Why Did Newspapers Print Addresses Of People The Interview and Ran Stories On?

In My Humble Opinion
1

I’ve been doing a project which involves looking through old Chicago newspapers, and one thing they all do is print the addresses of the people in the stories or even people they interview

For instance, they say “John Smith of 2122 West Fullerton, Chicago, IL, was killed last night.”

Or they might say “When asked about the hospital’s closing Sister Mary Frances Rose of The Sacred Heart Covent, 1212 Claremont Avenue Chicago IL, said that she was disappointed but the mission would continue at another hospital.”

Or they had the “Question of the Day,” where the Chicago Daily News asked each person, “What they liked on their Hot Dogs” (it was a story involving the 4th of July celebrations in Chicago. They printed not only the answers of all the people quesitoned but their names and addresses as well.

This practice seemed to go on till the 1970s but even then if it was a story like a murder they’d print the address. Like Dale Rosen of xxx Street, school teacher was found murdered today.

I recall when my mum died in 1980 the small Chicago suburban paper listed out address in the obituary.

OK, I understand why the practice died out. Too much info and people wanted privacy, but why do you think newspapers printed the names AND ADDRESSES in the old days.

Was it to prove the people really existed and they weren’t making up the stories? At first I thought, OK fair enough, but who really cares if a paper makes up a story about what people put on their hot dogs at a July 4th celebration?

Or do you think that people just like to see their names in the paper and the addresses were confirmation to those people?

Any other ideas why they used to do it?

As I said, I get why the papers STOPPED doing it. I just wanted to know what was the reason to begin with

Thanks

2

IIRC there used to be (and still is) a degree of journalistic paranoia about being sued by someone with the same name as someone about whom something bad was said. “Bruce Smith was today charged with child molestation” opens the way for an awful lot of people to be upset. Nowadays, they seem to be content with age and suburb, maybe occupation - “Bruce Smith, 46, a carpenter of Springfield Heights”, etc.

But back in the days before security concerns about publishing addresses was so widespread, once it became the house style to put in full addresses, it was universalised even if the story was a positive one.

Just my best guess.

3

Back in the day, the issues of privacy weren’t as important as the issue of identification. A city was built from neighborhoods, and there might be several Sacred Heart convents and a whole bunch of John Smiths and Dale Rosens in various parts of town.

These days it seems invasive. In those days, it was just the way things were.