Moses Yale Beach

Offices of the New York Sun, 1893, on Nassau Street, Manhattan

Moses was born in Wallingford, Connecticut, to Moses Sperry Beach and Lucretia Yale, and was a cousin of Canadian fur trader James Murray Yale and Gov. Elihu Yale of Yale University.[8] Linus Yale Sr. and Linus Yale Jr., of the Yale Lock Company, were fourth cousins.[9] His grandfather, Captain Elihu Yale (1747), was one of the first bayonet manufacturer in Connecticut during the American Revolutionary War, and one of the largest landholders of Wallingford.[10][11] His father was a plain farmer, and gave him an ordinary education. As a boy, he was a fifer in the War of 1812 at Fort Nathan Hale.[12] He showed a mechanical aptitude from an early age, and at 14 was apprenticed to a cabinetmaker. Before his term was up, he purchased his freedom and established a cabinet-making business in Northampton, Massachusetts. The business failed, and he moved to Springfield. There he endeavoured to manufacture a gunpowder engine for propelling balloons; but this enterprise was also a failure.

He was among the first to invest in paddle steamships to open steam navigation on the Connecticut river between Hartford and Springfield, and would have succeeded if financial difficulties had not obliged him to cease operations before his steamer was completed.[13] He then invented a rag-cutting machine for paper mills. The invention was widely used, but Moses derived no pecuniary benefit due to his tardiness in applying for a patent. He then settled in Ulster County, New York, where he invested in an extensive paper mill. At first he was successful, and after six years was wealthy; but after seven years, an imprudent investment dispersed his fortune, and was compelled to abandon his enterprise. In 1829, he became one of the trustees of Saugerties, N.Y., organizing their fire department, and purchased the first fire engine of the city.[14]

In the meantime though, he had married the sister of Benjamin Day, founder and proprietor of the New York Sun. In 1835, he acquired an interest in the paper from George W. Wisner, an early founder who had been in charge of reporting police news and writing police reports, being the first to do so in the industry.[15] His brother was Gov. Moses Wisner, a member of the family of Patriot Henry Wisner, a gunpowder manufacturer for George Washington during the Revolutionary War. After selling his shares, he would go back to Michigan and found his own journal. The Sun was then small, both in the size of its sheet and circulation, and with a $40,000 payment, Moses soon became sole proprietor, acquiring the shares of Benjamin Day and Mr. Wisner.

Great Moon Hoax of 1835, attention-grabbing stories published by the New York Sun

The New York Sun, as a penny press journal, brought many innovations to the industry, such as being the first U.S. journal to hire a Police reporter.[16][17] They were also the first newspaper to report crimes and personal events such as suicides, deaths, and divorces, which featured everyday people rather than public figures. As the early developers of the craft of reporting and storytelling, they changed journalism, and brought a new business model focused on mass-production and advertising rather than subscriptions. With the breakthrough of selling their newspaper for a penny, a very low price affordable to most, it got New Yorkers from all walks of life reading the news and stay informed. They also launched hoaxes with the aim of attracting attention, such as the Great Moon Hoax of 1835 or The Balloon-Hoax. Theses innovations led the journal to eventually become the most successful newspaper in America.[18]

James Gordon Bennett Sr., intrigued by the success of the New York Sun, would go on and copy the paper and found his own journal in 1835, naming it the New York Herald.[19] Through his 10 years of proprietorship, Moses would expand the four-page paper from three to eight columns. He would also later develop horse, rail, and pigeon services to accelerate the speed of news-gathering into his New York offices.[20] He established a ship news service in association with other organizations to obtain news from Europe, acquiring the steamboat "Naushon".[21][22][23] The "Pony Express" horses brought important news from Albany, and he ran special trains that ran from Baltimore to speed up the arrival of the news.[24] His pigeon house was built on the roof of his New York office at Nassau Street to bring news from nearby ports.[25] An important competitor was Horace Greeley of the New-York Tribune. The "Commodore Vanderbilt" used the newspaper to advertise his steamship sailings from New York to Hartford, charging one dollar a passenger to get aboard his steamboat the "Water Witch".[26]

Cunard Line steamship, used by "The New York Sun" to get their news from Europe[27]

According to historian Elmo Scott Watson, Moses invented print syndication in 1841 when he produced a two-page supplement and sold it to a score of newspapers in the U.S. northeast.[28] He also became the major shareholder in four banks and started being a banker himself, establishing banks in the states of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Florida.[29][30] During the California Gold Rush, he sent the Apollo storeship with his sons Henry and John to San Francisco, and equipped the vessel to become a profitable business venture. A partner in the venture was P.T. Barnum of Barnum & Bailey Circus, whom Moses helped get the approval for his Barnum's American Museum in New York.[31][32] He also later acquired the American book publishing company Harper Brothers, and established the "American Sun" in Europe, the "Weekly Sun" for farmers, and the "Illustrated Sun and Monthly Literary Journal".[33][34] The ruins of the ship are now buried in the underground of the Old Federal Reserve Bank Building of San Francisco, and two rooms are named after the ship.

In 1842, he published the first directory of wealthy Americans called the Wealth and Pedigree of Wealthy Citizens of New York City.[35] In the 1846 edition, Moses Yale Beach was featured with a fortune of US$300,000, which translates to 3.3 billions dollars in 2022 money in relation to GDP, and was featured along with Cornelius Vanderbilt at 1.2 million, and John Jacob Astor at 25 millions, the richest man in the world at the time.[36] In 1846, only fourteen individuals were millionaires in New York, with a population of about 500,000 people, making Moses Yale Beach among the richest men in the city.[37]

The "Naushon", a steamboat vessel co-owned by Moses Yale through the Associated Press, used for their news service from New York Harbor starting in 1846[38][39]

From 1843 to 1847, Moses grew the newspaper, employing 8 editors and reporters, 16 pressmen, 12 female folders, and 100 newsboy.[40] In the same year, he was appointed United States Ambassador to Mexico, and named Special Diplomatic Agent by U.S. President John Tyler. He was also a representative of New York's bankers for the war mission, and a director of several New York banks, carrying with him $50,000 to establish a National Bank of Mexico.[41] He cofounded the Harbor News Association in association with other newspapers and Samuel Morse, inventor of the telegraph, and the New York Associated Press, implicating robber baron Jay Gould. In May 1846, Moses founded the Associated Press[42][43] (at that time publisher of The Sun), and was joined by the New York Herald, the New York Courier, The Journal of Commerce, and the New York Evening Express.[44] The AP had been formed by the five New York daily papers to share the cost of transmitting news of the Mexican–American War.[45] Their offices would later be at 50 Rockefeller Plaza, formerly known as the Associated Press Building, and be part of Rockefeller Center.

Mexico City, Mexican–American War, featuring General Scott

During the Mexican–American War, Moses went on a trip to Washington where he met with Secretary of State James Buchanan and U.S. President James K. Polk for talks. His mission, as the President personal spy, would be to try to persuade the Mexican government to settle its ongoing war with the United States.[46] At the time, newspapers had better news gathering techniques than the government, having President Polk and government officials receiving the war news through their daily newspapers.[47]

As he already had a personal relationship with the former foreign minister of Mexico, Juan Almonte, President Polk sent him to Mexico to arrange a treaty of peace, bringing with him his daughter and a journalist named Jane Cazneau. Arrived on Mexican grounds, Moses received informations from General Mirabeau Lamar, the former president of the Republic of Texas, about the disenchantment of the Mexican bishops and clergy, as they were penalized by the War.[48]

He took meetings with them and tried to organize a resistance. His resistance would prove successful as the Bishops were able to raise an army of 5,000 men. The financing provided also prevented the Mexican army to counterback U.S General Winfield Scott. Following the Polkos Revolt, President Santa Anna would post a reward to capture Moses and declared that anyone found with a copy of his paper, the New York Sun, would be punished as a traitor.[49] The negotiations were eventually broken off by a false report announcing the defeat of General Zachary Taylor by Mexican General Antonio López de Santa Anna. Moses returned back home, along with General Scott, and eventually the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo would be settled, in 1847, where the territories of California, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, along with parts of Texas and Arizona, would be obtained by the United States.[50]

Governor Sam Houston declared that Texas owes much to the work of Moses Yale Beach during the war.[51]

Moses Yale Beach's Italianate house in Wallingford, Connecticut, designed by architect Henry Austin

Moses retired in 1857 with an ample fortune, and left the paper to his sons. He then returned to Wallingford, Connecticut, built the most luxurious Italianate house in the city, and engaged in local philanthropy.[52] The Moses Y. Beach Elementary School would later bore his name, following a land donation from him. He also gave $100,000 to the Union Army for the American Civil War, installed a 110 foot tall Liberty Pole, and gave $5,000 to St Paul's Episcopal Church reconstruction.[53]

His son Moses Sperry took over the journal, and under his leadership, they supported Abraham Lincoln, and were described as out-and-out loyalists.[54][55] The paper also covered his day of election as well as his assassination.[56][57]

Moses Yale Beach was married twice and left six sons and two daughters :

• Alfred Ely, entrepreneur who invented New York City's first subway system, opposed by John Jacob Astor III, owner of the Scientific American magazine, founder of a school for freed slaves after the American Civil War, joined the Union League
• Moses Sperry, politician, co owner of the New York Sun and the Boston Daily Times, featured in Mark Twain's book, The Innocents Abroad, member of the New York State Assembly, visited the Czar Alexander II of the House of Romanov, supported Abraham Lincoln policies
• As well as Eveline Shepherd, Mary Ely Day, Henry Day, Joseph Perkins, Moses Yale Beach (b. 1862), and William Yale Beach, a Freemason banker and real estate developer, doing business in the Masonic Temples of New York and Boston, among others.[58][59][60]

His granddaughter, Emma Beach, married to naturalist and artist Abbott Handerson Thayer, who pioneered the creation of the first effective forms of military camouflage. She was also credited with illustrations in the book Concealing Coloration in the Animal Kingdom and was described in Mark Twain's The Innocents Abroad.

His grandson, Frederick C. Beach, ran the family owned Scientific American Magazine, seated at the Woolworth Building, and invented a photolithographic process. The magazine is now the oldest continuously published magazine in the United States.[61][62]

His great-grandson, Stanley Yale Beach, was also an aviation pioneer and airship entrepreneur. He was a correspondent of Howard Hughes and General Billy Mitchell, father of the United States Air Force, and an early financier of another aviation pioneer, Gustave Whitehead, who claimed to have made a powered controlled airplane flight before the Wright brothers.[63][64]

• This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Gilman, D. C.; Peck, H. T.; Colby, F. M., eds. (1905). "Beach, Moses Yale" . New International Encyclopedia (1st ed.). New York: Dodd, Mead.
• "Moses Y. Beach". New York Times. July 21, 1868. Retrieved July 15, 2008. Moses Yale Beach died suddenly Sunday morning at Wallingford, Conn,, where he was born, Jan. 7, 1800. In 1814 he was apprenticed to a cabinetmaker in Hartford, Conn., whom he served for four years, and then, purchasing his freedom, went into the cabinet business on his own account at Northampton, Mass.
• Wilson, J. G.; Fiske, J., eds. (1900). "Beach, Moses Yale" . Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography. New York: D. Appleton.

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