Josiah Warren : Early American Individualist Anarchist Publisher and Writer

Image::1 Equally notable as an inventive genius, a social philosopher, and a peaceful revolutionist, Josiah Warren stands forth, by descent, by his practical, all-round talents, by the force of an earnest life's work, as an American of the sturdy pioneer type whose brawn and brains have formed the true foundation of the republic. But it is as a representative of ideas and aspirations born amid the widespread movements for social regeneration which arose and flourished at various times during the first half of the nineteenth century, that this singular personality claims our interest. He was born in Boston in 1798, of historically famous Puritan stock. The Warrens of Pilgrim lineage from which he sprang have furnished Massachusetts with many distinguished citizens, of whom the most renowned was General Joseph Warren, the Revolutionary hero killed by the British at Bunker Hill.

Of Josiah's parents and early life but little is known. He had a taste for music, and at an early age played with his brother George in local bands as a professional. At the age of twenty he married and soon after set out from his native place to improve his fortunes in the West. In those days the city of Cincinnati was quite on the verge of civilization, with the vast unknown beyond; and when Warren reached it he decided to settle there and pursue his vocation as an orchestra leader and teacher of music. His talents soon gained him an honorable professional repute which extended beyond the city; but he had other interests. He devoted his leisure time to mechanical pursuits, of which the earliest fruit was a lamp for burning lard that would furnish a cheaper and better light than tallow, which was then selling at a high price. So successful was this invention, which Warren patented in 1823, that he was soon running a lamp manufactory in Cincinnati.

There were, however, more pressing problems than those of illumination shortly to arise and occupy the active mind and generous heart of the ingenious young New Englander.