Rare Book Monthly
Articles - January - 2009 Issue
A Few Rhymes for the Carrier Boys
An inexpensive eye chart
They carefully included the statistics of sunrise and sunset, recorded the inches of rain and gathered the statistics of harvest. These people liked, and still like, numbers. They co-existed under the newspaper's roof with the romantics who wrote the news that carried emotional content. The romantics owned the social pages and social events, wrote of crimes, fires and celebrations and battled the editor[s] for larger headlines and better placement on the front page for 'their' stories. Emotion sold papers, the bean counters paid the bills and the arguments never stopped.
Certain days and certain activities however belonged conclusively and irretrievably to the romantics. The 4th of July, Thanksgiving and Washington's birthday were theirs. They grudgingly gave the bean counters Ground Hog Day, Socrates' birthday and the anniversary of the invention of decimals while demanding Valentines Day, conceding Easter demanding April Fools and always acted [and it was acting] like all the events and occasions the bean counters received was much, much too much. Okay, you can have July 16th, the Battle of Baylen and June 13th, anniversary of the beheading of Anthony Widville at Pontefract. That left such holidays as New Year's the uncontested property and providence of the romantics, who when left unguarded, could wax poetic in ways that history has mostly and very mercifully decided to ignore.
For the newspapers and newspapermen [and it was mostly men then] that waxed poetic on New Year's Day, the Carrier Address was on the short annual list of opportunities to wax poetic without provoking a riot among the bean counters who were sure to calculate to the last sou, the cost and benefit of such printing. Given the investment to set the type, buy the paper, ink the form, roll the roller and later gather, organize, fold, count and distribute such productions, it's surprising that any newspaper survived the extravagance. What inevitably saved the newspaper from bankruptcy was the piece's diminutive size - a single sheet 9 x 12.5" quarter folded to a quite manageable 4.5 x 6.25 inches. The type selected was a tasteful if minute 4 point that employed the same spacing as the car-packers on the Tokyo Metro at rush hour. Space should not be wasted! To further reduce burden to the firm and avoid all need for punches, staples and threads the piece was folded but not cut. For the recipient to then take this eye test required flipping the sheet back and forth, over and back and side to side to continue reading in page order.
Alas, the example that accompanies this article, is one hundred and forty years old today, remains a virgin, no burrs, tears or marks of any kind to suggest it has been out into the world. It probably hasn't and one suspects that would surprise no long-gone editor, delivery boy or reader. The piece was simply a convenience for encouraging tips and an opportunity for us today to speculate upon some of the underlying assumptions afoot and at work on January 1st, 1869.
Whatever else this 'carrier call' does it suggests a bustling community of newspaper readers thus confirming the national statistics that showed literacy approaching 90% in 1870. The printed word was becoming the currency of information, the great newspapers beginning their extended runs.
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