The Press., 1921-07-14
IS OLD NEWSPAPER
Baltimore Americans Long and
 EventfuI History.
First Issued in 177s, the Newspaper Has Continued Without a Break
 Until the Present Day.

Many people find a fascination in old newspapers. They like to read that such and such a paper is the old est in the country, or the first one published in such and such a city. And when a newspaper changes own CTS, says a writer in the Christian Science Monitor, it is always sure of finding interested readers for the scraps of it's own history which. it prints along with the announcement of the change. Thus when Frank A.. Munsey's New York Herald, in an- nouncing recently MT. Munsey's pur- chase of the Baltimore American, re- ferred to the American as folder than the government of the United States itself" and as the "secOnd oldest news paper in America" many who saw the item found their thoughts turning back to the days when newspapers today. "But presumably none were misled into taking that statement to indicate that the American was the second newspaper established in the United States. Of course, there were many before ii. The Baltimore Amer
 ican was first issued on August 2O 1773. Its founder was that William Goddard who was at the time editor of the Pennsylvania Chronicle of Phil adelphia, and who, on the occasion of a visit to Baltimore, was urged to un- dertake a publication there. The Bal timOre American was not specifically the paper which Goddard founded in Baltimore. His first issue there ap- peared under the title of the Maryland Journal and Baltimore Advertiser, and continued under that title until an- other Philadelphian went to Baltimore and, purchasing the newspapers, changed it's name to the Baltimore American and Commercial Intelll. gencer. Thus the name Baltimore American first served as the heading for the newspaper in 1795.
 But William Goddard was already a newspaper man of demonstrated en- terprise and ability, even before his experience with the Pennsylvania Chronicle. Apparently he had served as an editor in New York, and cer- tainly he had had newspaper experi- ence in Providence, R. l., where he established the Providence Gazette and Journal iE 1762. Thus Goddard him. self appears to have had some connec- ton with at least three newspapers before he ever thought of the one which eventually became the Balti- more American. And journalistic his tory brings up number of newspaper titles which were antecedent to his Baltimore foundation. There was the New England group, of which the Boston Newsletter first appeared on April A, 1704, and early found rivals in the Boston Gazette, initiated De- cenlber 21, 1719, and the New England Courant, appearing on August 2, 1721. The first newspaper in the middle colo nies, the American Mercury of Phila-. deIphia, began publication on Decem- Der 9, 1719 The Pennsylvania Ga zette, with which Benjamin Franklin's name was associated, appeared on De- cember 24, 1728. Ahead of Goddard in Maryland, William Parks, who had been made public printer there, es- tablished the Maryland Gazette at Annapolis, on September 19, 1727. But the Baltimore American gained its temporary precedence over newspapers now in existence and claims it's title as the second oldest in America, for continuing issues without break from the day when Goddard first issued the Maryland Journal in 1773.