Rensselaer Standard, Volume 1, Number 15, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 September 1879 — Newspaper Scandal. [ARTICLE]

Newspaper Scandal.

New Orleans Times. The way in which sensational journals work up a scandal is well told in a New York World of a recent date. 8om« weeks or so ago a story reporting the scandalous misconduct as to an American minister, a man now over 60 years of age, was hawked around the streets of New York and oflered for sale to any paper that would purchase it. It was brought to the World office and tendered to that paper for a very small sum, the seller imforming the editor that it would prove a profitable investment for the World, as the story was exceeding lively, sensational and nasty. The e#itor indignantly refused the offer on several grounds: that the story appeared to be false; was evidently malicious; irremediably ruined the character of a man and woman who enjoyed the confidence and respect of their friends and family; and because, even were it true, it was a matter unworthy of a place in -the columns of a decent newspaper. These reasons, sufficient, it would appear, for any respectable journal, did not suffice for one of the papers of the largest circulation in the West—the Chicago Times—for this very story, given in full, filled some five of the long columns of that paper. It is an encouraging fact, however, to notice that the sensation did not“take,” and that it has nowhere been repuDlished. The course of the World in this matter is worthy of the highest praise and commendation. For some years back, the World declares, a regular brokerage business has sprung up in New York and other Northern cities for the sale of sensations and scandals. Blackmailers and adventurere derive a rich profit from this business. They pry into family secrets and dig up old and forgotten family skeletons, write the matter up in a sensational style andthen oflfer their manuscripts for sale to the papers, unless the actors who figure in them offer to buy these stories up. It is impossible for an outsider to know the immensity of this business, and how much the decent newspapers of the country have to resist and fight against in opposing this system. They think, therefore, that those who refuse the advances of these sensationalists deserve credit and encourgement therefor. There is no doubt or it

— The Springfield Republican mentions a poor, distracted cud lady in Eastern Massachusetts who lately aun > i ed herself “twin sister of Queen Victoria and Henry Ward Beecher.” There were three hundred repTseentatives, preachers and laymen in the recent M. E. Conference at South Bend.