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Horatio alger myth examples

Horatio Alger, Jr. After graduating from Harvard College in , he traveled in Europe, then spent three years writing for local newspapers. His father pressured him into enrolling at Harvard Divinity School, from which he received a degree in Alger spent another year traveling in Europe, and was ordained as a minister of a Unitarian church in Brewster, Massachusetts in In , however, after having written several novels that drew little notice, he moved to New York to devote himself to writing.

Ragged Dick , his first serial story, became a bestseller. Through his biographies and novels, Alger created an architypical hero who embodied the American dream: a young man who brought himself out of poverty through hard work, and succeeded in becoming a man of greatness. The "Alger hero" influenced and inspired many young men of his generation, and contributed to the general acceptance of the business creed of the time.