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History

The site, situated on what was then part of Cornhill, was formerly the home of Anne Hutchinson, who was expelled from Massachusetts in 1638 for heresy.² Thomas Crease purchased the home in 1708, though it burned down in the Great Boston Fire on October 2, 1711.³ Crease constructed a new building on the site in 1718⁴ as a residence and apothecary shop. For generations, various pharmacists used the site for the same purpose: the first floor was for commercial use and the upper floors were residential. In 1817, Dr. Samuel Clarke, father of future minister James Freeman Clarke, bought the building.⁵

The building's first use as a bookstore dates to 1828, when Timothy Harrington Carter leased the space, whose address had now changed to 135 Washington Street, from a man named George Brimmer. Carter spent $7,000 renovating the building's commercial space, including the addition of projecting, small-paned windows on the ground floor.⁶

From 1832 to 1865, it was home to Ticknor and Fields, a publishing company founded by William Ticknor, later renamed when he partnered with James T. Fields. For part of the 19th century, the firm was one of the most important publishing companies in the United States, and the Old Corner Bookstore became a meeting-place for such authors as Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Charles Dickens, and Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr.⁷ Ticknor and Fields rented out the whole building, using only the corner for a retail space. Other sections of the building, particularly upstairs rooms and storefronts facing School Street, were in turn sublet to other businesses.⁸ After the death of Ticknor, Fields wanted to focus on publishing rather than the retail store. On November 12, 1864, he sold the Old Corner Bookstore to E. P. Dutton; Ticknor and Fields moved to Tremont Street.⁹ A succession of other publishing houses and booksellers followed Ticknor and Fields in the building.

In keeping with its literary past, in the 1890s the shop carried magazines such as: Arena, Argosy, Army and Navy Journal, Art, Art Amateur, The Atlantic, Black Cat, Bookman, Bradley His Book, Catholic World, The Century Magazine, The Chap-Book, The Church, The Churchman, Current Literature, Donahoe's Magazine, Every Month, Forum, Gunton's Magazine, Harpers Bazaar, Harper's Round Table, Harper's Weekly, Home and Country, Judge, Ladies' Home Journal, Frank Leslie's Popular Monthly, Leslie's Weekly, Life, Lippincott's Monthly Magazine, Munsey's Magazine, The Nation, North American Review, Outing, Pocket Magazine, Poet Lore, Public Opinion, Outlook, Puck, Puritan, Red Letter, Review of Reviews, Scientific American, Scribner's Magazine, Shoppell's, St. Nicholas Magazine, Town Talk, Truth, Vogue, What to Eat, Yale Review, and Youth's Companion.¹⁰

Preservation

The building was threatened with demolition and replacement by a parking garage in 1960 and was "rescued" through a purchase by Historic Boston, Inc. for the sum of $100,000.¹¹ Historic Boston is a not-for-profit preservation and real estate organization that rehabilitates historic and culturally significant properties in Boston's neighborhoods so that they are a usable part of the city's present and future. The building is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is a Boston Landmark under the auspices of the Boston Landmarks Commission.

Tenants

Historical

Tenants of 76 Cornhill

• 1718: Thomas Crease¹²
• 1789: Herman Brimmer, merchant,¹³ John Jackson, broker¹⁴ and Samuel Thayer and Minott Thayer, shopkeepers¹⁵
• 1807: John West¹⁶
• 1817: Dr. Samuel Clarke, apothecary¹⁷¹⁸

Tenants of 135 Washington Street

• 1828: Carter & Hendee (Richard B. Carter, Charles J. Hendee)¹⁹²⁰
• 1829: Benjamin Perkins & Co.²¹
• 1830: Gray and Bowen (Frederick T. Gray, Charles Bowen)²²
• 1833: Allen & Ticknor (John Allen, William D. Ticknor)²³
• 1838: Samuel H. Parker²⁴
• 1840: Parker & Ditson (S.H. Parker, Oliver Ditson)²⁵
• 1841: William D. Ticknor²⁶
• 1844: Oliver Ditson²⁷
• 1847: William D. Ticknor & Co. (Wm. D. Ticknor, John Reed Jr., James T. Fields)²⁸²⁹
• 1853: Ticknor, Reed, and Fields
• 1854: Ticknor and Fields
• 1868: E.P. Dutton & Co. (Edward Payson Dutton, Charles A. Clapp)³⁰³¹ and H.O. Houghton & Co.³²
• 1869: A. Williams & Co. (Alexander Williams)³³³⁴

Recent

In recent times, the Old Corner Bookstore's retail space was the original location of the Globe Corner Bookstore (a division of the Old Corner Bookstore, Inc.), which operated there for 16 years from 1982 to 1997 and specialized in travel books and maps. A Boston Globe company store operated in the building from 1998 through 2002, selling Boston Globe products and tourist memorabilia.

A national discount jewelry chain, Ultra Diamonds, occupied the retail space from 2005 until the company's bankruptcy in 2009. Then the space was briefly used as a showroom for crafts created by North Bennet Street School students and faculty. The space now houses a Chipotle Mexican Grill restaurant and an entertainment space.

Gallery

See also

• National Register of Historic Places listings in northern Boston, Massachusetts

Notes

Further reading

• Nathaniel Bradstreet Shurtleff. "Old Corner Bookstore." A topographical and historical description of Boston, Part 1, 2nd ed. Boston: Printed by request of the City Council, 1871
• "Old Corner Bookstore", New England Magazine, Nov. 1903.

External links

• Listing at City of Boston official site
• Official listing on Freedom Trail
• Boston Public Library. Images related to the bookstore, various dates
• Bostonian Society. Photos:
  • Old Corner Bookstore, corner of Washington and School Streets, c. 1870-85
  • Old Corner Bookstore, corner of School and Washington Streets, c. 1880-85
  • Old Corner Bookstore, Washington Street, c. 1884; photo by Boston Camera Club
  • Old Corner Bookstore at 283 Washington Street, c. 1890
  • Old Corner Bookstore at 283 Washington Street, c. 1900
  • Old Corner Bookstore, October 1960
  • Old Corner Bookstore at 285 Washington Street, 1964
  • Globe Corner Bookstore at 285 Washington Street, c. 1970

References

1. Wilson, Susan. Boston Sites & Insights: An Essential Guide to Historic Landmarks in and Around Boston. Beacon Press, 2004: 173. ISBN 978-0-8070-7135-9 /wiki/ISBN_(identifier) ↩

2. Old Corner Bookstore Building | Museum/Attraction Review | Boston | Frommers.com http://www.frommers.com/destinations/boston/A29759.html ↩

3. Wilson, Susan. Boston Sites & Insights: An Essential Guide to Historic Landmarks in and Around Boston. Beacon Press, 2004: 175. ISBN 978-0-8070-7135-9 /wiki/ISBN_(identifier) ↩

4. "Old Corner Bookstore" - Historic Boston Incorporated http://historicboston.org/portfolio_page/old-corner-bookstore/ ↩

5. Wilson, Susan. Boston Sites & Insights: An Essential Guide to Historic Landmarks in and Around Boston. Beacon Press, 2004: 175. ISBN 978-0-8070-7135-9 /wiki/ISBN_(identifier) ↩

6. Wilson, Susan. Boston Sites & Insights: An Essential Guide to Historic Landmarks in and Around Boston. Beacon Press, 2004: 175. ISBN 978-0-8070-7135-9 /wiki/ISBN_(identifier) ↩

7. Miller, Edwin Haviland. Salem Is My Dwelling Place: A Life of Nathaniel Hawthorne. Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 1991: 281. ISBN 0-87745-332-2 /wiki/ISBN_(identifier) ↩

8. Winship, Michael. American Literary Publishing in the Mid-Nineteenth Century: The Business of Ticknor and Fields. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1995: 180. ISBN 0-521-45469-7 /wiki/ISBN_(identifier) ↩

9. Tryon, Warren S. Parnassus Corner: A Life of James T. Fields, Publisher to the Victorians. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1963: 279. ↩

10. "On the News-Stands." Printers' Ink, v.18, no.13, March 31, 1897. ↩

11. Old Corner Bookstore Buildings Archived 2007-08-06 at the Wayback Machine http://www.historicboston.org/old_corner_bookstore_buildings.htm ↩

12. Nathaniel Bradstreet Shurtleff. "Old Corner Bookstore." A topographical and historical description of Boston], Part 1, 2nd ed. Boston: Printed by request of the City Council, 1871 ↩

13. Boston Directory. 1789 /wiki/Boston_Directory ↩

14. Boston Directory. 1789 /wiki/Boston_Directory ↩

15. Boston Directory. 1789, 1807 ↩

16. Monthly Anthology, June 1807 ↩

17. Henry Jenks. Old School Street. New England Magazine, Nov. 1895 https://books.google.com/books?id=m7YVAAAAYAAJ ↩

18. Boston Directory. 1823 ↩

19. Boston medical and surgical journal, May 19, 1829 ↩

20. Shurtleff. 1871 ↩

21. Boston medical and surgical journal, March 17, 1829 ↩

22. North American Review, v.30, 1830 https://books.google.com/books?id=8zkAAAAAYAAJ ↩

23. Shurtleff. 1871 ↩

24. Scott. Waverley Novels, v.3. Boston: Parker, 1838 ↩

25. Boston Almanac. 1841 /wiki/Boston_Almanac ↩

26. Boston Almanac. 1841 /wiki/Boston_Almanac ↩

27. Freemasons Monthly Magazine. 1844 ↩

28. Boston Almanac. 1847 ↩

29. Boston Directory. 1849 ↩

30. Boston Directory. 1868 ↩

31. Boston Almanac. 1871 ↩

32. Boston Directory. 1868 ↩

33. Shurtleff. 1871 ↩

34. Boston medical and surgical journal. 1872 ↩