In the issue published the week of August 22, 1846, The People's Journal, a socially progressive and literarily well-connected weekly, reported on a painter/forester in Sherwood Forest around whom a sort of school had started. The journal published reports like these in the optimistic belief that "[t]he influence of [similar] example[s] propagates itself with wonderful rapidity, and, aided by the press and public opinion, it is enabled to exercise a power almost omnipotent" (15).

To read a related blog post, click here: https://blogs.baylor.edu/19crs/2020/01/17/progressive-pragmatic-redemption-the-peoples-journal/