Isaac Collins
Isaac Collins was born in Delaware in 1746. He moved to Burlington in
1770, and was appointed Royal Printer. Taking up residence in the building
now known as the Burlington Pharmacy, he printed six-shilling notes
and almanacs in a print shop at 206 High Street. Historians are
uncertain whether this was the same print shop where currency was printed
in 1728 by Benjamin Franklin.
Collins was a Quaker, but in 1777, he began
publishing The New Jersey Gazette, a newspaper which
supported the revolutionary movement, and was expelled from the
Friends Meeting for warlike behavior. The next year, he moved his
printing press to Trenton.
In the early 1800s, Collins published a quarto Bible far more error-free
than most of its contemporary editions. In 1808, he moved back to a
house in Burlington, apologized to the
Friends for his support of the war, and was welcomed back into the Meeting.
| 