Samuel Palmer (printer)
Samuel Palmer (died 1732) was an English printer and author. Life He operated in a house in Bartholomew Close, London, later occupied by the two Jameses the typefounders. In 1725 Benjamin Franklin found work there, staying for a year, and was employed on the second edition of William Wollaston's Religion of Nature; during this period Franklin wrote A Dissertation on Liberty and Necessity, Pleasure and Pain. On 15 February 1731 a printing-press was set up at St. James's House for the Duke of York and some of the princesses to work under Palmer's supervision. Although his business was large and successful, Palmer ultimately became bankrupt. He was ailing two years before his death, which took place on 9 May 1732. Works In March 1729 Palmer circulated a prospectus of ‘The Practical Part of Printing, in which the Materials are fully described and all the Manual Operations explained’. But those in the trade were concerned that secrets would be disclosed, and the Earls of Pembroke and Oxford, Richard Mead, and others, persuaded him to change his plan, and write a history of printing. Several parts were actually published – about two-thirds of the book – when Palmer died. Palmer's ‘History of