The Walt Whitman Archive
Life & Letters
Correspondence
About this Item
Title: Walt Whitman to David McKay, [25 December 1888]
Date: [December 25, 1888]
Whitman Archive ID: upa.00125
Source: Walt Whitman Collection, 1842–1957, Rare Book & Manuscript Library, University of Pennsylvania. Transcribed from digital images or a microfilm reproduction of the original item. For a description of the editorial rationale behind our treatment of the correspondence, see our statement of editorial policy.
Contributors to digital file: Alex Ashland, Breanna Himschoot, and Stephanie Blalock
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Dave, I send a couple copies of my pho's, one for the children each—(If I knew their first names I w'd have written on)
W W
Have just had my breakfast—hot buckwheat cakes with syrup & a cup of tea—Merry Christmas to you & all
Walt Whitman
Correspondent:
David McKay (1860–1918) took
over Philadelphia-based publisher Rees Welsh's bookselling and publishing
businesses in 1881–2. McKay and Rees Welsh published the 1881 edition of
Leaves of Grass after opposition from the Boston
District Attorney prompted James R. Osgood & Company of Boston, the
publisher Whitman had originally contracted with for publication of the volume,
to withdraw. McKay also went on to publish Specimen Days &
Collect, November Boughs, Gems
from Walt Whitman, and Complete Prose Works. For
more information about McKay, see Joel Myerson, "McKay, David (1860–1918)," Walt Whitman: An
Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New York:
Garland Publishing, 1998).