Democratic Sentinel, Volume 9, Number 11, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 April 1885 — Editing a Newspaper. [ARTICLE]

Editing a Newspaper.

Editing a newspaper is a very nice business, says a contemporary, ana those who know nothing about it consider it a y ery easy business. If we publish jokes, people say we are rattle-headed, and if we oadtjokes, we are an old fossil. If we publish original matter, they blame us for not giving selections, and if we publish selections, folk* say we are lazy for not writing something they had not read in some other paper. Ignorant of what good editing is, people imagine the getting up of selected matter to be the easiest thing in the world to do where it is really the nicest work on a paper. If they fidd the editor with scissors in hand, they’re Sure to say, “Eh, that’s the way they get up original matter, eh? r * accompanying their new and witty questions with an idiotic wink or smile. The facts are, thot the inthe morality, the variety and usefulness of a paper depend in no small degree upon its selected matter, and few men are capable of the position who would not be able themselves to write many of the articles they select. A sensible editor desires considerable selected matter because he knows that onemind can not make as good a paper as five or six. If we give aman a complimentary notice, we are censured for being partial, and if we fail to give complimentary notices, we are informed that we are a hog. If we insert articles that please the ladies, the men are jealous, and if we do not cater to the wishes of the ladies, the paper, in the ones’ opinion, is not fit to make a bustle of. If we remain in our office and attend to our business, folks say we are too proud to mingle with our fellows, but if we go out they say we never attend to our business. If we wear old clothes, it is insinuated that business is bad, and if we wear good ones, they say we are extravagant. A newspaper and a newspaper editor that people don’t talk about and sometimes abuse are rather poor concerns. The men and business that an editor sometimes feels it a duty to defend, at the risk of making enemies of another class, are of the very first to show ingratitude. The editor who expects to receive much charity or gratitude will soon find out his mistake; but he should go ahead and do and say what he conscientiously thinks right, without regard to the frowns of grumblers. He should collect his subscriptions promptly and keep his weathereye on the postoffice or some other good government job. Send the grumblers to the rear. Public Sale! —Wm. H. & E. S. Bergman will offer at public sale, at their farm, two miles north-east of Rensselaer, on next Tuesday, April 14, 1885: Two of workhorses, 2 pony, 1 yearling colt, 17 head three-year-old steers, 1 sulky plow, 1 corn planter, 2 mower, cultivators, plows, harrow, 3 set heavy harness, 1 double set light harness, 1 set light harness, 1 top buggy, 1 wagon, 1 road cart, and other articles too numerous to mention. Sale to commence at 10 o’clock a. m. Simon Phillips, Auctioneer. The W. C. T. U. will meet at the residence of Mrs. Berry Paris, on Tuesday afternoon, April 14th. <** I W. C. T. U. selections came to hand too late for insertion this week. Get your Horse and Jack bills printed at this office.