Shillaber was born in Portsmouth, New Hampshire and began work in a printing office in 1830. He moved to Boston in the 1830s, and then became an editor with the Boston Daily Post and Saturday Evening Gazette. For the Post, Shillaber introduced his character Mrs. Ruth Partington, the American version of Mrs.
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The origin of the term "shill" is uncertain; it may be an abbreviation of "shillaber". The word originally denoted a carnival worker who pretended to be a member of the audience in an attempt to elicit interest in an attraction. Some sources trace the usage back to 1914,Note: Shillaber as a surname was known in the US during the 19th century. or as far back as 1911.
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American humorist Benjamin Penhallow Shillaber (1814–1890), who often wrote under the guise of his fictional character Mrs. Ruth Partington, the American version of Mrs. Malaprop, is a possible source.
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Torrey graduated from the Boston High School under Rev. Dr. Leach. At first, he also learned the printing business and worked for several years in the company of his father, which brought him into contact with the satirical magazine, Carpet Bag by Benjamin Penhallow Shillaber. Torrey served in several companies and was a member of the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company of Boston.
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Malaprop, which he would reuse frequently throughout his career. In 1851, Shillaber became the founding editor of The Carpet-Bag with his business partner Charles G. Halpine. The Boston-based humor magazine was one of the country's first comic publications. Though it would only survive for two years, it soon earned a national reputation and enticed contributions from humorist like George Derby and others, as well as serious writers who used pseudonyms like Enoch Fitzwhistle, Peter Snooks, and John P. Squibob.
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70, quoting Harold C. Martin Edgar Allan Poe In 1832, Edgar Allan Poe began writing short stories – including "The Masque of the Red Death", "The Pit and the Pendulum", "The Fall of the House of Usher", and "The Murders in the Rue Morgue" – that explore previously hidden levels of human psychology and push the boundaries of fiction toward mystery and fantasy. Humorous writers were also popular and included Seba Smith and Benjamin Penhallow Shillaber in New England and Davy Crockett, Augustus Baldwin Longstreet, Johnson J. Hooper, Thomas Bangs Thorpe, and George Washington Harris writing about the American frontier. The New England Brahmins were a group of writers connected to Harvard University and Cambridge, Massachusetts.
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In 1851 he emigrated to America, and took up his residence at Boston, where he became assistant editor of The Boston Post, and, with Benjamin Penhallow Shillaber, commenced a humorous journal called The Carpet Bag, which was unsuccessful. He afterwards resided at Washington, where he acted as the correspondent of The New York Times. Removing to New York he secured employment on the Herald, and in a few months established relations with several periodicals. He undertook a great variety of literary work, most of which was entirely ephemeral. He next became associate editor of the ‘New York Times,’ for which paper in 1855 and 1856 he wrote the Nicaragua correspondence at the time of William Walker's filibustering expedition.
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Latin: Divitis Indiae usque ad ultimum sinumThe stage was set for Roberts diplomatic career by Salem's trade with China and the East Indies. Pursuits of members of the East India Marine Society, established in 1799 and composed of those who had sailed beyond the Cape of Good Hope or Cape Horn as masters or supercargoes contributed to the beginnings of US international relations during the period of 1788 to 1845. From 1826 to 1832, John Shillaber, American consul in Batavia, sent a series of letters suggesting that he be empowered to negotiate trade treaties. Martin van Buren replied in a letter dated 13 December 1830, sent over the signature of clerk Daniel Brent, requesting a more precise knowledge of the nature and character of the governments in question, and more details on difficulties encountered.
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Woodbury convinced Jackson to send both 10-gun ships to support Potomac - with Roberts as Jackson's "special agent". Secretary of State Edward Livingston's "Instructions to Special Agent Edmund Roberts" signed 27 January 1832, ordering him to embark upon Peacock in the guise of the captain's clerk, his mission's purpose concealed except from the captain and those with a need to know; while in passage he was to gather as much as possible of the knowledge previously requested of Shillaber; his duties as envoy would then begin at Cochin-China. Livingston added a postscript that Roberts is to receive $6 per diem. Jackson later explained to the Senate in his message of 30 May 1834, "The expenses of the agency have been defrayed out of the contingent fund for foreign intercourse".
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