The Observer. Seven issues: Vol. I, No. 6 (Feb. 7, 1807) through Vol. I, No. 12 (Mar. 21, 1807). by [Early American Magazine.] [Woman Editor.] Beatrice Ironside (pseudonym of Eliza Anderson or Eliza Anderson Godefoy) - 1807

In late 1806 at the age of 27, Eliza Anderson began publishing The Observer, a weekly magazine, in Baltimore. Anderson thus arguably became the first female editor of a general interest magazine in the United States. Prior to Anderson's efforts, a few other women had edited American magazines, but those had been intended for a female audience. The Observer's audience, in contrast, was the general public.

Prior to The Observer, Anderson contributed to and, toward the end of its run, apparently edited The Companion and Weekly Miscellany, a Baltimore magazine published from November, 1804 through October, 1806. After that magazine ceased publication, the 27-year old Anderson started The Observer. The Observer had a run of just over a year – from late November, 1806 through December, 1807. This brief run was not atypical for American magazines of the time.

Offered here is a remarkable run of seven issues of The Observer in their original printed wrappers, Vol. I, Nos. 6-12, from February 7 through March 21, 1807. Each issue is 16 pages, not including the wrappers. (Issue 10 lacks 4 pages.)

The magazine included regular columns, original essays and verse, literary criticisms and letters to the editor (and responses). One commentator on the magazine suggested that the editor "apparently did most of the writing himself, for there is a notable similarity among nearly all the articles." [This commentator, W. Bird Terwilliger, writing in his 1941 doctoral dissertation on Baltimore literary periodicals, did not have access to recent scholarship which identified Ms. Anderson as the editor.]

In the February 21, 1807 issue of The Observer, Anderson introduced herself as editor under the pseudonym "Beatrice Ironside" as follows:

"As our able predecessors have always made it a point to let the public in some measure, into the secret of who and what kind of personages it might be, who took upon themselves the office of enlightening and amusing them, we cannot be in this respect less complaisant, than those in whose steps we humbly attempt to follow: and nothing doubting that much curiosity had been excited to know, what manner of woman our female editor may be, we shall proceed without farther delay, to satisfy our readers on this important question."

She continued by letting readers know what was to come: expect satire from the magazine and bring on the criticism that it may generate; she will merely turn an "iron-side" to it:

"She happens to have been luckily so constructed, that she can turn an iron-side to the `proud man's contumely,' (or woman's either) . . . and tho' she can return with cordial warmth the kindness and good will that may be proffered to her, yet insolence and neglect she knows how to endure with the happiest indifference. She will therefore, always take the liberty of laughing at the affected, the ridiculous and the vain, both in the lords and ladies of the creation, whenever it pleaseth her good fancy to do so; and the more fearlessly, not being very anxious about popularity."

Beatrice's "Budget" would appear as a fairly regular column in the magazine. There are two additional installments in this run.

Other notable content includes two excerpts from Washington Irving's "Whim-Whams and Opinions" ("Salmagundi"), a contemporary periodical from New York. And to cover the science beat, Anderson included material by her father, John Crawford, a Baltimore physician. Three installments of "An Anniversary Oration" introduce Crawford's work on quarantines. His theories of germ transmission of disease were widely scorned at the time, so The Observer may have been an alternative publication venue to the medical journals of the time for Crawford.

The wrappers are a main attraction of this group of issues. The customary practice at the time was to accumulate the individual issues of a volume and then have the complete volume of issues bound. In the process, the wrappers were discarded. And although the wrappers often contain "only" advertisements, they can provide a wealth of information, especially related to publishing history, since the ads are frequently books for sale or prospectuses for works to be published.

In this group of issues, for instance, there are detailed prospectuses for the publication of a new newspaper in Baltimore, The Federal Union (or, simply, The Union, on another wrapper). We find no record of such a paper being published at the time by Samuel Magill and James Kennedy.

More tantalizing are the publishing notices for a translation of a racy French novel, Dangerous Friendship, or, The Letters of Clara D'Albe, translated by "A Lady of Baltimore." The "lady" happened to be the editor of The Observer, Eliza Anderson. (See: A "Lady" Translator, blog by Natalie Wexler: https://nataliewexler.com/tag/claire-dalbe/ for a nice account of this aspect of Anderson's literary output.) The publishing notices appear on three consecutive issues of the magazine. Interestingly, the title of the novel varies in each notice.

The first two issues have the name Ephraim T. Mitchell at the upper right of the front wrapper, presumably for distribution purposes. Also, neatly written at the foot of p. 96 in the first issue is his name and address: Ephraim T. Mitchell, South Gay St., No. 20, Baltimore.

References: Mott: History of American Magazines: p. 204. Lomazow, American Periodicals: 75. Kribbs, American Literary Periodicals, 1741-1850: 648/649 [omitting any mention of Anderson].

Condition: Each issue is 16 pages plus printed wrappers (except issue No. 10 is lacking one signature of four pages). All issues maintain their original blue/gray printed wrappers. All are or were string-tied as issued; however the string ties are absent or partially deteriorated resulting in loose signatures on most. The issues have not been trimmed, and there are occasional stains and stray ink blots. Overall, nicely preserved examples of the magazines as they would have come from the printer.

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