"YELLOW" JOURNALISM.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 87, 6 January 1908, Page 4

"YELLOW" JOURNALISM.

Dr. W. W. Keen, in a letter to "Tho • ■Times," tolls tho following amusing story ; of'how lie was "interviewed" in tho "Now ; York Evening Journal," owned by W. R. ; Hearst. The-lotter followed upon a fierce ■ attack by Mr. Hearst on tho New York correspondent of "The Times," whom he de- ' scribed ■as a lineal descendant of Ananias. • "Mr. Hearst," says Dr. Keen, "ought to bo a judge of at least the 'lineal descendants of 1 Ananias,' since he cherishes certainly one in the editorial office of, tho 'Evening Journal,' as tho following personal incident will , show:—'Over a year ago I read a paper on 1 tho treatment of, chloroform poisoning by \ massago of tho heart before a surgical so- i eiety in Philadelphia. I related a fatal case of my own, and collected from European literature over a scoro of cases in which the oporatiou had been tried. The next < morning, answering a call on my telephone, j I was informed that it was the 'editorial f offico' of tho 'New York Evening .Journal'; S that thoy understood I had made a great > discovory, and could bring tho dead Dack ! to life. I replied 1 that I had mado no discovery, but only .used a method already 1 used over a score of times, that my efforts ! to restore my patient to life had been un- - successful, and that I wished, nothing said t about the matter. An hour later I was again called up. by tho 'editorial office' to ask . whether my patient had recovered or died. , 1 replied that he had died two years before n and was still, dead. What was my astonish- •] ■ rnont two days later to receive from a friend ( in Now York a copy of the 'Evening Journal' ' of tho same day on which our two conversa- ( tions occurred, and which must- have been 1 printed within two or, three hours aftor these conversations ended, containing an articlo • with groat scare headlines about a 'Wonder- ' fill Discovory—Tho Dead Brought to Lifo,' ] etc., and, what would have made Ananias j ,tako off his hat to the writer, an 'interview' j with the pationt, who, to thoir positive knowledge, had been dead for over two years. How reliable any statement in tho 'Evening Journal' may be, oven in its editorials, can 1)0 gauged by this little incident. And this Hearst is the man who reproaches English * newspapers with hoing 'utterly untrust- ? worthy,' and actually has the offroiitory to ! aspire to the Presidency of the United , States." ' J