Stoddard, William B. [editor]. Rural Repository, 1841-1843: 10 separate issues; A Semi-Monthly Journal, Embellished with Engravings. Hudson, N. Y.: Wm. B. Stoddard, 1841-3. First Editions. [9787]
Ten 8-page issues uncut, folded they measures 12 x 9 1/2 inches, opened each individual issue is all one sheet, some light stains. Several wood engravings in the lot. Good. Single Issue Periodical.
Ten issues pertaining to history, biography, literature, poetry, &c. The wood engravings in this lot include Troy Female Seminary; West Chester Boarding School; View of New Haven from the Southwest; View of Peekskill, N. Y.; Poughkeepsie Female Academy; Smyrna; State Prison at Auburn, N. Y.; The Kolloh-Man, or West African Superstition.
"The Rural Repository will be devoted to Polite Literature; containing Moral and Sentimental Tales, Original Communications, Biography, Traveling Sketches, Amusing Miscellany, Humorous and Historical Anecdotes, Useful Recipes, Poetry, &c., &c."
This periodical was in print from 1824-1851 "William B. Stoddard, son of Ashbel Stoddard, founded the Rural Repository, a semi-monthly literary journal, on June 12, 1824...Neatly printed on good paper...So immensely popular was the Repository in Columbia County and even throughout New York State and western New England that for twenty-seven years Stoddard published his journal with marked success. Prosperity made it possible to enlarge the paper to nine by twelve inches and to use wood engravings of local scenes and buildings...Moral and sentimental tales, historical sketches dealing with nearby cities and towns, and judicious selections of biography found high favor. Poetry, much of it local in origin, added interest. Contributions by young unknown authors appeared with those of nationally known writers, such as Nathaniel Parker Willis, William Cullen Bryant, and John Greenleaf Whittier...Stoddard's failing health forced discontinuation of the Repository in 1851." - Charles Williams Upton, New York History, Vol. 25, No. 2 (April, 1944) at jstor.
