The Open Court Publishing Company is a

publisher Publishing is the activities of making information, literature, music, software, and other content, physical or digital, available to the public for sale or free of charge. Traditionally, the term publishing refers to the creation and distribu ...

with offices in

Chicago Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...

and

LaSalle, Illinois LaSalle or La Salle is a city in LaSalle County, Illinois, United States, located at the intersection of Interstates 39 and 80. It is part of the Ottawa, IL Micropolitan Statistical Area. Originally platted in 1837 over , the city's boundaries ...

. It is part of the

Carus Publishing Company The Carus Publishing Company, now subsumed into Cricket Media, was a publisher with offices in Chicago, Peterborough, New Hampshire and Peru, Illinois. Its Peterborough office was closed June 30, 2015. Its Peru offices have closed as well, and op ...

of Peru, Illinois.

History

Open Court was founded in 1887 by Edward C. Hegeler of the Matthiessen-Hegeler Zinc Company, at one time the largest producer of

zinc Zinc is a chemical element; it has symbol Zn and atomic number 30. It is a slightly brittle metal at room temperature and has a shiny-greyish appearance when oxidation is removed. It is the first element in group 12 (IIB) of the periodic tabl ...

in the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

. Hegeler intended for the firm to serve the purpose of discussing religious and psychological problems on the principle that the scientific world-conception should be applied to religion. Its first managing editor was

Paul Carus Paul Carus (; 18 July 1852 – 11 February 1919) was a German-American author, editor, a student of comparative religion

, Hegeler's son-in-law through his marriage to engineer Mary Hegeler Carus.Fields 1992, pg. 138 For the first 80 years of its existence, the company had its offices in the Hegeler Carus Mansion. Open Court specializes in

philosophy Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...

science Science is a systematic discipline that builds and organises knowledge in the form of testable hypotheses and predictions about the universe. Modern science is typically divided into twoor threemajor branches: the natural sciences, which stu ...

, and

religion Religion is a range of social system, social-cultural systems, including designated religious behaviour, behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, religious text, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics in religion, ethics, or ...

. It was one of the first academic presses in the country, as well as one of the first publishers of inexpensive editions of the classics. It also published the journals ''Open Court'' and ''

The Monist ''The Monist: An International Quarterly Journal of General Philosophical Inquiry'' is a quarterly peer-reviewed academic journal in the field of philosophy. It was established in October 1890 by American publisher Edward C. Hegeler. History Init ...

''— the latter is still being published. The Open Court Monthly Magazine's motto was "Devoted to the Science of Religion, the Religion of Science, and the Extension of the Religious Parliament Idea."

''The Open Court''

The ''Open Court'' journal was founded in February 1887 as the official publication of the

Free Religious Association The Free Religious Association (FRA) was an American organization founded in 1867 to encourage free inquiry into religious matters and to promote what its founders called "free religion," which they understood to be the essence of religion that i ...

.''Writings of Charles S. Peirce: A Chronological Edition, Volume 8: 1890–1892''. Indiana University Press, 2009. pp. xxiii-xxxiv. By the end of 1887, its editor Benjamin F. Underwood resigned and Paul Carus became editor. The Open Court Publishing Company published ''The Open Court'' journal until 1936. Carus edited the journal for 32 years, until his death.

''Popular Culture & Philosophy'' series

One of Open Court Publishing's best-selling series is its semi-annual ''Popular Culture & Philosophy'' series, under the editorship of George Reisch. Volumes on the philosophy underpinning such television shows as ''

Star Trek ''Star Trek'' is an American science fiction media franchise created by Gene Roddenberry, which began with the Star Trek: The Original Series, series of the same name and became a worldwide Popular culture, pop-culture Cultural influence of ...

'', ''

Seinfeld ''Seinfeld'' ( ) is an American television sitcom created by Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld that originally aired on NBC from July 5, 1989, to May 14, 1998, with a total of nine seasons consisting of List of Seinfeld episodes, 180 episodes. It ...

'', ''

The Simpsons ''The Simpsons'' is an American animated sitcom created by Matt Groening and developed by Groening, James L. Brooks and Sam Simon for the Fox Broadcasting Company. It is a Satire (film and television), satirical depiction of American life ...

,'' and ''

Buffy the Vampire Slayer ''Buffy the Vampire Slayer'' is an American supernatural fiction, supernatural drama television series created by writer and director Joss Whedon. The concept is based on the Buffy the Vampire Slayer (film), 1992 film, also written by Whedon, a ...

'' propelled the series into the limelight.

Notes

References

*Fields, Rick. ''How the Swans Came to the Lake: A Narrative History of Buddhism in America'' (1992) Shambhala Publications.

External links