MONDAY NIGHT IN FLEET STREET
By R. J. CRUIKSHANK
THE death of the King presented Fleet Street with a series of difficult problems. The official bulletin did not appear on the tape machines until 12.12 a.m. Tuesday. Yet within a few minutes there were streaming from the presses newspapers which not only announced the King's death on their front pages but contained eight, nine or ten pages of letterpress and pictures connected with the event. Not all the London newspapers " caught the first editions," but two, at least, achieved the miracle. It was a combined triumph of human ingenuity and mechanical skill.
When King Edward died the newspapers had no rivals in the dissemination of the-news. .But on the night of George the Fifth's passing Fleet Street was acutely con- scious that the nation would first learn the news from the B.B.C. This meant that the first sharp impact of the shock would have passed long before the papers had issued from the machines. For the first time many of us felt that our actions were conditioned by a new medium out side our own. The public, whose hopes and fears had hung suspended for hours and were finally resolved that evening by the broadcast announcer, would expect from their morning newspapers something more than a repeti- tion of what they knew already.
That is why Fleet Street strained its resources to pro- duce newspapers that would contain the fullest possible accounts of the dead King's life, the scenes outside the Palace, in the London streets and at Sandringham itself, and of the impression made by the announcement through- out, the Empire and in foreign lands.
Competition induces miracles, and the production on Tuesday morning of newspapers embodying ten pages of letterpress and pictures about the dead King and his suc- cessor was one of them. The feat of legerdemain appar- ently impressed the public, because newspaper sales next day were. enormous, and this was particularly true of those papers which announced special supplements. I think this result suggests that broadcasting may be an ally as well as a rival to the popular Press.
The experience on Monday night. of one Fleet Street office may be taken as typical of all. When the first intimation of the King's illness reached us on Friday after- noon we began to prepare for the worst. Four pages of special articles and pictures composing a panorama of the reign were produced in advance. Then we set to work on an alternative front page announcing his Majesty's death and describing the procedure consequent upon the acces- sion of the new Sovereign. A substitute editorial page consisting of a leading article on the King and a personal appreciation of him was also assembled. These pro- visional pages were cast and held in waiting for transfer- ence to the machines immediately the signal of release was given. I should add, however, that the front page was revised from time to time by the inclusion of the latest bulletins from Sandringham, so that the full story of the King's illness would appear.
Meanwhile we went on with the task of preparing the normal paper, fully aware that when the tape machine whirred again all our efforts might be millified. This would be part of that waste of human talent and costly mechanism which is inseparable from the production of a newspaper. No reader can ever guess how much patient labour of how many hands may be sacrificed on such an occasion as this.
From the time of the first announcement, most of us had a depressing intuition that the King would not re- cover. As Monday lengthened,, the statements from Sandringham, coupled with private intelligence, strength- ened these fears. When, at twenty-five minutes past nine, came the bulletin, " The King's life is moving peace- fully to its close," we were certain that this night would see the end. (Incidentally, that message touched us by the startling beauty and dignity of its phrasing, and we attributed it to the good taste of Lord Dawson.) The effect of this grave 'bulletin was almost uncanny. At a time of night when a newspaper office is usually at its busiest ours was curiously hushed. Our men turned listlessly proofs and pages that we now felt sure would never appear : articles on the Coal dispute, on the co- ordination of National Defence, on Oil Sanctions. The meeting of the League Council, which he had thought so important, would be relegated to a back page. The troubles of M. Laval no longer seemed significant. . We took steps to excise the Wireless programmes, for we had learned that the B.B.C. was proposing to suspend its activities for twenty-four hours. The Stock Exchange and commodity markets, sports, the theatres—all theSe normal parts of the nation's life and the day's news would be modified when the final word came from Sandringham. The tardy moments crawled past. A crowd clustered around the tape machines., Men stared at the clock or marched nervously across the sub-editorial room. Old hands recalled waiting for the death of King Edward. It had come, they said, at 11.45 p.m. Telephones rang in- cessantly. These were inquiries from the outside world. New arrivals crowded around the Night Editor's desk. Almost every department of the newspaper office was represented. All were waiting the signal.
On an ordinary night our first edition—the papers that chiefly serve the West of England—goes to press at 10.35.
Tonight the circulation manager had arranged with Pad- dington to hold back the newspaper trains. We could make the change if the news came before twelve. The hands of the clock drew perilously near that hour. Then; at last, a man standing near the tape machine cried, " Flash." Doors swung open. Messengers stood poised for running. " We understand the King is dead." But we dared not take that as authentic. The presses had begun to turn. We were printing an edition announcing that the King was dying.
A few minutes later the tape assured us that the statement of death was correct though not yet officially confirmed. But still we held our hands. Then at last the instrument tapped out the official announcement, " Death came peacefully to the King at 11.55 p.m." At once the machine we had laboriously constructed began to function. The presses were stopped. A van loaded with papers was halted at the top of the street and brought back. The alternative front page was slipped into place, the new editorial page substituted for the old, and the four additional pages describing the late King's life inserted. All this was done with incredible speed and without a single slip. The co- ordination between the sub-editorial room, the composing room, the machine room and the distribution department was military in its precision. One felt a boyish pride and at the same time an adult regret that journalism, once the most casual of all man's occupations, could be so perfectly regimented. The vans sped away. The Western trains were waiting for us. And every paper that went out from our building recorded the King's death.
Immediately after the presses started thundering the staff -of sub-editors began recasting the paper for the next edition. There was a strange pause after the brief announcement that George the Fifth had passed into history. Then news came in a spate. From the four corners of the world flowed expressions • of regret. Telephone calls came from Paris, Berlin, Geneva, Wash- ington. The calling of Parliament, the new King's message to the Lord Mayor, the effect in the provinces, the curtailing of London's multifarious activities—all these descended rapidly upon us. Far into the morning hours we worked, preparing edition after edition. In every other office in the Street our actions must have been repeated as in a series of mirrors.
It seems oddly old-fashioned nowadays to talk of the romance of journalism. Our satisfaction was that of a day accomplished in the face of apparently insuperable difficulties. It was a task that could be lightened by no other satisfaction, because Fleet Street was deeply sincere in its regrets at the death of a monarch whom it respected and admired. It remembered the many occasions when it had seen him performing the functions of his great office with dignity, with graciousness, with kindliness. Despite the printed words, it seemed im- possible that so familiar and so well-loved a figure had passed forever from the scene.
Previous page
