soft coal dust and the other was hanging by his coat tail on a picket
fence. Somebody had thrown them out the window.
"Sick at heart I crept upstairs to the editorial rooms. There was
considerable noise going on. I went in easy as I could and looked
around. My $50 editorial writer was in a corner with half a chair in
his hands defending himself manfully against a quorum of the city
council. He had laid out three of them and was putting up a great
fight. The city editor was lying on the floor with four men sitting on
him, and a large, angry German was trying to punch the dramatic editor
off the top of the book case with a piece of gas pipe.
"It is enough to discourage any man to have a staff that is paying him
$1,400 per month treated that way.
"I went into my private office, and the enraged public followed me
there. I knew it was no use to argue with them, so I pulled out my
checkbook and tried to compromise. When all the money I had in the
bank was exhausted, and another batch of infuriated citizens came in,
I gave up in despair.
"At 11 o'clock the business office force came up in a body and
resigned. At 12 o'clock damage suits were filed against the paper to
the amount of $200,000, and I knew every one of them was good for a
judgment. I went downstairs and got about nine drinks and came back. I
met the editorial writer on the stairs, and I hit him on the point of
the chin without saying a word. He still held one leg of the chair in
his hand, and he swiped me over the head with it and ran. When I got
inside I found that the dramatic critic was about to win the day. He
was a college man and a great football player. He had thrashed the big
German and had pulled the four citizens off the city editor, and they
were waging great battle with the foe. Just then the society editor
dashed into the room barefooted, in his shirt and trousers, and I
heard a tremendous screeching and chattering, as if a thousand parrots
were talking at once.
* * * * *
"'Run!' he gasped out. 'The women are coming.'
"I looked out the window and saw that the sidewalk was full of them. I
made a break for a back window, jumped off onto a shed, and never
stopped until I was a mile out of town. That was the end of Binkley's
Practical School of Journalism. I have been tramping about the country
ever since.
"The fellow I attacked on the street today was a special Houston
correspondent I had engaged. I had a little grudge against him on
account of the first communication he sent the paper. I gave him carte
blanche to send in what he thought best, and he wired us 40,000 words
the first day about the mockingbirds singing in the trees by the
courthouse, while the snow was three feet deep in Dakota. Do you not
think I have had some hard luck?"
"I must tell you," said the Post Man, "that I don't believe your story
at all."
The ragged man replied sadly and reproachfully: "Did I not pay my last
dollar for refreshments while telling it to you? Have I asked you for
anything?"
"Well," said the Post Man, after reflecting a while, "it may be true,
but--"
(_Houston Daily Post_, Sunday morning, February 16, 1896.)