From 1891 to 1898, he and Victor Crăsescu (who signed with the pen name "Ștefan Basarabescu") were founders and managers of "Amicul Copiilor" ("The Children's Friend") magazine, which circulated classic works of children's literature and is sometimes rated as the first comic book magazine in Romanian history. Hasdeu, one of its main writers, is occasionally given credit as the person behind "Amicul Copiilor". Arbore himself experimented with the genre, publishing children's versions of "Don Quixote", "Tartarin of Tarascon" and "Robinson Crusoe", as well as popular histories—one about Ancient Egypt, the other about 1821 rebel Tudor Vladimirescu. Hasdeu co-opted Arbore for the early 1899 project to create a professional association of writers as part of his Press Society (an actual Romanian Writers' Society was only created some 10 years later, after Hasdeu's death).