Texas Almanac, 1947-1948 Page: 36
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36 TEXAS ALMANAC -1947-1948
from the coast. The News, like the flag,
followed this trade into the hinterland,
and by the early eighties much of its cir-
culation was in communities as far away
as Austin, Waco, Dallas, Fort Worth and
the Red River settlements.
Beginning about 1880, Dealey became a
staff correspondent and traveling agent
for The News He thus became familiar
at first hand with the rest of Texas. For
a time he headed the Houston office, then
the largest of the company outside of
Galveston. He was also stationed for a
number of months at Waco and then at
Dallas. The latter had a population of less
than 25,000, but Dealey was unshakable
in his belief that the town on the Trinity
River was destined to become a great
metropolis in its own right.
Executives within The News at Galves-
ton became concerned with the mounting
difficulty of delivering the paper to the
growing hlists of subscribers in the
northern part of Texas. R. G. Lowe and
Thomas W. Dealey urged Colonel Belo to
seek some solution. And so it was finally
decided that The News would be "shipped
by wire" from Galveston to a central
distribution point at Dallas. The idea had
been advanced by a railroad friend of
Colonel Lowe's, W. H. Newman. Thus
was born The Dallas Morning News,
originally conceived merely as a dupli-
cate of the Galveston edition, with leased
wires to transmit the bulk of its reading
matter.
The business manager chosen for the
new venture at Dallas was George Dealey.
Only twenty-six years of age, the young
man had none the less proven himself in
the eleven years he had been with the
company. His enthusiasm, his consistent
energy and his meticulous attention to
the job commended him highly to his
employers. He had also recently taken on
the responsibility of a family, having per-
suaded a daughter of Missouri to become
his wife. He had met Miss Olivia Allen,
daughter of the copublisher of the Lex-
ington Intelligencer, a year or so before
when a party of Missouri newspaper peo-
ple visited the seaside at Galveston. They
were married in 1884 and were stationed
in Houston for The News when he was
assigned to the new venture at Dallas.
Dallas News Founded.
The start of The Dallas Morning News
on October 1, 1885, was decisive in the
history of the publishing organization. It
was even more the epochal event in the
life of G. B. Dealey. During the next
sixty-one years the newspaper would
grow as he grew, becoming more and
more the expression of his personality
and genius, so that in the end the charac-
ter of the newspaper and the characterof its publisher were virtually one and
the same.
The course of the Dallas edition turned
out far different from that envisioned at
first by officials of the company. It
quickly outstripped its parent publication
at Galveston, both in circulation and
advertising. Identified from the start with
a lusty and growing young city, The
Dallas Morning News promptly evolved a
personality of its own. The assembly and
installation of machinery and the smooth
start of publication were largely the
result of Dealey's organizing ability. Dur-
ing the next ten years the orderly and
prosperous development of the paper,
especially in all those business office
functions without which the finest re-
porting and editing are defeated, was
primarily the work of the business
manager.
Executives of the company recognized
this fact in 1895, when, by the simple
expedient of dropping the word business
from his title of manager, they gave him
almost unlimited authority over all de-
partments of the Dallas enterprise. Thus
from that date forward The Dallas News
became increasingly the reflection of the
ideas and ideals of G. B. Dealey, although
it was not until 1906 that he became
vice-president and general manager of
all properties at Dallas and Galveston.
Training as Publisher.
From 1895 there began for Dealey what
may be called the education of a news-
paper publisher. It was a process of
growth and experiment which never ended
so long as he drew breath, for his face
was ever toward the future and he re-
tained the marvelous elasticity of youth
to the last. It may be worthwhile for a
moment to ponder the nature and func-
tion of great newspaper publishers. They
are not confined in the somewhat narrow
bounds of the work of reporter and
editor. The term is relatively new in the
history of journalism and has been
created out of the infinite complexity of
modern newspaper making. Willard Rich-
ardson almost singlehanded could edit,
manage and publish the original News.
Colonel Belo, who was the Chief Proprie-
tor from 1866 until his death in 1901,
skillfully directed the growth of his or-
ganization from a handful to a sizable
company. But in the new century the
newspaper world has been further trans-
formed in scope and in size. The over-all
direction of such vast enterprises calls for
a type of mind that generates ideas first
of all and yet has the instinct to select
the proper men and methods to carry
them out. Ideas remain greater than their
formal expression in print. Dealey was
not primarily a writing man, although he
always expressed himself clearly, force-
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Texas Almanac, 1947-1948, book, 1947; Dallas, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth117136/m1/38/: accessed May 7, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.