What was advertised in a colonial American newspaper 250 years ago today?
“Would be glad to be employed in keeping of books.”
Elizabeth Bedon’s advertisement proposing to open a boarding school in Savannah “for the education of young ladies” ran for the third and final time in the August 16, 1769, edition of the Georgia Gazette. Immediately below it appeared an employment advertisement inserted by George Bedon: “The subscriber being regularly bred to the mercantile business, would be glad to be employed in keeping of books, drawing out accounts, &c. Those who are pleased to employ him may depend upon the greatest correctness and dispatch.” That advertisement also made its third and final appearance on August 16, each time running in combination with Elizabeth’s advertisement.
George’s notice did not indicate where prospective employers could contact him. Given that Savannah was a small port, he may have considered listing such information unnecessary. After all, other advertisers did not always list their locations. In the same issue, Thomas Hamilton offered a “SMALL NEAT TENEMENT” for rent and Inglis and Hall hawked “superfine Philadelphia Flour.” Neither notice included a location, the advertisers expecting that they were familiar enough figures that interested parties would know where to find them.
That Elizabeth and George simultaneously placed advertisements seeking employment, however, suggests that they may have been new to Savannah and intended for the advertisements to serve as a form of introduction to their new neighbors. In that case, George likely meant for his advertisement to piggyback on Elizabeth’s, which concluded by advising “those who intend to intrust their children under her care to favour her with a line, directed to be left at Capt. Langford’s.” She apparently considered the captain a prominent enough figure in the community not to require additional information about his place of residence. George likely anticipated that subscribers and others engaged in sufficiently close reading of the advertisements that prospective employers would be able to deduce his location.
Even when they ran for multiple weeks, the order of advertisements in colonial newspapers shifted from issue to issue. Compositors moved them according to length in order to make all of the contents fit on the page. At only four lines, George’s advertisement would have been relatively easy to insert anywhere that a column fell just shy of being complete. That it consistently remained with Elizabeth’s advertisement suggests both that they purchased the two as a package and that the compositor exercised special care in making sure that they were not separated during the duration of their run in the Georgia Gazette.