A.C. McClurg & Co.

Bookplate, a drawing of a large acorn with a banner with the words "A.C. McClurg" above and "& Co." below. Leaves and branches frame the large acorn.

A.C. McClurg bookplate. From a 1904 edition of the Index (on the Internet Archive).

A Chicago publishing house, wholesaler, and retailer of books and merchandise.

A.C. McClurg & Co. traces its origin to the opening of a bookstore by W.W. Barlow & Co. at 147 Lake Street on August 23, 1844. Alexander C. McClurg went to work for the company, then known as S. C. Griggs, in 1859. After serving in the Civil War, McClurg returned to Griggs as a general.

In 1868, S.C Griggs lost all of its contents in a fire. Then the Great Chicago Fire of 1871 completely destroyed the store amounting to about $250,000 in damages. They were only able to collect about $40,000 from the insurance. Griggs sold his share of the company to E. L. Jansen, A. C. McClurg, and F. B. Smith. Jansen, McClurg & Co. was established in 1872.

McClurg’s ranked as one of the country’s largest book distributors by 1880 and also supplied to small-town retailers throughout the West and Midwest a variety of merchandise (such as stationery, toothbrushes, pipes).

General McClurg published the monthly literary magazine The Dial from1880 to 1892 (Edith had numerous published articles in The Dial).

In 1886 the company changed its name to A.C. McClurg & Co.

The firm's premises were destroyed by fire in 1889. General McClurg decided to sell shares of the corporation to employees.

General McClurg died in 1901. His obituary was published in The New York Times on April 16, 1901.

In 1914 the firm's most published its most profitable work: Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs. McClurg & Co. went on to publish 10 more Tarzan titles.

In 1923 A. C. McClurg sold its bookstore located at 218 South Wabash Street in Chicago to Brentano’s and the remainder of the company was liquidated in 1962.

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