Stop The Press

I was watching TV when the phrase “Stop the presses” was used to indicate that something was so urgent that it required immediate action. This reminded me of the one time that I actually did get to say those words and the silliness that was associated with the issue.
If the truth is told, telephones and other direct forms of communication have replaced the person running from the news room to the press room and have done that for many years. The person running with the pages to be changed are more of a theatrical effect then reality.
I had the opportunity to participate in an event of this type only once while working for a newspaper. It was a Sunday night and we were preparing for the first edition of the Sunday paper that would be printed just after midnight on Sunday morning. We did many things to prepare and the last step occurred after the printing had actually started in the press room which was located three floors below the editorial offices of the paper. It was discovered that a women’s name had been misspelled in a list of local sports scores. This was in a list that was printed in very fine type. In fact it was in the bowling list of scores from a bowling tournament. I never did know it was even seen unless it was just pure luck on the part of the editors. I was handed the page to take downstairs to give to the press operators, just so that they would have a record of the change that was needed. In fact all that was done at first was to chisel off the first letter of the name and then a new page could be made for latter editions of the paper.
I hurried to the elevator and went downstairs knowing that they were phoning ahead to have the change made. In fact it was done before I arrived in the press room. As I said to the press operators I just had to say it one time: “STOP THE PRESSES”. In fact I was laughing when I did it and the press people just ignored it all. I had my moment of fun and the paper was partially protected under California law because it could show that it had found the error and that it was not intentionally doing anything to the person named.
We were all aware of the importance of making the change as quickly as possible because of a previous instance that had been much more expensive to the paper. A front page error was not caught until after the paper had been put on trucks and the first truck was traveling all the way across the state. It had to be recalled and the papers replaced after the truck had already started to make deliveries. Remember this was before cell phones and they could not get in touch with the driver until he reached his first stop. What was the error that caused that much trouble? Somehow (never officially explained) someone had managed to add a line of type to a story on the front page of the first editions of the paper. It called a candidate for governor a SOB. You may know the candidate. Let’s just say that he later resigned from the Presidency. All of this was done just to protect the paper from a lawsuit. The paper is covered by a law that says that. if good intent is shown. then the paper is protected from a lawsuit.
It just shows that immediate action may not always be as fast as you want. It also shows that you must consider all cases as important, no matter what the level.