EDWARD WILLIAM BOK
BIOGRAPHICAL DATA
1863: October 9: Born at Helder, Netherlands.
1870; September 20: Arrived in the United States.
1870: Entered public schools of Brooklyn, New York.
1873: Obtained first position in Frost's Bakery, Smith Street, Brooklyn, at 50 cents per week.
1876: August 7: Entered employ of the Western Union Telegraph Company as office-boy.
1882: Entered employ of Henry Holt & Company as stenographer.
1884: Entered employ of Charles Scribner's Sons as stenographer.
1884: Became editor of The Brooklyn Magazine.
1886: Founded the Bok Syndicate Press.
1887: Published Henry Ward Beecher Memorial (privately printed).
1889: October 20: Became editor of The Ladies' Home Journal.
1890: Published Successward: Doubleday, McClure & Company.
1894: Published Before He Is Twenty: Fleming H. Revell Company.
1896: October 22: Married Mary Louise Curtis.
1897: September 7: Son born; William Curtis Bok.
1900: Published The Young Man in Business: L. G. Page & Company.
1905: January 25: Son born: Cary William Bok.
1906: Published Her Brother's Letters (Anonymous): Moffat, Yard & Company.
1907: Degree of LL.D. of Order of Augustinian Fathers conferred by order of Pope Pius X., by the Most Reverend Diomede Falconio, D.D., Apostolic Delegate to the United States, at Villanova College.
1910: Degree of LL.D. conferred, in absentia, by Hope College, Holland, Michigan (the only Dutch college in the United States).
1911: Founded, with others. The Child Federation of Philadelphia.
1912: Published The Edward Bok Books of Self-Knowledge; five volumes: Fleming H. Revell Company.
1913: Founded, with others, The Merion Civic Association, at Merion, Pennsylvania.
1915: Published Why I Believe in Poverty: Houghton, Mifflin Company.
1916: Published poem, God's Hand, set to music by Josef Hofmann: Schirmer & Company.
1917: Vice-president Philadelphia Belgian Relief Commission.
1917: Member of National Y. M. C. A. War Work Council.
1917: State chairman for Pennsylvania of Y. M. C. A. War Work Council.
1918: Member of Executive Committee and chairman of Publicity Committee, Philadelphia War Chest.
1918: Chairman of Philadelphia Y. M. C. A. Recruiting Committee.
1918: State chairman for Pennsylvania of United War Work Campaign.
1918: August-November: visited the battle-fronts in France as guest of the British Government.
1918: September 22: Relinquished editorship of The Ladies' Home Journal, completing thirty years of service.
1920: September 20: Upon the 50th anniversary of arrival in the United States, published The Americanization of Edward Bok.
1921: May 30: Awarded the one thousand dollar Joseph Pulitzer Prize for The Americanization of Edward Bok.
THE EXPRESSION OF A PERSONAL PLEASURE
I cannot close this record of a boy's development without an attempt to suggest the sense of deep personal pleasure which I feel that the imprint on the title-page of this book should be that of the publishing house which, thirty-six years ago, I entered as stenographer. It was there I received my start; it was there I laid the foundation of that future career then so hidden from me. The happiest days of my young manhood were spent in the employ of this house; I there began friendships which have grown closer with each passing year. And one of my deepest sources of satisfaction is, that during all the thirty-one years which have followed my resignation from the Scribner house, it has been my good fortune to hold the friendship, and, as I have been led to believe, the respect of my former employers. That they should now be my publishers demonstrates, in a striking manner, the curious turning of the wheel of time, and gives me a sense of gratification difficult of expression.
Edward W. Bok
INDEX
Abbey, Edwin A., 138
Abbott, Lyman, 144, 169
Adams, Charles F., 52
Adams, John, 52
Adams, John Quincy, 52
Addams, Jane, 168
Adriatic, 174
Alcott, Louisa, 46-51
Altman Collection, 139
American Lithographic Co., 24
American Magazine, 68
Antin, Mary, v
Appleton's Encyclopaedia, 15, 16, 29
Bakery shop, 9
Bangs, John Kendrick, 130
Baruch, Bernard, 173
Beaverbrook, Lord, 174
Beecher, Henry Ward, 55, 70-77
Bell, Alexander Graham, 15
Bellamy, Edward, 86
Bok, Cary William (son), 67
Bok, Edward William, arrival, 1;
schooldays, 2-7;
house-work, 8-9;
first money earned, 9;
first newspaper work, 11;
self-education, 15-25;
autograph collecting, 16-29;
study of shorthand, 26;
as a reporter, 26-29;
a visit to Boston, 31-46;
a visit to Concord, 46-52;
adventures in the stock-market, 59-67;
in the publishing business, 68-77;
employment with Scribner's, 78-86;
the Bok Syndicate Press, 86-90;
last years in New York, 97-107;
editorship of The Ladies' Home Journal, 103-107;
building up a magazine, 113-123;
visit to Oxford, 124-127;
adventures in art and civics, 134-146;
adventures in music, 160-167;
war time experiences, 168-180;
retirement as editor, 181-185
Bok, Mrs. Edward William, see Curtis, Mary Louise
Bok, Sieke Gertrude (mother), 1, 99, 100, 106
Bok Syndicate Press, 87, 88
Bok, William (brother), 1, 87
Bok, William Curtis (son), 153-159
Bok, William J. H. (father), 1, 6, 8, 53, 59, 66
Book Buyer, 80
Boston, 31-46
Boston Globe, 17
Boston Journal, 90
Bourrienne, 100
Boy Scouts, 144, 145
Brewer, Owen W., 97
Brooklyn Magazine, 56-59, 68-71
Brooklyn Eagle, viii, 11, 17, 26, 53
Brooks, Phillips, 42-46, 57
Burlingame, Edward L., 78, 80
Burnett, Frances H., 84
Bush, Rufus T., 68
Carlyle, Thomas, 48
Carnegie, Andrew, v, 84, 102
Carroll, Lewis, 124-127
Cary, Anna Louise, 56
Cary, Clarence, 59-67, 78.
Chase, William M., xix
Chicago Tribune, 141
Childs, George W., 18, 106
Cincinnati Times-Star, 90
Claflin, H. B., 57
Coghlan, Rose, 53, 54
Colver, Frederic L., 55, 56, 70
Concord, 46-52
Coney Island, 10
Cosmopolitan Magazine, 69
Crawford, Marion, 130
Curtis, Cyrus H. K., 103-107, 120-123, 149
Curtis, Mrs. Cyrus H. K., 113, 149, 181
Curtis, Mary Louise, 14, 149, 161, 163
Curtis Publishing Company, 120
Dana, Charles A., 130
Davenport, Fanny, 99, 100
Davis, Jefferson, 22
De Koven, Reginald, 160
Dodgson, Charles L., see Carroll, Lewis
Doubleday, Frank M., 80, 81, 97
Doyle, Conan, 130
Early, General Jubal, 17
Edison, Thomas A., 15
Elizabeth, Queen of the Belgians, 173
Elkius, George W., 139
Elman, Mischa, 164
Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 30, 46-51
Empress of Asia, 180
Evarts, William M., 26
Farrar, Canon, 57
Field, Cyrus W., 186
Fifth Avenue Hotel, 18
Fourth of July, 140-142
Freer, Charles L., 139
Frick, Henry C., 139
Fulton Market, 74
Gardner, Mrs. John L., 139
Garfield, James A., 16, 18
Garland, Hamlin, 130
Garrison, William Lloyd, 52
Gerard, James W., 173
Gibbons, Cardinal, 57
Gibson, Charles Dana, 138
Godey's Lady's Book, 110
Gould, Jay, 59-67
Grant, Ulysses S., 17-22, 26, 57
Great War, 169-180
Greenaway, Kate, 128-129
Harland, Marion, 57
Harmon, Dudley, 171
Harper and Bros., 12
Harper's Magazine, 12
Harper's Weekly, 12
Harper's Young People, 12
Harris, Joel Chandler, 130
Harrison, Mrs. Burton, 130
Harte, Bret, 129
Hay, Ian, 172
Hayes, Rutherford B., 18, 26-30, 76
Hegeman, Evelyn Lyon, 56
Hitchcock, Ripley, 17
Hodges, Dean, 169
Hofman, Josef, 160-164
Holmes, Oliver Wendell, 30-36
Holt, Henry, and Company, 68, 78
Hoover, Herbert, 172, 186
Hope, Anthony, 130
Howells, William Dean, 57, 119, 122, 168
Jerome, Jerome K., 130
Jewett, Sarah Orne, 130
Johnson, Eldridge R., 146
Johnson, John G., 139
Keller, Helen, 169
Kellogg, Clara Louise, 56
King, Horatio, 67
Kipling, Rudyard, 119, 130, 169
Knapp, Joseph P., 24
Ladies' Home Journal, 103-107, 113-123, 134, 160, 168-173, 181-185
Lane, Franklin K., 184
Lape, Esther Everett, 184
Lathrop, George P., 90
Lee, Robert E., 17
Life, 141
Lincoln, Mrs. Abraham, 22
Literary Leaves, 90, 104
Longfellow, Henry W., 17, 30, 37-42
Low, A. A., 28
Low, Seth, 57
Low, Will H., 138
Lynch, Albert, 138
McAdoo, William, 173
Mansfield, Richard, 85
Marchesi, Madame, 160
Mascagni, 160
Merion, 142-146, 149
Merion Civic Association, 143-146
Moffat, William D., 97
Moffat, Yard & Co., 97
Moody, Dwight L., 130
Morgan, J. Pierpont, 139
Moszkowski, 160
Mott, Lucretia, 52
Netherlands, 1, 3, 39, 194
New York Star, 90, 101
New York Sun, 171
New York Tribune, 17
Nightingale, Florence, 127
North, Ernest Dressel, 97
Northcliffe, Viscount, 172
Outlook, The, 144
Paderewski, 160
Peterson's Magazine, 110
Phelps, Elizabeth Stuart, 130
Philadelphia Orchestra, 162-167
Philadelphia Public Ledger, 17
Philadelphia Times, 90, 103
Phillips, Wendell, 42, 43
Philomathean Review, 56
Philomathean Society, 55
Plymouth Church, 55, 70
Plymouth Pulpit, 56
Porter, Gene Stratton, 169
Presbyterian Review, 81
Pulitzer Prize, v
Pyle, Howard, 138
Queen, The, 1
Raymond, Rossiter W., 57
Riis, Jacob, v
Roosevelt, Franklin D., 171
Roosevelt, Theodore, 147-159
Safford, Ray, 97
Sangster, Margaret, 57
Schlicht, Paul J., 69
Scribner, Charles, 78
Scribner's Sons, Charles, 78-86, 106, 213
Scribner's Magazine, 80, 81, 97
Sheridan, Philip H., 26, 57
Sherman, William T., 18, 20, 21, 30, 57
Smedley, W. T., 138
Smith, F. Hopkinson, 169
Sousa, John Philip, 160
South Brooklyn Advocate, 10
Stevenson, Robert Louis, 82, 83
Stockton, Frank R., 84, 85
Stokowski, Leopold, 163
Strauss, Edouard, 160
Strauss, Richard, 160
Sullivan, Sir Arthur, 160
Taft, Charles P., 139
Taft, William H., 171
Talmage, T. DeWitt, 57
Taylor, W. L., 138
Tennyson, Alfred, Lord, 17
Thursby, Emma C., 56
Tosti, 160
Twain, Mark, 98, 99, 129
Vanderbilt, William H.,15
Van Dyke, Henry, 169
Van Rensselaer, Alexander, 166
Victor Talking Machine Co., 145
Walker, E. D., 69
Washington, George, 40
Webster, Jean, 169
Western Union Telegraph Co., 13, 14, 59-67
Whittier, John Greenleaf, 17
Widener, Joseph E., 139
Wiggin, Kate Douglas, 130, 169
Wilcox, Ella Wheeler, 87, 88
Wiles, Irving R., 138
Wilkins, Mary E., 130
Wilson, Woodrow, 170
Young Men's Christian Association, 26