Tuesday Open Line


One of the things we usually take for granted is that our morning newspaper will appear on our doorstep every day. For over 150 years, getting papers to their subscribers was the chore of a small army of newspaper delivery boys. Usually somewhere between 10 and 15, youngsters hungry for their own pocket money got up at 4 a.m. to bicycle or walk through their neighborhoods to toss papers onto front porches. Today is the anniversary of the hiring of the very first newsboy in the U.S. — 10-year-old Barney Flaherty, who delivered the New York Sun in 1833. Now, most of our 48.5 million daily papers are delivered by commercial distributors; and the newsboy, like the milkman, is part of history. You can find more facts about America from the U.S. Census Bureau, online at <www.census.gov>.