The Presbyterian was begun February 16, 1831.
The Lutheran Observer was also commenced in 1831. It was a continuation of the Lutheran Intelligencer, founded in March, 1826, which was the first Lutheran periodical issued in America.
The Philadelphia Liberalist, edited by Rev. Zelotes Fuller, was issued weekly after June 9, 1832.
The Atlantic Journal and Friend of Knowledge was edited in Philadelphia in 1832 by Constantine Samuel Rafinesque. The editor was a celebrated botanist, who was born in Constantinople in 1784, and died in Philadelphia, September 14, 1842. His father had been a Philadelphia merchant. Rafinesque became professor of botany in Transylvania University, Lexington, Ky. Eight numbers only of the Atlantic Journal appeared.
The Cholera Gazette, July 11, 1832-November 21, 1832, a weekly paper, was published by Carey, Lea and Blanchard. It was edited by George Washington Dickson, a popular negro minstrel, who published in New York, in 1839, another weekly called the Polyanthus.
The North American Quarterly Magazine was begun in Philadelphia, in 1833, by Sumner Lincoln Fairfield, the author of "The Cities of the Plain." Fairfield was born in Warwick, Mass., June 25, 1803. The sad story of his life of sickness and distress was told by his wife (Jane Frazee) in 1846. She collected the money that made the existence of the magazine possible, and her pertinacity and courage kept the magazine alive for five years. Concerning the origin of the enterprise she writes:
"I returned to my home after having obtained the number of eight signatures, amounting to forty dollars. My husband took little notice of my success for a time. I paid the house rent and secured the comforts of a home. Each day I set apart for my visits five or six hours. In this way I soon laid aside the means sufficient to issue the first number of the North American Quarterly Magazine. When I had accumulated the sum of seven hundred dollars I gave it into the hands of Mr. Fairfield. He seemed amazed at my success. He found a dwelling to rent on Tenth, near Chestnut Street. To this pleasant abode we immediately repaired. In a very short time the work was out, and once more my heart rejoiced" (Autobiography of Jane Fairfield, p. 97).
Fairfield always contended that Bulwer stole from him the plot of his "Last Days of Pompeii." The story as told by Mrs. Fairfield is as follows: "His great poem, 'The Last Night of Pompeii,' was finished in 1830, and soon after its publication my husband sent copies to England, to Bulwer. He also wrote him a very long letter, but never received either an acknowledgment of the poem or the letter. Bulwer's novel of a similar title appeared about two years afterward, and, it is only justice to the poet to say, was in every respect an entire and most flagrant plagiarism. The Argument, the Introduction of the Two Lovers, Converted Christians, Forebodings of the Destruction, The Picture of Pompeii in Ruins, The Forum of Pompeii, The Manners and Morals of Campania Portrayed, Diomede, the Praetor, The Night Storm, Vesuvius Threatening, Dialogue of the Christians—the scenes of the whole plot, even the names of characters, were all taken from this most grand and sublime poem" (Autobiography of Jane Fairfield, p. 90).
The North American Quarterly Magazine ceased in 1838.
Waldie's Select Circulating Library, furnishing the best popular literature, price five dollars for fifty-two numbers, containing matter equal to fifty London duodecimo volumes; printed and published weekly by Adam Waldie, No. 6 North Eighth Street, Philadelphia. It was begun January 15, 1833, and was edited by John Jay Smith (1798-1881). Smith had been the editor of the Saturday Bulletin, 1830-32, Littell's Museum, Walsh's National Gazette and the Daily Express. The magazine reprinted standard works and published original reviews and literary notes.