Tag: Early 1800s

Publishing Firsts: Stereotyping

Vaults in the Harper & Brothers offices where stereotyped plates were stored (circa 1855).
The Harper brothers first began publishing in the early 1800s, when emerging technologies were fundamentally changing the process of printing–replacing the painstaking compositing, inking, and pulling processes needed for each page. More

Thomas Nelson: The Beginning

Title page of the Thomas Nelson edition of the Adventures of Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe (1860).
In 1800, an upstart 20-year-old printer named Thomas Neilson (who later changed his name to Nelson) set off a firestorm of controversy throughout the Scottish publishing world by offering something never before seen in Great Britain: classic books produced and printed for “the common man.” More

William Collins

Charles Chalmers and Rev. Thomas Chalmers.
Born on the south side of Glasgow in the village of Pollokshaws in 1789, William Collins left school to work as a weaver and clerk in a local cotton mill. More

Herman Melville and Moby-Dick

The original agreement between Herman Melville and Harper & Brothers for Moby-Dick, dated September 12, 1851.
Harper & Brothers turned down Herman Melville’s first book, Typee: A Peep at Polynesian Life, and it was released to strong sales by another publisher. More

Protectors Of Authors’ Rights

The first installment of Great Expectations by Charles Dickens published in Harper’s Weekly.
In the early 1800s, American publishers were notorious for reprinting titles from overseas at a fraction of the price, and without payment to authors. More

Early Offices

Westbow
Thomas Nelson’s bookshop once sat in a half-timbered storefront at 7 West Bow in Edinburgh, one of many rickety buildings rising precariously from the Z-shaped street like upside-down pyramids. More