Pioneer Imprints from Fifty States

Minnesota [110] Quoted from Wendell J. Ashton, Voice in the West, Biography of a Pioneer Newspaper (New York, 1950), p. 367, note 17. This book is about Utah's first newspaper, the Deseret News , established June 15, 1850, of which the earliest original issue in the Library of Congress is dated May 31, 1851. [111] It is now available again at the Church Historian's Office. Another copy is in the Harvard Law Library. [112] See Franklin L. West, Life of Franklin D. Richards (Salt Lake City [1924]). Minnesota ( Minnesota Chronicle and Register St. Paul, Minnesota Territory, Saturday, August 25, 1819. Vol. 1 No. 1) Minnesota's first printer was James Madison Goodhue of Hebron, N.H. An Amherst College graduate, he had abandoned a legal career to run a pioneer newspaper at Lancaster, Wis. Shortly after the establishment of the Minnesota Territory, he moved his printing equipment to St. Paul, and on April 28, 1849, he founded his weekly newspaper, The Minnesota Pioneer . It is reported that even though he brought along two printers, Goodhue himself worked both as compositor and pressman, and further that the printing press he used at Lancaster and St. Paul was the same on which Iowa's first printing had been performed. [113] The Library of Congress' scattered file of this first Minnesota newspaper contains just one 1849 issue, dated October 25. Taking precedence as the Library's earliest example of Minnesota printing is the first issue, dated August 25, 1849, of another St. Paul paper, the Minnesota Chronicle and Register , which resulted from the merger of two early rivals of the Pioneer . In an introductory editorial the proprietors, James Hughes and John Phillips Owens, make certain claims on behalf of this paper: Our union bases us upon a foundation which renders our permanent success beyond a contingency. The combining of the two offices places us in possession of probably the best and most complete printing establishment on the Mississippi, above St. Louis. These advantages, with our practical experience in the art, the aid of health and a free good will, and a moderate share of the other requisites, we hope will enable us to give the Chronicle and Register a place in the front rank of well executed, useful and instructive newspapers.... We have two new Washington Printing Presses, with all the recent improvements attached. We defy any establishment in the Union to produce superior pieces of machinery in the way of Hand Presses. Our assortment of book and job type is also of the newest and handsomest styles, and comprises larger quantities and greater varieties than can be found this side of St. Louis. And we are happy to announce we have more coming. They also make an interesting statement of editorial policy: The Chronicle and Register have each a reputatation [sic] at home and abroad, gained during the few months of their separate existence. The views of the respective editors in regard to general politics, and the relation they bear upon these matters to our present administrations, National and Territorial, has been a matter of no concealment on the part of either. And were it not for one reason, we would here let this subject rest. But the ground Minnesota at present occupies is neutral. We have no vote in the Legislative councils of the Nation, no vote for President. Why should we then divide and distract our people upon questions that they have no voice in determining? Why array each other in separate bands as Whigs and Democrats when such a course can only show the relative strength of the two parties, without adding one iota to the prosperity and welfare of either? The measures of one or the other of the great parties of the country will receive the sanction of the next Congress, and no thanks to Minnesota for her votes. We as citizens, and as whigs, are willing to leave it for the future to determine which of these parties are to sway the destinies of our Territory. The Library has eight issues of the Chronicle and Register from the year 1849, as well as later ones through February 17, 1851, all bearing its motto: "The greatest good for the greatest number." Many of the earlier issues are addressed to John M. Clayton, who was Secretary of State until July 1850, and some later issues are addressed to his successor, Daniel Webster. (The Library's file of The Minnesota Pioneer also has a State Department provenance.) (Short newspaper items) In addition the Library of Congress owns three official publications printed by James Madison Goodhue in 1849: Message from the Governor of Minnesota Territory to the Two Houses of the Legislative Assembly, at the Commencement of the First Session, September 4, 1849 ; Rules for the Government of the Council of Minnesota Territory, and Joint Rules of the Council and House, Adopted at a Session of the Legislature, Commenced September 3, 1849 ; and Message of the Governor, in Relation to a Memorial from Half-Breeds of Pembina . [114] On September 5, the day after it authorized Goodhue to do its printing, the newly formed legislature ordered the first two of these titles printed in editions of 500 and 100 copies, respectively. [115] The Library copies of both pamphlets are unbound, without marks of personal ownership. The first is an older acquisition of undetermined origin; the second a 1940 purchase from the Rosenbach Company in New York, at $165. The third title was ordered printed in 300 copies on October 1, 1849, the day the Governor's message was delivered. [116] It is a four-page leaflet, one of 73 rare American imprints that the printing historian Douglas C. McMurtrie sold to the Library for $600 in 1935. [113] See M. W. Berthel, Horns of Thunder, the Life and Times of James M. Goodhue, Including Selections from his Writings (St. Paul, 1948). [114] These are nos. 18, 66, and 23 in Esther Jerabek's A Bibliography of Minnesota Territorial Documents (St. Paul, 1936). Unrecorded in this bibliography are two early pamphlets printed by the Chronicle and Register : Courts of Record in the Territory of Minnesota; Approved Nov. 1, 1849—Took Effect Dec. 1, 1849 and Law of the Territory of Minnesota; Relative to the Powers and Duties of Justices. Approved November First, 1849—Took Effect December First, 1849 . The Library's copies are inscribed to Elisha Whittlesey, comptroller, U. S. Treasury Department. [115] See Journal of the Council During the First Session of the Legislative Assembly of the Territory of Minnesota (St. Paul, 1850), p. 23. [116] Ibid., p. 51. Washington ( Acts of the Legislative Assembly of the Territory of Washington, Passed at the Second Regular Session, Begun and Held at Olympia, December 4, 1854, in the Seventy-Ninth Year of American Independence ) ( Acts of the Legislative Assembly of the Territory of Washington, ... continued) The earliest recorded example of Washington printing is the first number of The Columbian , published at Olympia on September 11, 1852. The founders of this newspaper were James W. Wiley and Thornton F. McElroy, who purchased a press on which the Portland Oregonian had for a short time been printed and which before that saw service in California. [117] In 1853 the Territory of Washington was created from the northern part of the Territory of Oregon, and on April 17, 1854, the new Territorial legislature elected James W. Wiley to be Washington's first official printer. The earliest specimen of Washington printing held by the Library of Congress appears to be the following example of his work, printed at Olympia in 1855: Acts of the Legislative Assembly of the Territory of Washington, Passed at the Second Regular Session, Begun and Held at Olympia, December 4, 1854, in the Seventy-Ninth Year of American Independence . It includes an act passed at the second session, on February 1, 1855, specifying the size and distribution of the original edition: Sec. 1. Be it enacted by the Legislative Assembly of the Territory of Washington , That the Public Printer be, and is hereby required to print in pamphlet form, six hundred copies of the laws of the present session, and a like number of the laws of the last session of the Legislative Assembly.... Sec. 2. It shall be the duty of the Secretary of the territory to forward to each county auditor in the territory fifteen copies of the laws of each session for the use of the county officers, and two copies for each member of the Legislative Assembly, and to each officer of the Legislative Assembly, one copy of said laws. The Library owns three copies of this 75-page official document, all acquired probably during the last quarter of the 19th century. They are in old Library bindings and bear no marks of prior ownership. Among the Library's collections are five other Olympia imprints of the same year but from the press of the second official printer, George B. Goudy, who was elected on January 27, 1855. One of these, a work of more than 500 pages, the Library also holds in three copies: Statutes of the Territory of Washington: Being the Code Passed by the Legislative Assembly, At Their First Session Begun and Held at Olympia, February 27th, 1854. Also, Containing the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution of the United States, the Organic Act of Washington Territory, the Donation Laws, &C., &C. The others are Journal of the Council of the Territory of Washington: Together With the Memorials and Joint Resolutions of the First Session of {the} Legislative Assembly ... ; Journal of the House of Representatives of the Territory of Washington: Together With the Memorials and Joint Resolutions of the First Session of the Legislative Assembly ... ; Journal of the Council of the Territory of Washington, During the Second Session of the legislative Assembly ... ; and Journal of the House of Representatives of the Territory of Washington: Being the Second Session of the Legislative Assembly ... . Most official printing in the Territories was paid for by the Federal Government, and copies of many publications were sent to Washington, D.C., to meet certain administrative requirements. In some copies now at the Library of Congress visible evidence to this effect remains, as in the above-mentioned Council and House journals for the second legislative session, both inscribed to "Library State Dept." Although the Department of State continued to exercise broad supervision over the Territories at this period, supervision of their official printing was assigned, as it had been since 1842, to the Treasury Department. The cover or halftitle now bound in at the end of the above-mentioned House journal for the first legislative session bears notations made in the office of the Treasury Department's first comptroller, who exercised this particular responsibility. [118] One is a barely legible record in pencil: "Recd Oct 14/56 in letter of Sec Mason of Augt 26/56"; and another is in ink: "Finding enclosed to Sec Mason March 31/57." These notations refer to correspondence between the comptroller and the secretary of the Territory of Washington about remuneration for printing. Part of the correspondence is still retained at the National Archives (in Record Group 217). [117] See Roby Wentz, Eleven Western Presses (Los Angeles, 1956), p. 35-38. [118] See W. A. Katz, "Tracing Western Territorial Imprints Through the National Archives," The Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America , vol. 59 (1965), p. 1-11. Two Minnesota documents inscribed to the comptroller are cited in footnote no. 2 on page 69. Nebraska ( Laws, Resolutions and Memorials, Passed at the Regular Session of the First General Assembly of the Territory of Nebraska, Convened at Omaha City, on the 16th Day of January, Anno Domini, 1855. Together with the Constitution of the United States, the Organic Law, and the Proclamations Issued in the Organization of the Territorial Government ) Scholarly investigation has revealed that a supposed early instance of Nebraska printing—the Mormon General Epistle "written at Winter Quarters, Omaha Nation, west bank of Missouri River, near Council Bluffs, North America, and signed December 23d, 1847"—actually issued from a St. Louis press. [119] The Library of Congress copy of this imprint is consequently disqualified for discussion here, as are also the Library's three issues of the Omaha Arrow , beginning with the initial number dated July 28, 1854, since these issues were printed in Iowa, at Council Bluffs, before Omaha acquired its own press. Nebraska printing begins in fact with the 16th number of the Nebraska Palladium , issued at Bellevue on November 15, 1854. Previously issued at St. Mary's, Iowa, the paper takes pride in introducing printing to the newly formed Territory of Nebraska and identifies the men responsible: The first printers in our office, and who have set up the present number, are natives of three different states—Ohio, Virginia, and Massachusetts, namely: Thomas Morton, foreman, Columbus, Ohio (but Mr. Morton was born in England); A. D. Long, compositor, Virginia; Henry M. Reed, apprentice, Massachusetts. [120] The first Nebraska books were printed at Omaha by the Territorial printers Sherman & Strickland in 1855, and they are represented in the Library of Congress collections: Laws, Resolutions and Memorials, Passed at the Regular Session of the First General Assembly of the Territory of Nebraska, Convened at Omaha City, on the 16th Day of January, Anno Domini, 1855. Together with the Constitution of the United States, the Organic Law, and the Proclamations Issued in the Organization of the Territorial Government; Journal of the Council at the First Regular Session of the General Assembly, of the Territory of Nebraska, Begun and Held at Omaha City, Commencing on Tuesday the Sixteenth Day January, A. D. 1855, and Ending on the Sixteenth Day of March, A. D. 1855 ; and Journal of the House of Representatives, of the First Regular Session of the General Assembly of the Territory of Nebraska ... . These three official publications record quite fully the work of the first Nebraska Legislature, which consisted of a council of 13 and a house of 26 members. From later in the same year the Library owns still another Sherman & Strickland imprint: Annual Message of Mark W. Izard, Governor of the Territory of Nebraska, Addressed to the Legislative Assembly, December 18, 1855 . The Governor delivered this address at the convening of the second legislature. The press on which these four books were printed had been transported to Omaha from Ohio, and it was used to produce the initial number of the Omaha Nebraskan , January 17, 1855. [121] On March 13, with the approval of a joint resolution which may be read in the Laws, Resolutions and Memorials , John H. Sherman and Joseph B. Strickland became the official printers of the Territory; and "An Act to provide for Printing and Distributing the Laws of Nebraska Territory," also approved on March 13, stipulated that a thousand copies of the laws and resolutions of the first legislature be printed. Two of the thousand copies are listed as a "present" in Additions Made to the Library of Congress, Since the First Day of November, 1855. November 1, 1856 (Washington, 1856). [122] They are still on the Library shelves, along with a third copy received by transfer from another Government agency in 1911. The Library received its copy of the Journal of the Council in 1867 and its copy of the Journal of the House of Representatives probably not much later in the 19th century. [123] The Statute Law Book Company sold the Library Governor Izard's Annual Message for $22 in October 1935. [119] See no. 65 in Thomas W. Streeter's Americana—Beginnings (Morristown, N.J., 1952). The Library of Congress possesses one copy, not two as here reported. [120] Quoted from Douglas C. McMurtrie's "Pioneer Printing in Nebraska" in National Printer Journalist , vol. 50, no. 1 (January 1932), p. 20-21, 76-78. [121] Ibid., p. 76. [122] P. 99. [123] The latter title is indicated as wanting in a collective entry for Council and House journals in the Catalogue of Books Added to the Library of Congress, from December 1, 1866, to December 1, 1867 (Washington, 1868), p. 282. South Dakota In 1858 the Dakota Land Company sent out from St. Paul to Sioux Falls a newspaper editor named Samuel J. Albright, a printer named J. W. Barnes, and a printing press which Albright later insisted was the original Goodhue press (see above, p. 68 ), despite conflicting accounts of its history. If his testimony is correct, the same press introduced printing in Iowa, Minnesota, and South Dakota. It appears to have been first used at Sioux Falls to print a small election notice dated September 20, 1858; in the following summer, it was used to print South Dakota's first newspaper, The Democrat . [124] Establishment of the Territory of Dakota in 1861 attracted a second Dakota press to the new Territorial capital at Yankton. The earliest Dakota, or South Dakota, printing in the Library of Congress is from the newspaper associated with that press, The Dakotian , first published on June 6, 1861, by Frank M. Ziebach and William Freney of Sioux City, Iowa. The Library's earliest holding is the 13th number, which is dated April 1, 1862, and exhibits the paper's motto: "'Let all the Ends thou aims't at, be thy Country's, thy God's and Truth's.'— Wolsey. " This number follows upon a transfer of the editorship and proprietorship to Josiah C. Trask of Kansas, who announces, We have secured the interest which Mr. ZIEBACH, the former publisher of this paper, held in the office, and have made extensive additions for book work, &c.—We are now engaged in executing the incidental printing of the Legislative Assembly of this Territory under peculiar disadvantages; yet we believe it will compare favorably with the work of many older Territories. We are prepared to execute any style of printing to the satisfaction of patrons. By using fine print, Trask was able to present much material in this four-page issue. Among its contents are the text of the Governor's message to the first Territorial legislature and several U.S. laws passed by the first session of the 37th Congress. The lead editorial, "What We Mean to Do," contains the following statement of policy regarding the Civil War: At present, there is no room for disagreement in politics. So far as our knowledge extends, all parties join heartily in an indorsement of the truly patriotic and conservative course adopted by the President in the management of this war. He is not a patriot who will allow any slight disagreement te [sic] turn him from a straightforward opposition to the ambitious men who are now heading a Rebellion to destroy the fairest Government ever known. Until this war is ended by a suppression of the Rebellion, unless a change is forced upon us, we shall walk with men of ALL parties, in an earnest, honest purpose to do what we can to strengthen the arms of ABRAHAM LINCOLN, in whatever acts he may deem best for the people who have called him to his present proud position. In this determination we feel that all our patrons will sustain us. The editorial concludes with an appeal to support the paper: Few persons can know the expense and care requisite for a publication like this so far West. We feel that our Territory cannot support more than one or two papers. One of these must be at the Capital, and we shall endeavor to make this one worthy the support of all. We expect to receive pecuniary encouragement from men of all parties and all parts. After a few weeks, when we are better acquainted and our paper is better known, we shall ask for the assistance which will be due us from those whom we labor to benefit. A Library of Congress bound volume contains an incomplete but substantial run of The Dakotian from April 1, 1862, to December 17, 1864, without any marks of provenance. In addition the Library owns a file of South Dakota's third newspaper, The Dakota Republican , beginning with volume 1, number 31, published at Vermillion on April 5, 1862. This newspaper has for its motto "Our Country If Right, If Wrong, God Forgive, But Our Country Still!" The Library's issue of April 12, 1862, is inscribed "Wm H James"—this would be William Hartford James of Dakota City, Nebr., who served as Acting Governor of Nebraska in 1871-1872—and some of its 1868 and 1869 issues are inscribed "Dept of State." All of these papers are accounted for in A Check List of American Newspapers in the Library of Congress (1901). ( The Dakotian ) From the year 1862 the Library also possesses four books printed at Yankton all bearing the imprint of Josiah C. Trask, Public Printer: Council Journal of the Legislative Assembly of the Territory of Dakota, to which is Prefixed a List of the Members and Officers of the Council, With Their Residence, Post-Office Address, Occupation, Age, &c. ; House Journal of the Legislative Assembly of the Territory of Dakota, to which is Prefixed a List of the Members and Officers of the House ...; General Laws, and Memorials and Resolutions of the Territory of Dakota, Passed at the First Session of the Legislative Assembly, Commenced at the Town of Yankton, March 17, and Concluded May 15, 1862. To Which are Prefixed a Brief Description of the Territory and its Government, the Constitution of the United States, the Declaration of Independence, and the Act of Organizing the Territory ; and Private Laws of the Territory of Dakota, Passed at the First Session of the Legislative Assembly .... [125] Single copies of the Council and House journals were in the Library by 1877. The Library has four copies of the General Laws and Private Laws , bound together as issued; two copies are probably 19th-century accessions, the third came from the Department of Interior in 1900, and the fourth was transferred from an unspecified Government agency in 1925. [124] See Douglas C. McMurtrie, The Beginnings of the Press in South Dakota (Iowa City, Iowa, 1933). On the disputed history of the Goodhue press, see M. W. Berthel, Horns of Thunder (St. Paul, 1948), p. 26, note 3. [125] These are nos. 7, 9, 4, and 5, respectively, in Albert H. Allen's Dakota Imprints 1858-1889 (New York, 1947). Nevada Joseph T. Goodman, editor of the Territorial Enterprise. Courtesy of the New York Public Library. Nevada owes its first printing to W. L. Jernegan, who in partnership with Alfred James established a weekly newspaper, the Territorial Enterprise , at Genoa, then in western Utah Territory, on December 18, 1858. Jernegan had transported his printing equipment across the Sierras from Yolo County, Calif. [126] The earliest Nevada imprint in the Library of Congress dates from 1862, the year after Nevada's establishment as a separate Territory: Second Annual Message of Governor James W. Nye, to the Legislature of Nevada Territory, November 13, 1862. Together with Reports of Territorial Auditor, Treasurer, and Superintendent of Public Instruction. Printed at Carson City by J. T. Goodman & Co., Territorial printers, this publication has 48 pages, not including the title page printed on its yellow wrapper. Joseph T. Goodman was not only involved with official printing at this time, but he was also editing the Territorial Enterprise , which was then located at Virginia City and had become a daily paper. He is perhaps best remembered for launching Mark Twain on a literary career when he employed him as a reporter in August 1862. [127] Governor Nye's Second Annual Message covers an important period of national history. Strongly pro-Union, it gives an optimistic account of the year's events in the Civil War and bestows high praise on Lincoln's preliminary Emancipation Proclamation of September 22, 1862: "As an engine of war, its formidability is a powerful warrant of early peace, and as a measure of humanity, the enlightened world receives it with acclamations of unbounded joy." Part of the message concerns expected consequences from a bill recently passed by Congress authorizing construction of a Pacific Railroad, which would profoundly affect life in Nevada: No State nor Territory will derive such inestimable advantage from the road as the Territory of Nevada. Situated, as we are, in what, during a great portion of the year, is an almost inaccessible isolation of wealth; with mountains covered with perpetual snow frowning down directly upon us at the west, and with a series of ranges, difficult to cross, at the east of us, with a wilderness fit only for the original inhabitants of the waste, stretching away a thousand miles, and intervening between us and the frontier of agricultural enterprise; and with no means of receiving the common necessaries of life, except through the expensive freightage of tediously traveling trains of wagons; the value of the road to us will be beyond calculation. The inscription "Library Depr State" on the Library of Congress copy indicates it must have been submitted to the Department of State, which in 1862 was still in charge of the United States Territories. A date stamp on its wrapper suggests that it was transferred to the Library of Congress by December 1900, while a stamp on page 2 reveals that it was in custody of the Library's Division of Documents in September 1907. [126] See Richard E. Lingenfelter, The Newspapers of Nevada (San Francisco, 1964), p. 47-49. [127] See Ivan Benson, Mark Twain's Western Years (Stanford University, Calif. [1938]), chapters 4-6. Arizona ( The Weekly Arizonian ) [Click on image for larger view.] Printing began in Arizona with the establishment of The Weekly Arizonian , at the mining town of Tubac, on March 3, 1859. The Santa Rita Mining Company, which owned this newspaper, had imported the first press from Cincinnati, and the first printers are said to have been employees of the company named Jack Sims and George Smithson. [128] The Library of Congress file of the Arizonian starts with the issue of August 18, 1859, the earliest example of Arizona printing now held by the Library. The paper had removed from Tubac to Tucson shortly before that date under rather dramatic circumstances. Edward E. Cross, its first editor, vigorously opposed a movement in favor of separating Arizona from New Mexico and organizing it as an independent territory. In attacking population statistics put forward by Sylvester Mowry, the leader of that movement, Cross impugned Mowry's character, whereupon Mowry challenged him to a duel, which was fought with rifles on July 8 without injury to either party. Mowry subsequently purchased the printing press and moved it to Tucson. Under a new editor, J. Howard Wells, the Arizonian 's positions were completely reversed. [129] The issue of August 18 supports the candidacy of Sylvester Mowry for delegate to Congress, in an election scheduled for September 1. In view of past events it was understandable that the paper should encourage a heavy vote, not only to demonstrate the unity of Arizonians desiring Territorial status, but also to indicate the extent of the population. The following short article relates to the recurrent topic of numbers: A SLIGHT MISTAKE We understand Col. Bonneville says he has taken the names of all the Americans, between the Rio Grande and the Santa Cruz, and they number only one hundred and eighty. Come and pay us a longer visit, Colonel, and count again. There are nearly that number in and around Tucson alone, and there are a good many of us that dislike to be denationalized in so summary a manner. The Overland Mail Company alone, employs some seventy five Americans, between here and the Rio Grande, and they justly think, they have a right to be included, as well as the farmers living on the San Pedro and the Miembres rivers, it is hardly fair to leave them out. It is nearly as bad as cutting down the Americans on the Gila and Colorado to twelve. When there are ten times that number. Try it again Colonel, for evidently there is a slight mistake, some where. In the same issue is a notice illustrating the production difficulties characteristic of a frontier press: We have to apologize to the readers of the Arizonian, for the delay in issuing this our regular number; the detention has been unavoidably caused, by the indisposition of our printer. We hope it may not occur again, and will not as far as lays in our power to prevent it. When examined as recently as 1932, a Library of Congress binding contained 10 issues of the Arizonian from the year 1859, beginning July 14; however, that early issue has been missing from the binding at least since 1948. One mark of provenance occurs among the remaining issues: an inscription on the issue of August 18, the upper half of which has been cut away but which unquestionably reads, "Gov Rencher." The recipient was Abraham Rencher (1798-1883), a distinguished North Carolinian who was serving as Governor of the Territory of New Mexico in 1859. By whatever route, these issues reached the Library early enough to be recorded in A Check List of American Newspapers in the Library of Congress (1901). (Column from Arizonian ) [128] See Douglas C. McMurtrie, The Beginnings of Printing in Arizona (Chicago, 1937), p. 31, note 9. [129] See Estelle Lutrell, Newspapers and Periodicals of Arizona 1859-1911 (Tucson, 1950), p. 7-8, 63-64. For more on Cross and Mowry, see Jo Ann Schmitt, Fighting Editors (San Antonio, 1958), p. 1-21. Colorado The earliest examples of Colorado printing are the first numbers of two competing newspapers, which were issued at Denver on April 23, 1859, only about 20 minutes apart. [130] Taking precedence was the Rocky Mountain News , published by William N. Byers & Co. and printed with equipment purchased in Nebraska. Its printers were John L. Dailey of Ohio, a member of the company, and W. W. Whipple of Michigan. [131] The Library of Congress recently acquired its earliest example of Colorado printing, a broadside entitled Laws and Regulations of the Miners of the Gregory Diggings District , attributed to the Byers & Co. press. Printed sometime after July 16, 1859, it is one of but two located copies of the first extant Colorado imprint other than a newspaper or newspaper extra. [132] The laws, passed at miners' meetings on June 8 and July 16, apply to the district named for John Gregory, whose successful prospecting helped to stimulate the famous Pike's Peak gold rush. They were placed in historical context by Peter C. Schank, assistant chief of the American-British Law Division in the Library of Congress, in an article announcing this acquisition: the laws themselves are intrinsically valuable because they served as a model for much succeeding legislation, not only for other mining districts, but for State and national enactments as well. Despite the promulgation of California district laws 10 years earlier, the Gregory laws, perhaps because of the district's fame, the presence of prospectors with previous experience in other mining areas, and the imminent adoption of the first national mining statute, had a unique influence on the development of mining law in this country. [133] The lower margin of the Library's copy is inscribed, "Favor of Stiles E Mills, July 20th 1863." Neither the identity of Mr. Mills nor the intervening provenance has been established. In recent years this copy belonged to Thomas W. Streeter (1883-1965) of Morristown, N. J., owner of the most important private library of Americana assembled during the 20th century. The Library of Congress paid $2,800 for the broadside at that portion of the Streeter sale held by Parke-Bernet Galleries on April 23-24, 1968. [134] Previously the Library's first example of Colorado printing was the second issue of a small newspaper sheet, The Western Mountaineer , published at Golden City on December 14, 1859. This newspaper was printed on the same press, actually the first to reach Colorado, that under different ownership had lost the close race to print the first newspaper at Denver. Gold is a prominent topic in this particular issue, which includes an interesting account of the prospector, George Andrew Jackson, based on information he himself supplied. The Library's copy seems to have been detached from a bound volume, probably before its listing in A Check List of American Newspapers in the Library of Congress (1901). Penciled on its front page are the name "Lewis Cass [Esquire?]" and what appears to be another name beginning with "Amos." Lewis Cass was Secretary of State at the time of publication.

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