Call Number:

C0114

Repository:

Princeton University Library: Manuscripts Division

Extent:

• 8 boxes
• 2.70 linear feet

Language:

English

Preferred Citation:

Identification of specific item; Date (if known); Wilkinson Collection of Mary Mapes Dodge; Box and Folder Number; Special Collections, Princeton University Library.

Date:

1703-1955 (inclusive) and 1869-1900 (bulk)

Creator:

Dodge, Mary Mapes, 1830-1905

Form:

Articles of incorporation -- Pennsylvania -- 19th century., Contracts -- United States -- 19th century., Patents -- England -- 19th century., Ambrotypes., Daguerreotypes., Tintypes., and Editors -- United States -- 19th century.

Abstract:

Mary Mapes Dodge was an author and editor of St. Nicholas magazine. This collection consists of manuscripts and correspondence concerning St. Nicholas, and correspondence, documents, photographs, and memorabilia relating to the Dodge family.

Mary Mapes Dodge was an American children's writer and editor, best known for her novel Hans Brinker; or The Silver Skates, A Story of Life in Holland. In 1859 she began writing and editing, working with her father to publish two magazines, the Working Farmer and the United States Journal. Within a few years she had great success with a collection of short stories ns2:titled The Irvington Stories (1864). Dodge then wrote Hans Brinker, which became an instant bestseller. Later on she was an associate editor of Health and Home, edited by Harriet Beecher Stowe. She had charge of the household and children's departments of that paper. She became an editor in her own right with the children's magazine St. Nicholas, published by Charles Scribner' Sons, for she was able to solicit stories from a number of well-known writers including Mark Twain, Louisa May Alcott, and Robert Louis Stevenson. St. Nicholas became one of the most successful magazines for children during the second half of the nineteenth century, with a circulation of almost 70,000.. Dodge is buried in the Evergreen Cemetery, at Hillside, New Jersey.

The collection consists of manuscripts and correspondence concerning St. Nicholas magazine, and correspondence, documents, photographs (including daguerreotypes, ambrotypes, and tintypes), and memorabilia relating to the Dodge family, particularly James Mapes Dodge--collected by Mrs. H. Bernard Wilkinson, granddaughter of Mary Mapes Dodge. The collection contains several pages of Mary Mapes Dodge's Hans Brinker, as well as manuscripts for Louisa May Alcott's Eight Cousins and Under the Lilacs (47 pp.), Frances Hodgson Burnett's Little Lord Fauntleroy, and a biography of Douglas Jerrold. Correspondents include Samuel Langhorne Clemens, Rudyard Kipling, Theodore Roosevelt, Helen Keller, Robert Louis Stevenson, and Kate Douglas Wiggin. In addition, there is material about the Dodge Coal Storage Company, including a copy of its articles of incorporation, and various patents. Photographs include images of Mark Twain and family (some playful), Laurence Hutton, and James Mapes Dodge at the Onteora Club in the Catskills, as well as images of Douglas Jerrold, Celia Thaxter, and William Fayal Clarke.