Grit
America's Greatest Family Newspaper
By Robin Van Auken
Smashwords Edition
Copyright 2011 Robin Van Auken
Printed in the United States of America
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Strive and Succeed
Each weekend in the 1950s, 30,000 boys knocked at the doors of more than 700,000 American small-town homes and were welcomed with a smile and a dime as they delivered the weekly edition of Grit, America's Greatest Family Newspaper.
For more than 100 years, Grit delivered news, features, fiction, coupons, and comics to families across the nation. More than a million children have sold Grit, some for a few weeks, some for several years. Many adults, including Astronaut John Glenn, look back on the experience with pride.
A journalistic legacy, Grit recorded timely events and celebrated family and community through good times and bad. Many of its articles and features are endearing and touching portraits that chronicled the United States, indeed, the world's, progress and misfortune.
Founded in 1882 as a Saturday edition of the Daily Sun and Banner in Williamsport, Pennsylvania, Grit was at first a short-lived venture. Then, two years later, Dietrick Lamade purchased it. His story is typically American; the story of a young man who sought and found opportunity, and who, in 50 years, created one of the miracles of modern publishing.
Lamade was a German immigrant whose family moved to Williamsport in 1867. On Jan. 1, 1869, Johannes Lamade died from typhoid fever. The day after his funeral, his ninth child was born. At the age of 10, Deitrick, along with his older brothers and sister, quit school and helped support the family. He worked as an errand boy for various stores until, at 13, he began working in the office of a local German-language weekly, Beobachter.
His weekly salary was $3.
At 18, Lamade became a publisher. During the holiday season of 1877, he devoted his spare time to producing several issues of The Merchants' Free Press, a four-page advertising pamphlet. Then, in 1882, Lamade became advertising compositor and assistant composing room supervisor at the Daily Sun and Banner. There, he typeset the first head for Grit and created all of its forms.
Two years later, in 1884, he left the Sun and Banner to help revive a weekly publication, The Times, and build it into a daily. Ill health and lack of finances by its owner caused it to fold, just as Grit, also, began to crumble.
For the first time in his life, he was without a job. The 25-year-old had married in 1881 and now had a wife and two children to support. Rather than be defeated, he envisioned an opportunity: he would become a publisher.
Lamade gambled and, with two partners and a combined investment, he bought the equipment of the Times, and Grit's name and good will from the Sun and Banner.
The first year of Grit was one of adversity and uncertainty, as it owed more than it was worth and went through seven business partners, but Lamade did not lose faith. Circulation climbed to 4,000, but it needed more subscribers to survive.
Lamade decided to interest new subscribers with raffles and drawings. Coupons in the paper provided chances for readers to win various prizes, including a piano, gold watch, marble-top bedroom suit, rifle, and a silk dress. His partners thought his new idea was impractical and costly. One partner threw up his hands in horror at the idea of more debts, and announced that he was through with the enterprise.
That did not deter Lamade whose favorite saying was, "difficulties show what men are." He enlisted his younger brother as a new partner and the Grit was on its way.
Five days a week, from May until November 1885, Lamade traveled all over Pennsylvania, using his lottery to stimulate statewide circulation of Grit. His efforts saved his newspaper and transformed it into a national institution.
He carried two large suitcases of Grit advertising materials and convinced many small stores and newsagents to carry the publication. He tacked flyers to buildings, fences and trees, and hired boys to put circulars in all the houses. After his week on the road, he returned to the paper's offices and slept on a folding cot on Friday and Saturday nights to ensure that Grit was shipped to the out-of-town agents on Saturday mornings, and that the local edition was ready for Sunday mornings.
On Thanksgiving Day 1885, he held the grand prize drawing at Williamsport's Academy of Music. He gave out five prizes, three to out-of-towners and two to local residents. Lamade's tireless efforts more than doubled circulation and helped to stabilize Grit's finances.
In 1886, Grit showed a weekly circulation of 14,000 and its books showed all bills paid with a cash balance of $400. Lamade and his partners shook hands, patted themselves on their backs and gave themselves raises from $12 to $15 a week. They bought new equipment and moved to a first-floor location. By 1887, circulation had reached 20,000 and the partners ordered their first newspaper perfecting press at a price tag of $8,000.
In 1891, Grit and its 40 employees moved into its new home at the corner of William and West Third streets in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. Circulation averaged 53,000 copies weekly in most states east of the Mississippi.
Lamade expanded circulation even more by using direct mail and hiring newsboys in locations throughout the country to sell the paper. By the 20th century, circulation reached 100,000 then tripled by 1916. Grit was one of the first newspapers in America to feature color and fictional supplements.
By the late 1970s, its circulation was more than 1.2 million, but competing with metropolitan dailies or national magazines was never Lamade's goal. He wanted only to serve small towns and villages removed from the influences of big cities, places that had no daily newspaper of their own.
Although Lamade's 5-cent price tag eventually increased to 25 cents because of higher taxes, wages and materials, Grit maintained its 80-20 percent ratio of editorial matter to advertising content.
Lamade read his newspaper each week with a critical eye and always encouraged optimism. "Make every issue of Grit ring the joy bells of life," was his sage advice.
The unity of thought, purpose, and effort that existed between Grit and its employees is found in very few industries. From the first day that Dietrick Lamade acquired Grit, he never lost touch and he never overestimated himself.
"If I have succeeded," Lamade once said, "it is because I have concentrated on one thing."
He gathered about him the best men and women, calling them his Grit Family. Growing from three employees (himself included) to more than 250 in its Williamsport office, plus hundreds of correspondents and contributors nationwide, Dietrick's newspaper never reduced wages and never missed a pay day for any of its employees (even during its infancy and the Great Depression).