a long-term contract, quoting as justification Ecclesiasticus (Chapt. 33, verse 21): "As long as thou livest and hast breath in thee, give not thyself over to any". Kipling was also present when McClure began to contemplate the launch of a new literary magazine. He recalled in his autobiography: He died in New York City in 1949, at the age of 92. He is buried next to his wife Harriet at Hope Cemetery in Galesburg, Illinois. Legacy According to his biographer Peter Lyon, McClure was, "one of the greatest instinctive editors ever to function in the US, and one of the most wretched businessmen." Lyon suggests that he had a manic-depressive personality, combining enthusiasm, tenacity, and a remarkable talent for predicting public responses. He favored Western writers, and especially muckraking articles that made his magazine famous. On the other hand, he was unstable with a hair-trigger impatience that alienated many staffers. Always in the red, he sold first his book publishing house, then his nationwide newspaper syndicate, and finally his own magazine. Notes Further reading Baxter, Katherine Isobel. "'He's lost more money on Joseph Conrad than any editor alive!': Conrad and McClure's Magazine." Conradiana 41.2 (2009): 114–131. Gorton, Stephanie. Citizen Reporters: S. S. McClure, Ida Tarbell, and the Magazine that Rewrote America. New York: Ecco/HarperCollins, 2020. (Ghostwritten by Willa Cather), a primary source McCully, Emily Arnold (2014). Ida M. Tarbell The Woman Who Challenged Big Business and Won. New York: Clarion Books. Urgo, Joseph R. "Willa Cather's Political Apprenticeship at McClure's Magazine." in Willa Cather’s New York: New Essays on Cather in the City (2000): 60–74. External links McClure Publishing Company Archives - Special Collections, University of Delaware Library 1857 births 1949 deaths American male journalists American people of Scotch-Irish descent Knox College (Illinois) alumni McClure's American magazine founders Irish emigrants to the United States (before 1923) Progressive Era in the United States American investigative journalists