American monthly magazine
The Galaxy
|
Frequency
| Monthly
|
---|
Publisher
| W.C. and F. P. Church
|
---|
Founder
| W.C. and F. P. Church
|
---|
Founded
| 1866
|
---|
First issue
| May 1, 1866
(
1866-May-01
)
|
---|
Final issue
| 1878
|
---|
Country
| United States
|
---|
Based in
| New York City
|
---|
Language
| English
|
---|
Galaxy Magazine
, or
The Galaxy
, was an American monthly magazine founded by
William Conant Church
and his brother
Francis P. Church
in 1866.
[1]
[2]
[3]
[4]
In 1868,
Sheldon and Company
gained financial control of the magazine and it was eventually absorbed by
The Atlantic Monthly
in 1878.
[2]
[5]
Notable contributors to the magazine include
Mark Twain
,
Walt Whitman
,
Ion Hanford Perdicaris
and
Henry James
.
[2]
[4]
[6]
[7]
History
[
edit
]
In 1861, after the start of the
Civil War
, William Church served as a war correspondent for the
New York Evening Post
[8]
and later for
The New York Times
.
[9]
[10]
In 1863, after leaving the war behind, William and his brother started the
Army and Navy Journal
, and in 1866 they started
Galaxy
magazine.
Oliver Wendell Holmes
, who had named
The Atlantic Monthly
, may have named the new magazine.
[11]
The Church brothers published and edited the magazine for two years from 1866 to 1868. The publishing house of Sheldon and Company took over publishing in 1868, and ten years later in 1878 Sheldon ceased publication of the magazine and it was absorbed into
The Atlantic
.
[12]
[13]
Francis Church later went to work as an editorial writer for the
New York Sun
, where he wrote the Christmas editorial commonly referred to as "
Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus
."
[4]
Notable contributors
[
edit
]
After the magazine went into publication in 1866, besides the Church brothers working as editors,
Frederic Beecher Perkins
, a well known librarian and an experienced editor, was an office editor and
Richard Grant White
was an editorial contributor who wrote special articles for the magazine.
[11]
As departments were added to the
Galaxy
, other writers were added. George E. Pond, who had been associate editor of the
Army and Navy Journal
, wrote an editorial column (mainly political) called "Drift-Wood" under the name of "Phillip Quilibet", and
S.S. Conant
, who was editor of
Harper's Weekly
, wrote and critiqued for the
Galaxy's
fine arts department.
[11]
James F. Meline contributed reviews of French and German books, while
Professor E.L. Youmans
, edited the "Scientific Miscellany" from 1871 to 1874.
Carl Benson
, in private life known as
Charles Astor Bristed
, wrote for the department called "Casual Cogitations".
[11]
The
Galaxy
published many of Henry James's early short stories, including "A Day of Days" (1866), "A Light Man" (1869) and "
Madame de Mauves
" (1874).
[14]
Mark Twain wrote a column called "Memoranda" for the magazine from 1870 to 1871. Twain's introductory column announced that his department would carry "ample dissertations upon political economy".
[15]
Twain went on to contribute over eighty pieces to the
Galaxy
, which paid him $20 per page for his monthly column, more than double its regular rate.
[4]
[16]
In December 1866,
The Galaxy
published the first biographical essay of the poet Walt Whitman, written by his friend John Burroughs, titled "Walt Whitman and His
Drum-Taps
."
[17]
[18]
The magazine went on to publish four poems by Whitman,
A Carol of Harvest
(1867),
Brother of All with Generous Hand
(1870),
Warble for Lilac-Time
(1870), and
0 Star of France
(1871).
The Galaxy
also printed the beginnings of Whitman's essay
Democratic Vistas
in two articles. The first part titled
Democracy
, was published in December 1867 and the second part,
Personalism
, appeared in May 1868. Edward F. Grier wrote about the poet: "Whitman's position as a
Galaxy
author was important to his personal fortunes and his literary reputation.
The Galaxy
was respectable, it was popular, and it paid generously. It also provided a venue where Whitman could join with other writers in exploring the meaning of literary nationalism and cultural democracy for the new era."
[18]
See also
[
edit
]
Wikimedia Commons has media related to
The Galaxy
.
References
[
edit
]
- ^
James Henry (January 2, 2014).
Henry James: A Life in Letters
. Penguin Books Limited. pp. 46?.
ISBN
978-0-14-192213-3
. Retrieved
November 2,
2014
.
- ^
a
b
c
"Walt Whitman to Francis P. Church and William C. Church, 15 November 1869"
. The Walt Whitman Archive.
Archived
from the original on November 2, 2014.
With his brother Francis Pharcellus (1839?1906), he established the Galaxy in 1866.
- ^
"Francis Pharcellus Church"
. Rootsweb.
- ^
a
b
c
d
"Mark Twain's Contributions To
The Galaxy
"
. Twain Quotes.
- ^
NYT Obit (May 24, 1917).
"Col. W. C. Church, Editor, Dies at 80"
(PDF)
.
The New York Times
. Retrieved
4 January
2013
.
- ^
"Henry James, Collected Travel Writings: Great Britain and America"
. The Library of America.
- ^
Perdicaris, Ion Hanford (1866).
The Galaxy A Magazine of Entertaining Reading · Volume 2
. pp. 378?380.
- ^
Munsey's Magazine
. Frank A. Munsey & Company. 1917. pp. 717?.
- ^
"Francis Pharcellus Church"
. Storm Fax.
- ^
"Church, William Conant (1836-1917)"
. Lehigh University.
- ^
a
b
c
d
Frank L. Mott (January 1, 1938).
A History of American Magazines, 1865-1885
. Harvard University Press. pp. 361?.
ISBN
978-0-674-39552-7
.
- ^
The Galaxy
, A magazine of entertaining reading
. Stanford University. 1866.
- ^
"
The Galaxy
"
. University of Pennsylvania.
- ^
Eric L. Haralson; Kendall Johnson (2009).
Critical Companion to Henry James: A Literary Reference to His Life and Work
. Infobase Publishing. pp. 427?.
ISBN
978-1-4381-1727-0
.
- ^
J.R. LeMaster; James D. Wilson (May 13, 2013).
The Routledge Encyclopedia of Mark Twain
. Routledge. pp. 586?.
ISBN
978-1-135-88128-3
.
- ^
"Mark Twain in the Magazines"
. Cornell University.
- ^
John Burroughs (1971).
Notes on Walt Whitman, as poet and person
. Haskell House.
ISBN
9780838309223
.
- ^
a
b
Scholnick, Robert J. (1996), "
"Culture" or Democracy: Whitman, Eugene Benson, and
The Galaxy
",
Walt Whitman Quarterly Review
,
13
(4): 189?198,
doi
:
10.13008/2153-3695.1532
,
ISSN
0737-0679
External links
[
edit
]