Robert Bell

September 8

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , ,

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

Pennsylvania Journal (September 8, 1773).

“Given away GRATIS … ROBERT BELL’S SALE CATALOGUE of a COLLECTION of NEW AND OLD BOOKS.”

Robert Bell became one of the most prominent and influential American booksellers and publishers of the late eighteenth century, in part due to his flamboyant personality and flair for marketing.  He disseminated advertising in the same formats as other booksellers and publishers – newspaper notices, book catalogs, handbills, broadsides – yet introduced innovations intended to engage and entice consumers.

Such was the case in an advertisement that Bell placed in the September 8, 1773, edition of the Pennsylvania Journal.  If they included a headline at all (other than their names), most advertisers used a stark description of their wares, such as “BOOKS” or “PORT WINE.”  Bell, on the other hand, devised a headline that both described and addressed prospective customers: “The CURIOUS IN BOOKS.”  In other advertisements, his headlines addressed “THE SONS OF SCIENCE IN AMERICA” and “THE AMERICAN WORLD” and “those who possess a PUBLIC SPIRIT.”  In other advertisements, his headlines made dramatic pronouncements, such as “HISTORY” and “LITERATURE” and “XENOPHONTICK BANQUET.”  Bell often crafted a headline intended to distinguish his advertisements from others.

He invited “The CURIOUS” to note that “This Day is Published and given away GRATIS, to all who are pleased to call or send for it, ROBERT BELL’S SALE CATALOGUE Of a COLLECTION of NEW AND OLD BOOKS.”  Those who desired a copy had the option of visiting the shop or, for their convenience, Bell had catalogs delivered to those who requested them.  He emphasized the many choices available, declaring that the catalog listed “above FIFTEEN HUNDRED VOLUMES” and then further elaborating the selection included “a number of elegant and uncommon BOOKS, very scare and rarely to be met with.”  That was because many of them were secondhand books from “the LIBRARY of a Gentleman who lately left this Country.”  That meant customers had access to rare volumes not widely available in the colonial marketplace.  It also implied scarcity, just one copy of many of the books in the catalog, so prospective customers needed to purchase books that interested them quickly.

To encourage “The CURIOUS” to take action, Bell listed more than just the authors and titles of the books in his catalog.  Every entry included “the lowest Price fixed to each Book” so consumers could make their own assessments about whether they could afford the books and how much they valued them.  Presenting prospective customers with prices also helped them imagine completing transactions and adding books to their own libraries.  Although they had to pay for any purchases, Bell distributed the catalogs to “The CURIOUS” for free as a means of getting them started on those imaginative journeys that the bookseller hoped would culminate in sales.  Bell combined a lively advertisement and free catalog into an innovative marketing campaign that set him apart from most other booksellers of the period.

May 25

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , ,

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

South-Carolina Gazette and Country Journal (May 25, 1773).

“Other curious Tracts worthy of high Rank in every Gentleman’s Literary Repository.”

Robert Bell, one of the most influential booksellers and publishers in eighteenth-century America, had a memorably flamboyant style.  He often packed his newspaper advertisements and book catalogs with florid prose to attract the attention of prospective customers.  Such was the case in an advertisement that ran in several newspapers in May 1773, commencing in the Pennsylvania Chronicle and the Pennsylvania Packet at the beginning of the month and appearing in the South-Carolina Gazette and Country Journal by the end of the month.

Bell often opened his advertisements with an extravagant salutation.  In this instance, he addressed “THE SONS OF SCIENCE IN AMERICA,” advising them that they played an important role in the publication of “a decent American Edition of the splendid Judge BLACKSTONE’S COMMENTARIES on the LAWS of ENGLAND, in four Volumes.”  For nearly two years, Bell had been promoting the project throughout the colonies, including in an advertisement in the Providence Gazette that addressed the “Gentlemen of Rhode-Island, and all those who are animated by the Wish of seeing NATIVE FABRICATIONS flourish in AMERICA.”  The bookseller now reported that under the “auspicious Influence” of his supporters, those “SONS OF SCIENCE” and gentlemen who supported an American publishing industry, the fourth and final volume of Blackstone’s Commentaries went to press and “is now ready to be delivered to the Subscribers.”  Those who placed advance orders could expect to receive their books soon.

The “humble Providore to the Sentimentalists, and Hand Servant to the Friends of Literature” took the opportunity to promote another book that he marketed as “a fifth Volume to range uniformly with said Commentaries.”  That “New Edition” included “much esteemed Letters of the very respectable dissenting Divine Dr. FURNEAUX to Judge BLACKSTONE, with PRIESTLEY’S Remarks on the Commentaries, and some other curious Tracts worthy of high Rank in every Gentleman’s Literary Repository.”  Yet Bell did not confine sales of that book solely to gentlemen who purchased all four volumes of Blackstone’s Commentaries and had extensive libraries.  He presented a single volume with so many entries as an “Accommodation [for] the un-opulent, among whom are many firm Friends to the Exploration and Investigation of every Truth, in which Humanity or Christianity are inserted, who ardently wish to see the Foundation of civil and religious Liberty fully displayed, asserted and established, above and beyond the Reach of all Human Tyranny.”  A prospective buyer’s ideals, not his status, justified acquiring so many essays “in one Volume.”  Bell encouraged readers to think of themselves as part of community devoted to the highest ideals, a community that extended from New England to South Carolina.

February 3

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , ,

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

Pennsylvania Gazette (February 3, 1773).

“A LAWYER … lent the fourth volume of BLACKSTONE’s COMMENTARIES … to some gentleman whose name he hath forgot.”

After first appearing in the Pennsylvania Packet in January 1773, the curious story of the missing copy of “the fourth volume of BLACKSTONE’s COMMENTARIES, London edition,” ran among the advertisements in the February 2, 1773, edition of the Pennsylvania Gazette.  According to the advertisement, an unnamed lawyer lent the book “to some gentleman whose name he hath forgot” and desired for the borrower to return it, not to himself but instead to bookseller Robert Bell.  Readers may have suspected that Bell created the lawyer and the story of the missing book, especially since the advertisement concluded with a nota bene that announced that later in the month the “FOURTH VOLUME of the AMERICAN EDITION of BLACKSTONE’s COMMENTARIES ON THE LAWS OF ENGLAND, will be ready for the subscribers.”  How convenient that a borrower supposedly neglected to return just that volume to the unnamed lawyer!  How convenient that the narrator of the story thought that the missing book “hath been lent to several persons since it left the proprietor’s library” and called on “the second, third, or fourth borrower” to provide information about its whereabouts!

In the final third of the eighteenth century, Bell became one of the most prominent booksellers and publishers in the colonies and the new nation, working even before the Revolution to cultivate an American literary market.  He developed innovative marketing methods and attracted even more attention to them with his flamboyant personality.  While there is no way to definitively demonstrate that Bell fabricated the story of the lawyer and the missing volume of Blackstone’s Commentaries, such a ploy would not have been beyond the enterprising bookseller who spent two years marketing an American edition of all four volumes and gathering subscribers from throughout the colonies.  He made savvy use of the public prints, so it may have been possible that he initially published the story of the lawyer and the missing book in the Pennsylvania Packet to see if it generated additional interest in the complete collection of Blackstone’s Commentaries and later considered it worth the investment to disseminate the same story in another newspaper.  He updated the nota bene to indicate that publication would take place “some time this month” rather than “Sometime in February.”  The advertisement also included a date, February 2, 1773, the day before publication of that issue of the Pennsylvania Gazette.  Bell waited more than a week after inserting the notice in the Pennsylvania Packet before submitting it to another newspaper, further suggesting that the responses he received from the initial insertion may have aided him in deciding to run the same advertisement in an additional newspaper.  Even if he planned from the start to expand the circulation of the story of the lawyer and the missing volume of Blackstone’s Commentaries, he carefully timed his advertisements to coincide with publication of the final volume.

January 25

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , ,

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

Supplement to the Pennsylvania Packet (January 25, 1773).

“A LAWYER … lent the fourth volume of BLACKSTONE’s COMMENTARIES … to some gentleman whose name he hath forgot.”

A curious story appeared among the advertisements in the supplement that accompanied the January 25, 1773, edition of the Pennsylvania Packet, a story that may have been a complete fiction designed to incite interest in the forthcoming publication of “the FOURTH VOLUME of the AMERICAN EDITION of BLACKSTONE’s COMMENTARIES ON THE LAWS OF ENGLAND.”  The story concerned an unnamed lawyer seeking the return of a London edition that he lent “to some gentleman whose name he hath forgot,” but that lawyer and the missing book may very well have been creations of Robert Bell, a bookseller and publisher known for his innovative marketing strategies and flamboyant personality.  During the final third of the eighteenth century, Bell became one of the most vocal proponents of creating an American literary market, launching inventive advertising campaigns.

This particular advertisement described a lawyer who loaned the book and asked that the borrower “return it as soon as possible to ROBERT BELL, Bookseller, at the late Union Library in Third-street.”  The narrator of the advertisement, which may have been either Bell or the lawyer, stated that there was “reason to surmise the said fourth volume hath been lent to several persons since it left the proprietor’s library.”  Focus then shifted to anyone who had consulted the loaned-but-not-returned copy of the book.  “All the world assert it is a pity,” the narrator lamented, “that generosity should suffer; therefore it is hoped, even the second, third or fourth borrower possesseth integrity enough” to alert Bell about the whereabouts of the missing book.  Contending that so many readers consulted that copy of the book suggested both its utility and popularity.

That set the stage for the nota bene that appeared at the end of the advertisement.  The narrator announced that “Sometime in February” the fourth volume of the American edition of Blackstone’s Commentaries “will be ready for the subscribers.”  Bell just happened to be the publisher of that project, having advertised and distributed the first three volumes in 1771 and 1772.  (The title page for the fourth volume says 1772, but this advertisement suggests that may have been an error and that Bell actually released the fourth volume in early 1773.)  Although an extensive list of subscribers appeared before the title page of the fourth volume, Bell may have anticipated printing surplus copies to sell to customers who had not subscribed in advance.  Whether or not there was any truth to the story of the lawyer who loaned out a London edition of the book, Bell seems to have tried to generate even more interest in the forthcoming publication of his American edition.

September 14

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , ,

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

Pennsylvania Packet (September 14, 1772).

“The curious in books … are requested to call for the Catalogue.”

An advertisement in the September 14, 1772, edition of the Pennsylvania Packet invited readers to visit “the Book-Store of WILLIAM WOODHOUSE” to receive a free copy of “A CATALOGUE OF A COLLECTION OF NEW AND OLD BOOKS, In all the Arts and Sciences, and in various Languages.”  The advertisement indicates that the lengthy title of the catalog included “Also, as large quantity of entertaining Novels, with the lowest price printed to each book.”  At a glance, it appears that Woodhouse was responsible for compiling and promoting this catalog, but closer inspection reveals that Woodhouse almost certainly collaborated with another bookseller, Robert Bell.

Ten months later, Bell distributed a catalog that replicated the title of the catalog advertised in September 1772, with the exception of adding his name: “ROBERT BELL’s SALE CATALOGUE Of a COLLECTION of NEW AND OLD BOOK, In all the Arts and Sciences, and in various Languages, Also, a large Quantity of entertaining NOVELS; with the lowest Price printed to each BOOK; NOW SELLING, At the BOOK-STORE of WILLIAM WOODHOUSE, Bookseller, Stationer, and Bookbinder, in Front-street, near Chestnut-street, Philadelphia.”  Woodhouse apparently provided retail space for Bell in both 1772 and 1773.

Yet more than merely identical titles testify to Bell’s role in producing and marketing the catalog.  The newspaper advertisement concluded with a nota bene that declared, “In this Collection are many uncommon BOOKS, seldom to be found;—therefore, the curious in books—the Directors of Libraries—and all others, that delight in the food of the mind, are requested to call for the Catalogue at said WOODHOUSE’S, as above.”  Those flourishes, especially “the curious in books” and “food of the mind,” echoed the language that the flamboyant Bell deployed in other advertisements.  For instance, he previously marketed “ROBERTSON’S celebrated History of CHARLES the Fifth” to “ALL Gentlemen that possess a sentimental TASTE.”

Bell was one of the most innovative and influential American booksellers and publishers of the eighteenth century.  Inserting the “lowest price” in the entry for each book in the catalog distinguished it from other catalogs that merely listed authors, titles, and, sometimes, sizes ranging from folio to quarto to octavo to duodecimo.  In addition, Bell supplemented newspaper advertisements and catalogs with broadsides and subscription notices, creating savvy marketing campaigns that incorporated multiple media to entice colonizers to become consumers of the books that he hawked.

July 1

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , ,

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

Boston-Gazette (June 29, 1772).

“The Gentlemen who subscribed … for the American Edition of BLACKSTONE’S Commentaries … are desired to apply for the second Volume.”

Benjamin Edes and John Gill, printers of the Boston-Gazette, inserted a brief notice at the bottom of the final column of the June 29, 1772, edition.  “The Gentlemen who subscribed with Edes and Gill for the American Edition of BLACKSTONE’S Commentaries on the Laws of England,” they announced, are desired to apply for the second Volume.”  In addition, “A few of the First Volume may be had by applying as above.”  Edes and Gill did not publish this “American Edition.”  Instead, they served as local agents for Robert Bell, a printer and bookseller based in Philadelphia.

Over the course of many months, Bell inserted subscription notices for an American edition of William Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Laws of England in newspapers from New England to South Carolina.  He also distributed handbills to promote the project.  Bell sought to cultivate an American literary market that supplied American readers with American editions instead of books imported from London.  In addition to Blackstone’s Commentaries, he advertised an American edition of David Hume’s History of England, from the Invasion of Julius Caesar to the Revolution in 1688.  Bell suggested that consumers had a civic obligation to purchase these volumes, addressing his subscription notices to “all those who are animated by the Wish of seeing Native Fabrications in AMERICA.”

Bell also stated that those who assisted him in this venture engaged in “peaceable, yet active Patriotism.”  In case that was not enough to recruit local agents like Edes and Gill in Boston, he also pledged that “All Persons who collect the Names and Residence, and deliver the Books to twelve Subscribers, have a Claim of Right, and are allowed fourteen to the Dozen for their Assiduity.”  In other words, local agents received two copies gratis for each dozen they sold to subscribers.  The copies of the first volume of Blackstone’s Commentaries that Edes and Gill offered for sale when they announced that subscribers could pick up the second volume may have been copies they received for gathering subscriptions in Boston.  Bell devised marketing strategies to entice both reader-consumers and local agents.

February 16

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , ,

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

New-York Journal (February 13, 1772).

“Subscribers in the distant Provinces will be supplied as soon as possible.”

Robert Bell invested a lot of effort in promoting an “American Edition of BLACKSTONE’s COMMENTARIES ON THE LAWS OF ENGLAND” in the early 1770s.  He inserted subscription notices in newspapers from New England to South Carolina, encouraging colonizers to support the development of a distinctly American market for literature.  He inserted an update in the February 13, 1772, edition of the New-York Journal, alerting the public that the second volume “will be ready for Delivery to the Subscribers of Philadelphia and New-York, on the 28th of February.”  In addition, “Subscribers in the distant Provinces shall be supplied as soon as possible.”

Bell’s notice in the February 13 edition of the New-York Journal ran on a Thursday, the only day that John Holt, the printer, distributed that newspaper.  Most American newspapers published prior to the American Revolution were weeklies, though a few printers did experiment with producing and disseminating two or three issues per week.  Daily newspapers did not emerge until after the Revolution.  That meant that printers strategically chose which days to publish their newspapers.  Most selected Mondays and Thursdays.  Holt’s competitor, Hugh Gaine, published the New-York Gazette and Weekly Mercury on Mondays, thus allowing readers in New York two opportunities to peruse “the freshest ADVICES, both FOREIGN and DOMESTIC” throughout the week.  Some newspapers published in smaller towns in New England appeared on Tuesdays or Fridays or Wednesdays or Saturdays, one or two days after newspapers in Boston and New York.  That allowed printers to acquire the newest editions and reprint items of interest.

Sundays were the only day that printers did not distribute their latest issues anywhere in the colonies.  In the twentieth century, the Sunday newspaper became the most coveted edition, the one that contained the most sections of specialized content as well as advertising supplements.  Today, the Sunday edition remains a distinct entity, the only issue that many readers acquire and read.  That represents an evolution in publication and reading habits.  Once a week, the Adverts 250 Project examines a newspaper advertisement published 250 years ago that week instead of 250 years ago that day because printers did not produce Sunday editions in the eighteenth century.  That remained the case even for the dailies published in the largest cities after the Revolution.

January 28

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

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

South-Carolina Gazette and Country Journal (January 28, 1772).

“Those who are animated by the Wish of seeing Native Fabrications flourish in AMERICA.”

Robert Bell worked to create an American literary marketplace in the second half of the eighteenth century.  The flamboyant bookseller, publisher, and auctioneer commenced his efforts before the American Revolution, sponsoring the publication of American editions of popular titles that other booksellers imported.  His strategy included extensive advertising campaigns in newspapers published throughout the colonies.  He established a network of local agents, many of them printers, who inserted subscription notices in newspapers, accepted advance orders, and sold the books after they went to press.

Those subscription notices often featured identical copy from newspaper to newspaper.  For instance, Bell attempted to drum up interest in William Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Laws of England in 1772.  Advertisements that appeared in the Providence Gazette, the South-Carolina Gazette and Country Journal, and other newspapers all included a headline that proclaimed, “LITERATURE.”  Bell and his agents tailored the advertisements for local audiences, addressing the “Gentlemen of Rhode-Island” in the Providence Gazette and the “Gentlemen of SOUTH-CAROLINA” in the South-Carolina Gazette and Country Journal.  In each instance, though, they encouraged prospective subscribers to think of themselves as a much larger community of readers by extending the salutation to include “all of those who are animated by the Wish of seeing Native Fabrications flourish in AMERICA.”

Bell aimed to cultivate a community of American consumers, readers, and supporters of goods produced in the colonies, offering colonizers American editions of Blackstone’s Commentaries and other works “Printed on American Paper.”  Given the rate that printers reprinted items from one newspaper to another, readers already participated in communities of readers that extended from New England to Georgia, but Bell’s advertisements extended the experience beyond the news and into the advertisements.  He invited colonizers to further codify a unified community of geographically-dispersed readers and consumers who shared common interests when it came to both “LITERATURE” and “the Advancement” of domestic manufactures.  To do so, they needed to purchase his publications.

January 11

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , ,

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

Providence Gazette (January 11, 1772).

“The Names of the Subscribers to any of the above will be printed.”

Robert Bell, one of the most influential booksellers of the eighteenth century, worked to create an American literary market both before and after the American Revolution.  In the early 1770s, he published an American edition of William Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Laws of England.  He promoted this project to supporters of “domestic manufactures,” goods produced in the colonies.

In an advertisement in the January 11, 1772, edition of the Providence Gazette, for instance, he addressed the “Gentlemen of Rhode-Island, and all those who are animated by the Wish of seeing NATIVE FABRICATIONS flourish in AMERICA.”  Such “FABRICATIONS” included not only printing an American edition but doing so “on American Paper.”  That eliminated two kinds of imported goods, “the last British Edition” that Bell consulted in producing his American edition and paper produced in England.  In turn, this provided employment for papermakers and printers in the colonies.  In addition, those who purchased the American edition acquired it for a bargain price.  Bell indicated that the first volume of the British Edition “is sold for above Six Dollars,” but he charged “the small Price of Two Dollars” for the American edition.  The enterprising bookseller also hawked an “American Edition of ROBERTSON’s History of Charles the Fifth” and accepted subscriptions for another proposed project, “HUME’s History of ENGLAND.”  Colonizers could support the local economy by stocking their libraries with a significant number of American editions.

In the process, they could also receive recognition for their support of “NATIVE FABRICATIONS.”  Bell concluded his advertisement with a note that the “Names of the Subscribers to any of the above will be printed.”  Buyers had the chance to see their names in print in good company with others who had the good taste and intellectual acumen to read (or at least purchase) these works by Blackstone, Robertson, and Hume.  While relatively few friends and acquaintances might see any of these volumes in subscribers’ homes or offices, anyone who perused the lists, often bound into the books, would see who purchased copies of their own.  Bell hoped that a desire to support domestic manufactures would convince colonizers to buy his American editions, but he hedged his bets by also offering the opportunity to have such support publicly acknowledged.

September 18

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , ,

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

Final page of Robert Bell’s subscription notice for Blackstone’s Commentaries that may (or may not) have been distributed with the September 17, 1771, edition of the South-Carolina and American General Gazette.

“Peaceable, yet active Patriotism.”

Yesterday, the Adverts 250 Project featured Robert Bell’s subscription notice for Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Laws of England that Accessible Archives included with the September 17, 1771, edition of the South-Carolina and American General Gazette and addressed the difficulty of determining whether the subscription notice originally accompanied the newspaper.  Today, the marketing strategies deployed by Bell merit consideration.

First, however, consider the format of the subscription notice, a four-page flier.  On the first page, addressed “TO THE AMERICAN WORLD,” Bell encouraged prospective customers throughout the colonies to purchase American editions rather than imported books.  It could also have been published separately as a handbill, similar to the second page featuring two advertisements for books “Lately Published” by Bell, “YORICK’S Sentimental Journal Through FRANCE and ITALY” by Laurence Stern and “HISTORY OF BELISARIUS, THE HEROIC AND HUMANE ROMAN GENERAL” by Jean-François Marmontel.  On the third and fourth pages, Bell promoted William Robertson’s “HISTORY of CHARLES the FIFTH, EMPEROR of GERMANY,” a work he widely advertised in newspapers throughout the colonies, and other American editions.  The flier concluded with a note defending “the legality of literary publications in America.”

Both before and after the American Revolution, Bell established a reputation as one of the most vocal proponents of creating a distinctly American literary market served by printers and publishers in the colonies and, later, the new nation.  Bell advanced both political, economic, and cultural arguments in favor of an American book trade during the imperial crisis.  He opened his address “TO THE AMERICAN WORLD” by proclaiming that “THE inhabitants of this continent have now an easy, and advantageous opportunity of effectually establishing literary manufactures … the establishment of which will absolutely and eventually produce mental improvement, and commercial expansion.”  In addition, purchasing books published in America would result in “saving thousands of pounds” by consumers as well as keep the money on that side of the Atlantic.  Colonists could pay lower prices and, in the process, what they did spend would be “distributed among manufacturers and traders, whose residence upon the continent of course causeth the money to circulate from neighbour to neighbour, and by this circulation in America there is a great probability of its revolving to the very hands from which it originally migrated.”  Supporting domestic manufactures, including American publications, would create stronger local economies, Bell argued.

“American Gentlemen or Ladies” had a patriotic duty to lend their “auspicious patronage” to such projects by informing their local bookseller or printer that they wished to become “intentional purchasers of any of the literary works now in contemplation to be reprinted by subscription in America.”  In so doing, they would “render an essential service to the community, by encouraging native manufactures.  In turn, they “deserve[d] … grateful remembrance—By their country—By posterity.”  These subscribers would also contribute to the enlightenment of the entire community, the “MAN of the WOODS” as well as the “MAN of the COURT.”  In the hyperbolic prose he so often used in his marketing materials, Bell declared that “Americans, do certainly know, if universal encouragement is afforded, to a few publications of literary excellence … they will assuredly create sublime sensations, and effectually expand the human mind towards this most rational, and most dignified of all temporal enjoyments.”  In addition, he described himself and other American printers and publishers as engaging in “peaceable, yet active Patriotism” in making inexpensive American editions of several “literary WORKS” available to consumers.

Bell frequently inserted advertisements with similar messages into newspapers from New England to South Carolina, but those were not his only means of encouraging “THE AMERICAN WORLD” to support domestic manufactures and the creation of an American literary market that would result in self-improvement among readers far and wide.  In subscription notices (which may have been distributed with newspapers on occasion), book catalogs, and broadsides, he advanced the same arguments much more extensively than space in newspapers allowed.