Cheap at Just a Penny

A little more than 175 years ago in 1833, New Yorkers woke up with “The Sun” -- a newspaper peddling a new idea: Common news for common folks, cheap at just a penny.

September 1833, Benjamin H. Day launched the first penny newspaper, the New York Sun which was affordable for the mass public for the first time. Its circulation reached 5,000 within six months, and within a year, rose up to 10,000. The paper surpassed all the daily papers of the time by reaching 19,000 by 1835. Within the next five years, about a dozen new penny papers were launched. The biggest competitor to the Sun was The New York Herald launched in May 1835 by James G. Bennett.

While historians debate the origins of the Penny Press, there is no doubt it had a significant impact on journalism. Penny Press papers changed the content, journalistic standards, and financing. For these reasons, the Penny Press was a significant period for journalism and made significant contributions to the newspaper industry.

In early 1800s cost of the most newspapers was six cents. In those days economy it was a hard to affordable amount for the lower class citizens. Circulation and regulation of news heavily depended on the people who has the power to do so. With the emergence of one cent newspapers news became available for more than just upper class society. More and more people were able to read and reach the news, hence the demand and circulation increased and news became more and more important.

Printer Benjamin Day’s way of human-interest stories, tall tales and shocking crimes helped to attract average readers to a medium that was once enjoyed largely by the upper class. Method of sale was another innovation, “newsboys” from street corners was the cheapest and easiest way to catch up.

Penny papers succeeded based on increased circulation and concentrated importance on advertising. The penny papers did not rely on annual subscriptions or subsidies from political parties unlike their predecessors. Advertising targeted the working class circulation needs. Past papers did not print advertisements they did not agree with but unlike them the penny papers relinquished their "authority" on moral judgment, leaving it to readers. With the cheap press it has been identified the technological improvements and the importance of news as a device for advertising the paper. The advertisements were made available to more people, to a new economic class, thereby expanding the market for manufactured goods.

The writing in these papers was another brand new concept that added a new dimension to journalism as we know it today. In the beginning, the stories were startling and were often detailed and included brutal accounts of murders and household disputes. Along with this, came an importance on local and human interest stories. This broke the old-style writing and began reporting "interesting" stories regardless of their relevance. As it relied on sales and advertising, the penny press was free to publish whatever stories it thought interesting or pertinent, but ultimately selection was based on what would garner more advertisement revenues. But it also resulted in the fact that the mass public could now not only afford to buy the newspaper, but its needs were being taken into consideration.

It can be identified that the penny papers were favorable in expanding America’s newspaper readership. In his book, American Journalism, Mott cites from the Public Leger, a penny newspaper in Philadelphia in 1936:

In the cities of New York and Brooklyn, containing a population of 30,000, the daily circulation of the penny papers is not less than 70,000. This is nearly sufficient to place a newspaper in the hands of every man in the two cities, and even of every boy old enough to read (Mott, 1978, p. 241).

The penny press played an important role in upgrading the literacy level, at a faster rate. Since the penny newspapers were simply written, and affordable, they may have encouraged more people to read daily, allowing them to improve their own literacy. It should be noted that as literacy level rises the quality of the writing in the penny press also improved. Furthermore, the penny newspaper always came up with a new awareness and new ideas. This had a reflective impact on the society on the verge of literacy. Suddenly an average person with access to a newspaper became a far more important person on a societal and political level, and could no longer be looked down by the upper classes. Their voice, their opinions and soon their votes could no longer be ignored.

The penny papers gave life and importance to the voice of the common people, and often published that people should be provided with a realistic view of present-day life; abuses by authority should be exposed; and that the newspaper has a duty to give readers the news and not to support the powerful. The penny press was instrumental in increasing literacy levels in a practical society that was technologically ready to move forward.

They brought innovations, changes in the way news is gathered and reported and pushed the newspaper into a place as the “trusted” source of information.  This position is again being tested today as Internet and other media blur the lines of trust.  But we can thank the penny press for setting the stage that brought journalism into the forefront of American society.