What was advertised in a revolutionary American newspaper 250 years ago today?
“WANTED, at the AMERICAN MANUFACTORY … A Quantity of WOOL, COTTON, FLAX, and HEMP.”
In the middle of March 1775, supporters of a “FUND for establishing and carrying on an AMERICAN MANUFACTORY, of LINEN, WOOLLEN,” and textiles made of other items met at Carpenters’ Hall in Philadelphia to learn more about the undertaking. They pledged their support by signing their names to “Subscription Papers” or “general Proposals,” either at the meeting or at the London Coffee House in advance. The organizers and the “Subscribers” sought to encourage “domestic manufactures” (products made in the colonies) as alternatives to imported goods. Entrepreneurs had been pursuing that goal for more than a decade during the imperial crisis, though many devoted more effort during the times that colonizers adopted nonimportation agreements as political leverage. In the spring of 1775, those involved with the “AMERICAN MANUFACTORY” did so as part of the Continental Association. Its eighth article called for “encourage[ing] Frugality, Economy, and Industry; and promot[ing] Agriculture, Arts, and the Manufacturers of this Country.”
A month later, advertisements concerning the venture simultaneously appeared in the Pennsylvania Gazette and the Pennsylvania Journal on April 19. “WANTED, At the AMERICAN MANUFACTORY,” the notices advised, “A Quantity of WOOL, COTTON, FLAX, and HEMP.” Readers could demonstrate their commitment to the cause by supplying the resources necessary to produce textiles in the colony. The advertisement also noted that “a number of spinners and flax dressers may meet with employment” at the manufactory, contributing to the success of the Continental Association while earning their livelihoods.
When the printers of the Pennsylvania Gazette and the Pennsylvania Journal distributed the weekly issue of their newspapers on April 19, they were not yet aware of the momentous events that happened at Lexington and Concord in Massachusetts that morning, though it would not take long for word to spread to Philadelphia and throughout the colonies. Historians have long debated when the American Revolution began, echoing the question that John Adams posed to Thomas Jefferson in 1815: “What do We mean by the Revolution? The War? That was no part of the Revolution. It was only an Effect and Consequence of it. The Revolution was in the Minds of the People, and this was effected, from 1760 to 1775, in the course of fifteen Years before a drop of blood was drawn at Lexington.” Establishing the “AMERICAN MANUFACTORY” in Philadelphia before the war, according to Adams, was part of the revolution. Today, however, the 250th anniversary of the battles at Lexington and Concord offers a convenient moment for commemorating the American Revolution by aligning it with the Revolutionary War that secured independence for a new nation composed of thirteen former colonies. For readers of the Pennsylvania Journal in 1775, the political cartoon depicting a severed snake with the motto “UNITE OR DIE” had already been spreading its message for many months. The masthead, the articles and letters, and many of the advertisements had been part of a revolution that was already occurring “in the Minds of the People.”
