Quarterly Visitor (IA, 1844)

July 22, 2011

Roy Alden Atwood 1844, Alphabetical Order, Community Papers, Frontier Papers, Images, Iowa, Q, United States Leave a comment

Quarterly Visitor (IA, 1844); upper right corner of front page missing from extant copy

Publication History:

Place of Publication: Washington, Iowa

Frequency:  Quarterly

Volume and Issue Data:  Extant issue, June 1844

Size and Format:  13 x 20 inches; three columns; four pages; ink

Editor/Publisher:  Daniel C. Stover

Title Changes and Continuation:  None

General Description and Notes:

The extant copy of the Quarterly Visitor, June, 1844, contained three basic types of material:  news, features and editorials.  The front page contained mostly poems and short moralisms.  The second page carried three editorials (one which attacked the political neutrality of the Domestic Quarterly Review, another local handwritten paper), a report on an extra session of the Iowa legislature, three news items about rain, wheat and wind, a humor piece about someone’s misfortunes while seeking a claim, a biographical sketch of Henry Clay and two brief news stories.  The third page continued the biographical descriptions of “the most distinguished statesmen now living” (Clay, Martin Van Buren, John C. Calhoun, Richard M. Johnson, James Buchanan and John Tyler).  The rest of the page had an article about the organization of neighboring Keokuk County, a letter to the editor (dated Washington, June 25, 1844) and five short news items.  Included on the third page was a map of Keokuk County showing rivers, townships and sections.  The last page was one-third poetry and two-thirds news items.  Included in the news items were an accidental drowning story and an obituary.

Quarterly Visitor (IA, 1844)

Several references in the extant issue to previous issues provide evidence that at least one previous issue of the paper was written.

Daniel C. Stover, the editor, was a lawyer and had started a law practice in the county seat town of Washington with his brother sometime in 1840, a year after their arrival in Iowa City from Indiana.  In 1844 Stover served as the secretary of the Democratic Convention held in Washington, and was nominated as the Democratic candidate for the Washington County Commissioner’s Clerk.  During the period Stover edited the Visitor, his brother was the district court clerk in Washington.

Information Sources:

Bibliography:  Roy Alden Atwood, “Handwritten Newspapers on the Iowa Frontier, 1844-1854,” Journalism History, 7:2 (Summer 1980), 56-59, 66-67; Nathan Littler, History of Washington County, 1835-1875, ed. by Edna Jones (Washington, Iowa:  Jonathan C. Clark, 1977) pp. 29, 126, 221-222; Kathy Fisher, In the Beginning There Was Land:  A History of Washington County, Iowa (Washington, Iowa:  Washington Historical Society, 1978), pp. 107, 190-191.

Locations:  State Historical Society of Iowa, Archives, Iowa City, Iowa

Like It or Lump It (OR, 1844)

July 13, 2011

Roy Alden Atwood 1844, Alphabetical Order, L, Oregon, Organization Newspapers, United States Leave a comment

Publication History:

Place of Publication:  Falls?, Oregon (1844)

Frequency: Unknown

Volume and Issue Data:  Dec. 1844

Size and Format: Unknown

Editor/Publisher:  Falls Literary Association

Title Changes and Continuation: None

General Description and Notes:

None

Information Sources:

Bibliography: None

Locations: Oregon Historical Society

Domestic Quarterly Review (IA, 1844)

June 20, 2011

Roy Alden Atwood 1844, Alphabetical Order, D, Frontier Papers, Iowa, United States Leave a comment

Publication History:

Place of Publication:  Washington, Iowa; Sigourney, Iowa (1844)

Frequency:  Quarterly?

Volume and Issue Data:  Vol. 1, No. 1, April 1, 1844; at least three issues

Size and Format:  Four pages, 13″x21″; three columns per page

Editor/Publisher:  S.A. James

Title Changes and Continuation:  None

General Description and Notes:

According to Littler, the first issue of the Domestic Quarterly Review was “without doubt the first document published in the county that at all approximated in dignity of appearance, manner and matter of regular newspaper issue.”  Littler says the Review was a “12 column sheet, 3 wide columns to the page, and the pages were in size 13 by 21 inches” and “contained “probably as much matter in it as are found in regularly printed newspaper sheets of the same size.”

James described the Review as “a complete family, Young Lady or Gentleman’s newspaper” devoted “to Literature, Amusement and Particular Intelligence.”  The Review was “written and published at the low price of $1.00 a year, invariably in advance, and will be mailed to subscribers so as to reach them on the first day of each quarter in any part of the United States.”  James included a request that “Editors will confer a favor by giving the above notice (with this notice) an insertion.”

The editor of another local handwritten paper, the Quarterly Visitor, notes in that publication’s summer 1844 issue that “the printing office, publishing the ‘Quarterly Review,’ has removed to Sigourney in Keokuk Co.”  The Keokuk County History of 1880, which made liberal use of interviews with James, says that he issued three numbers of his handwritten newspaper.  The county history also notes that James lived in a small log cabin with his family for sometime after his move, so it seems doubtful that the “printing office” involved much more than the writing skills of James and perhaps his wife, Sarah.

Information Sources:

Bibliography:  Nathan Littler, History of Washington County, (Iowa), 1835-1875, ed. by Edna Jones (Washington, Iowa:  Jonathan Clark, 1977), 221-222; The History of Keokuk County, Iowa (Des Moines:  Union Historical Company, 1880), 459-460; Roy Alden Atwood, “Handwritten Newspapers on the Iowa Frontier, 1844-1854,” Journalism History, 7:2 (Summer 1980), 56-59, 66-67.

Locations:  No extant issues located, but quoted in Littler (1977).

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