|
Penny press newspapers were cheap, tabloid-style newspapers mass-produced in the United States from the 1830s onwards. Mass production of inexpensive newspapers became possible following the shift from hand-crafted to steam-powered printing.〔B. Kovarik. Revolutions in Communication: Media History from Gutenberg to the Digital Age. (The Continuum International Publishing Group, 2011, ISBN 978-1-4411-9495-4), p. 48.〕 Famous for costing one cent while other newspapers cost around 6 cents, penny press papers were revolutionary in making the news accessible to middle class citizens for a reasonable price. == History == As the East Coast's middle and working classes grew, so did their desire for news. Penny papers emerged as a cheap source of news with coverage of crime, tragedy, adventure, and gossip. The penny papers represented the crudest form of journalism because of the sensational gossip that was reported.〔Barbara Friedman. "The Penny Press: The Origins of the Modern News Media, 1833–1861. " Rev. of: title_of_work_reviewed_in_italics, clarifying_information. Journalism History 31.1 (2005): 56-56. Research Library Core, ProQuest. Web. 27 Oct. 2009.〕 The penny press was most noted for its price - only one cent per paper - while other contemporary newspapers were priced around six cents per issue. The exceptionally low price popularized the newspaper in America, and extended the influence of the newspaper media to the poorer classes. The penny press made the news and journalism more important, and also caused newspapers to begin to pay more attention to the public they served. Editors realized that the information that interested the upper class did not necessarily interest the penny-paying public. These new newspaper readers enjoyed information about police and criminal cases. The main revenue for the penny press was advertising while other newspapers relied heavily on high priced subscriptions to finance their activities.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=The Penny Press )〕 The idea of a penny paper was not new in the 1830s. By 1826, many editors were experimenting with sports news, gossip, and a cheap press.〔Fellow, R. Anthony, America Media History. (California State University, Fullerton) Ed. Rebeckah Matthews and Megan Garvey. 2005. p. 85-109.〕 Most newspapers in the early nineteenth century cost six cents and were distributed through subscriptions. On July 24, 1830, the first penny press newspaper came to the market: Lynde M. Walter's Boston ''Transcript''. Unlike most later penny papers, Walter's ''Transcript'' maintained what was considered good taste, featuring coverage of literature and the theater. This paper sold for four dollars a year.〔 The penny paper’s largest inspiration came from Charles Knight’s ''The Penny Magazine'' (1832–1845). The main purpose of this magazine was to educate and improve England’s poor, but it was also very popular with Americans. It became a very successful magazine as it attained a circulation of more than 20,000 within a year.〔 Frederic Hudson, one of the first to write about the history of American journalism, believed the rise of the penny press to be a key factor in the development of the modern newspaper. Hudson considered newspapers to be dull during the 1840s.〔 Benjamin Day took the lead in profoundly transforming the daily newspaper. The newspaper went from narrowly focusing on the wealthy, with sparse distribution, to a broad-based news medium. These changes were seen mostly in New York City, Boston, Philadelphia, and other East Coast cities.〔Donald K Brazeal. "Precursor to Modern Media Hype: The 1830s Penny Press". ''The Journal of American Culture'' 28.4 (2005): 405-414. Research Library Core, ProQuest. Web. 27 Oct. 2009.〕 Day introduced ''The Sun'', which appealed to a wide audience, using a simpler, more direct style, vivid language, and human interest stories.〔Bird, S. Elizabeth. ''For Enquiring Minds: A Cultural Study of Supermarket Tabloids''. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1992: 12-17.〕 Day was a New Englander who worked for the Springfield, Massachusetts paper, the ''Republican''. He came to New York to be a compositor, but in the depression of 1833 he started ''The Sun'' out of desperation. Day reasoned that a penny paper would be popular in hard times as many could not afford a six-cent paper. He also believed that a substantial, untapped market existed in the immigrant community. His paper was an instant success. Its motto, printed at the top of every page, was "The object of this paper is to lay before the public, at a price within the means of every one, all the news of the day, and at the same time offer an advantageous medium for advertisements."〔Jennifer Vance. "The Penny Press." Retrieved from http://iml.jou.ufl.edu/projects/spring04/vance/pennypress.html〕 Day made advances in written news by introducing a new meaning of sensationalism, which was defined as 'reliance on human-interest stories'. He placed emphasis on the common person as he or she was reflected in the political, educational, and social life of the day. Day also introduced a new way of selling papers by putting into practice the London Plan. This plan included newsboys hawking their newspapers on the streets.〔 The success of the penny papers was not automatic; selling the new concept of the newspaper to this new audience involved some persuasion. Consumers did not want to buy a new newspaper every day, and it was a challenge to convince them of the benefits of doing so. Most newspapers at the time did not have any sort of timeliness, so buying a newspaper daily seemed pointless to readers. But, eventually people became interesting in reading the latest news which the penny papers strived to provide.〔 James Gordon Bennett's 1835 ''New York Herald'' added another dimension to penny press newspapers, now common in journalistic practice. Whereas newspapers had generally relied on documents as sources, Bennett introduced the practices of observation and interviewing to provide stories with more vivid details.〔Francke, Warren T. "Sensationalism and the Development of Reporting in the Nineteenth Century: The Broom Sweeps Sensory Details." Paper presented at Conference on Sensationalism and the Media (Ann Arbor, Mich.), 1986.〕 Bennett is known for redefining the concept of news, reorganizing the news business and introducing newspaper competition. Bennett’s ''New York Herald'' was financially independent of politicians thanks to a large number of advertisers. Bennett reported mainly local news and instances of corruption, and strove for accuracy. He realized that “there was more journalistic money to be made in recording gossip that interested bar-rooms, work-shops, race courses, and tenement houses, than in consulting the tastes of drawing rooms and libraries.” He is also known for writing a “money page”, which was included in the ''Herald'', and also for his coverage of women in the news. His innovations sparked imitation as he spared nothing to get the news first.〔 Horace Greeley, publisher of 1841's ''The New York Tribune'', also had an extremely successful penny paper. He was involved with the first penny paper, Boston’s ''Morning Post'', which was a failure. Instead of sensational stories, Greeley relied on rationalism in the ''Tribune''. His editorial pages were the heart of his paper and the reason for its large influence. Greeley is also known for using his newspaper as a platform to promote the Whig and Republican parties.〔 Quite possibly the most famous penny press paper was started in 1851 by two men: George Jones (publisher) and Henry Raymond. This paper was originally named ''The New York Daily Times'', but was later changed to ''The New York Times'' in 1857. Originally sold at one cent per paper, it became famous for incorporating journalistic standards that are common today, as well as having very high quality reporting and writing. The first issue of the ''New York Daily Times'' addressed the various speculations about its purpose and positions that preceded its release. It stated: This independent stance on public issues is a trait that future newspapers adopted, and this made it a good paper to read because people could debate over its content without feeling that one side was always given an advantage. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Penny press」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|