Ebenezer Hazard

October 29

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , ,

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

Rivington’s New-York Gazetteer (October 26, 1775).

“A CONSTITUTIONAL POST-OFFICE is established in this city.”

Yet another advertisement for a “CONSTITUTIONAL POST-OFFICE,” an alternative to the British postal system, appeared in the public prints at the end of October 1775.  It ran in Rivington’s New-York Gazetteer, despite the reputation of that newspaper and its printer, James Rivington, for expressing Loyalist sentiments.  William Goddard originally envisioned the Constitutional Post and set about establishing local offices before the battles at Lexington and Concord, but after hostilities commenced the Second Continental Congress assumed responsibility for maintaining and expanding its services.  That included appointing Benjamin Franklin as the postmaster general, much to the chagrin of Goddard.  Ebenezer Hazard, a bookseller, became the postmaster in New York, though John Holt, the printer of the New-York Journal, lobbied for the position.  According to the nota bene in the advertisement, “The Office is kept at Noel and Hazard’s, near the Coffee-House,” the same location where the new postmaster and his partner, Garrat Noel, stocked the “JOURNAL OF THE PROCEEDINGS” of the First Continental Congress.

The notice in Rivington’s New-York Gazetteer, signed by Hazard as the “Post-master,” informed the public that a “CONSTITUTIONAL POST-OFFICE” is established in this city, by the post master general of all the united colonies on the continent of North-America.”  Hazard offered the most complete schedule of any that yet appeared in newspaper advertisements, stating that the “Posts are regularly dispatched” to Philadelphia on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, to Albany on Thursdays, to Hartford on Thursdays, and to New London, Newport, and Providence on Mondays.  The routes to both Hartford and New London extended “as far to the Eastward” as Portsmouth, New Hampshire.  Unlike some other postmasters, Hazard did not mention that service continued as far south as Georgia.  He focused primarily on the network that connected New York to New England and Pennsylvania.  As new advertisements for the Constitutional Post appeared in newspapers in multiple towns and cities, the public became more aware of an enterprise that competed with the imperial postal system to carry “Letters and Packets,” delivering news and information without interference from British authorities.

December 15

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

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

New-York Journal (December 15, 1774).

“JOURNAL OF THE PROCEEDINGS OF THE CONGRESS.”

According to their advertisement in the December 15, 1775, edition of the New-York Journal, Garrat Noel and Ebenezer Hazard stocked the “JOURNAL OF THE PROCEEDINGS OF THE CONGRESS, Held in PHILADELPHIA” at their bookstore.  They also marketed “STRICTURES On a pamphlet, entitled ‘A Friendly Address to all reasonable Americans, on the subject of our political confusions’” by Charles Lee and “AN ADDRESS, Occasioned by the late invasion of the liberties of the American Colonies, by the British Parliament, delivered in Charles-Town, South Carolina” by William Tennent.  The booksellers provided the public access to news and commentary about current events beyond what appeared in the public prints, though they privileged perspectives expressed by Patriots rather than Loyalists.

Noel and Hazard may have sold Hugh Gaine’s New York edition of the Proceedings of the First Continental Congress, though the other titles in their advertisement suggest that they could have sold the Philadelphia edition printed by William Bradford and Thomas Bradford.  The Bradfords also published Lee’s Strictures and Tennent’s Address, possibly sending copies of all three titles to Noel and Hazard.  Either  way, the masthead of the newspaper that featured the booksellers’ advertisement suggested that the Bradfords’ edition of the Proceedings made their way to New York.  Six months earlier, John Holt, the printer of the New-York Journal, incorporated a political cartoon depicting a severed snake, each segment representing one of the colonies, with the motto “UNITE OR DIE” into the masthead.  On December 15, he replaced it with a woodcut depicting twelve hands, one for each colony represented at the First Continental Congress, grasping a liberty pole with a liberty cap perched atop it on a pedestal inscribed “MAGNA CHARTA.”  A similar image appeared on the title page of the Bradfords’ edition of the Proceedings, described in Princeton University Library’s online catalog as “the first wood-cut device of the 12 colonies intended to symbolize the need for the true political unity of the colonies.”  Holt enhanced that image, having an ouroboros twice encircle the hands and pillar.  A message on the ouroboros proclaimed, “UNITED NOW – ALIVE AND FREE – AND THUS SUPPORTED EVER – BLESS OUR LAND – FIRM ON THIS BASIS LIBERTY SHALL STAND – TILL TIME BECOMES ETERNITY.”  This addition to his newspaper set the tone for readers to peruse Noel and Hazard’s advertisement, other paid notices, and the news and editorials selected by Holt.

New-York Journal (December 15, 1774).