Pennsylvania Ledger

May 12

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , ,

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

Pennsylvania Ledger (May 11, 1776).

“All the newest political pamphlets, either for or against independency, may be had at said Bell’s.”

Robert Bell, one of the most prominent American printers and booksellers of the second half of the eighteenth century, advertised his publications widely.  In the spring of 1776, he ran an advertisement that announced, “Just printed, published and now selling … THE DISEASES incident to ARMIES” and other medical treatises compiled in a single volume “for the use of military and naval surgeons.  He deployed identical copy in the Pennsylvania Evening Post and the Pennsylvania Ledger, stating that the volume would “contributeth to promote the health and happiness of such valuable lives as those of American soldiers and sailors.”  The savvy publisher sought to convince “land and sea officers,” in particular, and “all the friends of liberty and humanity,” in general, that they should endorse the publication and perhaps even purchase copies to supply to “military and naval surgeons” who treated American soldiers and sailors.

Despite such marketing appeals, Bell did not take a position on whether the colonies should declare independence, at least not in the works he selected to print, advertise, and sell.  He concluded his advertisement with at noted that “All the newest political pamphlets, either for or against independency, may be had at said Bell’s.”  Other printers and booksellers had pursued a similar course, though not as recently.  James Humphreys, Jr., the printer of the Pennsylvania Ledger, advertised “POLITICAL PAMPHLETS, ON Both Sides of the Question” a month after the battles at Lexington and Concord.  James Rivington listed political pamphlets that took opposing positions, some of them written in direct response to others, in advertisements with headlines like “THE AMERICAN CONTEST” and “The American Controversy” before the Sons of Liberty attacked his office, destroyed his press, and forced him to discontinue publishing Rivington’s New-York Gazetteer.  More than a year into the war, Bell was the only printer who promoted pamphlets “for or against independency” in his advertisements.  Other printers and booksellers likely stocked and sold some of those pamphlets, but they did not call attention to it as boldly as Bell did.

Pennsylvania Ledger (May 12, 1776).

Indeed, an advertisement for the second edition of Plain Truth appeared immediately below Bell’s advertisement for the medical manual in the May 11 edition of the Pennsylvania Ledger.  That pamphlet “contain[ed] remarks on … COMMON SENSE; Wherein are shewn that the Scheme of Independence is ruinous, delusive and impracticable.”  In another advertisement in the same issue, Bell advertised “Additions to Plain Truth.”  In both advertisements, he made an appeal for freedom of the press to justify publishing and selling “political pamphlets, either for or against independency.”  A nota bene at the end of the first advertisement declared, “To this pamphlet is subjoined a Defence of the Liberty of the Press, by the sagacious and patriotic Junius.”  The other pamphlet, according to the second advertisement, included a similar supplementary work.  “To this Pamphlet is annexed, for the information of all Americans, who wish to know and to enjoy the very Laws and Privileges which themselves have decreed,” a nota bene announced, “A Defence of the Liberty of the Press, by the Honorable the CONTINENTAL CONGRESS.”  If that did not provide sufficient cover, Bell also opined, “The enjoyment of Liberty, and even its support and preservation consists, in every man’s being allowed to speak his thoughts and lay open his sentiments.”  Bell had also published the first edition of Thomas Paine’s Common Sense, demonstrating that his press did disseminate diverse political views.

The advertisement concluded with a “Memorandum,” perhaps penned by Bell or possibly inserted by Humphreys, a loyalist printer known for charting a more moderate course than fellow printers in Philadelphia.  “If to preserve any part of the works of valuable writers, hath been looked upon as doing good service to the Public,” the memorandum explained, “The EDITOR hereof may hope, this his present endeavours will prove acceptable, at least to all the Loversof Freedom.”  Leveraging the principles that those “Lovers of Freedom” embraced and enunciated, the memorandum insisted that they must be “so consistent as to acknowledge the Press ought to be free for others as well as themselves.” They could not have it both ways and still claim to be “Lovers of Freedom.”  Rivington had made similar arguments.  Bell and Humphreys hoped for more success in doing so, encouraging greater consistency in their views about “Libertyof the Press” from those who did not like everything that they printed or sold.

May 4

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

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

Pennsylvania Ledger (May 4, 1776).

“His large and elegant STOCK of China, Glass and Earthern Wares.”

The extensive advertisement for a “large and elegant STOCK of China, Glass and Earthern Wares” that Joseph Stansbury ran in the May 4, 1776, edition of the Pennsylvania Ledger looked more like advertisements that appeared before the Continental Association went into effect on December 1, 1774, and before the war began on April 19, 1775.  It filled an entire column, listing countless items that Stansbury sticked at his store “opposite Christ Church [in] Philadelphia.”

To help prospective customers navigate his inventory, Stansbury used headings for “CHINA,” “GLASS,” and “EARTHERN WARE.”  To make the most efficient use of the space, he divided the column into two columns with a line of decorative type running down the center.  Under each heading, he grouped similar items together and, when their description extended more than one line, indented the second and subsequent lines so the resulting white space guided readers.  Some categories of goods were short, just two lines, such as “Rich enamelled tea-table sets complete” and “Blue and white soup terrines, two sizes.”  Others were much longer, including one that extended for twenty-two lines.  That one offered “Cream-pots, salts, mustards, pepper-castors, egg slices, custard cups, blamange moulds, cheese-toasters, cream-buckets, Italian lamps for the chambers of the sick, garden pots, flower horns, jarrs and beakers, sauce-boats, terrines, butter-tubs and stands, egg cups, bottles and basons, water dishes, fish drainers, cream cheese dishes, chamberpots, pattypans, baking dishes, compotiers, pudding dishes, pap boats, sallad dishes, plates, oblong dishes, mugs, jugs, childrens tea sets, whistling birds, &c.”  The “&c.” (the abbreviation for et cetera commonly used in the eighteenth century) suggested an even greater array of goods available to consumers who visited Stansbury’s store.  He promoted “a great choice of patterns” among his “Chocolate, & coffee tea-cups and saucers,” part of his larger theme of presenting all kinds of choices to consumers.

Stansbury encouraged the sort of conspicuous consumption that had become increasingly popular in the middle decades of the eighteenth century as colonizers participated in a transatlantic consumer revolution.  A series of boycotts (known at the time as nonimportation and nonconsumption agreements) during the imperial crisis and then the disruptions to trade during the war prompted many merchants, shopkeepers, and consumers to suspend some of their operations or abstain from importing and purchasing all sorts of goods.  Stansbury’s advertisement, however, testified to an active market or, at least, his desire to continue making sales despite the trying times.  As a Loyalist, Stansbury may not have much cared about the Patriot position when he ran his advertisement.  He was imprisoned later in 1776 for boisterously singing “God Save the King” and eventually served as an intermediary between Benedict Arnold and John André.

April 7

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

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

Pennsylvania Ledger (April 6, 1776).

“A few Copies of the Military Guide, FOR YOUNG OFFICERS.”

James Humphreys, Jr., the printer of the Pennsylvania Ledger, was so eager to sell surplus copies of Thomas Simes’s “Military Guide FOR YOUNG OFFICERS” that he inserted two advertisements in the April 6, 1776, edition of his newspaper.  A shorter notice appeared on the third page and a longer one on the fourth page.

Humphreys previously collaborated with Robert Aitken and Robert Bell in circulating subscription proposals for a local edition of the military manual originally published in London.  In an advertisement in the December 2, 1775, edition of the Pennsylvania Ledger, the printers declared that they took on the project “By Desire of some [of] the Members of the Honourable the American Continental CONGRESS, and some of the Military Officers of the Association.”  A few months later, they repeated that assertion in the longer advertisement that listed all three of their names and locations. That notice also featured other details from the subscription proposals, noting that the work was “a large and valuable Compilation from the most celebrated Military Writers” that included “an excellent Military, Historical and Explanatory DICTIONARY.”  The proposals had not, however, mentioned illustrations, but the advertisement that announced the two-volume set was “Printed and Published” informed readers that the “whole is illustrated with Eleven Copperplates.”  It concluded with a nota bene that instructed subscribers who had reserved copies in advance “to call or send for their Books.”  Aitken, Bell, and Humphreys had been running that advertisement in the Pennsylvania Evening Post and the Pennsylvania Ledger since late February.

Once the subscribers collected their books, Humphreys apparently had extra copies that he hoped to sell.  As long as they remained at his printing office they cut into any profits he earned on the venture.  In a streamlined advertisement, he announced that “A few Copies of the Military Guide, FOR YOUNG OFFICERS, By THOMAS SIMES, Esquire, In Two Volumes, large Octavo, embellished with a Number of Copperplates, (Price Three Dollars) May be had of the PRINTER hereof.”  Between the advertisement on the following page and the notices that already circulated widely, Humphreys assumed that prospective customers were already familiar with the local edition of Simes’s military manual.  It was one of many such works among “a flood of printings” in Philadelphia “to meet the demand for military texts,” according to the American Revolution Institute of the Society of the Cincinnati, yet that demand did not necessarily mean that copies sold themselves.  Aitken, Bell, and Humphreys carefully crafted a marketing campaign to enlist subscribers and then Humphreys still had “A few Copies” he hoped to sell.  He may have hoped that news that British troops evacuated Boston on March 17 would incite new demand for Simes’s manual.

March 31

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

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

Supplement to the Pennsylvania Ledger (March 30, 1776).

“BLANKS and HAND-BILLS in particular are done on the shortest notice.”

In the spring of 1776, Melchior Steiner and Charles (Carl) Cist ran an advertisement “to acquaint the public, that they have removed their PRINTING OFFICE to the house of Ludwick Sprogrell, in Second-street” in Philadelphia.  In their new location, the partners “carry on the PRINTING-BUSINESS in its different branches, in the English, German, and other languages, with care, fidelity & dispatch.”  That had been a common appeal in advertisements that they previously placed in several newspapers in December and January, emphasized in a headline that proclaimed, “PRINTING In ENGLISH, GERMAN, and other Languages.”  By the time they relocated, Steiner and Cist collaborated with William Bradford and Thomas Bradford, the printers of the Pennsylvania Journal, in printing a new edition of Thomas Paine’s Common Sense approved by the author and a German translation of the popular pamphlet.

Yet the printers did not limit themselves to books and pamphlets and other major projects.  They concluded their advertisement with a note that “BLANKS and HAND-BILLS in particular are done on the shortest notice.”  In other words, they accepted all sorts of smaller job printing assignments, quickly producing documents useful in business.  “BLANKS” referred to a variety of forms so commonly used that it saved time to print them in volume and then write the details by hand for each transaction.  In an advertisement in the Providence Gazette, John Carter listed more than a dozen kinds of blanks he printed, including “long and short Powers of Attorney, long and short Deeds, Bills of Sale, Bills of Lading, Portage Bills, Policies of Insurance, Apprentices Indentures, [and] Bonds of various Sorts.”  When it came to “HAND-BILLS,” customers used them to promote consumer goods and services, sometimes supplementing newspaper advertisements, and to disseminate news about politics, meetings, and other current events.  That printers so often advertised that they printed handbills suggests that many more of those items circulated in early American cities and towns than have survived in research libraries, historical societies, and private collections.  Steiner and Cist printed both blanks and handbills “on the shortest notice,” indicating that customers expected their orders to be filled speedily so they could get more information into circulation.

March 16

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , ,

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

Pennsylvania Ledger (March 16, 1776).

“PLAIN TRUTH … containing Remarks on a late Pamphlet intituled COMMON SENSE.”

Robert Bell published the first edition of Thomas Paine’s Common Sense on January 9, 1776, and not long after that he published a response, “PLAIN TRUTH; addressed to the INHABITANTS of AMERICA, containing Remarks on a late Pamphlet intituled COMMON SENSE.”  As was often the case in eighteenth-century advertisements for books and pamphlets, Bell used the extensive subtitle as the copy for marketing the volume: “Wherein are shewn, that the Scheme of INDEPENDENCE is Ruinous, Delusive, and impracticable: That were the Author’s Asseverations, respecting the Power of AMERICA, as Real as Nugatory, Reconciliation, on liberal Principles with GREAT-BRITAIN would be exalted Policy: And that, circumstances as we are, permanent Liberty, and true Happiness can only be obtained by Reconciliation with that Kingdon.”

According to Thomas R. Adams, only two pamphlets answered Common Sense in the six months between its publication in January and the Continental Congress declaring independence in July.  Robert Bell first advertised Plain Truth in the Pennsylvania Gazette on March 13.  Near the end of May, James Humphreys, Jr., published The True Interest of America Impartially Stated in Certain Strictures on a Pamphlet Intitled Common Sense.[1]  Bell quickly placed advertisements in other newspapers printed in Philadelphia, including the Pennsylvania Evening Post on March 14 and the Pennsylvania Ledger on March 16.  In each advertisement, he set the price at three shillings for a single copy “with large allowance to those who buy per the hundred or dozen.”  In other words, Bell offered a significant discount for buying in volume, hoping to make the pamphlet more attractive to consumers who might buy a dozen to share with friends and retailers who might buy a hundred to sell in their own shops in Philadelphia and beyond.  He may not have anticipated that Plain Truth would achieve the same popularity as Common Sense, yet he was still a savvy entrepreneur who aimed to generate revenue from the debate over declaring independence.  “To this Pamphlet is subjoined,” a nota bene at the end of the advertisement informed readers, “a Defence of the Liberty of the Press.”  Adams asserts that Bell “pleaded for the right to present both sides of the question.  No doubt he hoped thereby to increase the sales of both pamphlets.”[2]  James Rivington had done the same in advertisements with headlines like “THE AMERICAN CONTEST” and “The American Controversy” that promoted pamphlets “on both sides, in the unhappy dispute with Great-Britain.”  Humphreys, who eventually published The True Interest of America Impartially Stated, also ran advertisements for “POLITICAL PAMPHLETS, ON Both Sides of the Question.”  Such pamphlets educated colonizers and helped them understand and formulate their own positions, yet they also presented opportunities for printers to generate revenue from current events.

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[1] Thomas R. Adams, “The Authorship and Printing of Plain Truth by ‘Candidus,’” Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America 49, no. 3 (1955): 230-231.

[2] Adams, “Authorship and Printing,” 235.

March 2

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , ,

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

Pennsylvania Ledger (March 2, 1776).

“KEYSER’s FAMOUS PILLS … are selling … By NICHOLAS BROOKS.”

His advertisements in Philadelphia’s newspapers made it clear that Nicholas Brooks diversified his participation in the marketplace in the 1770s.  He often promoted selection of general merchandise, what he called a “curious Collection of various GOODS” in one advertisement, yet on other occasions he specialized in prints and maps.  Sometimes he made special note of those items in his advertisements, such as a nota bene that called attention to a “very large quantity of elegant pictures, maps, copper plater writings, and music,” while other times devoting advertisements exclusively to a “LARGE and curious collection of the most modern PRINTS and PICTURES.”  After the battles at Lexington and Concord in April 1775, Brooks partnered with Bernard Romans, a cartographer and engraver, to publish a “MAP, FROM BOSTON TO WORCESTER, PROVIDENCE AND SALEM” that showed the “SEAT of the present unhappy CIVIL WAR in NORTH-AMERICA” and print that provided “An Exact VIEW of the late BATTLE at CHARLESTOWN,” now known as the Battle of Bunker Hill.”  On the heels of those successful ventures, Brooks also advertised a “NEAT Mezzotinto print of the of the Hon. JOHN HANCOCK, Esquire, President of the CONTINENTAL CONGRESS.”

Yet maps and prints were not Brooks’s only significant side hustle.  He also peddled patent medicines, placing an extensive advertisement for “MAREDANT’s DROPS,” complete with testimonials in March 1772.” He continued hawking patent medicines during the Revolutionary War.  For instance, he placed two advertisements in the March 2, 1774, edition of the Pennsylvania Ledger.  The one for “Dr. RYAN’s INCOMPARABLE WORM-DESTROYONG SUGAR PLUMBS” rivaled his earlier advertisement for Maredant’s Drops in length.  Brooks billed this remedy as “Necessary to be kept in all FAMILIES.”  He described the efficacy of the medicine, noted its popularity in Great Britain and Ireland, and provided directions so prospective customers could see how easily they could administer the sugar plumbs once they purchased them.  In another notice, a much shorter one, Brooks advertised “KEYSER’s FAMOUS PILLS, so well known all over Europe, and in this and the neighbouring colonies, for their superior efficacy and peculiar mildness, in perfectly eradicating every degree of a certain disease.”  He did not need to say much more because this popular cure for venereal disease was advertised widely in the public prints.  Brooks did not exaggerate when he proclaimed that Keyser’s Pills were “so well known” on both sides of the Atlantic.  He also mentioned that he stocked Maredant’s Drops as well.  He offered discounts to retailers “who sell again.”  Side ventures into patent medicines accounted for an alternative revenue stream for Brooks, supplementing his sales of general merchandise and prints.

January 21

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

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

Pennsylvania Evening Post (January 20, 1776).

“A NEW Edition of COMMON SENSE is just published.”

On the same day that the first advertisement for Thomas Paine’s Common Sense appeared in a newspaper beyond Philadelphia, another advertisement for “A NEW Edition of COMMON SENSE” ran in both the Pennsylvania Evening Post and the Pennsylvania Ledger.  On January 9, 1776, the Pennsylvania Evening Post had been the first newspaper to carry an advertisement for the political pamphlet.  Within a week, Robert Bell, the publisher, inserted the advertisement in all six newspapers published in Philadelphia at the time.  The advertisement for the “NEW EDITION of COMMON SENSE” in the January 20 edition of the Pennsylvania Ledger was one of two for the pamphlet in that issue.  It also carried Bell’s original advertisement.  The printing office apparently included it on one of the first pages printed and later received the new notice to integrate into one of the last pages printed.

Pennsylvania Ledger (January 20, 1776).

These advertisements testify to the popularity of Common Sense immediately after its initial publication.  They also obscure a disagreement between Bell and Paine.  The author, who remained anonymous for nearly three months after publication of the first edition, did not authorize Bell to publish a second edition.  Paine wished to donate his share of the profits to purchase supplies for American soldiers participating in the invasion of Quebec, but he learned that Bell’s first edition did not generate any profits despite its popularity.  Disillusioned with their collaboration, Paine instructed Bell not to proceed with a second edition.  Instead, he intended to add appendices and other content and find a new publisher among the many printers in Philadelphia.  The author eventually worked with William Bradford and Thomas Bradford, the printers of the Pennsylvania Journal, though Bell moved forward with a second edition against Paine’s wishes.  Over the next several months, Bell and Paine engaged in an argument (even as the “Englishman” who penned Common Sense remained anonymous) in the public prints, both in letters and advertisements in the Pennsylvania Evening Post and other newspapers published in Philadelphia.  Advertisements became a means for promoting not only the political pamphlet but also the author’s preferred edition of it!

December 3

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

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

Pennsylvania Ledger (December 2, 1775).

“All the Printers … shall be compensated with full payment, either in Cash or Sentimental Food.”

Robert Bell, one of the most prominent American printers and booksellers during the second half of the eighteenth century, frequently distributed subscription proposals for works he wished to publish far and wide.  Such was the case when he marketed an American edition of James Burgh’s Political Disquisitions in 1775.  The extensive secondary title provided an overview of the multi-volume work: “An ENQUIRY into public ERRORS, DEFECTS, and ABUSES: illustrated by, and established upon FACTS and REMARKS, extracted from a variety of AUTHORS, ancient and modern; calculated to draw the timely ATTENTION of Government and People, to a due Consideration of the Necessity, and the Means, of Reforming those Errors, Defects, and Abuses, of Restoring the Constitution and Saving the State.”

Upon publishing the work, Bell set about a new round of marketing.  Once again, he wished to advertise widely.  This time, he appended a note to his advertisement that appeared in the December 2 edition of the Pennsylvania Ledger.  Addressing “All the Printers on the continent,” Bell offered that those “who will be so obliging as to insert the whole of this, and the following Advertisement, in their News Papers for three weeks, shall be compensated with full payment, either in Cash or Sentimental Food, by their humble servant, the Provedore to the Sentimentalists.”  The “following Advertisement” consisted of three portions: a standard notice typical of others for books that appeared in the Pennsylvania Ledger and other newspapers, a lengthy address from “The American Editor to his Countrymen,” and a brief announcement that Bell also sold “the Great Professor CULLEN’s Lectures, on the MATERIA MEDICA” to “AMERICAN PHYSICIANS, who wish to arrive at the top of their profession.”  The standard advertisement included the name of the book and its author, the price (“Thirty Six Shillings”), a description of some of its material aspects (“Three Volumes with neat Bindings”), and where to purchase it.  In the address, Bell asserted, “The perusal of the work, at this important period, will be attended with the most salutary and certain advantages if the inhabitants of America will be so rational as to act wisely, in taking warning from the folly of others, by permitting no ministerial extravagances to enter into their plan.”  They could lay “a sure foundation that freedom shall last for many generations” instead of allowing the current British administration to make “FREEMEN [into] SLAVES.”

The entire advertisement was much longer than most subscription proposals or notices about books already published.  That may have been the reason that Bell appended the note to “All the Printers on the continent.”  In other instances, fellow printers may have published shorter advertisements gratis, but this one required significant space in weekly newspapers that consisted of only four pages.  To increase the chances that printers would reprint it when they saw the advertisement in newspapers that they received through their exchange networks, Bell made sure that they knew that he would compensate them “with full payment, either in Cash or Sentimental Food.”  In other words, he would supply copies of Political Disquisitions or other books he published to those who preferred them rather than cash.  The flamboyant Bell was already known as “the Provedore to the Sentimentalists” from his newspaper advertisements, broadsides, and book catalogs.  He sought to maintain the image he cultivated by including that language in his note to printers, yet he realized that his reputation alone would not convince them to publish such an extensive advertisement.  Accordingly, he promised payment in advance rather than expecting newspaper printers to publish his advertisement as a courtesy, no matter how well their politics might align with those in Bell’s address “to his Countrymen.”

December 2

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

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

Pennsylvania Ledger (December 2, 1775).

“THE American Edition of SIMES’s MILITARY GUIDE.”

In December 1775, James Humphreys, Jr., Robert Bell, and Robert Aitken collaborated in advertising and publishing The Military Guide for Young Officers by Thomas Simes, making yet another military manual available to the public following the momentous events at Lexington and Concord the previous April.  More recent developments, both military and political, convinced printers that a market existed for military manuals.  According to the introduction to “Books in the Field: Studying the Art of War in Revolutionary America,” an exhibition sponsored by the American Revolution Institute of the Society of the Cincinnati, “a flood of printing began to appear from the American presses.  Much of this activity was centered in Philadelphia, where more than thirty works on military subjects were published in the years 1775 and 1776 alone.”

Of the three of the printer-booksellers who partnered in publishing Simes’s Military Guide, Humphreys was the only one who published a newspaper.  He gave their advertisement a privileged place at the top of the first column on the first page of the December 2, 1775, edition of the Pennsylvania Ledger.  Rather than advertising a book already available for sale, the printer-booksellers distributed subscription proposals, doing so, they claimed, “By Desire of some the Members of the Honourable American Continental CONGRESS, and some of the Military Officers of the Association.”  Readers who wished to reserve copies of the work became subscribers by submitting their names to any of those three printer-booksellers, though they also indicated that “SUBSCRIPTIONS are gratefully received … by all the Booksellers in America.”  Printers, authors, and others in the book trades had more than one reason for circulating subscription proposals.  They hoped to incite greater demand while also learning if sufficient interest existed to make a project viable and, if so, how many copies to produce.

This subscription proposal featured an overview of the contents of the military guide: “a large and valuable Compilation from the most celebrated Miliary Writers … Containing the Experience of many brave Heroes in critical Situations, for the Use of young Warriors” as well as “an excellent Military, Historical and Explanatory DICTIONARY.”  This “American Edition … will be printed on the same Paper and Type with the Specimen, and neatly bound in two Octavo Volumes.”  Apparently, Humphreys, Bell, and Aitken had specimens or samples of the paper and type on display at their printing offices so prospective subscribers could examine them and assess the material quality of the work for themselves before committing to ordering copies.  Printers often circulated specimens along with subscription proposals.  The partners planned to print some surplus copies, expecting that demand would warrant doing so, but encouraged subscribers with a discount.  Those who reserved their copies paid three dollars, but for “Non-subscribers, the Price will actually be FOUR DOLLARS.”  Subscribers did not need to part with their money “until the Delivery of the Work,” anticipated for “the latter end of December, 1775.”  Humphreys, Bell, and Aitken did not take the military manual to press as quickly as they expected.  The imprint on the title page gives the date of publication as 1776.  The partners made one final pitch in the subscription proposals, announcing that “the Names of those Gentlemen who have examined the Book, and do approve of its Publication may now be seen” at Aitken’s printing office.  These marketing efforts apparently helped the partners attract enough subscribers to publish the proposed work.  Not all subscription proposals met with such success.  Current events likely played a role in the outcome when Humphreys, Bell, and Aitken proposed an American edition of The Miliary Guide for Young Officers.

November 11

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , ,

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

Pennsylvania Ledger (November 11, 1775).

“AN ORATION … to Commemorate the Bloody Tragedy … By the Hon. JOHN HANCOCK.”

In addition to printing The Prussian Evolutions for Thomas Hanson in the fall of 1775, John Douglass McDougall published and sold “AN ORATION, Delivered March 6, 1774, at the Request of the Inhabitants of the Town of Boston, to Commemorate the Bloody Tragedy of the fifth of March, 1770.  By the Hon. JOHN HANCOCK, Esquire.”  The bookbinder, bookseller, and stationer had only recently added printer to the occupations he pursued at his shop in Philadelphia.  For his first forays, he focused on works supporting the American cause, either because doing so aligned with his political principles or because he spotted an opportunity to enhance his earnings.  Such motivations were not necessarily mutually exclusive.

In 1771, the residents of Boston marked the first anniversary of the “Bloody Tragedy,” now known as the Boston Massacre, with an oration delivered by James Lovell.  It did not take long for local printers to market copies.  So began an annual tradition.  Each year, a prominent figure delivered an “ORATION” and printers published and marketed those addresses.  Following Lovell, Joseph Warren spoke in 1772, Benjamin Church in 1773, John Hancock in 1774, and Joseph Warren again in 1775, just a few months before being killed in action at the Battle of Bunker Hill.  The annual oration became a ritual in Boston, as did the marketing of copies of the latest address in Boston’s newspapers each spring.  Printers outside of Boston, however, did not publish local editions, nor did booksellers outside of New England advertise copies they acquired from Boston.  The “Bloody Tragedy” and the trials of the soldiers involved had certainly been reported far and wide in newspapers throughout the colonies, but the subsequent commemorations did not receive as much notice, at least not in terms advertisements encouraging consumers beyond New England to purchase their own copies of the most recent oration.

That made McDougall’s new edition of Hancock’s oration from 1774 an innovation in the local market.  Why did he opt to publish Hancock’s address rather than the one more recently delivered by Warren?  As president of the Second Continental Congress, Hancock achieved recognition throughout the colonies, whereas Warren, even though he had died for the American cause, may have been considered a figure associated primarily with Massachusetts and thus not having the same appeal in Philadelphia, where the Second Continental Congress met and McDougall printed and advertised Hancock’s oration.  Whatever the reason, the publication and marketing of Hancock’s oration in Pennsylvania testified to a transition taking place throughout the colonies in the wake of the Coercive Acts and the battles at Lexington and Concord.  More colonizers began to think of themselves as sharing a common cause rather than having interests aligned with their own province.  They began to think of themselves as an imagined community of Americans despite the local and regional differences that distinguished each colony from the others.