Doubleday, Frank Nelson (1862-1934)

Frank Nelson Doubleday was born on January 8, 1862, in Brooklyn, New York, to William Edwards Doubleday and Ellen M. Dickinson. He attended a public primary school in Brooklyn, and then went to the Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute for two to three years. He began his career at Charles Scribner's Sons in 1877 and worked there for twenty years, rising through the ranks and leading many important projects, including the revival of the Book-Buyer magazine and the leadership of Scribner's Magazine in 1887. In 1897, Doubleday began his first independent firm, Doubleday and McClure Company. He ended the partnership with McClure in 1900 and began Doubleday, Page & Company, partnering with Walter Page. Doubleday's many acquisitions of other publishing firms led to multiple reincarnations of Doubleday, Page & Company, including Doubleday, Doran & Company, and various subsidiaries in England and the United States. Doubleday, Doran & Company became one of the leading publishing houses in the United States, with a well-known roster of writers, such as Rudyard Kipling, Joseph Conrad, T. E. Lawrence, and Jack London, and many popular periodicals, including Country Life, American Home, and World's Work. Doubleday transformed the publishing industry by considering publishing a business, instead of a literary pursuit. As a result he launched such innovative projects as collected sets of authors' works, book subscriptions, and extensive advertising and publicity campaigns. He also established a publishing plant in Garden City, Long Island, which was one of the first daylight factories and included a small hospital and dentist's office for employees. His employees also had health insurance and life insurance. . He and his second wife, Florence Van Wyck, engaged in many philanthropic activities and were well-known in New York society, with friends and associates such as Theodore Roosevelt, Andrew Carnegie, and John D. Rockefeller, Jr. Doubleday died in 1934 after a heart attack. He was succeeded as Chairman of the Board of Directors of Doubleday, Doran & Company by his son, Nelson Doubleday.