History
In December 1840, Graham had just acquired Burton's Gentleman's Magazine for $3,500, paying a dollar for each of its 3,500 subscribers, and merged it with another recently-purchased magazine, Atkinson's Casket, which only had 1500 subscribers. The Casket, subtitled "Flowers of Literature, Wit, and Sentiment" had been in existence since 1826 and, despite the small subscriber base, was flourishing financially.
Graham intended his new magazine to be popular amongst both men and women, containing fashion, photographs, music, short stories and critical reviews. He also hoped to reach out to both mainstream audiences and those with more refined tastes. Graham was not a writer himself, other than a section at the back of each issue called "Graham's Small Talk", and so relied heavily on contributors. To that end, Graham made sure it was popular amongst writers as a well-paying journal; the $5 standard become known as a "Graham page". Other journals at the time were paying the standard rate of $1 per page. His attempt at attracting the best contributors worked: Contributors to the magazine included William Cullen Bryant, Nathaniel Hawthorne, James Russell Lowell, Christopher Pearse Cranch, Fitz-Greene Halleck, George D. Prentice, Alice and Phoebe Cary. Not all writers, however, were paid. A notice in the May 1841 issue read:
"Writers who send articles to this Magazine for publication, must state distinctly at the time of sending them, whether they expect pay. We cannot allow compensation unless by special contract before publication. This rule will hereafter be rigidly enforced."
James Fenimore Cooper was reportedly the highest-paid contributor to Graham's, receiving $1,600 for the serial "The Islets of the Gulf, or Rose-Budd", later published as Jack Tier, or The Florida Reefs. He received another $1,000 for a series of biographies on distinguished naval commanders. Graham's at one point was advertised as having the most distinctive list of contributors ever achieved by any American magazine. Graham's boasted that many issues of his magazine cost $1,500 for "authorship" alone.
Graham's may have been the first magazine in America to copyright each issue. By March 1842, Graham's Magazine was issuing 40,000 copies. This boom was reflective of a changing market in American readership. John Sartain believed its success was due to the appeal of the engravings he provided for each issue. The Saturday Evening Post reported that the August 1841 issue of Graham's cost $1,300 for these "embellishments". The Post reported April 30, 1842: "It is doubtful, if engravings of equal beauty ever adorned an American work". Typical engravings in Graham's included bridges, happy maids, and scenes which focused on peaceful domestic life and promoted marriage. The editorial staff grew to include "two lady editors", Ann S. Stephens and Emma Catherine Embury.
Read more about this topic: Graham's Magazine
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