James Brown (publisher)

Brown was born in Acton, Massachusetts. He started his working life as a servant in the family of Prof. Levi Hedge, of Cambridge, Massachusetts, who he instructed him in the classics and mathematics.[1] Around 1832, he worked for booksellers Hilliard, Gray & Co. on Washington Street in Boston, along with William Hilliard, Harrison Gray, and J.H. Wilkins.[2] He was originally hired by Hilliard as a clerk. That firm was dissolved after the death of one of the partners and Brown went to work for Charles C. Little & Co.,[1] run by Charles Coffin Little, also a former clerk.

In 1837, the firm became Charles C. Little and James Brown, and Brown remained there until his death. Augustus Flagg joined them in 1838 and became the publishing house's managing partner after the deaths of the two founders.

The firm's name was changed to Little, Brown and Company in 1847.[3]

In 1853, Little, Brown began publishing the works of British poets from Chaucer to Wordsworth. There were 96 volumes published in the series in five years, but Brown did not live to see its completion. He died in Watertown, Massachusetts on March 10, 1855.[4]

His son John Murray Brown took over when Flagg retired in 1884. A life of James Brown, by George Stillman Hillard, was published in Boston in 1855.[1]