Transcript American Journalism

American Journalism
04:567:480:01
James Franklin
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More than a printer.
New-England Courant, started 1721
Attacked clergy, opposed inoculations.
Allied with Rev. John Checkley, who opposed
Puritan-controlled (Calvinist) government.
• Prior restraint ordered by royal government
against Checkley.
• Checkley refused, fined six pounds.
Trouble in New England
• Franklin and
Checkley allied
against Increase
Mather and Cotton
mather.
Increase Mather
• Hated the Courant.
• Part of the old
Guard.
Cotton Mather
• Controversy over
smallpox.
• Inoculate healthy
people with blood of
the infected.
• Cotton’s son Rev.
Thomas Walter
publlished the AntiCourant, favoring
inoculation.
The Courant
• Accused Rev. Walter of drunkenness.
• Checkley and Franklin fought over how to
proceed.
• Courant supporters called “The Hell-Fire
club.”
• Continued to publish anti-inoculation pieces.
• Mather supporters used the Boston Gazette to
support inoculation.
Smallpox innoculation
• Inoculation introduces smallpox virus into
the recipient. Vaccination introduces
vaccinia virus into the recipient. Vaccinia
confers protection against smallpox infection,
but with far fewer side effects, since it is a
much less virulent virus. Edward Jenner, the
inventor of vaccination, should be high on
everyone's list of greatest-ever human
beings.
Inoculation actualy worked,
though poorly
• John Adams, later to be president, was
inoculated in 1764.
• Adams was spent three weeks in the
hospital, suffering headaches,
backaches, knee-aches, gagging fever,
and eruption of pock marks.
James Franklin
• His journalistic rambunctiousness came
when the governor’s licensing power
was being disputed.
• Governor asked for licensing power.
• Printers gained some freedom.
• 1722: Courant criticizes Massachusetts
General Court on pirates.
Franklin imprisoned
• Got one month’s term.
• Ran the paper from jail while his
younger brother Benjamin did the work.
• Ben was 17.
• General Court studied the Courant:
– Paper mocked religion, profanely abused
the Scriptures
– Affronted government.
James Franklin
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Ordered to be on his best behavior.
Refused to obey.
Instead, he went into hiding.
Reappeared, rearrested.
Grand jury refused to indict.
James released Ben from indenture.
Ben Franklin
• 1723: Ben emerges as a front man for
James.
• Wrote essays under the name of
“Silence Dogwood.”
• Even James didn’t know the author.
• Amusing, spirited, Ben was set to have
a life as a publisher.
Ben leaves
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He quarreled with James.
Left Boston for Philadelphia.
Courant not financially successful.
James got sick and died in 1732, leaving the Courant
to his wife Anne.
• She made it successful, after it moved to Rhode
Island.
• Her two daughters were geniuses in publishing. So
was Anne’s son James Jr.
• James Jr. established the Newport Mercury in
Philadelphia, which ran until the 20th century.
Ben Franklin as Silence
Dogwood
• “ ’Tis true, drinking does not improve the
Faculties, but it enables us to USE
them; and therefore I conclude, that
much Study and Experience, and a little
Liquor, are of absolute Necessity for
some Tempers, in order to make them
accomplish’d Orators.”
William Bradford
The Bradfords
• First newspaper in Pennsylvania, The
American Mercury.
• Later, The American Magazine.
• Cornelia, Bradford’s stepmother,
competed with him.
Ben Franklin now in
Philadelphia, 1720s
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Pennsylvania Gazette
Published ads
Printed both sides of the page.
“The merchant may buy and sell with
jews (cq), Turks, Hereticks and Infidels
of all sorts, and get money by every one
of them, without giving offense to the
most orthodox” — but not the publisher.
Competition
• The Gazette vs. the Mercury
• Franklin sponsored printers in the
South. (The Virginia Gazette)
• Poor Richard’s Almanack.
• Southern printer Lewis Timothy died; his
wife, Elizabeth, took over —
successfully.
Elizabeth Timothy
Elizabeth Timothy
• First successful female publisher in
colonies.
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How wretched is a woman’s Fate,
No happy change her Fortune knows,
Subject to Man in every state.
How can she then be free from woes?
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In Youth a Father’s stern Command,
And jealous Eyes control her will;
A lordly Brother watchful stands,
To keep her closer Captive still.
The tyrant Husband next appears,
With Awful and Contracted Brow;
No more a lover’s form he wears.
Her slave’s become her Sov’reign now.
Conclusions
• 15th century revolution changed the
world from oral and scribal to printed.
• Printing developed in England despite
edicts prohibiting it.
• Information became highly prized.
• Intolerance characterize early use of the
printing press in America.
More conclusions
• Proclamations, religious and later
political pamphlets.
• James Franklin introduced controversy,
wit and humor.
• Franklin helped to proliferate printing.
• Women were crucial to early success.
• Soon, everyone had a press.
Next:
• Resistance
and liberty.
• Zenger,
Bradford, &
Alexander
• The Boston
Tea Party was
for journalism!