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"Christmas at Valley Forge 1943" Johns Hopkins Magazine, December 1965

 File — Container: 3, Folder: 16

Scope and Contents note

From the Series:

In Series 1: Writings are both drafts and published material that illustrate Sidney Offit's successful literary career. Novels, short stories, opinion pieces, essays, and examples of his editorial work are included. The largest part of the series contains drafts, revisions, corrections, notes, and annotations for Memoir of the Bookie's Son published in 1995. The many revisions and notes demonstrate a writer's progress from Chapter I of a project to publication. Galley sheets and business papers with St. Martin's Press are also included. All the items together present a view of writing, publishing, and promotion in the present period. Complementing the literary papers are four bound scrapbooks with copies of publicity, reviews, and correspondence related to Memoir of the Bookie's Son. Offit's often funny but very poignant tribute to his father touched many readers, and their thoughtful responses are collected in the scrapbooks. (See also scrapbooks in Series 8: Personal (Boxes 22 and 23) that contain similar items related to Memoir and other published volumes.)

Interesting too in this series are earlier examples of Offit's writings for popular magazines - stories published in Boy's Life (1971) for young readers; action adventures in Famous Western (1956, 1958) ; and a romantic tale in the Saturday Evening Post (Dec. 1956) entitled "He Kissed Me." Offit, an acknowledged baseball fan, was a contributing editor for Baseball Magazine (1955-1958). Issues of the magazine (1940-1964) are included in Series I, and they offer a pleasant and historical view of the sport in past years. Also in the series are examples of Offit's later editorial work represented in the various issues of Politics Today (1978-1980) for which he as served as book editor and Intellectual Digest (1970-1974) for which he served as associate editor.

Offit noted that two published pieces from his prodigious writing career were particularly meaningful for him. One essay written for the Columbia Journalism Review (Sept./Oct. 1974) entitled "The Death of ID" (Intellectual Digest) discussed the history and demise of the journal, and another piece written for the Johns Hopkins Magazine (1972) entitled "Baker, Barth and Sanskrit Scholar" referred back to his admiration for scholars at Hopkins. Copies of both articles are included in Series I (Box 3).

The manuscripts and letters related to Offit's books for young readers are among the archives of the Children's Literature Research Collection, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis MN 55455.

Dates

  • Creation: December 1965

Creator

Conditions Governing Access

Access to the Author's League Fund applications restricted until 5 years after DONOR's death.

This collection is housed off-site and requires 48-hours notice for retrieval. Please contact Special Collections for more information.

Extent

From the Collection: 68.46 Cubic Feet (45 record center cartons, 18 letter size document boxes, 1 letter half-size document box, 2 legal half-size document boxes, 1 flat box (20.5 x 14.5 x 1.5 inches), 4 flat boxes (15.5 x 12 x 3 inches), 1 flat box (15.5 x 10.5 x 3 inches), 1 flat box (21 x 17 x 1.5 inches), 2 oversize boxes (19 x 13 x 6 inches), 1 custom box (16.5 x 8.5 x 10.5 inches))

Language of Materials

From the Collection: English

Repository Details

Part of the Special Collections Repository

Contact:
The Sheridan Libraries
Special Collections
3400 N Charles St
Baltimore MD 21218 USA