of the nation and its interests, the amount of news available for publication increased many fold. Distance, once a formidable obstacle to newsgathering, practically ceased to exist when news could be flashed in a few minutes from one end of the world to the other. The news field was enlarged from the city and its suburbs to include the whole earth. The newspaper became truly a paper of news, a budget of facts rather than a medium for expressing the editor's opinions. As a purveyor of the news, it increased in circulation and prosperity. With an ample supply of facts upon which to base their opinions, the readers no longer needed to accept opinions ready-made from the editor. With greater independence in thinking and in voting on the part of the reading public the editorial leadership of the newspapers declined. At present the three or four columns of editorials are relatively unimportant as compared with the ten or twelve pages of news. To-day the names of the editors are unknown to the majority of the readers. Company ownership has contributed toward minimizing the opportunities of personal editorship, until now it is said that personal journalism, in the old sense of the term, has all but ceased to exist in this country.
Wars Develop Newspapers. In the gathering of news and in the effective presenting of it, the two most important influences have been the Civil War and the Spanish-American War. The great demand from readers of all classes for the latest reports from the front during the War of the Rebellion was a great stimulus to newspaper editors and publishers. The beginning of the present summary "lead," and of the long bulletin form of headline for news stories, is to be found in connection with the telegraph dispatches of war news. The advent of "yellow journalism," especially in New York
