1775 - Communications, Media

Communications, Media

Printer and typeface designer John Baskerville dies at Birmingham, Warwickshire, January 8 at age 68. French dramatist Pierre de Beaumarchais purchases his type, whose design has met with criticism in Britain.

The 5-year-old Massachusetts Spy carries the first eyewitness accounts of the battles of Lexington and Concord. Publisher Isaiah Thomas will move the paper from Boston to Worcester in 1778.

News of the skirmish at Lexington, Massachusetts, reaches Philadelphia via post rider Israel Bissel, 23, who takes a note penned at 10 o'clock in the morning of April 19, rides 36 miles to Worcester in 2 hours, alerts Israel Putnam at Brooklyn, Connecticut, during the night, and reaches Old Lyme at 1 o'clock in the morning of April 20. Bissel is ferried across the Connecticut River and reaches Saybrook by 4 in the afternoon and Guilford by 7. At noon on April 21 he arrives at Branford, and on the morning of April 22 reaches New Haven. Bissel arrives at New York City April 23, and the intelligence from Boston causes New Yorkers to close their port, distribute arms, and burn two sloops bound for the British garrison at Boston. Ferried across the Hudson, Bissell arrives at New Brunswick at 2 in the morning of April 24, reaches Princeton by dawn, and is in Trenton by 6 and in Philadelphia soon after, having traveled in 5 days a distance that the fastest stage would have taken 8 days to cover.