The Press: Painful Pictures

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The best newspapers, like the best people, make mistakes. But seldom is any paper so unfortunate as was the exemplary New York Times last week. One morning the Times's sober obituary page carried accounts of two famed men who had died the day before, Fairfax Harrison, onetime president of the Southern Railway, and Engineer Dexter Parshall Cooper, father of Passamaquoddy's tidal-harnessing project. Each was illustrated with a picture. Unfortunately, the purported likeness of Mr. Harrison bore the easily recognizable features of John Jeremiah Pelley, president of the Association of American Railroads, the picture of Mr. Cooper the features of famed Army engineer Lieut. Colonel Philip Bracken Fleming, now stationed at St. Paul—both very much alive. To all concerned the Times wrote apologies, except the Associated Press, which got a stern complaint for supplying the painful pictures.