40 Distribute and Be Damned
be sent to the country at large.
4
It was in such circumstances that Smith
began to boast that his activities enabled him to be “first with the news”.
Typically, histories of the press and its significance to the development
of a public sphere in countries such as the United Kingdom and USA
focus on the activities of the writers, editors, and publishers. Craig Calhoun, for example, in The Roots of Radicalism, offers a version of the
rise of the public sphere that has its origins in the activities of individuals
such as Richard Price, Joseph Priestley, and Thomas Paine, while in the
more immediate context, Simon Dawes considers the effects of recent
legislation and activities such as superinjunctions on newspaper publishers.
5
While the means of distribution have tended to come into play with
regard to legacy media, the assumption has often been that it was publishers who were the drivers of innovation. Historically, this was because
publishers were often identical with printers, as in the rush of political
pamphleteering in the seventeenth century,
6
or were owner-proprietors
who were also very active with regard to the content that appeared in
their publications, as with E.S. Dallas and W.T. Stead.
7
Habermas’s notion of a public sphere as “a realm of our social life in which something
approaching public opinion can be formed”
8
has thus tended to focus on
the media as producers of public opinion in recent criticism when it has
not focussed on the actual spaces (town halls, or the use of art in public
places
9
). More rarely, commentary dealing with legacy media has concentrated on a technological aspect that has affected the public sphere
separate to the content that is seen to shape opinion, such as the rise of
cheap wood pulp which, according to Kaplan, had a profound effect on
the formation of an American “republic of letters”, making available a
cheap mass press in the early twentieth century.
10
While avoiding any
simplistic notions of technological determinism, as indicated in the previous chapter, it is the role of such technological systems of production
and distribution in shaping the public sphere that is of particular significance here.
Returning to the early nineteenth century, as Wilson observes it was
the static nature of technological production which hindered the early
news trade the most: too few papers were printed.
11
As these difficulties
were addressed through innovations in print technology, a second problem emerged as an obstacle to the continued growth of William Henry
Smith II’s company: distribution. The mail coach system had begun to
distribute newspapers in the 1780s and continued unchallenged until the
1830s but the service was slow, with coaches averaging seven to eight
miles per hour in summer and only five miles in winter, compared to
40 miles per hour for trains by the mid-century.
12
Not only were trains
faster, they could also carry more, whether passengers or freight. As
Clarke observes, the expansion of the railways was one factor in the
growth of newspaper circulation in the second half of the nineteenth
century, contributing to the ecology in which print operated.
13
Other
be sent to the country at large.
4
It was in such circumstances that Smith
began to boast that his activities enabled him to be “first with the news”.
Typically, histories of the press and its significance to the development
of a public sphere in countries such as the United Kingdom and USA
focus on the activities of the writers, editors, and publishers. Craig Calhoun, for example, in The Roots of Radicalism, offers a version of the
rise of the public sphere that has its origins in the activities of individuals
such as Richard Price, Joseph Priestley, and Thomas Paine, while in the
more immediate context, Simon Dawes considers the effects of recent
legislation and activities such as superinjunctions on newspaper publishers.
5
While the means of distribution have tended to come into play with
regard to legacy media, the assumption has often been that it was publishers who were the drivers of innovation. Historically, this was because
publishers were often identical with printers, as in the rush of political
pamphleteering in the seventeenth century,
6
or were owner-proprietors
who were also very active with regard to the content that appeared in
their publications, as with E.S. Dallas and W.T. Stead.
7
Habermas’s notion of a public sphere as “a realm of our social life in which something
approaching public opinion can be formed”
8
has thus tended to focus on
the media as producers of public opinion in recent criticism when it has
not focussed on the actual spaces (town halls, or the use of art in public
places
9
). More rarely, commentary dealing with legacy media has concentrated on a technological aspect that has affected the public sphere
separate to the content that is seen to shape opinion, such as the rise of
cheap wood pulp which, according to Kaplan, had a profound effect on
the formation of an American “republic of letters”, making available a
cheap mass press in the early twentieth century.
10
While avoiding any
simplistic notions of technological determinism, as indicated in the previous chapter, it is the role of such technological systems of production
and distribution in shaping the public sphere that is of particular significance here.
Returning to the early nineteenth century, as Wilson observes it was
the static nature of technological production which hindered the early
news trade the most: too few papers were printed.
11
As these difficulties
were addressed through innovations in print technology, a second problem emerged as an obstacle to the continued growth of William Henry
Smith II’s company: distribution. The mail coach system had begun to
distribute newspapers in the 1780s and continued unchallenged until the
1830s but the service was slow, with coaches averaging seven to eight
miles per hour in summer and only five miles in winter, compared to
40 miles per hour for trains by the mid-century.
12
Not only were trains
faster, they could also carry more, whether passengers or freight. As
Clarke observes, the expansion of the railways was one factor in the
growth of newspaper circulation in the second half of the nineteenth
century, contributing to the ecology in which print operated.
13
Other