<\/p>\n
Not long ago Mr. Roger Ross of the Waterville office of the Metropolitan Insurance Company bought a house in Pittsfield. Stored away and forgotten in that house he found a collection of documents and old newspapers that deserve respectful attention. Mr. Ross has kindly let me examine those papers, and I want to tell you about some of them on this program.<\/p>\n
Among them is the oldest newspaper I have ever seen. I was familiar with the Boston Gazette because I own a copy of its famous issue of March 12, 1770, giving the first account of the Boston Massacre. I did not know how long before 1770 the paper had been published. Now there comes to light in Mr. Ross’ collection an issue of the Boston Gazette that is very old indeed. It was published on June 30, 1737, thirty-three years before my issue of 1770.<\/p>\n
Let us try to get this date of 1737 into perspective. George Washington was then five years old. Benjamin Franklin had just begun his career as a Philadelphia printer. No one in the American colonies even dreamed of independence from Britain. In England the great Samuel Johnson was at the height of his career, and his doting Boswell had not yet met him. In Maine the Indian wars still ravaged the land, and there were fewer than five thousand people in what is now the entire State of Maine.<\/p>\n
In 1737 the Boston Gazette was a very small four-page paper, only 9t x 7t inches. It was published by Joseph Boydell, and was printed by Kneeland and Green at the Printing House in Queen Street, Boston, over against the prison. Like all papers — and they were very few — then published in the American colonies, this one was eager for news from overseas, and the only way to get such news was when some ship arrived. So it is that on the first page of the Boston Gazette for June 30, 1737 appears this explanation: “On Friday last arrived here Captain Hall, in about six weeks from London, by whom from the public press of London, we have the following advices.” In other words, Captain Hall had brought London newspapers, which he turned over to the publisher of the Gazette.<\/p>\n
The news brought by Captain Hall that referred to the continent of Europe was two months old, all dated in the month of April, 1737. The King of Sardinia was showing off his bride, a princess of Lorraine. The King of France had forbidden his garrison troops to adorn their uniforms with extra ornaments. The King of Great Britain had agreed to furnish the King of Prussia with a body of troops to serve against the Turks. In St. Petersburg General Hains had been sentenced to death by a firing squad for neglecting to attack the Tartars. The King of the Two Sicilies had established a council of war.<\/p>\n
In London the most important news seemed to concern the law. The item said: “Yesterday being the first day of term, the Right Honorable Lord Chancellor and Judges went to Westminster Hall in the usual manner; the Lord Chancellor going in his new State Coach finely carved and gilded. It being the first time of his Lordship’s sitting in Westminster Hall, he was attended by four dukes, six earls, the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, and other dignitaries.”<\/p>\n
Even the Gazette’s news from Williamsburg, Virginia was a month old. There on May 20 the Royal Governor had prorogued the General Assembly until the end of July. It was through Williamsburg that the Gazette received from Ireland news that concerned American merchants. The item said: “We have received advices from Ireland that the Commissioners of Customs have denied the merchants there to inform their correspondents in America that, whenever they send over any rum, they take strict care that it be certified what British Plantation it came from, with affidavit of its being of the growth and manufacture of such British Plantation, in order to prevent the rum and the ship that brings it from being seized for bringing in rum of foreign plantations.”<\/p>\n
The principal local news concerned Harvard College. Edward Holyoke had just been elected Harvard’s new president. and the corporation had appealed to the Massachusetts legislature for help. The Gazette said: “The Harvard corporation petitioned the General Court to make provision for an honorable support of the president of the college, and to do what else they may think proper in Mr. Holyoke’s behalf. The court, taking the petition into consideration, has been pleased to make a grant of 200 pounds of the bills of the New Tenor for the President’s support for this year, and the Court, further considering the circumstances in which the Society at Marblehead, at present under Mr. Holyoke’s pastoral care, may be left by his removal to the college, has voted that, upon the ordination of Mr. Holyoke’s successor, there shall be paid out of the public treasury to the Society at Marblehead the sum of 140 pounds of the bills of the New Tenor.”<\/p>\n
One small item in the Gazette looks back to very early days in Boston. It was a notice of the death of Timothy Clark. who had been born in Cambridge in 1657. He had become quite prominent in Boston serving as selectman, Captain of the North Battery, builder of Boston Lighthouse and Justice of the Peace. What is worth noting is that, as early as 1700, high public office in Boston was no longer in the hands of men born in England, but rather that native sons were becoming leaders of the community.<\/p>\n
You have often heard me say that the best picture of the days of long ago in American life can be obtained from the ads in the old newspapers. That is certainly true of the few ads found in this 1737 issue of the Boston Gazette. Two of its eight columns on the fourth page were devoted to ads. Not one is a display advertisement. All are without headlines and in the same simple type as the news carried in the other columns.<\/p>\n
The first ad that strikes our attention was by Robert Jenkins, whose store was on the north side of the Town House in Boston. He informed the public that he had just received a new stock of what he called haberdashery. We are somewhat surprised to learn what Jenkins included in that term haberdashery, for he said it consisted of cambricks, spotted and flowered lawns, threads, fringes and lace; bone, ebony and ivory stick fans; ribbons and girdles; children’s silver peaks and flowers; needles, pins, buttons and sundry other things.<\/p>\n
It is interesting to note that, as early as 1737, stage coaches were operating out of Boston. Consider this notice that appeared in the Gazette: “One of the coaches belonging to Alexander Thorp and Isaac Casno will be ready to set out from Boston to Newport on Tuesday, the 28th of June. and is to be left on that island.<\/p>\n
On Tuesday, the 5th of July, the other coach is to set out from this place for Newport and will return on the 8th of July and thereafter a round trip will be made each week. Persons who design to go from Boston to Newport are desired to take their place in time and pay 30 shillings at the entry of their names in a book, which will be kept for that use by Isaac Casno, Sadler, at his shop near the Sun Tavern, and the remaining 30 shillings when they go into the Coach, so that the whole is three pounds for each passenger from Boston to Newport, and the same back again. The coach sets out from Boston at the house of Mr. Alexander Thorp each Tuesday, and from Newport each Thursday, and returns to Boston on Friday. Each passenger is allowed to carry 14 pounds of baggage, but must pay six pence a pound for whatever is above that weight.”<\/p>\n
Under the old apprentice system of binding out minors to serve a master until the age of 21, such boys frequently ran away and one popular means of escape was to run away to sea. Hence the followi ng ad in the 1737 Gazette: “This is to warn all masters of vessels not to carry a young lusty lad, full faced and his hair cut, about the age of 16, named Henry Watts. He is seeking opportunity to go to sea. Being an indentured apprentice, his master forbids carrying him off under penalty of the law.”<\/p>\n
Another ad refers to a quite different kind of runaway: “Broke out of Bridewell last Saturday night, a Negro manservant named Robin, of middle stature and bulk, supposed to have on, when he went away, an old red shag great coat, a white shirt, an old pair of dark colored cloth breeches, and without hat, cap,stockings or shoes. He may be known particularly by some wounds on one of his wrists, which he gave himself two days since. Whoever will return said Negro to Bridewell again shall receive from Peter Oliver of Boston a reward of three pounds.”<\/p>\n
Another advertiser wanted to get rid of his bound-out boy, but he sought due compensation. Just note how much this Boston ad sounded like slave ads of the time: “To be sold, a likely young man’s time for upwards of three years. He is very ingenious and expert in working at almost every branch of the smith’s trade, and is also somewhat used to the sea. Inquire of the printer of this paper.”<\/p>\n
Auctions were just as popular 230 years ago as they are today. One ad in the Gazette said: “On Thursday, the 23rd of June, will be sold by public vendue <\/em>by Daniel Goffe, at the Sun Tavern, a parcel of very valuable goods, plate, etc. Also the wearing apparel (very good), both woolen and linen, all belonging to a gentleman lately deceased. And at the same time and place will be sold a house and land situate in Fish Street, formerly the estate of George Burrel, deceased. All the goods to be seen the morning of the sale.”<\/p>\n Of the several real estate offerings in the Gazette ads, the following is typical: “To be sold, a very convenient brick dwelling house and land, accomodated with very good well and yard, near the town house in Boston, now occupied by Mr. Andrew Eliot, fronting upon Cornhill Street and upon Crooked Lane in the rear. Inquire of Mr. Henry Gibbs of Cambridge or of Mr. Joseph Gibbs of Boston.”<\/p>\n A common artisan in all the larger colonial towns was the saddler and in a place as prosperous as Boston had become through its West Indian trade, fine saddles were much in demand. Today, while everyone knows what a saddle is, few have ever heard of a saddle tree, the frame for a saddle. So the final ad to which I call your attention in that old Boston Gazette of 230 years ago was really unique.<\/p>\n It said: “Arthur Gale from London, living near the town house in Boston, makes all sorts of saddle trees to greater perfection than any others can perform in this country, but to accomplish the same it is necessary for me to see the horse on which the saddle is to be used. Only John Milliken and Isaac Casno, sadlers, work on said Gale’s trees.”<\/p>\n Year: 1967<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Read the script for “Little Talks” program #715, Broadcast on January 29, 1967<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":405,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[752,35296],"tags":[],"builder_content":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8675"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/405"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8675"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8675\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8675"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8675"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8675"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}