LEGENDARY COMMENTS BY GEORGE CHEVALLIER 6-3-17

The Newspaper

One the more historic institutions in this country is fast becoming relegated to history. And that is the printed word, the newspaper. Since its inception almost three hundred years ago, Americans have relied on their daily newspaper. One of the more famous quotes about newspapers was uttered by none other than Mark Twain. He said that anyone who doesn’t read the daily paper is uninformed, but anyone who reads it is misinformed. It just goes to show that not much has changed over the years.

Newspapers were a penny years ago and slowly rose to its present lofty price structure. I remember growing up that my grandfather read four papers every night – the Salisbury Times, the Baltimore Sun, the Wilmington Evening Journal and the Philadelphia Inquirer. He went down to Gordy’s Drug Store on Main St. to procure the three out-of-town papers, always leaving his car running while he went in for the papers. After all, it was still maintaining many small town ways. The local paper he had delivered. My grandmother would do terrible damage to the paper while reading it but, instead of chiding her, he simply increased his subscription to two papers – one for him and one for her. When I was first aware of his paper buying habit, they each cost a nickel. When they went to seven cents, I never heard him complain about anything so vociferously. He said that if they ever went to a dime, he was going to stop getting them – and he did.

My grandmother was deaf for the 60 years before she died in 1986. She said it never bothered her because if it was important enough, they would put it in the paper. She began reading the National Enquirer later in life and said that was some exciting news. When she finally stopped getting it, I asked why and she said it was just too exciting and her heart couldn’t stand it.

I grew up with the Salisbury Times and the reporting was far better than it is today. I miss columns such as “Local Happenings” where you could read about local people doing different things. Today there is too much opinion and not enough straight news. When they put the paper to bed in those days, that meant the world had gone to bed also. There were paper boys that got their bundle of around one hundred papers every afternoon. A bundle was delivered to the corner I lived on and it was eagerly anticipated. All the scores of any sports game the previous night was included. You never saw anything like “game ended too late for inclusion in this issue”. In the summer, the Little League scores and the subsequent write-ups about the games were a high priority to any boy my age. The long-time sports writer for the Times was Ed Nichols. We all thought he was something special, until someone made me aware of the fact that his column was almost identical to Bob Maisel’s daily column in the Baltimore Sun.

There was more local news in those days. They even listed every driving ticket and the amount fined. That was my first experience in “making the papers”. Some memories are not so sweet.