• U.S.

The Press: Honest Puffing

2 minute read
TIME

To sell neckties, rouge, nuts, cigarets and mattresses, U. S. advertisers have persistently sought and bought endorsements from many a famed cinemactress, socialite, banker, clown. Newsreaders, grown weary of such commercial fanfare, frequently flip past pages in their periodicals and newspapers which bear gaudy, bought accolades. But last week in the sedate New York Times many a reader paused before a full-page advertisement bearing a stern, well-known face and signature. Ambassador Charles Gates Dawes was tendering a testimonial to the Times. Said he: “The New York Times has reached its commanding position of influence in the country because of a conviction on the part of the public that in its editorial and news policy, it is influenced by the substance as distinguished from the semblance of things. . . . The Times stands like a beacon light in what is at times pretty foggy weather.”

Quick was the Times to explain that this testimonial was unbought. unsolicited. Senator Capper of Kansas and Novelist Arnold Bennett of England were two other testifiers whose good words the Times published lately. A dozen other celebrities scheduled to compliment the Times through its own pages include Charles Evans Hughes, Elihu Root, President Mary Emma Woolley of Mount Holyoke College, President Henry Smith Pritchett of the Carnegie Foundation.

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