The Washington Tribune

Digesting the News
By Clifford C. Mitchell

An Improved Service

Although this is written on the Sunday (June 4) preceding my release (June 8) from prison, it will not appear in the majority of our papers until after I will have been in the free world for nearly a week. This, of course, is merely one of the handicaps under which I have been laboring as a prison and colored journalist.

Immediately after my release this service will be improved by arranging my production and mailing service so as to reach and satisfy the "dead-line" date of the current issue of all the papers I serve in every part of America.

Under such a working schedule I will then be in a position to give our publishers and my readers a real up-to-the-minute "digest" of all pertinent matter appearing in the current issues of our weeklies, and all dailies.

My readers will appreciate that in the past my sole contact has been through the columns of a hundred or more of our publications that have reached me regularly and when such publications are of necessity late in reaching me, and my comments not prepared until the Sunday following and then not published until the second week following their preparation, it can readily be seen that in my effort to keep my releases "timely" I have been unable to "digest" many current events at an opportune time.

In an additional effort to improve my service I invite correspondence from all of my readers and will at all times endeavor to give each communication prompt and careful consideration, which, due to my past circumstances, I have been unable to do.

It may be that in the flood of letters I hope to receive that I can evolve some additional service, through the press and through personal communications that will enable my readers to take advantage of the storehouse of information which I have built up through the tens of thousands of compilations to be found in my files.

In fact, just as ninety-nine per cent of my past contacts have been made through the columns of our publications, I anticipate, especially during the period of my parole, that ninety-nine per cent of my personal contacts will be solely through correspondence. After I have served the period of my parole and become absolutely a free man then it will be time enough to attempt further development of my service through strictly personal contacts.

Until that time arrives I am asking for the continued co-operation of the publishers, and the readers of my weekly features. Address me: Clifford C. Mitchell, 3507 South Parkway, Chicago, Ill.