Printing a newspaper here offers a fascinating and a fairly profitable career to the young man just quitting his studies. Electricity and gasoline have greatly increased the pleasures of village life, have literally transformed rural regions by giving quick communication with business and social and intellectual centers. Modern devices have bereft life there of much of its old-time drudgery. The people are wide awake. Their general intelligence is quite equal to the general intelligence of city people.
Likewise, the newspapers are much improved. Modern printing machinery and facilities have removed irksome processes. Editorial associations and the technical newspaper press have inspired to higher ideals. The business has become standardized on a higher plane of excellence. Many of our high schools and almost all of our colleges have courses in journalism. Their educational influences are reflected already in the country newspapers, especially in the West. The state universities of Missouri, Kansas and Minnesota, for instance, have sent hundreds of young men back to their villages to do journalistic work. The leaven of preparation is working wonders.
Moreover, success in village or small town journalism frequently leads to success in big cities. The editors of big city newspapers are overwhelmed with candidates for a place on the staff, but the applicants usually are unknown beginners, and they are rejected. But the village editor of real ability cannot hide his light; his good work attracts attention. The managers of the great journals seek men of superior quality and ask them to join the newspaper staff. Hundreds of the finest editors in this country started or matured on our rural newspapers. Good newspaper work, whether in city or country, attracts attention and is sure of reward.
The village editor’s task is not easy. He writes almost all of the edition and conducts the business end as well. His editorial page may reflect his fancy for little or much comment, but he naturally will have one article in each edition on a subject of national importance and two or three relating to community interests. He will compile from the daily sheets a column or two of the most important news of the world and will clip from the exchanges interesting miscellaneous matter, paragraphs and articles. He will encourage his readers to write letters to the editor for publication, and these he will revise and prepare. He will have a news correspondent in every neighboring hamlet, and this news must be revised and made ready to print. His neighborhood news is of vital importance for his villagers know almost all of the inhabitants for miles around.