Isaac Collins (printer)

Isaac Collins (February 16, 1746 March 21, 1817) was a Quaker and an early American printer, publisher, bookseller and merchant. He published the ''New Jersey Gazette'' and ''New Jersey Almanac.'' He was associated with several other colonial newspapers and history works. He is noted for his 1791 bible, one of the leading family bibles published in the United States. He was active in the American Revolution and printed the continental currency for Congress.

Collins was associated with several colonial merchants, printers, and publishers, some who were notable in their own right like William Rind, James Parker, William Goddard, and Robert Aitken. He followed James Parker in the province of New Jersey as the official printer for King George III and did most of his printing and publishing there. Later in his life he temporarily moved to New York City and published there for twelve years from a printing firm he established. Collins was a firm believer in the freedom of the press and had journalist's viewpoints like those of Benjamin Franklin. He would not reveal his source of a story unless that person gave permission.

Early life

Collins was born near Centerville, Delaware, on February 16, 1746. He was the descendant of English immigrants that died early in their lives. His father was Charles Collins, a wine cooper from Bristol, England, who was an orphan and had immigrated to America in 1734 at the age of nineteen. When Collins's father immigrated to America, he debarked at New Castle, Delaware, an area with a large population of Quakers. Collins's father became a farmer in Brandywine Hundred near the Pennsylvania border and married Sarah Hammond, an English immigrant from Chester County, Pennsylvania. Collins had a sister (Elizabeth) who never married and was his only sibling. They were close throughout their lives.

Collins received primary schooling at the Center Meeting House in Centerville and at the Friends' school in Wilmington, Delaware. His upbringing was among the local Quakers, who had a religion called "Inner Light". Collins and his sister read religious works of authors like Robert Barclay, William Penn, and Isaac Pennington, following what the local Quakers did.

Following the death of his mother, his father remarried. Shortly after, his father died and his stepmother remarried, moving to another neighborhood. At this time, Collins was put under the guardianship of his mother's brother, John Hammond, who was living in Wilmington. He subsequently lost contact with his stepmother.

Apprenticeship

Collins became indentured under the printer James Adams of Franklin and Hall in 1761 to work as a journeyman in the printer trade for five years. This was Benjamin Franklin's old Philadelphia printing firm, run by his former foreman David Hall. Since Adams was his master, he provided Collins with not only printing skills (i.e. inking, closing the press) but was also obligated to provide him in further schooling in such subjects as reading, writing and arithmetic. Due to the effects of an economic slowdown, Adams released Collins when he was twenty years old in early 1766, with him having completed only four years of his apprenticeship.

His last year of the five year indenture was completed with William Rind, a printer of the ''Virginia Gazette'' in Colonial Williamsburg. Shortly after his 21st birthday, he moved to Philadelphia, to first get work as a journeyman printer with William Goddard and then with several other leading colonial printers. He received 25 percent more pay than other print shop journeymen.

Career and business partnership

Collins was accepted officially as a Quaker member on January 26, 1770. In this year, he formed a business partnership with Philadelphia printer Joseph Crukshank, a member of the Quaker society. They started the business at Crukshank's existing print shop on Second Street. After a short while, they moved to larger quarters on Third Street opposite the workhouse. The young journeymen issued seven imprints and these were the first to bear Collins's name. They published ''The American Traveler: Containing Observations on the Present State, Culture and Commerce of the British Colonies in America'' and ''An Account of the Convincement, Exercises, Services and Travels of that Ancient Servant of the Lord Richard Davis'' and ''Material Towards a History of the American Baptists,'' the first historical work written and printed in Pennsylvania. Their principal publication was Mary Collyer's translation of ''The Death of Abel'' by Swiss poet Solomon Gessner. The Crukshank & Collins firm lasted from January until August of 1770.

Mid life

Collins decided to do some exploratory trips to Burlington, New Jersey, in the later part of 1770 to check out the feasibility of opening up a print shop there. He decided to move there and became a resident printer, however kept his citizenship ties to Philadelphia. He began a courtship with Rachel Budd of Philadelphia in the early part of 1771. As was the Quaker traditions, they declared their intentions to get married at monthly meetings, which was done in March and April 1771 and were formally married on May 8, 1771. They had fourteen children: Rebecca, Charles, Rachel, Sarah, Elizabeth, Thomas, Susannah, William, Benjamin, Anna, Isaac, Stacy, Mary, and Joseph. They lived in Burlington for some seven years in an "old-fashioned" hipped-roof house that was at the southeast corner of High Street and Union Street. According to The West Jersey History Project, the house is now used as a pharmacy and still shows in large letters on its north side the year of 1731 when it was built.

Collins succeeded James Parker as New Jersey's official government printer to King George III. In Burlington, he started publishing the ''New Jersey Almanac'' in 1771 and printed it for twenty-six years continually each year thereafter. The ''New Jersey Almanac'' had a large circulation and sometimes almost rivaled Poor Richard's Alamac in its demand. It was compiled by Timothy Prueman Philom and contained essays on the ''Seasons, Agriculture,'' the ''Education of Youth,'' the ''Pleasures and Advantages of Society,'' and ''With the Fair Sex.'' It also had articles on Drunkenness, Gambling, Integrity, Solitude, Marriage, and Advice to the Ladies. The title changed its name about 1786, then referred to as ''To the New Jersey Almanac.''

Collins was active in the American Revolution and printed the continental currency for Congress. He printed at least 50 different colonial money notes of pounds, shillings and pence from 1771 - 1789. He starting publishing the weekly ''New Jersey Gazette'' in 1777, being the state's first regular newspaper and used '' packetmaker agents'' to distribute and sell his newspaper. Some merchants that sold the ''Gazette'' were Robert Aitken, Moses Bartram, and Joseph Crukshank. Collins was primarily a merchant-shopkeeper during this time, selling large quantities of quills, stationery and general goods to townspeople and the army, while his second job was as a printer.

Collins moved his printing equipment and family to Trenton, New Jersey and had even refused to reveal his source of a pseudonymous article even though the legislative council demanded it. He stood on his grounds as a faithful guardian of the liberty of the press and would not reveal his source unless the source gave him permission. He wrote many persuasive articles on the principle of freedom of the press, including one of particular interest in March 1781 to his friend Governor William Livingston. Collins had a journalist's viewpoint similar to Benjamin Franklin's in that a publisher had a public responsibility as a "Guardian of his Country's Reputation, and refused to insert such Writings as may hurt it."

Family bible

It was required in many of the Thirteen Colonies during the early part of the 18th century that every family have a bible. Most families went by the colony law requirements until the beginning of the American Revolutionary War. Up until this time, bibles came from Europe but could no longer be supplied because of hazards of the war. The Continental Congress obtained bids from Collins for producing copies of the KJV edition of the Bible for the colony families. He published 5,000 copies of a quarto edition family bible consisting of 925 pages in 1791. Collins was paid about four Spanish dollars per bible for the printing.

Collins's bible used higher quality printing types and better techniques than conventional printing of the time period. His bible was proofread up to eleven times before being published. Bible scholars note that it was one of the most textually accurate bibles ever printed and was one of the earliest American family bibles published. It was the largest publishing job ever done in America up to that point and three thousand bibles were pre-sold before printing started. It was different than the customary editions of the Christian Bible in that the dedication to King James was omitted and instead it had an address "To the Reader" by Reverend John Witherspoon. Some of the printed copies had Jean-Frédéric Osterwald's ''The Arguments of the Books and Chapters of the Old and New Testament With Practical Observations'' with a separate title page altogether.

Later life

Collins and his wife Rachel moved their family and business to New York City in 1796 and opened a printing office at 189 Pearl Street, the street of newspaper publishers John Lang, Archibald McLean, and John Tiebout. Others associated with the printing industry on Pearl Street that Collins patronized were William Durell (paper merchant), John Roberts (engraver), John Bowen (ink-maker), and Peter Meiser (bookbinder). Rachel, his first wife, died in 1805 of yellow fever. Collins moved back to Burlington in 1808, having lived in New York City for twelve years. His second marriage was to Deborah Smith in 1809, who was the widow of Benjamin Smith. The printing firm that Collins started on Pearl Street in New York City was continued by his sons and grandsons. Collins died at the age of 71 in Burlington, New Jersey, on March 21, 1817.

Works

Some of the works Collins printed and published are:

Newspapers and Almanacs

* ''New Jersey Gazette'' (Burlington), Dec. 5, 1777-Feb. 25, 1778
* ''New Jersey Gazette'' (Trenton), March 4, 1778-Nov. 27, 1786
* ''Burlington Almanac'' (Burlington), 1770-1777
* ''New Jersey Almanac'' (Trenton), 1778-1795

Government, other than money notes

* ''An Act to prevent persons, holding shares of propriety, from cutting timber on the unlocated lands in New Jersey''
* ''Revived Laws of New Jersey'' (1000 copies of 500 pages each)
* ''Minutes of the Convention of the State of New-Jersey''
* ''Votes and proceedings of various General Assemblies''
* ''Journal of the Proceedings of the Legislative Council''
* ''Acts of the General Assemble of New Jersey''
* ''Constitution of New-Jersey''

Religious publications

* ''Journal of the Life, Travels and Gospel Labours of that Faithful Servant and Minister of Christ, Job Scott''
* ''Christian Hymns, Poems, and Spiritual Songs, Sacred to the Praise of God our Savious''
* ''History of the Rise, Increase and Progress of the Christian People called Quakers''
* ''The Holy Bible'' (KJV), also known as Collins 1791 "Family Bible"
* ''The Power of Religion on the Mind''
* ''The Saint's Everlasting Rest''
* ''Methodism Displayed''
* ''New Testament'' 1789

History volumes

* ''Universal History, ancient and modern; from the earliest records of time, to the general peace of 1801''
* '' The History of Belisarius, the heroik and human Roman General''
* ''The Abbe, Memoirs, Illustrating the History of Jacobinism''
* ''Materials Towards a History of the American Baptists''
* ''The History of Revolution of South Carolina''
* '' The Original and Present State of Man ''
* ''The Economy of Human Life''

See also

Other colonial printers -

* William Hunter (publisher)
* William Parks (publisher)
* Alexander Purdie (publisher)

Notes

Bibliography

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External links

Paper Currency of Isaac Collins in the Collection of the American Numismatic Society

{{DEFAULTSORT:Collins, Isaac
1746 births
1817 deaths
18th-century publishers (people)
19th-century publishers (people)
People from Centerville, Delaware
People from Burlington, New Jersey
Businesspeople from New York City
Burials in New Jersey
Activists from Delaware
Activists from New Jersey
Activists from New York (state)
Colonial American printers