(Roughly) Daily

Liz Tracey on Noah Webster’s American Dictionary of the English Language— and the way that it declared Americans free from the tyranny of British institutions and their vocabularies…

Sometimes, a dictionary is more than just words and definitions—it may be intended to serve as a declaration of linguistic independence. When Noah Webster’s first edition of the American Dictionary of the English Language was published in April 1828, it held 70,000 words, 12,000 of which were making their first appearance in dictionary form. Webster’s goals for the work were grand: “to furnish a standard of our vernacular tongue, which we shall not be ashamed to bequeath to three hundred millions of people, who are destined to occupy, and I hope, to adorn the vast territory within our jurisdiction.”

Noah Webster’s roles in the formation of the early United States were manifold: editor of the Federalist Papers, owner and editor of the first American daily newspaper [see below], textbook author, a founder of Amherst College, promoter of the first US copyright laws, and author of one of the first works on epidemiology, used by nineteenth-century medical schools.

But his 1828 dictionary is what he’s remembered for, coming at a tremendous personal cost: twenty-one years invested, and a lifelong struggle with debt. In his preface to the three-volume work, he writes of his hopes that the dictionary will result in his fellow Americans’ “improvement and their happiness; and for the continued increase of the wealth, the learning, the moral and religious elevation of character, and the glory of my country.”…

More at: “Webster’s Dictionary 1828: Annotated,” from @liztracey in @JSTOR_Daily.

* Trevor Noah, Born a Crime

###

As we vindicate vernacular, we might recall that it was on this date in 1846 that the first edition of the Cambridge Chronicle was published. One of the earliest weeklies in the U.S., it served the newly-incorporated city of Cambridge, MA– using language consistent with Webster’s dictionary. (Nearby Boston was home to the first U.S. newspaper, the Publick Occurrences Both Forreign and Domestick, which was founded in 1690 (albeit short-lived).

The Cambridge Chronicle is technically the longest continuously-published weekly newspaper in the U.S… though it ceased original serving up original content in 2022, after being purchased by Gannett. It now re-publishes regional stories from other Gannett papers.

As for Webster, he began his journalistic career in 1779, writing articles for New England newspapers justifying the Revolutionary War. In 1793, Alexander Hamilton recruited him to edit the leading Federalist Party newspaper; then in December of that year, Webster founded New York’s (and the new American nation’s) first daily newspaper American Minerva, later renamed the Commercial Advertiser, which he edited for four years (writing the equivalent of 20 volumes of articles and editorials).