What was advertised in a colonial American newspaper 250 years ago today?
“That Part of Education so universally admired … corresponding by Letter in a polite easy Stile.”
Benjamin Waller taught penmanship and so much more to female pupils in Charleston on the eve of the American Revolution. In an advertisement addressed “TO THE LADIES” in the January 6, 1775, edition of the South-Carolina and American General Gazette, the tutor announced that he “opened a WRITING SCHOOL … for the Benefit of the Fair Sex only.” His students learned “the Italian, or any other Hand,” yet Waller’s lessons extended beyond writing to encompass style. He devoted much of his advertisement to describing the merits of “that Part of Education so universally admired, though very much neglected in this Province, that is, corresponding by Letter in a polite easy Stile.”
Waller likely intended for such an allegation to incite anxiety among many of his prospective pupils. After all, Charleston was one of the largest and most cosmopolitan urban ports in the colonies. The local gentry prided themselves on being as fashionable and genteel as their counterparts in New York and Philadelphia. In addition, they guarded against being considered a backwater outpost when compared to London and other European cities. Some would have been uncomfortable with Waller’s assertion that writing letters “in a Polite easy Stile” was not widely practiced in South Carolina, questioning whether they fell short of the ideal and put their deficiencies on display each time they wrote to family and friends.
Those were not the only stakes. Waller deployed a series of questions to illustrate what prospective pupils would gain from his instruction: “What Exstacy does a Letter wrote from Children to parents, or from one Friend to another, raise in their Breast if there appears Simplicity with elevated Sentiments? What transporting Pleasure must as Man feel while reading kind Expressions from his lovely Consort’s Pen? What an Impression does every Sentence leave on the Heart, endearing the Writer to the Receiver.” Writing letters, Waller argued, was not merely a skill but an art, just as much as the drawing and painting lessons advertised by other tutors. Women who were truly genteel could not take knowing how to write for granted; they also needed guidance, Waller suggested, in forming their thoughts and expressing them gracefully.