Sunday, 16th November 1913: Woodward Vetoes Fence Resolution, The Atlanta Constitution

Reading Time: 17 minutes [2888 words]

Declares

Contractors Have No

Right to Use the Streets

of Atlanta.

Mayor James G. Woodward has vetoed the

resolution passed up by council at its last meeting authorizing the Calhoun

estate to erect a fence in the street at the corner of Broad and Alabama

streets.

At a former meeting of council a

similar permit was rejected, and the mayor ordered Chief of Police Beavers to

notify the contractors to move the fence back to the sidewalk.

The streets and sidewalks belong to

the people, and the city council has no authority under the law to allow

contractors or any individual to use any part of the thoroughfares for private

purposes, Mayor Woodward said Saturday, commenting on his action.

I consider the crossing at Broad and

Alabama streets to be the most dangerous in the city, especially so now that

Whitehall Street has been partly torn up and vehicles forced to use Broad and

Forsyth streets.

The mayors message to council is as

follows:

I return to you without my approval

the resolution passed at your last session, giving a permit to build a fence in

the street at the corner of Alabama and Broad streets. At a former meeting of

your body, you rejected this same request. This possibly is the most dangerous

corner in the city of Atlanta.

We have at the present time a joint

committee appointed from the chamber of commerce and the general council

looking into the matter of street congestion. The central parts of the city are

very much crowded with the ordinary business of the city. While it has been, in

the past, the policy of the city to allow owners and contractors to build these

fences and obstructing the general passageway of the public, the city of Atlanta

has arrived at that point in its progress that it can no longer grant such

permits in our central congested business streets. Many other cities other than

Atlanta, yet with their streets no more congested than ours, do not permit such

obstructions. The corner of Broad and Alabama streets, as I say, is one of the

most congested and dangerous corners in the city, made so by the great number

of street cars at that corner and the large amount of vehicles and ordinary

street traffic taking that direction in order to avoid the Whitehall street

viaduct.

I am firm of the opinion that the

general council should grant no more permits for blockading the streets through

the business and congested sections. Besides, I thoroughly believe that all

such permits are illegal. I do not believe that the city authorities have power

to blockade the street or any part of a street. The streets are public highways

and every person has the right to such streets and no one has the right to

impede travel through such thoroughfares. I am thoroughly convinced that

Atlanta has got to cease giving such permits and there is no better time than

the present to make that beginning.

Aside from the reasons given, I am

convinced that the action of your general body is illegal from the fact that

you are attempting to set aside an ordinance of the city by resolution. While I

do not wish to appear in any way as attempting to retard any kind of

improvement, I am thoroughly satisfied that this action is the proper course in

this matter.

PAGE 12, COLUMN 1

ATLANTA

SNAPSHOTTERS CARE NOT WHAT BECOME OF

THEM IF THEY

GET THE PICTURE--THE PHOTOS THE THING

By Britt Craig.

Its no childs play, this business of illustrating the days

news.

For instance, take a look at Francis

Ebenezer Prince a-top the Healey building in position to which the city editor

evidently assigned him in the fond hope that he would fall. Nobody, it seems

loves a newspaper photographer but himself. Not even vengeful city editors, who

couldnt get out their papers without them.

Then, take a slant at Francis Eben

doing a Beachey on a bail and chain above a skeletonized skyscraper. No, dont

think what I know youre about to think. This honestly is Kid Prices first

experience with a chain and ball. He vows that it is the first time he has ever

been associated with such adornment.

See the flame and brimstone Brother

Price had to endure in order to get a newsy fire fighting picture. When this

particular picture was turned in to the city editor, the c. e. turned a merciless

eye on the photographer:

Why didnt you get the faces of the

firemen? he asked. Theres no news in the rear exposure of a herd of

firemen.

WHAT HE

IS

HIRED

FOR.

Dyou expect me to step over in the

fire and do it? queried the photographer.

Certainly. Thats what youre hired

for.

And thats the sentiment of every city

editor in the country. If photographers did all their editors expected of them

there would be fewer photographers and more corpses.

See that picture wherein the two ladies

are concealing their coveted features with fans! Well, thats a situation the

newspaper photographer encounters in every work day. That day isnt normal when

the camera man fails to meet antagonism from the fair sex.

Certainly they dont want their pictures

taken by an ordinary newspaper photographer who cant touch up the plate and

take out the wrinkles and moles and insert a dimple. They wouldnt mind,

however, if it was for the society page.

But in connection with news, never!

The very idea!

Likewise

The nerve of some people!

Scan the collection of choice mugs

behind the battery of cameras in the illustration. These men covered the Frank

trial for the three Atlanta papers, pestering unwilling witnesses and making

life unbearable for persons who happened to stumble into the limelight along

about that particular time.

A

SUGGESTION

TO

WILSON.

That picture is of a gang you could

stack against the whole of Mexico, Huerta and the rebels combined, and depend

upon Mexico hoisting the white flag in a hurry. You dont have to take any

single somebodys word for it. Ask the witnesses and folks connected with the

Frank trial.

Ask Daisy Grace. Ask Grace.

Ask Mrs. Applebaum. Ask Frank.

Ask anybody who has ever been of public

note.

Note the fighting expressions. Thats

their job, fighting. Fighting for pictures, fighting each other, fighting for

all they got and failing many, many times to get all they fight for. Its all

in a days work.

Happy-go-lucky sort of fellows,

carefree, dauntless, unappreciated, theyre the real men behind the guns.

Theyre read adventurers of life, and every day with them is a drama, a copious

adventure.

This morning they hobnob with stars in

the social constellation. Tonight they go into the submerged tenth to mingle

with the groveling snipes of the under strata. They see and know every phase of

human nature, they are adaptable to any situation.

However, this isnt intended to be a

treatise on the newspaper photographer. My admiration for the profession is

driving me astray from the orders given by the Sunday editor, who would take

pains to walk around the corner to avoid a treatise on anything from politics

to dyspepsia.

Personal vanity is one of the

photographers most effective assets. Not good that he himself is afflicted

with it. Did you ever see a sartorial model behind a news camera? No, neither

did anybody else. Its the vanity of his victim on which he banks.

SNAPSHOTTING

THE

SHARPSHOOTER.

One little instance:

Not so
very long ago, there photographers from three Atlanta

papers went on all out-of-town assignment to photograph a woman had gained wide

distinction for marksmanship through the somewhat difficult feat of putting six

bullets within the space of an inch into the anatomy of her husband.

She was in jail. The town was considerable distance from

Atlanta. The photographers arrived at 5 a. m. The only train on which their

plates could be shipped to Atlanta in time for press was one which passed at

9:35 a. m. They were confronted by a situation which demanded instant action.

It would have been possible to obtain snapshots for the

pretty prisoner as she left the jail at 10 oclock on her way to commitment

trial, but this would be too late. The only plan was to obtain posed pictures

in jail. A note was sent to the prisoner. She POSITIVELY refused, which the

camera men expected.

A caucus was held. It ended in this:

First

A note from Photographer No. 1:

My paper has a picture of you, but it does not to you

justice. A good many wrinkles show, and the eyes are blurred. I have orders

send in a picture. If I do not get a good photograph, I will be forced to use

this bad one.

Then this from No. 2:

The only picture I have of you is one that was taken in

1890. I am sure you do not want it published, which will be done unless I get a

good picture.

Which was followed by this from No. 3:

My paper is in possession of a picture of you in a kimono. I

am sure you would not wish it to appear in print, which will be done if I do

not get a good likeness of you.

PLAY ON

HER PRIDE,

YOU PLAY

THE ACE.

Result:

The prisoner requests an audience of the newspaper men, the

outcome of a contest of feminine obstinance against a knowledge of human

weakness.

Were there any such things as the bad pictures? Certainly

not! But the prisoner wasnt taking chances. The photographers knew she

wouldnt.

To balk at an assignment of any nature, no matter how

difficult or prospectless, means the professional death of the newspaper

photographer. It was during the Appelbaum murder case that the Atlanta men

fought so hard for pictures of Mrs. Callie Scott Appelbaum, central figure in

the noted Appelbaum murder mystery.

Mrs. Appelbaum always went heavily veiled, guarding against

the battery of cameras she invariably faced whenever appearing outside her cell.

Every conceivable effort had been made to obtain a, likeness of her. She had

always managed to thwart the newspaper men. Even an artist, who had smuggled

himself into her cell under the guise of an architect who was supposed to be

drawing plans for reconstruction of the room, found her face covered with a

newspaper the moment he came into her presence.

For days the newspapers went without picture, of the woman.

Finally, in desperation, the city editor of a local paper order one of his

staff photographers to get a picture of Mrs. Appelbaum under any circumstances.

Simultaneously, the city editors of each paper gave the same order to their

staff men. It was the day the prisoner went to the undertaking establishment

for a last glance at the body of the victim.

OFTEN

THEIR ZEAL

IS

MISGUIDED.

She went, as usual, thickly veiled. Two photographers

secreted themselves in an ante-room of the morgue in which the body lay. Their

presence was unknown by anyone connected with the establishment. She moved into

the dimly lighted morgue on the arm of Deputy Sheriff Plennie Miner.

As she kneeled beside the body, she lifted the veil to kiss

the brow of the man of whose murder she was suspected. As her lips touched the

skin, there was blinding flash, followed by the sound of scurrying feet as the

photographer fled from the ante-room Mrs. Appelbaum reeled, instinctively

snatching the veil over her face.

She arose and staggered into the arms of the deputy sheriff,

who had jumped for the door at which the flash had flared. As the woman fell

into Minors arms, the second photographer, who had failed to make to an

exposure, realized the intense value of the situation, and exploded his flash

machine. His camera caught the woman reeling into the deputys arms.

The identity of these two photographers

is an unsolved mystery. The pictures, however, went unpublished. It was cruelly

enterprising, but a feat that deserve a certain kind of hitherto unanalyzed

laudation, and one which none but a newspaper photographer would have undertaken.

The photographers quick wit is one of

his saying graces and an invaluable asset. His swift comprehension of a

situation and instant perception of news values border on genius. A snappy news

picture in this day of modern journalism is far more worthy than a news story.

THE

PHOTOS

THE

THING.

Francis Price, during the famous fire of the Brandon livery

stables on Marietta street in 1910, was standing beneath the quivering brick

wall of the wrecked building, napping action pictures of the huge water tower,

which had only recently been acquired by the fire department.

Suddenly he wall, with a tremendous groan, began to crumble.

A shout went up from the crowd. Men scurried in all directions, firemen

deserted their nozzles in flight for safety. Price stood in dire peril.

Wheeling around, apparently oblivious to danger, he focused his machine and

snapped at the wavering mess of brick and mortar. He had barely darted from

beneath when the wall crashed to the ground.

All sense of peril seems to desert the good camera man in his

zeal for newsy pictures. It is a kind of instinct that is imbued within him,

born of the haranguing of city editors, the love of his work, professional

pride and the love of good results from a good situation. Where sense of danger

is absent, there is an especial providence, it seems, that guides and protects

like the guiding instinct that drives a bird from poisonous herb.

Have you ever heard of a newspaper

photographer meeting death in performance of duty? They die, some do, in dire

circumstancesfor, as I wrote a few paragraphs back, they are, for the most

part, an unappreciated lotbut never on the job. Fate, it has been said, is

partial to the courageous. And courage, some contend, is nothing more than a

sort of obliviousness to danger.

It was an Atlanta photographer who

probably gave President Wilson his greatest scare in a situation outside of

presidential affairs and political situations. It was only a few Sundays ago

that the president passed through Atlanta on his way to mobile.

A request had been sent ahead that no

newspaper men or photographers be allowed at the tracks over which the

presidents care was to pass. Wilson, arriving in Atlanta, felt assured that he

would not be annoyed by flashlights or questions that would border on anything

from Mesic conditions to his menu for lunch.

While he stood on the observation

platform of his car shaking hands with the crowd, two camera men erected their

machines on the outer edge of the throng.

They were unobserved by the president.

Suddenly, an unusually heavy charge of flashlight powder was exploded. It

resembled the report of a gun. Wilson jumped back, frightened. Catching sight

of the photographer, he leveled a warning finger, saying:

Dont do that again.

The second photographer, sensing the

situation, took immediate advantage. His flash was exploded just as a secret

service man bowled over the camera of the first photographer. The exposure

caught Wilson in the unusual attitude and the secret service man

Contin
ued on Next Page.

PAGE 17, COLUMN 6

in action.

It was remarkable picture, and worth a goodly price.

NOT HALF-BAD

REPORTER

WHOLLY ROTTEN!

Then, there are other situations beside

those of a photographic nature to which the newspaper photographer must be

equal. Not infrequently are they called upon to cover news stories on which

their papers have not put reporters. This generally happens on out-of-town

assignments.

One instance of this kind I recall

during the Godbee trial at Millen. A paper which was covering the trial with a

special man from Savannah, found Savannah, found their correspondent absent

from Millen on the day of the verdict. One of the papers staff photographers

was in Millen. He was ordered by wire to cover the verdict. He answered that,

insomuch as his labors had been confined to photography, he wasnt sufficiently

versed in the art of reporting to competently report the case.

Another wire was sent him:

Write the story just as you would

write a letter home.

His story, put on the wire a few

minutes later, was in this form, more or less:

Dear Herald: This is a bum town. I

need more money for expenses. You neednt expect much story because Im not

intimate with a typewriter. Things look mighty blue for Mrs. Godbee. The

verdict was guilty. Yours respectfully,

FRED.

Later, another

telegram came from his office:

Describe the

scenes in the courtroom when the verdict was delivered. What did Mrs. Godbee

do?

It received

this reply:

There wasnt

any scenery. This trial was held in a courthouse. Mrs. Godbee went to jail.

Still another.

This one desperate.

Did Mrs.

Godbee cry, cuss or faint? Surely, she did something. Rush copy.

Reply:

Shes too old

to cry. She dont look to me like a fainting woman. Women dont cuss in small

towns.

With the result

that the paper depended upon the A. P. for description and the peculiar antics

of the prisoner at the time of verdict. However, photographers have enough to

do in illustrating the news of the day without dabbling in reporting.

Therefore, the hapless camera man received no censure from his office, which is

uncommon in newspaper shops. Censuring is one of the most popular pastimes with

the news executive.

WHEN THEY

ARE

SNAPPED

AWAY.

There surely must be some Happy Hunting

Ground for the newspaper photographers hereafter, some Elysia where there are

no such things as obstinate persons who shield their faces and run from the

camera. Where the city editor is a kind and loving soul who praises and never roasts.

Where salaries are in proportion to energy and ability and the pink slip is

unknown.

That portion of the public that daily

finds itself in the center of unpleasant limelight, consigns the news

photographer to every doom from Hell, Hull to Halifax, and, if there were no

criminal laws, would doubtless homicidally accomplish that consignment. The S.

R. O sign would stand at the entrance of Hades if every photographer complied

with the wishes of victims of the days news.

However, when all is said and done, and

the final records have been totaled, there is no other professional who

deserves a happier Happy Hunting Ground.

PAGE 14, COLUMN 4

BILL OF

EXCEPTIONS

IS FILED IN COURT

Frank

Case Is Now Formally

Before Highest Tribunal.

Argument in

December.

With the filling in the supreme court

Saturday of the bill of exceptions in the Frank case properly certified, all

doubt was removed that the case will be argued on or about December 15.

Arguments in the case may be made both

orally and by brief and it is probable that counsel will make use of both the

written and spoken forms of argument. While the case will be set on the several

days after that before it is reached.

After the case has once been argued,

the court will have until the opening of the second succeeding term, which

begins next October, in which to decide it. It is not believed, however, that

it will take anything like that much time and a decision may be expected the

latter part of February or the first of March.