CONTRASTS IN 150 YEARS OF PUBLISHING
IN OHIO
BY
CHARLES M. THOMAS
Nathaniel Willis, the publisher of the
Scioto Gazette, found
it necessary to cut the size of his
paper to half a sheet in the latter
part of the year 1802. He explained
the reason for this by the fol-
lowing paragraph which is found in his
issue for November 13:
By reason of the Menongehalia river not
having been navigable for some
time past, we have been disappointed in
receiving a supply of paper from
Red-Stone, which was contracted for and
to have been delivered at the
mouth of the Scioto last month; in order
to obtain a supply we sent to the
mills at George Town, Kentucky, but in
this effort we were also disap-
pointed, there not being a ream to be
had, we have therefore been under
the necessity of sending by land to
Red-Stone, at a very heavy expense,
from whence we shall be furnished in two
weeks, our readers will there-
fore excuse our issuing half a sheet during
that period. From the circum-
stance of the high price at which paper
now comes at, the editor earnestly
calls on those indebted, (if they wish a
press supported in Chillicothe) to
come forward and make payment.1
This quotation illustrates the difficulties
of early publishing
in Ohio. Securing adequate paper has
always been a problem.
William
Maxwell brought the first press into the territory that is
now Ohio, and published the first issue
of The Centinel of the
North-Western Territory on November 9, 1793.2 In the years
before Maxwell brought his press north
of the Ohio River, all
paper used in the territory west of the
Allegheny Mountains had
to be carried from the Atlantic seaboard
states, either by pack
horse or by wagon, over poor roads,
usually to Pittsburgh, and
then down the river in boats. As late as
1817, the average cost
1 Jesse J. Currier, "The
Territorial Press of Ohio, 1793-1803" (MS. M. A.
thesis, Ohio State University, 1940),
12.
A number of excellent research studies
have already made available the facts
concerning the origins of printing in
Ohio. The footnotes of this paper acknowledge
my indebtedness to these other students
of research. The main purpose of this paper
is to present an analysis of the
problems of publishing in Ohio through the years.
The use of a few original sources, not
available to earlier writers, has permitted the
clarification of details, but it is not
intended to repeat the work already done.
2 Osman Castle Hooper, History
of Ohio Journalism, 1793-1933 (Columbus, O., 1933), 2.
(184)
OHIO HISTORY CONFERENCE, 1942 185
for transportation of merchandise from
Philadelphia to Cincinnati
was close to seven or eight dollars a
hundredweight,3 and it takes
over a pound of paper to print a single
copy of an average-sized
small book.
The origin of Ohio paper mills dates to
within a few years
of the bringing of presses into the
West. The first paper mill
west of the mountains was established at
Royal Springs (now
Georgetown), near Lexington, Kentucky,
in 1793.4 The near-by
supply of paper may have encouraged
William Maxwell in his
plan to establish a press in Cincinnati.
When Nathaniel Willis was short of
paper, in 1802, he sent
first to this Georgetown mill, and
failing there he sent overland
to Redstone, Pennsylvania, where the
second paper mill west of
the mountains had been established in
1796.5 Redstone Old Fort
was located on the Monongahela River,
some thirty miles south of
Pittsburgh, at the site of the present
city of Brownsville. Down-
stream transportation all the way
apparently made it better for
the Scioto Gazette to get its
paper from Redstone than from the
closer Georgetown mill.
It has long been known that the first
paper mill in Ohio was
built on the Little Miami River, but
definite information concern-
ing the date and circumstances of its
establishment has become
available only within the past decade.
In 1938, Albert Barton
Smith, an old paper mill worker,
published in Trenton, New
Jersey, a thin and in some ways unique
pamphlet of reminiscences.6
His family history reveals that one
Johahn Schmidt, a paper mill
worker of Reiners, Germany, came to
America about 1780 and
was employed to build one of the first
paper mills in Maryland.
He operated this mill, later with the
help of his son John, until
the son moved by covered wagon to
Loveland, near Milford, Ohio,
in the spring of 1810. There, on the
Little Miami River, John
Smith built the first paper mill in Ohio
for a settler named Chris-
tian Waldschmidt or Wallsmith.7 The
mill was built during the
3 F. P. Goodwin, "The Rise of
Manufacturers in the Miami Country," American
Historical Review (New York), XII (1907), 767.
4 W. H. Venable, Beginnings of
Literary Culture, in the Ohio Valley (1891), 63.
5 Currier, "Territorial
Press," 12.
6 Albert Barton Smith, From Spook
Hill to Loveland in 1810.
7 Lyman Horace Weeks, A History of
Paper Manufacturing in the United States
(n. p., n. d.) 165.
186 OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND
HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
summer of 1810, and in September John
Smith turned out the
first sheet of paper. His son, Henry
Clay Smith, was born on
December 28, in the mill house a few
yards from the mill proper.
Wallsmith died in an epidemic about 1814 and the mill
passed to
his son-in-law, Mathias Kugler, but it
continued to be operated
by the Smiths, and Henry Clay Smith made
the last sheet of paper
from this mill in the year 1850. In the words of
his son. Henry
Clay Smith possessed "little skill
in business affairs," and so he
continued all his life to work in mills
owned by others. The
Kugler mill had probably been rendered
obsolete by the building
of the newer and more efficient mills in
southwestern Ohio.
Henry Clay Smith carefully cleaned out
the "stuff chests and
vats" and the Kugler building was
turned over to other purposes.
Smith then went on to work in other
paper mills in Ohio and
Indiana, dying at Elkhart, Indiana, in
1900. His son, Albert
Barton Smith, worked as an expert paper
maker in mills in Ohio,
Indiana and Michigan, and passed the
skill on to his paper-
making son Monteith, who died leaving
seven children. In the
words of the grandfather, however,
"All of them seem to have
tastes for other lines of work,"
and therefore the paper-making
family of Johahn Schmidt will soon cease
to exist after five gen-
erations and more than 160 years of
continuous work in paper
mills.
These early paper mills made a
remarkably good grade of
paper considering their primitive
facilities. William Maxwell
printed the code of laws for the
Northwest Territory at Cincinnati
in 17968 on paper which even today
remains in better condition
than much of the paper in books and
newspapers that are less
than twenty-five years old. The early
paper mills made paper by
thoroughly beating up clean rags and
placing the "stuff" in as
large a tank as was available. A wood
frame covered with fine
wire mesh was then dipped into the tank
and raised again, bringing
a thin layer of "stuff" up on
top of the wire. When the water
drained through the wire and the
"stuff" had dried it was paper,
8 Cf. R. G. Thwaites, "The Ohio Valley Press before the
War of 1812-1815," in
American Antiquarian Society, Proceedings
(Worcester), XIX (1908-1909), 309-368;
C. B. Galbreath, "The First
Newspaper in the Northwest Territory," in Ohio State
Archaeological and Historical Quarterly (Columbus),
XIII (1904), 332-349.
OHIO HISTORY CONFERENCE, 1942 187
which was then taken off the wire,
thoroughly dried in a loft, and
pressed free of wrinkles. Aside from the
slowness of the process,
the greatest difficulty was that most
tanks were small and a sheet
of paper could be no larger than the
tank from which it came.
Many years after it was founded, the
Kugler mill at Milford
installed a machine which could produce
a continuous sheet of
paper thirty-six inches wide at a speed
of twenty linear feet per
minute.9 The first
Fourdrinier machine in Ohio was installed in
the Beckett mill in Hamilton, which had
been established in
1849.10 This type of machine is the
basis of modern paper mak-
ing. It was invented by a Frenchman in
1799, developed by an
English firm during the next decade, and
first introduced into the
United States about 1827.11 This
paper-making machine causes
an equal supply of pulp to flow onto a
horizontal wire surface of
fine mesh which revolves and carries the
paper onto an endless
felt.12 This makes it
possible to produce a continuous strip of
paper, and, with modern perfections, at
great speed.
From the small beginnings of the
Wallsmith mill, Ohio has
developed into one of the leading
paper-making centers of the
Nation. The significance of this is
apparent when it is realized
that the United States makes more paper
than any five nations
combined.13 Ohio, with
fifty-three mills, ranks fifth among the
states of the Union in the number of its
paper mills, and ranks
first in the value of book paper
produced, the latter being twenty-
six million dollars a year, or about
one-fifth of the Nation's total.14
The Miami Valley was only one of many
paper-making cen-
ters in America in the early nineteenth
century, and not until
after 1840 did it show signs of
preeminence. The factors respon-
sible for this development are
significant, but difficult and uncer-
tain of analysis. Why did the Miami
Valley become the site of
many great paper mills? Most paper
makers will say it was
because of the available supply of good
water. Yet there were
numerous streams in America with water
just as adequate for
9 Smith,
Spook Hill to Loveland, 10.
10 Weeks, Paper Manufacturing, 279.
11 U. S. Dept. of Commerce, U. S.
Paper and Pulp Industry, Trade Publication
Series (Washington, D. C.), No. 182 (1938), 3.
12 Whiting Paper Co., How Paper Is
Made (n. p., n. d.).
13 W. B. Wheelwright, Essential Facts about Paper (Boston,
1920.)
14 U. S. Paper and Pulp, 12.
188
OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
paper making as the Miami rivers. The
available water was an
indispensable factor, but in itself not
adequate to account for the
development. An analysis today
emphasizes the importance of
other factors. An easily reached market
was evident as early as
1810 when the Wallsmith mill found
Cincinnati printers eagerly
seeking its paper. More significant is
the statement that some of
the Kugler paper found its way down the
Ohio River to the West
and South.l5 As early as 1817 the cost
for freight from Cincin-
nati to New Orleans was only one dollar
per hundred pounds.16
With the coming of canals wholesale
paper houses saw the chance
to supply these southern and western
markets to advantage, from
Cincinnati, downstream on the Ohio and
Mississippi rivers. This
advantage was maintained after the
railroads became the means
of transportation as southwestern Ohio
is centrally located within
easy reach of most of the Nation's
presses. The specialization of
the Miami Valley mills in the finer book
papers was obviously an
adjustment to the absence of any close
supply of pulp for making
the cheaper newsprint.
The Miami Valley paper industry would
never have started
its growth in the 1840's had there not
been an adequate supply of
skilled labor available. This
craftsmanship was nourished in fam-
ilies similar to that of Johahn Schmidt.
The early paper mills of
southwestern Ohio attracted such
artisans, and many children
were taught the skill that was the
family heritage.
The publisher of today may search almost
as long for his
paper stock as did Nathaniel Willis, but
this is because the mod-
ern user has become so exacting in his
demands. Several hundred
varieties of paper are available for
book making today, and weeks
may be spent in finding the exact paper
best suited for a par-
ticular use, but in the end it is very
likely that a Miami Valley
paper will be chosen.
Books and pamphlets have been published
in Ohio with regu-
larity in every year since 1796.
Thirty-five imprints had ap-
peared by 1803, if one may include in
this group nineteen
pamphlets of less than sixty pages each,
and two broadsides that
15 Smith, Spook Hill to Loveland, 19.
16 Goodwin, "Rise of
Manufacturers," 767.
OHIO HISTORY CONFERENCE, 1942 189
have been preserved. Cincinnati and
Chillicothe must divide
evenly the honors of this early
publishing, each with seventeen
imprints, unless one is able to prove a
claim to the single imprint
of unknown source. Of the thirty-five
imprints, twenty-three deal
with governmental affairs, three with
land sales or settlement, two
were semiofficial in nature, two were on
religious subjects, two
fraternal, one was a partisan political
address, one a book of
poetry, and one the constitution of the
Cincinnati Humane Society.
The volume grew from year to year until
the cumulative total
reached 118 by 1810, 287 by 1815, and
590 by 1820. Cincinnati
led in the latter year with 143 of the
total to that date, Chillicothe
came next with 121, and then Columbus
58, Zanesville 25, Mari-
etta 19, Lebanon 18, and Lisbon 10, followed by twenty-one other
communities with less than ten imprints
each.17
It is probably impossible to obtain any
reliable statistics on
Ohio printing and publishing in the
twentieth century. Today
many works are printed in one state but
published and copy-
righted in another, and many never
become a matter of any rec-
ord. A selective sampling of available
sources, however, indicates
that 146 books were published in Ohio in
the year 1900. This was
two and one-fourth per cent of the books
copyrighted in the
United States that year. Six Ohio firms
published from twelve
to sixteen books each for a total of
seventy-seven, and thirty-four
firms are listed with a single book.18
Even before 1800, and by 1820 with
considerable frequency,
the citizens of Ohio were expressing
themselves in books and
pamphlets. If a man of some education
wished to interpret the
gospel for his fellow citizens, praise
or damn the principles of a
political party, or inflict his own
poetry upon his neighbors, he
wrote a book. If the urge was
continuous, he established a news-
paper. Today there are more than four
hundred general news-
papers in Ohio,19 most of
which are conducted as well-organized
business enterprises with relatively
large capitalization and pri-
marily for economic motives. A hundred
years ago a newspaper
17 American Imprints Inventory, No.
17. A Check List of Ohio Imprints l796-1820
(Columbus, 1941).
18 Annual American Catalogue, 1900 (New York, 1901).
19 Hooper, Ohio Journalism, 181.
190 OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL
QUARTERLY
could be started with remarkably little
capital, and many were
maintained more for crusading purposes
than as a source of
income. Samuel Medary of Columbus,
having already success-
fully published three newspapers in a
period of twenty years, es-
tablished a fourth, the New
Constitution, on May 6, 1849, to
crusade for a new constitution for the
State.20 This newspaper's
reason for existence disappeared with
the ratification of the new
Constitution two years later. In 1861
Medary resigned as governor
of Kansas Territory and came back to
Columbus to establish the
Crisis which vigorously fought the Republican policies until
its
editor's death in November, 1864. The
office of the Crisis was
attacked by a mob on the night of March
5, 1864. Two hundred
citizens and soldiers in the mob failed
in their intention to destroy
the type with which the Crisis was
printed, for the actual printing
had been contracted out to another
printer whose shop was some
distance across town.
There was considerable specialization in
printing and pub-
lishing in Ohio by 1860, but the early
publishers had done all their
own work in one shop. William Maxwell,
with the help of his
wife and an apprentice, set the type,
operated the press, and dis-
tributed the papers. Maxwell's Code was
bound by Mrs. Max-
well who sewed it with wax ends tipped
with bristles.21 The use
of cuts is said to have appeared in Ohio
papers about 1800,22 but
Maxwell's Code contains a crude cut to
represent the seal of the
territory. The circle on this cut was
drawn freehand and is very
irregular in form. It may be seen, from
these irregularities, that
Maxwell made at least four cuts and then
rotated them in use on
his press for successive sections of the
book.
The first presses used in Ohio were made
of wood and
worked on the screw principle, like a
cider press.23 These presses
could, if necessary, be carried in a
large canoe. Within a few
years better presses were introduced
into Ohio. These new
presses contained more iron and the
platen was lifted by springs
20 Helen
P. Dorn, "Samuel Medary, Politician, Statesman, and Journalist" (MS.
M. A. thesis, Miami University, 1937).
21 Galbreath, "First
Newspaper," 345.
22 Currier, "Territorial
Press," 10.
23 V. C. Stump, "Early Newspapers
of Cincinnati," Ohio State Archaeological and
Historical Quarterly, XXXIV (1925), 169-183.
OHIO HISTORY CONFERENCE, 1942 191
on each side which greatly facilitated
the work. Still the lever
had to be operated by hand and required
all the strength of a
young apprentice. One of these early
presses is on display in the
Museum of the Ohio State Archaeological
and Historical Society
in Columbus. It is the press which James
Kilbourne bought for
the printing of the Western
Intelligencer at Worthington in 1811,
and was used to print that paper and its
successor, the Ohio State
Journal, until 1830. It is believed to have been a second-hand
press when Kilbourne bought it in
Marietta for use in Worth-
ington.24
With a capacity of about 250 impressions
an hour, these
early presses were slow and left much to
be desired according to
present-day standards for clarity of
impression. But the early
papers could always be read, and that
was the main objective of
eighteenth-century printing. By 1830 much better
presses were on
the market in Ohio. In that year the
Hamilton Intelligencer
bought an "Imperial Smith
Press" of the Cincinnati Type Foundry
for $250.00 with a ten dollar discount.25
There is, of course, a
decided contrast between the work of
these early presses and that
of the specialized presses of today. The
latter are made to print,
in several colors, many thousand
impressions an hour on a con-
tinuous roll of paper. In the printing
of a present-day textbook in
accounting, the paper must not be
permitted to stretch even a thou-
sandth of an inch between the
impressions of the black and the
red ink. If it were to stretch, with the
passing of a few copies,
the red line would not fall at the
correct position between two
rows of figures. Such precision as this
was neither possible nor
necessary a hundred years ago.
The functions of a publisher include the
distribution as well
as the manufacture of his books or
newspaper. Distribution and
the collection of accounts have always
been problems. The plea
of Nathaniel Willis for "those
indebted to come forward and make
payment" for the Scioto Gazette is
typical of requests repeatedly
found in early newspapers. Shera's
Oxford check-list for 1827-
1841 shows a sequence of periodicals
that lapsed after an average
24 Hooper, Ohio Journalism, 8.
25 A. H. Heiser, "A Printer's
Troubles; Oxford, Ohio,
during the Eighteen-
Thirties," Ohio State
Archaeological and Historical Quarterly, XLVII (1938), 40-58.
192
OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
life of a year or so. These usually had
an adequate number of
subscribers, but too few would pay their
bills.26 Books, if once
sold on credit, seem to have presented
even more difficult collec-
tion problems than did newspapers. The
firm of Bishop and Noble
was forced into liquidation at Oxford in
1835 when William Wal-
lace Bishop left town without having
made arrangements to meet
his notes. The assets of the firm
included accounts receivable of
$1344.59, of which only $83.41 had been collected after some
three years of effort.27 Much
depends on the credit policies of a
publisher, and it seems that Bishop and
Noble extended credit
for books bought by students of Miami
College, many of whom
were soon scattered to other states and
hard to reach. Today,
scholarly works, generally distributed
to an academic clientele, are
published and sold with credit losses
which are usually under
one per cent of gross sales.
Recently there has come to the writer's
attention an account
of a significant publishing enterprise
located at Oxford slightly
over a hundred years ago. It is more
interesting because the
methods used compare so closely with
those more recently devel-
oped there to take advantage of
efficient and economical printing
possibilities. There was published, in
1838, a two-volume edition
of Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the
Roman Empire, revised by
M. F. Guizot, with a title page carrying
the imprint, "Oxford, O./
Published by David Christy./
Stereotyped by J. A. James./
Cincinnati./ 1838./28
Jesse H. Shera is of the opinion that
the type was set in
Oxford, and that the papier-mache matrix
was probably also
stamped from the type in Oxford. The
matrix would then be sent
to Cincinnati for stereotyping, and the
plates would quite likely
be sent back to Oxford for the
completion of the printing process.
This system would allow the type to be
distributed once the matrix
was made, and then the same type used in
setting up another sec-
tion of the book. In this way a major
piece of publishing could
take advantage of low costs in the rural
community of Oxford,
where most of the hand work was done,
and at the same time
26 Jesse H. Shera, "The History of
Printing and Publishing in Oxford, Ohio,
1827-1841," ibid., XLIV
(1935), 103-37.
27 Heiser, "Printer's
Troubles," 40-58.
28 Shera, "History of
Printing," 103-37.
OHIO HISTORY CONFERENCE, 1942 193
utilize the technological facilities
available only in the larger cities.
Much the same division of labor is
maintained in the publishing
business in Oxford today. Typesetting
and press work is all done
there where a relatively high standard
of living may be main-
tained on a lower wage level than is
possible in larger cities. The
printed sheets are then sent away flat
to be bound, for today the
best binding is done by machinery in
larger cities.
Binding is a major problem of firms
today that are attempt-
ing to produce books in small editions
but good format. The set-
ting of the more complicated binding
machinery is so long a task
that it increases the per unit cost of a
small edition. If a book is
to be well bound at a cost of close to
twenty-five cents a copy on
an edition of five hundred, it must be
done by a combination of
hand and machine work. This requires a
skill that is seldom
found except in the largest cities.
A hundred years ago binding was already
a major problem,
unless it could be done by the printer's
wife, as in the case of
Maxwell's Code. A bill from the J. G.
Monfort firm of Hamilton
charges Bishop and Noble of Oxford for
binding done in 1834 and
1835 at the rate of sixteen and
two-thirds cents per copy for a
179-page book, and at twenty cents per
copy for a 309-page
book.29 Such prices,
considering the value of a dollar in 1835,
were a major consideration in
publishing.
The publisher of today faces one problem
that did not worry
early printers. Their paper was all rag,
and there was no question
concerning its durability. But wood-pulp
paper began to be made
in the United States in 1867, was in
general use by 1885, and
accounted for 83% of all the paper made
in the United States in
1910.30 Since the
discovery that much wood-pulp paper ages
rapidly, there has been no peace of mind
for the publisher who is
trying to manufacture books of permanent
value. Aside from the
cost, there just is not and cannot be
enough rag paper to meet the
demands of present-day book publishers.
Much wood-pulp paper
must be used and then there arises the
question of varieties and
grades, which range all the way from
ground-wood paper through
29 Cf. Heiser, "Printer's Troubles," and Shera,
"History of Printing."
30 U. S. Paper and Pulp, 4. Cf. Wheelwright, "Essential
Facts," 10. The 83%
includes paper made from waste
paper.
194 OHIO
ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
the various processes of chemical
reduction, and involve such
technical problems as the degree of
"shake" that has been main-
tained on the Fourdrinier machine and
its effect on the grain of
the paper. Some publishers may
compromise and announce the
use of a rag-content paper, meaning part
rag and part wood pulp.
Such publishers may be dead, and it is
hoped free from worry,
before it is evident that their
rag-content paper may be inferior
to some 100% wood-pulp papers. In fact,
the earliest durable
Chinese paper apparently was made from
the pulp of the mulberry
tree,31 and there is reason
for believing that the world's most
lasting paper eventually may be a
chemically reduced wood-pulp
product. Time alone can tell whether the
best of present-day
sulphite papers will approach or equal
the old-time rag papers,
but at least users are now aware of the
dangers of poor grade
wood-pulp papers.
A few years ago the American Library
Association pub-
lished a treatise which maintained that
"one-fourth of one per cent
of present-day books would amply include
all those worthy of a
place in the libraries of a hundred
years hence."32 This is prob-
ably a liberal estimate, and certainly
so if deduction is made on a
per-copy basis, but it is important that
the one-fourth of one per
cent represented by the books of real
value should be made to last.
These are seldom Books-of-the-Month, and
frequently have so
small a potential sale that they cannot
even be published without
subsidy. It is then that paper price and
quality become prime
considerations. The writer would not
maintain that every re-
search publication of the historical
presses is likely to find a place
among the one-fourth of one per cent,
but some of these historical
studies are in the same position as a
bit of research in one of the
physical sciences--of great importance,
but understandable and
read by a relatively small number of
students in that particular
field. Historians will understand the
illustration when it is re-
called that some of the most important
works of Frederick Jack-
son Turner were published on indirect
subsidy. Any amount of
time and care should be spent to provide
such works with the best
paper possible for the money that is
available.
31 U. S. Paper and Pulp, 1.
32 Mary E. Wheelock, Paper, Its
History and Development (Chicago, 1928).