Newspaper Reporting and Correspondence Part 4

=Injured Firemen:= Capt. Frank Makal, Engine Co. No. 4, cut by gla.s.s. Acting Captain W. E. Brown, fire boat No. 23, cut by gla.s.s. Peter Ryan, No. 15, flying gla.s.s.--_Milwaukee Free Press._

Or:

=The Dead:= Mrs. Charles Smith, 14 W. Gorham street. John Johnson, 1193 Chatham street. =The Injured:= Thomas Green, 1111 Grand street; face cut by flying gla.s.s. James Brown, 176 Orchard avenue; internal injuries; may die.

(c) _Manner of Death._--A number of fatalities at the beginning always attracts attention. Not infrequently the manner or the cause, especially in the case of a single death, is worth the first place in the lead--not as "One man killed----" but as "Crushed beneath a falling wall, a man was killed." If a man burns to death in a very unusual way, or for an unusual reason, we are more interested in the way he was burned, or the reason that he burned, than in the mere fact that he was burned to death. The first line then tells us how or why he was burned. Thus:

To save his money, which he hoped would some day raise him from the rank of a laborer to that of a prosperous merchant, Hing Lee, a Chinese laundryman, ran back into his burning laundry at 3031 Nicollet avenue today, after he was once safe from the flames, and was so badly burned that physicians say he cannot live.--_Minneapolis Journal._

=2. Injuries.=--Very often no one is killed in a fire but some one is injured. For example, five firemen are overcome by ammonia fumes or two men are seriously injured by a falling wall. This then becomes the feature. Injuries to human beings, if serious or in any considerable number, take precedence over other features, just as loss of human life does. Here is an example from the press in which all the injuries are gathered together at the beginning:

Six firemen and two laborers were overcome by smoke, while three other firemen received minor injuries by flying gla.s.s in a fire which broke out yesterday morning at 10:30 o'clock in the Wellauer-Hoffman building, at, etc.--_Milwaukee Free Press._

=3. Rescues.=--(a) _Number of People Rescued._--When people are rescued from great danger in a fire their escape makes a very good feature. If many of them are rescued or escape very narrowly, the mere number of people saved deserves the first place, as:

More than 150 men and women were saved from death today in a fire at 213-217 Grand street by toboganning from the roof of the burning structure on a board chute to the roof of an adjoining five-story building.--_New York Mail._

(b) _Manner of Rescue._--But more often the manner of their escape interests us most. If a man slides down a rope for four stories to escape death by fire we are more interested in how he saved himself than in the fact that he didn't burn, and so we tell how he escaped, in the first line. In the same way, if unusual means are used to save one or more persons, the means of rescue is usually worth featuring. For example:

Overcoats used as life nets saved the lives of a dozen women and children in a fire of incendiary origin in the three-story frame tenement house at 137 Havemeyer avenue, Brooklyn, to-day, etc.--_New York Mail._

=4. Property Threatened.=--Death and injury are the commonest unexpected circ.u.mstances in fire stories, but they are not the only ones that may be worth featuring. There is an inconceivable number of things that may happen at a fire and overshadow all interest in the fire itself. A good feature may be found in the property that is threatened. Often the fire in itself is insignificant, but because of a high wind or other circ.u.mstances it threatens to spread to neighboring buildings or to devastate a large area. In such a case the amount of property threatened or endangered deserves a place in the very first line, especially if it exceeds the amount of property actually destroyed and if it can be put in a striking way; _i. e._, the entire waterfront district, or twenty-five dwelling houses, or $5,000,000 worth of property. When contrasted with the small amount of damage actually done, the amount that is threatened becomes more important. Thus:

Fire that for a time threatened $2,000,000 worth of property destroyed $15,000 worth of lumber owned by the Milwaukee Lumber Company, 725 Clinton street, yesterday.... The territory between Mitch.e.l.l street and the Kinnickinnic river and Reed street, to the lake, containing manufactories, dwellings and stores, was menaced.--_Milwaukee News._

=5. Fire Fighting.=--Not unusually a serious fire results from the fact that it was not checked for some reason or other during its earlier stages. Perhaps the whole thing might have been avoided, or, on the contrary, a big fire may be extinguished with unexpected ease or unusual skill. In rare cases this matter of very efficient or very inefficient fire fighting is of sufficient importance to take the first place in the lead. For example:

Almost total lack of water pressure is blamed for the big loss in a fire started by a firebug to-day in the five-story factory building of Lamchick Brothers, manufacturing company, 400-402 South Second street, Williamsburg.--_New York Mail._ Rotten hose, which burst as fast as it was put in use, imperiled the lives of more than a score of firemen to-day at a blaze which swept the three-story frame flat house at Third avenue and Sixty-seventh street, Brooklyn, from cellar to roof, etc.--_New York Mail._

=6. Crowd.=--Not uncommonly in the city a tremendous crowd gathers to watch a fire and blocks traffic for hours. In the absence of other significant incidents--death, great loss, etc.--the reporter may begin his story with an account of the crowd present or the blockade of traffic. Such a beginning should always be used only as a last resort when a fire has no other interesting phase, for crowds always gather at fires and only a very serious blocking of traffic is worth reporting.

Thus:

Fully 15,000 persons were attracted to the scene of the fire in the portion of the plant of the Greenwald Packing Company, Claremont Stock Yards, which was discovered at 4:56 yesterday afternoon.--_Baltimore American._ Twenty-five thousand people jammed Broadway between Bleecker and Bond streets yesterday noon and had the excitement of watching 250 girls escape from a twelve-story loft building which was afire.--_New York Sun._

=7. Miscellaneous.=--There is an infinite number of things that may happen at a fire and overshadow the mere fire interest. These are the things that make one fire different from another, and whenever they are of sufficient importance they become the feature to be played up in the first line of the introduction. It would be impossible to enumerate all the unexpected things that might happen during a fire. It is this element of unexpected possibilities that makes the reporting of fires interesting, and an alert reporter is ever on the lookout for a new and unusual development in the fire to be used as the feature of his story.

Here are the leads of a few fire stories clipped from the daily newspapers:

With her home on fire and the smoke swirling around her head, Mrs. B. B. Blank, a well-known leader of the social set of Roland Park, bravely stood by her telephone and called upon the Roland Park Fire Company for aid shortly after 8 o'clock this morning.--_Baltimore Star._ Four charming young women attired in masculine apparel were the unexpected and embarra.s.sed hosts of four companies of fire department "laddies" last night, when fire broke out, etc.--_Milwaukee Free Press._ For the first time since its installation the high-pressure water power system was relied upon solely last night to fight a Broadway fire, and Chief Croker said that he was well satisfied with its work. The fire began on the third floor of the six-story, etc.--_New York Times._

C. FIRE STORIES WITH MORE THAN ONE FEATURE

It would appear from the foregoing examples that almost every fire story has a feature. And so it usually has. The great majority of fires that are worth reporting at all have some unusual incident connected with them that overshadows the mere fire itself. Sometimes the features are not of great significance, but it is only as a last resort that a reporter begins his story with "Fire"--only when the most ordinary of fires is to be covered.

Unusual features are so common in connection with fires that very often a single fire has more than one unusual feature. Perhaps the cause of the fire is exceptionally striking and at the same time the amount of property destroyed is of great news value in itself. Or the time and some unexpected attendant circ.u.mstance are both worth the first place.

In that case the reporter has to choose between the two features and begin with the one that seems to him to be the more striking. The other feature or features may often be arranged in the order of importance immediately after the most striking fact at the beginning, provided that this does not make the lead unduly complicated.

For instance, a cold storage warehouse burns and four firemen are overcome by the fumes from the ammonia pipes. Next door is a hospital and the flames frighten the patients almost into a panic. Either one of these incidents is worth the first line of the story. But which one is of the greater importance? Naturally the element of danger to human life must be considered first and the actual disabling of four firemen is of greater significance than a possible panic in the hospital. Following that line of logic our story would begin:

Four firemen were overcome by ammonia fumes and a panic in the St. Charles Hospital was narrowly averted, as a result of a fire which destroyed the cold storage warehouse of, etc.

Such a lead would not be too complicated for practical purposes. But suppose that around the corner from the cold storage warehouse is a livery in which fifty horses are stabled. The flames frighten the horses and they break loose and stampede in the streets. The story now has three features of striking interest. It would be possible to combine them all in the lead and to begin in this way:

Four firemen were overcome by ammonia fumes, a panic was narrowly averted in the St. Charles Hospital, and fifty frightened horses stampeded in the streets as a result of a fire, etc.

But see how far from the beginning the fire, the actual cause of it all, is placed. The fire is buried behind a ma.s.s of details and the reader is confused. The lead is not a happy one. The only thing to do is to break up the ma.s.s of details and put part of them immediately after the lead.

The arrangement is a matter that must be left to the judgment of the reporter.

This, however, is an extreme case because the various features are so disconnected and separate. The reporter would have little trouble if the several features were more alike. For instance, if one of the walls of the building had fallen and killed three firemen the case would have been simpler. The death of these men so far overshadows the other unusual incidents that it drives them out of the lead altogether. For we do not care about horses and frightened patients when men are crushed beneath falling walls. All that we are concerned with in our lead now is the dead and injured--with a feature like this we can trust our readers to go into the story far enough to pick up the other interesting features; we would begin in this way:

Three firemen were killed by falling walls and four others were overcome by ammonia fumes in a fire which destroyed the cold storage, etc.

The combination of dead and injured makes a good beginning, and it is always advisable to begin with such an enumeration whenever it is possible. Where the features are not so significant as death and injuries the matter of arranging more than one striking detail at the beginning of the lead becomes a greater problem. It must be left to one's own judgment and common sense. The lead must not be too long or complicated, and one must hesitate before burying the really important facts of the story behind several lines of more or less unusual details.

Just as soon as the lead becomes at all confusing take out the details and put them into the story later.

VII

FAULTS IN NEWS STORIES

Before we go on to the consideration of other kinds of news stories it will be well to consider in greater detail the facts we have learned from writing up fires. Our fire stories should have taught us a number of things about the form of the news story. Let us sum them up.

=Paragraph Length.=--We have seen that newspaper writing has a characteristic style of its own. In the first place notice the length of a newspaper paragraph. Count the number of words in an average paragraph and compare it with the number of words in a literary paragraph. We find that the newspaper paragraph is much shorter. There is a reason for this. Imagine a 150-word literary paragraph set up in a newspaper. There are about seven words to the line in a newspaper column and one hundred and fifty words would make something over twenty lines. Try to picture a newspaper made up of twenty-line paragraphs; it would be extremely difficult to read. We glance over a newspaper hastily and our haste requires many breaks to help us in gathering the facts. Hence the paragraphs must be short; the very narrowness of the newspaper column causes them to be shortened. The average lead, you will find, contains less than fifty words and the paragraphs following it are not much longer.

=Sentence Length.=--Notice sentence lengths as compared with literary sentences. You will find that newspaper sentences usually fall into two cla.s.ses: the sentences in the lead and the sentences in the body of the story. The first sentence is usually rather long--thirty to sixty words.

But the sentences in the body of the story are much shorter than most literary sentences. Why is this? It results from exactly the same thing that makes the newspaper paragraphs short--the need of many breaks.

Thus, after we finish a lead, we must fall into short sentences. They need not be choppy sentences, but they must be simple and easy to read.

THE LEAD AND THE BODY OF THE STORY

Our study of the fire story has shown that newspaper stories always have two separate and distinct parts: the lead and the body of the story. In writing the story a reporter must consider each part separately, although the reader does not distinguish between the two parts. Before writing a word the reporter must decide exactly what facts and details he is to put in the lead and exactly what fact he is going to play up in the first line, taking care to begin with the most interesting part of the story. After the lead is finished he writes the main body of the story in accordance with the rules of ordinary English composition. Each part must be separate and independent of the other.

=The Lead.=--The lead itself is always paragraphed separately. Usually it consists of a single sentence, although it is much better to break it into two than to make the sentence too long and complicated. As we have said before, the lead must not only tell the most interesting fact or incident in the story, but it must answer the natural questions that the reader immediately asks about this matter; i.e., when, where, what, why, who, and how. These questions must be answered briefly and concisely in their order of importance, and the most unusual answer or the most striking part of the story must precede all the rest. Beyond the answers to these questions there is no s.p.a.ce for details in the lead. Every word must have a purpose and a necessary purpose or it must be cut out and relegated to the body of the story. No s.p.a.ce should be given to explanations of minor importance. State the content of the news story as completely, accurately, and concisely as possible so that the reader may know just what happened, when it happened, where, to whom, and perhaps how and why it happened. Then begin a new paragraph and start the body of the story.

Many editors require that the lead consist of one long sentence and yet it must be grammatical. Many reporters forget all about English grammar in their attempt to crowd everything they know into one sentence. But mere quant.i.ty does not make the lead good; it must be grammatical and easy to read. The verb must have a grammatical subject and, if it is an _active_ verb, it must have a grammatical predicate. Clauses and modifiers must be attached in a way that cannot be overlooked. Dangling participles and absolute constructions should be shunned. All of the modifying clauses must be gathered together either before or after the princ.i.p.al clause. Everything must be compact and logical. Many papers disregard this matter, as will be seen in some of the extracts quoted in this book, but the best papers do not.

Every lead should be so constructed that it may stand alone and be self-sufficient. Never should a reporter trust to headlines to enlighten his readers upon the meaning of the lead--the exact reverse of this must be true. The story is written first and the headlines are written from the facts contained in the lead--and usually by another man. In writing the lead disregard the existence of headlines, for many readers do not read them at all. This is but an amplification of the old rule of composition that any piece of writing should be independent of its t.i.tle. The t.i.tle may be lost, but the essay must be clear without it.

There are many ways of beginning a lead in order to embody the feature in the first line. At first glance the operation of putting the emphasis of a sentence at the beginning, rather than at the end, may seem difficult, but with a clear idea of the rules of dependence in English grammar a reporter may transpose any clause to the beginning and thus play up the content of the clause. For instance, in this lead,