Commodification of Current Events

January 1

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

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

Dunlap’s Pennsylvania Packet (January 1, 1776).

“A CORRECT MAP … in which may be seen the march of Col. Arnold.”

On January 1, 1776, Robert Aitken, a printer and bookseller, advertised that he had for sale a “CORRECT MAP of the great river St. Lawrence, Nova-Scotia, Newfoundland, and that part of New-England, in which may be seen the march of Co. Arnold, from Casco-Bay to Quebec, by wat of Kennebec river.”  The map featured insets depicting the “plains of Quebec, the town of Halifax and its harbour, and a small perspective view of the city of Boston.”  Like several other maps and prints advertised in the months following the outbreak of hostilities at Lexington and Concord in April 1775, this map supplemented the news that colonizers read in the newspapers and heard when they discussed current events.

This “CORRECT MAP” aided in understanding the dual-pronged American invasion of Quebec that commenced near the end of August.  General Richard Montgomery and 1200 soldiers headed from Fort Ticonderoga, New York, recently captured from the British, toward Montreal.  That city surrendered to Montogomery on November 13.  Meanwhile, Colonel Benedict Arnold and 1100 soldiers sailed from Newburyport, Massachusetts, to the mouth of the Kennebec River on September 15.  They made a harrowing trek through the wilderness of northern New England, losing nearly half their number to death or desertion, before reaching Quebec City on November 14.  Arnold and his soldiers besieged the city, eventually supported by Montgomery and reinforcements on December 2.  The enlistments for many of the American soldiers ended on December 31, prompting Montgomery and Arnold to attack the city during a snowstorm.  The weather did not work to their advantage.  Montgomery was killed, Arnold wounded, and four hundred American soldiers captured.  Arnold assumed command and continued the siege, realizing that British reinforcements would arrive when the St. Lawrence River became navigable again in the spring.  When General John Burgoyne arrived in May, Arnold led a retreat to upstate New York.  Ultimately, the American invasion of Canada failed.

When they saw Aitken’s advertisement for a “CORRECT MAP … in which may be seen the march of Col. Arnold” in the January 1 edition of Dunlap’s Pennsylvania Packet, they had no way of knowing about the failed attack that occurred the previous day.  Supporters of the American cause still hoped that Montgomery and Arnold would capture Quebec City, dealing a significant blow to the British.  Along with newspaper coverage, the map chronicled what readers knew about the invasion of Canada, including the hardships endured by Arnold and the soldiers under his command who endured so many hardships in the wilderness of northern New England.

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For more information about the Quebec Campaign, see Nathan Wuertenberg’s more comprehensive overview.

November 30

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

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

New-York Journal (November 30, 1775).

“A neat Mezzotinto Print of the Hon. JOHN HANCOCK, Esq.”

Richard Sause, a cutler in New York, became a purveyor of patriotic memorabilia during the Revolutionary War.  In October 1775, he advertised “ROMAN’s MAP OF BOSTON,” billing it as “one of the most correct that has ever been published.”  He described the cartographer, Bernard Romans, as “the most skilful Draughtsman in all America,” noting that he earned credibility because he “was on the spot at the engagements of Lexington and Bunker’s-Hill.”  Nicholas Brooks, a shopkeeper who specialized in prints, and Romans collaborated on the project in Philadelphia.  Sause acted as a local agent for marketing and distributing the map in New York.

That was not the only item commemorating current events that Sause advertised and sold.  At the end of November 1775, he took to the pages of the New-York Journal once again, informing the public that he sold a “neat Mezzotinto Print of the Hon. JOHN HANCOCK, Esq.”  The print depicting the merchant from Boston who served as president of the Second Continental Congress was another one of Brooks’s projects.  In addition, Sause also stocked “a view of the BATTLE at Charlestown” and “an accurate Map of the Present Seat of Civil War, taken by an able Draftsman.”  Sause seemingly worked closely with Brooks in acquiring the various prints and marketing them to patriots in New York, perhaps even providing him with advertising copy to adapt for his own notices.  The prints that Sause offered for sale appeared in the same order in his advertisement in the New-York Journal that they did in Brooks’s advertisement in Pennsylvania Journal.  Brooks may have sent a clipping along with the prints that he dispatched to the cutler in New York.

Although Sause had established himself as a cutler who also sold hardware and jewelry in a series of advertisements in New York’s newspapers, his activities in the marketplace in 1775 emphasized his commitment to the American cause.  Before he began selling prints, he promoted “SMALL SWORDS” to gentlemen who anticipated participating in the defense of their liberties and their city.  Even though he continued to advertise an “assortment of Jewellery, Cutlery, Hardware, and Haberdashery,” he made items related to the conflict with Parliament and British troops quartered in the colonies the focal point of his advertisements.

November 1

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

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

Pennsylvania Journal (November 1, 1775).

“A NEAT Mezzotinto print of the Hon. JOHN HANCOCK.”

“A large and exact VIEW of the late BATTLE at CHARLESTOWN.”

“An accurate map of the present seat of CIVIL WAR.”

Nicholas Brooks produced and marketed items that commemorated the American Revolution before the colonies declared independence.  In an advertisement in the November 1, 1775, edition of the Pennsylvania Journal, for instance, he packaged together three prints previously advertised separately, each of them related to imperial crisis that had boiled over into a war.  For this notice, Brooks presented them as a collection of prints for consumers who wished to demonstrate their support for the American cause by purchasing and displaying one or more of them.

Brooks announced that a “NEAT Mezzotinto print of the Hon JOHN HANCOCK, Esquire, President of the CONTINENTAL CONGRESS,” that had previously been proposed in other advertisements had been published and was now for sale at his shop on Second Street in Philadelphia.  The subscribers who had reserved copies in advance could pick up their framed copies or arrange for delivery.  Others who had not placed advanced orders could acquire the print for three shillings and nine pence or pay two extra shillings for one “elegantly coloured.”

“Likewise, may be had at the above place,” Brooks reported, “a large and exact VIEW of the late BATTLE at CHARLESTOWN,” depicting what has become known as the Battle of Bunker Hill.  This print competed with an imitation bearing a similar title, “a neat and correct VIEW of the late BATTLE at CHARLESTOWN,” that Robert Aitken inserted in the Pennsylvania Magazine and sold separately.  Brooks, who had long experience selling framed prints, offered choices for his “exact VIEW.”  Customers could opt for an “elegantly coloured” version for seven shillings and six pence” or have it “put in a double carved and gilt frame, with glass 20 by 16 inches,” for eighteen shillings and six pence.  The eleven shillings for the frame, half again the cost of the print, indicated that Brooks anticipated that customers would display the “exact VIEW” proudly in their homes or offices.

He also promoted “an accurate map of the present seat of CIVIL WAR, taken by an able Draughtsman,” Bernard Romans, “who was on the spot of the late engagement.”  Brooks revised copy from earlier advertisements: “The draught was taken by the most skillful draughtsman in all America, and who was on the spot at the engagements of Lexington and Bunker’s Hill.”  The map showed a portion of New England that included Boston, Salem, Providence, and Worcester.   This print, he declared, was a “new impression, with useful additions,” though he did not specify how it differed from the one he previously marketed and sold.  As with the others, customers had a choice of a plain version for five shillings or a “coloured” one for six shillings and six pence.

Brooks added one more item, “a humorous and instructive print, entitled the COMET of 1774, done by a Gentleman in New-York.”  Did this print offer some sort of satirical commentary on current events?  Or was it unrelated to the prints of Hancock, the Battle of Bunker Hill, and the “CIVIL WAR” in New England?  Whatever the additional print depicted, Brooks made the prints that commemorated the American Revolution the focus of his advertisement, gathering together three items previously promoted individually.  In so doing, he not only offered each print to customers as separate purchases but also suggested that they could consider them part of a collection.  Consumers who really wanted to demonstrate their patriotism could easily acquire all three at his shop.

October 18

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

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

Pennsylvania Journal (October 18, 1775).

“An Elegy to the memory of the American Volunteers who fell … April 19, 1775.”

During the era of the American Revolution, advertisements for almanacs frequently appeared in newspapers from New England to Georgia each fall.  Such was the case in the Pennsylvania Journal in 1775.  James Adams, a printer in Delaware, inserted a notice that announced that he “JUST PUBLISHED … The WILMINGTON and PENNSYLVANIA ALMANACKS, For the year of our LORD, 1776.”

Adams followed a familiar format for advertising almanacs.  He indicated that both editions included “the usual astronomical calculations” that readers would find in any almanac as well as a variety of other enticing contents.  The Pennsylvania edition included “Pithy Sayings” for entertainment and “Tables of Interest at six and seven per cent” for reference as well as the “Continuation of William Penn’s Advice to his Children” and the “Conclusion of Wisdom’s Call to the young of both sexes.”  Adams published a portion of those pieces in the almanac for the previous year, anticipating that readers would purchase the subsequent edition for access to the essays in their entirety.  The almanac for 1776 also suggested “Substitutes for Tea,” certainly timely considering that the Continental Association remained in effect. Colonizers sought alternatives while they boycotted imported tea.

Current events played an even more prominent role in the Wilmington Almanack.  It featured an “Elegy to the memory of the American Volunteers, who fell in the engagement between the Massachusetts-Bay Militia and the British Troops, April 19, 1775.”  Six months after the battles at Lexington and Concord, Adams memorialized the minutemen who had died for the American cause during the first battles of the Revolutionary War.  In addition, the almanac featured “The Irishman’s Epistle to the Officers and troops at Boston,” “Liberty-Tree,” and “A droll Dialogue between a fisherman of Poole, in England, and a countryman, relative to the trade of America, and proposed victory over the Americans.”  Adams did not elaborate on those items, perhaps intentionally.  Presenting the titles of the pieces without further elaboration was standard practice in advertisements for almanacs, but in this case the printer may have intended to stoke curiosity that would lead to more sales.  For both almanacs, a concern for current events and a burst of patriotism influenced the contents and their marketing.

October 16

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , ,

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

New-York Journal (October 16, 1775).

“THIS Map of Boston, &c. is one of the most correct that has ever been published.”

Richard Sause, a cutler in New York, became a local agent in that city when Nicholas Brooks and Bernard Romans collaborated on a map of Boston.  Brooks, a shopkeeper in Philadelphia, described himself as “the printer of said Maps” in newspaper advertisements, though he likely meant that he was the publisher who collaborated with Romans, a noted cartographer.  Sause had not been among the original list of local agents in an advertisement that appeared in Rivington’s New-York Gazetteer in August 1775, nor had he been on the list on a broadside subscription proposal that circulated in the summer and fall.  When Brooks and Romans launched a second project, “An Exact VIEW of the late BATTLE at CHARLESTOWN,” the subscription proposal in the Pennsylvania Ledger included “Mr. Richard Sause in New-York” among the local agents.  Brooks and Romans apparently supplied him with copies of the map as well as the print depicting what is now known as the Battle of Bunker Hill.

Sause, a frequent advertiser, was already familiar to consumers in New York.  A woodcut depicting various kinds of cutlery available at his “Jewlery, Hardware, and Cutlery Store” often adorned his advertisements in newspapers printed in that city.  In the summer and fall of 1775, he emphasized “SMALL SWORDS” in his advertisements.  Following the outbreak of hostilities at Lexington and Concord in April, residents of New York and other towns did not know what to expect.  Many prepared to defend their liberties should the British turn their attention to them.  Sause made sure that Patriots in New York knew that he could supply them with various kinds of small swords.  He even made a pitch for those items at the end of his advertisement for Romans’s map of Boston: “Swords and Cutteaux de Chase [a short sword], with a variety of Jewellery, Hardware and Cutlery, to be sold at the above Store.”

Yet the “MAP OF BOSTON” was the main attraction in that advertisement.  In addition to the headline in capital letters, Sause’s notice billed the map as “one of the most correct that has ever been published.”  To help make sales, he emphasized that the “draught [draft] was taken by the most skilful Draughtsman in all America.”  Buyers could depend on its accuracy because Romans “was on the spot at the engagements of Lexington and Bunker’s-Hill.”  Current events certainly played a role in Sause expanding his business to incorporate a new revenue stream, yet marketing and selling both Brooks and Romans’s map of Boston and prints depicting the Battle of Bunker Hill also gave him an opportunity to participate in politics via the marketplace.

September 28

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

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

New-York Journal (September 28, 1775).

“The Words of Command used in the Manual Exercise, and an accurate Plan of Boston.”

Almost simultaneously with Hugh Gaine announcing in the New-York Gazette and Weekly Mercury that he had “Just PUBLISHED … HUTCHIN’s Improv’d; BEING AN ALMANACK … For the Year of our LORD 1776,” Frederick Shober and Samuel Loudon inserted an advertisement in the New-York Journal to alert the public that they had “Just published … The NEW-YORK and COUNTRY ALMANACK, For the Year of our Lord 1776.”  It included “all the necessary Articles usual in an Almanac, with the Addition of many curious Anecdotes, Receipts [or Recipes], [and] poetical Pieces.”  Unlike Gaine, Shober and Loudon did not provide an extensive list of the contents.  As printer of the New-York Gazette and Weekly Mercury, Gaine had access to as much space as he wished to devote to promoting an almanac he published.  Shober and Loudon, on the other hand, paid to run their advertisement in the New-York Journal.

The partners did, however, specify two items that they wanted prospective customers to know they would find in the New-York and Country Almanack: “the Words of Command used in the Manual Exercise, and an accurate Plan of Boston with the different Situations of the Provincials, and the Ministerial Armies.”  Both reflected current events.  The “REFERENCES TO THE PLAN” (or legend for the map of Boston) in the almanac highlighted the “Battle of Lexington, 19th of April,” and the “Battle of Bunker’s-Hill, 17th of June.”  For readers beyond Massachusetts who did not directly experience those battles, that helped solidify in their minds the dates that they occurred.  By the time that Shober and Loudon took their almanac to press, maps of Boston had circulated widely in the July issue of the Pennsylvania Magazine (and Loudon had been among the booksellers to advertise them).  Nicholas Brooks and Bernard Romans also collaborated on a map that they likely distributed by the end of summer.  Those may have served as models for the “Plan of Boston” that Sober and Loudon commissioned for their almanac.  Gaine also directed attention to the “beautiful Plan of Boston, and the Provincial Camp” in his almanac.  The “whole Process of making SALT PETRE, recommended by the Hon. the Continental Congress” and a “Method of making Gun-Powder” accompanied their map.  In Shober and Loudon’s almanac, the “Words of Command,” taken from the widely published Manual Exercise, supplemented the map.  In both cases, the events of the Revolutionary War inspired the contents of the almanacs and became selling points in marketing them.

“Plan of Boston” [left] and “References to the Plan” [right], in The New-York and Country Almanack for the Year of Our Lord 1776 (New York: Shober and Loudon, 1775). Courtesy American Antiquarian Society.

August 21

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , ,

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

New-York Gazette and Weekly Mercury (August 21, 1775).

“To the last Number for July, is affix’d a new and correct Plan of the TOWN of BOSTON, and PROVINCIAL CAMP.”

In the summer of 1775, Samuel Loudon, a bookseller in New York, stocked books printed by Robert Aitken in Philadelphia.  He advertised Military Instructions for Officers Detached in the Field, “DEDICATED TO His Excellency General Washington,” and The Art of Speaking in the August 21, 1775, edition of the New-York Gazette and Weekly Mercury.  He also noted that he stocked an assortment of paper and a “Variety of Books” that he “sold at the very lowest Price.”

Loudon concluded his advertisement by promoting another of Aitken’s projects.  The bookseller advised the public that he collected subscriptions “for that very useful and interesting “PENNSYLVANIA MAGAZINE, published by Mr. AITKEN.”  The Pennsylvania Magazine, or, American Monthly Museum commenced publication with its January 1775 issue, briefly overlapping with the Royal American Magazine.  Upon the demise of the latter, it became the only magazine published in the colonies.

To incite interest, Loudon noted that “the last Number for July” featured a “new and correct Plan of the TOWN of BOSTON, and PROVINCIAL CAMP.”  According to the Norman B. Leventhal Map and Education Center at the Boston Public Library, this map “was the earliest printed depiction of Boston after the battle of Bunker Hill, June 17, 1775.”  It includes an inset that “shows the location of the location of the battle, as well as provincial (American) lines in the communities surrounding Boston.”  This demonstrated “the commanding position enjoyed by the Continental Army.”

Getting a free map of Boston following the Battle of Bunker Hill was certainly an incentive to subscribe to the Pennsylvania Magazine!  But was it the first map of Boston created after that battle?  Perhaps, but it might better be described as one of the first depictions of Boston after the Battle of Bunker Hill.  A note in the Leventhal Center’s online catalog states, “This date is inferred,” likely because the map was “Engrav’d for the Pennsylva. Magazine” for July 1775.  Yet the assertion that it was the earliest printed depiction of Boston after the Battle of Bunker Hill may rely on an assumption that colonial printers published magazines at the beginning of the month when they instead issued monthly issues at the end of the month or early in the following month.  Thus, Aitken distributed the July 1775 issue of the Pennsylvania Magazine at the same time that he, Nicholas Brooks, and others advertised Bernard Romans’s map of Boston, a map that also featured an inset showing the “Provincial Lines” during the siege of the city and the site of the Battle of Bunker Hill.  Aitken may have consulted with Romans when preparing a map to accompany the magazine.  For prospective subscribers, it may not have mattered whether they acquired the first map of Boston published after the Battle of Bunker Hill, only that they had access to the map … and at a bargain price since it came as a premium with their subscription to the Pennsylvania Magazine rather than purchasing Romans’s map separately.

“A New and Correct Plan of the Town of Boston, and Provincial Camp” (1775). Courtesy Norman B. Leventhal Map and Education Center at the Boston Public Library.

April 8

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , ,

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

Virginia Gazette [Dixon and Hunter] (April 8, 1775).

“JOURNAL of the PROCEEDINGS OF THE CONVENTION held at RICHMOND.”

John Carter once again advertised that “A few Copies of The Proceedings of the late Continental CONGRESS May be had at the Printing-Office” in the April 8, 1775, edition of the Providence Gazette.  That same day, John Dixon and William Hunter advertised that they “have for SALE … the Journal of the Proceedings of the Congress held at Philadelphia” in the Virginia Gazette.  When the First Continental Congress concluded its meetings near the end of October 1774, printers in many towns rushed to publish local editions of the Extracts from the Votes and Proceedings of the American Continental Congress.  Dixon and his partner at the time, Alexander Purdie, printed the Extracts.  So did Carter.  Advertisements for the Extracts quickly appeared in newspapers.  Not nearly as many printers published the Journal.  William and Thomas Bradford produced a Philadelphia edition about a month after they published the Extracts.  In New York, Hugh Gaine published the only other edition.  In contrast to marketing for the Extracts, advertisements for the Journal did not immediately pepper newspapers throughout the colonies.

Yet over time printers and booksellers acquired copies of the Journal from the Bradfords or from Gaine and informed prospective customers that they stocked that volume.  Dixon and Hunter did so when they advertised a publication that came off their own press, “A JOURNAL of the PROCEEDINGS OF THE CONVENTION held at RICHMOND ON THE 20th OF MARCH, 1775.”  Although listed first in the advertisement, the Journal for the First Continental Congress received secondary attention.  Dixon and Hunter used larger type for the title of their new publication and created greater visual interest by breaking the title into several lines and centering each line.  Dixon and Hunter did not diminish the significance of the Journal for the First Continental Congress; instead, they treated the Journal for the convention at Richmond as breaking news, an important local update, and a continuation of coverage of proceedings that commenced with delegates in Philadelphia and then moved to meetings held throughout the colonies.  They also had an interest in selling the volume that they produced, yet they recognized an opportunity to package it with the Journal for the First Continental Congress and increase revenue.  Both publications kept the public informed while simultaneously commodifying American responses to the imperial crisis that ultimately became a revolution.

August 4

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , ,

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

New-York Journal (August 4, 1774).

“A complete collection of what may be with propriety stiled, AMERICAN STATE PAPERS.”

As the imperial crisis intensified, colonizers looked to the past as they considered their present circumstances and the future.  In the summer of 1774, an anonymous compiler issued a proposal for collecting and printing “AMERICAN STATE PAPERS” that documented the history of British North America.  The compiler acknowledged that recent events in the colonies “attract[ed] attention” and promoted “many inquiries” among the curious with “little, or no connection with the British colonies in America” as well as others with “perhaps more interested motives.”  Yet information about the history of the colonies, both the distant past and more recent events, was not readily accessible “by every person.”  Even those with means to travel in search of documents that told “the story of [the] rise and progress” of the colonies would spend more time seeking them out than reading them.  The compiler presented a published collection of “AMERICAN STATE PAPERS” as the solution, one that would make a “good American history” widely accessible while also “preserving from oblivion valuable materials” that otherwise might be lost, damaged, or destroyed.

The compiler envisioned a project that went back to “the grant from Henry 7th, to John Cabot, and his sons for making discoveries.”  It would also include “every important public paper (such as royal grants, charters, acts of parliament, &c. &c.) relating to America.”  Despite such an extensive scope, the compiler emphasized the recent past, the events that were part of the imperial crisis that colonizers currently experienced as Parliament sought to regulate trade and oversee governance much more than in the past.  The compiler considered the “history of the STAMP-ACT, and other acts of the British parliament for raising a revenue among us by internal taxation;– Resolves of the American assemblies;– Votes of town meeting;– and such political pamphlets and other fugitive pieces” worthy of preservation and inclusion.  A significant portion of this collection would be devoted to sources that told the story of the American Revolution; the compiler detailed a plan for constructing a narrative even before the war for independence began.

The proposal gave some details about the publication, indicating that it “may be comprised in five volumes octavo, and … the price of each volume, well bound and lettered, will not exceed one dollar and a half,” yet did more than call on readers to reserve copies by subscribing.  The compiler sought “friendly assistance” in acquiring documents that belonged in the collection.  To that end, he “begs that gentlemen who are possessed of proper materials for this purpose, will be kind enough to favour him with the use of them,” trusting that “they shall be carefully returned.”  The compiler then gave a list of local agents who accepted documents and “safely forwarded” them in addition to accepting subscriptions.  Printers, postmasters, and booksellers in fifteen towns in ten colonies participated in this endeavor, establishing a community of common interest across vasty distances.  The list of local agents underscored a common cause that extended across the colonies, a political project that looked to history to inform arguments about the rights and liberties that the colonies had enjoyed and should continue to experience.  The proposed collection of “AMERICAN STATE PAPERS” commodified the past, especially the decade of the imperial crisis.  It was part of the commodification of the American Revolution that occurred before the first shots at Lexington and Concord.

July 30

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

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

New-Hampshire Gazette (July 30, 1773).

“Just Published, The PARTICULARS of the late Melancholy and Shocking TRAGEDY, which happened at Salem.”

The account of the “most distressing and melancholy Affair” of the drowning of three men and seven women, five of them reportedly pregnant, when their boat sank near Salem during a sudden storm on June 17, 1773, first appeared in the Essex Gazette on June 22 and then in the Boston Evening-Post on June 28 and the Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Weekly News-Letter on July 1.  News also spread beyond the colony where the tragedy occurred.  On June 25, Daniel Fowle reprinted the account from the Essex Gazette in the New-Hampshire Gazette, though some readers likely already heard some of the details via word of mouth.

As was the case in Boston, commemoration and commodification of the drownings, entwined so tightly as to render them inseparable, soon appeared in the public prints.  Ezekiel Russell first advertised a broadside “Decorated with the Figures of Ten Coffins” that related “The Particulars of the late melancholy and shocking TRAGEDY, which lately happened at SALEM” in the July 12 edition of the Boston Evening-Post.  Just three days later, Russell inserted the same advertisement in the Massachusetts Spy, adding a brief note about a second broadside, “An ELEGY on the affecting Tragedy at Salem.”  Fowle apparently acquired copies of the first broadside, which Russell sold “by the Groce,” to sell at his printing office.  A brief advertisement in the July 30 edition of the New-Hampshire Gazette announced, “Just Published, The PARTICULARS of the late Melancholy and Shocking TRAGEDY, which happened at Salem, near Boston, on Thursday, the 17th Day of June, 1773.”

Fowle did not include any of those “PARTICULARS” in the advertisement, nor did he publish any of the extensive memorial that previously appeared in the advertisements in the other newspapers.  Between the account in the New-Hampshire Gazette and conversations about the drownings, he may have thought that the broadside did not need additional explanation.  He also did not have the same financial stake in marketing the broadside that Russell did, likely accepting only as many as he anticipated he could sell.  Russell played on the proximity of the tragedy to Boston in marketing the broadside to readers of newspaper published in that city, though he did proclaim that it “is recommended as very proper to be posted up in every House in New-England, to keep in Remembrance the most sorrowful Event.”  Fowle, on the other hand, did not assert such urgency to readers of his newspaper.  He presented the broadside for prospective customers who might be interested, but did not make the same hard sell in Portsmouth as Russell did in Boston.