Hidden between the pages of mildewed books, mixed within footnotes and citations and buried in scratched frames of microfilm, Mary Katherine Goddard’s legacy lives on.
Headstrong, determined and decades before her time, Mary Katherine Goddard set precedents for women journalists. As one of the first woman printers in Rhode Island, a printer in Pennsylvania and Maryland, a bookshop owner and the first woman postmistress for the United States, she evinced relentless determination despite any setbacks she faced.
Mary Katherine was born to Sarah Updike Goddard and Dr. Giles Goddard on June 16, 1738, in Groton, Connecticut. Sarah, determined to educate Mary Katherine and her younger brother William, taught her children to read and write and to enjoy the writings of Shakespeare, Pope, Swift and other 18th century writers. William and Mary Katherine’s writings serve as evidence of this, where such authors are quoted. (1)
After years of serving as a printer’s apprentice in Connecticut, William decided it was time to move on. With the urging of his mother, a Rhode Island native, he looked for an opportunity to start a newspaper in the Ocean State. In 1762, Sarah helped William finance the Providence Gazette and Country Journal and used her social connections to help William garner subscriptions to support the paper. (2)
William did not find instantaneous success in publishing the newspaper and to increase profits further, he turned to publishing books and patent medicines. Because of the overwhelming nature of running the two businesses, William looked to Mary Katherine and Sarah to assist him.
At the age of 24, Mary Katherine took up the printing business, an occupation that was not acceptable for an 18th century woman, with her brother.
An account of early women newspaper publishers explains the stigma behind women publishers. "In the early periods of American life it is surprising that so many women acted as publishers of newspapers. It is the usual conception that women in colonial times served only in the home, occupied with endless household cares and bearing children," Clarence S. Brigham wrote. (3)
Discouraged by the community’s indifference to the paper and lack of readership, William stopped the publication of the two-year-old paper. On May 11, 1765, having had enough of printing in Rhode Island, William left the business to his mother and sister.
The Gazette was a three-column folio, 8 by 14 inches, and was published on Saturdays. The paper’s content took four full days of work to compile and the average compositor could set the type for the edition in less than four hours. The hand presses the Goddards used produced 200 paper per hour. The process, similar to other colonial printers, used leather balls that were inked and then applied to the paper to create the print. The pages had to be fed through the press twice so text appeared on each side of the sheet. (4)
Following the traditional role of male colonial printers, Mary Katherine filled the role of news gatherer, editor, compiler, presswoman, subscription manager, debt collector and writer. "Mary Katherine filled all of these roles with dignity and honor," author P.William Filby wrote of her. (5)
Another author who studied the Goddard family extensively, Ward L. Miner, said, "Mary Katherine had the sleeves of her dress rolled up and wore a goodly sized apron as she used her own printer’s stick in the composition of the paper."
William’s absence from the Gazette contributed to Mary Katherine’s success. Left with a burden upon her shoulders, Mary Katherine acquired the skills she needed to print a successful publication. "It was probably during the years of [William’s] absence, and in her mother’s service, that his sister, Mary Katherine Goddard, learned the practical side of typography and journalism, a knowledge which she put to distinguished use several years later in Baltimore," Lawrence C. Wroth wrote. (6)
The Gazette served predominately as a means of political influence throughout the state. Editorials did not exist in the early days of colonial newspapers; however, columns and letters were printed regularly. Most letters to the editor were signed with pseudonyms so citizens would not ostracize themselves from the small community by the nature of their opinions. News stories were also difficult to find in early newspapers and were sprinkled with opinion, making them columns or letters. Most articles were unsigned and the few that were read "The Publisher" or "Sarah and William Goddard and Company." Few specific names were given as the authors of the articles.
Although Mary Katherine was the paper’s publisher for several years, it is difficult to identify which articles were written specifically by her. The publishers of the Gazette, including Mary Katherine, exerted a great deal of political control over their newspaper. Letters that went against the paper’s beliefs and stances on particular issues were not published. The content of the newspaper also varied from what a traditional newspaper would publish today. Instead of factual articles, Mary Katherine published literary prose and verse in the Gazette. (7)
An examination of several editions of the Gazette published under Mary Katherine and Sarah show the community’s disapproval of a newspaper run by women. Letters to the editor continued to be addressed "Mr. Printer" despite the colophon that indicated two women as its publishers.
The formality of the newspaper also differs from the format society expects of a newspaper today. The Providence Gazette published letters to the editor on its front page and reserved a portion of its inside pages for notices of runaway slaves. The notices typically began with a headline of "Ran away from the Subscriber" or "Abandoned my Bed and Board" and closed with a warning or a reward offering. In addition, the Gazette ran notices for the return of wives who had abandoned their husbands.
In 1763 Mary Katherine ran this notice in her paper: "Run away from Mark Anthony D’Wolf, of Bristol, a Negro Man named York, a very black looking Fellow, fail limb’d well set, and speaks good English. He had on when he sent away, a blue Broad-cloth Coat, a red great Coat, and a Pair of black Plush Breeches. Whoever will take up said Negro, and deliver him to the Subscriber, in Providence, or otherwise secure him, so that his Master may have him again, shall have four dollars reward, and all necessary charges paid by William Proud." (8)
Mary Katherine, Sarah and William Goddard were of the Episcopal faith and a brief biography of them appears in Wilkins Updike’s volumes titled, A History of the Episcopal Church in Narragansett Rhode Island. "Miss Goddard was in many respects a remarkable woman, inheriting some of the strong traits of the Updike family as well as those of her father," he wrote. No account explains how the family belonged to the Narragansett church yet lived in Providence. (9)
The exact printing location of the Providence Gazette remains a tangled mess. Some sources identify Mary Katherine and Sarah as printing the paper from its home at 21 Meeting Street, a building that has been dubbed "Shakespeare’s Head." Microfilm frames of the newspaper show it was published at various locations such as "Opposite the Court House," "At the store of Judge Jenckes, near the Great Bridge and published at the sign of Shakespeare’s Head," "near the Court House," and "Near the sign of the Golden Eagle, next door below Knight Dexter’s Esq." While these locations can be confirmed as places the Gazette was published from, it remains a mystery where Mary Katherine and her mother worked so diligently.
The Stamp Act had an immense effect on Mary Katherine’s ability to publish the Gazette and later the Philadelphia Chronicle and the Maryland Journal. Because of the Revolutionary War, a shortage of paper was eminent in the colonies. A series of articles were written throughout the time Mary Katherine printed the Gazette to condemn the Stamp Act.
In 1768 William called upon Mary Katherine and Sarah again to assist him in the publication of his new venture. He had established the Philadelphia Chronicle in Pennsylvania and thought it would be better financially to close the Providence Gazette and move his mother and sister to Pennsylvania. Against his mother’s will, he sold the Gazette to John Carter, who had been Sarah’s partner for a year. Carter paid $550 for the paper and its facilities. (10)
Reluctant to move, Sarah pleaded with her son. "I can hardly think of removing so near the period of my days into a strange part of the world," she wrote to him. (11) Despite her wishes, the mother and daughter duo arrived in Philadelphia in November of 1768. Mary Katherine and her mother ran the paper for her brother while he was in Maryland looking for a new business path.
In January 1770 Sarah died, leaving the newspaper to Mary Katherine.
In 1773 William started another venture. This time it was the Maryland Journal in Baltimore. The first issue of the Journal appeared on August 20, 1773. For several years, Mary Katherine published the Chronicle while her brother simultaneously published the Journal. Due to paper shortages, the Journal’s appearance varied and often, William was unable to publish consistently. Mary Katherine, however, was able to keep the Chronicle afloat despite paper troubles. Original copies of the Journal show at times it was printed on olive gray paper as opposed to the higher grade of paper it was normally printed on.
Despite its consistent publishing, trouble for the Chronicle was eminent. Shortly after, William’s business partners bought out his shares and forced him and his family out of the Chronicle’s business. (12)
For the next 10 years Mary Katherine ran the Journal’s operations successfully. "She took over the Journal in February 1774 and published it with distinction for the next 10 years," Filby wrote.
The Revolutionary War did more than create a paper shortage for publishers. It sparked a period of inflation and Mary Katherine was forced to raise her prices, however, her readers continued their loyalty. In 1773 the paper cost ten shillings a year. In 1777 the price doubled. October, 1779 it reached a high of 10 pounds per year. (13) Because it was hard to collect money from subscribers, Mary Katherine accepted alternative forms of payment. These included beef, pork, animal food, butter, hog’s lard, tallow, beeswax, flour, wheat, rye, Indian corn, beans and other goods she could sell in her shop.
"She was an efficient manager and was respected by the townspeople despite the fact that her brother was twice threatened by local mobs because of unpatriotic political articles he had published in the Journal," Edward T. James wrote. (14)
While she was well liked in the community and rarely had bouts with the law, in 1776 Mary Katherine filed a complaint to the Baltimore Committee of Safety. The complaint said that Mr. George Sommerville had "abused her with threats and indecent language on account of a late publication in her paper." Sommerville was released, under bond, on good behavior. (15) Mary Katherine’s run-in with an angry reader was a result of her gender. Male publishers rarely experienced such incidents.
While determination did not stop Mary Katherine from publishing, she experienced many difficulties in her first months at the Maryland Journal. In a letter she published, Mary Katherine publicly apologized to her readers for almost a month-long delay in publication. She failed to publish an issue between March 10 and March 31, 1774. She credited this to a lack of printing supplies such as folio sheets. The Revolutionary War prevented her access to the correct folio sheets, therefore, the Journal had to be printed on small sheets.
"We must admit that her carrying the Journal during the entire Revolutionary War was no small achievement," Miner wrote.
"During these years Mary Goddard’s activities were not confined to the composing room and editorial office. Her advertisements indicate the maintenance by her also of a well-stocked book and stationary store, her job-printing office was a busy one where copper plate work and the finer kinds of printing were carried on, and where books of various sorts were creditably produced. It had been claimed for her, too, that she operated the local paper mill, but whether her appeals for rags and her advertisements of paper for sale indicate so close a connection with the enterprise as this is not certain," Wroth wrote. (16)
Among her accomplishments at the Journal was the publication of the Declaration of Independence with the names of the signers attached to it.
"In spite of the fact that she was a woman, Mary Katherine ‘scooped’ perhaps the most important item of typographical Americana — the printing of the first official issue of the Declaration of Independence," Leona Hudack wrote. (17)
Mary Katherine’s work as a printer went much further than newspapers. She began publishing almanacs and found immediate success in doing so. The almanacs were a dependable source of revenue and were sold for 10 shillings a copy or $12 a dozen. (18)
In her 1782 Maryland and Virginia Almanack, Mary Katherine wrote in her preface to the public, "From the extensive sale of this Almanack last year, the publisher would presume to think that her endeavors, in some measure, met with the approbation of the Public. Nothing can be more flattering than this idea, which cannot fail to excite in her the highest sense of gratitude, attended with future diligence and perseverance." (19)
Her almanacs, published between 1782 and 1791, include the publication of fables, anecdotes, excerpts from other works and court hearings, trials and decisions. It also included accounts of astronomy. In 1782 Mary Katherine recognized the compilation of this information and her appreciation for it.
"The publisher hath been at the expense of gratifying the public with a type of the transit of mercury over the sun’s disk; and with regard to the astronomical part of the work, calculated by that ingenious mathematician Andrew Ellicott, Elq; of this state, it can be with truth and great confidence asserted, that, in point of accuracy, it is equal, if not superior, to any work of the kind on this continent," she wrote. (20)
"A picture of her in her 1783 almanac shows a not unattractive woman with thin lips and an air of fierce, dogged determination. Her brother testified that she was ‘an expert and correct compositor of types,’" (21)
Set back by Mary Katherine’s success in publishing almanacs, William began publishing his own rival edition, which mimicked Mary Katherine’s in appearance. Among his publications were William Goddard’s Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland and Virginia Almanack and Ephemeris, for the year of our lord, 1785, William Goddard’s Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland and Virginia Almanack and Ephemeris, for the year of our lord, 1787, The Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland and Virginia Almanack and Ephemeris, for the year of our lord, 1789 and The Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland and Virginia Almanack and Ephemeris, for the year of our lord, 1791. (22)
In one of his almanacs, William made reference to "a certain hypocritical character who published the almanac for the dirty and mean purpose of fraud and deception." (23) This has been interpreted as a passage about Mary Katherine.
Upset by her brother’s "intellectual theft" of her almanacs, Mary Katherine filed five lawsuits against her brother. No account gives the outcome of these suits. (24)
In 1775 Mary Katherine took on a new career move. Following in her father and her brother’s footsteps she went to work for the United States Post Office. She became the first woman postmistress in the colonies. However, her career was cut short when 14 years later she was ordered to turn over her office to John White. She was told, "a younger person able to ride a horse was needed." (25) In January 1790, believing she was relatively young at the age of 51, she wrote to George Washington to have the order appealed. She was unsuccessful in obtaining compensation or an appeal.
"That although Mr. White who succeeded her, might doubtless have been highly meritorious, in the different Offices, he has sustained, yet, she humbly conceives, he was not more worthy of public notice & protection in his Station, than She has uniformly been in hers," she wrote in a petition to Washington. (26)
Following her publishing career, in an effort in increase her profits, Mary Katherine retired to the operation of a Maryland bookstore until 1809 or 1810. The shop, located at 80 Baltimore Street, was described as an elegant bookstore. (27) She used her newspaper as a vice to inform the community about her new business. (28)
Mary Katherine has been described as constantly busy and energetic in her newspaper work. She ran the print shop and published the Maryland Journal fairly regularly each Tuesday, while overseeing the daily affairs of the Baltimore post office.
Because Mary Katherine never let her personal life interfere with the newspaper, little is known about her personality or social life. (29) In 1783, however, the Maryland Journal printed a notice of the theft of a trunk from her home. The article reported large sums of money and bank notes were lost. This coupled with a record of the 1790 Maryland Census prove her monetary success. (30) The census reported she owned four slaves and had one other free person living in her household. (31)
"Mary Katherine’s methods as a newspaper editor contrast with those of her brother. She was dependable and he brilliantly erratic. She never allowed her personal affairs to intrude in her newspaper. The impersonal quality of her editing convinces us she was an excellent newspaper woman but leaves little concrete or personal to say about her, no letter or other such materials have survived," Miner explained.
She died in Baltimore on August 12, 1816, at the age of 78 and is buried in the graveyard of St. Paul’s Parish in Baltimore. (32) She was living at 18 Conewago Street in Baltimore when she died. She left all her belongings and property to her African American servant and companion Belinda Starling. (33)
Footnotes
(1) Miner, Ward L. William Goddard, Newspaperman. Durham: Duke University Press, 1962.
(2) Filby, William P. "The Early Maryland Printers: William Goddard and Friends" American and British Genealogy & Heraldry, June 7, 1976.
(3) Brigham, Clarence. Journals and Journeymen: A Contribution to the History of Early American Newspapers. Philadelphia: The University of Pennsylvania Press, 1950.
(4) Rusden, Irma G. A brief history of Shakespeare’s Head. 1769-1947. Pamphlet on file at the Rhode Island Historical Society.
(5) Filby, William P. "The Early Maryland Printers: William Goddard and Friends" American and British Genealogy & Heraldry, June 7, 1976.
(6) Wroth, Lawrence C. A History of Printing in Colonial Maryland. Baltimore: Typothetae of Baltimore, 1922.
(7) Wroth, Lawrence C. The First Press in Providence: A Study in Social Development. Worcester: The Davis Press, 1942.
(8) The Providence Gazette and Country Journal, March 30, 1763. Recorded in Taylor, Maureen Alice. Runaways, Deserted and Notorious Villains from Rhode Island Newspapers Vol I: The Providence Gazette 1762-1800, Camden: Picton Press. 1995.
(9) Updike, Wilkins. A History of the Episcopal Church in Narragansett Rhode Island. Vol. 1 Boston: The Merrymount Press, 1907.
(10) Miner, Ward L. William Goddard, Newspaperman. Durham: Duke University Press, 1962.
(11) Miner, Ward L. William Goddard, Newspaperman. Durham: Duke University Press, 1962.
(12) Miner, Ward L. William Goddard, Newspaperman. Durham: Duke University Press, 1962.
(13) Hudak, Leona M. Early American Women Printers and Publishers 1639-1820. Metuchen: The Scarecrow Press, Inc. 1978.
(14) James, Edward T. Notable American Women 1607-1950. Vol. II Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1971.
(15) Hudak, Leona M. Early American Women Printers and Publishers 1639-1820. Metuchen: The Scarecrow Press, Inc. 1978.
(16) Wroth, Lawrence C. A History of Printing in Colonial Maryland. Baltimore: Typothetae of Baltimore, 1922.
(17) Hudak, Leona M. Early American Women Printers and Publishers 1639-1820. Metuchen: The Scarecrow Press, Inc. 1978.
(18) Miner, Ward L. William Goddard, Newspaperman. Durham: Duke University Press, 1962.
(19) The Maryland and Virginia Almanck and EPHEMERIS for the year of our lord 1782. Original manuscript available from the Rhode Island Historical Society.
(20) The Maryland and Virginia Almanck and EPHEMERIS for the year of our lord 1782. Original manuscript available from the Rhode Island Historical Society.
(21) James, Edward T. Notable American Women 1607-1950. Vol. II Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1971.
(22) All cited almanacs are available in original form at the Rhode Historical Society Manuscripts Division.
(23) Wheeler, Joseph T. The Maryland Press 1777-1790.
(24) Filby, William P. "The Early Maryland Printers: William Goddard and Friends" American and British Genealogy & Heraldry, June 7, 1976.
(25) Filby, William P. "The Early Maryland Printers: William Goddard and Friends" American and British Genealogy & Heraldry, June 7, 1976.
(26) Petition of Mary Katherine Goddard, January 29, 1790. [Online] http://www.gwu.edu/~ffcp/exhibit/p11/p11_3text.html. Also available through the National Archives.
(27) Wheeler, Joseph T. The Maryland Press 1777-1790. Baltimore: The Waverly Press, 1938
(28) James, Edward T. Notable American Women 1607-1950. Vol. II Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1971.
(29) Miner, Ward L. William Goddard, Newspaperman. Durham: Duke University Press, 1962.
(30) Miner, Ward L. William Goddard, Newspaperman. Durham: Duke University Press, 1962.
(31) 1790 Maryland Census. On file at the Rhode Island Historical Society. Mary Katherine is listed incorrectly as Mary Catherine in the census.
(32) James, Edward T. Notable American Women 1607-1950. Vol. II Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1971.
(33) Filby, William P. "The Early Maryland Printers: William Goddard and Friends" American and British Genealogy & Heraldry, June 7, 1976.
Works Cited
Brigham, Clarence. History and Bibliography of American Newspapers 1690-1820. Vol. I, II. Hamden: Archon Book, 1962.
Brigham, Clarence. Journals and Journeymen: A Contribution to the History of Early American Newspapers. Philadelphia: The University of Pennsylvania Press, 1950.
Filby, William P. "The Early Maryland Printers: William Goddard and Friends" American and British Genealogy & Heraldry, June 7, 1976.
Hudak, Leona M. Early American Women Printers and Publishers 1639-1820. Metuchen: The Scarecrow Press, Inc. 1978.
James, Edward T. Notable American Women 1607-1950. Vol. II Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1971.
The Maryland and Virginia Almanck and EPHEMERIS for the year of our lord 1782. Original manuscript available from the Rhode Island Historical Society.
Miner, Ward L. William Goddard, Newspaperman. Durham: Duke University Press, 1962.
Oswald, John Cylde. Printing in the Americas. Vol. II. Port Washington: Kennikat Press, Inc. 1937.
Petition of Mary Katherine Goddard, January 29, 1790. [Online] http://www.gwu.edu/~ffcp/exhibit/p11/p11_3text.html. Also available through the National Archives.
The Providence Gazette and Country Journal, March 30, 1763. Recorded in Taylor, Maureen Alice. Runaways, Deserted and Notorious Villains from Rhode Island Newspapers Vol. I: The Providence Gazette 1762-1800. Camden: Picton Press. 1995.
Printers and Printing in Providence 1762-1907. Providence Typographical Union No. 33, 1907.
Rusden, Irma G. A brief history of Shakespeare’s Head. 1769-1947. Pamphlet on file at the Rhode Island Historical Society.
1790 Maryland Census. On file at the Rhode Island Historical Society.
Schlesinger, Arthur M. Prelude to Independence. New York: Northeastern University Press, 1957.
Updike, Wilkins. A History of the Episcopal Church in Narragansett Rhode Island. Vol. 1 Boston: The Merrymount Press, 1907.