His passion to build, to realize his ambitions, made him careless about laying foundations. What he did usually had the character of improvisation, frequently on a grand scale, sometimes merely gay spurts of fancy. I was myself caught in one of the latter when Mr. McClure in London suddenly ordered me in Paris to drop whatever I was doing and to hurry into Germany to collect material for an animal magazine.
Animals were an abiding interest with _McClure’s_. Rudyard Kipling laid the foundation in the Jungle tales. After that great series few were the numbers that did not have an animal in text and picture. It was as much a passion as baseball was to become in the latter days with _The American Magazine_.
I spent a lively month visiting zoos, interviewing animal trainers and hunters and keepers, buying books and photographs, turning in what I considered a pretty good grist of materials and suggestions. What became of it, I never knew, for I never heard a word of it after I came back to America. The only remnant I have now of that month is a powder box of Dresden china bought at the showrooms of the factory of the crossed swords, it being my practice when on professional trips to use my leisure seeing the town, guidebook in hand, and buying all the souvenirs my purse permitted.
It was in 1906 that Mr. McClure brought home from one of his foraging expeditions the plan which was eventually to wreck his enterprises. He had it cut and dried ready to put into action. Without consultation with his partners he had organized a new company, the charter of which provided not only for a _McClure’s Universal Journal_, but a McClure’s Bank, a McClure’s Life Insurance Company, a McClure’s School Book Publishing Company, and later a McClure’s Ideal Settlement in which people could have cheap homes on their own terms. It undertook to combine with a cheap magazine—which it goes without saying was to have an enormous circulation with the enormous advertising which circulation brings—an attempt to solve some of the great abuses of the day, abuses at which we had been hammering in _McClure’s Magazine_. He proposed to do this by giving them a competition which would draw their teeth.
By the time Mr. McClure got around to explaining his plan to me and asking my cooperation he had worked himself up to regarding it as an inspiration which must not be questioned. It seemed to me to possess him like a religious vision which it was blasphemy to question. Obsessed as he was, he was blind and deaf to the obstacles in the way. I am sure I hurt Mr. McClure by telling him bluntly and at once that I would never have anything to do with such a scheme.
In a recently published letter Lincoln Steffens tells how he saw Mr. McClure’s plan. To him it was not only “fool” but “not quite right.” Certainly it was not right. As organized, it was a speculative scheme as alike as two peas to certain organizations the magazine had been battering.
The tragedy of the situation was that Mr. McClure did not see and could not understand the arguments of his associates that his plan was not only impossible but wrong. This failure of judgment was, I am convinced, due to his long illness. The mental and physical exhaustion from which he was suffering, and which he could not bring himself to understand or accept, explains the unwisdom of this undertaking, his contention that it was an inspiration, his stubbornness in insisting that it be accepted and set to work. Human reason has little influence on one who believes he is inspired.
The members of the staff were little more than outsiders when it came to the final decision. It was up to John Phillips to accept and do his utmost to aid in the grandiose adventure or patiently to wait while persuading the General that it was not the mission of the McClure crowd to reconstruct the economic life of the country, that we were journalists, not financial reformers. I think no man ever tried harder to keep another from a suicidal undertaking; and certainly no man could have been firmer from the start in his refusal to go along.
The struggle went on for six months, and no two men ever tried more honestly to adjust their differences; but they were irreconcilable. It came to a point where one or the other must sell his interest in the magazine. It was Mr. McClure who bought out his partner.
Although _McClure’s Magazine_ is no longer on the newsstands, it does occupy a permanent place in the history of the period that it served, because it worked itself into the literary and economic life of the country.
It was a magazine which from the first put quality above everything else and was willing to chase checks around town in order to pay for it. For those who collect Kipling there are the first publications of many of his rarest poems, short stories, and such distinguished serials as “Captains Courageous” and “Kim.” Here first appeared Willa Cather and O. Henry.
It was a magazine which backed regardless of expense, one might say, the investigations and reports of men like Ray Stannard Baker and Lincoln Steffens. For twelve years it encouraged with liberality and patience the work of which I have been talking in this narrative.
Mr. McClure had two editorial policies when it came to getting the thing he felt was important for the Magazine. First, the writer must be well paid and the expense money be generous. Second, and most important of all, he must be given time. He did not ask that you produce a great serial in six months. He gave you years if it was necessary. I spent the greater part of five years on “The History of the Standard Oil Company.” I was what was called a contributing editor; that is, I turned in suggestions as they came to me in my work around the country. I did occasional extra articles that seemed to be in my line. I read and took part in editorial counsels, but it was recognized that all the time I demanded should be given to the serial. I know of no other editor and no other publisher who has so fully recognized the necessity of generous pay and ample time, if he were to get from a staff work done according to the best editorial standard, and worthy of the magazine and the writer.
When it was finally decided that Mr. Phillips was to sever his long relation to _McClure’s_ several members of the editorial staff resigned, including Ray Stannard Baker, Lincoln Steffens, John Siddall, the efficient young managing editor Albert Boyden, and myself. We could not see the magazine without Mr. Phillips.
The last day we left the office, then on Twenty-third Street near Fourth Avenue, some of us went together to Madison Square and sat on a bench talking over our future. We were derelicts without a job.
But not for long.
[Illustration:
_First year of The American Magazine, 1907_ ]
There was then in New York, though it was not generally known, a magazine group which wanted a change. The magazine was very old—long known as _Frank Leslie’s Illustrated_ _Monthly_, recently changed to _The American Magazine_. Its owner was Frederick L. Colver; its editor, Ellery Sedgwick (afterward editor of the _Atlantic_); its publisher, William Morrow (afterward the founder of William Morrow & Company, the book publishing house). Mr. Colver approached Mr. Phillips: “Why don’t _you_ take it over?”
Finally in council assembled, our editorial group together with David A. McKinlay and John Trainor of the McClure business department, decided to incorporate the Phillips Publishing Company and buy _The American Magazine_. With what we could put in ourselves and money from the sale of stock to interested friends, we secured funds for the purchase and sufficient working capital.
We left _McClure’s_ in March: six months later, October, 1906, appeared our first issue. The announcement shows how seriously we took ourselves, as befitted people who had seen something in which they deeply believed go to pieces. We had been too cruelly bruised to take anything lightly, but luckily we were able to make two additions to our staff, each man with a vein of humor not to be dried up or muddled by any cataclysms—William Allen White and Finley Peter Dunne (Mr. Dooley).
We had known Mr. White in the _McClure’s_ office since the day of his famous editorial, “What’s the Matter with Kansas?” After that came his Boyville stories, two or three of which _McClure’s_ published, and then at intervals studies of political situations and political figures. It was not long before he began to come to New York. He was a little city-shy then, or wanted us to think so. As I was one of the official entertainers of the group, it occasionally fell to me to “take him by the hand,” as he put it, and show him the town. I could have hardly had a more delightful experience. He judged New York by Kansas standards, and New York usually suffered. His affection and loyalty for his state, his appreciation and understanding of everything that she does—wise and foolish—the incomparable journalistic style in which he presents her are what has made him so valuable a national citizen. His crowning achievement among the many to be credited to him has been remaining first, last, and always the editor of the Emporia _Gazette_. A staunch friendship had sprung up between Mr. White and Mr. Phillips, and it was natural enough that he interested himself in the new venture.