Many San Francisco weekly papers were bought up with cash payments, coming principally from the offices of the "United Railroads." But this did not seem to satisfy the plans of the defense, and suddenly the Calkins Syndicate developed into a concern of astonishing magnitude. From the publisher of obscure weeklies and dailies, it established a modern publishing plant, and took over much of the printing of the "Sunset Magazine," which contract alone brought the Calkins outfit several thousand dollars a month. The "Sacramento Union" and the "Fresno Herald" were purchased, and a bid made for the "San Francisco Post." The syndicate failed to get the "Post." The "San Francisco Globe" was started instead. Whatever money could do in the newspaper line, Calkins for a few months did. Newspaper men knew, of course, that the losses were enormous. The questions were, "Who is filling the sack? How long will the sack last?"
And wherever in America there has been an honest investigation,
the same conditions have been revealed. The Calkins
syndicate had its exact counterpart in Montana; or rather
two counterparts, for Senator Clark and Marcus Daly,
copper kings, were carrying on a feud, and each purchased or
established a string of newspapers to slander the other. Now
the gigantic "Anaconda" has swallowed them both, and there
are only two newspapers in Montana which are not owned or
controlled by "copper." One of these is owned by a politician
who, I am assured, serves the "interests" without hire; and the
other is the "Butte Daily Bulletin," Socialist, whose editor goes
in hourly peril of his life. In Oklahoma nearly everything is
"Standard Oil"; and at the other end of the continent is the
New York "Outlook," one of whose important stockholders
was discovered to be James Stillman, of the National City
Bank of New York—Standard Oil!
I have given elsewhere a picture of conditions in Los Angeles. In San Diego are two papers owned by the sugar-*king, and one paper of the Scripps group. In San Francisco are two Hearst papers, the "Examiner" and the "Call"; the "Chronicle," owned by "Mike" de Young, whom I have portrayed; and the "Bulletin" whose assorted knaveries will soon be set forth in detail. Also there is a monthly, the "Sunset," formerly owned by the Southern Pacific, and now serving the anti-union campaign of the "M. and M."—the Merchants' and Manufacturers' Association which has raised a million dollar slush fund; also a weekly, popularly known as "the Rich Man's Door-mat," and a number of gossip-weeklies and "kept" political sheets. The "Labor Digest" has recently gone over with startling suddenness to the cause of capital, reversing
