Grit

One day in October a Manhattan detective had just settled down to enjoy the latest issue of Bernarr Macfadden's True Detective Mysteries when a face staring from the pages made him jump. The face was that of a man whose furtive behavior he had marked while strolling his beat a few days before. The caption identified him--Walter Clyde Davis, wanted in Colorado Springs for embezzling $500,000. Last week the detective found his man again, arrested him. Unprotesting, Davis went along, hanged himself in his cell. . . .

A similar occurrence gained national publicity last month for a publication called Grit. It was in Grit that a North Carolina youngster spotted a picture of President Hoover's strangely missing friend Col. Raymond Robins, leading to the discovery and return of Col. Robins (TIME, Nov. 28). Proudly last fortnight Grit celebrated its 50th birthday.

People either know Grit intimately or know nothing whatever about it. Many a wide reader would be astonished to hear that Grit, besides being a half-century old, has a claimed circulation of some 425,000 in 48 States. 83% of its circulation in towns of less than 10,000 population.

Grit issues once a week from Williamsport, Pa., where it is published by its founder, a tall, robust, white-crowned German-American named Dietrick Lamade (pronounced Lam'-a-dy). It is a weekly--"America's Greatest Family Newspaper"--of 14 pages plus fiction supplement, aimed carefully at the smalltown family. In makeup it looks as the Christian Science Monitor might look if the Monitor were checkered with pictures. In content it is a strange combination of newspaper, magazine section, almanac, mail order catalog.

Across the top of Grit's front page is the design which has been there since its first year, a rococo drawing of two pudgy cherubs having a tug-of-war with a long banner lettered GRIT. Each cherub has a quill pen behind his ear. Around the shoulders of one is slung a pastepot. The other carries a pair of shears. Strewn about the background are stacks of books, a globe, a telescope on a tripod, a gear wheel and an anvil (presumably symbolizing business & industry).

There are pages of late Pennsylvania news, orthodox feature stories of national affairs. The bulk of the 400,000 circulation is attracted by the "departments"-Women's Realm; Household Helps; Odd. Strange & Curious; Live Topics for Women & Children; Clever Little Stories; The Story Section. Also there are comics. Will Rogers, and a Sermon for the People written weekly for the past 26 years by Rev. Stephen Paulson of Williamsport.

The 50th Anniversary Number included an extra supplement devoted to Grit, its history, its family. Peering from the front page was a large photograph of Founder-Publisher Lamade whose white hair is the only sign of his age--73. He was a $12-a-week printer on the Williamsport Daily Sun & Banner in 1882 when Grit first appeared as the Banner's Saturday afternoon edition. It made a poor start. Its publishers were about to scrap it when Printer Lamade got two other men to help him buy it, publish it separately in another shop. Grit Publishing Co. was founded with a capital of $ 1,000, of which $150 was Dietrick Lamade's savings.

For two years the paper barely eluded the sheriff. Then Publisher Lamade organized a lottery (legal in those days), with prizes of a piano, a gold watch, a marble-top chamber suite, a rifle, a silk dress pattern. Four coupons clipped from Grit bought a chance. Few months later the paper was out of debt; its circulation (initially 1,500) was 14,000. The three proprietors shook hands, raised their own wages from $12 to $15.

From that time on, with five exceptions, circulation mounted each year. The growth was stimulated by the employment of an army of boy salesmen who handle the bulk of Grit's circulation. Today there are 19,000 Grit-boys. An oldtime Grit-boy is Publisher John Charles Martin, head of the Curtis-Martin newspapers.

Last week Founder Lamade's bald Son George, vice president, was in Manhattan to see what he could do about boosting the scant national advertising in Grit. The paper has prospered on circulation profits, but Benton & Bowles advertising agency discovered by the way Grit readers responded to a jelly-making contest last autumn that it should be an excellent medium for household advertising. Thus far Grit's advertising has been predominantly the tawdry patent medicine type. Excerpt from an advertisement of "The Medicine Man" in the anniversary issue: "An Indian Chief told my Father that a tea made by taking two teaspoonsful of Coltsfoot would cure bleeding lungs, and it did."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.