Newspaper Reporting and Correspondence

Appendix Ii--News Stories to Be Corrected 311

INDEX 339

NEWSPAPER REPORTING AND CORRESPONDENCE

GATHERING THE NEWS

Unlike almost any other profession, that of a newspaper reporter combines two very different activities--the gathering of news and the writing of news. Part of the work must be done in the office and part of it outside on the street. At his desk in the office a reporter is engaged in the literary, or pseudo-literary, occupation of writing news stories; outside on the street he is a detective gathering news and hunting for elusive facts to be combined later into stories. Although the two activities are closely related, each requires a different sort of ability and a different training. In a newspaper office the two activities are rarely separated, but a beginner must learn each duty independent of the other. This book will not attempt to deal with both; it will confine itself mainly to one phase, the pseudo-literary activity of writing news stories.

However, introductory to the discussion of the writing of newspaper stories, we may glance at the other side of the newspaper writer's work--the gathering of the news. Where the newspaper gets its news and how it gets its news can be learned only by experience, for it differs in different cities and with different papers. But an outline of the background of news-gathering may assist us in writing the news after it is gathered and ready for us to write.

=1. Reporter vs. Correspondent.=--There are two capacities in which one may write news stories for a paper. He may work on the staff as a regular reporter or he may supply news from a distance as a correspondent. In the one case he works under the personal supervision of a city editor and spends his entire time at the regular occupation of gathering and writing news. As a correspondent he works in a distant city, under the indirect supervision of the city, telegraph, or state editor, and sends in only the occasional stories that seem to be of interest to his paper. In either case the same rules apply to his news gathering and to his news writing. And in either case the length of his employment depends upon his ability to turn in clean copy in the form in which his paper wishes to print the news. Both the reporter and the correspondent must write their stories in the same form and must look at news and the sources of news from almost the same point of view. Whatever is said of the reporter applies equally to the correspondent.

=2. Expected and Unexpected News.=--The daily news may be divided into two classes from the newspaper's point of view: expected and unexpected news. Expected news includes all stories of which the paper has a previous knowledge. Into this class fall all meetings, speeches, sermons, elections, athletic contests, social events, and daily happenings that do not come unexpectedly. They are the events that are announced beforehand and tipped off to the paper in time for the editor to send out a reporter to cover them personally. These events are of course recorded in the office, and each day the editor has a certain number of them, a certain amount of news that he is sure of. Each day he looks over his book to note the events that are to take place during that day and sends out his reporters to cover them.

The other class includes the stories that break unexpectedly. Accidents, deaths, fires, storms, and other unexpected happenings come without warning and the reporting of them cannot be arranged for in advance. These are the stories that the paper is most anxious to get and the things for which the whole staff always has its eyes and ears open. Seldom are they heard of in time for the paper to have them covered personally, and the reporting of such stories becomes a separate sort of work--the gathering and sorting of the facts that can be obtained only from chance witnesses.

=3. News Sources.=--There are certain sources from which the paper gets most of its tips of expected events and its knowledge of unexpected events. These every editor knows about. The courts, the public records, the public offices, the churches, and the schools furnish a great many of the tips of expected news. The police stations, the fire stations, the hospitals, and the morgues furnish most of the tips of unexpected news. Whenever an event is going to happen, or whenever an unexpected occurrence does happen, a notice of it is to be found in some one of these sources. Such a notice or a casual word from any one is called a "tip" and indicates the possibility of securing a story. The securing of the story is another matter. A would-be reporter may get good practice from studying the stories in the daily papers and trying to discover or imagine from what source the original news tip came. He will soon find that certain classes of stories always come from certain sources and that there is a perceptible amount of routine evident in the accounts of the most unexpected occurrences.

=4. Runs and Assignments.=--Between the news tip and the finished copy for the compositor there is a vast amount of news gathering, which falls to the lot of the reporter. This is handled by a system of runs and special assignments. A reporter usually has his own run, or beat, on which he gathers news. His run may cover a certain number of police stations or the city hall or any group of regular news sources. Each day he must visit the various sources of news on his beat and gather the tips and whatever facts about the stories behind the tips that he can. The tips that he secures furnish him with clues to the stories, and it is his business to get the facts behind all of the tips on his beat and to write them up, unless a tip opens up a story that is too big for him to handle alone without neglecting his beat.

Assignments are used to cover the stories that do not come in through the regular sources, and to handle the big stories that are unearthed on the regular beats. The editor turns over to the reporter the tip that he has received and instructs him to go out and get the facts. A paper's best reporters are used almost entirely on assignments, and when they go out after a story they practically become detectives. They follow every clue that the tip suggests and every clue that is opened up as they progress; they hunt down the facts until they are reasonably sure that they have secured the whole story. The result may not be worth writing, or it may be worth a place on the front page, but the reporter must get to the bottom of it. Whether on a beat or on an assignment every reporter must have his ears open for a tip of some unexpected story and must secure the facts or inform the editor at once. It is in this way that a paper gets a scoop, or beat, on its rivals by printing a story before the other papers have heard of it.

=5. Interviews for Facts.=--To cover an assignment and secure the facts of a story is not at all easy. If the reporter could be a personal witness of the happening which he is to report, the task would be simpler. But, outside the case of expected events, he rarely hears of the occurrence until after it is past and the excitement has subsided. Then he must find the persons who witnessed the occurrence or who know the facts, and get the story from them. Perhaps he has to see a dozen people to get the information he wants. Getting facts from people in this way is called interviewing--interviewing for facts, as distinguished from formal interviewing for the purpose of securing a statement or an opinion that is to be printed with the name of the man who utters it. Although a dozen interviews may be necessary for a single story, not one of them is mentioned in the story, for they are of no importance except in the facts that they supply.

For example, suppose a reporter is sent out to get the story of a fire that has started an hour or two before he goes on duty. All that his editor gives him is the tip from the fire department, or from some other source, of a fire at such-and-such an address. When he arrives at the scene there is nothing left but smoldering ruins with perhaps an engine throwing a stream on the smoking débris and a few by-standers still loitering about. He can see with his own eyes what kind of building has burned, and how completely it has been destroyed. A by-stander may be able to tell him who occupied the building or what it was used for, but he must hunt for some one else who can give him the exact facts that his paper wants. Perhaps he can find the tenant and learn from him what his loss has been. The tenant can give him the name of the owner and may be able to tell him something about the origin of the fire. He must find the owner to get the value of the building and the amount of insurance carried. Perhaps he cannot find any of these people and must ask the fire chief or some one else to give him what facts and estimates he can. If the fire is at all serious he must find out who was killed or injured and get their names and addresses and the nature of their injury or the manner of their death. Perhaps he can talk to some of the people who had narrow escapes, or interview the friends or relatives of the dead. Everywhere he turns new clues open up, and he must follow each one of them in turn until he is sure that he has all the facts.

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