In writing this history I have tried, as far as possible, to give it compact and interesting form. Therefore I have classed the newspapers by years and dates of first issues, where obtainable, and sought to enliven their history by anecdotal, biographical, and other references to their editors, and to the rough and ready times that environed them.

THE FIRST NEWSPAPER AND ITS EDITOR.

The first newspaper printed in Minnesota was the Minnesota Pioneer. James M. Goodhue was its editor and owner. He represented the intense personal journalism of the last century in the extreme west as pointedly as James Gordon Bennett, of the New York Herald, in the extreme east.

Goodhue was born in Hebron, New Hampshire, March 31st, 1810, was graduated from Amherst College in 1832, studied law, was admitted to the bar, and practiced some time in the East and in Wisconsin, before becoming an editor. The Pioneer of April 15th, 1852, gives the following graphic description of his coming to Minnesota, then a Territory only a few days more than six weeks old.

The 18th day of April, 1849, was a raw, cloudy day. The steamboat Senator, Capt. Smith, landed at Randall's warehouse, lower landing, the only building then there except Robert's old store. Took our press,

*Read in a series of five papers at monthly meetings of the Executive Council, Feb. 10 and Nov. 10, 1902, Feb. 9 and Oct. 12, 1903, and Feb. 8, 1904.

types, and printing apparatus all ashore. Went with our men to the house of Mr. Bass, corner of Third and Jackson streets. He kept the only public house in St. Paul; and it was crowded full, from cellar to garret. Mr. Bass was very obliging and did everything possible for our encouragement. The next thing was a printing office; and that it seemed impossible to obtain. Made the acquaintance of C. P. V. Lull and his partner, Gilbert. They furnished us, gratuitously; the lower story of their building for an office-the only vacant room in town. . . . The weather was cold and stormy, and our office was as open as a corn-rick. However, we picked our types up and made ready for the issue of the first paper ever printed in Minnesota or within many hundred miles of it; but upon search we found our news chase was left behind. William Nobles, blacksmith, made us a very good one after a delay of two or three days.

The paper was to be named "The Epistle of Saint Paul,” as announced in our prospectus, published in the February preceding; but we found so many little Saints in the Territory, jealous of Saint Paul, that we determined to call our paper "The Minnesota Pioneer." One hindrance after another delayed our first issue to the 28th of April, ten days.

The uncomfortable surroundings of the editor while in the Lull building are humorously referred to in the Pioneer of June 28th, 1849. He says: "Not that we would find fault with the pigs, for it is all owing to their bringing up; but really our equanimity is somewhat ruffled, if our chair is not jostled, by the movements of their hard backs under our loose floor.". Quite a step from that rude room and its little hand press to the stately Pioneer Building and its power presses of today!

After a few weeks in the Lull building Goodhue found a better location for his office in the second story of a frame building on the south side of Third street, between Minnesota and Robert streets. It was owned by Samuel H. Sargent, who used the first story for a store. The Lull and Sargent buildings were both burned in the fire that swept lower Third street in 1860.

The Minnesota Pioneer was a four-page, six-column sheet. A copy of the first number is in the vault of the Historical Society. It is still in a fair state of preservation, but soon will be worn out if kept in the regular files. Allow me to suggest that it be framed, with a glass on each side, and hung where it can be examined but not handled.

October 4th, 1849, Goodhue enlarged the Pioneer to seven columns, and on the 11th his brother, Isaac N. Goodhue, became junior editor. November 7th, 1850, the name of the

brother disappeared from the paper, and James M. Goodhue continued it alone.'

As soon as possible after coming to St. Paul, Mr. Goodhue built a cheap one-story house for his family. It faced Bench (now Second) street, between Cedar and Wabasha. It was but little better than a shack. In 1850 he built a better house on St. Peter and Third streets, his garden running back towards Fourth street on the ground that the jail now occupies. After his second residence was completed, he turned the first into a printing office. This was enlarged in 1851 by annexing a barn that stood conveniently near. There the printing office remained until 1854, when it went to the southeast corner of Third and Jackson street.

Goodhue knew well how to crayon with words. More than fifty years ago he pictured in a single graphic sentence a comparison between St. Paul and St. Anthony, now Minneapolis, that still holds pointedly true-"There can be no rivalry between them any more than there can be between a steam boat and a cotton factory, or a coal barge and a trip hammer.'

In the stroke of another sentence he pictured the destiny of the Indian: "Before those two great engines of civilization, the whiskey shop and the printing office, the poor Indians stand no more chance than so many Mexicans before two batteries of grape and canister."

In the issue of June 10th, 1852, he says to a young man who wants information about the churches, education, and weather of the territory: "As multiplying churches will no more annihilate sin than multiplying insurance offices will annihilate fires. the number of our churches affords no certain index of the degree of piety and morality attained to in St. Paul. As for intellect, we have several of the greatest men of the age here; and they will own it themselves. The coldest

day last winter froze the mercury (but then that was owing to exposing the thermometer to the cold weather!)" Mingled with these odd announcements, Goodhue gives the young man much valuable information. Evidently he punctuated that way to make his advice more effective.

His oddly graphic way of putting things is further shown in his description of the livery stable of one of his early patrons.

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