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NOTES AND QUERIES. tn s. vi. DEC. u, 1912.
liotes on
George Palmer Putnam : a Memoir. By George Haven Putnam, Litt.D. (Putnam's Sons.)
TEN years ago Dr. Putnam printed a memoir of his father for circulation in the family circle ; happily, he has been induced to give it to the public* and to include with it a history of the publishing house of which his father was the founder.
Those of our readers who are fond of tracing distinguished Americans to British ancestry will like to know that " the Putnams of Massachusetts came from the county of Buckinghamshire, in England, where the records show them to have lived, during a number of centuries, as small squires and substantial yeomen." The subject of the memoir was born in Brunswick, Maine, on the 7th of February, 1814. He took the name of Palmer from his mother, the daughter of Joseph Pearse Palmer, who had taken an active part in the "Committee of Safety" of Boston; and it was from the house of his father that in 1773 a body of citizens, disguised as Indians, went to the tea vessels at Griffin's Wharf, and, in throwing overboard the tea upon which the new tax was to be collected, committed the first act of the Revolution.
The Palmers, like the Putnams, were of Puritan origin, and we get delightful glimpses of a characteristic home life. George, with his affectionate nature, had hosts of friends, but they were " not like a tender, anxious mother." Putnam, after being for four years with his uncle, who had a carpet business, determined to strike out for himself, and in 1829 he decided to try his chances in New York City. As he recorded in the American Publishers' Circular in July, 1863, his " first studies consisted of paragraphs in the papers beginning ' Boy wanted,' and his first master in the book-trade was Mr. George W. Bleecker, who published a monthly called The Euterpiad, an ' Album of Music, Poetry, and Prose.' " We next find Putnam promoted from errand boy to" clerk and messenger for Mr. Jonathan Leavitt. " No more worthy or con- scientious man ever published or sold books," and he became the leading New York publisher of theological and religious works. What changes in taste have taken place since then ! Stacks of ' Scott's Bible ' came weekly from Boston, and " the pioneer in ' English Remainders,' " W. C. Hall, the Yankee of London, would send shelffuls of C'almet, Lightfoot, Baxter, Owen, and Lardner.
Daniel Applet on was at that time (1832-3) with his brother-in-law Leavitt, but soon after became the founder of the great house of D. Appleton & Co., and opened his own separate bvisiness at 200, Broadway. Among the invest- ments was Putnam's ' Chronology : an Intro- duction and Index to Universal History.' This manual was commenced by Putnam at the age of fifteen, and took about three years to complete. He worked chiefly at night after nine, when he had left the shop, and would keep on till two in the morning. He had had scarcely any education, so to repair this defect he used to go to the New York Mercantile Library, where he plodded through Herodotus, Thucydides, Xeno-
phon, Livy, Tacitus, and Sallust ; then Gibbon,
Hume, and Lingard, and classified systematically
by notes the stock of knowledge he had thus
acquired.
In 1833 he entered the employment of Wiley & Long, and in 1840 the firm of Wiley & Putnam was formed. In the same year Putnam made his first business journey to England, and in the following year he opened a branch house in Paternoster Row, this being the first agency established for the sale of American books in Great Britain ; the more remunerative portion of its business, however, consisted in the purchase of English publications for sale in the United States. Putnam returned to New York for the purpose of being married ; the lady, Victorine Haven, had been a pupil in his mother's school, and was then sixteen. They both possessed the social faculty to a marked degree, and, settling in London, speedily gathered a large circle about them, among their friends being Mrs. Cowdcn Clarke, Edward Moxpn, and that " scholarly young German " Nicholas Triibner. Others were Mazzini, Karl Blind, Louis Blanc, " and a quiet, ill-featured, sallow - cheeked young man who was known a few years later as Napoleon the Third." Putnam gave to his house " the very distinctive title of ' Knicker- bocker Cottage.'" ^His correspondents in- cluded that "genial companion" and "loyal friend " George Sumner ; Mrs. Sigourney, who sent the titles of twenty-eight of her works, some of which had been reprinted fifteen times ; Prescott, Theodore Parker, and Southgate, " the first and only Protestant-Episcopal Bishop at Constantinople . ' '
When Wiley & Putnam moved from Pater- noster Row to Waterloo Place, the shop was taken by Triibner, who, as is well known, at once made a speciality of Oriental literature and philology studies to which he devoted all his leisure time.
Putnam, much impressed with " the ignor- ance shown even by intelligent Britons in regard to matters relating to the United States," felt himself called upon to take notice of this. " He therefore wrote and put into print, in 1845, a volume of 300 pages, entitled ' America : Facts, Notes, and Statistics relating to the Government, Resources, Engagements, Manufactures, Com- merce, Religion, Education, Fine Arts, Manners- and Customs of the United States of America.' " In the course of three or four years from the date of its publication three editions were called for. The work was truly " a labour of love or of public spirit, done for the sake of the repute of his native land."
At this period Putnam was anxious to arrange that Wiley & Putnam should publish a uniform edition of all Carlyle's works then ready, and for this purpose he called in 1846 upon Carlyle, who' referred the matter to Emerson. The latter completed the arrangement under which the books were to be issued in New York. Putnam impressed Carlyle as being " a very intelligent, modest, and reputable - looking fellow," and Emerson wrote in reply : " The Covenant with Wiley & Putnam seems unexceptionable. I like the English side of these men very well ; that is, Putnam seems eager to stand well and rightly with his fellow-men." In June, 1847, the Put- nam family returned to New York by sailing vessel.
