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Man finds 19th-century periodicals
2007-08-05
An antiques collector stumbled upon a Civil War-era rarity that was about to suffer the same fate as yesterday's trash. Antiques collector Stephen Burns discovered that a pile of periodicals intended for the garbage heap turned out to be dozens of issues of "Little Pilgrim," a children's reader published in Philadelphia in the 1850s and '60s. The periodical featured fiction, poetry, riddles and other items for young readers. Burns was at an auction when a bidder bought a box of books, then offered him the primers in the bottom of the box. They would have just been thrown away, Burns said. He read and researched the periodicals over time, and discovered he had 64 issues of Little Pilgrim. The children's publication was written and edited by Grace Greenwood, an author, pioneering newspaperwoman, abolitionist, and women's rights advocate. Grace Greenwood was the pen name of Sara Jane Clarke, a native of Pompey, N.Y., and descendant of the preacher and theologian Jonathan Edwards. Burns, 65, now hopes to make the periodicals part of the curriculum in schools. He's seeking corporate sponsorship for an education program that could be used in classrooms.
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