The Massachusetts Gazette was a colonial American newspaper established by Richard Draper, printer for the royal governor and council in the Province of Massachusetts Bay. As the American Revolution drew closer, it was commissioned by the colonial government to lend its support for the measures of the British ministry. It was one of the few Loyalist newspapers operating during the years leading up to the revolution.
Draper's father, John Draper, was the publisher of The Boston News-Letter who for thirty years was its publisher. On the death of his father in November 1762, Richard Draper took over publication of the News Letter. This newspaper was devoted to the royal British government and in the controversy between Great Britain and the colonies he, as a Loyalist, supported the British Crown through this newspaper. Richard enlarged the newspaper title to The Boston Weekly News Letter and New England' Chronicle. A year later he changed it again to The Massachusetts Gazette; and Boston News Letter and printed the emblem of the King's arms in the heading. [1] [2] In 1768 it was united with The Boston Post-Boy. Draper's Post-Boy, was a Tory newspaper that seldom went afield from the British party line. He had the printing contract for Governor Bernard and the council and used the words Massachusetts Gazette as a part of the title. [3] The union of these two newspapers was something of an unusual match and lasted only a short term. Although the united newspapers were both called The Massachusetts Gazette, each continued as a separate publication; The Post-Boy was released on Mondays, with The News-Letter appearing on Thursdays. Together they came to be known as the "Siamese Twins" in journalism. [4] [5] This arrangement lasted from May 23, 1768, until September 25, 1769. Draper, upon his separation of the twin newspapers, kept alive only The News-Letter. [6]
William Goddard announced this latest development and the appearance of The Massachusetts Gazette in his Pennsylvania Chronicle , in the February 12, 1770 issue. [7]
Richard Draper's physical constitution was very weak, and he was often confined to his home by sickness. Soon after Richard's father died he took on Samuel Draper as a silent partner, who was connected with Zechariah Fowle, and established the firm of Richard. & Samuel. Draper The heading of the Gazette was inscribed with, "Published by Richard Draper, Printer to the Governor and Council, and by Samuel Draper, at the Printing Office in Newbury Street.". [1] [8] Draper employed a fair number of Loyalist writers, but he was competing with pro-independence newspapers which were greater in number, as were pro-independence writers. [1]
The Massachusetts provincial government made great efforts to counteract the influence of The Boston Gazette , and such writers as the Samuel Adams and the Quincys, and The Spy, a newspaper with its staff of contributors equally bold and resolute. The authorities then found recourse for publishing their views and almost exclusively fell back on The Massachusetts Gazette and Weekly News-Letter. All the Tory/Loyalist writers concentrated their voicing their views through the Boston Gazette Tory writers like Andrew Oliver, William Brattle, Daniel Leonard, and Jonathan Sewall now aimed their views at the pro independence Whigs. [9] [10]
News of a large shipment of stamped paper headed for the colonies had been received at Boston, in July. On August 5 the news was published for the first time in the Massachusetts Gazette & News-Letter, which included a list of men who had been appointed to distribute Stamps in the various Colonies. Andrew Oliver for Massachusetts was among those mentioned. At this time various newspapers in the colonies suspended their publications rather than submit to what they considered an unfair and burdensome tax upon paper. A ship laden with stamped paper arrived in Boston harbor in September. [11]
On the death of Richard Draper on June 6, 1774, his widow and his partner, John Boyle, took over operations and published the paper. [6]
Publick Occurrences Both Forreign and Domestick was the first multi-page newspaper published in British colonial America. After its first issue, which carried an account that offended the colonial governor, the newspaper was promptly closed down by British colonial authorities, only days later. No other newspaper would appear in the colonies until fourteen years later.
Daniel Fowle was a colonial American printer and publisher before and during the American Revolution, and the founder of The New Hampshire Gazette. He printed Samuel Adams' newspaper, The Independent Advertiser. He was jailed for printing a damaging account on the conduct of various Massachusetts representatives and after his trial, he lost his license to print. Dismayed with the Massachusetts government he subsequently chose to remove from Massachusetts to New Hampshire and established The New Hampshire Gazette. During the course of his printing career Fowle employed several apprentices. Using his newspaper, he openly criticized the Stamp Act in 1765. After American independence was established he was commissioned to print the state laws of New Hampshire.
John Howe was a loyalist printer during the American Revolution, a printer and Postmaster in Halifax, a spy prior to the War of 1812, and the father of Joseph Howe a Magistrate of the Colony of Nova Scotia. He was born in Boston, Massachusetts Bay colony, the son of Joseph Howe, a tin plate worker of Puritan ancestry, and Rebeccah Hart.
The Boston Gazette (1719–1798) was a newspaper published in Boston, in the British North American colonies. It was a weekly newspaper established by William Brooker, who was just appointed Postmaster of Boston, with its first issue released on December 21, 1719. The Boston Gazette is widely considered the most influential newspaper in early American history, especially in the years leading up to and into the American Revolution. In 1741 the Boston Gazette incorporated the New-England Weekly Journal, founded by Samuel Kneeland, and became the Boston-Gazette, or New-England Weekly Journal. Contributors included: Samuel Adams, Paul Revere, Phyllis Wheatley.
The Boston News-Letter, first published on April 24, 1704, is regarded as the first continuously published newspaper in the colony of Massachusetts. It was heavily subsidized by the British government, with a limited circulation. All copies were approved by the Royal governor before publication. The colonies’ first newspaper was Publick Occurrences Both Forreign and Domestick, which published its first and only issue on September 25, 1690. The Weekly Jamaica Courant followed in Kingston, Jamaica from 1718. In 1726 the Boston Gazette began publishing with Bartholomew Green, Jr., as printer.
Bartholomew Green was a colonial printer at Boston and later the publisher of The Boston News-Letter.
Samuel Green was an early American printer, the first of several printers from the Green family who followed in his footsteps. One of Green's major accomplishments as a printer was the Eliot Indian Bible, translated by the missionary John Eliot, typeset by James Printer, which became the first Bible to be printed in British America in 1663. Members of his family who also became printers include his sons Bartholomew, Bartholomew Green Jr. and Joseph Dennie. Throughout his adult life Green also served in the Massachusetts Bay Colonial Militia, advancing to the rank of captain later in life.
William Goddard was an early American patriot, publisher, printer and postal inspector. Born in New London, Connecticut, Goddard lived through the American Revolution and American Revolutionary War, during which he opposed British rule of the colonies through his actions and publications. He was a major figure in the development of the colonial postal system, which became the U.S. Post Office after the American Revolution.
Samuel Kneeland (c.1696–1769) was an American printer and publisher of The Boston Gazette and Weekly Journal. Kneeland obtained much of his work printing laws and other official documents for the Province of Massachusetts Bay colonial government for about two decades. He printed the first Bible in the English language ever produced in the American colonies, along with many other religious and spiritual works, including the Book of Psalms. He was also noted for introducing a number of innovations to newspaper printing and journalism. He was one of many colonial printers who were strongly opposed to and outspoken against the Stamp Act in 1765. Kneeland, primarily, along with his sons, were responsible for printing the greater majority of books, magazines and pamphlets published in Boston during his lifetime.
Margaret Green Draper was an American printer and journalist. She was the great-granddaughter of pioneering American printer Samuel Green. She was one of the first American women to run an independent business. A United Empire Loyalist, she supported the British monarchy during the American Revolutionary War.
Jonas Green was a colonial American printer and newspaper publisher together with his wife Anne Catherine Hoof Green in Maryland. He was a strong opponent of The Stamp Act.
William Parks was an 18th-century printer and journalist in England and Colonial America. He was the first printer in Maryland authorized as the official printer for the colonial government. He published the first newspaper in the Southern American colonies, the Maryland Gazette. He later became authorized as the official printer for the colonial government of Virginia. Parks was also the publisher and printer of the first official collection of the authentic 1733 set of Virginia's laws, and the first colonial publisher and proprietor of The Virginia Gazette newspaper. During his lifetime Parks established four new newspapers in the colonies. He also worked with Benjamin Franklin on several projects related to printing, most notably, the establishment of a paper mill in Virginia, the first such mill south of Pennsylvania.
Early American publishers and printers played a central role in the social, religious, political and commercial development of the Thirteen Colonies in British America prior to and during the American Revolution and the ensuing American Revolutionary War that established American independence.
Daniel Henchman was a publisher and bookseller in 18th-century colonial Boston. Aside from his mainstay of publishing, printing, and bookselling, he was involved in a variety of mercantile pursuits. He was also very involved in Boston's civic matters and gave generously to the poor fund through his church. He was also an officer in the Boston militia regiment. Primarily through Henchman's efforts, the first paper mill to appear in New England was built in Massachusetts. Some historians consider Henchman to be the most prominent publisher and bookseller in pre-Revolutionary New England.
Thomas Fleet (1685–1758) was an English printer who came to the British colonies in America and established himself as a printer and publisher in Boston. His decision to come to the colonies was prompted by people seeking retribution for what was considered his public display of disrespect for a popular member of the English clergy. Fleet produced works for various booksellers, printed pamphlets, ballads, children's stories and later established the Boston Evening Post. In his earlier years fleet compiled his own version of Mother Goose from stories told by his mother-in-law, Elizabeth Vergoose, to his children. When he published various controversial accounts about the colonial government and the clergy he was admonished, threatened with prosecution and subsequently became one of the first American printers to challenge royal authority and defend the idea of Freedom of the Press. Through his newspaper Fleet played an active role in the Christian revivalist controversy that occurred in the colonies during the early eighteenth century.
Andrew Barclay (1737–1823) was a Scottish bookbinder who emigrated from Kinross, Fifeshire, to Boston in the British-American colonies in the mid-eighteenth century. As the American Revolutionary War drew near, Barclay sided with the Loyalists and was compelled to leave Boston when the British were driven out in March 1776. Upon leaving Boston he was assigned a command in charge of getting Loyalist refugees out of Boston to Nova Scotia. Soon after, he continued his trade in British-occupied New York for the duration of the war. Bookbinder's trade labels like Barclay's, found on the inside cover of some of his works, are considered a rarity among books printed in colonial America.
Samuel Hall (1740-1807), was an Early American publisher and printer, newspaper editor, and an ardent colonial American patriot from Bedford, Massachusetts who was active in this capacity before and during the American Revolution, often printing newspapers and pamphlets in support of American independence. Hall was the founder of The Essex Gazette, the first newspaper published in Salem, Massachusetts in 1768. He often employed his newspaper as a voice supporting colonial grievances over taxation and other actions by the British Parliament that were considered oppressive, and ultimately in support of American independence.
The Essex Gazette was a weekly newspaper established in 1768 by Samuel Hall in Salem, Massachusetts, as the city's first newspaper and the first published in Massachusetts outside Boston, the colony's capital. it was the third newspaper to appear in Massachusetts. From its start, the newspaper was a strong proponent of American independence. The Gazette was relocated to Cambridge in 1775 following the outbreak of the American Revolutionary War with the Battles of Lexington and Concord. In early 1776, after the British army was driven from Boston, Hall moved the Gazette to the city, changing its name to The New England Chronicle.
Richard Draper (1726–1774) was an early American Boston printer and an editor of The Boston News-Letter. Together with his father and his nephew Draper printed and published The News-Letter. In the years leading up to the American Revolution Draper sided with the Loyalists and the Tory party, and through his newspaper he provided a voice for the Loyalist writers in Massachusetts and elsewhere.