Ticknor & Fields is established.

Originally Ticknor & Allen, it is located in the Old Corner Bookstore at today’s 283 Washington Street (3 School Street). After John Reed Jr. and James Fields become partners, it becomes Ticknor, Reed, and Fields in 1853, then Ticknor and Fields in 1854. The first home of The Atlantic Monthly in 1857,* the office becomes a meeting place for writers, including Emerson, Fuller, Hawthorne, Longfellow, Thoreau, and comes to be called “Parnassus Corner” after the mountain home of the Greek Muses. Books published include Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter and The House of the Seven Gables and Thoreau’s Walden. After Ticknor’s death, the company becomes Fields, Osgood & Company, and moves to Tremont Street in 1868,* becomes James R. Osgood & Company in 1871, merges with Hurd & Houghton to become Houghton & Osgood in 1878, and then Houghton Mifflin & Company in 1880.*