The Boston News-Letter

Boston News-Letter

Print journalism has come such a long way from where it used to be. Whether it was carrier pigeons or hand-working typewriters, the news world was shockingly different back in the 18-1900’s than it is now. Today, modern technology makes it possible for thousands of newspapers, magazines, and journals to share news across the entire world within minutes of an event occurring, whereas back in the day it would take weeks to hear about a story. Though this went on for quite a while there was one newsletter that was the start of a revolutionary change in the media world. This was a paper that was releasing foreign news for people to hear about within a week of the event happening, and it was the only paper to stay successful as long as it did. This was The Boston News-Letter. 

The Boston News-Letter was not the first ever newspaper, as that was called “Publick Occurrences”, but this paper was shut down immediately after the first publication by the British which was to be expected. The Boston News-Letter was the first ever successful newsletter, though, that did the work this paper showed it was capable of without getting immediately taken away by the British. It is interesting to note that this paper was originally not intended to be a newspaper at all, it was a way of communication between colonists until they came to the realization that the information that Campbell  was able to spread was something that they actually did need to have published for everyone to be up-to-date on. The first issue of the newsletter was published on April 24, 1704 byJohn Campbell who was the first editor and John Green who was the first to print (and who was eventually moved to being the editor after Campbell passed away years later). Each week it came out covering monday-monday news with a blank last page for people to leave their feedback on for the government. This paper also covered foreign news as well which was something no one else had been successful in to this point. People were able to learn about what was going on all over the world as opposed to hearing through the grapevine after weeks or even months of what may be occurring, and this was insanity to everyone. Some of the big stories the paper was able to cover in its 72 years of print included: Battles of Lexington and Concord, the Tea Party, Bunker Hill, and the most famous of all, Blackbeard the pirates head-to-head fight. This was a very impressive 72 years and after the British got this paper shut down like all of the others of its time, there was a new reign of papers that were able to build on the world that The Boston News-Letter had opened up. It was no longer a slow- paced world. Mass media was finally something of the present and something that would build bigger and bigger into the future.