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Reminiscences of Pioneer Days in St. Paul by Frank Moore
page 15 of 148 (10%)
magnitude of the news got circulated cheer after cheer rent the air,
and cannon, anvils, firecrackers and everything that would make a
noise was brought into requisition, and before sundown St. Paul had
celebrated the greatest Fourth of July in its history.

* * * * *

I arrived in St. Paul on the morning of the 17th of April, 1858, and
Immediately commenced work on the Daily Minnesotian, my brother, Geo.
W. Moore, being part owner and manager of the paper. I had not been at
work long before I learned what a "scoop" was. Congress had passed
a bill admitting Minnesota into the Union, but as there was no
telegraphic communication with Washington it required two or three
days for the news to reach the state. The Pioneer, Minnesotian and
Times were morning papers, and were generally printed the evening
before. It so happened that the news of the admission of Minnesota was
brought to St. Paul by a passenger on a late boat and the editors of
the Pioneer accidentally heard of the event and published the same
on the following morning, thus scooping the other two papers. The
Minnesotian got out an extra and sent it around to their subscribers
and they thought they had executed a great stroke of enterprise. It
was not long before I became familiar with the method of obtaining
news and I was at the levee on the arrival of every boat thereafter.
I could tell every boat by its whistle, and there was no more scoops
'till the telegraph line was completed in the summer of 1860.

* * * * *

During the latter part of the Civil war the daily newspapers began to
expand, and have ever since kept fully abreast of the requirements of
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