Press
History: Penny Press Era
Last updated July 10, 2000
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The
Country Changes
It's 1800.
- Most of the
big ports in the country have newspapers, which have jumped from
55 just after the American Revolution to 512.
- The War of
1812 will open the west to the Frontier Press.
- Magazines
start to take hold as a national medium, though not yet a mass
medium.
- And Thomas
Jefferson, an anti-federalist, is elected president.
The stage is
almost set for newspapers to make the leap to a mass medium.
One of the themes
of the textbook is that the media are technology driven. Well, in
the early 1800s printing technology brought together the new rotary
press and the steam engine. This is key ingredient to what is about
to come.
Also key was
the fact that Jefferson was president. Under his administration a
public education system was established. Remember that literacy, until
now, had been reserved for the elite. Well, while slaves in this country
still were excluded, the public education system opened up literacy
for the masses.
Jump ahead to
the 1830s.
- A generation
has been educated.
- Immigration
has brought a large populace to the cities.
- The economy
is good.
- Technology
has brought together the new rotary printing press and the steam
engine, which makes it possible to print thousands of papers inexpensively.
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Benjamin
Day and the Penny Press
All that is needed for newspapers to become a mass
medium is a good idea. Along comes Benjamin Day in 1833. Day
opened the New York Sun and created the Penny Press.
Newspapers of
the day cost about 10 cents each . . . too expensive for the masses.
But there was a large literate audience out there. Day took advantage
of the fact that he could print thousands of papers inexpensively
and sold the papers for a penny each. He also changed to content of
newspapers to make it more sensation and more popular to the lower
class. He hired boys to hawk the newspapers on street corners. His
idea was huge success and newspapers crossed that line that made them
truly mass media. Others were quick to follow his lead. They became
so powerful that they were called Lords of the Press.
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The
Importance of the Penny Press
The importance
of the Penny Press to mass media cannot be underestimated. Only recently
have we seen anything like it. In 1989 the Gannett Corporation started
a new kind of newspaper, called USA Today. The impact it had, and
continues to have, on other newspapers is akin to the Penny Press.
And still another
event has taken place that has had a more profound impact. The Internet
is changing ALL media in many ways.
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Reading
Assignment
You should be
reading Chapter Two in your textbook to get more information about
newspaper history.
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Exercise
Briefly describe
how the Penny Press transformed newspapers into mass media.
Note that when
submitting the answer start the subject line with:
J100x-L
-- YourLastName -- PennyPress
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lecture: Yellow Journalism |
