Question

What is the newspaper boom?

Answer 1

Newspapers flourished, dramatically, in early nineteenth-century America. By the 1830s the United States had some 900 newspapers, about twice as many as Great Britain—and had more newspaper readers, too. The 1840 U.S. census counted 1,631 newspapers; by 1850 the number was 2,526, with a total annual circulation of half a billion copies for a population of a little under 23.2 million people. Most of those newspapers were weeklies, but the growth in daily newspapers was even more striking. From just 24 in 1820, the number of daily newspapers grew to 138 in 1840 and to 254 in 1850. By mid-century the American newspaper industry was amazingly diverse in size and scope. Big city dailies had become major manufacturing enterprises, with highly capitalized printing plants, scores of employees, and circulations in the tens of thousands. Meanwhile, small town weeklies, with hand-operated presses, two or three employees, and circulations in the hundreds were thriving as well.

The causes of this boom in American newspapers were varied and independent in origin, but they were mutually reinforcing. The U.S. population was growing and spreading out to new regions distant from the old seaboard settlements. As new towns formed, new institutions—including newspapers—blossomed. Indiana, for example, had only one newspaper in 1810 but seventy-three by 1840. Politically, America was highly decentralized, with government business conducted at the national, state, county, and town levels. Each of these levels of government needed newspapers, and the new American system of political parties also supported newspapers. Commercially, as new businesses flourished, so did the advertising function of the newspaper press. Rapidly urbanizing cities could even support multiple daily newspapers. The early nineteenth century was also a boom time for religious and reform organization, and each voluntary association needed its newspaper.