Hazard, Ebenezer, 1744-1817

U.S. postmaster general, public official, and publisher.

American collector of historical records and Postmaster-General.

Postmaster and editor of historical records.

U.S. postmaster general, antiquarian, and businessman.

Ebenezer Hazard was an editor and postmaster-general of the United States from 1782 to 1789.

Hazard, a native of Philadelphia, was an editor of historical recordsand an early U.S. Postmaster General.

Noted collector and editor of American historical records.

Postmaster-general of the United States, 1782-1789.

Ebenezer Hazard (1744-1817) was born in Philadelphia and got his start in New York as a publisher. He was the first Deputy Postmaster of New York City and in 1782 was named the Postmaster General and remained in this position until 1789. Hazard married Abigail Arthur in 1783 and fathered at least four children in this marriage.

Born in Ireland, Mathew Carey spent most of his professional career in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania where he worked as a printer, publisher, and economist.

Ebenezer Hazard (1744-1817, APS 1781) was a publisher, businessman, an editor of historical documents and Postmaster-General of the United States. His two-volume work Historical Collections: Consisting of State Papers and Other Authentic Documents: Intended As Materials for An History of the United States of America (Philadelphia, 1792-1794) was the first published collection of American state papers and historical documents. As an excellent Greek scholar, Hazard assisted Charles Thomson, Secretary of the Continental Congress, in completing his translation of the New Testament for the Thomson Bible.

Hazard was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the son of a merchant named Samuel Hazard and his wife Catherine Clarkson. He was educated at the Academy of Samuel Finley in Nottingham, PA, and at the College of New Jersey (later Princeton, University), where he graduated in 1762.

Several years after college Hazard became a partner in the publishing firm of Noel & Hazard of New York from 1769 to 1775, and later joined the firm of Benedict & Hazard. On May 1, 1775 he was authorized by the Committee of Safety of New York to reorganize the local post office, and on October 5 was commissioned postmaster of the city of New York by the Continental Congress. The following year in late 1776 he was appointed surveyor-general of the Post Office of the United States. On January 28, 1782 he succeeded Richard Bache as Postmaster-General. He administered the Post Office with great efficiency and economy, and is one of the few postmasters to have made the post office pay its way. After the reorganization of the federal government under the Constitution, Hazard was replaced by Samuel Osgood. After quitting the federal government, he moved from Philadelphia to New York and back again in an effort to make a living. In Philadelphia Hazard served as the first secretary of the Insurance Company of North America and for many years as manager of the Schuylkill Bridge Company and the Delaware & Schuylkill Canal Company. All were moderately successful ventures.

However, Hazard’s greatest passion was intellectual and historical. His duties as surveyor-general of the post office (1777-1782) entailed extensive travel, and he took advantage of the opportunity to collect the documentary evidence and source-materials of early American history. In response to his petition to the Continental Congress on July 11, 1778, he was given permission to copy documents in the Continental archives, as well as a grant of one thousand dollars for expenses. He collected most of these materials before 1782, when he became Postmaster-General. The first two volumes entitled Historical Collections were published in Philadelphia from 1792-1794. Although subsequent volumes were planned, the first two sold so poorly that the project had to be abandoned. He also worked as a Greek translator of the New Testament for another project, the Thomson Bible published in 1808, which proved no more profitable.

Hazard was greatly concerned about the welfare of native Americans, and published a paper in 1816 entitled “Remarks on Mr. Schermerhorn’s Report Concerning the Western Indians” (Massachusetts Historical Society Collections, 2nd series, vol. IV).

On September 11, 1783 Hazard wed Abigail Arthur of Shrewsbury, N.J.. They had one son, Samuel Hazard, who carried on his father’s legacy of preserving historical documents. An archaeologist, Samuel Hazard published several multivolume historical registers and references, including the Register of Pennsylvania (16 vols., 1828-1836), the Annals of Pennsylvania, 1609-1682 (Philadelphia, 1850) and Pennsylvania Archives, 1682-1790 (12 vols., 1853). Ebenezer Hazard died on June 13, 1817.