Lest any doubt remain in the minds of U. S. newspapermen just why it is that Col. Charles Augustus Lindbergh disapproves of certain U. S. newspapers.* Editor Marlen Edwin Pew of Editor & Publisher (trade weekly) last week reported a talk which "I chanced to have . . . with the best-known, most-loved young man of this generation.
"I am prompted by the incident," wrote Editor Pew, "to revert again to the subject of press ethics." Editor Pew then quoted Article VI of the canons of the American Society of Newspaper Editors,†
"I dare assert," continued Editor Pew, that his [Lindbergh's] name and picture have been published in the press of the United States more times than that of any other individual in a similar period. I suppose his press linage throughout the universe is unequalled. Yet . . . everyone who has studied his nature has remarked his innate verecundity in personal relations."
Concluded Editor Pew: "If I may be pardoned for making a suggestion, it is that newspapermen who prize . . . the classic heroism and pathfinding of our young pioneer of the air should see in him less of the showman and more of the scientist."
New Hearstling
While Hearst and Patterson-McCormick newspapers snapped and snarled at each other in Chicago last week (see col. 2). a curious alliance was effected in Washington, D. C. Mrs. Eleanor Medill Patterson (sister of Joseph Medill Patterson and cousin of Robert Rutherford McCormick, co-publishers of Chicago Tribune, New York Daily News and Liberty} became editor-in-chief of Hearst's Washington Herald.
Like many another widow of wealth, social prominence and energy, Mrs. Patterson has had the problem of finding a career. Of the third generation of a publishing family, she has long inclined in the family direction, has tried to buy first the Washington Post, then the Herald. She also offered to lease the Herald. In last week's announcement of her new connection, the Herald said: "Hearst papers are not for sale. . . . Mrs. Patterson will work . . . under the regular Hearst newspaper contract."
Whether or not Editrix Patterson takes to her job any great knowledge of daily publishing, she is well-posted on the social lore of the capital, which she has already exoloited in signed articles and a novel (Glass Houses—TIME, March 15, 1926"). For years she has been one of Washington's up-&-doing hostesses. She acquired the title of countess through her marriage with Count Joseph Gizycka, Austrian-Pole, whom she met in St. Petersburg and Vienna and married in 1904. After their divorce in 1908 she appealed to the Tsar, won custody of their daughter Felicia. In 1925 she married Elmer Schlesinger, Manhattan lawyer. After his death she resumed her maiden name.
The Washington newspaper field where her talents will now be expended, is now lined up as follows:
Morning papers—
Post (McLean), 73,935 circulation.
Herald (Hearst), 62,647.
Evening papers—
Star (Noyes), 109.507.
Times (Hearst). 100,365.
News (Scripps-Howard). 57.711.*
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