Merry's Museum
Merry's Museum (1841–1872) was an illustrated children's magazine established by Samuel Griswold Goodrich in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1841. Louisa May Alcott served as editor for a year or so, and also contributed stories, as did Lucretia Peabody Hale, Caroline Hewins, Rebecca Sophia Clarke, Helen W. Pierson, and others. For some time it was published in New York.
Overview
Samuel Griswold Goodrich established the magazine in Boston in 1841. He continued to oversee the magazine until 1854.[1] Goodrich had previously written books for children under the guise of a character named Peter Parley. For his new project, he created a similar figure named Robert Merry who "narrated" the contents of the magazine.[2]
In 1868 Boston's Horace B. Fuller bought the enterprise, and remained as publisher until 1872, when the magazine ceased.[3] At the departure of John N. Stearns, Fuller invited Louisa May Alcott to serve as editor for an annual salary of $500. She found the offer more attractive than another that came around the same time from publisher Thomas Niles suggesting she write a girls' book (which eventually became the novel Little Women), though she had never written juvenile fiction. Alcott hoped to improve the magazine with content that was not only entertaining but also instructive.[4]
Editors included Goodrich (1841–1850); Rev. S.T. Allen (ca.1850);[5] and Alcott (ca.1868–1870).[6] Among the many contributors were Mary Bedford, Katherine Bertha, Emer Birdsey, Kitty Carroll, Margaret Field, Lilian Louise Gilbert, E.B. Greene, Mary B. Harris, Annie Moore, Anna North, Annie Phillips, Mary N. Prescott, Rose Scott, M.G. Sleeper, Olive Thorne, and Elisabeth A. Thurston.
References
- ^ Samuel Griswold Goodrich. Recollections of a Lifetime: or Men and Things I Have Seen, v.2. 1857; p.543.
- ^ Ogihara-Shuck, Eriko. "From Cane to Chair: Old Age and Storytelling in Juvenile Literature by Hawthorne, Goodrich, and Mogridge". From Alive and Kicking at All Ages; Cultural Constructions of Health and Life Course Identity (Ulla Kriebernegg, Roberta Maierhofer, and Barbara Ratzenböck, eds). Bielefeld, Germany: Transcript, 2014: 315. ISBN 978-3839425824
- ^ "A Visit to Merry's Museum". Merrycoz. Retrieved 23 August 2016.
- ^ Stern, Madeleine B. Louisa May Alcott: A Biography. Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1996: 163. ISBN 978-1-55553-417-2
- ^ Goodrich. 1857; p.543.
- ^ Frank Luther Mott. A History of American Magazines: 1741–1850, Volume 3. Harvard University Press, 1938; p.714+
Further reading
- Madeleine B. Stern. Louisa's Wonder Book: A Newly Discovered Alcott Juvenile. American Literature, Vol. 26, No. 3 (Nov., 1954), pp. 384–390.
- Pat Pflieger. A Visit to Merry's Museum; or, Social Values in a Nineteenth-Century American Periodical for Children (diss.). 1987–2006.
- "Merry's Museum." Louisa May Alcott encyclopedia. Greenwood Pr., 2001; p. 207+.
External links
Media related to Merry's Museum at Wikimedia Commons
- Merry's Museum. v.1–2 (Boston: Bradbury & Soden, School Street, 1841); v.11 (1849); v.13 (1847); v.15–16 (1848); v.20 (1850); v.27–28 (1854); v.33–34 (1857).
- Merry's Museum, new series. v.1 (Boston: Horace B. Fuller, Bromfield Street, 1868); (1869); (1871).
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