Moses King (April 13, 1853 – June 12, 1909) was an editor and publisher who produced guidebooks to travel destinations in the United States, including Massachusetts and New York.
King was born in Shoreditch, London, UK, to David Woolf King and Sarah Lazarus. He grew up in St. Louis, Missouri.
After working for several years, he returned to school and graduated from Phillips Exeter Academy in 1879 and Harvard College in 1881, at age 28.[1] He published his first guidebook while still in college, titled Harvard and its Surroundings.[2]
After college he held a series of jobs in the publishing industry, working for Science magazine, Bradstreet's magazine, and Rand-Avery Co. He married Bertha Maria Cloyes in 1881; they had three children.[3][4]
He steadily published travel guidebooks from 1878 onwards. By 1888 he formally established the Moses King Corporation. King's illustrated publications about Boston, New York City, Philadelphia, and elsewhere in the U.S. received generally positive reviews. King published a few handbooks in the Boston area that were written by Moses Forster Sweetser (1848-1897), such as the King's Handbook of the Boston Harbor. M. F. Sweetser was an author and a manuscript writer of many works. The more popular titles of King's publications returned in updated editions.
One darker chapter in King's career occurred in June 1893. During a business meeting in New York, King and photographer Arthur G. Massey engaged in an altercation resulting in Massey filing a lawsuit alleging that King had pulled out part of Massey's beard. Plaintiff demanded $10,000 in damages.[5]
In 1894 King moved from Boston to New York, where he remained until his death in 1909.[6]
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