Thursday, July 24, 2008

Where was the first newspaper printed?


You probably have a bulletin in your school. When you read what's posted on it, what do you get? You get news! At one time, this was the only form of "newspaper" that existed. News would be gathered from travelers or from government sources, and posted on a bulletin board for everyone to read.
Of course, this isn't really a newspaper, because you can take a newspaper with you to read whenever you like. So for the first newspaper ever printed we must go to China about 1300 years ago. At that time the government printed a paper called Tching pao, which meant "News of the Capital". In this way the government was able to keep its people informed of important developments.
There was also a government newspaper in ancient Rome which was distributed among the people. This was called Acta Diurna, which meant "Daily Happenings". These two are the first newspapers of which we have any records.By the 16th century, people were already paying to buy a newspaper! In Venice the government put out a paper called Noitizie Scritte ("Written News") and people paid one gazetta for a copy.
By the 18th century, newspaper were coming out more or less regularly which not only contained news but also opinion. One such paper was started in London as early as 1663 and was called The Intelligencer. Most early papers, however, came out only once a week because both communication and production were slow.
The first American newspaper was called Publick Occurrences, and was started in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1690. It was quickly stopped by the Governor of the colony. Benjamin Franklin conducted a newspaper, The Pennsylvania Gazette, from 1729 to 1765. In 1752, the Colonies has only two newspapers, but at the time of the American Revolution there were 37!Probably the most influential newspaper ever published, The Times Of London, began in 1785 and is still published today.
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Who discovered how to make paper?


Take a piece of paper and tear it in both directions. You will notice two things. It tore more easily in one direction than in the order, and hairlike fibres stick out from the edges of the tear.
The first shows that the paper was made by machine; otherwise it would tear the same way in all directions. The second shows that paper is a mat of tiny fibres, felted together. These fibers are the small particles of cellulose that help form the framework of plants.
Man had created a writing material before he invented paper. The ancient Egyptians, about 4000 years ago, took the stems of the papyrus plant and peeled them apart and flattened them. Then they laid them crosswise and pressed them down to stick them together. When dry, this made a sheet of papyrus and could be written on.But it wasn't paper. This was invented in China about the year 105, by a man called Ts'lai Lun. He found a way to make from the stringy inner bark of the mulberry tree.
The chinese pounded the bark in water to separate the fibers, then poured the soup mixture onto a tray with a bottom of thin bambo strips. The water drained away and the soft mat was laid on a smooth surface to dry. Bamboo and old rags were also used. Later on, somebody thought how to improve the paper by brushing starch on it.
Chinese traders traveled far to the west and came to the city of Samarkand in Russia. There they met Arab who learned their secret and took it to Spain. From there the art of papermaking spread over Europe and to England.
In time, all kinds of improved methods and machines for making paper werediscovered. One of the most important, for example, was a machine developed in France in 1798 that could make a continuous sheet or web of paper.
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