The Washington journalists’ dinner club that roasted politicians
Arthur Wallace Dunn’s 1915 history of the Gridiron Club, where Washington’s journalists satirized the politicians over dinner.
The story
The Gridiron Club brought Washington’s journalists together for dinners at which the country’s leaders were the joke. Arthur Wallace Dunn, a journalist and member himself, wrote its history in 1915, with a hundred and twenty-five illustrations, and the book is a record of political satire as the press practised it on the statesmen it reported on.
It follows the club’s dinners and the humour they turned on American leaders. Among the members it describes is William Wallace Jermane, whose initiation into the club is told on page 166.
That member is the link to this copy. It was presented to Jermane on November 15, 1915, by the Benjamin B. French Lodge No. 15 of Washington, when he was Deputy Grand Master of Masons for the District of Columbia. A printed plate inside the front cover honours him as a journalist, a Mason and a friend, under the motto that newspapers are the fourth estate of a nation; it is signed by the lodge secretary and embossed with the lodge seal. Jermane became Grand Master the next year. The navy ribbed cloth is bright, its gold stamping still strong, with mild rubbing at the edges and the foot of the spine.
Details
- Date
- 1915
- Publisher
- Frederick A. Stokes Company, New York
- Edition
- Original 1915 edition
- Binding
- cloth: Original navy-blue ribbed publisher's cloth, gilt titling and decorative garlands on upper board and spine
- Condition
- Publisher's original dark navy ribbed cloth, very bright gold stamping and ornament on front and spine, mild rubbing/bumping and wear at lower spine and extremities. Interior plates/pages look clean and intact in photographs. The striking Masonic presentation plate with ink secretary signature and embossed seal is preserved on front pastedown. No dust jacket seen. Exact pagination/collation not checked.
- Bookplate
- "Newspapers are the fourth estate of a nation" / IN APPRECIATION OF / WILLIAM WALLACE JERMANE / JOURNALIST / DEPUTY GRAND MASTER OF MASONS / DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA / AS A MAN AS A MASON / AS A FRIEND / AT THE GRAND VISITATION OF / BENJAMIN B. FRENCH LODGE / NO. 15 F.A.A.M. WASHINGTON D.C. / NOVEMBER 15, 1915 / [in ink] E. St. Clair Thompson / Secretary / [embossed lodge seal]
