Joseph Gales

For many years Gales and Seaton were the official printers to Congress, and the files of the National Intelligencer, containing a running account of the debates in both Houses, are one of the most valuable sources of United States congressional history for more than a quarter of a century. Under the title of Annals of Congress, Gales and Seaton published (1834–56, in 42 volumes) the debates in Congress from 1798 to 1824, together with the more important documents and laws, and under the title of Register of Debates in Congress (29 volumes) continued the publication in similar form to cover the years (1824–37). Gales was long the sole reporter on the U.S. Senate.[1]

He began as a reporter for the National Intelligencer in 1807, Reporting the debates in Congress and went on to become the publisher of the newspaper, which appeared three times a week. He made it a daily paper in 1813, originally with a focus on congressional debates. Increasingly it became a political newspaper, spokesman for the opponents of Jackson and supporters of John Quincy Adams, Henry Clay, and the Whig Party. In 1851, the Washington Daily Globe replaced it as the official reporter for Congress, and circulation declined.[2]

The former Gales School in Washington, D.C., houses the Central Union Mission.

During the 1820s, Gales was a member of the prestigious society, Columbian Institute for the Promotion of Arts and Sciences, who counted among their members former presidents Andrew Jackson and John Quincy Adams and many prominent men of the day, including well-known representatives of the military, government service, medical and other professions.[3]

Gales was elected Washington Alderman in 1814. In 1827 the city council elected him to fill out the term of the resigning Roger C. Weightman. He was then elected to his own two-year term in 1828. As mayor, he broke ground on the District of Columbia's C&O Canal. He also established relief committees for the poor and dispossessed of Washington.[4]

In 1830, Gales built a "country mansion" near the old Brentwood Road on 112 acres of land he bought in 1815. He named the estate for his town of birth, Eckington and it became the namesake of Washington, D.C.'s Eckington neighborhood. The house was sold to George Truesdale, who turned it into a hotel and then, following a fire that nearly destroyed it, into a women's college known as Washington College for Young Ladies. By 1922 it became the Mt. Carmel Retreat House for Women run by the Catholic Church.

Gales died on July 21, 1860, and was buried in Congressional Cemetery.