Benjamin Franklin's Printing Network: Disseminating Virtue in Early America.

In "Benjamin Franklin's Printing Network", Ralph Frasca explores Franklin's partnerships and business relationships with printers and their impact on the early American press. Besides analyzing the structure of the network, Frasca addresses two equally important questions: How did Franklin establish this informal group? And what were his motivations for doing so? This network grew to be the most prominent and geographically extensive of the early American printing organizations, lasting from the 1720s until the 1790s. Stretching from New England to the West Indies, it comprised more than two dozen members, including such memorable characters as the Job-like James Parker, the cunning Francis Childs, the malcontent Benjamin Mecom, the vengeful Benjamin Franklin Bache, the steadfast David Hall, and the deranged Anthony Armbruster. Franklin's network altered practices in both the European and American colonial printing trades by providing capital and political influence to set up workers as partners and associates. As an economic entity and a source of mutual support, the network was integral to the success of many eighteenth-century printers, as well as to the development of American journalism. Frasca argues that Franklin's principal motivation in establishing the network was his altruistic desire to assist Americans in their efforts to be virtuous. Using a variety of sources, Frasca shows that Franklin viewed virtuousness as a path to personal happiness and social utility.