Posted on: Sunday, August 29, 2004

OUR HONOLULU

By Bob Krauss
Advertiser Krauss

It is time that I call to your attention a revolutionary aspect of The Advertiser's new, state-of-the-art presses that everybody else has neglected to mention. From now on, when you read The Advertiser, the ink will not come off on your hands.

I'm not sure that the average, run-of-the-mill resident of Our Honolulu is aware of what this means to civilization in our time.

For years, readers ignored the brilliance of our writing, the sound logic of our editorials, our energetic coverage of news events, the artistic ability of our photographers, and the prompt delivery of all this to their doorsteps just because reading the newspaper got their fingers a little smudged.

You should have listened in on the tirades I have suffered through when somebody got me confused with the circulation desk.

So what's a little printer's ink here and there? After all, an artist creating a masterpiece expects to get spattered with a dab or two of paint.

This is what George Chaplin tried to explain to his wife, Esta, when he became editor in chief of The Advertiser in 1958. They bought an elegant house in Wai'alae-Kahala. Her deep-nap carpet in the living room was a thing of beauty forever. Until George came home and left footprints all the way to the kitchen.

You see, the wooden floor of the composing room in back of the news department was black with ink tracked in from decades of intimate communication with the printing facility in back. George had to go back and supervise the makeup on the newspaper pages in the composing room.

Esta failed to appreciate the magnificence of this contribution to journalism. Why couldn't George just stay in his office instead of hobnobbing with the printers in the back shop? Would you believe that she made the editor in chief of The Advertiser take his shoes off at the front door every time he came home?

It is true that printer's ink for centuries has left an unsavory stamp on my noble profession. Reporters were called "ink-stained wretches" with a salary to match.

Happily, our ultra-modern, high-technology press is squeaky-clean. The ink comes off our new press on the page, not on your hands.

We had a big party last weekend at Kapolei. A thousand employees and their spouses celebrated the new press with a trip through the printing plant. They came out as spick-and-span as first-day kindergarten pupils starting school.

So don't worry about ink coming off on your hands anymore. Probably, you haven't even noticed. That's the way it is with earth-shaking improvements. Nobody bothers to say thanks.