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November 13

Carl Robert Keyes Uncategorized , , , , ,

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

Maryland Journal (November 13, 1773).

“Mr. RATHELL thankfully acknowledges the receipt of a Letter signed ‘a Friend to Literary Institutions.’”

Joseph Rathell’s “PROPOSALS FOR ESTABLISHING A CIRCULATING LIBRARY IN BALTIMORE-TOWN” appeared once again in the November 13, 1773, edition of the Maryland Journal.  So did William Aikman’s address “To the LADIES and GENTLEMEN of the Town of BALTIMORE” concerning his efforts to establish a circulating library in Annapolis and deliver books to subscribers in Baltimore.  Aikman reported that he heard from prospective subscribers that they had concerns about “the trouble and risk they run of procuring and returning the books.”  To assuage such anxieties, he devised a plan for subscribers in Baltimore to submit orders and return books to a local merchant who would then forward them to Annapolis via a weekly packet ship.  Aikman planned to charge a dollar for delivery service in addition to the subscription fees.  Rathell mocked the additional fee in an advertisement that ran in the same issue of the Maryland Journal as Aikman’s notice.  He seemingly knew about Aikman’s advertisement before it appeared in print, perhaps tipped off by a friend in the printing office.

Whether or not that was the case, Rathell did receive other assistance from the Maryland Journal in marketing his circulating library.  The local news items included a blurb about his efforts and the response from residents of the city so far.  The blurb ran immediately below “SHIP NEWS” and before “PRICES CURRENT at BALTIMORE,” a prime spot for merchants and other readers to notice it.  It related that Rathell “thankfully acknowledges the receipt of a Letter signed ‘a Friend to Literary Institutions,’ enclosing the Names of sundry Ladies and Gentlemen, as Subscribers to his intended CIRCULATING LIBRARY.”  Readers may have doubted the veracity of this report, dismissing it as mere puffery.  Those who continued reading encountered commentary from Rathell that might have more appropriately appeared among the advertisements.  For instance, he pledged that “he will be particularly exact in selecting the Books, in which he will be principally governed by Gentlemen of known literary Skill, in Philadelphia, and New-York.”  In so doing, he directed attention away from Aikman’s library in Annapolis in favor of larger and more cosmopolitan port cities.  He also directly solicited requests from prospective subscribers to his library, proclaiming that “any Commands addressed to Mr. Rathell, directing his Attention to particular, scarce, or curious Publications, &c. shall meet due Regard.”  This advertisement masqueraded as a news item, supplementing the proposals that Rathell published elsewhere in the newspaper.  He could have incorporated all of the information into a single notice, but a news item doubled as an endorsement of his enterprise.  In the end, it did not matter.  Rathell did not manage to launch a circulating library in Baltimore.  Aikman had more success with his endeavor in Annapolis, at least prior to the Revolutionary War.

August 28

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , ,

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

Providence Gazette (August 28, 1773).

“A large Quantity of Ordure, supposed to have been taken from some Privy-House Vault.”

Samuel Young and William Tyler were not happy.  Who could blame them?  Who, that is, except for “some evil-minded Person or Persons” who had befouled their well?  Upon making an unpleasant discovery, Tyler and Young took to the pages of the Providence Gazette with an advertisement describing how the perpetrators had, “in a most filthy Manner, bedaub[ed] the Stones, Curb and Bucket, of Tyler and Young’s Well, with a large Quantity of Ordure.”  The victims of such a disgusting act of vandalism suspected that the miscreants had taken the excrement “from some Privy-House Vault.”  What explained such an assault?  Tyler and Young attributed it to “the Instigation of the Devil.”

The aggrieved colonizers did not exclude any possible suspects, describing the “Party or Parties concerned” as “he, she, or they.”  Whoever was responsible for carrying out the devil’s work, Tyler and Young wanted them held accountable.  They had not published their advertisement to advise the public about what had happened to their well but rather to enlist the aid of anyone with information that would allow them to identify or “discover” the perpetrators that they “may be brought to Justice.”  Tyler and Young offered a reward, conditional on the conviction of the “Offender or Offenders.”

As was often the case, an advertisement supplied readers with a combination of local news and gossip … and perhaps even a bit of amusement, depending on their predilections for scatological humor or how they felt about Tyler and Young.  Other advertisements in the August 28, 1773, edition of the Providence Gazette also delivered news, gossip, or a combination of the two.  Uzal Green, for instance, advised others not to extend credit to his wife, Martha, because he would not pay any of her bills since she “hath eloped from me, and refuses to return to my Bed and Board.”  Another advertisement recounted how “the Shop of Robert Leonard, Taylor, was feloniously broke open … and robbed.”  That notice offered rewards for recovering the stolen goods and capturing the thief.  In an estate notice, the executors of Dr. Samuel Carew encouraged “all those who have unsettled Accounts” to “pay their respective Debts” or face legal action.  In yet another advertisement, Nehemiah Underwood promised a reward for the capture and return of his sixteen-year-old runaway apprentice, Daniel Sanders.  None of those advertisements may have been as remarkable as Tyler and Young’s effort to identify the villain or villains who defiled their well, but each of them did incorporate local news that did not appear elsewhere in the newspaper.

July 9

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , ,

Who was the subject of an advertisement in a colonial American newspaper 250 years ago today?

New-London Gazette (July 9, 1773).

“Ran away … a NEGRO Man Slave named PRINCE.”

When “a NEGRO Man Slave named PRINCE” liberated himself by running away from his enslave, John Mulford “of East-Hampton, on Long Island,” in June 1773, the story became frontpage news in the New-London Gazette.  Timothy Green, the printer, did not actually treat the story as news, but he did run Mulford’s advertisement describing Prince and offering a reward for his capture and return on the front page of the July 9 edition of his newspaper.  Prince may have been familiar to some readers since he previously “lived about Six Years with Mr. Daniel Denison, at Stonington, in New-London County,” a roundabout way of saying that Denison enslaved Prince before Mulford did.  Like many other advertisements – from legal notices and estate notices to advertisements about burglaries and thefts to notices about wives who “eloped” from their husbands to advertisements about apprentices, enslaved people, and indentured servants who “ran away” to notices about lotteries that funded public works projects – this one delivered news to readers.  In many instances, advertisements provided more local news than printers inserted elsewhere in their newspapers.

Mulford’s advertisement about Prince was not the only paid notice on the first page of the July 9 edition of the New-London Gazette.  Green (or a compositor who worked in the printing office) positioned a real estate notice, an advertisement for a “variety of Goods suitable for the SEASON” available at a shop in Norwich, and the notice describing Prince as the first items in the first column.  An editorial “Continued from our last” issue filled the rest of the column and the remainder of the page.  Additional advertisements, including one about “two melatto men slaves,” Edward Peters and Rufus Cooper, who liberated themselves from Ezekiel Root of Pittsfield, Massachusetts, appeared on the third and fourth pages.  How did any advertisements land on the front page?  A standard edition of the New-London Gazette and other colonial newspapers consisted of four pages created by printing two on each side of a broadsheet and folding it in half.  Printers usually printed the first and fourth pages on one side, let the ink dry, and then printed the second and third pages on the other side.  Since many advertisements ran for several weeks, printers used type already set when they printed the first and fourth pages, reserving the second and third pages for the latest news that arrived in the printing office.  In this instance, Green selected advertisements and the continuation of an editorial to take to press while he figured out the content for the remaining two pages.  As a result, Prince’s escape and liberation from his enslaver became frontpage news.

June 17

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , ,

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

Rivington’s New-York Gazetteer (June 17, 1773).

“A Rogue!  A Rogue!  A Rogue!”

The headline set one advertisement apart from others that appeared in the June 17, 1773, edition of Rivington’s New-York Gazetteer.  Some of those others had headlines like “TO BE SOLD,” “IMPORTED,” “TO BE LETT,” or “WANTED.”  Many deployed the name of the advertiser as the headline, including “ABRAHAM DURYEE,” “ENNIS GRAHAM,” “THOMAS HAZARD,” and “JOSEPH PEARSALL.”  Even the printer used his own name, “JAMES RIVINGTON,” as the headline for his advertisement.  A few headlines provided more specific details, such as “DELAWARE LOTTERY,” “HORSEMANSHIP,” “INDIGO,” “THEATRE,” and “WATCHES.”

One distinctive advertisement paired two headlines, “FIVE POUNDS REWARD” and “A Rogue!  A Rogue!  A Rogue!” The first frequently appeared in advertisements describing and offering rewards for the capture and return of apprentices and indentured servants who ran away from their masters and enslaved people who liberated themselves from their enslavers.  In contrast, the repetition of “A Rogue!  A Rogue!  A Rogue!” set the advertisement apart from any of the others and likely demanded the attention of readers, inciting curiosity about what kind of offenses merited such a headline.

When they set about learning more, readers discovered that the rogue was an “atrocious villain, known by the name of Isaac Vanden Velden” who had recently “imposed on several persons in this city, with bills of exchange, which he has forged in the name of Mr. Paul Hogstraffer, of Albany.”  Even before those incidents, Vanden Velden had a reputation for misconduct in both Philadelphia and Albany, according to the advertisement, and sometimes “pretends to have large rights in land on the Mississippi.  The con artist “talks fast, and affects a good deal of propriety in his conversation,” so much so that he “has a very good address, and appears capable of executing any artful piece of fraud.”  Readers might detect Vander Velden, “a German,” from his speech; although he “speak good English,” he retained “a little of his own country accent.”

A nota bene indicated that the rogue was headed in the direction of Philadelphia.  Given the circulation of Rivington’s New-York Gazetteer well beyond the city, the advertiser hoped that readers put on alert about Vanden Velden would capture and “secure the above impostor in any of his Majesty’s jails, so that he may be brought to justice.”  In this instance, the advertisement with its extraordinary headline served as a public service announcement and a supplement to the news that ran elsewhere in the newspaper.

February 15

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , ,

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

Boston-Gazette (February 15, 1773).

“THE Persons who may incline to purchase PATTY HALL’s House … need not be afraid of the Neighbours.”

The feud between Patty Hall and her neighbors continued in the advertisements in the February 15, 1773, edition of the Boston-Gazette.  The altercation first appeared in the public prints when Hall placed a notice offering her house for sale in the February 1 edition of the Boston-Gazette.  She noted that her neighbors made “a great Bustle” in court about “a Piece of Land” associated with the property, but then “dropt the Matter.”  That being the case, she assured “Any Person that inclines to Purchase, may depend that a good Title will be given.”  Hall also accused her neighbors of various acts of vandalism and intimidation, including throwing stones at her.

Hall’s neighbors apparently read or heard about the advertisement.  They did not wait a week to respond in the next issue of the Boston-Gazette.  Instead, they placed notices in the next newspapers published in town, the Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Weekly News-Letter and the Massachusetts Spy on February 4.  Hall’s neighbors sarcastically mentioned the “Politeness” accorded to them before clarifying that the matter had moved to another court and requesting that public “suspend their Judgment” until “Evidences on both Sides are properly examined.”  They also inserted their advertisement in the next issue of the Boston-Gazette on February 8, a week after Hall’s original notice.  It ran immediately above a response from Hall.  She described additional harassment she claimed that she experienced from her neighbors.

Having set the record straight once already, Hall’s neighbors did not feel the need to rush to publish a response to Hall’s latest advertisement.  Instead, they waited for the next edition of the Boston-Gazette on February 15.  In what they framed as a letter to the editors, Hall’s neighbors assured anyone “who may incline to purchase PATTY HALL’s House – with such a Title as she can give – need not be afraid of the Neighbours.”  They asserted that knocking at all hours and other alleged torments “were never heard by the Neighbours” and concluded that “it was all done within Doors.”  That being the case, they declared, Hall was in the best position to identify the real culprits.  Her neighbors recommended that if anyone who purchased the house wished to avoid such intrusions that they “need not keep the same Company” as Hall.

Edes and Gill, the printers of the Boston-Gazette, may have enjoyed the argument between Hall and her neighbors.  They almost certainly appreciated the revenue that their advertisements generated.  In publishing those advertisements, Edes and Gill and the printers of other newspapers abdicated a small amount of editorial control to those who paid to purchase space in their publications.  The advertisements carried news, of a sort, that would not have appeared among the articles and editorials that the printers selected to include elsewhere in their newspapers.  Hall and her neighbors could have relied on rumors and gossip to malign each other, but they realized that advertisements gave them a much larger audience for presenting their grievances to the court of public opinion.

February 8

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , ,

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

Boston-Gazette (February 8, 1773).

“MRS. HALL is sensible that the Advertisement in Thursday’s Papers was intended to injure her in the Sale of her House.”

The feud between Patty Hall and her neighbors continued to move back and forth between newspapers.  It began when Hall inserted a notice in the February 1, 1773, edition of the Boston-Gazette.  She accused five of her neighbors of conspiring to drive her out of her house on Hanover Street by making spurious claims in court before dropping the matter and simultaneously vandalizing the house and even throwing stones at her as she passed through her year.  Hall did not give any reason that her neighbors felt such enmity, but she did declare that she could give “a good Title” to anyone who purchased the house.

Rather than waiting a week to respond in the next issue of the Boston-Gazette, Hall’s neighbors inserted a response in the February 4 editions of both the Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Weekly News-Letter and the Massachusetts Spy.  They described themselves as “THE PERSONS mentioned with so much Politeness by Mrs. HALL in her Advertisement” and directed readers to “See Edes and Gill’s last Gazette.”  They advised that the “Conduct of both Parties” would become apparent, “either to their Honor or Disgrace,” upon more extensive examination.  In other words, they cautioned readers not to believe everything that Hall put into print.  At the same time, they warned against trusting the title that Hall offered “until the same shall be determined in a due Course of Law,” clarifying that they had not dropped the case, as Hall indicated, but instead moved it to another court.

Hall had at least one thing in common with her neighbors.  She did not wait to respond in the same newspaper that carried their notice.  She did not allow them that much time to frame the narrative.  Instead, she once again published an advertisement in the Boston-Gazette, this time in the February 8 edition.  Her neighbors apparently decided to insert their advertisement in that newspaper as well.  The compositor conveniently combined the two notices into a single advertisement that told a story for readers.  The format, a short line instead of a full line separating the two notices, allows the possibility that Hall reprinted the advertisement to provide context for her response, but her reference to suspending further advertisements because she had “no Money to trifle with” suggests that she would not have taken on the expense of reprinting an advertisement she found so objectionable.

She certainly meant to acknowledge that “the Advertisement in Thursday’s Papers was intended to injure her in the Sale of her House.”  She intentionally misunderstood the “Compliment to her Politeness,” stressing that she “least intended” any pleasantries because she “knew to whom she was speaking, and chose to address them in a Language they understood.”  She adamantly asserted that she had “no Notion of treating Persons politely” when she suspected them of perpetrating the “dirty Actions” she described in her first advertisements as well as “daubing her Yard and Doors with the most nauseous Filth, beating at her Shutters with Axes and Clubs, and disturbing her with repeated Noises at all Hours of the Night.”  She lamented that she gave her neighbors “no other Provocation” except her “Refusal to cut down Part of her House” until a court determined the true ownership of the land that portion of the dwelling occupied.  Hall claimed that she welcomed a court decision because she was confident that it “will do her Justice, and act without Partiality.”  Beyond the courts, she continued to use the public prints to excoriate her neighbors for their malicious behavior.

Both Hall and her neighbors expected that the public engaged with their version of events across multiple publications and through discussing what they read in one newspaper or another or what their acquaintances told them they had read or heard.  As the adversaries waited for a legal decision from the court, they pursued another sort of vindication in the court of public opinion.

February 4

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , ,

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

Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Weekly News-Letter (February 4, 1773).

“The Conduct of the Parties from first to last will best appear … when the Evidences on both Sides are properly examined.”

Printers selected which items appeared among the news and editorials in their newspapers, yet colonizers exercised some amount of editorial authority when they published news in the form of advertisements.  Consider and exchange between Patty Hall and her neighbors in two newspapers published in Boston in the first week of February 1773.

Hall initiated the exchange with an advertisement in the February 1 edition of the Boston-Gazette.  Placing the notice for the purpose of selling a house, Hall seized the opportunity to name several of her neighbors and report that they “made a Complaint to the Selectmen, about a Piece of Land; and they laid it before the Grand Jury; and after making a great Bustle, dropt the Matter.”  The matter being settled, Hall declared that the purchaser “may depend that a good Title will be given.”  According to Hall, that was only the beginning of the trouble she supposedly had with her neighbors.  She claimed that at the same time she “had her Windows broke, Spouts tore down, the Drane stopt,and frequently Stones thrown at all Parts of the House.”  To make matters even worse, she “very nearly escap’d a great Stone thrown at her passing thro’ the Yard.”  She suspected that her neighbors were directly responsible or “employ somebody to do it” and offered a reward to anyone “that will apprehend the Person or Persons concern’d.”

Boston-Gazette (February 1, 1773).

The neighbors that Hall named – “Constable Hale, James Bailey, Samuel Sloan, Retailer, Elizabeth Clarke and Nowell, and Deacon Barrett” – objected to the version of events that Hall published in the Boston-Gazette.  Rather than wait a week to make their rebuttal in the next edition of that newspaper, they inserted their own notice in both the Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Weekly News-Letter and the Massachusetts Spy just three days later.  They identified themselves as “THE PERSON mentioned with so much Politeness by Mrs. HALL in her advertisement, *” and directed readers to “* See Edes and Gill’s last Gazette.”  They offered clarifications about the outcome of the “Bustle” in court, stating that when Hall “gave Notice that the Matter was dropt, she should have added,—  “in order to be taken up at another Court.’”  Unlike Hall, the neighbors considered the matter far from settled.  They encouraged others “to suspend their Judgment both as to the Merits of the Cause and the Title … until the same shall be determined in a due course of law.”  As for the other allegations made by Hall, her neighbors implied that she fabricated the story.  “The Conduct of the Parties from first to last will best appear, either to their Honor or Disgrace,” they asserted, “when the Evidences on both Sides are properly examined.”  In refusing the dignify Hall’s allegations with any more of a response, her neighbors suggested they had no merit.

Hall wished to frame the narrative of her troubles with her neighbors.  Purchasing a paid notice in one of the local newspapers allowed her to do so.  Similarly, those neighbors also bought advertising space to tell their side of the story.  This allowed both parties to bypass the printer-editors of the Boston-Gazette, the Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Weekly News-Letter, and the Massachusetts Spy to determine for themselves what kind of content the public read or heard about as colonizers discussed the altercation that appeared among newspaper advertisements that delivered all kinds of local news.

January 18

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , ,

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

Pennsylvania Packet (January 18, 1773).

“AN ADDRESS TO THE INHABITANTS OF THE BRITISH SETTLEMENTS IN AMERICA, UPON SLAVE-KEEPING.”

In January 1773, John Dunlap, printer of the Pennsylvania Packet, announced that An Address to the Inhabitants of the British Settlements in America, upon Slave-Keeping, a work attributed to Benjamin Rush, was “Just published” and available for sale.  Dunlap leveraged his access to the press to give the announcement special prominence in his newspaper, treating it as an editorial rather than an advertisement.

Consider how Dunlap organized the contents of the January 18, 1773, edition of the Pennsylvania Packet and the supplement that accompanied it.  In the standard issue, news items and editorials appeared on the first two pages, followed by advertising on the last two pages.  Similarly, the two-page supplement began with two columns of news and the remainder of the content consisted of advertising.  Dunlap’s announcement masqueraded as an editorial that ran in the first column of the second page and overflowed into the next column, followed by news from London, Newport, New York, and Philadelphia.  The printer inserted an excerpt from the pamphlet, hoping to entice readers to want more and purchase their own copies.  In giving prospective customers an overview of the essay, Dunlap noted that the “Author of the above Address after having showed the inconsistency of Slave-keeping with the principles of humanity – justice – good policy and religion; concludes as follows.”  After reading that conclusion, prospective customers could acquire the pamphlet and examine the various arguments about humanity, justice, good policy, and religion for themselves.  In treating this announcement as an editorial or news item, Dunlap adopted a strategy sometimes deployed by other printers to promote books and pamphlets they published.

Whatever the conclusions reached in the Address … upon Slave-Keeping, Dunlap apparently did not find them sufficiently convincing to alter his policies concerning the kinds of advertising that he printed in the Pennsylvania Packet.  Two advertisements about enslaved people appeared on the facing page, one offering a “HEALTHY country bred NEGRO LAD” for sale and the other seeking to hire a “SMART, active WHITE or NEGRO BOY … to wait on table and go on errands.”  Candidates for that position included enslaved youths who did the work while their enslavers received the wages.  An advertisement in the supplement described a “Negro Fellow named LONDON” who liberated himself by running away from his enslaver in Baltimore and offered a reward for his capture and return.  Even as Dunlap treated the conclusion of the Address … upon Slave-Keeping as an editorial intended to arouse interest in a pamphlet he sold, he generated revenue by printing and disseminating advertisements that perpetuated slavery.

December 28

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , ,

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

Boston-Gazette (December 28, 1772).

“The only true and correct ALMANACKS from my Copy, are those printed by R. Draper, Edes & Gill, and T. & [J.] Fleet.”

As 1772 came to an end and the new year approached, Richard Draper, Benjamin Edes and John Gill, and Thomas Fleet and John Fleet continued their efforts to direct prospective customers to the edition of Nathaniel Ames’s almanac for 1773 that they collaboratively printed and sold.  The final issues of the Boston Evening-Post, the Boston-Gazette, and the Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Post-Boy for 1772 once again carried advertisements with a note from the almanac’s author that warned against counterfeit editions and proclaimed that the “only true and correct ALMANACKS from my Copy, are those printed by R. Draper, Edes & Gill, and T. & [J.] Fleet.”

None of those newspapers featured the extended version that ran in the Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Weekly News-Letter on December 24.  The Fleets even ran a streamlined version in the Boston Evening-Post, eliminated the introductory lines that declared “THIS DAY IS PUBLISHED, And TO BE SOLD by R. DRAPER, T. & J. FLEET, and EDES & GILL” as well as the final lines that advised “Purchasers, especially by the Quantity, are requested to be particular in enquiring whether they are printed by the above Printers, of whom ALMANACKS may be had at the cheapest Rate.”

The version of the advertisement in the Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Post-Boy remained unchanged, as did the version in the Boston-Gazette.  Edes and Gill did not include any fanfare about “JUST PUBLISHED” the first time they inserted the note from Ames in the Boston-Gazette.  They positioned that note just below local news, implying that it was just as much a piece of newsworthy information as an advertisement for an item they sold.  Those printers pursued a similar strategy the next time they ran the notice.  This time it did not serve as a transition from news to advertising.  Instead, it was the only advertisement that appeared on second page of the December 28 edition of the Boston-Gazette, running immediately below news from Warsaw.  That made it even more likely that anyone carefully perusing the news would encounter the notice from the printers.  Taking advantage of their access to the press to shape how information was disseminated to reader-consumers, Edes and Gill continued their practice of treating counterfeit almanacs that competed with their “true and correct” almanacs as news the community needed to know.  As part of their marketing efforts, they used the placement of the notice on the page to enhance their insinuation that consumers had a duty to choose the “true and correct” copies over any counterfeits.

October 24

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

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

Providence Gazette (October 24, 1772).

“WEST’s ALMANACK … is now in the Press.”

Where advertisements appeared in colonial newspapers varied from publication.  Some printers reserved advertising for the final pages, placing news items on the front and interior pages.  Others placed advertisements on the first and last pages since those were the first pages printed when producing a standard four-page edition.  Advertisements, which often repeated for multiple weeks, could be set in type and printed first, saving the second and third pages for the latest news that arrived in the printing office.  In some instances, printers distributed advertising throughout the newspaper, placing paid notices in the rightmost column on each page.

John Carter, printer of the Providence Gazette, consistently placed advertising at the end of the newspaper.  Paid notices usually filled the final page, though sometimes news items ran in the upper left corner.  The third page often had advertising that appeared to the right of the news.  In general, Carter printed news and editorials in the first two pages.

That made the placement of an announcement about “WEST’s ALMANACK, for the Year of our Lord 1773, with some valuable Improvements and Additions” all the more noteworthy for its placement in the October 24, 1772, edition of the Providence Gazette.  Rather than appearing among the advertisements or even as the first of the advertisements, the notice ran on the third page, immediately below local news from Providence and above shipping news from the customs house, a regular news feature.  The first advertisements in the issue appeared lower in the column.  The notice about the almanac, authored by Benjamin West in an annual collaboration with the printer of the Providence Gazette, declared that it was “now in the Press, and will be speedily published by the Printer hereof.”  The notice appeared in larger type than the news above and below it, helping to draw attention to it.

Given his interest in the success of the almanac, Carter treated the notice about its publication as a news item.  In so doing, he exercised his prerogative as the printer of the newspaper to give the notice a privileged place, separate from other advertisements.  The following week, Carter inserted an advertisement to inform prospective customers that he “Just PUBLISHED” the almanac, placing it first among the advertisement in that issue.  In both his initial effort to incite interest and his subsequent attempt to market the almanac, Carter took advantage of his access to the press to increase the likelihood that consumers saw his notices.