A. Dickens

     The following is a news release from the Mallory College news bureau:

     Charles Dickens is often thought of as a creative giant whose novels are required reading in high school (A Tale of Two Cities) and in college (Bleak House or Hard Times). He is less often understood as a radical reformer with a social purpose who put his zeal not only into his novels but also into journalism.
     Professor Merle Rubens, of the English Department at Mallory College, has just completed and has had accepted for publication by the Mallory College University Press his book, Dickens: The Crusader.
     In his book, Professor Rubens says that Dickens' crusades included campaigns against the workhouse, which mistreated and starved paupers, and the working conditions in factories. Dickens wrote many articles about the deaths and mutilations in factories and the attempts by manufacturers to defy the laws designed to protect workers. "He pointed out that there were many fewer thefts, murders and other crimes than there were deaths from factory accidents," Professor Rubens said.
     In the pages of his weekly magazine Household Words, Dickens said of public health in London that it "was the tragedy of 'Hamlet' with nothing in it but the gravedigger." He campaigned for clean air, water fit to drink and sewers for the poor in the slums, the English professor said.
     Dickens also lauded the Ragged Schools, which consisted of volunteers who gave the poor children free instruction. There were no government-supported public schools then.
     "There is no one like him today, this whirlwind of energy, decency and genius. He oversaw charities and devised slum-clearing projects that included cheap housing for the poor with libraries, playgrounds and schools nearby," Professor Rubens says in the introduction to his book, which he says took five years to research and write.
     "Dickens," he said, "was one of society's great activists—a tough-minded, hard-headed man who worked for reform in his novels, his journalism, his personal life."

     You call Professor Rubens to verify the material in the news release. He tells you that he has seen it and that it is accurate. You ask him why so few students hear about the journalism of Dickens.
     "That is why I wrote this book," Rubens tells you. "I suppose the simple answer is that teachers of English literature may look down on journalism, whether it's the local newspaper or Dickens. Maybe that's simplistic. Any study of Dickens that ignores his journalism misses an essential part of the man, his willingness to be part of the society in which he lived and to try to remedy its ailments."

1. You are on the AP state wire rewrite desk and will put 150 words on the wire.

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2. You are in charge of the online www.freenews.com and decide to put this story out for your readers.

3. You work for Channel 7 in Freeport and have still photos of copies of Household Words. Write a one-minute item.

4. Write the story for The Freeport News.

B. Jobs

     Here are some recent figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics on the groups of workers with the highest rates of on-the-job fatalities. The rate is on the basis of the number of fatalities per l00,000 workers in the category:

Commercial fishermen	106
Loggers	102
Airplane pilots	94
Metalworkers	65
Taxi drivers	47
Construction laborers	39
Roofers	30
Electrical workers	29
Truck drivers	25
Farm workers	24

     First, use the computer or another aid to make a bar graph. Then write leads for the following:

1. The Associated Press.

2. A newspaper published in Oregon.

3. A newsletter for airplane pilots.

4. A TV or radio station in Anchorage.

5. An all-news radio station in New York City.