Nathan C. Brooks - The American Museum

The American Museum

In 1838, Brooks purchased Summer Lincoln Fairfield's The North American Quarterly and moved the publication from Philadelphia to Baltimore. Brooks partnered with Dr. Joseph E. Snodgrass, a Baltimore physician, to transform the publication into the The American Museum of Science, Literature and the Arts. The magazine mainly functioned as a literary publication, featuring literary criticism as well as poetry and short stories.

Brooks, who was a friend of the famed poet Edgar Allan Poe, published several of Poe's works in The American Museum. Poe's "Ligeia", "A Predicament" (published as "The Scythe of Time"), and "The Haunted Palace" were all originally published in Brooks' magazine. Nevertheless, the magazine was short lived. Only two volumes of the magazine were published and it ceased to exist after 1839.