Facebook? Huh! Johannes Gutenburg—he’s the man. You probably didn’t realize he was one of the premier social networking geniuses of his day. This is how I think it went down. A bunch of Sunday school kids approached Brother Gutenburg and said, “You know, we would really like to take our scriptures to church, but these handwritten bibles are too heavy, too big, and they don’t fit in our cowhide scripture totes. Can you help?”
And so he did. By 1450 the printing press was up and running. Boy, did that start a social networking buzz in a lot of circles—the possibility of reading the “good word” and other books yourself! Next thing you know Martin Luther was tacking his 95 Theses on a German church door, and down the road those pesky American colonists were delivering a Declaration of Independence! Since that day, the printed word has been used to shape man’s opinions, share his ideas and inventions, and rally the people to causes, noble or otherwise.
Then along came newspapers, a wonderful medium to keep in you in touch with the goings on of the world. Some of it true and some of it, well….
Before the pony express, the telegraph, the telephone , first class mail, overnight shipping, email, and yes, tweets. Before the fact checkers were around, tales of the “wild” west crept into eastern newspapers, maybe not for truth’s sake, but to sell papers! The people in the West didn’t even know they were the subject of,“Oh my heaven’s, did you hear about …?”-type conversations in the social circles of the East. Little did the East know that the West had its own communication system. Custer might have saved himself if he knew about this article in the Sioux Times:
Before the pony express, the telegraph, the telephone , first class mail, overnight shipping, email, and yes, tweets. Before the fact checkers were around, tales of the “wild” west crept into eastern newspapers, maybe not for truth’s sake, but to sell papers! The people in the West didn’t even know they were the subject of,“Oh my heaven’s, did you hear about …?”-type conversations in the social circles of the East. Little did the East know that the West had its own communication system. Custer might have saved himself if he knew about this article in the Sioux Times:
Strategic POW-WOW Tonight!
“Smoke -in-the-Face fairly certain despite rain wiping out end of signals this morning that white man, ”C. U.S. T…,” traveling to Little Bighorn. Meet in Chief Sitting Bull’s teepee tonight at full moon. All braves needed. Learn how teach white man lesson. Peace pipes for all who attend. Squaw duty for cowards. We’re going to win, I tell you! I’ve seen soldiers falling into camp like grasshoppers.”—Sitting Bull
And then there was that whole North and South thing!
Do you remember the episode of Little House on the Prairie when Mrs. Olesen tried her hand at a Walnut Grove publication? It was called "Harriet’s Happenings". She really got herself in a pickle with her gossip-style writing in her very own column. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=
One truth that did make it from West to East was that there was “gold in them there hills.” Easterners dropped everything, hitched up their brand spanking new Conestogas and headed west. I think the good Lord smiles from above watching all the antics of men. Surely, he put the gold in the west just to see if the Easterners would go there. And go there they did.
One truth that did make it from West to East was that there was “gold in them there hills.” Easterners dropped everything, hitched up their brand spanking new Conestogas and headed west. I think the good Lord smiles from above watching all the antics of men. Surely, he put the gold in the west just to see if the Easterners would go there. And go there they did.
But aside from reporting about the bigger problems of the world, my guess is that folks in big and little towns all across America went straight to the Society Pages of their local newspaper to see what the “Joneses” were up to. I can see them scouring the newspaper for tidbits about the well being or current news of their family and neighbors. That was the Facebook of 19th and 20th century America.
If you made the society pages, WOW! My husband and I made the Society Pages once—our engagement announcement. It came out just a few weeks before our wedding. None of this “countdown” till the wedding stuff with repeat notices. We're probably part of the very last generation to be featured in a newspaper this way. According to my reading, I haven’t seen a marriage announcement in years.
Maybe you don’t miss the intricate details of so and so’s wedding… Here's a cut and paste sample from the Lima News (Lima, Ohio), 1944.
And here’s something akin to putting your social security number online…or bragging? Lima (Ohio) News, 7 Nov 1901, p. 8
Mr. & Mrs. _______celebrated their fifth anniversary of their marriage Monday. About 100 guests were invited and MANY VALUABLE [caps added] presents were received.
Oh, and identity theft? That’s nothing new…
Lima (Ohio) News, 3 Aug 1932, p. 2
Lima (Ohio) News, 3 Aug 1932, p. 2
It’s always good to have your family on the right side of the law…Arnold F. Bessire (1858-1941)
Lima (Ohio) News, 24 April 1914, p. 15.
Lima (Ohio) News, 24 April 1914, p. 15.
My great-grandfather, Chester Allen Arthur Bessire (1883-1953) on the move...
Cando (North Dakota) Herald Record, 19 September 1912
Cando (North Dakota) Herald Record, 19 September 1912
Emma Bessire Allgier (1881-1945), daughter of Arnold F. Bessire...Lima (Ohio) News, 27 August 1945, p. 2
Frederick Donovan Bessire (1905-1918), grandson of Arnold F. Bessire...Lima (Ohio) News, 14 July 1918, p.9
My great grandmother, Ida Mae Bessire (1889-1960), must have had need for this. She saved it in her telephone book.
In this day and age we all have need for a little prayer. I'm going to say a little prayer of thanks for newspapers. Here's to all the wonderful people who are digitizing and indexing them so we can find our ancestors on the Facebook of the past. Thanks Mr. Gutenburg, you started it all.
