The next year there were printed, and kept for sale at the office of the _Pittsburgh Gazette_, spelling books, and _The A.B.C. with the Shorter Catechism, to which are Added Some Short and Easy Questions for Children_; secular instruction was combined with religious.[23] The _Pittsburgh Gazette_ also conducted an emporium where other reading matter might be purchased. In the issue for June 16, 1787, an illuminating notice appeared: “At the printing office, Pittsburgh, may be had the laws of this State, passed between the thirtieth of September, 1775, and the Revolution; New Testaments; Dilworth’s Spelling Books; New England Primers, with _Catechism_; _Westminster Shorter Catechism; Journey from Philadelphia to New York by Way of Burlington and South Amboy_, by Robert Slenner, Stocking Weaver; ... also a few books for the learner of the French language.” In November, 1787, there was announced as being in press at the office of the _Pittsburgh Gazette_ the _Pittsburgh Almanac or Western Ephemeris for 1788_.[24] The same year that the almanac appeared, John Boyd attempted the establishment of a circulating library. In his announcement on July 26th,[25] he declared that the library would be opened as soon as a hundred subscribers were secured; and that it would consist of five hundred well chosen books. Subscriptions were to be received at the office of the _Pittsburgh Gazette_. Boyd committed suicide in the early part of August by hanging himself to a tree on the hill in the town, which has ever since borne his name, and Scull became the sole owner of the _Pittsburgh Gazette_. This act of self-destruction, and the fact that Boyd’s name as owner appeared in the _Pittsburgh Gazette_ for the last time on August 2d, would indicate that the library was never established. Perhaps it was the anticipated failure of the enterprise that prompted Boyd to commit suicide. The door to higher education was opened on February 28, 1787, when the Pittsburgh Academy was incorporated by an Act of the General Assembly. This was the germ which has since developed into the University of Pittsburgh. Another step which tended to the material and mental advancement of the place, was the inauguration of a movement for communicating regularly with the outside world. On September 30, 1786, a post route was established with Philadelphia,[26] and the next year the general government entered into a contract for carrying the mails between Pittsburgh and that city.[27] Almost immediately afterward a post office was established in Pittsburgh with Scull as postmaster, and a regular post between the village and Philadelphia and the East was opened on July 19, 1788.[28] These events constituted another milestone in the progress of Pittsburgh.