Richard M. Peabody Gargoyle Magazine collection

Richard Myers Peabody, Jr. (1951- ) is a life long resident of the Washington DC area and has been a central figure in the literary intellectual life of the city. Peabody was one of the founding editors and publisher of Gargoyle magazine, a highly regarded Washington DC literary journal that published 36 issues between 1976 and 1990. Gargoyle magazine, which Peabody funded almost completely with his modest personal income, published the work of local writers as well as the literary compositions of internationally known authors, such as T.C. Boyle and Charles Bukowski. Peabody also ran an independent publishing company, Paycock Press, for which he designed, edited and published twelve books from 1976 to 1990.

Peabody is the author of three books of poetry, Sad Fashions (1990), Echt & Ersatz (1985), and I'm in Love with the Morton Salt Girl (1979), as well as a volume of short fiction entitled Monaural (1980). He has also edited several collections, including D.C. Magazines: A Literary Perspective (1982), Mavericks: Nine Independent Publishers (1983), Mondo Barbie (1993) and Coming to Terms: A Literary History of Abortion (1994). He has published numerous poems and fictional articles in Here!, Unicorn Times, Carousel, Trouser Press, The American Magazine, New South Writing, as well as many others.

A Washington, DC native, Peabody earned his degrees from local universities a bachelor of arts in English from the University of Maryland in 1973 and a masters in Art Literature from The American University in 1975. He attended Georgetown Writer's Conference in the summer of 1975. Peabody has taught creative writing courses and workshops at St. John's College in Annapolis, Maryland, at The Writer's Center in Bethesda, Maryland, at Georgetown University and at the University of Maryland.

Gelman Library retains an extensive collection of Peabody's Gargoyle magazine, as well as the book, D.C. Magazines: A Literary Retrospective, which he edited in 1981. The Peabody Gargoyle Magazine Collection is part of the Washington Writers Archives (WWA) at the Gelman Library's Department of Special Collections. WWA includes original manuscripts and records from writer's organizations in the Washington, DC area. Other collections in this archive include The David McAleavey Papers, which contains videotaped footage of Peabody speaking at the Washington Writing Conference, The Grace Cavalieri Papers, The Poetry Committee of the Greater Washington Area Records and The Word Works Records.

Gargoyle Magazine was an American anthology including poetry, fiction, articles, art, photos, interviews, satire, reviews, long poems, parts of novels and collages of European and American writers and artists. The magazine was founded in Bethesda, Maryland in 1976 by Richard Peabody, Russell Cox and Paul Pasquarella. Thirty eight issues were published between 1976 and 1990. Contributors were paid with one copy of the magazine in which their work appeared. The magazine is indexed in the Index of American Periodical Verse. In 1979, Peabody's independent publishing company, Paycock Press, began publishing books.