The opening of Preface
The present volume is an outgrowth of the writer’s “Handbook of American Authors,” first published in 1884, several features which the judgment of the public approved in the earlier work having been retained in this. Without pretending to contain an exhaustive list of American writers, it may nevertheless lay claim to be fairly inclusive, as the more than six thousand names herein mentioned will serve to show. A few names that might naturally be looked for here have been omitted at the request of their owners; while some others have not been included, for the reason that diligent search failed to discover any trustworthy data concerning them. Here and there, too, the reader may chance upon unfilled dates of birth, or initials unexpanded. Yet in the majority of such cases application by letter made directly to the owners of the names aforesaid, or to relatives and immediate friends of such persons, has failed to elicit any response.