The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Bay State Monthly, Vol. II, No. 6,
March, 1885, by Various

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Title: The Bay State Monthly, Vol. II, No. 6, March, 1885
A Massachusetts Magazine

Author: Various

Release Date: January 14, 2005 [EBook #14689]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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[Illustration: William Lee (Signature)]

THE BAY STATE MONTHLY.

_A Massachusetts Magazine_.

VOL. II.

MARCH, 1885.

No. 6.

* * * * *

LEE AND SHEPARD.

By George L. Austin, M.D.

For a quarter of a century the firm-name of Lee and Shepard has been
familiar to the public. During this interval of time it has been printed
upon millions of volumes, which have gone forth on their two-fold
mission of instruction and entertainment. Few publishing houses in
America have achieved a more honorable record, or have more indelibly
left their impress of good intentions and of deeds nobly done upon the
minds of increasing generations. It is of the individual members of this
firm, both of whom have grown gray in the business, that I purpose to
speak in this article. First of the senior partner of the house.

Born at the "North End," in Boston, on the seventeenth of April, 1826;
early put to school, and taken out of it at the age of eleven, at which
time he was left fatherless, the eldest of six children; with a good
mother to whisper words of encouragement in his ear, when everything in
the world and the future before him looked dark,--such was the start of
William Lee in life. Thousands before him, and since, have had the same
infelicitous experience; but how few have had the courage to overcome
the obstacles which he succeeded in overcoming? While other young men of
his age, many of them his playmates, were planning to fit themselves, by
a long course of study, for the duties of life, he was at once
confronted with the duties and burdens of life, without such advantages
as an education affords, and he met them with a manli