Make Me a City

by Jonathan Carr

  “Do you think it might have been a copy editor’s mistake?”

  Tom shrugs. “I don’t think the Tribune would allow a mistake like that in its leading article on the front page, would they?”

  They have given you two full columns.

  He places a cup of coffee next to you and stays by your side, one hand on your shoulder, while you read it through.

  “They didn’t change a word.”

  He squeezes your shoulder. “You’ve always deserved this.” The pride in his voice is unmistakable, and that touches you.

  “If it wasn’t for you…”

  “No, no. It was only a matter of time.”

  You thank him, but you know in your heart that this is Tom Hunter talking, a dear, kind, loving man who has no idea how the world really works, let alone newspapers.

  “The irony is that it would never have happened without those thugs.” The fact that you made the front page because of the premeditated disruption of a lecture by a great man, whose work has been an enormous influence on you, takes the edge off your excitement. “Did you see how dignified he looked, even at the end?”

  “Probably not the first time something like that’s happened to him. At least nobody got seriously hurt.”

  “Yes. At least there’s that.”

  He strokes your back. “It was excellently composed. You were clear and succinct about the single tax.”

  He finishes his coffee and urges you not to forget yours. “I shall book a table tonight at the Lakeview, and would be grateful if the Tribune correspondent Antje Hunter might grace me with her company.”

  “You mean, before on the stroke of midnight she has to turn into Annie Borne again, and write about ketchup and skirts?”

  “I have no doubt that thousands of women are waiting anxiously for Annie to tell them what to wear and how to make the best ketchup in Chicago.”

  You reach up to run your fingers through his hair.

  He hugs you, before throwing on his overcoat.

  “Don’t forget your umbrella. It looks as though it’s going to rain again.”

  He plucks it out of the basket by the front door. Pausing, he arches his neck and pushes up his spectacles. You recognize the gesture. He has had an idea. “You know what Henry George should do,” he says, “if he wants to convince people about his scheme? Write a story about how life improves for the ordinary person, when he begins living in a world of commonly owned property and a single tax. That way we could see how much better it might be. If the story’s good enough, I’ll try to have it considered for The Dial.” The Dial is a literary magazine for which he has started to work. “I hear they’re after stories with a political angle.”

  “The next time I happen to bump into Mr. George, I’ll make sure I mention it.”

  You exchange a smile before the door closes.

  That’s Tom all over, you think, but you love him for it. He wants to reduce everything to make-believe, turn it into a story, as if that’s the only way the world can be understood.

  In the empty apartment, you feel lost. You ought to go to the public library and look up some alternative recipes for ketchup with which to pad out the article. But the very dullness of the task makes you feel exhausted. It is hateful, writing just for the sake of writing. Maybe it’s time to give up being the Annie Borne of food and fashion. Having the chance to spread the word to Tribune readers about Mr. George’s ideas, instead of writing about some silly recipe or new fashion, was exhilarating. But today, Mr. Crewe is bound to be back at his desk.

  It was Tom who pushed you to go home via the Tribune office, on the off chance that nobody had covered the meeting. When it turned out that Mr. Crewe was supposed to have been there but had not yet been sighted, the night editor gave his grudging, conditional approval: “We’re a tad short of news tonight, so I guess you can have a shot at it. No promises, though.” Mr. Crewe is one of those long-serving correspondents who has gotten lazy and behaves as though he owns the place. The joke in the office is that whenever he has to mention a lady in one of his articles, instead of bothering with a description, he uses the same stock expression: “Mrs. X was elegantly attired, as if on her way to tea at the Palmer House Hotel.” The count, they say, is currently nearing twenty.

  You walk from room to room, pause over Tom’s desk and touch his chair, imagining it filled by his long, stooping back as he puzzles with his pencil over yet another manuscript. One day, he’ll stop filling the bookshelves at McClurg’s and write his own stories, or become an editor, or maybe both. You sit down in his chair, rest your elbows on the armrests and breathe in the scent of stale pipe smoke that rises from the cracked leather when you subside into it. You don’t know what you would do without him. If you’d had children, maybe you wouldn’t feel so protective of him. Maybe that’s partly what this is about. But children or no children, that does not change the fact that his unworldliness can feel terribly fragile. That, you have no doubt, is exactly what attracted you to him in the first place.

  You return to the kitchen and read the article again. It’s good, you’re sure it’s good, as good as anything else on the front page. And why will they never again let you write about things that matter? Because you’re a woman. It is that simple, and it infuriates you. Only Margaret Fuller ever managed to break the mold, but that was years ago with the New-York Tribune and, sadly, she’s long since gone. You seem to recall, strangely, that prior to the job at the New-York Tribune she was the editor—in fact the first editor—of The Dial. That’s an idea. Imagine Tom’s face if you tell him you’ve decided to write a story on behalf of Mr. George for The Dial. If fiction worked as a stepping-stone for Margaret Fuller, maybe it could work for you too.

  There is a knock on the front door. A Tribune messenger boy is standing outside. You take the note and tear it open and your heart sinks. Mr. Medill wants to see you.

  * * *

  Walking through the Tribune premises is always an ordeal. The women’s small office is located on its own, away from the main newsroom. But that is not, today, where you go. You approach the stairs, looking straight ahead as you walk past the open door of the typesetting room, and take the steps carefully. You don’t want to trip. Tripping is exactly the kind of thing Tom would do, if he were as nervous as you are. At the top of the stairs, you take a deep breath before pushing open the double doors.

  You are struck by the usual mid-morning mayhem. The air is muggy with male sweat and tobacco smoke; the rows of desks look like listing wrecks, submerged beneath piles of papers, old files, books, notepads, ashtrays and coffee cups. Some reporters are seated at them, others are on the move, standing in earnest little groups, arguing and gesticulating, waving sheafs of paper, shouting to each other across the room. The airlessness makes you feel faint, as you begin to navigate your way forward. It always surprises you that newspaper men should need to make such a commotion simply to produce words on paper. Oddly, while you are traversing the newsroom, you experience a moment of epiphany as you reflect on the discrepancy between the chaos and noise of production, and the crafted perfection and silence of the final product.

  As far as possible, you avoid meeting anyone’s eyes. It’s impossible not to overhear scraps of conversation. Sportswriter James Wendell is forecasting a win at the weekend for the White Stockings, columnist Frank Norten is boasting about an interview in which he “put Mayor Harrison in his place on the Irish and anarchist problems. That should make the boss happy.” Hubert Moss, who writes about farming issues, is pleading, as usual, to be given more space for his Life on the Prairies section. Joey Sholder is being slapped down by tubby news editor Magnus French; “You gotta have your facts straight, Joey. Otherwise there ain’t no point in calling this a newspaper, now is there?” You glance across when he begins the Mr. Gradgrind act, which he does at least once a week. A short man with a yellowy smoke-stained beard, he rocks back on his heels and tugs at his waistcoat, as he adopts an exaggerated English accent. “Now what I want, Mr.
Sholder, is Facts. Facts alone are wanted at the Tribune.” Mr. French is a first-class bore and you have never liked Dickens. They go well together. There are some grins, some yawns, and a call to “keep it down, Frenchie, can’t you?”

  They all look at you when you come in. They always do. You can feel their eyes follow you, as they always do. You are nearly there, at the far end of the room, and have had nothing more than a few nods of acknowledgment, and even a couple of compliments (“good piece, Mrs. Hunter”) when you hear the sandpaper drawl of Mr. Grayson Crewe. He’s leaning back in his chair, spinning a pencil with his fingertips. His eyes are red and sharp. “Hey, look who’s paying a visit, fellas. If that ain’t our very own sweet apple dumpling Annie Borne … no, no, no … wait on … Maybe I need a pair of spectacles. Because I’m not sure that’s Annie, after all.” He ruffles through a copy of the newspaper, pulling out pages, playing the fool until he’s holding up the front page to show everyone. “Blow me, if that ain’t the oddest-sounding name … Ant. Jee. Hun. Ter.” He reads your name aloud again, mispronouncing it, making it sound unintelligible and silly. “I prefer sweet ole Annie Borne. Wouldn’t want her getting any ideas above her station and trying to migrate to other columns, now would we, fellas?”

  You come to a halt and turn to face Mr. Crewe. You let him finish before, with a smile, you say: “Oh, don’t worry, Mr. Crewe, I wouldn’t pass muster for your column.” You pause. He grins, flicking the pencil against his puffy cheeks. “After all, I’m never elegantly attired, as if on my way to the Palmer House Hotel for tea.”

  The newsroom breaks out into laughter. That gives you a much-needed boost of confidence as you reach the door, turn into the corridor and walk toward the office at the end where you have an appointment with the Chicago Daily Tribune’s owner and editor in chief.

  * * *

  Mr. Medill is polite. He offers you a chair and calls for coffee to be brought. He asks for a minute, while he finishes what he is doing. “I will then give you my full attention, Mrs. Hunter.”

  You settle on the edge of the chair, ankles crossed, hands in your lap, holding your pencil and notebook in what you hope is a relaxed but efficient-looking manner. You have dressed carefully, in what Tom calls your “official outfit”—a long auburn skirt with a short velvet Eton jacket and a sensible felt hat with a bright blue bow at the side. It is smart without being ostentatious, serious but not dull. You try to act as if at ease, though you fear your nervousness will be written in the tightness of your expression, your tense posture. You glance across as he concentrates on the document in front of him. It seems that he can write as he thinks, quickly and efficiently. He crosses nothing out. Barely looking up, he dips his pen in the inkwell and continues. His gray hair, close cut, looks almost silver. His pen is gold-plated. His face is lean, well proportioned, with a fine brow and firm mouth. He gives off an aura of decisiveness and intelligence. This is what power looks like, you think. And then you tell yourself to calm down and keep things in perspective.

  You think back to the strangeness of how you have come to be seated here today in front of Mr. Joseph Medill, the run of circumstances that began such a long time ago with that letter from “An Excluded Female of Voting Age.” You were twenty-seven years old. You can still remember the arguments you used in that missive, full of youthful fire and courage. That, doubtless, was why it caught Mr. Medill’s attention. Why should we halt the fight for universal women’s suffrage, you wrote, until the battle for Negro male suffrage has been won? It wasn’t that you did not agree wholeheartedly with both causes, but you failed to understand why one should be advanced at the expense of the other. You were fully behind those admirable campaigners Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. “Women’s suffrage is a right before God,” you wrote. “It should also be a right in the constitution of the United States.”

  A few days later, there was a request on the Letters page from the editor that “An Excluded Female of Voting Age” should identify herself to the newspaper if she wanted to discover something to her advantage. Mr. Medill, in those days, did not edit the paper. But he owned it, and when the editor of the day told you he would give you a chance with food and fashion, you were left in no doubt that this was done on the owner’s instructions. Since Mr. Medill’s return to edit the paper, you have never seen him on his own.

  He looks up, and apologizes for having kept you waiting. He puts his elbows on the desk and frowns. He says he has asked you here to talk about your article. “I think Mr. George’s ideas,” he says, “are unworkable. I also think they lack rigor and vision. In the industrial age, land will become less important. Take the meatpacking industry in our city. How much land is used by Packingtown? One square mile? One square mile that produces an income…”

  At first, you are too much on edge to absorb what he is saying. You cannot challenge him or argue back. But the longer he speaks, the more you forget where you are and why you are here. There might be fragments of truth in what Mr. Medill says, but the fallacies in his argument are glaring. When an opportunity occurs, you point out where you believe him to be misinformed. Packingtown, for instance, depends on a vast hinterland for the raising of the livestock, it depends on the railroads, it depends on the exploitation of an oversupply of labor. It is disingenuous, therefore, to claim that it uses only one square mile of land. And look at the way in which the stockyards pollute the Chicago River and take no responsibility for it, although the river is a common resource that should be the property of all. The Chicago River continues to contaminate the Lake, the dirty water has yet again caused an outbreak of cholera.

  You speak passionately, and at length, and—you come to realize—without interruption from Mr. Medill. When you have finished, silence falls. He is leaning back in his chair, watching you. You cannot read his expression. But you know you have said too much, that you have likely roused his temper, that he is precisely one of those landowners who has made substantial profits from property speculation of the kind that Mr. George’s scheme would seek to abolish. You notice him rub his hands together. An expression of self-control or one of anger? When he throws one of his tantrums, he can be heard at the far end of the newsroom. You cringe at the thought of having to return through there, with the men sniggering behind your back. Oh how impulsive you can be, Antje Hunter. Was it not the hated Miss Trumbull who always snapped at you, for speaking before thinking? Maybe, for once, she was right. Because you have, haven’t you, just argued against every position Mr. Medill set out?

  A wave of revolt runs through you. To hell with Miss Trumbull and her kind. Let Mr. Medill fly off the handle if he wants. Let him speak sharply, let him lose his temper, let him insult you. There’s no need to cower before him and agree to everything he says because—without even consulting Tom or thinking it through—you have made an irrevocable decision. You will do no more work for the Tribune. Annie Borne will speak no more. The citizens of Chicago can survive very well without Annie’s advice about dressing for dinner or making ketchup. You will not write another line about food or fashion. Instead, you will find a way to write a book about something that really matters. You will find again the voice and courage of that young person who signed off as “An Excluded Woman of Voting Age.”

  Mr. Medill has begun to talk. He is not shouting. He does not even look angry. He seems to be saying he thought your article about Mr. George was interesting, that the description of events was precise and the arguments regarding the content of his lecture were evenly balanced. “I do not agree with Mr. George,” he says. “But I am always prepared to listen to an argument with which I do not agree, as long as it is cogently and fairly presented.”

  You find it hard, again, to concentrate. This time, it’s difficult because what he is saying is unexpected. You don’t, at first, understand the gist of his speech for what it is.

  “It has happened once before,” he says, “though never on a Chicago newspaper. But I see no reason why the Chicago Daily Tribune should not ha
ve a female reporter,” he says. “Do you?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Good.” He begins to make a list of topics that, he says, need examination—corrupt politicians, the anarchist movement, the city’s sanitation problems, the failings in the construction industry. The list goes on. You are taking notes. “And I have no objection,” he says, “if you would like to continue to explore the issues of Henry George’s single tax and women’s suffrage.”

  You add those to the list.

  “Yes, sir.” You hear the tremble in your voice as the enormity of what Mr. Medill is saying begins to sink in. You close your notebook. You thank him for the opportunity.

  “The night editor says he used your real name as a temporary measure because he did not want to be responsible for making one up. And ‘Annie Borne’ would hardly have been, in the circumstances”—he smiles—“appropriate.”

  “I would like to retain my own name,” you say. If a man can use his own name in a newspaper, why should a woman not do the same?

  Mr. Medill gives another thin, but not unkind, smile. “I suspected you might. Very well, Mrs. Hunter.”

  You close the door behind you, and stand in the corridor. Your heart is beating so fast, it makes you feel short of breath. After a silent prayer to the spirit of Margaret Fuller, to thank her for leading the way, you walk back toward the newsroom. This time, you do not care how they look at you or what they say. You’re going straight to the bookstore to tell Tom.

  1885

  NOTES FOR A PHOTOGRAPHIC EXHIBITION

  by S. Alfsson

  AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH

  When the Hutchinson Art Gallery asked me to prepare an autobiographical sketch for this catalog, I replied that although I had no objection to speaking about myself, I believe it is the photograph, and only the photograph, that should occupy the viewer’s attention. We therefore agreed that I would offer information about myself only where this might aid the interpretation of the exhibits. I hope this approach will cause no offense.