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introduced into the newspaper press of the United States the “Woman’s Page.”
The material supplied by the Bok Syndicate Press was of the best; the standard was kept high; the writers were selected from among the most popular authors of the day; and readability was the cardinal note. The women bought the newspapers containing the new page, the advertiser began to feel the presence of the new reader, and every newspaper that could not get the rights for the “Bok Page,” as it came to be known, started a “Woman’s Page” of it own. Naturally, the material so obtained was of an inferior character. No single newspaper could afford what the syndicate, with the expense divided among a hundred newspapers, could pay. Nor had the editors of these woman’s pages either a standard or a policy. In desperation they engaged any person they could to “get a lot of woman’s stuff.” It was stuff, and of the trashiest kind. So that almost coincident with the birth of the idea began its abuse and disintegration; the result we see in the meaningless presentations which pass for “woman’s pages” in the newspaper of to-day.
This is true even of the woman’s material in the leading newspapers, and the reason is not difficult to find. The average editor has, as a rule, no time to study the changing conditions of women’s interests; his time is and must be engrossed by the news and editorial pages. He usually delegates the Sunday “specials” to some editor who, again, has little time to study the ever-changing women’s problems, particularly in these days, and he relies upon unintelligent advice, or he places his |
