What did The Daily Courant blue plaque do at 12 Ludgate Circus?

The Story

# The Daily Courant at 12 Ludgate Circus Standing at this corner of Ludgate Circus in 1702, a modest printing house became the birthplace of London's newspaper revolution—the first daily newspaper to grace the capital's streets. From this very address, Edward Mallet and his team sent forth *The Daily Courant*, a single-sheet publication that transformed how Londoners consumed news, shifting from weekly broadsides and letters to the immediacy of daily reporting. Though the house itself no longer stands, this location near St. Paul's Cathedral was perfectly positioned for a printing enterprise in the heart of the City, where merchants, politicians, and curious citizens could gather news that was merely hours old rather than days. This humble printing house mattered profoundly not just to journalism, but to democracy itself—for it proved that Londoners hungered for current information and that daily publication was not merely possible, but essential, establishing a template for newspapers that would dominate the next three centuries and beyond.