Page:Newspaper writing and editing.djvu/65

 police headquarters and at other news sources telephone important information to the city editor so that he may assign men to get the news involved. When lack of time prevents the reporter from returning to the office to write his story, he telephones the facts to a "rewrite man," who puts them in news-story form. Or the reporter may dictate his story over the telephone to a man in the newspaper office, who, using an overhead receiver like that worn by telephone operators, takes it down rapidly on a typewriter. Experienced reporters can dictate their stories in this way with only their notes before them. The long distance service is used in the same manner by correspondents when it can be more advantageously employed than the telegraph.

Photographs. Illustrations, or "cuts," have come to be an important part of almost all newspapers. Although most of the photographs used for illustrations are made by the staff photographer or are secured from companies that make a specialty of taking pictures of current events, reporters and correspondents are often able to supply their papers with pictures of persons, places, or events that are a part of the day's news. Good photographs may sometimes be secured from amateurs who happen to get snapshots of some interesting occurrence. Every reporter and every correspondent should have a camera and should learn how to take pictures to illustrate the stories that he writes, even though he may not have occasion to take such photographs frequently. Unmounted photographic prints with a glossy surface and with strong contrasts are the most satisfactory ones from which to make newspaper halftones. A brief description of the picture should be written on the back of every photograph. Unmounted photographs should always be mailed flat. Correspondents are paid for photographs that are used by newspapers.