The Sun Hears an Echo

Like the loyal Westchester and Long Island commuters who would not think of boarding their homebound trains without it, the old (112 years) New York Sun dresses conservatively, does its huffing & puffing in genteel tones, and ordinarily abhors the idea of making a scene. It seldom surprises its small (circ. 294,000) clientele, many of whom consider the independent Democratic New York Times unforgivably radical (the Times supported Roosevelt in 1932, 1936 and 1944).

But a week ago, the Sun surprised even itself. Finally losing all patience with Harry Truman, it burst out all over Page One with a scalding editorial headed PRESIDENT TRUMAN GRINS WHILE LEWIS STRIKES. Excerpts: "Today the country is all but paralyzed . . . the nation beholds its President halting, hesitating, shuffling, postponing. . . . There is a good, old-fashioned word for all this. It is Cowardice. Useless Cowardice, silly Cowardice, unfruitful Cowardice!"

The Sun's outburst brought a storm of letters, "96%--or perhaps a trifle more than that" applauding it to the echo. Impressed by the greatest reader response in a decade, Executive Editor Keats Speed plastered 90 of them across 13 columns of type. The Sun knew its readers didn't like the Administration, but seemed surprised that they felt so strongly about it.

The Sun is a paper where tradition counts--but its tradition has not always been archconservative, nor have frontpage manifestos always been rare in it. In the great Charles A. Dana's day it frequently supported Democrats, and in Groceryman Frank Munsey's time (1916-25), violent eruptions which staffers called "Munsey proclamations" appeared with regularity on the face of the Sun. Great ghosts still haunt its dim corridors. Courtly Keats Speed, a great-nephew of Poet John Keats, still puts out his cigaret when he enters the newsroom, in habitual deference to a rule of the Munsey era, long since repealed. He and City Editor Edmond Bartnett, after 25 years, still address each other as "Mr." Sun employes, who own part of the paper's stock, have their own little union instead of a Newspaper Guild unit.

The paper has had its share of famous reporters (Frank O'Malley, Will Irwin, Alexander Woollcott, Edwin C. Hill, etc.), and still has a stable of byliners, including Critic Ward Morehouse, Cartoonist Rube Goldberg, Paragrapher H. I. Phillips. By long custom, Sun editorial writers are anonymous and stay that way: Francis Pharcellus Church, who wrote the famous "Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus" editorial on short notice in 1897, had to wait until his obituary (1906) to get credit for it.

The Sun had outlived its days of greatness (it is now seventh in circulation among Manhattan's nine dailies) before many of its present readers were old enough to vote the straight Republican ticket. Today's Sun editorials, like last week's on Truman, are plotted by Speed, General Manager Edwin S. Friendly and James Craig, chief editorial writer. Young (35) President-Publisher Thomas Dewart, who inherited the paper, sits in at times. There is little argument at their conferences. "We all think alike, so it's easy," says Keats Speed.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.