Reading and understanding newspapers. Пыж А.М. - 14 стр.

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there were 346 newspapers. In the Jacksonian populist 1830's, advances in
printing and papermaking technology led to an explosion of newspaper
growth, the emergence of the "Penny Press"; it was now possible to produce a
newspaper that could be sold for just a cent a copy. Previously, newspapers
were the province of the wealthy, literate minority. The price of a year's
subscription, usually over a full week's pay for a laborer, had to be paid in full
and "invariably in advance." This sudden availability of cheap, interesting
reading material was a significant stimulus to the achievement of the nearly
universal literacy now taken for granted in America.
The Industrial Revolution
The industrial revolution, as it transformed all aspects of American life
and society, dramatically affected newspapers. Both the numbers of papers and
their paid circulations continued to rise. The 1850 census catalogued 2,526
titles. In the 1850's powerful, giant presses appeared, able to print ten thousand
complete papers per hour. At this time the first "pictorial" weekly newspapers
emerged; they featured for the first time extensive illustrations of events in the
news, as woodcut engravings made from correspondents' sketches or taken
from that new invention, the photograph. During the Civil War the
unprecedented demand for timely, accurate news reporting transformed
American journalism into a dynamic, hardhitting force in the national life.
Reporters, called "specials," became the darlings of the public and the idols of
youngsters everywhere. Many accounts of battles turned in by these intrepid
adventurers stand today as the definitive histories of their subjects.
Newspaper growth continued unabated in the postwar years. An
astounding 11,314 different papers were recorded in the 1880 census. By the
1890's the first circulation figures of a million copies per issue were recorded
(ironically, these newspapers are now quite rare due to the atrocious quality of
cheap paper then in use, and to great losses in World War II era paper drives)
At this period appeared the features of the modern newspaper, bold "banner"
headlines, extensive use of illustrations, "funny pages," plus expanded
coverage of organized sporting events. The rise of "yellow journalism" also
marks this era. Hearst could truthfully boast that his newspapers manufactured
the public clamor for war on Spain in 1898. This is also the age of media
consolidation, as many independent newspapers were swallowed up into
powerful "chains"; with regrettable consequences for a once fearless and
incorruptible press, many were reduced to vehicles for the distribution of the
particular views of their owners, and so remained, without competing papers
to challenge their viewpoints. By the 1910's, all the essential features of the
recognizably modern newspaper had emerged. In our time, radio and
television have gradually supplanted newspapers as the nation's primary
information sources, so it may be difficult initially to appreciate the role that
newspapers have played in our history.

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