Daily Advert Update

November 7

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , , , , ,

What was advertised in a revolutionary American newspaper 250 years ago today?

Pennsylvania Evening Post (November 7, 1776).

“THE BATTLE of BUNKERS-HILL.  A dramatic piece of five acts, in heroic measure.”

In the fall of 1776, Robert Bell printed, advertised, and sold “THE BATTLE of BUNKERS-HILL.  A dramatic piece of five acts, in heroic measure.  By a Gentleman of Maryland.”  His advertisement in the November 7 edition of the Pennsylvania Evening Post featured a quotation from Virgil’s Aeneid, “Pulchrumque mori succurrit in armis,” along with a translation for readers who did not happen to know Latin, “‘Tis glorious to die in battle.”  Both the quotation and the translation also appeared on the title page of the play.  Most prospective customers were likely familiar with the Battle of Bunker’s Hill that occurred on June 17, 1775, during the siege of Boston.  Although the British won, they took such heavy losses at the hands of the Americans that they did not launch other attacks during the siege.  In that regard, the battle was an American victory, but one that came at cost.  General Joseph Warren, a patriot leader who only a few months earlier delivered the annual oration commemorating the Boston Massacre, was killed during the battle.

Bell’s advertisement did not go into such detail, perhaps because the printer expected that many prospective customers already knew the most significant details.  He expected that a “dramatic piece” would arouse both their curiosity and their patriotism, encouraging them to purchase the play.  Scholars have supplied some of the details that Bell did not include in his advertisement.  Curators at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, for instance, explain that “the headmaster of Maryland’s Somerset Academy,” Hugh Henry Brackenridge, “responded [to the battle] with a play for his students to perform.”  Bell printed the play and distributed it more widely to American readers.  When he did so, he included a frontispiece, “The Death of Warren,” that depicted the general on bended knee with his right hand over his chest and his left hand on his rifle for support.  Concerned soldiers appeared on the left of the mortally wounded general and a fallen comrade, another American casualty, laid on the ground on the right.  John Norman, who had produced other patriotic images, engraved the scene, though Bell did not promote it in his advertisement.  Instead, he announced that he stocked “all the new publications of the Military Art” as well as “a considerable variety of books in Navigation, and other branches of the Mathematics.”

Brackenridge demonstrated his patriotism by writing the play and then resigning from his position to join the Continental Army as a chaplain.  Bell, like many other printers, artists, and booksellers presented consumers with an opportunity to show their patriotism by buying and reading the play.  Such commemoration and commodification of the events associated with the American Revolution began before the war and continued during the war.

Hugh Henry Brackenridge, The Battle of Bunkers-Hill, a Dramatic Piece, of Five Acts, in Heroic Measure (Philadelphia: Robert Bell, 1776). Courtesy Metropolitan Museum of Art.

November 6

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , , , ,

What was advertised in a revolutionary American newspaper 250 years ago today?

Massachusetts Spy (November 6, 1776).

“BEHOLD A COWARD!”

The harsh tone exceeded what appeared in other advertisements placed for the same purpose.  Before the Revolutionary War, advertisements for runaways abounded in American newspapers.  Aggrieved masters ran advertisements for runaway indentured servants, runaway apprentices, and runaway convict servants.  The notices described the runaways and offered rewards for their capture and return.  Disgruntled enslavers ran similar advertisements about enslaved men and women who liberated themselves by running away.  After the war began, desertion notices started appearing.  In many instances, the number of desertion notices eclipsed advertisements about indentured servants, apprentices, convict servants, and enslaved people combined.

Like those familiar advertisements, desertion notices usually followed a familiar format.  Consider one that appeared in the November 6, 1776, edition of the Massachusetts Spy: “DESERTED from Captain William Gate’s Company, in Colonel Jonathan Holman’s Regiment, … Arthur Cary, a Soldier.”  The advertisement described Cary’s featured and clothing.  “Whoever will take up said deserter,” the notice continued, “and return him to me … shall have ten dollars reward and all reasonable charges paid.”  Many similar advertisements appeared in other newspapers in the fall of 1776.

The advertisement that ran immediately above that one in the Massachusetts Spy took a different approach.  It started with a headline that forcefully condemned the deserter: “BEHOLD A COWARD!”  It then told a story about the circumstances under which “DANIEL PITTEE, Ensign, in Capt. Timothy Stow’s Company, in Col. Wheelock’s Regiment,” deserted from “Head Quarters, [at] Ticonderoga” in October.  “THE PUBLIC are desired to take notice,” the advertisement proclaimed, that Pittee “applied … for a discharge upon hearing that the enemy were likely to attack our lines – he was refused and the next Day deserted the Camp.”  The notice, “Published by order of Brigadier General [James] Brickett,” ran in the Massachusetts Spy and newspapers published in Boston because the “infamous Runaway belongs to the south Parish of Dedham, County of Suffolk,” and his officers apparently suspected he was headed that way.  Unlike other advertisements about deserters, this one did not offer a reward for returning him to his regiment.  Instead, it aimed to humiliate and demean the deserter.  Pittee’s request for a discharge when an attack was likely may have been the deciding factor.  Such cowardice differed from the motivations of other soldiers who deserted in hopes of returning home to protect and aid their families.  The headline certainly attracted attention.  From the very first line, this desertion notice differed from others that so often appeared in newspapers during the Revolutionary War.

November 5

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , ,

What was advertised in a revolutionary American newspaper 250 years ago today?

Dunlap’s Pennsylvania Packet (November 5, 1776).

“THE Work-shop of the subscriber was broke open on Saturday night.”

It was bad luck for John Hallberstat, a leather dresser, that someone broke into his workshop in Philadelphia and stole a variety of goods during the night of Saturday, November 2, 1776.  Losing no time, he arranged for advertisements to appear in the next newspapers published in the city.  That meant Dunlap’s Pennsylvania Packet and the Pennsylvania Evening Post, both printed and distributed on Tuesdays.  The Pennsylvania Gazette and the Pennsylvania Journal would not come out until Wednesday and the Pennsylvania Ledger not until Saturday.  Hallberstat needed to move quickly to increase the chances that newspaper advertisements would help him recover the stolen items.

In notices with nearly identical copy, Hallberstat described the stolen goods: “twenty-four reed or summer deer skins in the hair, one feather bed, blanket and sheet, and three pairs of leather breeches just scowered.”  Most victims of theft or burglary who ran newspaper advertisements called on all readers to assist in identifying the perpetrators and returning the stolen goods.  Hallberstat, however, made a plea directly to those he thought the culprits most likely to approach to sell the items from his workshop.  “As it is likely the skins may be offered for sale to some skinners,” he declared, “they are requested to stop them and the thief.”  Similarly, “Vendue-master” or auctioneers “are requested to give information if the bed and blankets should be offered them for sale.”  Skinners and vendue masters could collude with the thief or thieves to their own advantage.  In case doing the right thing was not sufficient motivation for assisting Hallberstat, he offered “THREE POUNDS REWARD … to any person who shall discover the goods so that the owner may have them again, or for the thief or thieves so that they may be brought to justice.”

Hallberstat was fortunate that his advertisement ran in Dunlap’s Pennsylvania Packet at all on November 5.  It appeared as (almost) the last item at the bottom of the last column on the third page.  That would have been the final type set in place for that issue since printers tended to print the first and fourth pages on one side of the broadsheet first and finished with the second and third pages on the other side.  Only a brief note from the printer followed Hallberstat’s notice: “Advertisements omitted this week for want of room shall be inserted in our next.”  The printer selected some advertisements to exclude.  Given the urgency of Hallberstat’s advertisement, the printer may have made sure to give it a place in the November 5 edition.  That increased the chances that Hallberstat might recover the stolen goods.  Waiting to published the advertisement in the next issue on November 12 made it even less likely that it would yield the result that Hallberstat sought.

November 4

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , ,

What was advertised in a revolutionary American newspaper 250 years ago today?

Boston-Gazette (November 4, 1776).

“THE Publisher of this Paper … has removed from Watertown … to the Printing-Office … in Queen-Street, Boston.”

After a year and a half of being printed in Watertown, the Boston-Gazette returned to Boston!  Benjamin Edes, the printer, inserted a notice to that effect at top of the first column on the first page of the November 4, 1776, edition, making it the first item that readers encountered.  “The Publisher of this Paper,” he declared, “hereby informs his Customers, that he has removed from Watertown, to the Printing-Office opposite the Court-House in Queen-Street, Boston; where they and others may be supplied with the same as usual.”  Edes hoped to retain his current subscribers and add news ones now that he printed the Boston-Gazette in the city once again, though he did acknowledge in the advertisement announcing his intention to “remove to Boston” that it might not “accommodate” his subscribers “to continue [as] his Customers.”  He requested that those who wished to discontinue their subscriptions “settle their arrears” before he moved to his new location.

Edes had previously partnered with John Gill in printing the Boston-Gazette in Boston.  Their newspaper earned a reputation as a staunch advocate of the American cause.  They printed their final issue together on April 17, 1775, two days before the battles at Lexington and Concord.  The start of the war caused a major disruption for every newspaper in Boston.  Isaiah Thomas had already suspended the Massachusetts Spy and announced plans to relocate to Worcester.  All the other newspapers printed in Boston folded, suspended publication, or moved outside the city.  Edes and Gill dissolved their partnership and then Edes revived the Boston-Gazette in Watertown.  The Massachusetts Provincial Congress met there, making it a good spot for a patriot printer to publish a newspaper.  Edes remained in Watertown after the British evacuated Boston and the siege of the city ended in March 1776.

Boston-Gazette (November 4, 1776).

When he did return to Boston in November 1776, he supplemented the notice on the first page of the Boston-Gazette with an advertisement that appeared immediately after local news on the second page.  “THE Town Customers to this Paper,” Edes announced, “may be supplied as heretofore, by leaving the Place of their Residence with the Printer.”  Even if he lost some customers in Watertown and other towns outside Boston, Edes hoped to replace them with new ones in the city.  He also welcomed back former subscribers who had not been able to continue their subscriptions during the siege.  He met with sufficient success to continue publishing the Boston-Gazette for more than two decades.

November 3

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , ,

What was advertised in a revolutionary American newspaper 250 years ago this week?

Pennsylvania Evening Post (November 2, 1776).

“EDWARD POLE … MAKES and sells all kinds of the best FISHING TACKLE.”

As the Pennsylvania Evening Post carried news about the war and decisions made by the Continental Congress in the fall of 1776, it also carried a variety of advertisements, including one in which Edward Pole promoted the goods available at his “TACKLE SHOP in Market-street, near the Court-house, Philadelphia.”  Pole informed readers that he “MAKES and sells all kinds of the best FISHING TACKLE, for use of either sea or river: and has now on hand a very general assortment.”  He stocked “artificial flies, minnews and chub, leads, Indian grass, swivels, nets, and a great variety of other sorts too tedious for an advertisement.”  He intended for that last comment to entice prospective customers to visit his shop to see the “great variety” for themselves.

Pole called attention to his advertisement with a woodcut depicting a fish.  That image accounted for one-third of the space that he purchased for that notice.  It also distinguished it from all other advertisements in that issue since it was the only one to feature a woodcut.  By November 1776, consumers in Philadelphia likely associated that image with Pole and his tackle shop.  He had previously used it in advertisements in Dunlap’s Pennsylvania Packet in May and June 1774, in the Pennsylvania Ledger in January 1775, and again in Dunlap’s Pennsylvania Packet in April 1776.  Now it appeared in the Pennsylvania Evening Post.  Few entrepreneurs commissioned woodcuts depicting some aspect of their business to adorn their newspaper advertisements.  Those who did owned those woodcuts and could collect them from one printing office and deliver them to another at their discretion.  Such was the case with Pole, who published an image associated exclusively with his business in multiple newspapers.  Doing so required more than submitting copy to printing offices.  It meant that he had to oversee the woodcut itself, handing it over to printers when he ordered new advertisements, retrieving it when he discontinued his notices, and storing it securely during the interim when he did not advertise.  For Pole, running advertisements in local newspapers required more than quill, ink, and paper to write the copy.  He also managed the woodcut, a physical object, the produced the image that represented his tackle shop.

November 2

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , ,

What was advertised in a revolutionary American newspaper 250 years ago today?

New-York Gazette and Weekly Mercury [Newark] (November 2, 1776).
“Members of the New York Whaling Company are desired to meet … in Newark.”

The advertisement called on “Members of the New York Whaling Company … to meet at the House of Josiah Pierson, in Newark,” on November 9, 1776.  It ran in the New-York Gazette and Weekly Mercury published by Hugh Gaine in Newark following the British occupation of New York.  Gaine left the city, as did the New York Whaling Company, yet the printer did not remain in Newark for long.  The November 2 edition that carried the New York Whaling Company’s notice happened to be the last one that Gaine printed in Newark before returning to New York to resume publication of the New-York Gazette and Weekly Mercury in the occupied city.  He published a total of seven issues in Newark from September 21 through November 2.

Meanwhile, according to Clarence S. Brigham, “Gaine’s New York office, under the inspection of the British authorities, had been used for the publication of a paper with the same title, and the same volume numbering, … but issued weekly” from September 30 to November 4.[1]  Gaine’s name remained in the imprint in the first of those issues, but did not appear in subsequent ones.  It returned with the November 11 issue.

In his History of Printing in America, Isaiah Thomas provided a brief overview of Gaine and his newspaper during the imperial crisis and the war.  The New-York Gazette and Weekly Mercury “appeared rather a neutral paper.  Gaine seemed desirous to side with the successful party; but not knowing which would eventually prevail, he seems to have been unstable in his politics.”  When the war began, Gaine “leaned toward the country,” but then left New York for Newark just before the occupation.  He soon returned “and printed under the protection of the king’s army; and … devoted his paper to the royal cause.”[2]  He apparently believed “that appearances were against the ultimate success of the United States,” but after the American victory Gaine petitioned the state legislature for leave to remain in the city, and having obtained permission, his press was employed in book printing.”[3]  He discontinued the New-York Gazette and Weekly Mercury after the British left the city, having published it for thirty-one years.

Ironically, the first item on the first page of the last issue published in Newark was “An ACT to punish TRAITORS and disaffected PERSONS” passed by the state government in Princeton on October 4, 1776.  Gaine would soon become one of those “disaffected PERSONS” when he returned to New York and resumed publication of the New-York Gazette and Weekly Mercury there.

**********

[1] Clarence S. Brigham, History and Bibliography of American Newspaper, 1690-1820 (Worcester: American Antiquarian Society, 1947), 512-513.

[2] Isaiah Thomas, The History of Printing in America: With a Biography of Printers and an Account of Newspapers (1810; New York: Weathervane Books, 1970), 497-498.

[3] Thomas, History of Printing, 472-473.

November 1

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , , , , , , ,

What was advertised in a revolutionary American newspaper 250 years ago today?

Essex Journal (November 1, 1776).

“A Boarding-School.”

“EVENING SCHOOL for Youth of Both Sexes.”

“EVENING SCHOOL at the Town-House.”

“An Evening School.”

Compositors usually did not cluster together newspaper advertisements inserted for similar purposes, yet that was the case for four advertisements for schools that appeared one after the other in the November 1, 1776, edition of the Essex Journal.  Each advertisement also ran in the previous issue, but they were scattered throughout the other notices.

The first announced “A Boarding-School” in the headline.  Eleanor Druitt relocated from Boston to Newburyport in the spring of 1775, about a month before the battles at Lexington and Concord.  Despite the disruptions caused by the war, she operated “a Boarding, and Day-School, for the reception of young Ladies, near the Assembly-House.”  She planned to begin a new term on “Monday the 28th of October,” so instruction had already commenced when her advertisement ran for the second time on November 1.

In the next advertisement, John Vinal declared his intention to open an “EVENING SCHOOL for Youth of both Sexes … at the NORTH SCHOOL HOUSE” on the “first Monday Evening in November.”  Vinal’s school offered some competition for Druitt’s school, but competed even more directly against Nicolas Pike’s “EVENING SCHOOL at the Town-House” that would begin its new term “on the first Monday in November next.”  Pike’s notice was dated October 1 and the notation that appeared on the final line, “44-46,” indicated that it was supposed to run in issues 144, 145, and 146 on October 4, 11, and 18.  Vinal’s advertisement was dated October 24 with “47-49” on the final line to remind the compositor to insert it in the issues for October 25 and November 1 and 8.

Yet the Essex Journal did not discontinue Pike’s advertisement after the three insertions indicated in the notation.  The fourth advertisement, dated October 11, may help to explain that.  Robert Long proclaimed that he “DETERMINES to open an Evening School the first Monday in November next” in a notice that first ran on October 11 with “45.-47.” as the notation on the final line.  Perhaps Pike saw the advertisement for the competing school and instructed the printing office to extend the run of his own notice.  Long may have been similarly concerned and desired additional insertions of his advertisement.  The notation with issue numbers disappeared on October 25, the first time that Druitt and Vinal ran their advertisements, though the compositor may have dropped the notation to achieve uniform length for each column on that page (and Long’s advertisement did appear at the bottom of the column).  Alternately, perhaps neither Pike nor Long requested that their advertisements continue running in the Essex Journal.  Both should have been discontinued before issue 148 on November 1, according to the original notations, yet the compositor may have continued running them to fill the page.  An advertisement for an auction for a house with a “45.-47.” notation ran immediately below Long’s notice.

The schoolmasters and schoolmistress may have been deploying their advertisements strategically … or day-to-day operations in the printing office may have explained the additional insertions of some of the advertisements for schools opening in Newburyport in the fall of 1776.  Whatever the explanation, four advertisements for schools running one after the other was an unusual example of clustering notices placed for a similar purpose.  Early American newspapers did not tend to classify or categorize advertisements.

October 31

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , ,

What was advertised in a revolutionary American newspaper 250 years ago today?

Independent Chronicle (October 31, 1776).

“PUFFING, is not his Talent.”

On the last day of October in 1776, John Langdon published an advertisement addressed “TO THE PUBLIC in general; and all his good Friends, in Special,” in which he offered his services as an auctioneer.  He informed readers of the Independent Chronicle that they could find him on Fleet Street in Boston.

In his lively notice, Langdon commented on a common practice in other advertisements: “PUFFING.”  Many advertisers, including other auctioneers, bestowed elaborate praise on themselves and on the goods and services that they sold.  The Oxford English Dictionary notes that “puffery” appeared in print as early as 1731.  It originally meant “grandiloquent or bombastic language.”  Entrepreneurs adopted the practice to market goods as part of the consumer revolution in both Britain and the colonies.  By the time Langdon published his advertisement, “puffery” meant the “action or practice of ‘puffing’ someone or something; extravagant or undeserved praise, esp. for advertising or promotional purposes; writing, etc., intended to have this effect.”  Puffing and puffery had negative connotations since they suggested unwarranted exaggeration and perhaps even deception.

Langdon sought to assure his clients that “PUFFING, is not his talent,” yet he wanted them to know that he would make sincere efforts to “exert himself, and use his utmost Endeavours, to give Satisfaction to his Employers.”  They could depend on his “Fidelity, Assiduity, and Dexterity” when they engaged his services as an auctioneer.  In other words, he was faithful to his clients, seeking the best prices for them rather than for bidders; he gave constant and close attention to his business; and he adroitly applied cleverness and intelligence to running his auctions to achieve the best possible outcomes for his clients.  In a nota bene, he also made clear that “Moderate Commissions, will content him.”  He did not angle to claim a significant share of the proceeds from items his clients put up for sale.  Instead, he set a fair rate his part in successful transactions that resulted in the sale of their merchandise.  No part of his business, then, was over the top.  Rather than “PUFFING” his skills, Langdon wanted prospective customers to associate humble competence with his auctioneering.

October 30

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

What was advertised in a revolutionary American newspaper 250 years ago today?

Pennsylvania Gazette (October 30, 1776).

“The extraordinary Advance in the Price of Paper … has obliged them to raise the Price.”

In the fall of 1776, William Hall, David Hall, and William Sellers announced that they would raise the price of their newspaper, the Pennsylvania Gazette, starting on January 1, 1777.  William Bradford and Thomas Bradford made the same decision about the Pennsylvania Journal.  So did John James Humphreys, Jr., for the Pennsylvania Ledger and John Dunlap for Dunlap’s Pennsylvania Packet.  Although they competed for subscribers and advertisers, the printers of those newspapers collaborated in setting a new price and informing current and prospective subscribers.  They placed a joint notice, dated October 29, that appeared in each newspaper.

It first ran in the Pennsylvania Gazette and the Pennsylvania Journal on October 30.  The Halls and Sellers made it the first item in the first column on the first page of the Pennsylvania Gazette to increase the chances that readers saw it.  The Bradfords did the same in the Pennsylvania Journal.  Humphreys followed their lead in the Pennsylvania Ledger on November 2.  When Dunlap’s Pennsylvania Packet came out on November 5, it also featured the joint advertisement in the same spot on the first page.

By announcing this change together, the “Publishers of the several weekly NEWS-PAPERS in this City” showed solidarity in the face of “the extraordinary Advance in the Price of Paper, and other Materials in the Printing Business” that “obliged them to raise the Price to FIFTEEN SHILLINGS per Annum.”  Printers throughout the new nation reported similar challenges during the Revolutionary War.  The printers in Philadelphia “hope[d] that their Customers will not take it amiss to find that Price charged from and after the First Day of January next,” yet they recognized that some subscribers would likely wish to withdraw.  For those “who should not incline to have the Papers sent after that Time,” the printers requested that they visit the appropriate office to settle accounts.  Otherwise, it was an opt out system rather than an opt in system.  If subscribers did not opt out, then the printers “shall conclude they agree to the advanced Price” and would continue to deliver newspapers for the higher subscription fee.  In placing a joint advertisement, the printers may have intended to reduce anger or frustration directed from their own subscribers directed at their newspaper by making it clear that the printers of several weekly newspapers found the price increase necessary and none set a higher price than any of the others.

This agreement among the “Publishers of the several weekly NEWS-PAPERS in this City” did not include Henrich Miller and Henrich Millers Pennsylvanischer Staatsbote, a German newspaper, nor Benjamin Towne’s Pennsylvania Evening Post that came out three times a week on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays.

October 29

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , ,

What was advertised in a revolutionary American newspaper 250 years ago today?

Pennsylvania Evening Post (October 29, 1776).

“Different kinds of beer, as usual, equal in quality to any in this city.”

Francis Wade was back in business and he wanted the public to know it!  In late October 1776, the brewer began running advertisements in the Pennsylvania Evening Post that both acknowledged that his “absence for some time past obliged him to shut up his brewery” in Philadelphia and announced that he “has began to brew for the season.”  In early November, he inserted the same advertisement in the Pennsylvania Gazette in his effort to increase his market penetration by reaching more prospective customers.

Wade did not explain his absence, nor did he give directions to his brewery.  Perhaps he assumed that “his former customers and others that are disposed to make trial of his beer” knew where to find him.  For several months in late 1774 and early 1775, he ran advertisements that directed “his old country customers” to his new location at the corner of Fourth and Race Streets.  Perhaps Wade believed that his brewery became such a familiar location once he established himself there that he did not need to elaborate on his location, despite his recent absence and suspension of production.

Now that Wade’s brewery was operating again, he hoped that his former clientele and new customers would purchase the “different kinds of beer” offered there.  He pledged that all of them were “equal in quality to any in this city,” putting him in competition with other brewers that included Robert Hare and his Best American Draught Porter.  He claimed that customers could expect such quality “as usual,” suggesting that he believed his beer already earned that reputation and he wanted consumers to recall that was the case.  Even if he exaggerated, Wade stood to benefit from such puffery.  Prospective customers who had never tried his beer, he may have reasoned, might find such assertions convincing when they contemplated “mak[ing] trial of his beer” in their own homes or serving it in their taverns.