Page:History of Oregon Newspapers.pdf/195

186 tight, advertising hard to get, the Oregonian firmly intrenched. The paper dragged along until the next August. Then, August 1, 1895, the Oregonian ran the following journalistic obit:

"THE DAILY SUN A CORPSE.— The Portland Sun will not appear this morning, nor hereafter. A meeting of the conductors of the Sun was held yesterday, and it was decided to suspend publication. The property was already in the hands of a sheriff's keeper, and the accumulating difficulties of the publishing company finally became so great that it was impossible to bear them longer. The Sun has . . been run continuously as a morning opposition newspaper. It has been no secret of late that it was sorely in need of money, and it is known strenuous efforts were made to raise funds. They were unsuccessful, and the end came yesterday."

Now, the foregoing was practically correct. But not quite. The Oregonian had not counted on the grim, gallant sense of humor of someone in the Sun organization, stimulated, perhaps, by two or three drinks. For the Sun did "rise" that morning, with 125 words of news, no editorial, and the space filled with miscellaneous boiler plate, advertising, and matter re-run from previous issues. The title logotype on page 1 had been turned upside down, big ads and some of the boiler-plate were upside-down or turned side-wise. Dr. Powell Reeves, virile advertising medico who offered to make any ailing young man (who had the money) fit for life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness—this massive man of medicine stood on his double-column head like Lewis Carroll's old Father William. This issue doubtless was expected to be the Sun's final blaze of glory, although one of the two or three bits of original composition in the paper was a "Special Notice" appealing for help. "Owing to certain circumstances," this notice read, "the Sun force has taken a tumble and refused to work last night. For nearly ten months the men have struggled to give the people an acceptable paper. It may not yet be too late to redeem it to its usefulness. Whatever is done must be done immediately. Will the business men and interested parties come to the rescue, or do they prefer to be dictated to and governed by rings and 10-cent politicians? If they choose the latter, vale Sun, vale Portland, vale freedom in the Northwest! Quien sabe?"

The next day the paper had gone back to something like its normal appearance, but at the head of the editorial column there appeared an assignee's notice signed by Hugh McGuire for the Sun Publishing Co. The final issue, containing four pages, appeared the next day, August 3.

One of the Sun's printers was young Amos E. Voorhies, a recent arrival in Oregon. He showed then the same kind of business ability