Le Bijou is a printed amateur newspaper edited by Herbert A. Clark (1857 or 1858-1921), an African American amateur journalist from Cincinnati. Catalog record
Amateur newspapers occupy an unusual place in the history of journalism. Popular from the 1870’s into the early 1900’s, amateur newspapers were small journals created by non-professional publishers, editors, writers, and printers. The motivation for creating amateur newspapers was not financial but for “self-improvement, as a pleasing pastime, and for the advancement of their own peculiar institutions.” (Spencer, 1947) They were usually published by teenagers, though young adults and children, sometimes as young as 7, also contributed to amateur publications. Amateur newspapers generally contained some combination of editorials, short stories, poetry, word puzzles, jokes, local news, and a lot of commentary on other amateur journalists.
Amateur journalism began growing slowly in the 1840’s-1860’s although there are earlier examples. The first amateur newspaper in the United States is thought to be the Thespian Mirror printed by 14-year-old John Howard Payne in New York City from 1805-1806. These early papers would have been created in one of three ways: handwritten, printed at a print shop by a professional printer, or printed from a homemade press. The amateur newspaper collection at the American Antiquarian Society holds examples created from each of these methods.
In 1867 Benjamin O. Woods, a Boston pharmacist looking for a way to print labels for his shop, invented a hobby press or “Novelty Press.” Its relatively low price and small size made it affordable for middle-class families to purchase their own. In the 10 years following the invention of the hobby press, the number of amateur newspapers in the United States increased from less than 100 to almost 1,000. Amateur journalists would print and mail their papers to other amateur journalists around the country. They commented on and critiqued each other’s papers, offering both support and criticism. They formed associations that held conventions, elected executive boards, and published their own newspapers. The National Amateur Press Association was formed in 1876 and still exists today.
The amateur newspaper collection at the American Antiquarian Society consists of tens of thousands of issues. We have around 3,500 titles with at least one title from every state except Alaska and Hawaii.
For more information on Amateur Newspapers, check out The Fossils: The Historians of Amateur Journalism.
Access
Over 3,300 titles have been digitized and are available as Amateur Newspapers from the American Antiquarian Society, part of Gale Primary Sources. This resource is accessible from the AAS reading room.
Resources
Truman Joseph Spencer, History of Amateur Journalism, 1947. Catalog record