Page:History of Journalism in the United States.djvu/109

Rh that the Tory forces realized the necessity for using methods that they had once despised. Its very publication was a frank admission that the first battle in the great fight for popular sovereignty had been won; it was an admission that, after all, public opinion had to be considered.

The men who were entrusted with the undertaking of keeping the populace "from being misinformed" were John Mein, a bookseller of some literary ability, and John Fleming, a printer.

John Mein was the founder of the circulating library in Boston. He had come to the colony from Scotland but three years before, bringing with him an assortment of books, Irish linens and other merchandise. The necessity of some organ to defend the Crown was apparent to the shrewd Scotchman, who formed a partnership with John Fleming, another Scotchman then resident in the colony. Fleming was sent abroad to procure the best materials and workmen possible. They opened a printing shop in 1766, and the following year the Chronicle was brought out.

As might be expected, this representative of authority was mechanically superior to those journals which were dependent on popular support. It was the most ambitious endeavor in newspaper printing that the continent had yet seen. It was printed on a whole sheet quarto, after the fashion of the London Chronicle, containing only reading matter in the way of news and extracts from the European papers. Despite the fact that its superiority was commented on, it sold at the same price as the other Boston papers. It was unquestionably subsidized by the British Government.

The neutrality which was at first assumed, soon began to give way to the necessity for espousing the weakening