Illinois newspaper directory. History of the Illinois press association

Illinois Newspaper Dire< roRi and Historythe program lie arranged there should be definitely introduced the idea of co-operationwith universities to develop professional ideals and instruction for newspaper men. Hispresidential address follows:Address of J. W. Bailey in 1877"Fellow Citizens of East St. Louis: Permit me, in behalf of the Illinois PressAssociation, to tender you our heartfelt thanks for this generous welcome to yourthriving city—a city uniting the Fast and the West by links of iron and of love.Standing here as we do today, and viewing the outlines of the great metropolis on thewestern shore of your majestic river, and the strong highway of steel leading thereto,we are led to exclaim: Surely this, your city, must be the entrance gate to the mightyempire which stretches out toward the setting sun!"You have alluded in some degree to the press as the bulwark of national freedomand the hand-maid of our progressive civilization. We are not, I trust, insensible tothe import and value of this compliment. We feel, everyone of us, that the greatpowers with which we are entrusted should be rightly used—not for the promotion ofmere personal or party ends, but for the good first of our people, and then for the wealof mankind. As that trite couplet has it'No pent up Utica contracts our powers.The whole unbounded continent is ours.'"We have come to your city, lying upon the Great Father of Waters, to spend abrief season of relaxation from labor, and by an interchange of ideas concerning ourart, to better fit ourselves individually and collectively for the active duties of life.I am sure we shall carry away with us kindly remembrances of your lavish hospitality,and your words of sympathy and cheer. They are the flowers that sometimes markthe pathway of laborious life, and, like the acacia, will flourish green in our memories."With these brief remarks in acknowledgement of the courtesies you have so kindlytendered us, I will now present a few thoughts to the fraternity, and which I trustwill not be without interest to all. First, then, let us consider THE ADVANCEMENTOF THE AGE in the arts and sciences, and the inventive genius which is a peculiarcharacteristic of our day and generation. This age of ours, ladies and gentlemen, is oneof rapid progress in all the arts that tend to meliorate man's condition and crown himwith prosperity and happiness. Our days, in fact, are like the years of old, if we maybe allowed to reckon by progress and events; and we may well say:'Better fifty years of freedomThan a cycle of Cathay.'"Empires spring up, as it were, in a night; cities, once the slow creation of time,now rise as if by magic, from their ruins, like the fabled Phoenix from its funeral pyre.Forests are subdued; the earth gives out its hidden treasures of mineral wealth; timeand space are annihilated; and thought takes wings of lightning and flashes throughoceans and over broad continents. Thus we are enabled to read the descriptions ofEuropean battles 'ere the noise and smoke of cannon and musketry have died away; andthe world'Wonders what new inventionWill next claim its attention.'" 'The telephone,' some one suggests — a scientific process for the rapid communicationof sound from city to city, and designed 'ere long to reach across this greatcontinent of ours, enabling people many miles distant from each other to engage infamiliar converse. Yes, as the latest, the telephone is worthy of mention.33