The Cambridge History of English and American Literature in 18 Volumes (1907–21). rn VOLUME XVII. Later National Literature, Part II.
XIX. Later Magazines§ 13. The Galaxy
The Galaxy, an Illustrated Magazine of Entertaining Reading was published in New York from 1866 to 1878. Among contributors to the first volume were William Dean Howells, Henry James, Stedman, Stoddard, Bayard Taylor, Anthony Trollope, William Winter, Phœbe Cary, and C. G. Leland. As might be inferred from the subtitle, the Galaxy devoted much space to fiction, yet its quality may be indicated by the fact that when it died its subscription list went to The Atlantic Monthly.
In Philadelphia, Sartain’s Union Magazine of Literature and Art ran its brief course from 1849 to 1852. The proprietor, John Sartain, was one of the greatest of American mezzotint engravers, and the artistic excellence of the plates issued with the magazine may have helped to arouse interest in periodical illustrations of high grade; but the development of later magazine illustration did not lie in the direction of mezzotints. Lippincott’s Magazine of Literature, Science, and Education, founded in 1868, was at first a fairly solid general magazine, without illustrations. In the competition toward the close of the century it adopted a popular form, with many pictures and a complete novelette in each issue, and boasted in its prospectus: “It offers no problems to solve, has no continued stories to hinder, and appeals to you just when you want it.”