Fashioning of Middle-Class America

Sartain’s Union Magazine of Literature and Art, a Philadelphia periodical published monthly from 1849 to 1852, appealed to a quickly growing American middle-class readership through its rich variety of contents. In addition to providing a general history of this relatively unexplored antebellum periodical, this book argues that Sartain’s sought to shape a distinctly American and middle-class culture through its literary offerings, engravings, and columns on art, music, flowers, architecture, and fashion. It explores the periodical’s religious and moral messages and their relationship to the development of American middle-class culture. It also highlights the role of women in its publication, as particularly evident in its co-editorship by Caroline Kirkland and its contributions by numerous women writers.

«Among the hundreds of antebellum periodicals that helped to define American life and culture in the nineteenth century, ‘Sartain’s Union Magazine of Literature and Art’ (1849-1852) particularly stands out, not only for the quality of its contents (it was one of the earliest journals to pay its contributors, among them Edgar Poe and Longfellow), but because it has been consistently overlooked in studies of the period. Heidi Nichols finally corrects this surprising omission and demonstrates in her detailed and thoughtful examination of this important periodical that, like its more celebrated Philadelphia competitor – Godey’s Lady’s Book – Sartain’s exerted notable influence in matters literary, artistic, and social.» (Sterling DeLano, Professor of American Literature, Villanova University)

The Author: Heidi L. Nichols is Assistant Professor of English at Lancaster Bible College. She received her M.A. in English from Villanova University and her Ph.D. in Literature and Criticism from Indiana University of Pennsylvania. She has published articles on colonial and antebellum women writers.