A Reporter's Work — Jan. 1890
"A Reporter's Work." Independent, 16 Jan. 1890, p. 65.
THE Philadelphia papers, a few days ago, contained a notice of the death, at one of the hospitals, of F. Jennings Crute, a reporter on one of the newspapers of that city.
To the great majority of the unthinking public, the word reporter suggests an under-bred, prying fellow, whose delight it is to spy into the private affairs of his neighbors. He is Jenkins, the despicable eaves-dropper, who counts the wedding-garments of the bride, listens to family quarrels, and unearths the miserable history of the suicide, in order to furnish the morning meal of gossip to the public.
They forget that the public are hungry for this meal of personal gossip or it would not be served to them, and that the reporter whose “assignments” call him one hour to interview a tawdry actress and the next to give a list of the leaders of fashion at a ball, is no more responsible for the pettiness of his work than is the compositor who puts it into type. To-morrow he may be assigned to give to the world a clear, true account of a political conference in which vast interests are involved, or to risk his life in a plague-stricken district, in order to bring it relief.
He is not now, as he too often was thirty years ago, an illiterate penny-a-liner, trying to make a scanty living by his untrained wits. The local staff of the great daily newspapers is largely made up now of men who began their preparations for the work of journalism in Harvard, Yale or Johns Hopkins; and who are going through the prentice drudgery of their profession with a zeal and ability which deserve other reward than the sneers of an uncomprehending public.
Of this one man who fell the other day in the first steps of his career, I should like to say a word here. His life seems to me typical of his class and of the times.
Jennings Crute was the descendant of a Southern family, who since colonial times have made themselves felt in the history of the country. It was good fighting stock; the men have always been stout belligerents as politicians, theologians or soldiers. Jennings was a delicate, slight, blue-eyed lad with the low voice and shyness of a woman; but underneath was the tough fiber of his race.
He began work as a reporter on a country paper in Delaware when but a boy, and soon made his mark by the exceptionally vivid sharpness of his descriptions. In a short time he held a leading place on the local staff of one of the principal Philadelphia papers.
The lad, who looked like a sensitive girl, was a remarkable specialist in his way. He had a peculiar faculty for unearthing crime, and for bringing bidden wrongs to light. Set him on the track of a concealed misdoing which exposure would right, and he would follow it with the silent energy of a blood-hound. Through his obstinate pertinacity in a famous murder case which baffled the lawyers a year or two ago an innocent man was saved from the gallows. Two winters ago he penetrated in disguise into the worst “dives” of Philadelphia, publishing each morning an account of the horrors which he saw. After the first exposure he continued this work at the risk of his life; but he persevered until the city authorities were able to close all of these houses and to punish their keepers. Hordes of young girls and lads who had been lured to ruin in these dens owed their rescue to the quiet courage of this boy.
He had inherited consumption, and knew it. He knew, too, that the all-night work, the irregular hours, the exposure in every kind of weather, would hasten the end. But he had no thought of himself. He had but one idea—his work. How to do it best; how best to serve his paper and the world. He had two or three attacks of serious illness, but after each he staggered to his feet again and went to work with breathless haste. A stranger in a great city, and beset by the temptations which come to men at his work, he lived a clean life, now and then stopping to drag up other men out of the slough. He was a reserved man, with but few friends, and to them he probably never spoke a word of affection; but his loyalty touched them as something strange and unworldly. His feeling for them was part of his life as was the blood in his veins.
He was worn out with a hard winter’s work when there came one day last spring the vague report of a disaster at Johnstown.[1]
I wonder if the readers of The Independent ever thought of the work done by reporters at Johnstown? They hurried to it from every city of the country. The whole district around was laid waste—railways, bridges, roads washed away; the valleys were still flooded. They passed through this awful scene of disaster in boat, on horseback, on foot; some of them crossing the rivers in baskets slung on a rope. They suffered from exposure, hunger and the poison from thousands of decaying bodies; but they remained for weeks at their post, like soldiers ordered to lead a forlorn hope. It was wholly owing to their work that this country and the world were roused to the extent of the misfortune, and to the urgent necessity of help. The first credit for the help given is due not to the generous donors safe in their distant homes, but to these obscure young men who quietly sent home their daily reports and stood their ground in the face of disease and death.
They paid the penalty. Of the thirty newspaper men who were in Johnstown, but two, it is stated, escaped without serious illness. Three have since died from the effects of the work done there.
Jennings Crute was the first man from Philadelphia to reach the place. His reports of its condition were masterpieces of description—vivid, simple, terse, without a word of attempted fine writing. The powerful black strokes of his picture were drawn in the presence of death itself, for a waiting people, dumb with horror, to look upon.
The exposure, the severe work and the malignant poison of the air were too much for his strength; but he would not give up. One reporter after another was ordered home on furlough, ill; but Crute remained.
“I knew I had my death-blow,” he said afterward; “but there was so much to do there!”
After his return home he had a brief rest, and rallied, going back to work. He was assigned to report an encampment at Mt. Gertner, and with the hand of death upon him, rose before day to march with the troops instead of following leisurely with the other reporters, because he knew that he could describe more accurately the thing which he had actually seen.
He was brought home to die; but in the weeks which passed before the end, he fought death inch by inch, planning with indomitable energy work for the future. Even when he was actually dying he made his nurses dress him and wheel him into the sunshine “to gain strength so that he could go to the office next week.”
The weak, girlish-looking boy is at rest now, under the clay; but he is at work somewhere, eager, strong, hopeful, with the Chief whom he trusted and served so faithfully here.
The ambition of this man and of his class may seem petty to you—to get the first news for his paper, to tell it to the world in strong, exact words—anonymously, too; for the reporter has no name nor credit.
The favorite heroes of the world are still the gallant crusader or the soldier; yet to my commonplace, modern mind this weak lad, who never spared himself, who was zealous and faithful unto death to the obscure work to which he had pledged himself is the hero we need today.
There was room, too, in that obscure work for great triumphs. He closed the doors into which, as openings to Hell, thousands of children had been lured to the ruin of body and soul; and he gave his life at last in the work of bringing help to Johnstown.
There are thousands of other ambitious lads, poor, friendless and alone in our cities. It seems to me that the story of this dead boy should come to them with no uncertain meaning.
It seems to me, too, that it is time we understood the work of the class to which he belonged, and recognized its wide and often heroic service.
PHILADELPHIA, PENN.
Notes
1. May 31, 1889 flood of Johnstown, Pennsylvania.
Key Words
F. Jennings Crute, Johnstown flood, newspaper reporters
Creator
Abigail Fagan