Bartlett, John (14 June 1820–03 December 1905), editor, publisher, and lexicographer, was born in Plymouth, Massachusetts, the son of William Bartlett and Susan Thacher. Bartlett’s love of words manifested itself at an early age: at three years he was reciting verses from the Bible; by nine he had read it from cover to cover. Educated in Plymouth’s public schools, he left school at the age of sixteen. Soon after, he took a job at a bookbinding company that was then associated with the University Book Store serving Harvard University in Cambridge. His copious memory and love of books soon had the university faculty and students using him as a ready reference tool. “Ask John Bartlett” was the frequent answer to most questions. To help his memory, Bartlett began keeping a notebook of common phrases and quotations....
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Bartlett, John (1820-1905), editor, publisher, and lexicographer
John J. Doherty
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Day, F. Holland (1864-1933), publisher, photographer, and bibliophile
Estelle Jussim
Day, F. Holland (23 July 1864–06 November 1933), publisher, photographer, and bibliophile, was born Fred Holland Day in Norwood, Massachusetts, the son of Lewis Day, an industrialist, and Anna Smith. The only child of wealthy parents, young Day was educated largely by private tutors. The family split their time between their Norwood house and an apartment in Boston, at that time considered the Athens of America. At fifteen Day accompanied his mother to Denver, where she recuperated from a lung disease. It was in Denver that he made his first sustained contact with a large colony of Chinese, and their art and material culture made a lasting impact on him. He began to draw with Chinese inks and brushes and purchased many Chinese artifacts; he remained fascinated by Oriental culture to his dying day. This fascination was abetted by the world-class Oriental collections at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts....
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Fields, James Thomas (1817-1881), publisher, editor, writer, and lecturer
Rita K. Gollin
Fields, James Thomas (31 December 1817–24 April 1881), publisher, editor, writer, and lecturer, was born in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, the son of Michael Fields, a sea captain, and Margaret Beck Fields. His father died at sea before James's fourth birthday, leaving his devoted mother little more than the modest house where she raised her two sons. A gregarious and book-loving boy, James completed high school at the age of thirteen, then headed for Boston. Although college was never an option, a family friend arranged what turned out to be the next best thing: an apprenticeship with the booksellers Carter and Hendee at what is still known as the Old Corner Bookstore. Remaining at that workplace after Carter and Hendee sold out to Allen and Ticknor in 1832, and after ...
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Gode-von Aesch, Alexander (1906-1970), linguist, translator, and publisher
Dennis Wepman
Gode-von Aesch, Alexander (30 October 1906–10 August 1970), linguist, translator, and publisher, was born Alexander Gottfried Friedrich Gode-von Aesch in Bremen, Germany, the son of Heinrich Gode, a businessman, and Anna von Aesch. With a German father and a Swiss mother, Alexander Gode, as he was most often known, was multilingual from childhood and studied language at the Universities of Vienna and Paris. He immigrated to the United States in 1927 to pursue his education further and became a citizen in 1939. He obtained a master of arts degree in languages at Columbia University in New York City in 1929 and a doctorate of philosophy in Germanic studies there ten years later. He married Johanna Roeser in 1930; the couple had two children. After his wife's death in 1963 he married Janet Alison Livermore, with whom he also had two children....
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Huberman, Leo (1903-1968), teacher, writer, and publisher
Elizabeth Huberman
Huberman, Leo (17 October 1903–09 November 1968), teacher, writer, and publisher, was born in Newark, New Jersey, the son of Joseph Huberman, a painter and decorator, and Fannie Kramerman. After graduating in 1922 from Newark State Normal School he taught in the Newark public schools (1922–1926). Huberman received a B.S. in education in 1926 and later an M.S. in 1937 from New York University. During summer vacations he gained valuable industrial experience (beginning at age eleven) by working in a celluloid factory, a glass factory, as a post office clerk, and as a runner on Wall Street....
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Sheed, Francis Joseph (1897-1981), Catholic street preacher and book publisher
Edward R. Kantowicz
Sheed, Francis Joseph (20 March 1897–20 November 1981), Catholic street preacher and book publisher, was born in Sydney, Australia, the son of John Sheed, a draftsman, and Mary Maloney. Sheed’s family background prepared him for a lifetime of religious controversy. His father’s family were Scottish Presbyterians with a bitter animus against Roman Catholicism, while his father was a Marxist as well as a violently abusive alcoholic. His Irish mother, however, remained a devout Catholic all of her life and insisted that her son be baptized in the Roman church. For some inexplicable reason, his father insisted that the son attend Methodist Sunday school. This gave Frank a lifelong love for Wesleyan hymns and a very Protestant attraction to the person of Jesus. At the same time, it seems to have confirmed his Catholicism by driving it underground and giving it a whiff of martyrdom....
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Smith, Lloyd Pearsall (1822-1886), librarian, publisher, and editor
Donald G. Davis and Jeannette Woodward
Smith, Lloyd Pearsall (06 February 1822–02 July 1886), librarian, publisher, and editor, was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the son of John Jay Smith, a librarian, and Rachel Collins Pearsall. Following graduation from Haverford College at age fifteen, Smith became a bookkeeper and an accountant in the counting house of Waln & Leaming. In 1844 he married Hannah E. Jones, with whom he later adopted a daughter. While still at Waln & Leaming, Smith began publishing, among other works, ...
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Wilson, Halsey William (1868-1954), bibliographer and publisher
Marie C. Ellis
Wilson, Halsey William (12 May 1868–01 March 1954), bibliographer and publisher, was born in Wilmington, Vermont, the son of John Thompson Wilson, a stonecutter, and Althea Dunnell. An only child, Wilson lost both his parents to tuberculosis before he was three, and he spent his early childhood with his mother’s parents, first in Shelburne Falls, Massachusetts, and later near Colrain. When Wilson was twelve, he went to live with an uncle on a farm near Waterloo, Iowa. After attending the preparatory academy associated with Beloit College, in Wisconsin, from 1883 to 1885, Wilson moved to Minneapolis, studying at the University of Minnesota intermittently from 1885 to 1892. Hardworking and energetic, he financed his educational pursuits in a variety of ways, including running a small printing operation from his room. In December 1889 he and his roommate formed a partnership to sell books to fellow students, a venture that proved to be so successful and time-consuming that Wilson discontinued his college studies to concentrate on managing and expanding the enterprise. He later purchased his partner’s share of the bookshop with money inherited from his grandfather....
