Alexander Robertson

January 6

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

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

Norwich Packet (January 6, 1774).

“They now beg the Favour of the different Societies … That they would send the ANTHEMS, usually sung, that they may be inserted.”

Alexander Robertson, James Robertson, and John Trumull, the printers of the Norwich Packet, placed a notice in their own newspaper to announce that “an Elegant Edition of DR. WATTS’s PSALMS, with several Anthems,” was “NOW IN THE PRESS.”  It was not too late for customers to qualify for the bargain price, “no more than one Shilling and eight Pence,” as long as they reserved their copies “before they are published” and offered for sale to the general public.  In addition, “Those who take twelve Copies shall have one gratis.”  Printers sometimes offered such discounts to retailers who purchased in volume to sell again, though in this case the Robertsons and Trumbull likely had congregations in mind as well.

They certainly attempted to enlist the aid of congregations in submitting additional material to enhance the project and make their edition of Isaac Watts’s translation of The Psalms of David more attractive to prospective customers.  The Robertsons and Trumbull “now beg the Favour of the different Societies, whom they may have the Honour to serve, with this small elegant Edition: That they would send the ANTHEMS, usually sung, that they may be inserted.”  Such additions would make the books all the more useful to consumers … and marketable for the printers.  Having taken the project to press, they aimed to maximize the return on their investment by producing other items that could be bound in a single volume.  The book ultimately included eleven anthems, some of them likely contributed by members of the “different Societies” that saw the advertisement in the Norwich Packet.

The Robertsons and Trumbull also envisioned a companion to “Dr. WATTS’s PSALMS.”  They reported that “Sundry Gentlemen … expressed a Desire to have Dr. WATTS’s HYMNS printed in the same Manner as the Psalms, so that they may be bound up together.”  That does not seem to have happened, at least not in the copy of Watts’s Psalms held by the Library of Congress and reproduced in America’s Historical Imprints.  The printers likely did not take that project to press, lacking sufficient demand even though they claimed “Sundry Gentleman” suggested the idea to them.  That may have been a ploy to encourage prospective buyers to reserve copies in advance, but when they did not materialize the Robertsons and Trumbull presumably opted not to pursue publishing the hymns.

June 22

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , ,

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

Connecticut Courant (June 22, 1773).

“PROPOSALS, For PUBLISHING, upon a PLAN entirely new, a Periodical PAPER.”

For several years, three newspapers served residents of Connecticut, the New-London Gazette (established as the Connecticut Gazette in November 1763), the Connecticut Courant (established October 1764), published in Hartford, and the Connecticut Journal and New-Haven Post-Boy (founded October 1767).  In addition, the Newport Mercury, the Providence Gazette, and several newspapers published in New York circulated in Connecticut.  In 1773, Alexander Robertson, James Robertson, and John Trumbull made plans to launch a fourth newspaper in the colony.  To that end, they distributed subscription proposals for the “NORWICH PACKET, OR THE CONNECTICUT, MASSACHUSETTS, NEW-HAMPSHIRE, AND RHODE-ISLAND INTELLIGENCER, AND WEEKLY ADVERTISER.”  They intended for their newspaper to serve a region that extended far beyond the town where they published it.

As was the case with the Maryland Journal (published in Baltimore) and Rivington’s New-York Gazetteer, it took some time for the printers to amass a sufficient number of subscribers to commence publication.  The Robertsons and Trumbull stated that the “first Paper will be published as soon as a competent Number of Subscribers are procured.”  They printed the first issue in October 1773, the Norwich Packet became the third new newspaper in the colonies that year.  That brought the total to thirty-three newspapers throughout the colonies, most of them in English along with two in German published in Pennsylvania.  By the end of the year, the New-York Gazette or Weekly Post-Boy folded, while Isaiah Thomas and Henry-Walter Tinges established the Essex Journal in Newburyport, Massachusetts.  Even as a few newspapers, such as the Boston Chronicle, went out of business in the early 1770s, colonizers gained access to a greater variety of newspapers in the years just before the American Revolution.  Overall, the total number rose from twenty-six in 1765 to thirty-one in 1770 to forty-three in 1775.  During the Revolutionary War, several of those newspapers ceased or paused publication.  Printers founded others to supply colonizers with information about the war, commerce, and other news.

The Norwich Packet continued publication throughout most of the war, though suspended from late September 1782 through late October 1783.  The Robertsons and Trumbull, however, parted ways.  In May 1776, Trumbull became the sole publisher when the Robertsons, who were Loyalists, relocated to New York.  In their subscription proposals, the three printers asserted that they planned to publish a “succinct detail of the Proceedings of the Parliament of Great-Britain, especially such as relate to America, and the political Manoeuvres of the Statesmen in and out of Administration.”  How to interpret and respond to those “Proceedings” and “Manoeuvres” eventually resulted in such deep fissures that some colonizers declared and fought for independence while others remained loyal to Britain.  When the Robertsons and Trumbull established the Norwich Packet, the updates and editorials in the newspaper helped shape public discourse about the relationship between the colonies and Parliament.  Within just a couple of years, the Norwich Packet related and recorded many of the events of the Revolutionary War.  In order to publish “the most recent Advices of every remarkable Event,” however, the printers first had to convince “THE PUBLIC” to subscribe.

January 4

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , ,

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

Jan 4 1770 - 1:4:1770 New-York Chronicle
New-York Chronicle (January 4, 1770).

“To be SOLD … A Healthy likely Negro.”

When the new year began in 1770, colonists in New York had access to four newspapers printed in their bustling port city. Hugh Gaine published the New-York Gazette and Weekly Mercury on Mondays, the same day that James Parker circulated the New-York Gazette or Weekly Post-Boy. On Thursdays, John Holt distributed the New-York Journal. Commencing in May 1769, Alexander Robertson and James Robertson released a new issue of the New-York Chronicle on Thursdays. All four newspapers carried advertisements concerning enslaved men, women, and children, who comprised a significant portion of the population. According to the New-York Historical Society, “As many as 20 percent of colonial New Yorkers were enslaved Africans. … Almost every businessman in 18th-century New York had a stake, at one time or another, in the traffic of human beings.” Gaine, Parker, Holt, and the Robertsons certainly had a stake, generating revenue from advertisements offering enslaved people for sale and from notices describing those who escaped, the advertisers hoping that colonists would recognize, capture, and return “runaways” for a reward.

This advertisement seeking to sell a “Healthy likely Negro Wench, about Thirteen Years of Age,” appeared in the January 4, 1770, edition of the New-York Chronicle. As in so many other advertisements of this type, the seller did not include their name but instead instructed interested parties to “enquire of the Printers.” When they acted as information brokers in response to such enquiries, the Robertsons and other printers became even more enmeshed in the slave trade.

Yet the Robertsons ceased offering such services, not necessarily out of any moral compunction but instead because the New-York Chronicle closed down. The January 4 edition is the last known issue and, quite probably, the last issue of that newspaper. The newspaper did not survive an entire year, but the printers still managed to play a role in facilitating the slave trade in the colony. This advertisement offering a thirteen-year-old girl for sale ran on the final page of the January 4 edition. The New-York Chronicle helped to perpetuate slavery until the newspaper’s very end. New Yorkers then had one less place to insert advertisements about enslaved men, women, and children, but the disappearance of the New-York Chronicle likely made little difference in that regard. Three other newspapers continued to publish those advertisements, further embroiling colonial printers in maintaining and bolstering the slave trade. Gaine’s New-York Gazette and Weekly Mercury tended to carry the most advertisements concerning enslaved people, but the others published them as well. As the 1770s dawned in New York, none of the city’s newspaper printers refused such advertisements and the fees associated with them.

June 5

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , ,

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

Jun 5 - 6:5:1769 New-York Chronicle
New-York Chronicle (June 5, 1769).

“Advertisements … are inserted for Five Shillings.”

Advertising represented an important revenue stream for eighteenth-century printers, prompting many to regularly solicit advertisements in the colophons of their newspapers. In 1769, for example, the colophon for the New-York Gazette: Or, the Weekly Post-Boy stated that James Parker printed it “at the NEW PRINTING-OFFICE … where Subscriptions, and Advertisements, &c. for this Paper are taken in.” Similarly, William Goddard used the colophon of the Pennsylvania Chronicle to proclaim that “Subscriptions, (at TEN SHILLINGS per Annum) Advertisements, Articles and Letters of Intelligence are gratefully received for this Paper” at his printing office. While printers regularly encouraged colonists to submit advertisements, they much less frequently indicated how much it cost to advertise in their publications.

Those that did list their advertising rates most often did so in the colophon, again utilizing it for conducting business on behalf of the newspaper rather than merely listing the particulars about who published it. A systematic examination of the colophons of eighteenth-century newspapers would produce a much better accounting of eighteenth-century advertising rates than has yet been compiled by historians of early American print culture. Such a project would include the New-York Chronicle.

When Alexander Robertson and James Robertson launched this newspaper in May 1769, they included their advertising rates in the colophon: “Advertisements of no more Length than Breadth are inserted for Five Shillings, four Weeks, and One Shilling for each Week after, and larger Advertisements in the same Proportion.” Their pricing schedule reflected common practices among printers who listed the fees for inserting notices in newspapers. Advertisers commonly purchased a “square” of advertising as the basic unit, paying an initial fee that covered both setting the type and running the advertisement for several weeks, usually three or four. Most printers also indicated additional costs for continuing an advertisement after its initial run, as well as proportional pricing for those that exceeded the standard square. In this case, the five shillings that the Robertsons charged to insert an advertisement for four weeks consisted of one shilling for setting the type and one shilling for each week it appeared in the New-York Chronicle. Each additional week cost one shilling. In this case, the colophon revealed valuable information about the business of printing in early America.

May 29

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , ,

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

May 29 - 5:29:1769 New-York Chronicle
New-York Chronicle (May 29, 1769).

“A REGISTER BOOK is kept for the regular entry of … negroes.”

Colonists who read any of the newspapers published in New York in the late 1760s were likely familiar with John Coghill Knapp and the services he provided at the “Scrivener, Register, & Conveyance Office.” The attorney frequently inserted lengthy advertisements in multiple newspapers simultaneously. When Alexander Robertson and James Robertson launched the New-York Chronicle in May 1769, Knapp was one of the first to place an advertisement in their new publication. Indeed, when the Robertsons distributed their first issue on May 8 it included one of Knapp’s advertisements; the same advertisement appeared each week for the remainder of the month and beyond.

The inclusion of Knapp’s advertisement meant that the Robertsons and the New-York Chronicle were enmeshed in the slave trade as soon as the publication commenced. Among the many services he provided, Knapp consistently advertised slaves for sale or otherwise acted as a broker for clients seeking to find buyers for enslaved men, women, and children. In his advertisement in the inaugural issue of the New-York Chronicle, he advised readers that “A REGISTER BOOK is kept for the regular entry of estates for sale either in land, houses, or ground to build on; negroes, and white servants time; to which purchasers may have fee access.” In other words, he invited readers to visit his office to peruse the listings of enslaved people for sale, neatly organized in a register along with real estate and indentured servants.

Print culture, especially newspapers, played an important role in shaping politics during the revolutionary era, spreading information about the imperial crisis and various modes of resistance adopted throughout the colonies. As a result, printers and the press have long been recognized as agents of liberty and the patriot cause. Depicting the press solely as a progressive instrument, however, misses an important part of the story of the American founding. Advertisements that offered enslaved people for sale or offered rewards for those who had escaped in hopes of achieving their own freedom also testify to the power of the press yet demonstrate that it did not always serve the ideals of liberty for all who resided in the colonies. Even as the press became a significant tool advocating the cause of freedom for some colonists, it helped perpetuate the enslavement of others.