Publisher_Odyssey



In 1832, William Ticknor and James Thomas Fields both created a strong connection with the Riverside Press in Cambridge, Massachusetts. This was a printing company founded in1852 and owned by Henry Oscar Houghton, who was also a one-term mayor of Cambridge, Massachusetts. It was named the Riverside press because it was located next to the Charles River. Shortly after, he and George Mifflin become partners in 1872 and founded another publishing company. It became known for “…the typographic, stylistic, and artistic components of its work…”(par.2) The motto that was used from 1880 on was “‘…tout bien ou rien’ – do it well or not at all’”(par.2). The company was very hard working and the employees that worked there took pride in what they were doing. In 1880 Ticknor, Fields, Houghton, and Mifflin combined their printing operations. This combined the many different works of writers with the knowledge and experience of a publisher thus renaming themselves Houghton Mifflin Company. Shortly after 1888, the company was established as an Educational department. The sale of educational materials increased by 500 percent between 1891 and 1908. When Houghton died in 1895, Mifflin used Riverside Press’s reputation of high quality printing by releasing numerous ornate editions of written classical works. In 1905 there were about 60 steel presses, and to new buildings added to the current one to increase productivity. Eight years later it began to print standardized tests making it the fourth largest educational publisher in North America during 1921. Although it was a private for a while, Houghton Mifflin (HTN) then became a publicly traded company in 1967 on the New York Stock Exchange. It is currently no longer traded under that symbol, it is back to being a privately held company. With World War II being close ahead, printing production increased again. By 1946, Riverside Press expanded to the point where it owned all the surrounding land that once was vacant. Over the next couple of decades, Houghton Mifflin, which was the parent company of Riverside Press, invested three million dollars into the further development of the press. But by the last 1960’s its capability was called into question and by 1971, after 120 years of printing, Riverside Press was shut down.

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