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The Great

THE STORY OF THE ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA

By Herman Kogan

THE UNIVEBSITY OF CHICAGO PRESS

Library of Congress Catalog Number: 56-5379

THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PRESS, CHICAGO 37
Cambridge University Press, London, N,W. 1, England
The University of Toronto Press, Toronto 5, Canada

1958 by Herman Kogan, Published 1958

Composed and printed by Kingsport Press, Inc.,

Kingsport, Tennessee, U.S. A.

Some Prefatory Notes

This book, in which I have sought primarily to fill the assignment of
chronicler, is not intended to be the definitive history of the Ency-
clopaedia Britannica but is essentially an informal narrative designed
to tell the general reader of the origins, development, trials, and tri-
umphs of the great reference work. As such, it also relates the experi-
ences of many individuals publishers, editors, scholars, and con-
tributors, printers, critics, promoters, and salesmen who have been
part of the encyclopaedia's long and often exciting life.

I hasten to express the hope that the intellectual and scholarly
aspects of the Encyclopaedia Britannica have been competently
treated here. The discussion of each edition against its specific histori-
cal era may not be as extensive or as analytical as some may wish, but
I have sought to extract and synthesize from those editions and from
those eras articles and events of significance which typified the prevail-
ing spirit and intellectual atmosphere, whether hostile or friendly. Ad-
ditional material pertaining to the encyclopaedia's editorial history,
principally in its first 125 years, remains to be mined, and I hope that
those qualified to do so will be stimulated to engage in this task and
offer the results of their inquiries. It is a venture worthy of the efforts
of the best of scholars, and one that presents many provocative
possibilities suggested, I feel, in the pages that follow.

There is as much emphasis here on the Encyclopaedia Britannica as
a publishing enterprise a business as on its intellectual and schol-
arly elements. Justification for such emphasis is apparent to anyone
familiar with the history of encyclopaedias. Walter Yust, editor of the
Encyclopaedia Britannica since 1938, once told a convention of librar-
ians, "The business of revising books needs the businessman even
before it needs the editor and the scholar." He was referring to the
financial requirements of the system of continuous revision now used
by the Encyclopaedia Britannica. But his statement applies with equal

importance to the broader endeavor of encyclopaedia-making itself.

As this narrative shows, the Encyclopaedia Britannica has had in-
dividuals associated with it as publishers who were chiefly business-
men eager to maintain its physical and intellectual continuity. Some
were thwarted scholars or had bold streaks of vanity or were inter-
ested, above all, in profits. And some were concerned seriously with
stimulating learning and with furnishing to a vast number of persons
a means of acquiring knowledge.

Without these men, the notable editors and the distinguished con-
tributors might well have had no Encyclopaedia Britannica in which
to present the intellectual products of their erudition and experience.
With these men to finance publication, to work out plans for pro-
moting the sale of the work, and to gamble on their business acumen
and ingenuity for the financial success of various editions, the con-
tinued existence of the Encyclopaedia Britannica was assured.

A full listing of reference materials and other sources appears at
the end of this volume, but I wish at this point to thank various indi-
viduals for their indispensable help. They are, among myriad officials
of Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., the publisher and chairman, Wil-
liam Benton; its editor-in-chief, Walter Yust; its president, Robert C.
Preble; its managing editor, John V. Dodge; and the chairman of its
Board of Editors, Robert Maynard Hutchins. In Great Britain, John
Armitage, London editor of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, and Miss
Christine L, Turner, for many years the London company's secretary,
supplied data elsewhere unavailable. Stanley Morison, scholar and
wit, one of the world's prime authorities on typography, and the
official historian of the Times of London, offered vital counsel. J. S.
Maywood, chief of the intelligence division of the Times, and former
officials and employees of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, including
A. E. Dolphin, Miss Ellen Snoxall, and M. D. Law, now editor of
Charnbers's Encyclopaedia, granted interviews yielding information
that expanded my knowledge of the subject and clarified obscurities.

The responsibility for all that follows is, despite all aid and assist-
ance, fully my own.

HERMAN KOGAN

Contents

PART ONE

1. Three Men of Edinburgh 3

2. "Balloon Tytler" and Others 16

3. Constable's Famous Supplement 31

4. A Generation Spanned 44

5. The Ninth Edition and Horace Hooper 62

6. An Amazing Alliance 78

PART TWO

7. "We've Done It! We've Done It!" 87

8. Devices Novel, Devices Picturesque 94

9. Hooper's Revolution 109

10. The Book War 121

11. A Man Called "X" 132

12. Hooper Versus Jackson 143

13. The Contract With Cambridge 156

14. "High Tide Mark of Human Knowledge' 9 167

15. Triumph and Gloom 181

16. Hooper's Last Efforts 195

PART THREE

17. Prelude to 1929 211

18. "A Monument of Learning" 220

19. Innovations and Increases 238

PART FOUR

20. Bentons Gamble 249

21. Of Books, Films, and Great Books 260

22. A Crisis Met and Solved 268

PART FIVE

23. The Modern EB: How It Is Edited > . . 283

24. The Modern EB: How It Is Sold 299

Acknowledgments and Bibliography 315

Index 323

Part One

Three Men of Edinburgh

On a dismal February day in 1898 a man sat brooding in his dimly lit
office in London's Printing House Square, home of the Times. For
eight years Charles Frederick Moberly Bell, managing director of
"The Thunderer/' had struggled with the problem of keeping the
newspaper great and solvent. Sometimes the task seemed forlorn.
Sometimes a faint hope of success was aroused. In the years since he
had been summoned from his correspondent's post in Egypt, Bell,
stolidly and almost desperately, had prevented his newspaper from
sinking into a financial morass. Excessive costs, falling circulation, and
wasteful expenditures, together with the complicated arrangement by
which the heirs of the founder, the first John Walter, demanded im-
mediate payment for printing the newspaper that persisted in growing
economically ill year after year, continued to be burdensome, almost
disastrous.

Bell had worked hard. He had maintained the journalistic prestige
of the Times and built an illustrious staff, especially o foreign cor-
respondents. He had established a publications department and issued
a Times Gazetteer which produced extra revenue. And yet more money
was now needed, and more subscribers. The paper simply was unable
to support itself, certainly not with the competition from the popular
halfpenny newspapers and magazines designed principally for the
hundreds of thousands of newly educated readers.

To Bell had come scores of ideas and suggestions: the paper must
be made livelier in appearance and its grayness erased, its editorial
costs must be slashed and its high-priced foreign staff reduced. Al-
though he punctiliously scrawled earnest replies to such proposals,
Bell rejected them, for he considered them no proper solutions for
basic problems; moreover, they would require a lowering of standards
and lead to a decline in the newspaper's prestige and importance.

Now he slouched in a chair at his big oaken desk covered with un-
answered letters, galley proofs and page proofs, messages and mem-
orandums. Musing on the present and the future, he glanced at his
appointment book and stirred himself. On his schedule was a meeting
with a pair of visitors to London two Americans prepared to offer
yet another proposition. Perhaps they were worth listening to. Perhaps
their plan would have some merit. Yet, Americans?

Soon the men arrived. One was sharp-eyed, dartingly quick in his
movements and talking swiftly and choppily, a daring fellow named
James Clarke, already prospering in the book business in the United
States. The other was stocky, his eyes glistening beneath heavy brows;
he was Horace Everett Hooper, one of Clarke's partners in a firm that
specialized in bargain sales of reprints and sets of Dickens, Thackeray,
and George Eliot to settlers on the American prairies and in the new
cities of the Midwest, in sales of books publishers found it difficult to
ged rid of, and in mammoth auctions of "cheap books."

The callers wasted no time. They had come, they quickly informed
the weary Bell, with a letter of introduction from Adam W. Black of
the venerable publishing firm of A. & C. Black, in Soho Square. Bell
scanned the brief note, then lifted his shaggy head to listen.

"We have a contract with the Blacks," said Clarke, "for the reprint
rights to the ninth edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. We pro-
pose to reissue it at a very low price, much lower than it has ever sold
for. Now, we know the Times needs money and . . ."

4 THE GREAT EB

"I've been here for a year or more, sir. I have found this out/' inter-
rupted Hooper.

Bell shrugged and motioned for Clarke to continue.

"Well, we know the value of the Times '$ name. We can do each other
great good. Now here's our proposition. We propose that the Times ad-
vertise that anyone can have a set of the EB by paying only a guinea
down and thirteen more guineas yes, fourteen in all, much less than
the regular price in monthly instalments, not before the set is de-
livered but after. We, Mr. Bell, will take the risk of collecting the pay-
ments. We will pay for the advertisements in the Times and even in
other papers. We'll take at least a hundred columns of advertising
space. And all we want is the name of the Times behind us and we'll
pay the Times a good royalty. What say?"

Bell stared at the men. "But the edition is old. It's out of date.
Surely, gentlemen, everybody who wants it already owns it."

"That's not true," replied Hooper quickly. "There is a public a new
public that cannot pay cash and will buy it. This is a public that can-
not persuade a bookseller to give credit."

"But surely that public doesn't want an encyclopaedia at any price,
however low," Bell said.

"Leave it to me," replied Hooper. "We'll create a public that will
want it."

Despite the self-assurance of the Americans, Bell asked for time to
consider their proposition. When they left, he wrote a letter to Black,
seeking verification of the details they had given him:

"I have had much pleasure in seeing Mr. James Clarke, who
presented your letter of introduction, and discussing with him and
another gentleman, whose name I must apologize for forgetting, the
proposal as to the reissue of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. The pro-
posal is somewhat a novel one and from several points of view de-
serves very careful consideration. . . ." Was the arrangement a valid
one, Bell wanted to know. And was it safe to place the general propo-
sition before Arthur Walter, governing proprietor of the Times?

Black's reply reassured Bell, and soon he was in conference with
Walter, who was coldly unresponsive to any idea of affiliation with
Americans. But Bell drove hard. He emphasized the financial advan-
tages that might accrue to the Times. "We stand to lose nothing, not
even if only a single set is sold. Perhaps we will gain no revenue at all.
I understand the Civil Service Supply Association and the Army and
Navy stores are taking orders for the same set at eighteen guineas, only

THREE MEN OF EDINBURGH 5

four more than these Americans propose selling it for. Perhaps the
prospects of a big sale aren't very good, but I believe it is a plan worth
trying/'

Within a week, Clarke and Hooper were back. The Times, Bell in-
formed them, accepted their proposition. But, as ever, it must remain
conservative. In this unusual venture, the initial printing order would
be for only eight hundred sets.

With this pact, Bell instituted an extremely significant development in
the lives of the Times and the Encyclopaedia Britannica. The events
that followed upset tradition and precedent, created excitement, fury,
and controversy in the worlds of journalism, scholarship, bookselling,
and advertising, and helped to rescue from disaster both the newspa-
per and the encyclopaedia.

At the time of this vital transaction, the Encyclopaedia Britannica
had been in existence for 130 years, its life marked by some chaos and
much calm, its appeal, especially in its home country, limited mainly to
those few capable of affording it. Its progenitors had been numerous
and varied. One of the earliest works designed to present information
within the circle of human knowledge was the Naturalis historic* of
Pliny the Elder in A.B. 77, which contained some twenty thousand
extracts from two thousand works by more than four hundred writers
of his own and preceding ages. And through ensuing centuries there
appeared scores of other works encyclopaedic in nature: compilations
of philosophical or informational essays and treatises on the arts and
sciences. The Chinese are commonly accorded the distinction of having
published the first modern-style encyclopaedia, Tai Ping Ju Tan, in
the tenth century. Most remarkable in the thirteenth century was the
colossal Imagi mundi of Vincent of Beauvais, a Dominican friar and
librarian to France's Louis IX, who gathered together the knowledge
of the Middle Ages, working for twenty-four years, from 1240 to his
death in 1264. First to actually use the title of "Cyclopaedia''^ from
the Greek words meaning "learning within the circle" was a compiler
named Ringelberg in Basel in 1541; this work and others in the last
half of the sixteenth century and early part of the next were intended
to comprise, within moderate compass, a series of systematic digests
applicable to certain major departments of man's knowledge and art
or to the entire body of human learning.
The first important encyclopaedia in English most of its predeces-

6 THE CHEAT EB

sors were in Latin was the Lexicon Technicum, issued in 1704 by a
London clergyman named John Harris. Because, unlike its predeces-
sors, its contents were arranged in alphabetical order, Harris' work was
acclaimed an estimable advance toward a general encyclopaedia o
value. Actually, though it professed to be universal, the work was
limited almost entirely to mathematics and the physical sciences; one
of its contributors was Sir Isaac Newton. But its success in scholarly
circles encouraged Ephraim Chambers, a London globe-maker, to
bring forth in 1728 his impressive Cyclopaedia, or Universal Diction-
ary of Arts and Sciences, in two large folio volumes. He included such
innovations as an elaborate system of cross-references by which the
material, alphabetically arranged, was correlated.

Chambers' volumes were the direct inspiration for the famed and
influential French Encyclopedie Denis Diderot's Encyclopedia, ou
Dictionnaire raisonne des sciences, des arts et des metiers for which
the first prospectus appeared in 1750. Originally this work was in-
tended as a translation of Chambers' encyclopaedia and an expansion
of it to eight volumes with some six hundred plates. But the project
developed far beyond this innocent plan. Ostensibly the Encyclopedie
was a reference work; but its main purpose, from the very first volumes
in 1751 and 1752, was to bend its readers to rational and scientific
points of view rather than merely to impart knowledge and informa-
tion. Rousseau and Voltaire were among its contributors, and through-
out the thousands of pages in the twenty-eight volumes into which the
encyclopaedia finally grew there were strong notes of skepticism, firm
emphasis on subjects of positive knowledge, science, and technology
rather than on theology and religion, and sly criticism of existing con-
ditions in France and other parts of Europe.

The first two volumes were suppressed as injurious to royal author-
ity and to religion, and the police tried to seize all copies and the manu-
script of the next volumes. Governmental permission was eventually
secured to continue the work, and five more volumes appeared by late
1757. Within a year, however, Diderot was harassed by official inter-
ference, this time by a decree stopping the sale and an order to burn
all copies. From this point on until completion of the massive work in
1765, Diderot was forced to work in secret, but he succeeded in
completing his tremendous undertaking with the occasional conniv-
ance of friendly French authorities. For his important work, Diderot
was said to have received a meager sum, while the publishers of the
Encyclop6die amassed fortunes.

THREE MEN OF EDINBURGH 7

Publication of the French Encydopedie, discussed and fought over,
praised and criticized and evaluated everywhere as sections and then
whole volumes became available in western Europe, directly stimu-
lated the creation of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Three Scots, all
men of Edinburgh, were responsible, two of them, Andrew Bell and
Colin Macfarquhar, for the central idea and for obtaining subscribers
and the third, William Smellie ? a scholar brilliant and bibulous, for
the editing, writing, and arrangement of articles. Until this venture,
Bell was known in Edinburgh primarily for his skill in engraving
names, crests, or initials on dog collars. He was a spry fellow of unusual
appearance; he stood four and a half feet tall and had an enormous
nose and crooked legs. At parties, when guests stared or pointed to
his nose, he would disappear, then return with an even larger nose of
papier-mache. And, instead of riding a small horse through the streets
of Edinburgh, he chose the largest he could find, always mounting the
beast with a ladder while loungers cheered. Macfarquhar was a hard-
headed printer with a bent for learning. He soberly concentrated on
his business and possible profits. Evidently he engaged in what was
then and later called "ethical piracy," for he was twice brought into
court, once for reprinting without permission an edition of the Bible
and again for the same offense with Lord Chesterfield's Letters to His
Son. Each time he was compelled to pay small fines.

This pair considered the year 1768 a good one for bringing out an
encyclopaedia. Agitation and controversy over the French Encyclo-
pedic was still rife. Edinburgh was a city on the verge of a golden age,
a center of learning and a home of writers, thinkers, and philosophers,
wags, wits, and teachers. Bell and Macfarquhar intended to profit from
what they considered the errors of Diderot and other encyclopaedists.
Their production, they agreed, would differ in its basic nature: it would
have an orderly arrangement of the arts and sciences, and, although it
might be subtitled a "dictionary," it would contain not merely brief
definitions but, wherever feasible, lengthy essays and treatises. Each
art, each science, would be treated completely and definitively in a
systematic form and under its proper denomination, with technical
terms and subordinate topics also listed alphabetically. And they were
emphatic in their avowals that their Encyclopaedia Britannica would,
in intent and purpose, be as utilitarian as it would be philosophical.

Their choice for editor was only twenty-eight years old, but William

8 THE GREAT EB

Smellie was already adjudged "a veteran in wit, genius and bawdry"
among Edinburgh's literary men and intellectuals. As a boy of twelve
Smellie had been apprenticed by his father, Alexander Smellie, an
architect and stonemason in an Edinburgh suburb, to a maker of
whalebone stays for ladies' corsets. But such work was not for this boy,
and he shifted to Messrs. Hamilton, Balfour and Neal, official printers
for Edinburgh University. During his years there, Smellie was
permitted to attend whatever classes at the university he wished; he
concentrated on Latin, English, and the natural sciences. He won a
prize offered by the Edinburgh Philosophical Society for setting up a
special edition of Terence, and, by the time he was nineteen, he was
editing a literary weekly called the Scot's Journal At twenty-four he
was a master printer, publishing with two other men a compilation of
news and philosophical discussion, the Weekly Journal. Eager and in-
tellectually curious, he was one of the founders of the Newtonian Soci-
ety "for young men desirous of mental improvement." He assisted Dr.
William Buchan in preparing his scientific classic, Domestic Medi-
cine, and, after intensive botanical studies, published a series of
dissertations on the sexes of plants, in which he took strong issue with
some of the basic theories of Linnaeus and other orthodoxists.

As devoted to whiskey as to scholarship, Smellie, when roistering,
delighted in reciting tedious poems written in Latin by his father.
But Bell and Macfarquhar, appreciating his intellectual abilities, chose
him after only fleeting consideration of other possible editors. After
Smellie had agreed with the general plan of arrangement and publica-
tion, Bell wrote him a formal letter to bind the pact:

"Sir, as we are engaged in publishing a Dictionary of the Arts and
Sciences; and a,s you have informed us that there are fifteen capital
sciences which you will undertake for, and write up the subdivisions
and detached parts of these conform to your plan, and likewise to
prepare the whole work for the press etc. etc.; we hereby agree to
allow you .200 for your trouble." 1

Once hired, Smellie temporarily abandoned his drinking and de-
voted himself to his tasks. Bell and Macfarquhar bustled about Edin-
burgh with a prospectus of the forthcoming work, rounding up enough
interested Scots to be included in the "Society of Gentlemen" under
whose financial auspices the single sections, the individual volumes,
and then the entire work would be published. This kind of subscription

1 Throughout this book, the rate of exchange for the British pound is approxi-
mately $5 in American currency.

THREE MEN OF EDINBURGH 9

plan had evolved from the mode of individual patronage. As far back
as 1552 John Coxe's Tables of Grammar printed a subscription roster
of eight lords of the Privy Council. A surge in Great Britain's subscrip-
tion book publishing had come at the end of the seventeenth century
with Dryden's translation of Virgil, followed by long lists of subscribers
for Milton's Paradise Lost and for various works of Pope and Steele,
though Pope, in his "Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot," railed against those
"who roar aloud, "Subscribe! Subscribe!'" Samuel Johnson's every
enterprise had required subscribers before publication could be con-
templated, and it was he who had written, "He that asks subscribers
soon finds that he has enemies. All who do not encourage him, defame
him."

Bell and Macfarquhar managed to obtain the money they needed,
and, although Smellie insisted that he required time to turn out a more
comprehensive work, they and the subscribers pressed him. So, for
three years, sections of the encyclopaedia were issued periodically.
The first two numbers came in December, 1768, costing sixpence a
copy on plain paper and twopence more on finer paper. The first
volume ("Aa" to "Bzo") was completed and bound in 1769, the second
("Caaba" to "Lythrum") a year later and the third ("Macao" to "Zy-
glophyllum") in 1771. The price for the full set was 12, and scattered
through the volumes' 2,659 quarto pages were superb copperplate
engravings by Bell of 160 illustrations ranging from a detailed sketch
o Noah's Ark to a contemporary map of North America.

Purpose, method, and aim were crisply clear in Smellie's Preface.
"Utility ought to be the principal intention of every publication.
Wherever this intention does not plainly appear, neither the books nor
their authors have the smallest claim to the approbation of mankind."
The departure from usual encyclopaedic method was cogently stated:
"To diffuse the knowledge of Science, is the professed design of the
following work. What methods, it may be asked, have the compilers
employed to accomplish this design? Not to mention original articles,
they have had recourse to the best books upon almost every subject,
extracted the useful parts, and rejected whatever appeared trifling or
less interesting. Instead of dismembering the Sciences, by attempting
to treat them intelligibly under a multitude of technical terms, they
have digested the principles of every Science in the form of systems
or distinct treatises, and explained the terms as they occur in the order

10 THE GREAT EB

of the alphabet, with references to the Sciences to which they belong."
Smellie stressed his hope that this new kind of encyclopaedia would
benefit the greatest number of persons rather than merely please or
educate a limited group. "It is well if a man be capable of compre-
hending the principles and relations of the different parts of science,
when laid before him in one uninterrupted chain. But where is the
man who can learn the principles of any science from a Dictionary
compiled upon the plan hitherto adopted? We will, however, venture
to affirm, that any man of ordinary parts, may, if he chuses, learn the
principles of Agriculture, of Astronomy, of Botany, of Chemistry, etc.,
etc., from the ENCYCLOPAEDIA BBITANNICA." As for the "principal
authors made use of in the compilation," Smellie listed more than 150
sources, including Francis Bacon's essays, John Balfour's philosophical
writings, Chambers' Universal Dictionary of Arts and Sciences, and
other similar encyclopaedias, Hume's essays, Locke's essays on human
understanding and Voltaire's on taste, and varied gazettes, pamphlets,
magazines, newspapers, and textbooks.

How much of this first three-volume set Smellie wrote has never been
determined, but many of his own tastes, inclinations, and interests
were reflected in the pages. Certainly the article "Abridgement" was
Smellie's, for he was critical of windy rhetoric in writing and dis-
course. "Abridgement," he wrote, "is a term signifying the reduction of
a book into smaller compass. . . . This talent is peculiarly necessary to
the present state of literature; for many writers have acquired the
dexterity of spreading a few critical thoughts over several hundred
pages. When an author hits upon a thought that pleases him he is apt
to dwell upon it, to view it in different lights, to force it in improperly,
or upon the slightest relations. Though this may be pleasant to the
writer, it tires and vexes the reader."

Smellie's essay on "Language" was timely. He concluded his long
treatise on the language of the British: "Like a healthy oak planted in
rich and fertile soil, it has sprung up with vigour; and although
neglected, and suffered to be run over with weeds; although exposed
to every blast, and unprotected from every violence; it still beareth up
under all these inconveniences, and shoots up with a robust healthiness
and wild luxuriance of growth. Should this plant, so sound and vigor-
ous, be now cleared from those weeds with which it has been so
encumbered; should every obstacle which now buries it under thick

THREE MEN OF EDINBURGH II

shades, and hides it from the view of every passenger, be cleared
away; should the soil be cultivated with care, and a strong fence be
placed around it, to prevent the idle or the wicked from breaking of
distorting its branches; who can tell with what additional vigour it
would flourish; or what amazing magnitude and perfection it might at
last attain! How would the astonished world behold, with reveren-
tial awe, the majestic gracefulness of that object which they so lately

despised!"

Although poetry was discussed in a mere five hundred words and
drama in seven lines, Samuel Johnson's dictionary, published little
more than a decade before, received six pages. And not all of them
were laudatory: "Dr. Johnson, with great labour, has collected the
various meanings of every word, and quoted the authorities. But,
would it not have been an improvement if he had given an accurate
definition of the precise meaning of every word; pointed out the way
in which it ought to be employed with the greatest propriety; shewed
the various deviations from the original meaning, which custom had so
far established as to render allowable; and fixed the precise limits be-
yond which it could not be employed without becoming a vicious
expression?"

On "Woman/' the encyclopaedia was at its most succinct: "The
female of man. See HOMO." California was described as "a large
country of the West Indies"; Nigeria was called "Nigroland"; the
Sahara Desert "Sara"; Arabia "Felix"; and the mid-Atlantic referred
to as the "Ethiopic Ocean." India was described as the "Mogul Em-
pire," and South Africans were characterized as "Hottentots." Even a
prescription for toothache was included: "'Laxatives dissolved in asses'
milk/' Cold baths were prescribed for melancholy madness and the
bites of mad dogs. And in the article on "Tobacco," readers were
solemnly advised that its excessive use was capable of "drying up the
brain to a little black lump consisting of mere membranes." With these
oddities were others deemed of interest at that time. No less than
thirty-nine pages were devoted to a comprehensive discussion of
"Farriery," the art of curing the diseases of horses, treated so fully, ex-
plained Smellie, because most of the men engaged in this profession
were universally illiterate, and "the practice of this useful art has been
hitherto almost entirely confined to a set of men who are totally
ignorant of anatomy." On biblical matters, the articles reflected the
current acceptance of much legend as certain fact. Only an inch of
space was devoted to a simple but serious account of Jonah's encounter

12 THE GREAT EB

with the whale, but the section on Noah's Ark, illustrated with Bell's
engravings, was longer and quite explicit. A portion of it, referring to
the drawing of the Ark "floating on the waters of the deluge," read:
"It must be observed that besides the place requisite for the beasts and
birds, and their provisions, there was room required for Noah to lock up
household utensils, the instruments of husbandry, grain and seeds, to
sow the earth with after the deluge; for which purpose it was thought
that he might spare room in the upper storey for six and thirty cabbins,
besides a kitchen, a hall, four chambers, and a space about eight and
forty cubits in length to walk in/*

Financially, the three volumes brought no great riches to the men
most closely affiliated with the set, but the three thousand purchased
by others than subscribers constituted a reasonably good sale. Intel-
lectually, the new encyclopaedia evidently created no stir either in
this "Athens of the North" or elsewhere in the British Isles; James
Boswell, who followed almost all that went on in Edinburgh, nowhere
in his writings mentioned this initial edition.

Even the ubiquitous Boswell evidently was not aware of the angry
reaction among some buyers of the encyclopaedia to the inclusion in
the third volume not only of an unusually instructive article on
"Midwifery" but of the three accompanying full pages of copperplate
engravings that showed, in clinical detail, the exact processes involved
in normal and abnormal deliveries of babies. Many who considered the
illustrations obscene ripped the offending pages from the volume and
some, especially parents with children in school, threatened in ad-
dition to start legal action against Bell and Macfarquhar. No qualms of
any kind, however, affected two brothers, Edward and Charles Dilly,
well known in London as booksellers and exporters of books to the
American colonies; they thought well enough of this first edition of the
Encyclopaedia Britannica to issue in 1773 a reprint, omitting the names
of Bell, Macfarquhar, and Smellie but retaining on the title page the
dignified appellation of "Society of Gentlemen."

Bell and Macfarquhar pondered the possibility of establishing con-
tinuity with another edition, but for a time they did nothing about
it. Periodically both men discussed the idea with Smellie. But he
proffered no definite answer. He had turned to other editorial pursuits
and resumed his boisterous sessions with tavern cronies. In 1773 he
started the Edinburgh Magazine and Review with Gilbert Stuart, but

THREE MEN OF EDINBURGH 13

the project expired after little more than a year, primarily because the
cantankerous Stuart's slashing satires on the figures of his day ? his
intemperate drinking, and his erratic ways led to bickering and quar-
rels. Smellie also engaged in the study of French, the better to translate
Buffon's Natural History of the Earth and of Men and Quadrupeds, a
task on which he was engaged when Bell and Macfarquhar, early in
1776, approached him with a definite offer to be editor o the second
edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica.

Smellie listened, but he was unenthusiastic about their proposition,
although instead of a flat fee they now offered him one-third of the
profits. Smellie's refusal was based not on financial considerations but
on the fact that the Duke of Buccleuch, enlisted by Bell and Macfar-
quhar as one of their major subscribers, insisted that biographies of
living persons be included in the contemplated new edition. Angrily,
Smellie balked at this suggestion, maintaining that only the perspec-
tive of time could safely evaluate who was worthy of inclusion in a
contemporary encyclopaedia. When Bell and Macfarquhar sided with
their patron, Smellie declined the proposition, and his former asso-
ciates were obliged to look elsewhere for an editor.

Smellie proceeded with his translation of Buffon's classic work and
in 1780 was elected superintendent of natural history in the Society of
Antiquarians of Scotland. He also began to write his own General
System of Natural History, and his reputation as an elder in the
coteries of Edinburgh's literary set grew. With other lighthearted Scots
he organized the Crochallan Fencibles. They met periodically in the
tavern of Downey Douglas in the Anchor Close and invited politicians,
artists, writers, philosophers, and professors to speak at their gather-
ings, afterward subjecting them to the most merciless verbal assaults.
Smellie held court at these sessions, often bellowing, when asked by a
newcomer about his editorship of the Encyclopaedia Britanrnca, "I
wrote most of it, my lad, and snipped out from books enough material
for the printer. With pastepot and scissors I composed itl"

A rather grotesque figure in his later years, carelessly dressed, with
hair long and bushy, black clothes wrinkled and covered with snuff,
cocked hat rusty with wear, Smellie became a close friend of Robert
Burns when the poet came to Edinburgh. They were good compan-
ions, drinking and talking far into many nights. Burns considered
Smellie, as he later wrote to Peter Hill, an Edinburgh bookseller, a man
"positively of the first abilities and greatest strength of mind, as well as
one of the best hearts and keenest wits/' commenting that when he was

14 THE GREAT EB

in bad circumstances "if you add a tankard of brown stout and super-
add a magnum of right Oporto, you will see his sorrows vanish like the
morning mist before the summer sun." This buoyant poet ? Smellie's
"Rabbie," left, in a few lines, a vivid portrait of Smellie in those days
after his editorship of the Encyclopaedia Britannica:

To Crochallan came

The old cock'd hat, the grey surtout, the same;
His bristling beard just rising in its might,
'Twas four long nights and days to shaving night;
His uncomb'd grizzly locks, wild staring, thatch'd
A head for thought profound and clear, unmatched;
Yet tho! his caustic wit was biting, rude,
His heart was warm, benevolent, and good.

THREE MEN OF EDINBURGH 15

'Balloon Tytler 9 and Others

Rebuffed by Smellie, Bell and Macfarquhar searched among the
talented men of Edinburgh and decided upon a brilliant eccentric
named James Tytler to edit the second edition. Bom twenty-nine years
earlier in Fearn, Tytler had once inclined toward the ministry, planning
to follow the example of his father, a clergyman in the established
church of Scotland. But, unable to accept the strict doctrines, he had
then turned to medicine. To pay part of his expenses at Edinburgh
University, he had shipped out for a year to Greenland as a ship's
surgeon. Once graduated, Tytler promptly abandoned medicine to
open a small pharmacy in Leith, two miles out of Edinburgh. When
this enterprise failed because Tytler spent most of his working hours
reading obscure medical books, he took on literary hack work and

dabbled in scientific writing, toiling at meager fees for booksellers who
employed him to abridge, rewrite, or compile various volumes.

Tytler lived miserably and dressed carelessly. He was a slender little
man, a pathetic figure shuffling from bookseller to bookseller as he
sought work. As a family provider, he was abominable. It was not un-
common to see one of his children trudging through the Edinburgh
streets with a packet of copy for a printer, on whom the family's next
meal depended. Tytler's first wife deserted him and their children;
his second wife nagged and scolded him incessantly, and not without
cause.

He drank heavily, but he had phenomenal recuperative powers.
Once a Scottish gentleman requiring a brief treatise on some historical
matter tracked Tytler to a grimy garret where he was temporarily
hiding from family and creditors. Tytler, snoring heavily, lay on a
rickety bed. Roused and informed what was wanted, Tytler mumbled
to his landlady to bring paper, pen, and ink, scribbled away atop the
upturned washtub he used for a desk, and within two hours had
completed the assignment "as completely/' an admiring biographer,
Robert Meek, recorded later, "as if it had been the result of the most
mature deliberation, previous notice and a mind undisturbed by the
fumes of any liquid capable of deranging its ideas."

When Bell and Macfarquhar decided on Tytler as editor, he was
ensconced in Holyrood Palace, a debtors' sanctuary. Relieved of family
and financial responsibilities, Tytler had devoted himself there almost
entirely to his writing. He produced a volume titled Essays on the
Most Important Subjects of Natural and Revealed Religion, a compi-
lation underscored with a strong note of religious skepticism. Unable to
afford a printer, he had built his own press and set the essays by hand.
He had also written a great number of medical treatises, edited a
short-lived periodical called A Gentleman's and Ladies' Magazine, and
undertaken an abridgment of a Universal History, which he aban-
doned after turning out a single volume.

It was this gift for varied literary enterprise that prompted Bell and
Macfarquhar to overlook the many defects of Tytler's character. They
paid his debts, took him out of Holyrood Palace and installed him in
Macfarquhar's office on Nicolson Street. Not only did they know Tytler
to be a many-talented man; they also were aware of his constant state
of penury. Tytler could be had without great expense. He agreed to
work for only seventeen shillings a week, and, in his seven years with
Bell and Macfarquhar, Tytler's salary never increased; on this and re-

"BALLOON TYTLER" AND OTHERS 17

lated matters his biographer had cause to lament: "To supply the exi-
gencies of the present moment always set bounds to his pursuits, and
he was certainly happier in the possession of a few shillings than an
ignorant money-maker can possibly be with all the treasures of India.
Like many of the sons of literature, he knew not how to appreciate
his own merit, and would have furnished more valuable materials for
the contemptible sum of a few shillings than a man of inferior abilities
would have given for as many pounds."

But Tytler's encyclopaedia, for all his low pay, was a success, within
the limits of his time and place. Like the first edition of the Encyclo-
paedia Britannica, this one also was issued in separate parts, the first
appearing on June 21, 1777, the last on September 18, 1784101 in all,
making up ten volumes totaling 8,595 pages. This time Bell con-
tributed 340 plates, with a number of excellent maps placed together
in the 195-page article ''Geography." A great many articles were taken
over from the first edition; Tytler wrote dozens of new ones. On the
title page of the first bound volume of the "greatly Improved and
Enlarged" edition were indications of the advanced steps taken. For it
not only emphasized the inclusion of biographies "of the most Eminent
Persons in every Nation from the Earliest Ages down to the Present
Times" but boasted that the whole had been "COMPILED FROM THE

WRITINGS OF THE BEST AUTHORS, IN SEVERAL LANGUAGES; THE MOST
APPROVED DICTIONARIES, AS WELL OF GENERAL SCIENCE AS OF PARTICULAR
BRANCHES; THE TRANSACTIONS, JOURNALS, AND MEMOIRS, OF LEARNED
SOCIETIES, BOTH AT HOME AND ABROAD; THE MS LECTURES OF EMINENT
PROFESSORS ON DIFFERENT SCIENCES; AND A VARIETY OF ORIGINAL MA-
TERIALS, FURNISHED BY AN EXTENSIVE CORRESPONDENCE/'

Yet, for all the self-praise, there were important omissions. Al-
though the individual parts were issued during and after the American
Revolution, there was no mention of that event. Only in the article on
Boston there were none on Philadelphia or New York did an
oblique reference creep in; "The following is a description of this
capital before the commencement of the present American war,"
America was not completely neglected, however. In discussing New
England, for instance, Tytler laid emphasis on the "blind fanaticism"
with which the Puritan communities established legal codes ( "a sin-
gular mixture of good and evil, wisdom and folly") and offered this
explanation for the witchcraft frenzy of Salem; "Posterity will, proba-

18 THE GREAT EB

bly, never know exactly what was the cause or remedy of this dread-
ful disorder. It had, perhaps, its first origin in the melancholy which
those persecuted enthusiasts had brought with them from their own
country, which had increased with the scurvy they had contracted at
sea, from a change of climate and manner of living. The contagion,
however, ceased like all other epidemical distempers, exhausted by its
very communication. A perfect calm succeeded this agitation; and the
Puritans of New England have never since been seized with so
gloomy a fit of enthusiasm."

The highly touted biographies "A new department which has not
been found in any other collection of the same kind, except in the
French Encyclopedists" included an interesting assortment, subject
and space considered, A full page was given to Chaucer, a little over
a page to Jesus Christ, a page and a half to Shakespeare, a page and a
quarter to John Milton, and two pages to the essayist Joseph Addison,
"one of the brightest geniuses that this or any other country has
produced." Among the longest articles was that on war; it ran to 132
pages, enlarging in detail on the opening theme, "War is a great evil
but it is inevitable and oftentimes necessary." In "Chronology," the
date of the world's creation based on Archbishop Ussher's reckon-
ing, first added to the English Bible in 1701 was given with firm
decisiveness as 4004 B.C. Cain's birth, appropriately enough, was set
at 4003, and in 2348 B.C., read the article, "The old world is destroyed
by a deluge which continued 777 days." This event was referred to
again in the section placing the building of the Tower of Babel in
2247 B.C. "About the same time Noah is with great probability sup-
posed to have parted from his rebellious offspring and have led a
colony of some of the more tractable into the east and therefore
either he or one of his successors to have founded the ancient Chinese
monarchy."

An indication of methods of the age in treating diseases little under-
stood then was reflected in an article recording the cure devised by
Solano de Luque for tuberculosis. "He chose," wrote Tytler, "a spot of
ground on which no plants had been sown, and there he made a hole
large and deep enough to admit the patient up to the chin. The
interstices of the pit were then carefully filled up with the fresh mould,
so that the earth might everywhere come in contact with the patient's
body. In this situation the patient was suffered to remain till he began
to shiver or felt himself uneasy. . . . The patient was then taken
out, and, after being wrapped in a linen cloth, was placed upon a

"BALLOON TYTLER" AND OTHERS 19

mattress, and two hours afterwards his whole body was rubbed with
the ointment composed of the leaves of the solarium nigrum and hog's
lard/'

One article undoubtedly written by Tytler was "Flying," for he was
fanatically interested in the possibility of man's flight. After relating
how birds propelled themselves through air, Tytler told of the experi-
ments of Friar Bacon, who, five hundred years before, had affirmed
that the art of flying was possible. "He assures us, that he himself
knew how to make an engine wherein a man sitting might be able to
convey himself through the air like a bird; and further adds, that there
was then one who had tried it with success. The secret consisted in a
couple of large, thin, hollow copper globes, exhausted of air; which
being much lighter than air, would sustain a chair, wherein a person
might sit."

Tytler s devotion to these and other theories of flight was not limited
to writing about them. He devoutly believed that "in future ages, it
will be as usual to hear a man call for his wings, when he is going on a
journey, as it is now to call for his boots/' Early in 1784, after complet-
ing his work for the final volume of the edition and having contracted
with Bell and Macfarquhar to edit the next, Tytler set out to test some
of his theories of flight.

Spurred by the successful ascensions the previous year at Annonay,
France, of the Montgolfier brothers, Joseph and Jacques, in their
newly invented balloon, Tytler secured financial backing for his experi-
ment. He built a fire balloon in which hot air from a bucket of burning
coals or a small stove was introduced into the balloon, thereby pre-
sumably making the balloon lighter than air. And on August 27, 1784,
he and a crowd of cronies and backers, including a well-known golf
caddie nicknamed Lord North, the caricaturist John Kay, and business-
men and merchants, gathered at Comely Gardens, near King's Park in
Edinburgh. His balloon, 40 feet high and 30 feet in diameter, rose to
350 feet. But, after sailing jerkily for half a mile at that height, it
suddenly plummeted down upon a refuse pile along a road leading
out of the city.

Two other attempts in the next few months were equally unsuc-
cessful. In the first, the men hired to build the stove designed to furnish
hot air deceived Tytler by making it smaller than he had directed
them to, and the flight failed, a calamity that caused several gazettes,

20 THE GREAT EB

inspired by Tytler's disgruntled backers, to vilify him and suggest he be
placed under magisterial surveillance. But he made a final effort one
dawn in King's Park. This time, however, the stove engendered so
much heat that the balloon swiftly floated, before Tytler could control
its course, into a towering tree. The stove itself exploded and shat-
tered, and Tytler barely escaped with his life.

There were no further balloon ascensions, but his efforts won him the
mocking appellation of "Balloon Tytler." Robert Burns knew him thus,
writing in Notes on Scottish Song: "An obscure, tippling, but extraor-
dinary body of the name of Tytler, commonly known by the name of
Balloon Tytler, from his having projected a balloon a mortal who,
though he trudges about Edinburgh as a common printer, with leaky
shoes, a skylighted hat and knee buckles as unlike as 'George-by-the-
Grace-of-God and Solomon-the-Son-of -David,' yet that same unknown
drunken mortal is author and compiler of three-fourths of Elliott's
pompous 'Encyclopaedia Britannica,' which he composed at half a
guinea a week." On another occasion, when Tytler wrote a pamphlet
in defense of Mary, Queen of Scots, Burns was more friendly. He
sent his picture and "A Poetical Address to Mr. James Tytler," one
stanza of which read:

I send you a trifle, a head of a bard,

A trifle scarcely worthy your care;

But accept it, good sir, as a mark of regard,

Sincere as a saint's dying prayer.

The Elliott in Burns's verbal caricature was Charles Elliott, in
whose Edinburgh bookshop sets of the Encyclopaedia Britannica could
be purchased unbound for ten pounds. Elliott disposed of more than
fifteen hundred sets in less than a year, a sale that convinced Bell
and Macfarquhar that a third edition would yield even bigger profits.

But this edition was destined to do without the services of Tytler,
although he did write a dozen articles for it before disaster befell
him. After the failure of his balloon experiments, he devoted himself
primarily to literary work. His only extracurricular activity involved
tests with a perpetual motion machine, which proved unsuccessful,
and the concoction of a bleach for linen, which was effective but was
promptly purloined from him by unscrupulous clothing merchants to
whom he made his discovery known.

His non-encyclopaedic writings led to disaster. In 1792 he was im-

"BALLOON TYTLER" AND OTHEBS 21

portuned by a group calling itself "Friends of the People" to prepare
a pamphlet advocating more equal representation of all citizens in
Parliament. In the slim booklet he called on all the citizenry to ad-
dress the throne directly and scored the usual custom of petitioning
Parliament itself for reforms. For such suggestions more important men
had been tried for high treason. When Tytler heard that official in-
quiries were being made about the writer of the pamphlet, he left
Scotland. He took refuge first in a friend's house on the desolate
Salisbury Crags, then continued on to Belfast, where he waited for
the fury to die down by completing a three-volume System of Surgery,
on which he had labored intermittently for many years.

But Tytler never again returned to Scotland. When he failed to ap-
pear before the High Court of the Justiciary early in 1793, he was
banished from his native land. He sailed then for America, composing
at sea a long, banal poem titled, "The Rising of the Sun in the
West, or The Origin and Progress of Liberty/ 3 He settled in Salem,
Massachusetts, where he resumed the kind of life he had led in Scot-
land, interspersing periods of great conviviality with literary hack
duties or newspaper work. The periods of conviviality soon surpassed
the periods of industry. On a freezing January day in 1805, having
celebrated vigorously with drinking companions, Tytler staggered into
a deep ditch at the edge of a country road and caught a severe cold.
He died within a week, a failure in one sense, yet, considering the
Encyclopaedia Britannica, a man of accomplishment, a man of whom
his sorrowing but perceptive biographer offered apt estimate: "The
world was his country and the whole human race his brethren and
sisters. . . . He was a real friend to the whole human race, and if he
was an enemy to one human being, it was to himself."

At the time of Tytler's banishment, a number of single volumes of the
third edition had already been issued. Weekly numbers had started
to appear in 1787. Tytler made his editorial contributions, but Mac-
farquhar, self-educated and intellectually inquisitive, had as much to
do with the editing as Tytler. When Tytler fled the country, Mac-
farquhar took over the editorship. He intended to recruit notable con-
tributors, for he had great plans for expanding each edition of the
Encyclopaedia Britannica, as the limits of knowledge themselves were
constantly expanding, to make his set truly a compendium of all the
world's information and knowledge. But before he could put this plan

22 THE GREAT EB

into action, Macfarquhar died in 1793, worn out, it was recorded, "by
fatigue and anxiety of mind."

Bell, a more sanguine and hardy man, now assumed full ownership
and responsibility. He pushed publication, and the weekly numbers at
ten shillings each kept issuing from the printers, arousing more in-
terest, attracting more subscribers. Shortly after Macfarquhar died,
Bell hired George Gleig of Stirling to be editor. Gleig was a formida-
ble scholar, specializing in the moral and physical sciences. Earlier he
had been recruited as a contributor, and eventually his writings in
this edition totaled eighteen articles, varying from "Episcopacy" to
"Passion" to "Love and Marriage" to "Mathematics," the latter running
to 229 double-column pages. In contrast to Smellie and Tytler, Gleig,
destined in later years to be appointed a bishop of the Episcopal
Church of Scotland, worked steadily and soberly. He carried through
Macfarquhar's idea of recruiting notable contributors, inducing, among
others, Professor John Robinson, secretary of the Royal Society of
Edinburgh, to revise the article on "Optics" and to write a series of
articles on natural philosophy that attracted considerable attention
from the contemporary philosophers and intellectuals. William Smellie
himself was also a contributor. He composed a biography of Lord
Kames to supplant a scheduled sketch which the noted jurist's son,
Hugh Drummond, considered a "miserable tissue of falsehood and
malignity."

Steadily the numbers kept coming out, regularly the bound volumes
appeared, and by 1797 the third edition was deemed complete, in
eighteen volumes instead of a planned fifteen. It was a handsome set
with close to 15,000 pages, 542 engravings, and well-wrought maps
in a special section. An elaborate frontispiece showed a library with
huge Corinthian columns, in front of which men and women were
practicing the various arts and sciences described in the work; a
background disclosed a man and woman in a field with an elephant
and lion; and atop it all floated a balloon, which some wagsters
reckoned was a tribute to "Balloon Tytler." For the first time, the set
was officially dedicated. The honor was bestowed on King George III,
"Father of Your People, and enlightened Patron of Arts, Sciences and
Literature," Taking note of the war with the French, the dedication ex-
pressed the wish that "by the Wisdom of Your Councils, and the
Vigour of Your Fleets and Armies, Your MAJESTY may be enabled
soon to restore Peace to Europe; that You may again have leisure to
extend Your Royal Care to the Improvement of Arts, and the Advance-

"BALLOON TYTLER" AND OTHERS 23

ment of Knowledge; that You May Reign long over a Free, Happy and
a Loyal People. . . ."

Gleig used the Preface to take note of a prime competitor Cham-
bers' Cyclopaedia and though he cited it as a valuable work he also
referred to it as one of the "mere dictionaries." A distinguished feature
of the new edition, Gleig wrote, was that it gave "short, though lumi-
nous detail of the progress of each particular nation which from the re-
motest period to the present time has acted a conspicuous part on
the theatre of the world." As if to stress this aim, "America/' which
had covered eighteen pages in the second edition, now filled eighty.
Many articles were reprinted from the earlier editions. The one on
"Adam" informed the reader that he was "the first of the human race"
and "was formed by the Almighty on the sixth day of the Creation.
His body was made of the dust of the earth." The article concluded;
"Some are of the opinion that he died on the very spot where Jerusa-
lem was afterwards built; and was buried on the place where Christ
suffered, that so his bones might be sprinkled with the Savior's blood!"
In this edition, one exclamation mark was sufficient; there had been
three in the second edition.

In the Edinburgh community of scholars and savants, the edition
was a popular one, the best-received yet. This had been presaged al-
most from the first volume. "The patronage of a liberal subscription
made it necessary," wrote Gleig, "to double the number originally in-
tended." Eventually thirteen thousand sets were printed and the sale
of this edition and its predecessor together yielded 42,000 for Bell,
who had acquired all copyrights and sole ownership, and the heirs of
Macfarquhar. As editor, Gleig received 500 and Bell, as engraver,
received 1,000. James Hunter, an Edinburgh bookseller who acted
as a wholesaler, parceling out copies to other booksellers to dispose
of to subscribers, also profited, as did John Brown, who served as
"corrector of the press."

Popular in Scotland, its renown spreading to other sections of the
British Isles, this edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica was the
first of many to fall prey to the '"ethical pirates" in the United States.
Although the new nation's copyright laws protected Americans in
America, the act of 1790 also protected any American publisher who
wanted to reprint any British work by a special clause limiting bene-
fits to American citizens.

24 THE GREAT EB

First to take advantage of this largess was an energetic Philadelphia
printer named Thomas Dobson. He imported each number of the new
Encyclopaedia Britannica as it emerged from the printing presses
and began to issue his own by 1790. He hired such American writ-
ers as Jedidiah Morse to rewrite sections he considered either British-
biased or inaccurate, and he kept pace with the original edition, his
eighteenth volume appearing only a month or two after the one in
Edinburgh. Dobson called his set simply the Encyclopaedia; on his
title page appeared "THE FIRST AMERICAN EDITION, IN EIGHTEEN VOL-
UMES, GREATLY IMPROVED." He eliminated, of course, the dedication
to King George. His price was only six dollars for the entire set, less
than one-third the price of the original. His customers included
George Washington, who had tried to win a set in a lottery and had
failed; Thomas Jefferson, who wrote Dobson to tell him of his delight
with the articles on architecture; and Alexander Hamilton, who made
the purchase shortly before his fatal duel with Aaron Burr.

Dobson hired a number of skilled young engravers to make plates
for his edition, but all they did was to alter some of the details in
Bell's drawings. Each engraver scratched out Bell's name and substi-
tuted his own whether Scot, Thackara, Akin, Allerdice, Barker, Bal-
lance, Seymour, Lawrence, Smither, Lawson, or Trenchard and it is
ironic that, although some of these men gained considerable fame as
artists and engravers in later years, their biographers invariably indi-
cated that their renown stemmed from the plates in Dobson's En-
cyclopaedia.

A case of literary piracy closer to home was in Dublin, where
James Moore, a bookseller who also operated a lottery brokerage on
College Green, published a reprint of the third edition in 1791.
It bore the full title of Moore's Dublin Edition., Encyclopaedia Bri-
tannica, and word for word, plate for plate, was a precise reproduction
of the Edinburgh publication.

But neither Dobson's nor Moore's depredations appear to have
aroused any protest from Bell. Dobson did not halt his activities with
the third edition itself. In 1800, Glelg edited and Bell and his son-
in-law, Thomson Bonar, published a two-volume supplement to the
edition, and Dobson appropriated this, too, noting blandly in his pro-
spectus to potential buyers that Gleig intended to update various im-
portant subjects that had been treated in the first volumes of the
third edition; "Chemistry" was one of these, and "Astronomy" and
"Electricity" were others. In "Chemistry," chemical symbols were used

"BALLOON TYTLER" AND OTHERS 25

for the first time in an article written by the great Dr. Thomas
Thomson, who later based his notable System of Chemistry on his
encyclopaedia article.

The supplement itself was of considerable value in correcting errors
of earlier editions, although Gleig, for all his praise of its "beautiful
articles," was honest enough to acknowledge that imperfections still ex-
isted: "For perfection seems to be incompatible with the nature of
works constructed on such a plan, and embracing such a variety of
subjects." But the supplement is remembered because of several less
important but more picturesque details.

In the dedication to his monarch, Gleig took harsh notice of the
French EncyclopSdie, hitting directly on the basic difference between
it and his own. His was a conveyer of information, the other a shaper
of ideas and morals. "The French Encyclopedic," he wrote, "has been
accused, and justly accused, of having disseminated far and wide the
seeds of anarchy and atheism. If the Encyclopaedia Britannica shall
in any degree counteract the tendency of that pestiferous work, even
these two volumes will not be wholly unworthy of Your Majesty's at-
tention."

And it surely must have been pleasing to Gleig and Bell to hear
the story, one that has been retained in Encyclopaedia Britannica
folklore, of how the ruler of Persia, Futteh Ali, responded when the
British ambassador carried a set with him all the way from London
through months of weary traveling by land and sea. Overwhelmed by
the gift, the Shah decreed that his full title would be, after he had
read all of the volumes, "Most Exalted and Generous Prince; Bril-
liant as the Moon, Resplendent as the Sun; the Jewel of the World;
the Center of Beauty, of Musselmen and of the True Faith; Shadow
of God; Mirrow of Justice; Most Generous King of Kings; Master of
the Constellations Whose Throne is the Stirrup Cup of Heaven; and
Most Formidable Lord and Master of the Encyclopaedia Britannica! 9

Despite the satisfactory sale of this edition, strife and quarrels speckled
the final years of Andrew Bell's life. Over a disagreement about
whether to limit sales to subscribers or to attempt wider distribution
through bookstores, he and his son-in-law parted company so bitterly
that Bell vowed never to speak to Bonar again, a pledge he kept to
the day of his death in 1809. Also, after decreeing a new edition of
the Encyclopaedia Britannica, Bell found considerable fault with the

GREAT E B

man he had hired as editor, Dr. James Millar, a classical scholar and
fellow of Edinburgh's Royal College of Physicians. Bell considered
Dr. Millar too slow and dilatory. Dr. Millar, probably with justifica-
tion, insisted his salary was too meager, and for nearly a year the
two dour men refused to talk to each other and conducted their edi-
torial conferences through intermediaries.

In this strange arrangement, Dr. Millar's representative was Macvey
Napier, a bright young literary man and a member of the Society of
Writers to the Signet. Bell's representative was the man soon to be
called in Edinburgh "The Napoleon of Publishing," bold and aggres-
sive Archibald Constable. Apprenticed when a boy of twelve to a
bookseller, Constable had spent a few years in London, then had re-
turned to Edinburgh's High Street to open a store bearing the sign,
"Scarce Old Books." His first attempts at publishing, in 1795, were
quickly triumphant; he printed an account of bloody riots in Granada
by a man who had escaped. Then he sped on to more solid ventures.
In 1802 he was twenty-eight, a round-faced man, with no great learn-
ing but a fiery ambition. He was friendly with the leading literary
Scots who gathered regularly in his High Street bookshop. Even while
he was serving as Bell's intermediary with Millar, he was publishing
the new Edinburgh Review and Critical Journal, a savage, smart, and
witty journal which featured the writings of Francis Jeffrey, the lawyer-
critic, and Sydney Smith, the Anglican clergyman with the acid-tipped
pen. Constable smashed traditions and broke in on the London literary
monopoly by offering unprecedented sums to his contributors 20
for a single-page book review and as much as 1,000 for a philosophi-
cal dissertation or a long epic poem. Despite the strong Whig tone of
this journal and Constable's own political leanings, he was strengthen-
ing relations with Sir Walter Scott, an exponent of anti-Whiggism
who was nevertheless willing to deal with Constable in publishing
matters.

Through the efforts of Constable and Napier, a dubious peace be-
tween Bell and Millar was established. At Bell's urging, Constable be-
gan to take considerable interest in the publication. Harassed by rela-
tives demanding that he give Bonar a greater share in the enterprise
and irritated by quarrels with Millar, Bell turned increasingly to the
ruddy-faced High Street publisher. "Indeed," Constable recalled later,
"his calls upon my time were frequently a little inconvenient. I gave
him a great deal of advice, and if he had not had grandchildren and
two or three writers as agents, besides other interested persons about

"BALLOON TYTLER" AND OTHERS 27

him, the trouble I took in his service might have been beneficial to
us both."

By 1804, Bell proposed that Constable buy all the rights to the
Encyclopaedia Britannica, plus the parts of the fourth edition being
issued, for 20,000. But Constable declined. The work on the fourth
edition proceeded. Most of the volumes contained little more than
reprints of the third edition, except for several articles on mathematics
which won some acclaim, and a rather comprehensive account of
Dr. Edward Jenner's successful introduction of vaccination for cowpox
in 1796. When the edition was finally complete in 1810, it ran to
twenty volumes of 16,033 pages and 581 engravings, and about four
thousand sets, at 36 each, were sold. By this time Bell had been
dead a year, and Constable actively re-entered negotiations for pos-
session of the publication.

To begin with, he purchased from Bonar the copyright to the sup-
plement to the third edition for only 100. Within three years, Bell's
heirs had so mismanaged the affairs of the firm and its finances were
so snarled that its stock was put up for sale. All manner of legal mud-
dles had to be cleared, but now Constable was persistent in his zeal
to become the owner. He saw it as a property with a great future, "a
first-rate property," and his nimble mind, contemplating the advances
in knowledge, especially in scientific fields, bustled with ideas for its
improvement. So he put in his bid to purchase it all copyrights,
copies of the fifth edition that had been started in 1810 as a reprint
of the fourth, heirs' shares for 14,000. For a time Bonar delayed
negotiations; he had friends with money, and he threatened to buy
the publication himself. Eager to avoid further complications and de-
lay, Constable compromised by allowing Bonar a third interest and
finally came into possession of the property. In 1814, when Bonar died,
Constable bought his share from his heirs for a generous 4,500.

The transaction was derided by Constable's fellow publishers. They
pointed to articles already outdated. They predicted Constable would
bring ruin on himself and all connected with him by paying so large
a sum for ownership of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, especially since
he had acquired eighteen hundred copies of each of the first five
volumes of the fifth edition along with all the rest. But Constable
shrugged off the jeers. "The Encyclopaedia is no doubt the greatest
speculation we ever made/' he wrote to Robert Cathcart, one of his

28 THE GREAT EB

partners, "and will require a great command of money; but should
any doubt be entertained of the safety of it, we could have no diffi-
culty in selling it in shares for a very great premium."

Freed of the encumbrances of lawyers and Bell's relatives, Consta-
ble proceeded with spirit. He hired Dr. Millar to edit the remaining
volumes of the fifth edition. When the work neared completion in
1813, he arranged for wider distribution than any of the earlier edi-
tions had had, for he was determined that the fame of the Encyclo-
paedia Britannica and of Archibald Constable should spread
beyond the smoky limits of Edinburgh. He printed elaborate brochures
describing the virtues of the volumes; Blackwood's Magazine, started
in 1809 as a rival to Constable's Edinburgh Review, scoffed at "the
pomp of the announcement." And he became the first of the pub-
lishers of the Encyclopaedia Britannica to place advertisements in the
newspapers small, dignified, and discreet, in the mode of the day
offering the set for 36. Moreover, Constable determined to issue
a supplement to the fifth edition. This venture was to bring new
prestige to the Encyclopaedia Britannica, offer important contributions
to knowledge, and confound those who scoffed.

"BALLOON TYTLER" AND OTHERS 29

Constable s Famous Supplement

For good reason was Archibald Constable known in his trade as "The
Crafty." Shrewd in business affairs, he was also aware o new trends
in science and philosophy. He readily realized the importance o keep-
ing high the standards of the Encyclopaedia Britannica and making
it an authoritative record of such developments. He realized, too, that
unless his Encyclopaedia Britannica kept pace with rising competitors,
it might easily be outdistanced. Chambers' Cyclopaedia., now published
by Abraham Rees, was still thriving. In 1808, Dr. David Brewster, a
physicist of wide learning, had begun his Edinburgh Encyclopaedia.
A group of scholars was preparing an Encyclopaedia Metropolitana,
abandoning the alphabetical arrangement and grouping subjects under
headings of science pure, mixed, and applied history and biography,
geography, and lexicography.
Of first importance to Constable was the recruiting of authorities to

write about the subjects they knew best. In his brochure announcing
his proposed supplement to the fifth edition, he made it clear how
vital he considered such contributors. "The last four volumes of this
edition/' he wrote, "will be composed entirely of original Articles,
written by persons of the first literary eminence, purposely that all of
the most important Discoveries and Improvements in the Sciences,
Arts and Manufactures, may be brought down to the latest date; an
advantage which similar undertakings, published progressively during
a period of ten or twelve years, cannot possibly possess." No man of
modesty when his publishing projects were involved, Constable de-
clared that these volumes would "thus render the Encyclopaedia
Britannica the most complete repertory of human knowledge that
has yet been given to the public."

Even before selecting an editor, Constable engaged several out-
standing scholars to write special dissertations to be published sepa-
rately, then to be placed in the front of each volume of the supple-
ment. Dugald Stewart, the Scottish savant especially noted for his
application of common sense to the problems of philosophy, was his
guide in this venture. Stewart suggested that four major discourses be
written, one for each proposed volume, to form a general map of the
various departments of human knowledge, in much the same way
that D'Alembert's discourses served the French Encyclopedie. Each
writer would describe intellectual progress since Bacon's time.

The most distinguished of the dissertations all were long enough
for a full-sized book was Stewart's. Titled "A General View of the
Progress of Metaphysical, Ethical and Political Philosophy Since the
Revival of Letters in Europe," it ran to 423 pages of elegant rhetoric
studded with anecdote and analogy and ideas slightly tinged with the
sentiments of revolutionary France. To most readers, it imparted, as
one critic wrote, "a belief in progress the real progress which prac-
tical and human improvement are steadily, even when most imper-
ceptibly, making." Constable himself was so full of admiration that
he increased his original payment of 1,000 to the philosopher by
700.

John Playfair, another Edinburgh scholar, not only received 500
for consenting to write the dissertation on advances in mathematics
and physics he died before completing it but also profited in an-
other way. As a move toward setting up the supplement, Constable
asked half a dozen literary men to examine previous editions of the
Encyclopaedia Britannica and to prepare reports on their defects and
how they might be remedied or eliminated. Each received from 100

CONSTABLE'S FAMOUS SUPPLEMENT 31

to 200 for recommendations on which Constable based his plan for
the supplement. He turned his prospectus over to Stewart for an
expert opinion, but Stewart passed it on to Playfair. That diligent
scholar examined the prospectus and returned it to Constable within
a week, greatly improved. So pleased was Constable with Playfair's
revised plan that he sent him six bottles of his finest sherry, later
writing, "It was not to everybody I would have parted with such
wine! But the only regret which I felt upon this occasion was that I
had nothing better to offer."

With prospectus in hand, Constable sought his editor two editors,
at first, for he intended to use one for literary articles and another
for scientific essays. He considered Robert Cadell, his son-in-law and
another of his partners, and Dr. Thomas Brown, professor of moral
philosophy at Edinburgh University. Cadell was quickly rejected as
not sufficiently learned, and Dr. Brown refused the offer, an insult
which later led Constable to comment testily, "He preferred writing
trash or poetry to useful lucrative employment. It is fortunate all of us
are not equally fond of money, or the scramble would be greater and
hard blows more frequent."

Then Constable remembered the man who had been James Millar's
alter ego in the squabbles with Andrew Bell. In the decade since,
Macvey Napier had risen in stature as a contributor to magazines
and editor of the works of Sir Walter Raleigh. Constable had always
admired in Napier "a dash of gentility and aspiring consequence."
Napier accepted the assignment as sole editor. His contract, signed
on June 11, 1813, guaranteed him a fee, substantial for that period,
of 1,575, with an extra 735 if the supplement were reprinted or
if the first printing sold beyond 7,000 copies, and an additional 300
for expenses. Napier promptly set out to line up contributors who
would fulfil Constable's requirement of "first literary eminence." Fur-
nished with letters of introduction from Stewart, Napier went to Lon-
don. "Constable has prevailed upon him, after much solicitation/'
wrote Stewart to Francis Homer, the political economist, "to under-
take the laborious task of being the Editor of this work; and I really
know of no person more likely to execute it with judgment and abil-
ily."

Even when he left for London, Napier had promises of contributions
from notables besides Playfair and Stewart. Francis Jeffrey was one,
Sydney Smith another, and a third was Sir Walter Scott.

32 THE GREAT EB

Scott had been affiliated with Constable since 1802, when "The
Crafty" had published his two-volume collection of folk songs, Min-
strelsy of the Scottish Border. In 1808, responding to Constable's offer
of one thousand guineas for a new poem, Scott produced Marmion,
that vast romantic epic; its critical reception was cool, but popular
approval was so overwhelming that Constable happily printed eight
editions of the work. Although he had good reason to be grateful, Sir
Walter quarreled with Constable because of an adverse review of
Marmion in the Edinburgh Review and the magazine's strong Whig-
gism. The poet also fought with another of Constable's partners, Alex-
ander Gibson Hunter, who insisted that Scott complete a biography
of Jonathan Swift he had agreed to write for the firm. For a few years
Scott shunned Constable, except to send a messenger for his share of
the profits from Marmion, and wrote for the brothers Ballantyne
James, the fat, irresponsible one, whom the poet labeled "Aldiboton-
tiphoscophornio," and John, the lean one Scott called "Rigdumfun-
nidos" who were notably inept at the publishing business. The War
of 1812, the final months of the Napoleonic War, soaring prices, eco-
nomic distress, and starvation piled external chaos on the internal
chaos of the Ballantyne enterprise and led them toward the abyss of
bankruptcy. As they teetered there, Constable came to their rescue.
Because he realized how awkward it would be for Scott to be ex-
posed as an associate of wildcat publishers, Constable advanced the
poet and the brothers enough money for them to avoid ruin, then
formed a business alliance with Scott.

When Napier approached him to write for the supplement, Scott
was in the midst of the first of his Waverley novels. But he felt he
owed Constable a favor. He was not fond of the portly little publisher;
yet he respected him for his ability, for his role in transforming Edin-
burgh into a thriving publishing center, and for his influence in dif-
fusing knowledge and encouraging the impulse to self-education. Al-
though he called Constable "The Emperor" and grumbled about his
aggressive ways, Scott agreed to be a contributor, promising to write
on "Chivalry."

He turned in the first half of his article in the spring of 1814, com-
plaining that he did not have at his Abbotsford estate a sufficient
number of reference books on the subject, suggesting that illustrations
be used to achieve a richer effect, and proposing that the article
be set in type as fast as possible to determine whether it were of the
required length. When Napier told him more was needed, Scott re-
sponded with enough material to fill thirty pages. After tracing the

CONSTABLE'S FAMOUS SUPPLEMENT S3

history of "this curious and important subject" colorfully and eloquently
to its origins, Scott noted that "the total decay of the chivalrous princi-
ple is evident. As the progress of knowledge advanced, men learned
to despise its fantastic refinements; the really enlightened, as belong-
ing to a system inapplicable to the modern state of the world; the
licentious, fierce and subtile, as throwing the barriers of affected
punctilio betwixt them and the safe, ready and unceremonious grati-
fication of their lust or their vengeance."

When Napier called at Abbotsford to thank Scott for his article and
to present him with 100, the poet snorted.

"Now, tell me frankly," he asked, "if I don't take this money,
does it go into your pocket or the publisher's? It is impossible for me
to accept a penny for it from a literary brother,"

Napier replied that he had nothing to gain if Scott refused the
money,

With a shrug, Scott pocketed the 100. "I have trees to plant
and no conscience as to the purse of my fat friend Constable."

Subsequently, at the height of his new success as a historical novel-
ist, Scott contributed two other articles to later volumes of the sup-
plement. For each he received 100, with no inquiries about who
would profit if he refused the payment. "Romance/' which he defined
as "a fictitious narrative in prose and verse, the interest of which turns
upon marvellous and uncommon incidents," was twenty-one pages
long. But "Drama" ran for forty-three pages and was considerably
more contentious. It included not only an able historical survey of the
subject but a sharp and pertinent critique of the British theater of
Scott's day. He lamented the strong influences of lesser German dram-
atists on the national stage; he complained that "the wretched pieces
of Kotzebue have found a readier acceptance, or more willing trans-
lators, than the sublimity of Goethe, the romantic strength of Schiller,
or the deep tragic pathos of Lessing." London, he wrote, was
cursed with a monopolistic set of theatrical entrepreneurs and a sordid
collection of theatergoers "a corrupted metropolis" catering to an aw-
ful class of people and allowing vice and indecency to present a
bold and audacious front. He pleaded for the restoration of high
standards and good entertainment, although he had scorned the puri-
tanical who deemed all theater evil. "To those abstracted and enrapt
spirits, who feel, or suppose themselves capable of remaining con-
stantly involved in heavenly thoughts, any sublunary amusement may
justly seem frivolous/' Scott wrote. "But the mass of mankind are not

34 THE GREAT EB

so framed. . . . When the necessity of daily labour is removed, and
the call of social duty fulfilled, that of moderate and timely amuse-
ment claims its place, as a want inherent in our nature/'

In writing "Drama" Scott was substituting for William Hazlitt, for
when that critic-essayist was approached as an expert on the subject,
he had begged off with the excuse, "I know something about Congreve,
but nothing at all of Aristophanes, and yet I conceive that a writer of
an article on the Drama ought to be as well acquainted with the
one as the other." Eventually Hazlitt did write "Fine Arts," which was
considered by various critics, notably those of Blackwood's Magazine,
to be incomplete and inaccurate in important details. With charac-
teristic honesty, Hazlitt admitted that the criticism was valid and
promised to do better in future assignments.

Extremely conscientious, Macvey Napier kept hard after prospective
contributors he had encountered in London, engaging in constant cor-
respondence with all who had promised articles.

His most prolific writer and his best proselytizer of talent for the
supplement was the historian and philosopher James Mill. A contribu-
tor to scores of magazines and an East India House official, he was
famous for his massive History of India and equally renowned as leader
of the philosophic radicals, who derived their basic tenets from the
Utilitarian teachings of Jeremy Bentham: "It is the greatest happiness
of the greatest number that is the measure of right and wrong." Mill
was a precise and lucid writer, energetic and enthusiastic. He
was eventually responsible for more major articles than any other
man twelve in all, from "Beggar" to "Prison Discipline," written while
serving as tutor and companion to his brilliant young son, John Stuart
Mill, who worked and studied in the same room and was encouraged
to interrupt his father for long discussions on political economy.

James Mill also shot a fusillade of letters to Napier. In the six years
during which he sent in his erudite articles, Mill preceded, accom-
panied, or followed each with a letter elucidating various points, per-
sonal and philosophical. He kept Napier informed on the state of his
health he was compelled to decline to write an additional number
of articles because of periodic attacks of gout and on the progress
of his son in his philosophical and linguistic studies. To his treatise on
"Law of Nations" he appended a note: "My principal object will be
to show that there is hardly any such thing as a Law of Nations;

CONSTABLE'S FAMOUS SUPPLEMENT 35

that hardly anything deserving the name of Law between Nation
and Nation has existed or ever can exist," He sent detailed assur-
ances with potentially controversial contributions: "You need be un-
der no alarm about my article, 'Government'. I shall say nothing
capable of alarming even a Whig, and he is more terrified at the
principles of good government than the worst of the Tories/'

Actually, Mill's theories of government were considered quite bold,
so much so that he had not been permitted to write about them for the
Edinburgh Review. And his article on the subject for the Encyclo-
paedia Britannica, embodying some of the basic theories of Utilitari-
anismone that seemed to especially displease its opponents was that
good government could best be obtained by an extension of the rights
of franchise aroused great discussion and controversy. Although
many considered the treatise a masterpiece of political wisdom, it
provoked a number of articles by Thomas Babington Macaulay in
the Edinburgh Review defending Whiggism, which, despite its princi-
ples of toleration, its theory of emancipation, and its philosophy of
resistance to the arbitrary powers of government, feared what its lead-
ers considered the extremism of Philosophical Radicalism. And Macau-
lay in turn elicited a reply by John Stuart Mill in the Westminster
Review enlarging on his father's theories. All the discussion had a
marked effect on the agitation for governmental renovation that cul-
minated in the Reform Bill of 1832. The elder Mill was so important
a contributor to the supplement that eventually all his articles were
published in a single volume that served as a guidebook for a new
generation of philosophic radicals at the University of Cambridge, a
group vividly described years later by John Stuart Mill in his autobi-
ography.

As a recruiter of contributors for Napier, James Mill was especially
assiduous. He suggested names; he nagged those whom he suggested
to accept assignments; he harassed those who had accepted to meet
their deadlines. He proposed that David Ricardo, the economist, write
the article on Great Britain's funding system. A diffident man, Ricardo
at first declined because he felt he was not qualified, although he had
spoken often on the subject in the House of Commons. But Mill, in
Napie/s behalf, persisted. Ricardo finally completed a paper in
which he repeated his frequent charges that the system was a delu-
sion to the citizens, who fancied that the government's sinking fund

86 THE GREAT EB

was paying off their national debt, and a snare to the government,
which was consequently tempted to divert it to other purposes. All
nations, Ricardo urged, should defray their expenses, ordinary or ex-
traordinary, at the time incurred instead of providing for them by
loans.

Ricardo refused payment for the article. As Mill informed Napier,
the economist had moral objections to taking money for such work:
"Ricardo adds that his scruples are of two kinds first on account of
the article, which he says is not worth payment; secondly, because,
payment having formed no part of the motive which forced him to
write the article, he reckons himself not entitled to payment." Ricardo
thus joined Francis Jeffrey as one of the only two contributors to the
supplement who steadfastly refused payment. Though a pungent and
harsh critic in the Edinburgh Review, Jeffrey was mild and gentle
when offered compensation for his article on "Beauty." To Napier he
wrote, "I really have scruples about taking so much more than I can
possibly persuade myself I have earned, and seriously beg you to con-
sider whether you are not throwing work on me that would otherwise
be bestowed upon more variable contributions."

Despite his diffidence, Ricardo firmly defended his views when
Thomas Robert Malthus, importuned to write the article on "Popula-
tion," opposed inclusion of his essay in the same supplement with
Ricardo's. "I am not disposed to be offended at differences of opinion,"
Malthus wrote to Napier, "but I confess to you that I think the general
adoption of the new theories of my excellent friend Mr. Ricardo into
an Encyclopaedia . . . was rather premature." To this Ricardo
promptly replied, "I think the supplement will gain credit by being
among the first publications which has embodied and given circulation
to the new, and notwithstanding Mr. Malthus' opinions I will add cor-
rect, theories of political economy. Your publication was not intended
merely to give a view of the sciences that stood 45 years ago, but to
improve it, and to extend its boundaries." Napier agreed with Ricardo,
allowing the economist's article to stand as he had written it. Malthus'
article also appeared in the supplement.

Another contributor whose modesty vanished once he began to write
was Thomas Young, a many-sided scholar, a physicist who discovered
the law of the interference of light, a philosopher, a physician, and an
Egyptologist. When he was first approached by Napier, Dr. Young
refused to write on any subject but medicine, explaining that he did
not consider himself competent to discuss any of the others suggested

CONSTABLE'S FAMOUS SUPPLEMENT 87

by the editor. But once he completed the medical dissertation, he
grew more pliable. Agreeing to submit others if he could remain anony-
mous, he ultimately wrote, between 1816 and 1823, no less than sixty-
three articles, many of them brief biographies, half a dozen of major
proportions. His most notable was "Egypt," in which appeared the
first written account and partial interpretation of the Rosetta stone
and its hieroglyphics. The Rosetta stone had been discovered in 1799,
and Dr. Young's analysis of the writings contained a number of flaws,
as later scholars discovered. But for its time his account was a re-
markable one, still hailed a generation later as "the greatest effort of
scholarship and ingenuity of which modern literature can boast."
Young also contributed the article "Bridge," stimulated by the current
controversy about whether to replace old London Bridge with a sin-
gle-span iron bridge six hundred feet long: Young was in favor of the
new bridge and sought, in his writing, to dispel prevailing ignorance
and prejudice about its construction. His other contributions varied
greatly: they included "Carpentry," "Chromatics," "Cohesion," "Lan-
guages," "Life Preservers," "Road-making," "Steam Engine," "Tides,"
and "Weights and Measures."

For the first time in the history of the Encyclopaedia Britannica,
foreign experts contributed to its pages. One was the great French
physicist, Dominique Frangois Jean Arago, whose article on "Polariza-
tion" was translated by Dr. Young and whose treatment of "Double
Refraction" also appeared in a translation by an anonymous scholar.
Arago's contemporary, Jean Baptiste Biot, was represented by trans-
lations of his writings on "Electricity" and "Pendulum." Another inno-
vation in the supplement was that contributors, except for those like
Dr. Young who preferred anonymity, were identifiable by assigned
letters at the end of their writings which were keyed to a table of
contributors printed elsewhere in the volumes.

From the beginning the supplement, as Constable had hoped, was a
remarkable success. He printed 7,000 copies of the first volume at
twenty-five shillings each; all were disposed of within six months.
Copies of the second volume, at the same price, totaled 10,500, and
these, too, were sold rapidly not only in Great Britain but on a con-
tract basis in Philadelphia by a bookseller named Thomas Wardle.
Simultaneously with the publication of the individual volumes of
the supplement, Constable printed a sixth edition that was mostly a

38 THE GREAT EB

reprint of the fifth edition, with corrections of errors and a handful
of new articles. Some of Constable's associates opposed this as unduly
costly and unnecessary, but the pugnacious publisher emphasized the
need for keeping the encyclopaedia as current as possible, no matter
what the expense. As editor of this edition, he chose Charles Maclaren,
a staunch Whig literary man who owned and edited the Scotsman, and
paid him 500 "to keep the press going and have the whole finished in
three years." This edition appeared in twenty volumes from 1820 to
1823, at thirty-two shillings a volume.

When the supplement was finally completed in 1824, it ran not to
the contemplated four volumes but to six. It comprised 4,933 pages,
crammed with 699 principal articles informational and philosophical,
argumentative and disputative 125 plates, and 9 maps.

Constable was pleased, especially so because during the time it took
to produce the supplement, he had been vexed by business worries.
The Ballantynes, with whom he was still affiliated, conducted their
affairs carelessly, and Constable was frequently compelled to pay their
debts. Scott himself drew heavy overdrafts on the firm. He insisted
that his lands and estates were good security for these withdrawals
and sold to Constable batches of copyrights of poems and novels. Oc-
casionally business woes so plagued Constable that he fell ill and was
compelled to rest in the south of England for months at a time. But
always he was alert with comment and ideas for the Encyclopaedia
Britannica. "The value of the Encyclopaedia as a property must al-
ways be great," he now wrote to his London agent, Joseph Ogle Rob-
inson. Estimating that the gross sales revenue from the encyclopaedia
since he had taken it over in 1812 was 60,000, he added: "We can-
not have had less than a profit of 20,000 on these sales; we shall not,
I think, under any circumstances, get less than 10,000 at the final
close of the present impression; and we have the copyright free/'
Noting that a new edition of Chambers' Cyclopaedia had put a
crimp in sales of his encyclopaedia, he nevertheless remained firm
in his intentions. "The state of the book has been kept pure. . . . The
Supplement has surely a present value that is, for the volumes yet to
come out and it will supply materials for at least an equal number
of volumes of a new edition. . . . We shall make from 20,000 to 30,-
000 by the first edition of the Supplement, and this we owe to being
the proprietors of the greatest work. . . /'

The supplement must be sold wherever possible, he later advised
Robinson when the volumes were completed. He himself made a num-

CONSTABLE'S FAMOUS SUPPLEMENT 39

ber of trips to London to visit booksellers and expound on its sales
value. His imagination spurred by his own enthusiasm, he talked hap-
pily of publishing an Encyclopaedia for Youth and an Encyclopaedia
for Mechanics., both to be compiled from special sections of the En-
cyclopaedia Britannica. He contemplated a completely new edition,
the seventh, and signed Macvey Napier to be its editor at the munifi-
cent fee of 7^00. And always he urged larger appropriations for
promoting the sale of the supplement and the sixth edition. "This
book/' he wrote to Robinson, "must have the most vigorous advertising,
It is worthy of the best consideration all of us can give to the subject,
and must have it. The sale will then, I hope, be what the most san-
guine of us could wish it. ... It is the most valuable collection of
treatises ever combined in one work."

Unhappily for Constable and his glowing plans for his Encyclopaedia
Britannica, there could not have been a less opportune time than this
January of 1825 to write to Robinson about "vigorous advertising."
For Robinson and his partner, Thomas Hurst, were momentarily un-
interested in the mundane business of selling books. With many
thousands of others they had indulged in an orgy of speculation
raging throughout the British Isles. They were pouring their money
and thereby Constable's and Scott's and the Ballantynes' into the
wildest of schemes, gambling in South American mines, railways, and
gas companies, existent and non-existent alike, investing most recklessly
in hops and malt.

By midsummer a recession started and in October a panic was on.
Bankers restricted credit. Hurst and Robinson found themselves
close to ruin. They appealed for help to Constable, who scraped up all
his personal and business funds and sent large sums to London. Yet
by December disaster overtook them. Again Hurst and Robinson, un-
able to meet current obligations, turned to Constable. But he had ex-
hausted most of his available cash. All sources of credit were stopped.
The Ballantyne firm collapsed with a floating debt of 46,000. Con-
stable found that his debts totaled some 200,000. Scott's obligations,
when all the complexities of his tangled agreements and loosely drawn
contracts with the Ballantynes and Constable were smoothed out,
came to 130,000. One more effort Constable made to save himself
and the others. Suffering from gout and dropsy, he painfully made
his way to the Bank of England and begged its officers for a loan of

40 THE GEEAT EB

.200,000, offering as security the copyrights he owned of Scott's works.
He was turned down.

Scott blamed Constable for his woes, charging that the publisher
had been too rash in his expenditures and his general business con-
duct. With a noble air, the poet-novelist announced he would seek
to pay all his debts and set out grimly with his pen to make good
his vow. He signed a contract with Constable's son-in-law, Robert
Cadell, whose prudence had saved him from the fate that had be-
fallen other publishers. As Constable and Scott came to the end of
their long association, the publisher was by turn humble and arrogant.
At one meeting in Scott's paneled library at Abbotsford, he tried to
show some cheer.

"Come, come, Sir Walter/' rumbled Constable, "matters may yet
come round, and I trust that you and I may yet crack a cheerful bot-
tle of port together."

Scott replied frigidly, "Mr. Constable, whether we ever meet again
in these conditions must depend upon circumstances which yet remain
to be cleared up."

On a second visit, Constable rode back from the mansion to London
with young Benjamin Disraeli, another visitor at Abbotsford. The pub-
lisher boasted about his publishing exploits, Disraeli later recalled,
and acted as if he himself had written all the Waverley novels.
When the coach stalled on a muddy patch of highway, Constable
leaped out. Commanding the coachman to continue the journey, Con-
stable yelled, "Do you not know who I am? My man, look at me!
I am Archibald Constable!"

Constable managed to secure enough money to publish a cheap
edition of Scott's Miscellany, but the new volumes soon to be produced
with such labor and such speed at Abbotsford were no longer to be
issued under his imprint. And the great plans he had for the Ency-
clopaedia Britannica, for the advertising and promotion of the supple-
ment, lay in his desk in his office, gathering dust as the office itself
gathered gloom and dust, and there they remained when Constable,
to the end desperately striving to repay his debts, died in July, 1827.

Despite his dismal final years, Constable had made enduring con-
tributions to the development of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, for
the editions he published had added significantly to its original char-
acter.

CONSTABLE'S FAMOUS SUPPLEMENT 41

Since the first edition in 1768, a major asset stressed by the various
publishers and editors had been inclusiveness the presentation of an
orderly system of knowledge as comprehensive as the physical limits
of the books would permit. Smellie's idea of an encyclopaedia that
would digest the principles of every science in the form of systems
or distinct treatises had been something of a revolution in encyclo-
paedia making. The second edition, with its biographies and history,
and the next, principally with Professor Robinson's treatises and those
of Dr. Thomson on chemistry, had taken strides toward establish-
ing other vital qualities of the Encyclopaedia Britannica authority
and authenticity.

With Constable, these concepts received massive impetus. Increas-
ingly, he and Napier had insisted on contributors who were estab-
lished authorities in their fields, who were more aware than anyone
else of the fresh advances in their specialties and could adequately and
accurately record these advances for readers. Throughout the final vol-
umes of the fourth edition, in the fifth, sixth, and the brilliant supple-
ment to the fifth, these authorities had their say even if some con-
temporary critics disagreed with their theories and views. And by re-
cruiting authorities outside Great Britain, Constable had set a notable
precedent for international orientation that would subordinate na-
tional pride to editorial excellence.

Financially, Constable had shown the skeptics that such a work as
the Encyclopaedia Britannica could be profitable when sold at twenty
or thirty pounds. The profits from the sales were not large enough,
when calamity came, to offset the tremendous debts incurred in other
ventures, but the showing had been respectable. To his last sad days
Constable knew he had an important property in the Encyclopaedia
Britannica, and he had faith in its future. But, sick and bankrupt, he
had neither energy nor funds to carry through any of the grand plans
he had made for it, and he regretted this failure more than any
other part of his debacle.

There were others in the book business who also realized the im-
portance of keeping the encyclopaedia alive as an instrument of
knowledge and as a money-making device. Being canny, they sniffed
about, once Constable had died, and made discreet inquiry about
where and when and how the remaining copies of the Encyclopaedia
Britannica and its copyright might be secured, Being thrifty, they pon-
dered the price for this potentially valuable publication.

42 THE GREAT EB

One such man was Adam Black, owner of a bookshop at North Bridge,
confident in his methods, ambitious in his aspirations. Born in Edin-
burgh in 1784, Black, after a stint as apprentice to a bookseller and
a term of military service, had gone to London, where one of his first
and briefest positions had been with Thomas Sheraton, that moody,
solemn genius in furniture design, then preparing The Cabinet-Maker
and Artist's Encyclopaedia. Black worked for Sheraton only a week,
writing a few articles for him. Then he left, unable to keep up with
Sheraton's erratic working habits. He was twenty-four when he came
back to Edinburgh to open his bookshop and to make tentative ad-
vances into publishing.

Black was thriving comfortably when the opportunity arose, upon
Constable's death, to acquire the Encyclopaedia Britannica. The price
at auction was only 6,150. This was a fraction of its real and poten-
tial value, yet Black needed financial aid to make the purchase. He
persuaded three other men Thomas Allan and Alexander Wight,
bankers and publishers of the Caledonian Mercury, and a bookbinder
named Abram Thompson to join him. As he enlarged the firm, he
took a relative, Charles Black, in with him and renamed the company
A. & C. Black. Once in possession of the encyclopaedia, Black sub-
ordinated his other interests to it and set about to produce the seventh
edition, establishing 1830, three years away, as the time o publica-
tion.

CONSTABLE'S FAMOUS SUPPLEMENT 43

A Generation Spanned

With Macvey Napier, Black started placidly. Napier's reputation had
flourished. He was now an editor of the Edinburgh Review, a pro-
fessor of real estate and law at Edinburgh University, and chief
clerk at the Court of Sessions. Black assented to having him continue
as editor, agreeing without question to pay what Constable had pro-
posed in his contract, although Napier himself, eager to assure enough
money for good contributors, suggested that he receive 6,500 instead
of the 7,000, with the difference being given to writers. Black also
hired a subeditor, James Browne, to handle the burden of the edi-
torial work, thereby setting a pattern for future editions.

But a conflict sprang up. The nub of the argument between edi-
tor and publisher was the number of volumes in the seventh edition.
Black directed that the set have twenty volumes, to be issued, as al-

ways, in monthly parts and then in single books. Napier insisted that
only in twenty-five volumes could justice be done the full scope of
the enterprise. In the correspondence with Black, Napier, sometimes
acrimonious, sometimes patiently tolerant, had much to say on sub-
jects that have remained the unending dilemmas of encyclopaedists
how much to put into their books, how much money to spend on
editorial material, how deeply or how superficially to treat a subject.

One of Napier's arguments involved the sizes of competitors' works;
the new edition of the revised Chambers' Cyclopaedia under Abra-
ham Rees would run to thirty-five volumes, the Encyclopaedia Metro-
politans to at least twenty-five. He noted, too, the shifting character
not only of the Encyclopaedia Britannica but of similar works: "En-
cyclopaedias have risen into consequence with an important and in-
fluential class, for whose use they were not originally designed. As
they have been found to furnish the best means yet devised for dif-
fusing knowledge in a systematic form, and have been largely used
for that purpose, both in this and other countries they are now regu-
larly perused or consulted by men of science, and the whole body
of the learned. To limit the Encyclopaedia in such a way as to render
it necessary, either to diminish the quantity of miscellaneous matter
more particularly adapted to the wants and tastes of ordinary readers,
or to treat important subjects in a way too curt and superficial to
satisfy those of a higher class, would lower its popularity and reputa-
tion, and enable its rivals to gain an ascendancy at its expense. . . .
It seems pretty clear, therefore, that the Encyclopaedia Britannica
would take a lower station than it holds were it limited, in its reno-
vated form, to the same number of volumes that was so long ago
judged necessary to its completeness."

This last comment was in support of Napier's claim that if the
growth of the set from ten to twenty volumes thirty years earlier had
been judged necessary, more were now needed to cover the advances
in knowledge since then. Pressed by Black to make a compromise, he
wrote that with judicious editing the twenty-five volumes might be
reduced to twenty-four. Finally, after more letters were exchanged,
an interesting solution was achieved. When the seventh edition was
finished in 1842, it filled twenty-two volumes. Evidently as able a
bargainer as he was an editor, Napier really was the victor, for the
17,801 pages were larger and there were more pages in each volume
than in the preceding edition. The final volume served as an index
to the other twenty-one, the first index in the history of the Ency-

A GENERATION ?ANNE 45

clopaedia Britannica. Its 187 pages, prepared by a Robert Cox, con-
tained numerous errors and defective references. But the index was
popular with purchasers and established another precedent for future
editions.

The full set retained a large number of the best articles from the
supplement to the fifth and sixth editions, especially Scott's contribu-
tions and the dissertations by Professors Stewart and Playfair. There
were notable newcomers. Thomas de Quincey wrote "Schiller/* "Shake-
speare/' and "Pope," all three "much admired/' according to the Quar-
terly Review, c 'as specimens of critical biography." Another new con-
tributor was Sir James Mackintosh, a brilliant but querulous philoso-
pher. For his lengthy dissertation on the progress of ethical philosophy
in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries he insisted on being paid
600 instead of the 500 offered him. He also asked for as many as
one hundred pages, a demand not granted by Napier. Meliora and
other critical quarterlies found the article too skimpy and devoid of
information on the history of ethical philosophy on the Continent but
acknowledged that it was lucidly written. Another important article
was by Sir John Leslie, a professor of natural philosophy at Edin-
burgh University, who took up the progress of the mathematical and
physical sciences where the Playfair article in the supplement had
concluded. This difficult section was unusually well conceived by Les-
lie and described in Meliora as "an animated and instructive sequel/'

One article prompted heated reaction even before it was completed.
Influential Catholics denounced the apostate priest Joseph Blanco
White, an authority on Spanish subjects, and expressed concern that he
would be assigned articles on Catholic doctrine. Black was quick to
assure them that all articles on Catholic matters would be written by a
respected member of that faith. His reply promptly embroiled the
publisher with rabid members of antipapist cliques. In 1836, at a
public meeting of the Edinburgh Protestant association, Rev. William
Cunningham, a raucous anti-Catholic, cried out to his audience that
Black was being coerced by officials of the Catholic hierarchy,

"The Papists, ever alive to the advancement of their own purposes/'
declared the minister, "have sent a communication to the publisher of
the Encyclopaedia Britannica to the effect that unless he would allow
them to revise and superintend the articles in the work in connection
with or having reference to Popery, they would use their influence to
prevent its circulation." He also inveighed against what he called
"Popish influences" in the reference work.

46 THE GREAT EB

Black acted swiftly. He filed a suit for libel to the amount of
.10,000. Just as promptly, Mr. Cuningham backed down and paid to
have his public apology printed in the newspapers.

During the twelve years in which monthly numbers, half -volumes, and
full volumes came from the presses, Adam Black prospered and
bought out his partners. Throughout the period, he carefully watched
this most important of his expanding publishing interests. He adver-
tised frequently, regularly inserting in the columns of the London
Times small, one-column ads sandwiched between other advertisements,
such as those for Josiah Conder's thirty-volume The Modern Traveller:
A Description, Geographical, Historical and Topographical, of the Vari-
ous Countries of the Globe and for A Comparative Statement of the
Emoluments of the Lord Chancellor, and Some of His Officers in the
year 1797. In all, 5,354 were spent in advertising this edition, not
only in London and Edinburgh, but in key newspapers all over the
British Isles.

To acquaint more booksellers with his encyclopaedia, Black himself
went on the road, as Constable had done before him. He visited new
territories never invaded by Constable, seeking agents to handle the
sale of the completed edition, though in Ireland, he reported, virtually
everyone except Dubliners seemed uninterested in reading anything
but their prayer books. He also sent out a number of travelers to sound
out booksellers in every city and hamlet where potential customers
might be found. Black himself covered fourteen hundred miles in three
months by coach, gig, and foot and left a record that told of the recep-
tions and rebuffs he received and the idiosyncrasies of some of the sell-
ers. Black and his colleagues sought subscribers, for without an esti-
mate of the number of possible buyers, it was, of course, impossible to
proceed from single part to volume to full edition.

When the edition was finished, it went on sale for 24. Later Black
reported to his associates that he had spent 108,766 on the entire
project. Besides the allotment for advertising, others included 8,755
for editing, 13,887 to 167 contributors, 13,159 for plates, 29,279
for paper, 19,813 for printing. Five thousand sets of the seventh
edition were sold, plus uncounted individual sections, half-volumes,
and single volumes. Black's profit from the sale was modest, but he de-
rived great satisfaction from the intellectual prestige it brought him.
The Athenaeum, commenting carefully on each part as it emerged,

A GENERATION SPANNED 47

concluded that the entire edition was "the most valuable digest of
human knowledge that has yet appeared in Britain," and Gentleman's
Magazine intoned: "Unlike all other works of the same class, it seems
destined to maintain its place among the standard works of our na-
tional literature."

For the next decade Black was content to rest on this prestige, printing
only as many copies as were requested by scholars or the well-to-do.
There was no continuing sales campaign, no program of editorial
revision.

He became involved in a lawsuit when Colonel Matthew Stewart
demanded 2,000 in damages because the seventh edition had re-
printed the dissertation of his father, Dugald Stewart. The colonel
claimed that copyright of the article belonged to him as the professor's
heir. In a hearing before Lord Patrick Robertson two days before
Christmas, a jury took merely an hour to declare Black guiltless, a ver-
dict greeted by applause in the courtroom and in the newspapers. "It
appears to us," editorialized the Caledonian Mercury, remarking on
Black's expenditures and the risk involved in publishing the edition,
"that if the verdict of the jury had been in favor of the pursuer, the
effect would have been to extinguish publications of this class alto-
gether, and thus deprive the public of those most useful and instruc-
tive repertories of literary and scientific information. Such a result
would have been most injurious."

Black expanded his other publishing interests and became promi-
nent in civic and political affairs. Excessively devout in his religious
ways, Black was also a deeply tolerant man who could say at a church
meeting, "Every man who discharges the duties of a good citizen,
whether he is Papist or Protestant, Jew or Gentile, Mohammedan or
Hindoo, is entitled to the same civil privileges, and the State has no
right to give a preference to one man over another, or to lay a burden
upon one man rather than another because he thinks differently from
you on some religious question." He was elected chief magistrate of
Edinburgh and developed a reputation as a fair and liberal man. As he
rose in eminence, he received a letter from the Queen's representative
offering him a knighthood. He read it at the breakfast table to his wife
and family. They discussed the letter, as was customary with the
Blacks. Then he replied that he could not accept. "The title would only

48 THE GREAT EB

be an encumbrance," he wrote. "My wife has no desire to be called
'My Lady' and it would only foster vanity in my children."

In 1851 there occurred two important events in his publishing
career. From the trustees of Robert Cadell he bought all the remaining
copyrights of Scott's Waverley novels for 27,000, and he bestirred
himself to publish a new edition of die Encyclopaedia Britannica. The
decade since the seventh edition had been one marked by progress in
scientific, industrial, literary, and philosophic fields. Besides, sales of
the seventh edition were dwindling.

Macvey Napier had died in 1847, his final literary production a
massive History of the World, and as his successor Black chose Dr.
Thomas Stewart Traill, professor of medical jurisprudence at Edin-
burgh University and a versatile scholar who, most importantly, held
Black's liberal principles, Half a dozen subeditors also were hired to
handle the details of editorial production, among them Traill's son
Thomas, and several bright young instructors and professors from the
university were recruited along with a number of young ministers.
They did their work pasting up articles from earlier editions to be
sent to experts for rewriting, reading manuscripts, checking proofs,
preparing corrected copy for final publication in a large room at
Black's expanded North Bridge establishment. When Dr. Traill fell ill,
a young philosopher, John Downes, did most of the editing, besides
writing articles on "Pantheism," "Spinoza," and "Skepticism."

Black was especially active in the physical phase of the enterprise,
for he was eager to keep costs down. Contributors were startled to have
proofs of their writings returned to them with the admonition, "Sev-
enty-nine lines to strike out" or "Forty-two lines to fill." These nota-
tions were always Black's. Dr. Traill, an amiable man, did not protest
this invasion of the editorial sanctum.

Black's methods did cut costs. Instead of the 108,766 spent for the
seventh edition, the new one of equal size was published for 75,655.
And this was done without great harm to the work, although com-
plaints were heard that some of the articles especially those dealing
with scientific subjects had been drastically reduced, that not enough
revisions had been made, that the tone was antiquated. Meliora added
its plaint: "There is no account given of the temperance movement.
Literary men must have heard of this Cause. Its advocates and ad-
herents have long been collected into societies which have a good
position in the country and ought to have been known to literary men."

A GENERATION SPANNED 49

Yet Meliora, which prided itself on being "A Quarterly Review of
Social Science in its Ethical, Economical, Political and Ameliorative
Aspects/' fittingly took a larger view. "It is the greatest collection of
literary wealth ever compiled/' stated the same article, "and the great-
est investment of wealth in literature ever made." Reporting on a
statement issued by Black that of both the seventh and the new eighth
editions a total of ten thousand copies had been sold, the reviewer
added, "It is gratifying to be able to record the success which the
spirited publishers have obtained by the sale of copies which, con-
sidering their great outlay and liberal conduct throughout, is eminently
deserved. Such publishers do much for their country, and enshrine by
their words their names among the memorable."

Enthusiastically, the journal continued: "Three hundred and forty
writers . . . have united their learning to make this gigantic store-
house of knowledge. The possession of such a work is a library, for its
matter is equal to one hundred ordinary octavo volumes. No library of
English literature is complete without this Encyclopaedia/'

Again, such classics, or purported classics, as Scott's treatise on
"Drama" were reprinted. "Drama" carried an ingenuous footnote af-
firming that this was the same article that had been published in the
supplement: "We have deemed this homage due to the fame and
genius of this illustrious author, whose splendid view of the origin and
progress of the dramatic art we have accordingly presented to the
reader exactly as it proceeded from his own hand, leaving every
contemporaneous allusion and illustration untouched." But this also
was the edition which included some important writing by Thomas
Babington Macaulay, notably his biographies of Samuel Johnson, John
Bunyan, Oliver Goldsmith, and William Pitt. All were adjudged liter-
ary gems, and Macaulay was pleased with them, although slightly
disparaging about the article on Pitt. He worked on it from November,
1857, to August, 1858, stating to Black when finally he submitted it,
"What a time to have been dawdling over such a trifle!" He did them
all as a favor to his good friend Black, refusing to accept a single
shilling for the work.

There were other new contributors of consequence. They included
Charles Kingsley, the tall, spare, and sinewy clergyman, poet, and
novelist; Robert Chambers, a biologist and geologist who, in 1859,
would start a new Chambers 's Encyclopaedia with his brother, Wil-
liam; Baron Karl Josias von Bunsen, the Prussian diplomat and
scholar; and Sir John Herschel, a kindly and serene astronomer and

50 THE GREAT EB

chemist. Dugald Stewart's article was reprinted from the previous
editions, and John Leslie's was continued by Professor David Forbes,
who spent three years on it. A new treatise by Archbishop Richard
Whately of Dublin was an account of the "Rise, Progress and Corrup-
tions of Christianity." Archbishop Whately's and Forbes's writing filled
1 ? 000 pages, constituting a compendium of information on religion,
philosophy, and science nowhere else available, An American contrib-
utor appeared for the first time: Edward Everett, whose career as
orator and statesman included terms as governor of Massachusetts,
president of Harvard College, ambassador to Great Britain, Secretary
of State, and senator from Massachusetts, composed a 40,000-word
biographical eulogy of George Washington, concluding, "In the posses-
sion of that mysterious quality of character manifested in a long life of
meritorious service . . . and [in being] a living proof that pure patri-
otism is not a delusion, or virtue an empty name, no one of the sons of
man has equalled George Washington."

A representative number of contributors and editors gathered at a
gala dinner arranged by Black on June 5, 1861, to celebrate completion
of the eighth edition. Held in the Trafalgar Hotel at Greenwich, it set
a tradition for future publishers. The contributors listened comfortably
to inevitable tributes to themselves and drank toasts to the success of
the Encyclopaedia Britannica. W A gay troop of authors," reported the
correspondent for the Inverness Courier, "might be seen eating white-
bait and drinking champagne and claret supplied in profusion by their
publishers/' and, he added, "the long-tried integrity and independent
public character of Mr. Adam Black were cordially acknowledged."

But all this indeed, all the editions from the very first through the
recently acclaimed eighth was the prelude to the next edition, the
famous ninth.

Aging and increasingly economy-minded in spite of his accumula-
tion of wealth, Black was content to halt with the eighth edition. He
realized the vast expenses involved in issuing new editions, the diffi-
culties of gathering new editorial and sales staffs, the delays in publica-
tion. But he was hard-pressed by the three of his four sons whom he
had taken into the firm in the 1860's to prepare a new edition. They
James T., Francis, and Adam W. considered it sound business, and
yet they were equally stimulated by the basic motives that had
stirred the wisest of their predecessors: they wanted to include in their

A GENERATION SPANNED 51

encyclopaedia as much up-to-date information as was physically pos-
sible. They were sharply aware of the massive changes in thinking
and philosophies and meanings that had developed since the publica-
tion of Charles Darwin's Origin of Species in 1859, and they argued
incessantly with their father in behalf of an edition that would reflect
modern trends not only in England but in many parts of the world. By
1870 their collective persuasion had its effect. The elder Black sanc-
tioned the venture, turned the publishing firm over to his sons, and
toward the end of that year, just as the preliminary plans for the ninth
edition were being mapped, he retired to spend four quiet years, be-
fore his death at the age of ninety, in placid contemplation of a life
well spent.

For the first time, the man chosen to be editor was not a Scot but an
English-born scholar, Professor Thomas Spencer Baynes. He had spent
much time in Scotland, however, as editor of the Edinburgh Guardian
and as professor of logic at St. Andrews University. Originally trained
for the ministry, he had turned to philosophy while studying at the
Philosophical Institute of Edinburgh. He was a very tense man; twice
in his career before his appointment as editor he had suffered nervous
breakdowns. But he was cognizant of the Darwinian concepts of
man's origins and the importance of such concepts, of shifting ideas in
the biological and physical sciences, and of revolutionary tendencies
and methods of comparative study in history, religion, philosophy, and
literature. The great objects of inquiry in this exciting age, in Baynes's
view, were human nature and human life, and his general mission was
to record in the pages of the planned edition of the Encyclopaedia
Britannica all new findings and all new theories with a steady eye and
an impartial mind. Baynes wrote:

This is the more necessary as the prolific activity of modern science has
naturally stimulated speculation, and given birth to a number of somewhat
crude conjectures and hypotheses. The air is full of novel and extreme opin-
ions, arising often from a hasty or one-sided interpretation of the newer as-
pects and results of modern inquiry. The higher problems of philosophy and
religion, too, are being investigated afresh from opposite sides in a thorough
earnest spirit, as well as with a directness and intellectual power, which is
certainly one of the most striking signs of the times. This fresh outbreak of
the inevitable contest between the old and the new is a fruitful source of
exaggerated hopes and fears, and of excited denunciation and appeal. In
this conflict a work like the Encyclopaedia Britannica is not called upon to
take any direct part. It has to do with knowledge, rather than opinion, and
to deal with all subjects from a critical and historical, rather than a dogmatic,

52 THE GREAT EB

point of view. It cannot be the organ of any sect or party in science, religion
or philosophy. Its main duty is to give an accurate account of the facts and
an impartial summary of results in every department of inquiry and research.
As yet the rich materials thus supplied for throwing light on the central
problems of human life and history have only been very partially turned to
account. It may be said indeed that their real significance is perceived and
appreciated almost for the first time in our own day. But under the influence
of the modern spirit they are now being dealt with in a strictly scientific
manner.

This "modern spirit" reflected itself in the men Dr. Baynes ap-
proached to be contributors. The first volume showed the wisdom of
his choices. When it was issued in 1875, after four years of work, Na-
ture extolled it above all other encyclopaedias, predicting that the en-
tire edition would be "regarded as indicating the highest tidemark of
the science, literature and arts of the time. Baynes has already justified
the choice made of him as editor, and shown himself in all respects
competent to be the leader of such a splendid undertaking." Such a
reception other journals duplicated the praise pleased Baynes and
his associates, and they worked diligently to produce each volume on
schedule. As in the past, the timing and publication of each new
volume depended on the revenue from the preceding volume. Each
volume of the ninth sold for thirty to thirty-six shillings, depending on
the quality of the binding. Sometimes the sale was slow, sometimes the
books went well. It took fourteen years, from 1875 to 1889, to com-
plete all twenty-four volumes and the index.

In true modernist tradition, an important contributor was Thomas
Henry Huxley, the most stalwart proponent of the Darwinian theories
of evolution. He was prolific but sometimes tardy in sending his
articles. "I will do what I can if you like," he assured Baynes, "but if
you trust me it is at your proper peril/' His own almost illegible
handwriting gave Huxley quaint amusement: "Why people can't write
a plain legible hand I can't imagine." But Huxley was an extremely
valuable man. He helped to classify the biological subjects, suggested
the best men to write on them, and proposed changes in format and in
individual articles. Among his treatises were "Actinozoa," "Amphibia,"
"Animal Kingdom," and, of course, "Biology" and "Evolution." The
latter two synthesized the findings of Darwin. At first Huxley was
reluctant to write on evolution, but eventually he agreed to do it.
"Don't see how it is practicable to do justice to it with the time at my
disposal/' he told Baynes, "though I should really like to do it and I

A GENERATION SPANNED 53

am at my wit's end to think of anybody who can be trusted with it."

Huxley complained often. "Your printers/' he once wrote peevishly,
"are the worst species of that diabolic genus I know of. It is at least
a month since I sent them a revise of 'Evolution' by no means finished,
and from that time to this I have had nothing from them. I shall forget
all about the subject and then at the last moment they will send me a
revise in a great hurry, and expect it back by return post. But if they
get it, may I go to their Father!" But the complaints about punctuality
were more often turned against him. He had a good sense of humor
about his own tardiness, writing when he sent in his article on
"Amphibia" in August, 1875, "Considering it was to be done in May, I
think I am pretty punctual."

Baynes had difficulties with other contributors. The historian Ed-
ward Augustus Freeman was commissioned to write on "England."
Once he begged that he could not submit his article on time because of
a severe cold, Weeks later, while cruising in the Mediterranean, he
suddenly sent a note to his wife: "A thing has flashed across my mind
which may hasten my steps homeward. I had well nigh forgotten that
I have to finish which I have barely begun the article on England
for the Encyclopaedia Britannica by September. 'Tis a matter of 315
pounds so I cannot afford to let it slip." This fee was among the
highest, amounting to almost four pounds a page for an eighty-page
article covering the history of England up to the reign of James I.

John William Strutt Rayleigh, later the Lord Rayleigh who won the
Nobel Prize for physics in 1904, was another procrastinator. Asked to
write the article "Light," intended for Volume XIV, he was not ready
at the designated time. The article was scheduled for a later volume
under "Optics/' Again Rayleigh's article was not finished. So Baynes
set it forward to another volume, retitling the treatise "Undulating
Theory of Light." Once more Rayleigh was not finished. When finally
the article did appear, it was in the next to the last volume, under
"Wave Theory of Light."

One writer whose article was not used at all was Robert Louis
Stevenson, then twenty-five and with no great reputation. He was
paid five pounds, five shillings for an article on Robert Burns, but
Baynes rejected the finished product because it showed "want of
enthusiasm." With this opinion Stevenson reflectively agreed, writing
later, "To say truth, I had, I fancy, an exaggerated idea of the gravity
of an encyclopaedia and wished to give mere bones, and to make no
statement that should seem even warm, ... I believe you are right

$4 THE GREAT EJ3

in saying that I had not said enough of what is highest and best in him.
Such a topic is disenheartening; the clay feet are easier dealt with
than the golden head."

Some of the young British literary writers were contributors, Alger-
non Charles Swinburne wrote "Keats" and "Mary, Queen of Scots/'
When Baynes asked him to do a historical sketch of the latter, the
great lyric poet was delighted. To Edmund Clarence Stedman, he
expressed his pleasure that Baynes had written to "me, a mere poet,
proposing that I should contribute to that great repository of erudition
the biography of Mary, Queen of Scots. I doubt if the like compliment
was ever paid before to one of our Idle trade/ " William Rossetti, of
the Pre-Raphaelite group of poets, painters, and essayists, proved an
asset for Baynes, penning a large number of biographies of painters,
revising earlier ones, and writing a major biographical study of Percy
Bysshe Shelley, "My function," he told friends, "is that of the utility
man rather than of the desiderated expert bespeaking his own sub-
jects."

The article "Anarchism" was by an expert, Prince Petr Alekseevich
Kropotkin, geographer and revolutionary. Exiled from his native
Russia, he had settled in Switzerland but was ousted from his home
there after the assassination of Alexander II in Russia. In 1883, tried
for various acts of revolutionary agitation and for his role in arousing
strikes among the silkworkers at Lyons, he was removed to prison at
Clairvaux, France, where he was permitted a desk, ink, and pen. His
trial had caused a sensation among the intellectuals of Europe, and
Swinburne, Herbert Spencer, and others had signed petitions de-
manding his release. He was not freed, but authorities at Clairvaux
fitted out a special room for him, and he was permitted to continue
writing for the Encyclopaedia Britannica and other publications.

Of all the distinguished contributors, none aroused so much strife
and controversy and none so typified the conflicts between the old
and the new as William Robertson Smith, a short-statured, dark-
haired, and dark-eyed man with a swarthy complexion and a taste for
fine wines and tobacco, a scholar of profound learning and wisdom, yet
"lively and merry as a grig," and at twenty-eight one of the most
brilliant theologians in the British Isles.

Born in 1846 at Keig in Aberdeenshire, where his father, William
Pirie Smith, was a Free Church minister, Smith had entered Aberdeen

A GENERATION SPANNED 55

University as an intellectual prodigy of fifteen. Later, after specializing
in theology at the Free Church College in Edinburgh, he had become
an assistant professor of natural philosophy at Edinburgh University.
In his two years there, from 1868 to 1870, he was popular with col-
leagues and students. He composed much original work in experi-
mental and mathematical phases of electricity and produced complex,
erudite treatises such as Electrical Steam Lines and Hegel and the
Metaphysics of the Fluxional Calculus, Always an intense student of
religion, he had often interrupted his scientific lectures to engage in
long philosophical discussions with his eager students, among them
the young Robert Louis Stevenson. At twenty-four, Smith had been
appointed professor of oriental languages and Old Testament exegesis
at the Free Church College in Aberdeen, and it was here that Smith,
happy in his studious research, was approached by Baynes to join his
contributors as an expert on Old Testament history.

Baynes commissioned Smith to furnish five articles for Volume II
"Angel," "Apostle," "Aramaic Languages," "Ark of the Covenant," and
"Assideans" and two for Volume III "Baal" and "Bible." Duly
written and printed, the first group aroused little comment, except
from a reviewer or two who noted very slight inaccuracies.

Then on December 7, 1875, appeared the volume with the writings
on "Baal" and "Bible." Before submitting the second of these two con-
tributions, Smith had asked several of his friends among the clergy to
read it. All, orthodoxists and modernists alike, had judged it sound in
concept and execution. Its major thesis was that the Bible could be
considered not only as theology but as literature and that it had
historical links with other religions. Smith's theory was that the Semitic
religious concepts were common to all primitive peoples and could be
deduced from the data of known popular religions.

These ideas of historical interpretation of the Bible were then widely
accepted by the more enlightened theologians on the Continent. Yet in
this field more, than in any other, sharp changes had taken place since
the founding of the Encyclopaedia Britannica and, in point of fact, since
the preceding edition; in no portion of the encyclopaedia had the
interval between the eighth and ninth editions been more fruitful in
new queries and new replies. Smith's article on "Bible" reflected
these changes and queries.

Among those steadfast in refusing to consider either questions or
answers were the elders of the Free Church of Scotland, narrow in
their dogmatism, rigid in their doctrines. Some of the younger church-

56 THE GREAT EB

men had turned to the "new" kind of historical inquiry, but the church
hierarchy and many ministers held strictly to the orthodox interpreta-
tions, to the unswerving belief that every word of the Bible, and
especially of the Old Testament, was divinely inspired. Still, Smith's
fifteen-page treatise raised no immediate hubbub.

Then the Edinburgh Courant sent the volume for review to Dr.
A. H. Charteris, professor of biblical criticism at Edinburgh University,
a divine of the Free Church and the embodiment of the pietism of
the orthodox. He was shocked by Smith's article. It was close to
heresy, he wrote, to insist that there might be errors in the Bible.
Smith's article stated theories contrary to those of the established
church; it imperiled the fundamental doctrines of Christianity; it
brought discredit upon the theological professoriate of Scotland.
Charteris' critique, appearing on April 16, 1876, demanded to know of
the elders of the Free Church, precisely what they intended to do
about Smith's statements.

For a month quiet prevailed. But in May, Dr. James Begg, leader of ,
the church's most conservative branch and minister of the Newington
Free Church, cried out against Smith in the tones of a loud and
truculent traditionalist. A special committee was named to investigate
the article and the others Smith had written for the Encyclopaedia
Britannica and while this group deliberated, the church split be-
tween the orthodoxists and the Smith adherents. The church's leader,
Robert Rainy, principal of the New College of Edinburgh and profes-
sor of church history, tried to bring about a reconciliation, shudder-
ing at the prospect and notoriety of a heresy hearing. A man who al-
ways shied away from real controversy, preferring to arbitrate and
negotiate differences he was later described as having "a mind that
wormed like a corkscrew through material soft enough to be perfo-
rated in a chisel thrust" Rainy asked Smith to write an open letter,
gentle and full of atonement, disavowing what he had written.

Angrily, Smith refused. But he was forced to heed the growing dis-
cord when a pamphlet, "Infidelity in the Aberdeen Free Church Col-
lege," directly charged him with expressing dangerous, heretical ideas.
Smith responded with a slashing reply which appeared in all Edin-
burgh newspapers. Immediately the orthodoxists clamored for his neck
and preachers harangued their congregations. "Have we a Bible or
haven't we?" they chorused.

For two years the Smith case raged. A special Free Church College
committee was named to examine the facts of the case, and for these

A GENERATION SPANNED 57

ministers Smith wrote a paper explaining his views. Early in 1877 the
committee ruled that, while there were no grounds for a heresy
proceeding against Smith, certain statements in the Encyclopaedia
Britannica article were "fitted to create apprehension" and the full
treatise was of "a dangerous and unsettling tendency." The argument
was referred to the Higher Assembly of Aberdeen for action, while
Smith was temporarily deprived of his teaching post at the Free
Church College. Insisting that this action constituted a libel against
him, Smith demanded that all charges be itemized before the assem-
bly's meeting. What he requested was promptly granted, and the way
was open for a final showdown.

He was accused, in the indictment, of a number of theological
sins as determined by officials of the Free Church. He had, they stated,
rejected the Mosaic authorship of Deuteronomy, thereby implying
that the Scriptures were not divinely inspired. He had contradicted
orthodox doctrine by "neutrality of attitude and rashness of statement
tending to disparage" the divine authority and inspired character of
the Scriptures. He had taught that the Levitical system was not a
Mosaic institution; that Deuteronomy was not the historical record it
professed to be; that the sacred writers were liable to error in questions
of fact and occasionally sacrificed accuracy to party spirit; that some
parts of the Scriptures had the character of fiction; that the Song of
Solomon was a love poem and devoid of spiritual significance; that the
prophets were merely men of spiritual insight and had no supernatural
revelations of the future.

The assembly delegates gathered at Edinburgh in an atmosphere of
excitement. Thousands of pamphlets by as many as twenty-five differ-
ent writers were distributed by opponents and defenders of Smith. The
orthodoxists yelled "Heretic!" and the adherents of the man they ad-
miringly called "Smith o'Aiberdeen" replied, "A second Galileo!" At
the meeting, Dr. Begg warned that the eyes of all Scotland were upon
the assembly: "The righteous are trembling before the Ark of God!"
But Smith, eloquently and at length, made a point-by-point defense of
his article and his teachings and at the meeting's end was cleared of
all charges but one that he had rejected the Mosaic authorship of
Deuteronomy. Did a professor of the Free Church College, the as-
sembly asked, have a right to hold such a view?

Smith declared that he had made no irreligious statements either
in the article in the Encyclopaedia Britannica or in his teachings, and
the assembly put off a decision until its next meeting in 1880. Smith

58 THE GREAT EB

went off to the Orient, where he visited the Abdullah Effendi of
Jeddah and lived with the Richard Burtons in Arabia for several
months. He returned to face the assembly on a motion to deprive him
of his teaching job because of his allegedly unorthodox views.

At a meeting on May 27, 1880, before an overflowing crowd in the
assembly hall, with theological students thronging the balconies and
shouting for or against Smith or Begg, Smith began by denouncing
the assembly's action as irregular. Then he strode out. For fourteen
hours debate surged in the low-ceilinged hall. Finally Gilbert Beith,
a conciliatory elder of the church, offered a motion to admonish Smith
rather than eject him from his teaching position and to warn him
against publishing "unguarded and incomplete statements." This mo-
tion carried by a vote of 299 to 292, and Smith returned to accept the
verdict.

"I hope that I am not out of place/' he declared, "when I say that
while I thank God for the issue of this evening an issue which I trust
will be for His glory and for the maintenance of His truth I have
never been more sensible than on the present occasion of the blame
that rests upon men for statements which have proved so incomplete
that, even at the end of three years, the opinion of this House has been
so divided upon them. I feel that, in the providence of God, this is a
very weighty lesson to one placed, as I am, in the position of a teacher,
and I hope that by His grace I shall not fail to learn by it."

This seemingly abject yet tactful statement brought cheers from
every corner of the crowded hall. And the rancorous dispute appeared
to have ended.

Ten days later, however, it was renewed, violently and decisively.
For there now appeared a new volume of the Encyclopaedia Britan-
nica, the "H" volume. It was to have been issued earlier in the spring
but had been delayed because the article "Heat" by William Thomson,
Lord Kelvin, had been late in arriving. In this book was an article,
"Hebrew Language and Literature/' with the initials W. R. S. at its
end. And in it the church elders found new faults. They charged that
the article contained "unguarded statements" of the sort that had ap-
peared in "Bible" and other Smith writings, and they denounced
Smith as a man without honor. Smith argued that the article had been
written months before and that, in line with the assembly's admonition
to use greater care in stating his views, he had actually refused to
contribute articles on "Isaiah" and "Israel." New accusations that he had
broken faith and made flimsy promises now thudded against him. On

A GENERATION SPANNED 59

May 24, 1881, he was ordered removed from his job at the Free
Church College.

The ultimate effect of this battle between traditional orthodoxy and
modernist theology of the Victorian age was to vindicate the right of
free historial inquiry. The immediate effect of Smith's dismissal
was that he was hired, within a month, to serve with Baynes as joint
editor of the ninth edition. He accepted the post with the under-
standing that he could continue to give attention to the biblical and
philological studies by which he had made his reputation. Thirteen
more volumes remained to be issued. Because Baynes was ill and
beset with the weaknesses of advancing age, Smith assumed much of
the burden of putting them out. For eighteen months he toiled at the
job, not enjoying it "Anyone can edit/' he would grumble and
often acting the autocrat with his staff. He made his presence felt, and
his personality and his gifts. To the first eleven volumes he had con-
tributed some twenty articles; for the final thirteen he wrote more
than two hundred.

Moreover, Smith broadened the Encyclopaedia Britannicas interna-
tional aspect by including the work of the eminent European scholar
Julius Wellhausen, the German theologian whose ideas had formed
the basis of Smith's thinking in comparative religion. Another contrib-
utor closer to home was a young don at Christ College at Cambridge,
James G. Frazer, to whom Smith assigned "Totemism" and "Taboo,"
Smith considered these subjects important and saw an opportunity, by
printing good articles on them especially on the first of being ahead
of all other encyclopaedists then probing new findings in the science
of anthropology. Both of Frazer's articles constituted an important
development in the career of the future author of The Golden Bough,
for the seven months' research for them were, as Frazer recalled in
later years, "the beginning of a systematic application to anthropology
and especially to the study of the backward races of men whom we
call savages and barbarians."

In 1883 Smith was named professor of Arabic at Cambridge, and he
rejoiced at being once again in academic work with a chance of
escaping "the treadmill of the encyclopaedia." Actually he remained
as editor until the final volume was issued in 1888, a year after Baynes's
death, although for the five final years, much of the editorial labor was
carried on by J. Sutherland Black, subsequently Smith's official biog-

60 THE GREAT E B

rapher. When the edition was finished, another huge dinner was held
for contributors, after which Smith went off to Cambridge to teach and
work on plans for an Encyclopaedia Biblica. The final uproar in his
life, and a very mild one compared with what had gone before, came
shortly after the gala dinner, when an article appeared in the Scot's
Observer, commenting on the affair and making sour remarks about
Smith "All Scotland held him in flattering respect, or still more in
flattering horror/' The writer was believed to be W. E. Henley, once
employed by A. & C, Black, a fact that prompted Adam W. Black to
write to Smith deploring any association with anyone who would make
so derogatory a comment about him.

By the time Smith died in 1894 at forty-seven, this insulting
incident was forgotten, and what remained was the memory of an
earnest thinker who had advanced the cause of truth in dark and
shadowed places. For, largely as a result of Smith's articles in the
Encyclopaedia Britannica and subsequent writings, the movement for
a more liberal and rational tone in theological matters was begun in
Scotland and elsewhere where rigidity of thought had held command.
Writing of the Smith case two decades after the turmoil, James Bryce
saw its effect clearly:

The trial proved a turning point for the Scottish churches. . . . Opinions
formerly proscribed were thereafter freely expressed. Nearly all the doctrinal
prosecutions subsequently attempted in the Scottish Presbyterian Churches
have failed. Much feeling has been excited, but the result has been to secure
a greater latitude than was dreamt of forty years ago. ... It may be con-
jectured that as the process of adjusting the letter of Scripture to the con-
clusions of science which Galileo was not permitted to apply in the field of
astronomy has now been generally applied in the fields of geology and biol-
ogy, so the churches will presently reconcile themselves to the conclusions of
historic and linguistic criticism, now that such criticism has become truly
scientific in its methods. 1

1 Studies in Contemporary Biography (New York: Macmillan Co., 1902).

A GENERATION SPANNED 61

The Ninth Edition And Horace Hooper

Besides the comments on the Smith case in newspapers and magazines
everywhere, the completed ninth edition spurred much additional
discussion about its virtues and defects. Many called this the "scholars'
edition/' pointing out the authenticity of the work, the originality of
the thought, and the contributions to the intellectual thinking of the
time. Its eleven hundred contributors had been chosen with infinite
care, and they came not only from the British Isles but in greater
numbers than ever before from Germany, France, the Netherlands,
Sweden, Norway, Belgium, and the United States.

Interspersed among the 16,000 articles stretching over 25 volumes
and 20,504 pages were superb woodcuts, colored plates, and special
colored maps of London, Rome, Paris, New York, and Philadelphia.
Dates of a person's birth and death were used for the first time, a de-

vice quickly copied by other encyclopaedias. All the long, important
articles had individual indexes and bibliographies also innovations
and the final volume of the entire set was a complete index. And for
all its lofty intellectual nature, the ninth edition had its utilitarian side.
It gave detailed instructions and advice on how to make liquid glue,
how to tie knots, how to make gold lacquer, how to fashion snowshoes,
how to perform sleight-of-hand tricks, how to collect butterflies, how
to construct cheap farm bridges, how to make putty, how to build an
icehouse, how to shoe a horse, how to devise flies for trout fishing.

All the wonders, philosophical and practical, were duly noted by
the critics. The general reception of the entire work was highly favor-
able, best exemplified by the closing comment of a nine-page critique
in the discriminating Edinburgh Review: "Thoroughly well executed,
both in point of style and matter. . . . There never was a time when
the results of science and the results of history have been more ably
presented and preserved, although, as is inevitable, it exhibits and
provokes diversities of opinion on many subjects." Yet there were
persistent complaints that it had taken so long to produce the full set
that many of the early volumes were out of date by the time the later
volumes became available. This was inevitable under the system by
which the Encyclopaedia Britannica and other encyclopaedias of that
era were published, because publication of each volume always de-
pended on the success of the sale of the one preceding it. In the ninth
edition there had been frequent delays between volumes, since some
sold better than others.

Perhaps the most irate of all critics was an American, Thaddeus K.
Oglesby, a journalist of Montgomery, Alabama. The edition was pub-
lished in the United States through an arrangement A. and C. Black
had with Charles Scribner's publishing firm. So far as is known,
Oglesby may never have read beyond the first volume. But on page
719 he came upon a single paragraph that propelled him on a one-man
crusade against the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Under "American Liter-
ature" he read:

Since the Revolution days . . . the few thinkers of American born south
of Mason and Dixon's line outnumbered by those belonging to the single
State of Massachusetts have commonly migrated to New York or Boston
in search of a university training. In the world of letters, at least, the South-
ern States have shone by reflected light; nor is it too much to say, that mainly
by their connection with the North the Carolinas have been saved from sink-
ing to the level of Mexico or the Antilles. . . . Like the Spartan marshalling

THE NINTH EDITION AND HORACE HOOPER 63

his helots, the planter lounging among his slaves was made dead to Art. . . .
It has only flourished freely in a free soil; and for almost all its vitality and
aspirations ... we must turn to New England.

In his fury at such scurrilous sentiments, Oglesby dashed off para-
graph after paragraph in the Montgomery Advertiser, finally collecting
all his flaring prose in a book he titled Some Truths of History: A
Vindication of the South against the Encyclopaedia Britannica and
Other Maligners. He roared out against the "lies and calumnies" and
presented a historical summary to prove that the South had given
more presidents, soldiers, poets, painters, and musicians to the nation
than any other part of the country. As for Massachusetts, whither the
erudite encyclopaedist had insisted the cultured sons of the South
invariably fled, Oglesby ranted: "Where was there such bloody and
violent anti-Quakerism, religious intolerance, bigotry? Where were so-
called witches prosecuted, hanged, tortured, innocents murdered?
Where were skins of persons who died in almshouses tanned and
made into articles of merchandise? Where were people banished for
being Quakers? To each and all of these questions, History with its
inexorable, unerring pen, answers 'MASSACHUSETTS!' "

Notwithstanding blasts from such impassioned critics as Oglesby, the
ninth edition gained overwhelming popularity in the United States.
With Scribner's firm and Little, Brown and Company acting as distrib-
utors, A. & C. Black had been selling single volumes since 1875. Of
complete sets, Adam W. Black reported later that while only ten
thousand were sold in Great Britain, five times that number were
purchased in the United States.

These, of course, were the authorized copies of the Encyclopaedia
Britannica. Their sale was a fraction of total sales that included
pirated editions. Hundreds of thousands of direct, condensed, multi-
lated, or revised reprints were issued by large and small American
publishers in the decade after 1888. Laws preventing such practices
were no stronger than they had been in those days when Thomas
Dobson of Philadelphia had appropriated the third edition. Again it
was a Philadelphian who led the "ethical pirates/ 3 a Joseph M. Stod-
dart. Stoddart's volumes appeared almost simultaneously with the
originals, a feat made possible by the theft of proof sheets by a young
man who worked in the Neill and Company printing plant in Edin-

64 THE GREAT EB

burgh, one of several printers to whom the task of setting type for the
large edition had been allotted. As fast as sheets were turned over to
proofreaders, the thief succeeded in getting extra copies and sending
them on the fastest boat to the United States. This kind of activity
fazed Stoddart not at all he later issued a curt denial that he had
obtained material for his volumes through thievery and he continued
to issue his books for $5.00 each, while the authentic volumes were sold
for $9.00.

As in previous cases of piracy, the American courts actually pro-
tected Stoddart. When the Blacks and Scribner's sought to enjoin him
from publishing his reprint, he received a favorable ruling in 1879,
literally condoning what he was doing. Justice Arthur Butler declared:
"To reproduce a foreign publication is not wrong. There may be
differences of opinion about the morality of republishing a work here
that is copyrighted abroad; but the public policy of this country, as
respects the subject, is in favor of such republication. ... It is sup-
posed to have an influence upon the advance of learning and intelli-
gence." Stoddart did more than steal the contents. He went so far as
to publish a newspaper, Stoddart's Weekly, upholding his depreda-
tions. He claimed as did most of his imitators that he was bringing
the original Encyclopaedia Britannica up to date by issuing supple-
ments containing biographies of living persons.

Stoddart's closest competitor in piracy was Henry G. Allen of New
York, who had developed a special photographic process by which
the original pages could be copied. Allen's set, which he sanctimoni-
ously announced he had published "to answer the popular demand for
a work of moderate dimensions," sold for only $2.50 a volume, and,
although he claimed that the physical quality of the edition matched
the excellence of the original, the fact was that it was printed on
rough paper and the type was dim and difficult to read.

Adding to the din of the literary pirates, publishers of rival encyclo-
paedias raised a clamor of their own against the Encyclopaedia Bri-
tannica. One of the most vociferous was Alvin J. Johnson, a former
Yankee schoolmaster who had started his book career in the sixties by
selling cheap atlases. He soon succeeded so well that he organized a
firm to compete with his employer; in the same year that the first
volume of the Encyclopaedia Britannica's ninth edition was published
he started his Universal Encyclopaedia "A Scientific and Popular
Treasury of Useful Knowledge" edited by F. A. P. Barnard, president
of Columbia University, and Professor Arnold Guyot of Princeton. An

THE NINTH EDITION AND HORACE HOOPER 65

irrepressibly unorthodox promoter, Johnson created vigorous sales
campaigns. "Never let your prospect say "No/ Answer all questions
and be courageous/' he told his solicitors. "It you are ejected by the
front door, get back into the house by the basement and start all over
again/'

His blatant ads against the Encyclopaedia Britannica were equally
unrestrained. "THE BIG BLUNDERING BRITANNICA. ... An Expensive,
Cumbersome, and Almost Useless Work for Practical People/' began
one of his typical broadsides. He cited purported errors. He assailed
Thomas Henry Huxley's treatise on "Evolution." Huxley, he declaimed,
had dogmatically stated that everything in the Bible was false. "If
evolution is true, the Bible is false. The Bible is true, and evolution is
a malicious, diabolical lie!"

The publishers of Appletons American Cyclopaedia were less
strident but no less bitter. They dispatched thousands of pamphlets
through the nation, especially in the newly settled farmlands of the
West, and each of these booklets, extolling the Appleton publication,
demanded to know: "The Encyclopaedia Britannica: Is it adapted for
American Circulation?" Comments were sprinkled throughout the
booklets alleging that the Huxley articles and the rationalistic ap-
proach of William Robertson Smith in his theological contributions
veered close to godlessness. The Encyclopaedia Britannica was at-
tacked by the Appleton firm for too much indifference toward
American subjects, for including "long essays on dry subjects/' for
scoffing at American culture. "Is this caricature of American character
an edifying sort of reading for American families?" the pamphlets
asked, before offering on their final pages this advice: "Buy the Amer-
ican Cyclopaedia at $5 to $10 a volume The Best Encyclopaedia
ever Published A SAVING OF TEN CENTS PER DAY, the price of a cigar or
many other expenditures for luxuries or frivolities of a like amount,
would pay for a complete set of the Cyclopaedia by a bimonthly sub-
scription/'

Neither the Blacks nor their American agents took the literary
thievery and the criticisms mildly. They responded with advertise-
ments: "Beware of Mutilated and Spurious Reprints! All alleged 'Re-
prints' of the Encyclopaedia Britannica issued in this country are to a
large extent incomplete, inaccurate, and, by reason of serious mutila-
tions of the text, unreliable for purposes of reference/' Adverse reviews
of rival products were reprinted. Indorsements of the Encyclopaedia
Britannica from important readers, ministers, educators, authors, and

66 THE GREAT EB

government officials were scattered through the advertisements. Al-
though these advertisements rarely replied directly to the outcry of
the competitors, occasionally notice was taken of one specifically;
Appletoris American Cyclopaedia, for example, was characterized
as "An Unsafe Guide."

Booksellers joined in the general uproar. One of those most active
was a Chicagoan, J. W. Dickinson, who wrote long and colorful letters
to editors of the nation's leading newspapers inveighing against the
pirates and sent postal cards to prominent educators warning of the
attempts to sell pirated copies. "Some of these 'Reprint' hyenas are
prowling round in my territory, snarling at the houses of Adam and
Chas. Black of Edinburgh and Scribner's Sons of New York, as well as
at our own Chicago house," read a typical Dickinson communique.
"They are lying. . . . Should they appear in your vicinity, you will
do me a personal favor either to write or telegraph me. All their lies
can be exploded with ease, anything they may say to the contrary
notwithstanding."

Occasionally the newspapers in which the advertisements appeared
joined the battle. In 1890, the high-minded editor of the New York
Evening Post, E. L. Godkin, denounced two would-be pirates of the
Encyclopaedia Britannica. One of those whom he accused was no less
a personage than John Wanamaker, the wealthy merchant, postmaster-
general of the United States, and advocate of an extended Sunday
School system, and the other was Rev. Isaac Funk, head of the firm of
Funk and Wagnalls. Wanamaker had advertised that, by a special
photographic process similar to that used by Henry G. Allen, he in-
tended to issue a reprint of the Encyclopaedia Britannica and sell it
through his stores at only $38, as compared with the $225 for the
authentic Encyclopaedia Britannica. Funk and his partner also
trumpeted their intention of issuing a cheap reprint for only $40.

Godkin exploded. He headed his editorials on the subject "The
Black Robbery," denounced the plans of Wanamaker and of Funk as
"Plunder!" and "Theft!" and characterized both as "Parasites of the
Trade!" Wanamaker replied that what he intended to do was simply
good business, a practice engaged in by scores of others. Funk an-
swered with long diatribes against the Post. For six months both sides
exchanged angry statements, but on June 26, 1890, an important
decision by Judge William D. Shipman in the New York Supreme
Court stilled the clangor and brought an end to the plans of Wana-
maker and the clergyman-publisher.

THE NINTH EDITION AND HORACE HOOPER 67

Judge Shipman's ruling involved the ingenious complaint of Henry
G. Allen that A. & C. Black had sought to entrap potential pirates
by copyrighting in the United States articles in the authentic publica-
tion written by Americans. Allen's lawyers, while acknowledging that
if these articles were reprinted by the expropriators they were liable to
action under the American copyright laws, claimed that the British
publishers had copyrighted the Americans' articles merely for the
"immoral purpose" of legally ensnaring the pirates. But Judge Ship-
man refused to sustain this demurrer and ruled that Allen had indeed
violated the current copyright law by including the articles in his re-
print.

This case was still pending in the courts when Congress, where agi-
tation for a new act had long been brewing, passed the International
Copyright Law of 1891, which, while it did not afford complete pro-
tection for foreign publishers, made depredations somewhat more dif-
ficult for the pirates. Despite this law, bogus sets continued to come
from the presses and Americans by the many thousands continued to
buy.

In the thick of literary buccaneering was James Clarke, operating in
Chicago as one of the country's largest producers of cut-rate books.
Clarke was a Canadian who had joined the three Belford brothers,
Alexander, Charles, and Robert, in their Toronto bookselling business
early in 1875. Four years later, having evidently exhausted all sales
possibilities there, Clarke and Alexander Belford moved to Chicago,
where they formed the Belford-Clarke Company. In a town already
noted for energetic hustlers as well as unethical ones, Clarke and Bel-
ford carried on a profitable enterprise as "Cheap Johns/* as the pub-
lishers and distributors of inexpensive books were scornfully labeled
by their more dignified contemporaries. Their system exemplified pre-
vailing customs in a feverish book industry. They would publish a
brace of books usually a cheaply printed set of the complete works
of Dickens, Scott, Thackeray, or George Eliot at artificially high
prices and send as many as they could to jobbers. Then they dis-
patched traveling salesmen on the road to stock up booksellers. After
a few months, prices were slashed and local dry-goods stores and
small department stores were supplied with the same sets at lower
prices. Often the "Cheap Johns" clapped up makeshift bookstores in
small towns. In larger cities, if established booksellers refused to deal

68 THE GREAT EB

with them, Belford and Clarke simply sent their representatives to
the nearest department store or furniture emporium and opened a
book department on commission.

In addition to this kind of operation, Belford and Clarke issued a
pirated edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica in 1890, calling it the
Americanized Encyclopaedia Britannica Revised and Amended. It ran
to only ten volumes and purported to condense the material in the
original so that their edition would "contain all that is important to
know, in a nutshell compact, reliable and intelligible." Each volume
bore Christopher Marlowe's quotation "Infinite riches in a little room"
atop its pages. This publication sold so well for the pair that in a few
years they issued another, calling it the Home Encyclopaedia and ad-
mitting that it was largely derived from the ninth edition ("this mag-
nificent monument of Genius").

Clarke was active in another phase of bookselling. As head of James
Clarke and Company, he held exclusive rights to the distribution and
sale in the Midwest and West of the six-volume Century Dictionary.
This impressive encyclopaedic lexicon of the English language had
been compiled during a period of seven years under the editorship
of Dr. William D. Whitney, a Yale University philosopher. It ap-
peared in sections from 188 to 1891 with scores of illustrations and,
for the first time in the history of American dictionaries, dialect terms,
colloquialisms, provincialisms, and slang. For wide sales, Clarke
avoided the ordinary bookstores, concentrating instead on advertise-
ments in newspapers which offered the work, for a limited time, at
a reduced price ranging from $60 to $125. For an even more limited
period, the ads announced, an instalment-buying plan was avail-
able.

In the mid-1890's, the treasurer of James Clarke and Company was
a man teeming with sales ideas and promotional devices. In the book
business since his teens, Horace Everett Hooper had come to Chicago
from the West at the time of the World's Columbian Exposition of
1893. A sturdy young man of thirty-five, he had a proven talent
for knowing how to sell books and, more importantly, how to per-
suade people they really needed the books he offered for sale.

Hooper was descended from a Colonial family of Massachusetts whose
beginnings in this country went back to 1650. One of his ancestors
was nicknamed "King Hooper" and in the late 1700's controlled nearly

THE NINTH EDITION AND HORACE HOOPER 69

all the fishing interests and real estate in Marblehead. Horace's father,
William, was a Marblehead lawyer who dabbled in journalism. For a
brief time he was an editor of the Worcester Spy, the newspaper
famous in the days of the American Revolution for its report of the
Battle of Lexington headed "Americans! Liberty or Death! Join or
Die!" and for the rebellious writings of its first editor, Isaiah Thomas.
Hooper's mother was also of an old American family, descended from
John Leverett, one of Massachusetts' first governors.

Horace Hooper was born in Worcester in 1859, the sixth of eight
children, but when he was still a small boy the family moved to
Washington, where the elder Hooper had acquired a civil service job.
Horace attended elementary schools there and also went to a special
school to prepare for Princeton University; he spent one term at prep
school, where he was interested only in playing shortstop on the fresh-
man baseball team. At sixteen his formal schooling was at an end.
For a year or more he clerked in a bookstore in the capital; then he
took his savings and ran off to the new West, settling in Denver, Colo-
rado, where he quickly secured work as a book agent for a number
of eastern companies.

America was experiencing a boom in the sale of books by sub-
scription. The origins of this upsurge were rooted in the western mi-
grations, for in the wake of the covered wagons and the new settlers
had come circuit riders, district schoolmasters and, inevitably, book
agents ready to accept down payments for almost any kind of reading
matter, from Bibles to compendiums of cookery, from collections of
legal treatises to Civil War reminiscences. Indeed, the first affluent
era for the traveling book salesman came immediately in the decades
after the Civil War; Mark Twain, for one, had helped publish on a
subscription basis the Memoirs of General Grant, which netted the
general and his heirs $450,000 in royalties. Many of Mark Twain's own
books were sold by subscription, and his American Publishing Com-
pany, centered in Hartford, Connecticut, was typical of those calling
for salesmen and canvassers: "The sale of our works is an honorable
and praiseworthy employment, and is particularly adapted to dis-
abled Soldiers, aged and other Clergymen having leisure hours, Teach-
ers and Students during Vacation, etc., Invalids unable to endure hard
physical labor, Young Men who wish to travel, and gather knowledge
and experience by contact with the world, and all who can bring
industry, perseverance, and a determined will to work."

Many who responded to such advertisements engaged in high-pres-

70 THE GREAT EB

sure selling methods that made book agents unpopular for years in
the new territories. Some were unscrupulous and never sent on the
giant volumes or sets for which subscribers had handed over their
initial payments. But there were also scores of eager young men to
whom this kind of enterprise was an introduction to wider, deeper
pathways of the book world. Hooper fit neatly into the ranks of these
younger book agents, for he was a facile speaker, bursting with sin-
cerity and a genuine love for books. He read widely, shunning fiction
but memorizing whole pages of histories, biographies, and scientific
books. He joined the salesmen swarming into the West.

Before he was thirty, Hooper had established in Denver the Western
Book and Stationery Company, a distributing agent for books through-
out Colorado and adjoining states. Through friendship with George
Clarke, brother of the Chicago entrepreneur, he helped to organize
the sale of the Century Dictionary throughout that territory, mapping
out plans for his salesmen that brought results so pleasing to James
Clarke that he persuaded Hooper to move his firm to Chicago. There
Hooper's Western Book and Stationery Company became the entire
book section of The Fair, a State Street department store founded by
an ingenious merchant, Edward J. Lehmann, who parceled out, for
suitable commissions, parts of his emporium to various businesses. As-
sociated with Hooper as a partner in this venture was George Clarke,
and, soon enough, associated with both Clarkes in James Clarke and
Company, was Horace Hooper.

Hooper quickly showed how adept he was. By 1895, the sale of the
Century Dictionary had slowed down, and James Clarke was left
with many hundreds of sets on his hands. Hooper waited until a few
weeks before that year's Christmas season. Then he filled the local
newspaper with ebullient prose written by the firm's young advertis-
ing man, Henry Haxton, offering the multivolumed dictionaries at
special holiday rates. For a down payment of only fifteen dollars the
entire set would be delivered, with the balance to be paid monthly.
"An ideal Christmas present! Take advantage of this never-again offer!
BUY NOW! A GBEAT BOON!" read the ads in the Chicago newspapers.
In a month all the leftovers were sold.

With the holidays over and the firm looking ahead to a new year
Clarke's other company, Belford and Clarke, was then issuing its pi-
rated Home Encyclopaedia Hooper decided that he had earned a
vacation. When Haxton, who spent part of every year abroad, left for
England, Hooper followed.

THE NINTH EDITION AND HORACE HOOPER 71

It was a vacation trip, this maiden voyage of Hooper's, that would
result in a tremendous change in his fortunes and his future.

Haxton met Hooper at Plymouth when his ship landed. Flam-
boyant characters both Haxton with his elegant clothes, his spade
beard, and his flashing rings, Hooper with a full, curled mustache, a
snappish style of speech, and eyes darting everywhere. No railroad
would do for them. Instead, they hired horses and rode to London
over moors and through country towns, arriving flushed and excited.

It was inevitable that Hooper, although he had come to London for
pleasure, would soon be involved with business. He went to places
where there was talk of books and printing and newspapers and pub-
lishing. Already aware of the sales figures of the Encyclopaedia Bri-
tannica in the British Isles and in the United States the meager
amount in the first country and the overwhelming one, of both genu-
ine and pirated copies, in the second he learned that a new printing
of the Encyclopaedia Britannica's ninth edition had fared poorly. The
perennial complaint of out-of-dateness had balked a satisfactory sale,
and the price of 37 was too high for the mass of the population.

Hooper was aware, too, of the swift development of a new kind of
newspaper in England for a new kind of reader. The many thousands
who had benefited from the Education Act of 1870 and the thousands
more who followed them were eager for almost any kind of reading
matter they could afford, and in this very year of 1896 there were
smart and bold men to fill part of that need. The energetic Alfred
Harmsworth was one. Although only in his thirties, he was already a
success in newspaper publishing. His latest project was a halfpenny
newspaper, the Daily Mail., an eight-page gazette with special appeal
for the large and growing white-collar class through full treatment of
scandal as well as governmental news. In tone and form of adver-
tising, it was alert and colorful, shattering a century-old tradition by
the use of display type, broken column rules, and illustrations.
There was also George Newnes's sprightly weekly, Tit-Bits,, which
printed news and oddments from many newspapers and was bright in
style, jammed with ads, and imitated by scores of other weeklies.
Newnes's Strand Magazine often carried as many as a hundred pages
of advertisements.

Hooper heard and retained much of what was happening in jour-
nalism and in advertising. He met another American, Paul E. Derrick,

72 THE GREAT EB

who a few years earlier had opened an advertising office and was a
pioneer in using illustrated ads in periodicals. He read and leafed
through dozens of magazines in which he saw advertisements using
drawings and engravings especially created by noted artists for firms
selling everything from soap to cigarettes. All this had begun in the
middle of the 1880's, when Sir John Millais had painted his grandson
blowing bubbles. Eventually Thomas A. Barratt, managing director
of A. and F. Pears, had purchased the canvas from its first owner, the
London Illustrated News, for 2,300 and used it as an advertisement
for Pears soap. Some of the flashier halfpenny newspapers were
splattered with advertising sketches Sunlight Soap was touted by
drawings of a wife bending over a washtub, with a pouting husband
in the background, and the admonition, "Don't let steam and suds
be your husband's welcome on wash days!" Poster advertising was
rampant all over London, with ballyhoo for pills and nostrums, cereals
and cigarettes. And to act as a watchdog over all this there had been
formed the Society for the Checking of Abuses in Public Advertising.

But in the advertisements for books staid Victorianism persisted.
Most publishers simply inserted small ads containing the name of
the firm, the title of the book, and its author, occasionally adding a
favorable comment from a reviewer. It was considered bad taste to
engage in this new kind of advertising puffery for cultural products,
although, interestingly enough, one of the biggest advertisements
and, it must be added, one of the few of this kind carried up to
that time by the Times had been for a book. As far back as 1829,
Edmund Lodge's Portraits and Memories of the Most Illustrious Per-
sonages of British History had been given a full-page ad. But this
had indeed been a rarity. Now the Times, although faced with the
growing competition of the new gazettes, weekly and daily, symbol-
ized the stolidity of the passing generation. Its dull gray columns
rarely were broken by attention-attracting advertisements; its reputa-
tion was for solemnity, its future uncertain.

All this Hooper was quick to notice and consider. And he was soon
outlining a plan to Haxton in their rooms at the Savoy or at a mut-
ton dinner in Simpson's in the Strand. Question after question he
hurled at Haxton: Why was the sale of the Encyclopaedia Britannica
so low here? "Because the price is too high and they don't know
how to sell it," Hooper would reply to his own query. Who owned
the copyright? Who were the printers?

Aware of the growing effect of advertising on the London public,

THE NINTH EDITION AND HORACE HOOPER 73

Hooper was certain that what was selling soaps and oatmeal and pills
could sell the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Never one to show indif-
ference when an advertising campaign was in prospect, Haxton
matched Hooper's excitement with action. Within a week he and
Hooper were on their way to Edinburgh to confer with Edward Clark,
head of R. and R. Clark, chief printers of the ninth edition.

"Do you think it would be possible to lease the plates of the edition
from the owners and give them a royalty on the sets we sell or give
them cash?" Hooper asked.

Clark demanded more details.

"I don't know exactly what well do, I only have it generally in
mind/' said Hooper. "But I know that with the right kind of adver-
tising and the right kind of approach, our sale can be a great success."

Carefully, Clark estimated that an arrangement with A. & C.
Black was not outside the realm of possibility. Only two years earlier
the Blacks had moved from Edinburgh to new quarters in London's
Soho Square. The youngest and most enterprising of the brothers,
Adam W. Black, was the one most active in the firm. He contem-
plated expansion of other publishing plans and, disappointed in the
company's inability to sell the Encyclopaedia Britannica, would be
receptive, Clark told Hooper, to any sound proposal.

Hooper wasted no time in speeding back to the United States. Ex-
citedly he outlined the project to James and George Clarke. He and
the Clarkes would secure the copyright or the plates from the Blacks,
then market the Encyclopaedia Britannica on the widest scale. "Well
turn them topsy-turvy," Hoover cried, "and well all make money."

Readily the Clarkes agreed, James informing Hooper of an inter-
esting coincidence. He had recently discussed, he said, with Walter
Montgomery Jackson, head of the Grolier Society, a similar idea,
and he now proposed that Jackson be invited to join the project.
"This will take money," he said, "and Jackson's got it."

Hooper offered no objections, for he was aware that Jackson was
one of the most astute bookmen in the country. And the way was
clear for the affiliation of the two men who would mean so much to
the future of the Encyclopaedia Britannica.

Like Hooper, Walter Montgomery Jackson had been involved in the
making and selling of books since boyhood. His first job had been to
tidy up the bookshop and offices of Estes and Lauriat in Boston, ten

74 THE GREAT EB

miles from Newton Lower Falls, Massachusetts, where Jackson had
been born in 1863. An agile worker, young Jackson had swiftly come
to the attention of Dana Estes when, after each clean-up session in
the stockroom, the youth urged the publisher to come to the room to
see the results of his labors and then, after receiving routine approval,
asked, "What's next for me, sir?" At twenty-two, Jackson was a partner
in charge of the Estes and Lauriat manufacturing and publishing de-
partment. He helped greatly in expanding the company's business
and building a distribution system that covered the country. Within a
few years he was so eager to branch out that he made a pact to
spend half his time with the Estes and Lauriat firm and the rest with
his own non-competing enterprises.

By this time Jackson was part owner or director of half a dozen
publishing and distribution houses. His prime interest was in the
Grolier Society, which he had organized the previous year to publish
high-grade books for a limited clientele able and eager to pay top
prices for richly bound, specially illustrated editions of rare literature
and of standard classics. Jackson had derived both the name and
the idea for his firm from the Grolier Club, organized in 1884 by a
group of New York editors, publishers, bibliophiles, and art collectors
for "the literary study and promotion of the arts entering into the
production of books." Club and company were named for Jean Gro-
lier de Servieres, a former treasurer-general of France who loved
fine books and had employed the most skilful French binders to pre-
pare beautiful volumes for his library. Jackson's Grolier Society was
prospering, as were his other companies, and in the book trade he
was known as a man of active imagination and sound business sense.

Early in the summer of 1897, a conference was held in the New York
offices of James Clarke and company. Present were the Clarke broth-
ers, Hooper, and Jackson. The time was ready for their invasion of
Great Britain.

All agreed that if they succeeded in persuading the Blacks to as-
sent to Hooper's plan, a British corporation would be organized to sell
the Encyclopaedia Britannica at reduced rates through an energetic
advertising campaign under the direction of Hooper and Haxton. Each
of the four men was to put into such a corporation an equal amount
of money; each would share equally in any profits.

Because James Clarke had other business to tend to in London, he

THE NINTH EDITION AND HORACE HOOPER 75

was designated to present the joint proposition to the Blacks. He
sailed later that summer but, before approaching the publishers, car-
ried through negotiations to acquire a company owned by another
American, Carlyle Norwood Greig, who had created a successful busi-
ness by printing a shiny picture booklet called Beautiful Britain and
selling it to thousands of grocers who gave copies to customers pur-
chasing a specified amount of groceries. Greig's offices were on Lud-
gate Hill, and there Clarke prepared for his assault on the publishers
of the Encyclopaedia Britannica.

His conquest was swift and simple. Adam W. Black and his brothers
actually were as eager as Hooper had heard they were to rid them-
selves, under proper financial terms, of the edition they were having
such trouble selling to their countrymen. They accepted Clarke's pro-
posals quite readily, and on September 17 a contract was signed
yielding to James Clarke and Company the right to print five thousand
copies of the ninth edition for sale in the United Kingdom. For this
privilege, the Blacks were to receive a flat 6,500 1,000 on the
signing of the contract, the rest when the books were available.

Contract in hand, Clarke hurried back to the United States. Now
it was Hooper's turn. He went to London that November, taking over
the Ludgate Hill offices for many months his door would still bear
the name of Greig and Company, Limited and began the tasks of
ordering stock for the five thousand copies, of conferring with printers,
and, most important of all, of planning an advertising campaign with
Haxton.

By February, 1898, all was ready. And Hooper, writing to Clarke,
suggested, almost offhandedly, an interesting proposition. Always on
the alert for the best advertising medium, Hooper had persistently
had in mind the Times, despite that newspaper's reputed aversion to
hullabaloo in either its news or advertising columns. Haxton was not
easily upset by daring suggestions of any sort, but even he was skepti-
cal of any success in this, and so was every British publisher or book-
dealer with whom Hooper talked. But Hooper insisted that he
sensed a possibility of acceptance. To Clarke he wrote, "I am nearly
ready to begin selling operations. I suggest that you come to England
and that the two of us secure, if possible, The Times of London as
the medium through which the sales of the Encyclopaedia Britannica
should be made. I believe it likely that this can be done."

Clarke was aware of the element of daring in the entire venture,
and, like Haxton, he was not too enthusiastic about Hooper's pro-

76 THE GREAT EB

posal to sell the encyclopaedia with American-style advertisements in
the Times. Before arranging to sail for England he conveyed his
doubts in a letter to Hooper, but by return mail Hooper replied, "I've
found out a few important things since I've been here. We need
someone big in this project and we can use The Times. But I think
The Times needs us as much as we need The Times"

THE NINTH EDITION AND HORACE HOOPER 77

An Amazing Alliance

All the information Horace Hooper had collected about the Times
pointed to the fact that "The Thunderer" had reached a dangerous fi-
nancial plateau. Never in its long history had the newspaper been so
sorely in need of funds. This condition stemmed from many factors,
old and new. Back in 1789, when the first John Walter had trans-
formed his Daily Universal Register into the Times, he had created a
perpetual contract providing that his printing business possess sole
rights for printing the newspaper. In its first years, the Times was
merely an adjunct to the prospering printing firm. Walter had also
given a number of persons shares and half-shares in perpetuity, pro-
viding that under no circumstances were any but these specified share-
owners and their heirs to own the Times. John Walter II, forceful and
despotic, had built the newspaper into a profitable institution, and a

vastly respected one. He had given part interests in the paper to friends
and employees, so that now there were at least eighty so-called propri-
etors with varying degrees of power. The printing business was still
thriving, and not only were the Walters as publishers of the newspaper
required to pay the cost of printing to the Walters as printers, but
there was rent to be derived from Printing House Square and its envi-
rons, also owned by the Walter family. After the death of the second
Walter, when John Walter III was well into his term as governing pro-
prietor, the Times s profits dwindled. But in spite of this, costs and
rents had to be paid by the terms of the perpetual contract.

By the 1880's, this arrangement was responsible for complex litiga-
tion, with the result that a huge reserve fund established by the Wal-
ters was dissipated. The Times was lagging editorially, too, and much
of its vigor and reputation had diminished. An especially heavy blow
damaged its prestige in 1887. On March 7, the Times initiated a series
of articles, "Parnellism and Crime," contending that Charles Stewart
Parnell, the fiery exponent of Irish home rule, was behind a movement
to cause the revolutionary overthrow of British authority in Ireland. In
the final article, on April 18, a letter was printed, purportedly the fac-
simile of one written by Parnell to Patrick Egan, secretary of the Land
League, condoning the murder of Permanent Undersecretary Burke
and Lord Frederick Cavendish, chief secretary for Ireland, in Dublin's
Phoenix Park five years earlier. This letter had been obtained from a
Richard Piggott, a shady journalist, and in the heat of the fight over
home rule, George Edward Buckle, the Times s editor, had decided to
print it. Charging that the letter was a forgery, Parnell sued for libel
in the sum of 100,000. In the ensuing trial, Piggott admitted the letter
was spurious, then fled to Madrid where he hanged himself. Although
Parnell settled for 5,000, the total costs of the suit to the Times and,
worse, the injuries to its reputation were serious.

Although John Walter III was still alive, his son, Arthur Fraser Wal-
ter, served as the newspaper's managing director. A leisured country
gentleman, distrustful of intellectual persons, gentle and courteous, he
cared more for landscape gardening than for newspaper management.
To aid him in running the newspaper, he sent in 1890 for Charles
Frederick Moberly Bell, who for twenty years had been the paper's
chief correspondent in Egypt. Bell had been born in Alexandria, where
his father, Thomas Bell, was an English merchant trading in wheat
and cotton. While a clerk for his father's firm, he had started to send
long dispatches to the Times s financial columns, and from 1870, when

AN AMAZING ALLIANCE 79

he was only twenty-three, he had been a steady correspondent, au-
thoritative and dullish, but reliable.

When Arthur Walter summoned him, Bell believed that he would
assume his job as assistant to the managing director for only a few
months, then return to the comparative ease of his post in Alexandria.
But he was in his Printing House Square office only a week before he
realized that his return would be long delayed, if not impossible. The
Times, he quickly and sadly learned, was virtually insolvent, with as-
sets of 61,000 and liabilities of nearly twice that amount. Revenues,
the books showed, had fallen steadily at the rate of 9,000 a year .in
the preceding fifteen years, The accounting system was in a woeful
state; one foreign correspondent claimed he had not received any ex-
pense money for six years, while another, who had been allotted 1,-
850 in 1885 and 1,770 in 1889, could not furnish any evidence of hav-
ing spent more than 800 in either year. Circulation in fifteen years
had dropped from 65,000 to 40,000. Advertisements principally the
small want ads on which the Times a decade before had had a monop-
olyhad decreased considerably. A passionate believer in serving the
public, Bell found to his great displeasure that many of the newspa-
per's ad takers sulkily refused to tell customers when their notices
would appear. Staff morale was weak, and there was grumbling and
dissatisfaction with the way the Walters concentrated only on taking
profits from the printing business and permitted the editorial side of
the newspaper to languish.

Surveying all this, Bell set assiduously to work. He often remained
in his office eighteen hours a day, seeking to bring order out of financial
and editorial chaos. He was powerless, of course, to break up the com-
plex arrangement of Walters-the-printers versus Walters-the-proprie-
tors, but wherever this hulking, swarthy man his associates called
him "The Assyrian" sensed a chance for improvement, he moved
ahead energetically. He hired as foreign reporters a number of distin-
guished writers and several who would later become famous. Donald
Mackenzie Wallace, formerly correspondent at Constantinople and St
Petersburg, was appointed head of the foreign service. Valentine Chi-
rol, whom Bell had known in Egypt, was dispatched to the Near East.
The first woman ever to work on the Times, Flora Shaw, was made a
foreign correspondent, and still another new reporter was G. E. Morri-
son, later to gain renown as "Morrison of Pekin." Although Bell en-
larged his foreign staff, he cut down on cable costs and expense ac-
counts. "The merit of a correspondent," he wrote to one of his foreign

80 THE GREAT EB

reporters, "depends on the quality, not the quantity of his dispatches.
Remember that telegrams are for facts; appreciation and political
comment can come by post."

He sought advertisements, but always with an eye toward the
vaunted conservatism of the Times. When subscribers complained
about advertisements of certain stockbrokers, Bell explained in per-
sonal letters: "It is extremely probable that many advertisements are
misleading, and I am afraid that if we were to refuse all advertise-
ments which had this tendency none would remain. . . . We are ex-
tremely careful to exclude from our advertisements anything of an im-
moral character, and daily refuse advertisements on this ground."

In 1895, after the death of John Walter III and the accession of Ar-
thur Walter as governing proprietor, Bell was named managing direc-
tor and given some additional powers. To the Thursday edition he
added the Literary Supplement, its first number carrying a poem writ-
ten by Rudyard Kipling, its subsequent issues devoted to reviews of
books without prejudice of politics or nationality. That same year Bell
opened a publications department by issuing a Times Gazetteer; its
sale yielded a profit of nearly 2,000, but its success was limited be-
cause it was printed on poor paper and was cheaply made. A biography
of Bismarck had an inferior sale, primarily because of insufficient pro-
motion and advertising.

For a time Bell appeared to be clearing away the deadwood. A debt
of 41,000 was converted, through economies instituted by him, to a
profit of 24,000. But this was not enough. Costs rose anew. Circula-
tion and advertising revenue continued to fall. On the February morn-
ing in 1898 when Clarke and Hooper laid before Bell their proposition
to reissue the ninth edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica under
sponsorship of the Times to the paper's possible financial advantage
circulation stood at a new low of thirty-six thousand, and money
was needed, and needed quite desperately.

Still, before signing any agreement with Clarke and Hooper, Bell
was wary about the plan. He sent letter after letter to the Blacks, mak-
ing certain that all would go as the two Americans promised. "Before
we publish advertisements inducing people to send one guinea to this
office," he wrote, "we must have some guarantee that the E.B. will be
delivered as promised. This guarantee must be given by you or some
responsible firm in this country." And again, when Adam W. Black's

AN AMAZING ALLIANCE SI

reply was not satisfactory: "I do not think you quite see my point. By
inserting an advertisement that the E.B. shall be sent to anyone who
subscribes a guinea we guarantee that anyone who subscribes shall re-
ceive an E.B. But we have no control over the Encyclopaedia Britan-
nica. Who guarantees us that the Encyclopaedia Britannica will be de-
livered? If your firm does so, we know where we are but we know
nothing of Messrs. Clarke and Hooper or of the printer, binder or
others through whose hands the book will pass. Before we put in Ad-
vertisements that may result in 10,000 people having a claim on us for
a book which may be valued at 20 pounds before, that is, we enter
into a contract which may involve a liability of 200,000 pounds we
must be covered by some responsible, well known signature."

Bell's qualms finally were eased. On March 14, 1898, an agreement,
terse and pointed, was drawn in his office and duly signed. "We must
have a contract," said Hooper, looking ahead to any crisis, "that we can
drive a cart through in case of need. We can never provide for all the
ruts we shall meet on the road, and we've got to get through." The
terms were plain: the Times would take orders for this special reprint
of the ninth edition, deliver the orders to the Clarkes, Hooper, and
Jackson operating as James Clarke and Company, Limited and re-
tain as its commission one guinea on each order.

Within a week, the campaign was ready. And on March 23 the adver-
tisement for the reprint of the ninth edition covered page 15 of the
Times, an advertisement that exhorted, persuaded, lectured, and, most
startling, offered the set for only fourteen guineas fourteen pounds, a
bit less, if cash were paid with delivery promised not when this total
amount was received but immediately upon a down payment of a sin-
gle guinea. For the first time in England that anyone could recall, the
instalment plan the so-called hire-purchase system was applied to
book-buying. It had been used for some other commodities but never
for books and, above all, never for the Encyclopaedia Britannica.

"THE ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA is not a mere aid to memory to be
hastily consulted in moments of emergency," trumpeted Henry Hax-
ton's first ad. "It is not only the greatest of works of reference, but it is
a Library in Itself, a collection of admirable treatises upon all conceiv-
able subjects. Even the most recondite branches of learning are treated
without a trace of pedantry. The volumes are EMINENTLY READABLE."

In another section of the announcement, potential purchasers were

82 THE GREAT EB

warned that the offer was for a limited time, that this was the prime
opportunity to enrol in the plan before actual publication of the re-
print. "The Times does not guarantee that all orders will be filled, but
provision is made for the expected quotum of PROMPT APPLICATIONS/'
For readers with more expensive tastes, a set bound in half morocco
was available at eighteen guineas, and for twenty-five guineas one
might acquire a still richer one bound in dark green leather with the
royal arms stamped in gold on the side covers. "Although this set of 25
volumes weighs 175 pounds, terms provide for free delivery within the
London postal district/'

This Encyclopaedia Britannica was no mere rehash of mundane
writing; it was, boasted the advertisement, dramatic and personal.
"THE ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA gives no hospitality to the sort of
Charmless' drudge who used to compile works of reference when the
world was younger. . . . The ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA is essen-
tially the production of men who wrote out of the fullness of knowledge.
The wonderful story of the 19th Century is told by the men who made
its greatness; the history of modern progress in the arts, sciences and
industries has the glow that only a soldier can give to the tale of a
campaign; for the men who fought against ignorance, and brought en-
lightenment to their generation, themselves tell how the light was
spread/'

There were admonitions that only through this ninth edition al-
though the last volume had been printed a decade earlier could the
intelligent person be aware of modern trends and current events.
There were quoted opinions, including Gladstone's: "To own a set of
the Encyclopaedia Britannica is to acknowledge one's self as recogniz-
ing the best there is in literature/' There was a list of some of the
eleven hundred distinguished contributors. And again, emphatic and
bold, there was the fact that a down payment brought the encyclopae-
dia to one's doorstep at a 60 per cent reduction in the previous price
an "UNPRECEDENTED PRICE!"

Day after day the barrage continued; week by week public interest
expanded. August 6 was set as the "Absolutely Final Day," after
which the bargain offer would be withdrawn forever. Each adver-
tisement stressed the limited number available, the need for swift ac-
tion by all eager for "learning, scholarship and general information."
Together with these exhortations appeared specialized ads. Through-

AN AMAZING ALLIANCE 83

out April, for example, readers of the Times were treated to tempting
sections from articles on "Birds" and "Easter," and, when the Spanish-
American War broke out in the last week of the month, a specimen
page from the article on "Cuba" plus parts of others on the American
and Spanish armies, albeit from the 1875 printing, were quoted. In
May another inducement was put forward: two hundred revolving
bookcases of quartered oak, available to the first readers who applied,
"without favor of privilege," for only three pounds and delivered with-
out extra charge inside the London postal district. And through every
ad, large and small, echoed the theme: "HURRY! HURRY! HURRY!"

And hurry they did, with almost as many customers willing to pay
cash as buy on the instalment plan. By the end of the campaign's sec-
ond month the results were joyously good. Old-timers at Printing
House Square deplored the bustle of the Americans, notably Hooper
and Jackson, as they came and went to Bell's office, or clucked unhap-
pily about the uses to which the columns of the Times were being put.
But Bell, as he saw the orders pouring in, was not among these. By the
end of May the number sold stood at forty-three hundred five times
and more the amount Bell had hoped might be sold in a year. For the
first time in many months, the hard-working managing director was
jubilant over immediate and future prospects. The Times had found a
staunch ally, and his name was Horace Hooper. To Hooper had
fallen most of the organizational work of the campaign, both Clarkes
having been occupied with other publishing interests and Jackson not
having even arrived in England until the advertising was about to
begin. From this point on, as Hooper and Bell drew closer, there was
not much Hooper would propose in which Bell would not concur. It
was obvious that the Americans' plan, which had seemed so unpromis-
ing to Bell at first, was the medium by which the Times might be im-
measurably aided. Henceforth Bell would keep an ear eagerly cocked
for other proposals from these uninhibited newcomers.

84 THE CHEAT EB

Part Two

"Weve Done It! Weve Done It!"

The lure of the advertisements endured. Rarely had there been such a
response to any campaign in Great Britain in or out of publishing, and
so sustained was the popular reaction that it was soon announced that
individual inquiries could no longer be answered and all further par-
ticulars of the offer would be found in the columns of the Times,

In August, the low price was withdrawn, but the new offer at sixteen
guineas was still considerably below the amount charged originally by
A. & C. Black. Not only was the announcement of this price carried
in the Times, but advertisements of the set for seventeen guineas ap-
peared in the Daily Mail. Bell offered no objection to the use of col-
umns in the Harmsworth paper, for he was elated with the progress of
his own venture. Besides, Hooper explained that the Daily Mail plan,
while selling the volumes at a higher price, was actually designed for

lower-income groups, presumably non-readers of the Times, who were
required to make an initial instalment of only five shillings with the
rest payable in as many as thirty months. Bell felt that any other prof-
its Hooper and his associates could honestly make were no concern of
his. Moreover, the figures at the end of 1898 disclosed that, by carrying
through this plan with Hooper and Clarke and the others, no less than
11,830 had been added to the coffers of the Times.

But one irritating complaint, enough to irk a man of Bell's sensitive
morality and touchy temperament, had been provoked. Although
every advertisement had prominently mentioned that the Times edi-
tion of the Encyclopaedia Britannica was a reprint of the old ninth
and by no means a new one, there were grumblings. Some of the com-
plainants had evidently been so dazzled by Haxton's rhetoric that they
had disregarded the information about the reprint. Other criticisms un-
doubtedly were spurred by jealous rivals of the Times, and a witticism
was circulated among other journalists: "The Times is behind the En-
cyclopaedia and the Encyclopaedia is behind the times."

Patiently Bell scrawled detailed answers to those who wrote to him
about this matter. And he also authorized and helped write an adver-
tisement emphasizing the value of the Encyclopaedia Britannica as a
kind of permanent library, with immense advantages over competing
publications: "The various almanacs and Year Books supply to the
public the sort of ephemeral information which is in its way convenient
and useful, just as the minute hand of a clock is serviceable when one
has a train to catch, but for the broader purpose of life it is necessary
that men and events should be regarded from a point of view neither
too shifting nor in too point-blank a proximity. In the distance it is in-
teresting to know that Socrates loved better to stroll through the
streets than to stride over the fields, but the fact that a man of our day
whose house is just around the corner prefers billiards to golf
hardly fits the scholarly atmosphere of such a work as the Encyclopae-
dia Britannica. It has none of the perishability of a directory, because
its editors were wise enough not to attempt to give it the advantages
and disadvantages of an annual."

Any who felt cheated were invited to return their copies at the
Times's expense. Evidently Bell's sincere letters dissuaded many com-
plainants from asking for refunds, for he later reported that in the first
two months of the sale, when such objections were most frequent, only

88 THE GREAT EB

eleven of the forty-three hundred who ordered asked to be freed from
their contracts.

But these developments persuaded Bell that a new edition needed
to be prepared and, certainly, under the aegis of the Times. The
same advertising methods might well be employed, he reflected, and
the same hire-purchase system. He was noticing with some satisfaction
that instalment buying, once frowned on by all but low-wage earners,
had taken on a kind of respectability, obviously the result of the sale of
the reprint. One publisher of novels established a system of selling a
batch of half a dozen of his current books, to be delivered on payment
of the price for only one. And a firm of furniture-makers proclaimed
itself, in the midst of the campaign, The Times Furnishing Company,
Limited,'* printing its title in the old English type of the Times.

Hooper was in full agreement with Bell's suggestion that a new edition
be published. But he amended the plan. "We must get out a new ver-
sion in the shortest time possible, and it will be impossible to make it
an entirely new one," he said. "My idea is to put out a supplement,
maybe six, seven volumes, bringing everything as up to date as possi-
ble, and bring these out all at once. Well do a lot of advertising and
we'll hit it right again. Later, we can think about a completely new
edition."

Both Hooper and Jackson agreed that Bell should be placed in over-
all editorial charge. He could name the editor, pick a staff, and com-
mit the Times to full editorial responsibility. Clarke and Company
would pay all expenses. Bell also proposed that special editions of the
Century Dictionary and the Gazetteer be issued, both under auspices
of the Times, to be sold on the instalment plan. This latter project,
when carried through during 1899, eventually yielded some 8,000
for the paper,

Donald Mackenzie Wallace, the Times's foreign editor, was named
by Bell to edit the supplement. Hugh Chisholm, editor-in-chief of the
St. James's Gazette, was named his associate. At Hooper's suggestion,
an American office was established in New York. His brother, Frank-
lin H. Hooper, left his post as associate editor of the Century Diction-
ary to become American editor, and Arthur T. Hadley, president of
Yale University, was major consulting editor.

Throughout 1899 various announcements appeared in the Times re-
lating to this supplement. The first, on February 23, thanked the thou-

"WE'VE DONE IT! WE'VE DONE rr!" 89

sands who had purchased the reprint, then went on to disclose that
because it had been so well received a new edition, to consist of the
twenty-five volumes of the ninth and ten additional volumes to bring
information up to date, would be prepared and issued before the end
of the century. Contracts legalizing this venture were signed with A.
and C. Black; taking another step toward eventual liquidation of their
ownership of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, the Blacks received 40,-
000 for various rights.

When Wallace was summoned by royal command to accompany the
Prince of Wales on a trip around the world, Chisholm stepped into his
place. One of the most brilliant men in his class at Oxford, Chisholm,
still in his early thirties, had been extremely independent as editor of
the St. James's Gazette, achieving a certain fame when he among all
others, friend or foe, refused to praise William Gladstone upon that
statesman's death in 1898. Instead he had written, "The St. James's
Gazette had always seen in Gladstone a national danger. The danger
had been none the less because it was now removed. Therefore why
gloss over the past?"

Now, he and his staff of writers, rewriters, and subeditors who did
little more than paste up long articles from the ninth edition before
sending them off to experts for revision were housed in a top floor of
Printing House Square, there to be regularly visited by Hooper or
Jackson, the first talking rapidly, the second silently puffing on a big
cigar.

In the American office, Franklin Hooper prepared a long list of arti-
cles he thought Americans might want in the supplement and, with
Hadley's aid, secured qualified contributors. Ultimately, 43 of the con-
tributors were professors from Harvard and 39 from Yale, with 212
from Cambridge and 178 from Oxford, and others from universities in
Athens, Lisbon, Montreal, Florence, and Paris.

An extremely conscientious worker, Franklin Hooper read proofs of
all articles, whether by Americans or Europeans. One, "Algebraic
Forms," was so complicated and difficult that he assigned an assistant,
Edward S. Holden, a leading astronomer, to read and report on it.
Holden studied it for three days, then returned it. "It's beyond me," he
said. He suggested taking it to Simon Newcomb, professor of mathe-
matics at the Johns Hopkins University, the only man in America who
might understand it. Newcomb, after reading the article, wrote, "It's
magnificent, although I am not sure it is all clear to me. But it's really
magnificent." Hooper rejected the article as being "too magnificent."

90 THE GREAT EB

While this tenth edition was in editorial preparation, a number of vital
changes occurred in the business organization of the Anglo-American
venture. Far more than the Clarke brothers, Hooper and Jackson saw
in the Encyclopaedia Britannica a glowing future or, more precisely,
one that might be made to glow. All four partners had gained profit
from the reprint of the ninth edition, although because of their ex-
tremely free and easy accounting methods, the precise amounts accru-
ing to each could never be reckoned. Hooper netted enough, however,
to bring his bride, the former Harriett Meeker Cox whom he had
met on a business trip in her home town of Ames, Iowa, and had mar-
ried early in 1900 to an imposing country house named Pendell
Court, in Redhill, Surrey. This was a large manorial structure built in
1620, fronted by two yews Hooper called Adam and Eve, and graced
with rose gardens and a private lake with swans. Jackson also pur-
chased a country place, somewhat less impressive than Hooper's. But
the Clarkes were not happy with British life and customs and shunned
any prospect of settling more or less permanently in Great Britain;
they far preferred to spend most of their time in New York and Chi-
cago.

This cleavage of interests, plus the extensive interests of the Clarkes
in other book properties in America notably the "Peck's Bad Boy"
series written by George Peck, a Wisconsin judge led to a dissolution
of the partnership. Early in 1900 the Clarkes sold their interests in
Clarke and Company, Limited, to Hooper and Jackson. In a complex
transaction, Hooper gave the Clarkes five hundred shares of his stock in
the Western Book and Stationery Company and Jackson gave them five
hundred shares of stock in one of his several enterprises, the Standard
American Publishing Company. For these shares and a cash payment
of $425,000, Hooper and Jackson took over the entire British firm
which controlled the Encyclopaedia Britannica.

No formal partnership papers were ever signed between Hooper
and Jackson, so alike in some respects, so radically different in others.
They agreed to a general policy. For the time being, they retained the
name of Clarke and Company, Limited. Whenever possible, major ac-
tion was to be taken only with mutual consent, but in most cases ei-
ther was empowered to carry on the business without the other. They
had respect for each other's abilities. Hooper was the master promoter,
quick to realize public susceptibility to strategic advertising and per-

"WE'VE DONE IT! WE'VE DONE rd" 91

suasive promotion. Jackson was the solid businessman, wise in the
ways of developing a sound organization, skeptical about promotional
excesses. They conducted their business then, and would continue to
do so during the unruffled years of their association, in an unusually in-
formal, almost slipshod way. Neither drew a salary; each had the privi-
lege of taking what he needed for personal or business expenses from
drawing accounts established at several banks in the firm's name.

In their attitude toward the Encyclopaedia Britannica they differed.
Jackson was aware of its educational and commercial values and of how
to increase both, but he was not imbued with Hooper's fanaticism.
Hooper, emotionally devoted to the publication, had read nearly all
the ninth edition, starting in the years when he was hawking books in
Colorado. He believed deeply that, profits aside, the Encyclopaedia
Britannica was an educational heritage that needed to be brought
within reach of every person able to read English. He often spoke of
the Encyclopaedia Britannica as "a thorough library of knowledge."
He respected its editors and contributors, both past and present. He
felt that the surest way of democratizing the means of self-education
was to introduce the Encyclopaedia Britannica into the homes of
those who, he was confident, yearned for instruction and information
but had never believed it possible that they might one day own "the
best of all encyclopaedias." In this sense, Hooper was an important
pioneer in adult education, although to those who were becoming in-
creasingly annoyed by his kinetic presence in Printing House Square
and in the London habitats of bookdealers and publishers, he seemed
brash, overeager, and grasping, and some staid British gentlemen con-
sidered him "much too American."

Within six months after Hooper and Jackson bought out the Clarkes,
they established business offices in the High Holborn section of Lon-
don, at No. 125, meanwhile maintaining the editorial staff in quarters
at Printing House Square. And in May, 1901, they acquired full owner-
ship of the Encyclopaedia Britannica from A. & C. Black with a
contract that guaranteed a maximum final payment in addition to
the earlier ones of 6,500 and 40,000 of 5,000 through royalties to
the publishers of five shillings for every set of the tenth edition sold.

When Hooper went to the Soho Square offices of the Blacks to sign
the agreement, Mrs. Hooper accompanied him. They rode in a hand-
some carriage. After the contract was signed, the aged James Black in-
vited Hooper to his basement to sample his favorite whisky from huge
casks stored there. Hooper did so and emptied two glasses. When he

92 THE GREAT EB

emerged into the cool air he became so suddenly exhilarated that he
dismissed the coachman, mounted the driver's seat, and gaily whisked
his startled wife back to their hotel, crying as the carriage clattered
along the streets, "We've done it! We've done it!"

One further business adjustment took place before Hooper and Jackson
could concentrate on methods of interesting the public in their tenth
edition. In 1902, they liquidated Clarke and Company, Limited, and
formed two new firms. A British company named Hooper and Jackson,
Limited, was established solely for business to be conducted in the
United Kingdom, and for its operating expenses they transferred $100,-
000 from the old firm. The Encyclopaedia Britannica Company was es-
tablished in New York for business in America; all the remaining assets
of Clarke and Company were transferred there for the issuance of its
capital stock of $500,000 and bonds for $1 million. In the British firm
the capitalization was for twenty thousand shares at one pound each;
Hooper and Jackson each held 9,997, with 6 remaining shares, and in
New York, each man had 2,498 shares, with 4 remaining shares. The
individual shares remaining were placed in the names of various asso-
ciates of Hooper and Jackson, including Hooper's brother, Franklin;
his brother-in-law, William J. Cox, who worked for the American com-
pany as a clerk; and Harris B. Burrows, a book publisher in Cleveland.
These men understood that they were merely dummy directors and
had no voice in the management of the companies. Haphazard as this
all seemed, no one could then foresee any time when such an arrange-
ment might be used to personal advantage by either Hooper or Jack-
son in case of dissension. Profits were high, the immediate past had
been successful, and in this bright April of 1902 there was the next edi-
tion of the Encyclopaedia Britannica to look forward to, and a new
and spirited campaign to persuade the populace to come forward with
down payments.

"WE'VE DONE IT! WE'VE DONE IT!" 93

Devices Novel,, Devices Picturesque

Hooper had hoped to bring out all ten volumes of the supplement si-
multaneously, but the financial arrangements still made the issue of
one volume dependent upon the successful sale of its predecessor.
With the reorganization of the firms and the accompanying expense,
it was deemed wise to adhere to the old method.

So in May, 1902 with an astonishing lack of hullabaloo, considering
the events that subsequently revolved around this tenth edition the
first volume appeared. It was greeted by the Encyclopaedia Britan-
nicas sternest watchdog, the Athenaeum, with a full measure of praise,
principally for the high degree of proficiency in proofreading: "The ac-
curacy attained in a mass of matter which only experts can correct is
most creditable. We only hope it may encourage others who would
produce books of permanent importance to attain a like standard."

The rest of the year, as each volume appeared, this periodical sys-
tematically evaluated it. It found that the most worthwhile article in
the third volume was "Charity and Charities." It frowned on the biog-
raphies of living persons because "there is a school of wordy compli-
ment not unrepresented here." It complained of windy rhetoric, writ-
ing of one contributor that "learning seems cast about his shoulders
with the elegance and decorum of a toga about those of a Roman sen-
ator/' While stating that William Archer brought a wide knowledge to
his article on "Drama," the Athenaeum felt that he allowed "his preju-
dices and convictions to colour his work, and [was] oblivious to the
fact that a man of taste should have preferences, but no exclusions/* It
praised the great lucidity of the scientific articles and hailed the bibli-
ographies at the end of major sections as "a highly important feature."

The third volume was delayed because Bell, in checking one of the
first of the bound copies, found an error in the date on which Edward
VII was crowned. He had all copies called back, the offending page
taken out, and a new page, with the correct date, tipped back into the
books.

During the summer the ads promoted the encyclopaedia more in-
tensely. This tenth edition, comprising the ten new volumes and the
twenty-five of the ninth, would be a "bargain of bargains/' although no
specific price had yet been decided upon. "Biography since Dickens,
Statistics since the census of '71, Philosophy since Mill, Surgery since
Ascepticism, Politics since Peel, Sports since The Safety Bicycle, Elec-
tricity since Incandescent Lighting, Agriculture since English Wheat
Stood at 56/9 a quarter!"

By November, it was time to announce that the entire set would
soon be on sale. Taking as his example the dinners held by the Blacks
in earlier years, but enlarging on the basic idea, Hooper officially de-
clared the advertising campaign open with a lavish banquet for as
many of the one thousand contributors as could come. It was held at
the Hotel Cecil, with Donald Mackenzie Wallace presiding. Hooper
and Haxton worked to make it memorable. On the first page of each
menu a portrait of the Encyclopaedia Britannica's first editor, William
Smellie, stared out at the diners, and on the final page were portraits of
notable contributors to earlier editions, including Scott, De Quincey,
and Macaulay, with brief quotations beneath the list of toasts from some
of the first edition articles, such as "Rhetoric," "Wine," and "Banquet."
Especially eloquent was Wallace^ who in his remarks touched on the
history of the Encyclopaedia Britannica and evoked applause with his

DEVICES NOVEL, DEVICES PICTURESQUE 95

announcement that the final volume would be an index of six hundred
thousand references. Guests at the dinner included not only contribu-
tors but other notables as well. The political opponents Arthur Balfour
and James Bryce both attended, a circumstance that prompted the
Times in its lengthy report next morning to comment that the "two are
not only able to meet on friendly terms on the neutral ground of liter-
ature and science, but they rejoice to recognize the fact that, however
different the points of view, they are working for the same high and
noble objects."

More ads soon began to appear, urging all who had bought the
Times edition of the ninth to write for terms in purchasing the supple-
ment. These ads were not startling; they stated simply that the price
of the new edition would be twenty pounds, a figure determined by
Hooper, Haxton, Jackson, and Franklin Hooper early that summer at
a meeting in Paris. There was a reason for this approach. Haxton had
worked all year to devise, with Hooper's counsel, an ingenious plan for
arousing interest in the tenth edition, and he wanted to reveal it only
when the finished product was ready the following spring.

"A TOTTOJAMENT FOE READERS!" In the Times of March 31, 1903, this
announcement touched off Haxton's campaign. Spread above a full
page, it was an invitation to readers to engage in an intellectual con-
test. By answering correctly three series of twenty questions on general
knowledge, contestants were eligible to win one of a number of prizes,
the total cash value of which came to nearly 4,000. There was a prize
of a scholarship to Oxford or Cambridge or, for female winners, Girton.
There was another of 1,000, and dozens of other awards were possi-
ble for any man, woman, or child who sent in an entry blank which ap-
peared on the bottom of the page. No entrance fee was required. And,
insisted the ad, there was no motive in this joust of knowledge except
to make fortunate readers richer or to send a worthy student to col-
lege. In arranging the competition, said the ad, "The Times has at-
tached special value in one form of mental activity the searching for
what may be described as convertible information, knowledge that is
gathered for instant use. Each competitor will gain increased power of
mental concentration, will receive an admirable mental exercise in fol-
lowing a train of reasoning, will learn exactly where to look for a par-
ticular fact, will find a new form of recreation and will gain a fund of
general information."

96 THE GREAT EB

Near the bottom of the page appeared the only clue to future events
that were to stem from this initial announcement: "No one need be de-
terred from entering the competition by the fact that he does not enjoy
convenient access to a large collection of miscellaneous books; a stand-
ard work of reference so widely distributed that everyone can easily
use it, the Encyclopaedia Britannica, will yield all the information re-
quired for the answers, nor is it necessary that the competitor should
even own that one book."

For the next three days the advertisements made no further mention
of the Encyclopaedia Britannica; instead each was keynoted by such
slogans as "A Novel Pastime," "A Test of Wits," and "A New Influ-
ence/* Readers were invited to join and delight in "a new form of rec-
reation and a source of pleasure." Then a three-column advertisement
headed "Urgent Notice" mentioned the set again. It was not necessary,
this ad emphasized, to own the Encyclopaedia Britannica. It was futile
to inquire how many sets one had to buy in order to win a prize. On
April 6 appeared another full-page ad, replying to a number of con-
testants who presumably had written to ask for further details. No, it
was not necessary to subscribe to the Times. No, two persons could not
use a single group of questions. No, purchase of a set of the Encyclo-
paedia Britannica was not mandatory. Prospective competitors were
duly informed now that those from whom inquiries' and entry blanks
had been received included members of the House of Commons, a
professor of mathematics, an assistant manager of a hotel, a justice of
the peace, a clergyman, a clothier, a pawnbroker, a king's counsel, a
War Office clerk, a tailor, a glass manufacturer, a retired rear admiral,
a lodginghouse keeper, a solicitor, a timber importer, an accountant,
a wine-merchant.

Another two weeks passed, with intermittent ads, before the new
Encyclopaedia Britannica appeared. Then, on April 16, after the tenth
edition officially went on sale, the approach was made bolder. The
tournament, all were now informed, had really been organized to give
a novel and wholesome form of entertainment to owners of the Ency-
clopaedia Britannica, to help develop "the encyclopaedia habit/' True
enough, all others were eligible to join the competition, but it was
made quite clear that set owners had an advantage over all others. The
Encyclopaedia Britannica, exhorted the ad, was the best place to find
the answers to questions. If the reader had none, perhaps he could use
a friend's. If the friend had none, fortunately the Times possessed a
small number: "If you hurry you can get a loan set of 35 volumes for

DEVICES NOVEL, DEVICES PICTURESQUE 97

100 days at less than 3 shillings a week. When you see what a wonder-
ful book this is you will understand the purpose which animated the
Times in arranging this competition. ... No other book in the world
could stand such an ordeal as that to which the competition subjects
the ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA, because no other book in the world
contains all human knowledge from the time when the Temple of El-
lil was built at Niffer." Then followed an all-important suggestion: "Re-
member that if you have any idea of buying the ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRI-
TANNICA ( and here is a practical point which will come home to every
man who hates to throw away money) that the Times is now offering
this newly-completed book, just a fortnight old today, at an introduc-
tory price which is half the catalogue price." With this ad was a new
entry blank including a request for specimen pages of the tenth edi-
tion.

The approach had now been made directly. Each day the appeal
grew stronger. On April 17, users of the Encyclopaedia Britannica
were quoted as "expressing surprise at the ease with which they find
their way in the volumes ... to any information they desire." On
April 20, an offer was made of a 220-page pamphlet illustrating the
wonders to be found in the new edition. Next day appeared a portion
of an article in the Bristol Mercury praising the contest and declaring
"it is unnecessary to go beyond the ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA for
the answer to the most formidable questions on the list." On April 22,
the news of publication of the tenth edition was again reprinted, urg-
ing readers to buy this "great inducement to study."

By May, the contest was relegated to the background and the quali-
ties of the encyclopaedia were loudly acclaimed. The ads made com-
parisons with prices of other kinds of reading material: "When you pay
six shillings for a novel, middlemen add 71 per cent profit to the sum
they pay the publisher. When you buy the Encyclopaedia Britannica,
you get it at first hand; the process is as direct as that of eating an
apple when you pluck it from a tree." Not only was the new edition
"the most authoritative, the most complete and the most useful work
of reference," it also, "at its present temporary price," was the cheap-
est. Clothbound, it cost twenty-seven guineas and would be delivered
on a down payment of a single guinea; in half morocco, it was thirty-
three guineas; in .three-quarter, thirty-six guineas; in full morocco,
forty-seven guineas. Again, the device of timeliness was used; when
the Times of June 12, 1903, announced the assassination of King Alex-
ander and Queen Draga of Serbia, there appeared on the opposite

93 THE GREAT EB

page a large ad with extracts from the encyclopaedia's article on "Ser-
bia/* Similar extracts were printed in conjunction with important news
about discussions in Parliament on free trade and protection, about ec-
centric weather, about financial activities in the City of London, about
cricket, and about important litigation.

Thousands of eager competitors sent in their entry blanks; other thou-
sands responded to invitations for pamphlets about the Encyclopaedia
Britannica, and from these many names the clerks at High Holborn
drew up long lists of prospects. The winners of scholarships were less
important now than the rate of sales.

All the rest of the year, Haxton continued to create new advertise-
ments and new devices for keeping interest high. He was a man who
worked at a feverish pace and in eccentric ways. While in London, he
occupied a suite at the Savoy Hotel and often went without sleep for
three days and nights, using stenographers in shifts as he paced about
his rooms dictating, in a loud and shrill voice, his ads and prospectuses.
In regular conversation he stuttered badly, but when he embarked on
one of his dictating marathons he spoke easily and without hesitation,
the purple prose issuing from him quickly and exuberantly. Sometimes
his excitement with what he had just dictated got the better of him,
and he rushed to the lobby and ordered the head porter to fetch a
horse. This done, he leaped astride and galloped through the London
streets for hours until the horse grew weary. Then he returned to his
suite to continue his dictation to a bewildered stenographer. Once,
after a series of full-page ads appeared, he ripped them from the news-
paper and plastered the wall of one of his rooms with them, compell-
ing the management to demand that he leave. But Hooper brought
calm by paying for the cost of repapering the wall. "Haxton's too good
a man to lose/' he told Jackson, who protested that the advertising di-
rector's eccentricities would damage their reputation. "We have to
take care of him when he goes off this way. We need him/'

During the summer months, the tall, spade-bearded Haxton lived in
the country, moving from one rural hotel to another as the mood
pleased him. There, too, he wore out shifts of secretaries hired from ad-
joining villages or driven in by carriage and train from London. He
preferred to dictate most of his verbiage while seated in a rowboat on
the lake nearest whatever inn was his temporary home, his eyes flash-
ing and his arms waving wildly while he composed long sentences ex-

DEVICES NOVEL, DEVICES FICTUBESQUE 99

tolling the virtues of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Frequently he
frightened a secretary sitting primly at the other end of the boat when
he stripped to his underwear and, with a wild yell, leaped into the
lake for a few minutes' swimming. Soon he would clamber back into
the boat, explaining, *I was carried away, I had to cool off," and con-
tinue from the point at which he had been so aroused by his own
prose. But this strange man did produce effective and highly readable
ads, and the pace of the selling campaign quickened in the final
months of the year.

To the numerous prospects gleaned from the various lists went spe-
cial letters warning that the last days of the special sale of the tenth
edition were swiftly approaching. Not only in the columns of the
Times but in newspapers in the farthest reaches of the British Isles an-
nouncements appeared. Any innocent inquiry brought to the informa-
tion-seeker a flurry of leaflets, pamphlets, an illustrated booklet or two,
even prepaid telegrams which prospects needed but to sign and re-
turn. "Flight was useless/' a Times editor later recalled. "The whole
country from Land's End to John o'Groats and from Yarmouth to Dun-
more Head was pervaded by the Encyclopaedia Britannica. It loaded
the British breakfast table with the morning coffee, and lay, hard and
knobby, under British pillows throughout uneasy nights. There was no
escape from the torrent of 'follow ups' save by the despatch of a firm
order to purchase accompanied by an installment of one guinea." 1

In this persistent drive for purchasers, Haxton hammered on the
theme of taking advantage of an opportunity never again to be real-
ized. When the bargain offer had but eight more days to run, he com-
posed ads that appealed to. every aspect of a reader's personality. He
warned that, after December 19, no one could buy the tenth edition
for less than fifty-seven pounds, twice the bargain rate. "This does not
mean that the price will be increased for a short time only. It means
that the book will never again be sold for one penny less than the full
catalogue price. . . " Nor was this, suggested the ads, something to be
regarded fleetingly and as of slight importance. "If you had deter-
mined to insure your life and the premium was to be more than dou-
bled unless you made your application before a certain day, how great
an effort you would make to be in time. This is a parallel case. You
are asked to choose between being one of the men who are on time

1 F. Harccmrt Kitchin, Moberly Bell and His Times (London: Phillip Allan and
Co., 1925).

100 THE GREAT EB

and being one of the men who are too late, between ranking yourself
on one side of the actors in the world's drama who have succeeded be-
cause they have been prompt, and those who have failed because they
have let the moment that never comes back slip past them beyond re-
call/'

His advertisements based on this idea cited anecdotes drawn, of
course, from the pages of the Encyclopaedia Britannica of "A Man
Who Missed His Moment" against "A Man Who Took Time by the
Forelock." A moment-misser was Boulanger, who, in January, 1899,
could have become dictator of France had he acted in time, and a
forelock-grabber was Nathan Mayer Rothschild, who had used ad-
vance information of the results at Waterloo to make tremendous prof-
its in stock transactions. Placing these cases side by side, the ads thun-
dered: "UNDER WHICH OF THE ABOVE TWO COLUMNS WOULD YOU

CHOOSE TO FIGURE THE COLUMN OF SUCCESS OR THE COLUMN OF
FAILURE?"

The ads proclaiming "Going! Going! Gone!" continued. The tributes
grew to dithyrambs. Most books in a library, they scoffed, were "no
more than ephemeral phonograph records of obiter dicta by persons of
no authority." But the Encyclopaedia BritannicaP "It represents an ac-
cumulation of the permanent facts acquired by the light of science of
ages in every quarter of the globe. The Encyclopaedia Britannica can
reveal all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. Railway
communication, the telegraph, the motor car are slow vehicles in com-
parison with the rapid course of a thought that with the aid of these
volumes can fly from Thibet to Korea, from Korea to the Congo!"

Did a man work as a banker and did his sister, perhaps, spend her
time in embroidery or in the study of Browning? "The Encyclopaedia
Britannica makes the pursuit of the one intelligible to the other." Did
the goggle-eyed reader of Haxton's prose wish to save a part of his
household bills, those paid to his doctor, carpenter, or lawyer? "The
doctor, the carpenter, the lawyer have all gone to the Encyclopaedia
Britannica to learn. WHY NOT GO DIRECT and save the expense of an in-
termediary?" Was the reader embarrassed when called on to explain
what he knew about any household object a clock, telephone, furni-
ture, piano? "When once his curiosity is aroused, even at the expense
of some humiliation, he will want a book to help him. The only book
in the English language that can be relied on to help him over an in-
numerable list of inquiries is the Encyclopaedia Britannica!!"

DEVICES NOVEL, DEVICES PICTURESQUE 101

Naturally, such appeals were designed to bring results, Just as natur-
ally, the entire advertising campaign, from the first days of the now-
neglected scholarship competition to the frenzy of the final appeals,
evoked considerable criticism.

Chief among the fault-finders were those in the British publishing
world who increasingly resented these aggressive Americans and
their methods of promotion. There were unpleasant references to "that
American syndicate" and "those alien Americans," and there was, of
course, a general deploring of the affiliation of the Times with the
schemes devised by Hooper and Haxton and with their ostentatious
pronunciamentos about their Encyclopaedia Britannica. One reproof
from the editors of the Saturday Review, expressing the views of these
nettled publishers, read: "Tempora mutantur; the 'Times' has changed;
and the satirist's wail for the first time finds its full force: O Tempora
Mores. O 'Times 9 what manners! If there were not a certain lack of
proportion in the metaphor one might say that the Encyclopaedia Bri-
tannica were the thin end of the wedge, designed to expand the inter-
val between the past and present of the 'Times'. ... It once set the
world aflame by publishing, straight from the original text, the Berlin
treaty. The full text of the treaty was printed with no particular head-
line, with no other introduction than this: 'We are favoured with the
following/ That was dignity. This . . ."

At Punch, the funsters took a lighter view:

"You are old, Father Thunderer, old and austere,

Where learnt you such juvenile capers?"
"It's part of the Yankee Invasion, my dear,

To galvanize threepenny papers."

Jauntiest of the critics were Edward Verrall Lucas, the poet and es-
sayist, and Charles L. Graves. In later years of reflection, Lucas de-
scribed his jibes as part of his "nonsense period." Their attacks first ap-
peared in privately printed booklets, but in 1903 they were gathered
into a red-covered volume titled Wisdom While You Wait: Being a
Foretaste of the Glories of the Insidecompletuar Britanniaware. In
front was reprinted the "Father Thunderer" verse and midway was an-
other:

102 THE GREAT EB

"You are old, Father William, yet nimble and fleet,

How kept you your sinews so supple?"
"By reading this Supplement, slick and complete;

You ought to subscribe for a couple."

This sly compendium of mockery listed among its "editors" Bell,
William Hohenzollern, Sir George Newnes, and the brothers Harms-
worth, and, as American editors, Mr. Dooley, Buffalo Bill, Mrs. Mary
Baker Eddy, and John Wanamaker. In the mode of the Encyclopae-
dia Britannica advertisements, there were extracts supposedly from
the Insidecompletuar Britanniaware. From the "article" on "America"
the volume quoted:

. . . The Fauna of America is extensive and peculiar. Unlike other civi-
lised countries, dangerous wild beasts and birds of prey are commonly en-
countered in the most populous districts. Nothing can exceed the ferocity of
the Trust Fowl, while whole regions of New York are rendered unsafe by
the ravages of the Tammany Bos and the Tammany Tiger. Yet alongside
these examples of barbarous atavism, one encounters evidences of singular
refinement and humanity, Mr. Roosevelt, though originally a cowboy, has
set his face like a flint against the tyranny of the Beef Trust, and only a
superficial observer would count Mr. Hay as a man of straw. Furthermore,
the humanising influence of American culture is signally displayed by its
principal exports, which include, amongst other products, J. Pierpont Mor-
gan, canned peaches, Mr. Duke, duchesses, R. G. Knowles, coon songs,
Quaker oats, Tabs, Christian Science, Virginia hams, cocktails, Sunny Jim,
Honeysuckles, Bees, and Edna May. . . .

In the matter of liquid refreshment America has always set a high stand-
ard of excellence. As George Washington aptly observed, "I care not who
makes the laws of this nation so long as their drinks are discreetly
mixed.". . .

But the supreme boon conferred on the western world by this great Re-
public has yet to be revealed. All that is best in the present great Thesaurus
of Universal Knowledge, the INSIDECOMPLETUAR BRITANNIAWARE; all the
electrifying rag-time methods of our scheme of advertisement; all the "side-
shows" in this superb and brainy bazaar are the products of the volcanic
and voluptuous Transatlantic imagination.

Lucas and Graves laughed merrily at the lavish use of testimonials
made by the original advertisements. They quoted the mythical in-
dorsement of Ignace Paderewski, the famed pianist: "Ten volumes of
your harmonious work make the most perfect pianoforte stool imagina-
ble." And of Carrie Nation: "I don't know how my campaign against

DEVICES NOVEL, DEVICES PICTURESQUE 103

the liquor saloons would ever have succeeded but for your timely pub-
lication. There is no plate glass that can stand against one of your
tomes. You should see Volume XXVII bringing down a row of whisky
bottles. It's great!" And of Eugene Sandow, the man of mighty
strength: <C I now use your volumes exclusively in my schools of Physi-
cal Culture in place of the old-fashioned weights, bar-bells, &c." And
of H. G. Wells: "I have already given you an advertisement in The Sea
Lady., and can only repeat that for submarine reading your work has
no equal. The Atlantic is paved with it."

On the book's back cover, satirizing another kind of ad prepared by
Hooper and Haxton, were displays announcing that the Insidecomple-
tuar Britanniaware covered sports since Ping-Pong, trade since J. P.
Morgan, medicine since pink pills, horticulture since Grape Nuts, and
politics since Winston Churchill.

Later that year, Lucas and Graves satirized the scholarship competi-
tion in another volume called Wisdom on the Hire System. It told of
the many prizes for those who replied most accurately to questions:
first was an eight-room, fourth-floor flat in Portland Place, to be named
Bellevue; the second a portrait model of the winner, "to be placed ad-
vantageously at Madame Tussaud's"; and the final eighty consisted
of "half an hour's stimulating converse with the gentleman who invents
the advertisements for the Ency. Brit." The volume contained "Scenes
in the Lives of Competitors," ranging from a sketch of Arthur Balf our
dancing a jig when informed he had been named a winner to one of a
gloomy casket labeled "He failed in Every Question." There were a
number of limericks titled "Rhymes for the Times." Inevitably, some
poked fun at the American invasion:

There once was a clerk in a bank

Whose prospects were perfectly rank;

He developed such brain

In competing for gain,

That he's fit to shake hands with a Yank.

And others flicked humorously at all those who competed:

There was once an ambitious K. C.

Who said, 'Til a prize-winner be."

He toiled every night

Till his whiskers grew white

But his answers were wrong one in three.

104 THE GREAT EB

There once was a slovenly Dean,

Whose hat wasn't fit to be seen.

With his prize-winning fruits

He purchased new boots,

But his gaiters were still rather green.

No more avid reader of these humorous booklets than Horace Hooper
could be found in all London. Haxton raged and stormed up and down
the High Holborn offices, vowing to sue for libel or thrash either
Graves or Lucas, or both. Jackson frowned and worried about the harm
such attacks might do to their attempts to sell the work. But Hooper
chuckled.

"Greatest advertising in the world," he insisted. "They talk about
us, that's fine. If they didn't talk, they wouldn't help us. It'll stir inter-
est among people who might not even read the ads weVe been run-
ning. Let's take it in good grace and you'll see how little effect they
have on slowing down sales."

So the campaign, especially in the closing days of the year, con-
tinued. Hooper was in the midst of it all, checking copy for ads, rush-
ing around the High Holborn offices, acquiring the admiring nickname
from his closest subordinates of "Hell Every Hour" Hooper, although
to his face they always called him "H. E." He rarely left the offices
until late at night. Lunch was brought in from Claridge's or the Savoy
or a nearby restaurant, and at the lunch hour he and the others spoke
of nothing but the Encyclopaedia Britannica and how it could best be
sold.

Orders streamed into these offices, although occasionally there was
an angry reply, such as the prepaid telegram with the message, "From
my bath, I curse you!" and the letter from a retired member of Parlia-
ment protesting, "You have made a damnable hubbub, sir, and an as-
sault upon my privacy with your American tactics." To reasonable
complaints Jackson was delegated to reply tactfully. Hooper busied
himself with plans for carrying through collections. Fearful that many
who made down payments might not follow regularly with the re-
quired additional ones, Hooper imported from New York a former po-
liceman, William Miller, who stood six inches over six feet and
weighed 310 pounds. He assigned to him a small van painted vermil-
ion, with "Debt Collection Agency" in bright yellow on its sides, in-
tending to send this garish vehicle into neighborhoods where default-
ers lived, so that all could see, when the van stopped outside a door,

DEVICES NOVEL, DEVICES PICTURESQUE 105

who was slow in paying. But the truck was never used because of
legal restrictions and, moreover, because only an insignificant per-
centage of purchasers defaulted.

There were reports of good sales in foreign lands Australia, India,
South Africa, and even Japan where, increasingly since 1900, Hooper
and Jackson had dispatched agents to set up offices. From Oswald
Sickert, one of Haxton's aides, came a story of an experience in Aus-
tralia, a tale that set the office staff laughing and, in various versions,
entered the official lore of the encyclopaedia business. Sickert related
that one sheep-farmer was so overwhelmed by the advertisements in
his local newspaper about the tenth edition that he had sent in his
guinea. When he was informed that his purchase had arrived at the
local post office, he rode his foam-flecked horse fifteen miles into town
to pick it up. As he arrived at the building, he yelled, "Where is it?
Where is it?" Ushered inside, he was led to the large box. Feverishly
he ripped off the top, quickly he tore aside the paper coverings, and
then he stared in disbelief. "Books!" he bawled. "I ain't bought books,
have I?"

The cost of the campaigns for the reprint of the ninth and the tenth
edition had been considerable. Advertising in newspapers and period-
icals totaled 203,000, and circulars, booklets, and letters to prospects
another 90,000. But, as Hugh Chisholm soon made public in a long
and lucid report, the campaign expenditures and all the effort and
even the gibes had been worthwhile.

Using the occasion to strike back at the skeptics and critics of the
Americans and their methods, Chisholm emphasized that previously
the price of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, 37, had been prohibitive
to many, that only rich men, libraries, schools, and well-to-do private
institutions had been able to buy it.

"Apart from the existence of some exceptional obstacle," Chisholm
wrote, "it seemed paradoxical that the British public should have been
so much less appreciative than the American of a work which is a mon-
ument of British initiative and learning. ... I have myself heard peo-
ple in the United States attribute their success in life primarily to their
having in early days bought the Encyclopaedia Britannica, and anyone
who knows the American and realizes what has been done for their
country by their general acuteness of mind, passion for applying
knowledge, and quickness to appreciate the solid value of education

106 THE GREAT EB

agrees no matter how patriotic a Briton he may be that in our own
country we have had some leeway to make up and that anyone who
could give a proper stimulus in the right direction might justifiably
consider the object a good one on its own account."

Those whom the various advertisements offended were guilty, in
Chisholm's phrase, of "superficial and thoughtless criticism" and too
much given to "glib and contemptuous talk about the ubiquity and ex-
cess of advertisement." "It is always possible to make fun of people
who appear to have only one idea, and the devices adopted for inter-
esting the public in the Encyclopaedia Britannica novel, varied and
picturesque as they were have been the object of some clever skits,
and a good deal of satirical parody. Nobody minds this poking of fun
so long as it is not malicious. But while anybody with a sense of hu-
mour can appreciate the comical side of a persistent and vigorous at-
tempt to arouse preoccupied and negligent humanity to a sense of its
own interests by bombarding the portals of the mind from every con-
ceivable vantage ground, this, after all, is the essence of clever adver-
tising, and in the long run its only proper test is its success, provided
always that the thing advertised really is what it is claimed to be."

Indulging his passion for statistics, Chisholm covered every aspect
of the campaigns. One single full-page ad in the Times had resulted in
orders worth 8,000. More than 200,000 persons had written to the
newspaper since 1898 about the set. The number of volumes sold in
the 300 weeks since the Times sanctioned the reprint of the ninth
edition came to 1,500,000; their aggregate weight, 5,500 tons. The larg-
est sale on any one day was more than 30,000 and in a single week
more than 100,000. "The packing used for dispatching sets to subscrib-
ers would, if arranged in a solid block, have formed," exulted Chis-
holm, "an edifice as big as St. Paul's Cathedral and the Houses of
Parliament combined." And an added fillip of information was that
500,000 goats had been requisitioned for the book bindings.

Of the reprint of the ninth, 30,000 had been sold, and so far, said
Chisholm, 32,000 of the tenth edition had been disposed of a figure,
even with the price increase of December 19, that would eventually
rise to 70,000. The total sales already amounted to 600,000, a bounty
few had ever anticipated or even imagined possible. Few, perhaps, but
Horace Hooper was among them; his fervor had never dimmed, and
he quietly gloated when he learned that his predictions of the response
to his selling techniques had turned out to be correct. At a dinner
party a guest heard him citing Chisholm's statistics and remarked,

DEVICES NOVEL, DEVICES PICTURESQUE 107

"Dear me, I wouldn't have thought as many people as that wanted the
Encyclopaedia Britannica."
"They didn't/' replied Hooper. "I made them want it."

Because of the tangled and unorthodox nature of the Hooper-Jackson
business operations in the middle of 1903 they established a second
American office in Chicago to provide a legal bridgehead for combat-
ing irksome copyright thieves in the Middle West it was impossible
to determine exactly the full profits of Hooper and Jackson, but from
estimates and other recorded data it was evident each had made more
than half a million dollars.

As for the Times, its salvation had come by means of its association
with the Americans. Ever since the first contract in 1898, the newspa-
per had received ever increasing revenue each year, and with com-
paratively little effort. From 1898 to 1900, the annual profits from the
Times s Publications Department, headed by those from the sales of
the Encyclopaedia Britannica and followed by those from the sales,
also arranged through Hooper and Jackson, of the Century Dictionary,
The Times Gazetteer, and Fifty Years of Punch, had risen from 2,-
000 to 22,000. The grumpiest of coproprietors could take comfort in
this rise, and even more in the amount that had come to the paper
from the sale of the Encyclopaedia Britannica alone since the cautious
day in 1898 when Bell threw in his lot with the Americans. For that
sum, robust and handsome, was 108,000.

208 THE GREAT EB

Hooper s Revolution

Now, in the flush of this success, Horace Hooper was closer than ever
to Bell and the Times. In spite of the glories of the sales campaigns,
many executives and staff members of the Times scorned Hooper
and Jackson, though in lesser degree, since he was not so much in evi-
dence as Hooper for being too aggressive and too assertive, Some ex-
pressed fear that Hooper might wreck the paper. They disregarded or
refused to have faith in his stated reluctance to become involved with
its editorial side; Hooper would no more have proposed a topic for an
editorial to Bell than he would have suggested altering details in the
article on "Egyptology" in the Encyclopaedia Britannica.

Naturally enough, Bell was grateful to the Americans for helping to
ease his economic burden. But his personal feeling, especially for
Hooper, went deeper. He considered Hooper a shrewd, resourceful,
and trustworthy man, in whom were combined idealism, generosity,

109

and commercial acumen. Bell sometimes felt that Hooper was too im-
petuous, that Hooper's ideas were impractical, but he was never loath
to listen to him.

A number of new contracts were signed with the two Americans.
One, late in 1903, provided for the use of the Times s name for a new
edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, intended primarily as a re-
print of material from the ninth and tenth, with such alterations and
additions as might be necessary to update the work. Chisholm and
W. Alison Phillips, his cousin and an able historian, spent months in an
exhaustive examination of the earlier volumes, finally concluding that
a mere reprint was hardly feasible because only 10 per cent of the ma-
terial was fresh enough to be properly transferred to the contemplated
edition. Their report spurred Hooper to a swift decision: "Now we can
start from scratch and have a completely new edition! Completely re-
written! Knowledge has moved too fast and we must catch up with it."
Ultimately, this proposal would create fatal dissension between Hooper
and Jackson, but at this time it seemed logical and workable, and
Chisholm was directed to proceed.

Another important agreement made Hooper and Jackson, respec-
tively, advertisement director and circulation manager of the Times.
The formal contract was signed in May, 1904. The two offered their
services in an arrangement that involved no extra investment and little
risk for the newspaper. By its terms, if the newspaper's annual revenue
were less than 200,000, Hooper and Jackson were to make up half
the loss. But if the newspaper made more than 200,000, the Times
received half the excess. Hooper and Jackson were guaranteeing, in re-
turn for the right to associate themselves with the newspaper, that
they could be so successful that no losses would occur.

Jackson, who was in the United States when this arrangement was
made, cared little for it. Hooper sought to assure him. "We are under-
taking a very much bigger thing than we undertook when we first
started the E.B.," he wrote to Jackson, "and the profits to you and me
individually will be greater, and very much greater. I believe I am
honest when I say that we shall get half of the profits of the Times
without the least particle of trouble. This is a strong statement to
make, but I believe that is what we are getting, and what is more I
believe they are perfectly willing for us to have it, and that we'll have
to cast it up till you and I get into the place where we can't do any-
thing more with the Times and then they'll have to give it to us for
10 years beyond that."

110 THE GREAT EB

The extent to which Bell and evidently Arthur Walter were willing
to permit Hooper to take control of the business end of the newspaper
was jubilantly described. "It is understood that I am to take charge of
the advertising department down there. I can reorganize the rates, I
can sell quarter double columns or half double columns, I can put 3 or
4 canvassers on the streets of London canvassing for the advertising, I
can write and circularize as many people as I want that we will do
their advertising for them, charging them nothing or charging them
something as we may see fit, in other words they'll let me do whatever
I want in the advertising department down there."

When Jackson protested that he feared the Times might frown on
the use of new advertising techniques in its columns, Hooper replied,
"I want you to know that they are not weak-kneed in any way, shape
or manner. . . , They are all delighted, all willing to do everything I
ask them. . . . They are willing to let us say anything in our advertise-
ments, do anything we want, and make everything we can suggest."

With customary zeal, Hooper undertook his new assignment. He
placed Haxton in charge of recruiting salesmen and advertising copy-
writers, but he insisted, "I want to see every piece of advertising that
we're going to put in the paper." Hooper directed that the half-dozen
salesmen he would send, as he had put it to Jackson, "on the streets of
London canvassing for the advertising," dress smartly, speak well, and
be bold but not overbearing in their approach to prospective space-
buyers. Hooper was an inspiring force, and in many of the advertise-
ments that began to appear in the Times., his ideas and often his rhet-
oric could be detected.

Although little alteration was made on the traditional first page of
personals and want ads, the appearance of the Times on other pages
gradually began to change. Block ads, ads with illustrations, ads with
heavy black type, and ads of two columns and three columns and of
the full six columns appeared. While the new advertisements were not
startling judged by later standards or, for that matter, by the stand-
ards of less dignified newspapers of that day readers of the Times
were astounded that their solemn journal should have them. Even the
personals seemed to assume a capricious mien: "Hubby still love
little Muv. Come back to Father, who awaits his Hun. Baby brother
and Hub both in despair." A new type of institutional advertisement
was widely used. Written by Haxton, these ads appeared to the un-

HOOPERS

practiced eye to be feature stories, although, as in an effusive article
about the Midland Hotel in Manchester, the italicized note atop the
columns stated, "This announcement has been written by a member of
The Times Advertising Staff after independent investigation, for
which full facilities were afforded by the manager of the Midland
Railway Hotels." Such article-advertisements dealt not only with
pleasure places but with such establishments as the Keeley Institute, .
for which Haxton wrote "The Redemption of the Inebriate," after
thorough investigation and assistance from a "medical practitioner of
long experience/*

There were large ads, with varied formats, from the makers of
Hennessy's One Star Brandy, MarteU's Cognac hitherto content with
old-style ads repeating the brand name in light type down half a single
column and Old Bushmill's. To the horror of old subscribers, Martell's
Three Star Brandy was often featured on the same page with the par-
liamentary reports. And jammed together on pages that for years had
never been violated were advertisements, large and small, for Cockle's
Anti-bilious Pills for Brain Workers; Apollinaris ("The Queen of Table
Waters"); Remington typewriters; the Lanchester motorcar, with pho-
tographs of that massive automobile, the "Ideal of Luxury, Silence and
Ease"; and for furniture, teas, cocoa, watches, Allsopp's Lager, Eugene
Sandow's Physical Culture School, magazines of the hour, and the Na-
tional Movement against Consumption and Cancer. One full-page ad-
vertisement caused talk throughout London. In the center was a draw-
ing purportedly of Plato "meditating on immortality before Socra-
tes, the Butterfly, Skull and Poppy," and the page was spattered with
quotations from poets and philosophers about life and the extent of
man's existence and immortality. This high-flown prose and graphic
art combined to assert that "the jeopardy of Life is immensely in-
creased without such simple precautions as Eno's Fruit Salt It recti-
fies the Stomach and makes the Liver laugh with Joy." And in the
same classification was another that declared: "Only Live Fish swim
up stream. Which Way are You Going? With a clear head to steer a
strong body you can do things and win. Both can be built by proper
food, brain food Grape Nuts, the Most Scientific Food in the World."

As he had been obliged to do when the first advertisements for the
ninth edition reprint appeared, Bell took to his letter-writing table to
explain these innovations to subscribers. He, too, was annoyed by
the character of the Hooper-inspired advertisements, but he could not
overlook the revenue. "I can understand and sympathize," he wrote to

112 THE GBEAT EB

one irate subscriber, "with anyone who dislikes advertisements. As a
reader I dislike them myself. They increase the bulk of the paper, and,
until one gets to ignore them, they are even irritating. I object equally
strongly to paying rates and taxes, but I recognize that there are cer-
tain advantages, which I cannot have without paying for them, and
that, on the whole, the advantages outweigh the inconveniences. . . .
In the same way I think that if I subscribed to The Times and got a
paper of 'immense influence and almost Imperial authority' for a sum
that pays little more than the cost of the white paper on which it is
printed and the delivery, a sum that certainly does not pay in addition
the printers' bare wages, I should be inclined to look charitably upon
the eccentricities, perhaps the vulgarities, of those advertisers who pay
the whole cost of the staff, of the thousands of contributors, of the cor-
respondents, of the telegrams sometimes costing 100 pounds a column,
who, in fact, alone enable me to have on the white paper, for which
I have paid, all that news and all that thought, care and intelligence
which converts my white paper into an organ 'possessing immense in-
fluence and enjoying almost Imperial Authority." 7

To supplement income from these ads, Hooper arranged for Jackson to
operate as circulation manager. He believed the lure to subscribe to
the Times would be irresistible. "We are not going to make new news-
paper readers," he explained. "We are going to take people who are
now taking a newspaper over to our newspaper."

His idea was simple but, as it turned out, it had its several defects.
Persons who had not heretofore held annual subscriptions to the Times
could now obtain them at a rate reduced approximately 23 per cent.
The new price was three pounds a year instead of three pounds, eight-
een shillings. "A Novel Plan of Newspaper Distribution," read the ex-
planatory pamphlets distributed throughout London. Hooper rea-
soned that as more subscribers were gathered and more newspapers
sold, more advertisements would follow and at justifiably higher
rates. "Our purpose," read the booklet, "is to reorganize our budget, to
reduce our revenue from one source and increase it from another." A
strong appeal was directed to many who were not able to afford the
Times, who borrowed copies, who bought secondhand copies, or who
actually hired copies by the hour from news vendors. "The fact that
The Times offers, at its present price, good values for the money/' the
booklet admitted, "does not alter the fact that there are many persons

HOOPER'S REVOLUTION 113

to whom threepence a day seems a great deal to pay for a newspaper."
Frankly experimental, this offer was good for a limited time, until
June 25, 1904. To attract new readers, Bell rehired F. Harcourt Kitchin,
a former editorial staff member, to edit a weekly financial supplement
that would contain articles and reports on all staple industries of the
country and occasionally a series of articles and reports from principal
business centers of the world. When Kitchin drew up a prospectus and
preliminary supplement, Hooper was elated. "This is the finest thing
which has been produced by any newspaper since the world began,"
was his estimate, one that astounded the self-effacing Kitchin. Haxton
yearned to create advertisements informing readers that Kitchin's
supplement would impart to them secret information about the finan-
cial world. When Kitchin protested that this would be some miles
removed from the truth, Haxton insisted that he could exaggerate and
still not lie. The ads proves less sensational than Kitchin had antici-
pated, but still he was astonished to find himself referred to as "one
of the most brilliant financial geniuses" of the day with "a network of
great financial reporters all over the globe."

For all his efforts, Hooper's project was a failure. Although about
thirty-two thousand new subscribers were gained, the additional ex-
penses and costs were too high to make the venture even partly suc-
cessful. News vendors were disgruntled with the plan and generally
refused to co-operate, so that more men had to be hired to make de-
liveries to new subscribers. Neither did the circulation swell as much as
Hooper had expected, a disappointment that bore the practical disad-
vantage of preventing him from raising advertising rates as he had
hoped to do.

None of Hooper's ideas neither the blaring advertisements nor the
interesting supplements provoked as much excitement and strife
during his period of power at the newspaper as the formation of the
Times Book Club.

Late in 1904, Hooper proposed to Bell that the newspaper open a
lending library in one of London's busiest sectors and stock it with
books that could be borrowed without fee only by Times subscribers,
those already in the fold and newcomers who assuredly would be at-
tracted by the service. Hooper confidently maintained that this device
might well double the newspaper's circulation and increase the adver-
tising rates, thereby more than offsetting any costs involved. Bell ex-

114 THE GREAT E B

pressed great interest, and the two men went to various publishers to
explain the new plan. Most of the bookmen were enthusiastic and
agreed to supply the books at the usual rates allowed all booksellers
and libraries.

With one of the mightiest of the publishers, Frederick Macmillan,
Hooper was especially voluble. "This scheme/' he said, "will not bene-
fit the Times alone but all of you publishers. My experience with the
Encyclopaedia Britannica has led me to think that a large number of
books of all kinds can be sold if new methods, especially in advertising,
are used. We will agree to supply on loan the books our subscribers
want, and, of course, we will have to make large purchases from you
publishers, We will want the best trade terms, and our contracts will
be not for one year or two years but for at least four or five."

"What else is there to the plan?" Macmillan quietly asked,

Hooper waved his arm airily. "Of course," he said, "we shall be at
liberty to do what we like with the books we have bought and paid
for/'

Sensing trouble, Macmillan declined to sign with Hooper, but most
of his associates did, and so did Simpkin, Marshall and Company and
smaller wholesalers.

Bell was soon infected with Hooper's excitement. "The scheme," he
wrote to a friend in India in June, 1905, "is, briefly, to open a large
West End office of The Times well stocked with books, some 25,000
volumes of that sort of quality likely to be asked for by readers of The
Times." But he still had qualms, stimulated chiefly by his superior, Ar-
thur Walter, who insisted that the contract establishing the Book Club
repeat the guarantee that the receipts for the year would not go be-
low 200,000.

When Bell conveyed Walter's reservation, Hooper pondered for
several days, then finally agreed, but not before he had spoken his
mind on how slowly the project was getting under way. "Look here/'
he told Bell, "I have to come down to this office and put my shoulder
underneath you and you are a good heavy man and it takes me two
or three weeks to push you round into a place. Then you and I have
to push Mr. Walter into a place, and that takes a week or so. Then I
have to go up to High Holborn and push my partner Mr. Jackson into
a place and then I have to go out and enthuse the public. That didn't
make much difference when I was a young man and had plenty of en-
ergy and to spare. But now it is too hard."

Thus prodded, Bell and Walter signed a contract establishing the

HOOPER'S REVOLUTION 115

Book Club. It consisted of only twenty-one lines on two small sheets of
paper and called for management of the Book Club by Hooper and
Jackson, in exchange for a specific percentage of profits from subscrib-
ers gained through the club. It reaffirmed that the over-all revenue
from this and other schemes would not go below 200,000 and that
any gain from the selling of used books would go to Hooper and
Jackson.

Premises for the Book Club were rented on Bond Street, off bustling
Oxford Street, and books were purchased at net prices. Some publish-
ers had signed contracts for a year; others, wary because of Macmil-
lan's refusal to join them, agreed to supply books for only six months.
All summer, excitement was kept high by advertisements in the Times:
"All the newest books to read, and nothing to pay for the use of them.
. . . You can buy them after you have read them." By subscribing for
a year to the Times, the customer could take out three volumes at one
time, more by special arrangement. "And he can buy the books he
wants, after reading them, at on the average half the usual price/'
A chief librarian was hired, Janet Hogarth, formerly in charge of all
women clerks at the Bank of England. Twenty thousand circulars were
sent out, and ten thousand replies received.

"On the 15th of September, or thereabouts," wrote Bell to another
friend, "we blow our trumpets, send out 700,000 more circulars, pro-
spectuses, catalogues, etc., and shall see the result to a certain extent,
for many have already their subscriptions with other libraries to the
end of the year. . . . Before the end of the year we attack again those
of the 700,000 that have not fallen victims, and shall, I hope, reap in a
few more. Meanwhile" and here he wrote with prophetic insight
"we shall have the booksellers in arms against us, and a battle royal
between libraries, booksellers, publishers and The Times''

From the moment the doors swung open on September 11, enthusi-
asm prevailed and strife grew.

Vast crowds surging into the new library were photographed by men
Hooper had hired. Miss Hogarth and her fifteen librarians bustled
about, tending to the needs of long lines of subscribers. Hooper strode
through the place, greeting all around him. And he adjudged the
Book Club a vast success. Books were displayed on shelves and on ta-
bles. On the walls were posted lists of best sellers and books for good
reading. "The book you want when you want it," read one poster, and
another, "The book of the day."

116 THE GREAT EB

But before the week was out, trouble developed. It stemmed from a
more specific reference to the varied volumes that could be bought at
the Book Club at reduced prices. Any member, if he desired, could
purchase any book at prices ranging from 10 to 33 to 50 per cent be-
low the original cost, depending on the age of the book. A number of
publishers promptly protested, but Hooper waved them off. He re-
called to the complainants their eagerness for the Times to start the
club and reminded them that they had assured him they would spend
in advertising a good percentage of every pound the paper spent in
buying their books. "Almost without exception," he declared, "you told
us you welcomed the Times into the book business because the book
trade was in a bad condition and needed someone to stir it up. We are
doing the stirring. In the end, we all shall profit."

But the protests continued. In October, the Publishers' Association,
expressing fear that the Times Book Club would touch off a price-cut-
ting war of the kind the publishers themselves had averted by an offi-
cial pact in 1900, wrote to Bell, complaining about the "detrimental
effect on retail trade/' Bell replied that the secondhand books offered
by the club would be those used by at least two subscribers and re-
turned in such a condition that they could never again be sold as new.
These books, he insisted, were not new books and could legitimately
be sold at less than the "net prices" set by the publishers.

Temporarily, this appeared to mollify the publishers. Actually, the
leaders of the industry were preparing a stronger attack at a more pro-
pitious moment. Meanwhile, the idea was catching on. Even Alfred
Harmsworth, always watchful of the activities of his competitors or po-
tential competitors, expressed qualified commendation. "It's quite a
good notion/' he said, "to sell off books at about one-half price directly
they cease to be asked for by borrowers if the publishers would allow
it, which of course they won't/' (Harmsworth had already been stim-
ulated by the Hooper-Jackson example to enter the encyclopaedia
business. A few months earlier, he had summoned an editorial aide,
telling him, "Hooper and Jackson have spent a hundred thousand
pounds making the British public conscious of one word, and that
word is 'encyclopaedia/ I want you to cash in on that word/' The first
result was a prospectus for a Monthly Encyclopaedia, but this was
abandoned in favor of a traditional kind, called the Harmsworth Uni-
versal Encyclopaedia, which was successfully sold on the Hooper-
Jackson time-payment plan.)

While the publishers smoldered, the club continued to prosper and
the lists of new subscribers to grow. On May 1, 1906, upon moving

HOOPER'S REVOLUTION 117

from Bond Street to larger quarters on Oxford Street, the Book Club
announced in a six-column advertisement a huge sale. "The greatest
sale of books that has ever been held," boasted the ad. No less than
600,000 books were offered, and though the total cost of these, based
on established prices, would be 200,000, the Times Book Club was
offering them at an aggregate price of 25,000. In this significant ad-
vertisement, the Times went so far as to call attention to a steadfast
claim of Horace Hooper's:

It is the opinion of The Times that books have always been sold at too
high a figure, that if their prices were reduced to a scale more in correspond-
ence, for example, with the price of a newspaper, books would circulate in
correspondingly larger numbers. In the course of two days, for instance, The
Times itself prints in its columns and sells for sixpence as much news matter
as is contained in an important biography published at 21 shillings net. The
cost of the paper, printing and binding in the case of such a book may
amount to one shilling and sixpence. The enormous balance of its price goes
in profit to the publisher, author and booksellers, wholesale and retail. An
enormous balance indeed, but by no means an enormous profit, because the
quantity sold is small. At our great sale such books will be sold for 23 and 30
pence. Where do the books come from? The Times has purchased from the
publishers direct, 500,000 books of different kinds; it has secured a further
stock of 70,000 from dealers and other libraries, and has added to them
books from the surplus stock of The Times Book Club. The books acquired
direct from the publishers are, of course, entirely new. Of books from the
other sources, any that have been used at all have been rebound in special
bindings, and are therefore equal to new. The large discounts are possible
because of the enormous scale on which our purchases were made.

Customers subscribers and nonsubscribers alike were invited to
stock up their libraries with "the most important and valuable kinds
of books." Special bargains were 250 assorted books of biography,
travel, and fiction for only 23 and 1,000 in the same categories for
80.

By ten o'clock on the morning of the "jumble sale" Oxford Street was
blocked with crowds. After the first buyers surged in, the doors were
closed, and for the rest of the day, while the mob outside howled, the
doors were opened at hour intervals for two or three minutes to permit
more to enter. Again, photographers recorded the scene, Extra police-
men were called to keep order, and much of their labor involved
scurrying after persons who climbed barriers and attempted to get in-
side by other passages. Buyers bought by threes and sixes and dozens,
and many had servants with them to carry their purchases to waiting

118 THE GREAT EB

carriages. Hooper, standing in the midst of the turmoil, exulted to a
weary Miss Hogarth, "This is our biggest success o all!" And Bell,
highly elated, hurried to his desk to write to a friend, "We have not
only increased the number of our subscribers but we seem to have con-
verted a large number into supporters, and if we are left alone there is,
I hope, a dawn of a better day for The Times."

The publishers were furious. They asked Hooper and Bell to a con-
ference on May 9. To Bell's office in Printing House Square came Ed-
ward Bell, president of the Publishers* Association, and C. J. Long-
man. Neither side seemed disposed to be friendly. Edward Bell later
recalled testily that the managing director of the Times struck him as
one with a decidedly oriental set of features, leading the irritated book
publisher to believe rumors that Bell's real name was Moses Abel or
Benjamin Moss, and assumed that Hooper, who stared across a table
at him and said little, was obviously an American "of either Indian or
Mexican extraction because of a certain duskiness of complexion."

The representatives of the Publishers' Association asked that their
adversaries agree not to sell any surplus copies of new books at low-
ered prices for at least six months after publication. Although Bell re-
plied, "We decline to do that," the book publishers, judging from a
report filed later by Edward Bell, assumed that peace had been re-
stored. ^Hooper and Bell agree," Edward Bell told his colleagues, evi-
dently without justification, "that the Book Club will offer any large
amounts of unsold books to the publishers or the Booksellers Associa-
tion before making them available at reduced prices to the public/*

How grievously Edward Bell had erred or misinterpreted was ap-
parent on May 17, when another sale was announced for the new
headquarters of the Book Club. This one was heralded in a full-page
advertisement: "The success of our Great Sale of Books has been as-
tonishing It has astonished even ourselves! It has surpassed all our
expectations!"

Since that mammoth sale, two hundred thousand more books had
been added. Those who did not wish to confront the expected crowd
could fill out a form on the page by checking numbers corresponding
to the one hundred books listed. Featured prominently on the list was
a new two-volume biography of Randolph Churchill by his son, Win-
ston, available to members of the Book Club at only thirty-two pennies
a volume, about 40 per cent less than the established price. The list
also featured the work of a brilliant new novelist, W. S. Maugham,
tided The Merry Go Round ("The Story of a young barrister who mar-

HOOPER'S REVOLUTION 119

ries a barmaid, because honour bids him") and reduced from six shil-
lings to fourteen pence.

The publishers considered this a hostile act, and they retaliated.
After many meetings, the Publishers' Association, on July 4, issued a
resolution aimed directly at the Book Club. It stated that no new book
could be considered secondhand until at least six months after publica-
tion. No book subject to discount through regular book-trade channels
could be sold either new or secondhand at less than 75 per cent of the
established price in the six-month period. Both of these terms were in-
corporated into a formal agreement signed by all major publishers,
and, to strengthen their demands on Hooper and Bell, the publishers
agreed, on the suggestion of one of the industry's leaders, John Murray,
to cancel all advertisements in the Literary Supplement of the Times
and for that matter, anywhere else in that newspaper until the Times
signed the agreement.

To this, Bell, urged on by Hooper, responded with accusations of
"Unreasonable threats!" and "Monopoly!" He now felt and Hooper
stood by to support him and prod him that the fight with the pub-
lishers was over more than prices; it was one of principle. Hooper had
impressed on him that there were more than profits to be made, more
than prestige, more than subscribers. "The Times," insisted Hooper,
"must serve a public that wants to be educated. We started serving
them by letting them buy the Encyclopaedia Britannica at lower
prices, and the booksellers didn't like that But we won. Now the pub-
lishers and the booksellers are angry again. But it is our duty to spread
books around to people."

Both Bell and Hooper felt the publishers had gone too far with this
threat to cancel advertising because of the dispute. It showed, Bell
cried, that the attitude of the publishers was that "of the rat to the
ferret." He insisted that the Book Club was helping to create a bigger
reading public and that all publishers of books would eventually bene-
fit. Faced with the demand that he sign the new agreement or do bat-
tle, he chose to fight, Intoned Bell: "I must leave the public to judge
between our conduct and that of the Publishers' Association, which
condescends to retaliate in withdrawing its advertisements and boy-
cotting one bookseller in order to enforce a regulation carried behind
the back of that bookseller and avowedly directed against him alone."

The Book War was on in earnest.

120 THE GREAT EB

r;r;

Caricature by John Kay, the eighteenth-century Scottish painter and etcher, of two of the men responsible
for the first edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica: Andrew Bell (left), its engraver and one of its
publishers, and William Smellie, the Edinburgh scholar who was its editor.

Bell's three full-page plates illustrating the article on "Midwifery" of which one is shown here so
startled many purchasers of the first edition that they ripped the pages from the offending volume;
others were so shocked that they threatened to take legal action against the publishers.

ANDREW BELL
In a formal, idealized pose

JAMES TYTLER
Eccentric but able, he was EB's second editor

In addition to the men shown here,
another important figure in the encyclo-
paedia's early history was Colin Mac-
farquhar, Bell's copublisher who initiated
the third edition. He died in 1793 at
forty-eight, "worn out," wrote his biog-
rapher, "by fatigue and anxiety of mind."

GEORGE GLEIG
A clergyman who completed the third edition

58 Fovli of. a ftttfier~ Flock *to7rhcr

//z addition to his editorial duties, James tytler was fanatically interested in balloon ascensions. His
several attempts to make successful fights were caricatured in 1784 by Benjamin West, who shows Tytler
flanked by two sets of cronies. Ty tier's various efforts all ended in failure.

For "Zoology" Bell engraved a number of illustrations, of which these are striking examples. The crests
at the left and at the lower right were inserted to Jill space in the full-page drawings.

ARCHIBALD CONSTABLE

The publisher who was called, among other things,
"The Crafty" and "The Napoleon of Publishing."

MACVEY NAPIER
Editor of Constable' s fifth edition Sty

JAMES MILL SIR WALTER SCOTT

Contributors to the notable supplement

ADAM BLACK

Founder of the firm that published the dis-
tinguished ninth edition from 1875 to 1889.

WILLIAM ROBERTSON SMITH

His articles on religious subjects in the ninth edition aroused
Utter controversy but helped dispel theological darkness,

THOMAS HENRY HUXLEY

In the ninth edition he was the foremost interpreter
of the new trends in thought motivated by the
writings of Charles Darwin on evolution.

HORACE EVERETT HOOPER
He revolutionized the operationsand the historyof the Encyclopaedia Britannica

WALTER MONTGOMERY JACKSON

Hooper's associate later his adversary at a high point in the encyclopaedia's
career. Jackson also founded thriving publishing firms of his own.

CHARLES FREDERICK MOBERLY BELL WILLIAM J. COX

and His c

1898 in 19^-

nica. the "humanized" fourteenth edition in 1929.

Scenes in the Lives of Competitors, XVI.

HE OMITTED TO SEND HIS SECOND GUINEA.

BRINGING HOME THE WINNER.

British humorists delighted in parodying the Hooper- Jackson sales and promotional techniques of 1903-4.
Shown here are the cover of one satirical book, Wisdom While You Wait, and three^ typical illustrations from
another, Wisdom on the Hire System, jibing a contest in which college scholarships were to be awarded to
those readers who found the correct answers in the tenth edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica.

HUGH CHISHOLM

4SS4KS i

FRANKLIN H. HOOPER

JAMES I. GARVIN

WALTER YUST

ss- -

MOO KfflW

^TO

THE SUM OF HUMAN
KNOWLEDGE

A (""-'oIetG and, modern exposition of thought, learning
and achievement to 1910, a vivid representation of the
\vorld's activities, so arranged and classified as to afford
a maximum/ of accessibility," and embodying everything
that can possibly interest or concern a civilized people.

THE NEW EDITION (the HflO OF THE

The sum of human knowledge c '" r r f, n n f k fj V ^Tt'i < v u ' / t'r iM'V/'V'i

the o de I of er cc irH rr< ' ' ' < < h ' b ' ' I- 11 lr c f ' ' s ' f (l c ' " r e " '^ '

' 1 " nf tl" 1"^ - i KM nni i inn ti i / t I / /' / n>. (/ l i I j

* h h' A new and modern work of reference adapted to modern needa

..._ n t' nl ( n

h adriqu tcl\ n no r I c
HrK for the . cr ,c r r t
privet re luvcJ t) m \ II (

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i / i / o tt f r nc Is ill tind th t

: nt I f t h I r I p r- t beciac I

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m A ul
n 11 maJc of

Top of a full-page adiettisementfion the New York Times of \tanh j, 1911 ettullinq the attnkdts
of the deienth taition which uav published utidti the impnmatm of Cambndgi Vnnmit),

When Horace Hooper invaded South America two years before World War I, he dispatched this display
wagon through the streets to compare the merits of the Encyclopaedia Britannica with its competitors.

THOMAS BABINGTON MAC All LAY

His articles in the seventh edition on Samuel Johnson
and on Oliver Goldsmith and his other contributions
are considered small masterpieces of biography.

ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE

To the eighth edition which he called "that great
repository of erudition" this poet contributed brilliant
articles on Mary, Queen of Scots, and John Keats.

EDWARD EVERETT

MATTHEW ARNOLD

The famous orator was the first American ever to Distmguished poet and critic, he wrote on literary sub-
write for the Encyclopaedia "Britannica. His article, jects.for^ the ninth edition, acclaimed at the time of
in the eighth edition, was on George Washington. publication and later for its many scholarly qualities.

LEON TROTSKY H. L. MENCKEN

His vivid article on Lenin, his Russian Revolution A steady and versatile writer on American literature
associate, first appeared in the thirteenth edition. and allied topics from 1922 until his death in 1936.

BERNARD SHAW SI GMUND FREUD

His article, "Socialism: Principles and Outlook," The "father of 'psychoanalysis" wrote the first popular-
written originally for the fourteenth edition, is a i%ed description "of his methods for the encyclopaedia
minor classic, still retained in the modern EB. in 1922 and again for the 1929 edition.

GENERAL JOHN J. PERSHING

IRENE CASTLE

This famous American military leader contributed arti- In the 1929 edition she wrote about a subject in which
cit's in the 1920's on decisive battles of World War I. she surpassed all of her competitors: ballroom dancing.

HARRY HOUDINI

MARIE CURIE

Master magician and escape artist, he discussed The^ thirteenth and subsequent editions carried her
"Conjuring' 9 in the thirteenth edition. articles on '"Radium" and other scientific subjects.

FOUR OF THE FORTY-THREE NOBEL PRIZE WIN NINO CONTRIBUTORS

NIELS BOHR

He writes about the atom

RALPH BUNG HE
His topics deal with Africa

LINUS PAULING
His field is chemistry

GENERAL GEORGE C. MARSHALL
This distinguished soldier's subject is World War II

WILLIAM BE NT ON

A former advertising executive turned
educator and public servant, he is pub-
lisher of the Encyclopaedia Britannica
and chairman of its Board of Directors.

SIR GEOFFREY CROWTHER

m of the board of the British
_/, he also is active as vice-
chairman of the Board of Editors.

Chairman
company,

PRESIDENTS, PRESENT AND PAST

Robert Preble (left) has been president since 1951; his predecessor was
Harry Houghton (right), now chairman of Eft's executive committee.

The Book War

For a full year the conflict continued. An angry Bell and a defiant
Hooper assailed the publishers as the "Book Trust/* The publishers
called Bell a "captive of the American Syndicate."

The initial assault was made on September 25 ? when a half -page ad-
vertisement in the Times denounced the demands of the publishers as
"an attempt at monopoly" and continued: "The attempted restriction
is called for neither by the natural course of business nor by public
convenience, indeed it runs counter to both, and The Times is desir-
ous that all who care for books should know that it is determined at all
costs to continue the system which the logic of business and the advan-
tage of the reading public alike recommend."

For three consecutive days further denunciations flared under titles
of "The Real Evil," charging publishers with purposely putting exces-

sive prices on their wares; "A False Plea/' upbraiding publishers for
claiming they were acting in the interests of booksellers; and "A Glar-
ing Injustice to the Bookseller," decrying as excessively restrictive the
agreement the Times had refused to sign. The Publishers' Association
countered by placing the Times on an official black list. Major publish-
ers, responding to the suggestion of John Murray, started to withdraw
their advertisements and, as each contract expired, declined to furnish
the Book Club with new volumes.

More indignant than ever, Bell, as if to underscore his faith in
Hooper, announced after the black-listing that the Times was extend-
ing Hooper's contract as advertising manager and giving the "alien
American" further powers of hiring and firing in his department and
complete sway over display ads. As for the cutoff of the supply of
books, Bell and Hooper were momentarily hard pressed, but Hooper
soon found ways by which he hoped to circumvent the publishers' boy-
cott. The Book Club still had a contract with the big wholesale dealers,
Simpkin, Marshall and Company, and books did come in from that
source. Some publishers who were not members of the association were
persuaded to continue their relations with the Book Club. Hooper also
helped small shopkeepers in various localities build circulating librar-
ies by giving them several dozen old and unwanted books. Thus estab-
lished, these men were able to buy from all publishers at the usual
discounts after which they passed on the new volumes to the Times
Book Club. These way stations were set up not only in London but as
far away as northern Ireland and the Isle of Wight. They helped to
ease the problem for several months until investigators for the Pub-
lishers' Association learned of the scheme and stopped sending sup-
plies.

Despite the publishers' countermeasures and the withdrawal of their
advertisements, .Bell remained loyal to the traditions of the Times. In
the same issues containing attacks on the "Book Trust" the Literary
Supplement carried impartial, often highly laudatory, reviews of
books published by the very objects of Bell's assault All one might
find in the supplement to indicate the hostilities was the announcement
after each review, even the most favorable:

"The publishers of this book decline to supply The Times Book Club
with copies on ordinary Trade terms, and subscribers who would co-
operate with The Times to defeat the Publishers' Trust may do so by
refraining from ordering the book so far as is possible until it is in-
cluded in The Times monthly catalogue."

122 THE GBEAT EB

Its columns depleted of large-scale book advertising, the supple-
ment emphasized the Book Club's own announcements in a column
headed "Seen in the Book Shop." Among offerings in the midst of the
battle were The Life of Sir Richard Burton., by Thomas Wright, pub-
lished at twenty-four shillings but offered by the Book Club at seven
shillings; <( A Nice Edition of the Complete Works of Dickens/' a
twenty-one volume set reduced from 105 shillings to only 24; and a
number of popular American books for which the Times had secured
reprint rights. This latter group was headed by John Nicolay's Life of
Abraham Lincoln, and the Times called snide attention to the differ-
ence between its price of four shillings, sixpence, and the twelve shil-
lings, sixpence, charged by the "Book Trust" for Alonzo Rothchild's
Lincoln, Master of Men "and yet it is substantially the same as the
four shilling, sixpence volume and shows no superiority in manufac-
ture."

Everyone of importance, in and out of the British book world, seemed
to join in the clamor.

The economist Dr. Arthur Shadwell was employed by the Times to
write articles exploring the complex problems of book publishing, and
in a series of seven dullish contributions he lengthily concluded that
there was some right on both sides of the controversy. Henniker Hea-
ton, a publicity-minded member of Parliament, drew up a petition
signed by ten thousand "book buyers and book lovers of the United
Kingdom" in support of the Times, the signers including the Lord
Mayor of London, the Duke of Hamilton and other peers, representa-
tives of church, medicine, and law, business magnates, and social lead-
ers. This distinguished roster was printed by the Times over several
full pages. George Bernard Shaw, as might be expected, sided with
the Times. "How old is a book?" he asked, and replied, "A book is old
sixty minutes after it is published." Shaw arranged for a special vol-
ume containing three of his plays, John Bull's Other Island, Major Bar-
bara, and How He Lied to Her Husband, with this title-page imprint:
"This edition is issued by the author for The Times Book Club." The
historian George Trevelyan persuaded his publisher, Longmans, one
of the few major firms still bound by contract to the club, to sell his
Garibaldi's Defence of the Roman Republic at six shillings instead of
twelve.

Other writers denounced the club. From the United States Gertrude

THE BOOK WAR 123

Atherton sent a bold message, "I want to be able to tell The Times to
go to hell whenever I want to/' Rudyard Kipling went on official rec-
ord with his belief that the Book Club might eventually do away with
all booksellers and that then all authors, cut off from booksellers,
"would be absolutely at the mercy of The Times' 9 And G. Herbert
Thring, secretary of the Incorporated Society of Authors, drew up a
long resolution condemning the Book Club in the name of the organi-
zation's membership comprising most of Great Britain's authors.

In response to the Athertons and Kiplings and Thrings and all others
who opposed them, Hooper and Bell issued a pamphlet composed by
Henry Haxton in characteristic prose. Titled Fair Book Prices vs. Pub-
lishers' Trust Prices, it explored the economics of book publishing and
charged that the publishers had "maintained a truly Ephesian hubbub,
in which the voice of reason was drowned in random damnation of an
intruder daring enough not to fall down before their shrines." Did not
these authors realize that the Book Club operations would bring wider
distribution of books and greater royalties? Did they not see that the
existing high prices and restricted circulation constituted the central
citadel of the publishers' position? And who were these authors who
were so blind to the advantages of the Book Club? "The curled darlings
of the fiction market come forth from the lotosland where they dwell
withdrawn from the vulgar bustle of commerce, or emerge from the
vaporous private Utopias wherein they excogiate phosphorescent mil-
lenniums. In tones perhaps more shrill than the world expected to issue
from these oracular retreats, they proclaimed at once their disinterested
devotion to literature, their contempt for vulgar rewards, and their un-
bounded indignation at a reduction of their profits which, at the mere
asservation of the publishers, they believed to be imminent."

The booklet produced a prompt retort from the Publishers' Associa-
tion in a pamphlet asserting that the Book Club was merely an "ap-
pendage to the Encyclopaedia Britannica promotional campaigns."
"The American Syndicate," bristled the publishers, "has taken on the
task of wrecking the time-honored arrangement of publisher and au-
thor and bookseller and public not with a view to enhancing the rep-
utation of The Times, not to help authors and writers and readers, but
for one reason and one reason alone: Revenue."

This was a rather incomplete view; as the battle intensified in these
early months of 1907 it was evident that the Book Club was producing
neither the revenue nor the increase in subscribers Hooper had antici-
pated. Yet he remained defiant. Met by reporters during a trip to the

124 THE GREAT EB

United States, he sought to minimize the ferocity of the warfare by im-
plying that most publishers were annoyed simply because the Book
Club had been able 'to dispose of some books, notably the Churchill bi-
ography, which had not sold well at higher prices, "The Book Club is
very popular with the people," Hooper was quoted in the New York
Times. "It'll cost us some money, but we will win. It's important that
we do, because books cost too much and ought to be brought down in
price so more people could afford them." To this, Publishers' Weekly,
spokesman for American book manufacturers, responded indignantly:
"From every standpoint, practices such as those indulged in by The
Times Book Club and other undersellers are not in the line of legiti-
mate business enterprises, inasmuch as they do not 'make good' along
the whole line." It predicted, quite prophetically, that the club would
encounter more difficulty making headway because subscribers to the
Times were not multiplying as rapidly as Hooper had expected; a typ-
ical refusal from one woman read, "I want to belong to a book club,
not to a dispute." As much as 15,000 had already been lost to the
Times in publishers' advertisements. "The Times," was Publishers'
Weekly's stern conclusion, "will have time to repent at leisure for its
divagations in the book field."

The funsters and punsters again had their day with this latest of the
Hooper adventures. E. V. Lucas and C. L. Graves once more were
foremost among them, producing a small book on the book-club theme,
this one titled Signs of the Times, or The Hustlers Almanac for 1907
and dedicated "with the deepest sympathy" to the shade of John De-
lane, one of the greatest editors of the Times in earlier days. Mocking
the Times as the London edition of the New York Times and as "The
Only Paper Which Gives Itself Away Daily," it listed the editors in
chief as Messrs. Hooper and Bell, the general manager as Mr. Hoop-
erly Mober, the literary editor as Mr. Molby Belber, the city editor
as Moberly Hooper, and the advertisement manager as Mr, Whooper.

In this jaunty almanac, Hooper and Bell were depicted as going far
beyond the limits of a mere book club. On the first day of each month
a striking new idea was proposed. For January there was a Times
Meat Club, to which, of course, the Butchers' Association objected be-
cause of the offer of free hash. In subsequent months the mockery in-
cluded such innovations as the Times Cooperative Clothing Club, with
howls from the West End tailors and modistes; the Times Egg Club,
with farmers and dairymen in high dudgeon; the Times Royal Acad-
emy, with Hooper offering to buy six Sargents at a 15 per cent dis-

THE BOOK WAR 125

count and being attacked by art dealers; the Times Private Motoring
Track from Croydon to Brighton "for Times subscribers only"; the
Times Book Club Festival, with Bell and Hooper singing, "I love my
love and my love loves me," and Jackson trilling, "How we brought the
good news from New York to London"; the Times Cigar Club; and
the Times Beer Club. All the silliness was climaxed by the establish-
ment by the Times of a' new religion for subscribers only "The Com-
munity of Times Servers with the Right Rev. Moberly Bell as Chief
Archimandrake, assisted by the Rev. The Judicious Hooper" and an
offer of 25,000 for the use of Westminster Abbey as a temple of wor-
ship.

Throughout were scattered drawings by a clever caricaturist, George
Morrow, and mock advertisements. The one that best indicated the
critical intent of this book showed Uncle Sam pointing a bony finger
at the reader beneath a caption: "It's Your Money We Want."

The general furor over the Book Club roused some of the many co-
proprietors of the Times to action. For a decade or more several per-
sons and groups had sought to inquire into the assets and losses and
myriad details of the Walter heirs' majority control of the newspaper.
The most persistent was Dr. Walter Knowsley Sibley, a descendant
of the first John Walter and a holder of one-fortieth of a share in the
Times, He had been an irritant to Arthur Walter and his brother God-
frey since 1900, when, acting in the name of his mother, Mrs. Clara
Frances Sibley, he had raised questions about the way the Walters
were managing the newspaper and receiving fixed fees for printing
it. In 1905, Dr. Sibley had started suit against Walter, demanding to
see the accounts of the business and suggesting incorporation of a com-
pany, an eventuality which would have compelled Walter to give up
the printing division. Little developed on this matter until the end
of 1906 when, at the height of the Book War, a compromise agreement
was reached in which the Walters agreed to make a statement of the
number of partners and their respective holdings and of the full assets
of the partnership,

Dr. Sibley insisted that his action had no connection with the Book
War, but his disclaimer lost validity as the strife grew. The Sibley
group was especially indignant over the agreement with Hooper and
Jackson extending their control of the advertising and circulation de-
partments, There was continued muttering about the affiliation with

126 THE GBEAT EB

"alien Americans" and "alien publications." To Dr. Sibley's insistent
voice was added that of a Miss Brodie-Hall, also the holder of a small
share, who called a meeting on June 19, 1907, to ask all coproprietors
to join her in seeking legal action to set aside the agreements with
Hooper and Jackson. The pacts had been made with the Americans,
said she, so that Walter could insure his personal profits from the
printing of the newspaper.

Arthur Walter countered with a meeting of his own, informing the
coproprietors who attended that the agreements were in favor of the
Times. It was already evident that because of the Book War, Hooper
and Jackson had not yet gained a shilling of profit and, in point of fact,
had spent nearly 125,000 of their own since opening the club, little
of which had been retrieved and much of which would possibly never
be regained. For a short time Walter staved off litigation.

It was at this point that Hooper stepped forward with a startling plan
of his own "Amalgamation!" All the holdings and extra ventures of
Printing House Square the Times itself, the Encyclopaedia Britan-
nica, the Book Club, the printing business, even Hooper and Jackson,
Limited should be combined, insisted Hooper, into one gigantic firm.
Such a corporation would be capitalized at .400,000, with securities
offered for sale to the public; all other proprietors could be bought out
or be offered new shares in exchange for their holdings.

There were discussions between Hooper, Jackson, and Bell in
Hooper's Grosvenor Square town house. From them, Bell emerged a
strident supporter of the proposal. He was now certain that the Times
could never pay its own way under the existing organizational system,
so unwieldly and so complicated, and that if the newspaper were to
maintain its high standards, especially in its foreign service, it needed
subsidies beyond any funds it derived from subscriptions, advertise-
ments, or other traditional sources.

"We cannot do more for two years than balance receipts and ex-
penditures," he wrote to Arthur Walter. Hooper's plan, therefore,
seemed to Bell "our one chance of escape," and he laid before Walter
charts and figures prepared by Hooper and Jackson. To the influential
Lord Cromer, Bell wrote for aid and advice, emphasizing that under
the proposed merger neither American would have or desired, for
that matter editorial control of the Times. Hooper, by terms of the
prospectus, would be manager of the Book Club; Jackson, manager of

THE BOOK WAR 127

the Publications Department. "If the idea comes off," wrote Bell,
"Hooper and Jackson will each of them be large shareholders their
interest will be mainly the financial one. They are, moreover, Ameri-
cans, and not therefore imbued with British ideas about The Times:"
He was full of praise for both men. He had done business with them
for nearly ten years, and, though their contracts had many loopholes,
stated Bell, there had been no discord. "I have never known them
to raise a quibble or a difficulty, and they have accepted all my figures
without a query." The corporation, Bell explained to Lord Cromer,
would be managed by two committees, one for the newspaper with
headquarters at Printing House Square, the other for the subsidiary
publishing and for the Book Club at Oxford Street. Bell was certain
that within two years solvency and financial solidity would be estab-
lished.

While Walter hesitated in coming to a decision, the Sibley and
Brodie-Hall forces went into court with a demand that the complicated
partnership be dissolved and the Times be placed on sale. On July 18,
Justice Warrington ordered that this be done and appointed Walter
receiver. Despite this development, Hooper pushed for a reply. He
knew that a public sale, in spite of the legal ruling, was an eventuality
none of the conflicting parties really desired, since it would be consid-
ered a heavy blow to the paper's prestige.

Still Walter hesitated. His major fear was that Bell and Hooper
would continue a relentless fight with the book publishers, and this,
for all of Hooper's apparent willingness to continue to absorb the costs
of such a struggle, would have a damaging effect on the paper's rep-
utation. He employed a firm of accountants and stock experts to ex-
amine minutely the Hooper proposal, and the reply was not enthusias-
tic. Hooper scorned this report, reminding Walter that had it not been
for profits accruing to the paper from the Encyclopaedia Britannica,
the Times might have been compelled to cease publication. Again
he assured Walter, "I have no desire here except to straighten out a
mess that will simply continue to get worse and worse. I have no wish
to interfere editorially although I do think the Times is sometimes
too discreet." When Walter continued to vacillate, Hooper lost his tem-
per. In October, he told the chief proprietor, "Look here, Mr. Walter,
we have been talking with you almost three months now and have
not, so far as we can see, advanced a step." Thus pressed, Walter de-
cided against the Hooper proposition. His decision, leaving open the
matter of the newspaper's sale, saddened Bell and angered Hooper.

128 THE GREAT EB

Perhaps in irritation, perhaps reacting with hasty bitterness to Walter's
rejection, Hooper now made a move that propelled him into a long
stretch of bad fortune and new conflicts and brought him close to dis-
aster.

Since 1903, John Murray, the London publisher who had proposed
the cancellation of advertisements in the Times during the Book War,
had held the contract for publishing the collected letters of the late
Queen Victoria. For three years Viscount Esher and Arthur Christo-
pher Benson had been intrusted with the task of gathering these let-
ters, and now Murray announced that the first three volumes, cover-
ing the period from 1837 to 1861, would soon be issued by him. It was
an event of considerable importance to all of Great Britain, and Bell,
with a show of nerve that often served him well in crises, was deter-
mined to confer with Murray about the possibility that the Times
Book Club might distribute the volumes.

Although considerable bad feeling existed between him and Mur-
ray the book publisher had been among those who had accused the
Times of foisting a long-published ninth edition of the Encyclopaedia
Britannica on the public without stating it was a reprint Bell strode
into Murray's Albermarle Street office on October 15, two days before
scheduled publication. Boldly, he stated his proposition.

"We are willing to lose a little money on it if you care to meet us
halfway/' he told Murray, "and we will take a very large number if
you are disposed in this one case to deal with us directly. For the
sake of the late Queen we should like to give the book as good a send-
off as possible."

Murray saw his chance to end the Book War. "Nothing would give
me greater pleasure than to do business with you again," he replied,
"not only with regard to this book but all along the line. Can't you re-
consider your decision as to the six-month limit for new books? If this
were done, I think I could answer for it that not only mine but all
other doors would be opened. I cannot, however, make an exception."

Solemnly, Bell shook his shaggy head and left Murray's office.

On October 18, the Literary Supplement carried a favorable front-
page review of the volumes of letters, written by John Bailey, editor
of the Quarterly Review. At the end was the usual plea to readers to
desist from buying the book, and midway in the review was a para-
graph written by Bell which he had handed a day earlier to the

THE BOOK WAJR 129

supplement's editor, Bruce Richmond, with the admonition, Tut it
in!" It followed an especially laudatory paragraph of Bailey's and
read, "But a grave mistake has been committed in the name of pub-
lication. This book is one that will create very wide interest in one
form or another it will appeal to every reader in the Empire, and it is
difficult to overestimate its educational value if it were accessible to
the classes who are apt to believe that wisdom lies only in a democ-
racy. But the three volumes which might, one would imagine, have
been produced at ten shillings, and which at a reasonable figure would
have sold by hundreds of thousands, are offered to a privileged few at
three pounds, three shillings."

Bell had written this at Hooper's instigation, for Hooper was now
embarked on a daring drive to break the publishers' resistance.
Hooper had already made arrangements with Edward Ross, one of his
advertising aides, to write a long letter to the Times and, without
Bells knowledge, had given to Ross a mass of figures seeking to prove
that publishers charged exorbitant prices for their books. Ross's first
letter appeared the day after the review. It was long, angry, and full
of denunciation and was signed "Artifex" a rather unhappy choice,
since the translation of the Latin word is "cunning inventor." It as-
serted that The Letters of Queen Victoria could easily have been put
on the market for nine shillings. John Murray had paid nothing for the
contents of the books, Artifex asserted, and stood no real risk in selling
it. After citing the profit Murray could be expected to make from the
sales, the letter grew bolder.

"Now, sir," it continued, "these figures in any case spell simple ex-
tortion. More than two thirds of the price charged for the book repre-
sents an arbitrary addition to the natural price of the book, which
would be absolutely impossible if books were published under the or-
dinary competitive conditions applying to other productions. But this
is no ordinary case at all. ... I believe that I shall command the as-
sent of the thinking portion of the public when I say that in accepting
this task Mr. Murray has assumed a fiduciary position. Were he really
imbued with the lofty and chivalrous sentiments which he has publicly
professed, that aspect of the case would have presented itself to him
very forcibly. He would have felt, too, that the credit and prestige of
bringing out a book of this kind would be a reward which might well
make him content with a relatively small pecuniary return. He would
then have exerted himself to sell the book as cheaply as possible, and
to make it accessible to the greatest possible number; and his reward

130 THE GBEAT EB

would not have been wanting. Mr. Murray has seen things otherwise.
He has exploited the great personality of Queen Victoria for his own
ends, and carried the national interest in her doings for his own en-
richment into 32 pieces of silver, to be precise."

The words were those of Ross, but the figures and sentiments were
those of Horace Hooper. Warming up to his task, Artif ex warned that
the public would not be fooled by the high price of the book but
would wait until it dropped, as had such others as The Memoirs of
Prince Hohenlohe, twenty-six shillings in 1906 and only six in 1907;
Captain Scott's Voyage of the Discovery, forty-two shillings in 1905
and ten shillings in 1906; and Sir Evelyn Wood's From Midshipman
to Field Marshal, twenty-five shillings in 1906 and seven shillings, six-
pence, in 1907. "So the hocus pocus goes on; there are more examples.
. . . The public, at any rate, are no longer so easily deceived as they
were, and the tables may be turned even upon Mr. John Murray."

Murray sped to his attorneys. They wrote to Bell, demanding an
apology, insisting that all the statements in the letter were false. Bell's
attorneys replied that an apology would soon be forthcoming and ex-
pressed their regrets that Artifex's letter might have been distressing to
Murray. But no apology appeared. Instead, precisely one week after
the first letter, another was printed, similarly inspired, similarly signed,
similarly displayed. It repeated most of the data in the earlier letter but
now added to its accusations the charge that Murray was guilty of
"plunder" in charging what he did for the volumes of Queen Victoria's
letters.

The time for demanding apologies was past, so far as John Murray
was concerned. He instructed his attorneys to file a suit against the
Times for libel. This done, a hearing was set for the following May.
Before that contest, however, there was an upheaval in the fortunes
of the Times a development that would affect greatly the futures of
Bell, Hooper, Jackson, and the Encyclopaedia Britannica.

THE BOOK WAR 1S1

A Man Called "X"

In spite of Arthur Walter's rejection of Hooper's plan of amalgamation,
Bell continued to hope that Hooper and Jackson might be brought into
active participation if a new company were formed. What Bell did not
know was that Walter's brother, Godfrey, had quietly started plotting
to organize such a company, one that would satisfy court and co-own-
ers and cast aside Hooper and Jackson and all their works.

Godfrey Walter had always confined his attention to the printing
business. He was a shy, quiet man, ignorant of newspaper manage-
ment, interested primarily in seeing that rental of the buildings and
payments for printing were paid by the Times. But early in 1907,
while Bell was in the United States receiving an honorary degree from
the University of Pittsburgh, Godfrey Walter issued orders discharging
a number of advertising salesmen. Although this clearly clashed with
Hooper's command in this department, Hooper was too occupied

182

with the Book War to make more than a token protest. Besides, some
immediate savings were realized as a result of Walter's action, al-
though when the busy season started the Times was caught short and
losses ultimately outran whatever profits had been made.

Almost immediately after his brother turned down Hooper's pro-
posal, Godfrey Walter had approached a number of wealthy, influen-
tial friends and public figures to discuss formation of a new company.
From these talks emerged a tentative plan designed to quiet the pro-
tests of those coproprietors who had inveighed against the Walters and
especially against the warfare that Hooper, Bell, and Jackson insisted
on carrying on against the book publishers. The basis of the plan was
to establish a company of which the Times would be a major part,
and to appoint as the newspaper's managing director Cyril Arthur
Pearson, owner of the garish Standard and lesser publications.

These discussions were secret, but details filtered out And they
traveled to the ears of the lieutenants of Alfred Harmsworth, now
Lord NorthclifFe, as mighty a press lord as Pearson and twice as in-
genious and aggressive. On January 5, 1908, a tiny paragraph headed
"The Future of The Times" appeared in Northcliffe's Observer. It
read: "It is understood that negotiations are taking place which will
place the direction of The Times newspaper in the hands of a very
capable proprietor of several popular magazines and newspapers."
Another newspaper, the Daily Chronicle, went further, naming Pear-
son as the Times s potential purchaser.

Rumor bred rumor as these notices caught the eyes of the men cer-
tain to gain or lose by such a move. Many believed that Lord North-
cliff e himself was the "very capable proprietor." George Edward
Buckle, editor of the Times, thought it all a joke, intended to embar-
rass the Walters in their dealings with the coproprietors. Northcliffe
was unavailable for comment The Walters refused to talk. But Pear-
son declared, "There is nothing to it but there may be some day."

Pearson was being discreetly technical. By the time he issued his
partial denial he had already agreed, in a pact with the Walters, to
become managing director of the Times. By terms of the pending
agreement, which still needed approval by the courts, the new com-
pany would be capitalized at 850,000. It would merge the Times
with the faltering Standard and also own the printing business. For his
part, Pearson would sell his holdings in the Standard and the Daily
Express to the new company for 150,000.

Spurred to action by the notices in the Observer and Chronicle,

A MAN CALLED "x" 133

Arthur Walter, who had complied completely with his brother in the
plan favoring Pearson, gave Buckle, on the night of January 6, an item
to be inserted into next days Times. Buckle scanned it with unbe-
lieving eyes.

"Negotiations are in progress/' read the statement, "whereby it is
contemplated that The Times newspaper shall be formed into a lim-
ited company under the proposed chairmanship of Mr. Walter. The
newspaper, as heretofore, will be published at Printing House Square.
The Business Management will be reorganized by Mr. C. Arthur Pear-
son, the proposed Managing Director." Then followed the disclaimer
that any change would be made in the character of the newspaper or
that it would be subject to party control.

Bell's first knowledge of these developments came when he re-
turned that evening from Calais, where he had gone to greet his
daughter on her return from a trip to India. When Buckle handed
him Walter's statement, Bell's hulking shoulders drooped and his face
grew suddenly white. Then he forced a weak smile and said, "Perhaps
they will keep me as limerick editor." He walked slowly to his home
to tell his wife and daughter the news. When they expressed indigna-
tion, he shrugged. "What's the use of being bitter?" he asked. "It only
makes it worse for all of us."

But, as might be expected, Bell recovered rapidly. Within an hour
he was at his desk scribbling a letter to Arthur Walter. "Forgive me if
I say that I cannot help feeling deeply hurt," he wrote, "at the want
of confidence you have shown in one who has tried to serve you faith-
fully, and who regarded you as a friend." He added crisply that he in-
tended to work against the Pearson arrangement and offered to give
up his salary as of January 1. "Your own interests," he assured Walter,
"I regard as closely identified with those of The Times, and in no case
will I work against The Times' 9

Immediately, Bell set himself to determine means and measures by
which he could raise money enough to thwart any plan to organize a
new Times headed by Pearson, whom he considered one of the yellow-
est of yellow journalists and a man who would wreck everything he
had tried to build since he had been summoned from the tranquillity
of his post in Egypt.

From the beginning, Horace Hooper and Walter Jackson were deeply
involved. They dreaded Pearson, for they were certain he would put

134 THE GREAT EB

a stop to the affiliation of the Times with their own enterprises. Al-
ready they had spent nearly half a million dollars on the forthcoming
eleventh edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. They were plan-
ning, within a month, a new kind of work, The Historians' History of
the World, with approval and sanction of the Times. They discussed
briefly the possibility of making another effort to bid for the Times,
but this time Jackson was even less agreeable to the venture than he
had been a few months earlier, and all discussion on this matter was
dropped.

On the morning the Times carried the announcement of the nego-
tiations designed to make Pearson managing director, Horace Hooper
sat glumly in the grillroom of the Savoy Hotel. As he dawdled over
his breakfast, he was approached by Kennedy Jones, the shrewd and
resourceful editor of the Northcliffe-owned Daily Mail

"I see by the papers," said Jones, "that you are going to have a new
proprietor at the Times."

"Well, maybe," snapped Hooper. "I guess that even in this country
a man can't sell property which doesn't belong to him."

Eager to hear a fuller explanation of Hooper's remark, Jones seated
himself and asked more questions. Soon Hooper was disclosing to
Jones all he knew of the arrangements at the Times, of the conflicts
of interest between the many coproprietors, of the fears the Walters
held of any public sale of their newspaper, of facts and figures, of
losses and profits. "Pearson won't have so easy a time," Hooper said.
"There!! have to be approval from the court and the other proprietors
before it goes through. Itll take time."

When Jones asked about the possibility of discussing with Bell his
move against Pearson, Hooper nodded. "You ought to meet with Bell
and get more details. And if you do, I want to be in on the deal. I
don't want to make money. I'm interested only in one thing to pro-
tect the interests of the Encyclopaedia Britannica and the rest. I'll be
glad to help anyone who wants to fight on Moberly Bell's side against
Pearson. But I can't be connected with this openly."

Eagerly, Jones asked, "How much would it take to buy out the pro-
prietors so all will be content?"

"About 350,000 pounds should do it. The right kind of man backing
Bell with the right kind of money could do it."

For Hooper his own meaning was clear: Lord Northcliffe was "the
right kind of man." As for Jones, he thought immediately of Jones, "I
held The Times in the hollow of my hand," he wrote later. For three

A MAN CALLED *V 135

frantic days he sought financial aid from Lord Curzon and others, but
he was unsuccessful.

Then Jones apprized Northcliffe of what he had learned from
Hooper. Northcliflfe had long coveted the Times, but his immediate
reaction was to shrug off Jones's suggestion that he enter the contest
"In her present frail state/' he said, "an unseemly wrangle between two
yellow journalists for the possession of the Times would be more than
the old thing could stand." But when Jones told him that Hooper knew
of considerable dissatisfaction among a segment of the coproprietors
at the thought of Pearson's domination, Northcliffe informally author-
ized Jones to learn more and act as his representative in any eventual-
ity.

For his part, Hooper gingerly approached Bell, who was still striving
to secure enough money or promise of money to make a counterbid
against Pearson. Bell had considered fleetingly alliances with a free-
trade group and with another representing a German syndicate, but
he had decided against both, saying, "I prefer the Times wrong and
independent to the Times right and shackled." Nor would he con-
sider an earlier offer from Hooper to abandon the Times and join him
in his publishing ventures. "No, I'm going to smash the plan to wreck
the Times. I'll fight to the end!"

But when Hooper now quietly proposed, "Why not work with Al-
fred Harmsworth?" Bell roared, "Never! Never!"

"But he's interested and he has the money."

"Never! The same objections I have to Pearson apply to the other
one. Either of them would wreck the Times."

"If you won't work with him, he'll go over your head. Think it over.
It may be your only chance."

Bell agreed to consider the new proposal. He prepared a list of
prominent people who had enough money to buy the Times and sub-
mitted it to Lord Cromer, members of the Rothschild family, and
other financial giants, asking each, "Please cross off the name of any-
one to whose connection with The Times you would take serious ex-
ception." On every list the name of Northcliffe remained untouched.

Impressed by this response, Bell met with Jones, with Hooper close
at hand. There were long and guarded discussions, at the end of which
Jones sent a cable to Northcliffe, then at the Ritz Hotel in Paris. As
always, it was sent in care of Northcliffe's valet, Brunnbauer. It read,
in part: "Are you prepared to come into a deal which will upset ne-
gotiations eventually acquiring business ourselves?" and added that

136 THE GREAT EB

the man who could get the 350,000 necessary for the deal "would
save organization for empire."

After a slight delay, Northcliffe indicated he was interested. More
discussions followed between Bell, Jones, and Hooper. Bell insisted
only that he wanted the integrity and character of the newspaper
maintained. Hooper repeated his wish that his relationship with the
Times be maintained. Jones listened quietly, assuring them both that
Northcliffe would deal fairly with all involved.

On January 28, Northcliffe returned to London. Bell asked to see
him but received no reply; he was eager to bring the negotiations to a
decisive point because already rumors were circulating that an "un-
known capitalist" was preparing to fight Pearson for control of the
Times. One newspaper, the Graphic, actually went so far as to "re-
veal" that the men behind the plot to buy the newspaper were none
other than Hooper and Jackson. Bell wrote to Arthur Walter deny-
ing this but explaining that there was one man, indeed, with whom
he was dealing for purchase of the newspaper, a development not so
displeasing to Walter now, for he and his brother were beginning to
lose their zeal for the Pearson plan.

Finally Northcliffe made a definite move. Designating Hooper and
Jackson to act as his intermediaries, with additional counsel from Ken-
nedy Jones, he wrote, on February 3, "I am desirous of purchasing The
Times on behalf of myself and others, and I authorize you up to June
. 30th, 1908, to negotiate for the purchase of the copyright thereof for
any sum up to 350,000. I agree to be satisfied with the purchase at
that price."

This led finally to a direct meeting between Bell and Northcliffe.

"Well, Mr. Bell," said the press magnate when they confronted each
other a day later in the Sackville Street office of Northcliffe's account-
ant, "I am going to buy the Times. With your help, if you will give it,
In spite of you, if you do not."

"I will help you," Bell replied.

Complex negotiations now developed which assumed elements of in-
trigue. Hooper and Jackson played helpful roles. Northcliffe fre-
quently used the Americans as emissaries and often called on them for
special information about the financial structure of the Times. Each of
the principals assumed code names: Northcliffe was either "X" or "At-
lantic"; Hooper, "Adelaide"; Jackson, "Demerara"; Bell, "Canton";

A MAN CALLED "x" I3/

Kennedy Jones, "Alberta." In notes to his wife relating to any phase
of the negotiations, Bell wrote only in Arabic, a language both had
learned during their years in Egypt.

Northcliffe soon made it clear that if he put up the money he in-
tended to achieve full control of the Times. Although he assured Bell
that he meant to preserve the traditional character of the newspaper,
he would countenance nothing less than complete command, even if
his ownership must remain secret for a time. When Bell drew up a
long list of requirements and guaranties he thought were essential,
Northcliffe returned it unsigned, instructing his lawyer to inform Bell
of his conditions. With a sigh, Bell sent back his acceptance of North-
cliffe's terms: "It is understood that in the event of your acquiring The
Times newspaper I shall act as your Managing Director for 5 years &
carry out your absolute instructions. But you express your desire that
the present policy of the paper in Home and Foreign Affairs should
be continued under the editorship of Mr. Buckle and Mr. Valentine
Chirol. In my former letter I desired to make no conditions. I merely
wished to express what I believed to be your ideas/'

Bell soon realized the first real triumph of his fight On February 14,
Pearson, informed by Arthur Walter that opposition to his participa-
tion in ownership of the Times had grown steadily since the first an-
nouncements, formally withdrew, and the way became clearer for Bell
to drive toward the finish.

To throw the inquisitive ones off the trail and make others more re-
ceptive to his possible acquisition of the Times, Northcliffe himself
wrote an article for die Observer, "The Truth about The Times." Ap-
pearing with no name attached, this two-column analysis hinted slyly
of what might have happened had Pearson achieved control: Bell,
"who rescued that journal from an apparently hopeless condition after
the dark days of the Parnell Commission," would most assuredly, un-
der Pearson, "receive his cong6 at very short notice. ... In the inter-
ests of all concerned, the sooner the Court of Chancery takes the matter
in hand and settles affairs, one way or the other, the more certain we
are to have in the future, as in the past, a national uncommercial or-
gan, admired, if not always liked, by all political parties, spacious
enough to adequately report Parliamentary and legal proceedings, in-
dependent enough to be received everywhere as the representative of
the Englishman."

This done, Northcliffe soon disappeared from London and headed
for France, establishing headquarters at Boulogne to receive commu-

138 THE GREAT EB

niques from Adelaide and Demerara, Canton and Alberta. Back in
London, Bell, Hooper, and Jackson continued to consolidate gains al-
ready achieved. Pearson was out of the way, but a group led by Miss
Brodie-Hall was still making fluttery motions to buy out the other co-
proprietors. Bell already had 320,000 in the Bank of England, de-
posited there in his name by Northcliffe. And, as Northcliffe now in-
formed Hooper and Jackson, he was prepared to raise that sum to
400,000 if necessary.

By the first days of March, the end was in sight. Arthur Walter,
guessing at the identity of "X," assured his brother and his close asso-
ciates that the move was all for the best. "It would be disastrous to
the interest of all," he said, "if this contract is not confirmed." Bell
made ready for the important appearance in court on March 16. On
that day attorneys for Miss Brodie-Hall asked for a continuance. Jus-
tice Warrington shook his head and asked, "Are there any new of-
fers?" Bell strode forward firmly with his offer to pay 320,000 for the
Times, 10 per cent of it ready to be deposited at that instant. The
judge approved and scanned the draft of a notice intended for next
day's newspapers, and Bell hastily and happily sent to Northcliffe,
now at Versailles, and to Arthur Walter the same message: "Gone
through as we wanted." One additional message he wrote to his new
master, "I hope it is unnecessary for me to say again how grateful I
am to you."

For thirty days the name of the new head of the company now in pos-
session of the Times remained an official secret, although one or two
newspapers did hint at Northcliffe. Then William T. Stead, that ubiq-
uitous journalist, made full disclosure in his Review of Reviews. The
news spread, and Fleet Street and, indeed, all London braced for ex-
plosions at Printing House Square.

Hooper and Jackson anticipated little alteration of their own status.
Having aided Northcliffe so intimately in acquiring the newspaper,
they were confident he would show his gratitude in the proper man-
ner. Warmly expressing his and Hooper's views, Jackson congratulated
Northcliffe: "I must send you just a line to say how very glad I am
that matters have come to such a satisfactory conclusion. . . . Not
only the British Public but all friends of Great Britain will some day
know what a great good you have done for the nation and it will be
appreciated/'

A MAN CALLED "x" 139

Northcliffe appreciated the message. Assuring the two Americans
that no major changes were contemplated, he agreed to give them
exclusive rights to publish and sell such subscription books as might
later be mutually agreed on in the name of the Times and through
its influence. Hooper and Jackson congratulated themselves on passing
a crisis. The worst was now over, and, with Northcliffe in top com-
mand at the Times, with Bell presumably as strong, perhaps stronger,
than before, they felt their position was solid.

Then, in May, the John Murray libel suit came to trial. It lasted four
days, from May 5 through May 8, and was held before Justice Darling,
a jurist who fancied himself a wit and who, judging from his brusque
treatment of Hooper, disliked Americans, especially aggressive Ameri-
cans.

At one point Justice Darling interrupted questioning of Hooper to
ask, "How long, sir, have you been a publisher?" in a tone that im-
plied, "How dare you be a publisher?" Hooper snapped back a ready
reply, "All my life, since I was a boy." The jurist constantly interrupted
attorneys for both sides, but the jury managed to learn from Bell that
he believed the price for the Queen Victoria volumes could have been
much less, from John Murray that sales had diminished after publica-
tion of the Artifex letters, and from Hooper that while he had indeed
asked Edward Ross to write the allegedly libelous letters and had sup-
plied him with thoughts and figures, such words as "extortion" and
"plunder" were Ross's own. "I am against the excessive profits of pub-
lishers generally, not of Mr. Murray," said Hooper. Asked by Murray's
lawyers what Ross meant by the references to thirty-two pieces of sil-
ver, Hooper grinned. "I think he thought it a bright way of putting it,"
he replied.

Justice Darling's summation took a full hour, but the jury needed
only thirty-five minutes to return a verdict in Murray's favor, awarding
him 7,500.

Even before this decision, however, Northcliife had moved to end
the Book War. On May 7 he went to see Frederick Macmillan at the
book publisher's St. Martin's Street office. He was irritated, brusque,
and direct.

"You must keep this very secret," he told Macmillan, "but I have
purchased the controlling interest in the Times. Now the first thing
I wish to do is to end this damned Book War on terms that will be

140 THE GREAT EB

satisfactory to all of us. We want to continue the Book Club. It has
27,000 members, most of whom subscribed to the Times to get the ad-
vantages of the club, and they all appear to be satisfied with the serv-
ices they are getting. But it is all too expensive. Can we come to
friendly terms?"

"I am certain that we can," replied Macmillan.

Soon talks progressed between leaders of the Publishers* Association
and Kennedy Jones, whom Northcliffe deputized as his agent. Neither
Bell nor Jackson nor Hooper knew of, or were invited to, these negotia-
tions. In some phases disagreement developed, but eventually all ma-
jor issues were resolved, and one decision, contrary to the assurances
Northcliffe had given the two Americans who had aided him in acquir-
ing the Times, was that after June 30 Hooper and Jackson would have
no further affiliation with the Book Club.

Although the final settlement, hewing to the general lines of the net
book agreement which Bell and Hooper had so steadfastly resisted,
would not be drawn until September, Kennedy Jones took imperious
command at the Book Club. He put all the librarians and attendants
into blue uniforms and peppered them with daily complaints about
why the blinds were still drawn at nine o'clock in the morning or
why a certain assistant librarian turned her back on a certain sub-
scriber. To mark the end of the Book War, Murray permitted the Book
Club to distribute The Letters of Queen Victoria in a cheaper edition
for only six shillings, and Jones, who fancied himself a master sales-
man of commodities both material and intellectual, undertook a cam-
paign to dispose of thousands of the sets. All he actually did, however,
when the books were available, was to pile them high in the Book
Club's front windows, with dignified placards informing passers-by
that to purchase the volumes of letters was a patriotic duty. Such ap-
peals produced meager sales. Soon the books were removed from the
windows and stacked in the basement. When Jones petulantly asked
Janet Hogarth why the sale had been so disappointing, she replied
like a true Hooper loyalist, "You want Mr. Hooper to sell this for you.
He'd have had it in the Fiji Islands by this time!'"

But Horace Hooper was in no mood to co-operate with Kennedy
Jones. He felt he had been betrayed. Yet he was careful to keep his
feelings to himself. Northcliffe was too powerful a personage, with or
without the Times in his possession, for him to antagonize. He had al-
ready dictated Hooper's removal from the newspaper's advertising
department; and an argument over the settlement of the Book War

A MAN CALLED **x" 141

and what Hooper considered abject surrender to the book publishers
would only jeopardize, Hooper well knew, the future of the Encyclo-
paedia Britannicas eleventh edition, on which Hugh Chisholm and a
large staff had been hard at work for nearly five years. Moreover,
Hooper was soon involved in a new struggle, and his adversary was
neither book publisher nor competitor but Walter Montgomery Jack-
son.

142 THE GBEAT EB

Hooper versus Jackson

During the hectic period of Hooper's control of the advertising depart-
ment of the Times, the fury of the Book War, and the negotiations for
Northcliffe's purchase of the newspaper, work had proceeded on the
eleventh edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica.

On the top floor of the building at Printing House Square, Hugh
Chisholm presided over a staff of editors, subeditors, and departmen-
tal chiefs, with W. Alison Phillips as his chief assistant, In New York
the editorial staff again was headed by Franklin Hooper, with all
administrative details under the management of Charles Crawford
Whinery, formerly an assistant editor of the New International Ency-
clopaedia.

The bulk of the editorial work was done in London. Although the
majority of the contributors were acknowledged scholars, a new trend

143

was discernible. Chisholm relied primarily on journalists for his work-
ing force and added many of his newspaper associates to the line-up
of writers. Close to him was W. Garrett Fisher, who had worked with
him on the St. James s Gazette. Chisholm himself was an unusually
earnest worker, a kind of scholar-journalist. There were strange mo-
ments when he would drop his papers and sit moodily, making notes
for an article in almost illegible script. Then, leaping to his feet, he
would mumble, "My brain won t function," and hurry off to a large, soft
chair at the Athenaeum Club or to a round of golf on the links. De-
spite such lapses, Chisholm read some 90 per cent of the papers that
streamed into his office from the fifteen hundred contributors, and
eventually he wrote half a dozen biographies, including one of Austen
Chamberlain that filled twelve columns, and articles on "Parliament,"
"Representation," and the "Victorian Era in English History."

Chisholm was a man of strong prejudices. He held old-fashioned
views on many subjects. Reading the article on "Obstetrics," he 'was
shocked at some of the details and insisted that they be modified if
not deleted, a request that led one subeditor, during a heated argu-
ment on the matter, to shout, "Well, we ought to have something on
the subject newer than what Adam did for Eve when he was left alone
with her in the Garden of Eden!" He was so ardent a backer of femi-
nism that he seriously considered, at one time, excluding the article
on "Woman," saying, "They are so much an integral part of the hu-
man race that it is unnecessary to write of them as though they are a
race apart" He was dissuaded from this by his aides.

But in most ways Chisholm was an ideal editor for the kind of en-
cyclopaedia the eleventh edition was to be. Well grounded in learn-
ing, he was, nevertheless, no pedant. He possessed wide knowledge,
and he knew where to go to find information that he lacked. A man of
imagination, humor, and balance, with a great ability to assess the value
of subjects and their timeliness, he had the full respect not only of his
subordinates but especially of Hooper.

As always, Hooper avoided any direct interference with Chisholm
or the other editors. But even in the most heated periods of the Book
War he took time to show his interest in what was happening at Print-
ing House Square. At least twice a week he invited Chisholm and a
few of the other editors to lunch with him at the business offices in
High Holborn, where he listened to their problems and offered sug-
gestions. At one luncheon, a subeditor, Malcolm Mitchell, responsi-
ble for sections on "Ancient History," "Archaeology," "European His-

144 THE CHEAT EB

tory," and "Biblical History," reported that no new accounts of the an-
tiquities of Corsica or Sardinia had been prepared. Immediately,
Hooper wrote out a check for 70 and handed it to Mitchell. "Send
an expert to those places right away/' he ordered, "and let's have a
fresh story."

Hooper paid the closest attention to all business and production de-
tails. It was he who decided that the edition should be printed not on
the customary coarse paper but on the thin, tough, opaque India paper,
previously used chiefly for Bibles and prayer books. The suggestion for
this precedent-breaking step had come from Phillips while the two
were lunching one day at the Caf< Royal. At first Hooper replied
that such a plan was too expensive, and the conversation turned to
other matters. But after a few minutes, Hooper interrupted Phillips,
crying, "Yes, by God! It can be done. I will have a specimen volume
made up at once!"

Jackson made dutiful visits to High Holborn, but he was more oc-
cupied with his other publishing ventures than with the Encyclopae-
dia Britannica, his prime outside interests being a book-distributing
firm in Boston and the Grolier Society in New York. Through the lat-
ter, he was mapping a campaign to sell a new children's work in the
United States. For some years, a popular children's journal had been
published under NorthclifiVs auspices. Its founder and editor, Arthur
Mee, had persuaded Northcliffe to bind copies of the newspaper into
volumes and sell them in sets. In England its sale was large, but when
Mee offered the American reprint rights to Major George Haven Put-
nam, that distinguished publisher rejected the idea. Jackson immedi-
ately snapped it up, and he was now putting the final touches on plans
for selling the set all through the United States, calling it The Book of
Knowledge.

At the height of their earlier successes, Hooper had voiced few com-
plaints about Jackson's involvement in other publishing ventures. But
now the stresses of the Book War, the Northcliffe betrayal, and the
fears for the future of the eleventh edition all worried Hooper. More
frequently he warned Jackson that many decisions had to be made
about the forthcoming edition if, indeed,, there was to be any new
edition; that close attention needed to be paid to it, personally and
financially. When Jackson continued to disregard Hooper's insistent
and single-minded plaints, Hooper exploded. In June, 1908, he made

HOOPER VERSUS JACKSON 145

an angry threat to leave tihe business entirely. "For 10 straight years,"
he wrote to Jackson, "I have had to push you and Bell before I could
get your help and co-operation to push the public, and I have no
more intention of going on with it than I have of flying. I am perfectly
satisfied to close up the business and let it go. I believe there would
be no more trouble, that you and I each would not get more than a
million dollars out of it, and I shall be quite happy to retire to the
United States with that money and live quietly for the rest of my life.
... I certainly think it is also fair to point out to you that for 10
years I have certainly done more than half of the work in the business
and I think that you would also acknowledge that I have made more
than half the money/'

This heightened angry conflict between Hooper and Jackson. But
there were even deeper causes of dissension. Hooper's enthusiasm for
preparing an entirely new eleventh edition instead of reprinting what
was salvageable from the ninth and tenth editions had never been
fully shared by Jackson. However laudatory the idea was intellectu-
ally, it posed serious problems of financing. To meet these problems,
Hooper proposed that either a public stock issue o $1,500,000 be
floated in England and the United States to provide funds or that
sufficient loans be made on the strength of the Times s imprimatur to
support such a venture. He envisioned publication of the complete set
at one time and a simultaneous sale all over the world, with huge sums
spent on advertising.

Jackson balked. A successful businessman, he could see scant reason
to spend large sums to attain or attempt perfection when it might be
perfectly possible to extract the best of the ninth and tenth editions
and still have a successful sale. *Tm for bringing the new edition out
as in the old days/' he told Hooper. "Let's have one volume or a few
at one time, sell them and get enough money for the next volumes,
and so on. We can make the collections on them and use the proceeds
to pay for the manufacture of the next lot. That way we won't have
to borrow any money anywhere."

"Nothing doing!" replied Hooper. 'Tin determined that the eleventh
edition must be the greatest book ever published. I mean that from
an editorial and scholarly point of view. And I'm willing to pour as
much money into it as I can lay my hands on."

These basic differences in attitude Jackson insisting on adherence
to tried methods, Hooper on goals beyond immediate profit drove
the two apart. In September, 1908, Hooper went to Colorado for a

146 THE GREAT EB

month of the outdoor life he loved, living in tents in the mountains,
eating elk and deer meat and bear steak. When the vacation was over,
he met Jackson briefly in New York and renewed the talk and the
argument. At one point Hooper impetuously offered to sell out his in-
terests in the British and American firms for $2 million, but Jackson
refused to listen. Then Hooper offered to buy out Jackson for a similar
amount, and Jackson declined to sell. The meeting broke up in anger,
and Hooper sped to Chicago to plan new strategy.

In November, he wrote Jackson that the board of directors of the
American company was to meet on the twenty-fourth of that month to
discuss the status of the contemplated edition and steps that needed
to be taken for its completion. "I am acting in the best interests of
the company in calling this meeting," he informed Jackson.

Jackson refused to attend, implying that the meeting was not valid
and that the directors Franklin Hooper, Whinery, and Harris B.
Burrows, now president of the American company at $25,000 a year
were merely "dummy directors" who would do Horace Hooper's
bidding. As for Hooper's plans for issuing the eleventh edition, Jackson
wrote, "I believe that if you were a well man your judgment would
be quite the contrary." Hooper's idea was "a visionary and extravagant
scheme" and could lead only to disaster. "I trust that reflection will
bring you back to the exercise of your better judgment," concluded
Jackson, adding the gratuitous suggestion that Hooper return to his
camping outfit in the Colorado mountains because he evidently was
in no mental or physical condition to contemplate the future of the
business.

Hooper retorted that the meeting would definitely be held and that
Jackson had better attend. It was important, he insisted, to determine
whether they should continue in business and whether and how
more money should be raised. "In regard to my mental and physical
condition," he wrote, "I will say that I feel younger and better now
than I have for ten years and I cannot but believe that you know this.
. . . You yourself know that for the past eleven years I have had no
illness, and I may add that I have not had one for almost thirty years."
In another letter he again urged Jackson to come to the Chicago meet-
ing. "Now why not behave sensibly and come in here and go out to
Chicago and attend that meeting and put the information that you
have right at your fingers' tips before the Board of Directors and
let us make up our minds in a sensible, business-like fashion."

But Jackson, obviously advised by attorneys, continued to insist

HOOPER VERSUS JACKSON 147

that if lie attended such a meeting he might indirectly give sanction
to any decisions made there and approved by a majority of the board.
So the meeting was held without him and action was carried out
weakening his role in the business. Hooper, his brother Franklin, Bur-
rows, and Whinery voted changes in the bylaws of the corporation
that gave Horace Hooper sole rights to conduct the business as he saw
fit. They also granted him full authority to borrow enough money to
see the eleventh edition through to completion. At the same time,
Burrows resigned as president and Horace Hooper assumed the post,
while Jackson, nominally listed as the firm's treasurer, was stripped of
all but clerical duties.

Evidently Hooper intended this as a strong warning to Jackson that
he meant to push forward with the eleventh edition. He sent a letter
to Jackson hinting that the door was not closed to him and stressing
that matters were in a serious state. "To bring out the new book, it
seems very plain that some financing would be necessary to bring us
to this point even. Even when it comes to buying paper, ads, etc.,
we need at least 200,000 pounds more. . . . The whole question as to
whether or not we should liquidate and close up the business entirely
or whether we should raise the money and complete the new book is
something so very important that I have as yet been unable to under-
stand your refusal to seriously consider the question/ 7

Instead of replying, Jackson sailed for England. Hooper pursued
him on a later ship, but when he landed he found that Jackson had
sailed back to the United States. "This action on your part, taken in
conjunction with various similar actions on your part in the past/'
Hooper admonished Jackson in a new letter, "makes it necessary for us
to go ahead without further consultation with you. The interests of
the business demand it, and while I regret that you did not stay
here and conclude matters, it seems to me that there is only one course
of action left open to us. ... Your entire policy has been to make
agreements to do things and then not live up to your agreements."

The momentum of their quarrel increased. Soon Jackson was writ-
ing to Hooper accusing him of being "insincere and dishonest," of plot-
ting to deprive him of all control by installing his "dummy directors."
"Do you soberly and seriously think that your conduct is fair, even if
you believe you are within your legal rights? Do you not realize in
your own heart that you are merely betraying the confidence I have
rested in you and showing yourself unworthy of my trust? No wonder
that constantly in speech and letter you protest your honesty of pur-

148 THE GREAT E B

pose! Do you not protest a bit too much?" This, Jackson admitted, was
strong language, but he used it, he added, "to stimulate your con-
science, to arouse your sense of shame or honor, or to contrast before
your own eyes your honest self with your recent conduct. , . . Why
not be honest with yourself and with me, and have done with this
petty chicanery?"

Hooper, coached by his attorney, Jacob Newman, one of Chicago's
shrewdest* replied calmly. "I have your letter of January 4th/' he
wrote. "As the letter is quite evidently not written by you, though of
course you sign it, and as the man who wrote it evidently does not
know very much about the facts in connection with this business, I do
not attempt to answer it. There is hardly a correct statement made
in the letter. The only part that needs any answer at all is in regard
to going into Court. ... I shall be only too pleased to have you test
the matter of partnership in Court."

Thus challenged, Jackson conferred more frequently with his lawyers.
By May, 1909, the headlines read: "Hooper and Jackson at War/'

The fight was now in the open for all the public to see. On May 27,
Jackson filed a suit in the Superior Court of New Jersey at Trenton.
He named as defendants both Hoopers as well as Burrows and Whin-
ery, charging them with plotting to exclude him from real participa-
tion in the management of the business. He denounced as illegal the
board action of November 24 amending the bylaws. Again, as in his
letters, he called Hooper's associates ''dummy directors," selected to do
as Hooper commanded. He complained that he had been deprived of
the right to sign checks on company funds, as he and Hooper had
done ever since they became associates. He charged Hooper with seek-
ing to harm the business through unnecessary waste and disposition of
assets. And he named inoffensive, scholarly Franklin Hooper, inter-
ested only in his editorial duties, as his brother's aide and accomplice.

The suit centered on a vital point. Jackson insisted that he and
Hooper had a formal legal partnership and that Hooper had violated
that partnership. He asked that the courts now disband the partnership
and appoint a receiver to make an accounting of all finances, and he
demanded an injunction to restrain Hooper and the others from with-
drawing money from company accounts or disposing or transferring
their shares.

In the bill of particulars, Jackson disclosed some of the details of his

HOOPER VERSUS JACKSON 149

disagreement with Hooper over how the eleventh edition was to be
issued and also revealed their roles in the sale of the Times to North-
cliffe. When this disclosure was made known to the new owner of
the Times, he refused immediate comment, but he sent word to Bell
that he wished to see him about a decision he had long contemplated.

Hooper's reply to Jackson's suit denied all the charges, admitting
only that there had been a difference of opinion about the publication
of the eleventh edition. Still he sought to make peace. Less than a
week after Jackson's legal assault, Hooper encountered Jackson in the
lobby of the Belmont Hotel in New York and told him that one of
his lawyers had relayed the report that Jackson was willing to buy his
interest in the Encyclopaedia Britannica for $750,000 and a royalty of
$10 a set. Jackson admitted this was true.

"Well/' said Hooper, "I'm willing to accept it, but there are several
conditions."

"What are they?"

"The first one is that you will agree to complete and issue complete
the Encyclopaedia Britannica, eleventh edition, within the year."

"That is impossible/' replied Jackson.

"Very good," snapped Hooper. "Then that ends it. Now do you want
me to make an offer?"

Jackson chewed on an unlit cigar and nodded.

"My offer," said Hooper, "is this. Ill give you $450,000, pay it in
two years, with a $5 royalty on each set sold. The royalties will come
to at least $300,000."

Jackson shook his head and walked away.

Thwarted, Hooper filed a long affidavit on June 15. He traced their
joint careers, denying vigorously that they had ever been legally part-
ners. "It is not possible that any of the employees of Hooper and Jack-
son or of the Encyclopaedia Britannica Company . . . considered
that Jackson and I were partners. All the business that was transacted
in the offices of these companies was transacted in the name of one
corporation or the other, depending upon the kind of business. The
only sign on the door of the London office is 'Hooper and Jackson, Ltd/
The only sign on the door of the New York office is 'The Encyclopaedia
Britannica Company/ Neither the name of Jackson nor myself nor our
names together, except with the word, 'Limited/ have ever appeared
on any door. The letter-heads used and the bills used were all those
of the corporations. ... Of course, everybody understood that the
stock of the two corporations was principally owned by Mr. Jackson

150 THE GREAT EB

and myself, and I may have spoken of Mr. Jackson as my partner in
the sense that we were associated together in these corporations, and
I may have written some letters in which I used that expression, but
nobody ever entered into a contract with Jackson and myself as part-
ners."

These documents, disclosing intimate details about the sale of the
Times, produced prompt and near-catastrophic reactions in London.
Two days after Hooper's affidavit was made public, he received a curt
letter from Bell, written at Northcliffe's behest. The Times, Bell's let-
ter stated, was giving Hooper notice that it was canceling its contract
made in 1903 for the eleventh edition. A clause in that contract pro-
vided for a ninety-day period before the agreement became invalid;
so Hooper now had ninety days in which to scrap plans for the edition
or secure new support for it.

All that summer, Hooper fought to prevent disaster. He cut Bur-
rows' salary by $10,000 and his brother s from $10,000 to $7,000, He
sought new loans from banks, but without the name and reputation of
the Times behind him he found only dribbles instead of the greatly
needed flood of funds.

In the midst of these unhappy circumstances, Judge James E. How-
ell in the New Jersey court handed down a ruling granting Jackson a
limited injunction. While Judge Howell found that no strictly legal
partnership existed between Hooper and Jackson, he held that they
were "joint adventurers" and therefore were bound by precisely the
same rules as partners. In his summation, Judge Howell expressed
judicial surprise at the haphazard way in which the men ran their
business, at their "indiscriminate commingling of accounts." He noted
that none of the companies in which the pair was involved had paid
them salaries and that instead of declaring dividends on their corpo-
rate stock they drew profits from the business' bank accounts as they
saw fit. The affairs of the firms, at least until that memorable and con-
troversial November board meeting in Chicago, were carried on
merely by consultation and agreement between Hooper and Jackson,
"and they appear to have made and unmade these corporations, in
which they were equally interested, at their will." Judge Howell set a
later date for further hearings, proposing that meanwhile attorneys
for both men seek to come to a workable solution.

Jacob Newman immediately filed an appeal from this decision and

HOOPER VERSUS JACKSON 151

prepared legal action on the British front by claiming, in a suit in the
Chancery division of the High Court of Justice, that Hooper was en-
titled to carry on the business as he wished in spite of Judge How-
ell's ruling. And Hooper paused and took account of the status of the
eleventh edition, He found that $696,618 had been expended on edi-
tors' salaries and contributions since 1903. Cash on hand was only $44,-
506. Money still technically due from the prior sale of the tenth edi-
tion was $1,600,000, most of it uncollectable. What payments were be-
ing made were coming in at the rate of $3,000 to $4,000 a month, quite
useless for large needs. Between this time, early in September, and the
date on which he hoped to publish the full eleventh edition the
schedule had been moved forward six months from January, 1910
he needed at least $700,000 more. Originally the cost of the edition
had been estimated at $750,000, but it now appeared that the actual
amount would be twice as much.

Consequently, Hooper directed Chisholm to give notice of a sus-
pension of work to those employed on the eleventh-edition prepara-
tion. Because of dwindling funds, the active editorial staff had already
been cut to about thirty-five, and these persons now were told that
within a month operations would cease. All reading of copy was halted,
as well as all setting of type by R. and R. Clark in Edinburgh, and
day after day Chisholm and his editors idled in the offices or went out
to play golf.

In this dismal period, lawyers for both sides continued to seek an
equitable peace. Robert McCarter, former attorney-general of New
Jersey, represented Hooper in the New Jersey litigation, and Jackson's
attorney was Sherrerd DePue, a boyhood friend of McCarter 's with
an office adjoining his in Newark's Prudential Building. Heeding Judge
HowelTs admonition, the two worked out a plan to bring an end to
the conflict. They proposed that Hooper make a buy-or-sell proposi-
tion to Jackson, with a deadline of forty-eight hours. If Jackson were
to refuse Hooper's offer, he was to make one of his own. McCarter
conveyed this idea to Hooper and he agreed to draw up such an
offer.

On September 27, 1909, Hooper's proposal, lengthy and detailed,
arrived at the offices of Henry Wollman, another of his lawyers, with
instructions to convey it to McCarter and DePue. This plan provided
that Jackson have a three-month option to buy out Hooper for $750,-

152 THE GREAT EB

000, with $100,000 in cash when the option was taken up and $50,000
every third month till the full amount was paid. Fifty-one per cent
of the stock of both the British and American companies was to be
placed in the hands of trustees until all the $750,000 was paid, and
provision was to be made for the eleventh edition of the Encyclopaedia
Britannica to be printed within two years, No salaries to any execu-
tives were to be more than $10,000 a year, but the existing staff of the
Encyclopaedia Britannica was to be retained and the rest of the set
issued "on the same scale, and with the same care, expense and
scholarship already completed."

Within the week, Hooper, now in England, followed this letter with
a cablegram: "It is understood that offer is only rough draft and if
accepted either way formal contract with full details will be drawn
at once." Then came still another cablegram directing that when the
plan was shown to Jackson, it must be accompanied by a letter em-
phasizing that the offer was not binding until followed by a formal
contract with complete details.

The tangled and tragicomic events that ensued were to form the
basis of new litigation later, but it is clear that massive misunder-
standings, consciously or unconsciously motivated, bred massive com-
plications.

McCarter was shown both cablegrams but shied away from revealing
their contents to Jackson. "I'm afraid," he told DePue, "that if we put
the idea of a formal contract covering full details in bold type before
Jackson's eyes, it will break off negotiations."

DePue agreed, but he promised to inform Jackson that the plan was
only tentative and that no final settlement could be agreed upon
without the detailed contract.

When Jackson, unaware of these specified restrictions, read Hooper's
long memorandum in DePue's office, he immediately accepted the
terms. On October 7, he sent Hooper a cold note: "I beg to say that I
accept your offer to sell me your interests and that I assent to the
terms therein stated by you." Then he went with his lawyer to Mc-
Carter's office and formally handed McCarter his acceptance, saying
that he had the money for the deal. McCarter, as he later testified,
believed Jackson had implied that he had the full $750,000, but Jack-
son actually meant that he could, at a moment's notice, get the $100,-
000 for a down payment from a friend, John M. Graham of Boston's
International Trust Company, using his stock in the Grolier Society
as collateral.

HOOPER VERSUS JACKSON 153

Whatever the understanding or ? more precisely, the misunder-
standing Jackson considered himself legally the owner of Hooper's
interests in the business, Puffing grandly on a cigar, he strode into the
Encyclopaedia Britannica's New York offices and informed Whinery
he had bought out Hooper. "I do not want you to attend any more
directors' meetings," he told Whinery, "because I have now purchased
Mr, Hooper's interest, and I do not want anything done that will be in
any way inimicable to my interests, or resolutions passed, or anything
of that sort/ 5 " To James Clarke, his and Hooper's old associate, he
wired: "Have closed deal and bought Hooper's interest."

When Hooper learned of what Jackson had done, he instantly ca-
bled Wollman: "When delivering option did you as instructed by
cable deliver also letter regarding agreement to be drawn up? . . .
Do absolutely nothing meanwhile.'' He became more apprehensive
when a wire arrived from Burrows: "Jackson buys astounded. Con-
gratulate you. Commiserate Frank and myself advise concerning fu-
ture plans." Again a cable flew from Hooper to his lawyers: "Cables
worry me. . . . Did you follow my instructions?"

On October 11 news of the negotiations leaked to the newspapers.
Stories on this day, headed "Settling Encyclopaedia Suit," stated er-
roneously that the suit brought in New Jersey was soon to be with-
drawn because "negotiations have been in progress by which Mr.
Jackson will receive a huge sum said to be several hundred thousand
dollars in return for relinquishing his claim." The next morning the
more nearly accurate reports were that the dispute between Hooper
and Jackson was on the verge of settlement, that Jackson had decided
to buy out Hooper.

Actually the battle, far from being settled, was renewed by Hooper.
On the very next day he heard from Chisholm about a terse cable the
editor had received from Jackson: "Have bought out Hooper. Writing."
At once, Hooper shot off to Jackson a cable notifying him that all re-
mained as before. Yet Jackson would not be moved. Stubbornly, he
now considered himself the virtual owner, although not a penny had
exchanged hands, and when he received a letter from Hooper's London
lawyers. Burns, Berridge and Company, directing him to attend a
meeting of the directors of the British firm, he cabled: "Am equitable
owner all shares company having purchased Hooper's interest. No
directors' meetings should be held."

But a directors' meeting was, indeed, held, with Hooper presiding
and with new members of the board in attendance: his brother,

154 THE GREAT EB

Burrows, and W. Garrett Fisher. Again, as in Chicago, the balance of
power was shifted to Horace Hooper by a majority vote. The new
board, Hooper piously avowed later, was named so that the business
could be carried on if he suddenly dropped dead. And when Jackson
finally arrived, there was little he could do for the time being but
storm and stomp and threaten new legal action.

In the midst of this exchange, Hooper received a number of letters
commiserating with him about the suspension of work on the eleventh
edition. One of these came from Professor Phillips, who had grown to
admire the brash American much as Bell, in an earlier and happier
day, had.

In reply to Phillips' expression of sympathy, Hooper enunciated
his deep feelings about the Encyclopaedia Britannica and hinted that
this latest maneuver was only an expedient. He wrote:

I cannot express to you my feelings on reading your letter. For the last
four or five years it has been my one great ambition to bring out the llth
edition of the Britannica, and make it, from an editorial and scholarly point
of view, the greatest book that has ever been published. It is needless for me
to add that I wanted to make money, and more, that I expected to do so;
but if it had been for money alone I should have made that book very differ-
ent from what it has been made. We could easily have produced a book at
half the cost by doing hack work and taking a large share of it from the 10th
edition; but I felt that I should like to know that I had been instrumental
in producing a greater book, and in better form, than any other man. This
may seem to you like vanity, but it was really a desire to do something that
might leave the world a little bit better for my so doing.

The goodness of the book I don't think I deserve great credit for. The
conception of the idea was mine, but the carrying out has been due to Chis-
holm, yourself and your editorial force, and I don't mind telling you that I
really believe that it is too great to be crushed by any such methods or suits
as Mr. Jackson has started so far, and I still hope that the book comes out,
if not under my management, at least under somebody's who is competent,
and will get a good sale of the book. You may rest assured that it took me a
long time to make up my mind to give notice to the men who had worked so
faithfully on the staff down there.

From this correspondence there evolved a course of action designed
to rescue Hooper and his Encyclopaedia Britannica, a move based on
audacity and a supersalesman's skill.

HOOPER VERSUS JACKSON 155

The Contract with Cambridge

Long before he was harassed by litigation and financial difficulties,
Horace Hooper had talked with Phillips about the eventual establish-
ment of the Encyclopaedia Britannica as a public institution, guided
editorially, and eventually financially, by a great university. For Phil-
lips, the main advantage to such an arrangement was that it would
insure the maintenance of editorial excellence and high standards of
scholarship and would provide the public with a warrant of topmost
quality. Hooper agreed, but he now saw more than intellectual ad-
vantages. On the strength of the backing of a university, and without
any financial risk to that university, he surely could secure the loans
he needed. And, properly exploited, such an affiliation would cer-
tainly result in large sales and payment of royalties to the university.
So when Phillips again proposed that he seek out such a sponsor

for the Encyclopaedia Britawiica, now that the connection with the
Times was severed, Hopper replied, "Go to it. Do what you can."
Formal arrangements could be made later. "As for now/' he told
Phillips, "offer a royalty of 10 per cent on our sales. Tell them I'm
sure it will bring them a good deal of money."

Phillips registered at the Mitre Hotel in Oxford and made his first
overtures to the managers of the Oxford University Press. Impressed
with Hooper's offer, they went so far as to request Phillips not to ap-
proach any other university until they could come to a decision. Phil-
lips considered this an extremely hopeful sign. But in the end the uni-
versity rejected the proposal, yielding to the objections of those who
were chary of any affiliation with the Americans who had sold their
volumes however successfully so flamboyantly.

Hooper accepted the rejection with philosophic calm. "Phillips," he
said, "they think I was trying to bribe them. I offered them too much.
You go to Cambridge now and offer them just half."

And to Cambridge the obedient Phillips went. Here he encountered
a preliminary reception that was unusually warm, and he was soon
able to bring together Hooper and Richard T. Wright, aging secretary
of the Cambridge University Press Syndicate, the members of which
were popularly called "the Syndics." Wright had been responsible
for publication of the distinguished Cambridge Modern History, and
in his closing years in his post he hoped to bring off another pub-
lishing coup, preferably a profitable one. To the other Syndics he em-
phasized the great advantages of an alliance with Hooper and the
Encyclopaedia Britannica how such an association would involve no
risk and much profit to the university.

Hooper himself appeared several times before the Syndics to enu-
merate the benefits that would accrue to Cambridge. He impressed
them all with his earnestness and his zeal for producing an edition
that might well become the best of all editions, an instrument of
adult education with which one of the world's distinguished universi-
ties might with pride and propriety be affiliated. One of Hooper's
strongest adherents, won over by his persuasive arguments, was the
head of the Syndics, Montague Rhodes James, noted scholar, me-
dievalist, writer of ghost stories, and provost of King's College, a shy,
unworldly man. He and Hooper took long walks together on the col-
lege grounds, James nodding his head steadily as Hooper, arms waving,
peppered him with arguments.

"To me," Hooper would say, "the Encyclopaedia Britannica is like

THE CONTRACT WITH CAMBRIDGE 1 57

the Bible. It's something holy! And who else but Cambridge should
have it? It's got a great reputation, like Cambridge. It's reputable,
like Cambridge, And we're revising it completely. New articles! New
plates! There's no financial risk, and I'll give the university a handsome
commission on sales!"

Hooper invited James and other scholars among the Syndics to ex-
amine the work already completed, and they did so assiduously. Be-
yond some slight errors, they pronounced it all excellent. Before agree-
ing to a formal contract, Wright and James asked if Cambridge might
examine all other articles, present and future. To this Hooper eagerly
assented and promptly issued instructions to Chisholm to send all
material to James for examination. "It looks good," he chortled hap-
pily, "I think we've got them."

This tentative approval by Cambridge University seemed a propitious
omen.

Confident that the Syndics would sign a contract with him, Hooper
again moved forward with his plans for publication of the eleventh
edition. The Edinburgh firm of R. and R. Clark resumed setting
type, and final arrangements were made, too, for the printing of sets
to be sold in the United States. Hooper had begun negotiating for
American publication late in 1908. He was in New York trying to
decide between several Boston firms when he met George R. Car-
penter, one of the younger executives of the thriving Chicago printing
house of R. R, Donnelley and Sons. Carpenter persuaded Hooper to
take a one-day trip to Chicago to visit the Donnelley plant. Hooper,
after inspecting the extensive facilities of the firm's Lakeside Press,
forgot Boston and invited Carpenter to come to England for further
consultations. Carpenter and his young bride found, on their arrival
at Southampton, that Hooper, in a typical burst of grandeur, had
chartered the royal railroad coach to transport them to London. Even-
tually a satisfactory schedule of costs and printing processes was
worked out, and now Donnelley had the order for the composition,
presswork, and binding of the encyclopaedia in the United States.
Among those in the complicated negotiations for this contract who
were as impressed with Hooper's devotion to, and passionate interest
in, the Encyclopaedia Britannica as Bell had once been and as Mon-
tague Rhodes James now showed himself to be was the printing
firm's head, Thomas E. Donnelley, who accompanied Carpenter to

158 THE GREAT EB

London for the final signing. Donnelley saw in Hooper a man who
combined the sometimes conflicting traits o idealism and hard busi-
ness sense, a man of whose drive and energy and brain power there
could be little doubt. Although Hooper was still engaged in legal
controversy with Jackson and had only indefinite hopes of securing
the kind of money necessary to complete the eleventh edition, Don-
nelley satisfied himself that the contract should be signed, and soon
a persistent flow of copy came to the Chicago plant.

Almost simultaneously, Hooper won an important legal battle. Just
as he and Jackson were squaring off again in the courts, this time in
Chicago Jackson filing a new suit to restrain the transfer of shares
to anyone, Hooper demanding $300,000 "for damages suffered by us
through the pestiferous litigations directed against the company"' the
Appellate Court of New Jersey reversed the lower tribunal's decision
that had declared the two men "joint adventurers." "We hold," read
the high court's decision, "that the parties are not partners as to the
corporate property, but merely stockholders in two foreign corpora-
tions, distinct legal entities/' Any effort to restrain transfer of shares
was illegal, read the new decision, and the New Jersey court had no
jurisdiction in the matter.

This dissolved the earlier injunction against Hooper and stamped
approval on his actions ousting Jackson from any role in running
the business. And it prompted some peace overtures from Jackson.

Before long, Jackson was in Hooper's office at High Holborn. "Hor-
ace," he told Hooper, "I've had all the litigation I want. I've had a
lot of advice and I'm through now."

Hooper motioned to an adjoining desk. "Take your place over there
and sit down and attend to business."

When Jackson protested that he would take orders from neither
Harris Burrows nor Garrett Fisher, Hooper replied, "They have given
you no orders. There is no desire on anybody's part to give you or-
ders. I don't care to give you orders. Why work your imagination as
to whether there are orders or not orders to be given to you? Go at-
tend to business!"

Jackson sat in angry silence for a few minutes, then strode out of
the office.

Later, Hooper's attorney, Jacob Newman, met Jackson in London
and proposed that he rejoin Hooper and work with him in producing
the eleventh edition. Jackson wanted to know if Hooper had made
any progress in getting Oxford or Cambridge to back it.

THE CONTRACT WITH CAMBRIDGE 159

*I don't know/' said Newman, "but I know this. The sensible thing
for you to do is to go right back to the business. Take up your work
where you left it off, and I give you the assurance that everything
will be just as it was before the trouble arose. You'll draw the same
amount of money Horace draws, both of you shall have a salary to
be agreed upon, and all the old feeling will be annihilated."

Jackson's answer, according to Newman's later testimony, was, "I do
not believe I can do that. My lawyers will not permit me to give up
my lawsuit."

By this time Hooper was no longer concerned with pending or future
suits by Jackson. For on July 31, 1910, Montague Rhodes James,
having pored over many articles with his associates, informed Hooper
that a contract could be drawn. On August 8, the pact was prepared,
agreed upon, and signed by Hooper and A. W. Mason, vice-chancel-
lor of Cambridge University.

Hooper's triumph was great, although by the contract's terms re-
strictions and burdens were placed on him. Complete inspection by
die university of all plates for the eleventh edition was mandatory.
The first fourteen volumes were to be ready for final examination by
October 1, with publication on December 1. The last half and the
index were to be inspected within four months and published by
April 1, 1911. Penalty payments were to be made if the company
failed to deliver the plates for inspection promptly. All costs were to
be borne by the company, including expenses of preparation, editing,
contributors, artists, office maintenance, typesetting, paper, binding,
and warehousing, "and it is expressly agreed that the University
Press shall in no way be responsible for any of such costs or expenses."
In addition, Hooper agreed to set up offices in London's Fetter Lane,
where sets of the Encyclopaedia Britannica would be displayed and
orders taken, and to pay for the rental of these offices, plus all costs
of advertising, salaries of order clerks, and traveling expenses of the
Syndics on matters relating to the eleventh edition.

All advertisements were to be submitted to the University Press for
approval or disapproval within three days. All University Press de-
cisions on advertising matter were to be final. No false statements of
any kind were permissible, and all ads were to be specific on the
point that subscribers would not be obliged to pay a single instal-

160 THE GREAT EB

ment until the complete set was delivered. Orders for the work would
be taken either through selected booksellers, from the outlying offices
of the University Press especially set up for this purpose, or directly
from the company. Prices, subject to change, also were specified in
this strict contract; they ranged from fifteen to eighteen shillings a
volume in cloth binding before publication to twenty to thirty shillings
after publication, with higher charges for better bindings. Owners
of old ninth editions could trade in their sets for an allowance of
four to five pounds. Tenth edition owners could do likewise for an al-
lowance of four to six pounds. The contract even provided for the re-
turn of bookcases at one pound each.

Royalties were pegged surprisingly low. On each January 1, April 1,
July 1, and October 1, Hooper was to forward a statement to the Uni-
versity Press of all orders received at the London and branch offices.
Every January 25, April 25, July 25, and October 25, Cambridge
University would receive six shillings for every set ordered in the pre-
ceding three months a far lower amount than had been rejected by
Oxford. Within six months, however, an amendment to the contract
raised the royalties to six shillings for each of the first twenty-five thou-
sand sets sold, seven shillings, sixpence, for each of the next twenty-
five thousand and ten shillings for all remaining.

The University Press was protected against subscribers' claims of
non-delivery, damages, expenses, or violation of copyright. It reserved
the right to appoint a chartered accountant at any time to inspect
company books relating to orders. The contract was only for the elev-
enth edition, but a measure of how successful Hooper had been in
persuading James and the other Syndics was evident in the proviso
that a twelfth edition, if any, would be prepared under the editorial
supervision of the university.

Despite the many restrictions and hampering clauses, Hooper felt
triumphant, especially when he reflected on the meager royalty rate
the Syndics had been willing to accept. There was more cause for
rejoicing. In signing the contract, the university had implicitly ap-
proved the prospective edition as a commendable publication and
had added greatly to Hooper's prestige. Even more significantly, at
this important time, a signed copy of the contract waved in front of
stern bank officials worked miracles. Within a week, banks which had
been willing to lend Hooper no more than 40,000 gladly increased
the amount nearly fivefold. Again, Hooper had won, and he now set

THE CONTRACT WITH CAMBRIDGE 161

his mind to the task ahead of completing the edition and making the
public aware of its value and availability.

On October 21, two months before the first half of the work was due,
the advertising campaign was officially started with a dinner at Clar-
idge's, London's most expensive hotel. An impressive assemblage pre-
sided over by the university's chancellor, Lord Rayleigh, gathered to
cheer the union of Cambridge with the Encyclopaedia Britannica.
Hooper himself paid meticulous attention to every detail of the din-
ner, from the hiring of the musicians to the devising of menus bound
in the eleventh edition's own green sheepskin and the selection of
cigars offered in boxes that were replicas of individual volumes of the
Encyclopaedia Britannica.

There were huzzas when Lord Rayleigh announced that the heads
of both the great English-speaking nations, President William Howard
Taft and King George V, had agreed to accept a joint dedication.
There were enthusiastic cries of "Hear! Hear!" when speakers praised
Cambridge University, when other speakers commended the men who
had made the old Encyclopaedia Britannica and were now complet-
ing the new, "The University," declared S, H. Butcher, president of
the British Academy, "has acted on the principle laid down ... in
1693 that the Cambridge Press must make the advancement of learn-
ing its object. . . The University is a living organism, its roots are
in the past, and it is a thing of gradual growth; it looks to today and
to tomorrow and its hopes stretch out into the future." Hugh Chisholm,
recounting the steps by which the new edition had come into being,
had laudatory words for Cambridge: "By disseminating through all
its educational channels the contents of this book, it will really be
doing a great work to advance popular culture and give a real im-
petus to the desire for accurate knowledge."

Soon the first advertisements, considerably less florid than their
predecessors, began to appear in British newspapers and magazines.
The preparation for these had been long, careful, and sometimes irk-
some to Hooper, who occasionally found himself regretting the pro-
vision that gave the university the right to censor ads. At one point
he showed Phillips the copy for an ad that described the Encyclo-
paedia Britannica as "THE SOURCE OF ALL KNOWLEDGE." Gently, Phillips
remonstrated that this claim was a bit absurd, but that it might be

162 1HE GBEAT EB

fitting to announce that the set contained the "KEY TO ALL KNOWL-
EDGE/' since one of the publishers' professed objects was to stimu-
late purchasers to use the encyclopaedia as a guide to further study.
After staring at the draft for half a minute, Hooper sighed. "O.K.,
you're right."

On another occasion, after a series of one-column announcements
bearing a list of outstanding contributors and a specimen illustration
or two, Hooper decreed a change. "We've got to set a time limit on
our offer," he told Phillips and Oswald Sickert, now advertising man-
ager in place of an ailing Haxton.

Phillips objected to any change, maintaining that Cambridge Uni-
versity would consider time-limit ads undignified. He prepared sev-
eral dignified ads and offered them to Hooper.

"Yes, Phillips," said Hooper, after he had examined them. "That's a
very good idea." And turning to Sickert, he asked, "Didn't we try that
form of advertisement a long time ago with the tenth?"

"Yes, we did."

"And how long did we try it?"

"For a week."

"And what happened to the sales?"

"They went down like that," replied Sickert, lowering one hand so
that it grazed the floor.

"And when we went back to that old system of If you don't buy
it today it will be sixpence dearer tomorrow,' what happened?"

Raising his hand above his head, Sickert replied, "Why, the sales
went up like that!"

Hooper grinned at Phillips, winked at Sickert, and soon there were
time-limit ads for the Encyclopaedia Britannica all approved by the
Syndics. Not only did these urge customers to place their orders as
speedily as possible, but they noted that even a twenty-one-shilling
volume, word by word, would be the "cheapest bargain imaginable."
"It gives the purchaser 1,800,000 words for 21 shillings, whereas the
ordinary book contains only about 200,000 words." They told of that
major innovation in publishing the "wonders of India paper"
which shrank the six feet taken up by the old-style sets to less than
three feet. They enumerated the 400 compositors required to set up
the edition, the 250 tons of metal, the 1,500 tons of paper, the 150
tons of millboard, the 1,500 miles of thread, the 5 tons of ink, and
the 10 tons of glue. And, in Hooper tradition, they advised: "Don't
hesitate! Send in your order nowl"

THE CONTRACT WITH CAMBRIDGE 163

From the start of the sale there arose the inevitable chorus of com-
plaints, with an already antagonistic group, the British booksellers,
leading the pack.

Through their organ, Publishers' Circular, they complained that their
percentage of profit for handling orders was too low. Hooper offered
5 per cent of the purchase price, but the booksellers insisted on more
and suggested that the price be raised. Letters to Publishers' Circular
inveighed against the instalment plan of buying popularized in the
book field by the Americans "Customers will not buy other books
until they finish paying for their sets of the Encyclopaedia Britan-
nica. y> Many upbraided Cambridge for joining an alleged plot against
booksellers, and even when Hooper raised the profit percentage to
7M the outcry continued. Cambridge responded by withdrawing
its advertisements from Publishers' Circular, and the publication, in
an editorial titled "The First Duty/' asserted that the university had
an obligation to the booksellers of England and not to Hooper and
his "American system" of direct selling to customers which either by-
passed booksellers or allowed them infinitesimal profits.

The hubbub that always attended the publication of a new edition
of the Encyclopaedia Britannica certainly since the advent of Hooper
and Jackson continued. Bell loyally directed an article to be written
in the Times commenting favorably and hopefully on the union of
Cambridge and the Encyclopaedia Britannica. The newspaper had
dropped its affiliation with "the knowledge that other no less responsi-
ble hands will continue a work which, by its efforts, has now been
established on new and secure foundations. . . . The University
Presses of Oxford and Cambridge are not on the same footing as or-
dinary publishing concerns. They have a trust to discharge to the
nation in the promotion of higher educational interests. The Cam-
bridge Press has given many proofs that it recognizes this responsibil-
ity, but has never undertaken a work more consonant with its character
than the present." 1 The dignified Athenaeum noted that many consid-
ered the affiliation even more startling than that with the Times,
because Cambridge "with a special regard for its own products has

1 Bell's final years with the Times were less than happy, although he worked
as diligently as ever. He died at his desk on April 5, 1916, while writing a letter
on a copyright controversy.

164 THE GREAT EB

rather held aloof from the world outside its borders that courted its
recognition and approval."

Forced to defend itself, Cambridge, with James its principal spokes-
man, replied to its decriers and critics. A pamphlet was issued with
a full explanation but with few details of the contract of the ar-
rangement with the Encyclopaedia Britannica. "The association of the
University with the publication amounts to a guarantee that it is a
trustworthy guide to sound learning, being not only up-to-date, but
also the work of experts who are entitled to speak on their several
subjects. The new volumes represent the elaborate organization and
arduous labour of eight years, and the editor, while retaining certain
articles of permanent value, has been getting new ones in many coun-
tries." The university, admitted the pamphlet, had nothing to do with
organizing the encyclopaedia's staff, planning its production, or select-
ing writers. "What the Press has done," wrote James, "is to satisfy itself
that the new edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica is a work which
will do credit to Cambridge,"

When, in November, Hooper and Sickert started a campaign to
distribute thousands of booklets all over England with extracts from
articles, the highbrow Cambridge Review snidely commented: "The
pamphlet opens with a popular lecture on astronomy by Sir Robert
Ball, by shewing what the distance from star to star means in figures.
The words contained in the Encyclopaedia are almost equal to the
amount of sovereigns Mr. Lloyd George hopes to wring from the
wealthy taxpayer; the cost of production would almost keep Mr. Rock-
efeller or Mr. Carnegie for a calendar month; the amount of India
paper used would make a bag large enough to contain this earth
and leave enough to spare an envelope for the moon. ... A charm-
ing lady whose face we may not behold is reading it with its cover bent
backwards like a sixpenny novelette, to show that unlike some of our
own books occasionally borrowed by our friends, you may bend but
cannot break the back of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Finally, a
strong man is shown with a look of stern determination on his face
carrying the set of volumes in its case, to shew that those who
refuse to buy will be debarred from performing feats of strength from
which Sandow might shrink. All this proves how wide awake the
place is."

More critical letters and articles appeared during the remainder of
the year and in the first months of 1911, and James continued to re-

THE CONTRACT WITH CAMBRIDGE 165

spond with spirit. He defended the action of the Syndics in putting
the university's imprimatur on the new edition and found little justi-
fication for criticisms of advertising methods. Other professors and in-
fluential men at Cambridge upbraided him for joining Hooper and
reminded him that Cambridge University Press had been among the
strong anti-Hooper forces in the Book War. But this gentle scholar,
now whipped about in an academic tempest, stood firm by his promise
and asked that judgment on Cambridge's action be withheld until the
full edition could be impartially and judiciously examined. "The es-
sential question/' he wrote, "is whether or not the Syndics were right
in the high estimate they formed of the merits of the new edition.
Time will show that, and they await the verdict with complete confi-
dence."

166 THE GREAT EB

''High Tide Mark of Human Knowledge"

Neither academic criticism nor embittered carping nor waspish dis-
agreements could slow down Hooper's promotional campaign for the
eleventh edition. Instead o slackening in the face of the uproar, he
increased his pace on every possible front Tin living up to the con-
tract one hundred per cent/' he declared. Tm doing it my way, and
the university is going to get clean, honest royalties/*

More dinners for selected groups of contributors were held, all at
the Savoy Hotel. At one, attended by 150 writers on historical and
religious subjects, Chisholm humorously disclosed that technically King
Edward VII could be considered a contributor. Early in the work on
the new edition, Chisholm had decided to include illustrated plates
with the proper colors of the insignia of the principal British and
foreign orders of knighthood. Upon inquiry, he found that most books

167

on the subject had incorrect colors. Since King Edward held most of
the orders, it was suggested that he be asked to assist, Permission was
given, and an artist spent time at Buckingham Palace conferring with
the monarch, who displayed an interest not only in the preparation of
the plates but in all the processes involved in the publication of the
work. At another dinner, this one for scientific experts, Chisholm tolled
the count of the 1,507 contributors, noting that in this impressive
total there were 168 fellows of the Royal Society, 53 presidents or
secretaries of learned societies, 47 members of the British Museum
staff, 53 members of staffs of similar institutions, 47 staff members of
various laboratories and observatories. A special dinner was held also
for women employed by the Encyclopaedia Britannica, with Janet
Hogarth, who had been shifted from the Book Club in 1909 to head
the indexers for the eleventh edition, keynoting the evening: "The
Encyclopaedia Britannica has given women the chance to demon-
strate their rightful place in the learned world/'

Even more than in England, the sales campaign was intensified
in the United States, a logical step since sales there still outnumbered
those in the British Isles. The American drive was touched off by a
sumptuous dinner in January, 1911, at the Hotel Plaza, where the
guests included Alexander Graham Bell, Woodrow Wilson, James
Bryce, Joseph Cannon, Joseph Choate, Admiral Dewey, and J. Pier-
pont Morgan. As if to answer the critics of Cambridge University's
connection with the edition, Chisholm emphasized that the Cambridge
University Press 'lias the greatest faith in the book and the most con-
fident belief that it ... will do uncommonly well." He noted, too,
that the new edition was designed not merely for British readers but
for "English-speaking peoples" and paid warm tribute to his American
aides.

The ad campaign, which was to cost $1 million for the year, also
stressed the Cambridge University affiliation and the breadth of the
encyclopaedia's subject matter. The international character of the
many contributors was always cited: "Men of Action, Men of Learn-
ing, and Practical Experts from Twenty-One Countries Have Co-
operated with Sixty-Four English and American Editors to Produce
the NEW EDITION OF THE ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA." A breakdown
by professions and occupations was featured to show that the con-
tributors included 327 historians or archeologists, 161 theologians, 126
ministers, diplomats, and government officials, 107 biologists and ag-
riculturists, with the remainder comprising dozens in each category

168 THE GREAT EB

of sociologists, economists, geographers, explorers, mathematicians,
physicists, meteorologists, lawyers, physicians, surgeons, engineers, ar-
chitects, businessmen, manufacturers, and naval and military officers.
While the greatest number of contributors still came from England
and Scotland, the total of American contributors was now well ahead
of those from Germany, France, Canada, Italy, Austria-Hungary, the
Netherlands, Japan, India, Belgium, Australia, Switzerland, Serbia,
Norway, Turkey, Sweden, or Denmark.

A typical ad was the one appearing in the March 3, 1911, issue of
the New York Times, spread over a full page and headed: "THE SUM
OF HUMAN KNOWLEDGE/' The attributes of the edition were enumer-
ated vividly, from its "complete and modern exposition of thought,
learning and achievements to 1910" to the savings possible if orders
were placed before May 31; "only $4 a volume for ordinary paper
bound in Cloth, or $4.25 a volume for India paper bound in Cloth
(the Ninth Edition having been sold when first issued at $7.50 a vol-
ume, Cloth, which will be the ultimate price for the Eleventh Edi-
tion)."

Besides the daily newspaper ads, four-color displays in twenty lead-
ing magazines also invited readers to write for sample booklets and
pamphlets. Every inquiry, of course, was scrupulously followed by a
swift procession of booklets, pamphlets, testimonials ("Who would
have thought it possible that an encyclopaedia could ever compete
with the latest novel?"), statistics, and the inevitable "Hurry Up!"
telegraph blanks.

By the middle of May, the intense campaign had already made itself
felt A total of twenty thousand sets had been signed for in the
United States alone. But Hooper considered this too few for all the
money spent He ordered a daily assault, and a fresh torrent of ads
was produced, with results that were happily appropriate to the pur-
pose. By May 18, the total stood at twenty-three thousand, and six days
later this was increased by four thousand. Each figure was duly re-
ported in the press. Every one of the ads warned, in sixty-point
type, how many days remained to take advantage of the lower prices.
Finally, when the deadline was reached, the number of sets ordered at
prepublication prices in America was thirty-three thousand nearly
as many as had been sold of the ninth edition in Great Britain over
the fourteen-year period from 1875 to 1889.

No sooner had this time limit passed than a new campaign started,
emphasizing, as autumn approached, the suitability of the Encyclo-

"HIGH TIDE MARK OF HUMAN KNOWLEDGE" 169

paedia Britannica as a Christmas gift. As much attention was paid in
these ads to physical qualities as to intellectual values especially the
India paper, "which can be crumpled into a ball and ironed out
smooth again/' and the reduced weight and size ( "In this format the
volumes, though containing from 960 to 1,100 pages, are only 1 inch
thick").

In England, during the pre-Christmas months, the sales promotion
was persistent if less extensive. As in America, photographs were used
more frequently than in previous campaigns. One was of a dignified
young lady bending over a bookcase containing the new edition. An-
other, showing a young man carrying an entire set in his arms, had
as its muscular model Arthur Croxton, whom Hooper had hired in
1909 as business manager in the British office. Croxton, a man with a
bent for the theater, was hard at work planning some promotional
literature when Hooper told him, "Say, you look intellectual and
handsome enough for a photograph. I should like to see the effect of
an average man carrying a set of our new India edition. If the twenty-
nine volumes can be held with comfort by one man, it will be an
impressive advertisement." Croxton posed willingly, but he came to
regret it, for he was plagued for months afterward by friends who
twitted him about his great strength.

Croxton traveled extensively in these busy months throughout the
British Isles, placing ads, drumming up business among book$ellers,
trying various promotional devices. At the Caledonian Hotel in Edin-
burgh, he met the actor H. B, Irving, son of Henry Irving. Croxton
showed Irving, whom he knew from his days as a writer for the Toiler,
a specimen copy of an India-paper volume. "Listen," he said, "you're
playing Hamlet tonight. Why not give me a lift here by bringing on
this volume instead of the usual script when you're instructing the
actors in the play scene?"

Irving agreed. But Croxton's idea turned out to have little adver-
tising value, for the audience could hardly notice what book Irving
carried with him as he strode about the stage declaiming. Only one
person did detect the difference, and he was a stagehand who whis-
pered hoarsely, "Hoot mon, yeVe got the wrong prop in your hand."

The high intellectual standards that had characterized its predeces-
sors still dominated much of the new edition. And there were so-
called modern tendencies. Its forty million words totaled only 3 per

170 THE GREAT EB

cent more than in the ninth edition, but they were broken up into
many more articles under new headings, intended for easier reading.
The long omnibus treatises of earlier editions appeared now as three
or four articles, so that where the ninth edition had seventeen thou-
sand treatises and monographs, the new edition contained forty thou-
sand. This arrangement of articles tended to make the eleventh edi-
tion a practical reference work for laymen rather than an erudite
work largely for scholars and educators. In his Preface, Chisholm
called careful attention to this quality: "The object of the present
work is to furnish accounts of all subjects, which shall really explain
their meaning, to those who desire accurate information. Amid the
variety of beliefs which are held with sincere conviction by one set
of people or another, impartiality does not consist in concealing criti-
cism or withholding knowledge of divergent opinion, but in an atti-
tude of scientific respect which is precise in studying a belief in the
terms, and according to the interpretation accepted by those who
hold it."

Among the other signs of a strong drift toward popularization was
the use of more current material, notably in an increased number of
biographies of contemporaries. Many of these were no more than a
paragraph or two in length, but their inclusion added to the character
of the work as a reference aid; after all, the subtitle of the edition as
carried on the front page now read, "A Dictionary of Arts, Sciences,
Literature, and General Information/*

Another change was in the improved readability. Commenting on
some of the sections on religion, the observant Athenaeum stated, "The
world of intelligent readers and busy literary workers should be
thankful to find that there are learned theologians and critical in-
vestigators who can, when the occasion demands it, lay aside stiff
and technical phraseology, and say their say in simple, direct and
perspicuous English." And, at the end of its analysis of the com-
plete edition, the American Historical Review concluded that the work
had "literary charm and readableness/'

The index, praised by the Athenaeum as "a model of well-ordered
compactness," was designed primarily to aid the general reader. The
extensive bibliographies, which some experts considered too long and
sometimes out of date, were also meant to help the intelligent layman
who considered his Encyclopaedia Britannica not as the final com-
pendium of knowledge but as a stimulant to further study.

Yet, though the encyclopaedia had been seemingly transformed

"HIGH TIDE MARK OF HUMAKT KNOWLEDGE" 171

from one chiefly for specialists to a more popular work for laymen, the
bulk of the material still bore the marks and quality of authoritative
scholarship. Indeed, one American critic, Louis Heilperin, after full
examination of the complete set, reflected the opinion of those who
believed the edition was still top-heavy with technical articles. In the
first of a series of articles for the Nation, he hailed the edition for its
diffusion of general information, calling it "a monument to the learning
of the Anglo-Saxon race such as no other people has ever reared to
itself," Later, after studying the volumes more carefully, Heilperin
took note of the technical sections, characterizing the set now as "a
storehouse of information for people of all cultures, upon which is
reared an imposing super-structure, accessible only to a few, com-
prising the weightiest elements in the whole edifice the lengthy sci-
entific treatises designed for the specialist."

Some critics maintained that neither specialists nor laymen would
profit from the edition. A typical complaint was that there was too
much for the general reader, too little for the scholar. Others used
the publication of the eleventh edition as an occasion for the general
comment that the purpose of such works was to spread knowledge,
not to create a nation of smatterers, those who read encyclopaedias
only to learn something about everything but nothing very pro-
foundly. Inevitably, there were critics who frowned at what they con-
sidered an imbalance. London's Nation wondered why "Charity" re-
ceived twenty-six full pages and "Crime and Criminology" only seven
columns and criticized some of the articles on music, edited by the
musicologist Donald Francis Tovey, because Debussy received only
half the space devoted to the technical discussion of the bugle;
Handel, Bach, and Beethoven little more than the flute, clarinet, and
bassoon; and Berlioz less than the harmonium.

But for all the criticism, deserved and undeserved, the general
reaction was highly favorable. Even London's Nation, most severe of
the observers, considered the edition vastly superior to its predeces-
sors and contemporaries: "We conclude by wishing for the Encyclo-
paedia Britannica the great success which it deserves. It is a wonderful
treasure house of human knowledge, and a great glory to our nation."
Another British publication, Connoisseur, lauded the work and meta-
phorically declared, "Like a reservoir in which water from all streams
of knowledge has been collected, it offers an unfailing supply to those
who want information on practically every subject. If this one work
constituted a man's soul library, he would, if he mastered it, be learned

172 THE GREAT EB

above most of his compeers." Especially pleasing to most of the
commentators was the nearly simultaneous publication of all twenty-
nine volumes, an innovation that, as the Independent remarked,
"made it possible to keep the articles open to the last moment, so that
the new Britannica has the charm of freshness, the enviable privilege
of speaking the last word." This publication also called attention to the
fact that, although some had expressed indignation at American owner-
ship and supervision of what had been a Scottish publishing venture
for the preceding 142 years, the quality of the set had not been
injured nor had it decreased.

The American Historical Review, whose critic, George Burr, de-
plored the popularization of some sections, nevertheless declared that
to compare the new edition with any other encyclopaedia in the
English language was clearly idle. "Its advent," he wrote, "is a noble
step toward the good day when the learning and art of all the world
shall be enlisted for the creation of that international work which alone
can be a really faithful mirror of advancing knowledge." Other Amer-
ican critics agreed that there was no longer cause for complaint that
the work was too insular in its views. Referring to it as <C A Reference
Library for the English-Speaking World," the Review of Reviews de-
clared, "In turning its pages one is almost startled to find a column of
information about his native town in the Middle West a place that
had never been thought worthy of so much as a stickful of type in any
American reference book. In other and more important fields of
knowledge the same catholicity of selection and treatment has been
observed. Perhaps it is an indication of the relatively more important
place that America holds today in the world's civilization as well as a
tribute to the editorial genius that conceived and brought to fruition
this monumental work, that every one of the volumes is alive with the
intellectual and material progress of the new world."

From the religious quarters where such an uproar had been raised
over certain articles in the ninth edition there was silence now. "We
have gone far from the fury raised over W. Robertson Smith," com-
mented London's Nation. "No longer is there any attempt to conceal
the most radical hypotheses which criticism may have ventured or
reject their hypotheses." And the Spectator, closely examining all the
religious and scriptural articles, found them to be as "severely scientific
as the articles on Physics or Secular History. They claim attention and

"HIGH TIDE MARK OF HUMAN KNOWLEDGE*' 173

convince the mind and they are all written with reverent good taste
reverence has become good taste since honest scholarship has been
freed from obloquy."

But from certain Catholic critics there issued a harsh attack, not on
one man, as in Smith's case, but on all who had been involved in
publishing and editing the new edition. Leading the assault in Eng-
land was the Month, a Catholic publication in London which had, as
far back as 1886, termed an article on the Jesuits in the ninth edition
"an invective, not a history, a repository of accusations." When the
new edition appeared, the magazine again denounced the article on
the Jesuits. This one was written by the Rev. Ethelred Taunton, de-
scribed as a Jesuit, whereas the earlier article had been the work of
F. W. Littledale, a theologian at Dublin's Trinity College. Asserting
that few changes had been made, the magazine added, "To keep
seventy per cent of Littledale's article while dropping thirty is to rob
the result of all reliability." Although Littledale's accusation against
the Jesuits in connection with the instigation of the Thirty Years* War
had been considerably softened, the Month asserted, "It is not based
upon a study of the original, is full of partiality and overstatement of
fact, as well as allegations of bad motives and of pernicious doctrine."
Throughout 1911 the Month continued its acrid campaign. It charged
that the Encyclopaedia Britannica was guilty of "unscholarly bigotry";
that the "anti-Catholic animus" of several writers on subjects involving
Catholicism was well known; that all articles on the Catholic church
were "thoroughly Protestant and necessarily incorrect"; that the "acme
of contemptuous indifference to Catholic feeling" was reached in an
account by Viscount St. Gyres, a non-Catholic, of the "Church in
Europe since the Reformation." This latter article was, according to
the Month, "full of bitter animus against orthodox Catholicism, bris-
tling with misrepresentations, conveyed by phrase and epithet, by
assertion and innuendo. ... If they let Kropotkin write on Anarch-
ism, why not Catholics on Catholicism?" And finally, bitterly: "The
Encyclopaedia Britannica is a non-Catholic production, which means
practically that it is anti-Catholic, for the claims of the Church
Catholic are so unique, so far-reaching and fundamental, that they
cannot be ignored or misrepresented without distortion of the truth.
He that is not with her is against her."

Less violent, but no less critical, were the views of another British
Catholic magazine, the Tablet. Its first reactions to the eleventh edi-
tion were roseate "a revelation and a delight. . . . what used to be

174 THE GREAT EB

a work for laborious reference has suddenly become a library to read"
but soon the tone changed. More temperate than the Month, this
publication was careful in its charges, making no broad accusations but
calling to the attention of readers certain errors of interpretation and
information in articles dealing with Catholicism. At one time, for in-
stance, it complained of insufficient discussion of the Augustinian
canons, citing errors in the treatment of the administrative relationship
of the canons to the central church.

In contrast to attacks by United States publications, the Tablet
seemed a fervent defender of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. First
there appeared a pamphlet titled Poisoning the Wells, issued under
auspices of the American Federation of Catholic Societies and gen-
erally believed to have been written by the Rev. John S. Wynne, S.J.,
one of the editors of the Catholic Encyclopaedia. The booklet ap-
proached the vilification of Chisholm, Phillips, and their editorial staff.
It labeled the new edition "unscholarly, sectarian, and offensive" and
cited dozens of examples to prove its point. It denounced what it
called a "rationalistic and anti-Catholic spirit" and called on all good
Catholics to refrain from buying the set. The Jesuit monthly America
mirrored these charges; its editor, the Rev. T. J. Campbell, S.J., wrote:
"The frequently unveiled contempt of the usages, rituals and sacra-
mental agencies not only of Catholicism but of Christianity, combined
with the absence in many of its writers of any knowledge above ma-
terial things and a deplorable dullness of vision in what pertains to the
spiritual world, will always make of the Encyclopaedia Britannica a
most exasperating book for Catholics of every degree."

In replying, Chisholm and Phillips made use of the columns of the
friendliest of their Catholic critics. Soon there appeared in the Tablet
a list of Catholics who had written for the Encyclopaedia Britannica
some two hundred articles on churches and church history, including
the Abbe Boudinhon, professor of canon law at Catholic University in
Paris; His Eminence Cardinal Gibbons of Baltimore; and Father
Joseph Braun, a German scholar. Their works, together with scores
of other articles from Catholic pens, seemed, stated the Tablet, "suffi-
cient proof of the good intentions of the editors intentions which
many difficulties conspire to leave in some cases unfulfilled, difficul-
ties, some of them, which even the editors of the Catholic dictionaries
and cyclopaedias have not wholly escaped." Phillips' letters noted that
virtually all the articles dealing with Catholic subjects had been
examined by Abb6 Boudinhon or some other distinguished Catholic.

"HIGH TIDE MAKE OF HUMAN KNOWLEDGE" 175

When Father Wynne, in a letter to the Tablet, claimed that the editors
had promised that only Catholic writers would write on Catholic
subjects, Chisholm sent a reasoned rejoinder. Denying any such prom-
ise had been made, he wrote, "Such a course in the Encyclopaedia
Britannica would be impracticable with any attempt to write history
from an impartial but critical standpoint. We did not ask a Buddhist to
write on Buddhism, a Mohammedan -on Mohammedanism, or a Mor-
mon on the Mormons. We did, however, I believe, take every reason-
able precaution by the cooperation of men of all sorts of religious be-
lief, against the misrepresentation of the nature of the doctrines held
by different churches and different religions."

Others soon joined in the controversy in the columns of the Tablet.
Father Aidan Gasquet, O.S.B., abbot president at Sant' Anselmo in
Rome, denied the charges in Poisoning the Wells, especially those
accusing Chisholm of assigning articles on Catholicism to "bigots and
anti-Catholics." "The charge is undeserved and consequently unjust,"
he wrote, disclosing that he had been asked by Chisholm to examine
many articles and that his suggestions for their improvement had been
scrupulously followed. Father Wynne promptly responded with an
itemization of "new errors" in, among others, the articles "Divorce"
and "Attrition," E. Cuthbert Butler, another Catholic contributor, sided
with Father Gasquet, asserting that any purported promise by the
editors to secure writers "friendly to Catholicism" surely could not be
understood "as a promise to secure such a treatment of the great
questions of religious controversy as should be theologically satisfying
all round to all the people who hold all the divergent beliefs con-
cerning them, for this is plainly impossible." The Tablet's editorials
grew calmer and more friendly, now criticizing the "controversial
rhetoric and the exuberance of transatlantic hyperbole" in America
and in Poisoning the Wells and declaring that the pamphlet writer
had not proved his charge that the Encyclopaedia Britannica had
made "a shameful attempt to perpetuate ignorance, bigotry, and
fanaticism in matters of religion/' Many of the purported errors, stated
the magazine, were not so much factual as interpretative. One example
cited was the pamphlet's expressed horror at this sentence in the
article "Attrition": "It is held among the Roman Catholics that in the
sacrament of penance attrition becomes contrition." Many savants held
to this view, although others, notably St. Thomas Aquinas, had pre-
sented opposite opinions. The encyclopaedia's error, stated the Tablet,

176 THE GREAT EB

was neither malicious nor rooted in bigotry, but merely one of citing
the belief as universally Catholic.

One firm Catholic supporter of the Encyclopaedia Britannica in
America was Carlton J. H. Hayes, historian at Columbia University.
Asked by the Independent to make a close examination of the charges
and countercharges and the original material on which they were
based, Hayes, after a six months' study, absolved the editors of
practically all the accusations made in Poisoning the Wells. He noted
some errors of fact and deplored the assignment of Catholic subjects
to Viscount St. Gyres. But he added: "Now it is one thing to accuse
the editors of mistakes of judgment in selecting contributors, or even of
lack of proper attention to the detailed revising of the wide range of
religious subjects, but it is another thing to denounce their work
everywhere, in season and out of season as *a shameful attempt to
perpetuate ignorance, bigotry and fanaticism in matters of religion.'
That is impugning their motives; that is reading them out of the
society of scholars. And before subscribing to that conclusion, we
should naturally await the presentation in a passionless, critical man-
ner of weighty and convincing proofs. . . . But when the candid
student, be he Catholic, Protestant or agnostic, reads the pamphlet
that contains the crushing charge and painstakingly sifts its eighteen
pages of evidence, he may almost be entitled to wonder if some one be-
sides the editors of the Britannica has not been perpetuating ignorance,
bigotry and fanaticism in matters of religion."

Hayes made an important point in his analysis that applied not only
to the case at hand but to all charges of prejudice against specialized
or general encyclopaedias. "Suppose," he wrote, "that a zealous Protes-
tant, or better still, a brilliant parodist, would criticize the Catholic
Encyclopaedia in this pamphlet form, ascribing the merest slips to
bigotry and Popish prejudices. He might enjoy himself and be amus-
ing to others. He might conceivably, with the ill-informed, injure the
sales of the publication; but no trained person would suspect him of
scholarship. The type of scholarship which defaces this pamphlet
against the Britannica must in future be avoided if Catholics are to
convince the editors of the twelfth Edition of the great encyclopaedia,
and the intellectual generally, that Catholic learning has truthfullness,
authority and strength."

An unofficial end to the whole disturbing affair was announced by
the Tablet at the end of 1911, with an editorial, "A Pax Britannica."

"HIGH TIDE MARK OF HUMAN KNOWLEDGE" 177

Father Gasquet and Professor Hayes had gone to the root of the mat-
ter, it declared. "The point of controversy of real importance is, not
whether there are misstatements and mistakes in articles which deal
with Catholic matters, historical and dogmatic, but whether the man-
agers and editors made deliberate choice of writers who might be ex-
pected to set forth false views about the Catholic Church and its be-
liefs. . . . The right way to regard the Encyclopaedia Britannica is
to think of it as, what in effect it is, a great library. We do not think it
necessary to boycott the library at the British Museum because there
are some anti-Catholic and offensive volumes on its shelves. We use it
for what is good in it. Why should we mete out any different measure
to the Britannica? For our part, we think it wiser to weigh the grain
than to count the chaff, to make the willing acknowledgement of what
has already been done to free the Britannica from an old reproach,
and to look forward with confidence to the Twelfth Edition for the
continuance and completion of what has been so well begun in the
Eleventh."

Its final statement was especially incisive on the nature of encyclo-
paedias. Recalling that even the Catholic Dictionary, with its official
imprimatur, received harsh censure from Catholic critics when it ap-
peared, the editorialist advised, "The ways of Encyclopaedists, in the
best of circumstances, are hard. Let us not make them harder by
hurling unjust accusations of want of good faith against those who
have for the first time in this country tried to do justice, and with a
large measure of success. Their failures, where such there are, will be
more fully remedied by an exhibition on our side of some of that
spirit of fair play which we bespeak of them."

Thus, on a note of philosophical realism, the Tablet cooled the con-
troversy and ended its editorial, "This correspondence may now
cease."

An echo of the earlier fuss raised by academicians at Cambridge
University sounded just as the Catholic issue began to fade. A fly-
sheet addressed to the Syndics was circulated demanding that none
among them who had been party to the contract with the Encyclo-
paedia Britannica be reappointed to duty. Its signers were Archdeacon
William Cunningham, one of the earliest of the critics, and a number
of other faculty members and alumni. "No information has been given

178 THE GREAT EB

as to the rights which the University has acquired and the obligations
which the University has incurred, but the publication of this work,
although it has been undertaken by the Syndics on their own authority,
has not been treated as a transaction in the ordinary course o their
business." From advertising and from a prefatory note in the first
volume dated from Cambridge, the impression had developed in some
quarters that the university was responsible for the preparation and
production of the work. "We believe/' concluded the statement, "that
the reputation of the University has been injured by the representa-
tions which have been made; that this reputation has suffered and is
suffering, by the methods taken to advertise the work, and on these
grounds we enter our protest."

In this dispute, as in the days when Hooper and Jackson had issued
their Times reprint of the ninth edition, the fact seemed to be that
those who opposed the venture simply refused to read or, having read,
to understand plain statements. Over and over again announcements
issued jointly and separately by Hooper and the Syndics emphasized
that the work of preparing the edition had started indeed, was more
than three-fourths completed when Hooper first approached the
Syndics. It is true that in his advertisements, especially in America,
Hooper strongly suggested that Cambridge University had had charge
of the entire project even to listing the ads under the sponsorship of
"Cambridge University Press (Encyclopaedia Britannica Depart-
ment)" but these ads were approved by the Syndics and actually
conveyed no false information.

Stressing that the contract with Hooper was secret, as were all
their agreements for the publishing of books, the Syndics made an-
other reply to their critics. "The Encyclopaedia differs from other
books only in its magnitude. We are satisfied that it was a work which
deserved the imprimatur of the University, and that by its publication
we were contributing to the spread of knowledge. We recognized
that a work so costly in production could not meet with an adequate
sale unless widely advertised; we accept full responsibility for our
policy; and, without contending that we have never at any point
made a mistake, we believe that that policy promotes the interests
entrusted to us by the Senate."

For the time being, this exchange closed the case. When several of
the professors were not reappointed Syndics, the opposition acclaimed
this a minor victory. Gradually controversy and discussion subsided,
with final adjudication to come later.

"HIGH TIDE MARK OF HUMAN KNOWLEDGE" 179

Hooper paid no great heed to all the criticism. He was certain Chis-
holm could reply adequately, and he could always turn for any
needed solace to the laudatory estimates, such as the statement of
William A. E. Axon, a critic for the Library, a respected quarterly re-
view of bibliographical and library lore. Axon spent a solid year in
studying the edition. "What is the average student's verdict after a
year's use of the EB?" he asked. "Most readers will, I believe, say it is
one of satisfaction. It reaches a high standard of accurate and full
statement on important matters, and rarely fails to give some informa-
tion even on an obscure or little-known subject." Despite some defects
omissions, slight discrepancies, disproportionate amounts of space
his final conclusion was gratifying. "It is, when all deductions have
been made, the most useful of all books of reference, and represents
the combination of learning, research, co-operation and organization
in a higher degree than perhaps any other of the monumental works
of literature and science. It is the high-tide mark of human knowledge.
And it is knowledge brought to the service of all."

As seriously as Hooper respected the Encyclopaedia Britannica and
the knowledge and learning it symbolized, enthusiastic critical ovations
would have been far less sweet had not sales figures turned out to be
what he had anticipated. Now the year of 1911 was over, and his
triumph over innumerable difficulties and obstacles was complete. The
year-end report showed his company's net assets to be $4,100,000,
certainly an agreeable complement of the praiseworthy words in the
newspapers and magazines. Everywhere that his encyclopaedia was
being offered for sale, the response was gratifying. Refreshed and
exuberant, Hooper felt ready for what lay before him.

180 THE GREAT EB

Triumph and Gloom

Walter Jackson had taken no part in the sale of the eleventh edition,
but he was far from idle. He was promoting his own enterprises and
preparing new legal assaults against Hooper. His 'Book of Knowledge,
with all copyright difficulties resolved, was catching the fancy of the
American public, as parents discovered that their children enjoyed
reading its brief, illustrated articles on a variety of common subjects.
Jackson was equally successful with publishing enterprises in South
America, which he had invaded in 1908, shortly after his first quarrels
with Hooper. Sensing an opportunity for profits through furnishing
the Spanish-speaking peoples there with books comparable to the
favorites of the English-speaking world, he was busily selling, through
local agents, the Biblioteca international de obras famosas, a twenty-
four volume compendium of the best-known works of prominent
European authors.

I8J

Jackson had plans for still another publishing venture, but before he
could get it under way he filed a new suit against Hooper, this one
destined to be the last. On August 30, 1911, in New York's supreme
court, he demanded $5,200,000 from his former associate, basing the
claim on the muddled negotiations of 1909 when he had accepted the
"offer" made by Hooper from England. By failing to live up to that
agreement, Jackson now charged, Hooper had caused him to suffer
financial damage in that sum. Jackson also accused Hooper of illegally
excluding him from the business and of appropriating for himself and
his close collaborators "excessive salaries and compensation/'

The case was set for trial early the next year. Meanwhile, Jackson
pushed forward with his South American project. To help, he called
on one of Lord Northcliffe's most prized editorial lieutenants, John A.
Hammerton, a keen journalist, editor, and encyclopaedist. The two
had worked together amicably when the various intricacies of trans-
ferring copyrights to the Book of Knowledge from Northcliffe's Chil-
dren $ Encyclopaedia were being untangled, and although Hammerton
was snobbishly disdainful of most Americans, he regarded Jackson as
a sound businessman.

"I'm contemplating an ambitious publishing scheme in South Amer-
ica/' Jackson told Hammerton, "and I'd like you in with me. How
much are you making with Northcliffe?"

"One thousand pounds a year/'

Jackson waved his arm, a trail of smoke coming from his ever-
present cigar. "Not enough! I'll give you five thousand a year for five
years, plus royalties."

Hammerton wavered a bit, but in the end he agreed to join in
Jackson's enterprise for at least two years. Soon he was at work on
his assignment editorial supervision and production of a Spanish
encyclopaedia whose plates and rights for distribution in South Amer-
ica Jackson had acquired from its owner, Montaner y Simon of Barce-
lona, Spain's leading publisher. Not only was Hammerton to handle
editorial revision, insertion of articles of interest to South Americans,
and modernization of illustrations, he was also to originate all news-
paper publicity and advertising in the South American press. The
work was to be titled El diccionario enciclopedico hispano-americano,
and R. and R. Clark, printers of the Encyclopaedia "Britannica before
the gradual transfer after 1909 of the full printing to Chicago's R. R.
Donnelley and SOBS, were to handle production in Edinburgh.

Hammerton was barely aware of Jackson's fight with Hooper, but he

182 THE CHEAT KB

was intrigued with Jackson's instructions to him as he began adapting
the original edition for South American readers. "Whatever notes,
clippings, and correspondence you are throwing away, I want you to
burn/' Jackson warned him. "In fact, you had best burn all that's in
your wastepaper basket."

"Why on earth should that be necessary?" asked Hammerton.

"Well, I can only tell you that in America we stop at nothing to get
to know what our competitors are doing, and a good tip to the dustman
used to be a favorite way of finding out, You'd be surprised at what
can be learned about the activities of anyone when you can examine
his wastebasket at your leisure."

Despite the warnings, advance information of Hammerton's work
did reach Hooper. Immediately, Hooper hired a staff of Spanish-
language experts to plow through Jackson's Spanish encyclopaedia to
discover possible breaches of copyright. The researchers soon found
that two articles one on "Encyclopaedia" and the second on "Dic-
tionary" had been lifted entirely from the Encyclopaedia Britannica's
tenth edition.

But Jackson, too, had spies in the enemy camp. When Hooper de-
manded that his attorneys get an injunction to restrain Jackson from
selling his encyclopaedia, Hammerton soon learned of it. He acted
swiftly. Thousands of the books destined for South America had al-
ready been printed and bound in Edinburgh and packed for shipment,
but Hammerton wired to R. and R. Clark: "Hold everything." Then,
working feverishly with two Spanish assistants, he rewrote the offend-
ing articles and quickly dispatched them to Edinburgh, where they
were substituted for the originals and the volumes involved were re-
bound.

Meanwhile Hooper had filed for his injunction, but process-servers
sought Hammerton and Jackson in vain, Hammerton and his wife,
already on their way to Buenos Aires, sped to Lisbon. Jackson secreted
himself in London hotels under assumed names until the new volumes
were ready to be produced in court with the purloined articles gone
and new ones substituted.

Thwarted, Hooper vowed to follow the flight into South America.
But first there was to be a final legal battle with Jackson in New York.

For this clash, each man came arrayed with formidable legal talent.
Hooper's chief attorney was Samuel Untermyer, a man of sharp wit

TRIUMPH AND GLOOM 183

and sharper tactics, a master of cross-examination and incisive ques-
tioning who rarely raised his voice but who could easily upset a balky
witness. Jackson's chief counsel was Sherman L. Whipple, one of
Boston's best courtroom strategists, aided by the estimable lawyer-
diplomat Joseph H. Choate.

All through January and February, 1912, the hearing proceeded
before Justice Martin Bischoff. Most of the testimony revolved around
the misunderstandings aroused by the Hooper cablegrams of October,
1909. Over and over again, Jackson, a stern and assured figure in the
witness chair whenever he was questioned by Whipple, insisted that
his acceptance of Hooper's "offer" made him technically the owner
and that he had a right to all subsequent profits. When Hooper's New
Jersey lawyers had informed him of the offer, he declared, he was
not only prepared to pay $100,000 down for the business, but could
just as easily have put up the rest of the $750,000.

Slowly and with excruciating patience, Untermyer sought to show
that Jackson's suit had been instituted only because Hooper had been
unusually successful in marketing the eleventh edition in his own
way and by methods formerly frowned on by Jackson. Skilfully the
canny lawyer brought out Jackson's real feelings about the affiliation
with Cambridge and his stubborn insistence that, despite the happy
outcome of Hooper's plan, his own system would have been better.

"Now the interposition of the Cambridge University, or the publica-
tion of this book under its auspices, made a tremendous change in the
situation, did it not?" asked Untermyer.

"Made a tremendous change in what situation?"

"In the prestige under which the book would be issued."

"I do not think so, especially."

"You do not think," asked Untermyer, raising his voice slightly,
"that it made any difference whether Jackson and Hooper issued the
Encyclopaedia Britannica or whether it was issued in the name of the
Cambridge University Press?"

"I do not say that."

"I understand you to say that did you mean it?"

'You were not comparing Hooper and Jackson, ... I doubt that it
made much if any difference, as between the name of Cambridge
University and the name of a reputable London publishing house, but
that is simply a matter of opinion."

As the colloquy continued, Untermyer placed Jackson in the guise
of a rather naive man in his views about publishing promotion.

184 THE GREAT EB

"The prestige of the Cambridge University Press as publisher of
great books is very great, is it not?"

"I do not know anything about the prestige," replied Jackson.

"It exercises great care in publication work, does it not?"

"I am not familiar with its publications, except in one instance/*

"You considered, when you made that contract with the Times, that
its assuming the publication of the work would be of great value, did
you not?"

"At that time, but not later."

Then:

"And yet the name of the Cambridge University Press as publisher
you do not think was of any great value, do you?"

"Did think or do think? I do not exactly follow your question."

"At the time you heard of it you did not think it was of any value, did
you?"

"I did not think it was of any especial value."

"And you don't think so yet?"

"As compared with some other first-class publishing house?"

"As compared, for instance, with whom?"

"Adam and Charles Black, or Charles Scribner's Sons."

"You think that the name of Charles Scribner's Sons would have as
great an effect in the publication of a book of that kind as the
Cambridge University Press?"

"Perhaps not over the world,"

But later:

"I understood you to say that Scribner's or Black's name on a publica-
tion that goes all over the world would be just as good as the Cam-
bridge University Press?"

"I am inclined to think so."

Jackson also insisted he could have produced the eleventh edition
more efficiently and without great indebtedness to banks by issuing
single volumes periodically. This was how the Blacks had done it, how
the Century Dictionary had been brought out. But Hooper had in-
sisted that it be issued his way as a single unit. "Hooper said this
method of production and sale would be very much more successful
than any other way," testified Jackson. "I disagreed with him, and
said that I thought that not only would that not be the case but I
thought, that I was sure, that it would be a very much more costly
way, involving the risk of money and taking a hazard that perhaps
we were not putting out Just the most effective kind of advertisements,

TRIUMPH AND GLOOM 185

and that sort of thing." By the method of publishing one volume at a
time, estimated Jackson, the edition could have been issued within a
two-year period.

Untermyer was quick to pounce on this theory.

Did not Jackson know, he asked, that when the Blacks so issued the
ninth edition, only about forty thousand sets were sold?

"I know that this is not so," snapped Jackson.

"Do you? Well, what is the fact of the ninth edition, when issued by
the Blacks, according to their method of doing this business?"

"The fact is they sold in England and the Colonies between nine
and ten thousand sets. Scribner's sold in round figures fifty thousand
sets of their edition, and the pirates, who pirated here in America, sold
three or four hundred thousand sets."

"We are not speaking of pirating of the edition! That was stopped/'

"It is the same edition."

"We are talking of sales of the authorized edition."

"You said ninth edition."

Later, Untermyer pressed Jackson on this point. "At any rate, I am
asking you how many sets the Blacks sold or how many were sold of
the authorized edition by the method you have described of selling
books, if you know."

"About sixty thousand."

"Are you sure about that?"

"I am not absolutely certain, but I have had access to their books."

"Wasn't it under forty?"

"I think not."

"Do you know that there have been thirty-three thousand sets sold
within one year of this eleventh edition?"

"I believe that to be so."

"Do you know whether any such feat could have been accomplished
by the method you have in mind?"

"I think so."

"When it took the Blacks fourteen years to sell forty thousand or
thereabouts?"

"They did not use the same methods of sale."

"And I understand you to say that the Blacks were quite as good for
all purposes of publication all over the world as the Cambridge Uni-
versity?"

"I am inclined to think they were considerably better."

"You think they would be better."

186 THE GREAT EB

"I do."

"You think that to the ordinary purchaser of a book of that charac-
ter, the name of Blacks all over the world would mean as much as the
name of the Cambridge University?"

"No, but with that particular book, because their name had always
been associated with it.'*

"Now you know that the Cambridge University exercises an active
supervision over this work, don't you?"

"I have been told so, yes."

"Didn't you know that the articles were read by the professors,
members of the faculty, there, before they were permitted to be
printed, every one examined?"

"I have heard so."

"And don't you know that there were many of the members of the
faculty who wrote the articles themselves?"

"I assume that is so."

"And yet I understand you to say that the bringing of the Cam-
bridge University into this transaction in August, 1910, did not in any
way change the situation."

Haughtily, Jackson answered, "I have already replied very fully to
that."

Naturally enough, Hooper took advantage of his session in the
witness chair to deny all of Jackson's charges. An interesting admission
by him was that one of the purposes of shutting down production and
editorial work on the eleventh edition shortly after the Times served
notice of cancellation of its contract was besides the obvious one that
sufficient money for the edition was lacking to 'iDring Mr. Jackson to
his senses."

"What do you mean," asked Untermyer, "by bringing Mr. Jackson
to his senses?"

"I meant that he would realize that it was to his interest to stop
litigating and come and attend to his business."

"You never had any desire to acquire that interest, had you?"

"At no time at all," replied Hooper, fixing his flashing eyes on
Jackson.

"And when you were negotiating for acquiring it, was it for yourself
or for other people who worked with you in the business?"

"At no time that I have ever made an offer did I wish to buy it for
myself."

"You were satisfied with what you had?"

TKIUMPH AND GLOOM 187

"Absolutely"

Candidly and not without some smugness, Hooper revealed all the
details attendant on securing the imprimatur of Cambridge University.
He enumerated the difficulties he had encountered in attempting to
obtain loans before signing the contract with the university "A bank
that had previously loaned us money refused to loan us more than
40,000." He gave a picture of the post-contract situation "After
Cambridge took it ? we were able to borrow from one bank in London
185,000, which we could not have borrowed if it had not been for
the fact of the Cambridge agreement." And then he disclosed how the
financial situation had improved since the more dismal days when the
Times s contract ended.

The net assets in October, 1911, were a little more than $4,100,000,
compared with assets of $2,383,877 shown in the balance sheets of
October, 1909. "And is the situation improving every day?" asked
Untermyer.

"It is."

The success or failure of the undertaking, explained Hooper, de-
pended "on a great many things. ... It depended first on being able
to get money enough to advertise it widely. It depended on the name
that guaranteed the book. It depended on being able to get that book
out and delivered to the people. It depended on what we call in the
trade the scheme, that is, the plan, under which we advertised it."

"Now you say that advertising had a good deal to do with it?" asked
Untermyer.

"Everything."

"What did you spend in the first advertisement of that book?"

"During last year we spent over $1,000,000 in advertising."

"In advertising. And what was the result in the way of sales?"

"Thirty-three thousand sets."

"As the result of one campaign of advertising?"

"Yes, roughly speaking, about seven or eight months/'

"Had any such thing ever been known in the history of bookselling?"

"Never!"

"Or anything approaching it?"

"Not within a great distance."

The New Jersey lawyers except for Sherrerd DePue, who had died
were all summoned and questioned closely by both sides. Each
contradicted most of the testimony of his opposite number, although it
was clear that the bungling and, in the last analysis, the litigation had

188 THE GREAT EB

resulted from withholding Hooper's all-important proviso that no sale
agreement was final without a written contract.

By March 26, 1912, Justice Bischoff was ready with his decision
and it was entirely in Hooper's favor. The jurist held that the contract
offer was not binding because Hooper clearly contemplated that it was
to be followed by a more formal agreement containing details that
were not in the preliminary offer. Hooper's original terms were too
indefinite to be legally sound, especially in their reference to the fact
that 51 per cent of the stock of the companies was to be held by a
trustee for the benefit of the seller until the entire purchase price of
$750,000 was received.

After Justice Bischoff had dismissed his suit, Jackson trudged
wearily from the courtroom to the offices of the company from which
he issued his South American sets. He sat on the edge of the desk of
his secretary, Margaret Schneider, and stared out the window. Then
he lit a cigar, puffed for a few seconds, and sighed. "I'll never have a
partner again, Miss Schneider, not even if I have to sell shoestrings
like that little fellow down on the corner," he said.

Jackson's lawsuits against his former associate were over, but his
clashes with Hooper were not.

Now Hooper took out after Jackson in South America. On station-
ery of the Grolier Society, Jackson wrote to Hooper denying that he
was selling any Spanish translation of the Encyclopaedia Britannica;
a rumor to this effect had disturbed several meetings of Hooper's board
of directors. Jackson's protestations notwithstanding, Hooper dis-
patched Henry Haxton, long since recovered from the illness which
had prevented his participation in the eleventh edition sales campaign,
to Buenos Aires to check on Hammerton's progress.

Hammerton had performed a remarkable job. Although he had
previously frowned on American methods, he had yielded to Jackson's
advice to employ American-style selling. The time-payment plan was
used everywhere; at the opening of one campaign seven men were
stationed at a counter, where books were displayed, to take down-
payments, and these came so rapidly that the gold pieces were swept
into wastebaskets behind the counter.

After a preliminary survey, Haxton organized a counterattack
against Hammerton and the El diccionario enciclopedico hispano-
americano. He organized a procession through Buenos Aires streets of

TRIUMPH AND GLOOM 189

horse-drawn carriages with large posters attacking Jackson's publica-
tion as obsolete and unworthy. Behind the carriages came men with
sandwich boards inscribed with abusive criticism of El diccionario
enciclopedico hispano-americano and extolling the merits of the Ency-
clopaedia Britannica.

"Which book is right?" Haxton's sandwich signs and newspaper ad-
vertisements demanded. "El diccionario enciclopSdico hispano-ameri-
cano says that Queen Victoria is still Queen of Great Britain, but the
Encyclopaedia Britannica says the present sovereign of Great Britain
is George V. WHICH BOOK is BIGHT?"

Haxton had slipped since the days of the early campaigns. This kind
of appeal misfired badly. Not only was it patently unfair the Spanish
encyclopaedia, despite the error, carried a full and accurate biography
of King George but it aroused little interest among the residents of
Buenos Aires, who were more concerned with biographical informa-
tion about their own rulers and their own land. Moreover, Jackson's
publication had an obviously wider appeal siince it was in the language
of the country, whereas the Encyclopaedia Britannica was in English.
As a matter of fact, Hooper had, in earlier years, considered publishing
a Spanish translation and had sent a representative to Spain to
make preliminary arrangements for securing sales representatives in
Spanish-speaking countries, but this plan had been abandoned.

When Haxton's campaign proved ineffective, Hooper realized the
futility of making new efforts to best Jackson in South America. Al-
ready his rival was invading other sections of that continent with more
literary products. The prolonged litigation had cost Hooper close to
$500,000 in lawyer's fees and court expenses, and the threat of new
suits had not entirely passed. So Hooper called his cohorts back from
South America and, thereafter, through the outbreak of World War I,
concentrated on other projects closer to home.

Always concerned with the problem of keeping the Encyclopaedia
Britannica as up to date as possible, Hooper had proposed in 1911 that
a biennial reference book be issued, recording events of importance
and historical developments and trends in each two-year period pre-
ceding publication. For the first such book, which he hoped to publish
in 1913, he sought Chisholm as editor. As it turned out, Chisholm was
available. After he had completed his labors on the eleventh edition,
Chisholm had been asked by Lord Northcliffe if he were interested in

190 THE GREAT EB

the post of editor-in-chief of the Times. Chisholm was completely
amenable and agreed to notify Northcliffe when he returned from a
visit to the United States on a promotional campaign for the eleventh
edition. But when he did so, Chisholm found that the position had
been given to another. He readily accepted Hooper's offer, and, with
Janet Hogarth now wed to W. L. Courtney, editor of the Fortnightly
Review as his first assistant, he set out to do the job. Most of the arti-
cles in the single volume, published in 1913 as the "Britannica Year
Book, were the handiwork of contributors to the eleventh edition;
Chisholm himself was responsible for half a dozen, including a sixty-
seven-page review of English history for 1911 and 1912. The book's
subtitle was formidable: <e A Survey of the World's Progress since the
Completion in 1910 of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, Eleventh Edition,
Comprising a Register of Current Events and Additions to Knowledge
in Politics, Economics, Engineering, Industry, Sport, Law, Science, Art,
Literature, and other forms of Human Activity, National and Interna-
tional, up to the end of 1912." Of its 1,126 pages, nearly a quarter were
devoted exclusively to information about the United States, including a
diary of events of importance in 1911 and 1912, various statistical
tables, a list of the members of the Sixty-third Congress, and tabula-
tions by states of votes cast in the presidential elections of 1908 and
1912. Its reception was moderately favorable, although some quipsters,
remarking upon the speed with which it had been prepared and
issued, labeled it "Wisdom without Waiting."

Another of Hooper's ideas to stimulate wider use of the Encyclo-
paedia Britannica was the issuance of reading guides. The first of
what was intended as a series came out in 1913, a handbook containing
sixty-six courses of "systematic study or occasional reading." By use of
the guide and a set of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, readers could ob-
tain, according to the advertisements, a wide educational background.
The guide also stressed the utilitarian aspects of the Encyclopaedia
Britannica as firmly as its educational and philosophical values. The six
parts into which the guide divided the "wealth of material" to be
found in the Encyclopaedia Britannica included itemized suggestions
for "those engaged in certain occupations, or preparing for them"
farmers, dairymen, merchants, manufacturers of textiles, chemists,
insurance men, architects, printers, binders, papermakers, and "all who
love books" some thirty occupations in all; for those desiring reading
to supplement or take the place of school studies in music, ethnology,
philosophy, science, and the arts; for those interested in such "ques-

TRIUMPH AND GLOOM 191

tions of the day" as education, training of defectives, alcoholism,
trusts, finance, suffrage, or international relations; and for those seeking
information about recreation and vacations (motoring, a specimen
trip from New York to the White Mountains of Vermont, mountaineer-
ing, dancing, acting, and the like). The Encyclopaedia Britannica,
the guide emphasized, had much in it to bring light and knowledge to
children. There were scores of sample questions whose answers were
to be found in the volumes: "What makes people snore?" and "Why do
stars twinkle?" and "Why is winter colder than summer?" and many
more.

Hooper's third project, broached early in 1914, was to publish a
Junior Britannica, Mrs. Courtney and a staff were assigned to make up
a sample volume of articles taken from the senior edition and
shortened, rewritten in plainer language, and well illustrated with
photographs and drawings. Work was started, too, on a Japanese
history. Published the following year, it was an especially beautiful
volume on India paper, with fifteen hundred illustrations by Japanese
artists and many halftone plates and maps. Captain Francis Brinkley,
editor of the Japan Mail, edited it with the co-operation of Baron
Dairoku Kikuchi, former president of the Imperial University at Kyoto.
And an arrangement was put into effect in this same year to use the
plates of the ten-volume Century Dictionary for a single-volume edi-
tion on India paper, to be sold by Hooper's firm on a royalty basis.

If this period was a busy one for Hooper, it was also a fateful one.
Early in 1914, he and his associates pondered the best way of settling
all difficulties with Jackson. Business was thriving, profits were mount-
ing. As long as this continued, Hooper feared new legal onslaughts
from Jackson, despite Jackson's ever-growing concentration on pub-
lishing interests in South America. After many consultations, Hooper
decided to make one further effort to settle with Jackson. Working
through an intermediary, Frank Eagan, a friend of Jackson's and a
financier of considerable repute respected by both men, Hooper made
an offer in May, 1914, He would buy out Jackson's interests with the
implicit understanding that such a move would bar further lawsuits.
This time Jackson agreed. A settlement was effected by which Hooper
acquired his holdings in the American and British firms for a sum that,
with later adjustments and additions, eventually amounted to $900,-
000. (After his final break with Hooper, Jackson continued to prosper
in South America. When he died in 1923, two sons, H. Chapin Jackson
and W. Montgomery Jackson, disposed of their father's Grolier Society

192 THE GREAT EB

and other publishing interests and concentrated on expanding the
South American business. In the ensuing years their company, W. M.
Jackson, Inc., grew to a two-thousand-employee, $10 million firm, with
retail stores and publishing plants in eleven countries, mainly through-
out South America, with products ranging from encyclopaedias to
children's books in Spanish and Portuguese. )

Hooper made this important move with confidence that his future was
bright, that profits from his many enterprises would more than make
up the payments to his former associate. "I have a dozen other ideas
brewing," he told Chisholm, "and they'll all make money for us."
Hooper, enjoying the life of an afHuent British squire, lived in Dun-
stable with his wife and four sons on a vast country estate which he
called Cheverels. The home was staffed by many servants, and there
were two Mercedes automobiles and two chauffeurs. On the grounds
of the property were five gardens, with a gardener for each. Hooper
frequently took time off from work and legal troubles to go hunting in
Alpine forests, to charter a vessel on which to take his family for a trip
in the Norwegian fiords, or to motor through France and Italy in the
newest model automobile. He was no longer the lithe fellow who had
so startled England with his campaign for the Times reprint of the
ninth edition. In a little more than a decade, he had grown heavy
and paunchy. His once slick mustache drooped carelessly, his hair was-
patched with gray, and pince-nez spectacles covered his bright eyes.
But he was happy that his troubles with Jackson seemed over. Sales of
the eleventh edition not only in England and the United States but in
Australia, Japan, India, and other countries were high; the prospects
for paying off debts, even with the costs of legal fees and the settle-
ment with Jackson, seemed favorable; the chances for expansion of
new ideas seemed good.

But this optimistic outlook suddenly dimmed with the outbreak of
war in Europe in July, 1914. Sales began to drop sharply. The system
of collections from purchasers shuddered, shook, and virtually col-
lapsed. The idea of a children's encyclopaedia was abandoned; plans
for further biennial supplements were forgotten. The staff at the
London office was reduced to a few loyal but dejected workers.
By the time the "Lusitania" was sunk, Hooper was ready to shut down
the London office and return to the United States with his family.
Characteristically, after closing his country and town houses, he

TRIUMPH AND GLOOM 193

cabled to Germany's ambassador in the United States, Count Johann
Heinrich von Bernstorff, whom he had grown to know in connection
with acquiring certain German copyrights for the Encyclopaedia
Britannica. Informing Bernstorff that he and his family were sailing
on a Dutch ship, Hooper demanded that all German submarines be
advised of this and accordingly desist from making any torpedo attack.
As he said his farewells to Chisholm and Mrs. Courtney, he promised
to work diligently in behalf of influencing American opinion in favor
of the Allies. As for his own future, he grinned and told Mrs. Courtney,
"Don't worry. I can't be downhearted for long, even if you turn all the
lights down on me.

194 THE GREAT EB

Hooper s Last Efforts

Horace Hooper's return to the United States he and his family
settled in a large house in Morristown, New Jersey coincided with
a decisive phase of a project he had started when sales of the
Cambridge edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica slipped at the
outbreak of the war.

To an editorial conference one day in 1914 Franklin Hooper had
brought a photograph of a page from the encyclopaedia. Horace
scanned it, exclaiming over the clarity of reproduction in the photo-
graph half the size of the original page. "It's beautiful!" he cried.
"Why can't we bring out an edition that's smaller in size page by
page and sell it cheaper sell it to people who can't afford our big
one?"

On investigation, Hooper learned that such an edition could be

195

produced at less than half the cost of the larger one. Moreover, he
grew enthusiastic about the possibility of spreading the name and
fame of the Encyclopaedia Britannica into sectors of population pre-
sumably unaware of it. He found a sales and distribution medium in
the company owned by his friend and frequent golfing partner, Julius
H. Rosenwald, the Chicago millionaire and philanthropist. Rosenwald's
firm was the huge mail-order house of Sears, Roebuck and Company,
with no less than five million customers.

Hooper proposed to Rosenwald and his vice-president, Albert Loeb,
that, for a percentage of profits, the big firm should sell the photo-
graphed set through its catalogues and handle billing, credit, and col-
lections. "This will give Sears a chance to be associated with one of
the greatest trade names in history, the Encyclopaedia Britannica"
said Hooper, "and well put it out at a cost that will appeal to your
customers/" So persuasive was Hooper that he convinced both Rosen-
wald and Loeb that instalment sales of the work, which Hooper
proposed to call the Handy Volume Encyclopaedia Britannica, could
be made profitable for them.

One of Hooper's aides, James F. Patton, a Canadian, was installed
in the Sears, Roebuck and Company offices in Chicago to work out
the sales plan, and R. R. Donnelley and Sons was commissioned to
produce the cheaper set. The project was well under way by the time
Hooper returned to the United States. The Donnelley firm was busy
with a first printing of 50,000 copies, with twenty-two presses needed
to handle the text alone. Hooper promptly made himself available for
interviews, informing reporters, "I honestly believe that any young
man who takes this set of books and studies it regularly and consci-
entiously will get from it a better education than he can obtain at the
average university. And now it has been put or will soon be put
at the disposal of any young man who is willing to make a slight ef-
fort to obtain it." He affirmed and reaffirmed that any medium that
spread knowledge was important above all necessities of life. "I am
of the belief," he told reporters, "that it is immoral for valuable in-
formation to he shut off away from people. Throughout the years this
great storehouse of information, this Encyclopaedia Britannica., has
existed, but the people who needed it most could not partake of its
benefits. I believe that knowledge should be diffused. And this is the
idea back of the 'Handy Volume' edition of the Encyclopaedia Bri-
tannica the idea that we have no right to keep, by means of high
prices, this great university away from the ambitious young men and

196 THE GREAT EB

women who should be its students." Sales of the Handy Volume would
easily reach a million, Hooper estimated.

But before the sets were completed and advertising for them initi-
ated, financial reorganization was imperative. There had been many
drains on the company's working capital since publication of the
eleventh edition a few years earlier: payments to Jackson in settlement
of the vexing legal conflict, extensive costs of the litigation itself, the
sudden halt in instalment payments by many thousands of purchasers
in Great Britain with the onset of the war, and continued expenses.
Hooper was, moreover, beset by debts to British and American banks
which had made loans to him earlier, and he was heavily committed
to printers and paper-suppliers for the Handy Volume. In need of
more funds, he turned to his attorney, Samuel Untermyer, and Unter-
myer, aware of profits to be made not only from the sale of the Handy
Volume but of other possible editions to come, drew up a plan of
adjustment. In September, 1915, the Illinois firm was disbanded and
a new one organized under the laws of New York as the Encyclopaedia
Britannica Corporation, with 7,000 shares of preferred stock at $100
with an 8 per cent interest rate, and 25,000 shares, at $100 each, of
common stock. Untermyer and several associates, including his son,
Irwin, bought the 7,000 shares at $90 each, thereby yielding $630,000
in fresh capital for Hooper's new enterprise. Hooper and various of
his associates held most of the common stock.

Thus bolstered, Hooper proceeded with the Handy Volume sale.
Each book was an exact reproduction of its Cambridge edition coun-
terpart, except for narrower margins and smaller type. Whereas the
original books measured 8% by 111 inches, the present ones were
6M by 8M inches. The most attractive feature, well stressed in the
advertisements prepared by N. W. Ayer, was the price of only fifty-
five dollars, with low monthly instalments after an initial payment
of only one dollar.

Actually, Hooper seemed to be in direct competition with himself, for
sales crews under the direction of his brother-in-law, William J. Cox,
were also at work selling the more expensive edition. All this appeared
to be a replica of the "cheap book" technique developed years before
by Hooper's Chicago mentor, James Clarke, but Hooper insisted
that only through such methods could the whole company be made sol-
vent. This scheme illustrated how reluctant Hooper was to stay within

HOOPER'S IAST EFFORTS 197

the framework of a sound business, to devote himself to making it
strong and financially stable, and how eager he was for new promo-
tions and new devices. Such thinking reflected the quirk in Hooper's
character as a businessman. It had provoked the expensive clashes with
his more conservative associate, Jackson. It had propelled him toward
catastrophe several times. It might, even now, cause new calamities.

Yet the Hooper luck held for a time. From October, 1915, until
mid-1916, 55,000 sets of the Handy Volume were ordered, many of
them in rural districts where no salesman or book advertisement ever
had penetrated. And the sales of the major set suffered no harm. Cox's
crew in New York offered a good example of the kind of ingenuity
employed by encyclopaedia salesmen of that era, for this group, un-
der the direction of Cox's young son, Warren, was unusually successful
in producing orders.

Before his affiliation with the Encyclopaedia Britannica, Warren
Cox, who had theatrical yearnings, had worked with the Washington
Square players. Put in charge by his father of seventy-five salesmen
throughout New York, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey the first time
salesmen were extensively used Cox prepared a sales talk that ac-
tually was a sales act, with lines to be memorized and rarely altered.
Each prospective salesman was put through a three-week training
course. Besides the usual elements of salesmanship, Cox taught a few
extra pointers. One device was for the salesman to ask, very casually,
if the customer were interested in sheep or ships or any other subject
and, often before the prospect could even reply, quickly to look up
one of these subjects in the index volume. "Why, what d'you know?"
the salesman would blurt out. "Why, there are pages and pages on
this!" Then a quick shift to the specific volume and the precise pages
and an invitation to the customer to survey the great mass of mate-
rial.

An especially successful salesman was Charles Wollken, a former
newspaper reporter who specialized in selling to office managers. An
imposing, articulate man, Wollken strode past astonished secretaries
into inner offices, confronting amazed executives with, "Sir, I am mak-
ing a survey for a fact-gathering organization. Can you tell me who
Heraclitus was?" Rarely was the answer anything but, "I don't know."
Thereupon Wollken produced charts, pictures, and, of course, copies
of Encyclopaedia Eritannica volumes-, informed the prospect where he
could learn all about Heraclitus, then proceeded with a sales talk.
Brash as this method may have seemed, Wollken's yecprd showed

198 THE GBEAT EB

r, at least, down payments in two out of every three attempts.
He prided himself on the speed of his sales approach; he rarely spent
more than half an hour on a single prospect.

There were salesmen like Edward Noonan, who operated only in
towns near colleges. He always made arrangements with the local
druggist to work behind his soda fountain where, at opportune mo-
ments, he inveigled students and professors alike into discussions of
the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Before long, as records of the period
vividly show, Noonan managed to get a down payment; each druggist
for whom he worked shared in Noonan's commissions.

Another star salesman was Elias Manchester Boddy, who presented
himself to Cox one cold morning after arriving in a freight car from
the West Coast. Hungry and in need of a shave, Boddy asked for a
job. Cox told him, "I'll give you money for a shave and something to
eat, and 111 hire you if you can make a sale within the hour/' In far
less than the specified time, Boddy was back with a down payment
from the owner of the cigar and newspaper stand in the building at
342 Madison Avenue that housed the offices of the Encyclopaedia
Britannica.

Boddy was assigned to a district where sales were rare the Bowery.
Years later, after a career as a newspaper publisher in California,
Boddy recalled his experiences there: "I found that even the stinkiest
old flat in the heart of the Bowery often housed fine families of im-
migrants. I would work each day until I found a family with teen-age
youngsters who could speak English. I would make a date to come
back when Papa and the working brothers and sisters were home after
supper, and then I made a large chart showing how the whole family
could get a college education from a set of the Encyclopaedia Bri-
tannica. I even held classes for those who bought." Boddy established
a vastly satisfactory record by this technique, often earning as much
as $250 a week in commissions.

Boddy achieved another sales coup by convincing the top officials
in the New York police and fire departments that the Encyclopaedia
Britannica was indispensable to the efficiency of their uniformed men.
With permission of the authorities, Boddy visited one fire station and
one police station after another, striking up conversations with the
men on controversial subjects, then springing on them the informa-
tion that the final answers were all to be found in the latest edition
of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Ultimately, about 90 per cent of the
firehouses and police stations visited by Boddy were equipped with

HOOPER'S LAST EFFORTS 199

sets, for which the men paid by dropping a dime or a quarter at least
once each week into a cigar box alongside the Encyclopaedia Britan-
nica bookcase.

Critical reaction to the Handy Volume was skimpy but quite harsh
in at least one quarter. Although in the Outlook Henry Hoyt Moore
hailed it as "a handsome, impressive and remarkably compact set of
books/' another critic in the outspoken Reedy s Mirror in St. Louis
hammered away heavily. The magazine itself had already called stern
attention to the sale of the Handy Volume as "something of a swindle/'
because its price was 46 per cent below that of the original edition,
and had accused Hooper of perpetrating "the same old slippery trick."
Then, in a series of articles in the same magazine, Willard Huntington
Wright, a journalistic dilettante, a writer on art, philosophy, and aes-
thetics, and a confirmed iconoclast, made a vigorous attack upon the
eleventh edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica for being "bourgeois,
evangelical, chauvinistic, distorted and unfair." He was infuriated be-
cause some British writers, artists, and musicians received more space
than some Americans, Germans, and Russians, He listed two hundred
names he considered worthy of inclusion that were omitted. The edi-
tion, he wrote, was "a narrow, parochial, opinionated work of dubious
scholarship and striking unreliability," characterized by "misstatements,
inexcusable omissions, rabid and patriotic prejudices, personal animosi-
ties, blatant errors of fact, scholastic ignorance, gross neglect of non-
British culture, an astounding egotism, and an undisguised contempt
for American progress." Behind all this Wright spied a plot to mislead
the English-speaking public as to the achievements of Americans.

When these accusations were collected and printed under the title
of Misinforming a Nation early in 1917, Wright himself was severely
attacked for misleading statements, half-truths, and untruths. "The
confusion of thought, the mixed metaphor, the affectation of needless
and banal French words, and the spiteful and shallow temper .
pervade the book/' stated the New York Times. In the New Republic,
Francis Hackett remarked that in a work of 30,000 pages it was in-
evitable that some defects and deficiencies would appear, then added,
"It is unfortunate for Mr. Wright's remorseless purpose that he has
proceeded in an unscientific spirit and given so little objective justifica-
tion of his criticism. What he has to say is said in a nasty spirit." In
the very intellectual Dial, Henry Blake Fuller conceded to Wright

200 THE GREAT EB

the privilege of using a critical pickax on "this extensive, big-bulking
edifice" but suggested he would find it more entertaining and en-
lightening to examine virtually any other major encyclopaedia. Wright,
complained Fuller, "gets to be rather wearying and irritating. One is
irked by his disproportionate preoccupation with the arts. . . . He
clangs; he clanks/'

Despite adverse comment and the seeming competition between the
original edition and the Handy Volume., sales of the less expensive
set continued to thrive. Wages in the United States were high, unem-
ployment low. Hooper's second campaign for the Handy Volume, now
selling for sixty-five dollars, started strongly in the autumn of 1916
and improved month by month.

But with America's entry into the world conflict in 1917, President
Wilson asked that instalment buying be curtailed so as to maintain
the nation's economic stability. Among the first to be affected by this
presidential directive were those who sold subscription books and sets
on time payments. Orders for the Handy Volume dropped drastically.
Worse yet, so did the payments. The terms for the full-sized edition
went as low as five dollars down with the balance in fifty-four pay-
ments, plus a free copy of the one-volume Century Dictionary as an
added inducement. But all was to no avail. Unsold sets remained in
storage, and collections on sets sold trickled in very slowly or not at
all.

The banks which formerly had come to Hooper's aid in times of
distress now refused to renew their loans because of uncertain, war-
born financial conditions. Soon a creditors' committee was organized
under the direction of Percy Johnston of the Chemical National Bank,
and a program was mapped in which all new business was halted and
all efforts were concentrated on collecting payments due the company
and on paying debts. In June, 1918, all officers of the company except
Horace Hooper resigned, and his salary was cut from $3,500 to $1,800
a month. The creditors' committee named Charles F. Ross, nominated
by the Chemical National Bank, president; he retained Charles Whin-
ery as the man best qualified to help untangle the firm's affairs.
Together, they began calling back all sets on which customers had de-
faulted, and these now descended on the Sears, Roebuck plant in
Chicago by the thousands. In addition, scores of other customers dis-
continued payments and shipped their sets back to the company.

HOOPER'S LAST EFFORTS 201

To raise needed cash, Hooper organized a sale of many of the an-
tiques he and his wife had purchased during their years abroad. Mrs.
Hooper was an especially astute collector, and the auction, open only
to major antique dealers from all sections of the country, netted $200,-
000. To effect savings, the family moved to a smaller house in Bed-
ford Hills, Massachusetts. Although Hooper had little to do with the
operations of the Encyclopaedia Britannica all through 1918 while
the Whinery-Ross team ran the firm, he kept a watchful eye on its
affairs and knew of the progress being made in paying the greater
part of his companies' debts. Anticipating the time when the affairs
of the Encyclopaedia Britannica might be turned back to him, he
contemplated, as often before in dire situations, a plan to eliminate
future crises this time, however, a plan that would yield him no
profit but would insure the existence and integrity of his beloved
Encyclopaedia Britannica.

In March, 1919, Hooper sailed for England to seek help in carrying
out his new idea. At the Savile Club in London he outlined the de-
tails to W. Alison Phillips, Chisholm's assistant in preparing the elev-
enth edition and, since its publication, professor of modern history at
the University of Dublin.

"I think a fund should be raised to buy the Britannica and estab-
lish it as a public institution under joint control of, say, the Royal
Society and the British Academy," suggested Hooper. "In that way
the prestige of the book will be enormously increased for all time.
And the sale all over the world will bring big profits, as much maybe
as a million pounds. And that money could be used for endowing
scientific or some other kind of research. What do you think and
will you help me?"

As he had done nearly a decade earlier, when Hooper, confronted
with another financial crisis, had proposed an alignment with a major
university and had sought his aid in securing the imprimatur of Cam-
bridge, Phillips agreed to serve as an emissary. Like Hooper, Phillips
believed that if the Encyclopaedia Britannica were firmly endowed,
thereby avoiding periodic financial distress, it could be a forceful
medium for bringing together learned men of many countries and for
creating greater intellectual co-operation and better understanding
among nations.

202 THE GREAT EB

From Sir Frederic Kenyon, president of the British Academy, he
elicited approval of the general program and a promise to present it
favorably to his group. The head of the Royal Society, Sir Joseph
Thompson, was less enthusiastic, but he made it clear to Phillips that
his objections were inspired not by the nature of the plan but by the
unsuitability of the mathematical and physical articles in the volumes
for educational purposes. Yet he, too, agreed to consider the idea in
greater detail.

While these negotiations progressed, the faintly smoldering issue
that had developed over Hooper's contract with Cambridge University
for publication of the eleventh edition was publicly revived. Although
for all practical purposes the contract and the actual affiliation had
ended four years earlier with payment, incidentally, to the university
of some 16,000 as its share of royalties the university's senate, on
May 7, issued a resolution condemning the advertising still being used
in various parts of the world as "unworthy of the dignity of the Uni-
versity."

This development hampered Phillips, although he was able to bring
together Hooper, Sir Frederic, and others of the British Academy
amenable to his plan. In a meeting a month after the public announce-
ment from Cambridge, Hooper received assurances from this group
that his idea would win favor in a final consideration. Hooper also
met with the leaders of the Royal Society and was asked to draw up
a specifically detailed memorandum for their consideration. When this
was done by Phillips early the following October, the result was as
had been anticipated: the members of the British Academy voted for
it, the Royal Society voted against it. This, of course, was fatal to the
grand scheme. Although the Royal Society declined to make public
its reasons for the rejection, it was generally known that its members
still were haunted by the memory of the waspish criticism a minority
of academicians had leveled against the Cambridge Syndics when
they affiliated with Hooper. The tone and scope of advertising of all
products all over England had broadened since the first of the elev-
enth edition campaigns, so that the public now was inured to methods
far more lurid and blatant than Hooper's. "But the Royal Society, an
ancient and dignified body," wrote Phillips later, "may perhaps be
forgiven if it shrank from the prospect of being exposed to the fire of
contumelious criticism which had been so recently directed against
the University of Cambridge. It was, however, a pity."

HOOPER'S LAST EFFORTS 203

Hooper wasted little time lamenting the adverse decision emanating
from the community of scholars and educators. He turned once more
to the community of businessmen, specifically to Julius Rosenwald.

Partly because he was a good friend to Hooper and partly because
he was convinced that profits could be derived from the sale of the
Encyclopaedia Britannica, Rosenwald came to Hooper's aid. On Feb-
ruary 24, 1920, Sears, Roebuck and Company purchased the Ency-
clopaedia Britannica's copyrights, plates, unsold volumes, and as-
sorted merchandise for $1,330,000, retaining Hooper as publisher.
Heartened, Hooper proposed that a three-volume supplement to the
eleventh edition be prepared, and to this Rosenwald assented. A
month after the purchase he signed a contract with Hooper by which
the enterprising bookman was advanced $325,000 to prepare the sup-
plement not later than December, 1922.

With the enthusiasm that had characterized all his previous efforts,
Hooper swept into the new job. Once more he recruited Hugh Chis-
holm as editor. Since publication of the 1913 yearbook, Chisholm had
been on the staff of the Times, not as editor-in-chief as he had once
anticipated, but in various subsidiary editorial posts, in each of which
he had served with distinction. But when Hooper, in a chance meet-
ing with Chisholm at New York's Lotus Club, offered him the editor-
ship of the supplement, Chisholm accepted and sailed for England
to assemble a staff. Once again, he hired Mrs. Courtney as his first
assistant, and the High Holborn offices were reopened, cleaned,
dusted, and made ready.

The theme of the volumes, Hooper wrote Mrs. Courtney, must be
"The Wonderful Decade." "These volumes ought to be made up so
that the history of the War dominates the whole book. I am hoping
that it will be made so that people will want to buy it just for its
history of the War, whether they own the Britannica or not . . . We
cannot afford, of course, to ignore men like Lloyd George, President
Wilson and many others, but men who are on the border line, and
really ought to have an article and are not very important, we can
well afford to miss without it bothering us! The same remarks apply
to a great many other subjects, but we cannot get the military side
or the historical side too well done. Literature, for instance, is one of
the subjects that can be passed over with great ease and not do much
harm, and it is quite within a possibility that this is true of art. Of

204 THE GREAT EB

course, you understand, that I do not mean that these articles should
be ignored, but I mean that a great deal of space should not be
given to them."

Hooper obviously intended to take a more active editorial interest
in the supplement than he had in any of its predecessors. He insisted
that Chisholm make an earnest effort to recruit as contributors men
who had played vital roles in the recent war, both in friendly and in
enemy nations. George Saunders, formerly correspondent for the Times
in Berlin, aided in enlisting German contributors and supervised trans-
lation of their writings. Contributors of repute included the president
of the new republic of Czechoslovakia, Thomas Masaryk; Professor
Henri Pirenne, rector of the University of Ghent in Belgium; Pro-
fessor L. V. Birck of Copenhagen; H. N. Bronmer of the Nether-
lands legation in London; Baron Alstromer, the Swedish charge d'af-
faires in London; and Erik Colbran, an official of the League of
Nations.

Hooper left the United States for London in April, 1921, to be
closer to the editorial operation; the final volumes were still to be
printed by the Donnelley firm in Chicago. He worked long hours in
the High Holborn office he now shared with Chisholm; the summer
was a dry, hot one, and he sat at his roll-top desk in his- shirtsleeves,
poring over piles of proofs, occasionally consulting with Chisholm,
often calling out in his high-pitched voice for a messenger or an edi-
torial assistant.

In that year he brought over his eldest son, Horace, Jr., and put
him to work around the office. Young Hooper, a freshman at Williams
College, had been summoned by his father two days before his final
examinations. He was given a small salary and an allowance of two
pounds a week for clipping coupons in the circulation department
and writing preliminary advertisements under the direction of the re-
enlisted Henry Haxton. Later young Hooper went out on the road
with sales crews, invading such cities as Manchester, Leeds, Birming-
ham, and Edinburgh. In each he paid for advertisements in the largest
newspapers and in exchange was permitted to set up a display and
desk in the lobby of the newspaper office. There he sat, ready to
answer difficult questions asked him by merely flipping the index of
the eleventh edition and finding the proper section in the proper
volume. Everywhere but in Edinburgh the instalment plan was con-
sidered a boon; in that city the thrifty customers generally scorned
the "easy payments" and offered full cash.

HOOPER'S LAST EFFORTS 205

Another member of Horace Hooper's family also joined him his
brother-in-law, William J. Cox, who, since suspension of business in
the dreary months of 1918, had prospered as the vice-president of a
plumbing supply firm. Cox was reluctant to leave the certainties of
pipes and faucets for the uncertainties of the unpredictable encyclo-
paedia business-, but Hooper made him an offer of $10,000 a year to
become American sales manager, with a commission practically guar-
anteed to yield another $10,000 or $15,000, Besides, he was assured
that he need stay with the Encyclopaedia Britannica only six months.
"I just want you to help get things going," Hooper told him, "and
then you can go back."

But Cox was never to return to the plumbing supply company.
Working long hours, eating irregularly, Hooper suffered a mild heart
attack late in 1921, Harassed by myriad details, be had grown in-
creasingly fretful with his subordinates, even snapping at his son. Al-
though he tried to relax from the strain of preparing the supplement
by playing bridge almost every night in his suite at Claridge's, he
grew tense and harried. When the attack came, he was advised by
his physicians to shift some of his responsibilities- and duties; so Cox
was named president of the company. But Hooper, as might be ex-
pected, retained active direction even when he was compelled to rest
a few hours each day in his rooms.

Orders for the supplement came in rapidly. Sixty-five thousand
copies of this so-called twelfth edition, comprising the three new vol-
umes plus the eleventh edition, were to be sold in the next four
years. But even his curtailed activities proved too arduous- for Hooper.
In March, 1922, after the first two volumes had been issued and com-
mendably received, he was stricken again and ordered back to New
York. From his hospital bed, especially when he appeared to be im-
proving, he retained his interest in the project, cabling his congratu-
lations when the third and final volume was issued on May 6, then
writing to Chisholm and Mrs. Courtney about the possibility of pub-
lishing reading guides for use with the edition. Released from the
hospital with a warning from his doctors to rest for a good part of
each day, he still mapped out other projects. He grew steadily worse,
and on June 13 came another seizure, this one fatal

There were tributes and estimates. Some called him a genius, others
marveled at the combination in him of hard businessman and idealist.

206 THE GREAT EB

In retrospect, Hooper's flair for sales showmanship and promotional
devices was his strongest point. As his career proved, he shied away,
as Walter Jackson rarely did, from carrying on the day-to-day duties
essential to the operation of a business enterprise. His interest in the
diffusion of education verged on the fanatic. To some of his critics, he
appeared as "a ranker who loved to be accepted as a gentleman/' But
this, even if true, was a small part of his total personality, Essentially
Horace Hooper was a master salesman and a dazzling innovator,
passionately devoted to the important product he had to sell, always
certain that he could create in a vast public the desire for that prod-
uct, convinced to the end that as a medium of popular education his
Encyclopaedia Britannica was without a peer. He recognized, in his
time, the popular thirst for knowledge, and he devised a means of
satisfying that thirst and of stimulating it further.

In its editorial on his death, the New York Times offered an apt
evaluation: "In the view of the public, his success lay in the origi-
nality, boldness and brilliance of his operations. But that was merely
the surface. The deeper source was his faith in the intelligence and
the ambition of a great mass of citizens. Many professional educators
of note have done less than he toward popular enlightenment."

HOOPER'S LAST EFFORTS 207

Part Three

Prelude to 1929

For most of the decade after Horace Hooper's death, the affairs of
the Encyclopaedia Britannica were directed by William J, Cox, whose
on-and-off service had been of considerable value ever since 1901
when Hooper had first summoned him to London. Unlike Hooper in
personality or temperament, Cox, a lean and lithe man, was taciturn
and reserved. He never smoked, and no underling ever dared ap-
proach him with cigarette or cigar in hand. Like Hooper, Cox had
little formal education, but as a young salesman in his pre-encyclo-
paedia days he had obtained this high-school diploma by attending
special classes at Columbia University and had gone on to take col-
lege courses in law, civics, and economics. An avid reader, he, too,
had great respect for writers- and scholars. That he was an able sales
executive had been shown by his direction of the campaign for the

211

Handy Volume. Whether his ideas and methods could sustain and
nourish the company and the encyclopaedia itself now remained to
be seen.

One of Cox's first acts was to exhort Rosenwald to sell back the
Encyclopaedia Britannica to him and Mrs. Hooper, to whom Horace
Hooper had left his shares of stock in the encyclopaedia company be-
sides $250,000 in life insurance. Rosenwald was easily persuaded; in
the wake of the postwar depression, he had already taken severe ac-
tion in slashing expenses and in cutting down on ownership of fac-
tories and other subsidiaries. In August, 1923, for the comparatively
small sum of $265,000, ownership of the encyclopaedia reverted to
Cox and Mrs. Hooper. The ledgers of Sears, Roebuck showed that
in the venture since 1920 the mail-order concern had sustained losses
of $1,800,000.

Now Cox president of the newly formed company at $25,000 a
year withdrew the Handy Volume from the market and issued a
"New Form Edition." It combined two volumes of the Cambridge edi-
tion into one, with narrower page margins, and, priced at only $100,
amassed a respectable * sale of some twenty-five thousand in the
United States and Great Britain in the next two years. In 1924, under
Cox's stimulus, there was- published a two-volume collection of articles
by eighty journalists, statesmen, military leaders, and various world
figures, all reputed authorities in their respective fields. These Event-
ful Years, Cox called it, and its subtitle read "The Twentieth Century
in the Making as Told by Many of Its Makers." Although there actu-
ally was little new or vital in this compendium, its interest historically
and for future generations of encyclopaedists lay in the attempts
to secure contributions from those importuned to write for it and,
frequently, in what they had to say for themselves.

George Bernard Shaw was one such prospect. He was asked by
Franklin Hooper, whom Cox appointed to edit the volumes, to write
on "Communism in Russia" at what Hooper described as "the maximum
Britannica rate." Shaw replied with mock modesty that such an assign-
ment was quite beyond his abilities. "I do not know what has hap-
pened in Russia," he wrote, "and cannot find out. Even if I were to
visit Russia, as I have been invited to do, I should come back not
much wiser than I went as to the economic moral of the experiment.
Besides, the experiment is not yet consummated. I have not the least

212 THE GREAT EB

notion of what 'the maximum Britannica rate' comes to in figures;
but situated as I am at present, with a heavy budget of permanently
remunerative work waiting to be completed, I do not believe that
anything I could do for you would be worth what it would cost you
to induce me to do it. None the less, I am much obliged to you for
the invitation to contribute, and I should do the particular job you
propose for its own sake if I were qualified to do it justice."

Also unable to accept Hooper's invitation, but for different reasons,
was the great Hindu nationalist leader, Mohandas K. Gandhi. In reply
to a letter requesting an article on his passive resistance movement
came an official note from the Home Department, Bombay Castle,
India, informing Hooper that prisoners were permitted to write and
receive only one letter each month, limited strictly to private matters,
and that it was "not possible, therefore, to pass on your letter to
prisoner M. K. Gandhi." The gentle militant was then serving a term
for "conspiring to overthrow the government," a sentence soon to be
commuted after an emergency operation for appendicitis.

Several experts agreed to contribute but later declined because of
their enmity toward other contributors, fimile Bourgeois, the French
historian, was on a lecture tour in America when Hooper asked him
to write the chapter on modern French history. He was on the point
of assenting when, almost as an afterthought, he asked, "Who are
some of the others who will contribute?" Hooper told him, "Well,
Signor Nitti, the former premier of Italy, is one, and . . ." Bourgeois
yelled, "Nitti! ?I Pah!" Then Hooper mentioned the name of James
Louis Garvin, the editor of the London Observer. Bourgeois shouted,
"Garvin! Garvin!! I will not contribute! I cannot be in the same book
with Monsieur Garvin. He said that France was imperialistic!" Despite
his refusal, Bourgeois calmed down long enough to recommend as
his replacement Albert Thomas, who had held half a dozen jobs in the
French government.

Several contributors expressed surprise when they learned they
would be paid. "I am keeping the check," wrote Dr. James Brown
Scott, the expert on international law, "although I must say that I
did not expect anything except a copy of the volume in which the
article appeared. . . . You are setting a very pleasant but dangerous
precedent. However, do not let it worry you, as it will not be held
against you." Two other contributors returned their checks: Ambassa-
dor M. Hanihara for his article on "Japan" and Dr. Wellington Koo
for his on "China." "I do not wish it to appear," explained Hanihara,

PRELUDE TO 1929 213

"that I have written for a pecuniary consideration, but I am quite
satisfied with your assurance that it has, in some measure, helped to
complete the proposed publication."

A number of contributors notably the Germans made various stip-
ulations before assenting. Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz, the "German
sea dog/' agreed to write on the German navy only on condition that
These Eventful Years contain no vilification of his country; in his
reply, Hooper indicated his willingness to comply, but added, "I must
be the judge of what constitutes vilification of Germany." General
Erich von Ludendorff, the erratic chief -of-staff of the wartime Ger-
man army, insisted that all letters be written to him in German,
although he was capable of reading and corresponding in half a dozen
languages, including English. Assigned to furnish a general article on
the German army, Von Ludendorff wrote instead on "Germany Never
Defeated," in which he expounded the thesis that his country's loss
was due, not to America's entry into the war, but to "the damnable
precept of German social democracy." Another kind of German was
the antimilitaristic Maximilian Harden, twice imprisoned under the
German imperial regime. Hooper sent half a dozen letters before
he finally tracked down Harden and secured his agreement to write
on "Germany's Place in the Sun," Evidently fearful of assassination,
Harden asked that no extracts from his chapter be published sepa-
rately. "I am obliged to add to this remark because a misrepresenta-
tion could result by this/' he explained, "and in the strange condi-
tions of our life, an earnest danger would result! My bitter experi-
ence in these affairs teaches me to be careful."

From Sigmund Freud, Hooper obtained an article on his methods
of psychoanalysis. From Bertrand Russell came an incisive discussion
of government by propaganda. The central figures in the Battle of
Jutland, Admiral John Jellicoe and Admiral Reinhard Scheer, de-
scribed that decisive naval encounter. John Foster Dulles, then coun-
sel to the American Peace Commission, wrote on reparations; Bernard
Baruch, on the Allied debts; H. G. Wells made "A Forecast of the
World's Affairs/' Half a dozen women were among the contributors,
most notably Mme Marie Curie, who wrote about radium, and Lady
Rhondda, an active British feminist. Not only did Lady Rhondda en-
gage in frequent transatlantic arguments with Hooper about changes
in her article on the subject she knew best, but she held back the
proofs when they appeared with the working title of "The Triumph
of Women/' Her sex, she insisted, had not yet obtained a complete

214 1HE GBEAT EB

triumph and any article bearing her name and that title would mis-
lead scores of ladies who should be busy at the feminist ramparts. Not
until Hooper agreed to permit her to alter the title did she return
the corrected proofs; the heading then read, "The Political Awakening
of Women."

This firm reliance on internationally recognized specialists in contem-
porary matters as well as timeless subjects prevailed through the thir-
teenth edition, which consisted of the basic eleventh edition plus
three volumes to replace those issued in the last months of Horace
Hooper's life. In addition to the continued concentration on such con-
tributors, this edition included more articles relating to the United
States and the Western Hemisphere.

Cox began preparations for the thirteenth edition in 1925, selecting
as editor James Louis Garvin, the Irish-born journalist whose writings
in the London Observer intrigued him. Garvin, then fifty-seven, had
been a leading editorialist for the Newcastle Chronicle at twenty-
three, and then for over a decade had written brilliantly on literature,
politics, and foreign affairs for the Fortnightly Review. Since 1907 he
had been editor of Lord Northcliffe's Observer, and that publisher
considered him one of the world's greatest living journalists. Garvin
had worked miracles with Northcliffe's newspaper, a moribund weekly
journal when he assumed editorship. By making it a blend of news-
paper and magazine, devoting as much space to literature, music, art
and drama as to news and opinion, he managed, in a few years, to
increase its circulation tenfold to a quarter of a million copies. Few
British journalists wrote about America with such comprehensive and
sympathetic understanding, and during the war Garvin had been one
of the ablest interpreters of the American point of view to Great
Britain.

It was Garvin's pro-American attitude that persuaded Cox to offer
him the editorship at $10,000 a year. In a letter praising his Ob-
server articles and asking him to lunch at the Reform Club in Lon-
don, Cox wrote, "You are the one friend of America I have met in
high British circles." As editor, Garvin was assured absolute authority.
"Nothing will go in that you say won't go in," promised Cox.

So important was the appointment of Garvin considered in the
United States that the New York Times devoted a full column to the
announcement under the by-line of its London correspondent, T. R.

PRELTOE TO 1929 215

Ybarra. An editorial followed in which Americans were advised that
they had "the best of reasons" for taking an interest in Garvin's selec-
tion. "Naturally," stated the editorial, "die exuberance of his pen and
the confidence of his prophecies will have to be somewhat restrained
when he passes from current journalism to the sober and enduring
record of science and history. But there can be no question of his
competence for the work he is now to undertake, whether on the
score of intellectual ability, knowledge of who the experts are whom
he must call upon, or executive aptitudes. Those who know him best
are most sure that he will both command success and deserve it."

Garvin made his intentions explicit in a number of interviews. Not
only would the encyclopaedia continue to be based on scholarship
and learning, he said, but "the deliberate design is to restore inter-
national unity in these matters of intellectual co-operation, which was
broken by war and has remained too long and too widely interrupted
in peace." He hoped, too, that the new edition would be more cos-
mopolitan "to help to accumulate what may be called the common
stock of civilization."

Because of his journalistic background, Garvin was expected by
many observers to change the writing style of his contributors for
easier reading. But when a reporter asked him, "Do you intend to
jazz up the set?" Garvin grinned and replied, "Well, I've asked Albert
Einstein to do the section on space and time." The Brooklyn Eagle
commented, "Anyone who has tried to read Einstein will sigh with
relief. There can be no danger that the new editor plans to make
the EB light reading for light heads." With a newspaperman's eye for
contemporary events, Garvin asked Leon Trotsky, then carrying on
bitter ideological battles with his archfoe, Joseph Stalin, to write the
biography of Lenin, the father of the Russian Revolution. Trotsky
turned in the article, a reasonably accurate and unimpassioned one,
and received $106 for it a few months before he was banished to
Turkistan.

In the United States, where Franklin Hooper still served as Ameri-
can editor, a striking array of experts in varied fields was recruited.
H. L. Mencken, Henry Seidel Canby, Robert Morss Lovett, Carl Van
Doren, Louis Untermeyer, and W. E. B. DuBois divided among them
the subject of "American Literature." The point of view in their arti-
cles, from Mencken's on the American language to Untermeyer's on
the new poetry of Edgar Lee Masters, Vachel Lindsay, Edna St.
Vincent Millay, and Edwin Arlington Robinson, was clearly liberal,

216 THE GREAT EB

stressing the spirited life of American literature and reflecting the
modern flow of ideas. In other fields, there were articles by other
well-known Americans: Henry Ford's on mass production, actually
ghost-written for the auto magnate by Samuel Crowther; Harry Hou-
dini's on conjuring; Andrew Mellon's on finance; Amos Alonzo Stagg's
on football; Colonel E. M. House's on the Paris Peace Conference;
Bernard Baruch's on war debts; and General Lincoln Andrews' on
bootlegging and liquor smuggling. Contemplating all this, Bartlett
Cormack, in the Bookman, wrote, "Hail, Columbia! The Great Au-
thority has gone modern, and, significantly, American, with an en-
thusiasm and to an extent that must shiver the timbers of the Old
Subscribers of both England and the United States who have used
that encyclopaedia to assure themselves that whatever is true is dead,
and sung, 'Rule, Britannica!' when any question of authority lurched
up to disturb the Conservative Peace."

What that bitter critic Willard Huntington Wright now had to say,
in view of his earlier charges of the encyclopaedia's anti- Americanism,
was undetermined. Wright was busy in other fields. Under the
pseudonym of S. S. Van Dine, he had become the author of a series
of best-selling murder mysteries, occasionally contributing articles to
magazines on the theme, "I Used to Be a Highbrow."

Like Cormack, C. K. Ogden, an especially astute critic, in a lengthy
review in the Saturday Review of Literature expressed satisfaction
with "a notable advance ... in all that pertains to the American
scene. . . . The gradual widening of the Britannica horizon is also
evident in the effort to meet the needs of the average family as well
as of the librarian and the specialist. Never, we feel, has such a com-
prehensive record of human endeavor been offered in so small a com-
pass. . . . For, when all is said, these 5,000,000 words are a more
worthy record of our time than anything that has hitherto been pub-
lished." The liberal Nation, commending the edition, sarcastically com-
mented on the joint dedication of the edition to President Calvin
Coolidge and King George V: "This majestic panorama of the world's
knowledge, this grand survey of the terrestrial globe from the Aaland
Islands to the Zuyder Zee, this great cooperative effort of the patience
and learning of our civilization is dedicated, humbly and "by per-
mission,' to a pair of amiable gentlemen neither majestic nor learned
George of England and Calvin of America. Not since the present

PRELUDE TO 1929 217

Prince of Wales assumed Ms presidency of the Royal Society has any
such cosmic joke been solemnly perpetrated."

In a long and thoughtfully detailed analysis, an anonymous critic
in the New York Times maintained that for all the trumpeting about
a more readable style, a certain abstruse quality was still evident in
many of the articles that made up the three new volumes. This was
especially true of the scientific articles, the reviewer wrote, thereby
emphasizing a perennial hazard of encyclopaedists. "And the trouble
... has always been that on the one hand they tell the expert nothing
except what he already ought to know, while on the other hand their
terms are so technical that to one who is not an expert they tell little
or nothing/' Unlike previous critics, this one had a suggestion on how
to overcome this defect. "Of this perplexity it is perhaps presumptu-
ous to suggest a solution. But we are impressed by the success with
which the similar situation is mastered by the authorities who deal
with literature. They make no attempt to summarize the poems, the
novels, the dramas and the other books which have been produced
within the period under consideration, but are content to offer sign-
posts for the guidance of the student who must himself consult the
masterpieces, so indicated. We have thus not a photograph of the
country to be traversed, but a map with the roads clearly marked. We
cannot but think that the same method of reference applied to science
might save a good deal of valuable space and yield what is really
needed in an encyclopaedia. To summarize in a page or two the most
recent developments of mathematics is, after all, a hopeless task. But
it is not hopeless within a page or two for a great mathematician to
give invaluable guidance, at once to authorities like himself and to
students, as to where the latest developments are most responsibly
stated."

Despite defects he deplored, the reviewer made certain in his full
evaluation to note the encyclopaedia's good attributes. "These criti-
cisms," he concluded, "are doubtless outspoken. It must be remem-
bered always that the production of the Britannica is largely a labor
of love and that it represents an immense sacrifice of time and energy
on the part of world-wide comradeship of erudition. Criticism is in-
tended, then, to be constructive. It is animated only by the belief that
the Britannica, as it stands, represents a service to society the im-
portance of which it is not easy to estimate. The book is one which
should be available for every boy and girl of ability. It should be

218 THE GREAT EB

placed in the home, and, when placed, it should be used. The auto-
mobile, after all, carries you only a part of the way. Here is a vehicle
which travels over all time and all space, an observation car whence
you can survey the universe."

TO 1929 219

Monument of Learning

Diligently, Cox read every word in the reviews of the thirteenth edi-
tion and sensed, quite accurately, that the times demanded strong
editorial action. So he embarked on a major undertaking: prepara-
tion of a fourteenth edition. Its production ultimately would involve
thirty-five hundred contributors., hundreds of office and editorial
workers in New York, and scores of typographers, engravers, and
printers in Chicago; its cost finally would amount to $2,500,000; it
would contain great masses of new material, and its publication would,
for that era, climax the growing trend in what would be described,
approvingly or regretfully, as the "humanization" of the Encyclopaedia
Britannica.

For this complex undertaking, Garvin was selected as editor-in-
chief, Franklin Hooper as American editor. Besides close editorial as-

220

sociates in their respective offices, each had twenty-seven departmen-
tal advisers. Garvin's included Julian Huxley for biology and zoology,
Dr. Abraham Wolf, professor of logic and scientific method at the
University of London, for philosophy and psychology, and Captain
B. H. Liddell Hart, military historian, for military affairs and avia-
tion. Hooper's advisory board included John Dewey for philosophy,
Roscoe Pound, dean of Harvard Law School, for law, and Dr. Isaiah
Bowman, director of the American Geographical Society, for geogra-
phy.

While these men and their associates drew up lists of potential con-
tributors, Garvin and Hooper, by letter and by personal conference,
discussed methods and format. "Constructing an encyclopaedia," Gar-
vin noted, "is like building a battleship. One wants to have the heavi-
est armor in existence to keep out all torpedoes and shells. One wants
to have the biggest guns in existence to sink all other ships, and one
wants to have enough coal space to sail all around the world very fast.
All of these wants cannot be fulfilled. Something has to be sacrificed."
Such dedication to sacrifice had to prevail, especially when contribu-
tors who were requested to scale down their articles harangued
and even threatened Garvin or Hooper. Both agreed that the distinc-
tive style of the Encyclopaedia Britannica must be maintained, with
a large number of headings and with articles of reasonable length.
"EB must not become merely a dictionary," warned Garvin. He ob-
jected occasionally to the cutting up of long articles into too many
divisions, although Cox, who took an active part in the preliminary
preparation, insisted that such a practice would make it easier for
readers who neglected the index. It was Cox's steadfast idea that the
volumes be made usable for the greatest possible number. "Personally
I can't understand," he wrote to Garvin, "why anyone should object to
making a book for the many instead of a book for the -few"

Financing such a project seemed a monumental task. Certainly not
enough revenue could be derived from sales of previous editions or
special publications, and Cox balked at negotiating bank loans.
While the contributors were being selected and preliminary editorial
preparations made, Cox sought to persuade the University of Chicago
to take over the company and publish the forthcoming edition in con-
junction with Cambridge University, if the British institution could
be induced to renew its connections with the Encyclopaedia Bri-
tannica. Supported by a promise from Julius Rosenwald of a gift of
$1,000,000 to the University of Chicago, Cox opened informal discus-

**A MONUMENT OF LEABNING*' 221

sions with Max Mason, the university's president, and some of the
trustees. But the plan fell through, primarily because a majority of
the trustees, despite Rosenwald's proposals, expressed doubts that the
amount was adequate for a new edition or that the university would
be able to manage such a business competently. So, as he had done
with Hooper, Rosenwald continued to help Cox. At Rosenwald's
behest, Charles Kittle, then president of Sears, Roebuck and Company,
agreed to purchase ten-year, 7 per cent, sinking fund gold debentures
for $1,064,000, a sum Cox insisted would be more than enough to
see the proposed new edition to completion. He was heartened, too,
by Rosenwald's assurance, "Don't worry about money. Don't put a
limit on cash. Get out the best encyclopaedia you can."

In April, 1927, Cox set September, 1929, as a final publication
deadline, slyly although inaccurately warning his editors and staff
members that, unless the work were ready by that time, R. R. Don-
nelley and Sons, the printers in Chicago, would fine the firm $1,000
a day for every day's delay. Once again he assured Garvin that he
intended to keep away from the editorial phases of production and
concentrate primarily on drawing up an extensive sales campaign. "I
do hope," he wrote to Garvin, "that we will have an encyclopaedia
that will be more popular in its appeal than the eleventh edition.
You are free, of course, to do as you wish. But I think that all defi-
nitions should be in the simplest possible language and all processes
described in a clear way and illustrated as far as possible and in
general more things should be expressed with pictures."

In London, editorial offices were established on Regent Street in the
Imperial House nicknamed the "Monkey House" as pressures
mounted each month. Garvin was a talented journalist but not efficient
as an editorial organizer, especially for so complex an undertaking.
In all the time it took to prepare the edition, he appeared at the
editorial headquarters on no more than a dozen occasions. He pre-
ferred to work at his home, Gregories once occupied by Edmund
Burke in Beaconsfield, some twenty-five miles from London. To this
house he summoned his editorial aides. The most prominent among
them were two bright young newspaper writers, E. Ibbetson James,
the managing editor, and Raymond W. Postgate, a departmental edi-
tor who, besides newspaper work, had written books on a variety of
subjects, his most recent being Murder, Piracy and Treason. In the

222 THE CHEAT EB

office as a managerial aide was Mrs. Margaret Dorothy Law, whose
earlier experience working with high-powered personalities had been
gained as an advertisement writer for Harry Gordon Selfridge, the
Chicago merchant who had come to London with revolutionary ideas
about retail salesmanship and, after a cool reception, had finally been
brilliantly successful with his American-style department store on Ox-
ford Street.

From Gregories, Garvin issued a multitude of instructions, messages,
advice, warnings, and admonitions to his editors and subeditors. To
Gregories were transmitted perplexing problems, controversies over
space allotments, and requests for permission to reject articles. These
missives were pasted into large ledger books, later comprising what
came to be known in Encyclopaedia Britannica archives as "Garvin's
Bible," a full record of methods and problems involved in creating an
encyclopaedia and an instructive guide for future editors.

In "Garvin's Bible" was his admonition that in articles about com-
panies no mention be made of profits or dividends; and since many
such editorial contributions came from presidents of the firms them-
selves, this seemed a wise precaution for the sake of objective informa-
tion. In an article about Swinburne, Garvin noted that the word "mag-
nificent" ought to be omitted from what was otherwise an excellent
analysis: "It is almost a supreme word deserved by few, not by him,
he is resplendent, a different thing." In larger matters he was equally
careful, as in the article on H. G. Wells by Ellis Roberts; he ordered
it scrapped because he thought it might offend Wells by its rather
snobbish tone. (If he was aware of this order, Wells scarcely recipro-
cated, for when the edition was published, he was among its most
ungenial critics, an attitude ascribed by mutual acquaintances to his
animosity in political matters toward Garvin, whom Wells character-
ized as "a volcano erupting gruel.") Garvin was watchful, among
other things, of the wording and tone of captions to appear beneath
the work's many photographs. At one time he dispatched Postgate to
New York to scrutinize all captions lest they smack of journalistic sen-
sationalism. "To an educated mind," he wrote Postgate, "they often
seem crude, sometimes not quite so literate as to English, and con-
veying notions like those of an old-fashioned elementary school. . . .
These texts are singled out of the pictures and upon their prominence
the eye falls. People might easily get the idea from this (before they
had the time to go through the EB pages ) that the whole work was
on a low standard of writing and thinking, whereas it is on a very

"A MONUMENT OF LEABNING" 223

high one" From his store of varied facts about widely assorted sub-
jects, Garvin was able to discourse as authoritatively with a subeditor
about whether Burmese woodcarving was superior to Japanese wood-
carving as about the precise personality quirks of a historical figure.
Asked whether he approved a biography of William Congreve, the
Restoration playwright, he replied, "Yes I do, very much, but knock
out that utterly false touch about 'carpet slippers' no mind was less
soft, he was marble in style, love and money." When Franklin Hooper
sent on a long article on "Etiquette," Garvin replied tartly, "In no
case, unfortunately, can I accept any responsibility for the article. It
would be parodied in Punch, caricatured right and left, make us all
superbly ridiculous and knock down the reputation of the EB. It
might well appear in a quite different kind of publication, for in it-
self it is not ill done; but it is quite impossible for it to appear in any
kind of publication associated with my name. It must be omitted. I
deeply regret to say this."

The inevitable and vexing problems of allotment of space were usu-
ally settled amicably, if after many exchanges of letters and cables.
Nearly all contributors wrote more than their assigned number of
words. Most accepted the order to do their own editing calmly
enough, but occasionally a rebel protested. When Dr. Cloudesley
Brereton, the British educator, was asked by Hooper to cut his article
on "Schools and Curriculum," he stormed into the "Monkey House"
and announced to all around him, "I shall fight to the last ditch any
suggestion that the article be killed or a single word deleted from it!
If Mr. Hooper is not willing to take my declaration to this effect, I
shall appeal to Mr. Garvin. If Mr. Garvin supports Mr. Hooper, I
shall then air the whole matter in the public press, and if this fails,
I shall print, at my own cost, a pamphlet stating the whole case and
distribute it gratis!" Because there was nothing essentially erroneous
in the article and the reduction in length had been suggested only to
save space, a solution was achieved by cutting elsewhere in the edi-
tion, thereby avoiding the trouble threatened by the blustery peda-
gogue.

Another who caused difficulties was Lord Dunsany, the Irish poet
and novelist. An expert chess-player, he had agreed to write on
"Chess Problems." When his article arrived, it was in his highly indi-
vidualistic style, but it had virtually none of the technical details
about the subject itself; its opening line read, "The chess problem
which may be described as the critical position in a supposititious game

224 THE GREAT EB

of chess when one's antagonist announces, 'Mate!' in a given number
of moves, no matter what defence you adopt is to the game of chess
what poetry is to conversation." Lord Dunsany not only refused to
alter a single word, but he maintained a rigid attitude about his stylis-
tic innovations. A subeditor appealed to Garvin for advice. "Tell Lord
Dunsany," counseled Garvin, "that to our great regret our printers
inform us that they are far past the word 'Chess* and have been com-
pelled to leave a blank space and that completion is urgent. The only
thing left for us is to arrange for a new and shorter article, though
Lord Dunsany's honorarium will of course be remitted to him/' He
then advised the subeditor to call a local chess club and ask the secre-
tary to write "a compact and unvarnished article of not more than 500
words."

Cox's son, Warren, who had turned to painting and lampshade man-
ufacturing after his service in World War I, had been named art
editor of the edition, and he proposed to Garvin that at least a third
of all the space be devoted to art including lampshade-making. But
Garvin allotted a total of only 250 pages, adamantly insisting that
within these prescribed limits the subject could be adequately treated.
Yet when Hooper proposed that the general article on painting be
eliminated in favor of concentration only on specific artists, Garvin
cabled him: "Astounded procedure disastrously foolish destroying edi-
torial responsibility and Britannica character. Even Chambers Ency-
clopaedia has good general article on painting as on music. Absolutely
indispensable otherwise we would be hooted by every European
country." On another artistic matter, Garvin was curtly stubborn. The
Westminster Catholic Federation wrote demanding that Paul Gauguin's
painting of the Madonna be omitted from the edition. Replied Garvin:
"We wish to thank you very courteously for your letter. Our arrange-
ments do not permit of change."

Beyond anticipated difficulties and normal complications, certain
scandals threatened for a time to hold up production. In the spring
of 1928 it appeared that some 100,000 words on economic matters
might be delayed when Sir Leo Chiozza Money, the dapper and
brilliant economist and member of Parliament serving as departmental
editor for economics, was arrested with a Miss Irene Savidge on a
charge of engaging in improper conduct in Hyde Park. Both were
freed in court, but a parliamentary inquiry stirred the land when the
police were accused of having used third-degree methods in forcing
Miss Savidge to testify against Sir Leo. What concerned Garvin and

**A MONUMENT OF LEARNING" 225

his editors, however, was the delay this unsavory event caused in
the production of the articles Sir Leo was scheduled to procure. De-
spite their qualms, the economist managed to turn in all his assigned
material just as the other articles for the volume were being put on a
steamer to the United States en route to the Donnelley plant in Chi-
cago. Another unexpected mishap delayed the articles on the geog-
raphy of art. The French expert to whom they had been assigned
was surprised in his mistress' flat by her husband and was shot and
seriously wounded; the police padlocked his apartment for several
weeks during the course of the investigation.

In the United States, Franklin Hooper, a modest and somewhat prud-
ish man, was shocked by these scandals; he was the kind of editor who
frowned even on such a phrase as "pregnant with possibilities." But
he was too occupied with his phase of the imposing task to spend
much time bemoaning the morals of contributors. He and his closest
aides, notably Walter Pitkin of Columbia University, kept to the job
of obtaining needed articles, reading and inevitably scaling them
down to required size, and sending them on to the printers.

In the months before publication, considerable interest was centered
on celebrities who had been recruited to write for the edition, although
such contributors constituted an infinitesimal percentage of the total
list. Among the newcomers famed more for their exploits than for
scholarship were Gene Tunney, the heavyweight champion, assigned
to write on "Boxing"; Irene Castle, the ballroom dancer, on "Dancing";
Alfred E. Smith, on "New York"; Helen Wills, on "Tennis"; S. L.
"Roxy" Rothafel, the theater magnate, on "Stage Lighting"; and Al-
fred DunhiU, on "Tobacco Pipes." Lon Chaney, the movies' "man of
a thousand faces," and Otis Skinner, the American actor, collaborated
on "Make-up," and Lillian Gish and other motion-picture players wrote
on their profession. A New York Times editorial reacted to this "knock-
out idea" with considerable skepticism. "The man who has made
the most money in Wall Street," it stated, "would probably not be
the best encyclopaedia authority on the stock market. The richest man
in the world would perhaps not be the wisest choice for an article on
finance. With all deference to the cleverness of the idea, the humble
suggestion may be made that possibly there are better ways to col-
late an encyclopaedia."

Advance publicity and there was much of it about these per-

226 THE GREAT EB

sonalities unfortunately obscured the importance of scores of authori-
tative contributors from the United States and elsewhere. Collabo-
rators on the long article about the London Naval Conference, for
example, were Henry L. Stimson, who had headed the American dele-
gation, and J. Ramsay MacDonald, the British premier, who also con-
tributed a special piece about the development of the Labour party.
Elihu Root, former Secretary of State, wrote about the Permanent
Court of International Justice; Roscoe Pound, about legal education
in America; and Justice Charles Evans Hughes, about the Monroe
Doctrine. In the ranks of contributors, too, were eighteen recipients
of the Nobel Prize, including a trio of American scientists: Robert A.
Millikan, A. A. Michelson, and Arthur Holly Compton. James T. Shot-
well, one of Columbia University's leading professors and once an
editorial aide on the eleventh edition, wrote on historical subjects;
General John J. Pershing, on the late war; Frank B. Kellogg, a former
Secretary of State, on "Outlawry of War"; Charles F. Kettering, the
wizard inventor and president of the research division of General
Motors, on "Motor Car"; and the psychologist Dr. John B. Watson, on
"Behaviorism." Senators William E. Borah and Arthur Capper, college
presidents, industrialists, novelists, lawyers, doctors, statesmen, mili-
tary leaders, and scores of other authorities made up an impressive
roster of American contributors.

From Pershing's article Hooper felt compelled to delete a sentence
reading, "Lack of definite preparedness cost America immensely in
human life and treasure and might have been disastrous if the Allies
had not gained time for the American effort to materialize." Albert
Einstein's article on "Space-Time" was written in flawless English and
remained one of the few untouched by an editorial pencil. James
Truslow Adams, the historian, had to be watched carefully for mis-
spelled words. Julius Rosenwald's "Philanthropy" was patently sound,
although events shortly to develop in the American economy were to
make a mockery of a section that read, "Philanthropic endeavor in
America differs from that of other countries in its greater variety and
in the larger proportion undertaken through private initiative as com-
pared with that carried on by the state. . . . Moreover, as little pov-
erty exists and there is no pauper class, welfare work is carried on in
a more confident spirit, with the expectation of making social relief
ultimately needless."

Of the thirty-five hundred contributors, nearly half were Americans,
a proportion greater by some 40 per cent than the number in the

"A MONUMENT OF LEARNING" 227

eleventh edition or the intervening supplements. And these men and
women wrote not only on subjects connected with their own country
but on many with no national limits. There were several collaborations
that produced unsatisfactory results. Sometimes, when parts of an
article were by an Englishman and the other parts by an American in
order to present an international viewpoint, the transition in tone and
language and, indeed, in attitude, was accomplished with a dislocating
jerk or with needless repetition. Because readers throughout the
world studied the English language largely from British texts, the
encyclopaedia generally used British spelling and British terms. Yet
one assiduous scholar found almost as many American terms replacing
the British equivalents "progressive education" instead of the Euro-
pean "new education" and "motion pictures" instead of "cinema" and
another noted that in the article "National Parks and Monuments"
only American parks and monuments were described,

Before the volumes were ready for reviewers and purchasers, there
was an important shift in ownership. By the middle of 1928, it was
apparent that considerably more than the original $1,064,000 Cox had
thought sufficient would be required to complete the project, and
already some new articles had to be cancelled and older ones from the
preceding edition retained. Again and again Cox came to Rosenwald,
recalling the promise that whatever additional funds were necessary
would be furnished. Finally, after close to $2 million had been allot-
ted, it was proposed by Rosenwald's top executives, primarily Albert
W. Loeb, that, instead of handing out more money, Sears, Roebuck
and Company once more assume ownership of the encyclopaedia. By
mutual agreement, this was done, mainly by exchanging Mrs. Hooper's
holdings for Sears, Roebuck stock and by buying up all remaining
shares, including those held by Samuel Untermyer and associates; the
money paid for these shares totaled some $500,000. Cox remained
publisher, calmed by assurances from Rosenwald that he would not be
interfered with by any Sears, Roebuck officials.

In another sector of the enterprise, there were preliminary rum-
blings about the proposed contents of the edition, principally from
British critics reacting to the increased amount of space allotted to
American subjects and the greater dependence on American scholars.
In September, 1928, fully a year before the edition became available,
the debut issue of Britannia, a weekly edited by the British novelist

228 THE GREAT EB

Gilbert Frankau, charged that the American publisher of the Ency-
clopaedia Britannica had demanded of Garvin that all articles on
eastern political questions be written by Americans. To this Garvin
replied characteristically, "In the whole farrago there is not one grain,
not one atom, not one little jot nor tincture of truth. The American
gentleman concerned is incapable of suggesting anything like that.
The King's subject concerned is known to be among the last men alive
to whom such a stipulation could be safely breathed."

When the volumes did come out, the cries were renewed in other
British quarters. At Oxford University, the college newspaper, the
Isis, accused the Encyclopaedia Britannica of "being run by a nest of
Americans at a huge profit." And the New Statesman asked, "Why
BritannicaP Anglo-Saxon perhaps or Nordic or Anglo-American, but
certainly not British. A British encyclopaedia, for example, would not
inform us that members of the House of Commons enjoy the privilege
of free travel on British railways; nor in a record of great trans-oceanic
flights would it put Col. Lindbergh at the top of a list and make no
reference whatever to the two Englishmen who crossed the Atlantic
successfully eight years before him." A sour view of the "humaniza-
tion" of the encyclopaedia was expressed by London's Saturday Re-
view: "With many merits, perhaps particularly in the treatment of
science and of recent political history, the Fourteenth Edition of the
Encyclopaedia Britannica has been vitiated by an attempt to antici-
pate the demands of the plain man which is here out of place. It will
meet most of the requirements of most people most of the time but it
is not the final resort of the student. Should it come to be regarded as
that, the public will have a poorer idea of what in certain departments
constitutes knowledge." Mildly deploring this same trend, the London
Mercury offered a tongue-in-cheek explanation: "In no other country
in the world except America will you find that happy combination of
intellectual curiosity and surplus cash. No encyclopaedia, conceived
on such a scale as this one, can live without America. America pays the
piper, and not unreasonably demands the right to call every alternate
tune."

When a letter from Dr. W. D. Simpson, librarian of Aberdeen Uni-
versity, in the Times Literary Supplement expressed disagreement
with certain statements in the article on "Fathers of the Church," other
letters were received defending the article. But for some undisclosed
reason the Times refused to print these, prompting Dr. Simpson, a con-
scientious polemicist, to comment, "That's too bad of the supplement.

**A MONUMENT OF LEARNING** 229

That's not fair." Letters criticizing the edition, however, continued to
appear in the Supplement. Garvin personally sought a reason for the
sustained attacks and decided to his satisfaction, if not to his pleasure,
that they were being made in retaliation for Sir Robert Donald's
article on "Newspapers," in which no mention was made of the
Supplement and a reference noted that Geoffrey Dawson, editor of the
Times, was "a man who in fact had always taken great steps to safe-
guard his personal authority/' Capitalizing on the anti-American feel-
ing, the Educational Book Company, controlled by Lord Camrose,
issued new prospectuses stressing in red letters that its Harmsworth
Universal Encyclopaedia was a British production. Its salesmen also
struck hard at the "American influences" in the new Encyclopaedia
Britannica, Both practices were eliminated after Mrs. Law held a
number of conferences with Lord Camrose, during which she con-
vinced him of the unfairness and even the immorality of such methods.

In the United States, the new Encyclopaedia Britannica was generally
received enthusiastically in most instances for the very reasons that
some British critics were so cool. Although he decried the prepublica-
tion publicity that stressed the contributions of the Tunneys, the Fords,
and the Irene Castles, the historian Allan Nevins extolled the new con-
cepts exemplified in the edition. 'There is popularization/' he wrote in
an extensive article in the Saturday Review of Literature, "but not at
the expense of accuracy or erudition." As for "Americanization" "The
English editor notes in his introduction that there are 130 million
Americans and Canadians against 50 million people in the British Isles,
and the United States has become the richest, strongest, and most
vibrantly active nation in history. . . . The center of gravity of the
English-speaking world has decisively changed, and the editors make
the proper deduction/'

Yale University's president, James R. Angell, added his praise in the
same publication, asserting that in his special fields of philosophy and
education he had sought in vain to discover material errors. And he
made a strong point for the emphasis on modernity in the edition:
'To give Bishop Berkeley a little over a page and to comparative
psychology fifteen pages, probably reflects correctly current interest in
these two subjects, even among intelligent folk."

With this, Henry Noble MacCracken, president of Vassar College,

230 THE GREAT EB

agreed strongly in the Bookman. "It is, above all, an encyclopaedia of
the Twentieth Century; an encyclopaedia of the time; almost of the
day. . . . Yet, though this edition is a mirror of our age, the great past
has not been slighted. ... In short, the Encyclopaedia Britannica
puts a girdle around the world, not in forty minutes, as Puck promised
to do, or in twenty days as the Zeppelin did, but in twenty-odd vol-
umes. . . . On top of the little stand, the household telephone will
give access to the speech of men; while on the shelves below, the
Encyclopaedia Britannica will wait to serve our need for the written
word, as a great clearing house of civilized intercourse."

The edition's modernity was applauded in the American Nation by
Louis Heilperin, an expert on encyclopaedias. "No encyclopaedia,
however lavishly equipped with editors and paraphernalia, can ever
hope to be quite up to the minute, for men will die, or resign, or be
promoted or demoted, and things are not always today quite what
they seemed to be yesterday; but the Britannica comes as near to being
up to date as any reasonable standard can demand. . . The new
Britannica is a monument of learning and editorial competence. If
something of the finer flavor of culture which characterized the earlier
editions is lacking in this one, and what is offered bears often, in unac-
customed clearness, the stamp of practicality, it is because a new age is
upon us and efficiency has taken culture in hand,"

Various experts acclaimed the sections dealing with art and espe-
cially the scores of illustrations, some two hundred of which were in
full-page, dazzling color. Although Clennell Wilkinson in the London
Mercury decried Warren Cox's "personal weakness a passion for
lampshades," exemplified by a lengthy article by Cox on lamps and
shades, he admitted, in discussing the work's illustrations: "Nothing as
good could have been produced in England. . . . They tempt you to
begin to read here and there, and once you do that with this new
encyclopaedia, it is not easy to stop. That, to put it shortly, is the great
distinction of the 14th edition, that it will be read by all sorts of people,
both in England and America, and will undoubtedly do more for the
cause of education and culture than all the previous editions put to-
gether, which is no small achievement, when all is said and done."

The art critic of the New York Times, Edwin Alden Jewell, writing
about the work involved in producing the many halftones, the color
illustrations, and the engravings, told of the seventy-five draftsmen
who created new drawings, of the four photographers who prepared

4< A MONXJMENT OF LEABNINC" 231

the multicolor pages, and of the more than a hundred men and women
whose duty it was to secure from everywhere in the universe the
needed photographic material. As for the many articles under the gen-
eral heading of "Art/* there obviously were statements and opinions,
remarked Jewell, with which not all would agree. "But is not contro-
versy, when based upon sober and dignified appraisal, also a fact? And
by way of bolstering this semi-innovation, the editors have made an
effort to secure as many justifiably divergent points of view as possible,
so that within the volumes themselves a reader will unearth plenty of
controversy. This makes the work sparkle; gives it a living quality un-
dreamed of by those who in the past set out to prepare an encyclopae-
dia."

In the heartland of the United States, Howard Vincent O'Brien, the
popular columnist for the Chicago Daily News, wrote: "In the new
edition ... the editors have recognized that life has been getting
along and have tried to catch up. The older editions were content
to give the scholarly data for the literate. Users were supposed to be
interested only in such things as the genealogy of Publius Crassus and
the municipal government of Peshawar. Now, account has been taken
of the vastly increased complexity of life and there is pictured "how to'
information in commendable variety. The unlettered citizen is told, in
simple language, how to do all sorts of useful things, from carving a
duck to the best way of cleaning a panama hat." This "how-to" charac-
teristic, frowned on by the scholarly who would forever recall rever-
ently the ninth and the eleventh editions although they also con-
tained such articles was, indeed, a highly praised attribute of the
new edition, for besides those mentioned by O'Brien, this Encyclo-
paedia Brttannica could furnish for its readers knowledge of how to
sew, box, swim, dance, fence, and skate; play golf, tennis, or auction
bridge; operate a radio, movie camera, or automobile; manage a home;
cook; plan and plant a garden; make lace; tie knots; or weave bas-
kets.

William Cox was greatly pleased with the estimates from approving
critics, especially so since few commented on the inclusion of a
number of outdated articles. He himself had no doubts about the
work's excellence. "It is a magnificent encyclopaedia," he wrote to
Garvin when one of the first copies was placed before him, "the best
ever, the nearest thing to everybody's guide, philosopher and friend,

232 THE GREAT EB

the most universally helpful and enlightening book since books were,
an original service to the world today and a credit to us all."

Whatever arguments might be presented against this evaluation, it
was true that the fourteenth edition, though some scholars might
deplore its "practical" aspects, its "humanization," and its intensified
effort at popularization, marked one of the most significant changes in
the Encyclopaedia Britannica since its origin. In each major edition
there had been reflections of the times and the intellectual climate.
Each was larger in size than the last, with the editors, as the perceptive
critic, Glennell Wilkinson, wrote in the London Mercury y "all the time
taking a most unnatural, uneditorial kind of pride in the mere size of
the monster they had created." This drift toward increased growth in
both size and scholarship had reached its apex in the famous ninth
edition, a compendium of scholarship in the most literal sense. From the
point of view of scholars the ninth was easily the finest, but from other
points of view it was not. "Why not admit frankly," asked Wilkinson,
"that the old Encyclopaedia, as regards all its more important and
learned contributions, was becoming intolerably long-winded and dull?
No one but experts could understand its expert lenguage. The 14th edi-
tion, on the other hand, because it had to be Americanized had also to
be humanized, to quote from its advertisements, in order to meet the
requirement of a new kind of reader. And humanized in a very large
proportion of the work, and that not the least scholarly, has simply
meant plain English, and a merciful brevity, and a few explanatory
words now and then to help the ordinary reader over some style."

Henceforth there would be two principal schools of thought about
the Encyclopaedia Britannica, and, indeed, about the general nature
of all encyclopaedias. One would insist on the scholastic superiority of
previous editions, holding that the shift in emphasis, despite the host
of Nobel Prize winners and other men of extensive learning repre-
sented in the fourteenth edition, was detrimental to the established
reputation and scholarly character of the work. The other would con-
tinue to espouse the idea of making the encyclopaedia more under-
standable and thus more appealing and desirable to a far greater mass
of persons, while at the same time retaining its scholarly authority.
This latter group thought of the Encyclopaedia Britannica not only as
an authoritative source of knowledge, but as a publication, within
reasonable physical limits, designed to stimulate, inform, and instruct.
It contended that the work should be edited not merely for a learned
minority but for all who seek self-improvement.

"A MONUMENT OF LEARNING" 233

Throughout a steady advertising campaign that ran for a full year be-
fore the edition's publication in 1929, Cox, quite naturally, stressed
its 'liumanization." But almost as much attention was drawn to the
scholarly reputations of the contributors as to the articles on such new
subjects as television, shop-front design, family budgets, and the medi-
cal and legal aspects of aviation. With some pride, it was noted that
famous articles from older editions Macaulay's on Dr. Johnson, Bun-
yan, and Oliver Goldsmith; John Addington Symonds 9 on the Renais-
sance, Italy, and Machiavelli; and others by Swinburne, Tovey, and
Bryce were reprinted with only slight revision*

Cox's idea of selling the set was not to send out hordes of salesmen
but to carry on a campaign through letters and magazine and news-
paper advertisements designed to produce orders by mail. In this
period and through the rest of his tenure with the Encyclopaedia
Britantnca, he employed no more than a dozen salespeople. These few
worked in "mop-up" operations after specific areas had been suffused
with sales letters, circulars, booklets, pamphlets, and brochures, the
latter expensively produced and sent to community leaders who might
be expected to purchase a set and comment to friends and neighbors
on its many virtues. One of the handful of salespeople was Mrs. Alice
P. Ballard, who covered all Los Angeles and the surrounding area. In
1955, still employed by the Encyclopaedia Britannica in a selling
capacity in that territory, she recalled her early experiences: "I started
with a bundle of papers and a couple of little booklets under my arm
walking from door to door, telling them of the great 14th edition that
was coming off the press, stirring up the whole neighborhood with the
wonderful news that Nobel Prize men were writing for it. It sold for
$118, $10 down and $10 a month, and was to go to $129 in September,
1929, the publication date. I did house-to-house and office buildings
and schools and librarians."

For all their industry, such workers as Mrs. Ballard accounted for a
mere 10 per cent of the total sales during Cox's term with the com-
pany. Another 10 per cent was derived through a bookshop main-
tained on the ground floor of the tall building at 342 Madison Avenue
that housed the Encyclopaedia Britannica offices in New York. There,
Mrs. Lavinia Dudley, who divided her time between selling and
editorial duties in the office, marked as a high point of her experience

234 THE GREAT EB

the day she sold not one but five full sets to Charles Evans Hughes,
later chief justice of the United States Supreme Court,

The rest of the twenty thousand sets sold in the first year of the
fourteenth edition despite the depression resulted from mail and
newspaper campaigns. Many hundreds of thousands of pieces of ad-
vertising literature were dispatched in the prepublication months, and
as many or more afterward. There were routine, direct, sales letters
and also letters with "snob appeal." This was an expensive method,
and some of the minor executives in the organization and a number
of the executives at Sears, Roebuck and Company sought to per-
suade Cox to employ more salesmen or to seek to use the channels of
the vast mail-order company, but he remained steadfast

In 1930, the year after the edition had been published, Cox con-
tinued his mailings and magazine and newspaper advertisements. To
help in the ad writing, he hired a young literary columnist whose
articles in the Philadelphia Public Ledger had attracted and held his
attention. He was Walter Yust, who had been a newspaper man since
the days when he worked for the old Philadelphia Telegraph while a
student at the University of Pennsylvania. After several years of
service with the YMCA during World War I and as a reporter on other
Philadelphia papers and a writer of short stories and literary criticism
in Chicago, Memphis, and New York, Yust had eventually become
literary editor of the Public Ledger 9 writing a pert, witty column, "Of
Making Many Books/' In one of three about the Encyclopaedia Britan-
nica, he had stated, "It [the Encyclopaedia Britannica] comes in
twenty-four comfortably printed volumes, bearing enough words to
fill literally 500 ordinary sized books. And the book reviewer sits down
to it, certainly, very like a chap who has been ordered to eat and digest
a battleship."

The columns so interested Cox that he asked Yust to come up to
New York. During Yust's visit, Cox offered him a job as assistant to
Franklin Hooper, with a promise that on Hooper's retirement he
would be named editor. But after Yust accepted and signed a two-
year contract as an assistant editor, he found himself writing advertise-
ments. Although Cox had hired a large advertising firm to prepare
copy for magazines and newspapers, he invariably found fault with its
creations and passed them on to Yust for rewriting and revision. One
of Cox's favorite words was "monumental," and he impressed on Yust
the importance of working it into as many ads as possible.

"A MONUMENT OF LEARNING" 23$

Even as the economic depression grew worse, Cox stubbornly con-
tinued his expensive system of promotion. In 1931 a series of mono-
graphs was issued, each a collection of material from the Encyclopae-
dia Britannica on subjects from gardening to Chinese art, from theaters
and motion pictures to mammals and birds. Each contained the most
striking color and halftone illustrations from the original volumes,
reproduced on the slickest paper. These monographs were available
in the bookshop for two dollars each, but many were sent without cost
to selected prospective customers in high-income brackets.

The persistent depression, the drop in sales and prices (at one
period the price for the least expensively bound set slipped to $67.50),
and the death of Julius Rosenwald early in 1932 led to a rupture of
Cox's relations with the Encyclopaedia Britannica and Sears, Roebuck.
While Rosenwald lived, Cox was assured although the philanthropist
took no direct part in the detailed affairs of the encyclopaedia of
strong moral backing in any disagreements with top executives of the
mail-order firm. But with this support gone and in the face of rising
promotion costs and drops in sales, Cox soon was under pressure from
the executives, principally Robert E. Wood, the former army general
who was now its president.

Wood, who had come to Sears, Roebuck in 1924 after pioneering in
the opening of retail stores for its major rival, Montgomery, Ward and
Company, had always considered Rosenwald's acquisition of the Ency-
clopaedia Britannica a business error. The encyclopaedia was not the
appropriate kind of enterprise for the giant mail-order firm. He argued
that the business was far too risky and erratic, and the records of the
years immediately following 1929 supported this view. Wood had a
high personal regard for the fourteenth edition as a sound educational
work, but he looked with the eye of a dour realist upon balance sheets
that showed annual decreases in sales of the set. So he made several
proposals to Cox. One was that less money be spent for advertising; it
seemed unlikely that encyclopaedias, however worthy, could be sold to
hard-pressed Americans while the nation continued to be economically
ill. Another was that instead of continuing to concentrate on mail-
order selling, a system be established to sell the set through the
hundreds of retail branch stores which Wood had opened for Sears,
Roebuck throughout the country.

To such suggestions, Cox replied firmly and negatively. All through

236 THE GREAT EB

1932 he was summoned to Chicago periodically to discuss his differ-
ences with Wood and executives of Wood's persuasion. At the end of
that unhappy year, Cox offered to resign; he had become tubercular
and physicians advised him to quit. His resignation was accepted,
with customary official regrets and a settlement of $60,000. He spent a
period of convalescence in the Berkshires and later wrote a column of
general comment titled, in tribute to J. L. Garvin, 'The Observer"
for the Register in Torrington, Connecticut. The man named to replace
him and to assume responsibility for changes considered vital to the
existence and character of the Encyclopaedia Britannica was a Sears,
Roebuck veteran, Elkan Harrison Powell, whom his friends and asso-
ciates called "Buck."

**A MONUMENT OF LEARNING" 237

Innovations and Increases

In Powell, the Encyclopaedia Britannica had for the first time a chief
operating executive with no previous experience in the making or
selling of encyclopaedias. His background was diversified: he was edu-
cated at the University of Chicago, spent some years as a professional
football player and as an appraiser of property in litigation, and was,
for a decade, advertising manager and secretary-treasurer of Sears,
Roebuck and Company. A hobbyist fond of painting and photography,
he was a man who shunned arguments and quarrels, especially po-
litical debates, which he considered time-consuming.

At first, he had no real enthusiasm for his assignment; he even
neglected to tell his wife of his appointment as president, and she
learned of it through a family friend. But he had been directed by
General Wood to examine and reassess the Encyclopaedia Britannica

238

with a view toward placing it, depression or no, on a paying basis.

When his appointment was made known to the older hands at the
Encyclopaedia Britannica offices, they expected to be swept into the
street. But within weeks after Powell assumed his job, he had won
their support, especially by his frank admission, "I don't know any-
thing about books or bookselling." He instilled a new importance into
Franklin Hooper's position as editor, and the elderly man was soon
hard at work on suggestions not only for editorial improvements but
for promotional booklets to spur sales. When Powell learned that
Walter Yust, despite his excellent editorial experience, was writing
advertisements, he called him off such duties and officially named him
Hooper's associate.

Powell's first accomplishment was to establish spirit and order in the
New York offices; he commuted regularly from Sears, Roebuck's Chi-
cago headquarters in the initial year of his presidency. And then he
turned his attention to selling methods.

At first Powell sought to dispose of volumes by advertising them in
the mail-order firm's catalogues and by displaying them in selected
company stores. When this proved futile, he gradually abandoned
Cox's expensive mail-order system and proceeded to organize a direct-
sales organization. This was no easy task. Many of the men hired as
salesmen were honest and efficient, but others were old-style sharpers
who devised their own sales talks and promised their prospects more
than could be delivered. Sharp practices by some of these veterans
produced letters of complaint from customers who felt they had, in
one way or another, been bilked. Scores of salesmen were hired and
discharged, and in the first years of his tenure Powell had three sales
managers before he found, in lean-faced, intense Louis G. Schoene-
wald, the man to head the new sales system.

Schoenewald had come to the Encyclopaedia Britannica as a sales-
man in the last months of Cox's presidency. Like Powell, Schoenewald
knew little of bookselling before this affiliation, having previously been
in charge of sales for the Aeolian piano company in New York. When
the depression caused a slump in the piano business, Schoenewald
spent four months looking for new connections. Before selecting the
Encyclopaedia Britannica, he made his own survey of the reference-
book field, then offered his services just as the switch from Cox to
Powell was being arranged. In charge of the five-man New York crew
when Powell assumed office, Schoenewald had been helpful and in-
strumental in the switch to direct selling.

INNOVATIONS AND INCREASES 239

Shortly after Schoenewald was appointed national sales manager, he
instituted in the twenty-four sales offices then operating a system
similar to that in the New York headquarters. Its basis was simple
enough and not unlike the theory underlying all types of so-called
specialty selling: "The Britannica is sold with shoe leather. It doesn't
matter in what section of the country you are selling. People in any
part of the country buy a product for the same reasons, whether it
is a vacuum cleaner or a Britannica. The technique of selling is basi-
cally the same everywhere. In the South we talk a little slower and we
visit a little longer. But we say the same things/'

Under Schoenewald a method was devised of training salesmen to
memorize their talks and never to attempt impromptu deviations. The
earlier way of haphazard house-to-house canvassing the so-called
"cold turkey" was discarded almost entirely. Instead, salesmen made
appointments by telephoning a prospect's office or home. Wherever
possible, each sales talk took place with both husband and wife present.
Slowly, sometimes through trial and error, sometimes through whole-
sale dismissals of incompetents or shyster salesmen, the transition to
direct selling proceeded. Before long it became the established
method, to be sharpened and improved with time.

In the decade from 1933 to 1943, while sales crept slowly upward
from a low of 4,559 a year, other alterations were made in both
the editorial and business divisions of the Encyclopaedia Britannica.
One of these was a system of continuous revision of the editorial ma-
terial. This resulted not only from a reluctance on the part of Sears,
Roebuck officials to expend any great sums for completely new edi-
tions and from demands by salesmen that the set be kept as current
as possible, but also from an examination by Franklin Hooper and
Walter Yust of the editions from Smellie's first to Garvin's fourteenth.
They had been directed to make this investigation by Powell, who had
asked these questions: Was it possible to abandon the system of num-
bered editions? Could revisions in the editorial matter be made so
that all information might be brought as up to date as possible in an-
nual printings? How much of the material was more or less stable and
not subject to alteration from year to year and even from decade to
decade? What was the minimum size of printing orders? How often
could the set be printed with revision of a specific percentage of the
material at each printing?

240 THE GREAT EB

For a year Hooper and Yust carried on their study. Then they were
ready to report that a system of continuous revision would be not only
possible but beneficial. The traditional method of producing new edi-
tions or supplemental volumes to existing editions had involved need-
less waste of funds and always bore the disadvantage of having earlier
volumes out of date when the final volumes were issued. The man-
power problem had been persistently vexing, Once the first flush of
an edition's appearance had paled, only a small editorial department
and fewer salesmen were needed. But with each new edition, editorial
staffs had to be greatly enlarged, usually with difficulty and often at
added expense, and sales and promotion personnel had to be recruited
anew.

Yust and Hooper consulted with experts in the many fields covered
by the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Then they advised Powell that the
scholarly consensus though subject to amendment was that 75 per
cent of the work's material was reasonably "fixed" and might, for a
decade or more, remain unchanged but subject to periodical editorial
review. The remaining 25 per cent demanded constant watchfulness
and regular revision, some sections more than others. With these con-
siderations in mind and doubtless influenced by the fact that a num-
ber of competitors had already instituted their own continuous re-
vision systems the annual revision plan was adopted. The forty-one
thousand articles then in the work were divided into thirty classifica-
tions. Each classification was to be scrutinized by authorities and those
in the categories that required more or less constant surveillance were
to be revised throughout at least twice in the next decade. Since this
plan was then frankly experimental, it was deemed subject to altera-
tion, and, indeed, it has been changed to some degree in ensuing
years. But the basic idea still prevails: continuous revision to keep
the set as up to date as is humanly possible without printing, at regular
intervals, completely new editions.

Within a year after this important decision, the company offices
were centralized in Chicago, first in the Sears, Roebuck plant, later in
the Civic Opera Building on Wacker Drive. Chicago was considered
an excellent site from which to direct the expanded sales organization.
And with this move other innovations developed, some designed spe-
cifically to spur sales, some to improve the editorial product and
services.

One of Yust's assignments he was soon to succeed Franklin Hooper
as editor-in-chief was to undertake a long-range textual restyling of

INNOVATIONS AND INCREASES 241

the work. Toward that end, the skilled designer, Rudolph Ruzicka, was
hired, and he modernized display pages and end pieces and end
sheets, besides devising a sleeker, more attractive binding. Yust also
instituted new editorial controls, principally an adjustment of the in-
dex. In the earlier editions, references to information in the maps were
contained in the regular index. Revisions, when they were made, were
haphazard and inaccurate. To separate the index to maps from the
text index and to set it up as an index by itself, seventeen indexers
worked for two years, checking and correcting each reference against
the editorial material in the volumes themselves and amplifying in-
adequate entries. This indexing has been carefully maintained ever
since, though the lore of the company of that period is dotted with
entries about inexperienced workers who classified "Virginia Reel"
under Biography, "Defense Mechanism" under Military, "Gallstones"
under Geology, "Incest" under Business, and "Pope Innocent" under
Law,

Shortly after the move to Chicago, an edition for children under
twelve was published by the company. This sprightly work, titled
"Britannica Junior, derived from the purchase early in 1934 through
R. R. Donnelley and Sons of a twelve-volume children's set called
Weedons Modern Encyclopaedia, whose owners had fallen into debt
to the printing firm. Immediately after its acquisition, 60 per cent of
its text was revised, and eventually it was rewritten and restyled en-
tirely to become one of the company's strongest assets.

Another product ultimately became successful as a stimulant to sales
of the full set, as a revenue producer, and as a historical record,
Schoenewald's salesmen persisted in asking for an annual supple-
mentary publication as an adjunct to the system of continuous revision.
So Powell, taking his cue from Horace Hooper, revived the idea of an
annual volume and called it the Britannica Book of the Year. The first,
issued in 1938, covered the principal happenings of the preceding
year in interesting text and with some 200 pictures furnished by Life
magazine from the thousands it had printed in 1937. The loan of the
photographs, certainly one of the most salable features of the book,
was facilitated by R. R. Donnelley and Sons, printers of both the
magazine and the encyclopaedia. The attractive book was available to
all, but at a substantial discount to EB owners. In a joint preface,
Franklin Hooper, performing his final editorial duty before retirement,
and Yust emphasized this quality. "It answers demands on the part of

242 THE GKEAT EB

the public/' they wrote, "for an authoritative handbook recording what
has happened in a single year. It consolidates the significant facts,
whether statistical or historical, of the year."

To signalize publication of the Book of the Year, a dinner attended
by many of the scholars, journalists, public figures, and officials who
contributed to the book was held at New York's University Club. It
served a double purpose because it also marked the retirement of
Franklin Hooper from active work as editor. Then seventy-six and
still spry, Hooper had served in various editorial capacities for forty
years four decades in which his staunch faith in the Encyclopaedia
Britannica as the greatest of all reference works had not swerved for an
instant. Although in his last years with the company he had attempted
to draw up ideas to stimulate sales, he had rarely been able to under-
stand the need, even in the hectic heyday of his peripatetic brother,
for promotional campaigns and sales drives. He had always felt that
people should buy the Encyclopaedia Britannica without urging, for
he believed that, next to the Bible, the Encyclopaedia Britannica was
the greatest and most important book in existence.

Before the dinner, Hooper became ill and went to a room in the
club to rest for a few hours. The dinner, meanwhile, progressed. At
its end, P. W. Wilson, a former member of the British Parliament, arose
to eulogize Hooper and the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Wilson was half-
way through with his speech when Hooper, shaky and pale, appeared
in the dining room. He insisted on walking to his place at the speak-
ers' table; then in a weak and frail voice he began his farewell speech.
As he continued he seemed to grow stronger, and soon he was standing
stiffly erect and speaking clearly, while the entire assemblage listened
in respectful silence.

An editorial division that grew rapidly during this period was the
Library Research Service. In 1936, it was officially established under
the direction of Mrs. Aimee Buchanan, William Cox's former secretary,
who, with two assistants, undertook to reply to those set owners
seeking additional information on a wide range of subjects. Purchasers
were then entitled to ask as many questions as they wished for ten
years after buying the set. Within four years the service which sales-
men found to have strong customer appeal had broadened con-

INNOVATIONS AND INCBEASES 243

siderably. The variety and number of queries had also multiplied, and
Mrs. Buchanan's staff increased.

Mrs. Buchanan early received unusual queries. "Please tell me about
the care and feeding of worms in captivity/' pleaded one seeker for
knowledge, and he was satisfied with a reply covering seven single-
spaced pages. And there were other unique questions: "Please send
me information on a rock in a Southeast Asian country which is kept
suspended in the air by the humming of the natives." "What is the
cause and cure of child psychology?" "How many dog and cat ceme-
teries are there in the Union of South Africa?"

Mrs. Buchanan's researchers scoured Chicago libraries for answers
to even the most unlikely questions. They failed to find sufficient re-
plies to only 1 per cent of them, even when the number of questions
greatly increased. By 1940, as the service grew more and more popular,
each purchaser of the Britannica was given a sheet of fifty gummed
coupons limiting him to that many questions for the next ten years,
and Walter Yust, having been named editor on Franklin Hooper's re-
tirement, stipulated that only questions to which answers were avail-
able in library sources would be handled.

Another popular technique in a completely different field spread
the name of Encyclopaedia Britannica in these years. In 1939 one of
the nation's favorite radio programs was "Information Please," devised
by Dan Golenpaul and featuring a panel made up of Clifton Fadiman,
the literary critic and editor; John Kieran, nationally known sports
writer; Franklin P. Adams, columnist and professional wit; and Oscar
Levant, the concert pianist. Powell suggested to Golenpaul that the
Encyclopaedia Britannica be given to listeners who stumped the panel.
This was a good promotional stroke, but some salesmen reported that
many prospective customers were delaying their purchases because
they hoped to win a set from "Information Please." To combat this,
Powell and Schoenewald assured full cash refunds if within three
months any purchaser won an "Information Please" prize, and this
promise was maintained through the three years' affiliation with the
show. In this period, only one hundred sets were given away annually,
a pittance when assessed against the national publicity and promo-
tional value derived from the association with the highly original
panel quiz show. (A similar type of promotion was effective in later
years, when the Encyclopaedia Britannica was the indisputable au-
thority for various television quiz shows, especially "The $64,000 Ques-
tion" and "Twenty-one," )

244 THE GREAT EB

The result of all this was a gradual gain in sales and revenue. Yet
General Wood continued to insist that the mail-order company was
far out of its intellectual and business depths in continuing to main-
tain and sell the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Futhermore, the firm had
been embarrassed by complaints about some of the more aggressive
salesmen. Wood, therefore, was prepared and eager to dispose of the
encyclopaedia to a logical recipient.

To sell it to a commercial institution seemed unwise and, indeed,
was hardly discussed. Such an act would not only detract from the
work's prestige but might be deemed incompatible with the responsi-
bilities Wood and the company had inherited from the original interest
of Julius Rosenwald. A sounder move would be to turn over the En-
cyclopaedia Britannica,, at advantageous terms, to an educational in-
stitution that could be relied upon to maintain the reference work's
standards and reputation. And at this time, the University of Chicago
certainly a logical recipient was indirectly being prepared for such
a role by one of its most energetic officials, William Benton, an ad-
vertising wizard turned educator.

INNOVATIONS AND INCREASES 245

Part Four

Benton s Gamble

William Benton's shift from New York's Madison Avenue to the campus
of the University of Chicago in 1936 had, in a sense, fulfilled a family
tradition. His forebears included teachers, professors, ministers, and
missionaries. His father, Charles William Benton, was a Yale man and
a Congregational minister who left Connecticut in 1880 for a teaching
post in the state university at Minneapolis, Minnesota, where he re-
mained for thirty-three years, many of them as chairman of the de-
partment of romance languages. His mother, Elma Hixson Benton,
taught country school in her native Iowa at thirteen, at twenty-five
was Minnesota's first woman county superintendent of schools in Ot-
tertail County, the state's largest, and she continued to study and
teach all her life.

Benton was born in Minneapolis on April 1, 1900, and spent his
boyhood there and later, after his father died, on a bleak homestead

249

in Montana. He helped work his way through Shattuck military school
in Faribault, Minnesota, by selling scrapbooks for student memora-
bilia, special binders he designed for the school paper, and class
emblems, pins, and embossed stationery. After a year at Minnesota's
Carleton College, he went to Yale on a scholarship, became a con-
tributor to the Yale Record, and eventually its chairman and editor.
On the debating team, an associate and friend was Robert Maynard
Hutchins, like Benton the son of a minister-educator; his father was
William James Hutchins, president of Kentucky's Berea College.

After he received his degree in 1921, Benton joined the famous
sales organization of the National Cash Register Company, whose
founder, John H. Patterson, then known as "the father of scientific
salesmanship" and "the Napoleon of sales promotion," had beaten
financial panics and had built a $50 million business, of which the key
sales slogan was "Analyze! Visualize! Dramatize!" From this milieu to
the then youthful field of national advertising was a short step, al-
though Benton's mother had hoped he would become a lawyer or
"do something respectable like teaching or the ministry." He went to
work in August, 1922, as a twenty-five-dollar-a-week copywriter for
Albert D. Lasker's Lord and Thomas, then the largest advertising firm
in the country. After service with another agency, which grew to be-
come Batten, Barton, Durstine and Osborn, he and Chester Bowles,
a former assistant whom Benton had hired and helped to train, opened
their own advertising office on July 15, 1929, with a staff of three em-
ployees. Even after the onset of the depression, the firm of Benton and
Bowles survived and prospered. In the next six years, annual billings
rose from $40,000 to $18,000,000, and by 1935, although the company
had only five clients and all its accounts were concentrated in a single
office, Benton and Bowles stood sixth among the advertising agencies
of the world. In that year, too, Benton decided to retire from the ad-
vertising business. When the firm had been set up in 1929, Bowles had
promised to buy him out whenever Benton wanted to get out, and at
a good price. So, in December of 1935, Benton contracted all his
stock in the agency to Bowles and their partner and associate, Atherton
Hobler, and planned a round-the-world trip and a search for new
ventures and vistas.

One morning in the spring of 1936, three weeks after his official re-
tirement, Benton had a visitor. He was Robert Maynard Hutchins,

250 THE GREAT EB

now president of the University of Chicago. Hutchins came with a
problem and a proposal. Early in 1935, Charles Walgreen, head of the
multimillion-dollar retail drugstore chain, had alleged that his niece,
Lucille Norton, was being subjected to "Communist influences" in her
social science survey courses at the university. After a cursory inquiry
in which Walgreen was disturbed to find that among dozens of books
listed as required reading were the Communist Manifesto and New
Russia's Primer, Walgreen had withdrawn Miss Norton from the uni-
versity. The action had led to a hearing by a state senate committee.
Although the committee cleared the university of all the charges made
by Walgreen, the university was left with a touchy public relations
problem; of the city's four daily newspapers, only one, the tabloid
Times, was then friendly to the university. Hutchins asked Benton to
come to Chicago to study the problem of modern university public
relations in general and the Walgreen case in particular.

Benton went, and soon he was immersed in the intellectual tempest
on the university campus. He interviewed trustees, professors who
revered Hutchins and those who opposed him, newspaper publishers,
public officials, and business and professional men. Then he collected
the notes and documents gathered in four weeks of day-and-night
interviewing and wrote a privately printed and distributed book titled
The University of Chicago's Public Relations. This contained sugges-
tions for improving the university's status in the public eye, for at-
tracting desirable students, and for prompting the wealthy to give
money to the school, which, as Benton saw it, were the inherent aims
of good public relations. Benton even went so far as to ask whether
the name of the University of Chicago should be changed to dissipate
the taint of local gangsterism and the scandal of payless paydays for
the city's school teachers and, further, to make clear that the university
was a great private institution like Yale and Harvard and in no way
supported by public funds. Hutchins' observation at the time which
was used as the book's opening sentence spoke for many who read it:
"No book like this has ever been written before; surely not about a
university." (Each trustee was asked to return his copy after reading
it, because of the confidential nature of the proposals, but one evi-
dently never did. In 1954 Edward G. Bernays, the public relations
expert, told Benton he had purchased an annotated copy for fifty
dollars from a rare-book dealer and considered it the most astute
treatise of its kind he had ever seen.) Through personal discussions
with Walgreen, Benton helped solve the Walgreen problem so well

BENTON'S GAMBLE 251

that by early 1937 the drug magnate, after conferences with Hutchins,
had given the university $550,000, which, with another $250,000 se-
cured elsewhere, went to establish the Charles R. Walgreen Founda-
tion for the Study of American Institutions, with lectures and research
designed to "forward the development of good citizenship and the
improvement of public service/*

Benton now considered his affiliation with the university at an
end. But he was persuaded to remain on half-time duty spending
six months each year away from his Connecticut home as an aca-
demic vice-president of the university. His acceptance was partially
prompted by an interest in opportunities afforded by such methods
of communication in education as motion pictures and radio; in the
latter field, his advertising firm had achieved prominence as the major
customer first of the National Broadcasting Company and then of the
Columbia Broadcasting System. He was to continue this half-time
academic work for six years and then spend another two years on
one-quarter time.

One of his first assignments from Hutchins after Benton became
vice-president in October, 1937, was the writing of a recommendation
for the Rockefeller Foundation regarding ERPI (Electrical Research
Products, Inc.) Classroom Films, Inc., which had been organized as
a subsidiary of the American Telephone and Telegraph Company in
1929 to develop the classroom-film field as a market for sixteen-milli-
meter sound projectors, on which AT&T owned patents. The first talk-
ing films designed wholly for classrooms had been made by AT&T on
the campus of the University of Chicago. Benton's proposal for es-
tablishing a philanthropic corporation, with a foundation grant of $4
million, that would take over ERPI and develop classroom films on a
major scale, was rejected by the foundation, but he continued to be
fascinated by the potentialities of films as a medium of education and
he often sat in on many university classes to study their use.

In addition to his academic duties, Benton helped to provide back-
ing for the radio broadcasts of the University of Chicago Round
Table, the highly popular program that brought together distinguished
faculty members and outside authorities in weekly discussions on
timely and timeless subjects. Another Benton-inspired radio series was
"The Human Adventure/* which dramatized projects and research
being carried on at the university and was then adjudged by critics
to be the most highly advanced of public service programs. Benton
wrote articles for the mass magazines, made broadcasts frequently

252 THE GREAT EB

over national radio networks, visited newspaper publishers and their
editorial staffs, and spoke widely on behalf of the university. (In ad-
dition to his work at the university during this period, Benton became
a founder and vice-chairman of the Committee for Economic De-
velopment; was an original and key consultant to Nelson Rockefeller
when he was appointed co-ordinator of Inter- American Affairs; and
acquired ownership of the Muzak Corporation, a firm that piped back-
ground music into manifold institutions.)

Late in 1941, a memorandum atop the inevitable pile of papers and
letters on his desk attracted Benton's attention. Written by W. K.
Jordan, general editor of the University of Chicago Press, it reported
on a meeting of various scholars at which agreement was general on
the "desirability and practicality of preparing a new edition of the
Encyclopaedia Britannica." The group maintained that a new edition,
completely rewritten, seemed in order, although all agreed that con-
siderable preliminary discussion with other savants was essential be-
fore any full decision could be reached. The discussion had been
stimulated by a similar meeting held earlier in New York and called by
David Stevens, vice-president of the Rockefeller Foundation.

Benton's curiosity was swiftly aroused by the problems cited in Jor-
dan's report: Should the Encyclopaedia Britannica be made "more
scholarly?" Should it be completely rewritten in the mold of the
ninth edition? Would a super-scholarly encyclopaedia stimulate re-
search in important fields? Musing over Jordan's memorandum and
noting that "the discussion strayed on several occasions to the diffi-
cult problems of costs and distribution," Benton wondered what kind
of people bought the set, how it was marketed, and how many were
sold each year. Eager to learn more, Benton arranged a meeting
with Hutchins and General Wood, chairman of the Sears, Roebuck
board. There was informal discussion of whether the firm would sell
the property, the purchase possibly financed by the Rockefeller Foun-
dation. There was talk of the encyclopaedia's business history since
the days of Horace Hooper, and Wood told of the unsuccessful effort
in 1928 to interest the University of Chicago in taking over the com-
pany and of subsequent discussions just as futile involving Harvard
and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Soon Benton dispatched a memo to Hutchins: "Might not there be
some possibility that Sears, Roebuck might give the Encyclopaedia

BENTON'S GAMBLE 253

Britannica outright to the University (there might be important tax
savings)? Or might there be the possibility that Sears, Roebuck would
maintain ownership and would make a major investment in bringing
out a new edition, provided funds could be secured to insure a break-
even basis at least for the project?" For a week or more, Benton and
Hutchins discussed possibilities and probabilities, viewing the financ-
ing of the Encyclopaedia Britannica by the Rockefeller Foundation or
some other agency as potentially important in prestige for the uni-
versity and in scholarship for the encyclopaedia.

But the Rockefeller Foundation appeared not to be interested in
financial involvement. Nor did some individuals whom Benton sounded
out, When Benton turned to his friend, Henry R. Luce, the Time-
Life-Fortune magazine publisher, urging him to buy the rights to the
set and turn them over to the university as a gift, Luce showed no
enthusiasm and questioned, among other matters, the merit of retain-
ing the name Encyclopaedia Britannica. "Neither Bob nor I share
your fears/' replied Benton. "We feel this name is generic we doubt
that one American in a thousand associates the name with England."
In a note to Hutchins reporting on his exchange of letters with Luce,
Benton wrote, "I told him that the name had had 150 years of pro-
motion."

Then, in the midst of the early talks and the memos, came a decisive
luncheon with Wood on December 9, when Benton and Wood met
at the Chicago Club to discuss the attack on Pearl Harbor two days
earlier and related matters. As the waiter served coffee, Benton
suddenly asked, "General, don't you think it's rather unwise for a mail-
order house to own the Encyclopaedia Britannica and isn't it even
more unwise in wartime?"

"Yes," replied Wood. "Sears should never have acquired it in the
first place."

The discussion continued. As they rose from the table, Benton sug-
gested making a gift of the encyclopaedia to the University of Chicago.
Without replying, Wood walked silently downstairs for his hat and
coat. As his car drove tip to the club door, he turned to Benton and
said, "All right, Bill, 111 give you the Britannica."

Benton sped to the university, bursting in on Hutchins to tell him,
"Call the general! Tell him Bill Benton just arrived in your office and
says that he has given the Encyclopaedia Britannica to the University
of Chicago! See what he says!"

With Hutchins, Wood verified the offer by telephone. "Of course,"

THE CHEAT EB

he added, "I didn't mean that we would give you the cash and re-
ceivables we have in the corporation. I'm sure Bill understands that.
We can't give you our inventory either, that is, our present stock of
books and the books being printed. Youll have to come up with about
$300,000 for the inventory. But all the rest of it, the plates and the
copyright and the good will, everything else is yours as a gift to the
university."

Benton now assumed the role, as he was later to describe it, of "pro-
fessional beggar/' Where was he to get the $300,000 and the money
for working capital?

He turned first to one of the university's good friends, Lessing Rosen-
wald, a trustee and the son of the man who had helped save the
Encyclopaedia Britannica in its dire days during and after World
War I. Rosenwald listened patiently, but opposed any plan to have
the university take over the publication. Benton then sent letters to
friends everywhere. He lunched with magazine publishers, newspaper
owners, and philanthropists. But he could stir no interest in raising
the necessary money. When one reply gratuitously offered the advice
that the name of the work be changed to simply "The Encyclopaedia,"
Benton retorted, "It's one of the best known trade names in the world.
Compared to the name Encyclopaedia Britannica, Coca Cola and
Chevrolet and Kodak are mere passing fancies."

As Benton continued his search, Wood offered a liberal plan of pay-
ing for the inventory: a $100,000 down payment, the remaining $200,-
000 to be taken out of profits. Later the general secured his directors'
approval of a plan to lower the price for the inventory to $200,000,
with half to be paid on delivery of the gift and the rest to be trans-
mitted over five years at only a 2 per cent interest rate. Still later he
proposed a ten-year plan. He furnished Benton with earnings reports,
sales records and other essential data. In a very important concession,
Wood worked out an arrangement by which his company's bank
would, for the next five years, lend the encyclopaedia company 90 per
cent on the face value of all instalment accounts as soon as sales were
made. Perhaps more important, Wood agreed that during this period
all collections for sets sold on the instalment plan would continue to be
the responsibility of his firm's experienced and efficient credit-and-
collection network.

In the ensuing months of 1942, Wood continued to come forward

BENTON'S GAMBLE 255

with additional favorable terms. If the university, after accepting the
gift, failed to make a success of the venture after a year's operation,
Sears, Roebuck and Company would take it back and assume all
liabilities. If the university accepted the ten-year payment plan for
the inventory, Sears, Roebuck and Company would make a gift of
$50,000 in cash to the university to be used as working capital. Wood
estimated that this sum was enough for the purpose; Benton's own
estimate, after many conversations with Encyclopaedia Britannica of-
ficials and his own financial friends and attorneys, was between $100,-
000 and $150,000. This was not because Benton questioned Wood's
judgment; rather, he thought it wise to provide extra assurance to the
university trustees, most of whom were frankly incredulous at the
$50,000 estimate, inasmuch as their own advisers had informed them
that at least $750,000 was required.

To Wood's new offers Benton replied with gratitude. He sent to
Harold H. Swift, the meat-packing firm executive who headed the uni-
versity Board of Trustees, a letter detailing the generous proposals
and urging that the university provide any additional working capital
needed. And to Hutchins Benton wrote that although he realized the
business risks involved in the venture, he believed that the university
might gain $300,000 a year in profits that could be used to increase
salaries and services.

But despite the offers by Wood and the persuasive memos from
Benton, the university trustees were divided. The proposed gift,
Wood's liberal terms, and the question of putting up working capital
constituted the sole topics of discussion at many special trustees* meet-
ings in the closing months of 1942. Several trustees were downright
suspicious of the bounty. Some considered it "a dead horse" and
remembered the times when the company had approached utter ruin;
the university, they warned, would be put in a precarious financial
position if, after accepting, it were faced with a wartime governmental
decree stopping the time payments for encyclopaedias and other
reference works. Others argued that the university could not success-
fully run a business of this kind, that it was too volatile and too
speculative an enterprise, that university ownership would be "the
dead hand of disaster at its neck/' The salesmen of the Encyclopaedia
Britannica, some feared, would prove embarrassing when they invoked
the university's name in the presentations to prospects. William Scott
Bond, the board's vice-chairman, issued a circular letter to all the
trustees expressing doubts about whether the trustees of the university

256 THE CHEAT EB

indeed, of any private university had the legal right to put up
working capital and to underwrite the responsibility of a business
involving such financial risks. Benton argued that if it was legal for the
university to buy common stocks, it was legal to put money into
Encyclopaedia Britannica stock. He recalled that Wood had told him,
"Bill, don't pay too much attention to the financial record of the
business under Sears. If you will interest yourself in it and go to work
on it, you can build it. Tell your trustees this is a five-million-dollar
gift."

As the year drew to a close and Wood's deadline neared, Hutch-
ins lost heart. Riding home with Benton one night after an especially
prolonged discussion with a special board committee at the Chicago
Club, he sighed and told Benton, "Bill, they're going to turn it down."

In the face of this and in view of Wood's ultimatum that the offer
would be withdrawn on the approaching January 31, Benton made a
gambler's decision. He had just received $100,000 in payment for his
preferred stock in Benton and Bowles. He oflfered to put up this $100,-
000 as working capital. Besides, he agreed to become chairman of the
board of Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., and to take personal responsi-
bility for its management and development.

A special committee of trustees set out to study this proposal.
Hutchins urged acceptance, suggesting that because Benton was fur-
nishing the $100,000 and was to assume all the risks and the responsi-
bilities of the new company, he should have common stock in the
company. In this, Hutchins had the support of board chairman Swift.
Hutchins stressed that the University of Chicago was the "logical repos-
itory" for the Encyclopaedia Britannica. He was interested, he told the
trustees, not merely in having the university make money but in
bringing the institution and the publication together for education's
sake. There was no assurance, Hutchins cautioned, that the Sears,
Roebuck offer, once rejected, would ever be repeated. 'There is every
chance that it will not. This is another and major reason for acting
now."

At this critical point one year to the day of that December 9 Chi-
cago Club luncheon Wood increased his offer once more. He informed
Benton that because his firm stood high in the excess-profits tax brack-
ets, his treasurer had advised him to make the $300,000 in inventory
an outright gift. "Hell give us the whole thing, lock, stock, and bar-

BENTON'S GAMBLE 257

rel," exulted Benton in a memo to Hutchins. "No notes and no pay-
ment for inventory." This left only the issue of working capital.

Now there were new meetings and new discussions as Wood's dead-
line neared. More trustees were won over to Benton's proposal, now
that working capital was assured by him and the university could
avoid responsibility for management. On January 14, 1943, only two
weeks before the deadline, the special committee recommended to
the full board acceptance of the gift and of Benton's proposal "be-
cause of a) the educational merit of Britannica, b) the possibility
that the property may continue to earn substantial profits, and c) the
prestige value of Britannica."

In die official contracts signed that February 1, royalty and stock-
division schedules were established. In return for advice and counsel
from its faculty, the university would receive, for each of the first
10,000 sets sold, $1, with $5 for each of the next 5,000, $7 for each of
the next 5,000, and $10 for each of those over 20,000. Thus, on 10,000
sets the royalty would come to $10,000, on 15,000 to $35,000, on 20,000
to $70,000, and on 25,000 to $120,000. The scale of royalties on Bri-
tannica Junior was half this, and each atlas sold was to yield fifty
cents to the university. The royalties to be paid, Benton hoped, would
ultimately come to hundreds of thousands of dollars annually.

The stock distribution was patterned after that of Parents' Magazine,
as worked out by the General Education Board of the Rockefeller
Foundation, which originally financed it. The common stock was di-
vided into thirds. Because Benton was providing the working capital,
he was given two-thirds and the University of Chicago one-third. But
the University of Chicago was given the option of buying half of
Benton's stock after eighteen months of operation for $50,000,
just what Benton had paid, thereby giving to it two-thirds of the
stock. The university, for its further protection, was given preferred
stock equal to $850,000 in prior claims against assets in event of
liquidation. This was approximately the asset value of the company
when Benton began to operate.

It was agreed that three of the nine directors of Encyclopaedia
Britannica, Inc., should be university trustees and that the company
would not enter into new ventures without the consent of at least
two such members. Benton was not to dispose of his own stock without
first offering it to the university. Later he proposed and signed a
contract stating that, in the event of his death, the university would

258 THE GREAT EB

have the option for one year thereafter of buying enough stock from
his family to give it control, the price to be "the fair value thereof."

In a long letter to Swift, Benton assured him that he would strive to
make Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., a thriving company. He prom-
ised that changes considered essential for retaining and improving
editorial excellence would be instituted, reminding Swift that the
university had the right to withdraw its imprimatur from the work
if editorial standards declined. "If the Britannica venture does not
work out successfully for the University," wrote Benton, "I shall carry
the responsibility and may lose $100,000. If it does work out success-
fully, the University can acquire two-thirds of the stock ownership,
leaving me with a minority interest which, as business experience indi-
cates, is often of little value in a corporation run for the benefit of the
majority owners." For their part, the university trustees advised Benton
to run the corporation on sound business lines and to be guided by the
market and by competitive standards and conditions rather than by
the customs or pay scales of the university.

Soon the myriad technicalities were smoothed out, and Hutchins
made formal acknowledgment: "It is a development closely related to
the University's interest in extending educational facilities to the widest
possible number." To explain the contract between the university and
Benton, he summoned tfie faculty to a meeting in Mandel Hall. There
Hutchins enumerated the efforts made by Benton to acquire working
capital and cited financial gains that he hoped would accrue to the
university. And in his witty way, after noting that Benton had finally
put up the working capital himself, he remarked, "Vice-President
Benton has been the victim of his own propaganda."

BENTON'S GAMBLE 259

Of Books > Films and Great Books

The general public reaction to the transfer was favorable, best typified
by a Chicago Daily News editorial which agreed with a statement by
Hutchins that the University of Chicago's connection with the 175-
year-old publication was closely related to its interest in extending
educational facilities to the greatest number of persons. Virtually the
only derogatory statement came from a Spanish radio commentator in
Madrid: "The encyclopaedia forms the mind of a people and the
British mind will henceforth be molded by Chicago University. It must
be said that Chicago has been better known for its slaughterhouses
than for its contributions to science."

At first some of the executives of Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc.,
were skeptical about the merits of the affiliation. Except for Powell and
Schoenewald, few had been aware of the lengthy negotiations. Some

260 THE GREAT EB

declared privately that if the university were to dominate the or-
ganization they would resign; others were eager to co-operate com-
pletely. It soon became evident that there was scant cause for appre-
hension. Meeting Walter Yust, Benton expressed admiration for him
and for the Encyclopaedia Britannica. "I want you to call me Bill/'
he said. "Ill come up with lots of ideas. I always do. I get about five
hundred ideas a week and if one or two of them turn out all right I
feel I've had a successful week."

Benton was named chairman of a revised board of directors that
included, in addition to Hutchins, M. Lincoln Schuster, the book pub-
lisher; Paul G. Hoffman, head of the Studebaker Company; John
Stuart, board chairman of the Quaker Oats Company; Beardsley Ruml,
the social scientist and fiscal expert; Henry R. Luce; and Chester
Bowles. (Fifteen years later, Hoffman, Stuart, Hutchins and Ruml
were still serving. Among their associates were Adlai E. Stevenson,
industrialists Walter Paepcke and Curtis Gager, and advertising execu-
tive Albert W. Sherer. ) A board of editors was established; it was to
meet four times annually with Yust and his managing editor, John V.
Dodge, to discuss policies and procedures ranging from the feasibility
of publishing reading guides for encyclopaedia owners to specific
improvements in the methods of continuous revision. At its head was
Hutchins, and foremost among its members were the University of
Chicago professors Robert Redfield, Richard McKeon, and Ralph
Tyler, respectively authorities in anthropology, philosophy, and educa-
tion.

After the transfer, the primary objectives continued to be the main-
tenance and betterment of the Encyclopaedia Britannica itself, but a
number of subsidiary ventures were undertaken and completed. In the
first months after assuming the board chairmanship, Benton renewed
his interest in classroom movies. The ERPI company was still availa-
ble for the right buyer, and he began to plan for Encyclopaedia Bri-
tannica, Inc., to acquire the firm which, though quite small, with
only a $300,000 annual sales volume, had built up the country's largest
and most important classroom film library. Intensive talks began with
Kennedy Stevenson, financial vice-president of Western Electric, the
AT&T subsidiary that owned ERPI, and continued through most of
1943. Because Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., had no money to pay
for ERPI and consequently had to pledge its assets and credit to con-

OF BOOKS, FILMS AND GREAT BOOKS 261

summate the deal, purchase arrangements were complex. But by No-
vember 25 the encyclopaedia company was the new owner of ERPI
at a cost of $1,000,000 payable over the next decade, during which
time another $1,500,000 was spent in building and developing the
films firm. The purchase included hundreds of films which remained
persistently popular; as recently as the late 1950's surveys showed that
the three films still used most frequently in the country's classrooms,
Colonial Children, Adventures of Bunny Rabbit, and Gray Squirrel,
were part of this group. Four months after this purchase, the Eastman
Kodak Company turned over to the company about three hundred of
its famous Eastman Teaching Films on subjects ranging from agricul-
ture to science. This group, even then suffering from the competition
of sound movies, is now rarely used, but its acquisition late in 1943
made Encyclopaedia Britannica Films, Inc. by far the leading com-
pany of its kind.

Profits from the purchase of the films company, Benton told the uni-
versity trustees, would be desirable, but he cautioned that no gains
could be expected for at least ten years. He stressed a more important
motive: "This new relationship will enable the university to use its
resources and knowledge to develop an educational tool which expands
the range of material available to the teacher as no other device
can do."

In recent years, under its president, Maurice B. Mitchell, formerly
an executive of the Muzak Corporation, Encyclopaedia Britannica
Films, Inc., has moved forward as acknowledged world leader in
audio-visual education. As the use of classroom movies spread, the
company grew in size and scope. Many new films, made at its studios
in the Chicago suburb of Wilmette and on location in forests, factories
and foreign lands, were added to its original library. Many of the films
have been translated into thirteen foreign languages, virtually the only
ones of their kind with world-wide distribution. Each film is designed
for use in teaching and is so made that students can learn faster and
better with it than without it. Consequently, great care in production
and preparation is taken. Before a film is begun, researchers go over
the full field of texts and courses on the specified subject. Curriculum
specialists are consulted for advice, and every movie is made under
the supervision of an associate in research and production and with
the guidance of an expert or a scholar. New techniques have been ex-
tensively used, and as the films company has progressed technically
and intellectually, its creativity has increased. A massive project in

262 1HE GREAT EB

scientific education, the filming of an entire high-school course in in-
troductory physics, totals 162 half -hour movies in color. It was pro-
duced in 1956 in Pittsburgh in co-operation with local school officials
and the Fund for the Advancement of Education and, in Mitchell's
view, "may well revolutionize the teaching of the sciences in United
States schools." Special efforts in cultural fields have resulted in films
like William Shakespeare, produced in Great Britain for literature and
theater-arts classes in high schools and colleges, a movie "so extraor-
dinary/' according to Cecile Starr, educational films expert for the
Saturday Review, "that one must think twice before beginning its
praises, for fear of overpraising it." During 1957, sixty-two new films
were added to the company's library.

Profits from these and hundreds of others have been modest at best.
Financially, there have been no significant returns and no dividends
on the several millions of dollars invested since 1943. But the company
is considered increasingly important because of its contributions to
education, and profits are anticipated in the years ahead, for the
future for teaching and learning through audio-visual means is limit-
less.

In October, 1943, it was announced that Hutchins would edit a col-
lection of the great writings of Western civilization. Earlier that year
Benton had proposed such a collection when he and his wife were
students in a Great Books group, jocularly known as the "fat men's
class" and comprising many Chicago business leaders and their wives.
The class was conducted by Hutchins and Mortimer Adler, then pro-
fessor of philosophy of law at the University of Chicago. An intense
intellectual with a peppery manner of conveying learning and infor-
mation, Adler, called by Hutchins "The Great Bookie," had originated
and developed discussion groups at which persons of much or little
learning talked about the ideas of those whom Adler considered the
most original thinkers of the Western world.

Adler joined Hutchins in the task of preparing the collection. To
aid in choosing the volumes a distinguished editorial board was named,
including Stringfellow Barr, president of St. John's College; John Er-
skine, one of the pioneers in the study of notable writings of the ages;
and Mark Van Doren, the poet and teacher. The initial budget was
estimated at $500,000, with a separate allotment for an "index of
ideas." Original estimates were that such an index, the entries of
which would be correlated with the selected writings, would require a

OF BOOKS, FILMS AND GREAT BOOKS 263

small staff, an appropriation of only $60,000, and about two years'
steady work. Adler began with a handful of helpers in two cellar
offices near the university. They drew up a list of four thousand basic
ideas. For months Adler whittled away at this list, decreeing which
topics should be discarded, which might be incorporated with others.
More than a year after the time that had been deemed sufficient, he
finally pared it to manageable size 102 major ideas from "Angel" to
"World," subdivided into three thousand subtopics. Then started the
task of reading through the 443 works of seventy-four men, from
Aristotle to Tolstoy and from Homer to Marx, and finding all appro-
priate references to each of the ideas and subideas. At the peak of this
job Adler's staff, by now occupying a rambling graystone building pro-
vided by the university and promptly dubbed "Index House," num-
bered fifty, plus a clerical force of seventy-five. The scholars went
through all the books four times at a rate of six ideas a week, ultimately
making some 900,000 decisions about dropping or changing references.

Finally, in 1952, nearly nine years after its inception and at a cost of
some $2 million, the project was ready for printing: a fifty-four volume
set of the Great Books of the Western World, comprising thirty-two
thousand pages filled with twenty-five million words. Two of the
volumes, representing well over half the money spent, constituted the
Syntopicon, Adler's "survey of ideas" with essays on each of the 102
ideas. A third was Hutchins' The Great Conversation, in which he em-
phasized that great books constitute a most effective means of under-
standing not only an existing society but the people within it, that
they contain the notable ideas which, recognized or not, dominate
any particular society, and that there is no comparable repository of
Western tradition and thought. 1

There were critics the most irascible was Dwight Macdonald in
the New "Yorker who found reason for disparagement. Some believed
that Hutchins was too dogmatic and doctrinaire. Some debated the
choice of books and of ideas. But most agreed that the project was
unusually impressive, to be compared favorably with the appearance
of the first dictionary and the first encyclopaedia. Though critical of
some of the set's aspects, in his review in the New "York Times Gilbert
Highet called it "a majestic set" and "a noble monument to the power
of the human mind," and added: "They [the books] are a new and
valuable proof of the high level of contemporary culture, worthy to be

1 Hutchins had left the University of Chicago in 1950 to become associate
director of the Ford Foundation.

264 THE CHEAT EB

set beside our thronged symphony concerts, our uncomfortably but
encouragingly crowded art exhibitions, and other activities which are
the reverse of 'U.S. materialism/"

Besides helping to edit the work, Hutchins was instrumental in dis-
tributing the largest single lot through Paul Mellon's Old Dominion
Foundation, which made a grant to buy 1,600 sets for libraries
throughout the country. Subsequent sales went slowly, largely because
of the need for building a special staff, but by 1956 a concentrated
campaign was started, with the books priced at $298 and made avail-
able on the established Encyclopaedia Britannica twenty-four-month
time-payment plan.

Another ancillary venture was the formation of the Collection of
Contemporary American Painting sponsored by Encyclopaedia Bri-
tannica, Inc. Originally developed from an idea to commission painters
to produce special illustrations for Britannica Junior, the collection of
121 paintings first went on view at the Art Institute of Chicago in
April, 1945; in the group were works representing all contemporary
styles and schools, from the academic to the abstract, from realism to
impressionism, from Frederic Waugh to Stuart Davis, and from Grant
Wood to Salvador Dali. And in the next five years the paintings were
exhibited in forty major American cities, with attendance gratifyingly
running into the millions.

Editorialists and art critics praised the company for stimulating the
interest of the public in its national art, and various commentators
declared that other business institutions had been given a cultural
objective at which to aim. The show brought prestige to American art,
aided the reputations of individual artists, and, as had been hoped,
helped to spread the name of its sponsor. Noting that the show's cata-
logue displayed prominently the title of Encyclopaedia Britannica,
Harry Salpeter, the respected critic, commented wryly: "If you reserve
a small margin of your mind for the credit line, you will be doing no
more for one of the leading cultural institutions of the English-speaking
world than you do for the manufacturer of a dental cream through
whose enterprise the humor of Bob Hope is made available to you." 2

In mid-1944, the University of Chicago trustees were obliged to
decide whether to take advantage of the institution's option to buy for

2 At the end of the tour, Benton bought the collection, retained some of the
works, sold some, and gave many to schools and other institutions.

OF BOOKS, FILMS AND GBJEAT BOOKS 265

$50,000 half of Benton's stock, thereby getting two-thirds ownership of
the company. A negative decision was quickly reached.

Benton had assumed that if the company thrived the university
would exercise its option, and he would then become the minority
stockholder. The company had prospered in sales and profits beyond
all anticipations, and already the university had received over $300,000
in royalties, but the option was now rejected. A new argument had
implemented the old fear of having the university become responsible
for the Encyclopaedia Britannica: The university was doing so well
through its affiliation and benefiting so handsomely from the company's
prosperity that any change in the relationship was thought unwise.

There were some easy explanations for this prosperity. Since the
start of World War II, in contrast to the problems that had brought
Horace Hooper close to ruin in the First World War, sales had risen,
as they had, in fact, for most encyclopaedias. And they continued to
rise for the duration of the war. Only paper shortages and insufficient
printing and binding facilities prevented a more rapid increase. This
boom resulted from war-swollen incomes and a lack of durable con-
sumer goods; thousands of persons who had always wanted a top-
quality reference work now found themselves able to afford and ac-
quire one. Exempt from governmental credit restrictions, encyclo-
paedia makers tightened their monthly terms and still secured more
customers.

As gross sales mounted, so did net profits. And this prosperity, in
the opinion of some of the Encyclopaedia Britannica's top executives,
seemed destined to continue indefinitely. They held to this view even
after the war ended, when a slow shift should have been anticipated
in consumer buying toward the kind of goods hard to get or unavailable
during the war automobiles, refrigerators, radios, vacuum cleaners.

Spending on current and fresh ventures remained high. One new
one, based on Horace Hooper's venture after World War I, was Ten
Eventful Years, a four-volume history of the decade preceding 1947.
Elaborate plans were made for it. Contributors were selected from
among the personages involved in the events of that period generals,
rulers of nations, diplomats, scholars. They included such women as
Eleanor Roosevelt and Mme Chiang Kai-shek. But not much fore-
thought was given to the means of selling the set. Published in Sep-
tember, 1947, it recorded the major happenings of 1936-46, disclosed
many details from the number of Nazi submarines lost to the sources
for such war-inspired words as "scuttlebutt," "quisling," "commando,"

266 THE CHEAT EB

"gutbucket," and "bazooka" and afforded what friendly critics char-
acterized as a fascinating and instructive glimpse backward into a
significant decade. But the set had no sustained sales appeal and had
to be adjudged a failure.

Another enterprise was the invasion of the competitive retail book
market by the establishment of a department called the Encyclopaedia
Britannica Press. Some 2,400,000 paper-backed books for children
were produced inexpensively, their illustrations taken from Encyclo-
paedia Britannica Films stills. But they languished in warehouses, for
few of the top men in the company had knowledge or experience in
this area and no skilled sales promotion department had been or-
ganized to sell the books. The venture was eventually discontinued,
although the books later were successfully used as promotional premi-
ums for Britannica Junior.

Persistently expensive was the continuing preparation of the Great
Books of the Western World, with monthly costs often soaring to
$80,000. In addition, two floors were rented for the firm in Chicago's
stately Civic Opera Building, where formerly less than half a floor
had been sufficient; this increase was in part necessary because the
working force had doubled by the end of 1946 and in part due to the
requirements of the films company, whose headquarters had been
shifted from New York. Later the films company was moved to the
Chicago suburb of Wilmette and entailed additional costs by helping
to finance the purchase of homes for some fifty employees and their
families and by leasing a large bank building, which was remodeled
into offices, with a movie studio across the street.

Such adjustments and expansions were hardly unusual; companies
of all kinds which had charted large earnings in the war years antici-
pated greater ones in the postwar period. The executives at Ency-
clopaedia Britannica, Inc., were following this trend. In addition to
projects in progress, there were others discussed: an encyclopaedia
of music, supplemented by long-playing records; an edition of the
Bible based on the King James version but with new and special
interpretative material; an almanac; and pocket-sized books with ex-
tracts from the Encyclopaedia Britannica.

But by the middle of 1947 such ideas, though interesting and worth-
while, were discarded, for expenditures had grown increasingly vexa-
tious and, worse yet, the company, suddenly and critically, swirled into
a crisis.

OF BOOKS, FILMS AND CHEAT BOOKS 267

A Crisis Met and Solved

In 1946 estimates based on accelerated sales in the war years were
that annual gross sales of the Encyclopaedia Britannica for the fol-
lowing year would amount to close to $32 million. Consequently, orders
were placed for paper and for the printing of enough sets to cover this
anticipated demand. But as the year drew to a close it became evident
that the estimates had been unrealistically high. Sales had begun to
fall off, and large numbers of uncollectible instalment accounts were
accumulating fast. The prospects for 1947 looked far less attractive
than they had a few months earlier, and it was too late for cutbacks and
reductions in orders given to R. R. Donnelley and Sons. Yet, even this
overestimate in printing requirements would have been of small im-
port in the reference-book field, swollen inventories can be worked
off with a little time had it not been for another larger, and far more
critical, problem.

268

Ever since the days in Great Britain when Horace Hooper had in-
stituted time-payment plans with his sale of the Times reprint of the
ninth edition, most purchasers had paid by monthly instalments. By
1946, more than 80 per cent of Encyclopaedia Britannica owners were
in this category, and their payments constituted the principal source
of incoming cash for the company. Before turning over the Encyclo-
paedia Britannica to Benton and the University of Chicago, Sears,
Roebuck and Company had provided various important services: fi-
nancing, supervision of production, management of accounting and
credit passing and of collections. The credit-and-collection services, it
was agreed at the time of the 1943 transfer, would be maintained for
at least five more years through the six hundred Sears, Roebuck retail
stores, each staffed with people trained and experienced in this work.
This was a considerable asset, for the retail stores were able to in-
vestigate prospective purchasers promptly, rejecting those who were
not desirable credit risks. From 1943 through 1946, the Sears, Roebuck
credit staff saw to it that bills were sent promptly, that monthly
payments were made on time, and that when accounts fell behind,
appropriate steps were taken to collect on them.

At World War II's end, General Wood was eager to expand his
merchandising operations not only in the United States but in South
America. Because he would require his capital and his credit people
for this expansion, he asked Powell if Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc.,
could assume its own credit-and-collections operations as soon as pos-
sible, instead of waiting for the five-year deadline specified in the
1943 contract. Aware that no preparations had been made by the en-
cyclopaedia company to train or acquire sufficient personnel to assume
this important phase of the business, Wood told Powell, "Fll send our
people over to train your people." Powell agreed to the plan. He as-
sured Benton who was meanwhile absorbed in his postwar duties as
Assistant Secretary of State in Washington that the company would
actually save money by centralizing collections in Chicago under its
own direction.

In December, 1946, more than a full year before termination of the
1943 agreement, the shift started. Ninety skilled credit-and-collection
employees were transferred from Sears, Roebuck to the Encyclopaedia
Britannica offices to train workers assigned to or hired especially for
the new undertaking. They stayed for about three months, then re-
turned to their own jobs. The force that remained was supposed to
be sufficiently trained.

A CRISIS MET AND SOLVED 269

But it was soon alarmingly apparent that the training period had
been far too brief. Moreover, no such group, however well trained,
could be expected to duplicate the credit-and-collection of some six
hundred on-the-spot credit managers in Sears, Roebuck's far-flung
stores. Within two months after April, 1947, the new system broke
down so badly that the customary envelopes for forwarding payments
were not even being sent out. Collections dropped off by hundreds of
thousands of dollars monthly. Scores of customers made their payments
voluntarily, but often, when their money reached the main office, no
one knew where to put it or to which accounts to credit it. In addition,
with local credit controls relaxed, many salesmen took orders from
customers who were poor or, at best, marginal credit risks.

By the early fall of 1947 it was evident that not only was the col-
lection system in a state of disintegration but sales were far below
estimates. And R. R. Donnelley and Sons, in the midst of its own
expansion program, was asking for payment of a printing bill of $400,-
000. The encyclopaedia company, in its dealings with the huge printing
firm, had, since the transfer of 1943, adhered to the early-payment
schedules worked out by Sears, Roebuck; under these, payments were
to be made as soon as paper was purchased and printing proceeded.

Contrary to the optimistic predictions of the previous year, it now
appeared that the company might end the year 1947 with a sub-
stantial deficit.

That September, when Benton resigned as Assistant Secretary of State
with commendations from President Truman and Secretary of State
Marshall, he left Washington accompanied by Harry Houghton, presi-
dent of Muzak Corporation and a member of Encyclopaedia Britan-
nica, Inc.'s Board of Directors since 1945. On the trip to Chicago he
told Houghton the essential facts of the crisis and asked him to under-
take a swift survey. Canadian-born, in his mid-forties, Houghton had a
reputation for salvaging ailing companies.

Once in Chicago, Benton made clear Houghton's status in a letter to
Herbert P. Zimmerman, then president of R. R. Donnelley and Sons.
"I have told Buck Powell," he wrote, "that Harry Houghton is to act
as my full representative, with full authority. I know you will give
Harry your own views, with complete frankness, and I would be
grateful to you if you can find time to pass them along to me." He was
disturbed, added Benton, about erroneous estimates of sales, the soar-

270 THE CHEAT EB

ing of operating expenses, and commitments on such new ventures as
Ten Eventful Years, the Great Books of the Western World, and En-
cyclopaedia Britannica Films.

Houghton examined ledgers and account books. He talked to Powell
and Schoenewald and with lesser executives whose warnings had not
always been heeded. Unable to borrow on inventory, Houghton man-
aged to get the company out of some of its commitments for printing
and paper. After stern discussions, the tempo of development on the
Great Books project was slackened; its current operating appropriation
was reduced by more than two-thirds, and the staff for the Syntopicon
was skeletonized. Officials at the University of Chicago listened pa-
tiently and sympathetically to the details of the company's plight and
agreed to forego immediate payment of royalties, accepting long-term
debentures for the $468,000 due that year. ( Since 1943 the university
had already received $1,408,944 in royalties, which had been assigned
to its general education fund. ) From the sale of surplus stocks of paper,
$92,000 was procured.

At a board meeting the following January, Powell reported the dire
news: total sales for 1947 would be $16,428,000, about half the amount
that had been predicted earlier. Benton loaned the company $351,000
of his own money and this, together with other assets that could be
gathered immediately, enabled payment of the Donnelley bill, the only
one overdue. One reason for Benton's action was that the banks with
which the company dealt refused to extend more generous terms al-
though as they were under contract to do they did increase the
loans against the instalment accounts receivable to the agreed limit
of $7,800,000.

Yet all this was not enough. Significant changes had to be made in
the tottering credit-and-collection system. Against the objections of
Schoenewald and other executives who insisted that this specific
problem would somehow solve itself, Houghton set out to revamp the
operation. To supervise the reorganization, he installed Robert Conger,
the firm's operating manager in charge of manufacturing, processing,
and warehousing since 1945. Before joining the company Conger had
directed a widespread door-to-door collection organization for the
mail-order firm of Spiegel, Inc., and had helped to build that com-
pany's chain of retail stores and order offices.
One of the first of the Houghton-Conger proposals was to require

A CHISIS MET AND SOLVED 271

that all monthly payments for sets be collected through the local divi-
sion sales offices scattered over the United States instead of by the
Chicago headquarters. "It won't work," argued the skeptics. "You're
never going to get division managers to concern themselves with that
kind of detail."

There were other differences of opinion. Basic disagreements grew
in virulence. Early in 1948 Powell resigned. Named to succeed him,
Houghton sent letters of instruction to each of the company's sixteen
division managers, and he also made personal visits to key division
offices. "You've been salesmen up to now and only salesmen/' was
Houghton's message. "Now you must be salesmen and executives. From
now on you're responsible for collections as well as for sales in your
areas. The better the collections on the sales that your men make, the
better the credit risks and the higher your commissions and your net
earnings,"

Schoenewald had predicted that if such a demand were made, the
division chiefs would assuredly resign, Yet not a single man left after
Houghton's new system went into operation, with Conger in charge
of credit and collections. In the spring of 1949 Schoenewald's resigna-
tion was accepted; Paul E. Seaman, the company's division manager
in New York, was transferred to Chicago to replace him as vice-
president in charge of sales.

Houghton had carried out his assigned task well. Within six months
the company, aided further by stringent economies, cautious budget-
ing, and a reduction in the working staff, was steady once more. But
despite the progress, Houghton told Benton, what was really needed
now to head the company was a top-flight operating executive with
years of experience in the encyclopaedia business. After a survey of
candidates during 1949, the choice narrowed to three and finally to
one, Robert C. Preble, a veteran in the specialized world of subscrip-
tion book publishing.

A sales-minded individual since his boyhood in the Chicago suburb
of Oak Park, Preble had sold calculating machines and books during
his summers at the University of Illinois, where he also worked on the
staff of the Daily Illini. Six months after graduation in 1921, Preble had
become office manager for Midland Press, a Chicago publisher of
reference books; when he resigned in 1925 over disagreement with the
firm's editorial and sales policies, he was a vice-president. He joined

272 THE GREAT EB

the W. F. Quarrie Company, then publishers of the World Book En-
cyclopaedia, and remained with that firm and its corporate successors
for more than two decades, filling the positions of advertising manager,
editorial director, national sales manager, treasurer, and executive vice-
president. At the time he was approached, Preble was contemplating
resigning to establish a business of his own. But Houghton and Benton
were persuasive. That November Preble was installed as executive
vice-president and, after he had surveyed all phases of the company
from its home offices to its sales methods, he was named president at
the beginning of 195L 1

As the new president, Preble reversed or abandoned various ad-
ministrative and personnel procedures, reassigned responsibilities in
accordance with his own estimate of an individual's talents and ex-
perience, and established, unlike most of his predecessors, a practice
of discussing general policies fully with department heads and sub-
ordinates. He kept the prices of both the Encyclopaedia Britannica
and Britannica Junior from advancing in the next half dozen years
despite increases in the costs of paper, printing, and binding by in-
sisting that the various firms involved in their manufacture perfect
more efficient production techniques. As a result of economies, funds
became available for a stronger editorial-revision program. Salaries of
clerical workers were adjusted upward, and departments with out-
moded methods were streamlined. In July, 1951, new offices were es-
tablished on an upper floor of a building off Michigan Boulevard, at
half the annual rental of the Opera House quarters. The cumbersome
structure of the company's national sales organization was revamped.
Certain divisional sales territories were realigned, with each division
subdivided into local districts. The long-time compensation program
of salaries plus bonuses for achieving sales quotas was discarded. In-
stead, division and district managers were virtually established in
business for themselves on a profit-sharing basis, their earnings depend-
ent on the cash collected in their respective territories and on their
own efficiency in controlling the costs of producing sales.

A mail-order division became popular and profitable. Its key attrac-

1 Benton was now in the United States Senate, having been appointed in 1949
by his ex-partner, Chester Bowles, then governor of Connecticut, after the retire-
ment of Senator Raymond Baldwin. Elected in 1950 to fill out Baldwin's term,
Benton remained in the Senate until 1953. His term was characterized by his sup-
port of the Hoover Commission's reorganization proposals, by his fight for appro-
priations for the "Voice of America," and by his constant attack on Wisconsin's
Senator Joseph McCarthy, whose eventual censure stemmed from Benton's demand
for McCarthy's expulsion from the Senate.

A CRISIS MET AND SOLVED 273

tion was the Britannica Book of the "Year, notably improved in editorial
content and in illustrations. A later editorial innovation in the Book of
the Year was the inclusion of "broad subject surveys." In the 1955
volume, one was "Atomic Energy: Today and Tomorrow" with articles
by Lewis L. Strauss, chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission,
and by scientists engaged in atomic research. The other, "Latin
America/' stressed the developing awareness throughout the world of
the importance of Central and South America to the United States
and other free countries. Benton himself contributed a significant
27,000-word report in the 1956 edition. It dealt with the techniques of
propaganda, indoctrination, and education in the Soviet Union and
was based on his intensive and spirited discussions with U.S.S.R. gov-
ernment officials, artists, educators, civil servants, writers, and ad-
ministrators during a visit there in 1955. In the article and in other
writings and speeches Benton stressed the evidence he found of the
tremendous advances in scientific development and education in the
Soviet Union and of the vast training programs there of specialists in
every phase of the expanding Russian economy and in scientific ven-
tures.

Another project that proved successful in this post-crisis period was
publication of the interesting two-volume World Language Dictionary
developed by Preble from plans he brought with him when he joined
the company. Published in 1954, the first volume is the Funk and
Wagnall's New Practical Standard Dictionary, but much of the second,
running to 540 pages, provides a basic list of the 6,400 most-used
English words with their equivalents, in parallel columns, in six other
languages French, German, Italian, Spanish, Swedish, and Yiddish.
An additional section realphabetizes the words of each language and
contains phonetic pronunciations and explanations of grammatical
rules.

Other publications, begun in earlier years, continued to thrive. The
fifteen- volume Britannica Junior is the only encyclopaedia in existence
designed solely for school children through the ninth grade. Its closest
rivals contain material for students in the upper elementary grades
and high school and even for adults.

Since its acquisition in 1934, Britannica Junior, whose editor, Don E.
Walter, is a former teacher, has been revised in varying degrees no

274 THE GREAT EB

less than twenty-three times. Youngsters themselves selected the type
in which the set is printed. A vote that was taken favored large ten-
point type, and the work has used this size ever since. Other similar
experiments with illustrations, length of sentences and paragraphs, and
maps were conducted. Material in Britannica Junior is selected with
the counsel of a special University of Chicago advisory committee of
educational experts together with editorial consultants and librarians
from other major American universities. And the principles guiding the
selection of contributors to the junior edition are akin to those for the
parent but with one major difference. Each original manuscript for
Britannica Junior whether by Roscoe Pound, former dean of the
Harvard Law School, on "Law," by Emily Post on "Etiquette/' or by
Vilhjalmur Stefansson, the Arctic explorer, on "Eskimo" is turned
over to a staff of eight "text simplifiers" for examination in accord with
established principles of vocabulary for the grade-school child. The
simplified copy is returned to the contributor for rereading to make
certain that no changes have been made in meaning or implication.
New contributors are often selected from among writers of best-selling
books for children; always the stress is on obtaining authorities in their
fields.

Each revision, too, has brought a greater number of illustrations,
especially of those in color. The number of diagrammatic drawings
also has increased from edition to edition; all help to reduce to simple
terms either various mechanical operations, such as the working of a
gasoline engine, or physiological functions, such as human breathing.
Through diagrams and specific and unencumbered instructions, young
readers can learn, among many things, how to lay out a baseball
diamond or make objects out of soap, wood, or paper, how to sew,
cook, identify birds, animals, and flowers, or build a campfire. Maps of
varying sizes constitute an important section. Again, as in the text,
both index and maps, even with the mass of detailed information, are
highly legible.

The work's first volume is the Ready Reference Index. This is no
mere listing or sublisting of articles in the other fourteen volumes
but, as a writer in Grade Teacher Magazine once described it, "the
key which unlocks the vast store of information in the complete set"
The procedure is handy: The child first looks up the major topic in
which he is interested. Next to the word is its pronunciation with
standard dictionary diacritical markings, and next to this is a full but

A CRISIS MET AND SOLVED 275

simple definition of the word. Then, in heavy type, the volume and
page of the complete article on the word are given. And finally are
listings of subtopics, charts, pictures, and maps.

Another subsidiary publication is the Encyclopaedia Britannica
World Atlas. The first edition, issued in 1942, was the product of a
meeting of world geographers sponsored by the company to discuss
the composition of an "ideal" world atlas. Since that time the atlas
has gone through twelve editions, each an improvement over the last.
It includes not only the general and detailed maps one would expect
to find in any reputable atlas but also special data and information
intended, in the words of G. Donald Hudson, Encyclopaedia Britan-
nica's geographical editor, to "contribute to the progress of avoiding
periods of stress among the peoples of the world and to the need for
understanding each other's lives and living/*

The latest edition of the atlas shows vividly this orientation of sub-
ject matter to a world perspective. It contains geopolitical maps and
summaries of each of the world's political units set up in statistical
tables listing areas, populations, transportation facilities, communi-
cations, major crops, number of livestock, minerals, forest products,
chief items of manufacture, value of foreign trade, and major export
and import commodities. A section on geographical comparisons con-
tains data on famous waterfalls, oceans and seas, islands, lakes, rivers,
peaks, canals, dams, and bridges. The glossary of geographical terms
and the index are thorough and detailed. As in the senior and junior
encyclopaedias, there is continuous revision, employing the experience
and knowledge of British, Canadian, and American geographers and
the research efforts of scholars and scientists in geology, climatology,
history, political science, economics, and anthropology.

Since 1954, much time and effort have been expended in reshaping
the company's policies and methods in Great Britain.

During the years after Horace Hooper's death, there was no official
British division of the company, since all sales and business were
handled through the overseas branches of Sears, Roebuck and Com-
pany. By 1945, London headquarters were on Dean Street in the Soho
district, occupying two picturesque but inadequate buildings, one of
which, rumor had it, was once the home of Lord Nelson's paramour,
Lady Hamilton. The editorial director then was William D. Clark, a

276 THE GREAT EB

journalist who had served with the British Information Service in New
York and as a press attache in Washington during the Second World
War. Later Clark resigned to join the staff of the London Observer,
and John Armitage, editor of the Fortnightly and a specialist in edu-
cational matters, was named London editor. A, E. Dolphin, who had
started with the company as an accountant in the last days of Horace
Hooper, was appointed managing director and served until his resig-
nation in 1953.

One of Treble's objectives after assuming the presidency was to
modernize the British subsidiary. The editorial and business offices, by
1956, had been moved from the Dean Street buildings and were con-
solidated on the top floor of a modern office building on Belgrave
Street. Bookkeeping methods dating from the age of Charles Dickens
were replaced by new accounting machines. Printing and binding of
volumes in England was simplified and increased. Production methods
and policies in the fully owned subsidiary now more closely follow
the American example. Armitage's primary duties involve liaison with
committees of scholar-advisers from the universities of Oxford, Cam-
bridge, and London, as well as responsibility for all articles written
by authorities in Great Britain and the Commonwealth and, indeed,
all over Europe. He also edits the British Book of the Year, which is
wholly different from the American edition. Salesmen are hired,
trained, and directed as are their American counterparts. Sales director
is S. D. Keetch, who has absorbed American-style selling techniques,
with some modifications. Avoiding flamboyancy or "gimmicks,"
Keetch's force of over two hundred has steadily brought yearly reve-
nues to a point where Encyclopaedia Britarmica is the leader in the
subscription book field in Europe. Until his sudden death in 1955
while sailing to the United States, Hector McNeil, former Secretary of
State for Scotland in the Labour government, was in over-all charge
as chairman and managing director of the British subsidiary. He was
succeeded as chairman by Sir Geoffrey Crowther, who, in his nearly
two decades as editor of the Economist, was among the firmest expo-
nents of staunch Anglo-American alliances; he was added to the
boards of the encyclopaedia company and to the films firm as well
as to the Board of Editors. The post of managing director went to
Graham Martin, a businessman who for a previous decade had filled
the same position with the British Relay Wireless and Associated
Companies.

A CRISIS MET AND SOLVED 277

The company's health has improved year by year since the crisis of
1947-48. Stock earnings are plowed back to be used for sales expan-
sion and improvement of the encyclopaedia itself and affiliated
ventures, and for such new projects as, in 1957, the Encidopedia
barsa, a fifteen-volume work with a consultants' board made up of
the heads of leading universities of Latin America, Spain, and
Portugal.

A striking indication of its condition has been the amount of royalty
payments and other cash benefits given to the University of Chicago
under the contract of 1943. Toward the end of 1955, Benton, in a letter
to General Wood reporting on the company's financial standing and
the piling up annual royalties for the university, commented: "Larry
Kimpton [Lawrence A. Kimpton, Chancellor of the University of
Chicago] not long ago told me that the Britannica is going to rank in
university annals as the university's second largest donor, second only
to John D. Rockefeller."

Early in 1957 the encyclopaedia company paid more than $2 million
to retire the university's preferred shares and remaining debentures;
also, the university canceled its option to buy the block of stock
which would give it, upon Benton's death, control of the firm. In
a personal report to the trustees, Benton noted that for that very
year the university's cash income from the affiliation would amount
to $700,000, bringing to $4 million its total share from the fifteen-year
association. He also predicted that if sales volume remained at existing
high levels the university would derive another $4 million over the
next five years. Whereupon the trustees responded with a resolution
of appreciation, describing the history of the affiliation since 1943 as
"a brilliant and inspiring story of achievement" and citing Benton and
his associates for "their capable operation of this fine business enter-
prise and for the remarkable contribution that their efforts have made
to the growth and development of the University of Chicago and to
education in general."

Avowed realists in an enterprise that must compete on commercial
levels without debilitating its standards and reputation, the executives
of Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., are aware of the basic causes
beyond the financial and managerial skills of its operating officials
for the status that has been maintained and, in recent years, strength-
ened.

278 THE GBEAT EB

The first is the quality of the Encyclopaedia Britannica itself, the
responsibility of many editorial executives and their aides, advisers
scholars, educators, and scientists and assorted authorities from
the greatest universities of the English-speaking nations, and thou-
sands of contributors from all over the world.

And the second is the special abilities of the people who sell the
Encyclopaedia Britannica.

A CRISIS MET AND SOLVED 279

Part Five

The Modern EB: How It Is Edited

In editorial methods and procedures, the modern Encyclopaedia Bri-
tannica, unlike its predecessors, represents a kind of complex journal-
ism. Its system of continuous revision, in effect since publication of
the fourteenth edition, sets up rigid deadlines and strict schedules,
requires constant scrutiny of its contents and a steady watchfulness on
world events necessitating textual alterations, and makes imperative
keeping its information as up to date as is possible in a set of books
whose forty-one thousand articles comprise more than forty million
words.

Vital to this system is a corps of permanent advisers, some seventy-
five scholars on the faculties of the University of Chicago and other
major American universities and from Great Britain's London, Cam-
bridge, and Oxford universities. Each of these advisers has a definitely

283

assigned function: to watch articles within his field of specialization.
Each counsels the encyclopaedia's editors on the necessity for current
revision of an article, the need for additions, deletions, or entirely
new articles, and the contributors most competent to make such
changes or to write fresh material.

By methods devised by two veteran editorial workers, Mrs. Mae
McKay and Mrs. Harriet Milburn, a large editing staff checks articles,
works on the important index volume, and handles and controls the
flow of copy from contributors. The task is a constant one, for to sup-
plant the numbered editions there have been, since the fourteenth
edition in 1929, new printings at least once each year and sometimes
more frequently. Some changes have been minor a shift in a statistic,
a change of personnel, a correction of a spelling error. But some of the
larger revisions have involved changing or rewriting as many as four
million words and recruiting over four hundred new contributors.

Inevitably, new information seldom fits neatly into established re-
vision schedules. With the explosion of the atom bomb at Hiroshima
and subsequent fast-moving developments, a full article on the subject
was required swiftly, and to make room for it four full pages of new
material were inserted in the proper volume. Made suspect, too, by
the explosion, were some five hundred other articles, from "Alchemy"
to "Uranium/' which had to be checked and, in many cases, altered
by editorial workers before the onrushing deadline for a scheduled
new printing. When Elizabeth II became the British queen in 1952,
more than a few royal biographies and articles on English history were
affected. Her accession added a Roman numeral to the first Elizabeth.
Further, because of the British custom of referring to virtually all
government offices, official celebrations, and prizes in the name of the
sovereign, all through the work were scattered references to the high
court of justice known as "King's Bench Division,*' "His Majesty's
Stationer," and "King's Scouts." These had to be changed. Yet there
were exceptions to the rule, such as the "King's Cup Race," which re-
tained its old designation. The "King's Prize" for shooting, on the other
hand, had to be altered, as did the British anthem, now "God Save
the Queen."

Most frequently in need of periodic revision are the scientific sec-
tions. In some scientific fields, changes can be anticipated; all articles
in these classifications are scheduled for review by specified monitors
at short intervals. But sometimes unexpected developments occur. In
1953, when anthropologists declared that the Piltdown man's jaw

284 THE GREAT EB

was a hoax, and thereby revised many suggested theories of modern
man's origins, editor Walter Yust and his aides immediately consulted
the index for references. They were relieved to find that the article on
the subject did note that many experts had always expressed doubts
about the find. But it also stated that the jaw represented an indi-
vidual of early Pleistocene times. The article was not scheduled for
full review until 1956. But to report the hoax as soon as possible,
without waiting for that printing or for a special discussion of the
subject in the Book of the Year, the editors quickly consulted one of
the advisers on anthropology. And he specified how, with a minimum
of patching on the actual plates from which the article was printed,
interim alterations could be made immediately.

Wars have always caused drastic changes and editorial headaches.
Destroyed monuments and buildings, migrations and increases or de-
creases in population, new boundaries, new alliances, political shifts,
the establishment of new independent states all must be recorded in
the reference work as soon as possible, for readers are quick to note
such omissions. An example of how political changes can be vexatious
is the checkered history of Vilnyus, the European city also known as
Wilno and Vilna. Before 1938 it was in dispute between Poland and
Lithuania; then it was seized on March 17 of that year by Poland,
captured by the Soviet Union in September, 1939, ceded to Lithuania
a month later, taken again by the Soviet Union on June 15, 1940, lost
to Germany on June 22, returned in the summer of 1944 to Soviet
control, and ultimately established as the capital of the Lithuanian
Soviet Socialist Republic. Doggedly, the Encyclopaedia Britannica edi-
tors followed and recorded the shifting fortunes of this city and of
others similarly affected.

Physical catastrophes send the editors scurrying to the latest printing
of their work. In 1950, researchers had just completed some three
hundred editorial changes to incorporate the latest findings concerning
heights of peaks, lengths of rivers, and populations of cities in the vast
Himalayan mountain range. Almost simultaneously with the comple-
tion of this detailed job, heavy earthquakes were reported in that area.
The mountains were said to be "crawling southward" under the in-
fluence of violent earth shocks; some peaks were abruptly rising and
others were falling, rivers were changing their courses, whole villages
were disappearing. All the toil that had preceded the news of these
disasters had to be repeated for the next printing.

As with a newspaper, certain kinds of material can be prepared

THE MODERN E B: HOW IT IS EDITED 285

before a specific event. As soon as the Presidential candidates of all
parties are nominated, for instance, assignments are instantly made
for full biographies of each nominee, and appropriate photographs are
assembled. At the same time, shorter biographies are also prepared.
When the results of the national election are known, the full biography
of the winner and the pictures are sped to the printers, as is the shorter
biography of the loser. Similarly, if and when Alaska and Hawaii are
admitted to statehood, the Encyclopaedia Britannica will be ready;
changes will be necessary in at least 514 articles and in the big full-
color plate now showing the forty-eight-starred American flag. Oc-
casionally, a new edition has been held up just beyond a set deadline
to record a late development, When Franklin D. Roosevelt died sud-
denly, the editors were able to insert this event into the work along
with information about his successor, Harry S. Truman. When Pope
Pius XII was critically ill, the printers were asked to hold pertinent
sections of Volume XVII ("P" to TPlantT) as long as possible; this was
done, although the crisis was passed when the pontiff took a turn for
the better and survived his illness.

At the heart of the complex system designed to maintain the flow of
fresh material into those areas where alterations are most frequently
required is the copy-control section built over the years since adoption
of continuous revision. But there are essential preliminaries to the work
of copy control, Two years before each new printing, Yust care-
fully studies the schedule of some thirty subject classifications into
which the millions of words are divided. After conferences with his
immediate aides and after studying recommendations from scores of
editorial advisers, he selects the articles deemed in need of revision.
When the lists of articles to be revised are drawn, they are dispatched
to the specific advisers at American and English universities for the
names of likely contributors. Generally the suggestions of these schol-
ars on the need for change and the best possible contributors are
followed, since they are all prime authorities in their respective fields.
But occasionally an adviser is challenged, as when one proposed that
the biographies of Octavia and Miranda Hill, nineteenth-century pio-
neers in British housing, be deleted for "more important matter/' inas-
much as neither was especially well known outside of England. This
suggestion evoked from John Armitage, the set's London editor, the
protest: "I feel faint at the suggestion. Miranda may . . . depart from

286 THE GREAT EB

the title but Octavia stands second in our line of 19th century
heroines to Florence Nightingale. Her name is honourably mentioned
in any review of housing, and housing managers cannot pass their
examinations without a knowledge of her life and work. ... If Oc-
tavia does not rate as a great woman, there is none." The adviser
was overruled and neither of the Hill sisters was eliminated.

Dates, names, and essential details about the articles to be revised
are recorded by the copy-control section on large cards in a mechanical
device variously known among the hundred editorial workers as "the
Robot" or "the Monster." With the flick of a switch, it can disclose the
precise status of every article. Indeed, every bit of data about a
specific article, from the moment a prospective contributor is asked to
handle it to the date on which the corrected proof is sent to the
printer, is known to the Robot and remains known not only for the
current edition but for those of the future. The Robot has rarely lost a
challenge. A group of advisers clustered around it once defied a young
lady in charge to inform them what had happened to the article on
"Goldfish." She flipped a knob, looked at a card, then turned to one of
the professors, saying, "Why, you've been holding it for two months
and we've been trying to get it from you." Another inquired about an
article in his specialty and was quickly informed, "The contributor has
died and we are expecting a suggestion from you for a successor."
When the adviser expressed surprise, explaining that he had only just
heard of the contributor's death, he was told of another editorial
worker whose task it is to examine each day's obituary notices in the
New York Times and apprise the Robot of the demise of any con-
tributor.

On receipt of the names of proposed contributors, letters of solicita-
tion, specific in content and intent, are dispatched to them. They
state briefly what is wanted and by what date, and that the rate of
compensation is five dollars for reading each page of printed text and
two cents a word for writing the revision, a rate established at the
time of the publication of the fourteenth edition. The invitation is
sometimes rejected, but rarely because of low payment. Most experts
and scholars realize the prestige attached to being asked to con-
tribute to the Encyclopaedia Britannica, and less than 2 per cent of
those invited have ever declined.

An avid statistician once reckoned the number of processes from
the time the copy is solicited until it appears in its proper place in the
proper volume some nine months later to be 569. When the contributor

THE MODERN E B: HOW IT IS EDITED 287

accepts his assignment, a copy of the article in the latest printing is
sent to him, and the date is entered on the proper card in the Robot.
A favorite story in the editorial lore of the company involves the head
of a history department in a western university to whom a historical
article, many years unchanged, was sent. In agreeing to revise it, the
professor was aroused enough to write, "111 be glad to do this for you.
The article is badly organized, inaccurate and full of errors of both
omission and commission/' An investigation revealed that the critic
was the man who had written the earlier article years before a dis-
covery that remained undisclosed until the new treatise had been
received at the editor's desk.

Most writers of major articles are given at least a year to prepare
their manuscripts; not until a month before the scheduled delivery of
the article is the author prodded to produce it. Immediately upon
receipt, the words are counted and payment is promptly made. This
policy was instituted because of Yust's own experiences as a free-lance
writer, when quick compensation, however small, often elated him
more than a delayed check, however large.

The next step for the manuscript is the Robot, where receipt is
recorded and a note made of illustrations furnished or needed. Along
the route, the copy is read by the specialist advisers for authenticity,
then checked several times by editorial workers. After Yust and his
assistant editors read it, either the manuscript is approved or a rewrite
is decreed. Never is any material rewritten by anyone save the con-
tributor himself. Any article that is difficult to read or obtuse is sent
back to the writer with a request that he clarify the bothersome
sections. Although few specific instructions are sent to contributors,
it has been deemed wise to ask physical scientists, who often write
on technical matters which cannot be explained simply, to adhere to a
few general rules. The opening paragraph of these instructions reads:
"Each article under each heading should begin with a clear statement
in one sentence of the meaning and scope of that heading, comparable
to an extended dictionary definition. The first paragraph following
that heading should be an amplification of the first sentence, possibly
with a discussion of subheadings and the like if the article is to be a
long one. If it is to be very long with a number of sections, there should
be a short list of contents by section-titles and division-titles."

An article that does not require rewriting by the author and is
finally approved is turned over to typists who retype it on copy-
fitting paper. Subeditors then reread and check the article. They pre-
pare layouts of the actual page where the article will be placed. By

288 THE GREAT EB

tliis time it is known whether the revised article will be longer or
shorter than the original. For either eventuality, a solution is ready.
In a Killer-Filler file are lists of short articles that advisers have sug-
gested can be eliminated from the page or adjoining pages without
arousing protests from readers or impairing the basic purposes of the
encyclopaedia, and collections of likely entries, mainly brief biographies
or extended definitions, that can be inserted if a new article runs short.
If the Killer-Filler file cannot produce reasonable balm for the situ-
ation, part of the new entry, if too long, is set in smaller type or, often,
an additional page is inserted.

Back to the copy-control section goes the article, once it has been
tailored to fit. Initials of the contributor are affixed to the manuscript,
and it is then transferred to indexers who arrange their cards on a
circular device they call their Lazy Susan. They not only make direct
changes but also note all cross-references, "see also's," and related data
that may be affected by additions, deletions, and other changes.

A few more technical steps, and the copy is ready for the linotype
operators at R. R. Donnelley and Sons's Lakeside Press. This occurs
after proper notations have been transmitted to the Robot about the
myriad details of specific articles. Proofs are sent to the writers for
final checking and last-minute changes; all proofs are read, too, by
editorial experts. In previous years proofs were rarely sent to con-
tributors, but Yust put this into effect shortly after he became editor,
for he realized the importance both professionally and psychologically
of such a method. He also recalled with what indignation George
Bernard Shaw replied when offered not proofs but a typed copy of his
fourteenth-edition article on socialism. "Do not bother about sending
me a typescript/' Shaw scrawled on one of his postcards. "I have the
carbon duplicate of the one I sent you, besides an earlier-corrected
draft from which it was fair-copied. But if I cannot have a proof
(which is really shocking) at least let the printer set up from my copy
and not from a copy of it; for if the printer's errors are reinforced by
the typist's errors, and both edited by an American proofreader who
will conclude that I must mean exactly the opposite of what I had
written ( accidentally omitting the nots ) the result will be disastrous."

Shaw is one of forty-three Nobel Prize winners among the four thou-
sand contributors to the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Most of them, like
Shaw and Einstein and Sir Norman Angell ("Outlawry of War"),
Hans Adolph Krebs ("Citric Acid"), General George C. Marshall (a

THE MODERN E B: HOW IT IS EDITED 289

section of "World War II"), and J. J. R. Macleod ('Insulin"), were
asked to contribute after they had won this honor. But some were
contributors even before their selection: Ralph Bunche ("Beira/' "Bel-
gian Congo/' and "Nairobi"), who wrote for the set four years before
he won the Nobel Prize in 1950, and Professors Linus C. Pauling
("Theory of Resonance," "Valence," and "Ice") and Glenn T. Seaborg,
author of six articles from "Actinium" to "Transuranium Elements."

Shaw's article, interestingly enough, has been little altered since its
publication in 1929, although some additions have been made to it.
This is true of other major and minor classics written for earlier editions
that remain useful to students and scholars and casual readers alike.
There are among them Thomas Babington Macaulay's biographical es-
says on Samuel Johnson, Oliver Goldsmith, and John Bunyan; Sir
Donald Francis Tovey's writings on music, more than three dozen
articles from "Aria" to "Wagner, Wilhelm Richard"; G. K. Chesterton's
vivid, contentious treatise on Charles Dickens; Sigmund Freud's essay
on "Psychoanalysis," with additions enumerating advances in the im-
portant field in which he pioneered; and Julian Huxley's authoritative
"Courtship of Animals."

The exigencies of time and expense often make it impossible for the
continuous revision method to include as many changes as editors and
readers would like. To help fill the gaps are the Book of the Year
and the Library Research Service, both of which have developed here
and in Great Britain since their beginnings in the 1930's.

The first of these, in addition to its subject surveys, contains more
than a million words in its annual one thousand articles, reporting on
developments and news during the previous year in activities varying
from "Accident Prevention" and "Infantile Paralysis" to "Tariffs" and
"Zoology." Each issue is new in content, but the list of subjects remains
essentially stable. Editorial procedures resemble those of the parent
set, but the time between receipt of manuscripts and finished volume
is only five months. Deadlines for contributors are spread from mid-
September to mid-December, with most articles due by the end of
October. As with the encyclopaedia, a multitude of details including
a great deal of reading and checking of data is involved before final
copies are sent to the printer.

Since its origin, the function of the Library Research Service has
been to reply to readers' questions on subjects not covered either in

290 THE GREAT EB

the set or in the yearbook. Each purchaser has the right to ask a
maximum of fifty questions over a period of ten years, but no replies
are given to seekers of medical or legal advice or specific professional
or commercial information. In its first years, the service received ques-
tions that could often be answered by reference to only one or two
books. But as readers became more conversant with the privileges of
the valuable department and the amount of information that it could
supply, the questions grew more involved and more difficult.

The service sends its researchers for information to many institu-
tions, from the Chicago Public Library to New York's Library of En-
gineering Societies to the San Francisco Public Library and, of course,
to the Library of Congress. Owners of the Encyclopaedia Britannica
receive, in answer to their inquiries, individual, single-spaced reports,
from four to as many as thirty pages long, made up of extracts from
the highest authorities and supplemented by a bibliography to spur
further individual study.

The department has always been stubborn in its refusal to be
stumped. Actually, its rate of defeat has been about 1 per cent. On the
other hand, the following is a representative list of reports sent out
in a single day after researchers had collected their material:

Admission of China to the United Nations: Pro and Con
Security Measures and the Threat to Civil Liberties
Communism in the Schools
The Future of the Coal Industry

Statistics on the Sale of Soft Drinks in Bottles and Cans
The Guaranteed Annual Wage
Designing Skiving Tools

Statistical Quality Control for the Electronics Industry
Marketing Dehydrated Alfalfa
Organization and Operation of a Fabric Mart
Making Decorative Tiles for Table Tops

Construction of a Buffet Sideboard With Hutch China Cupboard
Interplanetary Navigation
Tibetan Concept of Morality

Maya Indian Baptismal Rites for Children Aged 3-12
Psychoanalytical Interpretation of the Works of Dostoevsky and Shake-
speare

Current Soviet Theories on the Origin of the Solar System
Lanchester's Equations on the Phugoid Theory of the Flight Path
Nature Study for Children
Children's Fears
Federal Aid to Education

THE MODERN EB: HOW IT IS EDITED 291

For owners of Britannica Junior an adjunct to the Library Research
Service is designed to aid parents and children. Pamphlets, booklets,
and bibliographies are available for set owners on an extensive range
of problems, from "Babies: Their Care and Training" to "Cultural
Activities for Children/' in addition to specific reports on questions
involving quarrels among siblings, activities for rainy days, eating
habits, home duties for children, vocational opportunities, and sex in-
struction.

Despite all precautions, checking and rechecking, and expert proof-
reading, letters complaining of errors, omissions, defects, misstate-
ments, or misinterpretations in E B are inevitable. Keen attention
even when the writer's return address is a state mental hospital and his
missive an eight-page farrago of nonsense about how to achieve
perpetual motion or square the circle is paid to all letters. Some-
times these communications provide useful clues to new information
and do catch mistakes which slipped past everyone on the 569-step
route from contributor's desk to printed page. Every form of criticism,
whether in letters or publications, is diligently investigated; many are
referred to the contributor and to the relevant adviser. In an average
year the most prevalent plaints, constituting some 70 per cent of the
total number received, charge errors of fact or omission, yet careful
editorial checks show that less than 6 per cent of such grievances
have any validity.

Charges of non-inclusion are sometimes as difficult to down as the
belief that rewards are offered for finding errors; that myth has per-
sisted since the days when the company offered a prize of a dollar to
any boy or girl who found a mistake in the early editions of Britannica
Junior. Such awards were given only for a year or two, but letter
writers still cagily ask about the "big prize" before disclosing the nature
of the purported error. One correspondent in Ohio, when informed
that the company would be happy to learn what mistakes he claimed
to have found but had to decline to pay any premium, replied, *1, as a
lawyer, sell my professional services. If you do not deign my infor-
mation worth at least $50, let us drop the correspondence forthwith."
At that, the Ohio lawyer was comparatively mild in his request. De-
mands others have made include (1) a new set of the Encyclopaedia
Britannica plus the World Atlas and World Language Dictionary,,
(2) $5,000, and (3) a position as an assistant editor.

292 THE GREAT EB

For many years, no critic or scholar has had cause to write about the
set with such vehemence as those who attacked William Robertson
Smith's treatises on religious subjects in the 1880's or as Willard Hunt-
ington Wright did in his peevish Misinforming a Nation in 1917. Some
of the bitterest attacks in recent years have come from the Soviet
Union. In 1952, when the Soviet Union was claiming Russian origin of
most of the great inventions, they assailed the editors of the Encyclo-
paedia Britannica as "modern savages" because Guglielmo Marconi in-
stead of A. S. Popov was named the inventor of the wireless telegraph
and James Watt instead of I. I. Polzunov was called "father of the
steam engine." This, however, was not the first assault by the Soviets.
Four years earlier, William Benton received a translation of an article
in Moscow's New Times titled, "How the Encyclopaedia Britannica
Distorts History." It was filled with allegations that 'lies and fabrica-
tions" made up the work's articles on the Union of Soviet Socialist
Republics. Benton forwarded copies to Hutchins and Yust for com-
ment. Hutchins' reply was characteristically brief and pungent: "Nuts!"
But Yust made a point-by-point rejoinder, carefully refuting the charges
that the work had neglected the role of the Communist party in the
Russian Revolution, that there was no mention of the Stakhanov move-
ment to reward laborers for increased production, that the heroic de-
fense of Stalingrad received not a word of attention, and that the
official History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union was un-
listed. Besides citing page and line in his rejoinder, Yust suggested a
more careful use of the index. By 1955, relations were more tranquil.
Benton, visiting the Soviet Union, interviewed the editors of the Soviet
encyclopaedia and asked if they were satisfied that the Encyclopaedia
Britannica devoted a fair amount of space to their vast country. They
replied affirmatively but insisted that their encyclopaedia was superior
because of its "complete objectivity," although admitting that all arti-
cles were written, as B. A. Vvedensky, editor-in-chief, asserted, "from
the position of our world outlook Marxism-Leninism." After he re-
turned to the United States, Benton dispatched copies of the latest
printing of the Encyclopaedia Britannica to a number of Soviet offi-
cials whom he had met, including Premier Nicolai Bulganin and
Klementi Voroshilov.

Despite the fact that Encyclopaedia Britannica has been American-
owned since 1901, charges are still made that it is "pro-British" a

THE MODEBN EB: HOW IT IS EDITED 29S

charge counterbalanced by critics who deplore its "Americanization."
Many such letters begin, "Of course, I would not expect to find this
in a British publication, but . . ." and then proceed to ask answers
to questions as farfetched as "What was the name of the Dobermann
Pinscher that won the best-of-breed in New York in 1921?" or "Why
can't I find the maiden name of Molly Pitcher's mother in your set?"
In one instance, Yust had special satisfaction in replying to an Anglo-
phobe who demanded to know why Washington's Farewell Address
was not included. "You point out," wrote Yust, "that Britannica does not
reprint in its entirety Washington's Farewell Address, and you ascribe
this to 'British bias.' You may have noted that the Declaration of In-
dependence and the Constitution are printed in full. If you wish a
copy of Washington's Farewell Address, let me refer you to the pub-
lication, 'Speeches and Documents in U.S. History.' It was published
this year by Oxford University Press, whose main address is London,
England."

Although articles on religion are rarely subjected to the type of
criticism encountered by similar writings in earlier editions, occasional
complaints are received about bias against specific creeds. Sometimes,
in interesting contrast to the outcry of certain Catholic critics against
articles in the eleventh edition, objections are heard that the articles
on Catholic subjects have been subjected to "clerical shearing" by
high-ranking members of that faith. One hasty critic insisted that all
religious articles marked "X" at the end indicated such "censorship."
What he did not know but was quickly made aware of by the edi-
tors was that the "X" signified that a subeditor had inserted current
information or had made minor revisions. Actually, the current practice
is to ask leaders of religious faiths to advise and verify factual points
and, in the case of controversial issues, to ask the writer to compare
opposing viewpoints. Since the 1957 printing and subsequent ones,
certain articles pertaining to the New Testament, which had drawn
frowns from Roman Catholic and Protestant clergy, were rewritten to
the satisfaction of both groups by Professor Jaroslav Jan Pelikan, a
young Lutheran minister and member of the University of Chicago's
Federated Theological Faculty.

Other sample queries and complaints: A man in Atlantic, Iowa, de-
manded to know if Jesse James was still alive and added, "111 take
your word for it." The reply was soon dispatched: "We too have

294 THE CHEAT EB

heard rumors that Jesse James is still alive or that he did not die in
1882 but lived to be over 100 years old. However, it seems that all of
the authoritative sources agree that he was killed in 1882." A woman
from El Paso, Texas, wrote to acclaim her father the inventor of slot
machines, and would the Encyclopaedia Britannica like to acquire the
patent? Back went the reply that the Encyclopaedia Britannica never
engages in such transactions, plus a bibliography to give the woman
clues as to whether anyone preceded her father in devising this boon
to mankind. A man from Mylo, North Dakota, complained that, al-
though the work he had purchased was handsome and fascinating,
he was appalled to find no Mylo, North Dakota, on any of the maps.
To him was sent the answer that lack of space prevents the inclusion
of towns with only 110 inhabitants. Another woman insisted on a
definitive answer to her query about whether a sexually inactive man
is more prolific intellectually. The careful reply, based on material
gleaned from the Library Research Service, was that some men can
be both romantic and intellectual and some cannot with examples
from history of each. A high school sophomore wrote, "You state that
all arachnida possess an endoskeleton, but my biology teacher says
they possess only an exoskeleton." The question was referred to Alex-
ander Petrunkevitch, Yale professor emeritus of biology, who replied
to the student that arachnida possess both an exoskeleton and an endo-
skeleton.

When one of his staff members informed Bruce Gould, editor of the
Ladies' Home Journal, that in 1768 the Encyclopaedia Britannica had
four sentences on the atom and five pages on love but that in the
current edition there were nine pages on the atom and nothing on
love, Gould queried Benton, an old friend of his: "Is it true that the
Britannica ignores love? And, if so, why?" In reply, Gould received
not only a list of index references to "love" in articles ranging from
"Libido" to "Ethics, History Of/' but also an interesting extract from
the second edition's article on the subject:

The symptoms produced by this passion are as follows: The eye-lids often
twinkle; the eyes are hollow, and yet appear as if full with pleasure; the
pulse is not peculiar to the passion, hut the same with that which attends
solicitude and care. When the object of this affection is thought of, par-
ticularly if the idea is sudden, the spirits are confused, the pulse changes,
and its force and time are very variable; in some instances, the person is
sad and watchful; in others, the person, not being conscious of his state,
pines away, is slothful, and regardless of food; tho' the wiser, when they

THE MODEBN EB: HOW IT IS EDITED 295

find themselves in love, seek pleasant company and active entertainments.
As the force of love prevails, sighs grow deeper; a tremor affects the heart
and pulse; the countenance is alternately pale and red; the voice is sup-
pressed in the sauces; the eyes grow dim; cold sweats break out; sleep
absents itself, at least until the morning; the secretions become disturbed;
and a loss of appetite, a hectic fever, melancholy, or perhaps madness, if
not death, constitutes the sad catastrophe.

To this Yust, commenting on the fact that the original article on
"Love" was dropped after the eighth edition, added, "Perhaps previous
editors agreed in a sense with the young lady on our staff who sug-
gested the following reply to a similar criticism 'Love is better ex-
perienced than read about: the opposite is true of the atomic bomb.'"

Polite replies have been sent to less reasonable correspondents, in-
cluding the man who maintained angrily that the principle of the
rotary engine is spurious and offered the Encyclopaedia Britannica
all rights to his treatise, "Fallacies in Rotary Design"; the befuddled
student who wrote, "1 want to ask you the Constitutional Convention
of what year was composed of how many men appointed by the
legislatures of what several states"; and the woman who insisted that
only the editor could give her the formula for inhibiting growth of
mold on her set of Encyclopaedia Britannica. (The answer was:
"Wipe them with a rag which has been wrung out in a solution of
half vinegar and half water, then rub the covers with a good paste
wax.")

Yust's momentary irritation at discovering that a letter writer is correct
and the Encyclopaedia Britannica is wrong has invariably been re-
placed instantly by a feeling of gratitude toward the correspondent.
Mary Beard, wife of the historian Charles A. Beard and herself a
scholar, once protested that too much space was given to biographies
of men and not enough to those of women. Yust made a count and
found that Mrs. Beard was justified. Of some thirteen thousand bi-
ographies, less than eight hundred were those of women. He wrote to
thank Mrs. Beard for the information then put her to work preparing
the biographies of women she thought should have a place. Another
correspondent, politely, but with a slight indication of petulance that
such a stupid error could be made, wrote to inquire whether a for-
mula printed in the encyclopaedia as "Cp equals 8.81 + O.G19T +
O.OOOOOzzzT 2 " should not really read "Cp equals 8.81 - 0.019T -

296 THE CHEAT EB

O.OOOOOzzzT 2 ?" Yust checked with the adviser and contributor and
replied, "You are correct, sir, and we are grateful to you." Yust has
sent similar expressions of gratitude after appropriate checking
to writers who reported that Russia's coldest temperature was not
94 below zero at Verkhoyansk but 103 below zero at Oimyakonsk;
that in Volume IV, page 22, a certain "not" should be "now" and on
page 628 of Volume XVIII, "external" should read "eternal"; that in
Volume XIII the latitude of Yakutsk is given as 62 5' and in Vol-
ume XXIII as 62 I 7 ; that Martha Washington was listed as "the first
Lady of the Land" instead of "the first First Lady of the Land"; that
Wisconsin is called the "Badger State" not because, as explained in the
work, it has many badgers, but from the way as Yust was informed
in an indignant letter from a sixth-grade class in a Milwaukee school
in which miners of southwestern Wisconsin burrowed into sides of
hills for metal.

Whenever Yust has found his attention called to genuine or alleged
errors by the same correspondent over a period of months or years,
he knows that he will soon receive from that writer a letter starting,
"Dear Sir, You will be interested to know that I have just finished
reading every word in all the 24 volumes of the Britannica. I believe
I am the first person who has ever done this." Yust acknowledges the
accomplishment with admiration (he, himself, has never read the set
through) but advises the proud writer that others have laid similar
claims. Their places in life are as varied as their names, ages, and the
time it took each to do it. A. Urban Shirk, a Little Neck, Long Island,
sales manager, went through the twenty-four volumes in four and a
half years. A youngster named Robin Weir, of Galloping Tiger Ranch,
Delray Beach, Florida, began to read the set when he was fourteen
and finished when he was nearly eighteen. An architect, J. Lloyd
Conrich, of San Francisco, read his set at a leisurely pace over seven-
teen years. "I enjoyed it all," he wrote to Yust, "even to discovering
such extremely interesting things as the number of muscles in an
elephant's trunk, and that people used to wean babies on warm
beer." A retired minister, George Roberts, took only three years to
finish his set, finding only the articles on physics and chemistry " liard
reading/ these being uncongenial to one who never studied them and
who invariably flunked mathematics in school." George F. Goodyear,
a Buffalo, New York, chemist, started to read in the second volume
when he was a student in Harvard Law School and wanted to learn
about astronomy. He continued to read at the rate of about a thousand

THE MODERN E B: HOW IT IS EDITED 297

pages a year and finished in twenty-two years. George Bernard Shaw
always claimed that in his youth he had read the complete ninth
edition at the British Museum except for the scientific articles. But
to C. S. Forester, the famous British novelist and creator of Horatio
Hornblower, belongs an interesting distinction: he read through two
separate editions.

Yust delights in hearing from all such claimants, as he does from the
critics, both serious and petty. A sensible man, he recognizes that
"facts" are not always incontrovertible, and he expects that there will
always be questions and inquiries and complaints both from the well-
meaning and the carpers. Some expect him to be an authority on
everything in his encyclopaedia, but Yust can reply, as Diderot once
did, "I know indeed a great enough number of things, but there is
hardly anyone who does not know his subject better than L" Strong in
his belief that his is the greatest of all modern encyclopaedias of a
general nature, Yust is zealous in his efforts to keep that standard high.
But, being a man of easy wit, he can smile with pride, knowing that a
jest often expresses an evaluation as effectively as a critical essay,
when he reads in a newspaper this advertisement:

FOR SALE!

COMPLETE SET OF ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA!
NEVER USED MY WIFE KNOWS EVERYTHING!

298 THE GREAT EB

The Modern E B: How It Is Sold

On any day or night o any week there is an Encyclopaedia Britannica
salesman sitting or standing in a living room, a kitchen, a study, a den,
an office, or in some less conventional place, with material from his
sales kit spread before him as he "tells the story" to a potential cus-
tomer.

He or she, for there are women so employed, too has reached the
particular site through one of several circumstances. Perhaps the
prospect was referred to him by a satisfied user of the encyclopaedia.
Perhaps the name was secured through a systematic telephone canvass
of residents in a particular neighborhood. This prospect sent in a
coupon that appeared in a magazine advertisement; that one signed
his name to an inquiry card he came upon In a wire rack at the corner
drugstore; a third knew of a friend who had recently bought the

fifteen-volume Britannica Junior and has written for information; an-
other responded to a knock on the door by a salesman using the
"cold-turkey** method of canvassing from house to house.

However the salesman has reached this point, he is engaging the
prospect in a project of which the ultimate aim is to sell the Ency-
clopaedia Britannicas ten-year educational program involving the
acquisition of the latest printing of the twenty-four-volume set, the
Book of the Year for a decade, the World Language Dictionary,
the Britannica World Atlas, the privilege of employing the Britannica
Library Research Service for a decade, and home-study guides. The
prospective customer may be a "hard sell" or an "easy sell." Even
before the sales talk begins, he may say, "Mister, I'm the toughest
nut to crack and I have no use for an encyclopaedia," or insist, "This
isn't for me, I don't read anything but pocketbooks and comic maga-
zines," or inform the salesman, "I know all the answers and there's
nothing the Encyclopaedia Britannica can teach me," or, somewhere
in the conversation, say, "I can't afford a set of books, even anything
as worthwhile as the Encyclopaedia Britannica." These and other
responses seldom balk the salesman. He may be a hard pusher and
whisk through his presentation. He may, if he is skilled and experi-
enced enough, decide within five minutes that there is no point in
continuing his sales talk. He will rarely argue; no salesman likes to
win an argument and lose a sale. If he belongs to the expanding class
of Encyclopaedia Britannica salesmen who maintain that qualitative
selling eventually leads to quantitative selling, he will be politely
persistent and agreeably aggressive. If he succeeds in convincing his
prospect of his need for the Encyclopaedia Britannica and closes the
sale, he is less likely to say a conventional "Thank you" than "I wish to
congratulate you." If he fails to make a sale he is less likely to pout
or glare and stride out than he is to say, "Thank you for your courtesy."

Obviously, such salesmen have come a long way from the kind of
booksellers once described by R. L. Duffus as men of "glittering eye
and well-oiled tongue," each with "a large and heavy foot which he
was ready to wedge into a doorway." Those old-time agents of an
earlier era, bold and truculent, often carried samples slung from a
harness under their coats. They were primarily wanderers who swept
into a city or a neighborhood, turned a quick profit, and moved away
swiftly and silently. They preyed on ignorance and often charged
prices three to four times the physical or intellectual value of the
books. They sold Life among the Mormons, tomes advising women

500 THE CHEAT EB

how to acquire and keep a husband, collections of "art treasures,"
one-volume cyclopaedias "encompassing all knowledge," thick biog-
raphies, and dullish histories. Even after the ranks of such book
agents, particularly numerous in the last decade of the nineteenth
century, had thinned, there were shady practices in the business of
selling so-called subscription books. With reason, prospects were wary
of anyone who announced that he had come to bring enlightenment
and culture to their households. But as time passed the people grew
wiser and less susceptible to chicanery, and where the people were
not alert, various governmental agencies and Better Business Bureaus
were.

With the Encyclopaedia Britannica, the goal remains the same as
it was in the days of Andrew Bell or those of Horace Hooper to sell
the set to people who ought to have it. And though techniques have
changed and types of salesmen have changed with them, that goal
always is kept in sight, and the essentials of achieving it locating a
potential prospect, getting an interview, and making a presentation
that should produce an order if one is obtainable are basic and
firm.

The backgrounds of the men and women who sell Encyclopaedia
Britannica are as varied as the reference work's subject matter. Many
have been involved in saleswork since their early adulthood. The
vice-president in charge of sales, Paul E. Seaman, was, at nineteen,
a member of a horse-and-buggy crew peddling clocks, linens, silver-
ware, tablecloths, and Smyrna rugs in country towns in Pennsylvania.
Seaman started with the Encyclopaedia Britannica company in 1942
in Connecticut, and proved adept enough to sell two sets a day for
eight consecutive weeks. Sent later to Philadelphia as a district man-
ager, he brought that city up from the bottom in sales to a place
among the leaders, then effected a similar improvement as division
manager in New York. An advocate of selling on weekends "You
can get them right after payday and when they're more reflective"
he and his New York salesmen tallied more than a million dollars a
year in weekend business alone. In 1949 he was transferred to Chicago
to become vice-president in charge of sales.

Into the ranks of his salesmen have come persons who formerly
were reporters, counselors, free-lance writers, artists, engineers, law-
yers, cab drivers, sales clerks, professors, used-car dealers, doctors,

THE MODERN EB: HOW IT IS SOLD 301

high-school principals and teachers, military men, musicians, and min-
isters. Some gravitated to the firm because their parents had owned
older editions of the Encyclopaedia Britannica and they themselves
had developed respect for it. Many are former salesmen of other
encyclopaedias and other subscription books who explain, "I was
tired of fighting Britannica so I joined it." James C. Bradley "Doc"
Bradley served for a decade as an ordained Presbyterian minister,
as executive secretary of the New York Federation of Churches, and
then as one of the top executives of the American Bible Society; he
invented display plates for automobiles and once headed a company
that made and sold the plates; and he edited church literature. With
EB since 1946, first as a salesman in the Bronx, then as district man-
ager there, he eventually became division manager in Chicago.
Hubert Graeme Cook, a Toronto district manager, was formerly a
professor of English, a lecturer on oriental affairs, a world traveler.
As a salesman of other books, C. T. Jorgensen worked in Mexico,
Canada, and South Africa. C. A. Flanders, a Houston, Texas, sales-
man, was a second mate on a tramp steamer when he first heard of
the possibilities of selling Encyclopaedia Britannica. Len Meyer never
progressed in formal schooling beyond eighth grade but educated
himself to a college level by avid reading and study; he served as an
ace salesman for the United States Rubber Company for eight years
before taking up his Encyclopaedia Britannica sales kit. There are
several former actors, but most people from the theater are not suc-
cessful in this kind of activity; EB sales experts have found that,
although selling is itself a form of dramatic acting, ex-performers tend
to improvise too freely and too frequently on the sales talk that has
been found to be most successful through test and trial and use.

Most new salesmen are hired through advertisements in the news-
papers; many are recommended by other salesmen. All hiring is done
by district managers, who insist they can tell after half an hour's con-
versation whether the prospective salesman will be an asset to the
company. Each applicant is given a standard personality and intel-
ligence test, but there are qualities sometimes undetected in such
examinations that district managers look for in those they interview.
Does the man speak easily and convincingly? Is it obvious that he
likes people and would like to serve them? Does he seem pleasant
and courteous? Is he physically healthy? District managers are ad-
vised against "desperation hiring" the kind that finds a manager,

802 THE GREAT EB

perhaps fearful that without enough salesmen his sales will drop,
saying, "I hire anyone because you never can tell by looking at a
man whether he will sell books."

Once hired, the salesman begins his training period. He knows that
no quotas are set, that his earnings depend entirely on sales; his com-
missions range from 15 per cent upward, depending on the volume
of sets sold over a specific period of time. There are, consequently,
no theoretical limits to what an Encyclopaedia Britannica salesman
can earn. A few newcomers have been known to hit selling streaks
that netted them weekly earnings as high as $1,000. Many experienced
salesmen earn more than either their district or division managers,
whose compensation is computed on a percentage of total sales in
their respective sectors. A bonus system for salesmen augments earn-
ings derived from commissions.

In training, the salesman learns something of the general history of
the Encyclopaedia Britannica and how to line up prospects by
making telephone calls, by using references furnished by satisfied
customers, by checking newspaper stories for the names of recent
graduates, even by the seldom-used "cold-turkey" method. Each is
assigned to a field trainer, a man of considerable experience, whom
he watches as a sale is attempted. When he is deemed ready, the
trainee himself initiates sales calls and makes his presentation while
the trainer sits by observing, mentally noting errors and faulty tech-
nique. Later, trainer and trainee discuss every phase of the presenta-
tion, from the "opener" (the exact words used to present the sales
talk) through the "spread" (the laying out of various pamphlets and
display material about the set and subsidiary publications) to the
"close" (the step before actual consummation of a sale, with collec-
tion of the initial instalment* or the folding up of all material used
in the presentation preparatory to leaving).

By the time the man is adjudged ready to proceed by himself, he
knows the basic sales talk and has already had considerable experi-
ence in meeting those many situations that not even the most fool-
proof sales talk can anticipate. Before he sets out, he is warned
against getting "gravy orders" orders from friends and relatives who
may be eager to start him off well in his new endeavor. For at least
six months, Seaman's directive advises, a new salesman must sell to
strangers, and then if he is proceeding successfully he is permitted to
approach those he knows well.

THE MODERN EB: HOW IT IS SOLD 303

To secure his prospects, an Encyclopaedia Britannica salesman uses
the telephone a great deal. He may spend as many as three hours
each morning calling people whose names have been referred to him
or picked from selected lists or have turned up on "wire-rack cards."
The latter developed from experiments devised by Seaman and his
national sales manager, Clay Cole, in Indianapolis and Kansas City.
Arrangements were made in those cities to place small wire baskets
full of cards in drugstores, gift shops, and other places where books
or magazines were sold, Store owners were promised a dollar for
every card mailed in. The tests brought thousands of replies but hardly
any sales. Many store owners had told their customers, relatives, and
friends, "I'm in a contest and I win if I get the most signatures," and
the loyal patrons had signed their names to requests for information
about the latest printing of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. When the
salesmen went to follow up these leads, they encountered scant suc-
cess. After some $7,500 had been spent, the experiment was dropped
and its defects studied. When it was resumed in Chicago, all con-
cerned, including the customers, were advised that no contest was
involved.

However the salesman makes his appointment, his next step is im-
portant. If his telephone call to a prospect results in a favorable re-
sponse he sets up a specific time for a presentation. Most of these
appointments, especially if the presentation is to be made to a married
couple or a family with children, are set for between six and nine
o'clock at night. This is an interesting change from the selling tech-
niques of the 1930's. Then, from 90 to 95 per cent of the sales were
consummated during the day in offices and factories or in homes.
When Seaman was district manager in Philadelphia, he noticed that a
prospect approached at work would frequently advise the salesman,
"Come back tomorrow, 111 have to ask my wife tonight." He set his
men to work evenings and on weekends and broadened this system
throughout the sales organization when he took over all sales for the
company.

The actual sales presentation is simple on its surface, yet, as all
salesmen know, psychologically complex, strewn with intangibles that
may suddenly thwart or suddenly produce an order. Each salesman
eventually learns the individual techniques that will make him suc-

304 THE GREAT EB

cessful, but the best of them are wary of applying to one prospect the
same technique that may have won him an easy sale with another.
Improvisation is often necessary, but free-wheeling improvisation can
prove a losing gamble. The Encyclopaedia Britannica salesman in-
variably begins by disclosing how he happened to get the prospect's
name (although the prospect has already been duly informed on the
telephone, in most cases). Then he proceeds to explain the "ten-year
educational program." This involves an elucidation of the virtues of
the latest printing, the exhibition of a sample volume of the set with
its specially inserted colored plates and interesting articles, and the
display of a folder about such subsidiary publications that can be
part of the over-all purchase plan as the Book of the Year, the World
Language Dictionary, the Britannica World Atlas, and other acces-
sories. Price is not mentioned until toward the close of the talk, when
the terms of payment are explained in detail.

Often a salesman is interrupted before he reaches the vital point of
price in his talk. For every objection the salesman needs an answer. In
the lore of Encyclopaedia Britannica salesmen are many anecdotes
telling how a certain phrase or a sentence in the midst or near the
close of a presentation helped to effect a sale.

Randolph Jones of Boston was experiencing considerable difficulty
with a young married couple whose main objection was that they had
recently bought a lot on which they hoped to build a house. "Maybe
when the house is built and we're settled in it, we can afford to think
about getting a set of the Britannica'' the husband said. Jones replied,
"You know, the Britannica is something you can put in the middle of
the lot and build your house around." The man and woman stared at
each other, nodded simultaneously, and wrote out a check,

A husband and wife in Seattle were approached by J. S. Dalton in
their new home. Dalton sat on a nail keg and they sat stiffly on orange
crates as he spread out the material from his sales kit and made his
presentation. The husband decided to buy the set, but each time he
prepared to sign the order card, the wife snatched the pen from his
hand. After the third time, Dalton, who had noticed on the walls
framed mottoes advocating temperance, remarked to the wife, "Isn't
it too bad that there are so many thriving saloons in this city? And
isn't it better to have a husband who wants to spend money for the

THE MODERN EB: HOW IT IS SOLD 305

culture and education of his family instead of for liquor?" The woman's
features softened, she said firmly, "Yes, it is," and then she signed
the order. Dalton is renowned in salesmanship annals for a feat he
accomplished after his car slipped off a wet Oregon road and hung
perilously over a cliff. Two passing motorists dragged him to safety.
Remarking on his narrow escape, one of the rescuers noticed Dalton's
sales kit and asked several questions. Dalton replied. Within half an
hour, his rescuer was signed up to buy a set of the Encyclopaedia
Britannica.

The key words that spark a sale may fill more than a sentence or
two. In Ironwood, Michigan, Earl E. Theiss had finished presenting his
program to the president of a Parent-Teachers Association group. Both
the prospect and his wife wanted to buy the set for their two teen-age
sons, but added, "We will eventually, but not now." Theiss replied
casually but earnestly, "Suppose ten years from now you may be
sitting here the same as now. Then the thought may go through
your minds, 'Did we do all for those two boys of ours while they
were still with us and not away?* It will be too late then. Procrasti-
nation is the thief of time. Putting off until tomorrow what we should
have done today is bad." Then he thanked the couple and started
down the street. One of the boys quickly overtook him. "Did I do
something wrong?" asked Theiss. "No, my folks want to buy the
books," was the reply.

The presence of children or conversation about children are potent
aids to salesmen. Zachary Caully, a former singer and Broadway stage
manager, encountered considerable opposition from the head of a
Manhattan household who scoffed at every laudable sentiment Caully
expressed about the encyclopaedia. Had the wife not objected, the
man, who weighed 250 pounds, would have thrown Caully out of the
apartment. Caully asked if there were children and the man replied,
"Yah, the older one is smart but the young one don't wanna learn
nothin*. Now get outta here." Caully persisted in discussing the chil-
dren and held the man's attention. But otherwise he made no progress.
Just as Caully was preparing to leave, the older boy ran into the
house, his face scratched and blood running from his mouth. "My
teacher gave me a composition to write," he explained tearfully, "and
I went to the library to look it up in the Encyclopaedia Britannica,
and there were two other boys ahead of me and later we got into a

806 THE GREAT EB

fight and they beat me up." The father stared hard at Caully, then
roared, "Gimme that order blank! Ill buy that set!"

Len Meyer had spent a frustrating hour with a merchant who re-
peated, "I don't need any set of books," and his wife who kept ad-
monishing him, "Don't listen to that salesman, hell hypnotize you."
As Meyer began to fold up his materials, he said, "Of course, this set
does have great advantages for anyone with intelligent children in
the family." "Smart children!" snapped the merchant. "My eleven-
year-old boy is the smartest kid in his class." Meyer resumed his talk.
Within ten minutes the man called to his wife, "Bring a check, I'm
buying the set!" After the set was delivered, Meyer called on the
family with a special gift for the youngster, a two-volume Popular
History of the World. When he left, he had been supplied with three
names of "sure prospects" given to him by the wife.

Selling Britannica Junior, C. A. Flanders paid a call on a dairy
farmer near Modesto, California. While the farmer milked his cows,
Flanders told him of the benefits of the fifteen-volume set for chil-
dren. The farmer was losing interest, complaining that his children's
schooling was expensive enough. At that moment one of the children,
who had been playing in the barnyard, threw a rock through the living-
room window. "I give up!" the farmer yelled. "It costs me money just
to talk about their schooling!" Taking a calculated risk of irritating the
farmer, Flanders said, "If the schools aren't teaching your children to
behave, and you are having difficulties with the problem, too, some-
thing has to be done. We consider our articles on 'Child Psychology*
and "Child Behavior' one of the greatest accomplishments of the new
Britannica Junior." Replied the farmer: "How much for cash?"

An unusual case in which an infant aided in producing sales in-
volved Fred Huserik, a veteran salesman in Seattle. He and an as-
sociate were in charge of an Encyclopaedia Britannica booth at a
country fair near the Yakima, Washington, Indian reservation, when
a young Indian woman asked if she could leave her tiny baby, carried
by her papoose-style, with them for a short while. When they as-
sented, the woman hung the cradle board from a nail protruding from
the wall and strolled away. Attracted by a pair of big round eyes
staring out from atop the blanket, a crowd gathered. Huserik took
quick advantage of this and promptly secured three orders. As the
morning wore on, the baby made no whimper, no sound, but stared
impassively at Huserik. More spectators stopped to look at the child
and another set was sold. By early evening, after Huserik had min-

THE MODERN EB: HOW IT IS SOLD 307

istered twice to the baby's various needs and the young mother had
returned, Huserik had sold five sets and secured a dozen leads for
further sales.

In EB annals are numerous accounts of how a kind of diplomacy
spoken or silent proved effective despite strongly expressed feelings
of hostility, interference from outsiders, or a prospect's desire for a
cheaper encyclopaedia.

On a cold-turkey canvass, Donald Fleetwood encountered a glower-
ing man who immediately declared, "Friend, you'll just waste your
time with me. Nobody can sell me anything! I've got no use for sales-
men of any kind." Fleetwood asked the man what he did for a living
and was told he was an assembly worker at the local Ford Motor
Company plant. "Did you ever stop to realize/' asked Fleetwood,
"that if there were no salesmen to sell the product you help assemble
that you would not have a job?" For a second or two the man mused,
then asked Fleetwood to step into his apartment; half an hour later
he was enrolled as an owner of the Encyclopaedia Britannica.

"Doc" Bradley was making a presentation to a lawyer in Hastings-
on-Hudson one summer afternoon when a neighbor strolled over, took
one look at the spread before the prospect, and scoffed, "Buying a
set of books, eh?" Bradley quickly countered this disruptive comment
by telling the neighbor, "Just a minute, sir, 111 be over to see you after
I finish here." He had resumed his talk when the prospect's mother-
in-law came toward them and, seeing the sample volume and various
booklets and placards, cried, "Books! What do you want with more
books? You've got the place full of books now!" The prospect glared,
reddened as Bradley discreetly remained quiet. Then he asked, "How
much did you say this was?" Bradley told him the price and the man,
staring hard at his mother-in-law, wrote out a down-payment check.

To a prospect who hesitated about buying the Encyclopaedia Bri-
tannica and hinted he would be interested in a cheaper set, Gregory
Grover, a veteran Chicago representative, once responded: "If you
could choose between two kinds of college education for your son,
the usual education or the superior one for a comparatively slight
additional amount, wouldn't you want your son to have a better
education? Well, the full set of Encyclopaedia Britannica, together
with the valuable research service, can mean the difference between

308 THE GBEAT EB

an average education and the superior education which Britannica
will assure."

Grover's rejoinder won for him the company's 1953 contest for
"tested sentences" and was duly recorded, for the benefit of fellow
salesmen, in the firm's monthly publication, EB News. The prime
object of this magazine beyond informing all salesmen of what their
colleagues are doing, of how they have succeeded and where they
have failed, of trends in population and of new methods and new
products is to create "progressive discontent/' the feeling that, how-
ever successful a salesman may be, improvement is possible and
necessary. Sometimes this method takes the shape of statements on
the nature of selling, as in a quotation from a speech by William
Benton: "Selling is at the very core of economic activity in a free
enterprise society. A man who can sell is never long out of a job, in
good times or bad. He can go to work each morning, confident that
he is not only bettering himself but also bettering society, by satisfying
wants that already exist and by creating further demand for products
and services that mean, in at least a material way, a better way of life
for all." Sometimes there are printed case studies of "hard sells" that
were effective, or exhortations "You Can't Sell EB by Remote Con-
trol, Radar, Crystal Gazing. To Sell EB you must get out in front of a
prospect and make a presentation!" or such sales slogans as "Wouldn't
You Hate to Compete with BritannicaP" or stories of men who have
sold many sets by rote or improvisation. For salesmen seeking ex-
cuses for poor business, the EB News once printed a satirical "Alibi
Almanac":

July Everyone on the beach.
August Too hot

September Too early in the season; people not back from the country.
Those who are back are too busy preparing kiddies for
school.

October World Series is killing business. Unseasonable weather starts.
November Political and business unrest due to elections. Football games

absorbing great deal of interest.

December Always bad. Everyone out Christmas shopping every evening.
January No one has any money left after Christmas shopping. Only
marketable item is do-it-yourself book on repairing electric
trains.

February Huge blizzards paralyze all transportation. Suburban towns
hemmed in by gigantic snowdrifts. Car refuses to start in
cold weather.

THE MODERN EB: HOW IT IS SOLD 309

March People are starting to worry about income tax due next month.

April Everyone spending all their money on outfits for Easter Parade.

May Daylight saving fouled up schedule. Unseasonable weather. Pros-
pects cleaning up flooded basements.

June Nice weather, everyone out driving in evenings. Also saving for
vacations.

Although most of the salesmen work out their individual schedules
in detail, there is always the possibility of making sales in odd
places, at strange times, and under special circumstances. M. L. Mc-
Clendon, of Houston, walked ten miles through swamps and the back-
waters of a muddy river to find the commercial fisherman who had
sent in a card; he finally hired a motorboat to take him down the
slough where the fisherman's nets were spread, located his man, and
came away with an order. Grant Pritchard found his Teaneck, New
Jersey, customer exercising a trotting horse. Invited to sit alongside
the prospect, Pritchard climbed aboard the carriage and held on
tightly while the horse trotted along a bumpy road. Some hectic
miles later he departed shakily but with a signed order card. Cy
Kephart called on a colonel at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, just as the
officer and his wife were about to leave for a reception. Would Kephart
be kind enough to watch the fifteen-month-old baby and the two
older children? Kephart did, changing diapers and feeding milk to the
infant. On their return, the grateful couple promptly signed up for a
set.

A former shipping expert, C. B. Otto, has in his district of Wash-
ington, D.C., customers that include government officials, members
of Congress and of the diplomatic corps, and staffs of foreign mis-
sions. Attempting to sell a set to the Soviet Embassy, Otto was inter-
viewed by four secretaries before he was finally permitted to see the
ambassador himself. A brief conversation followed about prices of
respective bindings. "Thank you, you'll hear from us further," Otto
was told. Two days later, he received a call from the embassy. Again
he was interviewed by four secretaries, then led into the richly arrayed
office of the ambassador and asked to make his presentation again.
This time, however, the sale was completed for one of the expensively
bound sets, with payment in cash.

Salesmen are advised against ever antagonizing a client or arguing,
but Ken Hiatt, a former marine and one of four brothers engaged in

310 THE GREAT EB

selling the Encyclopaedia Britannica, won an order by doing both
and more. On a hot summer day, he spied a burly young man dressed
in army tans working with hammer in hand on a half-completed house
near Long Beach, California. In a spirit of serviceman camaraderie,
Hiatt asked, "Hi, you building a house?" The young man glared, wiped
sweat from his brow, and roared, "What the hell do you think it is, a
chicken coop?" Hiatt responded, "Well, Buster, after looking at you, it
could be most anything, a barn, a pigpen, or even a chicken coop."
At this, the other man threw his hammer to the ground, strode over
to Hiatt, and began waving his fists. In a second, both men were roll-
ing in combat on the dusty soil. Hiatt soon bested his opponent and
helped him to his feet. The two men glared at each other, then broke
into laughter. The house builder explained that Hiatt's question could
not have come at a less appropriate time, for he had been struggling
for months with his house and had just hit himself on the hand with
his hammer. More conversation followed, and, Hiatt later reported
to his district manager, "Needless to say, this ex-G.I. became a
buyer,"

In contrast, Merritt M. Wood, Jr., as a beginning salesman in Hobbs,
New Mexico, made a presentation to a family whose head was a stolid,
silent man. Although the wife and children seemed eager to have the
set, the man sat and stared. Wood recalled what his trainer had told
him about the "five-second pause" after the presentation. He waited;
there was no response. He repeated his closing statements about the
set's value and the terms of payment. Still no reply. His pauses grew
longer and longer. Finally, the wife and children left for a movie, and
the man continued to crack his knuckles, rub his chin, and stare at
the display material, and he did so for two hours, during which Wood
smoked an entire pack of cigarettes. At the end of this period of
silence, the man whispered hoarsely, "111 take it."

Presentations before physically handicapped prospects require spe-
cial techniques. Noel L. Boydston, a Chicago representative for
Britannica Junior, used up a pad of notepaper in dealing with the
deaf-mute parents of two small children. There were many times when
he was not certain his points were being understood. Deaf-mute
friends arrived and interrupted the presentation, and Boydston waited
patiently while all four conversed in sign language. After the visitors
left, the presentation was resumed, and another pad of paper was
used up. The woman wrote: "How can this set be a good investment
for children one and three years old?" "One picture is worth 10,000

THE MODERN EB: HOW IT IS SOLD Sll

words/' wrote Boydston. The answer satisfied the parents. *Tf just
one of our children benefits from this program it will be worth the
price of the investment/* wrote the mother. "How much is the down
payment?"

There are salesmen who, even when their goals for the day or week
have been reached, cannot seem to resist selling. James Wilson had
put in eight days of hard work in Denver, securing nine solid orders.
He had run out of immediate prospects and was sitting in a restaurant
having breakfast when he met a dentist to whom he had sold a set a
year earlier. In a five-minute chat with the dentist, he picked up the
name of a prospect in a small town sixty miles away. He found where
his prospect's home was by asking the first man he met on the main
street. Just as the prospect was signing his order card, the man who
had given Wilson his directions telephoned and asked him to call at
his house. There he sold another set. In nine days, Wilson's earnings
came to some $800.

Even on his Florida honeymoon, Ralph Sonneman, nicknamed
"Supersonic/' continued to sell. When he came back to his Houston
district, he kept to his customarily furious pace, selling, on one par-
ticular weekend, nine sets. Sonneman has made presentations in
French, Spanish, and German. He also plays the piano for his cus-
tomers "but only after they've signed the order card."

Ralph C. A. Gilbert, who came into EB salesmanship after careers
as reporter, professional dancer, manufacturers' agent, and Canadian
army officer, once gained nineteen orders in a single week in the
British Columbia area, traveling by automobile, plane, water taxi,
jeep, logging railroad, and on foot.

An advocate of the sales-are-where-you-find-them school, too, is
Ernest V. Stolen, Alaska's district manager, who travels by snowshoe
and by plane. He has sold as many as twenty-two sets in a single
week for commissions of $1,750, and his monthly record of $4,617 in
commissions in 1951 is considered the top mark of recent years. Once,
seated in a plane next to the owner of a chain of radio stations in
Alaska, he sold him a set, then alighted, got into his car, and picked up
a hitchhiker. Before the hitchhiker left, he, too, had signed up to
become an Encyclopaedia Britannica owner.

For many of these salesmen there exist values and satisfactions be-
yond earned commissions. In their ranks are professionals who un-

312 THE GREAT EB

doubtedly could earn as much money or more selling other books or
other products. But those who have often been spurred to reflect on
the deeper nature of their activities speak of "an identification with
greatness" that they feel is theirs; of the encyclopaedia as "the finest
set of culture in twenty-four volumes anywhere"; of "a service motive"
in trying to persuade potential customers, and of an awareness that
to sell the Encyclopaedia Britannica is to spread education and in-
formation and provide a means by which each reader of the volumes
may be spurred to learn more than he already knows.

This Encyclopaedia Britannica they seek to sell in the United States
and in many lands for there are EB representatives in Canada,
Mexico, Central America, South America, England, Scotland, Ireland,
the Philippines, Japan, South Africa, Alaska, the Hawaiian Islands,
Australia, New Zealand, and other countries thrives as the leader
in the realm of encyclopaedias. It has endured throughout a long and
intellectually adventurous life and has met and overcome formidable
difficulties in its years as a commercial publishing enterprise.

Since 1768, the Encyclopaedia Britannica has served the cause of
education and enlightenment in placid times and in periods of tumult,
recording the changes and advances in man's and the world's develop-
ment. In all that time, its principles have withstood change, although
to meet shifting demands the techniques and mechanics of editing
and publishing it have repeatedly been revised. These principles are
basic:

To convey knowledge and information in a system as comprehensive
as its physical limits will permit.

To insist on the authenticity and reliability of its contents.

To present, with each successive edition, inventories of man's ideas
and accomplishments up to the time of publication.

To secure as contributors men and women who are the acclaimed
and acknowledged authorities in their fields of endeavor.

These are all qualities of substance. They form the foundation of
the Encyclopaedia Britannica and give it its strength and its influence.

Those who produce and those who sell this encyclopaedia speak
of its past with interest and pride. But they are also conscious of the
importance of the present. "My perhaps narrow way of viewing it,"
Walter Yust once wrote, "is that there has been no edition of the
Encyclopaedia Britannica greater than the current one." The sales-
man declares, "When you acquire the present edition, sir, you are
getting the very best there is."

THE MODERN EB: HOW IT IS SOLB SIS

And they and their colleagues have the confidence that for future
generations, as for those of the past and the present, the Encyclopaedia
Britannica will continue to serve as a register authoritative and val-
uable and respected of the progress of human knowledge.

314 THE GREAT EB

Acknowledgments and Bibliography

Besides the persons cited earlier, many others assisted with interviews,
letters, unpublished memoirs, court records, and assorted research
materials, suggestions, and ideas.

Those affiliated with the Encyclopaedia Britannica to whose files
and records I was allowed unlimited access include J. R. Bradley,
Miss Felicit6 Buhl, James E. Colvin, Robert E. Conger, Miss Daphne
Daume, Holman Faust, A. M. Gilbert, Thomas Goetz, Harry Hough-
ton, John Howe, Harry Joy, Howard Kasch, Paul Kruse, Mrs. Mae
MacKay, Len Meyer, Mrs. Harriet L. Milburn, Maurice B. Mitchell,
Warren Preece, Paul E. Seaman, Carleton Smith, Miss Virginia Sten-
berg, and Don E. Walter. In London's Encyclopaedia Britannica head-
quarters additional aid was given by S. D. Keetch and by the late
Hector McNeil

Among the officials, past and present, of Sears, Roebuck and Com-

S1S

pany who helped were General Robert E. Wood, Lessing Rosenwald,
and Emil J. Pollock. William J. Cox, former president of Encyclopaedia
Britannica, Inc., his son, Warren Cox, and Fred Davis furnished im-
portant background information. Horace E. Hooper, Jr., and Nathan-
iel L. Hooper, sons of one of the two Americans who revolutionized
the history of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, and W. Montgomery
Jackson, son of the other American, were highly considerate in sup-
plying data about their fathers' business and personal lives. Miss
Margaret Schneider of New York contributed anecdotal material about
her former employer, William Montgomery Jackson.

Appreciation for varied aid ranging from information on specific sub-
jects to guidance in research problems must be expressed to Laird
Bell, of Chicago; Manchester Boddy, of San Diego County, California;
Mrs. Lavinia Dudley, editor-in-chief of the Encyclopaedia Americana;
Philip Gee, of London and Edinburgh; Sir Louis Gluckstein, of Lon-
don; Paul G. Hoffman, of Los Angeles; Barry Holloway and H. B.
Kinneally, vice-presidents of the Grolier Society; Robert Whyte Mason,
British consul in Chicago; Frederic G. Melcher, editor of Publishers'
Weekly; William V. Morgenstern, of the University of Chicago; J. D.
Newth, managing director of A. & C. Black, London; John Nuveen, of
Chicago; S. C. Roberts, master of Pembroke College, Cambridge,
England; Harold H. Swift, of Chicago; and R. D. Williamson, of
Berkshire, England. Invaluably helpful were Benjamin Bowman, of
Newberry Library, Chicago; Herbert Hewitt, chief of the reference
division of the Chicago Public Library; Chester Lewis, head of the
New York Times reference library; Miss Virginia McEachern, chief of
the Chicago Sun-Times reference department; Miss Virginia Smucker,
chief of Time magazine's reference library, and members of the
reference library staff of the British Museum in London. For important
counsel, my gratitude is due such newspaper colleagues as William
Stoneman, chief of the Paris bureau of the Chicago Daily News;
Arthur Veysey, chief of the London bureau of the Chicago Tribune;
and Lloyd Wendt, assistant Sunday editor of the Chicago Tribune.
The transcripts of William Montgomery Jackson's suit against Horace
Hooper in August, 1911, and the subsequent trial in the Supreme
Court of New York County in January, 1912, were obtained with
the co-operation of Attorney A. M. Gilbert, of New York. I, Grant
Scott, clerk of the Superior Court of New Jersey, supplied records
relating to other phases of the Jackson-Hooper litigation.

Herbert P. Zimmerman, former president of R. R. Donnelley and

316 THE GREAT EB

Sons Company, graciously permitted the use of his private and in-
formative memoir of the relationship of his concern to the Encyclo-
paedia Britannica. For special technical help and advice, I offer warm
acknowledgement to Professor Bernard Kogan, of the University of
Illinois at Chicago, and to Gifford Ernest, scholar and journalist; and
for certain vital assistance, to Marshall Field, Jr., editor and publisher
of the Chicago Sun-Times, and to Milburn P. Akers, its executive
editor.

Following is a partial list of bibliographical materials used.

BOOKS

ALTICK, RICHARD D. The English Common Reader. Chicago: University
of Chicago Press, 1957.

BELL, E. H. C. The Life and Letters of C. F. Moberly Bell London:
Richards, 1927.

BLACK, JOHN SUTHERLAND, and CHRYSTAL, G. W. The Life of William
Robertson Smith. London: A. & C. Black, 1912.

BOWMAN, WILLIAM DODGSON. The Story of "The Times!' London: Dial
Press, 1931.

BRIGGS, ASA. Victorian People. Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1956.

BRYCE, JAMES. Studies in Contemporary Biography. New York: Mac-
xnillan Co., 1903.

CHAMBERS, ROBERT. Lives of Illustrious and Distinguished Scotsmen
From the Earliest Period to the Present Time. Glasgow: Blackie & Son,
1836-37.

CHEW, SAMUEL. Fruit among the Leaves: An Anniversary Anthology.
New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1950.

CONSTABLE, THOMAS. Archibald Constable and His Literary Correspond-
ents, esp. Vol. II. Edinburgh: Edmonston and Douglas, 1873.

COURTNEY, JANET E. Recollected in Tranquillity. London: Heinemann,
1926.

. An Oxford Portrait Gallery. London: Chapman and Hall, 1931.

CROCKER, LESTER G, The Embattled Philosopher: A Life of Denis Diderot.
East Lansing: Michigan State College Press, 1955.

CROXTON, ARTHUR. Crowded Nights and Days. London: Sampson, Low
and Marston, 1930.

DARK, SIDNEY. The Life of Sir Arthur Pearson. London: Hodder &
Stoughton, 1930.

DORAN, GEORGE H. Chronicles of Barabbas, New York: Rinehart & Co.,
1935.

DUFFXJS, R. L. Books: Their Place in a Democracy. Boston: Houghton
Mifflin Co., 1930.

EMMET, BORIS, and JEUCK, JOHN E. Catalogues and Counters. Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1950.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS AND BIBLIOGRAPHY 317

Encyclopaedia Britanrdca. Readings in all editions from 1768-71 to date.
Also numerous pirated editions, subsidiary publications, advertising booklets,
study guides, compilations of articles, and yearbooks.

FIELD, EUGENE. A Little Book of Profitable Tales. New York: Scribner's
Sons, 1895.

GOODING, LYDIA MARIAN. "The Encyclopaedia Britannica: A Critical and
Historical Study." Unpublished Master's thesis, Columbia University, New
York, 1929.

GOODSPEED, CHARLES E. Yankee Bookseller. Boston; Houghton Mifflin
Co., 1937.

HAMMERTON, SIR JOHN A. With Northcliffe in Fleet Street. London:
Hutchinson & Co., 1932.

. Books and Myself. London: Macdonald & Co., 1944.

The History of the Book War. London: The Times, 1907.

The History of "The Times'" 4 Vols. New York: Macmillan Co., 1935-52.

HYDE, WILLIAM H. "The Encyclopaedia Britannica: Study of the 14th
Edition." Unpublished Master's thesis, Columbia University, New York,
1938.

JOHNSON, ROY W. and LYNCH, RUSSELL W. The Sales Strategy of John H.
Patterson. Chicago: Dartnell Corp., 1932.

JONES, KENNEDY. Fleet Street and Downing Street. London: Hutchinson &
Co., 1919.

JOYCE, MICHAEL. Edinburgh: The Golden Age, 1769-1832. London:
Longmans, Green & Co., 1951.

KAY, JOHN. A Series of Original Portraits and Caricature Etchings. Edin-
burgh: Carver and Gidder, 1837-38.

KERR, ROBERT. Memoirs of the Life, Writings and Correspondence of
William Smellie. 2 vols. Edinburgh: John Anderson, 1811.

KmscHNER, EDWIN J. The Zeppelin in the Atomic Age. Urbana: Uni-
versity of Illinois Press, 1957.

KITCHIN, F. HARCOURT. Moberly Bell and His Times: An Unofficial Narra-
tive. London: Phillip Allan & Co., 1925.

LEGOUIS, EMILE, and CAZAMIAN, Louis. A History of English Literature.
New York: Macmillan Co., 1935.

LEHMANN-HAUPT, HELLMUT, et al. The Book in America. New York:
R. R, Bowker, 1939.

LUCAS, EDWARD VERRALL, and GRAVES, CHARLES LARCOM. Wisdom on
the Hire System. London: Isbister, 1903.

, Wisdom While You Wait. London: Britt, 1903.

. Signs of the Times; or, The Hustlers Almanac for 1907. London:

Alston Rivers, 1908.

LUNT, W. E. A History of England. New York: Harper & Bros., 1928.

MACMILLAN, SIR FREDERICK. The Net Book Agreement. Glasgow: Uni-
versity Press, 1924.

MEEK, ROBERT. A Biographical Sketch of the Life of James Tytler, Edin-
burgh: Denovan, 1805.

318 THE GREAT EB

MEREDITH, F. M., "The Encyclopaedia Britannica: History and Compari-
son of the 7th and 8th Editions." Unpublished Master's thesis, Columbia
University, New York, 1931.

MORGAN, CHARLES. The House of Macmillan, 1843-1943. New York:
Macmillan Co., 1944.

MORTIMER, J. H. Confessions of a Book Agent; or, Twenty Years by Stage
and Rail. Chicago: Cooperative, 1906.

NAPIER, MACVEY. Selection from the Correspondence of the Late Macvey
Napier, London: Macmillan & Co., 1879.

NICHOLSON, ALEXANDER. Memoirs of Adam Black. Edinburgh: A. & C.
Black, 1885.

OGLESBY, THADDEXJS K. Some Truths of History: A Vindication of the
South against the Encyclopaedia Britannica and Other Maligners. Atlanta,
Ga.: Byrd, 1903.

OWEN, W. (ed.). New and Complete Dictionary of Arts and Sciences.
London, 1754-63.

PEARSON, HESKETH. Sir Walter Scott. New York: Harper & Bros., 1954.

PHELPS, ROSE B. "The Encyclopaedia Britannica: 9th Edition." Unpub-
lished Master's thesis, Columbia University, New York, 1930.

REED, DORIS M. "The Encyclopaedia Britannica: A Critical and Historical
Study of the llth Edition." Unpublished Master's thesis, Columbia Uni-
versity, New York, 1931.

RYAN, A, P. Lord Northcliffe. London: Collins Sons & Co., 1953.

SELIGMAN, E. R. A. The Economics of Instalment Selling. New York:
Harper & Bros., 1927.

SHEEBAN, DONALD. This Was Publishing. Bloomington: Indiana Uni-
versity Press, 1952.

SHOVE, RAYMOND HOWABD. Cheap Book Production in the United States,
1870-1891, Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1937.

SMILES, SAMUEL. A Publisher and His Friends. London: John Murray,
1911,

"The Times" and the Publishers. London: Publishers* Association, 1906.

TREDBEY, F. D., The House of Black-wood, 1804-1954. Edinburgh: Black-
wood & Sons, 1954.

TURNER, E. S. The Shocking History of Advertising! New York: E. P.
Button & Co., 1953.

UNWIN, SIR STANLEY. The Truth About Publishing. London: Allen &
Unwin, 1926.

WATT, FRANCIS. The Book of Edinburgh Anecdote. London: Foulis, 1912.

WELLS DORIS M. "The Ownership and the Sales and Publication Policy
of the Encyclopaedia Britannica since the Ninth Edition." Unpublished
Master's thesis, Columbia University, New York, 1929.

WILSON, ARTHUR M, Diderot: The Testing Jeers. New York: Oxford Uni-
versity Press, 1957.

WRIGHT, WILLARD HUNTINGTON. Misinforming a Nation. New York:
Huebsch, 1917.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS AND BIBLIOGRAPHY 319

MAGAZINES AND NEWSPAPERS

Hundreds of articles in magazines and newspapers published in the
United States and Great Britain were read. Because a full listing would be
inordinately lengthy, the following is offered as representative of the scores
of sources.

British:

Athenaeum, June 15 ? 1861, statistics on seventh and eighth editions of
Encyclopaedia Britannica; Aug. 30, 1862, biography of Thomas Stewart
Traill; June 7, Aug. 16, and Nov. 8, 1902, review of articles in tenth edition;
Sept. 3, 1910, and Feb. 4, Feb. 25, Apr. 22, and Aug. 26, 1911, articles on
controversy over EB affiliation with Cambridge University,

Blackwootfs, April, 1817, review of supplement to fifth eclition; March,
1927, "First English Encyclopaedia."

Connoisseur, March, 1911, review of eleventh edition.

Edinburgh Review, April, 1889, review of ninth edition.

Lancet, scattered editions from Feb. 25 through Nov. 25, 1911, especially
on medical subjects in eleventh edition.

London Mercury, November, 1929, review of fourteenth edition.

Meliora, November, 1887, comments on eighth edition.

Nation, May 25 and Oct. 26, 1911, reviews and comment on eleventh
edition.

Nature, scattered issues from Mar. 4 through Sept. 7, 1875, reviews and
evaluations of scientific articles in early volumes of ninth edition; scattered
issues from Feb. 2, 1911, through Jan. 11, 1912, comment on eleventh edi-
tion articles on scientific and technical subjects.

Publishers' Circular, scattered issues from Sept. 3, 1910, through Dec. 2,
1911, articles and comment in connection with Cambridge University and
Hooper-Jackson litigation.

Review of Reviews, May, 1902, review of tenth edition; March, 1908,
"Encyclopaedias, Past and Present" by Louis Windmuller.

Saturday Review, Apr. 4, 1903, on connection with the Times.

Tablet, scattered issues from Mar. 4, 1911, through Jan. 27, 1912, on
music and architecture but mostly on Catholic criticism of eleventh edition.

The Month, August, 1882, "The Encyclopaedia Britannica on the Jesuits,"
by William Laughman; scattered issues from June through December, 1911,
especially on Catholic criticism.

American:

America, scattered issues from July 8, through Sept. 9, 1911, criticism of
Catholic articles in eleventh edition; Sept. 27, 1930, and Oct. 4, 1930, let-
ters on Catholic articles.

American, May 22, 1896, article stressing need for more American con-
tributors.

American Historical Review, October, 1911, historical summary by
George L. Burr of development of encyclopaedias.

320 THE GREAT EB

Annals of American Academy of Political and Social Science, 1911, "En-
cyclopaedia Britannica, llth Edition/' by Emory R. Johnson.

Bookman, January, 1927, "Hail, Columbia!" by Bartlett Cormack.

Business Week, Nov. 21, 1942, article on Sears, Roebuck ownership; May
14, 1953, a good summary of EB's business history.

Independent, Aug. 24, 1911, "Trials of an Encyclopedist/* by C. M,
Francis; Jan. 4, 1912, "The Encyclopaedia Britannica and Catholicism," by
Carlton J. H. Hayes.

Literary Digest, Feb. 21, 1914, "The King of All Encyclopaedias," article
on the history of Chinese encyclopaedias; May 29, 1926, article about J. L.
Garvin as editor.

Nation, May 25 and Oct. 26, 1911, "The New Britannica," by Louis
Heilperin; Oct. 27, 1926, "Peace in the Encyclopaedia"; Oct. 23, 1929,
"The World of Men and Things," by William Macdonald.

New Yorker, Nov. 29, 1952, Dwight Macdonald's review of Great Books
of the Western World.

Outlook, Jan. 24, 1917, on "Americanization" of EB.

Philosophical Review, January, 1915, "Dilemma of Diderot" by Carl
Becker.

Publishers' Weekly, Nov. 10, 1906, on the Book War; June 5, 1909, on
Hooper- Jackson litigation; scattered editions from Oct. 22, 1910, through
Jan. 7, 1911, on Cambridge affiliation; Sept. 2, 1911, and Mar. 30, 1912,
Hooper-Jackson litigation; June 24, 1922, Hooper obituary; Mar. 31, 1923,
"Romance of Book Publishing," account of life of Jackson; Jan, 30, 1943,
transfer of EB to University of Chicago.

Reedy's Mirror, scattered issues from Jan, 14 through Nov. 24, 1916,
anti-EB articles by William Marion Reedy; scattered issues from Nov. 24
through Dec. 29, 1916, "Culture in the Encyclopaedia Britannica," critical
articles by Willard Huntington Wright later collected in his book, Misin-
forming a Nation.

Saturday Review of Literature, Oct. 23, 1926, "The New Britannica," by
C. K, Ogden; Oct. 12, 1929, "Hail, Britannica!" by Allan Nevins, review of
fourteenth edition; Oct. 19, 1929, "A History of Culture," further comment
on fourteenth edition; Nov. 9, 1929, "Science in the Britannica," by James R.
Angell; May 2, 1942, "Thirty-two Million Word Classic" by W. A. Lydgate;
May 11, 1946, on errors in EB.

Saturday Evening Post, July 21-28, 1945, "160 Miles of Words" by
Warren Olivier.

Time, Feb. 1, 1943, "Cachet without Cash"; Apr, 16, 1945, on art collec-
tion; Jan. 15, 1951, "From A to Zygote."

Newspapers most widely used yet with varying frequency were the
Times of London, including scattered editions of its Literary Supplement,
from 1885 to date; New York Evening Post, 1890-1900; New York Herald-
Tribune, 1929 to date; New York Times, 1900 to date; Chicago Daily News,
1915 to date; Chicago Record-Herald, 1910; Chicago Sun and Chicago Sun-
Times, 1943 to date; Chicago Times, 1935-36; Chicago Tribune, 1900 to
date.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS AND BIBLIOGKAPHY 321

Index

Abdullah Effendi of Jeddah, 59

Aberdeen University, 55-56, 229

Adams, Franklin P., 244

Adams, James Truslow, 227

Addison, Joseph, 19

Adler, Mortimer J., 263-65

Adventures of Bunny Rabbit, 262

Akin, eighteenth-century engraver, 25

Alembert, Jean Le Rond d', 31

Alexander, King, 96

Alexander II, 55

Allan, Thomas, 43

Allen, Henry G., 65, 67, 68

Allerdice, eighteenth-century en-
graver, 25

Allsopp's Lager, 112

Alstromer, Baron, 205

America, criticisms of eleventh edition,
175

American Bible Society, 302

American Federation of Catholic So-
cieties, 175

American Geographical Society, 221

American Historical Review, on elev-
enth edition, 170, 173

American Publishing Company, 70

American Telephone and Telegraph
Company, 252

Americanized Encyclopaedia Britan
nica Revised and Amended, 69

Andrews, General Lincoln, 217

Angell, James R,, 230

Angell, Sir Norman, 289

Appleton's American Cyclopaedia,
66,67

Aquinas, St. Thomas, 176

Arago, Dominic Francois Jean, 38

Archer, William, 95

Aristotle, 264

Armitage, John, 277, 286

Art Institute of Chicago, 265

Athenaeum

on seventh edition, 47-48

on tenth edition, 94-95

on Cambridge University affiliation,
164-65

on eleventh edition, 171
Athenaeum Club, 144
Atherton, Gertrude, 123-24
Atomic Energy Commission, 274
Axon, William A. E., 180
Ayer, N. W., 197

Bach, Johann Sebastian, 172

Bacon, Francis, 11, 20, 31

Bailey, John, 129-30

Baldwin, Senator Raymond, 273 n.

Balfour, Arthur, 96, 104

Balfour, John, 11

Ball, Sir Robert, 165

Ballance, eighteenth-century engraver,

Ballantyne, James, 33, 39-41
Ballantyne, John, 33, 39-41
Ballard, Alice P., 234
Bank of England, 40, 116, 139
Barker, eighteenth-century engraver,

OE;

Barnard, F. A. P., 65
Barr, Stringfellow, 263
Barratt, Thomas A., 73
Baruch, Bernard, 214, 217
Batten, Barton, Durstine and Osborn,

250

Baynes, Dr. Thomas Spencer, 52-60
Beard, Charles A., 296
Beard, Mary, 296
Beautiful Britain, 76
Beethoven, Ludwig van, 172
Begg, Dr. James, 57-59
Beith, Gilbert, 59
Belford, Alexander, 68
Belford, Charles, 68

INDEX 355

Belford, Robert, 68
Belford-Clarke Company, 68, 69
Bell, Alexander Graham, 168
Bell, Andrew

and first edition, 7-16

and second edition, 17, 18

and third edition, 20, 21, 23-29,

31-32

Bell, Charles Frederick Moberly, 3-6
summoned from Egypt, 79
assistant managing director of the

Times, 80-81

first affiliation with the Encyclopae-
dia Britannica, 81-82, 87-89,
103, 108-14

and Times Book Club, 114-31
plan for amalgamation, 127-28, 129,

130, 131
and Northcliffe's acquisition of the

Times, 132-40
mentioned, 141, 151, 164
Bell, Edward, 119
Bell, Thomas, 79

Benson, Arthur Christopher, 129
Bentham, Jeremy, 35
Benton, Charles William, 249
Benton, Elma Hixson, 249-50
Benton, William, 245

early life and career, 249-50
affiliation with University of Chi-
cago, 250
public relations assignment,

250-52

as vice-president, 252-59
ideas, 252-53

and the Encyclopaedia Britannica
efforts to acquire for University of

Chicago, 253-59
chairman of board, 261
films company, 261-63
Great Books, 263-65
painting collection, 265
prosperity period, 265-67
crisis of 1947-48, 268-72
article for Book of the Year, 274
financial status of the Encyclopae-
dia Britannica, 278
Benton and Bowles, 250, 257
Berea College, 250
Berkeley, Bishop George, 230
Bernays, Edward G., 251
Bernstorff, Count Johann Heinrich

von, 194
Biblioteca internacional de obras

famosas, 181
Biot, Jean Baptiste, 38
Birck, L. V., 205

Bischoff, Judge Martin, 184-88
Black, A. & C., 4, 43, 52, 61, 63, 65,
66, 67, 68, 74, 76, 81, 87, 90, 92,
93, 185-87
Black, Adam

acquires the Encyclopaedia Britan-
nica, 43

and seventh edition, 44-48

publishes eighth edition, 49-51

last years, 52
Black, Adam W., 4, 51-52, 61, 64, 65,

74, 76, 81-82
Black, Charles, 43
Black, Francis, 51-52
Black, J. Sutherland, 60-61
Black, James T., 51-52, 92
Blackwood's Magazine, 29, 35
Boddy, Elias Manchester, 199-200
Bonar, Thomson, 25, 26-28
Bond, William Scott, 256-57
Book of Knowledge, The, 145, 181,

182
Bookman, on thirteenth edition, 217,

231

Borah, Senator William E. 9 227
Boswell, James, 13
Boudinhon, Abbe, 175
Boulanger, Georges E. J. M., 101
Bourgeois, Emile, 213
Bowles, Chester, 250, 261
Bowman, Dr. Isaiah, 221
Boydston, Noel L., 311-12
Bradley, James C., 302, 308
Braun, Father Joseph, 175
Brereton, Dr. Cloudesley, 224
Brewster, Dr. David, 30
Brinkley, Captain Francis, 192
Bristol Mercury, 98
Britannia, 228-29
Britannica Book of the Year, 242-43,

274, 277, 285, 290, 300, 305
Britannica Junior, 242, 258, 265, 267,
273, 274-76, 292, 300, 307, 311
Britannica Year Book, 191, 204
British Academy, 162, 202-3
British Information Service, 277
British Museum, 168, 178, 298
British Relay Wireless and Associated

Companies, 277

Brodie-Hall, Miss, 127-28, 139
Bronmer, H. N. 205
Brooklyn Eagle, 216
Brown, John, 24
Brown, Dr. Thomas, 31
Browne, James, 44
Browning, Robert, 101

326 INDEX

Brunnbauer, 136

Bryce, James, 61, 95, 168, 234

Buccleuch, Duke of; see Scott, Henry

Buchan, Dr. William, 9

Buchanan, Aimee, 243-44

Buckle, George Edward, 79, 134, 135,

138

Buffalo Bill, 103
Buffon's Natural History of the Earth

and of Men and Quadrupeds, 14
Bulganin, Premier Nicolai, 293
Bunche, Ralph, 290
Btmsen, Baron Christian Karl Josias

von, 50

Bunyan, John, 50, 234, 290
Burke, Edmund, 222
Burke, Thomas Henry, 79
Burns, Berridge and Company, 154
Burns, Robert, 14-15, 21, 54
Burr, Aaron, 25
Burr, George, 173
Burrows, Harris B., 93, 147, 148, 149,

151, 154, 159
Burton, Richard, 59
Butcher, S. H., 162
Butchers* Association, 125
Butler, Justice Arthur, 65
Butler, E. Cuthbert, 176

Cabinet-Maker and Artist's Encyclo-
paedia, The, 43

Cadell, Robert, 32, 41, 49

Caledonian Mercury, 43, 48

Cambridge Modern History, 157

Cambridge Review, 165

Cambridge University, 36, 60, 61, 90,
96, 157, 158, 162, 163, 164, 165,
166, 178-79, 184, 187, 188, 202,
203, 221, 277, 283

Cambridge University Press, 157,
160-65, 166, 178-79, 185

Cambridge University Press Syndicate
("Syndics"), 157-58, 161, 166,
178-79, 203

Campbell, Rev. T. J., 175

Camrose, Lord, 230

Canby, Henry Seidel, 216

Capper, Senator Arthur, 227

Carleton College, 250

Carnegie, Andrew, 165

Carpenter, George R., 158-59

Castle, Irene, 226, 230

Cathcart, Robert, 28

Catholic Dictionary, 178

Catholic Encyclopaedia, 175, 177

Caully, Zachary, 306-7

Cavendish, Lord Frederick, 79

Century Dictionary, 69, 71, 89, 108,

185, 192, 201
Chamberlain, Austen, 144
Chambers, Ephraim, 7
Chambers, Robert, 50
Chambers, William, 50
Chambers' Cyclopaedia, or Universal
Dictionary of Arts and Sciences,
7, 11, 24, 30, 39, 45
Chambers' s Encyclopaedia, 50, 225
Chaney, Lon, 226

Charles R. Walgreen Foundation for
the Study of American Institu-
tions, 252

Charteris, Dr. A. H., 57
Chaucer, Geoffrey, 19
Chemical National Bank, 201
Chesterfield, Lord, 8
Chesterton, G. K., 290
Chevrolet, 255
Chicago Club, 254, 257
Chicago Daily News, 232, 260
Chicago Public Library, 291
Chicago Times, 251
Children's Encyclopaedia, 182
Chirol, Valentine, 80, 136
Chisholm, Hugh, 89-90, 106-7, 110,

142

and eleventh edition, 143-44, 152,
154, 157, 162, 171, 175, 176,
180

and Britannica Jear Book, 190-91
later activities, 193, 194, 202, 204-5,

206

Choate, Joseph, 168, 184
Churchill, Randolph, 119, 125
Churchill, Winston, 104, 119
Civic Opera Building, 241, 267, 273
Civil Service Supply Association, 5
Claridge's, 105, 162, 206
Clark, Edward, 74

Clark, R. and R., 74, 152, 158, 182-83
Clark, William D., 276
Clarke, George, 71, 74, 82, 88, 91, 92
Clarke, James, 4-6

activities in the United States,

68-69, 71, 74
goes to England, 75-76
and C. F. Moberly Bell, 81 if., 88, 91,
92, 154, 197; see also Clarke and
Company, Ltd.; James Clarke
and Company
Clarke and Company, Ltd., 82, 89, 91,

93; see also Clarke, James
Clemens, Samuel Langhorne (Mark

Twain), 70
"Coca-Cola," 255

327

Cockle's Anti-bilious Pills for Brain

Workers, 112
Colbran, Erik, 205
Cole, Clay, 304

Collection of Contemporary Ameri-
can Painting, 265
Colonial Children, 262
Columbia Broadcasting System, 252
Columbia University, 65, 177, 211,

226

Comely Gardens, 20
Committee for Economic Develop-
ment, 253

Communist Manifesto, 251
Compton, Arthur Holly, 227
Conder, Josiah, 47
Conger, Robert, 271-72
Congreve, William, 224
Connoisseur, on eleventh edition,

172-73

Conrich, J. Lloyd, 297
Constable, Archibald, 27-28

publishes supplement to fifth edi-
tion of the Encyclopaedia Bri-
tannica, 29-40
final years, 41-42, 43, 44, 47
Cook, Hubert Graeme, 302
Coolidge, Calvin, 217
Cormack, Bartlett, 217
Courtney, Janet; see Hogarth, Janet
Courtney, W. L., 191
Cox, Harriett Meeker; see Hooper, Mrs.

Horace E.

Cox, Warren, 198-200, 225, 231
Cox, William J., 93, 197, 206, 211
issues These Eventful Years, 212-15
and thirteenth edition, 215-19
publishes fourteenth edition,

220-37, 239, 244
Coxe, John, 10
Crochallan Fencibles, 14-15
Crorner, Lord, 127-28, 136
Crowther, Sir Geoffrey, 277
Crowther, Samuel, 217
Croxton, Arthur, 170
Cunningham, Rev. William, 46-47,

178-79

Curie, Mme Marie, 214
Curzon, Lord, 136

Daily Chronicle, 133-34
Daily Express, 132
Dally lllini, 272
Daily Mail, 72, 84, 135
Daily Universal Register, 78
d'Alembert; see Alembert, Jean Le
Rond d*

Dali, Salvador, 265

Dalton, J. S., 305-6

Darling, Justice, 140

Darwin, Charles, 52, 53

Davis, Stuart, 265

Dawson, Geoifrey, 230

Debussy, Claude Achille, 172

Delane, John, 125

DePue, Sherrerd, 152-53, 188

De Quincey, Thomas, 46, 95

Derrick, Paul E., 72-73

Dewey, Admiral George, 168

Dewey, John, 221

Dial, 200-201

Diccionario enciclopedico hispano-

americano, El, 182, 189-90
Dickens, Charles, 4, 68, 93, 123, 277,

290

Dickinson, J. W., 67
Diderot, Denis, 7-8, 298
DiHy, Charles, 13
Dilly, Edward, 13
Disraeli, Benjamin, 41
Dobson, Thomas, 25, 64
Dobson's Encyclopaedia, 25
Dodge, John V., 261
Dolphin, A. E., 277
Domestic Medicine, 9
Donald, Sir Robert, 230
Donnelley, Thomas E., 158-59
Donnelley and Sons, R. R., 158-59,

182, 196, 205, 222, 226, 242, 268,

270, 271, 289; see also Lakeside

Press
"Dooley, Mr.," see Dunne, Finley

Peter

Douglas, Downey, 14
Downes, John, 49
Draga, Queen, 96
Drummond, Hugh, 23
Dryden, John, 10
DuBois, W. E. B., 216
Dudley, Lavinia, 234-35
Duffus, R. L., 300
Dulles, John Foster, 214
Dunhill, Alfred, 226
Dunne, Finley Peter ("Mr. Dooley"),

103
Dunsany, Lord, 224-25

Eagan, Frank, 192

East India House, 35

Eastman Kodak Company, 262

EB News, 309-10

Economist, 277

Eddy, Mrs. Mary Baker, 103

Edinburgh Courant, 57

828 INDEX

Edinburgh Encyclopaedia, 30
Edinburgh Guardian, 52
Edinburgh Magazine and Review, 13
Edinburgh Philosophical Society, 9
Edinburgh Protestant Association, 46
Edinburgh Review and Critical Jour-
nal, 27, 29, 32, 36, 37, 44
on ninth edition, 63
Edinburgh University, 9, 32, 44, 46, 49,

56,57

Education Act of 1870, 72
Educational Book Company, 230
Edward VII, 95, 167-68
Egan, Patrick, 79
Einstein, Albert, 216, 227, 289
Electrical Research Products, Inc.

(ERPI), 252, 261-62
Electrical Steam Lines, 56
Eliot, George, 4, 68
Elizabeth II, 284
Elliott, Charles, 21
Enciclopedia barsa, 278
Encyclopaedia Biblica, 61
Encyclopaedia Britannica, 4r-6
first edition
origins, 89
contents, 10-13
"midwifery" controversy, 13
piracy, 13

second edition, 14, 16
description, 18-20
third edition, 22-24

piracy in United States, 24-25
piracy in Dublin, 25
supplement, 26
fourth edition, 26-28

sale to Constable, 28
fifth edition, 28

famous supplement, 29-39
evaluation, 40-41
sixth edition, 38-39
seventh edition, 43
conflicts, 45

critical comment, 46, 4748
eighth edition, 49
comment, 49-50
contributors, 50-51
ninth edition
origins, 51-52
contributors, 52-55
and William Robertson Smith,

55-61

critical comment, 62-64
piracy in the United States,

6468
and Horace Hooper, 72-77

Encyclopaedia Britannica (Continued)
Times reprint of ninth edition, 4-6,

81-82
advertising campaign^ 82-84,

87-88, 179, 193, 269
tenth edition, 88-91, 92

advertising campaign, 94-102,
104-9, 115, 120, 124, 127,
128, 129, 131, 183
eleventh edition, 110, 135
editorial work, 143-45
Hooper-Jackson controversy over,

145-55

affiliation with Cambridge Univer-
sity, 156-62

advertising campaign, 162-64
opposition to, 164-66
promotion and advertising, 169-

70
description and evaluations,

170-73, 180

Catholic criticisms, 173-78
continued opposition from Cam-
bridge University professors,
178-79, 184, 186, 189, 194,
195, 196, 197
salesmen, 198-200
supplement, 204-6, 212
early subsidiary publications, 190,

191-92, 198, 200, 212-15
financial crisis, 201-2, 204, 206, 211
thirteenth edition, 215
contributors, 216-17
evaluations, 217-19
fourteenth edition

plans and procedures, 22022
editorial work, 222-24
contributors, 224-28
criticisms and evaluations, 228-

concepts, 232-33
sales, 234

effect of 1929 depression, 235-37
ownership by Sears, Roebuck and

Company, 228, 238-59
adoption of continuous revision,

240-41

Britannica Junior, 242
Britannica Book of the Year, 242-

Library Research Service, 243-44
promotions, 244
efforts to transfer to University of

Chicago, 249-59
modem period

reorganization, 260-61

INDEX 329

Encyclopaedia Britannica (Continued)

subsidiary ventures, 261-65; 273-
76

financial status, 265-66, 278

crisis of 1947-48, 268-72

British firm, 276-77

editorial methods, revision, anec-
dotes, 283-98

salesmen and their methods and
experiences, 299-312

evaluation, 313-14
Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., 257-

59, 260, 261, 265, 267, 269, 278
Encyclopaedia Britannica Company,

93, 150, 212
Encyclopaedia Britannica Corporation,

197
Encyclopaedia Britannica Films, Inc.,

262-63, 267, 271

Encyclopaedia Britannica Press, 267
Encyclopaedia Britannica World Atlas,

276, 292, 300, 305
Encyclopaedia for Mechanics, 40
Encyclopaedia Metropolitana, 30, 45
Encyclopaedia for Youth, 40
Encyclopaedias, history of, 6-8
Encyclopedia, ou Dictionnaire raisonne

des sciences, des arts et des m&-

tiers, 7-8, 26, 31
Eno's Fruit Salt, 112
Erskine, John, 263
Esher, Viscount, 129
Essays on the Most Important Subjects

of Natural and Revealed Religion,

Estes, Dana, 75
Estes and Lauriat, 74, 75
Everett, Edward, 51

Fadiman, Clifton, 244

Fair, The (Chicago), 71

Fair Book Prices vs. Publishers' Trust

Prices, 124

Fifty Years of Punch, 108
Fisher, W. Garrett, 144, 155, 159
Flanders, C. A., 302, 307
Fleetwood, Donald, 308
Forbes, David, 51
Ford, Henry, 217, 230
Ford Foundation, 264 n.
Forester, C. S., 298
Fortnightly, 277
Fortnightly Review, 191
Fortune, 254
Frankau, Gilbert, 229
Frazer, James G., 60

Free Church College (Aberdeen), 56,
57-58, 60

Free Church College (Edinburgh), 56

Free Church of Scotland, 55, 56, 57,
58

Freeman, Edward Augustus, 54

Freud, Sigmund, 214, 290

From Midshipman to Field Marshal,
131

Fuller, Henry Blake, 200-201

Fund for the Advancement of Educa-
tion, 263

Funk, Rev. Isaac, 67

Funk and Wagnalls, 67, 274

Futteh Ali, Shah, 26

Gager, Curtis, 261
Gandhi, Mohandas K., 213
Garibaldi's Defence of the Roman Re-
public, 123
Garvin, James Louis, 213

edits thirteenth edition 215-17, 221
edits fourteenth edition, 222-37, 238

Gasquet, Father Aidan, 176, 178

Gauguin, Paul, 225

General System of Natural History, 14

Gerttlemans and Ladies' Magazine,
A, 17

Gentleman's Magazine, 48

George, Lloyd, 165, 204

George III, 23, 25

George V, 162, 190, 217

Gibbons, James Cardinal, 175

Gilbert, Ralph C. A., 312

Girton College, 96

Gish, Lillian, 226

Gladstone, William, 83, 90

Gleig, George, 23-26

Godkin, E. L., 67

Golden Rough, The, 60

Goldsmith, Oliver, 50, 234, 290

Golenpaul, Dan, 244

Goodyear, George F., 297

Gould, Bruce, 295

Grade Teacher Magazine, 275

Graham, John M., 153

"Grape-Nuts," 112

Graphic, 137

Graves, Charles L., 102-4, 105, 125

Gray Squirrel, 262

Great Books of the Western World.
263-65, 267, 271

Great Conversation, The, 264

Greig, Carlyle Norwood, 76

Greig and Company, Ltd., 76

Grolier Club, 75

330 INDEX

Grolier Society, 74, 75, 145, 153, 189,

192-93

Grover, Gregory, 208-9
Guyot, Arnold, 65

Hackett, Francis, 200
Hadley, Arthur T., 89, 90
Hamilton, Alexander, 25
Hamilton, Balfour and Neal (print-
ers), 9

Hamilton, Duke of, 123
Hamilton, Lady, 276
Hammerton, John A., 182-83, 189-90
Handel, George Frederick, 172
Handy Volume Encyclopaedia Britan-

nica, 196-98, 200-201, 212
Hanihara, Masanao, 213-14
Harden, Maximilian, 214
Harmsworth, Alfred (Lord North-
diffe), 72, 87, 103, 117

acquisition of the Times, 132-40,
141, 142, 143, 145, 150,
182, 191
Harmsworth Universal Encyclopaedia,

117, 230
Harris, John, 7

Hart, Captain B. H. Liddell, 221
Harvard Law School, 221, 275, 297
Harvard University, 90, 251, 253
Haxton, Henry

early career, 71-76

first ads for the Encyclopaedia Bri-
tannica, 82-84, 87, 95, 96

ads for the tenth edition, 99-102

ads for the Times, 111-14

in South America, 189-90

mentioned, 105, 124, 163, 205
Hayes, Carlton J. H., 177, 178
Hazlitt, William, 34
Heaton, Henniker, 123
Hegel and the Metaphysics of the

Fluxional Calculus, 56
Heilperin, Louis, 172, 231
Henley, W. E., 61
Hennessy's One Star Brandy, 112
Herschel, Sir John, 50
Hiatt, Ken, 310-11
Highet, Gilbert, 264-65
Hill, Miranda, 286-87
Hill, Octavia, 286-87
Hill, Peter, 14
Historians' History of the World, The,

135
History of the Communist Party of the

Soviet Union, 293
History of India, 35

History of the World, 49
Hobler, Atherton, 250
Hoffman, Paul G,, 261
Hogarth, Janet (later Janet Court-
ney), 116-17, 119, 141, 168, 191,
192, 194, 204, 206
Hohenzollern, William, 103
Holden, Edward S., 90
Holyrood Palace, 17
Home, Henry (Lord Kames), 23
Home Encyclopaedia, 69, 71
Homer, 264

Hooper, Franklin H., 89, 90, 93, 96
and eleventh edition, 143-44, 147,

148, 149, 151, 154
and Handy Volume, 195-97
and These Eventful Years, 212-15
and thirteenth edition, 216-19
and fourteenth edition, 220-37
final years, 239-43
Hooper, Horace Everett

and C. F. Moberly Bell, 4-6
affiliation with James Clarke, 69-71
early life and career, 6970
sale of Century Dictionary, 71
in England, 72-73

first connections with the Encyclo-
paedia Britannica, 74-77
the Times reprint of ninth edition,

81-84, 87, 88
and tenth edition, 89-91
full control of Encyclopaedia Bri-

tannica, 91-93

relationship with Jackson, 9192
establishes American company, 93
sparks campaign for tenth edition,
94-102, 104, 105, 106, 107-8
advertisement director for the

Times, 109-14
and the Times Book Club, 114-20,

121-31, 140-41
and NorthcliirVs acquisition of the

Times, 132-40
Murray libel suit, 140-42
and eleventh edition, 142-45, 162-

80
conflicts with Jackson, 145-55, 159-

60, 182-89, 192

the contract with . Cambridge Uni-
versity, 156-62

return to the United States, 193-95
first affiliations with Sears, Roebuck

and Company, 195-97
financial difficulties and reorganiza-
tion, 201-2, 204

INDEX 331

Hooper, Horace Everett (Continued)
last efforts and final years, 202-7,

211, 212, 215
mentioned, 242, 253, 266, 276, 301

Hooper, Horace Everett, Jr., 205-6

Hooper, Mrs. Horace E. (former Har-
riett Meeker Cox), 91, 202, 212

Hooper, William, 70

Hooper and Jackson, Ltd. 123, 127

Hoover Commission, 273 n

Hope, Bob, 265

Hornblower, Horatio, 298

Homer, Francis, 31

Houdini, Harry, 217

Houghton, Harry, 270-72, 273

House, Colonel E. M., 217

How He Lied to Her Husband, 123

Howell, Judge James E., 151-52

Hudson, G. Donald, 276

Hughes, Justice Charles Evans, 227,
235

"Human Adventure, The," 252-53

Hume, David, 11

Hunter, Alexander Gibson, 33

Hunter, James, 24

Hurst, Thomas, 40

Huserik, Fred, 307-8

Hutchins, Robert Maynard, 250-52
negotiations to acquire the Encyclo-
paedia Britannica for the Uni-
versity of Chicago, 253-59
chairman of Board of Editors, 261
and Great Books of the Western

World, 263-65

other Encyclopaedia Britannica con-
nections, 293

Hutchins, William James, 250

Huxley, Julian, 221, 290

Huxley, Thomas Henry, 53-54, 66

Imagi mundi, 6

Incorporated Society of Authors, 124

Independent, on eleventh edition, 173,

177

"Information Please," 244
Insidecompletuar Britanniaware, 103

104
International Copyright Law of 1891,

International Trust Company, 153
Inverness Courier, 51
Irving, Sir Henry, 170
Irving, Henry Brodribb, 170
Isis, on fourteenth edition, 229

Jackson, H. Chapin, 192-93
Jackson, W. Montgomery, 192-93

Jackson, Inc., W. M., 193
Jackson, Walter Montgomery
early life and career, 74-75
acquisition of the Encyclopaedia
Britannica, 91-92, 93, 96,
105, 106, 108-11

Times circulation manager, 113-14
and Northcliffe's acquisition of the

Times, 132-40, 141-42
conflicts with Hooper, 145-55, 159-

60, 182-89, 192, 197
South American exterprises, 181-83,

189-90, 192-93
mentioned, 82, 84, 89, 90, 115, 116,

117, 126, 127, 131, 198, 206
James Clarke and Company, 69, 75-76
James, E. Ibbetson, 222
James, Jesse, 294-95
James, Montague Rhodes, 157-58,

160, 165-66
James I, 54
Japan Mail, 192
Jefferson, Thomas, 25
Jeffrey, Francis, 27, 32, 37
Jellicoe, Admiral John, 214
Jenner, Dr, Edward, 28
Jesus Christ, 19
Jewell, Edwin Alden, 231-32
John Bull's Other Island, 123
Johns Hopkins University, 90
Johnson, Alvin J., 65-66
Johnson, Samuel, 10, 12, 50, 234
Johnston, Percy, 201
Jones, Kennedy, 135-40, 141
Jones, Randolph, 305
Jordan, W. K., 253
Jorgensen, C. T., 302
Junior Britannica, 192

Kai-shek, Mme Chiang, 266

Kay, John, 20

Kames, Lord; see Home, Henry

Keeley Institute, 112

Keetch, S. D., 277

Kellogg, Frank B., 227

Kelvin, Lord; see Thomson, William

Kenyon, Sir Frederic, 203

Kephart, Cy, 310

Kettering, Charles F., 227

Kieran, John P., 244

Kikuchi, Baron Dairoku, 192

Kimpton, Lawrence A., 278

King's Park, 20-21

Kingsley, Charles, 50

Kipling, Rudyard, 80, 124

Kitchin, F. Harcourt, 100 n., 114

Kittle, Charles, 222

332 INDEX

"Kodak," 255
Koo, Dr. Wellington, 213
Krebs, Hans Adolph, 289
Kropotkin, Prince Petr Alekseevich, 55,
174

Ladies' Home Journal, 295

Lakeside Press, 158-59, 289; see also
Donnelley and Sons, R. R.

Land League, 79

Lasker, Albert D., 250

Law, Mrs. Margaret Dorothy, 223, 230

Lawson, eighteenth-century engraver,
25

League of Nations, 205

Lehmann, Edward J., 71

Lenin, Nikolai, 216

Leslie, Sir John, 46, 51

Letters to His Son, 8; see also Chester-
field, Lord

Letters of Queen Victoria, The, 130,
141

Levant, Oscar, 244

Leverett, John, 70

Lexicon Technicum, 7

Library of Congress, 291

Library of Engineering Societies, 291

Library Research Service, 243-44,
290-92, 295, 300

Life, 254

Life of Abraham Lincoln, 123

Life among the Mormons, 300

Life of Sir Richard Burton, The, 123

Lincoln, Master of Men, 123

Lindbergh, Colonel Charles E., 229

Lindsay, Vachel, 216

Linnaeus, 9

Literary piracy, 13, 64-68

Little, Brown and Company, 64

Littledale, F. W., 174

Locke, John, 11

Lodge, Edmund, 73

Loeb, Albert H., 196, 228

London Illustrated News, 73

London Mercury, on fourteenth edi-
tion, 229, 231, 233

London Observer, 133-34, 136, 213,
215, 277

London theaters, 34-35

Longman, C. J., 119

Longmans, 123

Lord and Thomas, 250

Louis IX, 6

Lotus Club, 204

Lovett, Robert Morss, 216

Lucas, Edward Verrall, 102-4, 105,
125

Luce, Henry R., 254

Ludendorff, General Erich F. W., 214

Luque, Solano de, 19-20

Macaulay, Thomas Babington, 36, 50,

95, 234, 290

McCarter, Robert, 152-53
McCarthy, Senator Joseph, 273 n.
McClendon, M. L,, 310
MacCracken, Henry Noble, 230-31
Macdonald, Dwight, 264
MacDonald, J. Ramsay, 227
Macfarquhar, Colin

and first edition, 7-16

and second edition, 20, 21

and third edition, 22-23, 24
Machiavelli, Niccol6, 234
McKay, Mae, 284
McKeon, Richard, 261
Macintosh, Sir James, 46
Maclaren, Charles, 39
Macleod, J. J. R., 290
Macmillan, Frederick, 115, 116, 140-

McNeil, Hector, 277
Madame Tussaud's, 104
Major Barbara, 123
Malthus, Thomas Robert, 37
Mandel Hall, 259
Marconi, Guglielmo, 293
Marlowe, Christopher, 69
Marmion, 33

Marshall, George C., 270, 289
MartelFs Cognac, 112
Martell's Three Star Brandy, 112
Martin, Graham, 277
Marx, Karl, 264
Mary, Queen of Scots, 21, 55
Masaryk, Thomas, 205
Mason, A. W., 160
Mason, Max, 222
Massachusetts Institute of Technology,

253

Masters, Edgar Lee, 216
Maugham, W. S., 119
Mee, Arthur, 145
Meek, Robert, 17
Meliora, 46

on eighth edition, 49-50
Mellon, Andrew, 217
Mellon, Paul, 265
Memoirs of General Grant, 70
Memoirs of Prince Hohenlohe, The, 131
Mencken, H. L., 216
Merry go Round, The, 119
Meyer, Len, 302, 307

INPEX 333

Michelson, A. A., 227

Midland Press, 272

Midland Railways Hotels, 112

Milbum, Harriet, 284

Mill, James, 35-37

Mill, John Stuart, 35-36, 93

Millais, Sir John, 73

Millar, Dr. James, 27, 29, 31

Millay, Edna St. Vincent, 216

Miller, William, 105-6

Millikan, Robert A., 227

Milton, John, 10, 19

Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, 33

Misinforming a Nation, 200-201, 293

Mitchell, Malcolm, 144-45

Mitchell, Maurice B., 262-63

Moberly Bell and His Times, 100 n.

Modern Traveller, The, 47

Money, Sir Leo Chiozza, 225-26

Montaner y Simon, 182

Montgolfier, Jacques, 20

Montgolfier, Joseph, 20

Montgomery, Ward and Company,
236

Montgomery Advertiser, 64

Month, criticism of eleventh edition,
174, 175

Monthly Encyclopaedia, 117

Moore, Henry Hoyt, 200

Moore, James, 25

Moore's Dublin Edition, Encyclopae-
dia Britannica, 25

Morgan, J. P., 104, 168

Morrison, G. E., 80

Morrow, George, 126

Morse, Jedidiah, 25

Murder, Piracy and Treason, 222

Murray, John, 120, 122, 129-31,
140-41

Muzak Corporation, 253, 262

Napier, Macvey, 27

and supplement to fifth edition of
the Encyclopaedia Britannica,
32-40

and Adam Black, 44-45, 49
Napoleonic War, 33
Nation (London), on eleventh edi-
tion, 172, 173
Nation (United States)

on eleventh edition, 172

on thirteenth edition, 217-18

on fourteenth edition, 231
Nation, Carrie, 103

National Broadcasting Company, 252
National Cash Register Company, 250

National Movement against Consump-
tion and Cancer, 112
Naturalis historia, 6
Nature, on ninth edition, 53
Neill and Company, 64
Nelson, Lord, 276
Nevins, Allan, 230
New College (Edinburgh), 57
New International Encyclopaedia, 143
New Practical Standard Dictionary,

274

New Republic, 200
New Russia's Primer, 251
New Statesman, on fourteenth edition,

229

New Times (Moscow), 293
New York Evening Post, 67
New York Federation of Churches,

302
New York Times, 125, 169, 200, 207,

215, 218-19, 226, 231-32, 264-

65, 287

New Yorker, 264
Newcomb, Simon, 90-91
Newington Free Church, 57
Newman, Jacob, 149, 151-52, 159-60
Newnes, George, 72, 103
Newton, Sir Isaac, 7
Newtonian Society, 9
Nicolay, John, 123
Nightingale, Florence, 287
Noah's Ark, 10, 13, 19
Nobel Prize, 54, 227, 233, 234, 289,

290

Noonan, Edward, 199
North, Lord, 20
NorthclifTe, Lord; see Harmsworth,

Alfred
Northcote, Stafford Henry (Viscount

St. Cyres), 174, 177
Norton, Lucille, 251
Notes on Scottish Song, 21

O'Brien, Howard Vincent, 232

Ogden, C. K., 217

Oglesby, Thaddeus K, 63-64

Old Bushmill's, 112

Old Dominion Foundation, 265

Origin of Species, 52

Otto, C. B., 310

Outlook, on Handy Volume, 200

Oxford University, 90, 96, 164, 229,

277, 283
Oxford University Press, 157, 294

Paderewski, Ignace, 103
Paepcke, Walter, 261

334 INDEX

Panic of 1825, 40-41
Paradise Lost, 10
Parents' Magazine, 258
Parnell, Charles Stewart, 79
Patterson, John EL, 250
Patton, James F., 196
Pauling, Linus C., 290
Pears, A. and F., 73
Pearson, Cyril Arthur, 133-39
Peck, George, 91
Peel, Sir Robert, 93
Pelikan, Jaroslav Jan, 294
Pershing, General John J., 227
Petrunkevitch, Alexander, 295
Philadelphia Public Ledger, 235
Philadelphia Telegraph, 235
Phillips, W. Alison, 110, 143-44, 155,
156-58, 162-63, 175, 176, 202-3
Philosophical Institute of Edinburgh,

Philosophic Radicals, 35-36
Piggott, Richard, 79
Pirenne, Henry, 205
Pitcher, Molly, 294
Pitkin, Walter, 226
Pitt, William, 50
Playfair, John, 31-32, 46
Pliny the Elder, 6
Poisoning the Wells, 175, 176
Pope, Alexander, 10
Pope Pius XII, 286
Popov, A. S., 293

Popular History of the World, 307
Portraits and Memories of the Most
Illustrious Personages of British
History, 73
Post, Emily, 275

Postgate, Raymond W., 222, 223
Pound, Roscoe, 221, 227, 275
Powell, Elkan Harrison, 237

heads the Encyclopaedia Britannica,
238-40, 241

innovations, 240-45

modem period, 260, 269-72
Preble, Robert C.

early years, 272-73

as president of JEB, 273
improvements and publications,

273-74

Prince of Wales, 90
Princeton University, 65, 70
Pritchard, Grant, 310
Publishers' Association, 117, 119, 120,

122, 124

Publishers' Circular, 164
Publishers' Weekly, 125

Punch, 102, 224

Putnam, Major George Haven, 145

Quarrie Company, W. F., 273
Quarterly Review, 46, 129

Rainy, Robert, 57

Raleigh, Sir Walter, 32

Rayleigh, John William Strutt (Lord
Rayleigh),54, 162

Rayleigh, Lord; see Rayleigh, John
William Strutt

Ready Reference Index, 275

Redfield, Robert, 261

Reedy s Mirror, 200

Rees, Abraham, 30, 45

Reform BiU of 1832, 36

Reform Club, 215

Review of Reviews (London), 139

Review of Reviews (United States),
on eleventh edition, 173

Rhondda, Lady, 214

Ricardo, David, 36-37

Richmond, Bruce, 130

Ringelberg, J, F. (Encyclopaedist), 6

Ritz Hotel, 136

Roberts, Ellis, 223

Roberts, George, 297

Robertson, Lord Patrick, 48

Robinson, Edwin Arlington, 216

Robinson, John, 23

Robinson, Joseph Ogle, 39-40, 42

Rockefeller, John D,, 165, 278

Rockefeller, Nelson, 253

Rockefeller Foundation, 252, 253, 254,
258

Roosevelt, Eleanor, 266

Roosevelt, Franklin D., 286

Root, Elihu, 227

Rosenwald, Julius H., 196, 204, 212,
221-22, 227, 228, 236, 245

Rosenwald, Lessing, 255

Rosetta Stone, 38

Ross, Charles F., 201-2

Ross, Edward, 130-31, 140-41

Rossetti, William, 55

Rothafel, S. L. ("Roxy"), 226

Rothchild, Alonzo, 123

Rothschild, Nathan Mayer, 101

Rousseau, Jean Jacques, 7

Royal College of Physicians (Edin-
burgh), 27

Royal Society, 168, 202-3, 218

Royal Society of Edinburgh, 23

Ruml, Beardsley, 261

Russell, Bertrand, 214

Ruzicka, Rudolph, 242

INDEX 335

St. Andrews University, 52

St. Gyres, Viscount; see Northcote,

Stafford Henry

St. James's Gazette, 89, 90, 144
St. John s College, 263
Salpeter, Harry, 265
Sandow, Eugene, 104, 112, 165
Saturday Review (British), 102

on fourteenth edition, 229
Saturday Review (New York), on ed-
ucational films, 263
see also Saturday Review of Liter-
ature
Saturday Review of Literature (New

York)

on thirteenth edition, 217
on fourteenth edition, 230
see also Saturday Review (New

York)

Saunders, George, 205
Savidge, Irene, 225-26
Savile Club, 202
Savoy Hotel, 96, 105, 135, 167
Scheer, Admiral Reinhard, 214
Schneider, Margaret, 189
Schoenewald, Louis G., 239-40, 242,

244, 260, 271-72
Schuster, M. Lincoln, 261
Scot, eighteenth-century engraver, 25
Scot's Journal, 9
Scot's Observer, 61
Scotsman, 39

Scott, Henry (Duke of Buccleuch), 14
Scott, Dr. James Brown, 213
Scott, Robert Falcon, 131
Scott, Sir Walter, 27
contributions to fifth edition supple-
ment, 32-35

break with Constable, 39-41, 46
mentioned, 49, 50, 68, 95
Scott's Miscellany, 41
Scribner's Sons, Charles, 63, 64, 65, 67,

185, 186

Seaborg, Glenn T., 290
Seaman, Paul E., 272, 301, 303, 304
Sears, Roebuck and Company, 196,

201, 204, 212, 222

ownership of the Encyclopae-
dia Britannica, 228, 235-59
later connections, 269-70, 276
Selfridge, Harry Gordon, 222
Servieres, Jean Grolier de, 75
Seymour, eighteenth-century engraver,

Shadwell, Dr. Arthur, 123
Shakespeare, William, 19

Shattuck Military School, 250

Shaw, Flora, 80

Shaw, George Bernard, 123, 212-13,

289-90, 298

Shelley, Percy Bysshe, 55
Sheraton, Thomas, 43
Sherer, Albert W., 261
Shipman, Judge William D. 67-68
Shirk, A. Urban, 297
Shotwell, James T., 227
Sibley, Mrs. Clara Frances, 126
Sibley, Dr. Walter Knowsley, 126-27,

128

Sickert, Oswald, 106, 163, 165
Signs of the Times, or The Hustler's

Almanac for 1907, 125
Simpkin, Marshall and Company, 115,

122

Simpson, Dr. W. D., 229-30
"$64,000 Question, The," 244
Skinner, Otis, 226
Smellie, Alexander, 9
Smellie, William, 8
and first edition of Encyclopaedia

Britannica, 9-14
later writings, 14
final years, 14-15
mentioned, 16, 23, 42, 95
Smith, Alfred E., 226
Smith, Sydney, 27, 32
Smith, William Pirie, 55
Smith, William Robertson
early life, 55-56

articles for ninth edition of the En-
cyclopaedia Britannica, 56
subsequent controversy, 57-61
appointed co-editor of ninth edition,

60-61

final years, 61
mentioned, 62, 66, 173, 293
Smither, eighteenth-century engraver,

Society of Antiquarians of Scotland, 14
Society for the Checking of Abuses in

Public Advertising, 73
Society of Writers to the Signet, 27
Some Truths of History, 64
Sonneman, Ralph, 312
Spanish- American War, 84
Spectator, on eleventh edition, 173-74
Spencer, Herbert, 55
Spiegel, Inc., 271
Stagg, Amos Alonzo, 217
StaSn, Joseph, 216
Standard, 133

Standard American Publishing Com-
pany, 91

336 INDEX

Starr, Cecile, 263

Stead, William T., 139

Stedman, Edmund Clarence, 55

Steele, Richard, 10

Stefansson, Vilhjalmur, 275

Stevens, David, 253

Stevenson, Adlai E., 261

Stevenson, Kennedy, 261

Stevenson, Robert Louis, 54-55, 56

Stewart, Dugald, 31-32, 46, 48, 51

Stewart, Colonel Matthew, 48

Stimson, Henry L., 227

Stoddart, Joseph M. 64-65

Stoddart's Weekly, 65

Stolen, Ernest V., 312

Strand Magazine, 72

Strauss, Lewis L., 274

Stuart, Gilbert, 13-14

Stuart, John, 261

Studebaker Company, 261

Studies in Contemporary Biography,
61 n.

Subscription book selling

in the eighteenth century, 9-10

in the late-nineteenth century, 70

71
in World War I, 201

Swift, Harold H., 256, 257, 259

Swift, Jonathan, 33

Swinburne, Algernon Charles, 55, 223,
234

Symonds, John Addington, 234

Syntopicon, 264

System of Chemistry, 26

Tables of Grammar, 10

Tablet, criticisms of eleventh edition,

174-75, 176, 177-78
Taft, William Howard, 162
Tai ring Yu Tan, 6
Tatkr, 170

Taunton, Rev. Ethelred, 174
Ten Eventful Years, 266-67, 271
Thackara, eighteenth-century engraver,

Thackeray, William Makepeace, 4, 68
Theiss, Earl E., 306
These Eventful Years, 212-15
Thomas, Albert, 213
Thomas, Isaiah, 70
Thompson, Abram, 43
Thompson, Sir Joseph, 203
Thomson, Dr. Thomas, 26, 42
Thomson, William (Lord Kelvin), 59
Thring, G. Herbert, 124
Time, 254

Times (London), 3^6, 47, 73, 76-77

history and crisis, 77-81

affiliation with Encyclopaedia Bri-
tannica, 81-83

ads for Times reprint, 83-84

and tenth edition, 96

"Tournament for Readers," 96-102

Norahcliffe acquires, 132-40

mentioned, 87, 88, 89, 107, 108, 109,
113, 114, 116, 117, 118, 119,
121, 122, 123, 124, 125, 126,
127, 128, 142, 143, 146, 150,
151, 164, 179, 187, 188, 191,
204, 205, 230
Times Beer Club, 126
Times Book Club, 114-31, 140-42, 168
Times Book Club Festival, 126
Times Cigar Club, 126
Times Cooperative Clothing Club, 125
Times Egg Club, 125
Times Furnishing Company, Ltd., 89
Times Gazetteer, 4, 81, 89, 108
Times Literary Supplement, 80, 120,

122, 129-30, 229-30,
Times Meat Club, 125
Times Private Motoring Track, 126
Times Royal Academy, 125-26
Tirpitz, Admiral Alfred von, 214
Tit-Bits, 72
Tolstoy, Leo, 264
Torrington (Conn.) Register, 237
Tovey, Donald Francis, 172, 234, 290
Tower of Babel, 19
Trafalgar Hotel, 51
Traill, Thomas, 49
Traill, Dr. Thomas Stewart, 49
Trenchard, eighteenth-century en-
graver, 25

Trevelyan, George, 123
Trinity College (Dublin), 174
Trotsky, Leon, 216
Truman, Harry S., 270, 286
Tunney, Gene, 226, 230
Twain, Mark; see Clemens, Samuel

Langhorne
"Twenty-one," 244
Tyler, Ralph, 261
Tytler, John, 17-23

on "Flying," 20-21

his System of Surgei-y, 22

"The Rising of the Sun in the West,"
22

death of, 22-23

Union of Soviet Socialist Republics,
274, 293

INDEX 357

United States Rubber Company, 302

Universal Encyclopaedia, 65

Universal History, 17

University Club (New York), 243

University of Chicago, 221-22, 238,

245, 249, 251, 252

affiliation with the Encyclopaedia
Britannica, 253-59, 260, 261,
263, 265, 269, 271, 275, 278,
283, 294

University of Chicago Federated The-
ological Faculty, 294

University of Chicago Press, 253

"University of Chicago Round Table/*
252-53

University of Chicago's Public Rela-
tions, The, 251

University of Dublin, 202

University of Ghent, 205

University of Illinois, 272

University of London, 221, 277, 283

University of Pennsylvania, 235

Untermeyer, Louis, 216

Untermyer, Irwin, 197

Untermyer, Samuel, 183-88, 197, 228

Ussher, Archbishop James, 19

Utilitarianism, 35, 36

Van Dine, S. S.; see Wright, Willard

Huntington
Van Doren, Carl, 216
Van Doren, Mark, 263
Vassar College, 230-31
Victoria, Queen, 129, 131, 140, 190
Vincent of Beauvais, 6
Virgil, 10
Voltaire, 7

VorosMov, Klementi, 293
Voyage of the Discovery, 131
Vvedensky, B. A., 293

Walgreen, Charles R., 251-52
Wallace, Donald MacKenzie, 80, 89-

91, 93, 95
Walter, Arthur Fraser, 5, 79-80, 111,

115-16, 126, 127, 128, 132-40
Walter, Don E., 274
Walter, Godfrey, 126, 132-33
Walter, John, 3, 78, 126
Walter, John II, 78-79
Walter, John III, 79, 81
Wanamaker, John, 67, 103
War of 1812, 33
Wardle, Thomas, 38
Warrington, Justice, 128, 139
Washington, George, 25, 51, 294
Washington, Martha, 297

Watson, Dr. John B., 227

Watt, James, 293

Waugh, Frederic, 265

Weedon's Modern Encyclopaedia, 242

Weekly Journal, 9

Weir, Robin, 297

Wellhausen, Julius, 60

Wells, H. G., 104, 214, 223

Western Book and Stationery Company,

71,91

Western Electric Company, 261
Westminster Catholic Federation, 225
Westminster Review, 36
Whately, Archbishop Richard, 51
Whinery, Charles Crawford, 143, 147,

148, 149, 154, 201-2
Whipple, Sherman, 184
White, Joseph Blanco, 46
Whitney, Dr. William D., 69
Wight, Alexander, 43
Wilkinson, Clennell, 231, 233
William Shakespeare, 263
Wills, Helen, 226
Wilson, James, 312
Wilson, P. W., 243
Wilson, Woodrow, 168, 201, 205
Wisdom on the Hire System, 104-5
Wisdom While You Wait: Being a Fore-
taste of the Glories of the Inside-
completuar Britanniaware, 102-4
Wolf, Dr. Abraham, 221
Wollken, Charles, 198-99
Wollman, Henry, 152, 154
Wood, Sir Evelyn, 131
Wood, Grant, 265
Wood, MerrittM., Jr., 311
Wood, General Robert E., 236-37, 238,

245, 253

negotiations to transfer ownership of

the Encyclopaedia Britannica to

the University of Chicago, 254r~

later connections with Encyclopaedia

Britannica, 269-70, 278
Worcester Spy, 70
World Book Encyclopaedia, 273
World Language Dictionary, 274, 292,

300, 305

World War I, 193-94, 201, 266
World War II, 254, 269
World's Columbian Exposition, 69
Wright, Richard T., 157-58
Wright, Thomas, 123
Wright, Willard Huntington (S. S. Van

Dine), 200-201, 217, 293
Wynne, Rev. John S,, 175, 176

338 INDEX

Yak Record, 250 Yust, Walter (Continued)

Yale University, 69, 89, 230, 249, 251, as Franklin Hooper's associate, 239-

295 43

Ybarra, T. R., 215-16 editorship of Encyclopaedia Britan-

Young, Dr. Thomas, 37-38 ' nica, 243-44, 261, 283-98, 313
Yust, Walter

early years with the Encyclopaedia

Britannica, 235-36 Zimmerman, Herbert P., 270-71

PRINTED IN THE U.S.A.

m S

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