Item Info

Media Type: Manuscripts
Source: Rare Book Department
Notes:

It is only by chance and great good fortune that this manuscript has survived and found its way into our collection.

The original owner of the manuscript was a Mr. J. M. Johnston, who, in the spring of 1841 was an apprentice in the office of Barrett and Thrasher, printers, No. 33 Carter’s Alley, Philadelphia, where, according to his recollection, Graham’s Magazine was printed, the revised proofs being read in the Saturday Evening Post office, Chestnut above Third, near the old Public Ledger Building. After the story had been put in type and the proof read, the manuscript found its way into the waste basket. Mr. Johnston picked it out and asked permission to keep it.

Twice in the 1850’s the manuscript escaped destruction by fire, and was once consigned to a rubbish heap, but fortunately retrieved by a neighbor. At this point Mr. Johnson had it bound. It found its way into the collection of George W. Childs, publisher of the Public Ledger, and then by bequest to the Drexel Institute. Offered fifty years later at auction, it eventually came into the hands of Colonel Richard Gimbel, who gave his collection to the Free Library of Philadelphia in 1971. 

Call Number: POE Rue Morgue
Creator Name: Poe, Edgar Allan, 1809-1849 - Author