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Jack Lawrence.
Lawrence, Jack. When the Ships Came In. 1st printing. New York: Farrar & Rinehart. 1940. hardcover. illustrated with drawings by John O’Hara Cosgrave, II. isbn: none. scarcity: scarce.

The author was a maritime news reporter for the New York Evening Mail newspaper from 1910 to 1917. This book tells of his exploits surrounding breaking news in the shipping world. The text covers a wide range of material from eccentric characters to unusual news stories. There are specific chapters concerning Lusitania, Vaterland/Leviathan and Deutschland, amongst over events. The Titanic content is significant as well, covering over 50 pages, although not terribly accurate a lot of the time.

The real significance of this book, from a historical perspective, is Lawrence’s insights into the process of just how the news was reported in the papers of the day. Shipping news reporters almost never wrote their own stories, they phoned them in to rewrite men, who were then responsible for pulling the information into a coherent article. This format may help explain the mishmash of fact and misinformation that was typical of the press during this time period.

The process of news gathering went something like this. When a ship came into port, the shipping news reporters would go aboard and interview people, who would relate to them what they experienced. The reporter would take his notes, go ashore and phone in the details to the paper’s main office. The rewrite men would take down the information and then use their notes to write the actual news article. That makes all the news people read in the papers third hand at best, fourth hand if the original interviewee was relating what he heard rather than what he personally experienced.

Further diluting the facts was that it was typical for the shipping news reporters to share their stories with their each other. No-one could be on hand for every vessel that came into port with a potential newsworthy event. So the reporters depended on each other to keep informed. In theory, one reporter could be the underlying source for every paper’s story about any one event.

Throughout the book, Lawrence gives us the insider’s view of the newspaper business during the early years of the 20th century. There was the typical mix of camaraderie and rivalries that always exist whenever a group of people with many personalities are required to work together. There are terrific stories of how the reporters sometimes played practical jokes on each other, and at the other extreme, how they covered for their colleagues if someone really blew a story. It was obviously a fascinating period in the history of news reporting, and few books have ever done such a good job of giving you the inside scoop on how it all worked.

With thanks to Senan Molony for letting me know about this book.