[Editor’s note: This was the first chapter of Richard Eby’s book about Harry Bishop. It was mostly used to set the scene of a newspaper office in San Diego in the 1940s, and contains very little about Bishop.]
It’s a little past two in the morning. The reporter alone in the newsroom, slumped in a chair, feet on a desk, is scanning a news magazine. He’s “in charge” of the paper at night, which means he’s on telephone watch, an assignment he views with scorn: eight lonely hours in limbo for a minimal night differential – and the “honor” of being “in charge.”
He is over the shock by now, his second day on the job, is no longer in a state of depression, and has coolly determined what prompted the move:
To the pragmatic lightweights in charge he’s the logical guy to exploit: a tiger when chasing a story, but a gentleman in the newsroom, so instead of an ace reporter they see a gullible dupe – someone to stick on the telephone watch when the regular dupe is on leave.
And they talk about about esprit de corps –
At least it’s only vacation relief and the guy will soon be back – unless, as his friends have pointed out, “he’s fled the country, heh heh.”.
Not funny, he cautions himself; it could easily happen, the rat…
Finding the slick pretentious, boring and vastly outdated (though dated that day, May 15, 1941) he hurls it at a waste paper basket (and misses), swings his feet to the floor and stands and stretches his legs. Then as if to prove he’s still in shape bends over and touches his toes while hardly unlocking his knees. Smugly satisfied, he lights a cigarette, takes a draw and holds it, releases a cloud of smoke, drops in his chair again and returns his feet to the desk.
Smoking his cigarette, he grimaces in disgust. “Telephone watch, for crying out loud – no job for a proven reporter. A clerk can pick up a phone. What are they thinking of?”
Beats the hell out of him.
Still, all he can do as a consummate pro is attend to his trifling chores if not with a surplus of zeal at least with a measure of care. Serve his time as best he can and never get suckered again. Edit and log the overnight stories. Prepare reports for superior minds in the morning.
Call the police on the hour. And jump when the telephone rings. For nothing would please him more than to pounce on a major disaster, homicide, scandal or shootout and brighten tomorrow’s editions.
And show up his idiot bosses.
Fat chance, he tells himself, for though a city of 200,000 (and growing as aircraft production increases and military bases expand) San Diego is peaceful at night and nothing will happen to warrant a story during his eight hour shift. Police and the Shore Patrol, at the urging of Navy Brass, hold the wild and unruly in check and the revelry down to a roar. The inevitable serviceman brawls are usually of short duration, settled by contestants themselves. If one gets out of hand the main eventers are collared and hustled back to their bases and the fans are invited to scatter or feel the whack of a night stick.
A policy befitting a city revered as a liberty town.
Even the drunks and major offenders taken to city jail have little of which to complain. The slammer, if they happen to notice, is housed in an elegant compound barely two years old. Constructed in 1939 it was considered picturesque: tower rising above smaller adjoining buildings surrounding a palm tree spotted courtyard used as a parking lot.
Adding to his displeasure (and of things of which to complain) is the filthy state of the newsroom: everywhere dirt and grime, newspapers scattered about, debris all over the floor and waste paper baskets half empty. It’s those slovenly creatures on dayside, the irresponsible slobs.
There is one diversion at least: the wire service machines housed in a room nearby clacking out news of the world, making the place seem alive. The reports are spiked on the wall by the overnight wire room clerk and he frequently drops in to scan them. Deciding it’s time for a visit, he stands and stretches his legs and takes a final draw on his smoke. Then he drops the butt on the floor and like a slovenly creature on dayside grinds it out with his foot.
A half hour later he is back in his chair with feet on the desk and wiser in world affairs but no longer alone in the newsroom. The movie critic is off in his corner booth writing a deadline review. No idle chit chat with this guy, a steady, reliable sort; quiet, intense and aloof, who doesn’t drink or carouse, which means they have little in common. Still, it’s nice to have him around, banging those typewriter keys.
Better than that, the maintenance guys are now on the scene with push brooms, buckets and mops. And monster containers for trash. Four diligent, hard working stiffs who will put the room in good order – at least by newspaper standards. He waves hello and they nod in return but waste no time getting started. Unsung, overlooked heroes, they face this horror each day and never a word of complaint. They will do a good job as always: sweep and mop the floors; polish and dust and tidy things up and cart off tons of debris.
And tomorrow they’ll do it again.
* * *
By mid-morning the newsroom is back in its normal state: cluttered, grimy, stuffy and hot and hazy with cigarette smoke. Off to one side a small group of women are hacking out social news. Neat, clean and well groomed, they gamely maintain a litter free zone that has little effect on the newsroom. Male reporters and deskmen, known to be major polluters, vastly outnumber the women and though passably fresh when first they arrive; most light up when they turn to their chores, then all start to wilt in the heat. Under a layer of cigarette smoke.
Reporters hunched over Remington uprights, pounding out copy on deadline, soon become sweaty and grimy. They shed their coats and loosen their collars but gain little if any relief. Deskmen working the stories and writing the headlines and under pressure as well as older and less frenetic, manage to stay unruffled. But, as the reporters do, they smother their ashtrays with cigarette butts and cover the floor with debris they casually aim at containers.
Scruffy newspaper guys as if from central casting, playing their roles to the hilt.
Except the city editor. A clean-cut type immune to the heat and the squalor. He can manage the desk all day – whip the stories in shape, counsel reporters, assign them their duties and answer complaints from the public – then take a seat in a board room and add some class to the place.
While others around him loosen their collars and mop their brows he’s cool as an ocean breeze: trimly dressed in fresh laundered shirt, striped silk tie, and suit just back from the cleaners. Still, reporters admire the guy; shrug off the fashion plate look. He is competent, honest and fair, which earns him solid support, and he won’t let the copy desk screw up their stories, which wins him rave reviews. Strict as an old Army sergeant he tolerates light hearted banter, even takes part now and then, but will shoot down the company comics (“I make the jokes here, jack”) before it gets out of hand.
The cigar he smokes helps foul the air but keeps him calm and composed on days when he’s churning inside. And today he’s churning inside for lack of a good, breaking story. In charge of the local news, he likes to compete with the wire desk crew for top display on Page One, but since Hitler started his blitzkrieg war, Europe gets most of the play and his stuff has been shunted inside. While reporters cover the city and county scrounging for area news the telegraph guys shove the shockers across that warrant the eye-grabbing headlines:
Nazis March Into Poland, Denmark and Norway Invaded, Fall of France, Disaster at Dunkirk, Battle of Britain, England Alert for Invasion; and today it’s more of the same. In the package he’s putting together – responsible stories and relevant pictures, all with a local bent – there is nothing to excite the consumer, and look what the wire desk has: Vichyites courting the Nazis; Rudolph Hess captive in Scotland; Parachute landings on Crete.
The clock is ticking toward deadline and once again he’ll be buried inside. Unless…
The telephone rings. He grabs the receiver and listens and his eyebrows go up at the message. He replaces the phone, summons reporters and gets them hot on the story. Then he rings up the photo department for the man who will salvage the day.
“Got a tip for you Harry…sounds pretty good…Navy plane over the city…trooper dangling behind…parachute fouled in the tail…likely to try for North Island…suggest you head for the bay.”
(Note: the editor depicted here is Fred Kinne, a retired Air Force colonel who actually came a few years later. Please forgive the deception. He was everyone’s favorite editor.)