Wednesday 25 September 2019

publick occurrences both forreign and domestick

Intended to be a monthly publication or “if any Glut of Occurences happen, offener,” the first multipage newspaper in the Americas (broadsides, single page notices had been printed in Cambridge in the colony of Massachusetts since the previous year), released its inaugural and final edition on this day in 1690 in Boston. Though the paper had consisted of four pages, there was only enough content to fill three (see also). There was no second edition due to the paper being closed by the colonial government four days after the first issue for failing to obtain the proper license for publication—“without the least Privity and Countenace of Authority.”