Worcester

American Antiquarian Society: 185 Salisbury Street, Worcester, Massachusetts 01609-1634.

Philip Gaskell (1970, page 25, USA2) writes: “Isaiah Thomas’s press: Probably built in about 1747.” In his 1956 thesis, page 169, he additionally mentions: “A good photograph of this press is reproduced by L.C. Wroth, The Colonial Printer (Portland, Maine, 1938), pl. VI.”

Website: The Isaiah Thomas printing press is one of the very few remaining examples of a typical eighteenth-century two-strike commercial press.

Website: “The history of the Thomas press is summarized in Old “No. 1”: The Story of Isaiah Thomas & His Printing Press ([PDF 7,2 MB], Worcester, 1989); the quotation about Thomas moving the press from Boston to Worcester is from this source. The 1970s restoration of the Thomas press is fully documented in a box of materials in the manuscripts collection at the American Antiquarian Society labeled Isaiah Thomas Press 1975-1978. This collection is supplemented by a correspondence file between the Society and Clinton Sisson, one of the conservators who worked on the press. A letter in this file from Associate Librarian of the Society Frederick E. Bauer Jr. contains an extensive summary of what is known about the press, including information about Thomas’s will and Campbell’s 1876 renovation.”