The Overland Monthly was founded in 1868 by Anton Roman, a San Francisco bookseller and publisher who felt that he could make a success of a monthly magazine distinctively literary in character and devoted to the interests of the Pacific States. The first issue appeared, with Bret Harte as editor, in July 1868, and it subsequently became one of the greatest magazines of its day. Its fortunes declined, however, after Harte's departure for the East in 1871 and with the depression of 1873. The editorship passed successively to W. C. Bartlett, to Benjamin P. Avery of the Bulletin, and finally to T. A. Harcourt and Walter M. Fisher, two of Hubert H. Bancroft's assistants. With the issue of December 1875 the magazine ceased publication.
In January 1883 a new Overland Monthly appeared, formed by a union of the old and the Californian, a literary monthly. Milicent Washburn Shinn served as editor from 1883 to 1894.
These Overland Monthly papers were transferred to the Bancroft Library from the Main Library, most of them coming from the Rare Books Department in 1958. They consist primarily of letters, ca. 1869-1875, addressed to Benjamin P. Avery and John H. Carmany (who bought the magazine from Roman in 1870). There are also a few letters, 1884-1886, from Sherman Day and Samuel Hopkins Willey, addressed to Miss Shinn. The collection also includes some manuscript poems, a note by Hubert H. Bancroft on his history project, and an account book of moneys paid contributors, 1869-1875. The correspondence, which was removed from the binders in which it was pasted, is arranged alphabetically, with single letters in a miscellany at the beginning. The manuscripts and account book are described in the Key to Arrangement. A list of the major correspondents and the contributors of the manuscript poems are included herein.
Five letters (from Zitella Corke, J.W. Gally, Rose H. Lathrop, John Muir, and Edmund C. Stedman) were added, Mar. 1972, gift of Sheldon Cheney.