| Revision as of 16:59, 4 July 2020 editBeenAroundAWhile (talk | contribs)Extended confirmed users103,575 editsNo edit summary← Previous edit | Revision as of 16:59, 4 July 2020 edit undoBeenAroundAWhile (talk | contribs)Extended confirmed users103,575 edits ←Blanked the pageTag: BlankingNext edit → | ||
| Line 1: | Line 1: | ||
| '''Daniel M. Grissom''' (1829-1930) was an American journalist of the 19th Century. | |||
| ==Personal life== | |||
| Grissom, who was born in ], was the son of Alfred Grissom, a tailor, and Abrilla or Adaline Pittman, 13 years his junior.<ref> </ref><ref></ref><ref name=1850census></ref> | |||
| He studied at ], Tennessee, where ] was one of his tutors, and he became a lawyer.<ref name=1850census/><ref name=WhenLincoln></ref> He moved to ], in 1842, when he was 21.<ref name=FrontPage></ref> | |||
| In the 1880 census, Grissom was living in Carondelet Township, adjoining ], with his wife, Frances R. Grissom.<ref></ref> The 1910 census stated he was widowed.<ref></ref> | |||
| In 1930 he was feted with a party to mark his 100th birthday in a Kirkwood ], where he lived for 18 years.<ref></ref> He died at the age of 101 on May 17, 1930,<ref></ref> and was buried in ].<ref></ref> | |||
| ==Professional life== | |||
| ===Editing=== | |||
| Grissom's initial journalistic job, in 1842 or shortly after, was with the ''],'' where he first covered a lecture series at the library. He was soon made editor, a position he held for ten years.<ref name=FrontPage/> | |||
| An interviewer wrote of him in 1927: "As a boy he had felt the urge to write and the career of a journalist attracted him strongly. . . . Grissom had the somewhat detached, impersonal attitude toward events often found in newspaper men."<ref name=FrontPage/> | |||
| In September 1861, the first year of the ], he and ], proprietor of the ''Evening News,'' were arrested and the newspaper was ordered repressed . The two were released and the suppression was lifted when "satisfactory guarantees" were made to the commanding general of Union forces that the newspaper "should not hereafter contain articles of a character calculated to impede the operations of the Government or impair the efficiency of the operations of the ]."<ref></ref> | |||
| He continued as editor when the ''St. Louis Union'' bought the ''News'' and the name of the combined newspapers was changed to ''].'' Some "five or six years later" he moved to the ''],'' where he became assistant editor to ].<ref name=FrontPage/> | |||
| In 1863, while editor of the ''Union,'' Grissom was nominated to be state printer of Missouri but was not chosen.<ref></ref>The ''Chicago Tribune'' referred to him as a "conservative" and to his successful opponent, a Dr. Curry, editor of the ''State Times,'' as a radical.<ref></ref> | |||
| St. Louis ] listed Grissom as an editor working for the '']'' in 1865 <ref></ref> and the '']'' in 1878<ref></ref> and 1880.<ref></ref> | |||
| Historian Walter B. Stevens said of him in 1911:<ref name=Stevens>"St. Louis, The Fourth City, 1764-1911," page 171]</ref> | |||
| <blockquote>He was at home in every field of editorial comment. What he wrote was easy to read. The style was virile and straightforward. There was no striving after effect in words.</blockquote> | |||
| By 1888, Grissom had retired; he was lauded that year in a speech by former ''Republican'' editor ], who said that Grissom, then living in Kirkwood, had done more "all-round work than any other man who ever wielded the pen in St. Louis."<ref></ref> | |||
| ===Reporting=== | |||
| ====Lincoln-Douglas==== | |||
| Grissom covered one of the ], in ], in 1858.<ref name=WhenLincoln/> | |||
| In 1928, he recalled:<ref name=WhenLincoln/> | |||
| <blockquote>Douglas, styled the "Little Giant,' was a small man scarcely 5 feet 4 inches, with broad shoulders and a stalwart neck. His head was massive and majestic-looking and his voice could deepen into a roar. He was well groomed and prosperous-looking and strode the stage as one at ease. At all times he seemed sure of himself.</blockquote> | |||
| <blockquote>Lincoln's clothes hung loosely on his 6-foot-4-inch frame. His small, twinkling gray eyes shone from beneath shaggy brows. . . . Sometimes he seemed all legs and feet and again all hands and neck. He had no stage manners, no studied art. His speech was full of short, homely words. . . . His very loneliness, modest bearing, air of mingled sadness and sincerity excited sympathy and won the hearts of the quiet, plain people.</blockquote> | |||
| ====Gasconade Bridge==== | |||
| As a journalist with the ''St. Louis Evening News,'' Grissom was seated in the last car of the ] train involved in the ] of 1855, in which more than thirty people were killed when a bridge collapsed under it.<ref name=WhenLincoln/> He recalled seventy-two years later: | |||
| <blockquote>Suddenly there was an awful crash, a sickening lurch—another—another. We were moving forward jerkily, sickeningly. Horrid sounds came from ahead. We realized in a flash what must have happened—the bridge was gone—we were being pulled into the river by the weight of the cars ahead, which had already crashed over the bank! Then—our car was going, too. The violent motion threw us to the floor. . . . </blockquote> | |||
| <blockquote>When a relief train from St. Louis came to our aid it was a very different kind of crowd . . . Hardly a word was spoken as we leaned our heads upon our hands, some uttering groans and low cries of despair caused by their own sufferings or the realization of the loss of friend or relative in the disaster.<ref name=FrontPage/> | |||
| </blockquote> | |||
| ===Other=== | |||
| Grissom was captain of Company G of the Ninth Regiment of the Enrolled Missouri Militia, which took action against Shelby in September-October 1863, fought at Booneville, Merrill’s Crossing and Dug Ford (near Jonesborough ) and Marshall in October, and was mustered out in November.<ref></ref><ref name=HistoryOf>''History of St. Louis'' </ref> | |||
| At a large public meeting in ] on June 17, 1865, Grissom was appointed, along with ] and Fred M. Kretschmar, to a committee to protest against the forcible removal of three judges from their chambers by armed men upon the order of Governor ].<ref name=HistoryOf/> | |||
| In 1892, Grissom produced a "handsome pamphlet of eighty-four pages" for the ] | |||
| in which he laid out a proposal to ] for separating the ] from all the other ] when making ] for improvements.<ref></ref> | |||
| ==Legacy== | |||
| Grissom's Landing on the ], ten miles below ], was named for him<ref></ref> or his family. | |||
| ==See also== | |||
| * ] (1836-1898), Grissom's managing editor on the ''Missouri Republican'' | |||
| *] | |||
| * ] | |||
| ==References== | |||
| {{ref list}} | |||
| {{DEFAULTSORT:Grissom, Daniel}} | |||
| ] | |||
| ] | |||
| ] | |||
| ] | |||
| ] | |||