The Book Business

In the publishing world last week, Doubleday, Page & Co. and the George H. Doran Co. united to produce "the largest publishing-house of English language books and periodicals in the world." Asked the purpose of the merger, Frank N. Doubleday said: "To sell more books." Many years ago an office boy for the publishing house of Charles Scribner's Sons, dreamed a dream. Thirty years ago (in 1897) he saw his dream come true. Frank N. Doubleday (with $25,000 borrowed money) had established a concern for the dissemination of books. George Henry Doran also was a stubbornly ambitious office boy-- in Toronto and Chicago publishing houses. In 1909 he founded his own publishing company. The new Doubleday, Doran & Co. proposes to be the most efficient existing avenue down which an author's ideas, facts & fancies may ride to the bookshelves of the world. Doubleday, Doran & Co. is certainly the most potent book publishing concern in the U. S. which owns its own production plant. Doubleday, Doran & Co. has already (through Doubleday, Page) started a chain of U. S. bookstores which will provide the most extensive retail machinery known to bookmakers. Doubleday, Doran & Co. will do everything for an author but write his book; and for a reader, everything but read it. In England the famed firm of William Heinemann, Ltd., is the property of the new company, hav ing been controlled for some time by Doubleday, Page. William Heinemann is dead. Fourteen miles outside of London stands the Heineman plant. The total list of active titles of these combined companies (including lesser subsidiaries) will be about 4,000. Doubleday, Doran authors include: Cobb Conrad

Ferber Kipling

Glasgow Wells

Morley Bennett

Borden Tarkington

Huxley O. Henry

West Rinehart

Burke Doyle

Sitwell Walpole

Mackenzie Maugham

Montague Swinnerton

Lucas Kennedy Drinkwater and many another. There were faint murmurs from malcontents that the merger smacked of trust making, "an attempt to publish all the books in the world"--as George Henry Doran once said he would like to do. To these murmurs Harry Hansen, literary critic of the New York World, replied: "So far as controlling writing--that is impossible ... no one can get a stranglehold on brains. The products of writing men crop up in the most unexpected places, and every now and then a wholly unknown and obscure firm makes a ten-strike with a newcomer. . . . The making of books is free and unconfined, and unless someone gobbles up all the paper in the world, so it must continue."

Each Friday afternoon Long Island residents have noted a huge limousine rolling placidly about the country. Within they have noted five men sitting around a table. This was the partners' sanctum, and in it for some years the brains of Doubleday, Page & Co. have gathered once a week in conference. A huger limousine will now be seen; a specially constructed Packard with six seats around the table.

The unique office is the idea of Frank N. Doubleday. Mr. Doubleday, no longer young and somewhat invalided as a result of sleeping sickness during the War period, does not see many people. He prefers the unconventional seclusion of this motor office to the telephone jangling and the unchanging aspects of "conference rooms."

The new chair is placed for George H. Doran. He, volcanic, is used to running his own business just as he sees fit. Occasionally he has run it on unconventional lines. The trade will watch with interest the working out of possible clashes of temperament and opinion.

In 1909 George Doran set up his own shop; two years later he absorbed A. C. Armstrong & Son. Since then he has become a distinctive figure in his world. He cares more about literature as a business than as an art. He is said to have an instinct of salesmanship that will get a writer's signature on a contract faster than can any other. He entertains constantly in a spacious Manhattan apartment. He presents his authors and their wives with walking sticks, gold cigaret cases. He works so vigorously that one admiring underling in a rival publishing house wondered why he was not constantly out of breath. His only fear in the world, he says, is rousing the temperaments of authors by unconsciously favoring others on his list. Sighs he: "Ah, the rows I have had with Marie Corelli!" Frank N. Doubleday started his business with S. S. McClure. In 1900 Mr. McClure withdrew and was succeeded by Walter Hines Page (later famed Wilson Ambassador to the Court of St. James's) whose name was added to the title of the firm. Mr. Page also withdrew, so Mr. Doran's is the third name joined to the Doubleday title. Mr. Doubleday is quiet, precise, almost academic. He has been unfailingly conservative, possesses an exceptionally keen brain for the mechanics & finance of his work. From his initials F. N. D., he is often called "Effendi."* His brother, Russell Doubleday, is another partner. Also quiet and unobtrusive, he is an enormous factor in the business. The third Doubleday concerned as a partner is Nelson, son of "Effendi." Nelson is tall, well-dressed, handsome. Many women and some men declare him "the best-looking man I have ever seen." Far less conservative than his parent, he is unflaggingly active in the firm and in society. He formed Nelson Doubleday, Inc., a subsidiary of the family firm, and adds many twists and ideas to the business management. At Garden City, L. I., stands the Doubleday factory. It is no ugly mass of brick & smoking chimneys. "Effendi" believes that men and women can work better if surrounded with peaceful country atmosphere. Around the plant he has set out a beautiful, restful garden. All office windows look on gentle country panorama. Employes with work admitting movement can go out into the garden and sit under the trees to labor. At luncheon time, they eat there. Many of the trees & shrubs have names, having been presented by personages. For every year in the firm's employ, a worker gets $5 for a Christmas present. In these surroundings and by these methods, Frank N. Doubleday has reared a production unit that pays dividends.

The capitalization of Doubleday, Doran & Co. will be approximately $5,250,000. The stock will be held by the directors and a few old (in point of service) employes; none available to the public.

*"Effendi" means "Master." As a Turkish title, is a sign of respect, such as Sir in English.