[Illustration (_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.)
[Illustration: (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.
[Footnote 113: See M. W. Berthel, _Horns of Thunder, the Life and
Times of James M. Goodhue, Including Selections from his Writings_
(St. Paul, 1948).]
[Footnote 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.]
[Footnote 115: See _Journal of the Council During the First Session
of the Legislative Assembly of the Territory of Minnesota_ (St. Paul,
1850), p. 23.]
[Footnote 116: Ibid., p. 51.]