How did the humble coffee house establish itself in England — the home of the pub — and gain the reputation of the “penny university”? A large part of this has to do with a group of people known as “runners”.
In the Oxford district, these “runners” would travel from one coffee house to another, gathering and sharing the latest and most exciting news. They would also carry bulletins, pamphlets, and handwritten or printed newspapers with them for patrons to read. Historian Tom Garner describes it as “human wi-fi” — an early form of rapidly communicating new ideas among groups of people at previously unimaginable speeds. Many coffee house owners developed agreements with publishers for the rights to distribute their publications. On top of this, some coffee houses began to hang bags on the walls for mailing items, eventually developing into the most efficient postal network of 18th century England.
This rapid dissemination of ideas, coupled with the democratisation of philosophy in coffee houses, played an important role in the blossoming of the Enlightenment — an intellectual and cultural movement which emphasised reason, natural rights and government by consent.
