TABLE OF CONTENTS The First US Newspaper Lasts Just One Edition 4 Penny Presses Grow in Popularity 6 The Telegraph Spreads News Quickly 8 The Clipper Perfects the Baseball Box Score 10 Nellie Bly Pioneers Stunt Reporting 12 Coverage of the Maine Sparks a War 14 Columbia Opens Its School of Journalism 16 Newspapers Cover the Stock Market Crash 18 A Chicago Paper Picks the Wrong President 20 The Press Publishes the Pentagon Papers 22 Investigative Journalism Unravels a Presidency 24 Newspapers Go Digital 26 Fact Sheet 28 Glossary 30 For More Information 31 Index 32 About the Author 32
1 THE FIRST US NEWSPAPER LASTS JUST ONE EDITION Publick Occurrences was published in Boston Massachusetts on September 25 1690 It was the first newspaper in the American colonies It was meant to be published monthly But four days after its first edition was published the paper was shut down by the government In 1690 Massachusetts was a In 1690 Massachusetts was a colony of Great Britain The colonists lived under the rule of the British Royal Government The government destroyed every copy of Publick Occurrences Only one known copy survives today The Royal Government was angry about what was printed in the about what was printed in the newspaper The paper criticized newspaper The paper criticized 4 Many colonists in Many colonists in Many colonists in Boston were unhappy Boston were unhappy Boston were unhappy Boston were unhappy Boston were unhappy Boston were unhappy Boston were unhappy Boston were unhappy Boston were unhappy with British rule with British rule with British rule
The first edition of the Boston News-Letter British actions in the French and Indian War 1754 1763 The government said the paper was illegal It said the paper had printed untrue things It also said printers had to have permission from the government to print information It was 14 years before the next colonial newspaper would be published But this one had more than one edition The Boston News Letter was published for 74 years The first newspapers changed how 4 Number of pages of the first colonial newspaper The British Royal Government shut down the first US newspaper Fourteen years passed before another colonial newspaper was published People began to read the newspaper people got information They did not have to wait for the town crier to tell them the news They could read it for themselves FREEDOM OF THE PRESS After the American Revolution the United States was no longer ruled by England The Bill of Rights was added to the US Constitution in 1791 The First Amendment of the Bill of Rights guarantees freedom of speech It says the government cannot tell the press what to say 5
