Part 26

***************************************************************** Vol. XXIII No.2 AUGUST 1910

INSTEAD OF AN ARTICLE {page 209-214} About Pittsburg and, Incidentally, about Editing a Magazine

Important articles in magazines of the type of "COLLIER'S," "MCCLURE'S," the "AMERICAN," and "EVERYBODY'S," like plays, are rewritten rather than written. Too begin with, there must be the idea, then to find the man or woman best able to embody it. That settled, the author must steep himself in his subject. When he acquires mastery, his findings are written down and submitted to the editor. This may take months; it often requires years.

It has happened that the editor did not know what he wanted until he read this first draft. Now he has the subject spread before him by an authority. His associates all read it and criticise. Sometimes that first draft is flawless, but most often it is returned to the author with direction for reconstruction. The process may be repeated half a dozen times. Finally the manuscript is satisfactory, which means that it is valuable, simply expressed, and readable. It is in shape for publication. It is put into type and sent around to outside experts who are the representative authorities on the subject.

In these days a magazine can afford to have its conclusions disputed, but its facts must be incontrovertible. Perhaps the trouble the big publications take to be right--and that means square and just, as well as accurate--explains such prestige and influence as they now enjoy in America.

At a women's club gathering in Mississippi, recently, Harris Dickson told his audience something about an article of his that had recently appeared in "EVERYBODY'S." He explained that a manuscript written by another man had been sent him to put in shape. The facts were there, and the moral, but the treatment was technical. It lacked carrying power. Dickson knew nothing of the other author, and so proceeded to get up the subject at first hand. He took not one of the facts for granted. After three months he returned the revised manuscript to the magazine. It was sent back, with specific directions for rewriting. In due course he again remailed it to the editor, who congratulated him on his achievement--for that is what it was. Then the article, having attained a satisfactory form (it was on Fraternal Insurance), was sent round among the experts. The first man who read it was a high official of one of the old line insurance companies, but a hearty believer in the fraternal system. He returned it with approval and an elaborate criticism. Then it was submitted to the chief insurance commissioner of a western state--the undoubted political authority on the subject. The approval and criticisms of both men, with the manuscript, were again forwarded to Mr. Dickson. The necessary corrections having been incorporated, the manuscript was ready for the printer. To make assurance doubly sure, proofs were sent out to prominent officials of leading fraternal organizations, who returned them with most commendatory letters. And then, and only then, did it appear in the magazine.

Mr. Dickson's audience, doubtless under the impression that magazines are produced by editors out of the contributions sent them by mail, expressed surprise that so much time, effort, and money should be devoted to what seemed a comparatively unimportant subject. Yet it involved a matter that concerned five million men and their families, and a tremendous controversy. Its appearance has made the controversy even keener, and of course the enemies of sanity and good order in fraternalism are now hurling bolts at us. However, when we have done our part and know we are right, we stay put.

Mr. Dickson told part of what to us is a familiar story. In this instance he knew nothing of the time and trouble the author and ourselves had taken just to get together the facts and place them in the right perspective. We began on this particular article in November, 1906, and during the interval it was being worked at or over by one of some dozen men. The same is true of most of our big series. "The Woman's Invasion" represented two and a half years of work. Fifteen months elapsed between the delivery of Judge Lindsey's first manuscript and the beginning of publication in the magazine. Trained writers, the best men we know about, are out investigating and gathering the facts for the articles we will print a year hence. This is the process of magazine making to-day. It is not peculiar to "EVERYBODY'S"; it is the rule with "COLLIER'S," "MCCLURE'S," the AMERICAN, and SUCCESS."

INSTEAD OF AN ARTICLE

This is all by way of introduction to the story of an article that was not written. About the time the Pittsburg flare-up began to show itself in the papers, it occurred to us that some exposition of the situation there would be of value and interest to our readers. Before going about it, we debated it very carefully. Some of us in the office (and this magazine is edited by all of us) were fairly familiar with the subject, and we believed it would subserve no useful purpose to tackle it along the "Shame of the Cities" lines. We agreed that the way to approach Pittsburg was to consider what had happened there, not as a sporadic outburst, but as an economic symptom. Whom could we get that was far enough from the controversies involved to treat the subject objectively and with a big perspective? Brand Whitlock. The Mayor of Toledo knows more about cities and their governments, and the evils that arise within them, than any other man, and he can write--with knowledge, with sympathy, with clarity. Also he knew Pittsburg. So we telegraphed to find if he was free to write an article, and, when he replied in the affirmative, the following letter was sent him:

April 1, 1910. DEAR MR. WHITLOCK:

The article we want is on Pittsburg. It is neither our purpose nor our desire merely to "muckrake" Pittsburg or any other city. The eruption there is typical of similar conditions in other great civic centers throughout the country, and it seems to us it might be made the text of a diagnosis of the whole municipal problem in America.

Here are a few thoughts that occur to me which might be represented:

We have come to realize that the real trouble in our country is Privilege. Big business, in its ruthless pursuit of results, has the ultimate responsibility for the ills that confront us in political, social, and commercial life. The graft scandals, the bank defalcations, etc., are simply symptoms of internal disorders. They are the eruptions of the disease.

Pittsburg might be called the typical get-rich-quick community. Its great wealth is based on the abundant coal and iron with which the Creator loaded its environment. Down on those deposits fasten thousands of Americans seized with the mania of money-making. They coin the coal and iron into millions. They work feverishly; they work their men furiously. It's a mad, frenzied scramble for success and sensation. To get rich quicker, they exact excessive protection from Congress--first to prop up infant industries, then to consolidate abnormal profits. If the government undertakes to deny their demands, they bluster first, then intrigue, then intimidate. Mills are closed down; the "prosperity" of the country is threatened, lobbies are organized, corruption funds subscribed, until Congress succumbs and new "jokers" are written into steel tariffs.

In the meantime a huge city is upreared. But this city is run for the benefit of its industries, not for the comfort of its inhabitants. Street railway, gas, electric corporations are organized, ostensibly to serve the community, actually enabling a greedy group to make more money. Again, what cannot be gained by request is won by force and guile.

Over and over again the various processes are repeated, until you have built up a sort of City Monstrous, dedicated to machinery, in which all the men and many of the women are just machines, and there is no ideal save that of feverish industrial adventure and accomplishment. Power--blind, ruthless, marvel-working, bending backs and bodies to its will--is Pittsburg's god, and Success its divine attribute Success that spells Gold, the instrument of exploitation and sensation. What wonder that weaker men, confronted by the colossal rewards of industrial conquest, are frenzied with the gold fever? In the absence of communal patriotism, graft becomes an incident. Graft and greed are the minor watchwords of success. Get money, anyway--but get it. Is it surprising that cashiers graft, that aldermen graft, that city officials graft, that there's a very pandemonium of graft? Isn't it the way the other fellows get rich?

All of a sudden the poison clogs the pores, and the infection blotches the surface--and every one is horrified. The great manufacturers, the great merchants, the great lawyers--high priests of the Power God--throw up their hands. Can such things be? Dreadful, horrible!--blindly oblivious of their own responsibility for the epidemic.

More startling still to the conquerors were the pitiless revelations of the Survey, exhibiting in mathematical terms the cost to the human factor of this monstrous material success. Hordes of anaemic, emaciated men and women, exhausted by long hours of toil, piled thick in wretched hovels, underfed, half-clothed, dragging out a miserable existence unrelieved by leisure or rest or recreation--the Juggernaut toll of efficiency--of the passion for results at any price. Against this horror, what avails Pittsburg's panorama of splendid churches, of lordly palaces, of noble art museums, of great orchestras, richly endowed educational institutions--the patriotic tribute of the conquerors to civilization? What is this boasted civilization of ours worth--not Pittsburg's only, for Pittsburg is an incident--if it be reared on the wrecked and depleted bodies of men at its base?

There would then be the opportunity in the article to suggest the regenerated Pittsburg--all this furious energy hitherto devoted to material success turned to social betterment and decent government. The turn of the worker comes. The conquerors, having learned that they cannot take greedily what belongs to a community, and find happiness, turn magnificently to the rescue of their own downtrodden. The old question--what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his soul?--has been burned into Pittsburg humanity once again.

For several years the newspapers have carried stories about these successive scandals in Pittsburg, until people have in a measure become confused as to how they connect, whether all are really parts of the same story. I doubt if the average man who reads the article in the morning paper has a clear grasp of what has been going on, and he can't discover it without hunting back through the files. Once we published an article by Owen Wister about the Capitol frauds in Pennsylvania, after the newspapers had been printing countless columns on the subject for months, and it was one of the most successful articles we have used, because of the way it crystallized and interpreted the whole occurrence.

A similar service is here suggested. Write the story of Pittsburg dramatically; crystallize the big exposures of the last few years through which bankers and politicians have been going to prison, culminating with the present crisis in the City Council; bring out the economic significance of these occurrences to Pittsburg, to the United States. Such an article will help all of us to see where we are "at," will help develop civic consciousness in New York, Chicago, San Francisco. It is immensely well worth doing.

I'm not dictating your article. What is written here is purely suggestive. You must tell what you see and find in your own way. You will, anyway. You know most of the facts. You are in touch with the balance. We'll help to get material. If you will, you can put up an article that the country will read. We'd like copy as soon as possible. Sincerely, J. O'H. COSGRAVE,

Editor.

Mr. Whitlock, replied, expressing willingness to handle the subject along the lines indicated, and asked for whatever assistance we could render him. William Hard, a member of our editorial force, had spent some time in Pittsburg, acquiring material for his "Woman's Invasion," and he recommended J. J. Nordman, a reporter of that city, as the best man to equip Mr. Whitlock with the historical details of the exposure. He would thus have immediately a succinct, up-to-date statement of the case for his use as a skeleton.

Mr. Nordman was willing to help, and soon after got into communication with Mr. Whitlock. Here is an account of his service, which was accompanied by a letter from District Attorney Blakeley, certifying to his reliability and knowledge of the facts.

May 10, 1910. HON. BRAND WHITLOCK, Toledo, Ohio. Dear Sir:

Mr. Cosgrave has asked me to forward you matter bearing on the Pittsburg graft expose and such clippings as I may have.