Adam Willis Wagnalls
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Adam Willis Wagnalls (September 24, 1843 – September 3, 1924) was an American publisher. He was the co-founder of the Funk & Wagnalls Company in 1877.
Wagnalls was born in Lithopolis, Ohio, but moved away at age 5. Wagnalls attended Wittenberg College (now Wittenberg University) in Springfield, Ohio, where he became a Lutheran minister, with Isaac Kaufmann Funk. He married Hester Anna Willis, also a native of Lithopolis. They had one child, Mabel Wagnalls Jones.
Isaac Kaufmann Funk had founded the business of I. K. Funk & Company in 1876. In 1877, Adam Wagnalls joined the firm as a partner. The two changed the name of the firm to Funk & Wagnalls Company in 1890. Prior to 1890, F. & W. published only religious-oriented works. The publication of The Literary Digest in 1890 marked a change for the firm to a publisher of general reference dictionaries and encyclopedias. The firm followed in 1894 with its most memorable publication, The Standard Dictionary of the English Language. 1912 saw the publication of the Funk & Wagnalls Standard Encyclopedia.
Wagnalls died on September 3, 1924, in Northport, New York and is buried with his wife and their daughter at Lithopolis Cemetery.[1]
References
[edit]Sources
[edit]External links
[edit]- Adam Willis Wagnalls at Find a Grave
- Adam Willis Wagnalls at New World Encyclopedia.
- Wagnalls Memorial Library
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