Isaiah Thomas was one of the most important printer-publishers in America in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. His newspaper, the Massachusetts Spy, founded in 1770, was an important Patriot vehicle before and during the Revolutionary War. After the war, from his base in Worcester, Massachusetts, Thomas built a publishing empire extending from Maine to Georgia and inland to the Mississippi. He wrote the first history of printing in America; published in 1810, it is still a valuable source in its field. In 1812 he founded and became the first president of the American Antiquarian Society, which he endowed to carry on his work of collecting and publishing materials related to the formation of the United States.

Born on 30 January 1750 in Boston, Thomas was the youngest of five children and a member of the fifth generation of Thomases in America. His great-great-grandfather, Evan Thomas, was established as a merchant in...