Ss mcclure autobiography

Originally published in 1914.
The first installment of My Autobiography by SS McClure, which ran in McClure's Magazine from October 1913 through May 1914.
Many of the earliest books, particularly those dating back to the 1900s and before, are now extremely scarce and increasingly expensive.

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S. S. McClure

American publisher (1857–1949)

S. S. McClure
S. S. McClure (c. 1903)
Born	Samuel Sidney McClure (1857-02-17)February 17, 1857 County Antrim, Ireland (now Northern Ireland)
Died	March 21, 1949(1949-03-21) (aged 92) New York City
Education	Knox College
Occupation(s)	Investigative journalist, publisher, editor
Spouse	Harriet Hurd (1883-1929; her death)

Samuel Sidney McClure (February 17, 1857 – March 21, 1949) was an American publisher who became known as a key figure in investigative, or muckraking, journalism. He co-founded and ran McClure's Magazine from 1893 to 1911, which ran numerous exposées of wrongdoing in business and politics, such as those written by Ida Tarbell, Ray Stannard Baker, and Lincoln Steffens. The magazine ran fiction and nonfiction by the leading writers of the day, including Sarah Orne Jewett, Mark Twain, William Dean Howells, Joel Chandler Harris, Jack London, Stephen Crane, William Allen White and Willa Cather.

Biography

He was born to an Ulster Scots family in County Antrim

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The Autobiography of S. S. McClure

S. S. McClure was one of America’s greatest editors and publishers in the lively era of muckraking reform. He is remembered for McClure’s Magazine, which early in the twentieth century published the works of famous authors and social reformers. He was also the mentor of young Willa Cather. After leaving her position at McClure’s in 1912, Cather ghosted this graceful portrait of her former boss.

Cather’s developing style is clear throughout The Autobiography of S. S. McClure. She goes far inside her subject to find his voice and catch the rhythms of his exciting life: his immigration from Ireland to America, his Horatio Alger–like rise from poverty and struggle to success. Cather shows the risks he took in forming the first newspaper syndicate in the United States, which gave him access to such literary masters as Conan Doyle, Rudyard Kipling, and Robert Louis Stevenson. His extensive contacts were advantageous later in establishing McClure’s, the medium for muckrakers like Ida Tarbell and Lincoln Steffens. These famous figures, and many o

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I wish to express my indebtedness to Miss Willa Sibert Cather for her invaluable assistance in the preparation of these memoirs. —S. S. McClure

So begins the first installment of My Autobiography by S. S. McClure, which ran in McClure's Magazine from October 1913 through May 1914. At the request of the magazine's new editors, who had ousted McClure in 1911 in an attempt to save the bankrupt periodical, McClure agreed to publish his autobiography in McClure's and relinquish any money earned through its publication as repayment on the magazine's debts. Ironically, however, this self-proclaimed self-made man ultimately relied on the talents and work of another in the writing of his life story, the most lasting representation of himself. Though McClure had frequently edited others' writing during his tenure at the magazine, he never imagined himself a writer and instead recruited the help of former McClure's editor Willa Cather. McClure's initial statement of gratitude, however, does not fully disclose Cather's essential role in the work; more than offering mere assistance,