Goddard Broadside of the Declaration of Independence, with "Printed by Mary Katharine Goddard" at bottom. Public DomainMary Katharine Goddard learned the printing trade through family ties. Her father was a successful doctor and postmaster, and her younger brother, William, started several presses in several colonies. When she took over her brother’s newspaper, the Maryland Journal, in Baltimore, the timing and location would directly connect her to the greatest moment in American history.Colonial NewspapersGoddard (1738–1816) was born in New London, Connecticut, but after her father’s death, her mother moved the family to Providence, Rhode Island, to join William. It was in Rhode Island that her entrepreneurial-minded brother founded his first newspaper, the Providence Gazette and Country Journal, in 1762, which also became Providence’s first newspaper. He also became Providence’s postmaster.

Shortly after launching the paper, though, William moved to New York in 1765, leaving the paper in the hands of his mother, Sarah, who soon accepted a partner, John Carter, who had been working with Benjamin Franklin and David Hall in Philadelphia.

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