Introduction

Through the study of our newspapers, we can learn of past events and track the growth of ideas. In the old Toronto newspapers, we can see the development of the city from its humble eighteenth century beginnings to a large, thriving metropolis.

The first newspaper published in Toronto appeared on October 4, 1798. Called the Upper Canada Gazette, or American Oracle, it published the activities and decisions of the government. For more than twenty years, the newspaper had no competition.

In 1802, the Upper Canada Gazette published the proclamation announcing the Treaty of Amiens to the townspeople. In 1812, Isaac Brock published a proclamation to alert the citizens of York of the possibilities of invasion.

In 1820, the Observer was started in Toronto marking the beginning of a flood of more newspapers. Each newspaper took on a personality of its own, but they all had one thing in common - lack of local news. Each editor expressed his opinions freely. One of the most famous editors was William Lyon Mackenzie from the Colonial Advocate.

By the 1830s, political unrest was building leading into the crisis of the rebellion. The number of newspapers multiplied. Papers of the period included the Albion, the Canadian Correspondent, the Royal Standard, the Constitution, the British Colonist and the Examiner. Two religious papers started called the Christian Guardian, a Methodist mouth-piece and the Church, the paper of the Church of England. But the rebellion in 1837 brought down all but one of the so-called "radical" press. The Mirror was the only reform paper to survive and bravely published the proclamations of Mackenzie's Provisional Government on Navy Island.

By the 1840s with the Union of Ontario and Quebec and the fight for Responsible Government, reform papers began to re-appear. The most famous and influential one was George Brown's Globe. This marked the beginning of modern journalism. George Brown was just as outspoken as previous editors, but he was able to present his opinions in a more balanced manner. This set the stage for "responsible journalism".

From the 1850s to 1867, both Toronto and Canada experienced tremendous expansion. The big circulation papers had three weekly editions, a daily for the city, a tri-weekly for the neighbourhood and a weekly for mailing across the Province and to Great Britain.

Papers were published for different nationalities; the earliest were for the English, Scottish and Irish immigrants. The first foreign newspaper in Toronto was the Beobachter, started in 1856. There were also papers that were found to support a particular cause, like the Orange movement, anti-slavery or temperance reform.

The following descriptions of some of the early Toronto newspapers will help you understand the historical significance of Toronto. In order to gain information from two hundred years ago, we must rely on these newspapers as a main source. Today we are able to keep track of events in many different ways. Some of these means are radio, television, newspapers, magazines and the Internet.

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