[instrumental trumpet music]
Some people spend a lot of time getting the news.
Other people spend a lot of time getting it
to them.
No matter how far you go to get the news…
The Associated Press -better known as AP -has
probably gone a lot further.
To Vietnam, for instance.
A napalm strike in the heart of the jungle
is 12,000 miles from New York City…
But Peter Arnett, Saigon correspondent for
The Associated Press is there…
Along with photographer Horst Faas, also an
AP man.
Their job is to spot the story and get the
news...
Halfway around the world and back to New York
headquarters, so that 8,000 members and subscribers
of this immense organization can get the story
to you.
Actually, for Peter and Horst, both Pulitzer
Prize winners for their work in Vietnam, the
story begins in the 30 man Saigon Bureau of
The Associated Press.
A check on the Assignment Board tells of the
day's missions...
And Horst prepares for the pictures...
As well as the mud.
Peter Arnett confirms their destination on
the map at briefing headquarters, and the
two men are off.
They follow a long tradition of AP war coverage.
In 1876, part-time correspondent Mark Kellogg
rode with General Custer into the battle of
the Little Big Horn...
and died in the massacre.
In Vietnam, two AP men have been killed and
nine wounded in the past two years alone.
Peter Arnett is a newsman, but he carries
a camera on most missions.
According to Horst Faas: "I cannot think of
any correspondent who worked for The AP in
Vietnam without a camera around his neck.
And every photographer, day in and out, tries
to bring news items along from his field trips."
The strike comes quickly.
Back in the Saigon Bureau, News Editor Bob
Tuckman takes down Peter's story over the
telephone.
Correspondent Ed White, in charge of the Saigon
Bureau, locates the date line on the map,
with his colleagues, then edits the copy...
And teletype operators begin to transmit the
story by wire.
Then Horst Faas returns from the battle area,
he goes over the negatives of his film...
As does Photo Editor John Nance.
Dark-room technicians turn the negatives into
prints -either color or black and white...
And Editor Nance checks the schedule to have
them transmitted.
He'll send a courier with photo prints to
the local telegraph office...
Where pictures are radioed from Saigon...
Through the Tokyo telegraph office...
To The Associated Press office in Tokyo, where
a photo editor checks prints...
And sends them off to San Francisco.
From there they are sent through a monitoring
device to New York.
In New York City, at The Associated Press
Building -headquarters for the entire network
-the picture winds up at the fourth floor...
Where a caption writer may be set to work
just 30 minutes after the picture left Saigon.
In another corner of this vast newsroom, heads
of news departments are already meeting to
discuss Peter Arnett's story along with others
being covered at the moment and developing
situations.
While they meet, a microphone connects them
to AP news executives in Washington and Chicago.
When foreign desk editors have checked the
story, they prepare to send it out to the
four corners of the globe.
Copy is sent by teletype machines, manned
by skilled operators.
The operator strikes the letter keys as he
would a typewriter...
Thus producing a punched paper, or tape...
Which feeds into a transmitter and sends signals
along the circuit.
The signals activate keys on receivers all
along that particular circuit...
Causing them to print out the story, letter
by letter, for editors all over the world.
Some newspapers also receive a special tape
along with printed copies of each story.
This is called automatic typesetting tape.
When the tape is fed into linecasting machines
at newspaper offices...
Stories are automatically set into type.
Moreover, the galley of type that the printer
pulls out is automatically set in lines of
equal width--justified, it's called.
Computers do the job here, and from these
galleys it's just a short step to newsprint...
And Peter Arnett's by-line.
Meanwhile, back at the photo desk in New York,
the wirephoto operator receives the incoming
picture...
And clamps it to a cylinder.
As the cylinder revolves under a tiny beam
of light...
Signals are sent along a circuit and recorded
on special photographic paper at the receiving
end in bureaus and newspaper offices.
When the transmission is finished, the picture
is automatically developed, dried and dropped
into a tray.
Total time: less than 9 minutes.
Wirephoto has been transmitting Associated
Press pictures since 1935...
Since the explosion of the Hindenburg...
And the most famous picture from World War
II.
A few years later, the Berlin wall.
1963: death by fire for a South Vietnamese
Buddhist.
November, 1963: history in Dallas.
Today, AP pictures are also transmitted in
color--either by wire or by mail.
That's how Horst Faas caught the napalm strike...
and how you got the news.
There's one more way that The Associated Press
gets the news to you.
At the broadcast news department in New York...
Incoming teletypes record news from all over
the world.
These get turned into hourly news summaries
for some 2,900 radio and television members
near and far...
Even as far as Nome, Alaska, where the dialect
is Eskimo.
You see, even though The Associated Press
doesn't print its own stories for the public...
You don't have to wade through wire copy...
Or wrap yourself in wirephotos to see what
The Associated Press has to say.
You can read it in the newspaper...
Or catch it on television...
Or hear it wherever you are...
RADIO VOICE: "And now the latest news from
the wires of The Associated Press."
Of course, New York and Saigon aren't the
only Associated Press Bureaus.
Besides member newspapers -who contribute
a great deal of their own news to the wires
-AP staffers work from bureaus all over the
world.
And whether someone's going up into space...
Or coming down to earth...
Or whether there's a crisis at Checkpoint
Charlie...
Or an interview in Mexico...
Or a fire next door, the speed and the coverage
are just the same: so fast, that a bulletin
can go around the world in a minute; so well-linked...
That what happens in India today...
Can turn up tomorrow in your local paper.
Whatever the hour, wherever the country, The
Associated Press can cover it.
It's the largest news cooperative in the world,
tracing its history back to 1848.
Since then, the newsgathering traditions have
remained...
The cooperative expanded.
Today, in the United States alone, more than
110 Associated Press Bureaus are located in
all 50 states.
The Washington Bureau, with 150 men and women,
ranks first in size outside of New York headquarters.
President Johnson is usually the top story
--and The Associated Press has been covering
Presidents for a long time.
Back in 1865, Washington Correspondent Lawrence
Gobright was at Ford's Theatre just minutes
after President Lincoln was shot.
His lead is a classic in brief journalism:
"The President was shot in a theatre tonight
and perhaps mortally wounded."
Today, President Johnson's every activity
may be covered by AP's Frank Cormier, with
a question at a press conference...
Or by columnist James Marlow, with a news
analysis for the paper.
Senate activities are the province of Jack
Bell, veteran newsman who has headed the AP's
large Senate staff for 28 years.
Jack Bell writes his stories from The Associated
Press booth in the Senate press gallery...
Then gives them to a teletype operator right
in the booth.
The operator transmits the story directly
to The Associated Press Washington office...
Where an editor checks the copy.
As the story moves out on the wire to AP members,
it's given a final reading by Washington News
Editor Marvin Arrowsmith.
A copy of the story reaches New York at the
same time as it reaches members.
At the General news desk, editors check the
story for fairness and accuracy...
Then send it to the A wire --prime news distribution
circuit in this country for national and international
news.
The A wire operates around the clock...
Its editor is in charge of pressing the buttons
that tell which stories should move... and
when...
So that you can get Jack Bell's story right
away.
Of course, you're not the only one getting
AP news.
Wires from The Associated Press reach 900
million people in more than 100 countries
through 8,500 newspapers, radio and television
stations.
From the World Services Desk in New York,
manned by News Editor Webb McKinley,
news from all over the world is distributed
to Associated Press subscribers outside the
United States.
In simultaneous transmission, a story will
move to Europe, Africa and Asia--always in
English.
News moves in Spanish, too, from the Latin
American desk, also in New York.
What else goes on at New York headquarters?
Financial and business news, as well as up-to-the-minute
stock market prices tabulated by computer.
And there are specialists..experts in the
field, like Alton Blakeslee, dean of AP science
writers...
Daily columnist Hal Boyle, who picked up a
Pulitzer Prize for his frontline coverage
of world War II.
AP men have won a total of 21 Pulitzers.
And there's Irving Desfor, camera columnist,
trying out a new technique.
His column is one of many provided by The
Associated Press on such topics as cooking,
stamps, home building and women's news.
News-in-depth is the speciality of the Newsfeatures
Department.
Their by-lines are famous: Sid Moody, John
Wheeler, Bernie Gavzer, Jules Loh...
Special Correspondent Saul Pett, whose feature
stories -like one on The Credibility Gap...
Get big display in newspapers.
The Associated Press is a cooperative -that
means it's owned by its members and that it
makes no profit.
Membership meets annually in New York to hear
reports and discuss operations.
Members also elect the Board of Directors...
18 men who serve without pay and meet three
times a year in New York to review all world-wide
operations.
The Board elects the President.
Right now it's Paul Miller currently President
of Gannett Newspapers.
The Board also appoints a General Manager
and gives him authority to run the operation.
Since 1962 it's been former war correspondent
Wes Gallagher.
These are some of the people at the top...
People in charge of the AP staffers, who in
turn are in charge of getting the news...
And getting it to you.
Mark Twain put it this way: "There are only
two forces that can carry light to all corners
of the globe –
the sun in heaven and The Associated Press
down here."
