Benjamin Guild (1749-1792) was a bookseller in Boston, Massachusetts, in the late 18th century.[1] He ran the "Boston Book Store" and a circulating subscription library in the 1780s and 1790s at no.59 Cornhill, "first door south of the Old-Brick Meeting-House."[2][3]
Biography
edit
Born in 1749 to Benjamin Guild and Abigail Graves, Benjamin attended Harvard College (class of 1769); classmates included Theophilus Parsons, Alexander Scammel, Peter Thacher, William Tudor, and Peleg Wadsworth.[4][5] He later tutored at Harvard, 1776-1780,[5] and travelled abroad.[6] In 1784 he married Betsey Quincy (1757-1825).[7][nb 1] He served as a charter member and an officer of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences,[8][9][10] and on the editorial committee of the Boston Magazine.[11]
Guild sold books from his shop at no.8 State Street from around 1785 until 1786, when he moved to Cornhill (1786-1792).[12] In addition to the bookshop, he ran a circulating library, one of the first in post-war Boston. The library contained "several thousands" of volumes, which, according to its 1787 newspaper advertisement "will furnish such a fund of amusement and information as cannot fail to entertain every class of readers ... whether solitary or social -- political or professional -- serious or gay."[13] Subscribers paid eight dollars per year, or "two dollars per quarter -- to have the liberty of taking out two books at a time and no more -- to change them as often as the subscriber pleases -- and no book to be retained longer than one month."[14] Guild stipulated that "any book lost, abused, leaves folded down, writ upon or torn, must be paid for."[14] After his death in 1792, Guild's bookshop and library were taken over by William P. Blake.[15]
Among the titles in Guild's circulating library in 1789:[16]
- Addison's Works
- Algerine Spy in Pennsylvania[17]
- Robert Bage's Barham Downs, a novel
- Countess de Genlis' Adelaide and Theodore
- Madame de Lafayette's Zayde, a Spanish History
- Raynal's Revolution in America
- John Rice's Art of Reading
- Robin's New Travels in America[18]
- Baron de Tott's memoirs of the Turkish Empire
- Nathaniel Wanley's Wonders[19]
- Wraxall's Tour
- Wyld's Practical Surveyor[20]
- Wynne's History of America[21]
- Yorrick's Sentimental Journey
- Zimmerman's Political Survey of Europe
See also
editNotes
edit- ^ Elizabeth Quincy was the daughter of Josiah Quincy I.[5]
References
edit- ^ "Guild, Benjamin 1749-1792", WorldCat, Online Computer Library Center, retrieved July 30, 2010
- ^ "Circulating Library", Massachusetts Centinel, January 6, 1787
- ^ Boston Directory, 1789
- ^ Boston News-Letter and New-England Chronicle, July 20, 1769
- ^ a b c Burleigh 1887.
- ^ "Mr. Benjamin Guild, late tutor of Harvard College, lately arrived from Holland, and who saw Mr. [John] Adams there in August last ..." cf. Salem Gazette, November 15, 1781
- ^ Massachusetts Centinel, June 23, 1784
- ^ Independent Chronicle, May 27, 1784
- ^ American Recorder and the Charlestown Advertiser, June 6, 1786
- ^ "Charter of Incorporation", Records of the Academy (American Academy of Arts and Sciences), no. 1964/1965, p. 38
- ^ E. W. Pitcher (1980), "Fiction in the Boston Magazine (1783-1786): A Checklist with Notes on Sources", William and Mary Quarterly, 37 (3): 473–483, doi:10.2307/1923813, JSTOR 1923813
- ^ Independent Chronicle and the Universal Advertiser, October 26, 1786
- ^ Massachusetts Centinel, December 19, 1787
- ^ a b Catalogue 1788.
- ^ American Apollo, October 26, 1792
- ^ Catalogue 1789.
- ^ "Markoe, Peter 1752?-1792", WorldCat, Online Computer Library Center, retrieved February 28, 2011
- ^ "Robin abbé 1750-1794", WorldCat, Online Computer Library Center, retrieved February 28, 2011
- ^ "Wanley, Nathaniel 1634-1680", WorldCat, Online Computer Library Center, retrieved February 28, 2011
- ^ "Wyld, Samuel", WorldCat, Online Computer Library Center, retrieved February 28, 2011
- ^ "Wynne, John Huddlestone 1743-1788", WorldCat, Online Computer Library Center, retrieved February 28, 2011
Bibliography
edit- An addition to a catalogue of a large assortment of books ... to be let or sold by Benjamin Guild at the Boston Book Store, no.59 Cornhill, Boston, 1788
- New select catalogue of Benjamin's Guild's circulating library ... at the Boston Book-Store, Boston: Benjamin Guild, 1789
- Charles Burleigh (1887), Genealogy and history of the Guild, Guile, and Gile family, Portland, Maine: Brown Thurston, p. 85
- Charles K. Bolton (1907), "Circulating libraries in Boston, 1765-1865", Publications of the Colonial Society of Massachusetts, vol. 11, p. 196+, hdl:2027/hvd.32044013656434 – via HathiTrust
- Jesse Shera (1949), "Foundations of the public library: the origins of the public library movement in New England, 1629-1855", University of Chicago Studies in Library Science, p. 137+, ISBN 9781406706512
External links
edit
- Diaries of Benjamin Guild, 1776, 1778, archived from the original on 2015-11-22, retrieved 2015-11-08 – via Harvard University, Colonial North American Project