Puff Piece

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.

October 16

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

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

New-Hampshire Gazette (October 16, 1772).

“The Exhibitions will be perform’d as usual.”

In the summer of 1772, an advertiser who went by “the Exhibitor” and “the Projector” sought to establish a series of performances of “several serious and comic pieces of Oratory” in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.  The Exhibitor proposed a subscription series as a means of determining whether sufficient interest existed to make the project viable, encouraging “those Ladies and Gentlemen who are inclined to favour” the proposal to subscribe quickly because “the Season advance, and he is obliged to go to the Southward in October next.”  Those ladies and gentlemen could purchase subscriptions at the printing office.  In addition, tickets for performances were available “at the Printing Office at Mr. Appleton’s Book-Store, and at Mr. Stavers’s Tavern.”

As was often the case with itinerant performers who advertised that they intended to remain in town for only a limited time, the Exhibitor decided to remain in Portsmouth longer than he originally indicated.  In the middle of October, he placed an advertisement to announce that “This Evening … The Exhibitions will be performed as usual, with Alterations.”  In other words, the show continued, but the Exhibitor varied the content to offer something new to prospective patrons who had recently been in the audience.  Readers could procure tickets “at the Printing-Office and the other usual Places.”

The Exhibitor seemed to get assistance in marketing the performance from Daniel Fowle and Robert Fowle, the printers of the New-Hampshire Gazette.  In the October 16 edition, they concluded the news from Portsmouth with a short blurb that reported, “The Actors at the Academy-House in this Town, give general Satisfaction to large and polite Audiences.  The usual Evenings proposed for this Entertainment are Mondays, Wednesdays and Friday Evenings.”  The Exhibitor’s new notice appeared immediately below that review; news content selected by the editor flowed seamlessly into an advertisement.  The Fowles may have done so as a service to the community if they recognized the benefits of having local productions inspired by “the Entertainments at Sadler’s Well’s,” a renowned theater that had been operating in London since 1683.  In addition, they may have received commissions on the tickets they sold, making the success of the Exhibitor’s venture worth promoting with a short puff piece embedded in the news.

March 31

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update, Guest Contribution , , , , ,

GUEST CURATOR: Aidan Griffin

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

New-London Gazette (March 31, 1769).

“Mulberry Trees, to the Number of Three-Thousand, to be sold at a reasonable Rate.”

If you know anything about the weather in New England, it might seem not that strange that William Hanks advertised mulberry trees in late March 1769. However, what surprised me was that these trees were used for silk production because silkworms love mulberry leaves. Attempts at silk production in America goes back really far. According to Bob Wyss, “Silkworms were first imported to Virginia as early as 1613.” Producing silk in Virginia makes sense as it is warmer there, but why in Connecticut? “In 1734 the Connecticut Colonial Assembly passed legislation offering financial incentives for silk growers.” Now this might seem difficult, but two people actually succeeded. “One was Nathaniel Aspinwall, a horticulturalist. In the 1750s Aspinwall planted mulberry trees at a nursery he owned in Long Island and later in Mansfield and New Haven, Connecticut. Aspinwall also raised and distributed to customers the silkworm eggs needed to produce the caterpillars and cocoons. The second individual was Ezra Stiles, president of Yale College, who kept a diary of his silk-raising activities from 1763 to 1790.” Soon, this interest in silk production turned into full-blown mania when prices for mulberry trees kept rising and rising. The mania ended in the early nineteenth century when the prices crashed. In such bitter irony, the crash hurt Connecticut the most. “No place was struck harder than Connecticut,” Wyss explains.

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ADDITIONAL COMMENTARY: Carl Robert Keyes

William Hanks’s advertisement for “Mulberry Trees … sold cheap for the speedy promoting the Culture of SILK” in Connecticut appeared on the same page as the “COUNTRY NEWS,” snippets of news from around the colony that supplemented letters to the editor and news from other places in North America and beyond. The “COUNTRY NEWS” also promoted silk production, noting the recent efforts of Hanks and others. In the previous year, the New-London Gazette reported, Hanks “raised Silk sufficient to make Three Women’s Gowns.” In addition, “Sundry Gentlemen in Windham and Lebanon have large Nurseries, and others Orchards of Mulberry Trees, which have been cultivated to bring on a Silk Manufactory.” Furthermore, “One Silk House is already erected in Lebanon.”

The “COUNTRY NEWS” did not, however, focus exclusively on silk. The printer inserted updates about vineyards as well, briefly noting that a “Gentleman in Windham is also cultivating a large Vineyard.” This section of the newspaper included an even longer overview of another colonist’s attempt to establish a local vineyard. That colonist was none other than William Hanks. “We are informed,” the New-London Gazette proclaimed, “that Mr. William Hanks of Mansfield, in this Colony, is now cultivating a large Vineyard; and as the Vines at present look very Promising, he hopes to be able in Two or Three Years to furnish the Public with Wines unadulterated with any Duties.”

The newspaper’s correspondent for that bit of news was probably none other than William Hanks himself. He likely submitted that information to the printing office at the same time as the copy for his advertisement. He then benefited from its appearance (along with the assertion that he had produced enough silk for three gowns) as a news item, one that simultaneously served as a puff piece that promoted the mulberry trees he advertised elsewhere in the newspaper. The final phrase in the report about his vineyard further enhanced Hanks’s marketing by giving it a political valence. In stressing that Hanks’s wine would be “unadulterated with any Duties,” the newspaper advanced “Buy American” sentiments consistent with calls to produce more goods in the colonies in order to correct a trade imbalance with Britain and to consume those goods as acts of resistance to the Townshend Acts and other abuses by Parliament. Readers of the New-London Gazette encountered this message in both the news and the advertisements as they moved from “Wines unadulterated with any Duties” in the “COUNTRY NEWS” to “Mulberry Trees … for the speedy promoting the Culture of SILK” among the paid notices.

August 17

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

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

Aug 17 - 8:17:1767 Boston Evening-Post
Boston Evening-Post (August 17, 1767).

“I … am of Opinion that they may be serviceable in many Disorders, if properly used.”

These items from the August 17, 1767, edition of the Boston Evening-Post blurred the lines between advertising and news content. The proprietor of “JACKSON’s Mineral Well in Boston” had previously advertised the spa in other newspapers. The “RULES” for the establishment, including the hours and rates, appeared in an advertisement on the final page of the issue that carried these announcements, easily identified as an advertisement among more than a score of other advertisements. These announcements, on the other hand, occupied a more liminal space on the third page, at the transition between the news content and advertising in the issue.

Aug 17 - 8:17:1767 Page 3 of Boston Evening-Post
Third Page of Boston Evening-Post (August 17, 1767).

The notices had the appearance of news. They followed immediately after an extract from a “Letter from a Gentleman in London” and news from Portsmouth, New Hampshire, but they preceded James McMaster’s advertisement for “A general Assortment of Scotch and English Goods” and the advertising that accounted for the remainder of the issue. In particular, the item by James Lloyd resembled a letter submitted to the newspaper rather than an advertisement. Lloyd sought to rectify an incorrect report that he described “Mr. Jackson’s mineral Spring” as being “of a noxious Quality.” Furthermore, he so wholly approved of the waters that he “recommended the Use of them” to his patients afflicted with various disorders. Was this news or an endorsement? The other item contained information that might have been considered general interest but did not explicitly address potential patrons.

Were these pieces local news items the editor selected as a service to readers? Or were they puff pieces and product placements that the proprietor of the “Mineral Well” had arranged to have printed in such close proximity to the news as to make them appear as though they came from a source that did not stand to generate revenue from inciting clients to visit the spa? If they were indeed advertisements, they could have been combined with verifiable advertisement printed on the following page.