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At the same time that journalists and editors were celebrating the vibrant new urban culture emerging in the United States at the point of mid-century, several commentators were criticizing the slavish dependence of American architects on classical or medieval styles. Those promoting an indigenous American architecture found an ardent advocate in the Boston-born sculptor Horatio Greenough with his new “functionalist” theory. However, the most fervent celebrant of the “triumph of the real” during the 1850s was a writer hardly known today: Charles Godfrey Leland who became the spirited editor of Philadelphia's struggling Graham's Monthly late in 1856. Leland brought a fresh conviction that America had reached a transitional stage in its cultural history. Leland discovered in Walt Whitman the epitome of the vigorous new cultural outlook he advocated. By rooting romantic idealism in an affection for everyday realities, Whitman became the most potent catalyst for change in 19th-century American culture with genteel conservatism and domestic sentimentalism.

This chapter discusses the effusion of gases through small holes and the concept of flux. Effusion is the process by which a gas escapes from a very small hole. The empirical relation known as Graham's law of effusion states that the rate of effusion is inversely proportional to the square root of the mass of the effusing molecule. The concept of flux is a very important one in thermal physics. It quantifies the flow of particles or the flow of energy or even the flow of momentum.

This chapter explores the proliferation of American art through the distribution of magazines with engraved pictures during the mid-1800s. It explains that several magazines such as Saturday Evening Post, Godey’s Lady’s Book, and Graham’s Lady’s and Gentleman’s Magazine published various engraved American artworks and these were circulated for thousands of readers to see. It points out that the wide circulation of the magazines was an important factor in the democratization of American art, as it gave an opportunity for the middle and lower classes to appreciate and enjoy art.

This chapter explores promotional strategies and editorial matter used in Godey’s Lady’s Book, Graham’s Lady’s and Gentleman’s Magazine, Peterson’s Magazine, and Sartain’s Union Magazine. These show differences on how these publications addressed their respective audiences. Godey’s artworks consisted mainly of images of women and children, to target its audience which consisted mainly of mothers. Both Graham’s and Peterson’s used numerous images of idealized beauty, as they both assumed that the majority of their readers were unmarried males. Sartain’s used titillating images of Indian maidens aimed to arouse a majority male readership.

This chapter examines competition between the magazines Godey’s Lady’s Book, Graham’s Lady’s and Gentleman’s Magazine, Peterson’s Magazine, and Sartain’s Union Magazine, in securing engravers. Both magazines Godey’s and Graham’s vied for the services of a well-known line engraver William E. Tucker. This ended with victory for Godey’s magazine. Peterson’s stayed away from conflict and relied heavily in its resident engraver, Jacob D. Gross, a pupil of the mezzotint engraving pioneer John Sartain. The chapter notes that Sartain’s competed heavily against Godey’s in securing engravers, with the former using John Sartain’s connections with his fellow engravers and the latter using its vast funds to attract talent.

This chapter discusses the rise of lithographic art print companies such as Goupil, Vibert and Co. and Currier and Ives in the 1850s, which eclipsed the prominence of illustrated magazines in Philadelphia. Lithographic prints were cheaper and easier to produce, and with the artists working for both Goupil, Vibert and Co. and Currier and Ives, the American public started to shift their focus toward art prints. Both Graham’s Lady’s and Gentleman’s Magazine and Sartain’s Union Magazine ended in the 1850s. Godey’s Lady’s Book and Peterson’s Magazine continued to thrive, as they continued to publish high quality literature and they kept a loyal readership.