Newspaper History

Category: Newspapers

This is the parent category for all individual newspapers.

  • Spring Bloom

    From the Albuquerque Morning Journal, April 4, 1915. By Juliet Wilbor Tompkins.

    The spring desire is on me, for the shops are all athrong,
    And the longing to be spending is a fever and a song.
    I will buy a frock of linen, silver green and grassy cool,
    Oh, a linen like a willow, with the mirror for a pool!
    I will buy a lacy jacket and a rosy morning cap;
    Ah, mother don’t be angry—it’s the rising of the sap.

    The spring desire is on me, and I cannot sleep at night,
    For my stockings shall be azure, and my shoes a dancing white.
    There shall roses be and ribbons round the hat that I shall trim,
    Oh, a laughing hat to crown me, with a shadow in the brim!
    I will choose the fairest colors, I will buy the finest weaves;
    Ah, mother please forgive me—I am putting out my leaves.

    Let me out into the morning—oh, my heart is on ahead
    To the heaped and growing counters of the city garden bed.
    I must fold away the winter, I must make me fine and sweet
    From the throat that’s full of singing to the glory of my feet!
    I will buy a silver tissue, I will buy a golden plume;
    Ah, mother you remember—I am bursting into bloom!

  • The Illusion of War

    From the Omaha Daily Bee, April 3, 1915. By Richard Le Gallienne.

    War
    I abhor.
    And yet, how sweet
    The sound along the marching street
    Of drum and fife, and I forget
    Wet eyes of widows, and forget
    Broken old mothers, and the whole
    Dark butchery without a soul.

    Without a soul, save this bright drink
    Of heady music, sweet as hell;
    And even my peace-abiding feet
    Go marching with the marching street,
    For yonder, yonder comes the fife,
    And what care I for human life?

    And tears fill my astonished eyes,
    And my full heart is like to break;
    And yet, ’tis all embannered lies,
    A dream those little drummers make.
    Oh, it is wickedness to clothe
    Yon hideous grinning thing that stalks,
    Hidden in music like a queen,
    That in a garden of glory walks
    Till good men love the thing they loathe.
    Art, thou hast many infamies,
    But not an infamy like this.
    Oh, stop the fife and still the drum,
    And show the monster as she is.

  • All the Time

    From the Evening Journal, April 2, 1915. By James Buckham.

    There’s a prosy kind of motto that you’ll find is very rife
    With the people you most envy for their rare success in life.
    I’ll admit it’s not romantic, has no touch of the sublime,
    But it’s just the rule to work by—namely, At it all the time.

    You’ll observe that men and women, who, ’tis said, have made their mark
    Do not drop the chalk of effort at the first approach of dark;
    And you’ll find them at life’s blackboard when the sun begins to climb
    For, obedient to their motto, they keep at it all the time.

    The thing God sets them doing gets to be their chief delight;
    ’Tis their first thought in the morning, and their last concern at night.
    They will turn away from pleasure just as promptly as from crime;
    Simple duty is their safeguard, for they’re at it all the time.

  • The Merry Robin

    From the Evening Star, April 1, 1915. By Philander Johnson.

    A robin sat upon a limb,
        A-singin’ very jolly.
    “Oh bird,” sez I, I sez to him,
        “You should be melancholy!

    “You haven’t any children small,
        No friends nor no relations;
    You’ve got no certainty at all
        Of lodgin’ or of rations.

    “You haven’t got no place to went,
        You loafer in a tree, you!
    Or if you have, I bet a cent
        No one is glad to see you.”

    The robin stopped his song an’ said,
        “Excuse me while I snicker.
    It is the narrow life you’ve led
        That makes you such a kicker.

    “This limb I sit on ain’t so fine
        And scant is my apparel;
    A simple sort o’ feed is mine,
        And yet I love to carol.

    “While thinkin’ on my state of ease
        My soul in song relaxes.
    I go an’ come jest when I please
        An’ never pay no taxes.”

  • The Heart of a Woman

    From the Rock Island Argus, March 31, 1915.

    Laughter and sunshine and story,
        Beauty and sweetness and trust;
    Courage and grandeur and glory,
        Shadow and darkness and dust—
    All things of light and of loving
        The heart of a woman contains,
    Grand virtues, great sweetness and sorrows,
        Peace, happiness, passion and pains.

    One moment it blooms like a garden
        With every sweet blossom life knows,
    A vale of the peace of the ages,
        A pathway through violet and rose—
    And then o’er the darkness and doubting
        The wings of a storm sweep the skies,
    And the garden is tossed in the tempest,
        And the vale in a dark ruin lies.

    One moment so pitiful, tender,
        And then all the rage and the hate
    Fill its beating with infinite shadows
        As it raves against infinite fate.
    One moment so true and so loving,
        So clinging and gentle and sweet,
    All the song of life sweeping its gamut,
        Every blossom of life in its beat.

    And yet, with all changing and travail,
        All sorrow and aching and cross,
    All sunshine today, then tomorrow
        Cast down in the grief of some loss;
    And yet with its battle and thunder,
        Its April of showers and shine,
    God give me the heart of a woman
        And take all the rest that is mine!

  • Bum

    From the Newark Evening Star, March 30, 1915. By W. D. Wegeforth.

    He’s a little dog, with a stubby tail, and a moth-eaten coat of tan,
    And his legs are short, of the wabbly sort; I doubt if they ever ran;
    And he howls at night, while in broad daylight he sleeps like a bloomin’ log,
    And he likes the feed of the gutter breed; he’s a most irregular dog.

    I call him Bum, and in total sum he’s all that his name implies,
    For he’s just a tramp with a highway stamp that culture cannot disguise;
    And his friends, I’ve found, in the streets abound, be they urchins or dogs or men;
    Yet he sticks to me with a fiendish glee, it is truly beyond my ken.

    I talk to him when I’m lonesome like and I’m sure that he understands
    When he looks at me so attentively and gently licks my hands;
    Then he rubs his nose on my tailored clothes, but I never say aught thereat,
    For the good Lord knows I can buy more clothes, but never a friend like that!

    So my good old pal, my irregular dog, my flea-bitten, stub-tailed friend,
    Has become a part of my very heart, to be cherished till life-time’s end;
    And on Judgement Day, if I take the way that leads where the righteous meet,
    If my dog is barred by the heavenly guard—we’ll both of us brave the heat.

  • Unappreciated Advantages

    From the Evening Star, March 29, 1915. By Philander Johnson.

    Now that we’ve got electric lights
        An’ trolley cars an’ such;
    An’ movies an’ a lot o’ sights
        That interest us much;
    Now that we’ve built the buildin’s tall,
        An’ streets in fine condition;
    We sit an’ dream an’ after all
        Jes’ want to go a-fishin’.

    Though mightily we are improved
        By many a new invention;
    By old-time impulses we’re moved
        To shun the world’s dissension.
    Amid the rattle and the glare
        We find ourselves a-wishin’
    To seek a lonesome spot somewhere
        An’ simply go a-fishin’.

  • The Cursing of Pertab Singh

    From The Sun, March 28, 1915. By F. W. Poole.

    The ryot crouched in his hut and moaned with his face to the plastered wall.
    He rent his rage and tore his hair and wept for his ruler’s fall.
    The children hushed their simple songs and whimpered and wailed with dread.
    Sir Pertab Singh, their prince, their king, had dared to touch the dead.

    The white sahibs had warned him though the slain was of their kin.
    They knew the awful laws of caste—to touch the dead is sin.
    “’Tis the son of a friend and comrade. His father is not here.”
    Sir Pertab gently bore the corpse and laid it on the bier.

    Five hundred priests of Brahma’s shrine awaited at the morn
    To make an ancient honored name a byword and a scorn.
    Calmly cool, Sir Pertab heard his fate all men might know—
    To be with outcast sweepers as the lowest of the low.

    “What care I for your paltry ban?” and as they paused he smiled.
    “If naught can soil me save your clan, then I am undefiled.
    Mine is a higher, nobler caste, of which you do not know,
    A caste as great as thine is mean—as high as thine is low.

    “A caste that was old and honored ere your upstart creed began—
    The caste of a loyal soldier. The creed of an honest man
    Who serves men less with a weakling word, and more with a well wrought deed—
    Who lives for the good of his kin and kind, and dies for his country’s need.

    “The caste of a man—his word a law which he obeys the first—
    Of one who well to serve the best will ever dare the worst—
    Who stands unawed by a host in arms, nor quails at a parting breath—
    Walks straight and true with a friend unto—and beyond—the gates of death.”

    The high priests gasped in wonderment, the vast throng gazed in awe
    That the will of a man was strong to stand in the face of an iron law.
    The pillars of caste that a realm had reared to shadow a man and king
    Wavered and crumbled and disappeared—and left Sir Pertab Singh.

  • Dealt

    From The Birmingham Age Herald, March 27, 1915. By Charles Miller.

    Life is a game of whist; from unseen sources
        The cards are shuffled and the hands are dealt.
    Blind our efforts to control the forces
        That, though unseen, are no less strongly felt.

    I do not like the way the cards are shuffled,
        But still I like the game and want to play.
    Thus through the long, long night will I, unruffled,
        Play what I get until the break of day.

  • Only a Dad

    From the Rock Island Argus, March 26, 1915.

    Only a dad with a tired face
    Coming home from the daily race,
    Bringing little of gold or fame
    To show how well he has played the game,
    But glad in his heart that his own rejoice
    To see him come and to hear his voice.

    Only a dad, of a brood of four,
    One of ten million men or more,
    Plodding along in the daily strife,
    Bearing the whips and scorns of life
    With never a whimper of pain or hate
    For the sake of those who at home await.

    Only a dad, neither rich nor proud,
    Merely one of the surging crowd,
    Toiling, striving from day to day,
    Facing whatever may come his way;
    Silent, whenever the harsh condemn,
    And bearing it all for the love of them.

    Only a dad, but he gives his all
    To smooth the way for children small,
    Doing, with courage stern and grim,
    The deeds that his father did for him;
    This is the line that for him I pen.
    Only a dad, but the best of men.