Statewide County OhArchives News.....Tid-Bits -- Part 110A: Newspapers Read by the Ohio Pioneers May 8, 2008 ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/oh/ohfiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Darlene E. Kelley http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00026.html#0006374 May 11, 2008, 1:13 am Historical Collections Of Ohio, And Then They Went West, Know Your Ohio May 8, 2008 Contributed for use in USGenWeb Arcives by Darlene E. Kelley http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00026.html#0006374 May 8, 2008 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Historical Collections of Ohio And Then They Went West Know Your Ohio Tid-Bits -- Part 110 A Newspapers Read by the Ohio Pioneers ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Part 110 A Newspapers Read By The Ohio Pioneers Journalism led the van of literary culture in the advanc into the Northwest Territory. It was in the little cluster of cabins, named by Territorial Governor St. Clair, Cincinnati, in 1793, that the initial newspaper made its appearance under the title of " Centinel of the Northwestern Territory," The proprietor and editor was one William Maxwell, an enterprising immigrant from New Jersey. It was a crude etablishment, the entire outfit of which, a wooden Ramage hand press, lie the one used by Dr. Benjamin Franklin in Philadelphia, type, cases, "furniure " and all could be moved in one load of a full grown wheelbarrow. The outfit was set up in a log cabin on the corner of Front and Sycamore Streets. Maxwell and hs good wife, Nancy, did all the work. The buckskin ball was dipped on ink, then daubd on the type, paper was then spread on and the press lever, precisely like a hand cider press, was pulled and released ad the printed paper removed. The paper was a folio, four pages, three columns in the page, in a small quarto form; the printed matter being eight and one half inches in width, ten ad one fourth inches long. The first issue of the first copy, was dated Saturday, November 9, 1793, and bore under its title the commendable motto: " Open to all parties but influenced by none." It was a weekly. It ontained news from London, England, dated July 15th, two months old. This initial number also gave an account of an attack by Indians on a provisin convoy, " a little time ago " between Fort St Clair and Fort Jefferson, and there was a public notice that $168 would be paid for " every scalp having the right ear appendant for the first ten indians who shall be killed within a specified time and territory." A column was used to set forth the advantages of rapid travel by packet boats, which made the voyage from Cincinnati to Pittsburg and return in four weeks. There were anecdotes and poetry and contributor's letters, which one was the familiar protest against the excessive taxation in Cincinnati. The paper that Maxwell controlled seems to have given him some prestige and " Pull " for in 1796 he was appointed postmaster of the little settlement that was to be the Quee City of the Ohio. That same year Maxwell sold the paper to Edmund Freeman, who changed the name to " Freeman's Journel" and published it as such till 1800 when he movd to Chillicothe, then the capital of the Ohio Territory, established July 4, 1800, and known officially as the Eastern Divison of the Territory of the United States Northwest of the Ohio River. In Chillicothe there had already been establshed in 1796, a paper known as the "Scioto Gazette." It was founded by Nathaniel Willis, grandfather of N.P. Willis, the famous poet. Nathaniel was born in Boston in 1755, and was an apprentice in the printing office of Benjamin Franklin. He was a patriot and was among the participants in the Boston Tea Party, and in that city published and edited, during the American Revolution the " Independent Chronicle." At the close of the Revolution,Willis moved from Boston to Virginia and established at Martinsburg, the " Potomic Gardian ." Later, ( 1796 ) he transferred his journalistic enterprise to Chillicothe and foundd the " Scioto Gazette." This issue, as nearly as can now be acertained, was intermittent for a time, but on April 25, 1800, Willis began a new series with Vol.1, No.1, and this paper has gone on continually since that date, therefore the oldest living paper in the west , and one of the oldest of continuous publication in the United States. As above noted, Edmund Freeman moved the " Freeman's Journel " in 1800 from Cincinnati to Chillicothe, where a year later he died and Willis bought the plant and " good will " of the paper and incorporated it with the "Scioto Gazette." The " Scioto Gazette " became the nestor of Ohio Journals and was the official organ of the Northwest Territory and later of the new State of Ohio, after its admission in the Union, March 1, 1803. In its columns were published all official announcements, and the proeedings of the Territorial Assembly. The paper strongly supported the statehood movement, headed by what Governor St. Clair called the " Virginia junta of Ross County," meaning such men as Thomas Worthington, Nathaniel Massie, and Edwin Tiffin of Ross County, and Charles Willing Byrd, territorial secretary, and William Henry Harrison, territorial repesentative in Congress. The " Western Spy and Hamilton Gazette" was a weekly paper started May 28, 1799, in Cincinnati, which had at that time a population of eight hundred. This paper was continued until 1809, when its name was changed to the " Whig " and under the later title was published for some years and in 1823, it was renamed the " National Republican Ohio Political Register." One of the editors was Sol Smith, once an actor and theatre manager in St.Louis and elsewhere and the gandfather of the later popular comedian, Sol Smith Russell. The printing outfit for the " Marietta Register and Virginia Herald " was brought to Marietta by Wyllys Sillman and Elijah Backus. The paper was first issued from a primitive press in the Campus Martius stockade on December 18, 1801. Ten years after the first issue, the paper bgan to change hands. In 1810, it was sld to Caleb Emerson, who published the first issue as the " American Friend. " Nineteen years later ( 1833 ) the title again was changed to the " Marietta Gazette." Ten years later in 1842, Beman Gates merged it into the " Intelligencer." The paper was then purchased in 1862, by R.M. Stinson, the scholar, litterateur and for some years State Lbrarian. He rechristened the paper the " Register " and later published as the " Register-Leader, with John Kaiser being the principal owner and editor. On December 9, 1804, the " Liberty Hall" and Cincinnati Mercury " was founded in that city by John M. Browne, of multitudinous vocations, for he was a preacher, editor, almanac publisher, town recorder, bookseller,and vendoe of patent medicines. This paper survived for eleven years when it was combined with the " Cincinnati Gazette, founded in 1806. The name, " Liberty Hall," was perpetuated in the weekly edition of the "Gazette" until the period of the Civil War. One of the time honored newspapers of Ohio was the " Western Star, establishe in Lebanon on March 1807, and still being pulished under its original neme, Its founder was John McLean, afterwards Justice of the United State Supreme Court. The paper was edited and managed by Nathanial McLean, brother of John. Its form and contents being typical of the inland journals of its day. It contained little or no editorial matter and no local intelligence whatever.It gace European news, two months old;New York and St.Louis items, three weeks in age. Perhaps the first paper pinte in a foreign tongue was the " Der Ohio Adler, the Ohio Eagle," first appearing in 1807, in Lancater, Fairfield County. Many whose early settlers were German. The founder of the paper was Jacob Dietrich, an immigrant fron the " fatherland." This paper passed into the hands of Edward Shaeffer about 1813, when an English edition was begun called the " Eagle," which continued, As near as can be ascertained the German edition was perpetuated under separate auspices until sometime in the 30's, when its title was changed to the " Lancaster Volksfreund," in 1841 it again changed hands and was removed to Columbus, again taking the name of " Adler." Two yers later ( 1843 ) Jacob Reinhard and Frederick Feiser bought the property and changed its name to the "Columbus Westbote." Under that name it was published by them and later Leo Hirsh and his sons until shortly after the entry of the United States in the war of 1917. It then ceased to exist. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Con't in Part 110 B . 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