Newspaper History

Category: Newspapers

This is the parent category for all individual newspapers.

  • The Soldier’s Easter Song

    From The Topeka State Journal, June 4, 1915. By Minna Irving.

    Back from gory battle came a soldier Easter Day,
    The streets were full of people in their Easter garments gay;
    Silver bells were ringing in the steeples overhead,
    The soldier he was wounded, and this is what he said:
    “It’s a long way to glory, it’s a long way to go
    From the dim and quiet churches where the Easter lilies blow.
    Good-by to home and comfort, farewell to sweethearts dear,
    It’s a long, long way to glory, and my heart’s right here.”

    When the soldier joined the colors he was full of thoughts of Fame,
    But he found among the trenches that they never spoke her name.
    Coming home upon a furlough with his right arm in a sling,
    He was strong for peace eternal when the chimes began to ring:
    “It’s a long way to glory, it’s a long way to go,
    The route is marked in crimson with the blood of friend and foe.
    There’s a girl I want to marry, we have waited ‘most a year,
    It’s a long, long way to glory when my heart is here.

    “I would rather have a cottage, and a garden and a cow,
    Than a V. C. on my bosom, and a laurel on my brow.
    War has led me through his shambles till my soul is worn to rags;
    Give us peace the wide world over, fold away the battle-flags;
    It’s a long way to glory, it’s a long way to go,
    It’s a long way to glory and the hardest road I know.
    From the snowy Easter lilies may the dove of peace appear,
    It’s a long, long way to glory, for my heart’s right here.”

  • Once Again

    From The Topeka State Journal, June 3, 1915. By Roy K. Moulton.

    Quite soon the world must hesitate
    And listen to the graduate
        And soak in good advice
    That’s given by the wise young men
    And women o’er and o’er again
        Without the slightest price.

    They’ve got a lot of it to give.
    They’ll tell the whole world how to live
        And how to win the strife.
    They’ll tell the old folk as of yore,
    In fancy and high-sounding lore
        How to succeed in life.

    It’s safe to say they will solve all
    Of Wilson’s problems, great and small,
        And questions of the day.
    The world, of course, will be polite
    And listen on commencement night
        And then go on its way.

  • The Good Old Rebel

    From the Richmond Times Dispatch, June 2, 1915. By Innes Randolph.

    [The following verses, which were set to music, and formed one of the favorite songs of the generation now nearly gone, were written almost immediately after the close of the Civil War, when the South was in the throes of reconstruction, and when an oath of allegiance and consequent pardon were prerequisite to the rights of citizenship.]

    Oh, I’m a good old Rebel,
        Now that’s just what I am;
    For this “fair Land of Freedom”
        I don’t care a dam.
    I’m glad I fit against it—
        I only wish we’d won,
    And I don’t want no pardon
        For anything I’ve done.

    I hates the Constitution,
        This great Republic, too;
    I hates the Freedmen’s Buro,
        In uniforms of blue.
    I hates the nasty eagle,
        With all his brag and fuss;
    The lyin’ thievin’ Yankees,
        I hates ‘em wuss and wuss.

    I hates the Yankee Nation
        And everything they do;
    I hates the Declaration
        Of Independence, too.
    I hates the glorious Union,
        ’Tis dripping with our blood;
    I hates the striped banner—
        I fit it all I could.

    I followed old Mars’ Robert
        For four year, near about,
    Got wounded in three places,
        And starved at Pint Lookout.
    I cotched the roomatism
        A-campin’ in the snow,
    But I killed a chance of Yankees—
        I’d like to kill some mo’.

    Three hundred thousand Yankees
        Is stiff in Southern dust;
    We got three hundred thousand
        Before they conquered us.
    They died of Southern fever
        And Southern steel and shot;
    I wish it was three millions
        Instead of what we got.

    I can’t take up my musket
        And fight ‘em now no more,
    But I ain’t agoin’ to love ‘em,
        Now that is sartin sure.
    And I don’t want no pardon
        For what I was and am;
    I won’t be reconstructed
        And I don’t care a dam.

  • Yanktum Doodlebug

    From The Fool-Killer, June 1, 1915. By John McDonough.

    Yankee Doodle prayed for peace
        Upon one Sunday morning;
    Then sold some shot and shells to kill
        Young men and babies borning.

    So it is with Yankee Doo—
        Yankee Doodle Dandy—
    War is hell, but then, oh well!
        Blood money comes in handy.

  • Song of the Submarine

    From the Omaha Daily Bee, May 31, 1915.

    I nose along with decks awash—
        All hid by flying spray;
    And carefully I search the sea
        For ships on which to prey.
    For none may know just when I come,
        And none know when I go;
    As quick as breath, as sure as death,
        I send them all below.
    Into her side my missile goes
        To wound her sore, and then
    Like frightened sheep, into the deep,
        Drop cursing, praying men.

    Sing ho! for ships I’ve met and sunk;
        Sing ho! my hearties, ho!
    A great machine quick turned to junk,
        Gone to a grave below
    Where silent things weave in and out
        And ragged sea weeds grow.

    I nose along beneath the fog
        That curtains all the sea;
    A slimy eel, all made of steel,
        A thing of mystery.
    For none may see and none may hear,
        Nor learn my deadly hate
    Until they know the crashing blow
        That shivers every plate.
    As through her side my missile goes
        To wound her sore and deep,
    And from her deck, a twisted wreck,
        Her white-faced seamen leap.

    Sing ho! for ships I’ve yet to meet;
        Sing ho! my hearties, ho!
    Pick and pride of some mighty fleet,
        Gone at a single blow,
    Down where the slimy sea-snakes creep,
        Their evil eyes aglow.

  • Civilization

    From the Evening Star, May 30, 1915. By Philander Johnson.

    Civilization! Mighty word,
    Which with all reverence is heard!
    You teach the world to read and write
    And into day transform the night.
    And yet ’tis ever in your name
    That armies march to fearful fame.
    As we your blessings great compute,
    We ask one favor more: Don’t shoot!

    As pictures fair entrance our eyes,
    And splendid buildings swiftly rise,
    Some of your skill you set apart
    For guns to shatter works of art.
    As Science seeks our lives to save
    She digs anew the soldier’s grave.
    As you are wise and resolute,
    We pray, be generous, Don’t shoot!

  • The Soul Purger

    From the Evening Public Ledger, May 29, 1915. By Grantland Rice.

    Two out—and the bases full—
        Three runs to win and two to tie;
    And then, amid the boding lull,
        Looms Crawford of the batting eye;
    I watch the pitcher writhe and whirl
        And shoot one from his mounded pen—
    I see the white pill dart and curl
        As Crawford’s bludgeon swings—and then—

    In that one moment through the stands
        There runs—before the groans and cheers—
    The taut grip of ten thousand hands—
        The pulse leap of a thousand years;
    The one great throbbing human call
        Above all science, war or love,
    As crashing bat meets speeding ball
        Or speeding ball meets waiting glove.

    Here end the sorrows of the race—
        All want and wretchedness and crime;
    Where Care must seek another place—
        Where Sin must bide another time;
    Here where the heart’s wiped clean and dry—
        The drudge soul lifted from the pit
    For those who wait for the reply—
        A strike-out—or a two-base hit?

  • Showing That One Should Be a Pro-Anti

    From the New York Tribune, May 28, 1915.

    Like countless other neutral guys,
    I’m pretty strong for the Allies.
    My brother joins the other faction
    And justifies each German action.

    We argued. Soon, with sneer and shout,
    We wildly waved our arms about,
    And heated phrases catapulted,
    Till each the other had insulted.

    Our quarrel didn’t end the strife,
    Nor saved a single soldier’s life;
    Our acid, violent verbosity
    Annulled no single small atrocity.

    The sufferings of the maimed and torn,
    For all our talk, must still be borne;
    Our most excited declarations
    Deterred no whit the warring nations.

    For all we raged—nay, almost fought—
    This change is all our wrangle wrought:
    The love each cherished for his brother
    Is gone, and now we hate each other.

  • My Son

    From the Rock Island Argus, May 27, 1915. By Douglas Malloch.

    I that had yearned for youth, my own, again,
        And mourned the wasteful hours of younger days,
    I that had sighed for spring, for summer, when
        The snows of winter covered all my ways—
    I that had prayed for years, for only one,
        Have found that prayer answered in my son.

    He is myself again, with hopes of old,
        With old temptations and with old desires;
    He is myself again—the clay to mold
        Into a man, and all the man aspires,
    Who says that youth returns to us no more?
        He is as I was in the days of yore.

    In my own days, in my own days of youth,
        Ah, how I wished a comrade and a friend!—
    To help me keep the quiet path of truth
        And through temptation my own feet attend.
    So shall I journey onward by his side,
        His father—yea, his comrade and his guide.

    I that have failed shall shape success in him.
        I that have wandered point the proper path,
    A signal when the signal lights are dim,
        A roof to fend him from the storms of wrath—
    So we shall journey upward, I and he,
        And he shall be the man I meant to be.

  • Charlie Chaplin

    From the New York Tribune, May 26, 1915.

    This Chaplin was wondrously comic, they told me,
    For weeks they continued to pester and scold me
    For sneering; I said that his antics were cheap,
    That his slap-stick endeavors would put me to sleep.
    “But he is so genial,” they said, “and so sunny,
    There never was any one equally funny.
    He walks in the quaintest, most curious fashion,
    So you’ll smile with delight or grin with compassion,
    And surely there’s nothing so fatal to gloom
    As a reel in which Charlie is made to consume
    Some peas with a knife; and his quizzical face,
    And the way that he stumbles all over the place
    Is simply immense; you will joyously roar
    Till the usher relentlessly points to the door.
    Why scorn Charlie Chaplin because he displays
    A species of art which wins popular praise?”

    So I went the next evening to see who was he
    Who seemed to provide such Dickensian glee,
    Whose stupid expressions roused millions of smiles
    And lured hard-earned quarters in fabulous piles;
    I sat and I waited with tremulous pulsing,
    Convinced that I soon would be wildly convulsing
    With uncontrolled giggles; and then on the screen
    Appeared, stumbled, ambled—you know what I mean—
    Our friend Charlie Chaplin; alas and alack,
    With a woebegone gaze and his hand on his back;
    He ran and he fell; and the maniac laughter
    Resounded and rose to the farthermost rafter.

    He banged all his colleagues, and kicked them around,
    And stepped on their throats as they lay on the ground;
    He ran with his hat on the side of his head;
    And the populace roared till their faces were red.
    Thus then, he continued; and when he had ended,
    The girl that was with me said, “Isn’t he splendid!”
    “O yes,” I replied, with a sorrowful sigh,
    “The masses adore him, and now I know why:
    With his silly confusion and countenance glum
    Their ideal American Hero has come!”