Concept

Montreal Gazette

Summary
The Montreal Gazette, formerly titled The Gazette, is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Three other daily English-language newspapers shuttered at various times during the second half of the 20th century. It is one of the French-speaking province's last two English-language dailies; the other is the Sherbrooke Record, which serves the anglophone community in Sherbrooke and the Eastern Townships southeast of Montreal. Founded in 1778 by Fleury Mesplet, The Gazette is Quebec's oldest daily newspaper and Canada's oldest daily newspaper still in publication. The oldest newspaper overall is the English-language Quebec Chronicle-Telegraph, which was established in 1764 and is published weekly. Fleury Mesplet founded a French-language weekly newspaper called La Gazette du commerce et littéraire, pour la ville et district de Montréal on June 3, 1778. It was the first entirely French-language newspaper in Canada. The paper did not accept advertising aside for the various books that Mesplet also published. The articles were meant to promote discussion, and it focused on literature and philosophy, as well as various anecdotal articles, poems and letters. Benjamin Franklin encouraged Mesplet to found the newspaper to persuade Canadians to join the American Revolution. A secret resolution of Congress dispatched Mesplat and his printing equipment to Canada in February 1776 "to establish a free press...for the frequent publication of such pieces as may be of service to the cause of the United Colonies." Mesplet, an immigrant from France, had previously lived in Philadelphia and supported the Americans when they occupied Montreal during the war. The newspaper was shut down in 1779 when Mesplet and the editor, Valentin Jautard, were arrested for sedition and imprisoned for three years. Mesplet began a second weekly, The Montreal Gazette / La Gazette de Montréal, on August 25, 1785, which had a dual French-English bilingual format similar to that used by the Quebec Gazette.
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