“Our Dogs” Magazine With Thurber’s “Snapshot Of A Dog”
A Thurber piece turned up in a magazine I never heard of until about ten minutes ago: Our Dogs: A Magazine for Dog Lovers. In their Spring 1953 issue, Elizabeth Taylor is the cover subject, and James Thurber gets a name-check. His short piece, “Snapshot of a Dog,” (a fond recollection of Rex, his “American Bull terrier”) was reprinted from The New Yorker, where it originally appeared March 9, 1935. Here’s what the opening page looks like in the dog mag.
Sharp-eyed readers might remember that the dog shown lower right of the Our Dog opening page was sold at auction in September of last year.
Here’s the Snapshot title as it appears in that 1935 issue of The New Yorker:
Same issue: a wonderful Thurber drawing appears on The Goings On About Town section:
And…this drawing deeper in the issue:
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James Thurber’s A-Z Spill entry:
James Thurber Born, Columbus, Ohio, December 8, 1894. Died 1961, New York City. New Yorker work: 1927 -1961, with several pieces run posthumously. According to the New Yorker’s legendary editor, William Shawn, “In the early days, a small company of writers, artists, and editors — E.B. White, James Thurber, Peter Arno, and Katharine White among them — did more to make the magazine what it is than can be measured.”
Key cartoon collection: The Seal in the Bedroom and Other Predicaments (Harper & Bros., 1932). Key anthology (writings & drawings): The Thurber Carnival (Harper & Row, 1945). There have been a number of Thurber biographies. Burton Bernstein’s Thurber (Dodd, Mead, 1975) and Harrison Kinney’s James Thurber: His Life and Times (Henry Holt & Co., 1995) are essential. Website