The 5,000 Richest Girls in the US        I am occasionally asked, “how do you find  all the strange stuff in your blog?”      The answer is “I stumble onto it.”  Researching one thing leads to reading about something else just as fascinating or unknown as what I am originally looking for.      For example: I was looking for stories about the election of Nathaniel Banks, Jr. as Speaker of the US House of the 34 th  Congress February 2, 1856. Banks was elected after the House had voted 133 times! over a period stretching from December 1855 to February 2, 1856 Nathaniel Banks 1842      A short story in the Alexandria Virginia Gazette from February 4, 1856 briefly reports the election of a new Speaker of the House.  The paper has a longer article about deep disagreement between General Winfield Scott, head of the US Army, and then Secretary of War Jefferson Davis.       On t...

  Richard Hoe's Cylinder steam driven printing press 1860 Journalism Of all the puerile follies that have masqueraded before High Heaven in the guise of Reform, the most childish has been the idea that the editor could vindicate his independence only by sitting on the fence and throwing stones with impartial vigor alike at friend and foe . --Whitelaw Reid, Republican Editor of the New York Tribune 1879 October 30, 1847 “We hope to see the day when the press is regarded as an avenue to distinction as eligible as the other learned professions.  It affords opportunity which other professions do not for the exercise of the highest talent and largest attainments in a direction to sway the minds of people, to enlighten their ignorance, and uphold and elevate public morals.” The New Orleans Picayune Since this is a blog based on what newspapers told the public it is probably best to start with a brief examination of how newspapers were printed and distributed as well as t...

“War With Paraguay and How To Sit In A Hoopskirt--America from 1848 through 1868 as told through the newspapers and magazines of the time” Journalism has been called “history’s first rough draft.” Newspapers and magazines have been the public discourse for most of American history. "The American Squadron en route to Paraguay" Harper's Magazine 1858   The “rough draft” is the only thing most people at a particular time and place have to frame their opinions and reactions.  Historians have the luxury of hindsight.   Combined with access to private journals, formerly secret or undiscovered documents, and statistical facts unknown to the average person of the time allow historians to pontificate on “what was really happening.” While writing a magazine article about my hometown, Raleigh, NC, on the eve of the Civil War, I was astonished at the difference between the “first rough draft” in the local newspapers of the time and what historians present the public with afte...