William Davis Ticknor (August 6, 1810-April 10, 1864) was an American publisher in Boston, Massachusetts and a founder of the publishing house Ticknor and Fields. Nickname: Beantown, The Hub, Athens of America Location in Massachusetts Founded  -Incorporated September 17, 1630  1820, as a city County Suffolk County Mayor Thomas Menino (Dem) Area  - Total  - Water 232. ...

Ticknor was born to lawyer and antiquarian William and Betsey (Ellis) Ticknor, in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In 1829, Timothy Harrington Carter converted Boston's Old Corner Book Store to house seven presses, and started printing and selling books. Ticknor and partner James Fields subsequently moved in, and by 1832 they had accumulated an impressive list of writers. Their shop in the Old Corner Bookstore became a meeting place for the most influential American writers of the nineteenth century. Harvard Square, May 2000 Cambridge a city in the Greater Boston area in Massachusetts, United States. ... Alternative meanings: Boston (disambiguation) The 18th-century Old State House in Boston is surrounded by tall buildings of the 19th and 20th centuries. ...

In the 1840's, Ticknor and Fields established the royalty system, which for the first time bound authors to publishers and rewarded them both a signing fee and a ten percent portion of sales. Soon Ticknor and Fields published the finest and most popular writers of the era: Horatio Alger, Lydia Maria Child, Charles Dickens, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Henry David Thoreau, Mark Twain, and John Greenleaf Whittier. Horatio Alger, Jr. ... Lydia Maria Child (February 11, 1802, Medford - July 7, 1880, Wayland) was an American abolitionist, novelist, and journalist. ... Charles Dickens used his rich imagination, sense of humour and detailed memories, particularly of his childhood, to enliven his fiction. ... Ralph Waldo Emerson Ralph Waldo Emerson (May 25, 1803 – April 27, 1882) was a famous American essayist and one of Americas most influential thinkers and writers. ... Nathaniel Hawthorne (July 4, 1804 – May 19, 1864) was a 19th century American novelist and short story writer. ... Oliver Wendell Holmes was the name of two prominent men, father and son: Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. ... Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (February 27, 1807 – March 24, 1882) was an American poet who wrote many poems that are still famous today, including The Song of Hiawatha and Evangeline. ... Harriet Beecher Stowe (June 14, 1811 – July 1, 1896) was an abolitionist, and writer of more than 10 books, the most famous being Uncle Toms Cabin which describes life in slavery, and which was first published in serial form from 1851 to 1852 in an abolitionist organ, the National... Henry David Thoreau Henry David Thoreau (July 12, 1817 – May 6, 1862; born David Henry Thoreau) was a noted American author and philosopher who is most famous for Walden, his essay on civil disobedience, and his call for the preservation of wilderness. ... Samuel Langhorne Clemens (November 30, 1835 – April 21, 1910), better known by his pen name Mark Twain, was a famous and popular American humorist, writer and lecturer. ... John Greenleaf Whittier (Haverhill, Massachusetts, December 17, 1807 – September 7, 1892 in Hampton Falls, New Hampshire) was an American Quaker poet, and an advocate of the abolition of slavery in the United States. ...

In March 1850 Ticknor and Fields published Nathaniel Hawthorne's Scarlet Letter, and in May of that year the Hawthornes moved to Tanglewood Cottage in the little town of Lenox, Massachusetts upon Ticknor's advice. Nathaniel Hawthorne (July 4, 1804 – May 19, 1864) was a 19th century American novelist and short story writer. ... Lenox is a town located in Berkshire County, Massachusetts. ...

In 1867 the business was moved from the Old Corner Bookstore to 124 Tremont Street in Boston. The firm also acquired magazines for its publishing list including the Atlantic Monthly, Our Young Folks, and the North American Review. The Atlantic Monthly (also known as The Atlantic) is an American literary/cultural magazine that was founded in November 1857. ... Founded in Boston in 1815, The North American Review (NAR) was the first literary magazine in the United States. ...

Over time, Ticknor and Fields formed a close relationship with Riverside Press, a Boston printing company owned by Henry Oscar Houghton. When Ticknor died, James Osgood took over the company, and in the late 1870s the firm merged with Houghton's to eventually form Houghton, Mifflin and Company in 1880, thus combining the literary works of writers with the expertise of a publisher.

Ticknor died in Philadelphia in 1864.