But the _Evening Post_, with the aid, among others, of former Secretary of State John M. Clayton, had no difficulty in proving Benton right.
These were years in which the business management of the newspaper began to feel markedly the hostility of the South. Its utterances against slavery were so biting and persistent that no one below Mason’s and Dixon’s line would advertise in it, and many Southern buyers boycotted New York merchants who patronized it. “Thousands of little merchants and traders in New York City,” as Bigelow later said, “jealous of the rivalry of the other more prosperous houses advertising with us, were in the habit of reporting them in the South, and in that way our advertising columns were made very barren.” New Englanders of large resources were equally offended by the paper’s low-tariff views. Bigelow’s business acumen, reinforcing Bryant’s, was very much needed.
Among his first acts was the reorganization of the job printing office. The income from this branch of the establishment, the first half year of Bigelow’s assistant-editorship, was but $1,812.52, and for the last half year of 1860 it was $7,295. This revolution was wrought by increasing the equipment, hiring a new foreman, and opening up new sources of business. When Bigelow became a partner the higher courts had adopted the rule that all cases reaching them on appeal should be printed. He had an extensive acquaintance among judges and lawyers, whom he gave to understand that the _Evening Post_ would do legal printing more satisfactorily than most job offices, and that it would always have the work done on time. Very shortly it was in command of virtually all the legal printing, and a great deal of other business came with the current. So competent was the supervision exercised by the foreman and bookkeeper that neither Bryant nor Bigelow, after the start was made, spent a total of three days time in this office, which was earning them $10,000 a year or more.
An equally important change was the removal in 1850 from the cramped quarters on Pine Street to a larger building on the northwest corner of Nassau and Liberty Streets. The old property had afforded room for only a hand press, which was operated by a powerful negro. Since the daily circulation in 1848 was but about 2,000 copies, the black could turn off the edition without exhaustion. In the new home it was able to have a large power press. At first an effort was made to operate it with one of the “caloric” engines which Ericsson had invented in 1835 and more recently perfected, but this was found inadequate, and one of Hoe’s new “lightning” engines was installed. Inasmuch as the circulation steadily rose, as the size of the newspaper was increased, and as the weekly, following in the footsteps of Greeley’s _Weekly Tribune_, became an important property, the improved press facilities were an absolute necessity.