Existing comment:
Gath:
Like many journalists of his time, George Alfred Townsend often signed his writings with pseudonyms. One of the most well-known of these is "Gath", which he first used in 1868 in the Chicago Tribune. A newspaper clipping dated July 1883 found in one of his scrapbook albums gives the following explanation for the name:
"... Suddenly the Chicago Tribune applied, too, for letters, and at the end of the first one I wrote I put 'G. A. T.' and then balanced my pen, and said, I'm tired of writing that.' So I tried to make some
monogram of it, and the only consonant that would make a syllable with it was H, which I added. 'Hello,' said I, 'that's a Philistine city. Hello again,' I said, 'It's written in the scripture, 'Tell it not in Gath.'' ...So I wrote 'Gath' below the letter.'"
The scripture Townsend quotes is II Samuel 1:20, "Tell it not in Gath, publish it not in the streets of Askelon." Years later Townsend would draw on this verse again, naming the first house he built at his Gapland estate "Askelon." |