and Daily Advertiser later changed to The City Gazette, or
Daily Advertiser. Associated in the publication of this paper
was Peter Freneau, a brother of Philip Freneau who was the
poet of the Revolution and later the editor of The National
Gazette.
A SCOOP
On September 3, 1783, The Gazette of Providence, Rhode Island, printed one of the great scoops of the period when it announced: "By the brig Don Golvez, Capt. Silas Jones, ar- rived in the river from London, we have received a copy of the long looked-for Definitive Treaty, which we embrace the earliest occasion of handing to the public."
EDITOEIAL CHANGES
If editorial expression before the Revolutionary Period was feeble and timid, as has been so often asserted, it was not because the colonial editors were weaklings or cowards, but because they knew that the publication of any criticism of the Government meant the suppression of their papers on account of the censorship. After the Stamp Act the newspapers became more critical and debates became more numerous. When the printer found, as he did in the case of the Stamp Act, that he could now violate the censorship with impunity, he became braver and more critical in his editorial expression, and en- joyed for the first time a freedom which rapidly changed the character of the American press.
HANDLING OF NEWS
In spite of the fact that daily newspapers did not make their appearance until after the Republic had been established, the newspapers showed unusual enterprise in printing the news of the more important battles. Instead of waiting to insert such accounts in regular issues, they printed handbills which were hawked on the streets and carried by the post-riders much the same as extra editions are to-day. These handbills, of which possibly The Boston Gazette issued the largest number, did not hesitate to employ large type whenever the Americans
