The editor of the New York Express is, we believe, the oldest editor whose name has steadily appeared in the imprint of any newspaper in that city. The first day of its publication was 17th February, 1817. At that time, John Long and John Turner, of the New York Gazette, were the oldest editors; the next in order was Zachariah Lewis, editor of the Commercial Advertiser; Amos Butler, of the Mercantile Advertiser; Coleman and Burnham, of the Evening Post; Aldon Spooner, of the Columbian, and Henry Wheaton, of the National Advocate. These were the only daily papers then printed in New York. Most of these editors are dead and their papers discontinued. The Express is a continuation of the Daily Advertiser; The Post, which was established by Alexander Hamilton, Rufus King, Oliver Wolcott and others, as a high-toned Federal journal, is now ably conducted as a Democratic paper by Mr. Bryant. In nothing is the amazing growth of New York more evident than in the typographical improvement and increased circulation of its press. We do not know that there has been much progress in editorial ability and dignity, for half a century ago the newspapers of New York were conducted by men fully as able to enlighten the public as any who have succeeded them, and who had a high standard of decorum and good taste.
What vast changes have since taken place in New York. The city, which now numbers about eight hundred thousand, had then a population of less than a hundred and sixty thousand, and Brooklyn, now numbering two hundred thousand and more inhabitants, was then a village. The great canal which has made New York the Empire State was then only talked of, and often derisively talked of as the big ditch. Not a railroad of any importance threaded the land. And yet the real greatness of the city was in those men, now dead and almost forgotten, whose far-sighted wisdom and inexhaustible energy, while New York was a second-rate town, discovered her capabilities of a grander fortune and adopted the means for its accomplishment. The vast river of life that rolls unheeding by their graves is only sounding with its murmuring tide the requiem of the mighty spirits who excavated the channels for its triumphal progress, and whose magic genius converted a barren island into the golden high way of the world's commerce.
