Aitken, Robert (22 January 1735–15 July 1802), printer and publisher, was born in Dalkeith, Scotland. His parents’ names are unknown. Sometime after serving a regular apprenticeship with a bookbinder in Edinburgh, he became established in Paisley, Scotland, as a binder, bookseller, and proprietor of a circulating library. From there he moved to Philadelphia in May 1771 with his wife, Janet Skeoch, and two children, the eldest of whom was seven; two more children were later born in Philadelphia. In June he opened a stationer’s shop and what was soon “the largest and most valuable bookstore” in the city. With the publication in 1773 of ...
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Aitken, Robert (1735-1802), printer and publisher
Vincent Freimarck
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Alden, Henry Mills (1836-1919), editor and author
Robert C. Kennedy
Alden, Henry Mills (11 November 1836–07 October 1919), editor and author, was born in Mount Tabor, Vermont, the son of Ira Alden, a farmer, and Elizabeth Packard Moore. Alden grew up in a working-class family in rural Vermont and in the manufacturing town of Hoosick, New York, where he worked from dawn until eight o’clock at night as a “bobbin boy” in a cotton factory. With only a sporadic common school education, Alden, at the age of fourteen, decided to prepare for college by entering Ball Seminary, where he performed chores to pay for his tuition. In 1852 Alden graduated valedictorian from Ball Seminary and entered Williams College the next year....
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Allen, Paul (1775-1826), editor and poet
Steven E. Kagle
Allen, Paul (15 February 1775–18 August 1826), editor and poet, was born in Providence, Rhode Island, the son of Paul Allen, Sr., a Rhode Island state representative, and Polly Cooke, the daughter of a governor of that state. In 1793 he graduated from Brown University (then Rhode Island College), where he displayed talent as an orator. Several of his orations were published, the earliest being a eulogy on a classmate delivered on 22 November 1792. Allen studied law but never practiced; indeed, most sources follow ...
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Bailey, Francis (1735-1815), printer and journalist
William F. Steirer
Bailey, Francis (1735–1815), printer and journalist, was born in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, the son of Robert Bailey and Margaret McDill Barley, farmers. Bailey was apprenticed to Peter Miller, printer at Ephrata, at an early age, and by the time he began publishing the ...
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Barrett, Benjamin Fiske (1808-1892), pastor, writer, and publisher
David B. Eller
Barrett, Benjamin Fiske (24 June 1808–06 August 1892), pastor, writer, and publisher, was born in Dresden, Maine, the son of Oliver Barrett, a carpenter, and Elizabeth Carlton. Young Benjamin was anxious to obtain an education and took delight in mastering his preparatory studies. Through his own labor he was able to attend Bowdoin College, graduating with a B.A. in 1832. Although not raised in any Christian denomination, Barrett became attracted to Unitarianism while in college. He subsequently attended Harvard Divinity School, graduating in 1838. He was ordained in the Unitarian church that same year and assigned to a parish at Syracuse, New York....
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Benét, William Rose (1886-1950), poet and editor
Lori J. Williams
Benét, William Rose (02 February 1886–04 May 1950), poet and editor, was born in Fort Hamilton, New York, the son of James Walker Benét, an army ordnance officer, and Frances Neill Rose. He attended the Sheffield Scientific School at Yale University, graduating in 1907. While at Yale, Benét edited the ...
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Bostwick, Arthur Elmore (1860-1942), editor and librarian
John Mark Tucker
Bostwick, Arthur Elmore (08 March 1860–13 February 1942), editor and librarian, was born in Litchfield, Connecticut, the son of David Elmore Bostwick, a physician, and Adelaide McKinley. Bostwick took advantage of the cultural assets in his hometown, reading periodicals from a neighbor’s private library, studying romance and classical languages, participating in music ensembles, and attending the Episcopal church where his mother was organist. His innate intellectual abilities were thus stimulated, laying the foundation for an active life of the mind. He attended Yale College, won the first Silliman Fellowship in physical science, graduated Phi Beta Kappa, and earned a B.A. in 1881 and a Ph.D. in physics in 1883. Aspiring to a college professorship, he declined an appointment as a Fellow at the Johns Hopkins University in favor of a temporary position at Yale but, when a permanent post was not forthcoming, he moved to Montclair, New Jersey, where he taught high school from 1884 to 1886. In 1885 Bostwick married Lucy Sawyer, with whom he had three children....
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Bradford, Andrew (1686?–24 November 1742), printer and journalist
Raymond A. Craig
Bradford, Andrew (1686?–24 November 1742), printer and journalist, was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the son of William Bradford, a printer and journalist, and Elizabeth Sowle, whose father, Andrew Sowle, was a printer in London. After being arrested and released for printing a pamphlet by Quaker apostate ...
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Bradford, John (1749-1830), first printer in Kentucky
Mary Kupiec Cayton
Bradford, John (06 June 1749–20 March 1830), first printer in Kentucky, was born in Prince William (later Fauquier) County, Virginia, the son of Daniel Bradford, a surveyor for Fauquier County, and Alice Morgan. He was one of eleven children in a family that probably also farmed. Bradford’s father taught him the craft of surveying. In 1771 John Bradford married Eliza James; they had five sons and four daughters....
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Carter, John (1745-1814), printer and editor
Kevin J. Hayes
Carter, John (21 July 1745–19 August 1814), printer and editor, was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the son of John Carter, a naval officer killed in battle two months before his son’s birth, and Elizabeth Spriggs. During the late 1750s, he was apprenticed in the shop of ...
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Carter, Robert (1819-1879), author and editor
James R. Simmons
Carter, Robert (05 February 1819–15 February 1879), author and editor, was born in Albany, New York, the son of Irish immigrants (names unknown). Although most of the details of Carter’s early life remain sketchy, he was apparently raised in conditions of wretched poverty. His education came from his sporadic sojourns at public schools, until he eventually attended the Jesuit College of Chambly in Canada. He quit school at fifteen, and he was appointed assistant librarian in the state library in Albany, where he remained until 1838. By age twenty he had decided to embark on a career in journalism, having already published some poetry and essays in the Albany newspapers. In 1841 he moved to Boston, and there he met ...
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Collier, Peter Fenelon (1849-1909), publisher
Patrick John Grizzard
Collier, Peter Fenelon (12 December 1849–24 April 1909), publisher, was born in Myshall, County Carlow, Ireland, the son of Robert C. Collier and Catherine Fenelon. With his family he immigrated to the United States at the age of seventeen. He began his education in the Irish countryside and continued at St. Mary’s Seminary in Cincinnati, Ohio. His parents had often urged him to join the priesthood, but at the age of twenty Collier left the seminary and settled in New York City, where he found work as a salesman with a publishing firm specializing in Catholic books....
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Collins, Isaac (1746-1817), printer
Richard F. Hixson
Collins, Isaac (16 February 1746–21 March 1817), printer, was born near Centerville, Delaware, the son of Charles Collins and Sarah Hammond, farmers. The family were members of the Society of Friends. When his father died in 1760, Isaac was indentured as a printer’s apprentice to James Adams, whose recent arrival in Wilmington marked the beginning of printing in Delaware. Collins stayed with Adams about five years, during which time he probably met Shepard Kollock, another Adams apprentice, who, like Collins, later worked for ...
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Cowley, Malcolm (1898-1989)
Maker: Carl Van Vechten
In
Malcolm Cowley Photograph by Carl Van Vechten, 1963. Courtesy of the Library of Congress (LC-USZ62-106863).
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Cowley, Malcolm (1898-1989), literary critic and editor
Robert L. Gale
Cowley, Malcolm (24 August 1898–28 March 1989), literary critic and editor, was born in a farmhouse near Belsano, Pennsylvania, the son of William Cowley, a homeopathic physician, and Josephine Hutmacher. After attending Pittsburgh public schools, in which he began a lifelong friendship with the critic ...
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Crain, Gustavus Dedman, Jr. (1885-1973), publisher
Catherine Goldberg
Crain, Gustavus Dedman, Jr. (19 November 1885–15 December 1973), publisher, was born in Lawrenceburg, Kentucky, the son of Gustavus Dedman, Sr., a salesman, and Anna Edwards. “G. D.” Crain, as he later called himself (he hated his first name), attended public schools in Louisville, Kentucky. He later accepted a scholarship to Centre College in Danville, Kentucky, where he earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in English. Immediately after graduating from Centre College in 1904, Crain became a reporter for the ...
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Donahoe, Patrick (1811-1901), editor and publisher
Timothy Walch
Donahoe, Patrick (17 March 1811–18 March 1901), editor and publisher, was born in County Caven, Ireland, the son of Terrence Donahoe and Jane Christy. The father’s occupation is unknown, but the family was clearly poor. In 1821 Patrick and his father immigrated to Boston, Massachusetts, where the boy received a basic education and entered the printing trades in 1825. Patrick worked as a printer for several Boston newspapers and became co-owner of ...
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Draper, John (1702-1762), journalist and publisher
David E. Maas
Draper, John (29 October 1702–29 November 1762), journalist and publisher, was born in Roxbury, Massachusetts, the son of Richard Draper, a Boston shopkeeper, and Sarah Kilby. Draper grew up in a home stressing religious values; his father was a deacon at the Brattle Street church as well as a Boston selectman. Draper also was deeply religious and joined his father’s church in 1727. He was apprenticed to ...
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Draper, Margaret Green (fl. 1750–1807), printer and a publisher
Samuel Willard Crompton
Draper, Margaret Green (fl. 1750–1807), printer and a publisher, was a . Nothing certain is known regarding her parentage or the place of her birth, although some sources suggest that she was a granddaughter of printer Bartholomew Green and the daughter of Thomas Green and Ann (maiden name unknown). What is known is that she married ...
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Draper, Richard (1727-1774), Massachusetts Loyalist, printer, and publisher
David E. Maas
Draper, Richard (24 February 1727–05 June 1774), Massachusetts Loyalist, printer, and publisher, was born in Boston, Massachusetts, the son of John Draper, the publisher of the Boston News-Letter, and Deborah Green. His mother came from a family of official printers in Connecticut going back six generations to ...
