The Bench
As I've mentioned, at one side of the
City Room there was an old oak bench and that was the home of the copy
boys. There were six of us at a time. Our boss was Dwight Newton, who later
became a radio columnist for the Examiner and was a wonderful person with
a great sense of humor. We were friends for years.
We sat at the bench until someone
in the room yelled, "boy!" The call might come from a reporter or
a copy editor. You would hop up, and the boys next to you would slide over.
When you finished the task you would take your seat at the end.
I hated being called "boy,"
and decided to do something about it. I agitated among the other copy boys
and then wrote a manifesto about how we all had names and should not be
called boys. We all took turns editing it.
Here is the dramatic conclusion...
(yes, I saved it all these years.)
We earnestly say that we do not like ignominity,
nor will we accept mediocrity. There is more to us than a pair of legs
to run errands with; two hands to fill a paste pot. We were born with a
personality, a character, and a name....
Our future and our happiness hang in the balance
and no obstacle, however great, will deter our safeguarding it.
Fortunately I showed it to Pop in the
telegraph room and he gently told me it was a bad idea. He explained that
we could not expect a reporter or copy editor to look our way and try to
remember the name of the next boy up, when we kept changing places on the
bench. Time was everything, he said, in getting out a paper. That was the
end of the manifesto.
There were two women reporters that
I remember. One was old. I thought at the time she must have been all of
thirty-five, but the other was younger and beautiful. The first time she
had me do something she smiled and thanked me. I had a big crush on her.
When a copy editor called you he would
hand you a finished story and you would run up an iron staircase to the
composing room with the Linotype machines. The men who ran them were artists. A reporter would hunt and peck at his
typewriter, cursing when he made a mistake, but the fingers of the Linotype
operator would lightly dance around the keyboard.
As he did, little brass type would
slide down a ramp in front of the machine, making a whirring noise. When
a line was finished it would be set in molten lead. An arm would then grab
the brass type faces, lift them up and re-sort them... a truly wonderful
machine.
I loved watching the men, who were
always friendly, and a big thrill was when they asked you your name and
then set it in a row of type. You could stamp it on an ink pad and
see your name in Examiner type and imagine it was your byline in a story.
The favorite haunt of the Examiner
crowd was Breen's Cafe at 71 Third Street. When a reporter wanted a mug
of coffee he would send you to Breen's and if someone was looking for a
reporter, you could find him at the bar at Breen's.
After a few months at the Examiner
I figured I knew all there was about writing. I did a piece I called, THE
ELBOW AND IT'S RELATIONSHIP TO MAN. (My grammar was poor. Notice I wrote
IT'S instead of ITS.)
It was supposed to be funny. America
was gearing up for defense in the summer of 1941 and I wrote that the elbow
was all out for defense.
I got up the nerve and took it into
Mr. Wren. My heart was pounding. I asked him if he would mind reading something
and he took it. That was an exciting moment. I thought I would
soon be off of the bench for good.
A few weeks later Mr. Wren called
me and I went to his office and he handed me my piece, then went back to
reading something else. I knew we wouldn't have the chance to discuss my
work.
I left and closed his door and read
what he had written.
Humor somewhat obvious, but keep on trying.
This is too general for newspaper use. Try to tie to some news line, say
sports.
Wren
"Keep on trying." Bill Wren's words stayed
with me for the fifteen years I wrote news for the NBC radio station in
San Francisco.
ONE SUNDAY IN DECEMBER