Pioneer Imprints from Fifty States · Roger J. Trienens
TO OUR PATRONS.
Alabama The earliest extant Alabama imprint is thought to be _The Declaration of the American Citizens on the Mobile, with Relation to the British Aggressions. September, 1807_, which was printed "on the Mobile" at an unspecified date. No one has yet identified the printer of this five-page statement inspired by the _Chesapeake-Leopard_ naval engagement. The next surviving evidence is a bail bond form dated February 24, 1811, and printed at St. Stephens by P. J. Forster, who is reported to have worked previously at Philadelphia.[62] A second St. Stephens printer, Thomas Eastin, founded a newspaper called _The Halcyon_ sometime in 1815, after Alabama newspapers had already appeared at Fort Stoddert (1811), Huntsville (1812), and Mobile (1813). Eastin had formerly worked at Nashville, at Alexandria, La., and at Natchez in association with Mississippi's first printer, Andrew Marschalk.[63] His work at St. Stephens included a 16-page pamphlet, which is among the three or four earliest Alabama imprints other than newspaper issues[64] and is the first specimen of Alabama printing in the Library of Congress. Headed "To the Citizens of Jackson County," it is signed by Joseph P. Kennedy and has on its final page the imprint, "St. Stephens (M.T.) Printed by Tho. Eastin. 1815." Here "M.T." denotes the Mississippi Territory, which in 1817 divided into the Alabama Territory and the State of Mississippi. St. Stephens was an early county seat of Washington County, now part of Alabama, whereas Jackson County, to whose inhabitants the author addresses himself, lies within the present Mississippi borders.
Sec. 4. Every person taking up a stray horse, mare or colt, shall within two months after the same is appraised, provided the owner shall not have claimed his property during that time, transmit to the printer of some public newspaper printed within this territory, a particular description of such stray or strays and the appraisment thereof, together with the district and place of residence certified by the clerk, or by the justice before whom such stray was appraised, to be inserted in such paper three weeks succesively, for the advertising of which the printer shall receive his usual and stated price for inserting advertisements in his newspaper. In 1809 the _Missouri Gazette_ was still the only newspaper available to print these advertisements. The Library of Congress must have obtained its copy of this book during the final quarter of the 19th century, when the "Law Department" stamp on the title page was in use. [Footnote 67: See David Kaser, _Joseph Charless, Printer in the Western Country_ (Philadelphia [1963]). A printed form, surviving in a copy dated in manuscript July 8, 1808, may have been printed by Charless at St. Louis; see no. 1836 in _The Celebrated Collection of Americana Formed by the Late Thomas Winthrop Streeter_ (New York, 1966-69), vol. 3.] Texas Aaron Mower of Philadelphia set the type for volume 1, number 1, of the _Gaceta de Texas_, dated "Nacogdoches, 25 de Mayo, de 1813," which is preserved at the National Archives and is the earliest evidence of printing activity in Texas. A political dispute forced the removal of Mower's press and type from Nacogdoches to Natchitoches, in Louisiana, where this Spanish-language newspaper was actually printed and issued.[70] Other transient presses operated briefly at Galveston in 1817, at Nacogdoches in 1819, and at San Antonio de Bexar in 1823.[71]
The permanent establishment of Texas printing dates from September 1829, when Godwin B. Cotten introduced a press at San Felipe and founded the _Texas Gazette_. In March 1832 he relocated at Brazoria. D. W. Anthony purchased both the press and the paper in the summer of 1832, and until July 1833 he continued to publish the paper at Brazoria under a new name, _The Constitutional Advocate and Texas Public Advertiser_. The earliest Texas printing in the Library of Congress is the number of the paper dated June 15, 1833, which offers news only from the United States and from overseas. "From the City of Mexico," writes Anthony, "we have heard nothing this week, except mere disjointed rumors from the interior. By the arrival of the next mail at San Felipe, we may reasonably expect that some certain intelligence will be received, of what the legislatures have done." Gathering news was one problem; he reveals another in the following paragraph: We are glad to be able at length, to present the ADVOCATE to our readers, on a sheet of its accustomed size. We stated before, that its being diminished two columns lately, was the consequence of a mistake made by our merchant in filling our order for paper. We now have an ample supply, and of excellent quality, so that we shall have no more apologies to offer on that score. These things, however, cost money, and that in hand, which we hope our good friends will not altogether forget.
Among the advertisements is the usual "JOB PRINTING DONE AT THIS OFFICE" and also an announcement of the "CONSTITUTION OF TEXAS, With or without the Memorial, For Sale at this Office and at the stores of W. C. White, San Felipe: David Ayres, Montville: and T. W. Moore, Harrisburg." Anthony printed these historic documents shortly after the Texas convention held at San Felipe in April, and the _Advocate_ began to carry this advertisement on May 11, 1833.[72] The Library's copy of the four-page newspaper has been removed from a bound volume. Since it is inscribed "Intelligencer, W. C.," it was obviously sent to the office of the _National Intelligencer_ at Washington City, as the capital was then called. It is slightly mutilated: an item has been cut from an outer column, affecting the third and fourth pages. There is no record of the issue in _A Check List of American Newspapers in the Library of Congress_ (1901), but its location does appear in the union list, _American Newspapers 1821-1936_ (1937). [Footnote 70: See Clarence S. Brigham, _History and Bibliography of American Newspapers 1690-1820_ (Worcester, 1947), p. [1069].] [Footnote 71: A reliable survey of early Texas printing is in Thomas W. Streeter's _Bibliography of Texas 1795-1845_ (Cambridge [Mass.] 1955-60), pt. 1, vol. 1, p. xxxi-lxi.] Illinois Illinois' first printing took place at Kaskaskia, the no longer existent Territorial capital. In 1814 Governor Ninian Edwards induced the Kentucky printer Matthew Duncan to settle there, and probably in May of that year Duncan founded a weekly newspaper, _The Illinois Herald_.
The earliest Illinois imprint in the Library of Congress, listed as number 4 in Cecil K. Byrd's definitive bibliography, is _Laws of the Territory of Illinois, Revised and Digested under the Authority of the Legislature. By Nathaniel Pope_, published by Duncan in two volumes dated June 2 and July 4, 1815. Nathaniel Pope (1784-1850), who prepared this earliest digest of Illinois statutes, went to Kaskaskia upon being appointed secretary of the newly authorized Illinois Territory and did important organizational work there in the spring of 1809 before Governor Edwards' arrival. On December 24, 1814, the legislature decreed that Pope should receive $300 "for revising the laws of this Territory making an index to the same, and superintending the printing thereof."[73] The work he produced was to a large extent based on an 1807 revision of the laws of the Indiana Territory, from which Illinois had recently been separated.[74] Even though it paid him for his labor and authorized printing, the Illinois Legislature never enacted Pope's digest into law. Nevertheless, the work had a certain importance, as explained by its 20th-century editor, Francis S. Philbrick: "The first thing that anyone will notice who opens this volume is that Pope began the practice of topical-alphabetical arrangement to which the lawyers of Illinois have now been accustomed for more than a hundred years. At the time of its appearance the work's importance was increased by the fact that it collected, so far as deemed consistent and still in force, the laws of 1812, 1813, and 1814. These enactments--though presumably all accessible in manuscript, for a time, at the county seats, and in many newspapers--had not all appeared in book form; nor did they so appear until fifteen years ago [i. e., in 1920-21]."[75]
The Library of Congress set of two rebound volumes is seriously imperfect, with numerous missing leaves replaced in facsimile. The volumes were purchased in June 1902 from the Statute Law Book Company in Washington together with a volume of Illinois session laws of 1817-18 for a combined price of $225. Arkansas William E. Woodruff, the first Arkansas printer, was a Long Islander who served his apprenticeship at Sag Harbor with Alden Spooner, nephew of the early Vermont printer of that name. Woodruff transported printing equipment purchased at Franklin, Tenn., to the Post of Arkansas, and there, on November 20, 1819, he began to publish _The Arkansas Gazette_. He later moved his press to Little Rock, where the newspaper has continued to the present day.[76] In his _History and Bibliography of American Newspapers 1690-1820_ (Worcester, Mass., 1947) Clarence S. Brigham locates the only complete file of early issues of the _Gazette_ at the Library of Congress. It must be reported here, regretfully, that the Library released these along with later issues for exchange in July 1953 as part of a space-saving operation, after making microfilm copies for retention. Subsequently the same file, extending from 1819 to 1875, was described at length under item 649 in Edward Eberstadt and Sons' Catalog 134 (Americana) issued in 1954.
RESOLVED ... That the governor be, and he is hereby, authorized to have printed in pamphlet form, a sufficient number of copies of the laws of the present general assembly, and all laws of a general nature passed by the general assembly of Missouri, in eighteen hundred and nineteen, and also the laws passed by the governor and judges of this territory, which have not been repealed by this general assembly; and to distribute such laws on application of those entitled to copies, in the manner herein-after provided, to wit: To the governor and secretary each one copy; to the judges of circuit and county courts, to the clerk of superior court, to the sheriff of each county, to every justice of the peace, to every constable, to the prosecuting attorney in behalf of the United States, and circuit or county court prosecuting attornies, to the territorial auditor, to the territorial treasurer, to the coroner of each county, to every member of the general assembly, each one copy: _Provided_, it shall be the duty of every officer, on his or their going out of office, to deliver the copy of the laws with [which][77] he shall have been furnished, in pursuance of this resolution, to his successor in office. _Resolved also_, That a sufficient number of copies shall be sent, by order of the governor, to the care of the several clerks of each county, in this territory, whose duty it shall be to distribute one copy to every officer or person allowed one in the foregoing part of this resolution.
_Resolved also_, That the governor be, and he is hereby, authorized to draw on the territorial treasurer for the amount of expenses arising thereon, which are not otherwise provided for by law. The two copies in possession of the Library of Congress carry no marks of previous ownership. One was recorded in the _Catalogue of Additions to the Library of Congress Since December, 1833_, dated December 1, 1834.[78] Whether this was the copy which retains a late 19th-century bookplate or the copy which the Library had rebound in 1914 is uncertain. Hawaii Hawaii's first printer was a young American named Elisha Loomis, previously employed as a printer's apprentice at Canandaigua, N.Y. He arrived at Hawaii with a group of Boston missionaries in 1820; but use of the printing press that he brought with him had to be delayed owing to the lack of a written Hawaiian language, which the missionaries proceeded to devise. At a special ceremony held at Honolulu on January 7, 1822, a few copies of the earliest Hawaiian imprint were struck off: a broadside captioned "Lesson I." Its text was afterwards incorporated in a printed primer of the Hawaiian language.[79] Loomis printed 500 copies of the primer in January, and in September 1822 he printed 2,000 copies of a second edition. The latter edition is the fifth recorded Hawaiian imprint,[80] as well as the earliest to be found among the Library of Congress holdings. In 16 pages, without a title page or an imprint statement, it opens with a section headed "THE ALPHABET" and includes lists of syllables, lists of words, and elementary Hawaiian readings of a religious character consistent with their missionary purpose.
The Library's copy is shelved in a special Hawaiiana Collection in the Rare Book Division. Bound with it is another rare primer in only four pages, captioned "KA BE-A-BA," which Loomis printed in 1824.[81] The small volume is in a black, half leather binding, with an old Library of Congress bookplate marked "Smithsonian Deposit." Since the final text page is date-stamped "1 Aug., 1858," the volume was probably received or bound by the Smithsonian Institution in that year. The Smithsonian transferred most of its book collection to the Library of Congress in 1866-67 and has continued to deposit in the Library quantities of material which it receives largely in exchange for its own publications. The Hawaiian rarities in this particular volume were cataloged at the Library in 1918. [Footnote 80: See H. R. Ballou and G. R. Carter, "The History of the Hawaiian Mission Press, with a Bibliography of the Earlier Publications," _Papers of the Hawaiian Historical Society_, no. 14, 1908, p. [9]-44.] [Footnote 81: The penciled note on p. [1], "Second Ed. Spelling Book," would appear to identify it with no. 10 in the Ballou and Carter bibliography.] Wisconsin "With a handful of brevier and an ounce or two of printer's ink"--as he later recollected--Wisconsin's first printer managed to produce 1,000 lottery tickets at Navarino, now the city of Green Bay, in 1827. The printer was Albert G. Ellis, who had previously worked as an apprentice at Herkimer, N.Y. He could not undertake regular printing at Navarino before obtaining a printing press in 1833; then, in partnership with another young New Yorker named John V. Suydam, he began to publish the _Green-Bay Intelligencer_.[82]
The first issue of this newspaper, dated December 11, 1833, is the oldest example of Wisconsin printing known to survive, and it is represented in the Library of Congress collections. Neatly printed in fine type on a small sheet, the four-page issue shows professional competence. The publishers apologize for the type they use and for the necessity, owing to limited patronage, of commencing the _Intelligencer_ on a semimonthly basis. Their front page features an Indian story entitled "The Red Head," chosen from some "fabulous tales ... politely furnished us by a gentleman of this place, who received them from the mouths of the native narrators." Inclusion of the story accords with a stated editorial policy of giving faithful descriptions of the character and manners of the natives. Some articles in this issue concern proposed improvements on the Fox and Wisconsin Rivers that would open navigation between Green Bay and the upper Mississippi. And the question where to locate the capital of an anticipated Territory of Wisconsin is another topic of the day. The Territory was not actually created until 1836. Aside from its obviously having been detached from a bound volume, there is no visible evidence of the Library of Congress copy's past history. It does not figure in _A Check List of American Newspapers in the Library of Congress_ (Washington, 1901); but it is registered in the union list, _American Newspapers 1821-1936_ (New York, 1937).
The Library of Congress also owns the only known copy of _Kikinawadendamoiwewin or almanac, wa aiongin obiboniman debeniminang iesos, 1834_, printed at Green Bay on the _Intelligencer_ press. Its 14 leaves, printed on one side only, are within an original paper cover bearing the manuscript title "Chippewa Almanac." A document held by the State Historical Society of Wisconsin reveals that in 1834 the Catholic mission at Green Bay charged "the Menominee Nation of Indians" for "an Indian Almanac rendered by signs equally useful to those among the Natives who are unable to read their language, published at Green Bay, 150 copies, $18"; and that the bill went unpaid.[83] Since the almanac was intended for use in the year 1834, it was likely printed before the end of 1833; yet there is no evidence to suggest that it predates the _Intelligencer_. At the suggestion of Douglas C. McMurtrie, the Library purchased its unique copy from the Rosenbach Company for "$375.00 less usual discount" in 1931. California As early as 1830 Agustín V. Zamorano, executive secretary of the Mexican territory of Alta California, was using limited printing equipment to produce official letterheads. Zamorano later became proprietor of California's first regular printing press, which was shipped from Boston (via Hawaii) and set up at Monterey about July 1834. While he controlled this press--that is, until the uprising in November 1836--Zamorano appears to have employed two printers, whose names are unknown.[84]
Under the revolutionary government the same press continued in operation at Monterey and at Sonoma, and the earliest California printing in the Library of Congress is the first known Sonoma issue: _Ecspocision_ [sic] _que hace el comdanante_ [sic] _general interino de la Alta California al gobernador de la misma_. It is a small pamphlet having 21 pages of text, preceded by a leaf bearing a woodcut of an eagle. The text is dated from Sonoma, August 17, 1837, and signed by Mariano G. Vallejo, beneath whose printed name is a manuscript flourish. Don Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo (1807-90) held the highest military office of Alta California at the time of writing, his headquarters then being at Sonoma. In his communication to the Governor, he advocates certain commercial reforms summarized as follows in Hubert Howe Bancroft's _History of the Pacific States of North America_ (San Francisco, 1882-90): His plan was to prohibit all coasting trade by foreign vessels, and to transfer the custom-house from Monterey to San Francisco. In defence of the first, he adduced the well known practice on the part of traders of presenting themselves at Monterey with a few cheap articles for inspection, afterward taking on board from secure hiding-places the valuable part of the cargo, to be sold at other ports. Thus the revenue was grossly defrauded, leaving the government without funds. By the change proposed not only would smuggling cease and the revenues be augmented, but Californians would be encouraged to become owners of coasting vessels or to build up a system of inland communication by mule-trains.... The transfer of the custom-house was advocated on the ground of San Francisco's natural advantages, the number and wealth of the establishments tributary to the bay, and the importance of building up the northern frontier as a matter of foreign policy.[85]
General Vallejo was his own printer. In a manuscript "Historia de California" he says of his pamphlet, "I wrote the attached statement of which I sent the original to the governor of the State and which I printed immediately in the small printing office that I had in Sonoma and of which I was the only employee; I had the printed copies distributed throughout all parts of California and furthermore I gave some copies to the captains of merchant ships that were going to ports in the United States of America."[86] The Library of Congress copy shows that the general left something to be desired as a printer, some pages being so poorly inked as to be scarcely legible. This copy--one of but four known to bibliographers--was previously in the possession of A. B. Thompson of San Francisco, and the Library purchased it from him in February 1904 for $15. Kansas By introducing printing at the Shawanoe mission station in the Indian Territory in March 1834, Jotham Meeker became the first printer of what is now Kansas. He had learned his trade at Cincinnati and for some years had served as a Baptist missionary and printer among various Indian tribes. The Library of Congress' earliest example of Kansas printing is the first number of _The Annual Register of Indian Affairs Within the Indian (or Western) Territory. Published by Isaac M'Coy. Shawanoe Baptist Mission House, Ind. Ter. January 1, 1835_. Isaac McCoy (1784-1846), publisher of four numbers of the _Annual Register_ between 1835 and 1838, was a prominent Baptist missionary, who also served as an Indian agent and strongly advocated the colonization of western Indians in a separate state. In this work he gives an account of the several mission stations operated by various denominations in the Indian Territory.
The following passage from the first number of the _Annual Register_ deals with the printer: At the Shawanoe station is a printing press in operation, under the management of Jotham Meeker, Missionary for the Ottawas. Mr. Meeker has invented a plan of writing (not like that of Mr. Guess, the Cherokee), by which, Indians of any tribe may learn to read in their own language in a few days. The first experiment was made with a sprightly Chippewa boy, wholly ignorant of letters, and of the English language. He studied three hours each day for nine days; at the expiration of which time there was put into his hands a writing of about twenty lines, of the contents of which he had no knowledge. After looking over it a few minutes, without the aid of an instructer, the boy read off the writing, to the unspeakable satisfaction of the teacher. Upon this plan elementary school books have been prepared, and printed, viz.--In Delaware, two; in Shawanoe, two; in Putawatomie, one; and two in Otoe, besides a considerable number of Hymns, &c. The design succeeds well.[87] Jotham Meeker's surviving journal, from which extracts have been published,[88] affords an interesting view of his work from December 15, 1834, when McCoy brought him the manuscript, until January 17, 1835, when he wrote, "Finish Br. M'Coy's Ann. Reg. a work of 52 pages, including the Cover. 1000 copies."
Another source of information about the _Annual Register_ is Isaac McCoy's book, _History of Baptist Indian Missions_ (Washington, New York, and Utica, 1840), wherein he states, I published it [the first number] at my own cost, and circulated it gratuitously. One was sent to each member of Congress, and to each principal man in the executive departments of Government.[89] Under the circumstances it is not surprising that three copies have made their way into the Library of Congress collections. On their respective title pages they are addressed in manuscript to "Hon Nathaniel Silsbee U.S. Sen," "Hon Jno. Cramer H. Reprs. U S," and "Hon Lucius Lyon H.R.U.S." New Mexico The first press of New Mexico was imported overland from the United States in 1834 to print _El Crepúsculo de la libertad_, a short-lived newspaper supporting the election of its editor, Antonio Barreiro, to the Mexican congress. It was operating at Santa Fe by August 1834 with Ramón Abreu as proprietor and with Jesús María Baca as printer,[90] the latter having learned his trade in Durango, Mexico.[91]
A broadside in the Library of Congress collections appears to be a genuine copy of the earliest extant issue of this press. Entitled _Lista de los ciudadanos que deberan componer los jurados de imprenta, formada por el Ayuntamiento de este capital_, it lists, in accordance with Mexican law, 90 men qualified to be jurors in cases of what the law terms "denuncias de los escritos."[92] The broadside is dated August 14, 1834, signed by "Juan Gallego, precidente--Domingo Fernandez, secretario," and carries the Ramón Abreu imprint. This copy must be one of 48 discovered in 1942 in a parcel marked "Benjamin Read Papers" at the New Mexico Historical Society. Benjamin Read (1853-1927) was an attorney who served in the New Mexico Legislature and who published a number of works on the State's history.[93] Before the find in 1942 only a single copy of the broadside was located. The authenticity of these 48 copies has been questioned, but in the opinion of the late collector Thomas W. Streeter they are originals.[94] The Library obtained its copy by exchange from Edward Eberstadt & Sons in May 1951.
Text from Project Gutenberg, public domain in the United States.