Page:History of Oregon Newspapers.pdf/38

Rh gentlemen of Oregon City, held in the Methodist church, on evening, the 12th inst., the following resolutions were adopted:

On motion of W. H. Gray, Esq., Colonel Taylor was called to the chair.

On motion of A. F. Hedges, J. S. Rinearson was ap pointed secretary of the meeting.

Col. Taylor, the chairman, then called upon Mr. Gray to state the object of the meeting, who arose and said that the law in relation to ardent spirits had been for some time, and was now, daily violated, and that the object of the meeting was to arouse public sentiment, and appoint a committee of vigilance, whose special duty it should be to see that the liquor law was fully enforced.

(Then follows five hundred words of detail, including several resolutions. The next to the last paragraph contained what the more modern reporter would have written in his first paragraph):

"Mr. Gray then proposed that a committee of vigilance, consisting of six, be appointed; whereupon the following gentlemen were named by the chairman as members of the committee, viz.: Messrs. Gray, Crawford, Robb, Barlow, Hood, and Engle."

The last paragraph informs the reader that the secretary was instructed to make out a complete record of the proceedings of the meeting, which was to be signed by the chairman and secretary, and handed to the editor, with the request that it be published in the Oregon Spectator, and that on motion the meeting adjourned with prayer.

If the term respectable gentleman is inseparable from all accounts of news coming from any distance, "painful duty" and "melancholy circumstances" are the stand-bys in all accounts of accidents. Thus the following introduction to an account of the death by drowning of Dr. John E. Long, secretary of the territory:

"It is our painful duty to record the death of Dr. John E. Long, secretary of the territory, who was drowned in the Clackamas river, near this place, on Sunday, 21st ult., under the following melancholy circumstances:"

This is followed by the chronological account of the drowning, as nearly as the facts could be pieced together, since there was no witness.

If it were not for the presence of a three-column general article on the first page of the thirteenth number of the Spectator justifying the annexation of Mexican territory, and almost a full column